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COLOSSIANS, CHAPTER 1:16-29
Verse 16. For by Him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers: all things were created by him, and for him.
For by him were all things created, now in the Church world we frequently see an understanding that there was a humanoid man, not a hum man, a man in human form, that had two hands that formed the creation. That is how we here this Scripture preached.
First of all God is not a man. When this creation was formed, God was not in the form of Jesus Christ of Nazareth. He was not a man; He was a spirit. Second of all, created, is different than formed. Creation refers to the actual substance out of which something is formed, okay. Creation refers to the creation of the basic building blocks of this world system. We call them the atoms or the elements that is the creation. Out of those atoms, God formed the man.
So what I am going to suggest to you is that this whole creation was formed out of the substance of the Son of God. He was slaughtered. We know He was the lamb that was slain from the foundation of the earth. What does that mean? He was the Son of God; the Lord propelled Him into the earth, joined Him to the earth, and sacrificed His own son. That word slain means dressed for market, it means cut into many, many potions. The people on the face of the earth were formed out of the very substance of the Son of God. That is what it means. Everything that you see, the people, the planets, the whole creation, it was not made out of nothing. It would be as if to say, if it was possible, that God were to take one of us, reformed us, and make a creation out of us. He took His Son, the substance of His Son, and made this creation out of it. So His Son is now in a new form, He was made into us, okay. Now somebody might hear this....
Comment: Inaudible
Pastor Vitale: Well I stopped you already; usually I ask you save your questions to the end of the message.
Comment: Inaudible
Pastor Vitale: That is okay, I guess I shocked you by what I said, but, since I stopped you, I will answer your question.
Comment: (Inaudible) .... about creation, God created the man and then he formed the women. The elements such as the dirt and the dust and so on, is what you are referring to, or the atoms and so on, that your are referring to?
Pastor Vitale: I am saying that atoms was made out of the spiritual Son of God. That this very creation was not made out of nothing. If you want to build a house, you have to go into the forest and cut down a tree. So Jesus, the spiritual Son of God, was what this creation was formed out of.
Comment: The earth was void and then God created; but Jesus was at the right hand of him. How can He, if He is on the right hand and.... I do not quite understand that.
Pastor Vitale: Well, you know we got into some very deep study here. I fully understand were you are coming from if you just give a minute, I will see if the Lord gives me something to say you. It is really difficult, because we have been studying in here for five years. I understand that you have never heard any of this.
Comment: Not in Europe.
Pastor Vitale: What I am teaching, I know you never heard it. All that I can say to you is just pray about what you hear. Okay because there is a spirit of the word and there is a letter of the word. Probably what you have heard is the letter of the word. We are going into the spirit of the word, it is deep teaching. All that I can recommend is that you listen and pray about it. Did you think that I was saying that Jesus who was slain on the cross, that the world was made out of him? Is that what you thought I was saying?
Comment: No, I understand, that we are all spiritual persons and all things are out of the spirit. However, I do not quite follow where Jesus spirit being was the total formation of the world and all thereof, because Jesus is His son, and He is God-head of.... the same as. So He sent Jesus, His son, but I do not quite gather the total thing, because God was the original spiritual person or being, or....
Pastor Vitale: I am trying to see if I could explain this to you. I am not really, sure what you are saying. Let me try it his way, okay. The man Jesus that was crucified on the cross, okay, I am not talking about Him. I am talking about the spiritual Son of God, did you understand that?
Comment: O yeah.
Pastor Vitale: Okay. The Scriptures says, He was the lamb that was slain from the foundation the earth. If you look that up in the Greek, what it is really saying is that He was slain so that the earth could be founded. That is what it is saying, if you study it in the Greek. He gave up, He became, He was rich, and He became poor. He gave up His spiritual authority when His Father caused Him to be joined to the earth. He is the breath of life that was breathed into the earth. So that the man could be formed, does that help you at all?
Comment: Inaudible
Pastor Vitale: You have to pray about it. This must be very shocking to you, I am sure I am going to shock you with a lot of other things that I am going to say.
Pastor Vitale: You can stop me whenever you want, okay? For by Him were all things created. Again we see in, I believe it is in the Gospel of John, it says Without him nothing was made. For years everybody, including myself, thought it meant He made it out of His hands. When we study in the Greek, we found out that what it is really saying was He laid down his spiritual life, so that the creation could be formed. When He was crucified, when he died on the cross, if you study that in the Greek, He laid down his soul life. He laid down his spiritual life; He was the lamb that was slain from the foundation of the earth. When He died on the cross, He laid down His soul life.
All things were created by the spiritual Jesus Christ, not the man Jesus Christ of Nazareth, but the Spiritual Son of God that was propelled into the earth, by the father. It says all things were created by Him, all things were created out of his substance. It had to be made out of something. If you build a house, you have cut down the tree. This world was not made out of nothing; it was made out of the person of the Spiritual Son of God. It says things that are in heaven and what's in heaven? Our human spirit is in heaven.
Heaven is the spirit of man, we are told in the book of Job, there is a spirit in men. You know that there is a spirit as well as a soul, amen? The things that are in heaven are the human spirits of men and the things that are on earth are the souls of men. So we are told in this verse that both the human spirits of men and the souls of men were made out of the spiritual Son of God.
How could the soul be made out of the spiritual Son of God? Brethren your soul would have no life, if the breath of life were not breathed into it, into the living soul at the bringing of time. That breath of life that God breathed into the living soul, was the father breathing His son into the earth. In our souls, our soul are in enlivened or quicken or given an existence, because that clay is mixed with the Son of God.
Our human spirit, of course is spirit, which is in the likeness of the Father. The Father is spirit and our human spirit is spirit. So our human spirit is that part of us, which is like the father. The Father does not have a body like this. The Father does not look like this, the Father does not have soul, which is our emotions. He does not have the kind of emotions that we have, He does not have the problems that we have, and the Father is spirit. The spirit in us is to be formed in the image of the Father. Both spirit and soul were formed out of the lamb that was slain, so that the earth come be founded.
And those that are visible and invisible whether they whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers. These are the things are in heaven and in earth. Thrones the Strong's 2362 and we have found out here that the throne of the Father is Jesus Christ. The throne of the Father is Jesus Christ, okay. Now we have another spirit that is in the earth today. His name is Satan and he has a throne also, his throne is who? Well, Satan is the other spirit; his throne is the carnal mind, amen. His throne is the carnal mind.
Paul is speaking here about that which was created, and he said out of the substance of the lamb who was slain was created thrones, plural. I want to suggest to you that Jesus Christ was not created. So the throne that the Scripture is taking about must be the carnal mind. Is anybody not following me? The throne here much be the carnal mind. Dominion is Strong's 2963 and that means to dominate, which does not tell us very much, except when I looked this word up in the lexicon it also said, that it is used of angle. I remind you that we found out, in one deep study, what it means that Jesus is the head of the corner. Have you heard that expression, Jesus is the head of the corner?
We found out that what it means is, a lot of people think that the body of Christ looks like a triangle that looks like something like this. We found out that the triangle which expresses the body of Christ, is not a triangle like this, but it is a right triangle. This is the man on the earth and this is the man from heaven. This right triangle forms an angle and inside here it is called, an angle, and outside it is called a corner.
Jesus is the head of the corner, He is the man who came down from heaven. Adam is the earthman, and Jesus is the head of the place where the two of them meet. That is what this is talking about. When I looked up this word dominions, I found out that it is talking about angles. Well, it is talking about the one who is head of the corner. I want to suggest to you, it is the one who was dominating, the one was dominating. If they are talking about a negative manifestation of it, we just said that throne cannot be Jesus because Jesus was created, so that throne must be the carnal mind, then the word dominion would be the one who is dominating the throne.
The one who is dominating the throne, which would be Satan. The who one is dominating throne or the one who is sitting on the throne, Satan, everybody with me? Principalities is Strong's 746 and it means beginning or origin and I want to suggest to you, I have known this for years, that the principalities that the Scriptures talk about are Adam, Eve, and Satan - those elements those principal elements that existed at the beginning of time. This creation is one living soul that has been unfolding as a plant unfold. God only made one living soul, we are in many members and the base root of that living soul was the creation. Adam, Eve and Satan the pestilence in the earth.
What Paul is saying here is that everything that exists in this creation was made out of the Son of God. Powers refers to spiritual strength; it means to have the power of choice, the powers to do what you want. What Paul is saying here that this whole creation, both natural and spiritual, both in earth and in heaven was carved out of the very substance of the Son of God. That is what he is saying.
I remind you how Satan, the unconscious part of the carnal mind, got here and I remind you about that. We know that the Father is eternal, He has no beginning, and He has no end. Just for purposes of explanation, I am going to draw Him as a circle. The Father was a son, He was self-existence and He decided to form a creation through which he could express himself. He is the invisible God and it was his intention to form a creation through which He would be seen.
The way he purposed to do it, was to cover himself with earth. The example that we use is The Invisible Man, did you ever see that movie? It is about a scientist who had a wife and a family, and he drank a potion and became invisible. He was frightening lot of people; all they could hear was his voice. He put on a coat, pants and shoes. He wrapped his head with bandages so that you could see the form of his face and he put a hat on his head and nobody knew that he was invisible. This is basically, what God is doing.
The Scripture says He would cover Himself with a dark cloud. It is the purpose of the Lord to be seen. The visible God desires to be seen and that is the purpose of the earth. That is the purpose of joining His son to the earth; it is fully his intention to be completely expressed through this creation. Right now, this creation is fallen; we are not expressing the nature and the image of the Father. However, we shall express the nature and the image of the Father for that is His purpose and original intention.
It will come to pass, in due season. So at the beginning of time, the Father separated part of himself. He call it The Son and He shot it forth. How do I explain this, this is what He did. He did not lose anything. Just like when you have baby, you may get weak for a couple of months but you recover, you have not lost anything. You have produced a whole new human being. That is what the Father did. He took a part from within himself and made it into the Son. He reproduced himself and because of this separation, in order to form this separation, there was an atomic explosion.
The Father is a sun and the sun is constantly exploding, it is heat, it is energy . When the son was propelled away from the Father there was fallout, spiritual fal-out. If you know anything about an atomic explosions, there is fallout, it is an ash. The Scriptures says that man was formed from the ash of the earth. When the Father separated the son from himself, He did it by atomic explosion and there was fallout, which was white ash.
This is how the Father brought matter (that is what his whole world is made out of - matter) into existence. In this matter was a pestilence - a by-product of the separation and in this matter was a pestilence in the earth and its name was Satan. The Father said to the son, I have purpose to have a creation through which I can express myself and for that purpose, I am joining you. I am joining you to the man that I am forming out of the ashes or the dust. If you look it up in the Hebrew, it is ashes. I am going to join you to the ashes of the earth. It is my full intention to have you fill the earth with the fullness of God.
So what happened was that the spiritual Son of God got locked into a creation called, the living soul. God called it Adam and he was locked in there with ashes and with the pestilence. The Father said to Him, rule over the pestilence. Rule him like you would ride a horse. Do not listen to anything he has to say, do not talk to him. He is there because he is necessary for the creation to become visible. His only function is to give visibility to the creation. He is not to make decisions, he is not to think, he is not to talk, and he is not to do anything. It would be like saying, cover your body, put clothing on. Would you think letting your shirt make your decision as to what you are going to do, for the today? That is what happen and that is how Satan came into the creation.
We had a tragedy at the beginning of time. God said to this new-formed creation.... now remember Jesus was rich and He became poor. When the whole world was formed out of his substance for a season, he lost his strength. Just like a woman who gives birth to baby. For a season, he lost his strength. There was a tragedy at the beginning of time. Satan, the unconscious part of the carnal mind, got out of its place and seduced the creation. The creation fell, and in this hour over this fallen creation Satan has a lot of dominion which she was never supposed to have.
Again, in this hour, the Father is setting things straight making things right. He is raising up His Christ in men, and Satan will be bruised under our feet, and she is still going to be there, otherwise, we would not have any visibility. However, she must be under control, totally under the control of the Christ. Do you have any questions on this?
Comment: I have a lot (inaudible).
Pastor Vitale: All things were create by Him, whether they were the carnal mind whether they were Satan in the carnal mind or they were the elements from the beginning of time (Adam, Eve, and Satan), or whether they were the powers that rule in the minds of men. All things were made out of the substance of Christ.
He is before all things, and by Him all things consist. If you look this up the in the Greek what it is really saying is He is in front of all things. He is the head of all things. He is the most important out of everything thing that was created - the earth, Satan, the principalities, the throne, He is in the front, that word before could mean in front.
He is everything, He is to be seen. When somebody is in front of you, they are the one who is seen. So what Paul is a saying, He is to be seen, right now Christ is underneath our carnal personalities. Some people do not have Christ and all you see our carnal personalities. Many Christians who have Christ frequently express their carnal personality and Christ is pushed back . He is pushed back behind. So Paul says no, he is suppose to be in front, as far as God is concern He is in front. He will be in front, that is his place, to be seen, and Satan and everything else has to be in the background, behind, underfoot, not making any decisions.
And He is before all things, and by Him all things consist. He is holding everything together. He is the thread that is flowing through the whole creation that is holding this whole creation together. Have you look out at planets, how come they stay in there orbit? How come our body stays together, how come all the organs in our body, do not blow apart? How come our flesh does not fall off our skeleton? He is the substance in the creation. He is that which causes us to maintain the form that we are in. Even though in this hour, it is really hard to see Him. It is really hard to see Him. We see Satan everywhere in personalities of men. We see Satan's carnal mind, you do not see the righteousness of God, except in some places. Frequently we do not see it the Church. We see the unrighteousness of the carnal mind in the Church frequently. It is not going to stay that way, but it is there. There is a lot of sin in the Church.
Verse 16. And all things were created by him and for him.
If they were created out of His substance, they were also created for Him. Now this is a great mystery and this is where a lot of people would stumble. Where somebody will come to me and say, you are preaching Pantheism, but I am not preaching Pantheism. Everything was made out of Him and is in a weakened fallen condition, it was also made for Him. It is the same thing as saying a baby was formed in you and exited your body. He produced this creation and now He is filling it with His male self.
This creation is fallen that makes it, spiritually female. Female and male are types for spiritual being. There is no male or female in Christ Jesus, it has nothing to do with your body. Female is weak and male is strong. He gave birth to this creation and we are weak. What so I mean we are weak? We are subject to this world system, bees sting us, viruses makes us sick and kill us. We are spiritually weak, we have no strength in this world system. Plants give us allergies, water can drown us, food can poison us, sun can give us skin cancer, we are spiritually weak and we, the creation to whom God said to take authority over, has authority over us. We can freeze to death, we can die of heat, earthquakes can kill us. We are supposed to be the rulers of this planet and we are weak and subject to nature.
Now In this nation, by the mind of man, we had taken a lot of authority over nature, but that's not God's deliverance from this world system that is the mind of man and it is collapsing. Our clean air is collapsing, our clean water is collapsing, and everything that we have done to protect us from this world system is collapsing. It is not working because it was not God, delivering us out of this weak condition. So we came out of Him, we exited from Him, and we are made for him.
That means it is fully his intention to fill us to overflowing with Himself. When He fills us to overflowing with Himself, we will no longer be weak. We will receive Him as our husband and we will become spiritually strong, and we will receive dominion over this world system. Bees will not be able to give us allergic reactions that can kill us anymore. That was what Cain said to the Father, when he was driven out of the garden. Everyone that sees me us going to kill me, who was he talking about? He was talking about going out into this world, in a condition of weakness. We can fall off the curb, hit our head, and die. We are weak, spiritually weak.
All things created out of His substance, He gave birth to it and all things were created for him, so that he could fill us and that He could be expressed through us. When Christ is expressed through us, we shall not be subject to this world system anymore and this world system shall be raise back up to that which God intended it to be.
Verse 17. And he is before all things, and by him all things stick together.
He is the stickcum in the creation.
Verse 18. And he is the head of the body, which is the church.
Let me remind you that your physical bodies are not apart of the Church. The Church is as spiritual body. We are told that we are spiritual stones being formed together to build a building. Well, just open your eyes are our bodies sticking together? There is no way Paul is talking about our physical bodies. As second witness if you look that word up the Greek, you may recall that, we talk the last few weeks about the fact that there is more that one Greek word that is translated body. There is a Greek work word that means physical body, and there is a Greek word that means spiritual body,. Paul says they are spiritual bodies, terrestrial bodies, terrestrial bodies and this is not the Greek word that means physical body, it is the Greek word means spiritual body. Jesus is the head of the spiritual body and who is the spiritual body of Christ? Our souls.
Know ye not that you are the temple of the Holy Ghost. If you look up that word temple in the Greek, you will find out there are two Greek words that can be translate temple. One is clearly speaking about a physical temple, because we are told that Jesus walked in to it. However, the Greek word in that Scripture, Know ye not you are the temple of the Holy Ghost, that is not the Greek word for the physical temple. It is another word referring to spiritual temple. What does this mean? If the body is made up of the soul of the members in the Church, to say that Jesus is the head, it means he is the head of all the souls which contain Christ. What that means that He is your new unconscious mind.
Christ that is being formed in you, is your new conscious, he is different than your carnal mind. The carnal mind is the old man, or the outer man, who is corruptible and you have a new man, you have an inner man and His name is Christ. He is being formed in you. He is your new unconscious mind, He is your new personality, put off the old man, put away those carnal thoughts which lead until death. Live out of the Christ the new man that is being formed in you. Think with His thoughts and think life.
There is a God that is the God of this new man and His name is the Lord Jesus Christ, who has been glorified. There is a god of the carnal mind, his name is Satan, the unconscious part of the carnal mind. If Christ is being formed in you, you have two minds. James says a double-minded man is unstable in all his ways. What does that mean? One day, one minute, one hour, you are thinking with your carnal mind and the other minute, day, or hour you thinking with the mind of Christ. You are not stable, you must stabilize, Christ in you must rise up, and take totally dominion over your carnal mind and utterly crush him.
That old man must be clothed upon and utterly silenced. Christ is the head of the spiritual body, He is the head of your soul. We did Ephesians, over this past week, and found out that if you are married, that your husband is the head of your physical body (you are not to withhold yourself) and he is the head of your physical life and your physical family, but that Jesus is the head of your spiritual life. We found that in the book of Ephesians.
He is he head of the body, He is the savior of the body. Jesus is the head of your spiritual life. He is also the beginning, the first born from the dead. He is the beginning, the first born out from among the dead ones. He is the first one that made it, out of the hell of this world system. The way He made it out of here, was that the life of the Father was fully born in Him. He was the shape of the Father, He was in the very image of the Father. He is the only one to date that was fully in the image of the Father and because he was without sin that Father raised from him for the dead. He is now that first one that has been born out of this world system. Where is He, He is in heaven?
We do not know what is waiting for us, but we see Jesus, and what happened to him, we can hope, is going to happen to us. He our elder brother, is he not? We are following him, Amen? He is our example, Paul said, I would brethren that you come to the fullness of the stature, the Lord Jesus Christ. Let that nature that was in that man be in you.
He is the beginning of the creation of God. We are told in the book of Revelation that the Lord Jesus Christ is the beginning of the creation of God. How is he the beginning? The Father raised him from the dead, he ascended to heaven, and He is in this hour is pouring His spirit upon all flesh.
He is raining on us, a drop of Him is in each of us. He fully intends to do in each of us, what He did in the man, Jesus of Nazareth. That is why He is the beginning, we are coming after him. He is going to do the same work in us that He did in the man Jesus of Nazareth. He is going to raise us from the dead.
He is the first one born out of the depth of this world system, that in all things He might have the preeminence on all things he might hold first place. He will always be first . Just as Jesus said, the Father is greater than I, as we mature in Christ, Jesus will always be greater than us, He will always have first place.
Verse 19. For it pleased the Father that in Him should all fullness dwell. It pleased the Father that all of fullness of God should dwell in Him.
So that He would overflow with it and pour Himself out upon us. It is the will of the Father.
Verse 20. And having made peace through the blood of his cross, by him to reconcile all things unto himself; by him, I say, whether they be things in earth, or things in heaven.
Now the interlinear text phased that a little differently, I just wanted to read it to you. And through him, to reconcile all things to himself, making peace through the blood of his cross and having made peace through the blood of his cross. I am going to take the translation from the interlinear, and through him, to reconcile all things to himself and through Christ; we are talking about the Father now, okay. It pleases the Father that all the fullness should dwell in the man Jesus of Nazareth. And through Him the Father through him is reconciling all things to himself. Brethren we are separated from the Father.
We see a couple of verses further down that our carnal minds are at enmity with the Father, but through Christ we are being reconciled unto the father. Well, how that? Christ is in right standing with the Father. As we are absorbed into Christ, as He become our mind, as our new man, as our inner man, which is in the image of God, becomes our mind, and as our old man is bruised under our feet we are being reconciled. Why? because the Father abides in His Christ. Christ is the throne of the Father; we read that in a few verses back.
As our soul rises, which is in the image of that old man, which is Satan and he dies and grows weaker and as we become more and more Christ like, we shall be absorbed into the position that Jesus has in relationship to His Father. He made peace through the blood of His cross. How can he make peace? Brethren if you have an absence of peace, it means that you have enemies. It says a little further down that we were the enemies of God, at enmity with him in our mind.
The way He makes peace is by killing His enemies. He puts down the rebellion; Jesus Christ does not negotiate when it comes to righteousness or sin. Sin must be blotted out, it is not acceptable, and it will not be tolerated in the kingdom of God. When God makes peace, He destroys all of His enemies and His enemies are the carnal mind of men. Because He loves you and He knows that if He destroyed your carnal mind without Christ appearing in you, you will die, He has not destroyed this human race. He has made a provision, he has made a way of escape. That way of escape is that His son should be formed in you. The righteousness of His Son is being formed in you.
Therefore, when it becomes time for God destroy the enmity in your flesh.... have you read that the enmity in your flesh must be slain? Why does God wait so long? If He slays the enmity in your flesh before Christ is strong enough to sustain that flesh you will die. God is never late; He knows exactly what He is doing.
Through him (through Christ) He is reconciling all things or the whole creation back unto Himself. The Father is reconciling the whole creation is back unto Himself. Why does He need Christ? The Father is a Holy God and if He came in contact with us, with all the sin in us, we would burn up and be destroyed. He has made a mediator - a buffer between God and man so that His righteousness does not destroy us. Christ Jesus the only mediator between God and man.
The only man that has ever obtained to the righteousness of the Father, stands between us and the destruction that would be upon us for sin. As He purifies us and brings us too into the image of the Father. Through Christ to reconcile all things unto the Father, making peace through the blood of the cross of him. Now who is the cross of Christ? You might think it was a wooden cross on Calvary, but the spiritual life of Christ that was in the man, Jesus, was nailed to the carnal mind that He had received from His mother. Jesus was born of the Father the incorruptible seed - the logos of God, He receive from his Father.
He received from His mother a body and a carnal mind, that was what made Him human. The body and the carnal mind that He got from His mother was what made Him human. The mind that He got from His Father (that logo that Holy incorruptible thing) that was what made Him God. The two of them were joining together and the God in Him totally ruled that which He inherited from His mother, and refused to let it sin. That is why when He was crucified the Father raised Him from the dead. He was made in the likeness of sinful flesh, what do you think that mean? He and a body and He had a carnal mind. He was in the likeness of sinful flesh but He was in the image of the Father.
Having made peace may peace, peace between who? Between fallen man (who was enmity with God in his mind) and God, though the blood of the cross - through crucifying the carnal mind. That is the only way that is will ever be peace between God and fallen man - through the slaying if the enmity in our flesh. That enmity is in our carnal mind. Why? Because that enmity is wild raging beast. He will never bow his knee to the Father. He must be slain. That is what Jesus is doing in you. He is killing your flesh. He is sacrificing your soul, and He is molding you into the image of the righteousness of God. How is he doing it? With fiery trials, and tribulation. Why are you surprise that the fiery trail is upon you? It is designed to reveal the sin in your mind. So it can be rooted out and replaced with the righteousness of Christ in that particular trial.
How do you make peace though blood of his cross or through the life of his cross? By Him to reconcile all things unto himself. Let me go back to this interlinear, The Father through Christ, reconcile the whole creation to himself making peace through the blood of the cross. Making peace through that shedding of the blood of the carnal mind or the enmity in his flesh, that is what it is saying. By Him I say whether they be things in us or things in heaven. That means He made peace with the spirits of men and He made peace with the souls of men through slaying His cross. He slew that which He inherited from His mother, there was no sin in Him. That is why the father raised Him from the dead.
Every Christian alive today has not slain their carnal mind, and we all sin. The reason we sin that He is not dead. Who is not dead? our carnal mind is not dead, our old man is not dead. If he was dead, Paul would not have said put him off and put on the new man. He is alive, He is whispering in our ears, He is trying to seduce us, he is saying that He is God, He would destroy us of He could. He is very much alive. And you, that were sometimes alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now hath he reconciled. And you (all you carnal people out there in the Church) that were sometimes alienated and the enemy of God, because of the way you think..You were sometimes alienated and enemies, because of the way you think, and because of wicked works.
That word wicked is Strong's 4190. On message 20, we did a word study on wicked, and we found out that they were three Greek word translated wicked. One word means, wicked by nature, which means you cannot be changed. Another word means, wicked by degeneracy, which means you were righteous but you fell, and became wicked and that implies it is possible for you to be righteous again. The third one, which is what we have here, Strong's 4190 means, evil by influence. Evil by influence, it means the influence that you have on people is evil. Brethren the Scripture is talking about Leviathan - the witchcraft of the mind.
We have an evil influence on people when we think with our carnal mind. I hope it is not all the time; it is a lot of the time. Our carnal mind has power. We touched on that back a few verses, when Paul was talking about powers and principalities. One of those words indicated the power, or the liberty that is in the carnal mind he is doing anything he wants to through the whole world and through a lot of people in the Church. He has free reign brethren. Except in a few cases. God has got to something. The Church has got to get stronger. We have some power, but it is not enough.
We were sometimes alienated and enemies of God, because the way we think, because of the wicked influence of the way we think. Yet despite that, He has reconciled us in the body of His flesh, through death. He has reconciled us; He has brought us back to a state of harmony. In the body of His flesh, that is human soul life brethren, through death. I prayed about that, when I went over this verse, I said Lord what does that mean? He has brought us into a state of harmony through His Adamic soul, which he raises from the dead. Through death. What I thought the Lord was saying to me was that He not only reconciled the living soul to Him, but He also reconciled all the divided members of the living soul, to live in harmony again. Remember at the tower of Babel all the members of the living soul were was as one man and God divided us. He divided us in our minds, He divided in our bodies, He divided us souls, He divided us into ethnic groups, and races.
He set us one against the other. In the body of His flesh (now that is the Church) his body is the Church. In souls of the Church, He has reconciled us through death. That means everybody's Adamic soul has to die, and we shall be reconciled one to another again, or should I put it the other way? We shall be reconciled to him and when we are reconciled to Him it is through union. When we are reconciled, He is going to kill us. That death, is going reconcile us to him and also reconcile us to one another, reversing the curse of Babel through death.
It does not say, through His death. In the body of his flesh, yet now, has he reconciled you in the body of his flesh through death. So all the preachers stand up and say, Jesus died instead of you. No Brethren you have to die. Your flesh has to die. When they preach it in the Church world, die to your flesh, but they do not understand the full extent of it. Our flesh must give up every aspect of its existence as we take on His mind and His personality and His nature. It is reconciled through death - his death and your death. We are crucified with Him. He is not crucified instead of us, not a physical crucifixion, but our soul must be crucified; our soul must be impaled upon Christ.
I will tell you what impale means, if you have a knife, and you hold it up like this, and you take a piece of paper and stick it on and the pen comes through the other side. That piece of paper is impaled upon this pen. We must be completely penetrated by Christ, which penetration will kill our soul. We would live by the life and the faith of the Son of God. We cannot fully live by him, unless your soul dies. You cannot have your cake and eat it too. You want to be double-minded for the rest of your life? There is no glory in being double-minded for the rest of our life. You have to pick one, just like a young women that has two boyfriends, you got to pick one, and you cannot married both of them. We have some stories about women that married one and keep the other for a lover, you cannot do it, and you got to pick one, Glory to God. Jesus.
We are being reconciled to the body of His flesh, through death so that we can be presented (to the Father) holy and unblameable, and reproveable in His sight. Now the word, holy, refers to the spirit, the word unblameable, means without spots, referring to the soul and un-reproveable is Strong's 410 it means that which cannot be called to account. It means unaccuse; I am going to suggest to you, it is talking about full stature. He wants to purify our spirit, purify our soul and bring us to full stature whereby we shall be without accusation, we shall be irreproachable - above or beyond reproach. How is He going to do it? He is going to purify spirit, and He is going to purify your soul and you shall be without reproach. That is how He is going to do it, one plus one equals two, Jesus.
Verse 23. If ye continue in the faith (and all of this is going to happen) if you continue in the faith, grounded and settled, and are not moved from the hope of the gospel.
We have this in another Scripture, grounded means, to be founded. Christ has to be your power base. We have done a lot of teaching about that in the book of Revelation. This is going to happen to you, if you continue in the faith, which is grounded and settled, if you continue in the foundation of Christ. What it is saying, if you live out of Christ - you cannot continue to live out of your carnal mind, that is what it is saying. The word steadfast means immoveable, if you moveably live out of Christ. What does that means? In every situation, you have two choices, will I think and react out of Christ or will I think and react out of the carnal mind? You have a choice and when you steadfastly choose Christ, this is going to happen to you. Your fallen soul will die. Why? It is going to die because of lack of use. It is called atrophy, if you do not use it.... it happens to your muscles, if you do not use your muscles, when you finally try to use them there is nothing there. Live steadfastly out of the powerbase of Christ and your carnal mind will dry up and die.
I do not mean to mislead you brethren, not without a fight. He is a wild raging loin, He is not giving up very easily. However, if you steadfastly (despite his screaming and yelling and threats) live out of Christ, He will die from lack of use. If you are not moved away from the hope of the gospel.... brethren let me remind you, the hope of the Gospel is not the rapture. The hope of the gospel is what, somebody?
Comment: Christ in you, the hope of glory?
Pastor Vitale: Amen, Christ in you, the hope of glory. Amen. He is going to appear in you - the rapture of your spirit, being caught up in transferred from your carnal mind into Christ. His appearance in you in full spiritual manhood which will give you dominion over the soul realm. You will not be so beggarly and weak and to be subject to diseases. You know we do not know what a disparate condition that we are in; we do not really realize how bad it is. We are not suppose to ever be sick. We are not suppose to ever be depressed, we are not supposed to ever be have a problem that we struggle with in our mind. We are supposed to have all the answers. The Lord has promised us peace and contentment. This life that we have is inferior, it is vile, and we just do not know any better.
I do not want anyone to lay hold of my words, saying I am some kind of prophet of doom. I know they are good things in this world. They are babies being born, and families and good times, but Brethren, everything is relative. When I look at Jesus and heaven, this world and everything of it, it corruptible, it is eaten by the moths, sooner or later. That is the truth, that is why the Scriptures says, Seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness and everything that you need that is corruptible will be added unto you, but have the proper foundation in you. Then when you lose the corruptible things of this world, you will continue to abide. What good is a man gains if He the whole world and Jesus comes and takes his soul and the foundation of Christ is not in him and He ceases to exist?
Do not be move away from the hope of the good new which is Christ in you and the hope of glory, which you have heard and which was preached to every creature which is under heaven. Now this every creature means the whole of the creature. This good news was preached to the whole creation under heaven? What about the Aborigines in Australia? Which was preached to the whole creation, which is under heaven. I want to suggest to you, Brethren, that this message was preached to Adam at the beginning of time. It says to every creature under heaven. Your human spirit which is now dead or in the process of being quicken, heard this message while she was in the loins of righteous Adam at the beginning of time.
See it does not say it was preached to the soul man it says it was preached to the whole creation, which is under heaven, whereby Paul was made a minister. Paul was not a minister to the dead, he was a minister to the creation under heaven, he was a minister to the spirits of men. Brethren, I want to tell you that this message is not for the dead, they cannot bear it. This message is for the living, or those who are called to be raised from the dead. Hallelujah.
Verse 24. Who now rejoice (Paul is speaking about himself) who was rejoicing in his sufferings for you.
Paul says he was rejoicing in his sufferings for you. First of all what kind of suffering did Paul had for you? We all know that he was stoned, and he was put over the wall in a basket and we know about a lot of terrible things that happened to him. However Brethren, I want to suggest to you that for Paul to preach this message he was being caught continuously by the carnal minds of the people he was preaching to. I want to tell you, I think it says it further down, that he had wounds in his flesh. You do not preach this message without getting caught. Now everybody here is going to be preaching this message. You are all called to preach this message, I do not care if it takes twenty-five years. I do not know that is up to God. If you are here, you are called to preach it, why? The sons of God are called to preach. I do not care what you look like; I do not care If you cannot tell a noun from a verb, I do not care if every time you open your mouth the words come out twisted, I do not care. If you are going to be a son, you are going to preach and Jesus is going to do it. Did you hear Oral Roberts testimony; he was a stutterer, he could not even talk. God told him that he was going to preach, he could not believe it. It is not of your own ability Brethren. God will call a man for whatever reason God has for calling that person, I honesty do not know. If He has called you, He will fix you and mold you and beat you and He will do anything He has to do to you, but you are going to manifest Christ.
Do not tell me that you cannot talk, do not tell me you get things mixed up, just put yourself to the study, submit yourself to the ministry, and do the best you can. God is going to do it. When you preach, the people you preach to, will kill you. They do not know they are dong it, but that is what he is talking about, I am not going to lie I do not lie to you in this ministry. Your soul is going to get caught. That is what he is talking about. He is saying he is rejoicing in his sufferings for you. Brethren when he was stoned to death and put over the wall in a basket, that was not for you in Colossi. The suffering is for Colossi, is he is being clawed to death by their carnal mind as he preaches this word.
He says he rejoices in it. Well, praise God. If you can do it, it is okay, but it cannot be inflicted on somebody as a religious work. I continue to encourage you, if people need compassion, they compassion, and to go to them when they are not taking the victory and tell them that have to rejoice is not helping them, okay. It is a true word, you are to rejoice, it is a true word, but not necessarily under every circumstances for everybody. When the person is taking the victory, praise God, you want to pray them through, praise God.
However, if they are hurting and they are wounded and they are bleeding and you come to them and tell them you should be rejoicing it is putting condemnation on them. We must understand the spirit of the Scripture. We must understand it, that is a true word, I am not saying it is not a true word. However, the circumstances matter, the circumstances count. We cannot deny people the opportunity to express their pain because then it internalizes and it kills them. It has to come out. We have to learn how to minister under many circumstances. I rejoice in all my sufferings, I was just doing one of the messages from the revival. I had it on the recording. I rejoice in all my sufferings, look what it produced in me. Look at this glory that it has produced in me. When I am going through it I have some trouble rejoicing, praise God.
Paul says he is rejoicing in his sufferings for them and fill up that which is behind of the afflictions of Christ. That is a bad translation. Fill up that which is behind, means to fill up that which is lacking of the afflictions of Christ, you know what he is saying to them? He is saying to them that my soul has to be killed and he is saying thank you for doing your part to afflict me so that Christ can appear in me. That is what he is saying to them, okay, but not everybody is where Paul apostle was, okay. That is what he is saying to them. Now rejoice in my sufferings for you, which are filling me up, which is filling up that which is lacking of the afflictions of Christ and those afflictions are to his soul man. The afflictions of Christ in my flesh for His body's sake, which is the Church. So he is being filled up with the afflictions of Christ for the body of Christ's sake, which is the Church.
Brethren, to be a Son of God is a sacrificial walk. The Lord requires you to seek nothing from the people that you are minister to. Trusting Him to meet your every need. Let me explain this. When you are in a fellowship, He will send people in that fellowship to meet your needs. However, you cannot be looking to the people to meet your needs. If God speaks to someone in the fellowship, if he sends them to pray for you, if he sends them to comfort you, if he sends to give you bananas, whatever, if he sends them you take it. However, for the minister looks to the people to meet his needs, is adultery. You cannot look to the people, if you are a minister; you must look to Christ, then if He sends the people close to you that is fine. When you look close to the people, you are going to develop ungodly soul tie with them. Then when they do not do it, you are going to be resentful; all kinds of ungodly doors are going to open up.
There is even a Scripture where Paul says, God comforts us, so we can comfort you. I want to say it again, it is very important, great comfort in ministry can come for the body to a minister in Christ. However, it can only come when God is anointing them to do it, if you start seeking them out, out of your own carnal mind, you will put and ungodly burden on them. It will break down the relationship in Christ; no good thing will come out of it. Does everyone know what I am saying, hallelujah?
Verse 25. Where of I am made a minister...
Paul is talking about Christ in His flesh for his body's sake, which is the Church. He is a minister to the body which is the Church. He is a minister to the soul man in whom Christ is being formed. He is not a minister to you flesh. He is a minister to the soul man in whom Christ is being formed. Why do I say that - Only the soul man whom Christ is being formed? He is talking about His body, Christ's body. If Christ is not in there it is not His body. If Christ is not in there, it is the carnal mind's body. He is a minister to the body of Christ, and what is the body of Christ? The body of Christ consists of the souls of men, in whom Christ is being formed. If you have the Holy Spirit but Christ is not being formed in you, your soul is the temple of the Holy Ghost. However, to be the body of Christ, Christ must be being formed in you - temple of the Holy Ghost, body of Christ. God is not frivolous, if He is saying it in a different way it means something else. If the Holy Ghost is in you, your soul, your fallen adamic soul is the temple of the Holy Ghost. However, as soon as you conceive and Christ begins to be formed in you, you become a member of the body of Christ.
If your soul is the temple of the Holy Ghost that does not make you a member of His flesh and His bones. To be a member of His flesh and bones, He must be, being formed in you. Then your fallen adamic soul is His flesh and the Christ that is being formed in you is His bones. We see two Churches, a Church within the Church. A Church that has the Holy Ghost, and a Church that is His body - a Church within a Church. We talk about this message 13; there is a Church within the Church. Paul said it himself, he said Many of you cannot discern the body of Christ and for this reason, you are sick and dying. What does that mean; you cannot recognize the people in the Church who have the spiritual authority to help you.
More often than not, the true body of Christ is not recognizable by the carnal Christians and they are rejected and hated it. This happened to me several times, over the years, that God had sent someone to me with a severe problem and I prayed for them and that problem had been rectified. Usually by the time it is rectified they are not talking to me anymore.
There is power in the sons in the making. You hear me complain a lot that I do not have enough power because I get frustrated when I see all the people that are in desperate need of the power of God. However, I know that when God sends someone to me, that there is a lot of authority in me to help them - when God brings them to me. This is a tough word, a carnal person hearing this message is going to say boy does not she have pride. I want to tell you, this is not pride, if it is the truth it is not pride.
There is authority in the people in whom Christ is being formed, that is not present in other believers. If there is a faithful believer out there with a small anointing that is crying out to God, and crying out to God, and crying out to God, and he has a whole two thousand member Church, praying for this person, and God decides to answer the prayer, He might just send that person to His son. Everybody does not have the same authority, Brethren. It is just the truth. Hallelujah!
Verse 25. Whereof I am made a minister unto the Church according to the dispensation, or the stewardship that was given to him of God, which is given to me for you, to fulfil, or to fully preach, the word of God.
Paul was given a commission to preach the full word of God to the Church, which is the body or the flesh of Christ.
Verse 26. Even the mystery which hath been hid from ages and from generations, but now is made manifest to the saints.
He is talking about the message that he is preaching. Paul preached the gospel of God, he did not preach the gospel of the cross. He is saying that the message he was given to preach was hidden, has been hidden from the ages and from the generations. The word ages is the Greek word eons which is speaking about the spiritual ages and the word generations is speaking about the generation of men.
The ages is spiritual, we know the ages are in the heart of man. We found that out in the Ecclesiastes. The ages are in the heart of man. That is spiritual, ages is speaking about our spiritual being. The generations is talking about the generations of humanity. It has been hidden, both from the generations of humanity and from the heart of man, which is the carnal mind of man. If you want this revelation Brethren, you must get into Christ.
This revelation is not available to the carnal mind. Now there is something out there that sounds a lot like it and it is coming out of the carnal mind. Why would you want this revelation without the fruit of it? What is the fruit of it? Christ in you the hope of glory. If you are out there listening to this revelation from someone who is preaching it out of their carnal mind, you are only deceiving yourself and you are tickling and itching your ears - you are all lifted up in pride that you have all this great revelation.
Brethren, this revelation is painful. If you are receiving this revelation from Christ, it is cutting your heart out. Amen? Amen. I tell you the truth. If you are getting all this revelation and you do not have any trouble in your life, it is not likely that you are getting it from Christ. Why? It is design to kill you. This revelation is not to give you a good time, it is not a night out, it is supposed to be implanting the seed of Christ in you. As He matures in you, He will kill your carnal mind that is what he supposed to do.
The sword of the spirit, the word of God, well what do you think we are doing with this sword, killing the demons out there on the streets on Halloween? Brethren the hope of glory is Christ in you. The demons on the streets on Halloween cannot stop Christ from coming forth in you. It is the demons in your mind that are going to try stop Him from coming forth in you. This if message is truly being preached to by Christ, your heart is being cut out. That is why there are so few numbers, people do not want tolerate it. I believe the hour is coming that there have no choice.
Hallelujah. There is a price to pay to get this word in Christ Brethren, a very heavy price. You do not stand up in God without paying the price. It is associated with suffering; we just read it couple of verses back. This word is associated with suffering, and suffering at the hands of other people - suffering in relationships and plugging your way through. It is nice if you are persecuted on the streets and they are trying to burn you are alive. That really sounds good, you are going to be martyred and all that.
However, Brethren, that the imputed persecution. I do not know it maybe happening today again, but it is not the persecution that will bring forth Christ. Being burnt at the stake, being slain, being crucified upside down (if that is even true, that happened to Peter) that does not produce Christ in you. The true martyrdom is the destruction of your carnal mind, which will exalt Christ in you. What good a religious spirit is going to do you? You want whip yourself, you want to crawl up the steps on your knees, what good is it? If you are going to suffer, let Christ appear in you. In this hour it is a spiritual suffering, Jesus said never before has the world seen such tribulation and never would it see it again. Brethren, there have been wars for centuries. Hitler was not the only man that did what he did. People had been tortured, they had been burned out, they have been burned alive this have been going on for thousands of years. What is the world of Jesus talking about? What He was saying was that this is a spiritual tribulation. That would produce Christ in you and no man has ever seen it before, that world have not seen it before.
He is not talking about the Spanish Inquisition, stretching you on a rack. It is a spiritual tribulation that the world has not seen before. It is going produce Christ in you, it is going kill your carnal mind and produce Christ in you. He said the world has never seen it before. That means this is not the second creation, it is the first creation. He said The world would never see it again, that means it is the only creation.
Verse 26. And now mystery (this message, that is a tribulation unto your soul that is going to produce Christ in you the hope of glory) is being revealed to the Church.
After all these thousand years of being hidden.... First it was preached to your human spirit in righteous Adam before he fell and now after all these thousand of years it is being preached again to your human spirit and to the powers and principalities which are your souls. In this hour.
Verse 27. To whom God would make known what is the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles; which is Christ in you, the hope of glory.
God would make known the riches of this glory. Glory is the Spirit of God in the soul realm, this glorious message coming through the soul realm and the richness of it (the spiritual richness of it), this mystery, this message which is being preached among the Gentiles which is Christ in you, the hope of glory. We are preaching the glory of it, it is the power of God unto salvation. The pain is just for a little season.
Verse 28. Whom we preach (we preach Christ), warning every man, and teaching every man in all wisdom (wisdom, meaning Christ).
This teaching and this warning is not coming out of the carnal mind, that means there is no condemnation in it. If is coming out of Christ, there cannot be any condemnation in it. Brethren, you can teach and you can warn without condemnation.
Verse 28. That we may present every man perfect in Christ Jesus. What is he warning them about? He is warning them about their carnal mind. Now when you preach this message, to unschooled people they are going to tell you that you are condemning them. When you point out there sins in Christ, they are going to say You are condemning me. If it is in Christ there can not be any condemnation. You are not going to like it anymore than your children like it, when you turn them over your knees, and they are going to claw at your soul.
The reason he is doing it, (warning every man and teaching every man) is that he would like to present every man perfect in Christ Jesus. He wants every man to stand up in full stature.
Verse 29. Whereunto I also labor...
Paul's labor is that you should stand up in full stature. He strives according to his working, which worketh in me mightily. Paul is saying by the power of Christ which is within me, which is Christ in me working mightily to give you what you need to stand up in full stature. I am working with Him, He works in the spirit and I work out here in the realm of appearance and together we are striving mightily to bring you into full stature. That is what he is saying, Hallelujah! Any questions tonight? Amen.
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