TO TELL THE TRUTH

"Truth is received in the mind, assimilated in the heart, and manifested in the way in which
   we live it out"

      "As the result of the work of His cross and resurrection, eternal life is received complete by those who believe. But while that life is victorious, incorruptible, and indestructible, the believer has to come by faith to prove it, to live by it, to learn its principles, to be conformed to it. The life in itself in the believer needs no addition, so far as quality and quantity are concerned. So far as power, its glory its potentialities are concerned nothing can be added to it. But the course of spiritual experience, of spiritual life, is to discover, to appropriate, and to grow in all that the life represents and means".

      However the discovery and living out of the Spiritual life is often impeded by a instrument that seeks experience for its justification, namely the human mind of the first Adam or old flesh man referred to in the bible. The I [ego] we identify with and within which we are programed by our past to be. We are all conditioned to want something, feel something expect something, this is simply the pre-programed un-conscious mind at work.  Yet the bible teaches in order to enter the new life He has made we need to be something all new. "The mind of the flesh is enmity against God; for it is not subject to the law of God; for neither can it be; and they that are IN the flesh cannot please God" Rom. 8:7,8.

     This new non-flesh man we must come to be and know is the new creation man God has made in heaven in Spirit. This new mans life though is only reveled first by a great need, or the self noted failure of the earthly Adamic personality [the flesh] to please God. Then recognized by a knowledge of a new creation by Spirit. And lastly lived out through faith in what we are in the new man God has made us to be in that Spirit. A faith in which we have learned and come to know the new man we are made into as "Hid in Christ". A spiritual life gleaned only from the Word of God and lived out by faith. "The Spirit of truth....will lead you into all truth" John 16:13.

      The Word tells us the very thoughts of God which forms our spirit. And therefore a opportunity to gain a knowledgeable mental formation of the life we have in Him. A mental position given by God that we then may transfer to ourselves, to define our very existence. This is the faith image that we will encounter by His Spirit life in us; once the old I, the flesh, the natural ego, the very existence of the first Adam, is put to death within our consideration as having any value. Just as He has declared it to be in His Word and in His mind as judicially annulled. God does not reference or hold to account this old man whom He has positioned in death through the work of His Son in any way what so ever!"So that we render a service which, instead of being old and formal, is new and spiritual" Rom. 7:6b, Wey.

      What we have become now and newly in God's estimation has no form as it is Spirit. But we are physical and earthly in the first Adam persona which we live in, in condition. That is why we are spiritually restricted in the Adam man; who can only think in its accustomed formula. That of the flesh or self-centered Adam of the earth. We must leave this man behind by changing our thoughts of Him. Securing in our mind any contemplation of the natural or carnal Christian Adam man as having any value towards God. In fact the more you make your thoughts of him the more you solidify his identity in you. By dwelling in him we are cut off from the spiritual dimension God has made for His children. "We have received....the Spirit which is of God; that we might know the things that are freely given us of God" 1 Cor. 2:12.

     In order to have His new spiritual awareness we must learn to "not to think" of our spiritual life in terms evaluated by what we are familiar with in the here and now in our earthly Adam identification and condition. Or even of what we think we will be in the splendid by and by for that matter. For His true life we can only live by what He has said to us in His Word now in the moment, by faith. In other words by trusting entirely in Him for identifying in us what we are to Him as to who we really are. This thought when truly dwelled upon gives us a new power: we then may relinquish gladly our old identification, to enjoy His new life. To gain the produce of His life is the surrender of our life, "reckon it as dead". We then will discover the new creation man just as shown to us in His Word! "Seeing that we have died to that which once held us in bondage [the flesh], the law [the flesh life of works] has no hold over us" Rom. 7:6a, Wey.

      The Word of God says we now live in God's mind and ours also as spirit; despite our feelings to the contrary that prescribe a experience. The Father now declares life is ruled by a new law: "the law of  the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus". We have been remade in spirit by the power or application of this spiritual law to create a new reality which God has established. We are formed into another man, a new man, a second Adam just as seen in His Son in His sight. Unlike the first or old in every way. We only must appropriate him. He is a Man who exists in perfection before Him, a Man in the flesh. Christ Jesus the object of all of God's thoughts toward us has become our image in God's view. Then by His power, in honor of our faith of that as true His identity is transferred to us by the Holy Spirit. 'Old thing have passed away; behold, all things are become new' 2 Cor. 5:17.

      In us He appears not as a physical form a man made to do good works; even though He is manifested in our mortal bodies while we linger here. We can only live this spirit life made by His  design by faith in His accomplishment as motivation. It is really His life becoming manifest in us by our trust which He honors then with spiritual growth. Not for a remade flesh Adam man here to change things in pleasing God. No now we have been newly made in Gods view into spirit. Nothing can ever be added of any value to reconstruct the Adam persona of old to form a new life. The crucified and dead Adam can never glorify Him in any way. " I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus: Phil. 3:14.

      We all know flesh cannot enter, so spirit [the thoughts in the present moment of our mind] is the only alternative for His life within us here. We now are found made by God into a second inheritance [His Son's] one of SPIRIT. We enter and live in Him in the spirit of our mind. But we have a condition, the flesh we must deal with. So while here, and in order to honor what God has done, we must learn that we really have two men: two personality's, even two natures to choose from. It is essential that the Christian know this, so that he can make the distinction between the two and then choose God's spiritual path."The spiritual did not come first, but the [old man] natural, and after that the [new man] spiritual" 1 Cor. 15:46.

     The spirit man is not made for for performance sake but to honor what God has done within us. How? By opening our eyes to all that is contained in His Mind for us as life just as spelled out in His Word. With this new knowledge we then may gaze into the glass and see His image as we view ourselves, existing in Him within His Son, all experienced by faith. We operate in this new life by simply counting it true. Nothing more! God then can work through our newly informed sub-conscious producing great peace, joy and a service not done in vain. A God ordained triumph over the Adam condition. "But we all, with unveiled face, [having been enlightened] beholding as in a mirror [our new self vision] the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as from the Lord, the Spirit" 2 Cor. 3:18.

      Really what we have become in Christ is in the realm of the un-manifested for practical purposes. We have a deep struggle with that concept as Adam conditioned men: proven by so much effort put into having a self centered experience. Also we can note it [the desire for proof by action] by what we have built; the obvious commercialization and the institutional like formations that many of our religious communities have adopted. Which generally simply follows the worlds example. In other words we attempt to look like what we expect [have been taught] God expects of us, so that we might recognize something familiar in order to please the first Adam mans need for personal justification. This is the works and law of man, the flesh mind of the old Adam. "For you were as sheep going astray, but are now returned unto the Shepherd and Bishop of your souls" 1 pet. 2:25.

      We cannot escape this old man, only deal with him. Buy putting him in the place of death as God has. Our old Adam based ideologies and learned colloquial belief systems do not reflect the new man God has created. In order to find him [the new personality] we must change our mind as to who we are entirely. "I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus" Phil. 3:14.

      The main barrier to that change is that the world has influenced the church and it has been lead down a road that has fostered what is unfortunately become a widely recognized biblical illiteracy, to the churches great shame. Even some might see it as embracing superstition and a alignment with the world, i.e. charismatic experience, encouraged emotionalism, cultural changes. kingdom building, psychological first aid, emphasis on works, and a lot of diversionary worldly entertainment. All of these in themselves tend to serve the needs of a class of men of the earth who can only recognize the old man as their quide. Men who perceive as proper the fulfilling of what is really a religious life purposed toward Christianity. All while operating within the confines of the first Adam mind. Which through no fault of its own simply follows the information that the spiritually dysfunctional Adam man is predisposed to. "For we walk by faith NOT by  [worldly perception]sight" 2 Cor. 5:7

     Our leaders mean well and are often loving Christian men and women yes but their hermeneutic [the branch of knowledge that deals with interpretation, especially of the Bible] is earthly.This type of thinking, to please the Adam man, requires [for justification] a man who has changed; the impossibility of the first Adam reworked. No this can never be as he is dead in God's sight. So there is a restriction upon their spiritual view, as their focus is upon the management of men's affaires; reflected in the attempted manifestation of a spiritual life controlled by the established pre-suppositional earthly Adam mans sub-conscious thought toward accomplishments on earth. "Holding forth the word of life; that I may rejoice in the day of Christ that I have not run in vain, neither labored in vain" Phil. 2:16.

     They miss heaven, the spiritual life which God has designed. They embrace the practical they have come to know here. Their reward in this world is seen as imminent, therefore more appealing to a first Adam mind set. However to live in the second man or new Spirit, first we must study and come to know the Word. Then we must recognize the loss or death of the old man. We then must wait and often suffer in the old, to have the new. However this is not the type of life favored or even possible of the Adam man [carnal Christian] who is mentally engaged with this world.... to tell the truth. So the question is which man will we choose? "Thou will show me the path of life" Ps. 16:11.