DUST IN THE WIND?

DUST IN THE WIND?

                “Thus declares the Lord who stretches out the heavens, lays the foundation of the earth and forms the spirit of man within him…” Zech. 12”1b

                “For just as the body without the spirit is dead, so also faith without works is dead.” James 2:26

                I think it was Socrates who came up with the idea that we are nothing more than dust in the wind. And yes, the Bible does say that we are made from dust and to dust we will return. Gen 3:19 But if that is all that we are, then we are not created in the image of God, for God doesn’t have a particle of dust in Him, for God is Spirit and those who worship Him must worship in Spirit and in truth. (Jn. 4:23)

                There is something in us of eternal value, so precious that the God who created us and the universe and everything in it, came into our dusty world and died to redeem us. So how is it that we are called His children if He is Spirit and we are but dust?

                The two texts which I quoted above are consistent with all that the Bible has to say about man. It is written into the very blueprint of the sanctuary. Man is a tri-part being, made up of spirit, soul and body and when we are born again, the Holy Spirit quickens our once dormant spirit so that which was once dead is now alive. We are new creatures and the Christian walk is all about learning to live by that recreated spirit that God has made alive in us.

                Dare I say that this is the very kingpin of salvation and that Jesus zeroed in on it when He told Nicodemus that we must be born again? Here in James 2:26, James tells us that the body without the spirit is dead… and the Bible agrees that we were dead in our trespasses and sins saying:

                “And you were dead in your trespasses and sins in which you formerly walked according to the course of this world according to the prince of the power of the air, of the spirit that is now working in the sons of disobedience. Among them we too all formerly lived in the lusts of our flesh, indulging the desires of the flesh and of the mind and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest. But God, being rich in mercy because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in our transgressions, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved) and raised us up with Him and seated us with Him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus.” Eph. 2:1-6

                What is it that has changed in us so that we, who were once dead and controlled by our flesh, are now made alive to be seated with Jesus Christ in heavenly places? The truth is that the spirit of man that was separated from God when Adam sinned is once again made alive in us through the last Adam Jesus Christ. Until then our fallen spirit is subject to the spirit of this world and if fallen man has any spiritual power at all, he derives it from Satan… but when we come to Christ and we are born again, He renews a right spirit within us. He restores us or “quickens us so that we become new creatures in Christ. So, our Christian life is very much about learning to live by that new life that Jesus has placed in us, rather than by the flesh, the dust that is still a part of this fallen creation.

                It is in our spirit that we are seated with Jesus in heavenly places. In fact Paul tells us of an experience he had saying: “I know a man in Christ who fourteen years ago- whether in the body I do not know, or out of the body, I do not know, God Knows- such a man was caught up to the third heaven…” 2 Cor. 12:2.

                What Paul is saying here is that as far as he was concerned, he couldn’t tell if he was in his body or out of his body. Either way, he experienced the third heaven and he saw and heard inexpressible words which a man is not permitted to speak. So what was it in Paul that was able to experience these things and to come back and tell us about it?

                We are so good at ignoring the plain teaching of Scripture so that we as Christians are willing to accept the godless philosophies of Socrates. We live on earth as if we are merely dust in the wind, when God says that we are much more than that. And Paul, once having tasted of the rarified atmosphere of heaven could exclaim that to die is gain and that he was hard pressed wanting to depart and be with Christ. He knew what heaven was like and he was ready to go back to that place that he had visited in his spirit some years before.

                Without understanding the true nature of man we cannot fully understand the nature of the New Birth. That which was once dead in us has been made alive by the resurrection power of Christ and we, having died to our flesh through the cross are now learning to live by that new spirit that God has made alive in us.

                There is a sense in which we as intellectual beings of flesh, can read the Bible and gain some form of intellectual relationship with God on the basis of law and doctrine, even as our spirit within us hungers for something more… something alive and life giving. We talk about the Holy Spirit but we remain disengaged and clinging to our intellectual handful of doctrines as if our life depends on getting them perfectly right and all the while, we could have had fellowship with Jesus Christ through His indwelling Holy Spirit. We could have been living by the Spirit, being transformed by the Spirit and made into the image of Christ, but like Cain, we keep offering to Him the fruit of our own works, our own doctrine, our own intellectual basket of fruit.

                But Able offered a better sacrifice than Cain. He came into the presence of the Lord with a lamb. He came to offer up his death in exchange for the life of Christ. Able did it in symbolic form, but we today, who live after the cross, may do so in reality. We offer our bodies as a living sacrifice to God . We are crucified with Christ, nevertheless we live, yet it is not us, but Christ who lives in us. And it was not our intellectual understanding of the Law that brought this new life to us, but by the receiving of Jesus Christ, for in Him we are a new creation.

                It is, of course in Romans 8 that Paul sums up all of his teaching, by telling us that it is by the spirit for he says beginning in verse 8:

                “”… and those who are in the flesh cannot please God. However you are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you. But if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ he does not belong to Him. And if Christ is in you though the body is dead because of sin, yet the spirit is alive because of righteousness. But if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who indwells you. So then brethren, we are under obligation not to the flesh to live according to the flesh- for if you are living according to the flesh, you must die; but if by the Spirit you are putting to death the deeds of the body you will live. For all who are being led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God.” Romans 8:8-14

                What Paul confirms for us here in verse 10 is that if Christ dwells in us then our spirit is alive and it is that spirit/Spirit within us that will raise our bodies to life in the resurrection: therefore our Christian walk is all about learning how to live by that spirit within us in concert with the Holy Spirit that we are transformed… that we are saved… that we presently have eternal life. John 6:54

                Paul then goes on to explain how that the whole of fallen creation is waiting with anxious longing for the reveling of the sons of God and that we have been predestined to become conformed to the image of His Son Jesus Christ. This is the purpose and the process of our Christian life.

                But this is also why the Law can only bring us to the Jordon… to the cross, for though it may point out how we have sinned, it has no power to rectify the situation. All it can do is to shepherd us to the foot of the cross, where we die to the Law and to our flesh and we receive the Spirit of Christ whereby we cry “Abba Father” we are adopted into the heavenly family, not just as a legal issue, but rather that our once dead spirit has been made alive and now we are learning how to live as members of God’s royal family. We are living by the Spirit and not by the flesh. And the Law is being fulfilled in us who walk not according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit.

                Both James and Paul are in perfect agreement with each other, for Paul tells us that we cannot be saved by the works of the flesh and James emphasizes that if we are filled with the Spirit of Christ, then His good works will be manifested in our lives. If Jesus dwells in us, then He is going to continue through us the work that He did when He was on the earth and of course we cannot even begin to do the work of Christ unless we are filled with the Spirit of Christ.

                This then is why we must take seriously the gifts of the Spirit, for it is in them that we continue the work of Jesus in this world. We have no power of our own to do these things unless Christ dwells in us. But today we have a church that largely ignores the gifts of the Spirit and chooses rather the intellectual wrangling over doctrine as if our eternal life depends upon every turn of phrase.

                But if we belong to Christ then we are new creatures. We are a new creation… and it is learning to live in the realm of that new creation that we are being transformed into His image from glory to glory.

                “Brethren, my heart’s desire and my prayer to God for them is for their salvation. For I bear them witness that they have a zeal for God but not in accordance with knowledge. For not knowing about God’s righteousness and seeking to establish their own, they did not subject themselves to the righteousness of God, for Christ is the end (or the goal) of the Law for righteousness to everyone who believes.

                So the goal of the Old Testament was to bring us to the New Testament where we enter by faith into Christ’s death and then by faith in the power of His resurrection, we receive a new spirit for God to dwell in and then we learn to live by that Spirit rather than by the Law. And the Holy Spirit dwelling in us will never lead us contrary to the Law, but will in every way fulfill the Law in and through us and that is what the fruit of the Spirit is all about. For if we are connected to the Vine; we will bear much fruit.

                Much is being lost by the falling away church today because they have abandoned the supernatural life of the Spirit and they are now falling back to the weak and worthless things of the flesh and seeking unity through compromise. They are going back to Rome to gain power in numbers and unity within the globalist antichrist system and they will take the Mark of the Beast because they have abandoned the seal of God which the Bible tells us is the Holy Spirit.

                “And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption.” Eph. 4:30

                “Now He who establishes us with you in Christ and anointed us is God, who also sealed us and gave us the Spirit in our hearts as a pledge.” 2 Cor. 1:21, 22

                “In Him you also after listening to the message of truth, the gospel of your salvation- having also believed, you were sealed in Him with the Holy Spirit of promise who is given as a pledge of our inheritance…” Ephesians 1:13, 14a

                In a very real sense we could say that the Mark of the Beast is the spirit of Satan as manifested in the final rejection of Christ, while the seal of God is the Holy Spirit who has been given to us as a pledge… and though we have been given a measure of the Holy Spirit as a down payment so to speak, when we receive our resurrection bodies we will shine like the stars forever more. And even though these things are invisible to us now, they are certainly not invisible to Satan and his demonic hoards.

                Even the smallest candle can dispel the darkness and send demons fleeing… if only we will begin to understand this treasure we hold in earthen vessels. ( 2 Cor. 4:7)