DO REAL Christians
Sin Every Day?
(Continued
from Page 3)
you anyway for His
own glory,
because He wants you to be well and healthy and to reflect His goodness
and mercy.
As I thought and
prayed about an
illustration of the transformation that occurs at the new birth, I
first
considered the tadpole which transforms into a frog, but there were
major
inconsistencies. Then I considered such creatures as helgramites, which
hatch from eggs laid by the attractive flying dragonflies and mosquito
hawks and live for the first portion of their lives as pond bottom
predator
insects. In time, they go through a metamorphosis and transform into
dragonflies
or mosquito hawks which flit about in the air on crystal wings and also
still capture and prey on other insects. But the transformation, the
metamorphosis
that God had me focus on was the caterpillar and the butterfly. As a
result,
I have written a tract, "TOTALLY
CHANGED".
The adult butterfly
which flits
from flower to flower and sips nectar, does no harm to anything and
even
benefits the plants whose flowers she visits by providing pollination,
then lays eggs on a protected part of the plant. These eggs hatch after
a time and the new hatchling is anything but harmless. It crawls on
stubby
legs and false legs called pseudopods on the young twigs and branches
of
the host plant and eats the new leaves and buds, sometimes nearly
destroying
the host plant. It has powerful, sharp cutting jaws and is fat and
often
ugly in appearance. It is the offspring of the beautiful butterfly, but
it is anything but beautiful. It has the genetic
codes that in time will
regulate
a beautiful butterfly that flits about on colorful wings sipping nectar
from flower to flower and providing valuable pollination service to the
flowers, then maybe even to migrate perhaps on a several thousand mile
migration in some species. .
Now when the
caterpillar was crawling
on the twig and chewing the leaves, it had no idea that someday it
would
fly two or more thousand miles to a distant land for the winter and
then
return in the spring to the same tree or plant or field to lay its eggs
and die. Its nature was to crawl and chew. It would have been unnatural
for it to dream of flying and sipping nectar. As a human being who has
not yet come to Jesus Christ for salvation, we are like the
caterpillar.
Our nature is basically selfish and self-centered and tends toward
anger
and frustration at anything or anyone who stands in the way of our
doing
what we please. That is our nature. That is who we are. It would be as
unnatural for us to seek the things of God as for a Monarch caterpillar
to dream of the days when it will fly 2500 miles from Michigan to
southern
Mexico for the winter.
Our identity, our
person, our will,
our nature is to satisfy our own needs and wants of the moment with no
thought of a better life sipping the nectar of the Holy Spirit
anointing
and infilling. But there comes a day in the life of a caterpillar that
it tires of crawling on the leaves and chewing and chewing. It feels
the
need to make a change and begins to do something it has never done
before
and probably never seen another caterpillar do, either. It begins to
spin
a
cocoon around itself.
It dies to
its old nature and the old nature is then buried in the cocoon.
Inside the cocoon,
it transforms
to become a pupae. If you cut away the cocoon at this stage, you find
that
there has formed a sort of casing around the body of the caterpillar
and
already it is different. "It's different now!" the gospel song says,
and
it is true. But at this stage of development, the creature is totally
helpless.
It cannot escape the thin shell around it which has
formed from the old
caterpillar
skin. It has no more legs at all, though you can see that a
shapesimilar
to butterfly legs is formed as well as a dwarf wing pattern. But the
living
creature inside is hardly more than a mass of white gooey stuff. If you
tried to carefully remove the thin shell from the internal mass, the
whole
thing would come apart. No, the creature must die to its old form and
the
limitations of its old nature. The totally faithless existence and
looking
only for something to chew on is gone and the ability to fly in the
power
and anointing of the Holy Spirit is now natural. This, then is who you
are if you are a true "new creature in Christ Jesus." (1
Corinthians
2:14). As sinners, our whole nature is much like that of the
caterpillar.
Our view, our outlook on life, our future all seems to be wrapped up in
finding that next leaf to chew on and fill our stomachs. Although there
may be twenty or a hundred other brother and sister caterpillars on the
twig, branch or plant, we couldn't care less about them. We want to
feed
ourselves. After the metamorphosis, the whole nature as well as
appearance
and ability is changed. Now this may result in a change of clothing
styles,
though not necessarily. Whereas as a sinner, the beautiful young lady
may
have displayed as much bare skin as possible to attract a man, after
she
is transformed and changed, she will wear whatever she wears not to
glorify
her own sexuality but to glorify and honor God. Contrary to the
teachings
of some church people, it is not the clothing that makes for sexual
attraction
but the spirit of lust the person really displays and the matching
lustful
spirit of the person of the opposite sex. Many successful prostitutes
wear
clothing which would meet the approval of the strictest holiness folks
and many young ladies who truly love the Lord wear swimsuits and shorts
when it is appropriate and men pay them no lustful attention because
the
girls or young women are not displaying their bodies in a lustful
spirit. 2
I have personally observed ladies from holiness churches who attracted
much attention from lustful men even though they were dressed to
approved
standards and I have observed young ladies who were not afraid to
display
the natural beauty God gave them for His glory who were totally ignored
by lustful men.
After the
metamorphosis, a butterfly
has no desire for leaves to chew on. It doesn't even have chewing jaws
to use if it did. Instead it is equipped with a tongue designed for
sipping
nectar from flowers and as it does, it provides a blessing in the form
of pollination for the flower. And likewise, a true Spirit-filled
Christian
will provide the salt for seasoning and preserving or the light for
others
to see their way by without even thinking about it. It is their
nature.
For "But the natural
man receiveth
not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him:
neither can he know them,
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because they are spiritually
discerned." Satan does not care how much truth we get as long as it
prevents
us from living in the center of God's plan and purpose for our lives.
He
only wants to keep us from realizing our real identity.
The Man Christ
Jesus, the Lamb of
God who was about to be slain as the once and forever sacrifice for
sin,
cried out to His Omnipotent Spirit asking what He already knew, by His
own words was not possible, that the human body in which He dwelt at
that
moment be spared the pain and agony which He knew Salvation's plan
required.
Without the shedding of His sinless blood, how would remission of sin
have
been paid for? So, in fact, in the Garden of Gethsemane, Jesus could be
said to have had both the consciousness of a man as He cried out yet at
the same instant, the consciousness of God knowing that the sacrifice
of
the flesh must take place for the Divine purpose to be
accomplished.
And just as each one
of us is one
human being composed of many parts and often having many different
titles
that describe or explain us, so, too God in whose image and likeness we
are made. Consider for a moment, we each have toes, feet, legs, knees,
thighs, hips and many other body part; many internal parts
are not even visible, yet we are only one entity or human being. And we
all at one time held the title of baby, son or daughter, toddler,
child,
and eventually,truck driver, airplane pilot, doctor, preacher or lawyer
or some other title that described us might include, "Slim" as a
tongue-in-cheek
nickname for a very fat person, "Red" for someone with copper colored
hair,
or "Champ" for someone who is a winner or something different to
different
other people according to our status in life.
So, too, Almighty
for God, described
from Genesis to Revelation as the One and Only Supreme Spirit who
controls
the universe has been called the Father, the Son and Holy Spirit based
upon what He is doing in the life of the person whose life He is
touching
at that time. If one needs healing, God may be Jehovah-Rapha, the
healer.
If that one needs salvation He is Yeshua or Jeshua, Jehovah our
Salvation.
He is also known as Jehovah Jireh, or my Provider; Jehovah Shamma,
Jehovah
Tsidkenu, and several other like titles in the Old Testament and the
Holy
Spirit and the Comforter as well as Jesus the Christ. But He is still
the
ONE Holy Spirit, THE Spirit of the LORD.
Just as the human
doctor is known
as "Doctor" in his office and perhaps on the street, but his children
call
him "Daddy", his wife calls him "Honey," and his and his fellow bowlers
in the bowling league may call him "Strike" if he is a thrower of
strikes
or "Loser" if he is a poor player. Friends may simply call him John or
Mike or Joe, completely overlooking his title or accomplishments. Still
other people always call him by his title. Should the doctor's child
always
refer to him as Doctor? Should his wife always? Are these titles
wrong?
Of course not. He is
still the same
Joe Blow whether he has the word Doctor appended to his name or is
being
called "Honey?" by a family member. Well then, how about his identity?
How does the Bank or the credit card company identify him? By "Daddy,"
or "Honey," or even "Doctor"? NO, they use his actual name as linked to
a specific account number. Likewise it says authority to cash the
check.
So is the Doctor three or four or more persons because he is different
things to different people? Of course not! How silly! It's that simple.
So too are questions about whether "in the name of" means in His actual
name or in His authority is like asking the bank if you can cash a
check
simply signed "doctor," "father" or "husband". The bank needs his name
and signature that says he has the authority to cash the check.
Thus, common sense
says that although
He did know He was the Son of God, He submmitted Himself to living as a
normal human being right up until the time came for Him to begin His
earthly
ministry as the Messiah. Before His baptism by John in the first
chapter
of John's Gospel, there is no record of Him performing any
miracles
whatever. Could He have done so? To what purpose in the plan of God
would
it have served? We do know that at His Bar Mizvah, He did know His
Divinity
by His remark when he said, "Wist ye not [meaning don't you
understand?)
that I must be about My Father's business?"
He had kept -His
earthly parents
reminded of His Divine paternity. Thus, He did have a consciousness
that
He was God in he flesh. It appears to me that it was not until He
submitted
as a human to being baptized by John, though He had no sins to be
buried,
yet based on Romans 6:3,4, if we are to rise with Him to walk in
newness of life, it was not until this point that to He began to
perform
miracles such as turning the water into wine at the wedding in
Cana
in John chapter 2, that it was when theHoly Spirit came upon Him that
His
anointing as the Messiah took place. And in parallel, we who have been
subjection-buried with Him in baptism should rise, as He did, to walk
in
newness of life.
This is NOT saying
that Jesus had
exactly the same change in His life after He was baptized as we do, for
we all have indeed sinned, whereas He had not. But He did arise out of
the water and began to demonstrate His Divine anointing and nature from
that point on and we, as we are transformed from our caterpillar like
lives
of just naturally doing destructive things to a wholly new
butterfly-like
nature of feasting on God's bounty also stop chewing on the things of
the
world and the limitations of stubby legs and a heavy body and
aretransformed
into one that can fly quite naturally through the air with the greatest
of ease.
Yes, we ARE to be
set apart and
holy unto God. Yes, we are to set Godly examples and be Christlike, but
we are also to go into all the world and preach the gospel to every
creature.
An important part of this "preaching" is in the Godly life example we
show.
"Christ in you the hope of glory." (Colossians 1:27). This includes the
heathen in the jungles, the prostitute on the city street and the truth
seeker in whatever church or denomination. If we are to show a life of
Christ through oour own lives, how then can we "sin a little every
day?"
No way!
-- S. M.
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