Series focal passage: 1 Corinthians chapter 2.  The Apostle Paul is writing to the church at Corinth about God’s mysterious wisdom and the fact that true saints are given access to that wisdom and are allowed to share in the glory that results from believing and obeying It.  Man must have unquestioning faith in order to receive such blessings.

In verse 5 the apostle states that the saints’ faith stands (is based on) the power of the Holy Spirit that resides within God’s holy people.  This faith enables them to believe His Holy Word.  Holy people are God’s Holy Word made flesh, as was Jesus of Nazareth.  In Romans 10:19 Paul reminds us that faith is simply taking God at His written Word.  Everything we know about God we learn from the written Bible, which is God in written form.  Jesus–“the Word” (Jn. 1:1-4,14)–was God in human form in the sense that He thought what God told Him to think, spoke what God told Him to speak and did what God told Him to do.  Read Jesus of Nazareth: God, Man or God-man.  Use “Nazareth” as your key word.  God did not intend for Jesus to be the only one to be led by Him through His (God’s) Holy Spirit.  Recall that on one occasion Jesus told Peter that the words he (Peter) had spoken were in fact God’s Words that He (God) had given to him (via the Holy Spirit)–Mat. 16:17.  I have had this happen to me when I would voice a Biblical Truth that I did not know until it exited my mouth.  I learned that Truth at the same time the hearers learned it.

Because of Christ’s total reliance upon the Father for His thoughts, words and deeds, Jesus could declare that He and God were “one” (Jn. 10:30).  Due to this relationship He could also say to the disciples: “When you have seen Me you have seen the Father.”  THE MAN JESUS WAS THE SPIRIT GOD MANIFESTED IN PHYSICAL FORM.  Jesus, as a 100% human being, totally gave Himself over to be directed by God through His (God’s) Holy Spirit inside Him.  Again, Jesus is not alone in this regard.  Paul reminds us that God’s true children are those who are led from within by His Spirit (Rom. 8:14), EXACTLY AS JESUS WAS LED.  John establishes this Truth in 1 John 2:6 where he states that in order to belong to God one must “walk (live) as He (Jesus) walked.”  In Revelation 3:21 Jesus stated that only those who overcome (temptation to sin) as He did as a man will join Him on His throne in the Kingdom of God.  If obedience to God is impossible, as we are told repeatedly, then Jesus and God will spend eternity alone.  In 1 John 3:3 the apostle, writing under the power of the Holy Spirit residing within him (2 Pet. 1:21), noted that to be one with God as Jesus was, one had to “purify himself even as He (Jesus) is pure.”  In Ephesians 5:26 the Lord tells us through Paul that this can be done only by “washing with the water of the Word (of God).”  We must then obey the Word that has cleansed us of sin in order to remain free of sin.  This is the ONLY way the man Jesus was able to maintain His “oneness” relationship with the Father.  This is the ONLY way we can have a “oneness” relationship with Him and be able to say as Jesus said, “The Father and I are one.”  In order to inherit eternal life WE MUST BE ONE WITH THE ONE WHO PROVIDES THAT LIFE AND ESTABLISHES THE RULES WE MUST OBEY IN ORDER TO RECEIVE THAT LIFE.

YOU WILL NEVER HEAR THESE WORDS IN CHURCH.  Which is why God commands true God seekers to “Come out of her (the Institutional Church) and be separate (from her);  do not touch that unclean thing  ….”  Only then are we God’s children and He is our God (2 Cor. 6:14-7:1).  The man Jesus kept Himself purified from sin and at one with the Father through belief in and obedience to His Word, WHICH IS THE WISDOM OF GOD.  ONLY BY EMBRACING HIS WISDOM, BELIEVING IT AND OBEYING IT CAN WE BE CHRIST’S SPIRITUAL BREATHREN AND HIS FRIENDS FOR WHOM HE DIED.  He told His disciples that He would die for His friends, and that they were His friends “… IF YOU DO WHATSOEVER I COMMAND YOU TO DO” (Jn. 15:13,14).  He said that His spiritual breathren were those who “… DO THE WILL OF MY FATHER IN HEAVEN  ….” (Mat. 12:46-50).  We are told what He commands us to do and what is the will of the Father ONLY in the Holy Bible, which is His wisdom and will for man in print.

Through the Holy Spirit-led teachings of the prophets and apostles we learn that God sanctifies His saints in the same way He sanctified Jesus of Nazareth–“by the washing with the water of the Word.”  In John 17:17 Jesus asked God to “… sanctify them (the disciples) by Your Truth.  Your Word is Truth.”  EVERYTHING COMES BACK TO GOD’S WORD.  Jesus knew this and overcame every obstacle Satan threw at Him by never deviating from that Word.  Because, and only because, He obeyed God’s Word He now sits at the right hand of His Father.  In order to join Him there (Rev. 3:21) we must walk as He walked and overcome temptation as He overcame.  We must grow in obedience/holiness until we “come to the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ” (Eph. 4:13).  Again, you do not hear these Truths in church.  Why?  Because your leaders either do not believe Them, or believe Them but are afraid to preach Them.  Satan has blinded the eyes and dulled the ears of those who do not believe God’s Truth.  Others believe God’s Word but refuse to preach It due to the consequences they would have to pay.  These are the same consequences the prophets, Jesus, the apostles and God’s modern saints must pay–persecution, ostracism, rejection, etc.  Read the series titled Persecution.  Use the title to download the series.

Though the price one must pay for true discipleship is burdensome, and sometimes deadly, it will be worth whatever price we must pay.  It is written in God’s Word: “Eye has not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart (mind) of man the things which God has prepared for them that love Him.  BUT GOD HAS REVEALED THEM TO US THROUGH HIS HOLY SPIRIT WHICH TEACHES US ALL THINGS, YEA, THE DEEP THINGS (WISDOM) OF GOD” (1 Cor. 2:9,10).  Why?  So that we can MANIFEST HIS GLORY IN THIS LIFE AND THE NEXT ONE.  Again, let us not forget that with His glory comes the hatred of the world, particularly the church world.  His glory is light.  The world walks in darkness.  Those who walk in darkness hate the light and do everything they can to extinguish it.  Satan’s premiere weapon against God seekers is his Catholic/Protestant religious system.  Let us not follow the easy, have-it-your-way path he has laid out for us. Let us study God’s pure Word with an open heart.  “He who has an (open) ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches” (Rev. 3:22).  Let us learn the wisdom/testimony/Truth/Law of God, believe It and obey It.  LET US BASK IN GOD’S GLORY.  Let us overcome Satan’s temptations, obey God and look forward to the next life.  L.J.