The Lord said “As the Heavens are higher than the earth, so are My thoughts higher than your thoughts and My ways higher than your ways.”
This was written to a wayward people. We know this because we the Elect, are not of the earth. We know the higher way.
We have taken God at His word, and we didn’t let go until we received His blessing. We had set out to obtain the full prize of God in Christ. God says many things, but really He says one thing. The “all things” He says and does for us, is just a break down of the one thing He is saying. Himself.
It was Paul who pleads for us to be reconciled to The Father. It was Jesus Christ who died for us not Himself. If we understand the cross and death of Jesus correctly, we would see ourselves hanging on the cross, because at the cross is where the exchange took place. “For on Him was laid the inequity of us all, and by His stripes we are healed”. So the full exchange already took place. Have you received that? Because that was among your first confessions. Being buried in the likeness of His death, and raised in newness of life. This is the Resurrection. This is where we get our new selves as being the “newness of life”. He gives us replicas of who He is. If you don’t get this foundational truth, you will be forever looking for another Jesus. You’ll be looking without what you’re suppose to look for within. Another Savior and saving because you didn’t learn this.
The curse passed on to all humanity was laid on that one man, to free all would be believers, from their Adamic nature of a wayward soul. For those who wander in their search, coming to the end of their selves , to receive what Adam lost.
God breathed into Adam and he became alive. When Gods breath departed from him he died. It’s that simple. Both man and animals breath oxygen, but you must be born again to receive The Holy Spirit.
The breath that departed that caused death was not oxygen, but Gods Holy Spirit. This death was spiritual being dead to the things of God. For this reason the disciples said “have you received The Holy Spirit?” Because this is the renewal of the breath of life Adam lost. This is why the Son of God became flesh and dwelled among us.
In this way humanity is restored in those who acknowledge and associate themselves with the death of Christ, and raised in understanding by recieving the Holy Spirit. This is how the fall is erased and how one gets back on track for the purposes of God.
Jesus Christ represents the new humanity. For this reason Paul called Jesus “the last Adam” and “the New Creation” saying “if anybody be in Christ, they are a new creation, old things HAVE passed away, all things HAVE become new. And if you recall your vows of the Baptism, that is what you agreed to. To come up from the water a new person.
We covenanted with God in this way. Just as other ceremonies are done with witnesses, so too with this vow. You are held accountable to that agreement by the testimony of two or three witnesses.
The Gospel message is that you get a do over. With the curse applied to humanity at the departure of The Garden of Eden for eating from that tree, God provided another tree for your choosing, because “cursed is everyone who hangs from a tree” Jesus hung on one for our curse, to reverse the I’ll effects from Eden. In the old covenant He was “the man called a branch” for us to graft into the succulence of the sap of that tree, and partake of it’s (His) richness. For this reason we went to the cross.
Death was passed on by our first birth, but life through the second. By eating from the tree of life they died spiritually, but we eat of the tree where one died and we live. He gave His all, His all is for us. He held nothing back. Everything that Jesus Christ had before “He became flesh and dwelled among us” is ours. His Testimony is that “I return to the Father and you see Me again no more” and now “He is seated at the right hand if the Father, waiting for His enemies to become His footstool. And because He defeated Satan, sin and death at the cross, the only enemy left is your own belief, so He is waiting for you to wake up.
If you understand the Gospel correctly, Satan, sin and death were defeated at the cross and we are called to join them where they are. To enjoy everything the Godhead has because the only enemy left is our unbelief and lack of faith. These now are the only enemies God didn’t defeat for us, however He did give us the tools to overcome these obstacles.
To really understand the polarity shift that takes place at the cross, the cursing for the blessing we need to go no further than back to the beginning where the departure took place, with the tools of the cross where the remedy takes place. For this reason the word “repent” means, turn, to pivot on your heals and do an about face.
Humanity was given full Dominion at the beginning, cursed themselves and left Eden to work the earth, the thing that was supposed to work for them, showing this inversion in thinking, or believing. When God said “cursed on you for now you shall work the earth with a curse and it shall yeild thorns and thistles” He did not curse them. They cursed themselves by walking contrary to their God given abilities. God just spelled out the new rules and just like a parent warning not to run across a street contrary to traffic, essentially that is what they did.
When you turn from God, you don’t get the next best thing but the opposite. The proverbial departure from Eden is a continual departure from faith in God, to no longer believe Him. Hence the term “repent” and means turn, do an about face. So you now should know your first action and the direction of your journey.
This is why the Gospel message of Jesus Christ started with these words “Repent for the Kingdom of God is at hand”. And had any of the previous attempts by humanity had worked, or if any could, the Son of God would not have become one of us. Because He was the last Adam, all those who are born in their departure like Adam can turn and get their do over.
This do over is implimented just as simply, precise and immediate as the departure, which is also called the fall. But you have to quit dis-believing. That’s what faith means, believe. The first couple traded in trust for the job of taking care of themselves, and just look around and tell us how that’s working for you.
This is why at baptism you are raised into newness of life. That is where you pick up where Adam left off to walk in newness of life. You have a clean slate and because the curse we received at Adams departure happened by a human, you can understand that the return had to be remedied by a human as well. And since the whole human race was genetically predisposed to do what the first humans did according to the laws of Kind begets according to kind. We needed a new kind. This is the reason James said “we are a KIND of firstfruits of His creation”, speaking of those who accept the invitation to associate with The only begotten through repentance and faith in Jesus Christ for our do over.
The tree of the cross in this way becomes our Tree of Life and our storehouse to obtain every tool for our return to godliness, meaning, god-likeness, and the reason why Paul said “For Jesus who knew no sin, became sin, for us to become the righteousness of God in Him”. Meaning that we are in the kind begat of Jesus and not Adam. This is why Paul called Jesus the last Adam (1 Corinthians 15)
That is why those who return to God in this way are called “born again believers”. And because the departure started with a thought, the reversal takes place in the understand and the need to know scripture. And because scripture was inscribed on papyrus, which means paper, and paper comes from trees. This becomes our tree of life, processed, refined and distributed for carnal consumption, not orally but mentally, where the association with Gods Spirit takes place. In the spirit of the mind. Your physical senses cannot feel Him.
Note: in the beginning God breathed in Adam and became a living being. That breath was not oxygen but the breath of God called the Holy Spirit. In that day they did die in spirit because Gods Holy Breath departed from them. This is why coupled with the gospel message that The Kingdom of God is at hand is “receive the Holy Spirit”. Yes, the Breath of God is given back and the life that Adam and Eve lost, we get back for our do over. And because at Jesus Christs baptism He received the Holy Spirit to never depart or leave again, we know as long as we abide in Christ we will never loose the Holy Spirit, the pneumas of God and not the air of the atmosphere. Two different breaths. We get ours from the mouth of God. This is in the Salvation packageo nessesary impliments for our do over.
God doesn’t hold the club of judgment over your head, Satan does. If you think continual confessions make you clean you are wrong. The one time blood sacrifice at the cross does. If you are continuing in your efforts in that way you don’t understand the fall the cross or our return called The Ascention. These are all actions from humans and one man’s cancels out the other. And because the fall, or departure was started by a man and the return or the arising or resurrection was completed by a man, that disbelief started the fall, belief impliments the resurrection and empowers the Ascention. You must have faith and believe in the only human proven to defeat death. Then you must impliment persistence in the faith. As scripture says “The Gospel of The Kingdom is preached and all are entering in, and the violent take it by force”.
The force is not physical but spiritual, pneumas, God’s air. It is God’s Breath and God’s Word in us making us Godly.
Note: If you are believing in God to do another work to give you a do over or a better life you are sorely mistaken. This belief spits in the face of The Last Adam (1 Corinthians 15.45), our savior and way out. You are reserved for a fearful judgment for despising the blood of Gods only begotten.
If you are still waiting to be saved, the way to be saved may pass you over because “Today is the day of Salvation”. Tomorrow may not be.
The Kingdom of God is at hand. Amen!