I used to think that suffering for Christ was being ridiculed for being a Christian. I was taught by mainstream religion that if I lived as a Christian I would be persecuted. I thought that not siding with my old drinking crowd was what Peter was speaking of in the following verses:
1Pe 4:3 For the time past of our life may suffice us to have wrought the will of the Gentiles, when we walked in lasciviousness, lusts, excess of wine, revellings, banquetings, and abominable idolatries:
1Pe 4:4 Wherein they think it strange that ye run not with them to the same excess of riot, speaking evil of you:
I had a few times, very few, that I actually spoke up against someone’s religious opinion but that didn’t bring life threatening persecution or physical danger. I am sure in other parts of the world where Christians are persecuted that would happen but not here in the United States. So, when I read Peter, James and Paul’s writings they left me scratching my head because I was always reading them outwardly. When I was given to see the battle inwardly, I absolutely began having persecution from the beastly gentile within me.
Remember, scripture tells us that words are spirits. Right out of the womb, we begin taking in spirits (words) that teach us “doctrines” of how to see the world and our place in that world. We learn about ourselves, our environment, and how to best survive and thrive in our environment from our family, friends, community, schools, jobs and the endless information we’re bombarded with from media and anywhere and everywhere there are words. This is the building of our earthly “temple” and the man of sin (our identity in flesh and blood) who sits in our temple acting as God. Our temple built of lies, and our life as the god of that temple otherwise known as the man of sin must be brought down brick by brick. This process will be what we struggle against and ultimately be the cause of our “end times” persecution that scripture describes.
Everything and anything we hear and read can become a doctrine. I’ll give just a small example from my life. For me, country western music and watching westerns was one of the ways I was drawn into forming an image of my beast. Music put a melody to words that the more I listened the more I began SEEING and believing what they were saying. Watching westerns instilled me with ideas and beliefs about how men were to treat women and that “country folk” were tougher than “city folk.” Drinking and bar fighting were glamorized, along with adulterous affairs and one nights stands.
This is only a small example of how “legions” of doctrines enter our “temple.” We form relationships with people who have “familiar spirits”, meaning they have been filled with the same spirits of information and, therefore, see the world as we do. Our beast is comfortable with others of its kind. This example I gave of country western-style music and movies is only an obvious example of a much more pervasive and insidious reality. The man of sin within us is surrounded by a fortress of lies posing as altruistic and moral but is at his core self justifying and self preserving. He is antiChrist because he comes from a darkened perspective that sees himself as god. Only Christ can reveal this ‘leviathan’ within us aka the man of sin, who will also ultimately be our persecutor. Once the scales fall off our eyes and Christ begins to reveal this man of sin within us, we will begin to see things differently and a war is started between the new man (Christ being formed within us) and our old man. It’s the fight between Jacob and Esau, the spirit of Christ and the spirit of satan.
Back to my example of country western indoctrination…as the scales have begun to fall off my eyes and Christ within me begins dismantling my temple of lies with a rod of iron, an example of the struggle manifests when someone crosses me and I don’t/can’t act in a way I would have in the past, the way I was taught in westerns about “being a man.” The old man inside me calls me a coward. When someone does something against a doctrine of mine and I don’t “set them in their place,” then I’m persecuted with thoughts from my old beast who ruled my old world. Thoughts that fire up fears that I’m letting someone take advantage of me. It’s frustrating and sometimes agonizing to keep my mouth shut in the face of what my beast perceives as a full assault on his “manhood.” Every streetcorner church preaches “turning the other cheek” but this goes from a saying to reality for the Elect. Our new man is being taught to SUBMIT to Christ as the true and only Authority. We have no “rights.” We are slaves of Christ and whatever situation He places us in is to be submitted to in humility…as unto Christ. Saying all this to say that the persecution is inward and very real for those whose world is being destroyed. If you’re a chosen vessel of Christ then your world is going through an earthquake like never before. I’ve experienced hard times, seen death, held hands of dying people who were dear to me but the death of myself has been the hardest death I’ve ever experienced. So, when Peter says “think it not strange concerning the fiery trial which is to try you,” he was speaking about the inward battle we will go through in the destruction of our earth and the recreation of a new earth, founded on the doctrines of Christ.
1Pe 4:12 Beloved, think it not strange concerning the fiery trial which is to try you, as though some strange thing happened unto you:
1Pe 4:13 But rejoice, inasmuch as ye are partakers of Christ’s sufferings; that, when his glory shall be revealed, ye may be glad also with exceeding joy.
1Pe 4:14 If ye be reproached for the name of Christ, happy are ye; for the spirit of glory and of God resteth upon you: on their part he is evil spoken of, but on your part he is glorified.
Heb 12:3 For consider him that endured such contradiction of sinners against himself, lest ye be wearied and faint in your minds.
Joh 1:10 He was in the world, and the world was made by him, and the world knew him not.
Joh 1:11 He came unto his own, and his own received him not.
Look at the preceding scriptures closely. Let’s look at them inwardly. Christ not only died to His literal flesh on the cross but lived 33 years walking around the dead. Those He created hated Him and didn’t even realize He had created them. This happened in the natural but is also happening NOW within us. As an Elect, Christ will enter us and endure the “contradiction of sinners against himself” that live in us – the world of doctrines within us of self preservation and self worship that know and receive Him not. Our old beast hates the truth and fights tooth and nail against it. My old fearful Satanic beast nature hates the new man in me being formed by the doctrines of Christ, so much so he would rather be dead than see his world taken from him. Everyday there is an inward fight to lay down and submit to the doctrines of Christ. My old world does not understand why I’m not living like I used to. I would liken it to the parable of the outward world’s doctrine of “schizophrenia.” Two people, two nations dwell within me, Jacob and Esau. What the outward world would call diving into your “psyche,” scripture would call exposing the man of sin. It’s the man on the island of the Gadarenes, who was filled with legions of devils.
Luk 8:27 And when he went forth to land, there met him out of the city a certain man, which had devils long time, and ware no clothes, neither abode in any house, but in the tombs.
Luk 8:28 When he saw Jesus, he cried out, and fell down before him, and with a loud voice said, What have I to do with thee, Jesus, thou Son of God most high? I beseech thee, torment me not.
Luk 8:29 (For he had commanded the unclean spirit to come out of the man. For oftentimes it had caught him: and he was kept bound with chains and in fetters; and he brake the bands, and was driven of the devil into the wilderness.)
Luk 8:30 And Jesus asked him, saying, What is thy name? And he said, Legion: because many devils were entered into him.
The Elect of God begin to recognize that these doctrines we have taken on are legions, spirits that are spoken words. Words are spirit, Christ said in John 6:63, and words make us what we are. Of course we know, or should know, that God is the Author of all things. As part of our creative process that is Authored completely by Christ, we are given over to these doctrines for a time. Once we have been given to see the truth inwardly, we are then taken on a journey where we begin walking through the nations within us, converting doctrines, casting out devils, healing the sick and raising the dead. We see that the time of our old world is coming to an end and we no longer have to live according to the will of the doctrines/people in it. Our world is falling apart. Our heavens are being opened and our Satanic nature is falling out of our heavens. Christ is descending into our world to rule it with a rod of iron.
Luk 10:18 And he said unto them, I beheld Satan as lightning fall from heaven.
Rev 19:11 And I saw heaven opened, and behold a white horse; and he that sat upon him was called Faithful and True, and in righteousness he doth judge and make war.
Rev 19:12 His eyes were as a flame of fire, and on his head were many crowns; and he had a name written, that no man knew, but he himself.
Rev 19:13 And he was clothed with a vesture dipped in blood: and his name is called The Word of God.
Rev 19:14 And the armies which were in heaven followed him upon white horses, clothed in fine linen, white and clean.
Rev 19:15 And out of his mouth goeth a sharp sword, that with it he should smite the nations: and he shall rule them with a rod of iron: and he treadeth the winepress of the fierceness and wrath of Almighty God.
Rev 19:16 And he hath on his vesture and on his thigh a name written, KING OF KINGS, AND LORD OF LORDS.
The outward manifestations of our beast such as lying, cheating, stealing, drunkenness, adultery, etc. have outwardly been brought into subjection to our Satanic nature for it’s own good, preserving itself through religion. This was not a change of the heart. The Subtil Satanic nature within me said, “You’d better get it together boy or you’re gonna destroy yourself.” It was merely my serpentine nature desiring to be seen as a good man or as Christ called it, “the goodman of the house,” it was the voice of the serpent telling me I had driven myself to such low standards and now I must lift myself back up. Christ, Who is the Creator of all things used the “wickedness” in me to correct me.
Jer 2:19 Thine own wickedness shall correct thee, and thy backslidings shall reprove thee: know therefore and see that it is an evil thing and bitter, that thou hast forsaken the LORD thy God, and that my fear is not in thee, saith the Lord GOD of hosts.
Job 12:16 With him is strength and wisdom: the deceived and the deceiver are his.
When Christ is revealed IN us He then begins to expose the inward beast that has led us by the nose. The outward goodman is not the issue as much as the inward goodman. Christ said that unless your righteousness EXCEEDS the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees you shall in no wise enter the kingdom of God. And then He said that He did not come to destroy the law and not one jot or tittle shall fall from the law until ALL has been fulfilled. Then He said that if you look upon a woman to lust after her you have committed adultery in your heart. All of this is inward.
Mat 5:17 Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil.
Mat 5:18 For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled.
Mat 5:19 Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so, he shall be called the least in the kingdom of heaven: but whosoever shall do and teach them, the same shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.
Mat 5:20 For I say unto you, That except your righteousness shall exceedthe righteousnessof the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven.
Mat 5:27 Ye have heard that it was said by them of old time, Thou shalt not commit adultery:
Mat 5:28 But I say unto you, That whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery with her already in his heart.
Mat 24:43 But know this, that if the goodman of the house had known in what watch the thief would come, he would have watched, and would not have suffered his house to be broken up.
Mat 24:44 Therefore be ye also ready: for in such an hour as ye think not the Son of man cometh.
The goodman of my house cleaned up his act alright, outwardly, but the heart was never changed. He still believed that his thoughts were not the problem. Now that Christ is marching through my life He is exposing the thoughts, the doctrines, the teachings and beliefs that molded a man after his OWN image, a man who thought that he sat in his own temple and that he was the goodman of the house. Scripture calls him the man of sin. He was molded by the “angel of light” – my satanic drive to be my own god. What has ruled my world has been kept secret until Christ took the scales off my eyes. Before we go into the next set of verses it must be pointed out that the entire religous world is looking for Christ’s outward return in the future. Everyone is looking for a second coming in which an evil man must appear first and sit in the literal temple in literal Israel, or some version of this message. But, because our Satanic world is not divided against itself we are always putting off Christ’s return in the future, outwardly, for some other person or generation. We don’t want to be exposed NOW. No one wants to deal with what Christ’s return will be like, NOW! No one knows they are the man of sin. Without Christ’s intervention, it cannot be known. This truth is why Paul was telling them not to be shaken IN MIND “BECAUSE” the day of Christ IS AT HAND. Christ is here, in you, if you are an Elect.
Let’s look at the following verse. The words “as that” are most often translated “because” 183 times out of 204. Instead of using the word “because” as it was most often used, the KJV translators used the words “as that” because it made more sense with a doctrine that believed Christ is returning outwardly, in the future, rather than returning inwardly in the life of every believer. Here’s the verse in the KJV so you can see the Strongs numbers.
2Th 2:2 That yeG5209 be notG3361 soonG5030 shakenG4531 inG575 mind,G3563 orG3383 be troubled,G2360 neitherG3383 byG1223 spirit,G4151 norG3383 byG1223 word,G3056 norG3383 byG1223 letterG1992 asG5613 fromG1223 us,G2257 as thatG3754 theG3588 dayG2250 of ChristG5547 is at hand (the word is present).G1764
In other words, Paul is saying don’t be so shaken by what you’re going through because the day of Christ is “present” in your life. I told you that this would happen when I was with you. What you’re going through is the revealing of your man of sin.
Now in verse three the KJV translators continued the narrative about a future outward coming of Christ by ADDING these words, “for that day shall not come.” Look after the words are written, there are no Strongs numbers to back up those words. They are a continuation of the false doctrine of a future man of sin and a future return of Christ. Look at the verse.
2Th 2:3 Let noG3361 manG5100 deceiveG1818 youG5209 byG2596 anyG3367 means:G5158 forG3754 that day shall not come, exceptG3362 there comeG2064 a falling awayG646 first,G4412 andG2532 that manG444 of sinG266 be revealed,G601 theG3588 sonG5207 of perdition;G684
Now, when you replace the words “as that” with the more commonly used word “because” and take out those added words from verse three, here is what you get:
2Th 2:1 Now we beseech you, brethren, by the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, and by our gathering together unto him,
2Th 2:2 That ye be not soon shaken in mind, or be troubled, neither by spirit, nor by word, nor by letter as from us, “because” the day of Christ is at hand.
2Th 2:3 Let no man deceive you by any means: for except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition; (the falling away of the scales from our eyes, exactly what happened to Paul himself. This is why he can tell them not to be alarmed because he had been through it, verse 5.)
2Th 2:4 Who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God, or that is worshipped; so that he as God sitteth in the temple of God, shewing himself that he is God.
2Th 2:5 Remember ye not, that, when I was yet with you, I told you these things?
We are being gathered now. Christ’s return started 2000 years ago on the day of pentecost when He entered the believers and they began to speak in new ways never heard. A new tongue is a new way of understanding (hearing) something never before understood (heard). It’s the same as saying “I never heard that before.” The truth crosses all language barriers and cuts to the heart. Christ told them to go wait for Him to return and that is what He did.
Act 1:4 And, being assembled together with them, commanded them that they should not depart from Jerusalem, butwait for the promise of the Father, which,saith he,ye have heard of me.
Act 1:5 For John truly baptized with water; but ye shall be baptized with the Holy Ghost not many days hence.
Wait for the promise, ye have heard of me, and you shall be baptized with the holy ghost NOT MANY DAYS HENCE. I’m going to return soon and you’ll be baptized IN FIRE.
Mat 3:11 I indeed baptize you with water unto repentance: but he that cometh after me is mightier than I, whose shoes I am not worthy to bear: he shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost, and with fire:
Mat 3:12 Whose fan is in his hand, and he will throughly purge his floor, and gather his wheat into the garner; but he will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire.
These verses are saying the same thing that Paul is saying in II Thessalonians 2. Don’t be alarmed by what’s happening to you. It’s what I told you would happen. It’s the revealing of your man of sin and he will have great wrath once he sees he has lost his power. No one wants to go through this fire of everything you ever thought or think being brought into subjection to Christ and going through the fire of judgment – peeling back each layer of the onion that covered the man of sin. Every thought, every word, everything is brought under the fire of the spirit of God and everything is shown what it was and where it came from whether from Christ as Creator or from the man of sin as creator. Christ will not share His creation with anyone and this is a consuming fire that will burn up the chaff with unquenchable heat. Christ is holding us back from seeing His return until He first reveals the man of sin in us and then at the same time He begins returning in our life, lighting up who and what we were from creation as beasts with a subtil serpentine nature and who we are as the man of sin who opposes and exalts himself ABOVE ALL, EVEN GOD HIMSELF. We are Lucifer claiming he is God and that he made himself evil and now has made himself good. He claims he is the creator of everything and God is not in control of his life…HE IS! AND NOW YOU KNOW….
2Th 2:6 And now ye know what withholdeth that he might be revealed in his time.
2Th 2:7 For the mystery of iniquity doth already work: only he who now letteth will let, until he be taken out of the way.
2Th 2:8 And then shall that Wicked be revealed, whom the Lord shall consume with the spirit of his mouth, and shall destroy with the brightness of his coming:
2Th 2:9 Even him, whose coming is after the working of Satan with all power and signs and lying wonders,
2Th 2:10 And with all deceivableness of unrighteousness in them that perish; because they received not the love of the truth, that they might be saved.
2Th 2:11 And for this cause God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie:
2Th 2:12 That they all might be damned who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness.
The man of sin in us is revealed and at the same time Christ’s brightness as THE ONE AND ONLY CREATOR consumes our man of sin whose coming together was after or by our Satanic nature. We had signs and lying wonders that deceived everything in us. God Himself sent us the strong delusion. But we praise God because all of what we thought we built will be destroyed by the brightness of the truth. Everything that I thought I built will be judged by the light of truth and because it denied God’s love in Christ and thought it built itself, it will be destroyed forever. A new heaven/mind and earth/body are being formed and Christ is being seen as The Creator of my old world and the new world that I exist in and am learning to exist in. I described one simple, small aspect of the making of my man of sin and what Christ used to build him up and then tear him down. You have your own man of sin that has been erected and will come down if you are an Elect. The return of Christ is now in the life of the Elect. Our satanic nature wants to put it off down the road on a literal second coming in the literal skies. But, that is a sign and lying wonder for those who are still blinded by their man of sin. So, as Paul said “don’t be shaken in mind” when Christ begins showing you what you are. It will indeed shake you to your core. Every thought, every act, good or evil, will be examined, no stone left unturned and then you will see the truth of the Godhead and how you have not built anything. I did not make my first creation, Christ did. And I am not recreating myself, Christ is. My past life has been sufficent to bring me to where I am today. The fulness of my Gentile has been fulfilled, “For I would not, brethren, that ye should be ignorant of this mystery, lest ye should be wise in your own conceits; that blindness in part is happened to Israel, until the fulness of the Gentiles be come in.”
1Pe 4:3 For the time past of our life may suffice us to have wrought the will of the Gentiles, when we walked in lasciviousness, lusts, excess of wine, revellings, banquetings, and abominable idolatries:
1Pe 4:4 Wherein they think it strange that ye run not with them to the same excess of riot, speaking evil of you:
I am left scratching my head in unbelief, amazed at the depths I had fallen and the heights I had risen, and all for the worship of my own godhood. I AM the man of sin! A Satan influenced nature (S.I.N.) that was deceived into thinking it was God. But, the good news is I am giving account now by seeing Christ as The Creator. He is judging what I saw as dead and what I saw as living. I am being judged as dead and yet I am now living unto God in the spirit. The end of me is at hand. I am not drunk anymore on false doctrine. I’ve been sobered up by Christ’s return. I am being taught what it means to love and worship God in truth. I can love out of a pure heart of knowing that what I and you are, were and will be is by the hand of God. We didn’t create ourselves, God did. I can now have fervent love in truth.
1Pe 4:5 Who shall give account to him that is ready to judge the quick and the dead.
1Pe 4:6 For for this cause was the gospel preached also to them that are dead, that they might be judged according to men in the flesh, but live according to God in the spirit.
1Pe 4:7 But the end of all things is at hand: be ye therefore sober, and watch unto prayer.
1Pe 4:8 And above all things have fervent charity among yourselves: for charity shall cover the multitude of sins.
1Pe 4:9 Use hospitality one to another without grudging.
1Pe 4:10 As every man hath received the gift, even so minister the same one to another, as good stewards of the manifold grace of God.
1Pe 4:11 If any man speak, let him speak as the oracles of God; if any man minister, let him do it as of the ability which God giveth: that God in all things may be glorified through Jesus Christ, to whom be praise and dominion for ever and ever. Amen.
Now the following verses should have a deeper meaning to you if you are seeing the return of Christ in you.
1Pe 4:12 Beloved, think it not strange concerning the fiery trial which is to try you, as though some strange thing happened unto you:
1Pe 4:13 But rejoice, inasmuch as ye are partakers of Christ’s sufferings; that, when his glory shall be revealed, ye may be glad also with exceeding joy.
1Pe 4:14 If ye be reproached for the name of Christ, happy are ye; for the spirit of glory and of God resteth upon you: on their part he is evil spoken of, but on your part he is glorified.
1Pe 4:15 But let none of you suffer as a murderer, or as a thief, or as an evildoer, or as a busybody in other men’s matters.
1Pe 4:16 Yet if any man suffer as a Christian, let him not be ashamed; but let him glorify God on this behalf.
1Pe 4:17 For the time is come that judgment must begin at the house of God: and if it first begin at us, what shall the end be of them that obey not the gospel of God?
1Pe 4:18 And if the righteous scarcely be saved, where shall the ungodly and the sinner appear?
1Pe 4:19 Wherefore let them that suffer according to the will of God commit the keeping of their souls to him in well doing, as unto a faithful Creator.
Judgment starts the process by the revealing of our man of sin. We shouldn’t be alarmed at what we see about what it took to get us where we are today. We will be taught to rejoice in what we are seeing because what we are seeing is something that no one in the world, who is not Elect, is privileged to see. No one sees what they are, everyone denies they are Satan, everyone has been sent the strong delusion. We were deceived by the man of sin that Christ created.
If Christ’s return is an outward future descending from the clouds, then why did Paul say that God revealed Christ in Him and that Christ is in us?
Gal 1:15 But when it pleased God, who separated me from my mother’s womb, and called me by his grace,
Gal 1:16 To reveal his Son in me, that I might preach him among the heathen; immediately I conferred not with flesh and blood:
2Co 13:5 Examine yourselves, whether ye be in the faith; prove your own selves. Know ye not your own selves, how that Jesus Christ is in you, except ye be reprobates?
So, if you are an Elect then Christ has returned and is walking through you exposing the man of sin in you. That man of sin is repeatedly exposed in parable form in scripture from Genesis to Revelation. He can be seen in characters like Pharoah, Nebuchadnezzar, Lucifer, Leviathan, Pilate, Pharisees, Sadducees, Judas, Herod, scribes, elders, Romans, the Dragon etc. Now you can think it not strange the wrath our man of sin will have against the new man being created within us.
Rev 12:12 Therefore rejoice, ye heavens, and ye that dwell in them. Woe to the inhabiters of the earth and of the sea! for the devil is come down unto you, having great wrath, because he knoweth that he hath but a short time.
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