The Grace System of Perception
RO66-01

In Romans 6, Paul takes up the attack of unbelievers on the divine viewpoint principle of salvation by grace, without any contributing effort on the part of the lost persons. All human viewpoint thinking rejects and rebels against the idea that God can take a sinner to heaven apart from any effort on the part of that sinner, and apart from any contribution on the part of that sinner to his salvation – that God can take a contaminated creature, with sin, into heaven simply on the basis of the provision that God alone makes for him. That's called grace salvation.

This kind of person argues that Paul's teaching, that God's grace always super-abounds where sin abounds, so that no human doing is involved, means that we should give the old sin nature full reign so that grace can abound all the more.

Paul emphatically rejects this idea. He is not teaching people to be evil. So, Paul began Romans 6 with that question: "What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin? Shall we continue under the domination of the old sin nature so that grace may abound? And he uses this strong Greek expression: "God forbid." He says, "No. I emphatically denied that that's what I'm teaching.

Paul answers the attack by pointing out that this accusation is illogical. In order for sin to abound in a person's life, the old sin nature has to be in sovereign control of that individual. But a born-again believer has died to the sovereign control of the old sin nature over him. That is one of the things that happens at the point of salvation. Your enslavement to the sin nature is terminated: period; over-and-out; forever. The old sin nature, therefore, can no longer exercise sovereign control over a Christian as it did when he was lost. When the old sin nature held sovereign authority in a person, everything he did was evil. So, the Scripture describes his life as one where sin abounds. That's what the expression means. It means that you're a slave to sin. Everything you do is sin. Every good thing you do pours out of your old sin nature, and that's evil. So, when the sin nature is in charge, as it is in the life of an unbeliever, there is nothing but evil that comes forth. So, sin abounds.

However, Paul says that now that a believer is in Christ, God the Holy Spirit indwells him as the sovereign authority over his life, so the person is no longer a helpless slave to the old sin nature.

So, Paul says, "Your logic is at fault here. How can a believer in Jesus Christ, who is now indwelt by the Holy Spirit, who is now the sovereign authority in his life, give sovereign authority to the old sin nature? It's impossible. You can't have two sovereign authorities. God the Holy Spirit, who is in sovereign authority in your life as a believer, will not tolerate that kind of abandonment to the old sin nature in a child of God. The Holy Spirit is now the authority in the life of a Christian, and He simply will not permit the old sin nature to dominate.

So, Paul says, "What you say is illogical." The Christians death to the control of the old sin nature is due to the fact that he is now in Jesus Christ." He has a position; that is, he is credited with the death of Christ on the cross for the evil of the world. That is, when Christ died, as far as God is concerned, you and I, as individual believers, died with Jesus Christ. We paid with Him, so to speak, for our sins.

The old sin nature is, of course, present genetically because it's part of your body structure. In every cell of our body, the old sin nature is genetically there. But while its authority is broken, it is still there, ready to pounce upon us to entice us to sin. And though a Christian may yield himself to these enticements, he doesn't have to do so as he did before he was saved. You cannot, once the old sin nature power has been broken, ever again, return to making that power sovereign authority in your life. So, it's illogical. This person who makes this statement does not understand a basic doctrinal principle of what happens when a person is born-again. The old sin nature is forever terminated in its authority, and God the Holy Spirit is forever now in charge.

So, Paul's rebuttal to the attack on pure grace salvation shows it is impossible for a Christian to give the old sin nature within in full sway since he died to its control, and the believer cannot reverse that death.

Paul goes on to explain now how it is that a Christian died to the authority of the old sin nature. That's where we pick up the exposition in this session. W begin at verse 3: "Don't you know that as many of us that were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into His death?" This verse says that we died to the control of the old sin nature through baptism. The Greek sentence begins a little differently than does our English sentence here. The Greek sentence actually begins with the word "or." It looks like this in Greek: it's this little letter "A," and it's a word which introduces the reason anyone would object to Paul statement in verse 2 – that a Christian died to the controlling power of the old sin nature. The Greek word is important to us. Paul says, "Your logic is at fault." Then he picks up and says, in verse 3, "Or," meaning: is it possible that the reason your logic is at fault is," and then he goes on to suggest a reason here.

Ignorance of Doctrine

I want to call your attention to the fact that Paul has no hesitancy in pointing out the ignorance of doctrine in a person which causes him to be arrogant in his human viewpoint opinions. Paul never hesitates to point out ignorance of doctrine as the basis for the misconceptions that people have, and the arrogance that they have in their misconceptions.

There are plenty of preachers that will pussyfoot around and soft-pedal the ignorance of doctrine, the consequences in the lives of people. But the apostle Paul is not that kind of a preacher. And if you're looking for preachers like that, who will make it easy on you for being ignorant of doctrine and the consequences of your actions reflecting that ignorance, then don't look to the apostle Paul, because you'll find little comfort with him.

Paul says, "Or is it possible that you don't know?" The word looks like this in Greek: "agnoeo." "Agnoeo" is a word that means "to be ignorant" – not to know. It is in the present tense. Whenever we have a word in Greek in the present tense, it means that this is a continual condition. This is the believer's continual condition relative to the point of doctrine being discussed here. It is a continual state of ignorance.

Furthermore, it is active, which indicates that this is the actual condition of this person. It's indicative. In this case, it's what we call an interrogative indicative, so it's a question. Paul is saying, "Is it possible that you are ignorant? What he is going to point out is ignorance concerning a particular point of doctrine. But we have a general principle here as well. And that is that a believer who is ignorant of Bible doctrine is a very dangerous person. And you must understand that. If you haven't learned that yet, you better do it very quickly for your own temporal and eternal blessing. Anybody who is ignorant of Bible doctrine is a very dangerous person, and you and I rub shoulders with them all the time.

At your place of employment (your place of business), you are dealing with people who basically are ignorant of Bible doctrine, and you must look upon them with a certain reservation in their thinking and in their influence upon you. They are very dangerous people.

This is a problem within a family where the father is supposed to be the number one authority on Bible doctrine within the home. If he is incapacitated at this point, he's a dangerous person in that home. He is a dangerous influence upon his wife and upon his children. That kind of a husband will not have the capacity to be able to make the decisions to have his children do what they should do and what is right. He will not have the capacity as a man to stand up to his wife, and to have her do what is right, and to take the consequences of that position.

When we are ignorant of doctrine, there's always the assumption that somehow we can beat the game. We think that somehow we can say that God says, "This is the principle, and these are the implications in our experience, but we can work around them. We can still get away with violating those principles." You cannot get away with violating those principles. But when you spot people like that, then you know that those are dangerous people. And you hold yourself in great reservation in your relationships to them.

People who are ignorant of doctrine are dominated by emotions generally, and they're in rebellion against reality. They're dominated by their feelings. So, it's their feelings; it's their fears; and, it's their concerns – those are the things that drive them rather than the fact that: "Almighty God has spoken, and what He says, that's what I do." And I go from there, and I leave it in His hands to resolve the issues and to handle my problems.

People who are dominated by emotions which are not controlled by doctrine in the mentality are people who will hurt you. They will destroy you. And it is your responsibility as the man in the family to have the doctrine that you need to be able to have your emotions under control to be able to guide your wife and your children. It is your place as a wife in the home to have the doctrine you need to have the capacity to be able to respond to your husband and to your children. You who are children, it is your responsibility to have doctrine in your souls so that you have the capacity to respond to your parents as you should. This is the whole name of the game in life. That is reality – to know doctrine.

The apostle Paul comes right off the bat and he says, "You're a bunch of ignorant dumbbells. And that's why you make a statement like that about letting the old sin nature have its full reign. If you knew doctrine, and you were ready to respond to it, instead of being rebels against it, you wouldn't make a statement like that. The person who is ignorant of doctrine is dangerous because he lives under the control of the old sin nature. That's what it's all about.

Moral Choices

Lust for Power

Attacking the Authority of Spiritual Leadership

In general, a person who is dominated by his old sin nature lacks discernment. He just lacks discernment. The Bible uses a very strong term for that person. It calls him "a fool." A person who does not function above doctrine just lacks discernment. He just does not have insights. And the thing that is fantastic about that is that he thinks that the people who do have discernment are the ones who are dumb. When he runs into people who act with spiritual discernment, he gets all emotional because he can't believe that they're that stupid, when he himself is the one that's out of line with the thinking of God. He himself is the one who is the fool – not the people he's talking to. They have discernment, and he lacks it. So, a person who lacks Bible doctrine is a dangerous person.

The reason Paul is going to stress this issue here is because we're going to take up the subject of baptism. And the subject of baptism has sent more people into hell, perhaps, than any other factor in the Word of God. It has sent more people into hell because people are struggling to be saved on the basis of some ritual which they perform like water baptism. There are a whole denomination to say: "If you don't have water baptism, you're not going to heaven." And the very fact that a person comes to Christ on the basis of water baptism ensures that he's going to hell. These people sit in church, and they think that they're actually going to heaven. And they have the horrible revelation when they wake up that God says that grace salvation means grace plus nothing. Grace salvation means grace without any human doing whatsoever.

So, the apostle Paul comes through strong when he uses this word: "or are you ignorant?" He is saying, "Can it be possible that you are absolutely in darkness upon a very critical factor of Bible doctrine at this point?" And indeed they are.

Ignorance of the divine viewpoint of doctrine has eternal consequences for the believer. So, Paul comes down on it very hard. You and I actually glorify the Lord Jesus Christ by having a positive attitude toward the work of the Holy Spirit within us in removing our doctrinal ignorance. He remembers our teacher – not some preacher. It is God the Holy Spirit who is your teacher. Some preacher is responsible for giving you, under the HICEE technique, a communication of understanding of what is in the Scriptures – not from the surface words of the English Bible, but from its original text. He's responsible to explain to you what's in there. But only God the Holy Spirit can make that understanding clear to you. Only He can make it real to you. Only He can bring a positive response on your part to it.

The Grace System of Perception

1. The Bible

   For example, He has given you a completed Bible. You have an Old and New Testament canon of Scripture. The thing is complete. You have the full knowledge of the revelation of God provided in order for you to have a source book of categories of doctrine. It is from the Bible, and the Bible alone, that you can receive divine viewpoint, and that you can receive categories of doctrine – doctrinal principles and propositions of truth that enable you to make those decisions as a father or as a mother or as a child, and that enable you to make those decisions in the various relationships that you have in life and the problems that you face. It's the Bible that has the basic divine viewpoint.

   Inerrancy

   That's why the Bible is inerrant. We reject any suggestion, as obviously it has never been established, that there is any error in the Bible. The Bible is a book of absolute truth because it has been provided by God for this very specific purpose.

   So, you have this fantastic divine provision – the phenomenon of a completed Scripture, produced by God the Holy Spirit, guiding human authors to preserve them from all error.

   Liberal Attacks of the Bible

   This is why the liberal preacher attacks the Bible. He's got to try to prove that the Bible has error in it. He's got to try to discredit the Bible as the source of authority, because if the Bible is true, then everything that the old sin nature, as it is expressed through liberal preaching, is condemned. The Bible condemns it. Therefore, they want to get rid of the authority of the Bible, and substitute something like the human mind, which is already contaminated by sin, and say that that is an authority to determine what is right or wrong. And the Bible is to be judged by our reason.

   However, God has given you a completed, perfect revelation of His thinking in the Scripture. And that's something very marvelous.

2. The Local Church

   In order to make this grace system of perception work, He has also given you the local church organization. The local church organization is a divine provision for the instruction in Bible doctrine. If all your local church ever does is sponsor ski trips to Colorado, you have some trouble. All that is fringe benefits. If all they do is run summer camps, you have trouble. That's fringe benefits. If all they do is run Christian education for your children, that's fringe benefits. But the hard core is done when that local church gathers as an assembly of God before the pastor-teacher gift, with the teaching authority vested in that gift to give explanation and understanding of the revelation of the completed Scripture. And the local church organization has that, and that alone, as its purpose.

   So, if you're looking for some Lonely Hearts Club within the local church, you're out of line. That's not what the church is for. If you're looking for a social life to be provided by your local church, you're out of line. That's not what it's for. All that may be there, but that's fringe benefits. That's secondary. And we don't get caught up with that as the primary thing. The thing we're here for this to tell you what God thinks, and you go with it from there. But somebody has to be able to explain it to you in the first place.

   The Belt of Truth

   This is a great vision for what the Bible calls the belt of truth. The belt of truth is the intake of doctrine, and the developing a reservoir of doctrine in the soul. And that's what every Christian soldier needs. That's part of his armor – the belt of truth. And without the local church organization, you'll never have it.

   So, there's a lot of snide remarks being made about church organizations today, and a lot of church organizations deserve those remarks. But don't you ever forget that the local church is God's divine provision for this system of your coming to divine viewpoint perception. Without the local church, you won't make it. You're not going to go very far in just sitting at home and reading the Bible. You're not going to go very far in just sitting home reading books about the Bible. It is that local church fellowship and eyeball-to-eyeball instruction that carries you from the spiritual deficiency of ignorance of doctrine to capacity in doctrine. And nothing else is ever going to make it for you.

   So, it is sad that most local churches in our country today are dealing in secondary and trivial things. The sheep are dumb. The wool is literally being pulled over their eyes by their own leadership.

3. The Pastor-Teacher

   God has also, in this position (to make the system work), given you the pastor-teacher gift.

   The HICEE Technique

   Every local church has the pastor-teacher gift functioning under the HICEE technique.

   1. Hermeneutics

      The HICEE technique means that he gets up and he explains the Word of God on the basis of hermeneutics. We won't go into detail on this now, but those are principles for interpreting the Bible. There are certain guidelines for interpreting Scripture.

   2. Isagogics

      There is the category of isagogics. That's the background of Scripture. Every book of the Bible has to be interpreted under the conditions of the times; under the meaning of terms; and, under the meaning of the lifestyle that people.

   3. Categories

      There are categories or classifications of doctrine – doctrine brought together from various statements of the Scripture. And we say, "Here is the doctrine on this subject. Right now, we're going to talk about the doctrine of baptism." How are we going to interpret this subject of the doctrine of baptism that we're getting into? By one way, and one way alone. From all of Scripture, we're going to have to bring the classification of what the Bible teaches here and there, and here and there, about baptism. And we're going to be able to list, before we're through, a very clear picture on the doctrine of baptism. That's classifications, or categories.

   4. Exegesis

      We have to go through exegesis. That is putting together the grammar of the Greek and the Hebrew text so that we understand what the writer was saying under the leadership of the Holy Spirit.

   5. Etymology

      We have the etymology, and that is the meaning of words. God gave us a marvel in the Greek and Hebrew languages– that He froze those languages so that the words and meanings are the same to us as they were when those writers were first led by the Holy Spirit to record them.

   Now, that's what God has giving you. And a pastor-teacher who does not operate on this technique is suspect. I'll tell you that. And you're playing a very dangerous game with your eternal soul and your eternal rewards if you support a ministry which does not operate on this technique. You, I can tell you, are being shortchanged in your understanding of divine viewpoint. The spiritual efficiency is not being removed from your soul, and you will pay for it even as a believer through loss of rewards for all eternity.

4. The Priesthood of the Believer

   Another factor that God has provided is the priesthood of all believers. Every one of you is a priest of God. There is not a special clergy among us as believers in this age. In the Old Testament, there was a clergy. They had a priesthood. Today, each of you is his own priest. I am no more of a priest before God than you are. I have no more access to God than you do. You are all equally the priests of God.

   Privacy

   What that means is, for one thing, that you are responsible for your own life. So, don't go around crying about your spiritual condition as being caused by somebody else's actions upon your life. You are responsible for your own life before God. You represent yourself before God. And that's why the principle of privacy comes in. That's why how you live your life as unto the Lord is nobody else's business. And you may do things that I question, and you may do things that somebody else may think is not very good for a Christian to do, or not very wise, but it is still none of your business. What your children do, as parents – that is your business until they grow to maturity, and they become their own priests. Then whether they go on with the Lord, or whether they restrict themselves in divine blessing, is their business. They are their own priests. While we may hope to see them do well, you will not be able to substitute for the priesthood. Each of you is your own priest.

   The reason for that is that each of you then is responsible for using this grace system of perception so that you will not be ignorant of doctrine. You are free to respond to God on your own as an individual. Your privacy should therefore be respected in every way. People in the local church service should not be embarrassed. We should not be putting you under the imposition of asking you to raise your hands. We should not be tagging you as a visitor. We should not be asking you to identify yourself and make a spectacle of yourself.

   We have plenty of you around here who have a natural talent for making spectacles of yourselves, let alone for us to be encouraging it trying to help you along to do that. In some churches, you can't slip in and slip out just unobtrusively. They come up and they slap a tag on you that says "Visitor," and everybody comes up and gives you a mouthful-of-teeth smile, and shakes your hand. It's an invasion of your privacy. All that you do with the Lord should be private. How much money you give to the Lord, and how you give it – that's nobody's business. And you should not be put under pressures. That's the freedoms of grace. God has made you your own priest. Therefore, you are to exercise your priesthood, and that is part of the grace system of developing spiritually.

5. The Indwelling Holy Spirit

   We also have provided as believers for us the indwelling Holy Spirit. He addresses every believer, and He enables the believer to grasp divine viewpoint principles. He is your teacher. Without him, you could make no forward progress in the spiritual life. God the Holy Spirit indwells your body as His temple, the Bible tells us, and He will never leave you. He is always there. That wasn't true of the Old Testament saints.

6. The Filling of the Holy Spirit

   There's another provision here, and that is what we call the filling of the Holy Spirit. The filling of the Holy Spirit is His controlling you. You have a boy who's an athlete. He loves football, and you say, "That kid is just full of football." What do you mean? It means football controls him. That's all he thinks about is football. This is exactly what the word means in Scripture. Filling of the Holy Spirit means that God the Holy Spirit is in control of your life.

   That's why we began this service with giving you as believers a moment to exercise the principle of 1 John 1:9 which says, "If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness." That is to believers, not to unbelievers. And as believers, when we confess known sins, God immediately forgives. That's all. Don't telling Him you're sorry. Don't promise that you'll never do it again. He knows better, and you should know better than that. Just confess it. Just name it. Just state it. And He forgives it. And the result is that you're back in fellowship, and He is able to teach you now, and to bless you once more. That is to be filled with the Spirit.

   You cannot learn doctrine without being filled with the Spirit. You can sit in this service, and if you're out of fellowship with God your Father, then this service is a total loss to you, and you shouldn't have even come. As a matter of fact, you're going to hear things that will put you on positions of responsibility, such that it would have been better for you to have stayed at home and never to have heard these things because God says, "Whatever you hear that is My truth, I hold that so against you, and you'll not get away with ignoring it thereafter. You will pay the price for ignoring truth you've heard. So, if you're going to be negative, don't even show up. Go someplace where they give you inspiring talks ("sermonettes" for "Christianettes"). So the filling of the Holy Spirit is a very critical part of the grace system of perception. It can't work without it. That's what makes it work.

7. The Living Human Spirit

   Then another provision that he has made for us is the living human spirit. The human spirit is dead when you're born. That's part of what the old sin nature does for you. It just kills you right off the bat. So, you're born physically alive and spiritually dead. The human spirit now comes to life. And the living human spirit becomes the reservoir (the container) of doctrine. That's where all the doctrine that you're taking in is stored in your being. It's stored in your living human spirit. And the living human spirit is within you like a vast classification system in which doctrine of various kinds are stored.

   When you're dead spiritually, you have no guidance. All that you have is the guidance of human viewpoint. It is just pouring into your soul. It's guiding your thinking; it's guiding your emotions; and, it's guiding your will (your decisions). It's a whole loused-up situation. Consequently, life does not have any relationship to reality, and everything goes afoul in your lifestyle. But when you become a believer, all that is crossed out, and now you have this divine viewpoint. That's what's in your human spirit. Down there in your human spirit is all of this divine viewpoint. It's guiding your thinking; is guiding your emotions; and, guiding your will. You think God's thoughts. That's great. You have God's feelings about people and things. You have God's decision mechanism working in you. You have become, for the first time, a normal human being. And as you pour doctrine into that human spirit, you develop your capacity for the spiritual life. That's the grace system of spiritual development.

   As the pastor-teacher does his job, and gives you a half a chance to take in doctrine, you are going to become a marvelous human being. You will go from day-to-day toward the perfection of what the Bible calls the image of Jesus Christ. Someday you'll be absolutely like Him. You'll never have a thought that He would not have had. You'll never have an emotion that He would not have expressed. You'll never have a decision that He would not have made. But we're not perfect now. But God has given you the grace system of perception to move toward that perfection even now.

8. Soul Capacity

   And the result is that you have soul capacity; that is, you have the capacity to function on Bible doctrine. You have the capacity to have doctrine cycled up into your soul so that it is able to affect and guide your life, and guide what you're doing now.

The Functioning of the Grace System of Perception

1. The Pastor-Teacher Gift

   First of all, you receive instruction via the pastor-teacher gift in Bible doctrine. You receive instruction. That's what has happened throughout this session. You walked in here; you sat down; and, you've been sitting here receiving instruction in divine viewpoint truth via the pastor-teacher communicator gift. This is the way you secure the belt of truth. This is the primary way you secure it. There are some secondary ways in which you may secure, but you'll not go very far. God's provision is, first of all, instruction through a special gift, through which He places at least one pastor-teacher gift in each church. That pastor-teacher is there because he's the executive authority on behalf of that congregation, upon the decision and the authority of the congregation to invest him with that responsibility. The congregation is the final authority. The pastor-teacher gift exercises that authority, and he exercises his teaching gift.

   That's why a pastor must be able to teach, the Bible says. He must be apt to teach – able to teach. Sometimes you have the horrible condition of somebody who has the gift of evangelist, which is another spiritual gift, and he becomes the pastor of a church. He can't get speaking engagements, and things get a little slow on the evangelism circuit, so he decides to be a pastor and take a church. That church hears sermons on how to be saved all the time. That church hears gospel sermon Sunday-after-Sunday, because all he knows is preach the gospel and ask the folks to walk down the aisle, so that he can build up his membership, so that the income can be greater, so that they can buy more chairs, and they can build more buildings, and carry on in a great and wonderful successful business-like operation. It's a disaster when an evangelist becomes the head of a church.

   If you spot somebody whose messages are all gospel preaching, you better get out of that in a hurry, and get yourself under a pastor-teacher gift who's instructing in doctrine. Someday you're going to stand for the Judgment Seat of Christ as a believer, and the books are going to be opened, and there's going to be a tally sheet made upon the divine good investments you have made with your life. And there will be a reward, or there will be a horrible loss of reward. Don't forget, as 1 Corinthians teaches us not only that there will be rewards, but it also teaches us that we'll be aware of the hay, wood, and stubble (loss of reward) that was involved as well. There's going to be a disappointment, and it's all going to start with the fact that you permitted yourself and your family to attend a church where the pastor-teacher gift was not properly exercised under the HICEE technique.

   So, first of all, this system begins with the instruction. Then here's what happens.

2. Understanding

   The second step is understanding. This is the understanding of the truth. Let's go back to the part of the soul that we call the mind. The mind actually has two sections to it. It has a perceptive side that we call the perceptive mind. It also has a decision making side that we call the directive mind. All of your actions come from this directive side. You make decisions on the basis of some kind of information that you have received over here from the perceptive side of your mind. The perceptive side gives information, and the directive side acts.

   Now, you have received instruction in Bible doctrine. It has entered your perceptive mind. You've heard several significant pieces of doctrine explained to you in this session. The Bible calls that (the Greek word is) "gnosis." That simply means "knowledge." You have sat here today, and you have received knowledge. You've heard a variety of Bible doctrine principles stated. And that's all we're saying at this point. You've listened; you've understood; and, you've grasped them. We told you a variety of relationships that people should have: responsibilities; attitude; and, so on. All of these have been based upon Bible doctrine principles.

   The Filling of the Holy Spirit

   Now, you have this knowledge in your mind. You have sat here; you have listened to it; you have understood it; you have paid attention; and, now you've comprehended it. This "gnosis" requires, of course, the filling of the Holy Spirit. Without the filling of the Holy Spirit, you can gain no knowledge. You will not understand spiritual phenomena. You'll get the surface, but that's all. You will not grasp the significance. You cannot learn doctrine without being filled with the Holy Spirit.

   That's why an unbeliever can't get to step one in understanding the Bible. He cannot begin to understand the Bible. First, he must become a believer before he can be filled with the spirit. Then he has the capacity now to start being able to learn doctrine of God.

   The Holy Spirit today, because you've been in a status of spirituality (that is, fellowship, with all known sins confessed) has enabled you to take "gnosis" into the perceptive side of your mind. He's enabled you to learn something. Now, you may not agree, or you may not disagree. We're not talking about that. All we're talking about is that God has enabled you to learn a doctrinal principle.

3. Storage

   Along comes a third factor. As we say, you may agree or disagree, but you have understood. Now comes storage. At this point, you may go either positive or negative toward this "gnosis" doctrine. If you go negative, that's the end of it. If you've heard something stated during this session that is a biblical principle and you reject it, it has no influence on your life. It stops right there. The perceptive side of your mind will not affect your life. That side of your mind does not make actions. It is simply understanding. It is simply "gnosis."

   However, let's say that you've taken this information and you go positive toward it. You say, "Yes, I believe it. I accept it." You have thereby transferred "gnosis" to "epignosis," which means, in the Greek, "full knowledge;" that is, knowledge toward which you are positive. Immediately that you go positive toward this knowledge, it is whipped down and stored in your living human spirit, and it is placed in one of these categories of doctrine.

4. The Effects of the Truth

   Step number 4 is the effects of the truth. Now the Word of God, which is alive and powerful, resides in your living human spirit. Now you have stored it in that reservoir. You have it in a place where you can use it, because out of this reservoir, this information will cycle up to your soul to guide you in your actions. Now the directive side of your mind has guidance, not from the world's human viewpoint, but from God's divine viewpoint. For the first time in your life, you become a real winner. Now you have the capacity for living. This "epignosis" knowledge is what Bible doctrine is all about. That's where it's headed for. Now you can make the decisions that God can bless. Storage in that living human spirit is very important.

   This is why, when people get into a problem area of their lives (into trouble), they suddenly are reaching out for some information from God, and there's nothing to give, because God the Holy Spirit goes down to your human spirit, as with a strong light beam, and when you need information, He shoots that light beam on that particular category of doctrine. If it's empty, you get no information to go up to your mind. You have no information to come up to your soul. Where are you going to get it?

   That's the cockeyed idea of somebody who comes and calls the pastor up and says, "I've got this problem. Can you give me a verse out of the Bible?" And they actually think you can give him a verse out of the Bible, and they're going to know what to do, and all their problems are going to be solved. You're never going to solve your problems at that point. You didn't prepare to solve them. You don't have the capacity.

   It's like somebody who gets sick because he let his body get decrepit, and broken, and all out of joint, and then he calls his doctor and says, "Can you give me a vitamin?" And he thinks that if he swallows something that his capacity is all going to be there. You get all out of shape, and you think that you're going to get up there, and you're going to do a little exercise, and you're going to be back in shape. It's going to take you a long time to get back in shape.

   Spiritual reversion is and is getting out of shape, and it takes a long time to get back in. And if you don't have the nutrients, which is doctrine in your human spirit, you're never going to go anywhere spiritually. So, God says that you have to store it in there. He has given you the system. Everything that you have listened to in the Word of God, through the pastor-teacher instructional gift, that you have gone positive toward, is stored right there in that living human spirit, and God the Holy Spirit is standing right by there to use it when you need it.

   The effects of the truth on your soul, as we have indicated, is that it is cycled up now to the directive side of your mind to guide your actions. It gives you a sense of true conscience. It gives you a set of values and of standards to govern your decisions. It gives you divine viewpoint. It clears up all those guilt hang-ups that you've had. All the things that are brooding in your subconscious are washed out, because the Word of God has been stored in your living human spirit, and you are coming into an orientation with God's thinking.

5. Application

   Step number 5 is an application: application now toward God; and, application toward man. The spiritual callouses are removed off your soul. And that's a doctrine in itself that we can't get into in this session. But every time you are negative toward something you've heard from the Word of God, you place a hardening upon the facets of your soul: upon your mind; upon your emotions; and, upon your will, and it becomes hardened in your response to our God. And just as a callous on your hand cannot be removed just bingo overnight, it takes time to peel off the layers of that callous. So, as callouses are built upon the soul, the Word of God indicates that it takes time before those calluses are again removed. And they're removed by the application of doctrine.

   So, your capacity to love God; your capacity to love people; your whole emotional lifestyle; and, your whole set of values that you function on – everything is all dependent upon the applying of what you have stored as the result of this grace system of perception.

6. The Spiritual Maturity Structure

   Finally, there's one point more, and that is the end product of truth. What is the product of all this? Within your soul, there gradually rises a spiritual maturity structure. The Bible describes spiritual maturity as a building. Gradually, there arises in your soul a spiritual maturity structure. That spiritual maturity structure takes you from a babyhood stage right up the mountain. The Bible describes it from a child's stage, to an adolescent state, to a full grown adult stage, and right up here to the top of the mountain called super-grace, where you have the capacity for God's grace to be pouring into your life, and just to be overflowing upon you; upon your children; upon your husband; upon your wife; upon your friends; upon your local congregation; upon your business associates; upon your employees; and, upon everybody that you come in touch with. You become a grace-oriented person. They are blessed by being around you. They are ennobled by being around you. They are moving toward God. They are enabled to be successful in their life. They are moved toward the place where they are functioning as normal human beings instead of barnyard animals. And all of this is because the product of truth began with a local church organization and its teaching ministry.

   The Breastplate of Righteousness

   This spiritual maturity structure is what the Bible calls the breastplate of righteousness. That breastplate of righteousness is what protects you from all the darts and the wiles and the sneakiness of the devil. Without that breastplate, you're doomed.

Dr. John E. Danish, 1977

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