MARRIAGE GRACE
The Cosmic Counterattack
The Grace Support System is operational whether or
not the believer sins. Grace depends upon God - not man. God's
Grace Support System operates for believers when they are in fellowship
and when they are not in fellowship. It also operates for unbelievers.
God's policy of grace extended to the unbeliever is clemency by overlooking
his sins and offering him the gospel for salvation. When the believer
sins, he loses fellowship with God; but that does not nullify the operation
of the grace of God in his life. Though sin will qualify him for
divine discipline, the Grace Support System is always operational.
However, as a member of the family, a child of God, the believer will be
disciplined severely for his wrongdoing.
For those whom the Lord loves He
disciplines,
And He scourges every son whom
He receives. (Hebrews 12:6)
Scourging refers to being whipped with a Roman whip that
was designed to take the skin off the back. Put another way, scourging
means to be skinned alive with a whip. The spiritual way of life
includes divine discipline to teach the believer to respect authority.
Just as the parent who loves his children disciplines them, the Lord (who
has been given all authority by the Father) disciplines believers who are
out of line. He sees all, knows all, and doesn't miss a thing.
Furthermore, His Justice is fair and impartial. He handles the discipline
Himself and will not tolerate any interference from others. When
a person arrogantly assumes the right to judge another and cuts loose with
malicious gossip or judging, the the Lord takes all the discipline away
from the accused (whether or not he is guilty) and gives it to the one
who judged. This is a way to get double discipline.
1 "Stop judging so that you
will not be judged.
2 "For with what judgment you judge,
you will be judged; for the measure which you measure out to others will
be measured out to you. (Matthew 7:1-2)
When the believer sins, he uses his volition from a position
of strength in the Filling of the Spirit to reject the commandment of the
Word and chooses to sin. When he sins, he loses the Filling of the
Spirit and enters the Cosmic System where he is subject to the Justice
of God. Even when the believer is in the Cosmic System in a state
of sin (under the control of his Old Sin Nature), God is still in control
of the situation.
5b He Himself has said, “I will
never ever abandon you, nor will I ever forsake you,” (Deut. 31:6)
6 so that we confidently say, “The Lord is my helper, I will not be afraid.
What shall man do to me?” (Psalm
118:6) (Hebrews 13:5b-6)
No matter what the believer does. No matter what the
sin. The sins were all paid for on the cross. Even when the
believer goes negative and rejects God. God will never abandon or
reject the believer. The believer is always a child of God, no matter
what he does or says. God is always under control. He is under
control of the believer even when he is in the Cosmic System. The
Grace Support System is still operational. Angels are standing ready
to effect a rescue mission should that be required to deliver the believer.
There is a big difference, however, between grace support
under authority and grace support under justice. When the believer
is under God's authority, he is filled with the Spirit and receives the
full support of the Grace Support System. This is a place of blessing.
However, when the believer rejects the authority of God and enters the
Cosmic System, he loses the Filling of the Spirit and faces the Justice
of God. God cannot accept sin and will have no fellowship with it
(Habakkuk 1:13). His absolute Righteousness and perfect Justice demand
that sin be judged. While the sins committed were judged on the cross
and will not be judged again, the Old Sin Nature with its human good and
evil were rejected at the cross. These things cause a believer to
lose his fellowship with God and succumb to the power of Satan's Cosmic
System. The believer in a state of sin has, in essence, rejected
the grace package of God. He has set himself in opposition to the
Plan of God as a rebellious child.
12 If we endure, we shall also
reign with Him;
If we
reject Him, He also will reject us;
13 If we are faithless, He remains
faithful; for He cannot deny Himself. (2 Timothy 2:12-13)
The word, "endure," is in the Greek, uJpomevnw
(hupomono,
present active indicative), which means to endure our testing and discipline
in the sense of abiding under authority. It means to stick it out
through the pressures and problems of this life. Those who do this
will reign with Christ as members of the Royal Family of God in the Millennium.
When the believer sins, he must accept responsibility for his sins, which
requires using 1 John 1:9 to acknowledge them to God so that he can be
restored to fellowship; and he must endure the discipline that God prescribes.
Otherwise, he cannot advance in the spiritual life. For those who
stick it out daily, there will be eternal rewards. As Jack Dempsey
once gave as the secret of his success, "To get up and fight another round."
"If we reject Him:"
The believer who chooses to sin has rejected the authority of God, and
God will have no choice but to place that one under His Justice.
The phrase, "He also will reject us,"
does not mean that God abandons us. It means that He gives us Justice
and cursing. Even when we sin, we are still God's children, and He
will never abandon nor forsake us. The believer who sins never loses
his salvation. "If we are faithless:"
This includes all ways that we fail to execute the Plan of God. Even
when we fail, God is always faithful. He never loses control, and
He will never deny His promises to us. He will never abandon nor
forsake us.
so that we confidently say, “The
Lord is my helper, I will not be afraid.
What shall man do to me?” (Hebrews
13:6)
The believer who relies upon the promises of God can have
confidence in his decision to rely upon Bible Doctrine. The world
is full of lies, pressures, and manipulation. The believer may sometimes
feel isolated. The Cosmic
Evangelist is ever prowling for converts and the user
lurks to snare, entrap, seduce the believer from the path of right.
When the world pressures the believer to conform, he can confidently resist.
He can stand up boldly to them and reject their lies. He does not
have to be afraid of the cosmic counterattack from people who are
in the Cosmic System. Caving in to fear is a sin. It is a weakness.
The cosmic counterattack must be met with a Problem Solving Device,
Impersonal Love for all Mankind.
Here is an example of how to use the Integrity Envelope
in the Space
Time Coordinate System to handle the cosmic counterattack. The
perfect relationship is love. That's is what we all want. However,
an attack that causes fear is not love. The fear is the believer's
reaction to the cosmic counterattack. The cosmic counterattack was
not motivated by fear. It was motivated to cause fear. It could
have come for a number of reasons, but the underlying motivation for someone
who would cause fear is bitterness. The opposite of love is hate
(which is bitterness). So the counterattack for love, which is the
positive Y axis is bitterness, which presses in from the negative Y direction.
The cosmic counterattacks upon love in the Integrity Envelope
on the back side (negative Y direction) range from self-righteousness to
worry to bitterness. The top of the back plane border is the edge
that must face the attack of Pride (arrogance) from the top plane.
This is the sin of self-righteousness. The center of the back plane
faces the worry-fear counterattack. And the lower edge of the back
plane faces the bitterness counterattack. However, the believer is
commanded to love his neighbor. Therefore, even in the face of the
cosmic
counterattack, he must have impersonal love from inside the Integrity
Envelope. When the cosmic counterattack is not recognized and handled
with the Problem Solving Device of Impersonal Love, it will overrun the
perimeter and lead to sin from the believer's area of weakness.
The believer can also fail by overrunning the boundary
of Personal Love in the positive Y direction. Chasing a paramour
or falling for the seduction of the user can lead to this failure.
In the Attraction Phase of Romance, overstepping the boundaries of Personal
Love occurs when wrong man or wrong woman is given the personal love which
should have been reserved for Right Man - Right Woman only. The one
who falls for the paramour rejects the authority of the head and becomes
a tail. The sins committed are lawlessness and lasciviousness, which
result from overstepping the boundaries of love.
FAITH AXIS COUNTERATTACKS
Faith is the basis for spiritual freedom.
You shall know the truth (doctrine),
and the doctrine shall make you free (John 8:32).
The believer's spiritual freedom in Christ comes from being
inside the Integrity Envelope on the Faith axis (X axis).
It is for freedom that Christ has
set you free. Therefore, keep standing fast, and do not become entangled
again in the yoke of slavery. (Galatians 5:1)
The Galatians had become guilty of legalism. They had
believed the false teachers who were not grace-oriented. Consequently,
they were trying to execute the spiritual life by keeping the Mosaic Law.
Paul was explaining to them in Galatians that to reject Bible Doctrine
would lead to loss of spiritual freedom and eventuate in slavery to the
Cosmic System. The Galatians had faced a counterattack of their faith
from the Judaizers who had convinced them to keep the Law for salvation.
This was an attack upon the grace of God and was specifically an attack
of false doctrine.
TIME AXIS COUNTERATTACKS
You have been severed from Christ,
you who are seeking to be justified by law; you have drifted off course
from grace. (Galatians 5:4)
By believing false doctrine, the Galatians had cut their
ties from Christ in the Grace Support System and had entered the sin of
self-justification (one of the Arrogance Skills). They were "seeking
to be justified by the law." Self-justification comes from arrogance.
After a person believes the lie of false doctrine (which is arrogance),
the next step is to enter self-justification, to vindicate self, or defend
self. Self-justification is a sin of jealousy. Jealousy is
an attack upon the Time axis. Ambition (from jealousy) leads to getting
ahead of grace, and selfishness (including self-justification), also from
jealousy, resists grace and holds back.
Paul points out the result: "You have drifted off
course from grace." This is in the Greek, ejkpivptw
(ekpipto),
which is a nautical term for a ship that drifts off course and runs aground.
This phrase is often erroneously translated, "fallen from grace," which
is misleading. The Galatians in apostasy have drifted off course
into false doctrine, but they are still under the grace of God. They
haven't fallen from God's grace, they have simply rejected His grace and
will suffer the consequences of Justice and cursing until they turn around.
The Integrity Envelope of the believer in the Spiritual
Space-Time Coordinate System is just like ship that must navigate the seas.
Since there are no landmarks at sea, coordinates must be known in order
to chart the course. If a person does not chart the course, the ship
will drift off course. Instruments are needed to align with fixed
points, e.g. stars; and accurate clocks are needed because the earth is
always moving under the stars. The ship that drifts off course may
run aground on rocks and be destroyed. This happened to Paul; and
when he used the analogy of a ship running aground, it was a strong metaphor.
The believer who does not master the orientation of the
Integrity Envelope in the Spiritual Space-Time Coordinate System will "drift
off
course from grace." That means being sucked into the Cosmic System
and becoming a slave to the devil. Freedom requires proper alignment
of all the axes. This begins with Rebound (1 John 1:9), which is
submission to the authority of God. That lines up the Z axis, which
stabilizes the ship. It may still be pointed in the wrong direction,
but at least it is stabilized so that decisions can be made to chart the
course. Rebound does not solve all one's problems. That is
why there are additional Problem Solving Devices.
INTEGRITY ENVELOPE CHECKLIST
After Rebound the other axes must be checked just as one
would check the orientation of the ship that had been drifting at sea.
Here is the checklist:
INTEGRITY ENVELOPE CHECKLIST
AXIS |
. |
MEANING
|
COSMIC COUNTERATTACK
|
Z |
+ |
Authority |
Arrogance, Cosmic
Babylon, Worldly (arrogant style of life) |
. |
- |
Hope |
Loss of confidence, giving up, laziness |
X |
+ |
Faith (Spiritual) |
Ecumenical Babylon,
Apostasy, Worldly (lust of flesh) |
. |
- |
Faith (Temporal) |
Immoral, unethical
lies from the Establishment, legalism |
Y |
+ |
Love (Personal) |
Political Babylon, Lawless, Lasciviousness,
Worldly (lust of the eye) |
. |
- |
Love (Impersonal) |
Worry, fear, self-righteousness, bitterness |
Time |
+ |
Strategy, Tactics |
Jealousy ambition, activism, rebellion |
. |
- |
Strategy, Tactics |
Jealousy selfish, self-justification,
recalcitrant |
HOPE AXIS COUNTERATTACKS
The Hope axis is named for the bottom plane, the foundation.
The top side of the Hope axis (Z axis) is the relationship with authority.
The bottom of the Integrity Envelope (negative Z direction) must withstand
those attacks which would cause a person to give up his stand under the
authority of God, i.e. lose confidence in the Plan of God.
Fruit of the Spirit
Another way of describing the production of virtue from the
Integrity Envelope is the analogy of the Fruit of the Spirit. This
is the agricultural metaphor. A tree produces fruit when it reaches
maturity. A good tree produces good fruit, and a bad tree produces
no fruit or bad fruit. In Galatians 5:22-23 Paul describes the fruit
of the Spirit. He lists nine types of fruit. Rather than use
the English, the Greek will be used directly.
FRUIT OF THE SPIRIT
Group |
Greek |
English |
Meaning
|
LOVE |
ajgavph |
agape |
Divine Love |
. |
carav |
chara |
Happiness (+H) |
. |
eijrhvnh |
eirene |
Peace and prosperity (TDNT 2-402, 414-415)1 |
HOPE |
makroqumiva |
makrothumia |
Endurance (patience that endures) (TDNT 4-374)1 |
. |
crhstovth" |
chrestotes |
Integrity (envelope), graciousness (TDNT 9-489)1 |
. |
ajgaqwsuvnh |
agathosune |
Divine good (C/Life, Adam - sweat of brow) (TDNT 1-18)1 |
FAITH |
pivsti" |
pistis |
Faith |
. |
prau>vth" |
prautes |
Humility (TDNT 6-645)1 |
. |
ejgkravteia |
egkrateia |
Self-control, inner strength (TDNT
2-339)1 |
The fruit of the Spirit as listed by Paul under the inspiration
of the Holy Spirit are listed in three groups of three. The first
group is the Love group: Love, Happiness, and Peace &
Prosperity. The pattern is a central theme with the next two words
defining the extent, such as height and depth. The height of love
is sharing the Happiness of God (+H). The depth of love is inner
peace and prosperity of the Greek, eijrhvnh (eirene)
from the Hebrew
<wOv (shalom).
The Hope group is: Hope, Integrity (envelope), and Divine
Good. Whereas, this is, indeed, the endurance group, the word Hope
(meaning in the Greek, confident expectation) is used to match 1 Corinthians
13:13. Both endurance and hope describe the strength of the roots,
or foundation, of the Integrity Envelope. The other members of this
group are Integrity (which requires the integrity or capacity for life
of the entire Integrity Envelope) and Divine Good such as Adam who represented
capacity for life and engaged in production by the sweat of the brow.
The third group is Faith: Faith, Humility, and Self-Control.
Faith is the fruit of metabolized Bible Doctrine in the soul. Humility
is the requirement for learning, which means submission to the authority
of God. So Humility is the upward aspect of Faith that is directed
toward God. Self-control is depth of Faith, which is directed toward
self, i.e. maintaining mental and spiritual stability.
Thus far, nine fruit have been identified. Since nine
is the number for the nine plagues of Egypt, a number for cursing, there
must be more. How many? In Revelation, the Tree of Life in
the Eternal State had twelve fruit.
Revelation 22:1-2, 14 (NAS)
1 And he showed me a river of the
water of life, clear as crystal, coming from the throne of God and of the
Lamb, 2 in the middle of its street. And on either side of the river was
the tree of life, bearing twelve kinds of fruit, yielding its fruit every
month; and the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations.
14 Blessed are those who wash their
robes, that they may have the right to the tree of life, and may enter
by the gates into the city.
The privilege of eating from the Tree of Life will be a reserved
for the winner believer (Revelation 2:7). Anyone who takes away from
the book of Revelation will have his privilege of eating from the Tree
of Life revoked (Revelation 22:19). The Tree of Life is also mentioned
in Genesis 2:9, 3:22, 24. The key to understanding it is:
Then the Lord God said, “Behold,
the man has become like one of Us, knowing good and evil; and now, lest
he stretch out his hand, and take also from the tree of life, and eat,
and live forever” (Genesis 3:22, NAS).
So the Tree of Life has fruit associated with Salvation,
living forever. If we use the fruit of Salvation as the missing fruit
group and recognize that the Trinity, the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit,
all had a part in salvation, then there will be twelve fruit. The
Father was the author of the Plan of God for mankind that included salvation.
The Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, the Light of the World, performed the work
of salvation through His substitutionary spiritual death on behalf of mankind.
The Holy Spirit reveals the way of salvation and performs the work of regeneration
at the moment of salvation to take a person out of darkness into light.
From this approach the first three fruit are:
-
Salvation work of the Father - author of the Plan.
-
Salvation work of Christ, the Light - Redemption, Reconciliation,
Propitiation.
-
Salvation work of the Holy Spirit - revealer of truth, regenerator,
ministry in the priesthood.
The
fruit listed in the illustration of the Tree of Life are:
-
Salvation work of the Father
-
Christ, the Light
-
Ministry of the Holy Spirit
-
Love
-
Happiness (+H)
-
Peace & Prosperity
-
Faith
-
Humility
-
Self-Control
-
Hope (endurance)
-
Integrity Envelope
-
Good
Stages of the Spiritual Life
The believer grows as a tree - a little every day.
He does not walk out one day and hit maturity. From the moment of
salvation, the beginnings of what he will be at maturity already exist.
Through spiritual childhood these fruit begin to develop a little each
day. There are no great spiritual victories that mean the believer
has arrived. Just because one test is passed, doesn't mean that the
spiritual life is finally a success. The final test will not be passed
until the completion of this life whether under dying grace or the sin
unto death.
The fruit of the Spirit, then, develop over time.
The beginner must first learn to use the basics of the first three fruit
of Salvation associated with the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. He
must begin to learn about his relationship with the Trinity, which includes:
-
Grace Orientation to the Plan of the Father
-
Doctrinal Orientation (Daily intake of Bible Doctrine, the
Word)
-
Rebound and the Filling of the Holy Spirit.
If the believer is not positive to the daily intake of Bible
Doctrine, he will become entrapped in the Cosmic System in a state of spiritual
ignorance and alienation from the Plan of God. It is as natural for
a new believer to love the Father and want to learn about Him as it is
for a newborn baby to love its mother. It is imperative that the
Bible instruction be grace oriented, however. Otherwise, the new
believer will never grow spiritually. The nourishment for the spiritual
life is Bible Doctrine.
BEGINNER STAGE
As newborn babies desire the pure
milk of the word, so that by it you may be caused to grow up as a result
of your salvation (1 Peter 2:2).
This Beginner Stage of the spiritual life is like
the Levitical priest advancing from the Laver (Rebound) through the Door
(Grace Orientation) and to the Table of Shewbread (Doctrinal Orientation).
The Beginner must change his lifestyle to match this pattern or there will
be no spiritual growth to maturity. The Beginner who is consistent
in following this pattern of life will eventually accumulate enough Bible
Doctrine in the soul to make some application. This may include use
of Faith Rest and prayer, and separation from the World. Testing
in the Beginner Stage includes love for the Father, recognition of sin
and carnality, and separation from the World.
INTERMEDIATE STAGE
When the Beginner Tests are passed, the believer will
be promoted to the Intermediate (or Spiritual Growth) Stage.
The Intermediate Stage is a time of intensified intake of Bible Doctrine
and rejection of the World. This phase is designed to grow in grace.
but grow in the grace and knowledge
of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. (2 Peter 3:18a, NAS)
The Intermediate Stage is characterized by obedience to Bible
Doctrine, submission to the authority of the Father, obeying the Holy Spirit,
and faith-application. The believer who sticks it out in this phase
will accumulate enough momentum to advance into Spiritual Warfare,
which is the third stage.
SPIRITUAL WARFARE STAGE
In Spiritual Warfare, the believer is tested against Satan's
demons. The counterpart to Spiritual Warfare under the Old Covenant
to Israel (Law) was conquering in the Promised Land. In Spiritual
Warfare the believer wins back from Satan his inheritance.
Ephesians 6:11-12
11 Put on the full armor of God,
that you may be able to stand firm against the schemes of the devil. 12
Because our struggle is not against blood and flesh, but against "archons",
(demon rulers) against "exzousias" (demon leaders), against
world-rulers of this darkness, against spirit-forces of evil in the heavens.
SUFFERING STAGE
After Spiritual Warfare, the believer advances into Suffering,
which is qualification for the Adult Spiritual Life. Suffering is
a time of Testing, which can only be passed by application of the Problem
Solving Devices (especially Personal Love for God and Impersonal Love for
all mankind). The Suffering tests prove that doctrine works for adversity
as well as prosperity. The Suffering tests are designed to burn away
the dross. They are severe. However, they can be passed with
the Problems Solving Devices.
There has no testing overtaken
you but such as is common to mankind, but God is faithful who will not
permit you to be tested beyond your capability, but He will with the testing
also provide the solution so that you will be able to bear up under it
(1 Cor. 10:13)
SPIRITUAL ADULTHOOD
After Suffering for a little while, the Lord will promote
the obedient believer into Spiritual Adulthood. He will enter
this new stage of his spiritual life without anything except his battle
scars. His first tactical objective will be Spiritual Self-Esteem;
the second, Spiritual Autonomy; and the third, Spiritual Maturity.
EVIDENCE TESTING
After Spiritual Maturity, another stage of testing may
occur. It is Evidence Testing, in which Satan is allowed to cross
examine the mature believer through suffering. The testimony of the
believer will be used in the appeal trial of Satan. This is what
happened to Job. The Lord Jesus Christ also had to pass Evidence
Testing before beginning His earthly ministry (Matthew
4:1-11). Evidence Testing includes two categories of testing:
(1) Relationship with God, (2) relationship with people.
After Evidence Testing the believer may live in Spiritual
Adulthood until his time of departure from this life. His final test
is Dying Grace (7th Stage). Those who do not advance spiritually
and qualify for Dying Grace are doomed to the Sin Unto Death, which is
designed to be the greatest misery in this life.
Testing
Testing is a way of life for the believer. Every new
doctrine that is learned will be tested for the purpose of approval.
Only verified doctrine will be used in the construction of the Edification
Complex of the Soul, which is also known as the Integrity Envelope.
The pastor teaches the doctrine and the believer metabolizes it under the
ministry of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit then administers a verification
test of the newly acquired doctrine prior to assimilating it into the Integrity
Envelope.
The value of testing is explained
in Romans 5:3-5.
And not only this, but we also
exult in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance (Romans
5:3)
The word for suffering, Greek qli'yi"
(thlipsis) is a word for intensive suffering, or stress testing.
Stress testing is a technical term that means testing under maximum pressure.
It has nothing to do with psychological stress, which is caused by failure
to apply the Problem Solving Devices to the pressures of life, trying to
solve problems with human solutions, and thus inviting stress into the
soul where it usually ends up in the subconscious. The stress testing
in view here is testing the roots, or foundation, of the Integrity Envelope.
The believer is told to be happy
when he encounters such testing because it will produce endurance. Endurance
is the Greek,
uJpomonhv (hupomone), which
means endurance in the sense of abiding under the authority of the Lord
and doctrine under pressure - e.g. staying in the frying pan without jumping
into the fire. The word used here for endurance is almost identical
to the word, makrothumia, in Galatians 5:22, which means patience
that endures.
and endurance produces verification
and verification confidence (hope) (Romans 5:4)
The stress test will produce endurance and endurance produces
verification, Greek dokimhv (dokime),
which means to prove by testing, or verification. The Holy Spirit verifies
each new doctrine learned. The use of the word, verification, here
is analogous to the verification testing of software. Here the testing
administered by the Holy Spirit is comprehensive and includes stress testing.
The verification testing produces confidence, Greek ejlpiv"
(elpis),
which means confident expectation. It is often translated hope, but
the Greek word for hope is much stronger than the English. The progression
of tests then is: Stress testing (suffering) > endurance > verification
> confidence. The Lord simply starts with the roots, or foundation,
in testing. If the roots and foundation can hold, then the superstructure
will hold. This is a stiff test since it goes directly to the roots.
The
NASA STS-85 mission patch is a symbolic illustration of Stress Testing
(Thilipsis Testing). The patch is the symbolic representation
of the soul model. The conscious mind is shown along with the subconscious.
When God takes the lid of the soul off to examine the roots of the Integrity
Envelope, the subconscious will break out to fill the void (absence of
thought on the top, or cerebral cortex). In other words, God delivers
the Stress Test to the roots. The result will look like the STS-85
patch. The subconscious will break out to fill the void. This
is illustrated on the patch by the yellow and red spikes in the left lobe.
Yellow represents Life, while red represents suffering (Stress Testing).
This is a Capacity for Life Stress Test. Notice that the Shuttle
Orbiter with the open payload bay doors in the middle corresponds to the
tree with roots shown in the Tree of Life illustration. The base
of the trunk and roots of the Tree of Life symbolize the Hope group:
Endurance (center), Integrity Envelope (upper), and Good (lower).
and confidence does not disappoint
us,
because the Love for God has been poured out in our hearts through
the
personal agency of the Holy Spirit who has been given to us
for
our benefit (Romans 5:5)
When we have passed the suffering, stress tests of the roots,
we will not be disappointed. We will have no regrets. This
is like a woman who has just had a baby. She is always happy about
it in spite of the suffering she has been through. We won't be disappointed
because the Holy Spirit will pour out the Love for God in our hearts.
This is our reciprocal Love for God in response to His Love for us (the
Love of God). The Greek in this verse means both the Love for God
(which comes from us) and the Love of God (which comes from God).
The Love (agape) is poured into the cup in the soul, which is inside
the Integrity Envelope. The Integrity Envelope had to be tested first
(and the Lord chose to test the foundation) and then, after it had been
verified, the love of God is poured into the cup in the soul. This
is a divine love that is beyond the imagination.
Blessing or Cursing
The grace of God is operational for believers and for unbelievers
alike. It is operational for good believers and for bad believers;
for doctrinal and for apostate believers. God does not cease His
grace policy when the believer goes negative, sins, and enters the Cosmic
System. God never loses control. Nothing ever surprises Him.
He knew all in eternity past. He is not a respecter of persons (Romans
2:11), which means that He is impartial and truly objective. He does
not give the believer special consideration over the unbeliever.
He doesn't treat someone who loves Him better than He treats someone who
hates Him. He will bless those who hate him just as He will bless
those who love him.
However, there are limits to the types of blessing that
He can give. He cannot share His Righteousness and His personal love
with the unbeliever because the unbeliever's soul cannot receive the Righteousness
or agape love of God. There is no way for the unbeliever to
experience God apart from observing His Justice. Similarly,
the sinning believer will taste the Justice of God, but he will not experience
the love of God. However, the grace of God operates whether or not
the believer is out of fellowship. Blessings from the Plan of God
may come into the believer's life even though he is out of fellowship and
pursuing reversionism. God's grace Plan is independent of the actions
of mankind.
When the believer sins and enters the Cosmic System, he
will lose the Filling of the Holy Spirit and he will be subject to the
Justice of God. Although the carnal believer is still under that
grace of God, he will be subject to the Justice of God, and the Lord will
discipline him as a child. When the Holy Spirit executes Justice
in the Cosmic System, it is divided into three parts, Cosmic, Political,
and Ecumenical Babylon. When a believer who is in the divine dynasphere
encounters something from the Cosmic System, the Holy Spirit will have
first judged that thing. Nothing comes into the presence of the Holy
Spirit without suffering judgment. Nothing will appear on the Stage
of Life without first facing the Justice of the Holy Spirit. This
means that sin and evil will bear the marks of the Justice of God.
It also means that when the believer enters the Cosmic System he will also
receive the Justice of God just as other things in the Cosmic System do.
He will receive judgment related to Cosmic, Political, and Ecumenical Babylon.
COSMIC SYSTEM
Ecumenical |
Political
|
Cosmic |
Cosmic, Political, and Ecumenical Babylon are the devil's
substitutes for three axes of the Space-Time Coordinate System. Cosmic
Babylon attacks the Hope (Z) axis. Political Babylon is the devil's
substitute for true love from the Love (Y) axis. And Ecumenical Babylon
is the counterattack of the Faith (X) axis.
Destiny
Every believer receives an inheritance and a calling at the
point of Salvation along with one or more spiritual gifts for spiritual
service. The believer has a new spiritual life that begins at salvation.
His destiny is to fulfill his calling. The question, "Who am I?",
can only be answered by means of spiritual growth. In due time, the
believer who executes the Plan of God will come to a personal sense of
destiny. He will come to understand his purpose and calling in the
new spiritual life. God has a Plan for the life of the believer that
includes a destiny of prosperity as only God can give in His matchless
grace.
The Golden Lampstand in the Tabernacle symbolizes the
Personal Sense of Destiny. Destiny can only be understood when the
believer walks in the light in fellowship with the Father every day.
One of the first experiences of destiny of many people is meeting Right
Man or Right Woman. When the Lord brings the Right Woman to the Right
Man, destiny has arrived. However, it may be a long time before the
tests of Attraction and Compatibility are completed and the couple are
ready for marriage.
Psalm 37:37-38
37 "Take note of the believer with
an integrity envelope. Observe the verified one because the mature
believer has a destiny (inheritance)."
38 But reversionists will be altogether
destroyed;
The destiny of the wicked will
be to be cut off (sin unto death).
In the Church Age every believer is a priest - male or female.
Everyone, regardless of race, gender, or social status, has equal opportunity
to execute the Plan of God. Everyone who is positive to God's Plan
can function under the priesthood to execute the spiritual life and reach
destiny. Destiny is achieved in only one way - by experiential sanctification.
To reach one's destiny, the believer must use the priesthood to execute
the spiritual life. Only consistent daily decisions to metabolize
Bible Doctrine will enable a person to receive his inheritance and achieve
his destiny. Those who stay positive will receive blessing beyond
the imagination in this life. Those who reject their calling and
destiny will die the sin unto death.
Next
References
1. Gerhard Kittel (ed.). Theological Dictionary
of the New Testament, (Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing
Company, 255 Jefferson, S.E., Grand Rapids, Michigan), 1964.
AUTHOR Larry Wood
Revised June 1, 2014