Spirit, truth, life

 Jesus brought a revival of the importance of being spiritual in the true sense. He was full of spiritually charged words which brought life rather than death when obeyed and lived by. He introduced this way to all who could accept it. When spiritual words are spoken, with true God-given spirit, they can be shunned or accepted, and when accepted, they open the door to life, leading away from ways of death. This makes it vital to have those who can impart such words, and vital, if we believe, to become such people too. Jesus empowers this way by having asked the Father to give to believers the Holy Spirit. This can provide what is needed to become a conveyor of spirit words, like Jesus. Spirit, truth, life. But the opposite of life is death, and it might be for that those who, despite believing, follow a murderous path, no matter how high they are, the words of spirit might be conveyed to them in such a manner as to lead them out of those ways, and into life. The Apostle Paul’s conversion was an example of this. Yet those who will not be converted, though they might even believe, but instead insist on aligning with evil, they go a path that leads to death. Discipline at a spiritual level can lead to punishment in this life of such sufficiency that their spirits are still saved eventually, but death might be first, to save their spirits. So the spiritual are needed for saving by words, and rebukes, and attempts to pull the erring from their errors, or in some severe cases, saving by spiritual punishment in solemn prayer. Live by spirit, whether spirit words, or spirit actions, and so escape the snares of the erring natural beast that otherwise we are. 

https://chatgpt.com/share/6a61197e-21c0-83ed-abd1-4ec2567a7706 

Jesus and God his Father

 The Gospel account of John records how Jesus was countering the Jews of his time. They were insisting they were descendants of Abraham, as John 8 records, and they did not like his teaching in which he in turn insisted that to call themselves this was missing the point if they were liars, since it is Satan, not Abraham, who is father of liars. John records how Jesus was upsetting them even more by insisting his own real father is God Himself. Jesus was referring, I believe, to this having God as his own Father when he stated “Before Abraham was born, I am.” I believe he was showing how much greater it is to have God as true Father, even more so than having Abraham as father, since God is and was and will be, and is therefore the one who is before Abraham.  But it is in his alignment with God, by being of all people the only one who truly had real knowledge of God, that he has unity with God, and in this he is the light you and I need in living our lives such that we do not, as he put it, ‘die in our sins’. He can impart this knowledge of God his Father to us, if we believe in him and hold to his teachings. By truly knowing God, this God whose Son he truly is, he could fully please God, and enlighten the world to this truth of God. We need to live by this light, or else we must stay in the dark. Finding Jesus and his Father God, and finding knowledge of Jesus and his Father God, by being given this knowledge by their imparting of it, by their revealing themselves, it becomes possible to overcome opposition and trouble from the world, and possible to have the faith in Jesus which enables following his teachings by holding to them in belief they will lead to the truth that sets free. 

AI response here to allow weighing of this against prevailing church opinions https://chatgpt.com/share/6a5e99f6-0ca8-83ed-81ea-1ba7b312803c 

Before Abraham

 “Before Abraham was born, I am.” What did Jesus mean by it? He was countering the Jews of his time who were insisting they were descendants of Abraham, as John 8 records, and they did not like his teaching in which he in turn insisted that to call themselves this was missing the point if they were liars, since it is Satan, not Abraham, who is father of liars, and Jesus was upsetting them even more by insisting his own real father is God Himself. I suggest Jesus meant to point to this having God as his own Father when he stated “Before Abraham was born, I am.” I believe he was showing how much greater it is to have God as true Father, even more so than having Abraham as father, since God is and was and will be, and is therefore the one who is before Abraham.  

Farm-assisting pharmacists

 The farm-assisting pharmacists, whose ancient precedent goes back well over five thousand years: An ancient profession like other ancient professions. Ancient things like this are not a forever thing. The Book of Revelation predicts the demise of such things. God and His Son are shown to be presiders in the future over a removal of such things from human civilisation. Things that cause sin. So when it speaks of pharmacy, and deceptions it causes worldwide, we ought to want to be sure what it means. The words it uses, based on Pharmakoi in its Ancient Greek meaning, has a link to our English words for pharmacist, pharmaceuticals, and even farming today. The farm link is interesting. Farmers need ideas of things to grow and a market for selling them. Humans are constantly looking for ways of profiting from resources. Farm land is a major resource. The link from this to drugs is not hard to see. Jesus interestingly alluded often to a book of what he called scripture which tells more clearly this link. It is known today as the Book of Enoch, preserved as we have it today by the Ethiopian churches and Beta Israel groups since ancient times. Fragments of the scriptural scrolls of it were found among the Dead Sea Scrolls, and Church Father writings quote from it. In this set of writings we find records of angels corrupting human society, apparently some 5,300 years ago, with knowledge including drug use from roots. Although it is rather obscure that it means roots for drug use, our knowledge from archaeology of that time does show the emergence of farming of roots for medicinal purposes. Ancient human societies did know how to turn farm land into medicinal resources. Other uses of land corrupted by angelic teachers, the Book of Enoch tells us, included metallurgy from mining. One of the links from metallurgy to corrupted practices was weapon production, for the art of war also taught by angelic fallen teachers. We see today how chemistry and land use combine to supply warfare, as well as supplying medicine. Things that cause sin and despair are going to be dealt with by Jesus when he returns for a thousand years of rule over this planet. But even before then, his teachings help us, if we believe, to turn from practices leading to sin and death. In turn, this saves us, if we follow his ways, from eventual condemnation when it will all be permanently ended in fire. 

The Truth from which comes no lie

 Can anyone rightly lie to an enemy? It is a grey area. Do not lie against a neighbour. Those who are one in their unity with Jesus Christ are to not lie to each other. Lies are evil things, and are tools typical of evildoers. If we are aligned with the sayings of Jesus, learning from his sayings, believing he is sent from God, and believing his veracity as anointed by God, we have access to the truth, as the true disciples of Jesus. Put truth together, without lies, and you have something from which no lie can come, and this is promised to those who are true disciples of Jesus. As followers of Jesus, the Lord Jesus treats his follower as a neighbour, and lies are not directed to them by God. Even if God lets a lie come to an enemy of God, He will not suffer a lie towards a neighbour or friend of His Son. 

Critical analysis of this by AI: https://chatgpt.com/share/6a57f009-370c-83ed-84f8-99e324c1e90f 

Authority is invisible

 Authority is largely invisible. I used to work in local government, in an office building, and as I walked around at work, authority was there, but it was intangible; invisible to senses, invisible to Science. Yet it was there. It was mostly manifested in how I was told to do my work, in how I was told what to do. It was invisible, but it was known. I very much knew I was working in a place where there was authority. Occasionally it came into how I behaved in events that took place; such as a phone call in which I was asked permission and my own response carried authority I found surprising, but it was real. Most of the time my mind simply superimposed that knowledge into my work, but other than that, there nothing visible in the work which said it was done under authority, within an office building of a local authority. Now in the world around us there is authority too, but Science does not detect it, nor does it inform us of it. Really we only know it because of rare events in history, and because there is this entity we call the Holy Spirit which informs some of us about it, and we tend, in our short life spans, to ‘get wind of it’. Yet that authority exists. It is there in the trees and stars, and the changing of tides, and cycles of day and night. It is the authority of the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. 

The Distinctive Son of Man

 Consider how Jesus called himself the Son of Man. Think of a children’s educational broadcast, say in stop motion, with various marionette characters, just one of which is a human child, while the other marionette characters are animals or other kinds of non-human character. Think how in the planning phase there might already have been a story board with the characters depicted in advance of their real marionette forms. Even at this stage, the main character might have been the human child. Then when given their final manifestation as marionettes, it becomes clear that this main character is a human child, although it might be that a further manifestation of the character in a live action adaptation of the broadcast, is a replacement with an actual child. This is not an analogy, but it helps describe the way God first made provision for there to be a most prominent, sent Son, who when in his original position side by side with angelic servants of God, was distinct by being one who would eventually be manifested as a real human, born as a human offspring. Prior to this, and prior to conception in human form, he had existence, but that existence was initially determined by what he would eventually be, a Son of Man. Before being flesh and bone, he had existence on a par with angels, yet greater by virtue of his intended human existence as ultimate judge to be sent by God into the world so as to be judge of humans, and mediator between them and God, Moreover, his name was higher than any angel’s name, and he would succeed where others had failed, in perfectly justly and lovingly shepherding humans, pleasing God in this, and God would therefore even make him the ultimate judge even over angels. Even if the angels were called gods, Jesus would still be made judge over them, and would be given to die in obedience to God as though he were on a par with failing human leaders, but be raised from the dead by God to demonstrate that God accepted him as not in any way a failure. These things given by God to him to do, along with striking miracles, would show that God was setting him apart as having a name greater than any other name, and doing so among the humans to whom He had sent Jesus. All this is a matter of distinctness from any angel, by virtue of being a human, actually born human, rather than the merely human appearance which angels could sometimes have. Jesus is the Son of Man, and described himself as such. It is his distinct nature. We can believe in this Jesus because though from among the angels he has come to us just like us: Human. 

Context and spiritual authority

 What place does scripture have as an authority for believers? It has a context-driven authority. Away from its original historic, cultural, and spiritual context in which it had particular authority, it is dangerous to expect it to be as fully authoritative. Half a century from now it will be even more irrelevant, since the resurrection will likely have happened, and a lot of what scripture says applies far less to the resurrected. There is, instead, a Holy Spirit bringing grace from the already resurrected Lord Jesus Christ. Furthermore, there is the ever enduring, ever relevant, ever authoritative faith and hope and love believers have even after resurrection. These can be a guiding factor in the here and now. 

Materialistic versus spiritual

 Materialism or spirituality. It is the crux of human life. How materialistic or how spiritual we are tends to produce effects in how we behave towards ourselves, and others, and God. If we ignore the spiritual things in life, or rather, the holy spiritual things (there are unholy spiritual things, and these are best avoided), we are left with the materialistic naturally human tendencies, which lead to fits sudden jealousy, dishonesty, and ultimately harm to those we should not harm, our truest neighbours and friends, those we should love. On the other hand, there is a whole level of human experience we easily miss out on when we are materialistic. Truth is at the heart of it. It connects spiritually minded people at a certain level, similar to how we dream. Indeed we can be most conscious of it in our dreams, or daydreams, when the materialistic ways of thinking, and human nature urges, and baser feelings, are less active. Yet to live materialistically is to allow the spiritual to stay dormant, and even to effectively die, ignored, forgotten, so that we might not believe it even exists, and deny any evidence of its existence in others too. But it does exist, and some have fostered its existence without falling into the pitfalls of unholy spirituality or abuses. True spiritual life is there between the material and the abusive. It is based on spiritual aspects of deep awareness which is not false, nor based on abuses and mind alterations, but true and heaven-given. It reaches its ultimate development in the most charitable of love, and in purest kindness, which highest heaven honours, even though it is typically hidden from public awareness and social credit. The greatest boost to this spiritual life is the message of the cross death and the resurrection of the Christ, Jesus, and the gift from God of the Holy Spirit to those who believe it. This resurrects that dormant spirit of truth. It fosters a community of shared awareness of this truthful spirit and its power to make behaviour more noble and holy. This community has Jesus as its head, its household master, connecting all both individually and together to God and His heavenly domain. This leads to a new kind of worship, which is actually very ancient, and which is the kind of worship God requires, in spirit and truth, rooted in no place or holy site, but irrespective of location on earth. 

https://chatgpt.com/share/6a51f901-4008-83eb-801e-3ead8afe8c40 

Good versus evil

 The struggle between good and evil often gets confused with a struggle between evil and evil. So we have phrases like “a lesser evil” as if to justify our acceptance that fighting evil tends towards using a lesser evil to counter a greater evil. Would it not be possible to simply overcome evil with good, and not have to resort to using evil to counter evil? Sometimes there is no cure for one evil than another evil, and sometimes it seems the cure is worse than what is cured. Leaders, shepherds, have to fend off evils somehow, and many are prone to using methods too unfair to the vulnerable. The poor become poorer, and fail to thrive under such leaders, like sheep and lambs made unhealthy by their unworthy, neglectful shepherd. To find a worthy shepherd is hard, and often unsuccessful. God has this ultimate unhappy task of finding decent shepherds for His hapless sheep. He condemns unworthy shepherds, but sometimes lets them continue their low grade work for lack of alternative, or perhaps when the sheep have by their wandering away angered their God. So into this backdrop we are blessed to have a worthy shepherd, a good shepherd, set aside by God for the ultimate time when the evil is to be finally overcome with good. God saves the best till last. Just a few decades and this good shepherd will come. The Christ. Having laid down his life for the sheep once and for all at his first coming, raised from the dead to ascend to the Father, he awaits the Father’s signal to return again. How does he overcome evil in a good way? He teaches the evil doer that their ways are evil, even though they hated him for it and crucified him out of that hatred. He leaves his word as sayings to be learned and persisted by those who believe in him and uphold his teachings, so these teachings can still be levelled at the evil doers through the ages and now today. Lies are evil. Murders are evil. Those practising such things are children of evil, not children of God. Biological descent and heritage make no difference. It is how we behave that determines what we are. His teachings can make the evil receiver of them good. Like a rebirth. But it takes first a confidence in Jesus being the good shepherd, sent by God, and secondly a deliberate effort to keep persistent hold on his teachings, so they take effect long term. No turning back. It is not a temporary cure, but needs to be integrated into our lives permanently. God has no temporary children. Temporary status is for slaves, not for children. Can it be a cure for evil today? It depends. If there is unbelief, and hardening against this high regard of Jesus, ignoring him as irrelevant, or simply insisting he is just as bad as the unworthy shepherds, then his teachings have no effect. The evil stay evil. The liars stay liars until they die. The murderers stay murderers. They die in their sins. But to those who believe, his teachings offer a way of escape from the clutches of such evil ways. Christ died for you. His sacrifice of his own life is as a lamb sacrificed by God for your sins. This is a new covenant available to you if you will believe and hold to it. And it leads to eternal life. It is the ultimate triumph of good over evil. Christ is alive for you. 

God’s faithful Son

 For the Lord Jesus, being the Christ seems to him have been primarily about being set apart by God for the purpose of being sent to judge and to testify to the truth, but not as someone like other great human beings who fail to satisfy God’s will that there be justice and provision for the poor, but rather Jesus was sent as the good shepherd, giving his life for the sheep. So those who believe in him have him as light to live by, light to learn from, light to be spiritually happy by having his faithful and truthful sayings to which they can hold, and having him as a good shepherd to save them from living sinfully, so they need not die in their sins. This is what it means that he is the Christ. In all of this, because Jesus has fully lived up to this, the Father is happy to identify Jesus as his Son, choosing him to be forever this Lord and Christ, having raised Jesus from the dead, after Jesus died on a cross as sacrifice for sins of all, for you and for me. 

https://chatgpt.com/share/6a4d5c2c-6640-83ed-b44e-b524548eb18f 

Gospel Priorities

 Here is the priority thinking for real Christians. Jesus, the Christ, died for you. He died during the Passover feast and that thus became a new covenant in his blood. His resurrection days later means he lives today and forever. Believe Jesus is raised from the dead by the God who sent him as the light for all. This resurrected Jesus has in turn sent others as light for all including those who are not Jews. One of those sent by Jesus was the Apostle Paul who preached the definitive gospel we should all prioritise, namely that our salvation from God is by belief in Jesus and holding to his teachings, and not by the Law of the old covenant. Receive the Holy Spirit from God to help with following this way. Encourage others who believe and follow this way, as we await the return of our Lord who is this Jesus Christ. Baptism which marks our identification with Jesus is the start of a life learning to follow his teachings. Those who believe in him and follow his teachings are known by him, and he leads them to eternal life, to eventually having a resurrection like his own if they die before he returns, and if they are alive at his return, to transformation to immortality by him. 

The Great Debate

 The revelation of the Name of the Son of Man was needed in a certain tumultuous time to save the governance of Nature’s order. It became a saving name, saving order of Nature from collapse into chaos resulting from angelic sin. Now we too are given this name for our salvation, and the Name that sustains order in Nature now sustains morality in our lives. The Name is the Name of the Lord Jesus Christ. But Science is blind to this. Scientists get given a powerful delusion in their work, great though that work may be. They suffer a delusion that the Laws of Nature are so totally known by them, that powers of the governance of Nature cannot exist. Their Standard Model of Physics does not include any force or particle that would produce a miracle or act as part of any governing of Nature. There is no such Name force or particle known to their Science.  So they think that nothing is governing chance events. Their known atomic and subatomic particles and quantum forces do not govern Nature in any theological sense, nor produce miracles affirming or rewarding faith, so such rewards of faith, such miracles of God, and such governance of Nature the scientists tend to deny by their discipline of thinking and their delusion. God is hidden, and His powers are too. He reveals it to the child, the fool, the innocent believer, but hides it from these scientifically wise. We, if we count ourselves among the scientifically wise, might have to become scientifically foolish in order to be open to the revelation of what is hidden. Blindness to such things is both a punishment and a leveller, making low the lofty, leading to the rebuking of the scientifically wise, and eventually the humiliation of the intelligent and proud. Walk into a church, hear the gospel, believe it and be granted a miracle and the Holy Spirit, and this scientific wisdom is proven foolish. The Name of Jesus is higher than the name of Science. The cross on which he died is wiser. The resurrection by which he rose is mightier. God is real.  God is true even when every typical human thinks and tells their lies. The blessing of the righteous life produced by this faith, instantiated by Jesus Christ, is greater than all the blessings of Science, even to the next generation. 

Nature’s Governance

 How did angels do anything to govern Nature before the Name of the Son of Man was revealed and incorporated into that government? The Name of the Lord Jesus Christ is today prevalent in all of the ins and outs of Nature and how it is governed angelically. We might pour scorn on any concept of angels and any governance of Nature. But it is deeply entwined in Nature that there are boundaries that must be observed, such as the high and low water marks of tides, the length of a day, the place of the solstice and equinox rising and setting of the Sun. Think of it like standards such as the measurement of distance and time. In human systems we incorporate such measurements into our technologies and day to day lives and how things are governed. Our Internet is founded on such measurements. Our lives obey times of day, and calendar, and property boundaries. Even at a least informed level or way of life, a primitive and fairly isolated person might be devoid of all other technology, but in order to survive for decades, they might need to know the time of year in which to plant seeds for crops, or know when best to take crops to a market. So too in Nature. It is a metaphysical insight to know that trees must have some kind of authorisation in order to put forth buds and leaves, either at a certain time of year such as Spring, or, if they are evergreen, on a continual basis. Science cannot observe it. It is at another level that we have to know it. It is metaphysical. Order is built into Nature. Order must be governed. It is a metaphysical principle outside of Science. But it is theological to know that angels are in charge of such governing. Then the Creator who ordained it all is in charge of guiding that governance at the highest level. And into that governance is woven the Name of the Son of Man, and this lordship at the highest level under God is given to the Son, Jesus Christ, raised by God from the dead. His Name is incorporated into the governing of Nature. Angels incorporated this Name into their governing framework when that Name was revealed to them long ago. We can know this by the Holy Spirit. And so I want to know: How was Nature governed before this Name was revealed? The gospel of John reveals a Logos existing from the beginning. But it is a mystery how this Logos was there with God but with a Name at first not known to the angels entrusted with governing natural order. There is a scripture called the Book of Enoch which offers light on this matter. It reveals that angelic governance before the revelation to them of the Name of the Son of Man was fine until angels started falling from their moral uprightness and started wandering away from duty, and this fall is what necessitated a bolstering of the Oath by which Nature is governed. The revelation of the Name of the Son of Man was needed for this salvation of the governance of Nature’s order. It became a saving name, saving order of Nature from collapse into chaos resulting from angelic sin. So too with us. We are given this name for our salvation too. The Name that sustains order in Nature now sustains morality in our lives. 

https://chatgpt.com/share/6a48c0d5-af04-83eb-bf34-c51d13c5f4d1 

Faith versus works?

 Faith versus works? Faith, in the sense Apostle Paul and other apostles spoke of it, is all a matter of persuasion. There is the gospel message, and it persuades. There are righteous acts according to the teachings of Jesus Christ, and these too persuade. Being persuaded about the veracity and heaven-sent wisdom of Jesus Christ saves. The persuasion does not come from the kind of actions performed in the course of obedience to the Law, such as circumcision, keeping feasts, offering sacrifices. These were performed over and over by Jews of Paul’s time without resulting in saving persuasion. It was good, yes, but not saving. It still fell short of pleasing God. Paul himself had lived in full compliance with these works of Law, as he called them; these actions which built Jewish identity, yet he still persecuted the church and grieved the Lord Jesus Christ by it. Jesus taught people teachings which persuaded them to believe he is from God, and that he could and would save those who truly followed him. He taught that persuasion of this kind and holding to his teachings was what constituted truly following him, and he would save these followers, these disciples, from falling short of what pleases God, saving them from eternal death, giving them eternal life. Paul affirmed that such persuasion is what leads to saving righteousness; true righteousness. Obedience to the identity-forming aspects of the Jewish Law did not constitute this, not persuade in the way necessary for this salvation. Obedience to Christ and his teachings is powerfully persuasive, even though some might think it is one set of works replacing another. Keeping the Lord’s Supper, for example, is a matter of powerful persuasion, because it proclaims the saving gospel message that Jesus Christ was offered as sacrifice for our moral shortcomings, dying on the cross for them, once and for all. Baptism shows how he died and then rose again. This all spreads the heavenly, persuasive message, which saves by persuasion.