True Government – Pt. 1

Ron Weinland

7th Feast of Tabernacles Sermon - 2012

Throughout each Feast of Tabernacles I marvel at how God leads us and what He blesses us with to feast upon from year to year.  Feast of Tabernacles sermons powerfully reflect and reveal how God is leading, molding and fashioning His Church in and through His Son Jesus Christ.

You go back and you look at the various sermons at various Feasts and it really is amazing, it’s inspiring to be able to see the thrust, the push, the drive, the purpose, the design that’s contained there to help mold and fashion us; and to give us those things that truly reflect how God is working with us and how He’s molding us and what He’s giving us at that time reveals much, because it’s a very powerful period of time that we experience, and we have day after day of sermons where we’re able to focus fully, more fully upon exactly what it is that God is giving us.  And that’s what the Holy Days are designed for.  That’s what the Sabbath is designed for.  The Sabbath, week by week, is so inspiring because it’s the very means, it’s the very way and purpose of why God gave us a Sabbath in the first place – to teach us, to show us His ways, to lead us in His ways.  And then the Holy Days, it also in a very powerful way reveals that plan then; it gives a special focus because it actually reveals that plan then throughout the Holy Days.  The Holy Days help reflect that plan whereas on the Sabbath there are all kinds of instruction that God may give us from Sabbath to Sabbath in the week, weekly Sabbaths. But on the Holy Days, the High Days, they’re very focused, because it’s about those days that reflect and picture His plan.

And so the Feast of Tabernacles, in a very powerful way because it’s leading up to the purpose, the greater purpose of what God is doing, and how the great harvest, if you will, if we look at the Feast period of Tabernacles and then the Last Great Day, the final harvest, the later harvests of God in that respect, and showing what He’s doing with mankind.  So the messages [that are] given during this period of time are very focused and very powerful in that regard.

So this year, God has been blessing us to more clearly see that process, of how He has led us toward this end-time, and especially during this past four years.  He’s also revealing to us a far stronger focus and clarity of a subject matter that is central to all understanding of how God works in human life to transform our mind into unity and oneness with Him.  That is a marvel!  That process, of how God transforms the human mind and brings us into a unity and a oneness with Him.

This Feast of Tabernacles, the last one to be observed in this age of mankind, is one that leads directly into what this Holy Day season pictures, the establishment of the Kingdom of God on earth.  Said another way, with really far clearer meaning and purpose it is the establishment of the very Government of God on earth.  And that’s what the subject matter of what this sermon is entitled, True Government with this being Part 1.

You know, it is indeed inspiring to have learned such powerful lessons concerning government as a result of the apostasy.  I’ve often mentioned how the lessons learned through this final end-time, beginning with when the 1st Seal was opened and when that apostasy occurred that was opened at that particular time in December of 1994, that as a result of that it will be some of the most powerful teaching tools used throughout the Millennium, what was gleaned in understanding and what God revealed that took place.  Indeed, some of the most powerful teaching tools that will be used throughout the Millennium and on into the Last Great Day.  It really completes more of the story of what Mr. Armstrong would give from Feast to Feast to Feast on this very subject about government, and it adds so much more to it, because the apostasy hadn’t occurred yet, and so those lessons that build up to a powerful crescendo, if you will, to drive the point home in the human mind, hadn’t been experienced yet...but now it has and it truly helps to drive the entire lesson home in such an incredibly powerful way.

It is so fitting that as we conclude this age of 6,000 years of mankind that God is sharpening our understanding and focus on this subject matter, because this is the crux of it all, it truly is.  That’s why Mr. Armstrong spoke on it year by year by year at the Feast of Tabernacles and at different times as well.

Where do we begin?  Well, because of what God has given us in deeper understanding over the past few years and at the Feast of Tabernacles, we’re going to go back to the very beginning.  And what was in the very beginning?  It is so very important that we do this in order to have a truer, clearer, and more fulfilling focus of God’s intent, spirit, and great purpose that is working to bring us into His Kingdom.

So when we talk about going back to the beginning, it’s back to the beginning.  I think a lot about the scripture we’ve been using here of recent time that speaks of the occasion, ‘though you know these things’, that it’s important to bring them back into remembrance, to remember them.  It’s so important to have a...maybe a way of expressing it, ‘the big picture’...’the big picture’ because it is from the beginning to the end, not the end of the world or the end of time – there is no such thing in that respect with God, He is eternal – but talking about the age of man, throughout the age of mankind, as long as mankind will exist, throughout that period of time.  And there are things that must be learned as far as the big picture is concerned, but to become a part of Elohim we have to go farther back and have the big picture in order to have the big picture to see what this is all about and what we’re going through...and though we know many of these things we do not understand many of these things.  And I guess that’s really a large part of the thrust of this particular sermon series because there are things here that are basic indeed.

So many people used to just switch off when they heard Mr. Armstrong talking.  I know what happened!  I heard comments about...that reflected the fact that they did switch off, that as soon as he began to talk about various matters, such as the two trees, and good and evil, and to simplify a process that as he would speak to world leaders he would comment how that he doesn’t preach the gospel, “He’s not preaching the gospel to them!” and yet he did, but in terms that they understood.  They had to have such basic things given to them, that there are basically two ways of life.  He simplified it.  He was inspired by God to simplify it that way, that there’s the give and the get way; and that really simplifies the nature of mankind and the nature of the world, because the way of man really is the way of get.  Now he experiences and there are things that at times man will understand about giving; he can grasp and comprehend the importance of being of that kind of a mind, but never grasping the kind of mind of God, the mind of God, of give always that exists there, which reflects and helps to even give a stronger definition of what His love is all about – always giving and sharing and so forth.

But the problem with man is there is that which is get.  And so to explain that there are those two ways of life is very much about preaching the gospel and the good news.  And so even a subject like this, a matter of government, people can switch off to it, and especially as we begin to look at some things that have to do with basic knowledge.  It’s basic knowledge but I’ve been inspired here in the last many weeks leading up to the Feast, and then going through these Feast sermons, to see even that far more clearly, of a matter of something that God is driving the point home on as well – is that we are given a lot of knowledge and especially at the end of this age.  We have talked about this in various sermons, of how that we’re given a great deal of knowledge, and that oftentimes that is taken by individuals receiving so much knowledge that that is what is spiritual, and it isn’t!  It’s just knowledge!  And it may be a knowledge that inspires and excites and that you come to believe and that you believe it’s true, but to be able to know it in the sense of understanding, to be able to grasp and understand why it’s there and why God has given us what He has is far, far greater in life.

And so we do have to begin with knowledge, and then we begin to understand it as we begin to practice it at times in our life.  We still don’t know it necessarily at all, in the sense of understanding; we have the knowledge, but as we begin to live it and practice it and prove it, as God says we should do, we begin to grow in understanding.  It isn’t all at one time.  We even build upon understanding.  We’re ever building upon understanding!

And then the beautiful part is what follows, the matter of wisdom, when it is in our mind, when we are at one with it, with God, in the sense that we know it, we have the knowledge in that respect, and we understand it now and we have chosen to live it.  It’s become our choice of life and we live it...and that’s wisdom, because that’s a choice of how to live always, whereas in the beginning oftentimes... I think of the Sabbath day.  I think of how that so many years went by, I had knowledge of it and then there came a time when God began to reveal to me that people didn’t really understand the Sabbath and its purpose – only in shallow ways – and as time went along that became clearer and clearer.  People think they understand and have all the wisdom about the Sabbath and they don’t.  It’s something we have built upon through time.  All the truths that God gives us, He continues to add more and more and more, and the more we live it and apply it... so the point being is that people went to Sabbath services every week but they didn’t understand it always by any measure, because with the understanding, especially with wisdom as you began to live it as a choice of life, of those things about the Sabbath that you came to understand – because there is much about the Sabbath to understand, and as God continued to give more and that became a matter of wisdom, that would become the mind, that’s the way we lived, God continually added more.

There’s always more to be given to make the understanding and the wisdom even greater and greater and greater, to come into greater unity and oneness. It’s something we ever have to grow in.  And so is the plan of God, from beginning to end, as far as what God is doing to bring mankind into Elohim and what He began to do from the beginning.

Let’s go over to Proverbs 8, because these things can seem to be basic but we need to strive to understand what God is doing, to put together the entirety of the picture the best we can, to build upon what we’ve been given, especially over the past several years, to build upon the things that God has been giving to us.  Because there is much said here, even throughout this sermon series – this is a powerful sermon series, it really is – in the sense of what is being given.  I’ve already given the next sermon here, pre-recorded it.  I gave this before but because there were some problems in the recording, the quality wasn’t as good, I wanted to give it again, and in coming back and giving it again I’ve actually grown in seeing a greater purpose now even of this series.  I understood it as God was giving it but I see it even more now, so I’ve been building, God’s been building it in the sense of my own understanding, and the grasp and the comprehension of what this is all about.

And so it’s exciting when we have knowledge and we grow in greater understanding.  The understanding is what becomes so exciting.  Knowledge is exciting too, but we can begin to lose that.  I think of the expression of ‘losing the first love’; if there is understanding there, just beginning to experience it from the very beginning, that excitement and so forth, that really reflects part of the dilemma and the problem and the difference between knowledge and understanding, because we can have knowledge about that and knowledge about the truth and it’s exciting and inspiring and encouraging to us, but we don’t yet grasp it, we don’t yet understand it.  But it’s when we start understanding it at different times, and we have those opportunities, those moments in time when we make a leap forward, with understanding, that we see and understand more the mind of God and why He is doing what He’s done, why He has given us certain things; and that adds a whole other dimension to it.  Understanding is so far beyond and so much better, more enjoyable to partake of than just knowledge.  Knowledge can be there and we can begin to lose some of that and the excitement about some of that through time, but understanding, the excitement will continue to grow if we continue to build upon it.

So here we’re going back now to Proverbs 8, and as we go through this particular series, hopefully and prayerfully the point is going to be driven home even more so, so that we come to, as we go through this, a far greater understanding of the purpose of government and how it functions and what God has been doing to teach us, to lead us, and to bring us to unity and oneness – to wisdom.  And that’s what Proverbs 8 is about here; it’s about this expression, this term ‘wisdom’.

So turning over there, to Proverbs 8:22 – The Eternal ‘possessed’ me, it’s a word in the Hebrew that means ‘to buy’ or ‘to acquire’, ‘to have’, ‘to get’.  And so it really zeros in on what it’s all about, what God had, what was the focus, what was the mind, the being of God.  We have talked about this in different terms and we’re going to look at some of those verses too concerning the word.  It’s said in different ways, but this one here by communication, the very use of the word reflects something unique in itself that goes above and beyond, obviously, knowledge, it goes beyond understanding of how things are to be, it is the way it is – wisdom – it’s a way of life to be lived, but with God it was absolute perfection that identified what the knowledge and the understanding was all about. It identified the way that was going to be lived and the purpose of it and so forth.  It gave definition to everything for existence.

And so it says, The Eternal possessed me; it’s speaking of ‘wisdom’.  It’s talking about wisdom here throughout Proverbs 8 and it says that’s what God had!  That’s what He had, that’s Him, it reveals who He is, this wisdom that’s revealed throughout the pages of the Bible.

The Eternal possessed me in the ‘beginning’, it’s a word that means, ‘or the first’ of His way.  It is His way!  It identifies who God is.  It identifies His thinking.  It identifies the perfection, the beauty of life.

So again here, wisdom is speaking in that respect, communicating, The Eternal possessed me in the beginning/the first of His way, whatever that is.  In other words, it’s always been there, it reveals God, the mind, the thinking of God, of His way.  A Hebrew word here that just means ‘the journey’ or ‘the way’, like the highway.  It’s showing this is God’s way, it’s always been there!  ...before His works of old.  And so the best we can do as human beings is begin to grasp and comprehend some kind of a beginning, and we can’t understand eternity, and we really can’t understand some of these things we’re going to look at – only in a very shallow way – but it’s revealed here then that this was there before His works of old.  So something existed before something began to happen, before ‘works’, the things that began to be produced were there.  And so there is a big picture here, that starts here, that begins to be made here.  So wisdom was always there, and wisdom had to be there, this way, this mind, the purpose and everything that was going to be accomplished before anything was made, before anything was created.  That’s what it’s talking about here, before the works of old/His works of old.

Verse 23 – l was set up from everlasting, in other words, wisdom has always been established, this is the way it is, this is the way of God, this is the being of God, the thought, the thinking, the process, the purpose, the will of God that’s summarized here in how it’s being spoken of.  I was set up from everlasting, from the beginning, a word that is a little bit different than before here.  This one means ‘the head’, ‘the chief’, ‘the front’, ‘the start’, ‘or ever the earth was’.  So it’s talking about, again, the works, the creation of things that revealed a purpose of why they were being created.  So it reveals the purpose.  And so if we’re able to understand more about the very beginning of creation, what began to be created in the very, very beginning, that helps us to understand what God was doing and the entire process as we begin to see it pieced together, placed together, put together.  It begins to reveal a very powerful process here of the will and the mind and the wisdom of God  from the very beginning, but we have to have more than just pieces of the story along the way, it has to be put together, and this sermon series helps to put more of that together.

We have learned how God describes those things about Himself, His mind, His thinking, in terms like this here in Proverbs, as described as wisdom.  We focused on this in times past even at the Feast of Tabernacles, and in the New Testament, as I mentioned, it’s described in different terms here, to grasp a different way of thinking about it, of seeing it.  Because words communicate thoughts, ideas, they have different definitions, and these things help us to piece it all together in a more powerful way.  And this word here is the word ‘Logos’, the Word, the revelatory thought of God Himself, that which reveals the very thought, the thinking process, the purpose, the will, the mind, the being of God, and that’s something we’ll continue to grow in understanding of.  Knowledge just begins the process; it’s the understanding of it that becomes so beautiful.  It truly becomes more and more beautiful, more awe inspiring.

Let’s turn over to John 1 where this is spoken of, to look at where the word ‘Logos’ is used here, this revelatory thought, that which conveys the thinking.  And we focused on this in a very strong way during the Feast in 2010.  God had us focus upon some of these things in a very, very powerful way, to give us a deeper understanding.  And now this year we’re picking up on some of those things, bringing more of that story there, building upon more than what we were given in 2010.  It’s helping a maturing process, to become more mature in our ability to understand even that which was given as a kind of overview, but yet very inspiring and very revealing in 2010 – but now two years later we’ve been given more because we’ve had time to build upon it.

I’m more inspired just by giving this the second time now, because the picture is clearer, the big picture is clearer in my mind, even in this short length of time here – and how much more in two years, of what we had two years ago at the Feast, and now this year building upon these things.

John 1:1 – In the beginning was the Word; that’s basically how some of this is described about the word ‘wisdom’ in Proverbs, because it’s speaking about the same thing in a little different definition.  It’s conveying the thought, the revelatory thought of God and that which is communicated to our mind.  We begin to understand it’s the revelatory thought... it’s a means of communication and we’re able to come into that which is a matter of understanding and definition, to the mind of God, the being of God.  It’s an awesome thing, it truly is.

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was ‘with’ God; it’s an expression here that means ‘unto God’, meaning it was just God’s Word, and the Word was God, it identifies who God is, the Word, that which is communicated, that which is revealed reveals God.  It reveals His will.  So we take the Bible from beginning to end, very powerfully so it reveals the mind, the Word, the thinking, the revelatory thought of God, and we’re being brought into a unity and a oneness with that mind, that way of life that governs life.  Because it’s about governing life, it’s about what governs our life, and as we choose what we are given from Sabbath to Sabbath, Holy Day to Holy Day, as we grow, we make choices about that government, about that way, regulating and ruling our lives.  We desire to be in unity with it.  We desire to be subject to it because we come to believe and see and understand the beauty of it, of God’s way. But it’s about governing life.  ...and the Word was God.

Verse 2 – The same was in the beginning with/unto God.  All things were made by him/it if you will, because it’s referring to the Word, who is God, and without him/without it was not anything made that was made.  Everything was a matter of what God did from His purpose, His will, His mind, His thought, His revelatory thought, that which regulated His thinking, His mind, expressed in the terms of wisdom or which really identifies the Word.  What truly is wisdom is the Word of God.

In him/it, speaking of the Word was life, and the life was the light of men; it really is right here revealing even a purpose of God, that it’s about mankind.  So in it the Word was life, and the purpose of that life was what was going to be given in and through mankind, candidly, because mankind is to become a part of Elohim.  And so that Word was life for mankind; it’s purpose was to give life to mankind and it was the light of men, to lead, to light the way, to show the way into God’s Kingdom, into the way of God, because the purpose of it all is about Elohim, about becoming a part of the God Family – from the very beginning.

...and the light shines in darkness and the darkness does not comprehend it; revealing that what comes from God, God has to give it, the source is God, and it’s the only thing that truly is light, that lights the way of life to be lived.  So darkness is out there and only light that comes from God can show the way, the purpose, and everything else is darkness, and the darkness can’t comprehend the light.  These are beautiful expressions to explain and to teach us more and more about God.

Isaiah 45; let’s turn over to Isaiah 45. So we’ve gone through things like this, we’ve gone through entire sermons talking about the Word, entire sermon talking about the matter of wisdom, the being, the mind of God.  And now with this overview of these things, bringing these things even more so together, of a purpose of it all, of what God is doing and why, is a beautiful thing.  God just helps us to see it.  The more we see the more beautiful it becomes.

Isaiah 45:5 – God begins to identify Himself.  He identifies Himself throughout the Bible in different ways, but this is one of those areas that is very powerful. And He says - I am the Eternal/Yahweh, the Self-Existing One.  The Self-Existing One, eternal life – we can’t comprehend that!  We can’t even begin to comprehend that! Mankind has tried to understand a physical universe and he can’t comprehend it; he definitely can’t believe that, as a whole by human nature, that God brought it into being out of nothing.  That just... to them that just isn’t science!  It’s like science is the god and science has to have the answers.  And science doesn’t have the answers, science can only go so far because it deals with physical laws, not spiritual ones, not God; and so they try to come up with some kind of a beginning and so they come up with this great big theory, some kind of a big bang.  And you think, “Well, by what laws does a bang exist?  And by what laws do particles exist?  Where did they come from?  So if this bang happened what elements were there to create it and where did those elements come from?  Little bangs? And they just all started cooperating and became bigger?  Well, where did that little one come from?”

That’s what’s amazing about the universe when you see how vast it is, and then you go down to molecules and you just go down lower and lower and you look at atoms and then parts of... where does it end?  And man can only even see so much, we’re so limited!  And that’s the problem, we’re limited, God is not, and the mind of man cannot comprehend that.  It’s the light, and man can’t comprehend that, God has to bring Him into it because there is that which is spiritual that man cannot have unless God gives it.

So, I am the Eternal, the Self-Existing One, and there is none else. In other words, there is no one else.  He says He’s the only self-existing one; that’s what He’s saying here.  And why we couldn’t see that for years and years and years...well, it wasn’t time because God was going to restore... I mean, the early Church did.  The early Church understood this, but somewhere along the line, throughout Thyatira and then on into Sardis, this knowledge was lost and then because of the influence of the Catholic church and the matter of the trinity that began to muddle up the minds of people.  And so when God began to restore the Church, restore truth to the Church through Philadelphia, this is one area He didn’t completely give because you can’t know the light, you can’t have the light unless God gives it and makes it clear.  God saved it and reserved it for a particular moment in time, for this age.

So He says, I am the Self-Existing One and there is no one else, there is no God, this is the word now for Elohim; there is no God beside Me: and so even then, there was no one else even as a matter of Elohim, the Family, a uniplural word.  There was just one in the Family, that’s what He’s explaining here.  I am the Self-Existing One, the Eternally Self-Existing One and there is no one else, in essence, in the Family.  That’s what He’s saying here!  And at this time Jesus Christ wasn’t there, He hadn’t been born yet.

He says, I clothed you, speaking to Israel, and really to all of mankind.  He’s given us all that we have, but in the scenario here, in a story of those whom He brought out of Egypt, He says, I clothed you although you have not known Me: that they might know from the rising of the sun and from the west, that there is none besides Me.  There is no one else!  I am Yahweh, the Eternal Self-Existing One, and there is none else/no one else.  I mean, how much clearer can you be?  How much clearer can you get?  How much more needs to be said?  But if your mind isn’t opened to it, that which is very clear, it just isn’t opened to it, if you believe something else.

A little farther down in verse 18 it goes on to say, For thus says the Eternal who created the heavens; so it was Yahweh, that’s the word being used here, the Self-Existing One who created the heavens, the universe, if you will; God Himself, it’s the word Elohim, Elohim Himself, making it very clear here there was only one in Elohim at this point.  ...who formed the earth and made it; and now it’s speaking of the earth and He made it.  He has established it, He did not create it in vain; and so God making it very clear here, from the very beginning He was the only one, He said He is the one who created the heavens and He is the one who created the earth, He made it. And He said, He established it, and when He did it He says, He did not create it in vain, He didn’t create it in this Hebrew word ‘tohu’, which means in confusion, without form, but, it says, He formed it to be inhabited, to be able to have life and to sustain life.  And then He says, I am the Eternal, the Self-Existing One; and there is no one else.  Awesome really, truly, very powerful what God says.  He says what He says very clearly and yet it isn’t so clear, is it, to the human mind, if you believe something different.

So to understand true government, which obviously can only come from God – all truth comes from God – we need to grasp how God’s ways must come to govern human life through free choice.  That’s a marvel!  To understand how transformation takes place through free choice; it can’t just be instantly created, a unity and a oneness with God.  It wasn’t able to be done, and that’s the lesson of the angelic realm, that there is no being that can be created to be God, to be perfect in thinking, to be perfect in mind, to be perfect in a specific way of life...and it can’t be created from nothing.  We need to grasp how God’s ways must come to govern human life through free choice and by God’s intervention in our life in order to transform our minds into that which is fully in unity and oneness with His Kingdom, the way of Elohim, the way – government - of the Family of God, because that’s His way.  The way is the government of the Family of God.  That’s what governs the Family of God; it is that way.  There is a way that God exists, His being, that we talked about as far as wisdom and the Word.  It is His way, it governs everything about His life, and it just is what it is by what He reveals, about how to live life.  And then God gives us the opportunity through choice to be governed that way as well, to have that same mind, the same thinking, to be in unity with that same thinking...and it is an incredible process!

That’s not something that can even begin to be appreciated through just knowledge.  You know, the knowledge about Sunday being the wrong day, and the Sabbath, seventh-day being the right thing – that’s one thing, but to understand the process, to understand why things are the way they are, to understand how things come to be and how it exists and so forth...understanding is so much greater than just knowledge, so far beyond it, it truly is, and God just gives us more and more understanding as we continue to go forward.  And then as we live it more and more it becomes more a part of us, then its wisdom – we are at one with God in those specific areas in our thinking.

To grasp how this process works in our life is to learn why God takes us through this human process, so that His true government can become the way that regulates our thinking, and this also means we must learn and come to understand the thinking that works against this transformation, because there is working that builds toward the transformation, that yields to this transformation, that allows and enables this transformation, and there is that which works against it.  And we have to understand that which works against it – it’s so very, very basic – and that is why we have started from the beginning, from the beginning.

Only order, truth, beauty, peace, and unity with God existed when God first began creating.  That’s all that existed.  God gave us much deeper understanding of the creation of the spirit realm at the Feast of 2010 because that is where the first of His creation began, it’s the matter of the spirit realm.  In one sermon with the title, that very title, it was entitled ‘The Spirit Realm’, we covered things like the sea of glass, just some basic things that was made up of spirit properties.  It was created from and in a spirit world.  And so there are things that God began from the very beginning to create but it wasn’t physical yet, it wasn’t in a physical universe; it was in a spirit realm – again, by design beautiful!  Not talking about in appearance, but in purpose, the beauty, the purpose that’s there, that’s the beauty, because it’s the understanding.  The purpose reveals, in essence, the understanding.  The understanding of the purpose is inspiring.

And so again here, there are spirit properties, as we talked about, in the spirit realm, things in a physical realm we can think about as far as the human mind is concerned, so we picked out various things God began to create, talking about His throne and talking about various things that could be seen, talking about a sea of glass and things that we can think of that are described in different places in the Bible in a spirit realm that somehow have spirit properties that can be seen.  It’s not just all blackness, dark, by any measure.  Its light, it’s beautiful for that which can be seen in a spirit realm if you have the ability to see that which is created and made on a spiritual realm.

In that particular sermon here we made those comments, we talked about those things, just as there are things that have physical properties in a physical realm that can be seen.  Then we read of what God did next after the spirit heaven was created.  So that’s where God began; He created first by creating a spirit heaven, if you will, a place of existence for spirit beings to dwell in.  And we can read about some of this.

Let’s go over to Hebrews 1 and just start looking at some of the things here, being reminded, and build upon then some of those things that we’ve gone through in many sermons in bringing together in this particular series, far more powerfully so, in a subject of government, true government.

Hebrews 1:1 – God, who at different times and in many various ways spoke in time past unto the fathers by the prophets, has in these last days spoken unto us by/through His Son.  And so we see this transition, and that’s a beautiful transition too, of how God through time through the first 4,000 years primarily spoke through the prophets, and then something began to change after 4,000 years, He sent His Son. His Son began to preach of this way but in a way that built upon the things that were given already through the prophets, giving a spiritual understanding to them even more so as God began to work with a Body, a Church, not just individuals now as had been in times past.  Now it began to be something that began to be done through His Son and in an organized fashion of a Church, of a congregation on a spiritual plane.

So it says, has in these last days spoken unto us through/by His Son, whom He appointed heir of all things, by/through whom, speaking of Christ, also He/God made the worlds, Who/Christ being the brightness of His glory, of the glory of God, and the express image of His person and upholding all things by the word of His power; it’s all done by God, His power.  ...when He/Christ had by Himself purged our sins, sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high: was resurrected, became a part of Elohim, the first of the firstfruits to enter into Elohim, into the God Family.

Being ‘made’, in the Greek here this word for ‘made’ means ‘to come’, or ‘brought into’, to come into being, to be brought into being.  Being made so much better than the angels, as He has, by inheritance obtained a more excellent name than they.  And so the point being made here is that there is that which is intended, has been intended, was intended from the very beginning to happen in and through Jesus Christ that has to do with a matter of inheritance, something to be received from God through inheritance that wasn’t given to the angels.  That which they received was a matter of creation, of being created and given to them, an estate, a place, a being, an existence and a purpose from the very beginning of their creation.  And therein is great understanding, not just knowledge to be received.

Going on in verse 5 it says, For unto which of the angels did He say at any time, You are My Son; now, they’re referred to as the sons of God but not in the sense of being born of Him, of a lineage, of something to do with His mind and His being; it’s different.  And that’s a beautiful thing to understand, what God has been giving to us in a very powerful way about the angelic realm, of how they were created that’s so different and what is so beautiful about a powerful truth that God gave to us, of how God Almighty is going to dwell in Elohim for all eternity.  It says here, You are My Son, this day have I begotten You?  Never said to any of the angelic beings; it wasn’t their purpose, it wasn’t the purpose of their creation.

And again, I will be to Him a Father and He shall be to Me a Son?  So, to whom was that ever stated? ...of having that kind of a relationship, one that’s a Family kind of relationship that’s unique, that’s different from a matter of being created and brought into being.

Verse 6 – And again, when He brought in the first begotten into the world, He said, And let all the angels of God worship Him.  And of the angels He said, in Psalms, Who makes His angels spirits and His ministers a flame of fire.  So the angelic beings, the angelic realm, they were created, they were made, that which was made first was heaven, the spiritual heaven, a spiritual realm, and then angelic beings were created, but something was different now, they were composed of spirit but the uniqueness of what they had, of how they were made becomes quite awesome here when we begin to understand a distinction, a difference made with the creation of mankind.  So God fashioned, made, the angels of spirit essence with spirit given life.  So now they had life of their own – not eternal life, not self-existing life, but now they had life that could continue on because it’s spirit.  He gave independent free moral agent life to beings, to angels composed of spirit essence.  That’s awesome to understand!

Verse 13 – But to which of the angels did He say at any time, Sit on My right hand until I make your enemies Your footstool?  Are they not all ministering spirits sent forth to minister for/to them who shall be heirs of salvation?  A beautiful picture of what’s being given here of God’s purpose, of that which is in the angelic realm, of beings who are made to help in a process, to serve in a particular process of ministering to those who would become heirs of salvation, to those who would become a part of the God Family.  And so again, it shows a purpose of creation.  They’re not the same.  The angelic realm is not the same as the realm of mankind, the purpose is not the same, it’s different, and it’s fulfilling for both, for what both are created for if all will yield to that.  All the angelic realm did not and all of mankind has not and will not.

So again, there is a spirit realm with things created of spirit essence, then there are angels who dwell in a spirit realm, who God made of spirit essence but with independent life in them.  They had independent life, not self-existing life...and that’s where the mistake has been made in times past.  We haven’t understood, the Church was not brought to a time to grasp and comprehend this fully, that the idea, the belief and so much in that respect as far as what the Church was concerned at that time was that since they are spirit that they are eternal, and that’s not what that means by definition.  That means they would have to have self-existing life within themselves or that God would be existing in them to keep them in that state, and that’s not the case.  They have independent life in a spirit realm, just like there are spirit things composed in the spirit realm, like we talked about the sea of glass; it exists because it’s made of spirit, God sustains it, indeed, because it’s spirit, just like He does in a physical world, that which is physical He sustains by His power.  He sustains that which is created in the spirit realm as well, including the angelic realm.  They are composed of spirit essence but the angels were given life, just like mankind.  There are elements on the earth but we have life, we’re able to breathe, we’re able to function, but they’re able to do it in a spirit realm.  So that life will continue on unless God changes it; He has the power to change it because their life isn’t self-existing.  He is the only one.  He is the only Eternal Self-Existing One and there is no one else!  He is the only one that is eternally self- existing!  There is no one else!  None of the angels are eternally self-existing!

God has helped to clarify those things and helped us to understand them more clearly because it’s an understanding of the entire process and purpose of God, what He’s doing and why.

In another sermon in 2010 that was entitled ‘The Creation of Evil’ God revealed the primary difference between the creation of mankind and that of the angelic realm.  Let’s turn over to Psalms 103 and be reminded of a few points here, of a few things that fit into an entire picture in a very powerful way.  So in this sermon here that was entitled ‘The Creation of Evil’ God revealed the primary difference or differences between the creation of mankind and that of the angelic realm.

Psalm 103:19 – The Eternal has prepared His throne in the heavens, and His Kingdom rules over all; and so His Kingdom rules over all; it isn’t that all yield to that and submit to it, but His Kingdom rules over all and that which will not...  you know, God has a plan to bring it all into unity and oneness with Him.

Verse 20 – Bless the Eternal, all you His angels, and so this is very much focusing upon the angelic realm in what’s being stated here and it reveals much as well.  It says ...you ‘mighty’ ones, in other words a word here that simply means ‘those who excel in strength’.  Because they were made of spirit essence they were mighty ones, not like physical temporary weak human beings who can easily be killed and lose life.  These beings were made different. They were made of spirit.  And so He says, again, those of you who excel in strength, who do His commandments; there is a lot revealed here because this is what they did when God created them.  ...who do His commandments, obeying the instruction of His word.  This is how they were created, they were shown His way; they weren’t shown any other way, they were only shown God’s way.  He gave to them His way.  He told them of His way.  He told them how life would be, how their existence would be, what their purpose was, in part; not all of the story, not all was revealed, but again, began to reveal to them things about themselves and how they were to function, why they were created.  They were created – they knew they were created – they were brought into that knowledge that God created them, brought them into being, gave them life and began to show them purpose of life and how to live and how they were to function, what their jobs were.

Verse 21 – Bless the Eternal, all you His hosts, and you ministers of His who do His pleasure.  And so again here, from the beginning, these beings, these angels, the angelic beings, they were given His ways and it says here, those who do His commandments and obey His instruction and word. Because they didn’t know any other way, they didn’t want any other way, it’s just the way it was.  They worked together in unity and harmony because that’s the way they were created.  God didn’t create them to be adversarial.  He didn’t create them to resist Him.  He didn’t create them and teach them a way to fight against them.  He taught them a way of life that would be a blessing!

And so it goes on to say, Bless the Eternal, all you His hosts, and you ministers of His who do His pleasure; and so they were blessed in that!  Life was a great blessing to them.  The fullness of life was great for them.  Bless the Eternal, all His works in all places of His domain; bless the Eternal, O my soul.  So again, this is recorded to make a clear distinction in that which should be understood in the differences between the creation of mankind and the creation of the angels.  Although we know there is a difference in composition the point of this is just missed by people, they don’t understand it.  You’re able to understand it and you’re the only ones that really can understand these verses and what’s being said here because you’re being shown what they mean.

Mankind was formed, created, in a weak and temporary form and is able to receive mercy when working or living to be obedient and faithful to God and His word, and there is no such thing though said of the angels...so what’s the difference?  Well, the angels are described as being mighty ones, those who excel in strength, who are expected to praise God.  It’s just the way they were made!  ...to honor God, to worship God, to worship God’s way, to live in God’s way, to love God’s way.  They loved it!  ...and to do His commandments, to obey His instructions.  They weren’t made to disobey.  And so this is how they were created, to live such a life, and it was full and it had great purpose and meaning in it as God revealed those things and taught them and gave to them knowledge and understanding of things.  They didn’t receive everything all at once.

So again, the angels were made of spirit and not of temporary physical flesh.  They were not created with the frame that could feel pain, know hunger, experience thirst, and physical discomfort.  They didn’t have any of that.  They were not made subject to the kind of pulls that exist in a temporary physical creation from birth.  You know, when a baby is uncomfortable and wants food and feels hunger...the angelic realm never had any of those things; they were just made of spirit life that was strong and created to live within the way of God.  Nothing else was known at this point, only peace was known.

They weren’t made to have pulls in their life like pulls of ‘the lust of the flesh, or the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life’...the pride of life wasn’t a pull but it became a part of life for them later.  But again, none of this existed.  They didn’t have the pulls like we do as human beings, ‘lust of the flesh, lust of the eyes...’ the way we think because of these things.  And so because we’re just created in a temporary physical way, physical sustained beings that are different totally just by the very creation itself of what we’re like, and we have to have food – when we don’t have it we’re hungry...and we want, we desire, we want to have for ourselves and we become very selfish in the mind, in our thinking.

Let’s turn over to Isaiah 45.  So what eventually happened at a point in time in the angelic realm is of supreme importance to understand, and that is why it is important to understand what God said that we read earlier.  So reading this again...Isaiah 45 – For thus says the Eternal who created the heavens, the Self-Existing One, Elohim, God Himself, who formed the earth and made it, He has established it, He did not create it in tohu, in confusion or without form, but He formed it to be inhabited.

Verse 5 - He said, I am the Eternal and there is no one else! Driving the point home as we read earlier.

Then we come to Genesis.  We know these things.  I love the verse that speaks of that, ‘though we know these things’ we need to remember them and we need to put it into the entire picture of what God is showing, because it has to be there to give greater understanding so that we can more fully appreciate it all, ‘though we know these things by knowledge’ we don’t always understand.  And we can build upon the understanding and come to appreciate it and see it more fully, more clearly, more powerfully, what God is revealing – to understand how these things worked, how they happened and why God designed and made everything the way it was.

Genesis 1:1 - We should know these things very well.  When we come on the scene in Genesis 1 God makes it clear that the earth was different from the way when He first created it, because it says here, In the, or its really a beginning, no such word as ‘the’ here.  In a beginning God, or it’s even using the word Elohim here because it’s really revealing the purpose here from the very beginning, that it’s about a Family.  But there was only one; God made it very clear there was only Him.  In a beginning God created the heaven and the earth.  And the earth ‘was’, or the Hebrew here, it means ‘it became’; it’s like the expression that’s used in Genesis 19:26 where it say’s ‘Lot’s wife became a pillar of salt’.  So it’s not that she was a pillar of salt, it’s the word ‘became’.  And so the earth became without form and void.  God made it very clear He didn’t create it in tohu and bohu, but here it says that’s what condition it was here at the beginning here when you come on the scene in Genesis, from the very beginning of the scriptures.

And it says, and the earth became; it wasn’t that way before but it became that way, and darkness was upon the face of the deep.  Now, we understand what happened, or we know what happened.  And darkness was upon the face of the deep, so the earth was here, there was darkness on the face of the deep, God came on the scene at a particular moment of time, was going to refashion and remould and do things within a seven day period here that we read about.  Not the beginning of the creation of the earth, the earth was already here, but to remould and refashion it so life could be here, so it could be inhabited once again with life.

And the spirit of God/Elohim moved upon the face of the waters; so they were already here!  ...and God said, Let there be light, and there was light.  And so there was that which couldn’t make it through the atmosphere of the earth, and finally God separated things in the atmosphere and made it possible for light once again to shine through to the earth, and it goes through and describes some of these things, God setting in motion here, setting the earth in a particular rotation and orbit once again, setting things right to sustain life in seasons and so forth.  So, all those are explained here in Genesis.

And then we come to the story of how it all became this way, of what happened during the time that God first created it to be inhabited and what happened later when God had to remould and refashion everything in that seven day period that we read about in Genesis 1.  So in Isaiah 14, this being, one of the angelic beings – all of them who were created to be in unity and harmony with God, because there wasn’t anything else, nothing else existed!  It was a beautiful way of life because everyone lived it...but they had free choice in minds to choose.  God didn’t make them like He did the animal kingdom that just are a matter of like a robot might be, in other words, something done by instinct.  There is a uniqueness far beyond what we might consider to be a robot but getting the point across that they don’t have their own thinking in their own mind.

Geese that migrate, the different migrations of various kinds of birds that take place.  We talked recently here about the monarch type butterfly, the migrations they have from Canada down into Mexico and back and the uniqueness of that through four generations of existence.  Those things that you see, that we see in the world that God created – they don’t think about it.  They’ve taken some of these butterflies and put them in different parts of the United States and they still come back onto the right path again. They didn’t figure those things out!  They don’t have the minds, the capacity to think about how they’re going to get back on course again and travel several hundred miles of something they didn’t even know they were taken.  What would you be like if you were taken in a dark container and moved to a different part of the world?  Some of us get lost without maps in cities, without navigation devices; it’s not too hard to do, to get lost in cities and so forth.  And yet these things that God has created, like the butterflies, they travel several hundreds of miles and get back on course again.  Where does that come from?  God created it in them!

But the angelic beings, they were not made like that, they were made with free minds, the ability...  God didn’t want robots.  He didn’t want beings with just instinct that responded all the time to instinct.  For a purpose...for a purpose...for what He knew was going to come to pass, for what He knew would happen through time.  We don’t know the amount of time, whether it was thousands of years, tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands, millions of years...we don’t know what period of time it was when this event finally took place, when one...ONE BEING began to choose something different than what God had given.  That’s incredible to understand¸ not just to know – but to understand how this happened, why it was made possible that it could happen, why it had to be that way and couldn’t be any other way!  ...and yet God knowing exactly what it would lead to, knowing exactly what would happen when He created mankind, knowing exactly what would happen, that mankind would have to have a Saviour, a Passover, a King – all these things that had been planned so long ago.

Isaiah 14:12 – How have you fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, light bringer.  The three archangels that are described in scripture – Lucifer, Gabriel, and Michael – three with the greatest of power, the greatest of beauty, the greatest of magnificence of all the angelic realm, and we don’t know the exact numbers of the rest but they were limited, there wasn’t a continuing creation – multiple millions, whatever it was.  We really don’t know the number; God hasn’t revealed that to us.

And so the question is asked here... we don’t even know if it’s in the millions, candidly.  How many millions?  We don’t know.  But we know of three specifically that were created in a very specific way and then all the others who were created as well.  But it says, How have you fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning.  The one who was to bring brightness, who had the purpose of the creation, to be a light bringer, the giver of light, which has to do with God!

And because of this, it goes on to explain the story, How have you become cut down to the ground, you who weaken the nations?  What brought you to this state?  How did you arrive here? Because you have said in your heart/in your mind... It didn’t have a ‘heart’; it’s an expression here for that which is the deepest, most inner part of our being, our thinking, that which comes from the motivation, the deepest recesses of our purpose, our choice of purpose and existence and how we think and what our motivation is in our life.  And so when beings are created in this manner, to have a response themselves of their choices...because even in the angelic realm there is great freedom to do many things!  It’s a great freedom, but within God’s way, not some other way.

Satan wanted something different.  And so it says here, Because you have said in your heart, I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars, above the angels of God.  God put him in a position of such great power already, but the government and things about God’s Kingdom at that time were divided up amongst three beings with different functions and jobs and responsibilities, but Satan wasn’t satisfied there.  He wanted something different.  He wanted what the other two had as well and he wanted to be over all the angels.  He wanted to govern and rule over all.  God hadn’t given him that so where does this come from?  What is this?  It is the very thing...  it is the very thing that must be understood and seen by all who become a part of Elohim, truly, to see this with all of their being, to go far beyond knowledge, to understand and then to choose it, that it be your way of life, be your mind, that you be in unity and oneness with God in these matters.

Because you have said in your heart, I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God.  I will sit also upon the mount of the congregation in the sides of the north.  He just wanted God's throne, to rule over everything.  I will ascend above the heights of the clouds.  I will be like the most High.  “It won’t be divided up anymore!  I will be like the Most High!  I will be like God, because there won’t be anyone else to share the government with in the angelic realm, I’ll be over all!”  So this is what he was striving to do in the sense of being like the Almighty, so very likely, probably, wasn’t a matter of thinking he was going to be God, but that he was going to be like Him in the sense of God was the one who was over all the angelic realm and now Satan wanted to be over it all and not share it with two other beings in the sense of how it was divided up.

Yet you shall be brought down to hell, the word ‘sheol’ here, which just means ‘lifeless confinement’, no life, ‘lifeless confinement’.  A unique word here, but again, in time, it definitely becomes that very powerfully so, never to have life again.  ...to the sides of the pit, the borders or enclosures of the dungeon.  So even this is descriptive in part of what will happen in a temporary time there of restraint and confinement indeed until everything is taken away.  So one extreme to another, what he wanted, he’s going to have the exact opposite – nothing.  And that’s what happens – we’re either a part of God’s government, a part of the way that governs life, to be in agreement with the wisdom, the mind, the revelatory thought, the being of God or not.  Everything must some into unity and oneness to go into eternity, to go into everlasting life.

Verse 16 – They who see you shall stare/gaze upon you and consider you saying, Is this the one who made the earth to tremble, who shook the kingdoms? When they see that power that’s taken away and then come to nothing.

The spirit realm with angelic beings was a unique realm of existence and there was no motivation to do anything other than what God had said or revealed to them from the beginning.  The angelic realm was filled by God’s purpose and it responded in thankfulness for all that He had given them.  That was just the way they were, that was their existence, and even when God created the physical universe it says, ‘the angels rejoiced at all that God had created’, and they were excited by all that they saw being created and brought into existence into a physical realm.

Let’s turn over to Ezekiel 28, because at a point in time after the physical creation, after God had revealed to the angelic realm that man would be created and that they would have the potential to become Elohim, in the God Family, then Lucifer, becoming Satan, became filled with jealousy and envy and turned against God.  And so in this process, at some point in time, perhaps to prevent it, perhaps all of it wasn’t here, perhaps more were swayed in their thinking when this knowledge came along; we don’t really have the entire story because God hasn’t shown it all.  But certainly in the very beginning of time here there was that which began to work in Satan, that he wanted more than what God was giving to him; it began to be a part of his heart, as we read about in Isaiah.  So something happened in his heart where he began to feel a certain way, began to think a certain way, began to want more, and then at some point just outright rebellion when he began to fight against God, when he began to try to take from God what God had given.

Something began to happen in his mind just in his relationship with two other archangels, two other beings, and he wanted it all, but the way things began to happen, what God had given, there was a division made here, there was still that division that existed and God revealed more of the purpose of what He was going to do and there was a great rebellion, so much so that they actually tried to destroy the very place of where mankind was going to be created.  Why not just destroy the earth so it can’t sustain life?  And that’s exactly what Satan did, and he talked a third of the angelic realm into doing the very same thing.  Something began in his heart, as it talks about, and then it finally came out in action, and that’s what happens in life.  It all begins in our thinking and then eventually comes out of our mouth, or in their case, ever how they communicated with each other, and he began to communicate division, he began to communicate something different to the other angels that he was over, that he worked with at that particular point in time in where they were supposed to be in the part of God’s government preparing the earth, to be on the earth.

God makes it very clear that this is very obviously where they were and what their place was to be and they wanted to leave it, they wanted to leave their first estate, their first habitation as it reveals in scripture.

From the very beginning here they began to understand that God had a purpose for creating something greater, Elohim, not just the angelic realm now, and so Lucifer became Satan, he began to put into action the things, the wrong thinking that began to enter into his mind.  He became filled with jealousy and that jealousy just grew and grew and grew; and you know, that’s what happens in people, it starts out small, it can start out not even existing there about a certain individual, and then something starts working and a little bit more is added to it and it just grows and develops and there is a wrong reaction, an action that comes out of it that isn’t good.  It starts in the mind though, and that’s exactly what happened here.  He became filled with jealousy and envy and just began to turn against God in his thinking and then in his actions, he became evil – the creation of evil – something that God allowed to come into being...and God knew it would come into being.  So evil had been created where only once peace had existed.  Awesome to understand this!  Only peace had existed until this took place.  God has not revealed the time it took place for this spirit being, an archangel, to turn away from peace and to turn to evil, but it happened and we need to understand that, to understand what took place, to understand the thinking in the mind.

Isn’t that what God teaches us and works with us to grasp?  I think of some series we’ve just gone through before the Feast here about relationships and the ability to see motivation, where it comes from, to desire to receive and have the kind of motivation that comes from God, but to see human nature, selfish motivation, we have to see what happens in the mind, why we think the way we do, because that’s what leads to our actions, that’s what happened to Lucifer.  He began to think wrong in his heart and in his mind, and then eventually that led to action against God – and that’s what happens to us.

We are blessed in this human life to be able to see those things in the mind.  God blesses us to be able to see things that can come into the mind - but to fight against them in the mind, that’s where the transformation takes place.  It’s a beautiful, it’s an awesome thing!  It’s in the mind where the battle takes place, and so if we will yield to that battle and desire to be a part of that battle and fight against the thinking so it doesn’t come out in action like it did with Lucifer.  Now, once Satan began to do that he polluted his mind; he didn’t turn back.  Spirit can’t turn from that, it becomes what it is by choice.  And that which is physical, however, with a spirit essence living in it, there is that which God has created in the mind that can be changed and molded and fashioned in thinking.  That is such an incredible thing to understand, how that works, and we’re ever growing in that and it just becomes richer and richer and more exciting the more we understand it.

And so again, it’s the thinking process, the thought process that begins in the mind, and that’s where we’re to battle these things before they come out in actual action, in sin.  So for the thoughts that come into a mind...now, if we dwell upon it and begin to dwell and think wrong things in the mind, in a wrong fashion, that’s a different matter, there is sin that can be there in that kind of thinking, that kind of a mind, but just for the thought to come into the mind, wrong thoughts, isn’t sin in itself, that’s where we have to deal with it.  It’s in the mind, it’s the choices, it’s the things we’re bombarded with that just come into the mind...especially today because of music and TV and all the things that are out there, someone says something...  So things come into our mind, but it’s how we deal with the thoughts that count, and that’s the very beginning and the basis of learning true government, to embrace that, what truly regulates the mind and the life of mankind.

Ezekiel 28:11 – So again, some more about what it says here – Moreover, the word of the Eternal came unto me, saying, Son of man, take up a lamentation upon the king of Tyrus, and say unto him, Thus says the Lord Eternal; You seal up the sum, full of wisdom, and perfect in beauty.  You have been in Eden, the garden of God, right at the very throne of God.  There is a physical garden of Eden and he was also in that, but this is referring to that which is on a spiritual plane, the very presence of God because it’s about being fully nurtured and taken care of and having everything provided in a spirit realm, and Satan had everything provided for him, he was in the very presence of God, able to receive things directly from God.

So again here, all that was given from the very beginning.  And then it goes on to say here, You have been in Eden, where all the fullness of life was, an enclosure, a garden, a surrounding here, this garden is speaking of here where there is just an environment of great enjoyment, of fellowship with God and the angelic realm and the things that are beautiful where they were nurtured, spiritually fed, an oasis like we can refer to something that’s physical.  So, You have been in the garden in Eden, the garden of God; every precious stone was your covering, so it mentions all these, that which is something given here physical for us to understand, but that which was the equivalent, to that which was spiritual for him.  The workmanship of your tabrets and of your ‘pipes’, this word for ‘pipes’ meaning ‘the setting used by a jeweller’, the setting, the jewels and how you’ve been set, the beauty of it, was prepared in you in the day that you were created. Great purpose that he had with two other archangels, no others made as beautiful as those three were, as magnificent.

Verse 14 – You were the anointed cherub who covers; right there at the very throne of God; and I had set you so.  In other words, I placed you there.  You were upon the holy mountain of God, in the upper part of the government, that’s what it’s talking about here, the very highest echelons of government in how the Kingdom of God at that time was governed, because it was an angelic realm governed by the ways of God and everything that God gave as a purpose and things to be accomplished, they did it, they just did it, but there was a way it was administered and a way that it was told and given and communicated and came from God to others.  Then they would go off and there would be that which would, just like in anything, anything to be done or as a matter of function in government of life and what regulated it, came through him to other angelic beings as it went through Michael and Gabriel and the jobs they were given.

So again here, it says you have walked up and down in the midst of the stones of fire, right there by the throne of God, you were perfect in your ways from the day you were created until iniquity was found in you. It began in the thinking, in the mind, and then it finally led to actions against God, fighting against God outwardly.  By the multitude of your merchandise, your trafficking, your trading; I love this expression because it’s the same old story, and if we can learn this, how it happens, what the beginning of it is...  You know when someone has a wrong spirit, a wrong mind, they want to be divisive, when they stir something up, it starts with this word here of trafficking, trading your merchandise; what are you trading?  Well, some murmuring, it’s the grumbling, it’s the twisting and distorting of fact and truth and that’s the merchandise, that’s what you begin to palm off onto others, and then if they take it then they pass that merchandise along to others and it just gets passed along – that which is distorted and twisted and false and it’s the way Satan has been from the very beginning.  That’s why he has the names that he does – accuser, false accuser – twisting and distorting things.

It says, they have filled the midst of you with violence, injustice, oppression, wrong ways, evil, and you have sinned, therefore I have cast you as profane out of the mountain, in other words out of His Kingdom, out of His government, and I will destroy you, O covering cherub, from the midst of the stones of fire.

And then this verse here – this is so important to understand – verse 17 - Your heart was lifted up because of your beauty, you began to look at yourself, you began to rely on yourself and your thinking, not on God.  And that’s what God helps us to understand, we need to rely on Him and not ourselves.  We have always relied on ourselves as human beings, we think we know it all, we believe we’re right, and yet we come to see we’re wrong and we have to come to understand that God is right and only His way is right, and we have to make the choices then to be in unity and oneness with that.  But it says here about Lucifer, Satan, who became Satan, you  have corrupted your wisdom; that which God gave from the very beginning was perfect and beautiful, and the wisdom that was there because it was all God’s way.  But He says, you’ve corrupted that now, and because of that the change has taken place in spirit that is wrong, and it will not change back.  There is no desire; he has no desire to change back, to become something different.  He’s chosen by choice something that is him now.  That’s what some people try to relate to the angelic realm and wonder, “Well, why can’t they repent?  Why can’t they...?”  Because they don’t understand spirit, they don’t understand how spirit works, and there is no desire to change there.  We’re just very blessed that we can change and be transformed.

Again here, so important to understand this beginning of it all, this process here.  Mr. Armstrong was given strong and powerful spiritual insight as to God’s great purpose for the Kingdom of God, the Family of God, Elohim.  I’m so thankful that God gave that to him, about Elohim and about the Family, because the world doesn’t understand that; they think they’re going to go to heaven and they don’t know what they’re going to do.  But they don’t understand it’s all about become a part of the God Family, to become God.  That’s the purpose of our existence.  He went on to teach about government.  God gave him the importance of government, that it was focal to this understanding about Elohim, how Elohim would function and live, exist.

And so we grow and we come to see and know God more fully.  There are attributes of God that we’re to understand, that should become self-evident, why God has created all life as He has, and it’s the story of true government.  It’s what truly governs life God’s way.

I’m just going to read this quickly to you, because now that we’ve looked at an overview of what happened from the beginning in the spirit realm we need to shift gears a little and focus on certain attributes of God that are fundamental to understanding the process that leads to the creation of Elohim.  And so this statement here in Hebrews 13:8 about Jesus Christ, it says, Jesus Christ, the same yesterday, today, and forever. So the point being is that this has been misunderstood in times past, but Jesus Christ does not change His ways; His judgments, His words are consistent and do not change for they are fully at one with God!  He is fully at one with God, of the same mind, of the same Word, for He is the Logos.  It’s a beautiful thing that God has revealed to us and understanding John and ‘the Word became flesh’, understanding the life of Jesus Christ.  The Word of God was made flesh and later resurrected to immortal life.

So His name, Jesus Christ Elohim – that’s His name in the God Family!  He will never change in those things that are now permanent; they are now permanent, they have been from the very beginning, it’s who He was - that reflect that which is eternal in the Word of God, the first of the firstfruits...and then all the rest that can become a part of the same Family, the same mind, and the same unity and oneness through time through a transformation.  And so the point being here, a very strong scripture about Jesus Christ doesn’t change.  He is the same because He is in a unity and a oneness with God and it reveals that about God, that God doesn’t change.  He is the same...and that’s the point of it all.  Now this has been misunderstood in times past because it was thought Jesus Christ eternally existed.  No, it reflects  and reveals the way God has always been, always will be – the same yesterday, today, and forever.

Turn over there to Malachi 3 and read these few verses here.  Malachi 3:5 – It says here, And I will come near here to you in judgment; and I will be a swift witness against the sorcerers, and against the adulterers, and against the false swearers, and against those that oppress the hireling for his wages, the widow, the fatherless, that turn aside the stranger from his right, and that doesn’t fear Me, says the Eternal of hosts.  So again, God revealing in time here His purpose, what He’s going to do.  He’s going to bring everything into unity and oneness with Him and these things are going to be gotten rid of.  He makes this very clear that this isn’t His way, that this isn’t agreement with His way and it must be gotten rid of, that which defies and goes against His way, against true government, of that which gives happiness and fullness and richness and peace in life.

And then verse 6 He says, For I am the Eternal, the Self-Existing One; I do not change!  So again here, that’s why it says what it does about Jesus Christ.  He’s the same yesterday, today, and forever; He doesn’t change, and God doesn’t change!  He says, therefore you sons of Jacob are not consumed. Because God has a plan and a purpose of what He’s working out and how He’s going to perform that purpose, because He doesn’t change, because His purpose is His Family, Elohim.

James 1:17 – It says, Every good and every perfect gift is from above and comes down from the Father of lights; again, showing the source of light and everything is from God the Father, in whom is no ‘variableness’, that’s what it means, a Greek work that just means ‘no variation’, ‘no change’.  ...in whom is no variableness nor shadow of turning; in other words it’s like saying here no turning or shifting as with the shadow that’s cast and never leaves the object it’s cast from.  A shadow stays with what it’s being cast from, it doesn’t take off and go someplace separate, it’s there.  And so God Almighty doesn’t change, it’s always there, nothing turning, nothing changing, it’s always consistent, something that’s absolute!  And the world needs that which is absolute.  That’s one thing that’s so absolutely clear, is nothing is absolute, everything is so messed up, so upside down.

I think of politics because it’s so much in the news now a days, here every four years, and it just goes back and forth, the fickleness of the human mind, to think that some... you know, “One party didn’t give me what I want so I’ll get the other party in.  They’ll solve all these problems and solve all of our...”  Nobody can, nobody does!  The shallowness of the thinking of mankind because mankind doesn’t grasp God and doesn’t understand God’s purpose.

Another verse, John 17:17 – Sanctify them through Your truth, your Word is truth. Doesn’t change!  God’s Word is the truth, it’s always the same.  Truth by truth doesn’t change, it is what it is, and God’s Word is truth and something you can rely upon.  It’s absolute, it’s dependable, it’s the truth, it is what it is, there is nothing else, by its own definition.

Psalm 119:142- It says, Your righteousness is an everlasting righteousness, and Your law is the truth.  And so the truth is the truth, by its own definition there is nothing else, and it says here that God’s law is a matter of the truth; it is the truth, it doesn’t change, it reveals that it doesn’t change.  The very fact of the definition of what’s being spoken of here, truth doesn’t change.  We come into greater understanding of truth through time and what we thought was the present truth; that does change, because we’re building upon something and constantly being led in a particular direction though toward greater truth, toward greater stability, toward greater oneness and that which is absolute with God, because we don’t have that yet.  As long as we’re in this human body we’re ever growing in that direction, as long as we’re growing and going in that direction, that’s what’s important.

So, Your righteousness is an everlasting righteousness, because it doesn’t change.

Another Psalm here, Psalm 146:5 – Happy is he who has the God of Jacob for his help, whose hope is in the Eternal his God.

Verse 6 – Who made heaven and earth and the sea and all that is therein, who keeps truth forever.  It’s always there, that which is stable and sound and never changes; it’s always there.  The Word, the Logos, never changes; it’s the same yesterday, today, and forever.

And that leads up toward the end of this sermon here now, of that which we have come to in Part 1 here.  Only God, and now His Son can be fully depended upon for everlasting truth in His Word, and His ways.  Only God can be fully trusted with 100% guarantee of what He will ALWAYS do; He does not change.  His way does not change, cannot change, but is consistent for all eternity, and this is the very reason Mr. Armstrong made so very important a point when speaking of government and Elohim when he spoke in these terms, that only God can trust God, can trust Himself for all eternity, therefore we must become God in Elohim, the God Family, the Kingdom of God, the government of God, immortal in everlasting life, in God and God in us.

So we have been so blessed.  I think of all the years of hearing Mr. Armstrong Feast after Feast after Feast and other sermons even in between that focused on matters of government, and I think of how we’ve been able to add a little bit more as time has gone on, the experience of the apostasy and what that has taught in a very powerful way and that fits into this sermon series very powerfully so, and then these things here about the importance of why, that God is going to dwell in us. Because He didn’t dwell in the spirit realm, they were made, they were created spirit beings with individual life and can make choices, made choices about things they were doing, just like we have many choices to live in what we do within a realm of law and order of God’s way of life – as long as it doesn’t go against that.  And that’s where our battle is; but a lot of choices to do a lot of different things and freedoms in those choices that make us the individuals we are.

And the angels had that; they had the freedom and choices of different things within the government, the realm of God.  But for mankind, what we’re being brought into, a blessing of being able to choose God’s way and come into that, and then in time, once we’re made Elohim, God will always be in us, we’ll never be separated from His being, from His oneness.  We’ll be in total unity and oneness with Him but that has to be sustained by God, it can’t exist without God, it must be in a unity and oneness of spirit with God!  And so that’s the beauty of God always eternally existing in us in a spirit realm, in a spirit manner, in a spiritual manner in the mind, and us in unity and oneness with Him because it’s of the mind and the thinking.  When we’re of oneness with God in the most beautiful way’s in our life, it’s a spiritual connection with God in the mind and a unity and oneness that is beautiful and powerful.

So that’s what we’re being given, and that’s the importance of understanding of why Elohim must exist, why it’s being brought into being, because only God can trust Himself for all eternity.  Certainly the angelic realm has chosen, those who have been faithful to God, and they have become more convicted and more deeply imbedded in that, entrenched in that and convicted in that through time and that’s their choice. But again, only God can be guaranteed for all eternity in the sense of His way and His government, by being in unity and oneness with Him.

Let’s turn over to Romans 8 and we’ll conclude here in some of this.  Romans 8:19 – For the earnest expectation of the ‘creature’, or it’s really the word ‘creation’ in the Greek here, waits for the manifestation of the Sons of God – Elohim.  There’s a process we have to go through, a transformation we have to go through to come into oneness of God’s government and God’s ways, of the same mind.  And so we have the impregnation of God’s spirit and then we’re able to continue in that spirit.  It’s not just enough being impregnated with it, that life has to come into us and continue to abide in us and dwell in us, like the blood of an umbilical cord to a baby in the womb.  And we’re very much like that, but we get cut off from the flow of God’s spirit when sin is there and we don’t have that connection then and can’t be strengthened then at those times, and our strongest times of life spiritually, obviously are when we are fully connected with God in that respect, He in us and we in Him, and sin isn’t there, and when sin comes we repent of it and continue to fight that fight.  But we look forward to the time we’re in Elohim, when we’re always in God and God is always in us, that spiritual connection in the mind, in the being.

Verse 20 – For the creation was made subject to vanity, not willingly, but by reason of Him who has subjected the same in hope, as we talked about earlier, the ability to be drawn by, because we’re physical human beings, to be drawn to ‘lust of the flesh, lust of the eyes...’ and so forth.

Verse 21 - Because the creation itself shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption; and that’s the way we are as human beings until God calls us and draws us; and that’s the purpose of Elohim.  ...into the glorious liberty of the children of God, to when we’re in that, in the God Family, for we know that the whole creation groans and travails in pain until gathered together, until now.  It has been, for mankind, for 6,000 years, of what’s been taking place, the creation of what God is doing in His creation of mankind to become Elohim.

Verse 23 – And not only that, but we ourselves also who have the firstfruits of the spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body.  We know we’re not there until we’re there.  It’s a journey.  It’s a long one in this physical human life until finally a change comes, some, the vast majority who are already dead and waiting to be resurrected, they don’t know they’re waiting but they’re awaiting a time.

One last area of scripture here, 2nd Corinthians 5:17 and we’ll close with this Part 1 here today.

2 Corinthians 5:17 – Therefore if anyone be in Christ they are a new creation, the word ‘creature’ again here, but it’s the Greek word ‘creation’.  And so there is that creation; it’s what we refer to as the transformation of the mind, it’s this creating process that’s going on inside of us by choices that are made, of coming into unity and oneness with God and God dwelling in us then when there is no sin, and when we repent of sin when it comes so that we can continue in God and God in us – because therein is the life and the existence that will eventually be Elohim.

Therefore, if anyone be in Christ they are a new creation; old things have passed away and behold all things have become new.  And all things are of God, who has reconciled us to Himself by/through Jesus Christ and has given us the ministry of ‘reconciliation’ to show us, a word here that’s sometimes translated as ‘atonement’, shown us how to become at one with God, to be atoned to God, to be of the same mind by choice.  It can’t be instantly created, but by choice we can come into unity and oneness in God for all eternity.

Verse 19 – For the purpose that God was in Christ reconciling the world unto Himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them, but forgiving us and leading us, giving us grace even, and bringing us to repentance so He can continue to be with us and in us.  ...and has committed unto us the Word of ‘reconciliation’; so again here, that Greek word, ‘reconcile’, it’s a compound word, a beautiful word, it means ‘to alter’, ‘to change’ one of the words is, ‘to alter and change’ and then the second word here ‘according to’.  So, ‘to alter and change according to’ the mind of God, to bring us into unity with the mind of God, to alter and change, to transform us, to bring us into true government, to that which truly governs life for all eternity.

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