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February 13, 2014 · 7:28 pm

Branches of Spiritual Life

If one was to pull a big ripe juicy apple from a tree you would have a picture that represents the common understanding of the relationship between God and mankind. By holding that freshly plucked apple we have depicted a separation between the apple and the tree. What is commonly understood is the immediate process of death. As the freshness drains from the fruit so too does the value of the apple. In other words the sooner the apple is eaten the more life it can transfer.

Likewise once the umbilical cord is cut and once the human consciousness is activated we children of God begin to learn that we are separated from God. Even thought that is not true there is nothing in this material realm that has been able to convince most humans that they are more than just sons and daughters of Adam, that they are the apples of God’s eye and that they can never be separated from God our heavenly Father. Just because a physical separation has taken place does not mean that a spiritual connection does not still exist.

Romans 8:38-39 For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, 39 nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Consciousness is simply our translation and perception of reality. Once Adam became convinced that he was separated from God, God in his mercy asked he and eve to leave the garden so they would not obtain eternal life convinced that they were separated from God. Today even the Christian orthodoxy holds to the belief that only after death are we humans again reunited never to be separated from God again.

1 Corinthians 15:45 And so it is written, “The first man Adam became a living being.” The last Adam became a life-giving spirit.

The reason Jesus was sent and the purpose of His ministry was to convince all humans that they are and will always be the daughters and sons of God. One of His important titles and office of great authority is that of “Last Adam”. Jesus became the first human since Adam to possess a consciousness in this material world that would dare to declare that man is a child of God and that God and man are connected as one. His entire demonstration was interpreted as supernatural because from a material point of view there was no visible connection to a life source that produced the “miracles” displayed. As He tried to convince the members of the religious community during the time of His ministry they became fearful that His demonstrations of life would lead their followers away and so we humans conspired and killed Him.

The question of the post is; can we humans change our point of view from our material perspective to one that perceives from a spiritual or kingdom of God point of view and behold the life connection we have with God? God’s spiritual Kingdom gives life to all that are connected however the humanistic material kingdoms on earth gather resources (taxes, tithes, food, clothing etc.) to maintain the life of the kingdom.

John 15:7-8 If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you, you will ask what you desire, and it shall be done for you. 8 By this My Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit; so you will be My disciples.

1Corinthians 11:23-25; 28-30 For I received from the Lord that which I also delivered to you: that the Lord Jesus on the same night in which He was betrayed took bread; and when He had given thanks, He broke it and said, “Take, eat; this is My body which is broken for you; do this in remembrance of Me.” 25 In the same manner He also took the cup after supper, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in My blood. This do, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of Me.”
But let a man examine himself, and so let him eat of the bread and drink of the cup. 29 For he who eats and drinks in an unworthy manner eats and drinks judgment to himself, not discerning the Lord’s body. 30 For this reason many are weak and sick among you, and many sleep.

Taking communion was to be a conscious reminder of the life connection and unity between man and God. Before Jesus there were hints that a day was coming that all would be made new. However because understanding this requires more than an earthly perspective the purpose and authority of Jesus ministry is mostly interpreted as something that happens after life on earth.

Still today most humans respond in the same way as Martha when facing the death of her brother.

John 11:20-24 Now Martha, as soon as she heard that Jesus was coming, went and met Him, but Mary was sitting in the house. 21 Now Martha said to Jesus, “Lord, if You had been here, my brother would not have died. 22 But even now I know that whatever You ask of God, God will give You.” 23 Jesus said to her, “Your brother will rise again.” 24 Martha said to Him, “I know that he will rise again in the resurrection at the last day.”

But the truth of all matter is that we humans have an eternal connection to God the source of life now, before death. Jesus understood this connection and embodied it, declared it and demonstrated it for the purpose letting us know we also have this connection.

Jesus declared and his words ask each of us today.

John 11:26-26 Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in Me, though he may die, he shall live. 26 And whoever lives and believes in Me shall never die. Do you believe this?”

If we focus on verse 26 which states “whoever lives and believes in Me shall never die.” We can see the difference between the mind of Jesus and the mind of the average human. The gap is huge. Jesus is not disputing the truth about life after death, nor did our Father in heaven contradict that truth but used it when he asked Adam and Eve to leave the garden before they ate of the tree of eternal life. Eternal life with Eternal God is possible now and it is a reality that our consciousness must embrace.

In John 15:5 Jesus declares “I am the vine, you are the branches…” indicating that our function is to help people understand that they are connected to God’s life source and that life can flow through them as well. As ambassadors of a spiritual kingdom we live and work in this material realm helping all sons and daughters of God to understand that their life source connection to God is intact and may become active even if the illusion is that we are cutoff.

We are called children of light because we can illuminate the truth concerning this spiritual connection that was made available to all humans by the ministry of Jesus. Many are not ready to see or accept but that does not negate our obligation to live the reality of our understanding openly for anyone to see. To conceal this reality is like hiding a lamp under a basket. We each have been given authority to empower others to become conscious of this connection of life. Branches are not the source of life they are just the conduit that makes a path in this material realm.

I want to encourage us because we are of the Wi-Fi generation that understands connections beyond physical boundaries so we are not constrained by religious tradition or political protocol. Our understanding liberates us to communicate truth of a spiritual nature even if our assignment is bound to this material realm. If we walk in love and speak truth in love we will see life blossom even in the most dark and chaotic places in this material realm. For where the life force of the Lord is, there will always be life and liberty.

Notice how this modern translation below puts the reality of this truth to a point somewhere in the future. How does your bible translation record the passage? Read, pray and ask God is this a now truth or is this only a future truth? If you feel like sharing please comment so I and other followers of this blog may know what God is speaking concerning the presentation of this truth pro or con. Thank You!

Romans 8:18-22 (New Living Translation NLT)
The Future Glory
Yet what we suffer now is nothing compared to the glory he will reveal to us later. 19 For all creation is waiting eagerly for that future day when God will reveal who his children really are. 20 Against its will, all creation was subjected to God’s curse. But with eager hope, 21 the creation looks forward to the day when it will join God’s children in glorious freedom from death and decay. 22 For we know that all creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time.

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Tagged as children of God, demonstrative evidence, Disciple, evidence, evidence locker, evlocker, freedom, Jesus, Kingdom of God, liberty, material world, relationships, Son of God, spiritual kingdom, spiritual reality, truth

January 4, 2014 · 1:51 pm

The Evidence of Natural Order

Forgiveness, grace and mercy are the evidence of God’s Presence and they are a part of the natural order of God’s Kingdom. To make this more obvious let us compare this same evidence to the fruit produced by the organized religions of the material world specifically Christian religious organizations. Forgiveness, grace and mercy can also be said to be the fruit of a life connected or entangled with the life and laws of God.

The natural order of the material world and its religious organizations will have some rate of decay (entropy). However the energy to maintain and grow these organizations can be measured by examining the fruit yielded. The same could be said for our current understanding of God’s spiritual kingdom. Let us assume two things. 1) that the material world and its laws are a shadow of how the spiritual world operates and 2) that our human mind is capable of observing the effects of true spiritual fruit.

If energy is the exercising of authority then the fruit of a material or spiritual realm can be used to measure the effectiveness of that realm to maintain or grow itself. We can observe the use of authority in God’s Kingdom and the various Christian religious organizations to determine similarities and gain understanding of the natural order in both the spiritual and material realms. I will limit this discussion in hopes that we will become conscious of our experience as well as become more observant of the future uses of authority.

When observing religious organizations, we may notice that during periods when there are no limits as to who can execute forgiveness, grace and mercy these organizations begin to have a fruitful period of growth and membership is extended to any human. But when the organization limits authority or requires hierarchical consent (ie. new member, discipleship programs) to protect structure and traditions by limiting how and who receives the benefits of membership the trend towards growth slows. The apparent growth during times when authority is limited usually comes when it consumes other like organizations or its members(pre-approved humans).

The Kingdom of God places it authority to execute forgiveness, grace and mercy in the heart of each individual member. As new members are birthed authority for them to do the same is transferred immediately and the Kingdom grows. The only tradition is that they learn to execute the forgiveness, grace and mercy that was freely given to them for every human they meet. God’s kingdom does not need to expended energy to maintain exceptions for cultural traditions, national affiliations, gender, race or economic status, all energy is expended for growth.

What we begin to notice is the execution of authority produces fruit. God’s Kingdom has always maintained that His law be written on the heart of every member. However material realm organizations have always held a natural order of hierarchy where different rules are applied at different levels for different circumstances.

Matthew 28:18-19 And Jesus came and spoke to them, saying, “All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth. ¹⁹Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations,…..

The non-equality with respect to authority in the material realm corrodes and establishes a natural order with duration short of eternity. One reason the material realm will never be eternal is that it must expend energy in the transfer process of authority in order to establish and maintain an authority hierarchy in its social order. In the Kingdom of God the same Spirit that raised Jesus from the dead resides in all believers and forgiveness, grace and mercy have no limits.

The Kingdom of God establishes a different natural order where each person can live and walk in the way of Jesus by simply executing forgiveness, grace and mercy to every human they come in contact with. Each person also has the freedom to ignore the status quo of their material world and extend forgiveness, grace and mercy to people who look and think nothing like themselves. Even our enemies can become members of God’s Kingdom when we use our authority and execute forgiveness, grace and mercy.

There are many people committed to their religious order but I encourage us all to compare our way to God’s way. As we begin our comparison I encourage us to simply limit our initial assessment in the way we execute forgiveness, grace and mercy. I pray that we each have the courage to make the comparison and begin to live an eternal life that shows forth the evidence of God’s natural order.

The Parable of the Unforgiving Servant (Matthew 18:21-35 NLT)

²¹Then Peter came to him and asked, “Lord, how often should I forgive someone who sins against me? Seven times?” ²²“No, not seven times,” Jesus replied, “but seventy times seven!

²³“Therefore, the Kingdom of Heaven can be compared to a king who decided to bring his accounts up to date with servants who had borrowed money from him.²⁴In the process, one of his debtors was brought in who owed him millions of dollars. ²⁵He couldn’t pay, so his master ordered that he be sold—along with his wife, his children, and everything he owned—to pay the debt.²⁶“But the man fell down before his master and begged him, ‘Please, be patient with me, and I will pay it all.’ ²⁷Then his master was filled with pity for him, and he released him and forgave his debt.²⁸“But when the man left the king, he went to a fellow servant who owed him a few thousand dollars. He grabbed him by the throat and demanded instant payment. ²⁹“His fellow servant fell down before him and begged for a little more time. ‘Be patient with me, and I will pay it,’ he pleaded. ³⁰But his creditor wouldn’t wait. He had the man arrested and put in prison until the debt could be paid in full.³¹“When some of the other servants saw this, they were very upset. They went to the king and told him everything that had happened. ³²Then the king called in the man he had forgiven and said, ‘You evil servant! I forgave you that tremendous debt because you pleaded with me.³³Shouldn’t you have mercy on your fellow servant, just as I had mercy on you?’³⁴Then the angry king sent the man to prison to be tortured until he had paid his entire debt.³⁵“That’s what my heavenly Father will do to you if you refuse to forgive your brothers and sisters from your heart.”

Evidence Not Understood

I want to begin with a word of encouragement. God’s light is the evidence of His active Kingdom within our being and it may appear to be having little to no effect on the darkness in the world around us, but that is an illusion. We are children of light and light is the fruit of our being. Also God is the source of our being and His Kingdom shines out from within us. The only thing that restricts the work of God’s light shining through us, is us.

My pre-question is, if we shine a flashlight down a dark well how far will the light shine? From our human point of view, our perception is only as good as we are able to detect the reflection of light returning to our eyes. But from lights point of view each photon will continue from its source unless there is something to reflect it from its path. We humans say light is absorbed if there is nothing to reflect it back so we can detect it. But is that true?

So when we judge the evidence of our light which is actually the light of the Presence of God that is within, are we detecting the reflections from a human point of view or are we measuring lights effects from lights point of view? These two points of view is the difference between a spiritual and a material (religious) perspective. Without this understanding bible interpretation can become subjective to the culture (point of view) reading the scripture. As children and ambassadors of God we need to view His light from His point of view.

John 1:5 (NKJV) And the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it.

John 1:5 (NLT) The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness can never extinguish it.

It should be seen from both of these translations and interpretations above that there are two points of view. One is from the reader who is observing the light leave the source and the effect it is having on darkness. The other point of view is from light itself which understands that darkness has no effect on it. At the moment that darkness encounters light darkness is transformed into light and darkness exist no more. Also another property of light is that it is impossible to separate it from it source. The light in you is God.

At first glance from our human material point of view it would seem that darkness has a power equal to that of light but that is not true. Even traditional scriptural interpretation tends to agree with that misunderstanding. If you happen to be open to prophetic words by our contemporary brothers and sisters some of them also confirm this misunderstanding of reality.

Even the scientist of today interpret their observations by concluding that black holes, dark matter and the like have a power that even light cannot overcome. The current scientific mindset draws conclusions that a photon is no match for the gravitational pull of a black hole’s darkness. Fear is the fruit of darkness and heaven help anything that becomes trapped within the gravitational effect of a black hole. And yet our universe is expanding 186,000 miles in all directions every second.

My point is not to review the theories of emission and absorption as it relates to photons but to encourage us to add a different perspective in how we view reality and the kingdom of Light (God). Religion in my opinion is allowing fear to influence its world view by supporting an apocalyptic point of view that is focusing on the terrible (darkness) and ignoring the great (light) things that can and will happen in our future.

In our personal lives of transformation we must acknowledge that we do not walk in perfect love (light) and therefore fear is a possible response to our perception of reality. Is the sun rising or is it setting in our understanding of scripture? Are we the last generation of Christians on earth or will our great-grandchildren get a chance to advance beyond our level of faith. More important have our spiritual communities reached their high water mark of faith and do we still think it possible for every member of our community to become like Jesus before we each individually give up the ghost? (Luke 6:40)

Matthew 5:14-16 (NLT) “You are the light of the world—like a city on a hilltop that cannot be hidden. ¹⁵No one lights a lamp and then puts it under a basket. Instead, a lamp is placed on a stand, where it gives light to everyone in the house. ¹⁶In the same way, let your good deeds shine out for all to see, so that everyone will praise your heavenly Father.

2 Corinthians 4:6-7 (NLT) For God, who said, “Let there be light in the darkness,” has made this light shine in our hearts so we could know the glory of God that is seen in the face of Jesus Christ. ⁷We now have this light shining in our hearts, but we ourselves are like fragile clay jars containing this great treasure. This makes it clear that our great power is from God, not from ourselves.

For example if your car has ever broken down and you have been alone and stopped on a dark wooded road at night with your headlights on you will experience this illusion. The illusion is that darkness is swallowing the light and this experience creates the misunderstanding and belief that if we had a greater source of light the edge of darkness and fear would move away from us to a greater distance. The true reality is that if we could move out to the point of light it would be just as bright and the comfort and peace we experience next to the car would be just as true. In fact, if we were on a hilltop lost in the woods ten miles away and saw the light from the headlights however faint, peace, comfort and hope would flood in even thought we are still ten miles away. Standing alone next to the car we could mark at twenty feet where the light dims our fear begins to rise. However from the point of view of a lost person ten miles away that same mark twenty feet away from the car the place as where their hope is at maximum and fear ends.

The same is true when we are standing in our stained glass buildings on Sunday morning. During our times of worship we take comfort from the light of our Father’s Presence and we look at the world outside the door of our sanctuary as a scary place. But from the other point of view many of the estranged men and women driving by our buildings of stained glass see our glimmer of light that we hide all week and say if I can just make it 10 more miles I will be safe.

Our mission is simply to bring light to the lost. But it is only from lights point of view (Kingdom of God) will we ever be able to truly judge the impact that one photon can have as it penetrates the consciousness of a person who by all appearances just seems to crush the life out of every spark that escapes the source within us. We can hide the light if we choose, but we should know that it is the only hope for a world that cannot believe that they too are children of Light.

John 6:63 (NLT) The Spirit alone gives eternal life. Human effort accomplishes nothing. And the very words I have spoken to you are spirit and life.

2 Peter 1:19 (NLT) Because of that experience, we have even greater confidence in the message proclaimed by the prophets. You must pay close attention to what they wrote, for their words are like a lamp shining in a dark place—until the Day dawns, and Christ the Morning Star shines in your hearts.

Isaiah 55:11 (NKJV) So shall My word be that goes forth from My mouth; It shall not return to Me void, But it shall accomplish what I please, And it shall prosper in the thing for which I sent it.

John 1:4-5 (NLT) The Word gave life to everything that was created, and his life brought light to everyone.⁵The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness can never extinguish it.

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