Illustrations:
Part 1 of 4 Parts
The Following Message Has Been Transcribed For
Clarity, Continuity Of Thought, And Punctuation By
The LEM Transcribing & Editing Team.
INTRODUCTION
Christ Jesus never argues over doctrine, but He does respond to doctrine. We know that Paul debated with the Jews in the synagogue. We are also told in the Scripture that heresies must arise in the Church. By listening to heresy, we learn to distinguish between the truth and the lie.
If we are never taught what the heresy is, we will never be able to recognize the truth, and we will never be able to recognize heresy coming from other people. What I said is true, even though it sounds like a contradiction. We can never recognize the light, or learn what light is, unless we see the darkness.
The Lord teaches us with contrast. Therefore, God's people should receive instruction about error, but only when that instruction compares and points out the differences between the erroneous doctrine and the truth. It is not the Will of the Lord for pastors and teachers to tell Christians what is true and what is false for their entire lives. The job of the pastor and the teacher is to teach the Body of Christ how to distinguish between the Spirit of Truth and the Spirit of Error for themselves.
And, indeed, The Spirit of Truth is a person. His Name is Jesus. And the Spirit of Error is a person. Her name is the Serpent.
The job of the Ministry is the same job that human parents have: To raise their children to be mature adults who can function as spiritual males. You cannot be controlling the life of your forty year old son. You have to get to your children when they are little and train them up. Is that not what the Scripture says? Train them up and teach them the difference between right and wrong. Then you let them go, and you leave them in God's hands.
What we do is put information into the computer of your mind so that when you hear an error, it is possible for the Lord to come to you (whether it is Christ in you, or the Glorified Jesus Christ), and call forth out of your memory, out of your spiritual database, what you may have heard in a meeting like this.
You, yourself, may have completely forgotten what you heard, but the Lord can call forth from your memory the understanding or response that you need in the midst of a doctrinal encounter. If you do not have the information in your memory, if you have never heard it, you are empty and defenseless, and one of two things will happen. Either you will fall prey to the false doctrine, or you will stand up against the false doctrine without a weapon.
In the case of the latter, you might become hostile, and say, Look, the Bible says it is wrong, and you are a dirty, no good sinner. You fell into condemnation, because you had nothing to fight with, but that is not God. That is your Carnal Mind. God does not fight like that. God fights with truth, and an honest exchange of ideas.
THE MARKETPLACE OF IDEAS
This is one of the things that I like about Rush Limbaugh. That is what he talks about all the time. A lot of people do not like him, but he talks a lot about the forum, or the marketplace of ideas There are certain political forces in this country that would quash free speech, if they could, but this is not the way of the Lord. The Lord lets everyone speak their mind, and exercise themselves by listening to both sides so that they can call upon God to find out what is true and right in His eyes. God encourages people to think, rather than to be programmed.
PASTOR JAMES DAVID MANNING
This same principle exists in Christ, and we are exercising it today. We have just listened to an audio clip of Pastor James David Manning's May 4, 2006 TV message. Pastor Manning is a man that I have a lot of respect for. I do not agree with the direction he has gone in these past couple of years, but I believe that he has an apostolic anointing, and I would like to respond to him.
In today's world, I believe Pastor Manning is preaching error. I believe he is preaching an anti-Christ message. That is my opinion. This is not a personal attack against the man. I repeat, I have a lot of respect for Pastor Manning. I have preached in his church. But I believe that he has taken a wrong turn. I also believe that the Lord has raised up Living Epistles Ministries to respond publicly to what Pastor Manning is openly saying these days.
My disagreement with what he is preaching has nothing to do with my personal feelings for him, the respect I have for him, or my recognition of all of the years that he has faithfully served God. He has stood in that pulpit and preached, and pulled drug addicts off the street for many years. I know his testimony. I know the sacrifice that he has made for the body of Christ.
For the last two years or so, however, I disagree with what he is preaching. Nevertheless, I have no intention of throwing my respect for him into the street or into the sewer, because I disagree with what he is preaching today . I say this is with all respect, Pastor Manning, because you will receive a published transcript of his message.
I have already downloaded your Tuesday, May 9, 2006 message off of your web site and played it for the brethren. And, now, I am going to have a Godly debate with you. I am going to tell you where and why I disagree with you and, in some instances, I will give Scripture which will oppose what you are saying. Let every person listening to this tape or reading this book seek God for himself, and make a judgment as to what is true and what is false. And let us all be edified from this debate and mature, and get closer to God, because that is what teaching in the Church is intended to accomplish.
We should all want instruction, because instruction brings us closer to God. The answer to every problem that we have is to get closer to God. If you need to be healed, get closer to God. If you have financial problems, get closer to God. If you are lonely, get closer to God. If you have emotional wounds, get closer to God. The same answer applies to whatever human problem you have. That is why Christians study, because they want to get closer to God.
There are two ways to get closer to God, through prayer and through study. That is what we are doing today. I have my computer right here. I am going to play the audio file close enough for it to be recorded on this message, and I will be stopping the tape and responding to Pastor Manning as I am led by the Lord.
PASTOR MANNING (audio clip): Today San Francisco can be considered one of the more wicked cities on the planet. I mean, it is a wicked place. It is a place of open rebellion and perversion, with the court-sanctioned perversion at the highest magnitude. The mayors, the legislators, and every other person and citizenry of San Francisco sanction ugly perversion against God, against Bible lifestyles, more so than any other city on the planet.
PASTOR VITALE: I want to clarify, at this point, what Pastor Manning means when he says that he is saying something by permission. Does anyone know what he means when he says, "I say this by permission"?
COMMENT: I think he means the angel that he thinks is Jesus within him, is giving him permission.
PASTOR VITALE: Actually, that is correct, but let me make it clearer for those who may not understand. Pastor Manning is saying, It is not God within me speaking directly to you, but the Lord agrees with what I am saying, even though it is coming out of my own mind.
Paul said the same thing, and I preach that way frequently. I say it this way, The Lord is not telling me this right now, but this is what I believe, as a result of all the heavy instruction I have been under. Therefore, I have permission to speak this way, because it is my understanding of what the Lord has taught me.
Pastor Manning calls San Francisco that sinful city and is talking about the political movement there, to legalize same sex marriage.
We know that the teaching in the Church is that homosexual behavior is wrong. God loves homosexuals. He loves everybody, but He says the behavior is wrong.
Now, listen carefully, tough, and you will hear Pastor Manning equate homosexual behavior with speaking in tongues. Listen to it and see if you can hear it. This is a training ministry. Listen to it.
PASTOR MANNING (audio clip): ....a city called Los Angeles on the street called Azusa, these same demons. The Bible says that when the earthquakes take place, many false prophets shall rise. In the year 1906, Azusa Street started. It started because these demons that were released from the earthquake moved down to Los Angeles and up comes all of these false prophets and these Azusa Street tongue talking blasphemers and liars on the Word and the throne of God.
PASTOR VITALE: Azusa Street is a little street in California where the modern day revival of the Holy Spirit took place. One man (maybe 2) read the Scriptures about the outpouring of the Spirit of God upon the apostles which resulted in their speaking in tongues, and asked God why that is not happening today. He fasted and prayed for what we call the anointing today, and the Holy Spirit fell in this little house on Azusa Street. We take speaking in tongues for granted today, but in those days no one spoke in tongues. If anyone did, it was just an individual experience that nobody knew about. It was not the common experience that we see in the Church today.
It is my understanding that, at that time, people were flying to that little house on Azuza street from all over the world to have hands laid on them to receive the gift of speaking in tongues. Today, speaking in tongues is accepted by millions of Christians, so we do not realize how exciting that event of 100 years ago was. April of 1906 is the Azuza Street one hundredth year anniversary.
DISCERNING THE SPIRIT OF ANTICHRIST
Pastor Manning is saying that the earthquake prophesied in the Book of Revelation occurred physically in San Francisco, that the same spiritual event that caused the physical earthquake resulted in demons arising out of a spiritual pit, and that those demons caused two things to happen in the physical world: 1) Government started sanctioning homosexual behavior, which the Bible says is wrong, and 2) People in the Church started to speak in tongues.
I want to put that on the drawing board for you, because this It is very important that you understand how the spirit of anti-Christ works. Anti-Christ is a mixture of truth and lies.
The human mind is vulnerable when it listens to someone they know and trust, especially someone with charisma. When a teacher instructs the average person, saying something that is true followed by something that is not true, the human mind recognizes the truth, but rarely recognizes the lie.
We know that the Bible speaks about an end-time earthquake (truth), so the average mind doesn't judge what the teacher says after that. We are supposed to judge the spirit on the person, not the person. We are supposed to judge whether they are speaking the truth or a lie.
You do not judge with your Carnal Mnid. You have to judge with your Christ mind. That means you have to say, Lord, be my ability to judge. We do not want the truth that comes from our Carnal Mnid. We cannot do it ourselves. We judge the Word to determine whether it is truth or a lie,with God's help, and we judge the spirit on the man. You cannot judge righteously with your Carnal Mnid. We do not judge people before the time, but only under the express anointing of God.
We do have judgment of sin in this ministry. I am anointed to do that under certain circumstances, but I do not go around knocking everybody down, telling them what they did wrong today.
[Pastor Vitale at the drawing board showing two sides of the controversy]: This is how anti-Christ works. First, she says a truth -- the Bible talks about an earthquake. We know that. Earthquakes are a part of the judgment of the end time. Now, the lie follows immediately on the heels of the truth: The result of earthquake is speaking in tongues. Does everybody get it? Do you see what he did?
Pastor Manning made a false statement. He said, earthquake = tongues. We can take that a step further. Pastor Manning says that the judgment of God = tongues. What does that mean? Pastor Manning has drawn the conclusion, and taught whoever will believe it, that the Bible says that tongues are bad, illegal, and wrong. That is the conclusion he drew. Does anybody not understand this? We have just demonstrated the false reasoning of the Carnal Mind.
If you stop to think about it, almost everybody knows about this kind of false reasoning.
Someone sent me an e-mail, once, proving how tomatoes cause death. It read like this: My mother sent me tomatoes this morning; I ate the tomatoes this morning; I had a heart attack and I died. Beware of eating tomatoes because tomatoes can kill you. The e-mail was sent to me as a joke, but it is an excellent example of false reasoning.
The Spirit of anti-Christ employs this false reasoning of the Carnal Mind, and Pastor Manning has manifested that same reasoning in the audio clip that we are listening to. When you preach to people or have an audience listening to you, the people are open to you.
You are supposed to be listening to everything that the preacher says, asking God to help you to understand and to reveal if there is any error.
You are not supposed to be listening to a preacher looking for error.
You are supposed to be listening to a preacher, wanting to learn.
If something does not sound right to you, then you ask the Lord or you can ask the preacher. You are not supposed to be judging the preacher trying to catch him in the lie.
This is not what we are doing here. We are recognizing something that we believe to be the Spirit of Error and responding to it. This is not the wrong spirit that the Pharisees had towards Jesus, when they tried to catch Him in the lie.
When you sit under a preacher, you are open to the spirit of that preacher, so you are ninety-nine percent willing to accept whatever is said. Why?
Because you should not be here unless you believe that the Lord sent you to be under this preacher. If you do not think the Lord sent you to study under me, you should not be here. You should be trusting God that if I make a mistake, that He will correct me; that everything will straighten out, and everything will be okay.
When you listen to a preacher that is preaching an anti-Christ message, the false reasoning goes right into your mind, even if you are not particularly thinking about it. It is called subliminal impartation of an idea. The words go right into your subconscious, and all of a sudden, you believe that speaking in tongues is bad.
We have not gotten to that part of the audio clip yet, but Pastor Manning is not only saying that physical women cannot preach, but that physical women are second class citizens. Do you know that Pastor Manning's congregation is filled with women saying amen to that lie? These women are captured in their mind.
The Scriptural response to this error is that all of mortal humanity, physical men and physical women, are spiritually female in relation to Christ Jesus, who is the only spiritual male. Therefore, it is possible for a physical woman to be a spiritual male, and for a physical man to be a spiritual woman. There is no male or female in Christ Jesus, you see, because of this spiritual truth.
You are supposed to honor the teacher that God puts you under, but you are joined to the Lord. The Lord puts us under a teacher, and expects us to honor him, because it is so hard to understand instruction from a Spirit. God raises up human teachers who speak in languages that mortal men can understand, but it is the Lord who sent you here to be instructed.
Some people get hung up thinking that because their primary relationship is with the Lord, that only the Spirit of the Lord can teach them. But this is not how God's program works. It is very hard to understand the Spirit of the Lord. He does not teach in human language, and everybody does not have the ability to understand the level that He communicates on, so He sends you to a teacher.
The messages that are coming forth from Living Epistles Ministries today are already being passed on to other ministers who teach on a different level, on a level for the lower grades. This is spiritual bread that is coming forth. Everybody in his own ability, as the Lord will use you, as the Lord brings the situation to you, will be asked to pass on, maybe one little thought that you hear here. I am going to be preaching here for two hours. One thought that you hear here may take you an hour to explain to somebody.
I teach the teachers. I teach on a very high level. This is apostolic teaching. You do not need a public forum, but as the Lord gives you the opportunity, this message is broken down. The analogy in the Scripture is bread crumbs. Whatever you can get, you get, and you break it down for the people that you talk to, and they break it down for the people that they talk to. The message is coming forth in a very concentrated form here. That is one of the characteristics of apostolic teaching.
All of this goes into your subconscious mind if you have a false teacher. This is what is happening with Pastor Manning. The major problem, as I see it, is that he has this high anointing, but he had a spiritual ascension a couple of years ago that was not of God. The Scripture talks about the resurrection of damnation or the resurrection of the just. We all have an inner being living within us, hopefully, your inner being is Christ. My inner being is Christ Jesus. He lives inside of me.
The Scripture is very clear about that. We have an inner man and an outer man, and a new man, and an old man. My new man is Christ Jesus. He lives through me, He teaches through me, He talks through me, and He thinks through me. But, His thinking is so different than the thought process of the Carnal Mind, that sometimes people form bad opinions about me because they cannot relate to the way He thinks. They just cannot relate to it, so they assume wrong things about me, a teacher who thinks with the Mind of Christ.
Pastor Manning had a spiritual ascension, but he did not ascend on the side of Christ. He did not ascend in Christ. His Carnal Mnid ascended, and now he is preaching apostolic doctrine out of his Carnal Mind. Pastor Manning is preaching anti-Christ doctrine, and thinking with anti-Christ reasoning that draws wrong conclusions. Is everybody okay with this?
Pastor Manning preaches a deep, truthful understanding of the Scripture that the Church rejects, but, this truth is revealed to him by his Carnal Mind, so he does not understand, interpret, or teach it correctly.
Today, we are separating the potpourri of ideas from one of Pastor Manning's messages, into three categories:
1) Truth from an apostolic level that is not recognized by the Church world,
2) Error that is believed by most of the Church world, and
3) Apostolic doctrinal error that is being channeled to Pastor Manning from by a collective spirit guide.
We have found error that most of the Church world thinks is right, the rapture, for example; error that most of the Church world would think is wrong, debunking the Protestant Reformation, for example; and then we have found some truth that is on a high apostolic level.
I am going to say it again.
Pastor Manning is preaching truth on a high apostolic level and doctrine that is acceptable to the Church world, which I believe is wrong; he is preaching error on an apostolic level.
Pastor Manning is preaching on three different levels, and we are distinguishing those three levels today.
EARTHQUAKE
Pastor Manning says that the earthquake that took place in San Francisco was a physical manifestation of the earthquake prophesied in the Scripture. He says that demons came out of the spiritual pit at the time of the physical earthquake, and caused spiritual corruption. We are focusing today on what Pastor Manning calls the corruption of speaking in tongues.
The Scripture tells us clearly that speaking in tongues is of God, so I would like to go on and address what the Scripture says about earthquakes.
The Church world believes, to the best of my knowledge, that earthquakes are bad and that they release demons into the atmosphere, but that is not what I believe. The Doctrine of Christ teaches that a spiritual earthquake signifies someone, rising up from under the earth. Who is buried under the earth? Who in the Scripture is buried under the earth?
COMMENT: Abel.
PASTOR VITALE: Yes, the answer is Abel. He is the one who is buried under the earth. Cain killed his brother Abel. The Scripture says that Jehovah said to Cain, Your brother's blood cries to me from under the ground. The earthquake is the breaking up of the earth, because Abel is rising from the dead. The prophet Ezekiel asks, Can these bones live again? What bones? The dead bones of Abel, who is the root system of Adam, the anointed of God.
Abel is the righteous one that was killed by Cain, the unrighteous one. In this fallen world, the unrighteous are stronger than the righteous. That is why the world is in the condition that it is in. Is the Lord's answer to change His Law and make unrighteousness acceptable? No! The Lord is sending more power to the righteous. We have Christ in us, the hope of glory, who is joined to, or is about to be joined to the Glorified Jesus Christ. This is the double portion: Christ in you, plus the Glorified Jesus Christ. The union of these two is stronger than all of the evils of all the Carnal Minds in this world.
The double portion is the Lord's answer to the problems of mortal humanity, because when only good and evil exist, evil proves to be ultimately stronger than good. There may be individuals in which good prevails over evil but, if you look at humanity at large, people are killing each other, torturing each other, starving each other, stealing from the sick and the poor. If you look at humanity, in general, or at the United Nations, the evil always prevails over the good in this world.
Good and Evil Vs. Righteousness
The answer is that mortal men are lacking. We need to have something added to us. Those of us who desire righteousness and pursue righteousness, look to have something added to us that will make us stronger than the evil of this world.
This is the problem with what is coming out of Hollywood and television today. The theme of many movies today is about the conflict between good and evil, but there are no movies that I know of today that portray Jesus and His righteousness.
Spiritually uneducated Christians, in the western world, in particular, do not understand that the problem of mortal man is not the conflict between good and evil. Good and evil are the two sides of fallen man, and a house divided will not stand. This means that if good conquers evil to the exclusion of all evil, or if evil conquers good, to the exclusion of all good, mortal mankind would cease to exist in its present form, because it would have destroyed its other side.
This is exactly what happened when Adam sinned: Good and evil, also known as The Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, killed Adam's righteous side, also called the Tree of Life, and Adam became half a man, or a castrated spiritual male, and the spiritual woman who became the wife of Leviathan, the spiritual sexual organ of the Serpent in this fallen world.
The conflict is not between good and evil. It is between good and evil, and righteousness. Christ Jesus, our righteousness, the Righteous Side of fallen adam, is come into this fallen world to overshadow and restrain mortal mankind's good and evil side, which will result in mortal mankind ceasing to exist in its present form.
Righteousness is overshadowing the good and evil like gold-plating wood. That is the parable in the Scripture. Humanity, which is symbolized by wood, will be overshadowed or gold plated with the righteousness of Christ Jesus. There is no shadow of turning in Christ Jesus. He has no evil side to turn to. Good has another side. The other side of good is evil, just like your hand has an outside and an inside. The other side of good is evil. If the pressure on a good person is strong enough, that person will turn to his evil side. There is no other side to righteousness.
That is what the Scripture (King James Translation) means when it says, there is no shadow of turning. There is nothing for the Lord Jesus to turn to. He is righteous on the inside, and He is righteous on the outside. No matter how you twist Him or turn Him, He is righteous. Therefore, there is no failure in Christ Jesus.
The movies coming out of Hollywood showing the struggle between good and evil, with good prevailing, is a subliminal message to you and to your children that good will prevail over evil in this fallen world. The truth is, though, that in the overall scheme of things, good never prevails over evil, except in isolated instances which evil eventually breaks down. This is why everybody dies. We are all dying because evil is prevailing over good, because Abel is under the ground, and Cain is on top of Abel.
Praise God, the earthquake is coming, and Abel is being resurrected from the dead. Abel is the root system of Adam in all his glory. Adam is a supernatural being who had dominion over all the worlds before he fell. There was no such thing as disease, or death, or hunger, or want. Adam fell down and he died. But just like a plant outside in your garden, his root remains in the ground of mortal humanity. We are told in the Book of Job that, as long as that root remains, it can regenerate if the spiritual water just comes and touches it.
Can These Bones Live Again?
The Lord said to Ezekiel, the prophet, Can these bones live again? The answer is Yes, they can live again. Adam in his first estate, righteous Adam, with dominion over every evil in this world can live again. Why? Because Jehovah said so, and sent Jesus Christ to bring it to pass. Abel is breaking through Cain's ground and Adam is in the process of being raised from the dead, and will live again, so the earthquake is a good thing. This is something that the Church world does not know.
Pastor Manning and the Church world say that the earthquake is a bad thing, but I do not agree with him, and the Doctrine of Christ does not agree with him. The earthquake that the Scripture speaks about is a good thing. Jesus said that these things would happen in the last days. There will be earthquakes in divers places, wars and other problems. All of this turmoil that is coming on the earth is because Christ Jesus is piercing into this good and evil world. He is rising up from underneath the ground of our Carnal Mind, and He is going to overshadow us with His spiritually golden righteousness.
Brethren, if you have a problem and you need surgery, it is not a pleasant experience having a doctor cut you open with a knife, but then when the process is over, you live. A spiritual earthquake is not the most pleasant process, but the result of Christ Jesus piercing into this world, and all of the difficulties and the stresses that we are experiencing because of it, will result in the resurrection of the dead Adam.
Brethren, the promise of the Scripture is not to go to heaven. The promise of the Scripture is the resurrection of the dead Adam, dominion over death, hell, destruction, pain and suffering The promise of the Scripture is the resurrection of righteousness in mortal mankind, the resurrection of conscious existence, without suffering.
The Symbol of an Earthquake
In the Scripture, Is a Good Thing
The first Scripture we will look at is Revelation 6:12:
I beheld when he had opened the sixth seal, and, lo, there was a great earthquake; and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and the moon became as blood. KJV
The Church world and Pastor Manning, I believe, see this as something evil, but the Doctrine of Christ reveals that there is a spiritual sun and a spiritual moon in every individual. Each individual is considered a world, and we each have a sun and a moon, a spirit and a soul.
The Book of Malachi clearly identifies the Lord as the Sun of Righteousness. Brethren, if there is a Sun of Righteousness, there must be a sun of unrighteousness. The principle of reverse inference tells us that if there is a sun of righteousness, there must be a sun of unrighteousness. The spiritual sun within us is about to be covered.
Who is the sun and moon of unrighteous men, or of the Carnal Mind, or of the old man? It is Leviathan and Satan. Christ Jesus and Christ, our new sun and moon are coming to overshadow the Leviathan and Satan, and they will become old.
Is that a bad thing? If you are dying, and you are eligible for a heart transplant, is it a bad thing if a new heart is given to you? No, it is a good thing.
The sun of the old man, the sun of our old nature shall become black as sackcloth, means that its light will be put out when Christ Jesus overshadows it.
Old Man - New Man
What does Old Man mean? Our old nature which produces thoughts of death in our life, will be covered over and seen no more.
The moon will become as blood. Whose blood? Whose blood is covering the moon of the old man? The blood of Jesus. What does the blood of Jesus do? It purifies us.
Satan, the spirit of our fallen human nature, is the moon that reflects the pride of Leviathan, the sun that will be overshadowed. The foundational characteristic of our human nature is pride. That is what man is made of. The sun/pride of the old man, which is Satan, will be covered over, and seen no more. The elements of the creation are not being destroyed. They are being reconfigured, because every element of the creation that God made is necessary.
What happened is that the element that was underneath climbed up on top, and the whole creation became lopsided and died. A natural example is a baby born with its stomach outside on its chest. It cannot live. Every aspect of the creation will be reconfigured and restored to its proper place. Nothing is being destroyed.
Something can be good in a particular function, but when you move it into another area and it continues to do the same thing, it becomes evil.
You have no problem with your six-month old baby pooping in its diaper, but when your thirty-five year old son is pooping in his diaper, it is not a good thing. My little three-year old grandchild just loves to strip. She will come out, and she does not care who is in the living room, she will just take off all her clothes. You cannot be doing that when you are twenty-three years old or out on the street. They will arrest you.
What was good before the creation fell, became evil after the fall. Is that evil going to be destroyed? No! It is going to be put back in its place, where it is going to serve its original function.
The earthquake is a sign. All of these signs that sound so frightening in the Book of Revelation, signal the end of time. They are spiritual events which are restoring things to the way they were before the fall, but this restoration is not without pain. I am not going to lie to you. It is not without pain, but what correction to your health have you ever had that was without pain?
Rev. 8:5-7 And the angel took the censer, and filled it with fire of the altar, and cast it into the earth; and there were voices, and thunderings, and lightnings, and an earthquake. And the seven angels which had the seven trumpets prepared themselves to sound. The first angel sounded, and there followed hail and fire mingled with blood, and they were cast upon the earth: and the third part of trees was burnt up, and all green grass was burnt up.
I do not want to spend too much time on this, brethren, but I am telling you that this is the old nature, or the Old Man, being burnt up. We preached a whole series on the Book of Revelation explaining how the judgments of the Book of Revelation signify the destruction of the Old Man.
John the Baptist knew that he had to decrease so that Jesus could increase. The Old Man has to be destroyed so that the New Man can become our Inner Man, because our inner man is our true reality. When the New Man, which is in the Image of Righteousness (His name is Christ), takes over the job of sustaining our physical existence, we will think only righteous thoughts and speak only righteous words.
At that time we no longer be vulnerable to sickness or disease, and we will stop dying. Neither will we have to labor to have our needs met. The Scripture says there will be no more labor. That means no washing clothes, no growing food, no laboring in the fields, no shopping for food, clothing or personal needs. We will spend every moment in spiritual communion with God. I do not know exactly how this will work, but the ultimate end of the promise is complete restoration to an existence where we are so fully joined to God, that He will sustain our life and defend us from all evil. That is the definition of perfection.
This whole concept of interpreting the prophesies in the Book of Revelation to say that God is sending people to hell is not in agreement with the Doctrine of Christ, which teaches that we are in hell now. This world is hell, brethren. The extent of the mind control and illusion that convinces people to think that a great God who loves us would place people in a world where they are tormented, raped, murdered, killed, and tortured every day, never ceases to amaze me. This fallen world is hell. It is not God's ideal for us.
We have to be restored, and this world must be restored, because the situation that exists right now, this world and our life experience, do not line up with God's vision for us. It is a perversion that cannot continue because everything that God wills must come into existence.
The whole creation is in rebellion. It is the exact opposite of what Jehovah intended when the world was first initiated. The will of God must manifest in the earth, one way or another. The world itself, each individual, our inner man, our mind, everything about this world must be an accurate reflection of Jehovah's original intention for the creation. This is the rebellion that we hear about. We do not know that we are in rebellion. Most of us do not have the power to not be in rebellion. That is why the Lord has mercy on us.
We do a lot of things that are illegal and wrong from God's point of view, but He winks at them because we are ignorant. The Scriptural expression, "He is winking at it," means that He is not doing anything about it now, but, rather, is looking at the motives of our heart, because He knows that we are fallen. The Lord wants only to know that we are doing the best we can with what we have.
This is why it is so dangerous for Christians to look at people and judge them with their Carnal Mind, which does not know whether or not someone is doing the best they can with what they have. You do not know where that person came from. Someone can look like they are in serious sin and, yet, be more devoted and connected to God than the Pharisee who prays in public day and night.
The Lord looks at your heart. He is not looking at your outward appearance. Therefore, the Church is commanded to not judge. The only one that can judge is Christ Jesus. If you are mature enough to have Christ Jesus formed in you, and Christ Jesus in you reveals sin in somebody, and tells you to tell that person, that is a whole different story. Everybody should assume that they are not at that level, though, because to assume that you are at that level when you are not, is very dangerous for the person you judge and for yourself.
Rev. 11:13: And the same hour there was a great earthquake, and the tenth part of the city fell, and in the earthquake were slain of men seven thousand: and the remnant were affrighted, and gave glory to the God of heaven.
Who was slain? The Old Man that is slain.
The Old Man must be slain, but the Church is not receiving this message. We are told in the Book of Thessalonians that the Man of Sin, our old nature, is sitting in the temple of God, calling himself God. Paul clearly said that we are the temple of God, so it must be our old nature who is sitting in the temple of God, calling himself God, saying, I am Christ. This is a general statement and, of course, there are always exceptions.
The old nature is sitting in the people of God saying, I am God, and refusing to let Christ in. That same account in the Book of Thessalonians says thatt Christ will come, and slay That Evil One, and take His rightful place on the throne of the hearts of His people.
It is the Old Man that is being slain, not physical people. This is, again, one of the problems with Pastor Manning's teachings, that he brings spiritual truth into the natural. But, of course, unfortunately, many other teachers do the same thing.
Let's look at the incorrect principle that women cannot preach. What Pastor Manning does not seem to understand, and what the Church does not understand, is that all of mortal humanity, physical males and physical females, are spiritually female in relationship to Christ Jesus. Christ Jesus is the only spiritual male. Physical men and physical women are all spiritual women. In Christ Jesus, there is no more male or female, because if Christ Jesus is speaking through you, the sex of your physical body is of no consequence.
Pastor Manning's teachings put physical women in bondage and make physical women second class citizens, when Christ Jesus seeks to liberate them. These teachings hinder Christ Jesus from expressing Himself through the females of the Church population to the Church and to the world. To say that physical women cannot preach or manifest the anointing limits the number of people that can represent Christ Jesus to the world, by more than fifty percent. Those of you who have been in the Church for a while know that, more often than not, there are more women that are anointed than men.
Saying that women cannot preach is an anti-Christ statement that removes weapons that God can use to reach other people from God's spiritual pouch. Weapons to fight against people? No! Weapons to fight against the Old Man. God is mad at sin!
At one point in his account, Pastor Manning is saying, God does not like you, but I say that God likes everybody! God does not like the sin in men, He does not like your old nature. God does not like the behavior that manifests through your old nature, but it is totally inaccurate to say that God does not like someone.
God loves everybody, but He comes with correction, because He does not like your sin. His motive is always to do good to you. Sometimes God hurts you with His correction, but His motive is to do good to you. This means that, no matter how painful God's judgments might be, they will ultimately enure to our benefit.
It is an error to say that God does not like somebody. God's people are here in the earth. Our job is to represent God, His nature, His Plan, and His message to the world. How can we say God does not like somebody? God loves everybody, but He will correct behavior and attitudes that, in His estimation, are wrong. Why are they wrong? Because they oppose His Good Will for you. He wants good for you. If you have an attitude or a behavior that will produce evil in your life, He will oppose you. But His correctio does not mean that He does not like you.
I like Pastor Manning. I do not agree with, and sometimes I do not like what he is saying, but I like him.
Revelation 11:13 speaks about the death of the old man. We must be very careful not to apply Scriptures that are speaking about the spiritual man to individual human beings. You have to distinguish between the spiritual man and the human being. People will die, and people do die, but not because God is slaying them. People die because the consequence of their behavior is death.
THE PUNISHMENT OF GOD
The Jews teach that Jehovah is responsible for everything that happens, and the word punish, which brings forth condemnation, is found frequently in Jewish writings. I had a problem with this or years, but today I understand it.
When God created the universe, He incorporated a righteous law as part of the creation because we cannot exist without Law. You have to have order.
To bring it down to our level, if you jump out of a six story window, your bones will break and you will die when your physical body hits the ground. The law of gravity ensures that. In like manner, there are spiritual laws in this creation. If you kill, you will be killed. If you hurt, you will be hurt. You will reap what you have sown.
But if you love, there are no negative consequences, because there is no law against love. There is no negative consequence for loving someone. If you steal, something will be stolen from you.
That is the Law, and the law is not applied to our behavior, alone. The law is applied to the thoughts of our mind, even to the hidden motives of our heart. A good example is your son going for a joy ride, and his pal saying to him, stay in the car with the motor running, because I just have to make a stop at the liquor store. Then, when the friend robs the liquor store, your son, who is behind the wheel, but did not know what was going on, is going to jail. Every thought that comes out of our unconscious mind is a sowing that we will reap the consequences for, whether we know the thought is there, or not.
How unfair it is you say, that we should experience the consequences of our unconscious thoughts when we do not even know that they are there, and could not stop them if we knew. This Sowing & Reaping Judgment, this Law id a terrible thing? Now listen to me, brethren, this Law is God's great, great blessing to us, especially concerning the fallen condition that we are in.
Jehovah's answer to our human predicament is Jesus Christ, who is given to us as a New Mind that can look into the unconscious part of our fallen Carnal Mind, and correct thoughts which will surely produce death in our lives, even if they never rise into the conscious part of our Carnal Mind.
I am going to say it again, because this is essentially important. The whole world is under Jehovah's Righteous, Corrective Judgment, which the Jews call punishment. We all reap what we sow – even Christians. The only difference for Christians in this regard, is that through the flesh of Jesus Christ, we can escape the corruption that is in this world through lust.
Heb 10:20, By a new and living way, which he hath consecrated for us, through the veil, that is to say, his flesh; KJV
Col 1:27, 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: KJV
2 Peter 1:4, Whereby are given unto us exceeding great and precious promises: that by these ye might be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust. KJV
You have to know that if you are sick, there is a reason for it. God is not mad at you, but it is a consequence for something that happened, either that you did, or your parents did, or your grandparents did, or your great grandparents did. If your life is very evil, then somewhere in this generation, or in previous generations, you, or your ancestors have sown evil, because the Scripture says the judgment will continue unto the third and fourth generation.
Do not be mad at God. Just confess that for you to be in an unhappy situation, something wrong was done by you or your ancestors. Do not worry about it. Just say, Jesus, I confess it was wrong and please get me out of here.
That was what I did when I was dying, and today I am alive. I am not condemning myself, my parents, or my grandparents. I do not care about placing blame For me to be dying at twelve years old, my ancestors had to do something terribly wrong. I believed the Scripture, and prayed, saying, I don't know what I or my ancestors did, Lord, please just help me.
Jehovah's righteous Sowing &Reaping Judgment is what the Jews call punishment. Satan is not out to get you, as it is taught in the Church. Satan is the unconscious part of the Carnal Mind of all human beings. You may be victimized by the unrighteous, unconscious thoughts of the unconscious part of the Carnal Mind of your brethren. If that is the case, you have to seek Jesus for deliverance. If something unhappy in your life is cleaving unto you, and no matter how you pray, you cannot shake it, it might be the punishing thoughts of your brother, or it may be something on your family line that you have to deal with.
Listen, I have to say this again, because people have to hear this, but I do not hear anyone else in the Church preaching it:
Jehovah's righteous Sowing & Reaping Judgment produces car accidents, and disease, and financial disaster. Satan is not out to get you. You are reaping the fruit of your own thoughts and behavior, and the thoughts and behavior of at least four or more previous generations -- people that you never even met in your lifetime.
What is the answer to this problem? How do we get out of this vicious cycle of being judged for the thoughts of the unconscious part of our Carnal Mind, that we do not even know are there? Jehovah's answer for fallen humanity is Jesus Christ, another, New Mind that can see into the unconscious thoughts of your Carnal Mind and recognize them, so that we can .cry out to Jesus and say, I saw that thought in the back of my mind, and I do not want it manifested through me. I will have nothing to do with it. I rebuke it and bless that person, and Ipray for the best that could happen to them.
At this time, in our present condition, we do not have the power to stop the thoughts of the unconscious part of our Carnal Mind
The Church world says that sin that arises out of the unconscious part of your Carnal Mind is under the Blood of Jesus. What does that mean? It means that you will not reap a negative consequence for that evil thought, but this is a lie.
I want to tell you that somebody hurt me not too long ago, and Satan in the back of my mind wanted to wish them evil, very badly.
I had to struggle with the thought for almost three or four days saying, I will not agree with that thought that they should be disappointed. I bless them and pray that everything goes well for them. I struggled with that thought for several days, but I had no negative consequence to that evil thought that Satan stirred up from the back of the Carnal Mind of my old man.
Does the evil thought that I had make me an evil person? No, it does not! Most people will not admit when something wrong comes out of them, because in this world we are all taught to cover our tail and defend ourselves, but the Lord requires us to admit it when we think evil thoughys or do something wong. Now, you do not admit your sins to your enemy. You confess them to God, and to one other person that you trust.
A thought rose up in the back of my mind that was really bad, but I did not agree with it. I cast it down, and now I do not have to experience the consequences of my fallen nature. My new nature, which is righteous in Christ Jesus, gave me the power to say no to my Old Man: You may be cursing that person, but I bless her in Christ Jesus. I am delivered from the sword of the Sowing & Reaping Judgment in this situation, because there is no negative consequence for blessing someone. I came under the protection of the Law of Love when I said, I bless you. I do not care what you said about me. I do not care how you hurt me, I bless you.
Jehovah's answer to the predicament of fallen man (we suffer the consequences for unconscious thoughts that we do not even know are there), is the mind of Christ, which has the ability to see what is there. If you will not look at the thoughts of the unconscious part of your Carnal Mind, you are not using the tool that God gave you, and you will not reap the benefit of it, which is righteousness. This is a very, very important point: The Scripture is not necessarily talking about behavior when it says that we are all sinners. We are all sinners because Satan is the unconscious part of everybody's Carnal Mind.
When I first came to the Lord, I told Him that I did not understand why I was a sinner. I did not get it. I could not understand what I had done in my life that was so bad?" I needed to hear this teaching at that time. It was nowhere in the Church then, but it is here today.
We are all sinners in the deepest spiritual part of our being, where the Serpent, the one who generated us dwells, be cause we are the offspring of the Woman and the Serpent. We are supposed to be the offspring of the Woman and Jehovah, but we are the offspring of the Woman and the Serpent. That is why we have to be adopted. If we were in the image of God today, there would be no need to adopt us, but the Scripture says that we are being adopted. The Church is in a lot of fantasy about who we are.
Old Man - New Man (con't)
The Re-Birth of Christ
Rev 11:19, And the temple of God was opened in heaven, and there was seen in his temple the ark of his testament: and there were lightnings, and voices, and thunderings, and an earthquake, and great hail.
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Rev 12:1, And there appeared a great wonder in heaven; a woman clothed with the sun, and the moon under her feet, and upon her head a crown of twelve stars.
We see that a woman is giving birth to Christ, as a result of the earthquake. This is what the earthquake is all about.
Abel is coming up from under the ground of our humanity, as a result of the earthquake. Humanity is represented by the imagery of a woman. Physical men, physical women, you are all spiritually female in relation to Christ, and we are all, hopefully, being impregnated with the Christ child. Physical men are being impregnated with the spiritual Christ child as well as physical women, and this is why we are told in Jeremiah 30:6 that in the last days men will experience pain that can be likened to the pangs of childbirth.
We are talking about the spiritual childbirth that both physical men and physical women will be experiencing in the last days, because there is no salvation apart from birthing the Christ child. We shall be saved when we bear the Christ child. This is true for the physical men who are spiritual women, as well as the physical women who also spiritual women. You must bear the Christ child. I am very pregnant with the Christ child today, and it is He who is talking to you through me.
The Death Of The Carnal Mind
Rev 16:18-19: And there were voices, and thunders, and lightnings; and there was a great earthquake, such as was not since men were upon the earth, so mighty an earthquake, and so great. And the great city was divided into three parts, and the cities of the nations fell: and great Babylon came in remembrance before God, to give unto her the cup of the wine of the fierceness of his wrath.
The three parts of the city represent the three parts of the Carnal Mind, Satan, Leviathan and Cain. The famous psychiatrist, Dr. Freud, called it the ego, the super ego, and the id. There are three parts to the mind: The conscious, the subconscious mind and the unconscious. There is also a super conscious, which signifies a mind higher than the other three, and that is the Christ mind.
So, we see that it is the individual Carnal Mind that is being dismantled and falling apart, and the great Babylon is the collective Body of the Serpent which exists in a higher spiritual realm that is across from the Body of Christ. Down here in the visible, physical world, we are all separate, but in the higher spiritual realms, there is just one Spiritual Body that the Carnal Mind expresses its self through, and every mortal human is a part of it. That is who the great Babylon is, who is coming in remembrance before God. This means that God is about to deal with her to prepare her to receive a new wine skin (mind) which will be able to tolerate the intense vibration of His Spirit.
The Wrath Of God
This Greek word translated wrath can also be translated passion. The bottom line is this, brethren, mortal humanity is the wife of Christ Jesus . Nobody that reads the Scripture can deny that. We are the bride of Christ, but we are inhabited and, in most instances, directed by, our old nature. The Lord's passion for us is driving Him to judge the Church and destroy the old nature, so that He can fill us with His righteous nature.
Brethren, this truth has a very sexual connotation. Mortal humanity is in bed with the Serpent. We are in the bed of our mind with the wrong person. Wherefore, the Lord has every intention of removing Leviathan, the spiritual sexual member of the Serpent, from our mind, and penetrating us with the regenerated Adam, His own spiritual sexual member, who carries His own righteous nature. The Lord Jesus wants to permanently fill us with Himself Everything that happens and exists in this physical world is a type of some spiritual reality, which is given to help us to understand spiritual principles. .
Humanity is made to be possessed by a spiritual man. Right now, we are possessed by a spiritual person, our Old Man, who has the Serpent's nature. Someone else is in bed with God's wife, and this must change. The Church's understanding of the wrath of God is wrong. God is not against men. God loves men. I use that term, men, generically. Adam, means mankind. God loves physical men and physical women.
God is angry at the spiritual being, our Old Man, who is inhabiting us through a spiritual connection that can be likened to human sexual intercourse. Someone else is inside of God's woman. God's passion for us, therefore, will be expressed through actions which will put an end to that illegal union. God will then enter into a righteous relationship with mortal humanity, His wife. It does not matter whether you are a physical woman or a physical man. We are talking about mind and spirit.
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07/10/06ab-FinalEdit
9/06/06-Edited for content by Pastor Vitale
