The Soul of the Lord Jesus Christ

Colossians 1:21-23

COL-166

Hebrews 4:12: "The Word of God is active and powerful, and capable of discerning the spirit and the soul, and dividing them asunder."

Please listened attentively to that which God has prepared for us this day.

Our subject is "Reconciliation of the Colossians," segment number eleven in Colossians 1:21-23.

The Lord Jesus Christ

The learning of Bible doctrine was a central activity of the Lord Jesus Christ in His humanity from childhood. That is a very important thing for you to remember about the person of the Lord Jesus Christ. He was both God and Man. In His humanity, He was precisely and exactly the way you and I are, except for one difference: he did not have a sin nature. But He knew in His humanity (and the two natures were always separate) nothing about spiritual things. He had no spiritual insights in His humanity. He had to learn every one of them from Scripture. From the Old Testament Bible, He had to learn doctrinal propositions. And from His childhood, that's what was done. It was done by His parents. It was done by the Hebrew school of instruction that He attended. And as he grew up, the Word of God was very big in His life.

That should be a clue to you young people of what the most important thing in your life should be. And there was a problem that He had that all of us have. As He grew up, He was always having to make choices: the things of God, and the things of this world; and, the priorities of God, and the priorities of other things. Please never forget that the Lord Jesus Christ was not that wimpy character – that little twit with long girlish hair that you see in pictures of Him. He was a perfect human being – right back to Adam. He was absolute perfection in every respect. And He had a mind at maximum capacity; great physical strength; a boy's boy; and, a man's man. Therefore, he played. He was engaged in the athletic and sports activities that were current in His day. He was out there playing with the kids in the neighborhood. He was engaged in the social activities of the youth.

However, in it all, there was a difference. There was no doubt about it – that His friends saw the difference. They knew there was something distinctively different about this boy because He was always right. He was never wrong. He never engaged in the things that He should not engage in, that were contrary to the laws of God. He knew doctrine, and He lived it. There was nothing hypocritical about this boy.

Well, He got to be 12 years old. And as was the custom of his parents, they went to Jerusalem to celebrate the great Passover feast – the great commemoration of Israel's freedom from its enslavement in Egypt, and Israel's moral freedom with the Ten Commandments that God gave. The reason the Ten Commandments, along with the rest of the Law, was given (but that moral code was the heart of it) was because these people had been slaves in Egypt. And now they were finally, after centuries, being released. But they didn't know how to act. They didn't know how not to be re-enslaved.

So, God says, "Here are ten principles. If you will obey these ten principles, you'll be protected from prostituting your freedom, and you will not return to enslavement in your lives. Of course, the heart of that enslavement would be to Satan. If they obeyed those commandments, they would be free.

So, the Lord Jesus, looked forward to this Passover feast. This was a big event. And, at 12 years of age, He was taken to Jerusalem with his parents. The account of that is in Luke 2:41-52. At this point in life, this boy, who always did what was right, and who always put God first, and who always put the things of God into top priority in his life, now made a very dramatic revelation about Himself that caught His parents off-guard, and showed exactly where this life was going.

Luke 2:41: "And His parents used to go to Jerusalem every year at the feast of the Passover. And when He became 12, they went up there, according to the custom of the feast. And as they were returning, after spending the full number of days." And what that means is that one day was the Feast of Passover celebration. Then for seven days after that was the feast of the unleavened bread, when they celebrated the spiritual provisions that God had made for the nations. So, it was a total of an eight-day festival – an eight-day holiday for the family.

"So, after spending the full eight days, the boy Jesus stayed behind in Jerusalem, and His parents were unaware of it, but supposed Him to be in the caravan. And they went a day's journey, and they began looking for Him among their relatives and acquaintances. And when they did not find Him, they returned to Jerusalem, looking for Him. And it came about that, after three days, they found Him in the temple, sitting in the midst of the teachers, both listening to them, and asking questions. And all who heard Him were amazed at His understanding and His answers. And when they saw Him, they were astonished. And His mother said to Him, 'Son, why have you treated us this way? Behold, your father and I have been anxiously looking for you.' And He said to them, 'Why is it that you were looking for Me? Did you not know that I had to be in My Father's house, or about My Father's things?' And they did not understand the statement which He had made to them.

"And He went down with them, and came to Nazareth, and He continued in subjection to them. And His mother treasured all these things in her heart. And Jesus kept increasing in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and man."

Jesus inadvertently was left behind. After the family started back, at the end of the eight-day celebration, they started back to Nazareth, thinking that He was with some other part of the caravan, with friends or family members. This was a fun kid, so they did not think it odd that He was not immediately hanging around them, but was in the company of others that they were acquainted with.

So, they got out one day's journey. And that night, they're settling down for the evening, and they can't find Jesus. They checked where they might expect to find – among friends and relatives. He's not there. So, they take a second day, traveling back to Jerusalem. They look around throughout Jerusalem. This is the third day now. And finally, on the third day, they discovered that He's in the temple. This is a 12-year-old child. What's He doing? He's sitting with all the people with the degrees – the university and college degrees. These are theologians. They are all the people who graduated from the Hebrew seminaries, and the schools of biblical learning. These were uncommon men. They were scholars. And Jesus is found with the teachers, listening to their doctrinal instruction, and asking perceptive questions.

Now, when people see this boy surrounded by these religious leaders of Israel who were well-known, people got curious, and a crowd began to gather around about them. And they're listening to this boy in His discussion of doctrine with these religious theologians. He was carrying on a mature theological discussion with them. People listening were amazed. The Greek word there means that they were blown out of their senses. It's kind of an interesting meaning, because we talk about something "blowing your mind." Well, that's exactly what the Greek says. People listening – their minds were blown. They were just astounded at what was happening here. The understanding that he had was so impressive. And when His parents found Him, they were impressed as well.

Now, why was this? Well, it was because Jesus views, as I've been trying to stress to you that the Bible is the Word of God. It is without mistake. It is inerrant. And what it does is convey to our minds the mind of God. Therefore, it is to be a priority in life, and it is to be obeyed. It is not to be revised by human opinion; by societal practices; or, by anything that you are engaged in, in life. You don't revise the Word of God to fit your life in the world.

Undoubtedly, His parents, while they had been concerned for Him, were also somewhat pleased, and had some great satisfaction to see their son engaged in biblical discussions with these men. There are a lot of things that kids do that you're not proud of as parents: that are humiliation; that are embarrassment; and, that are great disappointment. So, there's no doubt, while they were concerned and confused, because they didn't understand something here yet, they were very pleased where it was they found Him.

Sometimes parents have a great deal of grief where they find their children. But Jesus was very clear in the situation that confronted Him. His parents did not understand that He had a higher duty to His Heavenly Father. You will notice that He made a clear distinction between His foster-father, Joseph, and His Heavenly Father, God. And He indicated by this distinction that now, at 12 years old, he had come to an understanding in his humanity of who He was, and what His mission was in life. This 12-year-old boy knew He was headed for the cross. This 12-year-old boy knew that he was a God-Man. He was a God-Boy. He was going to be a God-Man who was going to die on the cross for the sins of the world. He knew what life was about. And because He understood the principles of the Word of God from his own reading of Scripture, and His own study, and the instruction He received, He understood what He enunciated later to His disciples and to all of us in Matthew 6:33: "But first seek His kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you.

We might ask a youth: "Well, what do you want to do in life?" He might say, "Oh, I'd like to do this at school. I like to do this at sports. I like to do this in social events. I like to do this with my friends. I like to have this in life. I'd like to get this." OK, here's the way to do it: "Seek ye first the kingdom (God's kingdom), your service to God (God's business) and His righteousness (your standard of reconciliation to the absolute righteousness of God – that's your standard of living), and all these things that you want are going to be added unto you," except certain things you won't get. Anything that's bunko in your life you won't get. God will keep that from you, and he will try to steer you away from it. But you may say, "No, I'm going to go for Bunko. I love it." And you're not going to give it up. But you are subject to God. You will never say, "I have to do something here, but it conflicts with what I need to do at church. It conflicts with a service. It conflicts with an activity." Jesus never had to think twice. For Him, it was always God first, and the things of this life and of the world second.

Now, His parents should have understood, from the information they already had on Him, that He did have a higher duty to God, and the time would come when He would know such intimate relationship to His Heavenly Father, that He would know exactly what to do. The reason he stayed in Jerusalem was because His Heavenly Father said, "Jesus, I want you to stay here, and I want you to go to the temple, and I want you to discuss the Word of God with these teachers who can teach you a lot. And I want to make a testimony and a demonstration about You at this point in Your life."

But Jesus knew the difference between His earthly father and His Heavenly Father. So, for Jesus, it was the things of God first. As for us, it should be church things first; doctrine first; and, Christian service before anything else. So, when was the last time you were someplace else when you should have been here about the Lord's business, or you should have been there about the Lord's business? Don't tell yourself that it was all right. You violated Matthew 6:33.

Now, sometimes God arranges things that you cannot be about certain things, like you cannot be in a church service, because you have an employment demand time schedule. That's different. That's an arrangement that God has placed in your life as legitimate. But where you have the choice, that's the thing we're talking about. Where you can say, or you cannot say; where you can come, or where you cannot go; or, where you can go to the things of God, or you can go to things of the world.

What the Lord Jesus did was what He always did. He was obedient to His Heavenly Father. And because of that, that made Him obedient to His earthly parents. So, as you saw in the passage, He went home with them as an obedient boy, back to Nazareth, and He continued to learn the Word of God. He continued to mature spiritually as well as maturing intellectually; in His education; and, in His mental development.

He didn't have to substitute schoolwork for God's work. Isn't that interesting? He never substituted school work for God's work. Do you think that it's all right to do that? Talk that over with the Lord Jesus: "How did you do that? You were a boy. You never substituted school things for God's things. And yet you were the smartest man on the face of the earth. You had more discernment than Solomon." He developed physically. He was a carpenter. He was a man of considerable physical strength. And because of His personal purity, He was a man whose body worked at maximum capacity. And He developed socially.

Children

Verse 52 is the summary of it. That's the basis upon our ministries here in the Berean Christian Academy, and the ministries that we have in the Berean Youth Clubs. These are the things that we're trying to do for our young people in those ministries. And boy, don't you ever forget that it's an uphill fight because of parents. It is amazing that the greatest problem we have with trying to do what? Verse 52: We want to have these kids increase in their intellectual capacities. We want them to increase physically in good health and good moral care of their bodies. We want them to increase spiritually – favor with God. And we want them to have social graces.

Some Christians just don't have even good manners. Some Christians are so aggressively self-oriented (they're the pushy kind), that they have no social graces. That was not true of Jesus. And yet He could stand up to the best of them, and sound off, and read them out for what they were – telling them what they really were, and put people downwind of themselves, and they knew that they were listening to Somebody who had command presence. He developed socially. That's what we're trying to do in Berean Christian Academy and the Berean Youth Clubs. And parents who don't help their children understand the principles that the parents of Jesus helped Him understand: "First, the Kingdom of God, Jesus. First that, and then these other things will all fall in line that need to fall in line in your life.

One of the greatest tragedies for all of us, as Christians, is getting down there and looking back, and seeing how much we trivialized our lives. Why in the world was I running around doing that? Why in the world was I not doing these things that would have counted for eternity? "Well, you know, I had a wife, and I had to go along with her. I had a husband, and I had to go along with him. I had to do this. I had my friends. I had to be part of them. I didn't want to be left out. There's the church gang. They weren't always on-track, but I didn't want to be separated from them." But you were willing to be separated from your Heavenly Father? "Why did you look for Me? Did you not know that I had to be about My Father's business? I'm here because I'm a God-Boy, and He told Me to be here for this meeting." But He grew up as an obedient Son, and to maturity, and into the age of 30, when He then entered the formal ministry to prepare Him to execute His mission as the Lamb of God to pay for the sins of the world.

Now, when He formally did enter His mission as the Messiah Savior to fulfill the Abrahamic Covenant, Jesus, in His humanity had to face-off with Satan in the wilderness temptation. It's the same as you and I do all the time. And please remember that anything that I tell you on the basis of what the Bible teaches, and the implications of what it teaches, is said unto the context of this age of grace. Therefore, you do whatever you want to do. You can blow it all off, and say, "No, he's wrong, man. Boy, if I have something that's going to interfere with a campout, I go with the thing out there. I'm not going to go with that campout. God is not that important. That's important out there – this thing of the world that's going to be over, and gone, and forgotten, and nothing."

Now, if you want to do that: bingo! Do it. Please understand that nobody is trying to keep you from acting out your own life, because you only have to account for yourself. And I don't worry about you doing bad things, because at Judgment Seat of Christ, I'm not going to be held responsible for that. But I sure will be held responsible if I don't warn you, and I don't alert you to the principles of the Word of God.

I'm trying to show you that the Lord Jesus Christ was a superb example of making the right choices. What comes first? Don't look to the religious world. You're not going to find it there. Don't look to your friends. You're not going to find it there. Don't even look to some of your Christian friends. You're not going to find it there. Certainly don't look to the government. You're not going to find it there.

I read that article about this Christian young man and his wife that had the seven babies, and the abuse that they took from some powerful person in the social scene, who couldn't believe that anybody would be so benighted, and who had the audacity to say that God has nothing to do with this. I went back and read that sentence again, and said, "Is that what she said?" The arrogance – that's the world you move in. And that is the world, folks, that you're substituting for your relationship with God. Stop attributing to them what is not there.

Somebody recently said, "I've been attending a church service, and I've been so impressed with how much insight is being spoken. Then the other day, I said, 'You know? That preacher isn't really teaching me much. He says a summary statement. And because of my background at Berean, I can fill in all underneath it, and it's all there. And all of a sudden, I'm making him look like a good preacher. But he hasn't taught me anything. I'm filling in what he should have said.'"

That's what you do with the world all the time. You're always viewing them in terms of yourself. You're a godly person with perspective from the Lord, and the things of God. You're attributing that quality to those people who don't give a Fig Newton about Jesus Christ or the things of the Kingdom of God.

So, don't be trapped up into thinking that the people of this world system who follow Satan's world view are your friends. They're the enemies of God. How can they be your friends?

Well, when Jesus formally entered into His mission as Messiah Savior at age 30, He had come to fulfill the promises of the Abrahamic Covenant to Israel, and to bring to the whole world a basis of salvation? And He had to face-off, in His humanity (not His deity – just as in His humanity), with Satan in the wilderness, temptation. I want to read that to you in Matthew 4:1-11, just to refresh your mind on that:

"Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit." Always He was guided by the Holy Spirit. He was always in temporal fellowship: "Into the wilderness, to be tempted by the devil. And after He had fasted 40 days and 40 nights, He then became hungry. And the tempter came and said to Him, 'If you are the Son of God." OK, all of you should know that there are four kinds of "ifs" in the Greek Bible: one; two; three; or, four. What kind of "if" do you think this is? Condition one, two, three, or four? It's condition number one. First class condition can be translated by the word "since." Instead of saying "if," put the word "since" in there. Now, you wouldn't get that from the English. But that's what's amazing. The devil didn't have the gall to use second class condition, which is: "If you were this, and you're not." He didn't use second class. He used first class: "Since you are the Son of God – you know it; I know it; the demons know it; all of hell knows it; all of Hades knows it; and, all of heaven knows it. We're not going to play games on that.

"'Since you are the Son of God, and therefore, omnipotent, command these stones become bread.' But He answered and said, 'It is written: man shall not live on bread alone, but on every Word that proceeds out of the mouth of God.'" Where did the devil attack Jesus? In His mind. I hope you're getting a new appreciation for your soul. The mentality of the soul is where the battle is always fought. And if it's the mind of God, the devil is going to go down in flames. If it is the mind of Satan, and the world view of Satan, and the old sin nature mentality, you're the one who is going to go down in flames. Jesus had no trouble out of His human spirit where He had stored this particular verse of Scripture. The Spirit of God put it up to His mind. Jesus said, "I know how to answer you: 'Man doesn't live by material things alone, but by every Word that comes out of the mouth of God.' And right now the Word of God is: 'I want you to be hungry, Jesus. I want you to be fasting, and I want you to be hungry. And I don't want you to be making food for Yourself. That's the will of God. So, Satan, bug off'".

Then Satan replies: "Oh, so you can talk Scripture. OK, let's talk the Bible." At least that's one thing we can give him credit for. He knows the Bible like most Christians never dreamed of knowing it: "Then the devil took Him into the holy city. And He had him stand on the pinnacle of the temple," there in Jerusalem. It was probably a 600 foot drop from the pinnacle down to the valley of Kidron: "And said to Him, "If You are." This is a first-class condition, so we can say: "Since you are the Son of God, throw Yourself down. For it is written." Now the devil quotes Scripture: "'He will give His angels charge concerning You, and on their hands, they will bear You up, lets You strike Your foot against a stone.'" Now that's true Scripture. But as I've told you before, you can tell the facts and not tell the truth. The devil here was telling the facts, but not the truth. This indeed was true. But again, this was not the will of God. It was not the will of God for the Lord Jesus Christ to get up there and throw Himself down, and presumptively to test what God would do – to challenge God.

"So, Jesus said, "On the other hand, it is written: 'You shall not put the Lord your God to the test.'" You don't presumptively challenge God. "Again, the devil took Him to a very high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world in their glory." These are the kingdoms of all the nations of the world which Satan now controls, which are now all under his authority, including the USA: "And he said to Him, 'All these things I will give you (since I am the king of all the world), if you fall down and worship me.'" Again, he uses the Word of God. Satan has hit the mind of Christ with a very attractive proposition. Jesus knew that He was going to become the king of the world through an enormous humiliation, and terrible suffering, and terrible degradation. But here the devil said, "I'll make you the King without any sweat."

"Jesus said to him, 'Be gone, Satan. For it is written, 'You shall worship the Lord your God, and serve him only.''" That's part of worship: "Oh, no, no. I had to do this thing out here. I couldn't be down there at church where I had this duty; I had this ministry; I had this activity; or, where I had this church service. I can't just serve God only. I have to serve all these human elements that are in my life that I'm associated with. They they're more important:" "You shall worship the Lord your God, and you serve Him only:" "Seek ye first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these other worthwhile things will be added unto you."

"Then the devil left him." He bugged out. "And behold, angels came and began ministering to Him," and they prepared a very gourmet feast for the Lord on that occasion, to break His fast. When he formally entered, then, upon His ministry, Satan made these three appeals to what? To the mind of His soul, trying to lead him into the sin: the same approach that he does to you today. But Jesus met every mental attack of Satan with the doctrinal reservoir of truth, which is built up and stored in His human spirit, as there is in yours. And the Spirit of God directed His volition to say "No," and His emotions to be revolted. That's what happens when you're acting upon the Spirit of God with the mind of God. Satan gives you something and says, "Here." Your emotions are revolted. You want to throw up. And your volition just says, "No." Throughout His life, the doctrinally oriented mind of Christ could never be penetrated by the mind of Satan. Therefore, He always remained in temporal fellowship. Therefore, He always remained sinless in His mind; sinless in His volition; and sinless in His emotions. His mind; His volition; and, His emotions were never hardened toward God. There were never any calluses on it.

The reason you are willing to substitute something out of the world system is because you've gotten hard in one of these three elements of your soul toward God. And if you don't want to hear that kind of talk, because you said, "Oh-oh, that means that I can't go and do this next week, and that next week, and be involved in this, and skip this. I don't want to skip this." And you're sitting here, bugging it out of your mind now – wiping it out, due to negative volition. And ultimately, as people have done, you won't even walk in here: "I'm not going to sit and listen to the mind of God. It irritates the fool out of me. I have my own mind. That's what I want to live by."

So, Jesus maintained his sinlessness. Consequently, He was faithful to His Heavenly Father. In John 8:29: "Jesus could therefore say, 'And He Who sent Me is with Me. He has not left Me alone, for I always do the things that are pleasing to Him.'" God the Father walks with you when you are on-track with His will, and when you are on-track with putting him first in the priority of your life: "He who sent Me the Father is with Me. He has not left Me alone." "No, never alone," the song goes. For I always do the things that are pleasing to Him." Wow, what a thing to be able to say! "I always do the things that are pleasing to Him."

How could you say that? Because, since boyhood, he knew doctrine. And all His life, priority number one came to God. He didn't stay home to watch television when it was time to be at church. He didn't stay home to get rested up when it was time to be in church. He didn't stay home to stay out of the bad weather when it was time to be in church. He didn't stay home because he didn't feel well. Boy, what a great pressure point that is for Satan: "I don't feel well. I shouldn't go to church." At what point in the life of Jesus Christ did He not feel well, and cut out of walking the walk that His Father had appointed for Him?

That whole conversation with the woman at Sychar at the well was because He was so completely, physically washed-out, that He just sank down on the side of the wall there, and was resting. He was so exhausted. On another occasion, He had to take His disciples, and He says, "Boys, we gotta get out here into the wilderness area, away from the crowd. I'm so completely debilitated. We all need to get some rest." But He kept doing the job, even when He didn't have all the energy to do it.

John 8:46: "Which one of you convicts Me of sin? If I speak truth, why do you not believe Me?" Jesus could also say: "I am a sinless person." And the reason He was sinless was because God was the priority – not the world, and not its attractions. Jesus Christ was no Demas. Yet, for this, he was not admired. He was hated for his godly world view, and for His sinlessness.

In John 15:25, Jesus says, "But they have done this in order that the Word may be fulfilled that is written in their Law: "They hated me without a cause." In the Old Testament, it was declared that the Messiah Savior would be hated without a cause. Here, He's quoting that, and He said, "They're fulfilling the Word. I, who have done nothing but good; I, who am the access of them – their access to eternal life; and, I, who have given them the next breath, so they can breathe and go out and make that next money, and have all the good life: I am the one who is hated without a cause. There is no reason to hate Me."

Well, there was, in a way. The reason was that He spoke to them the mind of God. And when the mind of God is spoken to you by someone, and it impacts upon your mind of Satan, then you hate the person who speaks. In ancient times, sometimes, a messenger who brought the bad news of the battle lost, they would kill the messenger for bringing the bad news, as if that would change things. So, here they hated Jesus, as if that would change the truth. In fact, they went all the way and even killed Him, as if that would change the truth.

John 15:18-19: "If the world hates you, you know that it has hated Me before it hated you. If you were of the world, the world would love its own. But because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore, the world hates you." You should not be very pleased that people who follow Satan's philosophy and world view like you. If your friends, are non-Christians, or uninformed Christians (untaught Christians), and they treat you as a hail-person-well-met, don't be happy about it. If you're standing out there as a person that's a beacon of light of God's point of view, they're going to not like you. They're going to dislike you. If they don't outright hate you, they're going to separate themselves from you. They're going to cool you. And they're not going to welcome you.

Now, what Jesus faced in that temptation wilderness, interestingly enough, is what all of us face – the same way, and the same thing. The devil has certain techniques that he's worked out. He knows they work, and he keeps using them. This one is in 1 John 2:16. Here's the way he hits you. He approaches you in this way: "For all that is in the world (the system of Satan) is the lust of the flesh." He hits you, first of all, with sensuality. What did he hit Jesus with? Sensuality: "Get the bread. Feed your hunger. Satisfy." So, first is the lust of the flesh – the lust of the old sin nature.

Secondly: "The lust of the eyes." What did he hit Jesus with? The lust of the eyes. The eyes want. The eyes desire. And what he hit Jesus with was what was the presumption to challenge God: "Throw yourself off the temple. That would be great. That would be a fun thing to do. Have no rappelling, and no ropes. Just the repelling angels will pick you up. And they'll pull back. And they'll belay you down softly." That's a lot of fun. I'd like to jump off of one of those cliffs at the Wichita Mountains, and have the angels repel me down. But nobody has ever wanted to join me in that adventure.

Prayer

The lust of the eyes is telling God what to do: "This is what I want. This is how it is." Sometimes, folks, we need to start praying. The things we pray for, and they don't come about. So, at a certain point, I say, "Now, Father, this is not working. What's the plan? I thought that what we needed was to have the grades filled in Berean Christian Academy. Instead, here You've come along, and You've provided us with funds to do it – without the students. Now I know what the plan is, at this point in time."

Very often, I say, "I'm backing off. This is what it seems to me it should be. This is what I'd like to see done. Now what is the plan?" It's the lust of our eyes, and the visions we have, that substitute for the vision of God.

The third thing: "The boastful pride of life:" "To Jesus he said, 'I'll make you King of the world. I'll give you all the glory. If you worship me, you'll have power and glory. So, we ask for the sensual evil; control over other people; self-exaltation; and, all the things about which it says, "Are not from the Father, but they are from the world.

Now, a Christian with a human spirit reservoir filled with Bible doctrine also possesses the mind of Christ with which to meet Satan and to win. That's why I stress to you that he did not act in His deity. He acted in His humanity in all of this, so that we understand we can do the same. We have the Word of God. We have the Holy Spirit and temporal fellowship. 1 Corinthians 2:16 says, "For who has known the mind of the Lord, that he should instruct Him? But we have the mind of Christ." How do you have the mind of Christ? Because you have an expository preacher. Otherwise, you'd have nothing. You'd have emotions being played. You'd have volition being driven for you, but you wouldn't have a mind that is the mind of Christ. And for that, when you do have that mind, you are going to be hated by the world.

In Luke 21:17, Jesus says, "You will be hated by all on account of My Name." If you're going to be a spiritual Christian, then the world is not going to like you. And I'll tell you something else. A lot of Christians won't like you either. A lot of Christians will badmouth you, as these conservative-right Christians won't like you either, because you're acting on the mind of Christ.

This is a call to what? When He talks to us about putting the kingdom of God first, and all of these things, what's He asking us to do? He's calling upon us for Christian separation. He's asking us to be separated from the world. And that is what we have lost track of in the Christian community in an enormous way. But what does 2 Corinthians 2:14-18 tell us? Listen carefully: "But thanks be to God, Who always leads us in His triumph in Christ, and manifests through us the sweet aroma of the knowledge of Him in every place (knowledge through the Word). For we are a fragrance offering to God among those who are being saved, and among those who are perishing." We are a fragrant offering: to the one, an aroma from death to death; and, to the other, an aroma from life to life: "Who is adequate for these things? For we are not like many, peddling the Word of God, but as from sincerity (but as from God), we speak in Christ, in the sight of God. We have the message of God's truth." We are conveying a true message.

So, what is it that the Lord God is calling upon us to do? He is calling upon us to find ourselves separated from the world system, and to step aside from this thing that brings us down, and that makes us part, instead of being an example: so that we're either the taste of death for those for those who reject; or, the taste of life for those who believe.

Spiritual Reversionism

Now, we have seen, in 1 Corinthians 1:21, that Paul is talked about going down and going down. He says that that's how you were. And in Ephesians 4:17-18, we have been reviewing the descent into spiritual reversionism. If we don't do the things we've been talking about this morning, this is what happens: First, our mind is empty of Bible doctrine viewpoint. We lack full knowledge – that "epignosis" knowledge stored in our human spirit reservoir. This spiritual vacuum of the mind draws in the human viewpoint from the world; the sin nature; and, the devil. That's where all the bum information comes from. Yet, so many of us love what the world offers us. The mind, this, is operating on false doctrine, lacking divine values and standards for life. We don't have the mind of God.

Then Ephesians 4 says, "The mind becomes hard toward the Father: insensitive in the mind; in the emotions; and, in the will. The mind is dominated by spiritual ignorance then – out of touch with the reality of divine viewpoint. We're operating on Satan's world view. At that point, we are alienated from the life of God in the form of a spiritual maturity structure of the soul. We have no basis for defense against Satan. We have no basis for offense against his system. Instead of being separated from the world, we are now separated from God, our Father. How is that for degeneration? The Christian is now in the status of carnality. He's under the control of the old sin nature. He's descending rapidly into spiritual revisionism, because he's out of temporal fellowship. And he's rapidly degenerating into spiritual insanity.

Tonight, I'll tell you what happens in spiritual insanity, and it will turn your stomach. I'll say it as nice as I can. Here, the believer goes berserk. He's mindless in his conduct and in his feelings. There is a horrendous moral breakdown. Brutal self-centered takes place. Total enslavement now occurs to the lust patterns of the old sin nature, and a person becomes downright ugly. What person? The Christian person. That's what Paul is saying.

Colossians one 21. This is the way you used to be. Don't go back to that. But you can. At that point, this person has lost of all sense of decency; all sense of loyalty; all sense of kindness; all sense of rationality; all sense of self-control; and, all sense of responsibility. And he prostitutes the Christian manhood and the Christian womanhood that we have in Christ. All godly purpose in life is lost. The person then abandons himself to self-centeredness, and to practicing evil. This person cannot sing the little chorus, that in the past, we have sung. They could not say the words of:

"Let the beauty of Jesus be seen in me.
All his wonderful passion and purity.
Oh, Thou Spirit, divine,
All my nature refined,
Till the beauty of Jesus be seen in me.

The hypocrite cannot sing this. And this is what happens. So many Christians should be able to sing this without any hesitation; without any compromise; and, without any pretense. We Christians are part of God's royal family in Christ Jesus. . . . He came as the suffering Lamb of God the first time. He will come a second time as King of Kings. That is the one we are related to? And we are going to prostitute our Christian manhood and Christian womanhood? We are going to give priority to the world system, ahead of Christ? We are going to refuse to be separated from the world, and unto the Lord Jesus Christ? And to have the spirit of these words be the objective of our life? . . .

When I was a youth, there was a famous evangelist who was a gypsy in his racial background. His name was Smith, and he referred to himself as Gypsy Smith. Gypsy Smith love this song. I have sat in that huge Moody Memorial church in Chicago on LaSalle Street as Gypsy Smith would leave that 3,500-seat auditorium, and all those voices reverberating against the ceiling and the walls: "And let the beauty of Jesus be seen in me." And he would try to convey that this was a tenderness of relationship to Christ by starting very softly. And then he would convey that there was a power that developed by bringing up the volume, till it was at a high point. And then: "Oh, Thou Spirit divine," from the high point on down: "All my nature refined." And then back to the tenderness softly: "The beauty of Jesus be seen in me." . . .

As you leave this morning, please remember the offering boxes at the door for your gifts to the Lord's work.

Our Heavenly Father, we thank You for the joy of Christian separation, and we pray that holiness would be written on our foreheads, as Christians, and that we would live up to our position in the royal family of God. And indeed, may the beauty of Jesus be seen in us, because we're true-blue. We're acting in genuine positive-volition to the Word of God. And the things of the world (all the things that occupy our lives) take second place to the things of God's business. May we all be 12-year-old boy Jesus, going about the things of our Father's business. We pray in His name. Amen.

Dr. John E. Danish, 1995

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