Contd from December 2000
He is creating something higher than angels or archangels! He is creating the supreme MASTERPIECE of all God's creation ... HOLY, PERFECT SPIRITUAL CHARACTERS!
And what is Character?
Perfect Character, such as God is creating in us, is a person finally made immortal, who is a separate entity from God; who, through independent free choice has come to KNOW, and to CHOOSE, and to DO, what is right.
Inanimate rock will roll down hill by power of gravity. Water runs in its channels through creeks and rivers into oceans. Great planets, some many times larger than the earth, must travel in God's ordained course. These things are marvellous examples of the creative power of God. Yet these things are inanimate-they have no mind, no free choice, NO CHARACTER!
Dumb animals do not sin. They do not know enough to sin! They act by instinct, or according to training of others. They do not have this Character!
CHARACTER is the possession and practice of love, patience, mercy, faith, kindness, gentleness, meekness, temperance, self-restraint, and right self-direction! Character involves KNOWLEDGE, WISDOM, PURPOSE, ABILITY, all properly controlled and developed, and through independent CHOICE!
Holy, righteous CHARACTER is something even God cannot create instantaneously! It is produced, or developed, only through EXPERIENCE! Experience requires TIME, and CIRCUMSTANCES! And so God creates Time and God creates Circumstances which produce character!
And so God first formed out of the dust-out of 16 elements of matter-the flesh-and-blood man, in the IMAGE of God-(and "image" means form, or shape, not composition). And through seven thousand years of experience, God is taking the human family through a process, the result of which, even "as we have borne the image of the earthy (mortal Adam): we shall also bear the image of the heavenly"-Christ Jesus immortal, "second" Adam-(l Cor. 15:49).
Yes, once fashioned, shaped, moulded according to God's Purpose, even WE shall be LIKE HIM, for we shall see Him as He is!
There are just two broad principles of life-God's Way, or God's Law, summed up in the Ten Commandments, and Satan's way of competition, greed, vanity.
All suffering-all unhappiness, fear, misery, and death, has come from the transgression of God's Law! Living by that great Law of Love, then, is the only way to peace, happiness, and joy.
God placed man on this planet to learn that lesson to learn it through generations of EXPERIENCE!
Yes, we, too, LEARN by suffering! God has REVEALED the TRUE way-His revelation always has been available to man! But man, given the right of free choice, always has turned his back on God, and on God's true WAY. And even though man as a whole still refuses to see or learn the lesson, he has written this lesson indelibly in the history of human experience!
We learn through EXPERIENCE! And through SUFFERING! This, then, is the very stuff CHARACTER is made of!
And that's why we are not taken immediately to our reward-away from all the unhappy circumstances of this world-just the minute we accept Christ, and are converted. Yes, that's why " many afflictions" visit the righteous, even as God sent affliction upon Job--tho the Eternal delivers us out of them all! That's why God permits Christians to suffer-why God even chastens every son whom He loves! It strengthens us-develops us into the CHARACTERS God is creating! It teaches us to rely on God-and reliance on God is the very foundation of Character.
Jesus suffered, was made perfect through suffering! Paul suffered! WE suffer-to the end that we shall learn. We are being created, in true righteousness and holiness, unto GOOD WORKS! Unto perfect CHARACTER!
And so it is that in His matchless WISDOM God has permitted man to sin. God permits nations to go to war! For almost 6,000 years God has permitted Satan to sway this world, to deceive it into transgression of His Law, that it might learn by reaping that the results of Satan's way are not good! The RESULTS are the staggering mountain of woe and human misery, the fear, the heartache, the injustice and the suffering in this world today! A comparatively few true Christians have learned that GOD'S WAY is good!
God has given us powers approaching the creative, that we might learn, through them, and through years, centuries and millenniums of experience, to CREATE-not to destroy! That we might learn to direct creative powers into peaceful, useful, PRODUCTIVE channels-not toward harmful, destructive, evil results.
The PURPOSE of life, then, is not to learn to create, devise, plan, and set in motion more and greater forces-but to learn to control the powers at our disposal-to learn to guide them into beneficial uses-to learn to direct them toward DOING GOOD, to produce peace, and happiness, and joy! In other words, to develop Godly CHARACTER!
Once this great principle is seen and grasped, it will be realized that the quantity-that is, the vastness of the creative development, is not the true measure of value or the yardstick of real progress. The important thing is the direction of that development.
Thus, the greater the nation's industrial might, the greater is its retrogression if that productive energy is directed toward destruction and evil.
That's another way of saying that POWER alone is good or evil according to how it is used. Power uncontrolled, or wrongly directed, becomes DANGEROUS, and the greater the power the greater the danger and the evil.
Money, in this world, is power The love of money is only a form of lust, and when the power of money is directed lustfully, it becomes, truly, a root of all evil.
But MONEY is not evil. Employed in right, useful, wise and godly channels, money becomes a great blessing, and the more so used the greater the blessing.
We were not put here to see how GREAT man can develop the powers GOD permits him to utilize. The important thing is RIGHT DIRECTION-WISE CONTROL-PROPER USE! So far as mere SIZE goes, all the great industries and projects of all nations combined are not a drop in the bucket compared to the greatness of the POWER OF GOD! (Isaiah 40:12-18.)
We are here for the express purpose of learning how to rightly direct the vast powers of GOD! Powers so tremendous the mind of man could not now conceive! If we are faithful in little things, God will entrust us with BIG things, later on, when we're born into His Kingdom! This life is the training ground.
Now what powers are at your disposal! And how well are you learning to control and properly direct them?
Well, start out by looking at your temper! Some tempers are mild, and others are quite powerful. Are you learning to control, and rightly direct yours?
Your voice is another. Do you use it like a wild, raucous, snarling animal-yelling, accusing, cursing? Perhaps- or are you controlling it and training it to speak softly, kindly, courteously, and only letting forth its real power when there's purpose in it?
Your personality is a power, if you develop and train it so as to charm, influence, persuade others rightly, to bring pleasure and encouragement and sunshine and inspiration to others, and to lead them as they ought to be led. Most people let their personalities stagnate. They never do one thing to improve or develop them-yet a charming, captivating, and persuasive personality is one of the greatest forces for GOOD with which an all-wise God endowed you.
Your money-your income-is a power God lets you possess. Do you employ it only for the necessities of keeping alive, and for selfish pleasures and desires?
The first tenth of every dime or every dollar is NOT YOURS. All of it belongs to God, and that first tenth God reserves for His own use-for His work!
God has directed every one of us not only to pay His first tenth, but also to GIVE, liberally of generous offerings besides. They can be used to bring happiness and good to others, in addition to yourself and immediate family.
And if you are honest with God's tithe, faithful and generous with additional offerings, then you are employing the power of money toward the purpose for which you were born.
And God always prospers, now in this life, the honest and faithful tithe-payer!
From hereon, THINK FOR YOURSELF! Think out your own problems, according to your own circumstances. What powers, what opportunities, are now in your control?
Perhaps, through your job, your profession, your business, you have really important powers to wield.
Perhaps you have not much more than just your own self.
Analyse for yourself your own position and circumstances. Ask yourself, how are you using the powers you may have to use?
And ARE YOU DEVELOPING-GROWING in self-control, in ability to restrain impulse, wrong desire, selfish motive, or vanity? If you had some really great POWER thrust into your hands to direct-perhaps thirty million dollars-perhaps a vast manufacturing industry with many subsidiaries would you be able to direct and wield that power as you know GOD would have it used?
Are you sure? Well, the test is this:
If you are now rightly directing little powers in your control, such as your temper, your voice, your passions and emotion, or your present, possibly small, income, then you probably could be entrusted to control properly at least a slightly larger power. But if you have not yet learned to control and constructively guide even these little powers God has permitted you to use, then you are not at all qualified or fit to handle greater responsibilities!
Don't ask God for more money, more powers, bigger opportunities. First, demonstrate your ability wisely to use the power of a CREATOR over the little powers and opportunities you now have. If you are not faithful even in the paltry unrighteous mammon, who will entrust to your care the TRUE RICHES, and the GREAT powers of God? But, if you are faithful over what God has already given you, He will say to you some day:
"Well done, thou good servant: because thou hast been faithful in a very little, have thou authority over MUCH!"
Mankind, swayed by human nature, the devil and his demons, has followed the beaten path of destruction-of polluting, perverting, destroying whatever he has been allowed to handle and use and control. He has perverted the sacred Word of God, polluted his own mind, dissipated his body; he has failed to train or has mis-taught his children; he has manifested resentment, envy, and hatred toward his neighbour, sought to get the best of his neighbour in a deal; tried to get more out of life than he put into it, which is destruction rather than construction; perverted the human food supply; turned scientific and technological developments into engines of destruction until now, unless God steps in, he would annihilate human life from off the earth!
Soon, now, Jesus Christ is coming again to earth, to FINISH His tremendous spiritual creation on the SEVENTH millennial day, just as He finished that of the present world on the seventh literal day. Satan will be restrained a thousand years. As Christ healed the sick and preached the Gospel on the literal Sabbath, so He will heal up these ugly wounds of the whole world during His Millennial Sabbath Day!
He shall rebuke strong nations, until they all beat their swords into plowshares, their spears into pruning-hooks, and the nations learn war no more but rather find the way of PEACE!
Competition shall be abolished. The premium will no longer be on GETTING, but on SERVING. A man will no longer be adjudged successful by what he HAS-what he has been able to amass for himself-but rather by how well, and how much he has served-by how much good he has contributed!
People at last will find the Way to peace, the true source of happiness-they will be filled with JOY! They will learn God's laws of health, and they will be vigorous, filled with joyous vital energy! They will be active; they will come into a prosperity we can hardly imagine now! And they shall find salvation, and ETERNAL LIFE!
After a thousand years of this, we shall all look back and COMPARE:
We shall compare the actual RESULT of six thousand years of being deceived into living Satan's way of competition, of strife, of jealousy, bitterness, envy, greed, and vanity, with the HAPPINESS, the WORLD PEACE, the PROSPERITY, and the energized JOY of one millennium lived by GOD'S LAWS!
We shall have learned our lesson!
We shall have learned that all Power, all KNOWLEDGE and WISDOM, all GOOD, comes alone from God. We shall have learned that we are not, ourselves, even capable of knowing which is the right way-which are the TRUE values-unless we go to GOD for that knowledge, and permit Him to reveal it. We shall have learned that the POWER to become strong and noble characters also had to come from God-that we have had to receive EVERYTHING from Him! But we ourselves shall have learned these truths, and made our own decisions!
We shall have had to WANT this righteousness of God with such fervent and burning desire that we have been willing to FIGHT our own selves, to suffer trying to control and to master our selves, and finally to throw ourselves on God's mercy, trusting in HIS power, in order to overcome!
GOD is the PERFECT character, and His purpose is to create in us, by development and with our consent and active determined effort, His very own perfection until we become like HIM!
The PURPOSE of life is that in us God is really re-creating His own kind-reproducing Himself after His own kind-for we are, upon real conversion, actually begotten as sons (yet unborn) of GOD; then, through study of God's revelation in His Word, living by His every Word, constant prayer, daily experience with trials and testings, we grow spiritually more and more like God, until, at the time of the resurrection we shall be instantaneously CHANGED from mortal into immortal-we shall then be BORN of God-WE SHALL THEN BE GOD!(4)
For the word "God" comes to us from the Hebrew word "Elohim," which means the Ever-living, Eternal Creating, All-Powerful, Governing KINGDOM. "Elohim" means one God-not many gods. But that ONE GOD is a KINGDOM. There is but one true CHURCH-one Church, but many members! (1 Cor. 12:20).
So it is with God.
As an illustration, there is the mineral kingdom, the plant kingdom, the animal kingdom; and we might segregate it and designate the human kingdom, in this material world. Spiritually, there is the angel kingdom, and, high above all, the KINGDOM OF GOD. A human-flesh and blood-cannot enter into the Kingdom of God (John 3:3-6), but one BORN of God can!
Do you really grasp it? The PURPOSE of your being alive is that finally you will be BORN into the Kingdom of God, when you will actually BE GOD, even as Jesus was and is God, and His Father, a different Person, also is God!
The first beginning toward fulfilling your PURPOSE on earth is to REPENT-repent of these wrong ways, customs and practices. Accepting Jesus Christ as personal Saviour, truly, means letting HIM "who went about doing GOOD" live your life to you henceforth-just as He would live it! It mean living henceforth by every Word of God-making the Bible your guide, your AUTHORITY in life. means you now begin to develop CREATIVE instead of destructive powers. You are setting out on training to become CREATOR-to become GOD!
When you fully grasp this tremendous, wonderful TRUTH, your mind will be filled with transcends JOY and GLORY! It gives a NEW MEANING to life so wonderful you'll never comprehend the fu heights of its splendour!
It means, of course, total renunciation, denial, those injurious things and ways which have are false, seemed so bright and alluring to this world.
But your eyes will be open at last to the great deception-the scales will fall from your blinded vision-you'll see the meaning of life, its great purpose, as you never dreamed it could be! Giving up the "bright lights" of this world's evil temptations and pitfalls-its snares and delusion which have glittered and then ended only in sorrow and suffering-is but emerging from gross DARKNESS into the splendour of TRUE LIGHT, and of happiness and joy forever.
KNOWLEDGE is of no value except as it is used. Not the hearers, but the doers of the law shall be justified. The command to STUDY is for the purpose of putting the instruction into action that we may "show" ourselves approved unto God. And it is written, "A good UNDERSTANDING have all that do His commandments." Since the purpose the knowledge is to do, the doing is the condition to acquiring right knowledge. Bible study is of value only in proportion as the knowledge revealed is incorporated into your character in actually living it.
Editors Comments.
(1) and the "tree" which symbolised the ways of SIN.
Gen.2:16 points out that God commanded the man saying, Of EVERY tree of the garden thou mayst freely eat:
This shows quite clearly that Adam had access to EVERY tree of the garden; this included the tree of LIFE. A REAL LIVING TREE. This tree in the Kingdom will bare twelve manner of fruit, different kinds, AND each of the months. (Rev. 22:2). It was the tree of the Knowledge of good and evil that God said don't eat and even then gave the reason why.
So eternal life was freely available to Adam and Eve IF he took of the fruit of that tree. He would have lived forever.
It was however the serpent that lied to Eve saying in effect that God was
lying when he said you would not die. Death however was not immediate so Adam
could have also taken of the Tree of Life and God would have been back to square
one.
(3) so God used just seven 24 hour days for the present creation.
Sorry there is no such thing as a day with 24 hours of daylight in it (or a thousand years for that matter at the moment). Now We understood what he was getting at. AT the spring and Autumn equinox the day is 12 hours long; that is, there is 12 hours of daylight; Christ said so in John 11:9. There is more hours of daylight in summer and less in winter. It also only takes 12 hours of time for grass (Gen.1:12) to grow when watered.
(2) Seven thousand year "Days"
There is no actual scripture in the bible that refers to a seven thousand year plan. Although one can reasonably take it as read that because Rev 20:5 mentions a thousand years, and 2 Peter 3:8 refers to a thousand years being a day (but this is with the Lord on earth) and Gen.2:2 refers to Him resting on the seventh day; and Foundations are referred to in Psalms. 104:5 and Job 38.Then God is the great planner.
As Christ has not made an appearance at the 2000 years after his so called birth and as man has been going for about 6000 years it is reasonable to assume HE has a 6000 year plan.
(4) We shall then be GOD.
This needs clarification. It must at all times be born in mind that we humans will never be able to replace the being known as The Ancient of Days also now know as the Heavenly Father also known as the Eternal and the Everlasting one, the one that has never died or been resurrected.
It must also be born in mind that one cannot replace the NOW Son of God, the one that was with God before the earth was, also known as the Logos, or The Word or the one that became flesh and blood, that died and was resurrected and now lives for evermore. We can however become God in the sense as being a Son of god as Jesus was the first born (after resurrection) from the dead. We then go on to live forever.
Introduction by Editor:
This is again one of those "original" articles by Herbert that built up the church in early years. It has been marked with [] to show where we think he was a little off and have put comments at the end.
Just What do You MEAN-BORN AGAIN!
Don't be too sure you know! Many religious people talk about being "born again"-yet they don't really know what Christ meant by those words. The TRUTH is surprising, startling-here made so plain you will UNDERSTAND!
Introduction: I was taught by the Church in which I grew up, that when you repented and were baptized (some churches teach when you "receive Christ") that you were "Born Again." I had puzzled over John 3:6 which says, "That which is Born of flesh is flesh; that which is Born of Spirit is Spirit." I knew I was still flesh because when I cut myself I still bled. I couldn't walk through walls as Christ did after He became Spirit. In mid-1955 I came across a booklet that made the meaning of "Born Again" very clear to me. I am reproducing this booklet hoping that it will help you with Bible truth on this subject.
Tom Justus, Minister
Church of God, Sabbath Day
Springdale, Arkansas
December, 1996
Presented By:
Church of God UK
Let's be honest-don't some of these religious terms seem vague, meaningless, when you stop to think about it?
Do you know that most people who think they have been "born again" actually have no more real conception of what it means than the young man who said he "gave his heart to the Lord" at a revival meeting. When asked if he had his chest cut open so he could reach in, take his heart out, and hand it to the Lord, he stammered confusedly that he guessed he didn't really know what it did mean, when he had been told that he "gave his heart to the Lord."
It's about time the TRUTH of what Jesus Christ meant by being "born again" is made so plain you will UNDERSTAND! For He did not say or mean what most religious people think! And NOTHING IS SO IMPORTANT!
When Jesus said we cannot enter into the Kingdom of God except we be BORN AGAIN (John 3:3-6), Nicodemus was confused. He didn't understand-but he did know that he had been BORN-once! And he knew that to be BORN meant that he was literally delivered out of his mother's womb, after having been begotten by his human father, and having been nourished by food through his mother so that, as a growing fetus, he developed and grew physically large enough to be finally BORN! That was no ethereal, imaginary, mystic, unreal event.
Yes, Nicodemus knew what it meant to be BORN! But Jesus was talking about being born AGAIN-A second time-not of material flesh-not after being physically begotten by his human father-but of the SPIRIT, after being begotten by the heavenly Father!
WHY cannot people understand? It's hard to believe, but YOUR BIBLE says that this whole world is DECEIVED!
Incredible though it seems, that is true!
Yes, even the clergy! Many large denominations of this world's organized religion ignore this subject altogether. Some refer to it, as a mythical, mystic, meaningless expression, casually and rarely, putting no emphasis on it as a doctrine or teaching. But a few put major stress on "a born-again experience" without the slightest conception of what it means!
WHY this confusion of tongues? Actually, it has resulted from the greatest, more colossal and diabolical conspiracy ever perpetrated on mankind, which occurred between the years of 70 and 120 A.D. actually beginning as early as 50 A.D.
The most tremendous discovery of this 20th Century-the most important acquisition of new knowledge-is the discovery of the true factual and authentic history of that gigantic organized conspiracy that resulted in deceiving the entire western world!
If it were truly UNDERSTOOD today what Jesus meant by being BORN AGAIN, the subject would be neither ignored, nor misrepresented in a pseudo spiritual, mystic sentimentalism.
One religious leader, victim of the Great Delusion, gave this definition of a Christian: "One who has been born again, and washed in the blood of Christ." It will sound incredible to some, but emphatically that is not the Biblical definition. We shall make that PLAIN!
I have before me a religious weekly, in newspaper style, with a 3-column headline across the top of a 5 column front page, which says: "What 'Born Again' Means." It is a long article, continuing over on, and almost filling an additional whole page. But I read in vain to discover what this evangelist, with the title of "Doctor," thought the words really mean. He listed eight conditions, or religious states, which he thought resulted from the "experience." But what the words "born again" mean-what actually takes place, and how and when-or just what the "experience" is-he simply didn't know. After talking all around his subject, never getting down to it, he finally said the new birth is a "mystery" which we cannot understand!
But WE CAN UNDERSTAND! To be contd.
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Night of 7th April 2001 Saturday Passover night Night to be much observed unleavened bread Meal followed by foot washing. Starting as the sun goes down on the 7th.
8th April 2001 Sunday. Passover Day =First day of unleavened bread.
14th April 2001 Saturday, 7th and last day of unleavened bread.
28th May 2001 Monday, Pentecost.
18th September 2001 Tuesday, Feast of Trumpets.
27th September 2001 Thursday, Atonement.
1st October 2001 Monday evening, start of Feast of Tabernacles.
2nd October 2001 Tuesday. First day of Tabernacles.
9th October 2001 Tuesday.8th and Last great Day.
10th October 2001---Home??.
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Don't believe us read it for yourselves in the Secrets of the Federal Reserve by Eustace Mullins. From Bloomfield books 26 Meadow Lane Sudbury Suffolk England.
We English must now get a grip of ourselves and GET BACK TO GOD and remove these unelected officials so that we control our own destinies and Identities AND world debt for all nations for all time. Start by praying about it and then watch for results.
It is most probably that the EURO when it creates such chaos in about 10 months time will then be changed back to the Mark with the "E" sign which looks like an evil spider will then become a world currency as the mark of the beast.
An amazing 100-page booklet uses prophecy, archaeology, languages, heraldry, etc. as proof it was. Maastricht prophesied? Send a donation of $5 dollars cash to Harold Hemenway. P.O.Box 88401, Tukwila, WA., 98138, U.S.A. or 4 to Church of God P.O.Box 53 Farnborough Hants GU14 OYZ UK.
Sorry we underestimated the demand for the above booklet. We now have more in stock and will keep a supply in.
A.Cain