Being1inChrist

Everything in our life hangs on faith. Do I believe God has given me eternal life based on the life, death, burial and resurrection of Christ? Do I believe that all sin has been taken care of in Christ or do I believe I must work a work and salvation is then a debt owed to me by God?

“Now to him that worketh is the reward not reckoned of grace, but of debt.”

No part of me can be saved by my own works. Everything in me has been stamped with death because I am under the law. The law of God has condemned everything in me from birth. I was shaped in self righteousness (iniquity-Ezk.33:13) and in sin did my babylonian church conceive me. Everything I did or did not do was based on my own godhood, my own knowledge of what was good and what was evil for me.

“Behold, I was shapen in iniquity; and in sin did my mother conceive me.” 

“And the serpent said unto the woman, Ye shall not surely die: For God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil.”

I can lay no claims to purity because every thought in my unconverted heart is a thought of self and self only. I think I am my own god and that I make bad choices and good choices independent from The God. With this thought I believe God owes me.

“As it is written, There is none righteous, no, not one: There is none that understandeth, there is none that seeketh after God. They are all gone out of the way, they are all together become unprofitable; there is none that doeth good, no, not one. Their throat is an open sepulchre; with their tongues they have used deceit; the poison of asps is under their lips: Whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness: Their feet are swift to shed blood: Destruction and misery are in their ways: And the way of peace have they not known: There is no fear of God before their eyes. Now we know that what things soever the law saith, it saith to them who are under the law: that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may become guilty before God. Therefore by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified in his sight: for by the law is the knowledge of sin.”

The law of sin and death produces a misunderstanding in my heart that God owes me something because I am good or evil. Not knowing that God moves me to do good or moves me to do evil.

“I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the LORD do all these”

“So then it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that sheweth mercy. For the scripture saith unto Pharaoh, Even for this same purpose have I raised thee up (the evil in me), that I might shew my power in thee, and that my name might be declared throughout all the earth. Therefore hath he mercy on whom he will have mercy, and whom he will he hardeneth. Thou wilt say then unto me, Why doth he yet find fault? For who hath resisted his will? Nay but, O man, who art thou that repliest against God? Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it, Why hast thou made me thus? Hath not the potter power over the clay, of the same lump to make one vessel unto honour(the good), and another unto dishonour(the evil)?”

Everything must be attributed to God as The Author and Finisher of everything I was, am, or will be or it is considered a work of the flesh. A work of the flesh, meaning I have not been given the truth that I create nothing and God is Creator of all. This lie leads parts of me that are still unconverted to get angry at God when things don’t go the way I think they should because I thought I had a will separate from God. Yesterday while putting up fence, the end post, where a 12 foot gate was attached moved considerably and the gate would not attach right. When I stretched the 100 yard fence with the tractor the post moved in the ground. This left the fence with slackness and a leaning post. I was extremely angry and disappointed because I thought I had done everything right. I thought that it was by wisdom and experience that would make the post and fence go up without a hitch. I asked God in my thoughts “why did you do that”? The thought was because I thought I had deserved a good outcome based on my carnal reasoning and was not seeing that God makes a post lean or stand straight, not my carnal wisdom. I was taking pride in the work of my hands and robbing the glory from God. Above where Romans 3 is quoted it says that there is none righteous, no not one, it is speaking to my whole world within me. This is where we start off as Elect, as all of mankind. Shapen in iniquity and every thought is conceived in sin. Sin being taking credit for everything and anything, good or evil and every thought based off the premise that all things are by me and for me. If a work is of man, meaning a work that is perceived as my own, it will come to nothing, for my own good. In one way or another, the work will not stand whether in the long or short of it. In God’s perspective, it is a vapor, it has not been granted eternity. But, if it be a work of God that He desires to remain then no one can stop it nor destroy it – either way, the will of God cannot be stopped – it is the will of God who is the sole author and creator of all things. The Lord creates all things including things He intends to destroy. As scripture says He has “…created the waster to destroy.”

“And now I say unto you, Refrain from these men, and let them alone: for if this counsel or this work be of men, it will come to nought: But if it be of God, ye cannot overthrow it; lest haply ye be found even to fight against God.”

Even my apparent failure is of God because I was not given the will of God for something to turn out according to my carnal reasoning. I was given by God to be led astray by thoughts of a self will to try and accomplish something that was not going to be accomplished…the thwarting of my trust in my flesh was exactly what He had willed – thus the failure is for my GOOD because it destroys my trust in self. Failure is a will of God saying no to my perceived self-will. Every thought that goes through my mind (ministering spirit) must hang on the truth that God is doing something for my good, either to teach me patience or to teach me faith. It is not as though we are individual beings that make independent choices separate from Him that work out to the good or to the bad. Each decision is a will of God for the good (ultimately) or for the bad (short term). Bad being an outcome where my carnal self-will is not given what it desires and good being an outcome where God is glorified. A “work of men” is anything I do for my own glorification, where my trust was in myself, and will come to nothing.

“O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! how unsearchable are his judgments, and his ways past finding out! For who hath known the mind of the Lord? or who hath been his counsellor? Or who hath first given to him, and it shall be recompensed unto him again? For of him, and through him, and to him, are all things: to whom be glory for ever. Amen.”

I don’t give anything to God but what He has willed I give back to Him. As the verse above says, “who has first given to God and then God returns the favor to him? Because all things are of God, through God and to God”. So, everything comes down from Him to us and we only give Him back what He desired to have. He owes us nothing. But, to the person who has been given this truth God has given him everything. Nothing is impossible, nothing is too grand, nothing is to be seen as an impossibility.

“Jesus said unto him, If thou canst believe, all things are possible to him that believeth.”

God has showed me the impossible, to my mind, the depths He would drive me. Driven to situations and depths that I never dreamed possible. In my early years I had such confidence in my own wisdom and knowledge and never dreamed I would be driven to such lows. I thought that I was untouchable because of my own wisdom and knowledge, never knowing that I was being led to the slaughter. And today the same principal applies to the good. I had never dreamed I would be where I am and have what I have and know it was not my wisdom or knowledge that got me here but what God has predestined it be. It is, was and always will be God as The only Creator, creating through His Son Jesus Christ. Whatever He opens no man can shut and whatever He shuts no man can open. I have quoted the following verse a thousand times but the enormity of it surpasses the carnal mind.

“Wherefore David blessed the LORD before all the congregation: and David said, Blessed be thou, LORD God of Israel our father, for ever and ever. Thine, O LORD, is the greatness, and the power, and the glory, and the victory, and the majesty: for all that is in the heaven and in the earth is thine; thine is the kingdom, O LORD, and thou art exalted as head above all. Both riches and honour come of thee, and thou reignest over all; and in thine hand is power and might; and in thine hand it is to make great, and to give strength unto all. Now therefore, our God, we thank thee, and praise thy glorious name. But who am I, and what is my people, that we should be able to offer so willingly after this sort? for all things come of thee, and of thine own have we given thee. For we are strangers before thee, and sojourners, as were all our fathers: our days on the earth are as a shadow, and there is none abiding. O LORD our God, all this store that we have prepared to build thee an house for thine holy name cometh of thine hand, and is all thine own. I know also, my God, that thou triest the heart, and hast pleasure in uprightness. As for me, in the uprightness of mine heart I have willingly offered all these things: and now have I seen with joy thy people, which are present here, to offer willingly unto thee. O LORD God of Abraham, Isaac, and of Israel, our fathers, keep this for ever in the imagination of the thoughts of the heart of thy people, and prepare their heart unto thee.”

The last line of these verses are what I pray for. God knows my heart whether I believe these things or not because He gives me the belief or He doesn’t. And I pray that He keeps this belief in every imagination of my heart and prepares my heart every minute of every day for His glory. When I was a child I believed, had faith, that my dad could do anything and there was nothing he couldn’t do. This child-like faith is what Christ is creating in our hearts to trust Him as our Creator. There is nothing that He cannot do, nor is anything too big for Him. To please God is to believe in God as The only Creator. We cannot believe in ourselves, someone else, something else, but only God as The Author and Finisher of all things. “But without faith it is impossible to please him: for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him.” God is the strength of my hands. The strength of my legs. He makes my heart beat and my lungs work. I do not stay alive because my heart beats, rather my heart is beating because God is keeping me alive. Nothing is separate from Him nor a power independent from Him. He is The All in all. Christ is in us bringing every imagination into subjection to the supremecy of God The Father. Christ is subduing every thought in us to The Father as God and as the power behind everything. When King David prayed, “As for me, in the uprightness of mine heart I have willingly offered all these things: and now have I seen with joy thy people, which are present here, to offer willingly unto thee. O LORD God of Abraham, Isaac, and of Israel, our fathers, keep this for ever in the imagination of the thoughts of the heart of thy people, and prepare their heart unto thee“, It was a parable of Christ praying this about us. Bringing every thought into subjection to God as The Creator, not my intellect, experience, or savvy. It’s always God, from beginning to end. To be given the faith of Christ to believe this, is to die to my world and live unto the kingdom OF God. Where everything is seen as a power of God, from God, by God and for God. A parable of this understanding is in a “eunuch”. A eunuch has no desire for the flesh to procreate something in an image of itself. They only care for the things of God. Inwardly it is the same for us. When we are given by God to be castrated from the world we become spiritual eunuchs. Like a steer. We see that Boo and Rocky (our steers) are very committed to us and don’t really care about anything else because they are steers who have been castrated. They don’t care about procreation. When we have been castrated from the world by God we don’t care about creating an image of ourselves in the world anymore but are committed unto God for His glory. A steer is more docile, calm, and trainable because his desire for procreation has been removed. He doesn’t have the drive for creating an image of himself anymore but solely for his master. This is called being circumcised in the heart. The other day my wife was listening to a woman who was training her calf on a halter. The woman said that when training a calf you teach the calf that when it pulls against the lead there’s pressure but when the calf comes closer to you the pressure is relieved. This is what Christ is teaching us. There’s only pressure when we resist Him, and don’t have faith in Him. When we give up our own thoughts of experience or knowledge and trust Him as all knowledge the pressure leaves. To have faith in Christ as The Creator is to be relieved of all worry and pressure. Christ is a very kind, gentle Shepherd Who never tugs on us but only asks us to follow Him. When we don’t there’s pressure, when we do there’s peace and joy. It’s the same principal Christ told the woman at the well.

“Then cometh he to a city of Samaria, which is called Sychar, near to the parcel of ground that Jacob gave to his son Joseph. Now Jacob’s well was there. Jesus therefore, being wearied with his journey, sat thus on the well: and it was about the sixth hour. There cometh a woman of Samaria to draw water: Jesus saith unto her, Give me to drink. (For his disciples were gone away unto the city to buy meat.) Then saith the woman of Samaria unto him, How is it that thou, being a Jew, askest drink of me, which am a woman of Samaria? for the Jews have no dealings with the Samaritans. Jesus answered and said unto her, If thou knewest the gift of God, and who it is that saith to thee, Give me to drink; thou wouldest have asked of him, and he would have given thee living water. The woman saith unto him, Sir, thou hast nothing to draw with, and the well is deep: from whence then hast thou that living water? Art thou greater than our father Jacob, which gave us the well, and drank thereof himself, and his children, and his cattle? Jesus answered and said unto her, Whosoever drinketh of this water shall thirst again:But whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life. The woman saith unto him, Sir, give me this water, that I thirst not, neither come hither to draw. Jesus saith unto her, Go, call thy husband, and come hither. The woman answered and said, I have no husband. Jesus said unto her, Thou hast well said, I have no husband: For thou hast had five husbands; and he whom thou now hast is not thy husband: in that saidst thou truly. The woman saith unto him, Sir, I perceive that thou art a prophet. Our fathers worshipped in this mountain; and ye say, that in Jerusalem is the place where men ought to worship. Jesus saith unto her, Woman, believe me, the hour cometh, when ye shall neither in this mountain, nor yet at Jerusalem, worship the Father. Ye worship ye know not what: we know what we worship: for salvation is of the Jews. But the hour cometh, and now is, when the true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth: for the Father seeketh such to worship him.Godisa Spirit: and they that worship him must worshiphimin spirit and in truth. The woman saith unto him, I know that Messias cometh, which is called Christ: when he is come, he will tell us all things. Jesus saith unto her, I that speak unto thee am he.“

Whosoever in me follows Christ in faith never thirsts. The world in me is filled with unbelievers who have lived their lives based on wisdom, experience, and their own knowledge, which is water that does not quench my thirst because it is not based on the spirit of God which is based on the truth that Christ is The only Creator. When we are given by Christ to trust in The Father we are worshipping God in spirit and in the truth that our Father controls it all. Then our world is converted, thought by thought. God is Spirit and we must worship Him in spirit. Spirit being the thoughts/ministering spirits that lead us to know that God is in absolute total control of everything. We need not worry and pull away, add pressure. But even our pulling away is a power of God that is teaching us to trust Him and submit to everything that comes our way. He is teaching us to be led by a halter to eternal life, life that goes on and does not die in my finite wisdom. The wisdom of man teaches us that there are ghouls and goblins out there in some spirit realm and they are sent by a greater goblin called Satan. Carnal wisdom teaches that we must be always scared that this greater ghoul is always trying to lead us astray and it’s up to us to be led astray or to resist him or them. But the truth is that the only devil is my own thought of I “shall be as God to know between good and evil”. And that greater thought multiplies into more ways of being my own god which are more evil spirits, more thoughts and doctrines. To know there is only One God, Who creates all things and controls all things is the ultimate blow to the converting of the world within me. It is faith in God as my Lord and my redeemer that converts a world drinking its own water, that ends up leaving us thirsty again. We have to keep coming back to our own well to learn more because we are always thirsty to rule more. But the truth of Christ as The Image of God and as The Only One ever Begotten by God is a water well we can drink from and never be thirsty because this truth tells me that Christ only knows God in truth. Human wisdom leaves me thirsty to know what’s next and how it will all play out. Truth leaves me quenched because I can trust God as having the whole thing played out in perfect order. The woman at the well said that when Messias come that He would “tell us all things” and Christ’s response was “I that speak to thee am He”. If Christ is in us He IS telling us all things. He is leading us, we are not leading ourselves. He is telling us to rest in Him as The Creator and never thirst again.

“Jesus said unto him (me, you), If thou canst believe, all things are possible to him that believeth.”

Man as an individual nor mankind as a whole create anything. Christ is The Creator that God The Father creates through. Everything is parable in the spirit of a revelation of God or of man as a whole. To prove this Christ has written the story of Joseph as an example. From being born from a dead womb, to being thrown into a hole. From being sold into slavery, to being placed as the head of Potiphar’s house, to being thrown into prison and then becoming the most powerful man in Eygpt. Our lives, as The Elect, reflect the way God has moved us from having many ideas of color to being thrown into a pit by the very ones we were closest to – our nearest and dearest ideas of self. We have been adorned with a spiritual coat of many colors, like the rainbow God set over the sky as a promise of His faithfulness to us to never destroy us by false doctrine again. Our coat is Christ, the covering He has covered us with, to remove all sin and to stamp us with the blessing of sonship. But because we are still living in an unconverted world we are thrown into a pit by the very things we love. We are stripped of our trust in Christ and sold to “strife”, Midian. Then “Jehovah adds” (the meaning of the name Joseph) to us, even while being a slave, to know that we belong to God. Potiphar’s name means “belonging to the sun” and that reflects what we are being taught, all light/knowledge comes from God through Christ. Christ is The Sun/Son of righteousness. While we are enslaved to our old Babylonian world it wants us to be intimate with her, like Potiphar’s wife, but Christ’s spirit within us, refuses her advances. To get us to higher ground and to develop more trust in God He allows Babylon to overcome us and speak lies about us. When we refuse her advances (lies) our Babylonian doctrines war against the Spirit of Christ within us and tell us that we’re no good and that a situation is hopeless. Refusing to trust in ourselves, but rather God, sends our old world (like Potiphar’s wife) into a maddening rage. It sends us into an even deeper pit of despair, a prison inside our own body and mind, where we are reminded of our past and all the failures and we are buffeted with thoughts of despair. But because God is developing faith in us, to trust Him, even in this great dark time, He gives us to have hope and we continue to believe in the face of darkness. Then when God has developed the faith that He desires in us He lifts us up to the highest ground, to sit next to Him in Christ. We are at the right hand of God in Christ. All of this is faith in God through trials to lift us up to the highest ground. It is where we count it all joy in tribulation knowing the end result. Where we live in a place of total trust in God as our benevolent Creator Who has only our best in mind that will bring Him glory. But it doesn’t stop there. Now that we are exalted in Christ everything that we were enslaved to becomes our servants. We are exalted over all of our Egypt in Christ. We are clothed in Christ and given the right hand of The Father, His ring. A gold chain is put around our neck symbolizing the spirit of God that turns our head. We are given “the treasure of the glorious rest” in Christ, the meaning of the name “Zaphnathpaaneah”- which Pharaoh names Joseph. We see that the trials and faults were added to us to create faith in us. Because faith can move mountains God removes the things in us that did not trust Him and we begin to flourish. We have children that cause us to forget our toil – Manassah – and cause us to see we are doubly fruitful – Ephraim.

“And the thing was good in the eyes of Pharaoh, and in the eyes of all his servants. And Pharaoh said unto his servants, Can we find such a one as this is, a man in whom the Spirit of God is? And Pharaoh said unto Joseph, Forasmuch as God hath shewed thee all this, there is none so discreet and wise as thou art: Thou shalt be over my house, and according unto thy word shall all my people be ruled: only in the throne will I be greater than thou. And Pharaoh said unto Joseph, See, I have set thee over all the land of Egypt. And Pharaoh took off his ring from his hand, and put it upon Joseph’s hand, and arrayed him in vestures of fine linen, and put a gold chain about his neck; And he made him to ride in the second chariot which he had; and they cried before him, Bow the knee: and he made him ruler over all the land of Egypt. And Pharaoh said unto Joseph, I am Pharaoh, and without thee shall no man lift up his hand or foot in all the land of Egypt. And Pharaoh called Joseph’s name Zaphnathpaaneah; and he gave him to wife Asenath the daughter of Potipherah priest of On. And Joseph went out over all the land of Egypt. And Joseph was thirty years old when he stood before Pharaoh king of Egypt. And Joseph went out from the presence of Pharaoh, and went throughout all the land of Egypt. And in the seven plenteous years the earth brought forth by handfuls. And he gathered up all the food of the seven years, which were in the land of Egypt, and laid up the food in the cities: the food of the field, which was round about every city, laid he up in the same. And Joseph gathered corn as the sand of the sea, very much, until he left numbering; for it was without number. And unto Joseph were born two sons before the years of famine came, which Asenath the daughter of Potipherah priest of On bare unto him. And Joseph called the name of the firstborn Manasseh: For God, said he, hath made me forget all my toil, and all my father’s house. And the name of the second called he Ephraim: For God hath caused me to be fruitful in the land of my affliction. And the seven years of plenteousness, that was in the land of Egypt, were ended. And the seven years of dearth began to come, according as Joseph had said: and the dearth was in all lands; but in all the land of Egypt there was bread. And when all the land of Egypt was famished, the people cried to Pharaoh for bread: and Pharaoh said unto all the Egyptians, Go unto Joseph; what he saith to you, do. And the famine was over all the face of the earth: And Joseph opened all the storehouses, and sold unto the Egyptians; and the famine waxed sore in the land of Egypt. And all countries came into Egypt to Joseph for to buy corn; because that the famine was so sore in all lands.

Everything becomes ours. Height, depth, all of everything is ours, there is no limit in what we possess in Christ. We begin to possess “the treasure of the glorious rest”. The new clothing of Christ. The ring of authority and the golden necklace we possess in Christ. Nothing is held from us if we are given to believe it. If we are given to give God the glory for all things then nothing is held from us, in this life or the life to come. As Israel left Egypt with more than they entered Egypt with, so we are storing up treasures for the next life. Faith is the greatest treasure we can possess because when we are given to trust God then nothing is held from us. How can it when you know God creates everything every day for us? All is ours.

“…For all things are yours; Whether Paul, or Apollos, or Cephas, or the world, or life, or death, or things present, or things to come; all are yours; And ye are Christ’s; and Christ is God’s.”