Made to drink in one Spirit

“In the last day, that great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried, saying, If any man thirst, let him come unto Me, and drink. He that believeth on Me, as the scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water. (But this spake He of the Spirit, which they that believe on Him should receive: for the Holy Ghost was not yet given; because that Jesus was not yet glorified.)” (John 7:37-39).

 

“Therefore will I divide Him a portion with the great, and He shall divide the spoil with the strong; because He hath poured out His soul unto death: and He was numbered with the transgressors; and He bare the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors.” (Isa. 53:12). When God glorified HIS Son, then He divided HIS Son’s inheritance—“the Spirit of HIS Son” (Gal. 4:6)—with all who received Him. Those throughout the Christian age who trusted in His Son were the strong. They received power to become the sons of God, and with them the Father divided the spoils of HIS warfare with Satan in the great controversy.

 

We are made to drink of one Spirit, which is Jesus’ and which flows from Him. “And he shewed me a pure river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding out of the throne of God and of the Lamb…. And the Spirit and the bride say, Come. And let him that heareth say, Come. And let him that is athirst come. And whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely.” (Rev. 22:1,17).

 
“He that believeth on the Son of God hath the witness in himself.” (1 Jn. 5:10).

We want the witness of the Spirit. So do many millions. It gives evidence that God is with us; it gives certainty of salvation. Hinduism, Buddhism, the other religions of the non-Christian world, along with Catholicism and Evangelical Protestantism, all strive to have this witness of the Spirit. “In those churches which [Satan] can bring under his deceptive power he will make it appear that God's special blessing is poured out; there will be manifest what is thought to be great religious interest. Multitudes will exult that God is working marvelously for them, when the work is that of another spirit. Under a religious guise, Satan will seek to extend his influence over the Christian world.” Great Controversy, p. 464. The witness of the Spirit is what constituted the showdown on Mount Carmel. Both Elijah and the prophets of Baal claimed to have the witness of the Spirit; however, the false prophets had a witness from the wrong spirit; they had a familiar spirit. “Through spiritualism, Satan appears as a benefactor of the race, healing the diseases of the people, and professing to present a new and more exalted system of religious faith.” Great Controversy, p. 589. Worship of and praying to “the Spirit”, which has swept the denominations, is but the development of a delusion that began in the ancient apostatizing apostolic church. The full product of the delusion is yet to be seen. Elijah had the true Spirit of the Lord because he stood before Him. He said, “As the LORD God of Israel liveth, before whom I stand…” (1Ki. 17:1). Jesus told Jeremiah, “Therefore thus saith the LORD, If thou return, then will I bring thee again, and thou shalt stand before Me….” (Jer. 15:19). And to Abraham, “I am the Almighty God; walk before Me, and be thou perfect.” (Gen. 17:1).

In all three cases, the Spirit of the Lord came to them from the Lord because of their standing before the Lord. “Now the Lord is that Spirit: and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.” (2Cor. 3:17). The Spirit was the Lord’s Spirit, “the Spirit of Christ”, “the Spirit of HIS Son” (Rom. 8:9;Gal. 4:6). But, the whole world wandering after the Beast, which includes Christianity and Islam, and which soon will include the African and Asian religions, all have been sold on the misconception that the Spirit is another divine being besides the Father and Son; the Holy Spirit, “whom all Asia and the world worshippeth.” (Acts 19:27). Should we follow the customs of the world? Shouldn’t the close similarities between Christianity’s trinity and the trinities of the rest of the world cause every thinking Christian to question this pagan abomination that maketh desolate? Shouldn’t we question this Spirit third person? Shouldn’t the fear of the Lord cause us to fear every practice and doctrine that the heathen religions have? Are we really examining ourselves to see if we are doing like the rest of the world, knowing that Satan is ferocious and very subtle, more than all the other beasts of paradise to infiltrate himself into the church of Christ through doctrine? In the end, his doctrines bite like an adder and devour like a lion.

 

Jesus said, “The Spirit of truth…shall glorify me: for he shall receiveG2983 of mine, and shall shew it unto you. All things that the Father hath are mine: therefore said I, that he shall takeG2983 of mine, and shall shew it unto you” (John 16:13-15). When Jesus said that, wasn’t He equating “the Spirit of truth” to “the Father”? Jesus speaks of the Spirit in verse 14 and then in the same breath, and regarding the accomplishment of the same work, speaks of the Father in the next verse. Both Father and Spirit take (G2983, lambanō) of what is Christ’s and both show it to His disciples. If Jesus taught His disciples that both the Spirit of truth and the Father would perform the same function, then wasn’t He simply reiterating Himself and equating the Spirit of truth to the Father, for the sakes of the slow-hearted men? He had difficulty explaining the things of God to them. In the same context, He said, “I have yet many things to say unto you, but ye cannot bear them now.” (John 16:12). They must suffer the great disappointment of the cross; then they must experience their magnified, restored joy of seeing Him again and watching Him ascend; and finally, they must follow through with repentance and receive a transformation of the heart. Then they would have minds cleared of all prejudices that were placed in them by Satan and his religious system. Simultaneously, Christ would minister for them before His Father, leading them to full repentance and justification before God. Then, the Father could send HIS SPIRIT of truth to teach them in a moment what it would have taken Christ a lifetime to teach while walking with them on earth without the great tests that came with His humiliation and death.

 

Unlike John 16 where we hear that the Father takes from Christ, in the Revelation we see Christ taking from His Father. And then we see Christ giving the things of God to His angel, His angel showing them to John, and John disseminating them. “The Revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave unto Him, to shew unto His servants things which must shortly come to pass; and He sent and signified it by His angel unto His servant John: who bare record….” (Rev. 1:1,2). Where in this delegation of communication is the Holy Ghost? It must be there. John wrote that he communicated everything he saw. “Who bare record of the word of God, and of the testimony of Jesus Christ, and of all things that he saw.” (Rev. 1:2). In Revelation 1:2, we hear John inferring that what he saw in the prophecy was the word of God and the Testimony of Jesus, which is the Spirit of prophecy. Just as for 70 years he had been testifying of Jesus and His redemption, John testified of everything that he saw in the prophecy through the same Testimony of the glorified Son of God, which had come from God’s mouth. The same Spirit, which had constrained him to testify of Christ for years, was now upon him in a greater measure.

So, let’s look at the Testimony of Jesus which is the Spirit of Prophecy. Who is the Holy Spirit/the Comforter/the Spirit of truth/the Spirit of prophecy? Or, what is it? “Of which salvation the prophets have enquired and searched diligently, who prophesied of the grace that should come unto you: searching what, or what manner of time the Spirit of Christ which was in them did signify, when it testified beforehand the sufferings of Christ, and the glory that should follow.” (1Pet. 1:10,11). “It” that “testified” (vs. 11) is the “Spirit of Christ which was in them” (vs. 11), just as the Lord, through Isaiah, said that “His Spirit” is “My mouth” (Isa. 34:16). “It” that testified wasn’t the words of the prophets’ mouths, but Christ’s control of their mouths through His Spirit upon them. Peter later wrote that that “Spirit of Christ which was in them” (1Pet. 1:11) was the same “Holy Ghost” moving the “holy men of God” (2Pet. 1:21). So, we see that the Holy Ghost, or the Holy Spirit, is the thought of Christ, the mouth of Christ, the voice of Christ, His Spirit made humanly audible and understandable.

 

The Spirit “itself” who helps “our infirmities” (Rom. 8:26), does the same work as our High Priest (Heb. 4:15; 7:25), who lives to make intercession for us, and out of whose eyes goes “the seven Spirits of God…into all the earth” (Rev. 5:6). The Spirit itself bears witness with our spirit that we are the children of God after we are born again by “the Spirit of HIS Son” (Gal. 4:6, cf Rom. 8:16). Then, after we are reborn with a newly created spirit, it (the Spirit/Spirit of Christ/Holy Ghost) testifies in a greater measure to those who for long time have been testifying of Jesus and His redemption. “For we are made partakers of Christ, if we hold the beginning of our confidence stedfast unto the end” (Heb. 3:14), whether it was the Christians of the New Testament or the prophets of the Old. “Unto whom it was revealed, that not unto themselves, but unto us they did minister the things, which are now reported unto you by them that have preached the gospel unto you with the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven; which things the angels desire to look into.” (1Pet. 1:12). The Spirit of Christ is the Testimony of Jesus that gave the word of God to John; it is the Holy Ghost, “the power of the Highest” (Luke 1:35). The Holy Ghost, the Spirit of Christ, is a special dispensation of “that one and the selfsame Spirit, dividing to every man severally as He will.” (1Cor. 12:11). We can know it by its loyalty to the high standard of God, or “the testimony of the Bible…those plain, soul-testing truths which require self-denial and renunciation of the world.” Great Controversy, p. 464.

 

And who reveals Christ to us?

 

“I am one that bear witnessG3140 of Myself, and the Father that sent Me beareth witnessG3140 of Me.” (John 8:18). “This is He that came by water and blood, even Jesus Christ; not by water only, but by water and blood. And it is the Spirit that beareth witnessG3140, because the Spirit is truth…. And we know that the Son of God is come, and hath given us an understanding, that we may know HIM that is true, and we are in HIM that is true, even in HIS Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God, and eternal life.” (1Jn. 5:6,20). “And this is life eternal, that they might know THEE the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom THOU hast sent.” (John 17:3).

 

The Spirit of truth, the Spirit that is truth and “beareth witness”, is God’s Spirit, “HIM that is true”, “the only true God”, “God, that cannot lie”. (1Jn. 5:20; John 17:3; Tit. 1:2). “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. God is a Spirit: and they that worship HIM must worship HIM in spirit and in truth.” (John 4:23,24). The admonition is not to worship the Spirit. We are to worship God who is holy; and we are to worship HIM from the same nature that HE is—in a holy spirit, in union with HIS holy SPIRIT. “Speak unto all the congregation of the children of Israel, and say unto them, Ye shall be holy: for I the LORD your God am holy.” (Lev. 19:2).“But they rebelled, and vexed His holy Spirit: therefore He was turned to be their enemy, and He fought against them.” (Isa. 63:10).

 

Jesus is equally the truth, the faithful and true witness, as His Father is. “The straight testimony of the true witness” (Early Writings, p. 270), is the Spirit of truth. “And unto the angel of the church of the Laodiceans write; These things saith the Amen, the faithful and true witnessG3144, the beginning of the creation of God.” (Rev. 3:14). “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. 19:11). “Faithful is He that calleth you.” (1Thess. 5:24). His witness is righteous warfare and fair judgments, “who without respect of persons judgeth according to every man’s work.” (1Pet. 1:17). But, to all who procrastinate until the very end, all of His righteous judgments come at once. “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. 19:15).

 

Does the Spirit bear witness of Christ? Or, does the Father? Or, does Christ bear witness of Himself as He says He does in John 8:18? It is God and His Son both who testify; together, THEY are the Spirit. And when we unite with the Father and Son, we come under THEIR influence and possess what THEY possess—the Spirit.

 

“The Spirit of truth…shall glorify me: for he shall receive of mine, and shall shew it unto you. All things that the Father hath are mine: therefore said I, that he shall take of mine, and shall shew it unto you.” (John 16:13-15). “But when the Comforter is come, whom I will send unto you from the Father, even the Spirit of truth, which proceedeth from the Father, he shall testifyG3140 of me: and ye also shall bear witnessG3140, because ye have been with me from the beginning.” (John 15:26,27).

 

“He”, “the Spirit of truth shall receive of Mine. All things…the Father hath are Mine: therefore said I, that He shall take of Mine….” The Father is the SPIRIT. He will take of HIS glory and give is to us, as HE did to HIS Son at His baptism. “The Father Himself will answer the petition of His Son. Direct from the throne issue the beams of His glory. The heavens are opened, and upon the Saviour’s head descends a dovelike form of purest light,—fit emblem of Him, the meek and lowly One.” Desire of Ages, p. 112.

 

As HE sent to HIS Son’ s baptism, not a third person of a trinity, but some of HIS own glory resembling the purest dove, so the Father sends to HIS children not a third person, but HIS own SPIRIT through HIS atoning Son. And HIS Son has His own Spirit. And all His children are remade in THEIR image and they have their own spirit of Christ, a new spirit from Christ’s mediation (see Romans 8:9;Eze. 36:26,27). Together, the sinner is saved, by THEIR grace through his faith gifted from Jesus, “the faith of Jesus Christ” (Gal. 2:16;Eph. 2:8); THEIR Spirit (the Father through HIS Son) reaches down as the sinner’s spirit reaches up (through the Son) and lays hold on eternal life.

“Let him take hold of My strength, that he may make peace with Me; and he shall make peace with Me.” (Isa. 27:5). Divinity and mortal man meet “in the Spirit.” (Rev. 1:10). The newborn has become a living soul; he is a quickened spirit. “What? know ye not that he which is joined to an harlot is one body? for two, saith He, shall be one flesh. But he that is joined unto the Lord is one spirit.” (1Cor. 6:16,17). Therefore, we can say that  THEIR SPIRIT (the Father’s and His Son’s) united with our spirit (the Son’s with ours) is one Spirit. THEIR SPIRIT and our spirit is one Spirit. SPIRIT+Spirit+spirit = the Spirit. “Jesus answered and said unto him, If a man love Me, he will keep My words: and My Father will love him, and WE will come unto him, and make OUR abode with him.” (John 14:23). The Father and Son are inseparable, and appear as one Spirit. When we are reconciled with THEM, we join THEIR inseparable Spirit. “That they all may be one; as THOU, Father, art in ME, and I in THEE, that they also may be one in US: that the world may believe that THOU hast sent Me.” (John 17:21). “And I have declared unto them THY name, and will declare it: that the love wherewith THOU hast loved Me may be in them, and I in them.” (John 17:26).

 

And in the Spirit of God and of His only begotten Son, we all have perfect fellowship and unity.

 

“And the glory which THOU gavest Me I have given them; that they may be one, even as We are one.” (John 17:22).

“For as the body is one, and hath many members, and all the members of that one body, being many, are one body: so also is Christ. For by one Spirit are we all baptized into one body, whether we be Jews or Gentiles, whether we be bond or free; and have been all made to drink into one Spirit.” (1Cor. 12:12,13).

 

“Jesus stood and cried, saying, If any man thirst, let him come unto Me, and drink.” (John 7:37). Those who receive the Prince and Saviour receive His water of life on the inside and the outside; they are washed and “clean every wit” (John 13:10) and united in one Spirit.

 

“But now in Christ Jesus ye who sometimes were far off are made nigh by the blood of Christ.

For He is our peace, who hath made both one, and hath broken down the middle wall of partition between us;
Having abolished in His flesh the enmity, even the law of commandments contained in ordinances; for to make in Himself of twain one new man, so making peace;
And that He might reconcile both unto God in one body by the cross, having slain the enmity thereby:
And came and preached peace to you which were afar off, and to them that were nigh.
For through Him we both have access by one Spirit unto the Father.
Now therefore ye are no more strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens with the saints, and of the household of God.” (Eph. 2:13-18).

The church has perfect unity because they all drink of the same Source, Jesus and His Spirit.

 

“With all lowliness and meekness, with longsuffering, forbearing one another in love;

Endeavouring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.
There is one body, and one Spirit, even as ye are called in one hope of your calling;
One Lord, one faith, one baptism,
One God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all.” (Eph. 4:2-6).

The people of God can take an unlimited amount of calumny.

 

“The miracle-working power manifested through spiritualism will exert its influence against those who choose to obey God rather than men. Communications from the spirits will declare that God has sent them to convince the rejecters of Sunday of their error, affirming that the laws of the land should be obeyed as the law of God. They will lament the great wickedness in the world and second the testimony of religious teachers that the degraded state of morals is caused by the desecration of Sunday. Great will be the indignation excited against all who refuse to accept their testimony.” Great Controversy, p. 590.

 

“And then the great deceiver will persuade men that those who serve God are causing these evils. The class that have provoked the displeasure of Heaven will charge all their troubles upon those whose obedience to God's commandments is a perpetual reproof to transgressors. It will be declared that men are offending God by the violation of the Sunday sabbath; that this sin has brought calamities which will not cease until Sunday observance shall be strictly enforced; and that those who present the claims of the fourth commandment, thus destroying reverence for Sunday, are troublers of the people, preventing their restoration to divine favor and temporal prosperity. Thus the accusation urged of old against the servant of God will be repeated and upon grounds equally well established: "And it came to pass, when Ahab saw Elijah, that Ahab said unto him, Art thou he that troubleth Israel? And he answered, I have not troubled Israel; but thou, and thy father's house, in that ye have forsaken the commandments of the Lord, and thou hast followed Baalim." 1 Kings 18:17, 18.” Ibid.

 

The unity of God’s people gives them a strength that terrifies the enemy of souls.

 

“Only let your conversation be as it becometh the gospel of Christ: that whether I come and see you, or else be absent, I may hear of your affairs, that ye stand fast in one spirit, with one mind striving together for the faith of the gospel;

And in nothing terrified by your adversaries: which is to them an evident token of perdition, but to you of salvation, and that of God.
For unto you it is given in the behalf of Christ, not only to believe on Him, but also to suffer for His sake;
Having the same conflict which ye saw in me, and now hear to be in me.
If there be therefore any consolation in Christ, if any comfort of love, if any fellowship of the Spirit, if any bowels and mercies,
Fulfil ye my joy, that ye be likeminded, having the same love, being of one accord, of one mind.
Let nothing be done through strife or vainglory; but in lowliness of mind let each esteem other better than themselves.” (Phil. 1:27-2:3).

Jesus, the fruit of God's loins

“[David] therefore being a prophet, and knowing that God had sworn with an oath to him, that of the fruit of his loins, according to the flesh, He would raise up Christ to sit on his throne.” (Acts 2:30).

“Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle, separated unto the gospel of God, (which He had promised afore by His prophets in the holy scriptures,) concerning His Son Jesus Christ our Lord, which was made of the seed of David according to the flesh.” (Rom. 1:1-3).

I believe those New Testament statements are based on the following promises to David.

“Now therefore thus shalt thou say unto My servant David, Thus saith the LORD of hosts, I took thee from the sheepcote, even from following the sheep, that thou shouldest be ruler over My people Israel:

And I have been with thee whithersoever thou hast walked, and have cut off all thine enemies from before thee, and have made thee a name like the name of the great men that are in the earth.
Also I will ordain a place for My people Israel, and will plant them, and they shall dwell in their place, and shall be moved no more; neither shall the children of wickedness waste them any more, as at the beginning,

And since the time that I commanded judges to be over My people Israel. Moreover I will subdue all thine enemies. Furthermore I tell thee that the LORD will build thee an house.

And it shall come to pass, when thy days be expired that thou must go to be with thy fathers, that I will raise up thy seed after thee, which shall be of thy sons; and I will establish his kingdom.

He shall build Me an house, and I will stablish his throne for ever.

I will be his Father, and he shall be My son: and I will not take My mercy away from him, as I took it from him that was before thee:

But I will settle him in Mine house and in My kingdom for ever: and his throne shall be established for evermore.” (1Chron. 17:7-14).

“Take of them of the captivity, even of Heldai, of Tobijah, and of Jedaiah, which are come from Babylon, and come thou the same day, and go into the house of Josiah the son of Zephaniah;

Then take silver and gold, and make crowns, and set them upon the head of Joshua the son of Josedech, the high priest;

And speak unto him, saying, Thus speaketh the LORD of hosts, saying, Behold the Man whose name is The BRANCH; and He shall grow up out of His place, and He shall build the temple of the LORD:

Even He shall build the temple of the LORD; and He shall bear the glory, and shall sit and rule upon His throne; and He shall be a Priest upon His throne: and the counsel of peace shall be between them both.” (Zech. 6:10-13).

As quoted above, “Therefore being a prophet, and knowing that God had sworn with an oath to him, that of the fruit of his loins(G3751), according to the flesh, He would raise up Christ to sit on his throne” (Acts 2:30).

G3751 osphus Of uncertain affinity; the loin (externally), that is, the hip; internally) procreative power: -loin.

This text literally refers to King David, that out of his loins Christ (first referring to Solomon in 1Chronicles 17, and then to the Branch or Messiah in Zechariah 6, which would also grow out of the root of David in Isaiah 11:1 and Jeremiah 23:5) would come to His people.

“Behold, the days come, saith the LORD, that I will raise unto David a righteous Branch, and a King shall reign and prosper, and shall execute judgment and justice in the earth. In His days Judah shall be saved, and Israel shall dwell safely: and this is His name whereby He shall be called, THE LORD OUR RIGHTEOUSNESS.” (Jer. 23:5,6).

“In those days, and at that time, will I cause the Branch of righteousness to grow up unto David; and He shall execute judgment and righteousness in the land.

In those days shall Judah be saved, and Jerusalem shall dwell safely: and this is the name wherewith she shall be called, The LORD our righteousness.

For thus saith the LORD; David shall never want a man to sit upon the throne of the house of Israel;

Neither shall the priests the Levites want a man before Me to offer burnt offerings, and to kindle meat offerings, and to do sacrifice continually.” (Jer. 33:15-18).

So, in a figurative sense, King David could represent God the Father, having lived a millennium in the deep, misty past of the apostolic church. Like King Arthur of English lore, the concept of David brought to the Jewish mind something that was very much a glorified myth. It was Babylonian and Egyptian ancestor worship. To them David was sinless, and worthy of godlike status. And, when in vision David witnessed, “The LORD said unto My Lord, Sit Thou at My right hand, until I make Thine enemies Thy footstool” (Ps. 110:1), the rabbis who lived after the failed Nehemiah-Ezra revival, and who were spoken of in Malachi as “sorcerers” (Mal. 3:5) that the Messiah would quickly condemn in judgment, interpreted David to write in Psalm 110 that “the Lord” was David himself and that David was singing an ode to himself, or that that psalm was Jehovah reciting a praise to David. In keeping with Babylonian thought, the post-exilic rabbis taught that not only David, but all their ancient fathers were faultless and their nation had never been in captivity. “They answered Him, We be Abraham’s seed, and were never in bondage to any man.” (John 8:33).

The Jews’ Babylonian Judaism was not the original, peculiar Hebrew religion, and the vast majority of Jews had lost their faith in Jehovah. “Then said He unto me, The iniquity of the house of Israel and Judah is exceeding great, and the land is full of blood, and the city full of perverseness: for they say, The LORD hath forsaken the earth, and the LORD seeth not.” (Eze. 9:9). Thus, they adopted the name of Jove (Jupiter) for Jehovah, which became Yahweh to match the Roman pronunciation of Jove, and they exalted their famous historical figures to the place of Jehovah. Nonetheless, Jehovah still watched over His people because they were to be the family through which He would send His Son to redeem the world. While He did not want those heroes to be looked upon as replacements of their God, He did desire His people to see His ancient servants as object lessons of Himself. Those heroes of faith in Him testified of Him, and didn’t want to be worshiped as if they were Jehovah. 

Therefore, to His later faithful ones who were witnesses to Christ’s resurrection, the greatest and godliest king of ancient Israel, and the ancient founder of the kingdom, David would be the perfect object lesson and likeness for their ancient God, whose kingdom reigns over heaven and earth. Thus, David’s loins could represent God’s loins. And a son, eons later coming out of David’s loins, according to the flesh, could speak of the Anointed One coming out of God’s loins, by the anointing “power of the Highest” (Luke 1:35).  “A greater than Solomon” (Luke 11:31), “came out from God” (John 16:27), “and He shall reign over the house of Jacob for ever; and of His kingdom there shall be no end” (Luke 1:33, cf 1Chron. 17:14; Rev. 21:7). And it all reveals the first begetting from the infinitely more distant past, when He “whose goings forth have been from of old, from everlasting” (Mic. 5:2), and “who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of every creature” (Col. 1:15) was begotten and became “the Son of the Blessed” (Mark 14:61). “Being made so much better than the angels, as He hath by inheritance obtained a more excellent name than they. For unto which of the angels said He at any time, Thou art My Son, this day have I begotten Thee? And again, I will be to Him a Father, and He shall be to Me a Son?” (Heb. 1:4,5, cf 1Chron. 17:13).

“The dedication of the first-born had its origin in the earliest times. God had promised to give the First-born of heaven to save the sinner. This gift was to be acknowledged in every household by the consecration of the first-born son. He was to be devoted to the priesthood, as a representative of Christ among men.…

Thus the law for the presentation of the first-born was made particularly significant. While it was a memorial of the Lord’s wonderful deliverance of the children of Israel, it prefigured a greater deliverance, to be wrought out by the only-begotten Son of God. As the blood sprinkled on the doorposts had saved the first-born of Israel, so the blood of Christ has power to save the world.” Desire of Ages, p. 51.

King David, a man after Christ’s own heart, relative to “the Son of David” whose heart infinitely more imitated the image of His Father’s heart, was a similitude for the purpose of teaching and confirming the Messiah in the Jews’ minds of Christ’s day. And it also overlays the similitude of Abraham in relation to Isaac, which taught and confirmed the minds of the children of Israel during the long era of the judges. As King David had lived during the misty past in the minds of the Hellenized Jews, and great ages separated their first faithful and holy king from the present dictatorial Herods, so, during the period from Moses to David, had Abraham lived as a past figure of misty aural tradition recently put into the new innovation of writing. Equally great ages had existed in the minds of the children of Israel between them and that godly progenitor of Jehovah’s blessing. Therefore, in the Hebrew minds of the post-Egyptian enslavement, Abraham could be likened to Jehovah. In either respective generation of captivity, both Abraham and David seemed as ancient as God Himself, who used those consecrated men to represent Himself in each Israelite mind, “from whence also he received Him in a figure.” (Heb. 11:19).

Likewise again, a similar similitude for the sake of hope and faith could also be drawn from the 10 generations between Noah and Abram. As Abram, one day to be the father of faith, came from the loins of his father Noah who was himself a preacher of righteousness by faith, so light could shine on the descendents of Shem during their darkening world which was being overrun by the satanic, occult rebellion of Ham, Cush, and Nimrod.

God has always given promise and prophecy through types as the source of encouragement to His people. Through His parabolic metaphors the people of God have always had something with which to bring hope to each other and about which to witness to others who never heard of the most ancient Creator God of love. So, Acts 2:30 can be seen as evidence of the Prototokos coming from the loins of God, the Only Begotten beginning of the Son of God, the First-begotten of God, “the Beginning of the creation of God” (Rev. 3:14).

In extension to the first-born model, as Melchisedec (Christ) is contrasted to Levi, Levi who paid tithes to Melchisedec because he was in the loins of his father Abraham (that is, in Abraham’s DNA), so Christ created the universe, while He was yet deep in the womb of His Father, Jehovah. “And as I may so say, Levi also, who receiveth tithes, payed tithes in Abraham. For he was yet in the loins of his father, when Melchisedec met him.” (Heb. 7:9,10). (Human reproduction, made in the image of the Godhead, gives a corporeal picture of Jehovah’s virtue-filled power to create.)

In the womb of God, the Son of God gradually received from His Father that dynamic, holy power to create, as well as the infinite creative information as His Father taught Him everything.

“Verily, verily, I say unto you, The Son can do nothing of Himself, but what He seeth the Father do: for what things soever He doeth, these also doeth the Son likewise. For the Father loveth the Son, and sheweth Him all things that Himself doeth: and He will shew Him greater works than these, that ye may marvel.” (John 5:19,20).

“For as the Father raiseth up the dead, and quickeneth them; even so the Son quickeneth whom He will.”  (John 5:21). Here we see the spiritual role that the Son plays in our existence. The Father affects us physically, and the Son was made “a quickening spirit” (1Cor. 15:45), in order to affect us spiritually with conviction of the heart and new birth in conversion. Jesus is the Spirit that we know, He is the one who quickens us from spiritual death. By water (His convicting words of grace and truth) and by Spirit (His own virtue) we are born again. He is our Prince and Saviour. The Father through Jesus is the Spirit of truth and the Comforter.

“Concerning His Son Jesus Christ our Lord, which was made of the seed of David according to the flesh; and declared to be the Son of God with power, according to the spirit of holiness, by the resurrection from the dead: by whom we have received grace and apostleship, for obedience to the faith among all nations, for His name.” (Rom. 1:3-5).

“And without controversy great is the mystery of godliness: God was manifest in the flesh, justified in the Spirit, seen of angels, preached unto the Gentiles, believed on in the world, received up into glory.” (1Tim. 3:16).

“God was manifest in the flesh”, “declared to be the Son of God with power”, “justified in the Spirit”,“according to the spirit of holiness”, “by the resurrection from the dead”, “received up into glory”.

The Spirit of Romans 7

“Wherefore the Law is holy, and the commandment holy, and just, and good….

For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh,) dwelleth no good thing : for to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not. ….

For I delight in the Law of God after the inward man:

But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members.

O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?

I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord. So then with the mind I myself serve the Law of God; but with the flesh the law of sin.” (Rom. 7:12,18,22-25).

 

In chapter 7 of his letter to the Romans, Paul had used an example for the “law in my members”. That example was “concupiscence” (vs. 8) Strong’s G1939 epithumia “a longing (especially for what is forbidden): concupiscence, desire, lust (after)”. It reminds me of what I’d heard people say about their teenagers who had gone crazy over their boyfriends or girlfriends, “It’s the hormones!” Well, there is no dispute that our post-Eden hormones can drive a person up a wall. But, these cravings could also equate to every kind of substance abuse: narcotics, nicotine, alcohol, and even high blood sugar. Yes, it’s possible to eat “for drunkenness” (Ecc. 10:17).

The high sugar/high fat diet for drunkenness has been done for eons. Since the beginning of time, the sugar habit in childhood has laid the foundation for the alcohol habit later in life. Halloween and its ancient counterpart has been built upon that premise. Chemicals of any kind, natural or artificially derived, and from whatever source, surge through the brain and body, furiously demanding responses which God created in man. But, the brain and body’s nervous system is very delicate, and God never intended them to be recklessly abused, as sexual lusts and man-made derivatives and substances do. Our bodies were made to be the temple of God, a habitation of God through His Spirit. Every vice falls into the category of Paul’s example, concupiscence. The issue of Romans 7 is an extremely relevant one.

Paul was not treating concupiscence, or fornication, lightly. The sanctified apostle took very serious any trespass of the Law of God, especially fornication. He wrote, “Flee fornication. Every sin that a man doeth is without the body; but he that committeth fornication sinneth against his own body.” (1Cor. 6:18). Paul understood that the most difficult sins for us to overcome were those which satisfy our deepest animal cravings, and they were the most offensive to God in whose image we were made. They become an idol, Satan’s idolatry which he has used to successfully oppose the work of redemption since the beginning of time. This was an issue in the Corinthian church. “It is reported commonly that there is fornication among you, and such fornication as is not so much as named among the Gentiles, that one should have his father’s wife.” (1Cor. 5:1). Paul knew scripture very well and would never handle the word of God dishonestly. “Therefore seeing we have this ministry, as we have received mercy, we faint not; but have renounced the hidden things of dishonesty, not walking in craftiness, nor handling the word of God deceitfully; but by manifestation of the truth commending ourselves to every man’s conscience in the sight of God.” (2Cor. 4:1,2).

Paul remembered the judgment of God upon Reuben for the same offense as the man in the Corinthian church. “And it came to pass, when Israel dwelt in that land, that Reuben went and lay with Bilhah his father’s concubine: and Israel heard it.” (Gen. 35:22). “Unstable as water, thou shalt not excel; because thou wentest up to thy father’s bed; then defiledst thou it: he went up to my couch.” (Gen. 49:4). “Now the sons of Reuben the firstborn of Israel, (for he was the firstborn; but, forasmuch as he defiled his father’s bed, his birthright was given unto the sons of Joseph the son of Israel: and the genealogy is not to be reckoned after the birthright.” (1Chron. 5:1).

Paul’s abhorrence of concupiscence even went to such an extent that he recommended (but didn’t require) that the young people not marry. “For I would that all men were even as I myself. But every man hath his proper gift of God, one after this manner, and another after that. I say therefore to the unmarried and widows, It is good for them if they abide even as I…. I suppose therefore that this is good for the present distress, I say, that it is good for a man so to be. Art thou bound unto a wife? seek not to be loosed. Art thou loosed from a wife? seek not a wife. But and if thou marry, thou hast not sinned; and if a virgin marry, she hath not sinned. Nevertheless such shall have trouble in the flesh: but I spare you…. The wife is bound by the law as long as her husband liveth; but if her husband be dead, she is at liberty to be married to whom she will; only in the Lord. But she is happier if she so abide, after my judgment: and I think also that I have the Spirit of God.” (1Cor. 7:7,8,26-28,39,40). Paul saw that “the days are evil.” (Eph. 5:16).

In that evil empire, it would be better to remain virgin than to find someone who was not suitable or had deeply buried sexual sins that might later be resurrected by the darkness always encroaching upon the apostolic church. Civilization had become as grossly corrupted as Israel was in Moses’ and Isaiah’s and Jeremiah’s day. “Thou shalt not take thee a wife, neither shalt thou have sons or daughters in this place. For thus saith the LORD concerning the sons and concerning the daughters that are born in this place, and concerning their mothers that bare them, and concerning their fathers that begat them in this land; they shall die of grievous deaths; they shall not be lamented; neither shall they be buried; but they shall be as dung upon the face of the earth: and they shall be consumed by the sword, and by famine; and their carcases shall be meat for the fowls of heaven, and for the beasts of the earth.” (Jer. 16:2-4). “How shall I pardon thee for this? thy children have forsaken Me, and sworn by them that are no gods: when I had fed them to the full, they then committed adultery, and assembled themselves by troops in the harlots’ houses. They were as fed horses in the morning: every one neighed after his neighbour’s wife. Shall I not visit for these things? saith the LORD: and shall not My soul be avenged on such a nation as this?” (Jer. 5:7-9). “When the Lord shall have washed away the filth of the daughters of Zion, and shall have purged the blood of Jerusalem from the midst thereof by the spirit of judgment, and by the spirit of burning....” (Isa. 4:4). The Lord required Moses to command the lust-enslaved men of Israel to stay away from their spouses while preparing for Judgment Day at Mount Sinai. “And he said unto the people, Be ready against the third day: come not at your wives.” (Ex. 19:15).

Far from making light of the evil of concupiscence, Paul uses it to illustrate the plight of the whole world under sin. He discerned the coming wrath of God. “And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not convenient; being filled with all unrighteousness, fornication, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness; full of envy, murder, debate, deceit, malignity; whisperers, backbiters, haters of God, despiteful, proud, boasters, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents, without understanding, covenantbreakers, without natural affection, implacable, unmerciful: who knowing the judgment of God, that they which commit such things are worthy of death, not only do the same, but have pleasure in them that do them.” (Rom. 1:28-32). And he was instructing his churches to flee from sin.

“Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, that ye should obey it in the lusts thereof.

Neither yield ye your members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin: but yield yourselves unto God, as those that are alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness unto God.

For sin shall not have dominion over you: for ye are not under [“the curse of” (Gal. 3:13)] the law, but under grace.

What then? shall we sin, because we are not under the law, but under grace? God forbid.

Know ye not, that to whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are to whom ye obey; whether of sin unto death, or of obedience unto righteousness?

But God be thanked, that ye were the servants of sin, but ye have obeyed from the heart that form of doctrine which was delivered you.

Being then made free from sin, ye became the servants of righteousness.

For when ye were the servants of sin, ye were free from righteousness.

What fruit had ye then in those things whereof ye are now ashamed? for the end of those things is death….

For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.” (Rom. 6:12-21,23).

Paul even mourned for the plagues that would sweep the Greco-Roman world because his efforts to teach and spare it were constantly being blocked by the Jewish leadership. “Who both killed the Lord Jesus, and their own prophets, and have persecuted us; and they please not God, and are contrary to all men: forbidding us to speak to the Gentiles that they might be saved, to fill up their sins alway: for the wrath is come upon them to the uttermost.” (1Thess. 2:15,16). The Lord also drove Ellen White to warn the world at the end of time that the same conditions of ancient Canaan and pagan Rome should strike fear in our hearts today. Before the Lamb’s day of visiting judgment upon a humanity possessed by Satan, Mrs. White’s fearful instruction, like Paul’s, was for the church to gain victory over the destructive lower nature.

“God gives no permission to man to violate the laws of his being. But man, through yielding to Satan’s temptations to indulge intemperance, brings the higher faculties into subjection to the animal appetites and passions. When these gain the ascendency, man, who was created a little lower than the angels, with faculties susceptible of the highest cultivation, surrenders to be controlled by Satan. And he gains easy access to those who are in bondage to appetite. Through intemperance, some sacrifice one-half, and others two-thirds, of their physical, mental and moral powers and become playthings for the enemy.” Messages to Young People, p. 236.

 

“Indulgence of appetite strengthens the animal propensities, giving them the ascendency over the mental and spiritual powers.

‘Abstain from fleshly lusts, which war against the soul,’ is the language of the apostle Peter.

You need to exercise temperance in all things. Cultivate the higher powers of the mind, and there will be less strength of growth of the animal. It is impossible for you to increase in spiritual strength while your appetite and passions are not under perfect control. Says the inspired apostle, ‘I keep under my body, and bring it into subjection; lest that by any means, when I have preached to others, I myself should be a castaway.’” Testimony Studies on Diets and Foods, p. 27.

“Indulgence of appetite strengthens the animal propensities, giving them the ascendency over the mental and spiritual powers.” Review and Herald, January 25, 1881 par. 23.

“‘Abstain from fleshly lusts, which war against the soul,’ is the language of the apostle Peter. Many regard this warning as applicable only to the licentious; but is has a broader meaning. It guards against every injurious gratification of appetite or passion.… These indulgences may well be classed among the lusts that exert a pernicious influence upon moral character. The earlier these hurtful habits are formed, the more firmly will they hold their victim in slavery to lust, and the more certainly will they lower the standard of spirituality.” Review and Herald, January 25, 1881 par. 24.

“Multitudes eagerly accept teachings that leave them at liberty to obey the promptings of the carnal heart. The reins of self-control are laid upon the neck of lust, the powers of mind and soul are made subject to the animal propensities, and Satan exultingly sweeps into his net thousands who profess to be followers of Christ.

But none need be deceived by the lying claims of spiritualism.” Great Controversy, p. 555,556.

 

“Those who are living upon the earth when the intercession of Christ shall cease in the sanctuary above are to stand in the sight of a holy God without a mediator. Their robes must be spotless, their characters must be purified from sin by the blood of sprinkling. Through the grace of God and their own diligent effort they must be conqueroros in the battle with evil.” Great Controversy, p. 425.

Paul likens the hormonal urges in a general sense to the propensities of our fallen nature to commit sin in every way possible. Those cravings bind us as if they possess us. Yet, the secret to successful victory was faith and dependence on Christ. The fallen human must have the help of the Spirit of God in Christ in order to obey “the truth through the Spirit” (1 Pet. 1:22). “For if ye live after the flesh, ye shall die: but if ye through the Spirit do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live.” (Rom. 8:13). “Through the grace of God and their own diligent effort they must be conqueroros in the battle with evil.” To try to “deny self” against those urges without grace from our Creator and Redeemer causes depression, insanity, or going headlong into some fanatical religion. If we are honest with ourselves, we end up with Paul’s same woeful cry that reaches the ears of the Lord of sabaoth: “I have no control of my will! I am wretched in every way! Who can rescue me from my nagging, destructive cravings?” There is a master puppeteer who works those cravings in order to manipulate us. The nightmarish son of perdition, that mystery of iniquity, is coming over the world again today, and Ellen White prophesied against it when she wrote the same concerning the ancient Roman Empire.

“Satanic agencies were incorporated with men. The bodies of human beings, made for the dwelling place of God, had become the habitation of demons. The senses, the nerves, the passions, the organs of men, were worked by supernatural agencies in the indulgence of the vilest lust. The very stamp of demons was impressed upon the countenances of men. Human faces reflected the expression of the legions of evil with which they were possessed. Such was the prospect upon which the world’s Redeemer looked. What a spectacle for Infinite Purity to behold! 

     Sin had become a science, and vice was consecrated as a part of religion. Rebellion had struck its roots deep into the heart, and the hostility of man was most violent against heaven. It was demonstrated before the universe that, apart from God, humanity could not be uplifted. A new element of life and power must be imparted by Him who made the world.” Desire of Ages, p. 36,37.

Of course, “Him who made the world” is the Son of God, the innocent One sent from the Father. And “the new element” imparted by the Son is His Spirit upon our fallen nature. It is the anointing from Messiah, the Anointed One, which He would give the world from His reconciled Father. His words of grace and truth would be the seed that, received by faith into the sinner, holds the principle of new life, the “new element”, the “anointing”.

“The anointing which ye have received of Him abideth in you, and ye need not that any man teach [“seduce” (vs. 26)] you: but as the same anointing teacheth you of all things, and is truth, and is no lie, and even as it hath taught you, ye shall abide in Him. And now, little children, abide in Him; that, when He shall appear, we may have confidence, and not be ashamed before Him at His coming. If ye know that He is righteous, ye know that every one that doeth righteousness is born of Him.” (1Jn. 2:27-29).

“Then said Jesus to those Jews which believed on Him, If ye continue in My word, then are ye My disciples indeed; and ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free…. If the Son therefore shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed.” (John 8:31,32,36). The Son brings to His people “the spirit of judgment, and...the spirit of burning.” (Isa. 4:4).

“They said one to another, Did not our heart burn within us, while He talked with us by the way, and while He opened to us the scriptures?” (Luke 24:32).

“Now the parable is this: The seed is the word of God.” (Luke 8:11).

“He that soweth the good seed is the Son of man.” (Matt. 13:37).

“Seeing ye have purified your souls in obeying the truth through the Spirit unto unfeigned love of the brethren, see that ye love one another with a pure heart fervently:

 Being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the word of God, which liveth and abideth for ever….

But the word of the Lord endureth for ever. And this is the word which by the gospel is preached unto you.

Wherefore laying aside all malice, and all guile, and hypocrisies, and envies, and all evil speakings,

As newborn babes, desire the sincere milk of the word, that ye may grow thereby:

If so be ye have tasted that the Lord is gracious.” (1Pet. 1:22,23,25-2:3).

In the word of God and the anointing of Jesus Paul found the antidote for his terrible sin problem: Christ, His life and death; His words and Spirit; His living intercession before His Father in the sanctuary which the Lord pitched and not man.

The Spirit is the words of Christ, the living, incorruptible, quickening words from Him who is “the Word of life” (1Jn. 1:1). The words of Him who loved us and died for us contain the power of His Father, and He commissions angels to bring His words home to the spirit of the Christian. The Spirit is in the word of Christ through the power of God upon the prophets as they present the testimony of Jesus. The Spirit of God is thus the Spirit of Christ, or the testimony of Jesus, and it corrects every dead doctrine, previously usurped and corrupted by Satan, turning corrupted doctrine back into its original, primitive, empowering arrangement of convicting truth for victory over the devil’s controlling influence. The counsel of God in Christ’s words, through His prophets and angelic spirits, is the “law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus” (Rom. 8:2) that is the power of God unto salvation in the human heart at conversion. It gives the “newborn babes” freedom from dead works and from the law of the flesh, freedom from a human set of laws that require only human efforts, “the will of the flesh” and “the will of man” (John 1:13).

Rather, the power of God unto salvation comes via faith in Christ’s Spirit of life that is in His words and in the “Law of God” (Rom. 7:25). By conceptualizing the lifeless body of the Christ, who had determinedly sought to have the perfection of His Father, and then by the reconciliation He made for the whole world, repentance caused Paul to love the Law of God and to be determined to serve God with his whole mind. He obeyed from his heart the form of doctrine that Christ delivered to him, which he reiterated in Romans 8:1,2. Being made free from sin through the body of Christ, Paul became a servant of righteousness. He had complete victory over concupiscence. He was no longer driven by the fallen nature.

 “There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death. For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh: that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.” (Rom. 8:1-4).

Because of Adam’s fall from perfection and innocence, God could no longer, by simply commanding obedience, see His righteousness fulfilled in us because our nature was weakened by sin and we lost the conception that God loved us. Sin is selfishness and to choose selfishness robs from the soul any place for disinterested love. The choice to sin thrust upon mankind a worldview of selfishness and robbed from the human race the true unselfish knowledge of our Father in heaven.

In the words of Paul, “the Law could not” “[fulfill its] righteousness...in us” because “[the Law] was weak through [our] flesh” (Rom. 8:3). This was experienced by Paul in the previous chapter 7. “To will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not.” “In me (that is, in my flesh,) dwelleth no good thing.” (Rom. 7:18). But, “God sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh” “for [the condemnation of] sin”, did the work of convicting us of our sin in His Son’s beautiful, perfect, and persecuted flesh. The weak offense of the Law became the strong offense through the cross. We needed a tangible demonstration of our sin—we needed transgression of the Law demonstrated through the crucifixion of the innocent One—the Righteousness of God incorporated into human flesh.

We also needed to see God’s condemnation of our sin; we needed to hear His sorrowful expressions of loathing throughout the Old Testament. But God could no longer use His Law to do this, because we were no longer capable of responding positively toward His Law’s conviction. Our minds could not decipher the Law’s deeper language, God’s true, sorrowful loathing of our sin. To our confused minds and warped consciences, the deeper conviction of sin had been as if it were speaking in an unknown tongue. We could not receive it; but only wage war against it. But when, in our one opportunity to spare Him, we see that we mugged and assassinated the friendly and immaculate High Priest, “the Holy One of God” (Luke 4:34), we are crucified with Christ. We see that the Son of the Blessed One came only to be a blessing to us. So we receive the mission of the Lamb and He makes us open to the purpose of His Father’s Law—subservience to love.

“Blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered. Blessed is the man unto whom the LORD imputeth not iniquity, and in whose spirit there is no guile.” (Ps. 32:1,2).

“God was manifest in the flesh” and “justified in the Spirit” (1Tim. 3:16). By our surrender to “this Stone” (Matt. 21:44)—the towering Law in the anointed Prince Messiah made flesh—we are reconciled to God and the great King can once again open to us His blessedness—His Spirit that brings us the promise of pardon. “That the blessing of Abraham might come on the Gentiles through Jesus Christ; that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith.” (Gal. 3:14). Once we have come to Jesus and are reconciled to God, we have a new disposition toward God and His Law. We suddenly love His Law, and find it wonderfully and very doable! We can obey it, which we take great pleasure in. This was the experience of David. “Then said I, Lo, I come: in the volume of the book it is written of me, I delight to do Thy will, O my God: yea, Thy law is within my heart.” (Ps. 40:7,8). We follow after God’s Spirit of blessedness. Eden’s first dominion, SPIRIT+Spirit+spirit, is restored in us. We “were sealed with that holy Spirit of promise” (Eph. 1:13), at least partially so “until the redemption of the purchased possession.” (Eph. 1:14). Our blessedness, or happiness and peace, is an asher (“happy”) that didn’t come from ashera the “happy” (lawless) groves of Ashtoreth. The blessedness from above is Law-based happiness.

And “our shortcomings and mistakes” which often make us “bow down and weep at the feet of Jesus” Steps to Christ, p. 64, cause us to “groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body” (Rom. 8:23). “But we are not to be discouraged. Even if we are overcome by the enemy, we are not cast off, not forsaken and rejected of God. No; Christ is at the right hand of God, who also maketh intercession for us.” Steps to Christ, p. 64. “No earthly parent could be as patient with the faults and mistakes of his children, as is God with those He seeks to save. No one could plead more tenderly with the transgressor. No human lips ever poured out more tender entreaties to the wanderer than does He. All His promises, His warnings, are but the breathing of unutterable love.” Steps to Christ, p. 35.

Because we have surrendered to the call of God and to the keeping of Christ, He will hold us with a hand that will never let go.

“Nothing is apparently more helpless, yet really more invincible, than the soul that feels its nothingness and relies wholly on the merits of the Saviour. By prayer, by the study of His word, by faith in His abiding presence, the weakest of human beings may live in contact with the living Christ, and He will hold them by a hand that will never let go.” Ministry of Healing, p. 182.

“Let him take hold of My strength, that he may make peace with Me; and he shall make peace with Me.” (Isa. 27:5).

 

“I am the good shepherd, and know My sheep, and am known of Mine. As the Father knoweth Me, even so know I the Father: and I lay down My life for the sheep. And other sheep I have, which are not of this fold: them also I must bring, and they shall hear My voice; and there shall be one fold, and one shepherd…. My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me: and I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of My hand. My Father, which gave them Me, is greater than all; and no man is able to pluck them out of My Father’s hand.” (John 10:14-16,27-29). The Father through the good Shepherd coming to the sheep who have faith and who know His voice brings them the Spirit. SPIRIT+Spirit+spirit= the Spirit.

   “All who are seeking to work in harmony with God’s plan of education will have His sustaining grace, His continual presence, His keeping power. To everyone He says: ‘Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee.’ ‘I will not fail thee, nor forsake thee.’ Joshua 1:9, 5.” Ministry of Healing, p. 405.

     “Those who take Christ at His word, and surrender their souls to His keeping, their lives to His ordering, will find peace and quietude. Nothing of the world can make them sad when Jesus makes them glad by His presence. In perfect acquiescence there is perfect rest. The Lord says, ‘Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on Thee: because he trusteth in Thee.’ Isaiah 26:3. Our lives may seem a tangle; but as we commit ourselves to the wise Master Worker, He will bring out the pattern of life and character that will be to His own glory. And that character which expresses the glory--character--of Christ will be received into the Paradise of God. A renovated race shall walk with Him in white, for they are worthy.” Desire of Ages, p. 331.

God’s pardoning blessedness comes only through the work of His Son’s merciful death. The Father and Son can say together,  “So then death worketh in Us, but life in you.” (2Cor. 4:12). Christ “was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon Him; and with His stripes we are healed.” (Isa. 53:5). “We…joy in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom we have now received the atonement.” (Rom. 5:11). Through the atoning pardon comes Christ's anointing Spirit and His words. Once we have received the anointing of the living Anointed One, now His Law can enter and remain in us. Then, through His words, His sayings, His commandments, teachings, instructions, doctrine, statutes, judgments, His name, et cetera, we abide in Him and in His continuing atonement. “I am the vine, ye are the branches: he that abideth in Me and I in him.... If ye abide in Me, and My words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you.” (John 15:5,7). Jesus lives in us by Spirit in His words. This is what we hear from Paul in Romans 7 and 8.

“He that abideth in Me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit: for without Me ye can do nothing.... Ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you.” (John 15:5,7).

“Nothing is apparently more helpless, yet really more invincible, than the soul that feels its nothingness and relies wholly on the merits of the Saviour. By prayer, by the study of His word, by faith in His abiding presence, the weakest of human beings may live in contact with the living Christ, and He will hold them by a hand that will never let go.” Ministry of Healing, p. 182.

After our seeking God with all our heart, bearing up under His condemnation of our sins, then He would give us over to His Son. “Ye have forgotten the exhortation which speaketh unto you as unto children, My son, despise not thou the chastening of the Lord, nor faint when thou art rebuked of Him: for whom the Lord loveth He chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom He receiveth. If ye endure chastening, God dealeth with you as with sons; for what son is he whom the Father chasteneth not?” (Heb. 12:5-7). Once we submit to the Father’s rebukes and chastening, He gives us to Jesus, who will in no wise throw us out. We sought Jesus with all our heart and we found Him; we received Him and He gave us power to become sons of God. “And because ye are sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit of His Son into your hearts, crying, Abba, Father.” (Gal. 4:6). Our spirit is united with the Father’s  and the Son’s. SPIRIT+Spirit+spirit.

 

The only other option comes to those who won’t stand before the Father’s condemnation through His Law, and receive His Son’s Spirit. “If any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of His.” (Rom. 8:9). “If ye be without chastisement, whereof all are partakers, then are ye [illegitimate], and not sons.” (Heb. 12:8). Them He would have to hand over to His adversary, the devil whose empty Ashtoreth worship gives a deceptive feeling of redemption, and is billed as redemption. But, God is not in it, and it leads away from power to overcome sin. It leads away from redemption; it sends its victims into a tailspin. And after a hopeless, headlong tumble into complete lawlessness and wrathful possession by the evil one, the victim must be destroyed. “That which beareth thorns and briers is rejected, and is nigh unto cursing; whose end is to be burned.” (Heb. 6:8).

Our deliverance from sin would come by God’s wrath abiding on us until we surrender to His righteous judgment, and then Christ’s taking us under His wing, enveloping us in His bosom. By faith, His disciples would join Him, as He had joined His Father. He would come to us spiritually with His words, the same Comforter and Wonderful Counselor that He had been for His disciples when He taught them. As with the apostles, through His Spirit He would welcome into the holy precincts of His grace and truth everyone who surrendered to the severity of His Father’s Law. “And He said, Thy name shall be called no more Jacob, but Israel [“He who fights with God and overcomes (self)”]: for as a prince hast thou power with God and with men, and hast prevailed.” (Gen. 32:28).

“He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches; To him that overcometh will I give to eat of the hidden manna, and will give him a white stone, and in the stone a new name written, which no man knoweth saving he that receiveth it.” (Rev. 2:17). “To him that overcometh will I grant to sit with Me in My throne, even as I also overcame, and am set down with My Father in His throne. He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches.” (Rev. 3:21,22). Who sat down with His Father? Jesus. Who is making this promise? The Spirit. Who is the Spirit then? Obviously, it is Jesus testifying through His servant. John, who is “in the Spirit” (Rev. 1:10) and is giving us the words of Jesus. “The words that I speak unto you, they are spirit....” (John 6:63).

“Come unto Me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.” (Matt. 11:28). “If any man thirst, let him come unto Me, and drink.” (John 7:37). “The Spirit and the bride say, Come.... And whosoever will, let him take of the water of life freely.” (Rev. 22:17). “Blessed is he that readeth, and they that hear the words of this prophecy, and keep those things which are written therein.” (Rev. 1:3). The Spirit is Jesus calling us.

“Believe Me that I am in the Father, and the Father in Me…. If ye love Me, keep My commandments. And I will pray the Father, and He shall give you another Comforter, that He may abide with you for ever;… I will not leave you comfortless: I will come to you…. At that day ye shall know that I am in My Father, and ye in Me, and I in you.” (John 14:11,15,16,18,20). “I and My Father are one.” (John 10:30). Since Jesus comes to us through His words that are Spirit, then only those who seek to keep His commandments, words, Law etc. can have His Spirit, the Comforter. Jesus will not leave us comfortless. His words will be a witness to His presence in our hearts and minds.

“All Mine are Thine, and Thine are Mine; and I am glorified in them. And now I am no more in the world, but these are in the world, and I come to Thee. Holy Father, keep through Thine own name those whom Thou hast given Me, that they may be one, as We are…. I in them, and Thou in Me, that they may be made perfect in one; and that the world may know that Thou hast sent Me, and hast loved them, as Thou hast loved Me…. And I have declared unto them Thy name, and will declare it: that the love wherewith Thou hast loved Me may be in them, and I in them.” (John 17:10,11,23,26). When we are united in Their union, through faith in Jesus’ words, which are spirit, then the SPIRIT of Jehovah with the Spirit of His Son in our spirit is “the Spirit” that we experience. SPIRIT+Spirit+spirit= the Spirit.

“Nevertheless I tell you the truth; it is expedient for you that I go away: for if I go not away, the Comforter will not come unto you; but if I depart, I will send Him unto you…. Howbeit when He, the Spirit of truth, is come, He will guide you into all truth: for He shall not speak of Himself; but whatsoever He shall hear, that shall He speak: and He will shew you things to come [prophecy is the testimony of Jesus.]” (John 16:7,8,13).

Remember that the same apostle wrote,

“The anointing which ye have received of Him [“the Son” “from the beginning” (vs. 24)] abideth in you, and ye need not that any man teach you: but as the same anointing teacheth you of all things, and is truth, and is no lie, and even as it hath taught you, ye shall abide in Him. And now, little children, abide in Him; that, when He shall appear, we may have confidence, and not be ashamed before Him at His coming. If ye know that He is righteous, ye know that every one that doeth righteousness is born of Him.” (1Jn. 2:27-29).

In closing, the Comforter Jesus sent to Earth from His greater COMFORTER FATHER still gives abundant comfort to those who are in great need. They have confidence to stand in the great wrath of the Lamb. THE COMFORTER+the Comforter+the comforted= the Comforter.