". . . I must be about My Father's business?"
It is very, very important that you read the posts in numerical order.
Scripture quotations are from 1984 NIV of The Holy Bible unless otherwise noted.
The RefTagger Tool uses the NKJV of The Holy Bible for Scripture Quotations.
Luke 2:49 (NKJV) And He said to them, "Why did you seek Me? Did you not know that I must be about My Father's business?"
John 7:18 "He who speaks on his own does so to gain honor for himself, but he who works for the honor of the one who sent him is a man of truth; there is nothing false about him."
More About The Holy Spirit
God's Business
Matthew 15:18 "But the things that come out of the mouth come from the heart, and these make a man ‘unclean.’ (19) For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false testimony, slander. (20) These are what make a man ‘unclean’; but eating with unwashed hands does not make him ‘unclean' ".
This puts God in The Character Development Business. Business is about getting things done and if you want to make something happen you have to write it down. Writing something down is a quick way of capturing a thought so you can make it happen--bringing it to life. Of all the ways of keeping records, the written word is the oldest, simplest, and most effective. Think about how in a court you must have some form of documentation to prove anything. Thanks to the written word, we have access to ideas today that have been around for thousands of years. Whether we live for an eternity or not depends on our names being written in The Lamb's Book Of Life. Written words are crucial and in The Holy Bible, when God says "it is written" that means it will be done.
Everything in any organization or society comes down to the character of all of those involved. All ruling authorities are only as good as their collective character. If the collective characters are good, then any form of government will work well whether it be a Dictatorship, Socialism, a Democracy, or a Republic. But when people are placed in positions of power, they become prideful and very corrupt because evil preys on pride and seeks political power which is the power to use deadly force to impose your will on another person. This is why all governments in the world are extremely corrupt, they are being dominated by an unseen Enemy in an unseen Spiritual War.
How people handle themselves publicly and privately is God's Business:
Hebrews 4:12 "For the word of God is living and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart."
God knows and judges the Intent / Motives / Purpose of all of our actions.
When you go into the presence of the Spirit Of God, be prepared for any of "your" hidden, private and personal business to be revealed to everyone because Job 41:11 ". . . everything under heaven belongs to me." Those who are very humble have nothing to hide, they live out loud in the open, and are always prepared for this.
The Road Less Traveled
I was disciplined by the Lord (Hebrews 12:5-11), sometime in the early 1990's, because I halfheartedly wanted to shift back into the traditional path of spiritual growth and religious norms which are just Comfort Zones. When I was disciplined by the Lord, I felt a terrible sick-like stressed feeling in my chest cavity for a short time that I had never felt before or since. The Lord wanted me to continue following my heart because He was leading me to the truth. When growing up, I stopped going to church after age fifteen because I knew in my heart that something was not right. If you know things are not working right, then something has to change to get different results; it is insane to expect different results from doing the same things. The old way of viewing things must be given up to make room for a new view, but we are naturally scared of change--we always want to stay in our Comfort Zones, being surrounded by the familiar.
The Holy Spirit is supposed to be our primary spiritual Teacher (John 14:26) and as The Spirit Of Truth (John 15:26), He helps us see ourselves as God sees us and works to establish humility in us which God desires. (Matthew 18:4, Luke 18:14) Those who are anointed do not need a human spiritual teacher. (1 John 2:26-27) Before continuing, please read How The Spirit Helps Us Understand. Self reliance is what the first temptation of Jesus by Satan was about (Matthew 4:1-4) and God protects us in many ways that we don't see or understand--and if we did, we would be way too scared to function. God always has our best interests at heart and the more you grow spiritually, the more you learn to trust in Him:
Proverbs 3:5 (NKJV) "Trust in the LORD with all your heart, and lean not on your own understanding; (6) in all your ways acknowledge Him, and He shall direct your paths.
This is one of my favorite Scriptures. If you go into a book store or library and think about all the knowledge contained in all those books, you realize how very large the Infinite Information / Knowledge / Spiritual Universe is and how lost we can get without guidance from The Holy Spirit. (John 14:26) Two key insights from "The Road Less Traveled" by M. Scott Peck:
pg. 195 "the universe makes sense--that is, it follows certain laws and is predictable; but human beings are poor examiners, subject to superstition, bias, prejudice, and a profound tendency to see what they want to see rather that what is really there;"
pg. 192 "It is no wonder, then, that the world of humanity is so full of conflict. We have a situation in which human beings, who must deal with each other, have vastly different views as to the nature of reality, yet each one believes his or her own view to be the correct one since it is based on the microcosm of personal experience."
We all are trying to figure out the scheme of things and we have evil spirits working against us who deliberately cause us to help corrupt the information we give and receive with very well hidden lies--and we really, really do not want to see this hidden Spiritual War. Thank God for The Holy Spirit Of Truth who is our Tour Guide through The Infinite Universe Of Knowledge. The Holy Spirit is the light of God / Love that shines in us and helps us to continually examine our actions and live a life that is dedicated to the truth and living in peace with others. People that are affected by evil avoid the light of being self aware of their actions and the truly evil would rather destroy the person trying to show them the error of their ways than deal with the pain of self examination.
Jeremiah 17:9 "The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure.
Who can understand it?"
Warfare Intelligence
In any war, intelligence is very, very important. In Spiritual Warfare, having the simple awareness of being engaged in a War Of Ideas is half the battle. Our severely-out-manned Enemy has the big advantage of being united against mostly unaware human beings. When someone kills as many people as possible, just before committing suicide, that is a major battle victory for our Enemy who wants to destroy all of us. What is a new soldier to do since there are so many different religions with different beliefs within them? Just check the WHOLE date, what are we measuring? Month, Day, 2011 A.D. Anno Domini means "in the year of our Lord; since Christ was born." Without A Major Significant Event, a time line is useless and we'd have to find something else to measure time from. The religion with The Creator who came in human form (where Time, that He created, is being measured from) and promises to return again to rule over His creation has got the be the True Religion. Also, what religion has the most division, confusion, and persecution against it? Christianity is the answer. In warfare you defend against the biggest threats and non-threats can be ignored. From analyzing the Enemy's attack pattern and tactics, you can see that he is trying to keep people from a very powerful weapon that he doesn't want them to discover about Christianity, The Nuclear Truth about The Good Shepherd. So the best way the Enemy can hide the truth is to be in the churches and Theology Schools poised as Preachers / Teachers who give people a counterfeit truth.
A More Effective Wisdom Distribution System
A Lack Of Understanding
Looking back, I'm glad I stopped going to church, dropping out of a confused and dysfunctional system, which many people are doing on their own. (see Plain Truth Ministries: Christianity Without the Religion) The Church is not a building that you are supposed to go to. The Church is "The Body Of Christ" which is a group of people in action, doing God's will and acting on His behalf in the world. (1 Corinthians 12:27-31) I know that Hebrews 10:25 says "Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, . . ." but the meeting does not have to always be in the same building or in a building at all--Comfort Zones.
Acts 17:24 "God who made the world and everything in it, since He is Lord of heaven and earth, does not dwell in temples made with hands."
God dwells in people through The Holy Spirit and makes them a part of The Church / Body Of Christ. We are supposed to be The Church, not go to a church. All the envy, strife, and divisions among the different churches are the result of a lack of spiritual growth and understanding, which is stunted in most churches. (1 Corinthians 3:2-4) I grew up in a church that believed that you have to "speak in tongues" in order to be saved which is not true at all. A Mandatory Gift is an oxymoron and a lying euphemism for "A Requirement." God gives gifts as He sees fit (1 Corinthians 12:11) and the answer to all the questions in 1 Corinthians 12:29-30 is "no." I was born again by the new birth (John 3:8) as a preteen, and didn't realize it until I was anointed and saved ten years later by confessing my salvation because of this false belief that I didn't understand at the time. I've also learned that God is a spirit and He is only concerned with our spirit--that which affects our mindset or way of thinking. Most churches get stuck on the symbols (The Son) of Water Baptism and The Communion Sacrament that do not change anything about a person's way of thinking. It's the ideas (The Father) of Salvation and Scripture Memorization that those symbols represent that changes our thought process and makes a difference in the world. Being stuck on the symbols is like a group of people going around stamping the word "love" on the shirts of other people for the command to "love one another;" the idea that the symbols represent is what is important. I have never been baptized by water and I never will be because Jesus Christ transferred John's Water Baptism (Matthew 3:11) to The Holy Spirit Baptism (Matthew 3:13-15) when he died on the cross. I have also been given A New Baptism from the Lord for people, that corrects the core cause of our problems, that I will reveal in the next post. Like I said in Post #5, most of the things in this world are a hustle. People are mostly getting a spiritual run a round and being distracted from The Truth.
Wisdom From Water
Water is a symbol for The Spirit Of God and that is what water baptism is about, people being soaked in God's Holy Spirit by Salvation. The properties of water teach us how God wants us to function as A Collective Group Of People. Water functions as one single unit, it is not divided against itself at all. Water is very flexible and adaptable. Love requires us to be very, very flexible when we deal with each other to live in peace and harmony. Water settles to the same level on the top which means no water wants to exalt itself over any other water, in humility it functions as one unit and keeps everything in balance. Water also diffuses (spreads out) heat or cold through out itself so that all connected water will remain at the same temperature. No water is left out in the cold by other water, no water is left to burn up in heat while other water is in air conditioning, no rich or poor water, it is all the same. Water also diffuses any blow throughout itself by making waves so that all the connected water can help absorb the blow. Water truly functions as, "All for one and one for all." The Ant Kingdom is the closest thing on earth that functions like water. (Proverbs 6:6-8)
Diffusion of power and humility are very, very important because this allows God, who knows everything and is in everyone, to remain in control by coordinating everyones activities. God created everyone with a conscience so that we will instinctively know extreme right from wrong and this is how God, "The Infinite Spirit Of Love," is in everyone. He dwells in the Saints by His Holy Spirit. So when things are in perfect balance, like in Exodus 16:17-19, it is only because The Spirit Of God / Love is in control. It is all good only when it is all God. Satan always wants to centralize power into fewer and fewer people through the authorities and governments so he can eventually control the whole world through one person.
Jethro's Advice: Exodus 18
God / Love is a spirit and the best analogy for a spirit is the wind. The wind does not stir around in a building and wait for people to come feel it, the wind moves through neighborhoods, cities, counties, states, etc. going to the people to be felt and that is how The Body Of Christ should function--taking the message of God's Kingdom to the masses. We should have groups of people organized into cells and making appointments with people to minister and fellowship with them. The key here is "make an appointment" with people when you encounter them in public places so they will be expecting to meet or talk to you, not popping up at their door unsuspected which annoys people. We hear about Terrorist Cells of people doing bad things and we need to form Love Cells of people who do good.
The current situation with pastors and church congregations reminds me of Moses and Jethro in Exodus 18:13-27. Moses was handling too much of the burden of settling all the people's disputes by himself and Jethro told Moses to train some of the people to help him and let them bear most of the burden leaving him only the very difficult cases. This is the same type of situation with modern pastors having to be teachers, counselors, psychologists, social workers, crisis center call monitors, business executives, etc. which is way too much stress, work and responsibility being put on one person which often leads to burnout. Pastors of congregations are carrying way too much of a burden.
God expects us to grow spiritually (John 15:1-2, Hebrews 5:11-14) from infants to mature adults. A big part of spiritual growth is learning how to become less of a burden to someone and growing into taking the initiative to help out and becoming an asset to the person or the situation. There is a tremendous amount of spiritual information that must be taught and maintained in people for them to function in love. The more you spread out the power of information distribution, the harder it is for the Enemy to deceive people. All you need to be able to teach something is an understanding of that something and the more you teach it, the better you get. ("All we need from a sermon is some good info. We can do without the theatrical show. A once a week performance is way too slow.") So taking the teachings of the sermons and bible study classes and assigning them to individuals or small groups and letting them edify others in personal fellowship, being highly interactive with each other, would greatly improve the Wisdom Distribution System Of The Body Of Christ.
Since about 90% of our experience is sight and sound, the technology of television can put many people around the world in virtually the same place at the same time. TV, webinars, and conference calls can bridge the gaps between people and make the world a smaller place. You hear of business mergers between companies all the time and I wonder when the Protestants and the Catholics will merge? The Baptists and the Methodists? etc., etc..
A Culture Of Love
Culture - n. the total range of activities and ideas of a group of people with shared traditions, which are transmitted and reinforced by members of the group.
When people are empowered to freely distribute the knowledge and love of Jesus Christ and develop the habit of sharing wisdom with everyone, we will change the culture of our country with everyone being responsible for cultural maintenance. A big part of a culture of love would be developing a culture of safety as well, teaching and reinforcing teachings frequently to prevent people, especially parents with new infants and young children, from hurting themselves or others and arming them with information on how to protect themselves from predators since love always protects. So if one bad thing ever happens to someone in The Body Of Christ, love will make sure that it will not continue to happen to others repeatedly unlike our present culture. We would have little children singing bible verses when playing Patty Cake Patty Cake and we all would live in peace and harmony.
False Beliefs
There are many, many false beliefs that are circulating the globe and creating chaos. Believing Satan's lies causes severe dysfunction in people's spirit leaving them conflicted and confused. Too function properly, people need a clear conscious toward God (Acts 24:16) and believing spiritual lies cause guilt, leaving a person divided against their self and dysfunctional.
2 Corinthians 10:4 "The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. (5) We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ."
You can only fight Satan's lies with God's truth. I'll address a few of what I think are the most harmful false beliefs. These are essentially Anti-Wisdom and attacks on sound judgement.
1) "You are thinking too much / deep." The only way this statement can make sense is if you where in perfect conditions (Heaven) and you are trying to figure out a way to improve things; which should be impossible because perfect is that which can not be improved. But in a world where (1) People are naturally lazy, mentally and physically, and also naturally selfish; these are two very serious problems. (2) This makes people naturally ignorant by not actively seeking wisdom, so they don't know that they are lazy, selfish, and ignorant. (3) When they do seek wisdom, they only do the naturally lazy minimum by listening to Authorities, trusting them do all of their spiritual work for them and not verifying the information for themselves. (4) People are naturally afraid of change even though things are becoming worse at a faster rate. Under these conditions, this has got to be the worst thing you can say to a person and get them to believe in. This is essentially a quick, hypnotic command to "remain ignorant." But to say "remain ignorant" is too obvious and would draw attention to people's ignorance, so the above hidden invalidating phrase is used to hide the real meaning. It is called Sophistry - n. a subtle, tricky, superficially plausible, but generally fallacious method of reasoning.
2) "If it aint broke don't fix it." In the mind, this quickly gets converted to the hidden meaning of "don't try to improve things" which is ridiculous and a very dangerous thought. This is closely related to #1 because together they form a mental catch-22. This should ONLY apply to something that you don't understand very well. If you tinker with something, with very little understanding of it (which is foolish), you will more than likely make it worse and not be able to return it to the original condition. But how can you get a better understanding of things if you are not supposed to think much or deep? "Don't try to improve things" tells you to not think about what you are doing, just do or accept what you are told in the exact way it was explained. This is brainwashing and causes people to not think for themselves or ask questions which is very dangerous. The path to true holiness is in questioning everything. (see Genesis 18:22-33 and 1 Thessalonians 5:21-22 Abraham questioned God but human authorities are not to be questioned?; only for those who lack understanding and remain children spiritually.) People then move into accepting religious dogma, that is not supposed to be questioned because it comes from a trusted authority figure. (If someone doesn't want things questioned, they usually are hiding something.) They become very comfortable with these cherished beliefs and some get defensive and even hostile when their beliefs, that produce very dysfunctional communities, are challenged. So with your judgement corrupted ("it's the communities, not the beliefs"), you are not supposed to be able to tell the difference between "broke" and normal.
3) "Falling in love is real love." The main problem with so much confusion about love is the inaccuracy of the English Language which has so many terms for the same idea. There are many different types of love and we use that four letter word way too loosely. In a nut shell, we fall in love only when we are consciously or unconsciously sexually motivated. Real love is an act of will and a choice that requires us to put forth an effort. Falling in love is effortless and we don't even control who we fall in love with, so it is not a choice. The honeymoon eventually ends (impaired judgement) and we return to the real world where real love will start or the couple will go their separate ways.
4) "The intense feeling from Romantic Love is not supposed to fade." Now don't get me wrong, I think all women everywhere should get as much romance (special attention and showers of appreciation) from as many people as possible because they are by far the most wonderful creatures on the planet--God really saved the best for last! But the false belief that there is only one special man for every woman and only one special woman for every man and this is predetermined by fate is a bunch a crap. Many people waste a lot of time and energy trying to live up to this lie that we get from fairy tales and movies. Lies that affect marriages are the most destructive because happy marriages are the foundation of happy families that produces happy children. Happy marriages are the building blocks of a country.
5) The Global Economy 1 Corinthians 3:19 "For the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God. For it is written,'He catches the wise in their own craftiness' " I'll never forget how hard I laughed at our Global Economic System when the Lord revealed to me that The Kingdom Of Heaven is a Global and Historical Family Reunion. Politicians, Business People, and Scientist will have a very hard time accepting that all the knowledge and degrees concerning money and finances are foolishness with God because they have many years invested in this nonsense. The economy of the Kingdom Of Heaven is "Freely you have received, freely give." (Matthew 10:8) Prosperity preachers fall for this trap by believing that when God controlled the riches in the Old Testament, which were simply cattle and crops, the control of a nature based increase transfers into our modern day Economic System and a monetary increase. This simply is not true because this would require God (who always controls nature) to directly control people's money handling decisions to continually funnel more money back to the tithers. If all the Saints were tithers, this would require God to directly control Sinner's money handling decisions (who don't have His Holy Spirit in them) all the time, and not just occasionally, but God gives people free will so this does not make sense and it is a great fallacy. Jesus said we will always have the poor with us in Matthew 26:11 because He knows that in Satan's economic system, for something to be valuable there must be a scarcity of it which means there will never be enough money for everyone to be rich from their earnings. This would require World Wide Continuous Full Employment and a very Radical Change In Wages which can only happen after An Extreme Change In Heart / Character of The Global Business World; this requires a miraculous change in the human thought process. What we have to learn from a Global Economy is that sin causes suffering and it is a sin to not love God with all your heart, soul, and mind and to not love your neighbor as yourself. Obeying these two commandments create A Global Family who do things for each other because of the love and wisdom in their hearts. In a Kingdom Of Love there is no use for money.
You have to see the Creation in the hands of The Creator to see what we are really capable of. It is hard to imagine a world where you don't have to "make a living" your survival would be guaranteed and everyone would be free to be as creative as they can. In such a world, hospitality, personality and entertainment would be the most important things. The world would be on big Global Human Party with everyone making their city as appealing as possible because everyone would be into traveling and visiting all the different cultures. And just like taking a vacation now, after a while, traveling makes you appreciate home more, until it is time to take another vacation.
When Jesus Christ returns to establish His Kingdom, all of this current global nonsense will be forgotten.
John 7:18 "He who speaks on his own does so to gain honor for himself, but he who works for the honor of the one who sent him is a man of truth; there is nothing false about him."
More About The Holy Spirit
God's Business
Matthew 15:18 "But the things that come out of the mouth come from the heart, and these make a man ‘unclean.’ (19) For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false testimony, slander. (20) These are what make a man ‘unclean’; but eating with unwashed hands does not make him ‘unclean' ".
This puts God in The Character Development Business. Business is about getting things done and if you want to make something happen you have to write it down. Writing something down is a quick way of capturing a thought so you can make it happen--bringing it to life. Of all the ways of keeping records, the written word is the oldest, simplest, and most effective. Think about how in a court you must have some form of documentation to prove anything. Thanks to the written word, we have access to ideas today that have been around for thousands of years. Whether we live for an eternity or not depends on our names being written in The Lamb's Book Of Life. Written words are crucial and in The Holy Bible, when God says "it is written" that means it will be done.
Everything in any organization or society comes down to the character of all of those involved. All ruling authorities are only as good as their collective character. If the collective characters are good, then any form of government will work well whether it be a Dictatorship, Socialism, a Democracy, or a Republic. But when people are placed in positions of power, they become prideful and very corrupt because evil preys on pride and seeks political power which is the power to use deadly force to impose your will on another person. This is why all governments in the world are extremely corrupt, they are being dominated by an unseen Enemy in an unseen Spiritual War.
How people handle themselves publicly and privately is God's Business:
Hebrews 4:12 "For the word of God is living and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart."
God knows and judges the Intent / Motives / Purpose of all of our actions.
When you go into the presence of the Spirit Of God, be prepared for any of "your" hidden, private and personal business to be revealed to everyone because Job 41:11 ". . . everything under heaven belongs to me." Those who are very humble have nothing to hide, they live out loud in the open, and are always prepared for this.
The Road Less Traveled
I was disciplined by the Lord (Hebrews 12:5-11), sometime in the early 1990's, because I halfheartedly wanted to shift back into the traditional path of spiritual growth and religious norms which are just Comfort Zones. When I was disciplined by the Lord, I felt a terrible sick-like stressed feeling in my chest cavity for a short time that I had never felt before or since. The Lord wanted me to continue following my heart because He was leading me to the truth. When growing up, I stopped going to church after age fifteen because I knew in my heart that something was not right. If you know things are not working right, then something has to change to get different results; it is insane to expect different results from doing the same things. The old way of viewing things must be given up to make room for a new view, but we are naturally scared of change--we always want to stay in our Comfort Zones, being surrounded by the familiar.
The Holy Spirit is supposed to be our primary spiritual Teacher (John 14:26) and as The Spirit Of Truth (John 15:26), He helps us see ourselves as God sees us and works to establish humility in us which God desires. (Matthew 18:4, Luke 18:14) Those who are anointed do not need a human spiritual teacher. (1 John 2:26-27) Before continuing, please read How The Spirit Helps Us Understand. Self reliance is what the first temptation of Jesus by Satan was about (Matthew 4:1-4) and God protects us in many ways that we don't see or understand--and if we did, we would be way too scared to function. God always has our best interests at heart and the more you grow spiritually, the more you learn to trust in Him:
Proverbs 3:5 (NKJV) "Trust in the LORD with all your heart, and lean not on your own understanding; (6) in all your ways acknowledge Him, and He shall direct your paths.
This is one of my favorite Scriptures. If you go into a book store or library and think about all the knowledge contained in all those books, you realize how very large the Infinite Information / Knowledge / Spiritual Universe is and how lost we can get without guidance from The Holy Spirit. (John 14:26) Two key insights from "The Road Less Traveled" by M. Scott Peck:
pg. 195 "the universe makes sense--that is, it follows certain laws and is predictable; but human beings are poor examiners, subject to superstition, bias, prejudice, and a profound tendency to see what they want to see rather that what is really there;"
pg. 192 "It is no wonder, then, that the world of humanity is so full of conflict. We have a situation in which human beings, who must deal with each other, have vastly different views as to the nature of reality, yet each one believes his or her own view to be the correct one since it is based on the microcosm of personal experience."
We all are trying to figure out the scheme of things and we have evil spirits working against us who deliberately cause us to help corrupt the information we give and receive with very well hidden lies--and we really, really do not want to see this hidden Spiritual War. Thank God for The Holy Spirit Of Truth who is our Tour Guide through The Infinite Universe Of Knowledge. The Holy Spirit is the light of God / Love that shines in us and helps us to continually examine our actions and live a life that is dedicated to the truth and living in peace with others. People that are affected by evil avoid the light of being self aware of their actions and the truly evil would rather destroy the person trying to show them the error of their ways than deal with the pain of self examination.
Jeremiah 17:9 "The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure.
Who can understand it?"
Warfare Intelligence
In any war, intelligence is very, very important. In Spiritual Warfare, having the simple awareness of being engaged in a War Of Ideas is half the battle. Our severely-out-manned Enemy has the big advantage of being united against mostly unaware human beings. When someone kills as many people as possible, just before committing suicide, that is a major battle victory for our Enemy who wants to destroy all of us. What is a new soldier to do since there are so many different religions with different beliefs within them? Just check the WHOLE date, what are we measuring? Month, Day, 2011 A.D. Anno Domini means "in the year of our Lord; since Christ was born." Without A Major Significant Event, a time line is useless and we'd have to find something else to measure time from. The religion with The Creator who came in human form (where Time, that He created, is being measured from) and promises to return again to rule over His creation has got the be the True Religion. Also, what religion has the most division, confusion, and persecution against it? Christianity is the answer. In warfare you defend against the biggest threats and non-threats can be ignored. From analyzing the Enemy's attack pattern and tactics, you can see that he is trying to keep people from a very powerful weapon that he doesn't want them to discover about Christianity, The Nuclear Truth about The Good Shepherd. So the best way the Enemy can hide the truth is to be in the churches and Theology Schools poised as Preachers / Teachers who give people a counterfeit truth.
A More Effective Wisdom Distribution System
A Lack Of Understanding
Looking back, I'm glad I stopped going to church, dropping out of a confused and dysfunctional system, which many people are doing on their own. (see Plain Truth Ministries: Christianity Without the Religion) The Church is not a building that you are supposed to go to. The Church is "The Body Of Christ" which is a group of people in action, doing God's will and acting on His behalf in the world. (1 Corinthians 12:27-31) I know that Hebrews 10:25 says "Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, . . ." but the meeting does not have to always be in the same building or in a building at all--Comfort Zones.
Acts 17:24 "God who made the world and everything in it, since He is Lord of heaven and earth, does not dwell in temples made with hands."
God dwells in people through The Holy Spirit and makes them a part of The Church / Body Of Christ. We are supposed to be The Church, not go to a church. All the envy, strife, and divisions among the different churches are the result of a lack of spiritual growth and understanding, which is stunted in most churches. (1 Corinthians 3:2-4) I grew up in a church that believed that you have to "speak in tongues" in order to be saved which is not true at all. A Mandatory Gift is an oxymoron and a lying euphemism for "A Requirement." God gives gifts as He sees fit (1 Corinthians 12:11) and the answer to all the questions in 1 Corinthians 12:29-30 is "no." I was born again by the new birth (John 3:8) as a preteen, and didn't realize it until I was anointed and saved ten years later by confessing my salvation because of this false belief that I didn't understand at the time. I've also learned that God is a spirit and He is only concerned with our spirit--that which affects our mindset or way of thinking. Most churches get stuck on the symbols (The Son) of Water Baptism and The Communion Sacrament that do not change anything about a person's way of thinking. It's the ideas (The Father) of Salvation and Scripture Memorization that those symbols represent that changes our thought process and makes a difference in the world. Being stuck on the symbols is like a group of people going around stamping the word "love" on the shirts of other people for the command to "love one another;" the idea that the symbols represent is what is important. I have never been baptized by water and I never will be because Jesus Christ transferred John's Water Baptism (Matthew 3:11) to The Holy Spirit Baptism (Matthew 3:13-15) when he died on the cross. I have also been given A New Baptism from the Lord for people, that corrects the core cause of our problems, that I will reveal in the next post. Like I said in Post #5, most of the things in this world are a hustle. People are mostly getting a spiritual run a round and being distracted from The Truth.
Wisdom From Water
Water is a symbol for The Spirit Of God and that is what water baptism is about, people being soaked in God's Holy Spirit by Salvation. The properties of water teach us how God wants us to function as A Collective Group Of People. Water functions as one single unit, it is not divided against itself at all. Water is very flexible and adaptable. Love requires us to be very, very flexible when we deal with each other to live in peace and harmony. Water settles to the same level on the top which means no water wants to exalt itself over any other water, in humility it functions as one unit and keeps everything in balance. Water also diffuses (spreads out) heat or cold through out itself so that all connected water will remain at the same temperature. No water is left out in the cold by other water, no water is left to burn up in heat while other water is in air conditioning, no rich or poor water, it is all the same. Water also diffuses any blow throughout itself by making waves so that all the connected water can help absorb the blow. Water truly functions as, "All for one and one for all." The Ant Kingdom is the closest thing on earth that functions like water. (Proverbs 6:6-8)
Diffusion of power and humility are very, very important because this allows God, who knows everything and is in everyone, to remain in control by coordinating everyones activities. God created everyone with a conscience so that we will instinctively know extreme right from wrong and this is how God, "The Infinite Spirit Of Love," is in everyone. He dwells in the Saints by His Holy Spirit. So when things are in perfect balance, like in Exodus 16:17-19, it is only because The Spirit Of God / Love is in control. It is all good only when it is all God. Satan always wants to centralize power into fewer and fewer people through the authorities and governments so he can eventually control the whole world through one person.
Jethro's Advice: Exodus 18
God / Love is a spirit and the best analogy for a spirit is the wind. The wind does not stir around in a building and wait for people to come feel it, the wind moves through neighborhoods, cities, counties, states, etc. going to the people to be felt and that is how The Body Of Christ should function--taking the message of God's Kingdom to the masses. We should have groups of people organized into cells and making appointments with people to minister and fellowship with them. The key here is "make an appointment" with people when you encounter them in public places so they will be expecting to meet or talk to you, not popping up at their door unsuspected which annoys people. We hear about Terrorist Cells of people doing bad things and we need to form Love Cells of people who do good.
The current situation with pastors and church congregations reminds me of Moses and Jethro in Exodus 18:13-27. Moses was handling too much of the burden of settling all the people's disputes by himself and Jethro told Moses to train some of the people to help him and let them bear most of the burden leaving him only the very difficult cases. This is the same type of situation with modern pastors having to be teachers, counselors, psychologists, social workers, crisis center call monitors, business executives, etc. which is way too much stress, work and responsibility being put on one person which often leads to burnout. Pastors of congregations are carrying way too much of a burden.
God expects us to grow spiritually (John 15:1-2, Hebrews 5:11-14) from infants to mature adults. A big part of spiritual growth is learning how to become less of a burden to someone and growing into taking the initiative to help out and becoming an asset to the person or the situation. There is a tremendous amount of spiritual information that must be taught and maintained in people for them to function in love. The more you spread out the power of information distribution, the harder it is for the Enemy to deceive people. All you need to be able to teach something is an understanding of that something and the more you teach it, the better you get. ("All we need from a sermon is some good info. We can do without the theatrical show. A once a week performance is way too slow.") So taking the teachings of the sermons and bible study classes and assigning them to individuals or small groups and letting them edify others in personal fellowship, being highly interactive with each other, would greatly improve the Wisdom Distribution System Of The Body Of Christ.
Since about 90% of our experience is sight and sound, the technology of television can put many people around the world in virtually the same place at the same time. TV, webinars, and conference calls can bridge the gaps between people and make the world a smaller place. You hear of business mergers between companies all the time and I wonder when the Protestants and the Catholics will merge? The Baptists and the Methodists? etc., etc..
A Culture Of Love
Culture - n. the total range of activities and ideas of a group of people with shared traditions, which are transmitted and reinforced by members of the group.
When people are empowered to freely distribute the knowledge and love of Jesus Christ and develop the habit of sharing wisdom with everyone, we will change the culture of our country with everyone being responsible for cultural maintenance. A big part of a culture of love would be developing a culture of safety as well, teaching and reinforcing teachings frequently to prevent people, especially parents with new infants and young children, from hurting themselves or others and arming them with information on how to protect themselves from predators since love always protects. So if one bad thing ever happens to someone in The Body Of Christ, love will make sure that it will not continue to happen to others repeatedly unlike our present culture. We would have little children singing bible verses when playing Patty Cake Patty Cake and we all would live in peace and harmony.
False Beliefs
There are many, many false beliefs that are circulating the globe and creating chaos. Believing Satan's lies causes severe dysfunction in people's spirit leaving them conflicted and confused. Too function properly, people need a clear conscious toward God (Acts 24:16) and believing spiritual lies cause guilt, leaving a person divided against their self and dysfunctional.
2 Corinthians 10:4 "The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. (5) We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ."
You can only fight Satan's lies with God's truth. I'll address a few of what I think are the most harmful false beliefs. These are essentially Anti-Wisdom and attacks on sound judgement.
1) "You are thinking too much / deep." The only way this statement can make sense is if you where in perfect conditions (Heaven) and you are trying to figure out a way to improve things; which should be impossible because perfect is that which can not be improved. But in a world where (1) People are naturally lazy, mentally and physically, and also naturally selfish; these are two very serious problems. (2) This makes people naturally ignorant by not actively seeking wisdom, so they don't know that they are lazy, selfish, and ignorant. (3) When they do seek wisdom, they only do the naturally lazy minimum by listening to Authorities, trusting them do all of their spiritual work for them and not verifying the information for themselves. (4) People are naturally afraid of change even though things are becoming worse at a faster rate. Under these conditions, this has got to be the worst thing you can say to a person and get them to believe in. This is essentially a quick, hypnotic command to "remain ignorant." But to say "remain ignorant" is too obvious and would draw attention to people's ignorance, so the above hidden invalidating phrase is used to hide the real meaning. It is called Sophistry - n. a subtle, tricky, superficially plausible, but generally fallacious method of reasoning.
2) "If it aint broke don't fix it." In the mind, this quickly gets converted to the hidden meaning of "don't try to improve things" which is ridiculous and a very dangerous thought. This is closely related to #1 because together they form a mental catch-22. This should ONLY apply to something that you don't understand very well. If you tinker with something, with very little understanding of it (which is foolish), you will more than likely make it worse and not be able to return it to the original condition. But how can you get a better understanding of things if you are not supposed to think much or deep? "Don't try to improve things" tells you to not think about what you are doing, just do or accept what you are told in the exact way it was explained. This is brainwashing and causes people to not think for themselves or ask questions which is very dangerous. The path to true holiness is in questioning everything. (see Genesis 18:22-33 and 1 Thessalonians 5:21-22 Abraham questioned God but human authorities are not to be questioned?; only for those who lack understanding and remain children spiritually.) People then move into accepting religious dogma, that is not supposed to be questioned because it comes from a trusted authority figure. (If someone doesn't want things questioned, they usually are hiding something.) They become very comfortable with these cherished beliefs and some get defensive and even hostile when their beliefs, that produce very dysfunctional communities, are challenged. So with your judgement corrupted ("it's the communities, not the beliefs"), you are not supposed to be able to tell the difference between "broke" and normal.
3) "Falling in love is real love." The main problem with so much confusion about love is the inaccuracy of the English Language which has so many terms for the same idea. There are many different types of love and we use that four letter word way too loosely. In a nut shell, we fall in love only when we are consciously or unconsciously sexually motivated. Real love is an act of will and a choice that requires us to put forth an effort. Falling in love is effortless and we don't even control who we fall in love with, so it is not a choice. The honeymoon eventually ends (impaired judgement) and we return to the real world where real love will start or the couple will go their separate ways.
4) "The intense feeling from Romantic Love is not supposed to fade." Now don't get me wrong, I think all women everywhere should get as much romance (special attention and showers of appreciation) from as many people as possible because they are by far the most wonderful creatures on the planet--God really saved the best for last! But the false belief that there is only one special man for every woman and only one special woman for every man and this is predetermined by fate is a bunch a crap. Many people waste a lot of time and energy trying to live up to this lie that we get from fairy tales and movies. Lies that affect marriages are the most destructive because happy marriages are the foundation of happy families that produces happy children. Happy marriages are the building blocks of a country.
5) The Global Economy 1 Corinthians 3:19 "For the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God. For it is written,'He catches the wise in their own craftiness' " I'll never forget how hard I laughed at our Global Economic System when the Lord revealed to me that The Kingdom Of Heaven is a Global and Historical Family Reunion. Politicians, Business People, and Scientist will have a very hard time accepting that all the knowledge and degrees concerning money and finances are foolishness with God because they have many years invested in this nonsense. The economy of the Kingdom Of Heaven is "Freely you have received, freely give." (Matthew 10:8) Prosperity preachers fall for this trap by believing that when God controlled the riches in the Old Testament, which were simply cattle and crops, the control of a nature based increase transfers into our modern day Economic System and a monetary increase. This simply is not true because this would require God (who always controls nature) to directly control people's money handling decisions to continually funnel more money back to the tithers. If all the Saints were tithers, this would require God to directly control Sinner's money handling decisions (who don't have His Holy Spirit in them) all the time, and not just occasionally, but God gives people free will so this does not make sense and it is a great fallacy. Jesus said we will always have the poor with us in Matthew 26:11 because He knows that in Satan's economic system, for something to be valuable there must be a scarcity of it which means there will never be enough money for everyone to be rich from their earnings. This would require World Wide Continuous Full Employment and a very Radical Change In Wages which can only happen after An Extreme Change In Heart / Character of The Global Business World; this requires a miraculous change in the human thought process. What we have to learn from a Global Economy is that sin causes suffering and it is a sin to not love God with all your heart, soul, and mind and to not love your neighbor as yourself. Obeying these two commandments create A Global Family who do things for each other because of the love and wisdom in their hearts. In a Kingdom Of Love there is no use for money.
You have to see the Creation in the hands of The Creator to see what we are really capable of. It is hard to imagine a world where you don't have to "make a living" your survival would be guaranteed and everyone would be free to be as creative as they can. In such a world, hospitality, personality and entertainment would be the most important things. The world would be on big Global Human Party with everyone making their city as appealing as possible because everyone would be into traveling and visiting all the different cultures. And just like taking a vacation now, after a while, traveling makes you appreciate home more, until it is time to take another vacation.
When Jesus Christ returns to establish His Kingdom, all of this current global nonsense will be forgotten.
