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Galatians 1:1, Paul, an apostle (not of men, neither by man, but by Jesus Christ. Paul is telling the Church of Galatia that he was appointed an apostle not by man, and neither is he an apostle of men, but he is an apostle of the Lord Jesus Christ. He is not an apostle of man; that means his apostleship comes forth of the life of Christ within him. Neither by man; neither was he appointed by man, but he was appointed by the Lord Jesus Christ. There is a move in the Church today, some people put a name on it, they call it a shepherding spirit, but it is more than that, they are trying to lay hold of the ministry that the Lord is raising up in this hour and put it in submission to other men.
They are saying, You must have a pastor. If God calls you to preach, who are you in submission to? What Church do you answer to? What body of pastors are you submitted to? I find nothing in the Scripture that requires that, but only that we be submitted to the Lord Jesus Christ, and those to whom He directs us. There is a wickedness in the Church today, antichrist is moving in great power.
What does antichrist do? He builds structures, he builds denominations, he builds manmade walls, and those walls get in between the preacher or the minister and the Lord. That is what he does, and that is why we have so many organizations in this country today, probably across the world. There are places where God used to move mightily, and you go there today and there is no move of the Spirit. Why is there no move of the spirit? Because somewhere, some way, somehow, the mind of man tried to interfere and succeeded, and the Holy Spirit withdrew and went elsewhere.
He will always be manifesting in His Church, but He will leave certain areas or certain local bodies if they serve their own soul, or the mind of man, however you want to put it, rather than serving God. It is very subtle, and it is very slow; it is a seduction, and one day the congregation looks up and the Spirit of God is gone, and they say, What happened to Him, where did He go? And I declare to you, that the Spirit of God does withdraw from wherever He is not being worshiped, and worship is submission to His will. Glory to God!
Paul, an apostle (not of men, neither by man, but by Jesus Christ, and God the Father, who raised Him from the dead;) As the Lord was preparing me for this message this morning, He said something very interesting to me. I looked up that word raised, the Greek word that is translated raise, and it can also be translated to wake up from sleep, to awaken, to stand into an upright position, and the whole Church world reads this Scripture and says, Well, Jesus Christ was raised from the dead after the crucifixion. That is true, His body was raised from the dead, but His soul was raised from the dead before He was crucified. His soul was raised from the dead, and during His baptism with John, He was awakened from spiritual sleep; He was awakened from spiritual death before his body crucified. The Lord wants us to know that whatever happens in the realm of the spirit will eventually happen in the natural.
His soul was raised from the dead, His spirit was raised from the dead, and eventually, His body was raised from the dead. So, if you are hearing this word and your spirit and your soul is in the process of being raised from the dead, you must believe that at some point your body will be raised from the dead, because what happens to this body is just a reflection of what has happened in the realm of the spirit.
This Scripture is much more profound than the way it is preached. Jesus Christ was raised from the dead: spirit, soul, and body, and it did not all happen on the cross. The cross was the last expression of His resurrection from the dead. And I would also like to say that He is still being raised from the dead, because the Lord Jesus Christ is the head of the body, and everyone in whom His spirit is dwelling right now is being raised from the dead. Anyone that knows anything about birthing babies knows that the hardest part is for the head to be born, and once the head is born, the rest of the body usually comes right out.
Jesus Christ of Nazareth was raised from the dead, and now those first fruits, the 42nd Generation, those who are part of the head company, are being raised from the dead now, and then the rest of the body is just going to march right through.
We are going through all the hard times. We are getting beat, it is hard, we are getting knocked around and paying the price so that the rest of the body can just flow forth. For those of you that know anything about birthing babies, sometimes they get beat up pretty bad, they come out black and blue, and sometimes, in an extreme case, an arm could be broken or there could be any kind of damage. This birth is a hard birth and the Lord has promised it will not be stillborn. The whole child will be born in many members, as we talked about last week, but this is a tough deliverance, and there are a lot of people paying a heavy price for this birth to come forth, but it is the birth that will save the entire creation. It is the child that is going to save the living soul in childbearing. Hallelujah!
Galatians, Chapter 1, verses 2-3, And all the brethren which are with me, unto the churches of Galatia: Grace be to you and peace from God the Father, and from our Lord Jesus Christ.
Galatians, Chapter 1, verse 4, Who gave Himself for our sins... This is a verse that is preached all over the Church world, that Jesus Christ gave Himself for our sins, that He was crucified in place of the Levitical sacrifice so that God would no longer condemn us, but I declare to you, that is not an accurate understanding of that verse.
Jesus Christ of Nazareth was not a replacement for the Levitical sacrifice. The Levitical sacrifice is a type of the soul, not the body. It is our soul that must be sacrificed, and what it says here is that Jesus Christ gave Himself, He gave his soul life for (or because of) our sins, and what is sin? Sin is a failure to be righteous. It is an inability to be righteous.
Somehow there is so much condemnation in the word sin, just at the sound of it, but when you analyze it, God says, Sin is the failure to do the righteous thing. It is my understanding of the Scripture that man without Christ cannot do the righteous thing. It is impossible for a man without Christ to do the righteous thing, so what did Jesus Christ do for us? He was not a helpless animal, that when God saw His blood pouring on the ground, the blood lust of Jehovah was satisfied, so that He would not kill us anymore. That is what is preached. It is not true. What happened to Jesus Christ's soul, was that it was nailed to the Adamic soul within His mind. He was born of a woman, an Israelite woman, He had a body and a soul from the line of Judah. He had a natural soul and He also had the soul of Christ, why?
Because when the Holy Spirit hovered over Mary, He not only impregnated her, the child that He impregnated her with had its human spirit fertilized so that Christ was already present when that baby was born, that baby named Jesus Christ of Nazareth. And what is happening today is that we are born as natural people and then we have to go through the Church world. We must have an experience with God and be touched by the Lord. Lord willing, our human spirit is fertilized, and Christ starts to be formed in us, and because Jesus Christ permitted Himself to be crucified, and He permitted His Adamic soul to be crucified by the Christ that was in Him; what does that mean? It means the two were joined.
We are told in the Scripture, Of the twain, he made one new man, of what twain? Twain meaning two. Of the Adamic soul and of the Christ soul. He joined them together in crucifixion, and made one new man, the creation of God, and what He did on the cross, in the body of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, He is doing in each of us whose human spirit has been fertilized; He is coming forth. We now have an Adamic soul and we have a Christ soul. The Christ soul starts out smaller and weaker than the Adamic soul, but He grows up as a mustard seed, and He will get stronger than our Adamic soul, and be joined to our Adamic soul for the life of the ages. What does that mean to you and to me? It means that His righteousness will be joined to us for the life of the ages, because we are not able to be righteous; it is impossible for us to be righteous.
So it is not that He was just some animal that was killed, that made bloodthirsty Jehovah happy, no. By His death He now dwells in our soul, and He is our righteousness, and He is our ability. He is our enablement to stop sinning. Glory to God, that is what He did for us, and He is still doing it. His body is still coming forth in you and me. He is the head who gave Himself for our sins. He did not just give himself on the cross of Calvary, He gave His spiritual life to be nailed to the living soul for the life of the ages. That means that man is still being created. What is missing from natural man? His righteousness is missing.
It is as if we are atom that the Lord is putting together, and there is a positive charge and a negative charge. Natural man is negative; he must sin, he must destroy, everything he touches he destroys, but the positive charge is being added to the creation, Jesus Christ, our righteousness, is going to make us whole and complete, because we are complete in Him, and we shall stop sinning. Why? Because He shall give us the ability to do what is right, and we shall stop dying. Glory to God.
So when He gave Himself for our sins, He did a much greater thing than is being preached today. He is the ransom that was paid. In the natural world, if a child is kidnapped, you pay the ransom, the kidnaper takes the ransom, and you get your child back, but in the realm of the spirit, God gave His only Son as a ransom, to be joined to the living soul for the life of the ages. God gave His Son as a ransom, not to get Him back; He gave His Son so that we should stop dying. And now Jesus Christ is joined to us forever, and He is our righteousness, our ability to stop missing the mark. Now we have to transfer that which is our true life; our human spirit must transfer out of the Adamic soul into the soul of Christ. It is painful, but what a glorious word. It is a glorious word!
Galatians, Chapter 1, verse 4, Who gave Himself for our sins, that He might deliver us from this present evil world... that Greek word, translated world, means age, and that age is the life that we are living in Adam. We are being delivered from this present evil, spiritual, Adamic age, by how? By getting our true life, which is our human spirit, free from it, and transferring it into the new age, which is Jesus Christ, and all this according to the will of God and our Father, to whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen.
COMMENT: Does sin mean missing the mark?
PASTOR VITALE: Yes, sin does mean to miss the mark, which means we try to do what is right. I think most people try to do what is right, but we cannot do what is right. It is impossible in Adam to do what is right. What is right? It is what God requires of us. And this is all in the mind, what is right is in the mind. What we see happening in the natural is just an expression of what occurred in the mind, and that is why the Scripture says, There is therefore now no more condemnation in Christ Jesus, but we must hear the correction. Correction is not condemnation. We must hear the correction. A lot of people cannot discern the difference between correction and condemnation.
What is the difference between correction and condemnation? Correction will rebuke you when an error has been made. You hear the word and you forget about it, and it goes into your mind, and by the power of the spirit of Jesus Christ, hopefully, the true word will cast out the error. And if a demon is there, the demon has to be cast out. It will convict you of the truth, and the error will be replaced by the truth. You must hear the correction, you must be rebuked, whoever is thinking incorrectly, and then you forget about it and leave it to God to work in the mind.
Condemnation says, I will never let you forget this. I will remind you of it five times a day, every day, for the rest of your life. You are no good. You are rotten, because you did this one thing. That is condemnation. Rebuke, godly rebuke is not condemnation, and truth is never condemnation. The truth will set you free. That is the word of Jesus, The truth will set you free. You have got to hear it, and it is painful, but if we bear the chastening as sons, we shall; I believe the word says, If we endure the chastening, we shall yield the peaceable fruit of righteousness, which is His correct thinking in our mind that brings peace. Whenever there is a lack of peace, it is not God.
The Lord showed me something else this morning that I wanted to put in this message today. If you just bear with me, I want to find out where it was. Yes, this is a very interesting point.
I am in Chapter 2 of the Book of Galatians.
Verse 1, Then fourteen years after, I went up again to Jerusalem, this is Paul speaking, with Barnabas, and took Titus with me also, and I went up by revelation. Do you know how many preachers have asked me, Why did you come to my Church. What are you doing here? Jesus sent me. I know Jesus sent you, but what made you come to my Church today? I went by revelation, brother. It amazes how many men have the responsibility of a congregation and they cannot comprehend this.
Where did you get your congregation? Supernaturally, brother. Well, I know supernaturally, but how did you get your congregation? How did you get here? Supernaturally. Amen? I mean, I am talking about a particular local preacher. I had a conversation with him, and he could not comprehend what I was talking about. I said to him, I was speaking to someone the other day and it came out that the Lord has me holding some meetings in Howard Beach. He said, Oh, how did you get to Howard Beach, you must be friends with someone that lives in Howard Beach? I have never known a soul in Howard Beach in all my life. He said, How did you get into Howard Beach? I said, The Lord told a woman to open her home to me.
The true minister of Christ goes and ministers by the supernatural power of the Lord Jesus Christ. I knew the Church was carnal, but it never failed to amaze me at how carnal the more spiritual people in the Church are. The Church is carnal, and the Lord is calling us to spiritual things, because life, the true life is in His Spirit, and we cannot afford to be carnal, because to be carnally minded is death.
Verse 1, And I went up by revelation, and communicated unto them that gospel which I preach among the Gentiles, but privately to them which were of reputation, lest by any means I should run, or had run, in vain.
So Paul went up to Jerusalem by revelation, and he communicated unto the people in Jerusalem, Paul speaking, that gospel which I preach among the Gentiles, but privately to them that were of reputation, less by any means I should run, or had run, in vain. Paul is saying that the gospel that he preached was so offensive, that those that had a reputation to maintain in the world; he had to preach it to them privately, because they would not bear the reproach of being associated with that gospel. Lest he should have run in vain; lest all of his efforts and all of his persecution should be in vain. And Paul was severely persecuted. What does it mean, be in vain? It means that, if the gospel did not do its work; the Scripture says that the Word of God will not come back void.
What does it mean that the Word of God will not come back void? If I am speaking a true word, and I am speaking by the Spirit of God, then when you leave here, you will have something added to you that you did not have before; seeds on your soul that will root. And if God gives the increase, those seeds will prosper and grow. They will be part of the process that will cause Christ to be formed in you. That is what Paul is talking about. He did what he had to do so that the Word of God would prosper.
We have a lot of religious people in the Church today that will not yield to the Holy Spirit. They have got it in their head that they have to do things a certain way, and if you will not agree with it, they will not even pray for you. This is ungodly! You must move by the spirit; you must meet everybody wherever they are, to the fullest degree that you can, without sinning. The Church is to reach out, wherever they can find you, and bring you into the kingdom. A lot of people know that in the natural; they will go where the prostitutes are, they will go where the homosexuals are; they have no problem with that, but they have a problem doing it spiritually. They have a problem getting to the middle-class people who, for whatever reason, do not go to Church.
They say, You do not go to Church? Then you are going to hell. That is what they will tell you, but I find that the Lord is sending me to people that never go to Church, and He is sending me right into their lives and having me preach the Word to them. The Lord knows, the Lord knows! Glory to God, Jesus is not religious, He is a merciful spirit.
We are still in verse 2, And I went up by revelation, God told him to go, and I communicated unto them that gospel which I preach among the Gentiles, but privately. He preaches it privately, to them which were well known, or established businessmen, lest by any means I should run, or had run, in vain. The most important thing to Paul is that the work of the Lord gets done, and what is the work of the Lord? That everyone that God sends to him should receive this word in their heart, so that their spirit should be fertilized, and Christ should be formed in them. And if he had to do something a little out of the ordinary to reach that person, as long as it was not sin, he did it; he taught them privately.
I was raised up under a preacher who had a very anointed word, and a couple of people came to him and asked him to teach them privately, and he told them (and I am not criticizing him because I do not know what God said to him in that circumstance); he told them, I cannot do that, I preached it and it is on tape. Get the tapes and listen to the tapes, that is all I can do for you. So when I started preaching, I had the same attitude, but the Lord spoke to me. I want to make it very clear, I am not criticizing this man, I do not know what God said to him, but God came to me recently and said, I want you to preach or teach individuals, and just out of obedience I started doing it. He brought several people into my life, and I fellowship with them and teach them, as we spend time together. After I was obedient, the Lord started to show me that a lot of people, and especially the ones He is sending to me, really could not get it off the tapes.
They needed a more personal attention than just listening to the tapes. So in my case, He told me, Teach them privately, but I only teach those privately who the Lord tells me to teach privately. You see, ministers can get all messed up saying, I do not teach privately. I cannot teach anyone privately, come to the meetings. Well, if God tells me to teach someone privately, I will teach them privately. He wants everyone to come to His kingdom, and there is a certain group that He is calling in this hour and He will do anything He must do to get those sheep. He will send a minister of the gospel to them personally, if necessary. He is going to chasten them. He is going to do whatever He must do, because there is a group that He has ordained will enter into the kingdom of God in the very near future, and you are coming because it is His right of election. You are coming whatever it will take, either the hard way or the easy way, but you are coming, and it is glorious. You are coming to something beautiful, the only the problem is that some of us do not understand it. Hallelujah! Glory to God.
I would like to back up to verse 3, But neither Titus, who was with me, being a Greek, was compelled to be circumcised. Paul had come in contact with Jews that were teaching that, even though Jesus had been crucified, and resurrected, and ascended, it was still necessary to be circumcised. They were still keeping the law, and they were saying that Paul's friend Titus needed to be circumcised.
Paul goes on to say, in verse 4, And that because false brethren; false brethren were saying this, who unawares brought in, who came privily to spy out our liberty which we have in Christ Jesus. What liberty? Liberty from the law of ordinances. There is a big misunderstanding in the Church today. They say, We are not under the law, we are under grace, we can do anything we want. No, you cannot. You cannot do anything you want, you have to do righteousness, and if, in a particular area you do not do righteousness, you are under the law of the Holy Spirit, who will chasten you, thank God for it, that will shall live and not die.
So these Jews were saying, Our liberty in Christ Jesus is not valid. We still have to keep the works of the Mosaic law. The law we are required to keep is the law of righteousness. Jesus expressed it in two sentences, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with all thy heart, thy mind, and thy soul, and thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.
We are no longer required to keep the Mosaic law, to make sacrifices, or to be involved in any other ritualistic law where we are required to obey the law of righteousness, as expressed by the two things I just read of the words of Jesus. And if we cannot do it, the Holy Spirit is our schoolmaster who will correct us, and thank God for it.
Verse 4, And that because of false brethren unawares brought in, who came in privily to spy out our liberty which we have in Christ Jesus, that they might bring us into bondage.
Verse 5, To whom we gave place by subjection, no, not for an hour; Paul is saying, We did not give them place by subjection. What does subjection mean? Subjection means submission. We did not submit to them. What they were preaching was ungodly, and we did not submit to them, no, not for even an hour, that the truth of the gospel might continue with you. Paul is saying that he had a confrontation with some Jewish believers, and if Paul, and his friends that were with him, had made the error of thinking it was a godly thing to submit to these other people, because he was in their town, because he was in their Church, because he did not want a fight, because he did not want any disruption.
These are all things that many carnal Christians think, I will not disagree with you; I will not tell you the truth; I will not make trouble; I will not fight with you. That is all ungodly, but Paul is saying that, if he did not do that, if he had submitted to these Jewish Christians that were preaching false doctrine, he would have caused the children of the kingdom to stumble. He said, No, we did not do it, we did not submit to unrighteousness, not for one hour; we did not do it. Not even for an hour did we submit to this false teaching, that the truth of the gospel might continue with you. Why? Because if you saw us submitting to it, you would have submitted to it too. We would have come around an hour later or a day later, but you might have spiritually died because of it. So we fought the fight, we resisted the evil, we spoke the truth, and we bore the reproach in our soul, so that you might live. That is what he is saying.
Verse 6, But of these who seemed to be somewhat, (whatsoever they were, it maketh no matter to me: God accepteth no man's person:) for they who seemed to be somewhat in conference added nothing to me:
God accepteth no man's person. That means God does not care who you are or what you are in this world. He does not accept or consider or recognize any difference between the Adamic souls of men. He really does not care if you are physically beautiful. He will use any talent you have for His glory, but He will not receive you over another, just because you speak well, or because you are a talented musician, or because you are intelligent. It means nothing to God. He made you, everything you have He has given you; He has what you have a million times over. There is nothing that you have that He needs, other than that it is His purpose to live through you. There is nothing of your Adamic soul that He needs. He gave it all to you, He is the author of it. So God does not have respect of persons, but these people were saying, they seemed to be somewhat, or they seemed to be big shots, for they who seemed to be somewhat in conference added nothing to me.
This is really interesting, but that English word, conference, and the following word, added to, is the same Greek word. It is the same Greek word, and it was there twice. The Lord told me what it means. Paul was saying that these people, that made themselves to be something in the Church of God, are making themselves out to be big shots, but they did not add anything to me. This is how the Lord showed it to me. That word, conference, if you look it up in the Greek, Paul is saying that these men that made themselves to be something, they were saying that Christ had been added to them.
The correct translation is added to, but the King James translators could not put that word down twice, so they changed the word, added to, to conference. But what it really says in the Greek, is that they were two Adamic men that were saying that Christ had been added to them. Something has been added to them, and Paul is saying, Well, if something had been added to them, I sure could not see it, because it did not touch me.
I will say it again. Paul was saying, If you were a man that Christ has been added to, then when you relate to me, something of Christ in you should be added to me. I should feel it; His life should come from you to me. I should be enhanced, I should grow. If we have a conversation in Christ, you do not just have to be a preacher, OK, but if we have a conversation, and that conversation is in Christ, I should be touched by Christ in you. I should know Christ is in you, because He is touching me, He is increasing me, He is adding something to me. Paul is saying, These men are making themselves big shots in the Church, and I cannot perceive Christ in them. If they did have Christ, Paul did not get all lifted up in pride and say, I know that Christ is not in them. He did not take a stand like that. He said, If Christ is in them, I cannot perceive it.
Why could he not perceive it? Because if Christ was in those men, He did not reach out and touch Paul. He did not reach out and witness to Paul that He was in there. You know, this is a big problem in the Church. In a meeting here, a few years ago, a couple of people came to visit, and they claimed to be born again. They were friends of somebody here and we talked. They asked questions at the end of the meeting, and at the following meeting, their names came up. I happened to say, (whoever brought it up, I do not know), but I happened to say, They were very nice young men, but I could not perceive Christ in either one of them. I could not perceive Christ in the person one of the brethren was friends with, and I was accused of attacking him or saying ungodly things about him.
I did not know this Scripture was here a couple of years ago, brethren. It is perfectly acceptable, in Christ, to discern whether or not a human being has Christ. You do not have to make excuses for him and tell me he is just born again. I am not trying to harm him, I am speaking the truth. I cannot perceive Christ in him. If He is there, praise the Lord, but He did not rise up and touch me by means of acknowledgment. The Lord did not reveal to me that He is manifesting through that vessel. It is not ungodly to say this. Paul says we should know who we are dealing with. Amen.
So that is what Paul is saying here, that he went to Jerusalem and he met these men who were making themselves big shots in the Church, claiming that Christ had been added to them, and that Christ was manifesting through them, but Paul says, If He was, I sure could not discern it.
Verse 7, But contrariwise, when they saw that the gospel of the uncircumcision was committed unto me, as the gospel of the circumcision was unto Peter;
Verse 9, And when James, Cephas, and John, who seemed to be pillars, perceived the grace that was given unto me, they gave to me and Barnabas the right hands of fellowship; that we should go unto the heathen, and they unto the circumcision.
And when James, Cephas, and John, who seemed to be pillars, perceived the grace that was given unto me, they; they, the men who were calling themselves big shots, gave to me, Paul and Barnabas, the right hands of fellowship. This verse is saying that they, the men who were calling themselves big shots in the Church, discerned Christ in Paul. They did not discern him so much themselves, but they were influenced because Peter, James and John recognized Christ in Paul, and they accepted him as an apostle of God. Now, this is a second witness that they did not have Christ, because if these men had Christ themselves, they would have perceived Christ in Paul, but it says right here, in verse 7, But contrariwise, when they saw that the gospel of the uncircumcision was committed unto me, and verse 9, And when James, Cephas and John, who seemed to be pillars, perceived the grace that was given to me, these men accepted Paul and Barnabas.
Because they saw men that they respected accept him. Look at how important your witness is to younger Christians! The more mature we become in Christ, the greater our responsibility. If we accept people as Christians that are not true Christians; if we follow after people that are not moving in Christ, there is a whole string of people behind us that we are destroying, along with ourselves. The Lord says, We will be accountable for every word we say. I heard a perversion of that, saying, If you tell someone to pick up their shoe at the wrong time, you are going to be held accountable for it. That is not what the Scripture is talking about.
But as we mature in Christ, and we minister to those younger than us, the Lord will hold us accountable. If you do not know the answer to something, say you do not know the answer. So these men followed good examples, Peter, James, and John, and because they followed good examples, they accepted the apostle Paul. This is a very important word. We are to recognize and look for and discern Christ in others, and if we cannot discern Christ in others, we do not follow them.
You must pick very carefully who you follow. If you are a young Christian, and you do not have this discernment yourself, and you are going to follow another man (Paul says, Follow me as I follow Christ); if you are young, it is OK to follow another man, but somehow God will have to witness to you that that man is of God. This is a very serious business, the ability to discern Christ in other people, and it is a godly thing to do, as long as we do not let our soul condemn them if we find that they do not have Christ. Any condemnation is not of God.
I would just like to comment on this word, pillars, in verse 9, And when James, Cephas and John, who seemed to be pillars. That word, pillars, refers to a tall, usually cement column, that bears very heavy weight, and we do have this on another message, where the Lord revealed to us that the weight that spiritual pillars hold is the Lord. This word means that the Lord is resting in these men; He is indwelling these men, and they are bearing the weight of the life of the Lord, because He has made them able to do it. Did I make that clear? Does anybody not understand what I just said?
Verse 9, And when James, and Cephas and John, who seemed to be pillars, perceived the grace that was given unto me. The pillars of the Church are men in whom Christ is manifesting a large percentage of the time. They perceived that grace was given to Paul. Why? Was it because they were pillars? No, because they had Christ in them. That is how they could recognize that grace had been given unto Paul, and they accepted them. I just want to point out that this was fourteen years after the Lord called Paul. For fourteen years he was rejected and unaccepted by the Jews. It took fourteen years for him to be accepted and for the gospel that he was preaching to be accepted.
PASTOR VITALE: I think we are going to leave it there. Do you have any more questions? You have to put that mic on before you talk. Does anybody have a question?
COMMENT: What does it say in the word about Paul being stoned to death and he rose again, or something like that?
PASTOR VITALE: There is a Scripture, I believe it is in the Book of Acts, where it says that Paul fell down and the other apostles stood around him. Now, I never studied this myself, but I am told, if you study it in the Greek, it is obvious that he died from that stoning, and then, the apostles raised him from the dead.
COMMENT: Could it have been because Paul had reached that high spiritual ground? That he could not die because he reached such a spiritual height? You were saying that, as we are growing in the Lord, and we are reaching that realm, that we shall never die. That is what xxxx had shared with me, that ye shall never die. And then I remember my girlfriend telling me that Paul was stoned to death. I never knew this until she told me, and then you were sharing about incarnation last week, so I just wanted to ask you, when Paul was stoned to death and he rose from the dead, it had to be that he must have reached that spiritual height already?
PASTOR VITALE: Paul had been resurrected from the dead in his soul. His soul was resurrected from the dead, and even though his body was raised from the dead, in this instance, it was the similar experience that Lazarus had. His body was raised but he still had a vile body, and he was killed, I believe he was crucified by Rome, OK, but we are talking about the body being raised from the dead. We are talking about the experience that Jesus Christ of Nazareth had, that our form is changed so that we cannot be killed anymore. Paul was raised from the dead, by the power of God, through the apostles, just as Lazarus was raised from the dead; it was not necessary that he was in full stature.
COMMENT: He raised Lazarus from the dead. Lazarus had not already reached, what was the word you said?
PASTOR VITALE: Spiritual maturity.
COMMENT: Right, but eventually he died.
PASTOR VITALE: Lazarus died. As far as I know, he died again. See, that is the sign whether or not you have spiritual maturity. If Jesus raises you from the dead, and you die again, all that he did; it is similar to being healed from a disease in your body, but you still die at the end of your natural life. When you are raised from the dead because your soul is right (is made righteous by Christ in you), then your body will never die.
COMMENT: That is when the soul becomes righteous.
PASTOR VITALE: That is when the soul becomes righteous, but I do believe that Paul did not have to die; that he was in the same condition that Jesus was in before the crucifixion, but he said that it was time for him to be offered up. Yes, he did not have to die, but whether or not he was in that condition at the time that the apostles raised him from the dead, I do not know. It could be either way, but I felt the Lord wanted me to put this on the message, I do not know what the condition was.
COMMENT: I was just thinking about Enoch, how he was taken up, and Elijah, I think it was Elijah, was taken up. They never had to see death; they never had to die, and I was thinking, could it be possible that because he walked with God, he must have reached that spiritual maturity, that he never had to see death. Am I saying it right?
PASTOR VITALE: Yeah, I believe that that is what happened to him.
COMMENT: What about the others, like Moses or David?
PASTOR VITALE: I do not believe they reached that spiritual maturity. The only ones that I know about are Enoch and Elijah in the Old Testament, that their soul was made righteous, because they; let me start over again. The Scripture says, He who is joined to God is one spirit. Because they walked so closely with God (and God relates to us in our spirit), their spirit became the Spirit of God, and because their spirit was the Spirit of God, it raised their sin-filled soul from the dead. And because that happened, they did not have to taste death. If you look at that word in the Hebrew, what it really means is that they no longer had to experience death. Yes, if you look up the word taste in the Greek, that is what it means. They no longer had to experience death. It is in the Book of Hebrews.
Now, all of us down here in hell are all experiencing death and the pain of it. But because their souls were raised from the dead, their Adamic souls were not destroyed, but came into submission to their spirits, which were now Christ, and they no longer had to experience death or pain or the hell that is associated with it.
COMMENT: And it is possible for it to happen today.
PASTOR VITALE: It is possible, did you say possible?
COMMENT: Anything is possible.
PASTOR VITALE: I thought I heard you say impossible.
COMMENT: No, no, anything is possible. God is today, yesterday and tomorrow. God never changes. I wonder if it has ever been recorded about what happened back in Enoch's time.
PASTOR VITALE: It has happened to Jesus and now we are waiting for it to happen to group of people who are the offspring or the children of Jesus Christ. And a lot of us feel it is going to happen very soon. God has not told us the exact hour, but we can see the signs of the times, and there is a first a group of people, a first fruits company, that are going to stand up in full stature, hopefully very soon. Now, some Christians think the Scripture which applies to this, they think it is the rapture, that their body is going off the earth, but no.
COMMENT: It does not say rapture in the Bible. So what word is used in the Greek?
PASTOR VITALE: Catching up, catching up. But it is our soul that is being caught up to righteousness in Christ.
COMMENT: Oh, because some people believe, I think, from what I understand, it is after Christ comes back, that you get caught up with Him?
PASTOR VITALE: Well that is true, but what does it mean? We are waiting for the appearance of Christ, and His appearing in us. He is being formed in you, and He is going to appear in you, and when He appears in you, He is going to catch your soul up to where He is, to a condition where your spirit is righteousness, because Christ has been formed in it, and you are now one spirit. And Christ catches your soul up, brings it into submission, and is going to force it to do righteousness. Christ in you is going to force your soul to do righteousness, and because of that, your body will stop dying.
COMMENT: Do you think it will take a long time?
PASTOR VITALE: Well, it all depends on whose mind you are looking at it with. To God's mind, it is happening very quickly, but to my carnal mind, it is taking a very long time; it is taking thousands of years.
COMMENT: A thousand years is like one day to God, because there is no time with God, so what is years and years and years and years, is maybe like a couple of days for God. God is just a big God, mighty and big and powerful, and we are just these little people and these little minds, compared to Him.
PASTOR VITALE: Yes, but we are living in such an exciting day. The Scripture says that when Israel was waiting for Jesus to manifest, there was an air of anticipation, because they knew Messiah was going to be manifested, but in this hour, it is even more exciting, because Jesus was manifested, and the apostles were manifested. But they faded away, and now, when Christ appears this time in the first fruits company, it is for the life of the ages. They are not going to fade away, the people that Christ is appearing in will not fade away, but one by one, or in groups (however the Lord sees fit), the entire human race is going to be absorbed into Christ, stand up in full stature, and stop dying.
COMMENT: What is the first fruits company, what does that word mean again?
PASTOR VITALE: The human race, as we see it today, is just one living soul. God just created one living soul and He named him Adam. Adam, in the Scripture, is likened to a plant that puts forth many leaves, so the creation God started with Adam has now put forth many leaves, and we see many human beings across the face of the earth. Now, the Lord is going to indwell every human being on the face of the earth and save their life by bringing their sinful soul into submission, but He has to start somewhere. He is not going to do it to everybody at once. He will start with a group of people that are called the first fruits company, that group of human beings in whom Christ will appear, hopefully in the very near future. They will be caught up to full stature, they will have total dominion over sin and death, their thoughts will be 100% righteous, 100% of the time, and they will go forth to do the same thing in the rest of humanity.
Glory to God, what a word, is that not better than the rapture? Is that not better than the rapture, better than going to heaven and walking on streets of gold? Do you see the difference? I just want to put this on here first. The carnal mind says that there is a mansion waiting for me, and that there are streets of gold waiting for me. Look at the selfishness in it! And I want to be very clear, it is all for them, but what about the rest of humanity?
It is just a childish doctrine. I am not condemning those who believe in it, it is just an immature doctrine, that is all it is. It is immature, but everything is for them, and everybody that is not going the way they think it will go, will burn in hell forever. But the Scripture says that those who are going, it is a spiritual rapture. They are getting caught up to righteousness, where they stop dying, and then they are going right back where they came from, and they are going to get every last human being on the face of the earth out with them. No selfishness! Jesus said, He who is greatest amongst you shall be a minister.
COMMENT: Where does say that? What you were just talking about?
PASTOR VITALE: Oh, there are many teachings on it. I do not know if God will give me a Scripture right now.
COMMENT: I mean, could you could pinpoint Scriptures and put them all together?
PASTOR VITALE: Oh, yes, there are many Scriptures on it, nothing is coming to me right now, but there are a lot of teachings. The doctrine is called Sonship, which teaches power and authority to the believer rather than the rapture. The Lord is not giving me a Scripture for you right now, but there are many books if you want to study this in depth. There are lot of good books coming out of the Voice of the Overcomer, which is Bill Britton's ministry, but he is not alive anymore.
COMMENT: Like with the rapture, you were comparing the two; I remember you were telling me that what people believe the rapture is and what the Word of God says.
PASTOR VITALE: See, there are really no Scriptures for the rapture. The Scriptures that are used to support the rapture are basically Scriptures that are misunderstood by the carnal mind. It is man's understanding, not God's. The Scripture says, Here is a secret, we shall all be changed. We shall be caught up, and those sleep will not prevent us, it is all man's understanding of what God says. The Scripture does not say, I am taking you off the earth to another place. You said it exactly, it is man's understanding. And a lot of the teachings on this doctrine have come forth in our studies in the Book of Revelation; it is all through the Book of Revelation, if you are willing to at least pray about the revelation that the Lord is bringing forth in the earth now, which is the mind of God interpreting these translations.
COMMENT: Is there really a heaven?
PASTOR VITALE: The way the Lord is bringing it forth is that there is this realm of appearance, and depending on whose mind is manifesting in you, it is either hell or heaven for you. And I do not think anyone would have any trouble seeing that by looking at the people over in Iraq right now. I have seen pictures of them, they have no food, babies are dying; this is hell. Heaven and hell are in the flesh. This is the creation that God made, and when Adam is ruling in it, whose God is Satan, it is hell, and when Christ is ruling in it, whose God is the Father, it is heaven.
COMMENT: What does God mean when He says, I go to prepare a place for you? Like you know, from my understanding, that there was some place else outside of the earth, there was actually a heaven, where Jesus said, I go to prepare a place for you.
PASTOR VITALE: It is a spiritual place, and before Jesus Christ ascended, there was no spiritual place in which there was life. What is heaven? Heaven is all provision, having all of your needs met. It is peace, contentment, no more suffering, no more tears. So we agree on what heaven is. Well, I want to suggest to you that we could stay in the same condition we are in and go to another place and still have the same torment that we have now. The problem of humanity is in our mind, and when receive the mind of Christ and it manifests in us 100% of the time, all suffering will disappear, and when it happens in enough people, the glory of God, which we call heaven, will cover the entire earth (the Scripture says), as the waters cover the sea.
So when Jesus said, I go to prepare a place for you, He meant that by His crucifixion, resurrection and ascension, He prepared a spiritual place in Him that we could enter into and live, because in the condition we are in now, we are all going to die. Can you hear that? The place that He is preparing is Himself, and we have found studies in the Book of Revelation that express it this way: There are two souls, and Christ's soul is in perfect submission to God. He is in right standing with God, and He is the place, and we can run to Him without being perfect, and be justified before God. Can you hear that? He is the place He is preparing, He is the realm of the spirit, He is the age of the kingdom, He is the New Age, He is the city of refuge that we are running to. Until we are cleansed from all sin, it is here, it is here on the earth, except that it is going to change.
COMMENT: It says there will be a new heaven and a new earth.
PASTOR VITALE: Right, a new heaven, a new spirit which is now Christ; and a new earth, a new soul which is the soul of Christ; and all things shall be made new, even our body, and there will not be any more tears or poverty or hunger.
COMMENT: So, you mean it is here, but God is going to make it into a new earth?
PASTOR VITALE: Exactly, and because we get a new spirit and a new soul, the visible earth will also be renewed in righteousness.
COMMENT: I was say that, if we went to a place right now that did have streets of gold (and I heard someone say that he went the spirit and saw this place; he went out of his body); well, if I went there right now, and I was walking on a street of gold right now, yes that would be beautiful, and if I stepped on the flowers and they popped right back up and had life, but if I go there and I still have torment in my mind, like right now, what good does it do? So, I have to agree with what she is saying, that at this time, He is going to bring us to a place where there is no more torment, there no more fear, and there is only love and there is only heaven in our minds, and in our souls, and in our spirits and in our bodies. And to me, heaven would be to have a glorified mind and a glorified body, and then, if it was in the outward realm of appearance, if there were streets of gold, that would be fine, but what is the use of it without it being inside of us?
PASTOR VITALE: That is excellent, xxxx.
COMMENT: But does not heaven mean streets of gold? I hear that a lot, streets of gold, what does it really mean?
PASTOR VITALE: Well, I do not actually know if there is a Scripture that actually says streets of gold. I think that when the Scripture describes the heavenly Jerusalem in the back of the Book of Revelation, maybe it says something about streets of gold. I know it talks about the foundation. But what we have to understand is that this is a symbolic spiritual description of our new soul, and gold typifies deity. It will mean that our soul, which is now reprobate silver, is going to be renewed and become a glorious silver; and our spirit, which is downtrodden and married to Satan, and producing all the names of blasphemy, is going to be purified like pure gold, which is the deity of the Lord Jesus Christ, we are going to be as God, be His Son, right?
COMMENT: What about the people who passed away, like the ones who are dead now, and who, knew the Lord? Where their souls be?
PASTOR VITALE: Their souls have dissolved, their bodies dissolve. The body goes back to the earth, and the dust that our soul is made of, goes back into the spiritual lump of clay. Man is still being formed, but their spirits are with Jesus.
COMMENT: Does not it say in the word that, To be absent in the body is to be present with the Lord?
PASTOR VITALE: Right, their spirits are with Jesus, amen. The spirit, which is our true life; our true life is our human spirit that is now joined to the Lord, and we are now one with Him. So everything that He is, when the process is completed, we shall be. We shall receive everything that He has.
COMMENT: The question is that, in the word where it says, caught up, that I think a lot of people got the idea; and if you just look at it, to read it for the first time, without any spiritual understanding (I do not have all the spiritual understanding of it yet), but it says, in the twinkling of an eye. And so, the first thought is that we would not have to die to go to heaven, because in the twinkling of an eye, to be changed, there is no way that this body going to change, just like that, without something happening in the spirit. And it is not going to change by going through the universe, and it is changing in the twinkling of an eye. So there comes that idea that we are going to be leaving these bodies, and we are going to go in the spirit out into heaven, and we are going to be changed in the twinkling of an eye and go to heaven with Jesus. And it also says, in the clouds, so when you hear clouds, you think clouds, and in the twinkling of eye, you think, in the snap of a finger, so the question is, what does this mean?
PASTOR VITALE: Well, the twinkling of an eye does not mean what man thinks it means, and if you look up the words in the Greek, which I know, I did this study, I am just trying to remember what it was. Let me just leave it with this, I do have this on another message. If you want it, I can locate the message for you; I do not remember what the Greek words mean, but generally speaking, it means a lifetime. It means a lifetime. Because in God's mind, He created a living soul, and that living soul fell, and for all of these thousands of years, God is working towards regenerating His dead creation. So when the Lord says, through the apostle Paul, It will happen in a twinkling of the eye; to God, a twinkling of an eye is one man's lifetime. It is just one man's lifetime. I know that I have this on another message. The Lord has taught me a lot through movies, and I took out a movie once; I picked this movie and I did not know why I picked it. It was a terrible movie, but the name of it was something about a moment. The Lord had me watch it, and the one thing He taught me out of it, was the Scripture that says, The children of darkness are smarter than the children of light.
Well, this was a very worldly movie. It was about a woman who had a revelation that her whole lifetime was just a moment. In light of time, all the thousands of years, her lifetime was just a moment, and the Scripture says that the children of darkness are wiser than the children of light. We get all these carnal thoughts in our mind, but that is what the Lord told me, and if you want, I will find out what message it is for you, exactly what the Greek words say, and how I got that. Your lifetime is a moment in the perfection, or the process, which is perfecting God's creation, the living soul; your lifetime is just a moment. So, we shall be caught up in one lifetime.
COMMENT: That is true, and the people that are not even saved could tell you that. Then the Christians, when they get saved, I do not know how they get this turned around. My dad does not even profess to be a Christian, and I said, Your life is like one speck on the line of eternity, and he goes, It is not even that. And my mom said, Yeah, well, we are going to be changed in the twinkling of an eye. That is what Christians believe, that you do not even blink your eye, and Jesus will be taking us to heaven.
PASTOR VITALE: There is no condemnation, but it is spiritual childishness, and I say that without condemnation. God is calling His Church to maturity, and somewhere along the line, we are going to have to be able to hear this and laugh at our childishness. There is no other way to go, we are going to have to laugh at the things we believe. I laugh at myself. I remember when the Lord brought forth the teaching here that the human beings before the Flood did not look like we look now, that they reproduced in a different way, and that they were beings that were male and female.
COMMENT: Did you say before the Flood or before the Fall?
PASTOR VITALE: Before the Flood.
COMMENT: Before the Flood, huh?
PASTOR VITALE: They were human beings that were both male and female, and they reproduced from within themselves. I have it on one of my messages that they must have looked female, because they must have needed a womb to pass out the baby, and it was after I made that message, that the Lord corrected me. He said, Sheila, no, the way we bear children now is the form of birth that comes from a fallen condition. These men were glorious compared to the way human beings are today. They did not have wombs, and they did not look like women. They reproduced in a totality different way. It was just a childish thought in my mind. And I remember a preacher that I loved dearly; just before God started giving him very deep revelation, he preached that the Serpent must have had legs. How did you draw the conclusion that the Serpent must have had legs? Because the Scripture says, You shall crawl upon the earth, so to his carnal mind, it meant that at one time the Serpent had feet. That is not what the Scripture is saying.
And once I was driving with my daughter along a major highway here, Route 112. There is old-age home on Route 112, and one of the inmates was standing out on the road enjoying the air and the grass, and my little girl said, Oh, mom, look at that, I did not know they let the inmates out, you know, childish thoughts. We are spiritual children, and that is nothing to be ashamed of, but it is time to grow up. The Lord is saying, Come up, come up.
Glory to God, she is 19 now. At three years old she was taught about the Holy Spirit, and it was taught to her as the Holy Ghost, and when she came to Church with me, and she found out that the Holy Ghost did not look like Casper, she was really upset. I am making a joke out it, but she was a three-year-old little girl who was very upset that Casper the Ghost did not appear to her, that is what she thought it meant. Well, that is how we get these doctrines, these false doctrines in the Church, it is all spiritual childishness. There is no condemnation. Yeah, like Casper the Ghost too, but that is not what the Holy Ghost looks like. I had a little girl, a human little girl who is six years old, say to me recently, I know Jesus. He is an itty, bitty, bitty, tiny baby, and I said, Oh, no, He is all grown up now. He is a big strong man with big muscles, and she looked at me with big wide eyes, she thought He was this little baby that you see in the nativity scenes; childish thoughts.
The Lord is saying, It is time to go on, and what will destroy us, what will destroy the children who are called in this hour, to grow up into spiritual maturity, is pride. Our greatest enemy is pride. What will keep us children is pride, that says, I am sorry I said it and believed it, and I am not going to laugh at myself, and I am not going to change because I will feel like a fool. Whether it is said on a conscious or an unconscious level, there are people that will not enter into the kingdom for that reason, and that is a manifestation of pride.
COMMENT: We were talking about hell, and this is the point of weakness with me, you know. I was talking to her about it, and I guess I said something like, I do not want to feel like I am going to go there after I die. That teaching that you are going to go there after you die, and there is no hope of getting out, puts you under a fear that it is going to happen to you. And I was talking about it last night, and she said, Why are feeling like that that would happen to you, anyway? So I guess everybody does not go through that fear, maybe she does not, or maybe it is unconscious, and it controls people, and they think they believe that they are going to heaven, but unconsciously they are driven by this fear anyway, because it is really a controlling type of fear, with no hope of ever getting out.
And I was talking about it yesterday, and I was sharing with her the same way that, in correcting a child, if you spank them, they are screaming and crying at the time, but in hopes that they are going to improve, and that they are going to think about what they are doing, and change. Or like some methods of putting them in their room, and restraining them, and they are screaming and crying for the time, but you decide to let them out at some point, and they come back out and you try it again. And you just try and try again, until there is an improvement. And sometimes along the line, they get an understanding; they obtain grace and get an understanding. But the teaching about hell, it does not make sense that is it is literal. I cannot say literal, that is not even the right word, but to be thrown into a physical fire, that this body was going into a physical fire, and it would be consumed. So what is left? My soul? Well, if my soul is in that fire, what is going to happen to my soul? Something is going to happen to it, it is going to change; it is not going to stay the same, something is going to burn within it, right?
COMMENT: It is a very wrong teaching in the Church, and that teaching says that we have an immortal soul, a soul that does not die. That is not true. The Scripture clearly states that the soul that sins, it shall die. So if you throw your soul into the fire, as well as your body, it shall die. It is not an immortal soul, God has cursed it unto death.
PASTOR VITALE: I just have one more thing, that which shall never die is that which we have received of God, which is our human spirit, and when you throw our human spirit into the fire, it becomes purified like pure gold; it becomes one with Christ.
COMMENT: Well, that brings up another question, after I finish this particular thing that we were talking about. The question is in that verse that says, Do not fear man, but fear the one can throw both body and soul in hell. For a while I thought it was talking about Satan, but I cannot think of it as being Satan now; I think of it as being God that has the authority to throw both soul and body into hell, but it must mean that it dies, it dies. I do not completely understand the process of death and what death really is. It is a dissolving process? I do not understand it.
PASTOR VITALE: I believe that when Jesus said that, and I have not checked the tenses in the Greek, but for those of you that are not familiar with this, very frequently the King James translators changed the tense that was originally in the Aramaic. When they put it into the English, they did not use the same tense, and I believe the Lord has told me, that what He meant when He said that was, Fear the one who has already cast your body and your soul into hell. This is hell, torment, and hell hath torment. If there is torment in your mind, your soul (which is your mind), is already in hell. It has already happened. He cast the human race into hell. When Adam sinned in the garden, the whole creation went down to hell with him. So Jesus is saying, Do not fear man, fear the God whose done this to you. Why? Because I am the God that has done this to you, and now, the very same God is here to get you out. So do not fear fallen man, I have already shown you My power. Look at the judgment that has fallen on you. Fear Me! I have come to get you out.
COMMENT: This false teaching has caused us to be afraid of God's judgment and His correction, and that, if we cannot understand this teaching, we are going to burn forever, without any hope of getting out. There is a verse about hell being prepared for the devil and his angels, and that we are not supposed to have to go there. I thought about that, and I thought, yeah, but I also thought that if Satan and his angels are thrown into the Lake of Fire, what is going to happen to him? He is not going to be there with the same thought in his mind that there was no hope of getting out. Like, forever he is just screaming, Let me out of here, let me out here? What sense does that make? There is no purpose in that.
PASTOR VITALE: What kind of a God would do that?
COMMENT: Yes, even if Satan and his demons deserved it. Or else, what sense does it make? It has got to be that they are thrown into this Lake of Fire too, and something is going to happen to them. They are not going to have a body where they are crying forever to get out.
PASTOR VITALE: No.
COMMENT: They are going to be burned into another form or something, I do not know what it means, but somehow, they are going to changed; the devil and his angels are going to be changed.
PASTOR VITALE: Correct. Why would God do that? God is a rational God; it makes no sense. He is God Almighty, all powerful; He has the authority to correct, to change, to bring the dead unto life, to raise them unto life. For what purpose would He do this to any creature, that they should be tormented forever, when He has the authority to make a correction? Why would He do this? Why would a merciful, righteous God do this?
COMMENT: This sounds that I am in agreement with the teaching that I use to hear at Light of the City, that the devil and his angels will be reconciled, but I am not really saying that, but have you said that he will be neutralized, and the Lake of Fire is the agent that will neutralize them?
PASTOR VITALE: Neutralized, yes, and the Lake of Fire is Christ. I am trying to keep this simple here. Just give me a second, sometimes I cannot find the words. Christ is our new mind, He is our new soul. If you have Christ, you have two souls. He started as a mustard seed, and He is smaller, and in some ways, weaker than Adam. Now, a lot of people are going to lay hold of my words and say this is false doctrine, but it is not. Christ is coming forth from seed, and when He is in full stature, He will be all powerful God in you. And He will swallow up your Adamic soul, and He will change His form, and Satan and Adam and the whole part of the Adamic soul will serve Christ. And how will he serve Christ? The function of Adam and Satan is to give the creation form. The invisible God wants to appear.
COMMENT: So what will happen in the end times to Satan and his demons? What does it mean in the word that they going to be thrown into the Lake of Fire, or even before that, I remember there is a Scripture talking about fire and brimstone, something like that?
PASTOR VITALE: First of all, we must find out who Satan and the devil and his angels are, and as we have talking about this for a while, the Devil is man. He is Adam, and he is ruled by his unconscious mind, which is Satan.
COMMENT: Oh, I know what you mean, but was not the devil once an angel called Lucifer, and then when Lucifer fell, he became the god of this world?
PASTOR VITALE: Lucifer is a transliteration of a Greek word. Let me explain that to you. Lucifer was never intended to be a proper name in the Scripture. Originally it was a Hebrew word that meant the anointed one that had the light of God, and in a Latin translation of the Scripture, it was changed to that Hebrew word, whatever it was, or in the Greek, I do not have it exactly right, which changed into proper noun, but when the Scripture came forth, under the anointing, Lucifer was never a proper name, it meant the one who shone with the light of God, and who is the one that shone with the light of God? Adam, before the Fall. Adam shone with the light of God before the Fall (you could call him an angel), and he fell.
COMMENT: He deceived Eve in the garden, remember?
PASTOR VITALE: Satan deceived Eve. I remember, yes (chuckle). Satan deceived Eve in the garden, but the whole creation fell, and that anointed cherub, that walked in the high realms of God's spirit, became this fallen creation, ruled by the prince of the power of the air. Where? In his mind.
COMMENT: Is there a Satan? Is there actually a Devil?
PASTOR VITALE: It is the spirit, those are the names for the spiritual...
COMMENT: Not like a man, but I mean spiritual, like the prince of darkness?
PASTOR VITALE: He is the unconscious mind of man, and he is capable of the great depths of wickedness. That is where you are confused. You are looking for a personification of the Devil, that he is a man.
COMMENT: From what the word says, and probably too, from what I have been taught, I thought...
PASTOR VITALE: Well, that is how it is taught, but the Devil is man, and he is a many-membered man, and he is the human race.
COMMENT: ...that there was an archangel. I feel funny talking about this.
PASTOR VITALE: A lot of people are going to blessed by this.
COMMENT: Does it say in the word, that before Satan fell, does it talk about Lucifer at all? Does it talk about him being an angel, a cherub, the anointed one; and because he disobeyed, or he wanted to be better than God, that God cast him down into the earth?
PASTOR VITALE: That is true, and it also says, if you read that Scripture (and I am really sorry I am not strong on the letter); for anybody reading this message, it is either in Isaiah or Ezekiel, and if you want, I will find the Scripture for you. It also says, in that passage, that he is a man. It says it right in that passage.
COMMENT: Right, the carnal mind, the antichrist, or something like that.
PASTOR VITALE: Well no, this Scripture is either in Isaiah or Ezekiel, I cannot remember which one it is.
COMMENT: And then, when Satan fell, or whatever, Lucifer or something; when he fell, and God lowered him, or something like that, and then God created Adam and Eve, and then everything was...
PASTOR VITALE: Oh, that is not in the Scripture, that is man's interpretation of the Scripture. No, what is in the Scripture is that there was an anointed cherub who was filled with the light and the life of God, and in his mind, he lifted himself up above God and said that he would be God, and sin was found in him, and he fell, and that passage that says that clearly states that this anointed cherub was a man. He was a man, Adam. This is Adam.
COMMENT: Adam? Really?!
COMMENT: We talked about that last night.
COMMENT: Because this is all new to me, is this a new thing that I am learning?
PASTOR VITALE: No, it has been around for a long time. It is new to you, but...
COMMENT: It has been around, even in the Church?
PASTOR VITALE: Oh yes, the Lord had this revelation in the Church for years.
COMMENT: Oh, OK.
PASTOR VITALE: Glory to God.
COMMENT: Maybe I have not been listening all this time.
COMMENT: You know, there a lot of churches out there that do not believe this, and the basic Church world still does not have it.
PASTOR VITALE: Now, do not get embarrassed because we cannot understand this unless...
COMMENT: People are going to be listening to this and they are going to laugh.
PASTOR VITALE: No, do not be embarrassed. Let me just say this. We are all getting excited but we must remember that there are people that need to hear this message, so let us just try and let the Holy Spirit lead, OK? And I forgot what I wanted to say. Oh yes, we cannot understand this doctrine until the Lord prepares our heart, and the preparation that enables us to understand, is the fact that Christ is starting to be formed in us, and that is why large parts of the Church world reject this doctrine; either they have never heard it, or if they have heard it, they reject it because their carnal mind will never believe this.
COMMENT: Why would they reject it if it is in the Scriptures?
PASTOR VITALE: Because their carnal mind cannot comprehend it. They read the Word and their carnal mind interprets the Word for them. This is what the mind of Christ has to say about the Scripture.
COMMENT: Was there actually a Serpent that deceived Eve? What I am saying is, does not it talk about the Serpent who deceived Eve, and about Christ crushing the head of the Serpent?
PASTOR VITALE: Yes, that account; the whole Bible is a parable. Do you know what a parable is?
COMMENT: It is like symbols?
PASTOR VITALE: Yes, or an allegory. It is symbolic because we cannot comprehend the deep truths of God, and as I was reading in the Book of Galatians, further on; well, let me read it to you right now, because the Lord gave me this witness for you, if I could find it quickly.
In the Book of Galatians, Chapter 4, verse 24, Paul is talking about Mount Agar, and the children of the promise and the children of the flesh.
I will read from verse 21: Tell me, ye that desire to be under the law, do ye not hear the law? For it is written, that Abraham had two sons, the one by a bondmaid, and the other by a freewoman. But he who was of the bondwoman was born after the flesh; the carnal mind, but he of the freewoman, the mind of Christ, was by promise. Which things are an allegory, or parable.
Paul is saying that this account in Genesis, the account about the two sons Abraham had, is a parable; it is a story that you can understand, by which God's intention is to impart deep spiritual truth to you. So if you need a witness that a lot of, if not the whole Scripture, is a parable, here it is right here.
It is in Galatians 4:24, Which things are an allegory, for these are the two covenants. Who are the two covenants? The son of the bondmaid and the son of the freewoman, Isaac and Ishmael. They represent the two covenants.
He is saying, The one from the mount Sinai, which gendereth to bondage, which is Agar, that is the son of the flesh, Ismael.
Verse 25, For this Agar is mount Sinai in Arabia, and answereth to Jerusalem which now is, and is in bondage with her children. The carnal mind or the flesh mind is in bondage with her children.
Verse 26, But Jerusalem which is above is free, which is the mother of us all. Do you hear what I am trying to say? The whole Bible is an allegory or a parable, and we have to, by the grace of God (we cannot do it unless He enables us), find out the spiritual truth behind the word.
COMMENT: Is there a Serpent?
PASTOR VITALE: The Serpent is the unconscious mind, known as Satan. Well, l I told you that I mailed you some tapes, and tape number 2 deals with this issue.
COMMENT: What about demons?
PASTOR VITALE: What about them? Ask me a question.
COMMENT: Can I ask a question about that? Last night we were talking about this, and I was saying that Adam and Satan are one, or the carnal mind and Satan are one, and then we were talking about demons, and I said that demons; I just thought about this recently, that when Adam fell, and separated his mind from God, and reproduced out of his own mind, that is where demons came from. Is that correct?
PASTOR VITALE: It is not 100% correct. It is correct, but let me just expound on it. When Adam separated from God and reproduced from within himself, he produced the carnal mind, and the carnal mind produces the demons. You just left a step out there.
COMMENT: So he produced the demons, but it was his carnal mind that came into existence after he separated from God.
PASTOR VITALE: Right. Now, every human being alive has a carnal mind, but I do not believe that every human being alive has demons. There are people in the earth who have been trained in the Word of God, who were, to the best of their ability, walking in the admonition of the Scriptures, and they may not have any demons, but they do have a carnal mind. They are still separated from God in their mind; we are a fallen creation.
The demons come forth when our mind is reprobate, we fornicate with wrong ideas in our mind, and the carnal mind produces fruit. Did I explain that? Do you understand that?
In this hour, every human being alive has a carnal mind, except Jesus Christ of Nazareth, but everybody does not necessarily have to have demons. Demons are the fruit of agreeing with the ungodliness in our mind. So if we are a human being, and we have a carnal mind, and we hear somebody say, It is OK to fornicate, and because we know the Word of God, we can say, No, that is a lie. It is not OK to fornicate, there will not be any demon in that area. But our country is filled with people who have demons in their mind; their carnal mind said, It is OK to fornicate, and they do not believe the Word of God, or they have never heard it. They have demons, and it is getting worse in every generation.
COMMENT: I know that He has shown me that it is not true that there are only a few people that are highly demonized, who need go into a Church and get delivered; I believe He has shown me that every person on the earth needs to be delivered.
PASTOR VITALE: Well, there are different forms of deliverance. One form of deliverance deals with demons, and the other form of deliverance deals with the carnal mind.
COMMENT: We got on the subject about that, and she said, Oh, I do not know, because you are saying that we create demons, right? And she said that she had a pastor tell her that there is no such thing, that demons cannot multiply, and I said, Well, I do not quite agree with that, I believe that demons can multiply. You said that demons can rebirth even when they are cast out. So that means they can multiply.
PASTOR VITALE: Demons can multiply, to the fullest extent that we are walking away from God, demons proportionately will multiply in our mind.
COMMENT: Adam separated himself from God and he begat a carnal mind? Is that what he begat, a carnal mind? Then, out of that carnal mind he produced fruit called demons, and so, to flatly say it, we create demons.
PASTOR VITALE: Yes, we birth demons. The carnal mind, which we are until we become Christ, brings forth fruit, demons, just as the mind of Christ brings forth the fruit of the spirit, joy and peace and righteousness and love. That is the fruit of the mind of Christ, and the carnal mind, or the mind of Satan, brings forth demons, strife, contention and hatred, but the big problem is and the problem that makes people afraid, is that we really do not understand what demons are. We have excepted Hollywood's definition of demons.
COMMENT: I used to think that Satan was before Adam.
PASTOR VITALE: I do not believe that.
COMMENT: That is what I thought, because I know in the Word it says; I do not know, that is what I thought, that Satan was before Adam and that he deceived Eve, or something like that, and then Adam knew that it was not right. Then, I used to think that Satan was, just from what I was taught, that there actually is a Satan out there.
PASTOR VITALE: There actually is a Satan, but not in the way that you are thinking of, and he is very real, but not in the way that you are thinking of him. He is in our minds, and he is very real. And one of the things that happens, as God bring us into this end-time warfare, is that He lets us perceive Satan in our own minds, and when Christ is conceived in us, OK, and the warfare revs up, he stops hiding. You see, right now he is hiding. He does not want you to know that he is there, that he is in your mind, but when God calls you to the end-time...
COMMENT: I know he comes into my mind.
COMMENT: He does not just come into your mind.
PASTOR VITALE: He actually talks to you.
COMMENT: He is in the unconscious mind.
PASTOR VITALE: And he is there, and he is there as a very much of an individual.
COMMENT: He does not come from outside, and through her mind, and talks to her and she rejects it.
PASTOR VITALE: No, he is in there, he lives in there. He lives in your mind, OK? And I have had a couple of people that God is bringing to this end-time warfare, and after they have been in it for a while... I had a conversation with this woman, and she said, Oh, he just talked to me. Do you know what he just said? And like xxxx said to me the other day, that he was saying wicked things to you right when we were working in the office.
COMMENT: When does Satan go away?
PASTOR VITALE: My first experience with demons (because I had the reaction that everybody else has), was that I was terrified. You are doing very well. I was scared out of my mind when I found out that I had demons.
COMMENT: (Chuckle), I am doing very well.
PASTOR VITALE: You are doing very well. Yes, you seem to be doing well, and I was just sitting there denying it, and you know, while this sister prayed for me, and this demon spoke to me loud and clear. He said, F-you, only he said the whole word, F-you, but it is spiritual pestilence. That was what the Lord told me, when I was very upset that I found out that I needed deliverance. He told me there is spiritual pestilence and only the carnal mind condemns us for having demons. Christ does not condemn us, He is cleansing us. And to answer your question, When does Satan go away? The answer to that is that there are two manifestations of deliverance. Demons have to be cast out, which includes the breaking of curses (I will include that together); and the second manifestation of deliverance is dealing with Satan himself, and Satan must be swallowed up by Christ. He will go away when Christ is our mind, 100% of the time.
But before that it is a process, and as we move into the place where Christ becomes our mind, 100% of the time, Satan gets weaker and weaker, and Christ in us gets stronger and stronger, and we get to the point where we see him in our mind.
Paul said, We are not ignorant of his devices. We know what you are trying to do, Satan! We know you are trying to make contention, we know you are trying to divide, we know you are trying to separate, we know that is you, Satan, and in Christ you must be dealt with. And as we get stronger and stronger, we recognize him sooner, and God teaches us how to wage war against him. The battle is in our mind. The enemy is not outside of us, whether what somebody did to you, whether you are right or wrong, about what you think somebody did, it does not matter; the battle is in your mind and how you deal with it. It is your battle! Satan in your mind is your enemy. Your enemies are not outside of you, they are inside of you; inside your own head! Glory to God for that revelation! Thank you, Jesus.
How are we ever going to get into the kingdom if we think that our enemies are outside of us? That is why there is no condemnation in Christ Jesus. It is our own battle with Satan in our mind, and we know what the end will be. We will be victorious in Christ. Amen. Are you OK?
COMMENT: Yeah, why?
PASTOR VITALE: Well, you look a little nervous, but you know, you are getting a lot today, you are getting a crash course here. Glory to God!
COMMENT: I see that whatever it is that God is teaching me, new things, eventually as I grow, and I understand. I do not have to understand it all today, but I believe the Lord will eventually reveal and help me to understand, because whatever I was taught two years ago, two years later I had more of an understanding of it.
PASTOR VITALE: Definitely. Well, as soon as you can start on the messages, and that you can control because you can play them back and you can pray as you hear it. This is very fast, the Lord really dumped a lot on you today, but I really believe the hour is very short. Apparently, you are being called, in this hour. Apparently, you are called to the company of the five virgins that will have oil in their lamps, and this is the oil; you are getting it right now, you are getting oil in your lamp! Glory to God!
COMMENT: I knew I was called but I did not know what kind of calling I had, I just knew that I had a high calling, but I have always said, Lord, I am not worthy of having that calling.
PASTOR VITALE: Nobody is worthy of it. I say all the time, God has got a sense of humor, he picked me. And the Scripture clearly states that very few great ones are going to be included in this. It is because He wants to show His power, so He is taking the weakest people He can find; the most messed-up people he can find, no matter what their mess-up is (everybody has got their own thing). He is taking the most messed-up people He can find, and He is cleaning them up, and that is how He is glorified in them. How is He glorified if He takes a man that has made it in this world? A man who comes from a wonderful family, who is healthy spiritually, and has an emotionally healthy family, and is physically healthy? He grows up, he goes to Harvard, and he has every opportunity in the world. His father is wise, and his mother is loving, he has everything a child could have at the beginning of life, and he becomes a great doctor, and everybody admires him. Well, what is the big deal? Look at what he started with! It is no big deal. But take someone that is messed up, whose life is destroyed, and make them a Son of God, there is glory to God. He wants to be glorified.
COMMENT: And He wants to set you free. He wants to deliver you so that you will be free. He wants to deliver you so that he can use you. Adam can try to do the same thing Christ is doing, but Christ is the one that is really going to prevail, because He is the one that is going to make you the real son, and He is the one who is going to set you free, and He wants to be seen in you. He wants you to know the truth, because he wants you free.
COMMENT: Do you believe I have some kind of calling?
PASTOR VITALE: Yes, I do, or you would not be here. I believe you are called to the high calling in Christ Jesus, in that He wants to stand up in you in full stature, and what does that mean? It means that He wants to utterly possess you, He wants to be your everything, He wants to rule in your mind, and be the one who decides where your body goes, and what you think. That is what being your God means. A lot of people do not understand that if they do not have Christ that Satan is their god. They think that they have their own thoughts and their own ideas, but they do not. Our thoughts come either from Satan or from God, but Satan is the ruler right now. Satan has been ruling in our life for so many years that we think it is us. But the Lord wants to rule us totally, just like Satan has been ruling us since we were born. He wants every thought that we think to be of His life. He wants every word that we say to come forth from His spirit, and everything that we do to be of His mind. When that comes to pass, we will stop dying, because He is righteous. So, if He is our everything, we will be righteous, and we will stop dying. We will not make any more mistakes. Glory to God! Well, I feel the Lord is closing the meeting, does somebody have anything else they want to say? OK, God bless you.
01/25/02rs
1st Edit, 03/29/19, rh
