Articles
Part 10 of 11 Parts
The Following Message Has Been Transcribed For
Clarity, Continuity Of Thought, And Punctuation By
The LEM Transcribing & Editing Team.
We finished Zephaniah 3 through verse 20. But, as I reviewed all of the Alternate Translations, the Lord showed me that I did have some inaccuracies in verse 20. We are going to go over verse 20 briefly, and I will point out to you specifically the changes that I made. Then we are going to look at the Amplified Translations, and we are going to go through verse 1 through 20, the amplified, interspersed translations. I will go very slowly. I will take questions as we go, sentence by sentence.
I find this to be a very exciting chapter and, Lord willing, in the next couple of weeks, I will put all three chapters of the Book of Zephaniah together and intersperse them. I am going to add scriptural cross-references to other verses that support whatever verse I am putting the reference next to. I will put in some footnotes. And, Lord willing, we will print up the first completed Alternate Translation or the first Alternate Translation of a whole book that we have, and that is very exciting. So keep on praying for me, because Satan is mad at me. He does not like what I am doing. But that is very exciting, and this is just the beginning. If the Lord lets us, we will just do the whole Bible. Praise the Lord. Glory to God.
I will start with the Alternate Translation, amplified and interspersed, of verses -- Zephaniah 3:18-19. And what you have, the notes that you have, we will be getting to in about 10 or 15 minutes. Basically, we will be starting -- it should say in the upper right- hand corner, page 7. We will be going through that, although I did give you page 6 also, just for your own information. What you will probably be interested in is starting on page 7, about the middle of the page, where it says verse 1. Pages 7, 8 and 9 and 10 is the whole chapter, amplified and interspersed. And, as I said, I will take questions at any point as we go through that.
Let us just do a quickie on chapter 20. If you have listened to part 9 of this series, you will hear some changes, basically, I took different translations for two of the Hebrew words that have somewhat changed the Alternate Translation.
But for the time being, this is Alternate Translation, amplified and interspersed, of verses 18 and 19, Zephaniah 3: "Surely, at the appointed time, I shall strengthen my dead, fallen soul, which has been leaning on her earthen side since she was seduced and marked with Satan's carnal mind, and I will draw her back into the Kingdom of Heaven by nailing her to the Lord Jesus Christ. And I shall incarnate Christ Jesus within the carnal mind, which is holding my dead fallen soul captive. And Christ Jesus shall go beyond this abominable age, which Satan has formed and is ruling over, and he shall mark my dead, fallen soul with the mind of Christ, which is in Christ Jesus, and offer the carnal mind as a sacrifice to the Lord Jesus Christ. And this is how I shall cause the many members of my dead, fallen soul to stand up in the visible world."
Verse 20: "'At that time'" -- at what time? At the time that all this is happening. "'I will bring you again, even in the time that I gather you, for I will make you a name and a praise among all people of the earth when I turn back your captivity before your eyes,' says the Lord."
I believe, right now, this is a personal word to somebody here. If you do not know, let me tell you that the word of God is supernatural. That is why it can bless us, no matter how poor or inaccurate the translation. If it is the spiritual word of God coming through, any attempt at translation, Jesus can work in anything, and that was a personal word. It could be. If you want to take it as yours, you take it. But the word of my heart is that it is for one person here. Now that can mean, when a preacher says something like that, do not take any negative attitude that it cannot be for me. Anyone with faith can lay hold of something like that. What it means is that it is a word of knowledge primarily or specifically at this moment for one person here, but if you want to lay hold of it in faith, you lay hold of it in faith. I know, when I was being raised up, I laid hold of every word that ever came forth out of the realm of God's Spirit. I was a barracuda. Nothing was enough for me. I took everything I could lay my hands on. So lay your hands on it, brethren. I am going to read it again.
"'At that time will I bring you again'" -- that means I will restore you -- "'even in the time that I gather you, for I will make you a name and a praise amongst all people of the earth when I turn back your captivity before your eyes,' says the Lord." Hallelujah.
"At that time," Strong's 6256 -- it means a certain time. This word means a specific time as opposed to the word translated in verse 18, which is translated "solemn assembly," and can be translated "a certain place or an age." This is the same word used in verse 19. It means a specific time, not a specific place but a specific time.
And "at that time, I will bring you again." The Hebrew word translated "bring" is Strong's 935. Now I have taken a different translation here than I chose on part 9 of this message: "to bring again" or Strong's 935. And I have chosen two other translations out of Gesenius' Lexicon: "to enter into judgment" and "to take for a wife." Some of you might know that there is a specific relationship between going into judgment and being chosen to be the Lord's wife, because you cannot be the Lord's wife if you are not purified, and the judgments purify.
You may recall the Book of Esther. There was a year of purification which took place amongst all the young virgins. They did not even know which one would be chosen to be the King's bride, but they spent a year purifying themselves. We see judgment intimately associated with marriage to Christ, because it is the judgment that purifies us in preparation for the marriage.
"At that time will I bring you again. Even in the time that I gather you" -- even in the time that I gather you. The Hebrew word translated "gather" is Strong's 6908. I have chosen different translations for this word also, although I think I did tell you in the last message that this word means to grasp with the hand and to draw in. I am basically going to use the translation "to gather together." To gather together. And as we go on with this translation, you will see the change that I made is that the Lord has shown me that this gathering in is speaking about the gathering and joining together of the soul with the mind of Christ with the carnal mind. We are talking about the Kingdom of Heaven.
You might recall that the Kingdom of God is the man Christ Jesus in which the mind of Christ exists. He is a whole new kingdom that is being raised up in our mind, but that Kingdom of God -- even though we have the Kingdom of God being formed in us, we are still dying until such time as the carnal mind is dismantled, because, as long as there is sin in our mind at all, we have not entered into eternal life. Despite the fact of how mature the Kingdom of God is, if the Kingdom of God is as mature as possible, unless and until that Kingdom of God, which is the man Christ Jesus, until he completely paralyzes the carnal mind and binds her to his authority, we are still dead, because sin is still in operation in us. This gathering together is speaking about the fully mature Kingdom of God, gathering the carnal mind unto himself, which gathering will paralyze her and exalt the whole creation into a condition of full stature.
And someone did ask me a couple weeks ago -- the question is probably on one of these messages. When does full stature actually occur? Is full stature -- have we attained to full stature when Christ Jesus is fully mature in us before the temptation, or do we enter in full stature after the temptation? And let me remind you that the temptation is the contest between a fully mature Christ Jesus and a fully mature carnal mind. At the time that this question was asked of me, I did not know the answer. I believe I have heard from the Lord with regard to that answer. You are the one that asked me the question? Do you know the -- yes. I believe I have heard from the Lord with regard to that question, and the answer is that we are not in full stature until after the temptation. Full stature implies sinlessness. Even though the Kingdom of God is as mature as he can be when he is within us, so long as sin is manifesting, we cannot be in full stature. It is only after the temptation, after the Kingdom of God, which is the man Christ Jesus, after he defeats the carnal mind, brings her into submission, paralyzes her and binds her to him that we can say that we are in full stature and that we are sinless. I have answered your question. Amen. Did you hear that? OK.
Alternate Translation, the first third of Zephaniah 3:20: "And at that specific time that I judge my dead, fallen soul and marry her, I shall gather her together with Christ Jesus into the Kingdom of Heaven." And at that specific time that I judge my dead, fallen soul and marry her, I shall gather her together with Christ Jesus into the kingdom of Heaven.
Amplified Translation, the first third of Zephaniah 3:20: "And at the specific time that I purify my dead, fallen soul through judgment, I shall marry her, birth Christ Jesus as her renewed mind, and gather them together with the carnal mind into the Kingdom of Heaven."
This is the binding of the sacrifice to the altar, which I just mentioned. As a witness to that, I offer you Psalms 118:27: "God is the Lord which hath showed us light. Bind the sacrifice with cords, even unto the horns of the altar." Horns typify spiritual power. The two horns, or the two spiritual powers which form the altar, are the human spirit and the Lord Jesus Christ. Remember, however, the teaching which came forth in Zachariah 11: that, as far as the Lord is concerned, the human spirit is Christ Jesus. Why? Because the human spirit is likened unto a female ovum, which will grow up into a full-blown man, Christ Jesus, at which point the ovum and the sperm disappear. The only thing that we have is the Son. So, when the Father looks at the human spirit, he sees the Son which will be produced out of this human spirit after she is fertilized. As far as the Lord is concerned, the human spirit is Christ Jesus inasmuch as she ceases to exist after her Son, Christ Jesus, is born and marries her. The Lord is looking at the end from the beginning.
Continuing with the second third of Zephaniah 3:20: "For I will make you a name and a praise among all people of the earth." "Make you" can be translated "to give you." A name -- I think I changed this also. It is Strong's 8034, and a name is a spirit. Or maybe I did not change it. Praise is Strong's 8416. The translation of that is glory, and we have been -- we received a symbol here years ago that glory signifies the Spirit of God in the soul realm. I would say the Spirit of God in this visible world, because personal- -- the Spirit of God in the soul realm is basically personality, and personality is visible. We see it. We can evaluate it. We respond to it. Men are seen in two levels in this world: their physical appearance and their personality.
Most human beings that have an awareness of individuals would tell you that the person's personality is more powerful than their appearance. We have seen some very unattractive men and women who have achieved successfully. Their talents have been successful. Their marriages have been successful. Their careers have been successful, and they have completely overcome their physical drawbacks and their appearance by positive qualities in their personality. Even though the carnal mind would be inclined to say that the physical appearance is more powerful because it is more easily seen, the truth is that the personality is really more visible than the body, if you can receive what I am saying. Personality is very, very visible in this world.
We are translating the word glory as "the visible world as demonstrated through the personality." And the word people is referring to a single race or a tribe. And please note that the whole world shall be one single race or tribe. We see that, in verse 19, Jehovah is dealing with the whole soul, both -- and that includes the soul plus the mind in it. And in verse 20, he is dealing with the people of the earth or the individual, the individual Sons of God.
Alternate Translation, the second third of Zephaniah 3:20: "And I shall give my Spirit to all men in the visible earth."
Amplified Translation, second third of Zephaniah 3:20: "And the whole human race shall have my sinless nature." And the whole human race shall have my sinless nature.
Please note the sequence of the phrase "praise and fame" in verse 19. That is, praise is stated first and then fame, as opposed to the sequence in verse 20, which says "name and praise" -- that is, name first and then praise. The significance is that praise, signifying soul, and name, signifying spirit -- the Lord places soul before spirit in verse 19, which is speaking to the soul, and spirit before soul in verse 20, which is speaking specifically to Christ Jesus.
Continuing with the third third of Zephaniah 3:20: "'When I turn back your captivity before your eyes,' says the Lord." "Turn back" is Strong's 7725. It means conversion. Captivity is Strong's 7622. It means to restore anyone to his former welfare and happiness. "Before your eyes" means to be seen with the eyes.
Alternate Translation, the third third of Zephaniah 3:20: "When your visible appearance reveals that I have made your soul alive again and converted your mind back to Christ Jesus."
A Scripture that witnesses to that is Romans 8:11: "But if the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you."
"When your visible appearance reveals that I have made your soul alive again" -- that is the quickening of the mortal body, brethren -- "and converted your mind back to Christ Jesus" -- that is the raising up of Christ from the dead. We see that, when the Spirit raised up the man Jesus from the dead, he was raised up in two stages. First, the Christ in him, which is his human spirit, was raised from the dead. And when Christ is raised from the dead, the name changes to Christ Jesus. Why? Because Christ -- if you can hear this, it gets a little complicated. Please, Lord, help me to get this across. When the Scripture says Christ is raised from the dead, the Lord is speaking about his dead Christ. And the name of the dead Christ? The human spirit. Amen. All right. And when Christ is raised from the dead, the way that resurrection takes place is that the Lord Jesus Christ crucifies Christ, the dead human spirit, strengthening her, and there is an offspring, and that is the formation of an altar. The Lord Jesus Christ penetrates or crucifies the human spirit for the purpose of strengthening her, shoring her up, and the result of that union is the birth of Christ Jesus. Let me read this for you exactly as it here -- as it says it here.
For Jesus to be raised from the dead, he that raised up Christ from the dead, the human spirit, by the formation of Christ Jesus, shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit. The Spirit in Christ Jesus is the Spirit -- do you know? -- of Christ. Amen. That dwelleth in you. We see it is the Spirit of Christ that raised up the whole man Jesus from the dead, and he did it in two stages. First, he raised up Christ from the dead, and then he quickened or gave life to the soul. First, he raised the mind from death unto life, and then soul received life, and then the whole man was raised from the dead. And in the same way, this is happening to you. The Lord Jesus Christ is crucifying your human spirit, strengthening her, shoring her up, bringing forth Christ Jesus in you. And when Christ Jesus is fully raised from the dead in you, he shall quicken your soul, and then your whole man shall be raised from the dead. Even your body will be preserved, and you will not be able to die anymore. Hallelujah.
Alternate Translation, Zephaniah 3:20: "And at the specific time that I purify my dead, fallen soul through judgment, I shall marry her, birth Christ Jesus as her renewed mind, and gather them together with the carnal mind into the Kingdom of Heaven. And when your visible appearance reveals that I have made your soul alive again and converted your mind back to Christ Jesus, the whole human race shall have my sinless nature."
And how shall your visible appearance show that you have been -- what is the exact Scripture? That I have made your soul alive again and converted your mind back to Christ Jesus -- how will your visible appearance reveal this? We said earlier that we are really talking about personality. The words that come out of your mouth, brethren, will reveal that your mind has been raised from the dead. You will be talking about the great things of God, and your body will be preserved, and you will not be sick or deformed anymore. We see that your visible appearance, first in personality and then in flesh, will reveal your resurrection. You do not believe the man that tells you he has been raised from the dead, who is speaking profanity, spiritual profanity -- I am not just talking about cursing -- false doctrine, profane things, lies, spiritual lies. You do not believe that he has been raised from the dead, because it is a lie.
Also, this resurrection from the dead is -- we have just said that it is in two stages. I would like to point out two Scriptures to you, indicating that the first stage is mediated by the Holy Ghost, which leads us to Christ Jesus, and the second stage is Christ Jesus gathering us together with the carnal mind to bring us into full stature. It is called the temptation. I just mentioned it earlier. It is the binding of the carnal mind to the altar. And Jesus is our altar, because it is not until that carnal mind is bound up and cannot move or escape that we are out of the woods at all. We will continue to die until such time as the carnal mind is completely shut down. She does not have to be dead now, but she has to be paralyzed. She has to cease from sin.
The first Scripture is John 6:44: "No man can come to me except the Father which hath sent me draw him, and I will raise him up at the last day." This is Jesus speaking, so we see that no man can come to Jesus or no man can become as Jesus -- that is, no man can become except the Father which sent Jesus in the form of the Holy Spirit draw that man. And Jesus will raise Christ up at the end of the age. This verse is speaking about leading the called-out ones into the kingdom, and the kingdom is Christ Jesus.
For Christ Jesus to be formed in us, we have to be -- Christ Jesus being the kingdom, we have to be led to submit ourselves to spiritual conditions which will result in Christ Jesus being formed in us. And the one who is doing that leading is the Holy Spirit. And we are told clearly in John 6:44 that there is no way we can be led into any such experience except the Father draw us to the Lord Jesus Christ. We cannot do it of our self.
The second stage of our being raised from the dead is being gathered into the Kingdom of Heaven, which is the paralyzing of the carnal mind and full stature. This is expressed by John 14:6: "Jesus saith unto him, 'I am the way, the truth and the life. No man cometh unto the Father but by me.'" Jesus is saying that Christ Jesus is the only way unto glorification. You must be born again, brethren. You must be born again, or there is no way that you will return unto the spirit world. There is no way that you will get out of hell to be transformed back into spirit unless you are born again in the form of Christ Jesus, unless your human spirit be born again as the man Christ Jesus.
It is not reincarnation. It is not your soul being born again. It is not your flesh body being born again, but it is your human spirit. Your human spirit has been born as the carnal mind. Another way to say born is incarnate. Your human spirit has been incarnated as the carnal mind. She must incarnate again as Christ Jesus. It is the only way you will ever make it back to a spiritual existence. Why? Because that which is born of the flesh is flesh. Our human spirit has been born of the flesh. Satan is part of the soul. He has begotten us, and corruption shall never inherit incorruption, brethren, and the flesh is corruption. Therefore, you must be born again. Your human spirit, your true essence, your true reality, must be born again or renewed or reformed or begotten by a Father which is Spirit, because that which is born of the Spirit is Spirit. Therefore, if you wish to return to your spiritual existence, you must be born again, or you shall never see the Kingdom of Heaven. It is the only way to get in. Your human spirit has to be born again in a different form. Hallelujah.
"Jesus saith unto him, 'I am the way, the truth and the life. No man cometh unto the Father but by me.'" John 14:6. This verse is speaking about the gathering into the Kingdom of Heaven.
Please note that the first phrase of Zephaniah 3:20 is speaking about the two stages of the first phase of Jehovah's covenant with humanity called grace, which is extended first to the Jew and then to the gentile in two different forms, and the second phase called union, which is extended both to the Jew and the gentile in the same form. We see that the first phrase of Zephaniah 3:20, "and at the specific time that I purify my dead, fallen soul through judgment" -- I think what I was referring to here is that -- I think I changed that Alternate Translation, and this really does not apply anymore.
It does not apply insofar as that I am talking about the first or second phrase. But since I mentioned it, I will review that: that there is one covenant that Jehovah has made with humanity. It comes in two stages. The first stage is the reconciliation of man unto God, and we see this in the ministry of the Holy Spirit, which leads us to the Father. Jesus said, "No man can come unto me unless the Father draw him." And this is the ministry of grace. It is the first stage of Jehovah's covenant with mankind. It has one set of rules for the Jew and another set of rules for the gentile, but the results are the same. Both groups of people come into reconciliation with Jehovah. They are granted the privilege of a relationship with Jehovah, which will not result in their death, but which will result in their life. We call it the imputed anointing. It is the principle of the forgiveness of sins but not the actual forgiveness of sins, because the actual forgiveness of sins is the erasing or the eradication of those sins from your very soul.
And that is the activity of the second stage of Jehovah's covenant with mankind, no longer the promise. The first stage is the promise of the forgiveness of sins, and the Lord looks at us as if we were holy, because he knows how assured his ability is to fulfill that promise. He knows, when he says, "I shall deliver you from your sins," that it is just a matter of time until we are delivered. Therefore, the Lord Jesus Christ talks to us and treats us as if we are delivered, because he has such faith and confidence in his own ability to perform his word. But anyone with a rational mind knows that we are not delivered from our sins yet.
The second stage of God's covenant with man is the actual deliverance from our sins, the actual ripping out and eradication of those sins and -- which will bring us into a reality condition of holiness, and we will know that we have entered into the reality of holiness when we stop dying. And this is the principle that we see in verse 20 of Zephaniah 3.
And the King James translation says that we will be first led into the kingdom, that he will bring us into the kingdom, and then he will gather us into the kingdom, or he will lead us to the kingdom. He will lead us to the Kingdom of God, and then he will gather us together, our carnal mind together with that kingdom, which is the actual entering into sinlessness. What a glorious promise. Who could turn away from this? Only a spiritually insane person. And we are not only turning away from it; we are running as fast as our short, little legs can carry us. That means we are all spiritually insane. Amen. The whole bunch of us. Hallelujah.
Our Alternate Translation of Zachariah 11:14 more clearly expounds Jehovah's promise to us of the two-phase covenant. I would like to read it to you.
Alternate Translation, Zachariah 11:14: "And I overturn their carnal minds so that the imparted anointing could be liberated" -- that is the true deliverance from sin -- "which is the binding together of the grace of the Old Covenant, first to Judah and then to Israel, with the grace of the New Covenant, which is with the Israel of God." Please note that the term Israel is speaking about a united Israel, which includes all 12 tribes.
Recap, Zephaniah 3:18-20. This is amplified and interspersed: "Surely, at the appointed time, I shall strengthen my dead, fallen soul, which has been leaning on her earthen side since she was seduced and marked with Satan's carnal mind, and draw her back into the Kingdom of Heaven by nailing her to the Lord Jesus Christ. And I shall incarnate Christ Jesus within the carnal mind, which is holding my dead, fallen soul captive. And Christ Jesus shall go beyond this abominable age, which Satan has formed and is ruling over, and he shall mark my dead, fallen soul with the mind of Christ, which is in Christ Jesus, and offer the carnal mind as a sacrifice to the Lord Jesus Christ. And this is how I shall cause the many members of my dead, fallen soul to stand up in the visible world. And at the specific time that I purify my dead, fallen soul through judgment, I shall marry her, birth Christ Jesus as her renewed mind, and gather them all together with the carnal mind into the Kingdom of Heaven. And when your visible appearance reveals that I have made your soul alive again and converted your mind back to Christ Jesus, the whole human race shall have my sinless nature."
It looks like I repeated this twice. I do not know why I did that. OK.
We will go on to page 7. I would just like to make you aware of a couple of errors, a couple of typographical errors. We are starting in the middle of the page on page 7, where it says "Recap: Zephaniah 3." It is verses 18 through 20. I have verse 18 through 19 written down. It is 18 through 20. And I meant to type it in, but I did not.
Let me go over these markings here. It says verse 1, 2, 3A, 5A. What all that means is that I have taken the translations in the order of the King James Scriptures. And, after I have looked at them, I realize that they are not in a logical sequence for whatever reason. God knows. And I have put them into the best English that I could possibly put them into by moving some of the sentences around. For people who are students, who would like to follow very specifically what I am doing, I have put in all of these numbers so you could see what I did, that I moved -- when I say 3A or 3B, what it means is that I split verse 3. If you look, you will see that I put part of verse 4 in between the beginning of verse 3 and the end of verse 3. So I try the best I can for the people who are really trying to be scholars or even for the people that are trying to prove that I do not know what I am talking about. I have taken great lengths to show you how I get these translations so that, if you would like to, you can check it out yourself. And if you would like to do that, if you listen to the earlier messages, you can hear the Alternate Translations as I work them up, and you can hear them as they come forth with verse 1, 2, 3, 4 in the King James. And now you see me mixing them all together, mixing all the verses up so that we have a good English translation that makes sense, that goes in the proper sequence from one event to the other logically. And that is what I have done here. If you do not want to be such a scholar, that is fine. Just ignore the numbers.
In accordance with the number of the verses as they appear here, verse 1 through the paragraph that is marked 5A -- it begins 5A. It is 1, 2, 3 -- the first four full paragraphs is Jehovah making a general statement. This is Jehovah making a general statement. He is speaking, I believe, to the world. I have not yet reviewed the whole chapter of Alternate Translations, but at this point it looks to me like it is Jehovah speaking to all of humanity.
And as you read further, if the Lord quickens unto you, you will see that the three paragraphs labeled 6 -- beginning 6, 8A and 7A -- that is the next three paragraphs -- you will see that the person changes. What does that mean? It means, in the beginning paragraphs, it is the prophet speaking. For example, go back to where it says verse 2. It is the prophet speaking. He is saying, "She, the soul, did not obey Jehovah's voice." It is a third person telling a story. It is the prophet giving you the story of what happened to this soul that she has come under this terrible judgment. But beginning with chapter 6, if you notice, it becomes the first person. What does that mean? It is Jehovah himself speaking through the prophet, and the person changes. Look where it says 8A: "It is therefore my decision." Now we know it is not the prophet's decision. It is Jehovah's decision.
The way an English scholar would express this switch is to say the person changes. OK. When we deal with language, there are six different persons we could be speaking English in: I; you; he, she or it; we; you or they. Six different persons. We call it conjugating a verb. When you take any verb -- we are using the verb "to run" right now -- any verb in a form with the preposition "to" before it -- to run, to walk, to talk, to eat -- this is called the infinitive form of the verb. It is called an unconjugated verb. What does that mean? It means it is not clear whether you are saying "I eat," "you eat," "he, she or it eats," "we eat," "you eat" or "they eat." It is a form of a verb which does not reveal the subject. It is called the infinitive form, and we say the verb is unconjugated.
In the first few paragraphs that I pointed out to you, those paragraphs are written in the third person. It is somebody telling a story about what Jehovah said. This is the third person: "he, she or it." Jehovah said, and Jehovah said, and Jehovah is doing this. The prophet is telling you, in his own words, what Jehovah said and what Jehovah is going to do. When you get to the next verse, beginning with verse 6 as we have it interspersed, we see that the person changes to the first person, and it is now Jehovah speaking directly.
This is the same event that we see, if you notice it, in the Book of Job. When the young man is prophesying to Job at the end of the Book of Job, first he is saying to Job, "Do you not know that God is great?" And it is this young man. His name is Elihu, if I am pronouncing it right. He is talking about Jehovah, about the wonders of Jehovah. Then all of a sudden, if you examine that chapter in the Book of Job, you will see it is not the young man speaking to Job anymore, but it is Jehovah directly saying to Job, "And where were you when I stretched out the heavens?"
We see that this is a scriptural principle, and it is a principle of the reality of the Spirit of God that prophecy can be manifested through us in different realms of strength. And in one of the weaker realms of strength, the prophet is saying, "Thus saith the Lord. Thus saith the Lord. The Lord says to you. The Lord gives you this instruction. The Lord says do that." And then, as the prophet goes into a deeper trance, you will find the prophet no longer saying, "Thus saith the Lord," but the prophet saying, "I am your God who has brought you out of the land of Egypt. You shall have no other gods before me." Does that mean that the prophet is calling himself God? No, brethren. It is up to you to determine the spirit on the prophet. It could be the Lord manifesting himself at a much deeper level through this man whereby the Lord is actually speaking in the first person to you through that very man. And that is what we see in the Book of Zephaniah, and it is very common in the prophets. I do not have any recollection of ever pointing this out to you before, but I know for myself that I see this frequently. Have I pointed this out before?
No, but I have seen it.
Yeah. I know that it exists throughout the Scriptures. And as you read the Hebrew prophets, if you are aware of it, you will see. From verse to verse, it switches back and forth between the words of the prophet and the very words of Jehovah himself speaking through the prophet. It goes back and forth, if you have eyes to see it.
If you are not up to this kind of observation yet, do not wrack your brain with it, because it is going to hurt your carnal mind. This book is designed for you to be blessed by and to learn from at the level that you are at. We have a lot of technical details here. If your mind is not up to it, then do not worry about it. You are just going to hurt yourself. Get whatever the Lord is giving you. Get whatever your spirit and your mind can handle, and do not look at your brother, and do not compare yourself to anyone else's spiritual growth, and just get the most that you can get.
The ministry of Christ is a little red schoolroom. We have all grades together in one classroom. Everybody has the same textbook, but the Spirit of God is full well able to minister to you on your level. You might notice, those of you who have been in the church for years, that the deeper the anointing in the church, the less likely there is to be a Sunday school for little children. Did you ever notice that? Brethren, you do not need Sunday school for your little children. If it is truly the Spirit of Christ in that service, he ministers not only to every category of student but to every individual person in their exact place of need without any variation, if necessary, to 5,000 people in one service, because, brethren, he is God.
And you do not have to separate the children from their parents, so long as the parents are in control of their children, which, if you are not, parents, you need prayer. You are supposed to be in control of your children. Everybody sits in the same little red schoolroom. Everybody has the same textbook, and everybody gets their need met exactly where they are at by the Spirit of Christ, through the same words that everybody is hearing, although you may not be hearing the same words. That is a supernatural move, where the spirit that the preacher sits up here and says the same -- I can only say one word at a time, but the Spirit of Christ will make you hear, out of what I am saying, whatever he wants you to hear. This is supernatural ministry, brethren.
Beginning with the verse labeled verse 6, the next three verses, you may notice, is the Lord Jesus Christ speaking to somebody. And I suggest to you that he is -- I am sorry. It is Jehovah speaking to the Lord Jesus Christ. Excuse me. And beginning with the paragraph after 7A, it is not numbered. I did type it in over there, beginning with that paragraph which starts, "So the Lord Jesus Christ said to them." We now hear the Lord Jesus Christ relaying faithfully Jehovah's message to humanity. Jehovah speaks to Jesus. Jesus speaks to men. And when Jesus speaks to men, he speaks to his Son in the man. The Lord Jesus Christ speaks to Christ Jesus, in which is the mind of Christ in you. He is the God of the living. He is not the god of the dead. He is really not even trying to communicate with your carnal mind other than to wound it and kill it. He is burning your carnal mind, brethren, and he is boiling the spirit in it. Your carnal mind is the fulfillment of the Levitical sacrifice, which is being roasted. He has nothing much to do with your carnal mind. He is talking to his Son in you.
We see Jehovah talks to the Lord Jesus, and the Lord Jesus faithfully repeats the message to Christ Jesus in you. And if you are listening to this message with your carnal brain, you have got a problem, because what is going to happen when you are hearing this message with your carnal mind? It is sure to be perverted.
That is what happened to Eve in chapter 3 of the Book of Genesis: "The serpent said to Eve, 'Yea, hath God said you shall not eat of every tree'" -- or of the whole tree -- "'of the garden?' And the woman said unto the serpent, 'We may eat of the fruit of the tree of the garden. But the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden'" -- the partial tree -- "'God hath said ye shall not eat of it; neither shall ye touch it, lest ye die.'" And the Hebrew word translated "die" means die to your immortality. It does not mean cease to exist. It means you will cease to be immortal. You will die to the Garden of Eden and be translated into the realm of hell and death.
But her carnal mind, which the serpent stands for, says to her -- verse 4: "And the serpent said unto the woman, 'You shall not surely die.'" Well, that is the truth. But if you look in the Hebrew -- I will be one second -- if you look in the Hebrew, the serpent used a different Hebrew word. One -- the Hebrew word that Eve said was, "You will surely die to your immortality." And the serpent says, "Ye shall not surely cease to exist." Her carnal mind perverted the spirit of what the Lord was saying to Eve.
And how interesting that we find the King James translators following through on this by translating both of those Hebrew words to "die," so that -- not that this was conscious; it was unconscious -- so that some people looking for a deeper understanding of the Scripture have completely misunderstood what the Lord is saying in these two Scriptures, yet this is an accurate translation. Both of these Hebrew words can legitimately be translated "die." It is an accurate translation but deceptive because it is not clear that one word means to die to immortality and become mortal and the other word means to cease to exist.
Once again, the paragraph beginning, "So the Lord Jesus Christ said to them," followed by paragraph number 9, begins the Lord Jesus Christ's message to humanity. And please note -- this is very important -- that the only members of humanity that can hear what the Lord Jesus is saying or understand it are those people in whom Christ is being formed. Everyone else is deaf to what he is saying. Some people will not even listen. Some people listen, but they do not understand. The man in whom Christ Jesus is being formed will listen and will understand.
And this is another scriptural principle. If you have been reading the Bible for a while, you will hear this throughout the Scripture: "O Son of man, hear and understand." It is not enough to hear. You have to understand, or what good is hearing doing if you do not understand? O Son of man, hear. And when you hear, if you are listening and you hear, Lord willing, the Holy Spirit will penetrate your heart and join with your human spirit and form Christ Jesus in you. And then, when the eyes of your understanding are open, you shall understand. Hallelujah. It is so simple. You try doing it. It is so simple.
Also, please notice that the majority of the verses are the Lord Jesus speaking to humanity. That is because we are so thick that what the Lord said to -- what Jehovah said to the Lord Jesus in three verses is taking the Lord Jesus one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine. My goodness, we are really thick, are we not? 10, 11, 12, 13 verses to tell us, and we still do not know what he is talking about, but we are trying. Amen.
- We are going to start with verse 1. I will make comments as the Lord leads me, but I will be open to questions, sentence by sentence as we go. Hallelujah.
Verse 1, Jehovah speaking to whoever is listening: "Woe to the soul which is unclean because of her rebellious mind." Please note that rebellion is in the mind. Rebellion does act out in rebellious deeds, but rebellion is in the mind. That means it shows itself first as an -- anybody? Attitude. As an attitude. So we must be very careful not to think in terms of, oh, I have a bad attitude; I am having a bad day; I am off. It is really important that we know that attitude is the expression of sin in our mind. Why? Because, if we do not know this, we will not know that there is a necessity to repent. And if we do not know that there is a necessity to repent or to confess this attitude as sin, we are hindered in being relieved from that sin.
The Lord's intention goes beyond our just doing it today or our just not doing it tomorrow or our getting this attitude under control. In this hour, he is desiring to make his covenant with us real. He wants us to not even have to fight the fight. He wants to rip the attitude out of us. It is good to repress it. It is good to say I am having a bad attitude; I better watch it; I better be careful to protect myself and not put myself in circumstances that will provoke me beyond my ability to cope. This is wisdom, but that is only half of what Jesus wants to do for you. He wants to deliver you of the whole attitude, so that you can go anywhere, so that you can do anything, so that you can be around any kind of people, so that you can walk into any kind of situation fearlessly, knowing that your mind is guarded by Christ.
Because, brethren, when you have to stay away from a certain situation because you are afraid that you will lose control of an ungodly attitude -- brethren, that is bondage. That is like saying this place is off limits to you. That is like saying, people with rebellion in their mind, people with a short fuse, you cannot eat in this restaurant. You cannot come into this house. You cannot do this kind of activity. That is segregation, brethren, spiritual segregation which is being inflicted upon you by powers and principalities who know that, if you do not segregate yourself, you could wind up in jail or you could wind up in the hospital. Can you hear this? Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. We see the wisdom and the power to keep ourselves away from situations which will cause ungodly attitudes, which will do harm unto us, is only a Band-Aid. It is a temporary treatment to a spiritual cancer that is trying to destroy our life.
And although self-restraint and this kind of wisdom is a gift from God, because some people do not have the self-restraint and they wind up in jail or the hospital, other people do not have the wisdom, and that makes you a scriptural fool. Again, I am never insulting you with that word. The definition of scriptural fool is as follows: the fool does not see the danger, and just keeps on going until he winds up in the hospital or he winds up in jail. The wise man sees the danger, knows that he is in a situation or being confronted with a situation he cannot cope with, and turns away. If you cannot recognize danger and you just charge in, you are a scriptural fool.
Now that does not mean you are to condemn yourself. If you are foolish, get wise. All things are possible in Christ. Ask the Lord for wisdom. He is the one who giveth -- anybody know the Scripture?
Liberally.
Liberally to all who ask. But do not be deceived. If you have got a foolish mind and you ask for wisdom, you have got some trials coming on you, and you have got some whippings and some hard experience, because the judgment for a fool is -- I know you know that one.
Chastisement.
What kind of chastisement? A rod across your back. So if you are foolish and you have asked for wisdom, get ready to bend over, because he just got a rod with your name on it, and it is looking for you. Do not go running around saying Satan is after you. That is not Satan. It is your Father in heaven answering your very own prayer. Hallelujah. Hallelujah.
"Woe to the soul which is unclean because of her rebellious mind." Brethren, there is no such thing as unclean behavior coming forth from a clean mind. Can a good tree produce evil fruit, brethren, or can an evil tree produce good fruit? No, it is not possible. Evil behavior or unclean behavior is the fruit of an evil and unclean mind. Your mind must be cleansed, and mind is spirit. To clean spirit, you must have a spiritual cleansing. And beware of false doctrine in the church which tells you that you cannot have an unclean spirit, that all sin is in your soul or your body or whatever else. Your spirit can be filthy. The Scripture clearly states that we are to be cleansed of all filth, spiritual wickedness in the soul and the spirit.
I hear preachers say that, once the Holy Ghost touches you, your spirit cannot be dirty. God [AUDIO CUTS OUT] perceived to come out of the spirit. And I started investigating, and I started asking questions. I said, where is [AUDIO CUTS OUT] that your spirit cannot be perverted or corrupted? And guess what? There is not any. On the contrary, there is at least one, probably more, Scriptures that say, "Be cleansed of all spiritual filth in your [AUDIO CUTS OUT] and in your spirit."
Brethren, getting your soul cleansed without cleansing your spirit is like spinning [AUDIO CUTS OUT] [UNINTELLIGIBLE] and exact [AUDIO CUTS OUT] my words and crucify me, but I am going to say it anyway. This is the whole major problem with Old Order deliverance. [AUDIO CUTS OUT] soul, but it does not cleanse your spirit. And the whole purpose -- and I am not against Old Order deliverance, but it cannot exist in a vacuum. If you use Old Order deliverance and your soul begins to [AUDIO CUTS OUT] the cleansing of your soul is an empowering. It empowers you. Spiritual wickedness in your soul [AUDIO CUTS OUT] and hinders you from doing what you would choose to do. It hinders you from serving and following after God. Get your [AUDIO CUTS OUT] in your soul and take that empowering. To go on with God, and when he confronts you with [AUDIO CUTS OUT] submit to that cleansing through confession of sin and repentance. But if you take the cleansing in your soul, the Lord could just show you the sins of your spirit and you cannot face them. A much worse sin will come upon you.
"I have healed you in your soul," says the Lord. "Now go and sin no more. Get the healing and the cleansing in your spirit, all [AUDIO CUTS OUT] lest a worse condition of your soul come upon you."
You cannot just get your symptom healed and go about your business, because something worse [AUDIO CUTS OUT] on you, because you have not gotten the root. You have to kill the root. The world knows that. If you have a tumor, if you any kind of a disease, a cancer, you have to kill the root. You do not just kill the bump on the surface of your arm. Any questions or comments?
Verse 2: "She did not obey Jehovah's words." We are speaking about soul [AUDIO CUTS OUT] and his unclean mind. She did not obey Jehovah's voice, neither did she benefit [AUDIO CUTS OUT] his in- -- [AUDIO CUTS OUT] She did not obey Jehovah's voice or benefit from his instructions because her carnal mind [AUDIO CUTS OUT] overthrown. Her carnal mind was not overthrown. When we worked up this verse, we used as -- [AUDIO CUTS OUT]
"He who endureth to the end shall be saved." I have commented on the fact that that Greek word translated "endureth" means to be overthrown. He who is overthrown unto the end of their own soul shall [AUDIO CUTS OUT] so we see that we are not saved when we stand up and say, Lord Jesus Christ, I have received you. Not only are we not saved; sometimes we are not even reconciled unto God, because although a lot of people in the church do not [AUDIO CUTS OUT] we could stand on Mount Zion for 2,500 years saying, Lord Jesus Christ, I receive you. And if he does not receive us, we are [AUDIO CUTS OUT] empty and bankrupt. And it is a mercy of God that he does not take [AUDIO CUTS OUT] our [UNINTELLIGIBLE] to actually say, Lord Jesus, I receive you, when we should be down on [AUDIO CUTS OUT] saying, Jesus, please receive me and have mercy on me and save me from my sins. I have this in my life. We arrogantly stand up and say, I have chosen you. But my Bible says [AUDIO CUTS OUT] not chosen me. Lord speaking: "But I have chosen you. And if I have not chosen you, you are still in your sins." Jesus.
"She did not obey Jehovah's voice or benefit from his instructions." Now what was his instructions? What [AUDIO CUTS OUT] his instructions? We found this principle in the Book of Hebrews where it speaks about the Jews not entering in because of unbelief, because of unbelief. When we looked up those Greek words and did that study, we found out that unbelief is not really an ideal translation. A better translation is obedient. Obedient. Because, when somebody says to me, I did not enter in because of unbelief, my response is, how could you force somebody to believe? Even the man in the Scripture says, "I believe, Lord. Help my unbelief." How could you force yourself to believe? Either you believe or you do not believe. That is not a voluntary act. You can make a choice to act as if you believe, to do what you would do if you believed, but you cannot force yourself to believe. Either you believe or you do not. Therefore, I found it very interesting to find out that the Greek indicates the correct translation is obedience. They did not enter in because of a lack of obedience. That I can deal with. Why? Because obedience is talking about behavior, and belief is talking about mind.
In this hour, brethren, most of us have dominion over our behavior most of the time. In the event that we do not, the Lord knows it, and as we cry out to him, he is empowering us. But most people, especially those who are serving the Lord, have dominion over their behavior most of the time, or at the very least, they are working on it, and they are gaining more and more dominion over their ungodly behavior more and more of the time. But to have dominion over your thoughts, outside of being in a place where you are waging spiritual warfare on Christ Jesus, people do not have dominion over their thoughts. That is the whole point.
I have had people say to me, how can you take action against somebody's sin? Someone said to me just recently that they heard about a ministry that put two people out because it was revealed that they were fornicating. And this person said to me, "Does everybody not have sin?" I said, yes, everybody has sin. "How could you put two people out of the church because they are fornicating and leave the person in the church who may still be drinking, who may still be having all kinds of sin in their mind?" And I said, brother, the bottom line is confession and repentance. Confession and repentance. Are you overcome by your sin, or are you actively, blatantly defying the word of God, determining to follow your own standard?
If you are engaged in a sin that you have the power to stop doing, but you have made a judgment that you are going to do it whether anybody else likes it or not, this is grounds to be put out of the church, whether your sin be fornication, theft, alcoholism, drug addiction or any other evil work. Unrepented of, arrogant, blatant, chosen sin makes you ineligible to fellowship with the family of God. However, as soon as you repent, you are supposed to be restored unto the brethren. That is the bottom line. You have to be trying. There has to be some seriousness in your cry for help. Are you overcome, or are you an arrogant son of a gun who is mocking the very principles that God stands for? That is the bottom line, brethren: confession and repentance, an attitude of your heart.
And one thing is for sure. If you are engaged in behavioral sin, and you really are overcome, you are not going to do it in the face of all your brethren who are offended by your sin. At least cover it up while you are praying for help to stop. Do not come walking in with your girlfriend when your wife is home watching the baby, getting in the car with her and driving off with her, giggling and looking in each other's eyes all the way. And then when you wind up in the pulpit preaching on top of it, something is really wrong in that church. That is the difference: an attitude of the heart.
We are talking about Israel being disobedient, not so much not having belief but being disobedient. So now the question is: disobedient with regard to what? In the same -- I guess the Lord wants me to say this. In the same manner, if we are dealing with a homosexual who is flagrantly homosexual, obviously homosexual, and any other visible sin, if that person is seeking assistance, you are not supposed to be looking at what they look like. You are supposed to be trying to help them until such time as the Lord tells you the person has had enough; they have not repented; put them out. But that word has to come directly from the Lord. The doors of the church should be open to anybody who is truly seeking help at that moment, and that is a judgment that must be made by the minister who, hopefully, is hearing from Christ. You put up with anything, so long as the Lord tells you to do it.
Yes. Please speak on the microphone. I think there is one right next to you, under June's foot.
So you are saying to us that, if you are a minister and you have a congregation, and there is a person in there, a lesbian or a homosexual, that it is your job to hear from the Lord somewhere in your prayers and to ask this individual to leave? Because that happens in the church world.
Oh, yeah. It --
That is the will of God?
If the person is coming into your church saying I --
Saying something, but not just listening?
If they -- if, by their behavior, if they are coming in with their homosexual mate, sitting in the service holding hands, you do not let them in the church. If they come in, but they look weird, and they are saying, I want help, will you pray for me, you take them in no matter what they look like.
And this goes -- now that part, it goes on and on and on and on until there is no help for them? Or --
Until the Lord speaks and says either they have got to start making some changes or it is time that -- we have given you enough grace; now you have got to start making some changes. Or the Lord speaks and says their heart is not sincere, and you have done all that you could do. And then you tell them, either you start to make some changes, or you are not welcome here anymore, because this is the house of God, and you go under the instruction of the Lord.
We are speaking about Israel's disobedience. Now we are in a whole different ballgame. Why? Disobedience is referring to behavior, and unbelief is referring to mind. What did Israel not do? Israel was under a carnal law. What did Israel do or not do that would have the Lord say she was disobedient? And I suggest to you what she did not do, which is the whole message of the Book of Zephaniah, is that she did not confess her sins and repent. She kept the law. She made the animal sacrifices. She tithed, the Bible says, of everything. The Jews tithed on everything. They gave 10 percent of everything, not just -- there was not even that much money in those days. Whenever they made a sale, they gave 10 percent. They kept the law to the letter. They fasted. They engaged in ritualistic washings. They were perfect in the keeping of the law, but they were disobedient. In what way?
My Bible says, "I am tired of your fasting. I am tired of your sacrifice. I would have obedience instead of sacrifice. I would have you having mercy on the widow and the orphan rather than your sacrifices. I would rather [AUDIO CUTS OUT] heart than your animal sacrifices and your money." They were disobedient in that they failed to confess the sin. What was the main sin of Israel? Pride: main sin in the church today. They failed to confess their pride because, brethren, if you do not have mer- -- [AUDIO CUTS OUT] the widow and the orphan, if you do not have the compassion on the oppressed and the afflicted and the physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually sick people of this world, the root of your sin is pride, that you think that you are better than them. And what you do not know is that, in the blink of an eye, you could be right where they are. The Lord takes his [AUDIO CUTS OUT] for you [AUDIO CUTS OUT] or stops thinking about you for one second, and boom. That which you have despised shall be upon you, and we will see if you find someone to have mercy on you or you will someone to despise you in your darkest hour.
And Israel did not enter in, not because of unbelief, brethren, but because of disobedience, because they [AUDIO CUTS OUT] confess and repent, which would have made them eligible for a spiritual cleansing, which would have permitted them to enter in.
Now we have heard the saying that the mechanism was not really in place to bring forth the spiritual cleansing, because that mechanism is in the man Christ Jesus, the only mediator between God and man. That mechanism is in the second stage of God's covenant with humanity, and the covenant that Jehovah had with Israel was the first stage of that covenant, which led Israel into a relationship, a reconciliation with Jehovah. And that the natural Jew plus the gentile, which have both experienced the first state of Jehovah's reconciliation with man, the giving of the opportunity for reconciliation -- both Jew and gentile will now enter into the second stage of this covenant, which will purge them from their sins together. And this purging will take place through the fiery cleansing of the Spirit of Christ, which is the lake of fire, which is in the man Christ Jesus. Glory to God.
They did not obey. They did not benefit from Jehovah's instruction. Brethren, I myself have recently been rebuked by the Lord for not being tough enough, because fallen minds do not benefit from instruction alone. It is just a fact of life. Fallen minds do not benefit from instruction alone. There must be blows given. There must be painful consequences for ungodly deeds and ungodly behavior, and it is the painful blow that brings the correction.
We will continue reviewing the recap of Zephaniah 3:1-20. We are on verse 2 Alternate Translation: "And her carnal mind was not overthrown." I will just read it. I am not going to comment on the first sentence. I have a whole message on that before this. But this is where we are. We are in verse 2, which said, "She did not obey Jehovah's voice or benefit from his instructions because her carnal mind was not overthrown." And now I will be commenting on -- "and her carnal mind was not overthrown," because she, the carnal mind, was not sacrificed to Jehovah.
This is the whole issue, the whole issue of what the Lord is hitting home in this hour. Many believers are at peace in Israel because they are leading a pretty decent life. The Kingdom of God is being formed in them. Wickedness in their soul is down under their feet. They have got control over sin in their life, and they feel safe. But, brethren, the Lord is clearly trumpeting this message to you. You have control or you may have control over sin in your life now. Now is the time to paralyze her in preparation for her complete death. If you do not take steps to paralyze her and ultimately kill her right now, she will be strengthened. And when she is strengthened, she will rise up, break her bands and kill Christ in you. This is the message of the hour.
What will strengthen her, brethren? Temptation. Temptation will come to you. Everyone is being tested. When temptation comes to you and sin arises in you in great strength, she will break the bands that you have on her. She will be powerful enough to break the bands when you are tempted with something that, in the depths of your heart, you really want to do, or if someone else comes along with strong carnal mind and strengthens that potential in you that, if you did not know it was sin, you would really do it. When that happens, she is going to come out from under your stranglehold. You have got her in a neck hold, but she is not paralyzed. She is fully alive, fully alert; you have just got her down. And when this temptation comes along, or someone else's strong carnal mind, she will find the strength within her to break the bands that you have on her. And as soon as she is out from under, she will be strong enough to kill Christ Jesus in you. You must paralyze her now while she is down.
And the way that you do it, says the Lord, is through confession of sin. And you have got to see your sins before you can confess them as sin. Pray to the Lord to open your eyes. Know what your weaknesses are. You must see sin in yourself, and you must see sin in other people. You are not to condemn yourself, nor are you to condemn other people, but you must view the sin. You must look at. You must recognize it. You must name it for what it is: sin, spiritual filth. You must hate it without condemnation. And by the grace of God, love the people, forgive them and help them to overcome. This is the challenge of the hour, and it will save your spiritual life. It is not enough to have your sin under control. That is the message of the hour, brethren.
In Zephaniah 3:2, we are seeing that her carnal mind was not overthrown, because the carnal mind was not sacrificed to Jehovah. Now the word sacrifice is going a step beyond being paralyzed. In the condition known as full stature, which is the first stage of the resurrection, the carnal mind is paralyzed. You can have your carnal mind in a headlock and you still have sin. How do you know you still have sin? You still get sick. You can recognize sin in your mind, and eventually you will die. You are still aging. When you paralyze your carnal mind, that is the first step toward sacrificing her. She is brought into a condition where she is incapable of making you sin. When you have her down in a headlock underneath your feet, completely pinned to the mat, she can still make you sin. It does not matter that you are controlling your behavior. We are talking about behavior here. It is good to control your behavior, but it is not good enough to raise you from the dead. You see? It is good enough for you to reap blessings in your life, because you will reap what you sow. And you will reap blessings, and those blessings will go on your children, but you are still going to die. For you to stop dying, you must stop sinning, and having your sin under control is not -- it is stopping your behavior from sinning, but it is not stopping the sin in your mind, and that is why you still die.
When I say you must paralyze her, I mean she must be bound to Christ in you with such a strength that sin in your mind ceases. And that is something that we can only move into as Christ gives us the ability to do it. Believe me, if I had the ability to do it today, I would be in that condition. But I do not have the strength. I am doing everything I can do. I confess every sin the Lord shows me. I repent to the fullest degree that I am able. I pray for my enemies. I pray for those who despitefully use me. I actively wage war against sin in my own life. Now this is behind -- besides good behavior. I am dealing with sin in my mind and in my heart, and I am waiting for Jesus to come in and give me the victory. I am waiting for Jesus to rise up and give me the strength to paralyze my carnal mind to the point that she is incapable of making me sin. And that is the condition known as full stature.
To actually sacrifice your carnal mind, that means to fully kill her. We are talking about the second and third stage of the resurrection, to fully sacrifice her. But the first stage is enough to paralyze her. That is enough to raise us from the dead into everlasting life in this fallen body. The first stage of the resurrection is that we will not die but we will live forever in this body. But there is more than everlasting life in this body. It is everlasting life in a spirit body like Jesus has in this hour, which is preferable to this life, to the first stage of the resurrection. Why is it preferable? In the first stage of the resurrection, brethren, although it is highly unlikely, it is still possible for Satan to get loose and for you to lose it. She has to be fully killed, sacrificed, burnt in the lake of fire, fully dead. And for that to happen, you have to go into glorification, which is the third stage of the resurrection.
We see that Judah lost her Christ mind. She lost her authority as the mediator between God and humanity because her carnal mind was not overthrown. Christ Jesus was formed in her. The mind of Christ was formed in her, but her carnal mind was not sacrificed to Jehovah. And her carnal mind was not sacrificed to Jehovah because she would not confess her sins and repent. Pride, brethren. Pride: It is the sin that is in the church today. People think that they are going to be raised from the dead because they heal the sick, because they cast out demons, because they feed the poor. I have heard all kinds of stories. Because they dance in the church, because they preach, because they teach. Brethren, you have got to confess your sins and repent.
You are more likely to enter into the kingdom not knowing one smidgen of this doctrine. If you are on your face before the Lord, truly confessing your sins and repenting, you will enter in before the person that could spew out this doctrine at the snap of their fingers but is arrogant and haughty in their heart, without true confession and repentance. The person with no doctrine at all but deep faith and humility before God -- they will enter in before you. I am telling you the truth. Do not think you are entering in because you have all this deep doctrine. If God has offered this doctrine to you, then you are responsible to study and show yourself approved, but you are not entering in on this doctrine alone. You had better start dealing with your pride, because it is going to kill you. As sure as you are sitting here tonight, that pride is going to kill you.
"And her priests have committed treason." Who are the priests in the church today? Who are the priests in the church today? The office of priest is to offer up sacrifices on behalf of the people's sins. The priests are the elders in the church, brethren. The elders in the church have the authority to forgive sins.
If you are a married man and you have a relationship with Christ, you have the authority to forgive the sins of your wife and your children. If you are not in Christ, if your wife is the one in the family who has the relationship with Christ, she has the authority, men, to forgive your sins. That does not mean she has the right to take your place in the natural matters of the physical human family. She does not. But spiritually speaking, she does have authority to pray on your behalf, to forgive your sins. It is very important that you forgive your husband, essential in a relationship, like any of the married women here. Unforgiveness for your husband could kill him, because the Scripture clearly says, "He whose sins you forgive, they are forgiven. And he whose sins you do not forgive, they are not forgiven." You have a responsibility to forgive your husband's sins if you are the spiritual one in the family and he is not.
But any elder in the church, anyone who is a spiritual male, the one who is offering up spiritual sacrifices -- and what is the spiritual sacrifice? It is the carnal mind. Yes. The priest is the one who is, first of all, offering up his own carnal mind as a sacrifice. What does that mean? Brethren, in order to minister Christ to you, I must be continuously sacrificing my own carnal mind. I must be denying my own rejection, my own hurt, my own pride, my own desire for vengeance or retaliation, or the luxury, if you would call it that, for unforgiveness -- I must deny all that and turn against it and war against all such inclinations in order to minister Christ to you, because if I yield to any of these carnal passions, Christ is tread underfoot. Therefore, in order to minister Christ to you, I must be continuously sacrificing my own carnal mind.
And then secondly, I sacrifice your carnal mind. When I come to you and I rebuke you, if your carnal mind is up, if in any given particular situation, you have refused -- not refused, but it is usually conscious -- failed to react out of Christ and are in fact reacting out of your carnal mind, should I perceive it and come to you and rebuke you, I am sacrificing your carnal mind. What has happened is you have failed to do it, so for that instant you are spiritually female, and you need a spiritual male to do it for you. I come, and I rebuke you, hopefully gently, and that gives you enough strength to rise up and at least pray about doing righteousness. If you can receive the correction, you may find the strength to do righteousness. If you do not receive it but you at least pray about it, then you bring the Lord Jesus into it, and surely you will find the strength somewhere along the line to do righteousness. And this is the true forgiveness of sins. It is not just to say the words, "I forgive your sins." It is to bring the correction.
I first sacrifice my carnal mind; then I sacrifice your carnal mind. And it is definitely to your benefit to be in submission, either -- at the very least to pray about what I say, because I am Christ to you in all areas that you are not capable of being Christ yourself. You see? If Christ is being formed in you, in some areas, you are spiritually male, and you do not need me to sacrifice your carnal mind. Why? You are sacrificing your own carnal mind. You are restraining yourself. You are doing what is right. You do not need me to be Christ unto you. Christ Jesus is internalized in you in this area. But in every area that he is not mature enough to be sacrificing your carnal mind and the thoughts in your head in response to any given situation, if the thoughts that you are thinking are carnal and not Christ, that means that Christ Jesus in you has not been mature enough, has failed for whatever reason to sacrifice your carnal mind, and the thoughts of the carnal mind have become your thoughts in this incident.
Then I come in and, with my correction, I attempt to sacrifice your carnal mind. If you work with me, all the more power to you. If you really cannot hear what I am saying, but you pray, you are still pretty covered. If you rebel against me and you will not even consider what I am praying, your sins are not forgiven. I can say all the words that I want to, but your sins are not forgiven. And the only time I can forgive your sins without your cooperation is when I go into full stature. Or maybe I do not have be in full stature when -- if, in that particular incident, God authorizes me to execute judgment against you and that judgment brings you into repentance, then in that situation I have the authority to forgive your sins without your cooperation.
But I am limited in that area. What am I limited to? To what degree am I limited? I am limited to the degree that I have overcome. I cannot judge sin in you in areas that I have not overcome. If you can hear it, hear it. Praise the Lord. If I try to judge sin in you in an area that I have not overcome, we are both going into the ditch. That means that I am responsible, brethren, to recognize areas of sin in you that I have not yet overcome. I may have that sin under lock and key, but I have not truly overcome it. If I try to judge you in that area, we are both going down, so I had better run from you. I am fleeing from you in areas of sin in your life that neither have I overcome. The Lord has to send someone else to minister to you in that area. Amen. And I am responsible to recognize those areas, or we are both finished. And what good is that going to do somebody? No good at all, brethren.
"And her carnal mind was not sacrificed to Jehovah because she would not confess her sins and repent. And her priests have committed treason by violently prostituting Christ Jesus." What does that mean? Violently prostituting Christ Jesus. The priest, who was supposed to be sacrificing his carnal mind so that the Christ mind could be appearing, is willfully choosing to respond out of the carnal mind. The Scripture says "violently prostituting Christ Jesus." That means he is not waging the warfare. Brethren, your carnal mind is not laying down on the altar saying, "Burn me, burn me." You have to bind her up and force her down underneath the Christ in you. To violently prostitute Christ Jesus means to not wage the warfare that would put the carnal mind down underneath her.
And if you do not wage that warfare, the carnal mind is thinking through you and speaking through you, and only disaster can result from that. And we are told in Zephaniah 3 that this condition exists in the church, and it exists -- what condition? That the pastors are not waging the warfare against their carnal mind so that Christ can come forth from them to minister to you. And the reason this is happening is that they are not willing to confess their sins and repent. It is not a failure of being overcome. It is a refusal of the elders in the church to confess their sin that is resulting in their ministering to you out of their carnal minds instead of Christ. This is the word. There are elders in the church who have Christ Jesus but who are ministering out of their carnality because their pride refuses to confess that a pastor could have sin, or for whatever reason they do not want to admit that they have sin.
And this failure and refusal to admit their sins or to confess when they are up against a situation that they cannot handle, like I just described, because you have the same sin -- you are supposed to send them to someone else. Brethren, if you go to a psychiatrist and they feel they cannot help you, they are supposed to send you to somebody else. If you go to a medical doctor and they know your disease is beyond their knowledge, they are supposed to send you to somebody else.
We see that the priests are violently prostituting Christ Jesus because they will not confess their sins. If you do not confess your sin, you are doing violence to Christ Jesus. You are killing him. He can die in you. He is a fetus in you. The glorified Christ cannot die; Jehovah cannot die, but Christ Jesus in you is a fetus. He can die. And when you refuse to confess your sins, you are killing him. You are strengthening your carnal mind and killing Christ. And every time you confess your sins, you are strengthening Christ and killing your carnal mind.
And if you are in denial as to what your sins are, you have got a real big problem, so make your covenant with the Lord Jesus. Make it right now, brethren, when you are sober and you are sane and you are in control that you are confessing every sin you can see and believing him to show it to you, because when you make such a covenant with him, when you tell him that you want to see your sins and you want to confess them but you really cannot, at that point, the full responsibility for opening your eyes and your ears, if your heart is true, if you really mean it that you really want to do this, you just do not know how but that you are willing if he will help you, if that is true, the full responsibility for making you see your sins now rests on the Lord Jesus Christ. And he is able to do it. But do not be surprised if the fiery trial comes upon you, brethren.
"And her priests have committed treason by violently prostituting Christ Jesus and tearing away the Spirit of Christ." Tearing away the Spirit of Christ. What this is speaking about, brethren, is the breaking down of the spiritual altar. Remember, the Spirit of Christ is joined to your human spirit. The way Christ Jesus is -- look, a human fetus is joined by an umbilical cord. Does anybody here not know that? That you have a fetus inside your wombs, ladies, and that fetus is floating in the amniotic fluid, but there is a connection between the fetus and the mother, and that connection is called an umbilical cord. That is what your belly button is. There is a lifeline that goes from the baby's belly button and I guess it connects to the placenta somewhere. I am not even sure myself. But it connects to the mother's body. The spiritual umbilical cord between Christ Jesus and the human being is the Spirit of Christ. The Spirit of Christ plugs into your human spirit. On one end of the Spirit of Christ is your human spirit; on the other end of the Spirit of Christ is the man Christ Jesus.
And, in fact, I think it is in Zephaniah 2. We even hear the Lord speaking about a lifeline that the men in whom Christ appears, the gentiles, the non-physical Jew or the non-natural Jew, the church, the men in whom Christ first appear -- then they are going out to the natural Jew, and they are going to be a lifeline unto them. I think that is in Zephaniah 2. We are going to be the connection between the natural Jew and his restoration unto Jehovah. Christ Jesus, the only mediator between God and man, is a spiritual umbilical cord. If you can hear it, hear it. Hallelujah.
The next paragraph, which begins with 3, verse 3: "And that is why Satan, the fallen, dead soul's unconscious mind, is like an army of fierce young soldiers executing the sowing and reaping judgment upon herself because of the sins of her carnal mind." What is that speaking about? Why? And that is why -- what is why? Because the priests will not confess their sins and repent. And that is why Satan, the unconscious mind of fallen man, is like an army of fierce young soldiers executing the sowing and reaping judgment upon herself, upon the soul, because of the sins of the carnal mind. We see in this hour that we may never -- although I do not even think this is possible, if it is possible to never sin with your body or with your behavior or with your mouth, your carnal mind sins continuously. Jesus said, "If you look after a woman with lust in your eyes, you have committed adultery. If you hate your brother, you have killed him." We are dealing with the hidden sins of the heart in this hour.
And Satan, your own unconscious mind, is your judge. Therefore, every evil thing that comes upon you, brethren, is a judgment which is legitimately and legally executed upon you by your own executioner who is in your unconscious mind, Satan. Jesus said, "The prince of the world cometh and he have nothing in me." If there was no sin in you, Satan could not touch you. Satan touches you because he has legal ground, and the way you take his legal ground away is by confessing your sins. And if you keep maintaining your innocence and blaming everything on Satan, you are going to have a problem. You need to confess your guilt and cry out to the Lord Jesus Christ to make his promise real to you that all things will work for your good, even when the prince of this world cometh and finds legal ground to torment you, either with physical illness or financial difficulties or marital problems or emotional problems or any kind of problem in this world. The answer, brethren, is not to pray to make it go away. The answer is not to run from it. But the answer is to turn and face it, armed with the Scripture, which is the promise of God that he will turn it to your good.
You cannot run from it. Satan has legal ground to torment you. But fight the war, brethren, and the result of Satan's torment will be that your bands will burn off, and not only your bands but the bands of your children. And, as you become a stronger and stronger warrior, whatever spiritual children or whatever people he puts in your life for ministry, he will burn their bands off, brethren. But you will war. As long as you are down here in hell, you will war. You will war to the end of the war, and just pray for the best.
And the victory is sweet. There are many good things in God. It is a lot better than being overcome. But if you think you are going to be having a life in a Caribbean island, I do not see it happening except to the baby Christians who have not entered into the war yet. And if there is no fight, then there cannot be any victory.
Brethren, if you are happy laying in a crib, having someone stick a bottle in your mouth every four hours, well, then if the Lord lets you stay in that condition, stay in that condition. But it does not turn me on. I know there are people in this world. It is called mental illness. If they could, they would go back to their infancy and have somebody just take care of them and provide their every need. If you truly feel that way in this world, you are qualified to be on a psychiatrist's couch. That is a serious emotional problem to have serious desires to be totally cared for instead of totally independent. You have a dependency need. It is not healthy. It is not healthy in this physical world, nor is it healthy spiritually. How long are you going to be lying on your back in a crib, having the Lord stick a bottle in your mouth every time you cry? Do you not want to go out and face the world? Do you not want to grow up and be like Daddy? You should want to grow up and be like Daddy. If you do not, you have to ask yourself how come you are so infantile that you want to be taken care of for the rest of your life, from the womb to the tomb. And I am here tonight to tell you that, if you do feel that way and you are that infantile, get ready, because Da- -- [AUDIO CUTS OUT]
Did you get it to the right spot? It did not sound like it was the right spot there. It should be going forward now, because you turned the tape around. Let us hear the last --
When he pushes you out, you will flap. We see that our own unconscious mind is judging us. And this is very interesting, because the psychiatrists know that our own unconscious mind brings 99 percent of our trouble into your life. I read an article in a psychiatric magazine about it, how our unconscious mind sets us up for all the trouble that we have.
You know, I have -- those of you who know me know that I have a long history of physical illness. And the first time I ever heard a psychologist say -- actually I think it -- I do not know who the first one that I heard say it. I was so offended when I heard a psychologist say, talking about family structure, saying, "Well, this child in a dysfunctional family will decide to get sick." And I was so offended when I heard that. I said to myself, how could anybody decide to get sick? What a crazy thing to say. But apparently there is truth in it. But it is not your conscious mind that decides; it is your unconscious mind. We are told that a large part of our life is ruled by our unconscious mind, and our unconscious mind can decide to make us sick.
It is something that is beyond us. It is reasoning that is beyond us. When Christ begins to be formed in us and we begin to introspect and look into ourselves, we start to wage war with Satan in our mind who is making these decisions for us: that we shall get sick, that we shall be an alcoholic, that we should be a drug addict, that we should be married and divorced five times, that we should marry an alcoholic, that we should marry an adulterous man. All of these setups that we fall into that seems to be a pattern in our life but we cannot figure out how this problem happens to us over and over and over again -- brethren, it is your own unconscious mind that is attracting you to the same kind of woman who is going to steal all your money and leave you flat for another man, or it is your same unconscious mind that is attracting that woman to an adulterous man. It is your unconscious mind that is willing what your life will be against your conscious mind, and your unconscious mind is stronger than your conscious mind.
But when Christ Jesus begins to be formed in you and you start to wage this warfare, it should be against your own unconscious mind. Satan is not out there on Mars. He is in your mind, and Christ Jesus is saying to him, uh-uh, uh-uh. [AUDIO CUTS OUT] marry a woman that is going to take all my money and leave me for another man, or Christ Jesus in that women is saying, I am not going to marry another alcoholic or another adulterous man. I am going to wage war against you, Satan. You have power over my unconscious mind, but Christ Jesus has power over you. And World War V has just begun.
Brethren, this is what the Scripture is all about. It is not about getting a Cadillac or getting raptured and going to a mansion. It is about taking dominion over powers and principalities in your unconscious mind which are ruling your life unto your destruction and which have ruled in your family line for generations, which powers and principalities are saying to you, Little David, for they are Goliath -- and they are saying to you, "Who do you think you are to come against me, you little slip of a boy?" And David is saying, "Who do you think you are to blaspheme the name of the God of Israel?" But if you do not fight, brethren, you are captive. There is no fight. You are just totally captive, and Satan will rule your life and bring to pass every family line curse that has been in your family for generations.
But despite this fact that Satan is an army of fierce young soldiers executing the sowing and reaping judgment upon herself because of the sins of the carnal mind -- despite that, Satan shall be cut off because of Christ Jesus' righteousness. And I just got ahead of myself. That is what I just told you about. There is power; there is spiritual power in righteousness. You see? There is spiritual power in sin, but there is greater spiritual authority in righteousness. The spiritual power which is in sin or which is in evil is stronger than the spiritual power which is in the goodness of the fallen man. The fallen man has both good and evil within him. Some men are heroes; some men do very sacrificial deeds. But no matter how good you are in this world, sin is stronger than your goodness. How do I know that? Because, as surely as you were born, you shall die. The power of sin is greater than the power of good in this world. But the power of righteousness, which is in Christ Jesus, is greater than the power of sin.
Therefore, brethren, if your righteousness does not exceed the righteousness of the Pharisees, which is the goodness of this world, you shall surely not enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. You cannot enter in on the good works of this world. If you are the nicest, kindest, most generous, most sacrificial person that ever lived, you cannot keep your own soul alive. Evil is stronger than good, but righteousness is greater than evil. To have righteousness, however, you must have the one who is righteous. Christ Jesus must be formed in you. And to have Christ Jesus formed in you, you must confess your sins and repent. And if you cannot see your sins, you have got a big problem. So make your covenant, brethren. The Lord Jesus Christ is able to show you your sins.
And we see that, when the righteousness which is in Christ Jesus appears in us, our human spirit shall be boiled. Well, this is a subtlety. It says the human spirit shall be boiled, but what we are not told, what is left out, and you may recall my teaching from one of the Scriptures, a lot of what the Scripture says is that -- and that is where we get this whole concept of amplification from. A lot of what the Scripture says is presupposing that you have prior knowledge. If you go to take a college course, many college courses have what they call prerequisites. You cannot take Physics 5 if you have not taken physics 1, 2, 3 and 4. Why? Because some of the things, if not all of the things, being taught in Physics 5 presupposes that you know are the basic principles that were taught in Physics 1, 2, 3 and 4. And you could never understand what is being taught in Physics 5 if you did not take Physics 1, 2, 3 and 4. So when you go into Physics 5, the teacher or the professor will be making statements which presuppose that you have other knowledge.
Here we see a Scripture saying that your human spirit will be boiled. This statement presupposes, brethren, that you know that you human spirit is joined to whom? Who? Satan. Satan. Your human spirit is the salt which is dissolved in the water of Satan's world. The human spirit is salt. So, to say that the human spirit will be boiled is really an insult to Satan.
You may recall, during the Gulf War, President Bush consistently referred to Saddam ("sah-DAHM") Hussein [AUDIO CUTS OUT] which, of that country, Saddam ("sah-DAHM") is an honorable name, but Saddam ("SAD-um") is an insult. I do not remember what that word means. Saddam ("SAD-um") is an insult, is an insulting word. And President Bush consistently referred to Saddam ("sah-DAHM") Hussein as Saddam ("SAD-um") Hussein. There was a presupposition there that the dictator knew the correct pronunciation of his own name and that the dictator also knew the meaning of the word Saddam ("SAD-um"). If the dictator did not know this, there would be no point in President Bush having called him Saddam ("SAD-um"). If the man did not know he was being insulted, what is the point of mispronouncing his name?
We see, in the Scripture, much of what is said, especially in prophecy, presupposes other, less mature knowledge for you to get the full understanding of what the Lord is saying. Prophecy is very complicated, brethren. Once again, by the anointing of Christ, you have to choose the right translation of the Hebrew word. Then you have to be able to interpret the symbol, and then you have to have the knowledge which is presupposed in words which are not amplified. It is a miracle that we are getting the knowledge that we are getting out of these Scriptures. I hope you all realize how blessed you are that the parables are being opened unto you. It is a sign that you are true disciples of the Lord Jesus Christ, and it is a great honor. But we do not receive this honor without pain, brethren. There is a price to pay.
We see that the reaping and sowing judgment of our own carnal mind shall be cut off by Christ Jesus, who shall boil Satan, to whom the human spirit is joined or completely dissolved in. And then the human spirit, after the boiling separates her from Satan, she shall be joined to her true husband, Christ Jesus, the only one who can preserve her soul alive. And the reason Christ Jesus is the only one who can preserve her soul alive is because he is the only one strong enough to bring her to repentance. Your soul will not be made alive without repentance. An unrighteous man cannot force you to repent. Only a righteous man can force you to repent against your will. Therefore, we see that only the sons of God, who have already overcome their own sins, have the authority to execute the judgments which will enforce repentance upon you. An unrighteous man cannot show you your sins or force you to repent. He does not have the power, the authority to do it, and if he tries, judgment will fall on him also. It will be a disaster.
Let me point out to you also -- this is very interesting -- that this Alternate Translation says, "When her human spirit is boiled, then she shall be joined to her true husband." Not only does the Scripture not tell you that the human spirit is joined to Satan but, for whatever reason, at this point the Scripture also eliminates the truth that before Satan is boiled, the carnal mind is being roasted in the fire or the lake of fire, which is Christ. Once again, we see the type of the Levitical sacrifice being fulfilled, not in the crucifixion of the physical man Jesus of Nazareth but in the sacrifice of the carnal mind on two levels.
Actually, the Lord is giving us some further information on that. In the sacrifice of the whole fallen personality of the man, and the name of the complete fallen personality is the devil, and the devil's unconscious mind is Satan, who is being boiled, and the devil's conscious mind is the carnal mind who is being roasted in the lake of fire. We see that the devil is the beast, and Satan is the unconscious mind of the beast, and the carnal mind is the conscious mind of the beast. We see the Levitical sacrifice of beasts, goats and cows and heifers, is fulfilled in the sacrifice of the spiritual beast, the devil, and her unconscious mind, Satan, who is boiled, and her conscious mind, the carnal mind, who is roasted.
The physical man Jesus of Nazareth was crucified, and the sacrifice was of his soul life. He could have lived forever, but he gave up that soul life to be exalted into a higher position or a higher condition of pure Spirit, whereby he was in a form whereby he could be poured out upon all flesh and do the same thing for every human being that he did within himself as Jesus of Nazareth. And what is this same thing that he is doing for us that he did for himself? He is sacrificing the devil in us. He is roasting our carnal mind in the lake of fire and boiling Satan, setting our human spirit free so that she can marry Christ Jesus, whom he is bringing forth in us.
We see the sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ was the sacrifice of his soul life. He gave up his soul life. He already had overcome. Christ Jesus in the man Jesus of Nazareth, who was Christ, had already crucified or sacrificed the devil within himself. He had boiled his own unconscious mind and roasted his own carnal mind. He was without sin. But he sacrificed that sinless life to be exalted into a condition of pure Spirit whereby he has entered into our hearts and is reproducing the life of Christ Jesus, who is sacrificing our own beast, our own devil, whose unconscious mind is Satan and whose conscious mind is the carnal mind.
One more time, the sacrifice of Jesus of Nazareth was that he gave up a sinless life, which would have permitted him to live forever. That is the bloodless sacrifice that is typified by the grain offerings. There are bloodless sacrifices amongst the Levitical sacrifices. The blood sacrifice is the sacrifice of the beast within all of us. It is the sacrifice of our fallen man, whose name is the devil, whose unconscious mind is Satan and whose conscious mind is the carnal mind.
We see that Jesus' sinless life, the spiritual blood, if you will, of his glorified life, which is without blood -- He has been glorified. He is no longer flesh and blood; He is flesh and bones. His glorified life is appearing in us as the Kingdom of God, and we shall enter into that place which he has prepared for us, the Kingdom of God, with the blood of the sacrifice of our own carnal mind. One more time, the bloodless sacrifice is Christ Jesus in us, but the blood sacrifice is our own carnal mind. Brethren, you must enter in with two sacrifices: one bloodless and one bloody. I strongly suggest you review the message "Not without Blood." I have been listening to it myself. It is a very important revelation. Get it into your spirit. It is important. Jesus.
Verse 5: "You see, Jehovah incarnates the mind of Christ in the midst of his soul from age to age. But the devil, the one who is presently possessing her soul illegally, is the only one who forms the carnal mind, which is the visible expression of the devil's deadly existence." So what is this saying? Jehovah incarnates the mind of Christ, or Jehovah incarnates Christ Jesus in the midst of this dead, fallen soul from age to age, but the devil is the one who is presently possessing her illegally. He is the only one who forms the devil, which is the visible expression -- or, we could say, is the only one who forms the carnal mind, which is the visible expression of the devil's deadly existence. I see what I did here.
"You see, Jehovah incarnates the mind of Christ in the midst of his soul from age to age. But the devil, the one who is presently possessing her illegally, is the only one who forms the carnal mind, which is the visible expression of the devil's deadly existence." What that is saying is that Christ Jesus and the mind of Christ, which is in Christ Jesus, is formed by Jehovah from age to age. He keeps forming His mind. He keeps forming His mind. Why? Because his mind keeps getting killed. The mind of Christ keeps getting killed.
Paul says, "We are killed all the day long." The carnal mind kills Christ Jesus and the mind of Christ all the day long. Why? Because the devil is in possession of the soul. The devil is in the possession of power. He is up at the top of the mountain. He is possessing the mountain. You try and take the mountain. Ask any military strategist. You need much more power to charge the mountain or the hill and take the hill than you do to defend it. Offense always takes more power than a defense. You just stand there and shoot everybody that charges up the hill.
The Scripture is saying the reason people are having so much trouble being righteous, the reason people are having trouble confessing their sins and repenting -- it is not that you are this bad, terrible person, although you are responsible for what you are doing, but the Lord is acknowledging that the devil has possession of you. The Lord knows it. He is taking that into consideration. There is still something you have to do. You cannot just go la-dee-da down the primrose path saying, the devil possesses me; rapture me out of here. That is not acceptable to the Lord. But he is taking into consideration your fallen, desperate condition.
However, he has given you something to do that the Lord has determined you are capable of doing. And that which you are capable of doing, he is requiring to do: confess your sin, confess your weakness, confess your inability to get the devil out of you. And even more than that: to bring forth righteousness from within you. We do not have the power to bring forth righteousness, let alone get the devil out. That is what our part is: to confess that we are wrong and God is right, that he is the only one that can help us, that we need him, that he is righteous, that every failure is ours, that every wickedness that falls upon us is the result of sin in our own life or in our ancestors' lives, that God is righteous, that he has not punished us unrighteously. And we deserve everything that comes upon us, but because of the mercy of God, he has promised to use it for our good. He has not put this sin upon us. He has not put this pain and this torment upon us to teach us about sin. We are in pain and torment because we have sinned, and that the judgment for sin is righteous. Every evil thing in our life is a righteous judgment of God because of sin. We are guilty without condemnation.
What does that mean? If you are guilty with condemnation, there is no getting up off the floor. You just stay there and get beaten until you die. But confession of guilt without condemnation raises you from the dead. We are guilty without condemnation, and we labor in the things of God, waiting, as Job says -- does anybody know the Scripture? Waiting for our change. Waiting for our change from unrighteousness to righteousness. Waiting for our change from death unto life. Waiting for our change from a vile body that gets sick and gets wounded and causes us pain and dies to a glorious body like unto his that is invulnerable, that never gets sick, that will never die.
We are possessed of the devil. It is a great mystery. The devil has within him both good and evil. That which is good which is in the devil -- does anybody know what is good? The human spirit. Everything good in us, everything good that we think or do, all creativity, all godliness, emanates from our human spirit, which was originally with God. But, the human spirit is weak. She is only one strand of what was intended to be a threefold cord. And the devil is strong. He is a threefold cord. He is three strands: the devil, Satan and the carnal mind -- or the serpent, I should say. The devil is a threefold cord: the serpent, Satan and the carnal mind. That is why good is weaker than evil, but righteousness -- the threefold cord of the human spirit, the Lord Jesus Christ and Christ Jesus: that righteousness is stronger than evil.
Are we on? Yeah. I have all these verses interspersed. At this point, the first -- it looks like it is the first five verses. We see Jehovah just making a general statement about the condition of his fallen, dead soul. In the next verses, we see Jehovah speaking to the Lord Jesus Christ and giving him his assignment to go down into the hell that this fallen, dead soul -- or that this dead soul has fallen into, to get the people out. And in the last few verses, we see the Lord Jesus Christ faithfully repeating Jehovah's message to fallen, dead humanity.
We are going to stop here, because this is the end of Jehovah's exhortation, if you will. And we will review his instructions to the Lord Jesus on the next message, but I will open the floor for questions. Are there any questions on tonight's message? Anybody? Any questions on any issue at all? No questions. I do feel that the Lord is telling me to wait until the next message to review his instructions to the Lord Jesus Christ.
Transcribed by VerbalFusion 01/18/18
02/20/17, 1st Edit rh