THREE ELEMENTS

THE THREE ELEMENTS

                “Now may the God of peace Himself sanctify you entirely; and may your spirit and soul and body be preserved complete without blame at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.” 1Thess. 5:23

                In order to fully understand what it means to be born again, to be justified and then sanctified and then glorified, we really do need to understand the true nature of man. Man is a triune being, made up of spirit and soul and body. This pattern of the nature of man is given to us in the tabernacle of Moses and it is shown to us so that we might better understand the fullness of our salvation.

                Adam was a living soul, housed in a body made of dust (elements of the soil) and he had a spirit, breathed into him by God. These elements were in perfect balance, just as the godhead is in perfect balance and as such Adam was made in the image of God.

                When Adam sinned, the Spirit of God departed from him, leaving only a human spirit, soul and body and the human spirit, weakened greatly by the absence of God’s Spirit, lost its ascendancy so that the soul and the flesh began to dominate Adam and all mankind after Him. So a fallen man is a man in which the Spirit of God no longer dwells.

                It is that Spirit of God that Jesus brought back, born into a human body, learning and perfecting faith through the things that He suffered. And then He went back to heaven to send that Spirit down to us at Pentecost. So Pentecost corresponds to creation when God breathed into Adam’s nostrils the breath of life and that is why we are called “A new creation” and Jesus “The new Adam,” for He brought back to us the Spirit that Adam had lost in the fall.

                So, as fallen humans we are dominated by our soul and our body; and our human spirit is all but dormant and prone to the domination of evil spirits and the lusts of the flesh and the pride of our godless souls. (Our minds, made up of mind, will and emotions)

                We are without hope and without God in the world and unless Jesus had come and restored to us the Spirit that He had breathed into Adam we would not have eternal life. So we see Jesus doing something very significant to His disciples just before He went back to heaven. John 20:22 says. “And when He had said this, He breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit.” What does this mean?

                What it means is that Jesus was restoring the same breath that He had breathed into Adam at creation. Not much is said about this act of Jesus for we always talk about Pentecost, but in fact, this act of Jesus was huge. In this act Jesus breathed His Spirit into the human race beginning with His disciples and it is by this Spirit that we are born again. The Holy Spirit that fell upon the same disciples a few weeks later was the baptism of the Holy Spirit that would empower them to do the works of Christ and even greater works because He had gone to the father. Jesus tells us as much in Acts 1:8. So when we are born again we first receive eth breath of God, the Spirit of God that Adam lost in the fall. Then once we are made into vessels in which god may dwell, then He pours out His Holy Spirit for power to witness and to do the works of Christ in the world.

                So there are two separate acts of the Holy Spirit. One is to restore the Spirit (Breath) of God into humans, to restore them to the image of God as redeemed humans; and the second act is to empower us to do the works of Jesus in the world. One is our infilling and one is our baptism of power.

                So, likewise when we are born again we receive a new spirit (the breath of God) and this spirit, though newly placed in us, like a baby in a manger, will begin to grow in us and as we feed it through the Word (Table of Showbread) and the Holy Spirit (Menorah) and prayer (Altar of incense) we grow up in maturity learning to live by the Spirit rather than by our fleshly mind or our fleshly body. In this growing process we are learning to live by the Spirit as Adam did, through the Spirit and power of our new Adam, Jesus Christ.

                In maturing in Christ we are taking every thought captive to the obedience of Christ. 2 Cor. 10:5 and we are doing it all by the power of “This treasure we have in earthen vessels.” 2 Cor. 4:7

                So when we get saved as in the outer court of the tabernacle we are saved by the blood of the Lamb, we offer our bodies as a living sacrifice upon the altar, (The altar of sacrifice) we are washed clean in baptism, ( Laver) and now we are ready to begin our Christian journey to maturity.

                Notice if you will that in being born again we are still in the outer court. We are babes in Christ, but like Jesus’ parable of the sower, it must be determined what kind of soil this new life, this seed has been planted in. Will it fall on rocky soil and die in the heat of the sun? Will it be choked out by the cares of this world? Will it fall prey to the devil and his wiles, or will it prove to be good soil in which the seed of eternal life will grow and flourish and grow into maturity at the harvest?

                It is interesting and infinitely sad that many so called Christians never enter within the veil of sanctification. They hang around the outer court shouting about being born again, yet remaining babies and living more like the world than like maturing Christians. And the fact that God’s design of the sanctuary shows such Christians still in the outer court and given the fact that Hebrews 12:14 says to pursue Sanctification without which no one will see God… and if we add to that Jesus’ [parable of the good soil, we would have to say that much of the church today is in a critical condition. The Seed of salvation has never taken root in them. It has not grown or matured and because of it many are falling away from the faith and preparing to wonder after the Beast of Rev. 13

                We have taken our salvation much too lightly. We live by presumption rather than true faith. We live with one foot still in the world and one in the outer court and we think everything is okay as long as we make it to church once in a while.

                And while we are at it, we take church much too lightly as well, for as Paul tells us in Eph.4:11-16 the fivefold ministry of the church (Apostles, Prophets, Evangelists, Pastors and Teachers) is given for the equipping of the saints for the work of service in building up the Body of Christ until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a mature man, to the measure of the stature which belongs to the fullness of Christ.”

                So I would say that if your church is way too much like Sesame Street or a nightclub and full of immature Christians from the top down, you had better go and find a church where they teach the Word, where they live by the Spirit and where they are operating in the fivefold ministry to bring people to maturity. Your ultimate salvation is at stake. Once saved always saved is not a Biblical doctrine, for everywhere in Scripture it calls for growth and maturity in Christ… and while the thief on the cross was saved, because of his faith in Christ, had he lived on he would have been expected to grow in his knowledge and to have matured in Christ just as we must do.

                Paul prayed for his people asking that they may “know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge and that they may be filled up to all the fullness of God. (See Eph. 3:14-21)

                So the tabernacle of Moses shows us in type that there are three elements involved in our Sanctification. First: The Holy Spirit, (without which the entire Holy Place would be shrouded in complete darkness.) Secondly: The Word of God (without which we would have no knowledge of God, nor would we have any information about where we came from, how we fell, what God is doing to restore us through Jesus Christ, what the cross and resurrection of Jesus has to do with it all and what our goal and destiny is in Christ Jesus. In other words without God’s definitive Word we wouldn’t have a clue. Thirdly: We may enter into an active and ongoing relationship and conversation with God as our prayers are mixed with the sweet incense of the Holy Spirit so that they go up before God as a pleasing aroma to the Father. And we must learn that our prayers change us, not God. So we must learn to hear His voice in our spirit and to walk in obedience to Him.

                All of this takes place by the power of God for we are His temples. He dwells in us so that as we walk in the Spirit and in the Word and in conversation with God, we grow up into Him as He restores us to the image of His Son, who is the new Adam, which was originally in the image of God.

                Do you begin to get a picture of what the Christian life is all about? Why is it then that we seem to stumble through life having no picture of what our salvation really is and what its goals are and what it is that Jesus really came to do in restoring us?

                We become like amoebas swimming in the sea of humanity with no greater vision of our purpose and destiny than to find a bit of algae to feed upon. But through the Holy Spirit and the Word and prayer, we can burst out into the fresh air and daylight of heaven, to discover the infinite world of God’s purposes that can only be seen in the Spirit and in the Word and in conversation with our Creator.

                So how is it that we think we can mature as Christians or walk in sanctification, if we have not received and prayed for the Holy Spirit… if we are not learning to walk by the Spirit and not by the flesh? (Romans chapter 8)  Or how are we maturing in the Word if we read it for 5 minutes, if at all, and spend 4 hours with the TV or the internet, or whatever it is that takes up our time and attention? And how are we growing in our conversation with God with our 18 second prayers in which we tell God what we think He should do? We need to enter more fully into our salvation. It must be all-consuming and transforming. Salvation is not a side issue that we remind ourselves of once a week.

                The work of prophets and watchmen and Pastors is to let people know where we are in the divine scheme of things, and to wake us up and to make sure our lamps are filled with oil and that we are maturing in Christ. These men and women of God can teach us and train us and admonish us and motivate us, but they cannot live our life for us and they can’t stand before God in our place on judgment day. We ourselves must walk the walk. We must be filled with the Holy Spirit and transformed by the renewing of our minds in Christ Jesus.

                Like marriage, we as the Bride have taken the name of our Bridegroom. We have entered into a covenant relationship with Him. The question remains then:  Are we living like a faithful Bride or are we still dating other gods, entertaining other passions, seeking other fulfillment, married to our stuff… reading everyone else’s love letters, while ignoring Jesus’ love letter to us?

                Friends, the hour is late and if there is any purpose in my writing morning after morning, it is to wake us up to the times in which we live and to jolt us if necessary as to what true salvation entails. We don’t want to come to the judgment seat of Christ only to have Him say, “I never knew you.” We don’t want to bang on the doors of the wedding feast, only to have it said to us that we are not known and that we must go out and buy oil for our lamps from those that sell.

                So if the things we say tend to hit us right between the eyes or to jolt us from time to time, please understand that it is the love of God, working through vessels of clay to prepare us for His soon coming. We are not one wit better than you are. We are but stone jars in which the water has been turned into wine. We are learning how to be one of those from whom rivers of living water will flow from our innermost being, (John 7:38) with a prayer that not too much of the flesh will be mixed in with it.

                Our salvation and our sanctification involve all three elements of our being, spirit, soul and body. Hebrews 12:5-14 tells us that our heavenly Father disciplines us as sons (and daughters) and without this discipline we are illegitimate children. Verse 10 says that our Father disciplines us for our good, that we may share His holiness. Then verse 14 tells us that without this Sanctification no one will see God.

                Don’t let that part of the church that is falling away tell you that none of this matters. We have a race to run in which we are getting rid of the extra baggage in our lives so that we may run the race to win. We are casting down imaginations and every lofty thing raised up against the knowledge of God and taking every thought captive to the obedience of Christ. And quite the opposite of legalism, this is Spirit powered, not flesh powered, so that the power might be of God and not of ourselves. 2Cor. 4:7.

                What people don’t realize as they look at sanctification as some sort of daunting task, is that crossing over into the Holy Place fills us with” joy unspeakable and full of glory.” 1 Peter 1:8.

                Life in the Spirit is a life of freedom from the chains of this world, for in Christ we can cast them off even as Paul shook the viper from His hand and into the fire. We have been given authority over all the power of the enemy and power to tread on serpents and scorpions. Luke 10:19

                John came baptizing us with water for repentance and the washing away of our sins (the outer court) but One came after him who would baptize us with the Holy Spirit and with fire. Which baptism are you living under? (Acts 19:1-6)

                It is time to fill our lamps with oil and to wake up for the Bridegroom is coming! We don’t want to be found sleeping in Laodicea. It is Philadelphia that has before it an open door and the key of David which is Jesus Christ the coming King.

                Maturing in Christ is a lifelong process. We are born again as babes in Christ and we grow up into Him by walking in the three elements shown to us in the Holy Place. So we are justified by the blood. We are sanctified by the Word and the Holy Spirit and prayer and will look forward to our glorification when “this perishable will have put on the imperishable and this mortal will have put on immortality and death is swallowed up in victory at the coming of our Lord. 1 Cor. 15:48-58.

                It all begins when we enter into the death of Christ by faith so that we may come to live in the power of His resurrection to live by His Spirit and not by our old man of flesh… for he is dead and the life that we now live in the flesh we live by faith in the Son of God who loved us and gave His life for us. Gal. 2:20