The Awesome Creation of Mankind, Pt. 1

Ronald Weinland

September 25, 2021

Feast of Tabernacles Sermon

On occasion in various sermons over the past year I’ve referred to small segments of what will be focused upon more fully in this particular sermon series. The subject matter of this series is something God has been giving us more of a maturing process in and understanding over the years. I love it when God reveals things to us and gives us understanding of how He does and why He does things in the manner that He does.

It’s one thing to receive the truth. That’s exciting and inspiring, to know the things that God wants us to grasp and comprehend about His plan and purpose, but how He does it, how He performs the things that He does to me are very exciting and inspiring. And this covers some of that in this sermon that’s entitled The Awesome Creation of Mankind.

So again, it’s not something we don’t understand but we continue to build upon the things that God gives us. And another reason why we need to always be spiritually alert, close to God, seeking His spirit in our lives so that we can receive and understand the things that He gives to us Sabbath by Sabbath, Holy Day to Holy Day. Because I’m reminded of or I think of the two trees that Herbert Armstrong had focused on toward the end of his life. And you can tell he was mightily excited by what he was going into. He was excited. He was inspired by the subject matter because he talked about this in several different sermons.

And so it got to the point where some were turning off to what he was saying because it was just these two trees again. It’s like, “You’ve talked about these two trees, what more is there?” Matter of fact some people made those kinds of comments, “Is there anything different in what he’s saying? That’s all I’m hearing, two trees.” Well, that was a spiritual matter because the reality is every time something else was being added to his understanding, and that’s why he had the excitement that he did in giving and delivering what God was giving to him.

So, to me that’s always a good thing to remember, to understand that we need to be close to God in order to receive everything He has for us and to cry out to be fed spiritually, to be nurtured spiritually because these are matters that are spiritual and not of carnal, physical understanding at all.

Anyway, the awesome creation of mankind. God has given us a lot on this over the years now and we just continue to build upon it. It’s really so incredible, it really is, to understand why we’re created the way we are, the need, the purpose and that there was no other way to create Elohim. It’s really awesome to understand that because sometimes in the beginning and the different transitions we’ve had, Philadelphia, and then Laodicea where started going asleep as a Church, lukewarm in spirit. But the things that had been given in Philadelphia in the growth process, there, the sixties, the seventies, the eighties until Herbert Armstrong died, really quite incredible in that sense of the things that continued to be added that are so inspiring about God’s plan and purpose.

So again, we understand the Millennium will see the establishment of the Kingdom of God to reign over mankind for 1,100 years. And it’s the time that, obviously, the 144,000 that we spoke about yesterday, are going to become a part of the God Family. And it’s an awesome thing to think about how God has waited so long for this.

I couldn’t help but think about some of that this morning. I can’t comprehend the kind of patience, the kind of planning, the meticulousness of just the creation of the universe that had to take so long. It didn’t just pop into being by command. It didn’t just appear, every planet, every star, every galaxy, everything that’s out there. It was methodically prepared and planned and created, brought into being, molded and fashioned, different things out there that are so awesome that we get a glimpse of here and there with Hubble that goes farther and farther out. I think it’s on the blink right now though. Things that just we are in awe.

Especially in God’s Church, we become more and more in awe of how great God is. And mankind feels he believes that what is it, 3.5 billion light years out there is the edge? There was a time when people tried to figure out about the earth. “Where is the edge and where are we going to fall off, and where does it end?” And it’s like you think of the creation that God has and everything that’s out there and we have no idea about how vast it is.

But to think about the time involved in all that with all the angelic beings that were involved in that, but all with a purpose of eventually creating this earth, this solar system, to put man on it, God knowing how mankind had to be created, knowing what it would take to create His own family. Awesome patience. Of things we can’t comprehend like that.

So that takes me to Psalm 8, a scripture we’re very familiar with when David said, Psalms 8:3—When I consider Your heavens… And I marvel at this. He didn’t see too much. All he saw was what you could see with the naked eye at nighttime. He couldn’t see the other part from looking out from various parts of the earth, of what you can see. He was in one specific area, and it was exceedingly limited, what he saw, but to know that God created it all.

But for us to marvel in this age of how incredibly vast it is shows how puny we are, how small we are, how great Almighty God is. It really…it goes beyond words.

When I consider Your heavens, the work of Your fingers, the moon and the stars, which You have ordained, what is man that You are mindful of it, and the children of man that You visit them? Because it’s about mankind, God’s purpose, everything that’s out there to bring us down to this time, what we refer to as the end-time because of man’s rule. But hardly the end of anything. It’s the beginning of that which is incredibly great, God’s family brought into existence.

For You have made them a little lower than the angels, for great purpose, great purpose, why it had to be done that way. Couldn’t be done any other way.

…and You have crowned them with glory and honor. So, what does that mean? It’s not the glory and honor we have now though we have incredible glory and honor in the sense of mankind, in the sense of rule on the earth, in the sense of everything that we have been given on a physical plane as human beings. But it’s about what’s coming. It’s about the future, glory and honor of God’s purpose of creating us in the first place. You think, people in the world they don’t have any idea why they exist.

You have crowned them with glory and honor; You have made them to have dominion over the works of Your hands. Not just this planet, over the works of God’s hands, over everything. You have put all under their feet. Everything. Everything. That’s God’s purpose because everything is to be brought under, in subjection to God Almighty.

And so, the plan is in God’s family, when the time comes in that sense and everything is handed over to Him once again when Christ has completed his work with mankind and everyone has entered the God family, no more resistance anywhere in the universe. No where within the spirit realm. No resistance to God Almighty anymore.

…all sheep and oxen—even the beasts of the field, the birds of the air. And so again, it’s this focus of something that’s physical, but what we see is so much more. …the fish of the sea that pass through the paths of the seas. O Eternal, our LORD, how excellent is Your name in all the earth! And so, we grow in that, of understanding more and more the excellence, the glory, the might of God.

Going back to Genesis here in the beginning. Genesis 2:7—So, the Eternal formed mankind of the dust of the land, made physical from the elements. That’s the point of it all. From those things that are physical, from physical elements of the earth. We’re not only made from them, but we have to have those things coming into our life throughout out life, physical things of the earth to be nurtured by because we need certain elements in our system, in our body to continue in physical life. And it’s an awesome thing to understand how we’re created to be able to continue on, to have life for a period of time, whatever that that period is.

…and breathed into their nostrils the breath of life, of both Adam and Eve, and they became living beings. Incredible! So, we’re only created to have temporary lives and then to understand appointed to die. That’s an incredible thing to grasp and comprehend the purpose of. God has purposed that everyone who becomes a physical human being, who is born as a physical human being, that every one of them is to die – except for a very, very small slight amount at the very end of this age.

Those who are alive now who are going to become a part of 144,000 who don’t die. Though there’ll be many who die of the Body who are going to become a part of 144,000, there’ll be those who don’t. But to think to be among those who are going to be changed in a moment, in a twinkling of an eye, as it says there, as Paul recorded, awesome! Very few get to have that experience. Course, when you die you don’t really know it and next thing you know, you’re spirit.

So, to understand the reasons of all these things is beyond incredible. It’s beyond being awesome. We’re made physical and less than a creation into spirit life, less that that kind of a creation of the angelic realm; physical, temporary.

It’s difficult to grasp sometimes the process, the things that God reveals in us that comes through experience and learning. And I can’t help but go all the way back to the beginning, from my beginning, in the sense of that which was spiritual, being at Ambassador, being there in that environment where things were being given as far as understanding of God’s way of life and God’s family, and the kind of… I don’t know if you’d call it debate but kind of debate because people would have usually an ordained pastor, usually an evangelist teaching them in those classroom environments, and it would open up to the class at times to discuss some of these things back and forth.

And these were the kinds of things that were discussed without very much comprehension. Very much on a physical plane because that’s where we were, especially at that point of the early seventies. And we can’t see what we can’t see, but to grow in that process, to see how God has continued to reveal various matters like the two trees that came later on, and to help us to understand the beginning of God’s creation and the things that happened there and what God was doing was awesome. Awesome! Because they’re on a spiritual plane. They’re not just physical things. But so often we have in times past especially, heard things on a physical plane.

So again here, 1 John 2. To grasp how and why we’re made this way is something not known by the world, sadly, not known by very many at all in the sense of they can’t go very far because they haven’t received it yet in a scattered body.

1 John 2:16—For all that is in the world—the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life—is not of the Father but is of the world. Okay, we know this. We’ve been given great understanding of this, to comprehend how we’re made, that God purposed that this was what we would be like. It’s not of God but it developed within mankind as soon as we drew breath. Adam and Eve, as soon as they drew breath it started. A baby when it’s born, doesn’t take long. It starts right away this developing of this mind, of this thinking that opposes God Almighty! That is against God!

He created beings knowing that they would be against Him! Incredible! Awesome, to understand that. Think, “Why would You do that? Couldn’t it have been done a little differently?” No. Absolutely not. That’s the marvel of what God is creating. And though we think we know all of that and understand that process, we don’t. We just see it just a teeny bit, we really do. But God continues to add to that through time here and once we’re spirit we’ll see it on a far greater plane, obviously. It’s incredible.

So, all these things, they’re not of God, they’re not of the Father. He didn’t create them; He allowed for the making of those things. Like the creation of evil. He created the ability for evil to exist, but He didn’t create the evil. Satan, who was Lucifer, wasn’t created evil. But of his own choice he became evil, he became against God. Human beings, same thing. Same thing! But not only created with the ability to have this mindset, but created to be that way, that it would have that mindset— Awesome! —that it would be against Him.

Even the world passes away, and the lusts thereof. Boy, how much do we want that? All the drama that’s in the world, all the drama that ever exist in a family, all the drama that ever exists in a company, all the drama that exists between neighbors, all the drama that ever exists anywhere to be gone. All because of lust and pride.

…and the lusts thereof; but whoever does the will of God abides forever. So, there’s a contrast being made there of two different ways. One that was of Satan, because that’s what he became, and one that is of God. And He offers those things as choice.

I marvel when I see some of these kinds of things on TV in a movie or a show, or people talk about that and debate various things. And they talk about this thing of wanting people to have choice, and letting them have choice, and respecting those choices. For mankind, what are those choices? Stupidity. Stupidity! We come up with stupid ideas. We come up with ways that are not God’s ways. They’re not right!

Whether it be in religion – and that even becomes worse! And the Church, candidly, has had to go through a lot coming out of that protestant background. It’s had such an impact on people’s lives. And too often people want to hold on to some of those things and don’t realize “That’s my nature. I tend to have a kind of protestant nature, a syrupy kind of nature toward how I think about God – unreal.”

And so, we have different battles and some have to work on those things and fight against those things because it’s evil. It’s not God. It’s not God’s way. It’s not God’s will, the way of this world, the religions of this world. Nothing in any of the religions of this world. It’s all sick, perverted, distorted. We have to become deeply convicted of that.

“But whoever does the will of God abides forever.” And that’s God’s desire, to bring us into that unity and oneness with Him to want to do, to have that mindset to do His will. I love that about Christ when it says he came to do away with the first to establish the second. And it’s all the context he came to do away with the first, which had to do with the sacrificial system in context there, of this that didn’t do anything.

Offering up a bull, offering up a lamb, whatever it was, you know what it was always associated with? Pride. The more you could offer up on the altar and people saw you. Pride. “Look at me! You offered up a lamb. I’m offering up twelve bulls. My wealth. Look how great I am.” That’s the way human beings are. It’s automatic.

By the time you’re an adult (long before that), but by the time we are an adult it’s proficient in us. We are so proficient in it. Pride, self, “Look at me, is someone watching me, what I’m doing, because I’m important.” You have to laugh at that nature because it’s sick. It gets into big trouble because of that. Only when we come into a unity with God and able to learn to do His will does life take on real meaning. Incredible.

So, how incredible it is that lust is going to pass away. Why? Because human life is going to pass away. It comes a point in time when there is no more human life. I can just see anyone trying to tell someone in the world something like that. “We don’t have much longer, 1,100 years, and after that there will never be any more human beings.” “You are…! What are you smoking? I want some of that!” That’s probably what some would think. “You’re really out there!” It’s kind of like of like the LSD era.

Let’s turn over to Galatians 5. So, how deeply do we grasp that we were made to resist God, to fight against God? Made to sin. Because sin is resisting God, fighting against God, His ways, His mind, His being. We’re actually slaves to sin. That’s what we become immediately when we start this process of human nature working in our lives. We grow and because of selfishness we have sin, we have a nature that fights and resists God, by design, by design of the Great God of the universe so He could create Elohim in us. Amazing!

I think of this, how God’s purpose has never been to save every human, every person who had human life. It hasn’t been God’s purpose. That’s of a mindset as though eternal life is owed to people, and it’s not. That’s why I think of missionaries and different ones that felt like they had to go out and “spread the word, the gospel about Jesus.” I said the right thing. They didn’t spread it about Joshua.

So, anyway, to think about that kind of mindset that feels like they have to do this because they believe that God is desperately trying to save us all; He wants to save people in all the countries of the world. And people give large sums of money to be able to try to do that. They just don’t understand; they don’t grasp that isn’t God’s purpose. And it isn’t God’s purpose to save every human life. He offers His way of life, but it’s of choice. And the reality is that most, as a whole, just don’t want it, will not choose it.

When you think about the angelic realm and what happened there and one-third after all that time, we don’t understand the length of time it might have been, if you want to talk about earth time. Billions and billions of years? I can’t comprehend that. Not a one of us can comprehend something like that. And seeing what God was doing and seeing what was taking place and being a part of something so incredible and the vastness of the universe? Awesome to understand, to see what God was doing.

And then think about our lives and what God is offering us and all by a matter of choice through time of what God has given us the ability to do, to have something that’s so great. I’ll come back to this. I want to talk about this first, go into this.

Galatians 5:13—For brethren, you have been called into liberty/into freedom. So, mankind wasn’t given that freedom. Mankind was made slave to sin, of a nature that’s against God, and then only by God’s drawing us, by God’s giving us the ability to comprehend and see some things in a different plane, in a different way, with different thinking He begins to work with us and show us true freedom, a true peace. That’s why I love the expression about, “I gave you peace, but not as the world I give it to you.” Because the world’s way of giving peace is not peace at all. It’s peace their way. And that has a lot of different definition to it than what God’s is.

For brethren, you have been called, a calling that God gives us that reveals right away that God the Father is the one who is drawing us. I love that one word there that talks about akin to dragging us in the beginning. Because why? “I don’t want to go! I don’t want to…” We’re carnal! We fight against God. We resist God. We want our way. And so, it’s that expression there of being drug a little bit because we’re trying to hold on to something back here, clawing at something, and so we’re resisting God. What an awesome thing we can go through that and get to a point where we begin to want God and we don’t have to be drug anymore along the ground, as it were. Say, “No, I don’t just want to walk toward that, I want to run toward that with all my being! That’s what I want!”

So, You have been called unto liberty, freedom, only do not use that liberty/that freedom for an occasion, or an opportunity, as the word is, to the flesh; but by/through agape serve one another. There’s a lot said there. There’s a sermon there, what that’s all about, what that means, and what this means for us, in that respect.

So, we can misuse the grace, the mercy that God has given to us, which everyone who ever leaves or is put out of God’s Church has done. They start taking advantage of grace, of God’s love, of God’s mercy, of God’s patience, and sooner or later we have to answer for that.

“But by/through,” again, “this love,” that comes from God, “serve one another.” The reality is to understand what that’s saying there, we can’t serve, we can’t help one another of our own. It takes God’s spirit to help someone in a right way because it has to be something that’s in unity and harmony with God. So, how do we serve one another? Is it a matter of passing something out or… Might be. But it has to do with not serving self and a willingness to give of ourselves for the sake of someone else, whatever that choice might be, to let someone else have their way. We don’t have to have our way. There’s a lot in that about serving other people then, serving others around us, wanting to see them be fulfilled, filled, happy, joyful.

Verse 14—For all the law is fulfilled in one word, even in this: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. Can’t do it. You can’t do it of yourself. It takes God’s help to love others, to love your neighbor, those who are close to you, those who are next to you. And too often times people have thought about where they live and they have neighbors next door, that this is what it’s talking about. And because of that people haven’t grown and understood what this is about. And so it’s like, well, I’ve got to love my neighbor. There is a love we should have toward them and how we deal with them, but it’s like because they’re not a part of the Church not going to deal with them. Anyway, don’t want to get into all...

But it’s us. The ones who are closest to us are those who are sitting in this environment next to us, across the aisle from us, whatever it is. This is God’s desire and God’s focus because this is where you can apply it and practice it more than anywhere else in life. So, God gives us that environment as He calls people into a body, the Church, the Body of Christ to apply these things.

“You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” We love ourselves a lot! Every one of us loves ourselves a lot. Because that’s what selfishness is about. It’s not agape love of self, it’s just physical selfish carnal love of self. Because we want to take care of self first of all. We want things to be our way. And even beyond that, we want others to agree with us about what we think, about what we see. And someone that irritates me the greatest is that what I found on the internet and share this bit of information with you. “Did you know?” And we become so convicted of certain things out there.

Now, there’s a balance in that, but too often we tend to go too far as human beings because we want to bring others into agreement with us, so we say something and want someone to agree then with what “I” see. And if you don’t, something is wrong with you. What’s wrong with you? You don’t agree with me?

“Chemtrails. They’re poisoning us. Can’t you see that? They’re out there!” I have to laugh when I think about a lot of chemtrails going across the sky because my wife and I, when we see them together, it’s like, “Oh, not us!” It’s like, protect… You have to laugh at such things. And if it is, what can you do about it?

“You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” We have to cry out to God to help us to love each other. I hope you in some of your prayers are asking for help from God to be able to love the brethren the way He wants us to as a family, to want to see each other succeed and come through all this despite whatever our quirks are, our differences, our different ways of thinking and expressing ourselves, or whatever it is we have, our problems, our weaknesses. We all have them! Every one of us! There’s not a one of us that’s perfect. Why? Because of this selfish nature we have. Because we love ourselves. It’s the way we are so we have to ask God…we have to ask God for help to love others in the Body His way with agape. That’s something you can’t do on your own.

So, to have this sense of—I don’t like the word “attachment”—but closeness, sense of understanding we are God’s family. And to comprehend within all that we would be fearful of judging others in God’s family. He is the Judge! We are not. But our nature is to judge one another as human beings, and we have to get away from that, we truly do. To look down upon others, to talk about others, to put others in a bad light rather than a good light, to see the bad in one another rather than seeing the good in one another and talking about those things that are good. That’s what we’re supposed to do as God’s people! To do otherwise is not a healthy thing spiritually. And so, we have to battle with that, we truly do.

But if you bite and devour one another, take heed that you do not be consumed by one another! And that’s what happens when these things happen. I’ve seen these things happen in God’s Church in different areas at different times and people biting and devouring each other and talking about each other and cutting each other down. And after a while that gets around so someone else starts biting them back. It’s like little children. (Bite!) And then they, “I’ll show you!” (Bite) You know, in biting back. And then we do this to one another on a plane that is not right in relationships. So, “see that you not be consumed by one another.” It destroys.

That’s what happened within the angelic realm. Started destroying in relationships. The demonic world is not in unity and oneness. The demonic world is screwed up. People think sometimes, well, they’re all in unity with Satan and they’re all in unity with one another. No, they’re not. They’re just distorted, perverted beings and they do things with the similar desire because that sick nature they have against God, anything to do with God. A little cooperation here and there just like we see, if it benefits them.

Just like we see with the different governments. “Yeah, we’ll do that. We’ll enter into the agreement.” “We’ll build you some subs, diesel engines.” “Okay. Okay.” Someone else comes along, “Wouldn’t you like nuclear subs? They’re much quieter.” Nuclear subs, they’re much quieter (if you didn’t hear that). “We’ll give you a lot of money to do this, too, and we’ll charge you a little bit too, you know.” And then all of a sudden… That’s the way the world is. It’s the way mankind is.

We have to become sick of it, sick, sick, sick of it so that we want and hunger for more and more and more what is right and true from God. But we have to experience that evil. We have to experience it in order to choose something different if that’s our choice. That really says it all in a nutshell, why God created us this way. Beautiful! Awesome! And not all will.

So, it goes on to say here, Then I say, Walk in the spirit and you shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh. “Walk in the spirit.” So, that means striving to be in unity with God, walking in what is true. Meaning, you have to do something. You have to put one foot in front of the other. You have to move forward. There is some work involved in this, to walk in the spirit. It’s not just natural. It’s something we have to pray to God for help in having, of His spirit so that we can do this.

For the flesh lusts contrary to the spirit. Just like I mentioned, it fights against God. …and the spirit is contrary to the flesh; and these are contrary to one another, so that you cannot do the things that you want. But if you are led of the spirit, you are not under the law. It means here, in this respect here, the penalty of the law, which is death. That’s what this is about. You’re not under the law. It doesn’t mean you don’t live by God’s way of life, God’s law. Yes, we strive to, the spirit of it especially even more so. But we’re not under the penalty, which always has to do with the death penalty.

Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are these, adultery, fornication… It’s amazing how these have to be mentioned right up front. Because these are the greatest pulls of human nature, of human life. Adultery. Most people in my experience through time have left the Church because of adultery and fornication, sexual things, of the nature of mankind to want what we want. A willingness to give up truth, a willingness to even be with what you would think, of someone who has… Well, I shouldn’t even… I don’t want to zero in on that because it becomes a little too specific.

But to think within the Church, that individuals would play with in their thinking, their mind to have an affair with someone else. That should be shocking to a mind with which God is working. And it should be abhorrent to us. And if it isn’t, that’s why people get sucked into those things. Because it isn’t hated. It isn’t abhorred like it should be.

But to live in the environment of God’s Church, these are the things that have been the greatest, in that respect, in God’s Church of people making choices they prefer an affair with someone else—I mean, this is mind boggling—with someone else knowing what God has to say about it but wanting to still have fellowship with everybody in the Church, but wanting this more and hiding it. Mind boggling.

How long does one think they can get by with that? How can one think that somehow they’re not being cut off by God’s spirit? Not just quenching the spirit but I mean cut off from God’s spirit. To do that week by week, month by month, what happens to the mind? What happens to the mind when those things happen? And to contrast that to what God offers? You would think we would be able to look at that and say, “That’s just pretty dumb. That’s just really sick.” Because how can you compare what God offers with an affair that, how long is that going to last? And if that’s what you want in this physical life, how long are you going to have it? How long are you going to be able to have that in… Hmmm. And then you’re going to get all wrinkled up and you’re going to die. That long maximum. At some point, it just happens, you die.

And so, you took that, a person wanted that more than they wanted God. This has happened in PKG too many times. And you think, mindboggling that such things could happen.

Now, of recent time it’s been more of things of people just robbing God. That’s even exceeded adultery and fornication. Think, what a step to take! That’s real growth. I’m just… Anyway, you think “At least it’s not committing adultery, or whatever, I’m just going to steal from God Almighty. I’m going to take the big step, the big plunge.” I’m sorry, time to show the insanity of it. Absolutely insane!

So, the flesh are manifest, they’re revealed, they’re out there. …adultery, fornication, uncleanness, being impure, lasciviousness, licentiousness, promiscuity. Again, so many of these things have to do with things that are of a sexual nature still.

…idolatry. That lumps them all in there because anything that someone puts up before God is idolatry. Whatever we esteem more than God is idolatry. Stealing from God: “Take this out of the… I’ll keep that for myself, keep it in here. God doesn’t really need that because I’ve heard they have a lot already, so they really don’t.”

And we do. That’s a marvel to me, how that we’re living in a point in time here I don’t know what to do with it yet, God hasn’t shown me yet. I feel that this book may be the place where we’re going to plunge much into it. The last one, started plunging and didn’t work, something not clicking here. There’s a reason why the door hasn’t opened, so we pull back. Pull back and go at it in a different route – and it had to be another book.

Idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies, envying’s, murders. The way of mankind. But what’s amazing is these things come in then in God’s Church. …drunkenness, carousing, desiring to keep that lifestyle rather than what God says we should live. Wanting to rub shoulders with the world. How much…? …and things like these, of which I am telling or warning you, as I’ve also told you before, that those who do such things shall not inherit the Kingdom of God. It’s not going to be offered.

Especially, as we talk in context here, someone being called. He’s speaking to the Church of God. This is directed to the Church of God, not to the world, of people who have been begotten of God’s holy spirit, that awesome, awesome miracle that takes place when God’s spirit begins to work in us if we choose, if we want to transform our thinking from, away from selfishness, the way that we were created naturally into something that is a creation on a spiritual plane.

And there is no other way for Elohim to be born. Incredible!

But the fruit of the spirit is agape. It’s something that comes from God. It’s not of something you can work up though you have to work at it, because it’s a matter of your relationship with God and praying and desiring to conquer and overcome the carnal things of your life. You want to live God’s way, to be in unity with God, thinking about God, what would God do? What does God want me to do?

How does God want me to present myself before Him in Sabbath services, on a Holy Day? “Just come as you are?” Men, grow your hair way out because, you know God says it’s a shame to have it like that… Scruffy, not even combed? Give me a break! We are to present ourselves before God. We’re coming into God’s presence in a way that we don’t do during the rest of the week. And so we’re to have that…

What I’m saying is that we’re to have that mindset that I’m coming before God. And if we really believe that and think that way then we’re going to be walking in the spirit because God’s part of it. If we really aren’t thinking that way then we really don’t care. We want to wear our t-shirt and our coveralls and, you know, it’s brown around the… Because we’ve been outside working in it. And we present ourselves before...?

What kind of a mind is…? Where is God in the picture? “Just come as you are.” That’s the world, “Come as you are. We’ve got big hearts. Just be whoever you want to be.” And today it’s like, you don’t even have to be the sex you are, you can be something different. You can be something that doesn’t even exist if that’s what you want. And everybody else is supposed to accept that and say, “Oh, that’s wonderful. That’s okay. I don’t care.” This world is so sick.

But too often in God’s Church we allow these things into our lives and if we’re not careful we let down our standards, and so forth. Now, there is balance in all this. And that doesn’t mean we have to wear the ties or…don’t even have to wear this. I do this more for up here because of that and going out to everyone in the Church and to honor God as well as His servant, as His minister. If I’m not speaking I don’t tend to do the same level, but I still strive to know and to exemplify the fact that I’m coming before God. Not going to wear my blue jeans to Sabbath services. Not going to wear my… Well, anyway.

Is God in the picture of our life or not day in and day out in our thinking, especially when we come before Him? That’s why this thing of robbing Him just blows my mind. Because the carnal mind can understand that if it wants, if it wants…if it wants.

…shall not inherit the Kingdom of God. So, we can’t just live any way we want. We can’t come just as we are before God. We have to change. We have to change, and not only change, but we have to fight against this nature with which we have been created, that God made us to be like so that we could see the differences. Because by experiencing it you see the product, you have lived the product of what human nature, of what selfishness produces long before…well, not a long time because I wasn’t that old, of coming into the Church and being baptized into God’s Church. I was becoming sick of human nature. Mine and others around me. That was a blessing to begin seeing carnal human nature, selfishness.

I think of time in college on Friday nights at this university, this college campus. People would go out to this nearest place and start drinking on Friday, beer. It was a beer joint with a band and different ones, a dance floor and so forth. And people basically being drunk by four in the afternoon, five o’clock in the afternoon. Isn’t that the life to live that Friday after Friday after Friday? And then seeing people on the dance floor. And I’m so thankful God just… It’s like when He showed me the Sabbath, I knew it was true.

But this was just before that. Looked out on the dancefloor and I saw something I had never seen before. I saw that each person was in love with themselves. They didn’t care… It’s like “Look at me, at how I can dance.” And it’s like just draping your hands around yourself and wooo, you love yourself so much. I’m sorry, but that isn’t what I saw, that way. But anyway, I could see it on a plane that I’d never been able to see it. We love ourselves. We think we’re the best one out there on the floor. We want others to see, really, how good we are and to acknowledge that.

I went home sickened by that. Well, not home, at that time it was a dorm. Went back early, still light out before everyone started coming back soused, drunk around 6:30 or 7. I mean, the day is just beginning but they’re already coming back to eat and whatever at the dorm and people gathering together. And that’s where I met the football player who broke my jaw in two places.

But that’s where I started seeing things. Human nature is hideous, and we have to begin seeing that. Because what I saw was myself and I went back more depressed than I’ve ever been in my life that night. Before I got smacked in the jaw and my jaw broken I was down because what I saw so sickened me inside.

What a beautiful thing! What a beautiful thing to come to that point in time where you see what your nature is really like. Now, how are you going to address it? So, I started making some changes. Started changing some things on a physical level. And then at the end of that semester went home and there I was told about the Sabbath and the Holy Days, and I knew it was true.

What an incredible thing we go through in life, this ability then to experience things in life. And it's through that that God created us that way so that we could come to those points where when God begins to reveal to us what nature is like—and so many aren’t going to care—but if you do care and you do make that choice, “I don’t like this. I don’t want this. I don’t want to be like that. I want to be different.” And God shows us what we can be like and then to grab a hold of that, it’s a beautiful thing.

That’s why it’s mindboggling sometimes to think that perhaps the vast majority of mankind will not accept it. Is that possible? I started to mention this earlier, but for now to think about the angelic creation and how long they were with God. That’s what we’re talking about. And then for that mind to begin to change in a third of them, that perhaps being together for billions and billons of years (we don’t know), and seeing the greatness, the beauty, the glory of God Almighty and what He was doing, and then coming to that point.

And then God making us so that that process is speeded out dramatically, so we start out automatically with a mind that resists Him, it’s against Him, so He can create Elohim in us, so we can make the choice and the distinction between the two ways.

It’s an awesome thing the way we’re made, the creation of mankind. But all for that very purpose. Because it’s about a spirit and a way of thinking, of something that God will not allow into His family, and that we have the choice of what we’re going to do.

And then to think that perhaps will it be a third of mankind that refuses God? Mankind starts out with that nature. Mankind is carnal by nature. Mankind is already against God. But we’re physical, not even spirit in the sense of spirit life and having experienced things for billions of years and have evidence out there for that long. Ours is short lived and it’s filled with things of lust, “lust of the flesh, lust of the eyes, and the pride of life.”

My point being is that it could be a whole lot more when it’s all said and done who end up saying no to God and His way of life. Two-thirds? I, candidly, wouldn’t be shocked. Ninety percent? That capacity is within human life, within the mind of human beings, because I’ve seen it in God’s Church over and over and over again. The percentages are exceedingly high of those who have been baptized with God’s spirit and then said no to God, “I’d rather have a temporary affair.” “I’d rather satiate, I’d rather have this experience for a time. I’d rather do ‘this’ or do ‘that’.” “I’d rather keep my pot! Yeah… yeah man, yeah.” Whatever it is that we want more than God.

You think, what a comparison! You want to keep something that… “I would, rather than listening to God’s apostle, I’d like to still go outside because I have proof of it that I will be in my bare feet, because I’ve done it for so long and I know that it’s okay to do because I’ve experienced this. There is so much proof out there.”

Which, I hope the individual hears me today because he didn’t hear me before. You have a choice to make – in or out. You’re going to abide by, live by the things that God gives as instruction, as guidance and direction, and to realize there is something in this besides what you see and think is physical, or maybe on a spirit plane or something that has healing power, that something how these things are going to come up between you. You know, go out and hug a tree, “Oh, this feels so good! Feel that energy. I am being renewed! I’ll kiss it! I love this tree!”

How insane is that?! I would wish that anyone who feels that way, that there had been a lot of dogs out there the night before! I’m sorry, that’s what I truly wish could happen, so you could get it in between your toes and “Oh, I feel it! Doesn’t it feel… That’s not energy?!” Sorry. That’s how insane we can be as human beings, and sometimes in God’s own Church. Mindboggling!

So, something that God has been showing is indeed going to be a lot of people in time who refuse God even after the hundred years. Masses and masses and masses and masses of people throughout the earth. That’s, in one way, hard to grasp, and yet now not so hard to grasp.

And the point of all that is to us (that’s why God is showing it more and more), so that we can grasp more what we are given the opportunity of. To realize you have to fight for this, you have to really want it and not be rejected, to want God to say, “Now I know you.” Because we love God, we love His way of life, we love His plan and purpose, we love what He’s doing and how He’s doing it. It fills our life, it strengthens us. Beautiful!

So, all these things, different nature, the nature of human being, envying’s, murder, drunkenness, carousing, all these things that people want and desire in life and sometimes in God’s Church, will not inherit the Kingdom of God. But the fruit of the spirit, again, is this love, the joy, the peace, the opposite of that which is drama, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, fruit of the spirit, meekness. I love this one because this is one that many have tripped up on through time. It’s a teachable spirit.

We can’t receive of God’s way of life unless we have a teachable spirit, because every Sabbath we have to have meekness, a teachable spirit. What does that mean? It means it’s not about your way, it’s about God’s way. And if I have a teachable spirit to be taught by God, to learn from God, and to get past this thing of saying, “But he’s a man! He’s a man!” Well, if that man doesn’t do what God wants God will take care of it. But you have to look to God.

Just as what happened between Herbert Armstrong and the Apostasy, God took care of it. Not in our time as we might have done it, but in His time to perform, to bring about a greater purpose of something to teach the Church, to teach a small remnant things that they needed to know, things they needed to see, things they needed to experience so they could have something unique created in them that is different from others who are going to be a part of the temple of God’s Family, of Mount Zion, of holy Jerusalem.

Awesome to understand things to that level, to that plane, that we are very unique at this time. We have different places within the temple, within God’s structure of government, of organization, of family. Because it really comes down to family. It’s not a matter of government in the sense of thinking… It’s the matter that this is just the way it is. Dad is dad. Mom is mom. Older brother, older sister, that’s who they are. I’m younger… But you don’t worry. On a spiritual plane, that’s a beautiful thing. We all work together, family.

“Meekness.” Because I’ll be real candid with you we still have a few that don’t have meekness in God’s Church. On occasion I have some that, we have some, that I experience myself some who communicate to me that they don’t have meekness. They have something else. They want me to see something different because, “Did you see this, because it’s a little different from what you’re saying about Covid?”

I don’t care. I don’t care what you see. I know what I see. I know various things about how I function before God. I’m answerable to that. I understand that deeply, deeply, deeply. Not easy decisions to come to at times, various things like that that are best for the body, and in time come to see how God molds and fashions and leads me and leads all of us to see spiritually. But we have to experience different things to get there

So, we don’t see everything all at once, so what was initially said about Covid was not where we were going fully. Step by step and then finally we got to the point where, hmm, I think it was the first day on the first sermon, made it pretty plain. We receive it or we don’t. We have meekness or we don’t. We have a meek spirit, a teachable spirit or we still insist on our own way.

And anyone out there today who is listening who still insists on their own way that is different from what God has expressed through His apostle either you repent and change, or you’re gone. God will just cut off His spirit from you because we either have ears to hear and eyes to see, and if we refuse, it’s over with in this age for us. It’s as simple as that.

So, I’m waiting to see, hoping and praying, in that respect, that some are able to repent because I don’t like going through this. But it’s necessary. It’s a part of something that has to be because if we really love each other we really want to see each other succeed and come through all this. We have been together in…look at the different periods of time. Some I’ve been together with for decades stabbed me in the back, stabbed others in the Church of God in the back, betrayal. And we experience those things and they’re hard to go through because you wanted them to succeed.

I think I’ve shared it before where for one individual I prayed that God not allow Satan to have him – more than once. But in the end it’s his choice and God can’t prevent that choice. On the contrary, He allows us to make the choices. And so, certain things can happen to prevent, to give someone more time, and God is merciful in that, by certain petitions does do that. But ultimately, it’s still that person’s choice and their decision. And if they want something else there comes a point in time where God says, “You can have it. Your mind is set on something totally different. You’ve been given every opportunity, every favor, every grace, blessings that you cannot even begin to comprehend, an open door that you can’t begin at this stage to comprehend because you’re too weak. But you had the opportunities.” Awesome!

This is what we are, made carnal, to experience things in life so that what we are all comes to the surface in time. And how we address what comes to the surface, gold being refined, silver, whatever, and whether we will work to get rid of the dross, the impurity. It’s up to us, no one else.

…meekness, self-control. Against which there is no law, in other words, requiring death. So, those who are Christ’s have nailed to the pole—I hate this word “crucified” because it conjures up those wrong things in the mind—have nailed to the pole. In other words, it’s taking us back to what he did, a willingness here to destroy, to put to death self, selfishness, the flesh. Our carnal nature. In other words, in understanding in that process that it’s Christ who did that for us and so we’re willing to fight that fight, cry out to God for forgiveness of our sins, over and over and over again to fight, to conquer, to persevere until it’s gone, whatever that is in our life, never giving up in the fight.

That’s why I love those examples about Jacob wrestling with God and never giving up. You just keep fighting because you want what God has placed before you. He believed God. It’s why he did what he did. That was accounted to him for righteousness. What an awesome thing! Did he have to know about Passover, Unleavened Bread, Pentecost, all those things? No. He believed God and what God had given him for his life in that period of time and God accounted that to him as righteous, able to work with him on a spiritual plane. Awesome!

…nailed to the pole with the affections and lusts. If we live in the spirit, if this is true in our life, if this is what we want, let us also walk in the spirit. In other words, it’s up to us. We have to work at it.

So, God reveals to us that if we want His way of life and then to live forever more, then we’re choosing the fight of our life for our life. Truly, that’s what’s before us. Because it’s not something temporary. That shouldn’t be our goal, to save this life. It’s a means to an end of something far, far greater.

Romans 7:14—For we know that the law is spiritual, but I am carnal, of the flesh, sold under sin. Again, over and over again how these things are expressed through scripture. That’s me. That’s the way I was made. That’s the way I was born. We were all born that way, to sin. We’re slaves to it, and we have to experience that. What an incredible thing to understand! So that when the day comes you can say, “I don’t like that experience. I want what God is saying I can experience, that I can have.” “Do I want drama or peace?” Sadly, a lot of people are going to choose drama. Oh, I love the drama! Can’t wait to turn into it again tomorrow. It’s on TV! It’s As the World Churns. I don’t know if that show is still out there or not. As the World Turns, is it still out? Maybe no one should answer that. You really shouldn’t know that.

There was a thing on TV I think it was five days a week and you could go back to it not a month later but years later and it’s like, same people, same drama. They’re going through some of the same things. Isn’t life beautiful. I want to see more of that!

I am carnal, of the flesh, sold under sin. So, the day that I saw myself was one of the most beautiful days of my life. I was depressed as I have never been depressed in my life. Down, fed up with life. Fed. Up. With. Life. It was so ugly. Helped me drop to my knees and say, “If there is a God,” because at that point I kind of had this goofy belief that there probably is a God but believing in science and that too; He probably used creation, this evolution thing, that that’s how He did it. That’s probably… Stupidity of human beings. But that was a beginning.

What a beautiful thing to understand in our lives the day that God begins to draw us out of this cesspool or that we begin to make those choices for ourselves. Because sometimes people grow up in the Church and are reared in the Church and they have to experience certain things in the world and then make the choice for themselves. But it’s still everyone’s choice.

…sold under sin. For that which I do I allow not. Verse 15 is a little awkwardly translated here. This word “allow” means “to come to know or to perceive.” The spiritual context is For that which I do, referring to sin, being sold under sin, I have not (as it should be, in that respect) yet come to know or to perceive. There are things that with God’s calling we can come to know and perceive in time.

For that which I want to do, that I don’t do. So, even as we grow spiritually there are certain things that if we really want God, if we really desire God and we’ve made this known to God day in and day out in our lives, then in time there are certain things that we still battle with, that we still have pop up in our life in our thinking. Because we all have thinking that haunts us, if you will, going way, way back.

There are things that I know that are in my mind and in my thinking that developed when I was a teenager. Because I came into the Church around 19 there and all those things that were a part of my thinking and how I lived my life, and so forth, I know there are things there that are up there that I don’t like. Me. That I want to become something different that God has shown me.

So, we have to acknowledge that because that’s where repentance comes in, because you want to repent of that, because you want what God places before you. So, what an incredible process. The creation of Elohim. We were created this way because it’s the only way that God can create Elohim. You’ve got to see it, you’ve got to loathe it, you’ve got to want something different and then cry out to God for the help because you know that’s the only source, from God Almighty, and through His Son Joshua to be able to receive this transformation of the way we think so that “I” can think differently.

So that all that wrong thinking of just loving self, of… “I hate being selfish, yet I am.” That’s what he’s talking about here. I don’t care how long you’re in God’s Church, you know what? You’re always going to have to deal with selfishness because it’s always there, because that’s what we are but at different levels as far as growth is concerned and overcoming is concerned. And we see things at different stages, and we come to points where we try to fight it, and even if we have something that’s physical that leads to certain things that might happen in thinking and whatever because…

I’ve shared with my family that ever since—I don’t know if it was anything to do with that—I was cut open here, and a second time, and put new veins in and strip out arteries here and here and put them in, put me back together that something has changed. I don’t deal with—course, you’d never be able to see that in me when I’m working up here and doing things—stress or things of that nature in the same level as in the past.

So, I know I have a greater battle in my life right now because I see something that’s different in me physically, for whatever reason, and maybe it’s some of the medications that keep this thing beating at a particular rate. But I know that I have a battle on my hand that sometimes I have to be careful because if I see something… Well, I’ve experienced it here at different times and I have to realize that I have to deal with things differently because I have to get a hold of this, because I want to be right toward everyone in every way.

And so, there are things we have to see in ourselves. We have to see what our battle is. So, no matter how things go in our life there are things we deal with at different times in our life that are accentuated, sometimes just because of our physical makeup. I don’t have to go any further, hopefully. People experience those things in life and because of that you realize certain battles may be intensified a little bit because you want to catch them more quickly because you don’t want to say or do something or give the thought that something is wrong.

For that which I do, I have not yet come to know or perceive. So, there are some things sometimes that we do that we don’t see it clearly enough, but we keep fighting. You keep fighting until you get through it.

For that which I want to do, that I don’t do. Now, this is a good thing! I hope you understand this is a good thing because this is the engagement in battle. Because if you don’t see this, you don’t care, it’s like…rob from God, “Didn’t send in my tithes,” whatever the reasons are. You don’t even think about it. You just do it. Lust, whatever it might be in life, you just do it because God’s not in the picture. You just do what you want to do.

But if you’re engaged in this you’re fighting a fight. “I don’t want that!” So, after you’ve already done something then by that experience you can, “Man! Did it again. I wish I could just go back, take that away and redo it.” Doesn’t work that way. You have to repent and strive to make sure it doesn’t happen again the next time. And then it happens again. “Aaargh!” We’re sick! And then after a while get to a point where you’re able to catch things quickly.

Isn’t that an amazing thing, that as you keep fighting of these things there are times when you begin to catch it more quickly, you see something coming up here. “Not going to respond like I normally do. I’m going to be different. I’m going to act different. I’m going to do something differently to fight this because I want to fight it. I don’t want to be that way.” What an awesome thing. But this shows the battle. Beautiful.

But, or otherwise, in other words, Yet what I hate, that I do. We still have things in our life with our carnal human nature that are always going to be there, things that we really hate once we’ve done them or responded or said something that we blurted out because of our nature. Individually we all have different things, weaknesses in itself. And to be able to say, “Well, this is it. I hate it.”

That’s what I said the other day here. Maybe it was yesterday. But you’ve got to hate what’s wrong, and so that when it does pop up you hate it, you don’t want that, you don’t want to hurt anyone else. Because most things have to do with relationships when we’re not loving our neighbor as we should. And if we want to do it God’s way we know we want to love our neighbor as ourselves better than ourselves, more than ourselves. We really want to strive to do that to keep self out of the way, to fight against selfishness.

If I then do that which I don’t want to do, I consent or agree together with the law that it’s good. Isn’t that a beautiful thing? Then we’re agreeing that God is right. That’s what repentance is about, “I am wrong, God is right. I don’t like this. I don’t…” So, He gives us the ability to see these things. What an awesome thing that with God’s spirit we can change, we can see these things, and then we can make the choice to repent because we hate it. And if we don’t hate it something is wrong, something is really wrong.

Now then, it is no more I that do it but sin that dwells in me. So, we realize what’s taking place. We have selfishness. That’s where the sin is. That’s the way “I” was created. It’s always going to be there, but at varying levels because “I’m” fighting a fight, seeking to conquer and overcome, and having victory over various battles in life, refining, being transformed in the way “I” think.

We should be able to see that in our lives, that we are being transformed, that we are growing in our ability to think differently about various matters of God’s way of life. We’re making some changes in different areas of our life. Because if we’re not making changes constantly and refining that process we’re not growing.

For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh [or bodily form as the word has to do here]) dwells no good thing. Are we convicted of that? In this of itself, by itself without God’s spirit? That’s a mouthful. But we’re always reminded of this, “dwells no good thing.” It’s not good. Selfishness is not good. And yet that’s our nature. What a contradiction of God’s way of life. And that’s what we have to see.

For to will is present with me. We want, we hear this, and “I want to live good, well, right before God. I want to honour God, I want to please God, I want to live right toward everyone, I want to love everyone in the Body, but it’s not in me fully to be able to accomplish that. But that’s my fight. That’s my struggle. That’s where I want to battle.” But how to perform that which is good I do not find, in other words, in me. It’s not in our nature. That’s why we cry out to God. Because you’re convicted of the fact that it’s not in you; you don’t have it.

So, when we get to a point where we think we’re doing pretty good and we can hold on to our own ways, even if it disagrees with what we’re being taught in the Church, something is going to give. It’s not God. God doesn’t give. He requires a way of life to be lived, to be fought for, to persevere for it.

Just heard of someone who is still fighting this Covid thing. Got a big head about Covid, about we don’t have to take shots, shouldn’t have to take shots, you’re all wrong about what you’re saying in taking shots. Not fully saying it fully that way but pushing that envelope a lot, being vocal about it. Just being vocal about it. Sick, sick, sick. Hasn’t gotten the point yet. Doesn’t grasp God’s love yet in this area and what it’s about toward one another within the Body and toward the world around us. Awesome. It’s spiritual.

And that should raise alarm bells, because if we can’t grasp and see something quickly or early on then it should sober us to the core of our being to realize “There is something going on inside me that’s revealing, this is manifesting, revealing a weakness that I don’t want. There’s a lack of closeness to God and His spirit.”

It’s like what I was referring to the other day here about when Herbert Armstrong in 1970-72 and the book came out The Incredible Human Potential and there were some who thought he was “Starting to teach about the immortality of the soul. That’s what this is all about, that we have this spirit in the mind and this…” We didn’t know too much about computer chips then. Anyway, back then they filled up whole rooms. “It’s in my head!” Anyway, a chip we can better understand today.

So, there’s this connection in the mind, in the spirit in man, and God’s spirit is there, and it connects with that “And if I can’t see it, I’m in danger. If I’m speaking out…”

The fact that anyone would speak out against to someone else in God’s Church, I can’t tell you how fearful that should be, if it isn’t. Because I saw so much of that with Herbert Armstrong over the years and I saw what happened to those people, experienced those things to where to me it’s an incredibly fearful thing to come to that point. Because it’s not me; it’s about God. And I say that boldly and comfortably today, whereas many years ago it was harder for me to fulfill that function or that role. Today, it’s not. It’s just it is what it is. And if someone doesn’t like it out there that hears this, I can’t help it, and you’re very close to being gone.

It’s better for the Body. If you don’t change, you won’t repent, God is cleaning up the Body, God is cleaning up the Church in a massive way. All this stuff is coming to the surface. And I marvel what God uses at times to bring those things to the surface. At one time through a long period of time— Amazing! —make-up. Thick! Thick! Different face. But can’t have it. Can have it. Can’t have it. Can have it. Getting whiplash here. But those who were converted, convicted of God’s way of life did it God’s way. It’s a beautiful thing. We’ve come to balance. It’s good to have, to use in balance.

We don’t go to extremes. We have learned what moderation means. So, we don’t have green strips running down through here and pink slips stretched down through here, men or women, and things that freak you out today where you see. “Oh, did you see that?!” Tattoo’s running down through here to where, “That’s a nice-looking jacket!” Oh, it’s not a jacket, it’s an arm of tattoo’s. “Wow, a lot of work went into that.” …and I think a lot of money. We don’t do those things. We learn balance. Incredible.

And so, those things are given to the Church, things about hair… I mean, they’re physical things, but God uses those things to teach us spiritual things of the mind. And someone who’s not close to God spiritually, they see the physical things. That gets in the way.

Tens of thousands have left God’s Church because of such things. What a great reason to leave God’s Church – over physical things. Covid is a very physical thing of human life. Very physical. But it’s brought to light within the Body, within the Church things that are spirit, of where we are, of how we think.

And if you can’t see those things you have to cry out to God to have mercy upon you so that you can grasp and understand what I’m saying. Because this is spiritual. It’s not in you. It’s not in any of us except that God’s spirit is in us and then we know, we understand.

Romans 7:18—For I know that in me (in my body, in my being) dwells no good things; for to will is present with me, but how to perform that which is good it’s not there. It has to come from God. So, that’s why we’re motivated to pray, cry out, “Father, it comes from You, Your spirit. I need, I want Your spirit.” For the good that I would do, I don’t do; but the evil which I don’t want to do, that I do. Now, if I do that which I don’t want to do, it is no more I who does it, again, but sin that dwells in me.

I find then a law, that when I would do good evil is present with me. So again, that which we have to come to see and understand, how God created us. That’s the way we are. We have to accept that, personal responsibility, accountability, “That’s the way I am. And I have a choice to fight that, to conquer that or to give into ‘lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, the pride of life’ and resist God and refuse His holy spirit.”

For I delight in the law of God after the inward man, meaning up here, what God offers us and gives to us. That should be our delight, to rejoice in. At the Feast of Tabernacles God tells us to rejoice. Right now we should be able to rejoice day after day before God, that we’re receiving so much more because we’re able to do it day by day and not just Sabbath by Sabbath. This is an intensified time of being able to draw closer to God, to receive more of His holy spirit into our life, and to experience that measure of what we picture as the Millennium is, in the sense of understanding a world under one government, a world with one Church, and to recognize the beauty and the joy and the excitement of that, of how close we are to that. It’s almost in our grasp now. And ready to go through whatever it takes – life or death – to get there.

Verse 23—But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members. There is the battle. And so, it’s ongoing constantly, constantly, constantly, and that’s what Paul is telling us. That’s what God is telling us.

O wretched man/woman, whatever, that I am! We have to be able to see that. “I hate self. I hate selfishness. I loathe it!” And if we don’t see these things in ourselves then we need to just cry out to God, and He’ll show you. He’ll lift up that lid into the sewer. Get a great big whiff. You stink. I stink. We have to be able to do that, to be able to say, “I hate this!” And I really do. I’m sickened by selfishness. Are we all? Our selfishness that’s just there every day?

Who will deliver me from this body of death? Well, we know the answer. What an awesome thing. All a part of God’s creation, of why He made us this way. Beautiful.

I thank God—through Joshua the Christ our Lord! That’s how! So, then, with the mind I myself serve the law of God. “That’s what I want. That’s what I want to work toward. That’s what I’m working at.” …but with the flesh the law of sin. It’s always going to be there, but you want one to win out – God, God’s way, God’s spirit.

Romans 8:1—Therefore, there is no condemnation to those who are in Christ Joshua, who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the spirit. So, if we’re walking in the way of life that God has given to us, we’re in agreement and unity with what God gives us Sabbath by Sabbath, because this is how it comes about (this is how we’re able to see various things), and that we’re in unity and oneness and accord with everything that God gives us, truth that comes along that God gives us, whatever it might be, guidance, direction, and so forth that maybe is very physical, we’re in unity with it. We are at one.

“…do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the spirit.” So, that’s that choice. We want that. We desire that. We cry out to God for it.

For the law of the spirit of life in Christ Joshua has made me free from the law of sin and death. It’s only by God living and dwelling within us and having that access to His holy spirit and believing Him and crying out. That’s why we cry out to Him. And as we grow God accounts that to us as righteousness, because we know we’re not, “Oh wretched man/woman that I am,” whatever, “because I know what I am.” Thank God how He cleanses us, how He justifies us. But the choice is ours.

For what the law could not do in that it was weak because of the flesh… Protestant world loves this one here. It’s like, “See! That’s why the law had to be done away with. It’s harsh. It’s cruel. It’s too hard.” Yeah, if you try to do it on your own as human beings you can’t do it. That’s why you need God.

…God sent His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, even about sin. Which is what this is saying, He condemned sin in the flesh, that the righteousness of the law, “the righteousness of the law” be made complete in us. It’s about God. It’s about this transformation of the mind and the choices we make. …who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the spirit.

And so, we walk according to the spirit. We strive to love one another. We strive to be on guard against our mouth or what we might say to someone else – and especially to speak against God’s minister. I mean, if that blurts out of our mouth to anyone, where are you? What is going on in your mind? Don’t you recognize what you’re walking in? Because you’re out in the feedlot, in a wet feedlot after a great rain. And a feedlot is where cattle are fed, and they get rid of a lot of… They eat a lot of hay and so they get rid of a lot of hay in different form. And people get out there and it’s like they don’t have waders on, they’re just up here waist deep, or up here walking in it and not seeing it and not smelling it.

And if you have the audacity to speak against what’s been given in the Church, if you don’t repent soon, quickly, you are out of here! You do not belong in God’s presence of God’s people. You do not deserve to be in the presence of the fellowship of God’s people. Awesome! I don’t have any qualms about saying that whatsoever. And you should know who you are. And if you don’t know who you are, I feel even worse for you. But you don’t feel worse for you, if that’s the way you are, because you’ve already made up your mind. Somewhere back wherever it is you’ve been holding on to things, doing things that you shouldn’t be doing and you’ve cut yourself off from God’s spirit. Be here by next year’s Feast? Without repentance you won’t be. You will not be here at the next Feast of Tabernacles if you don’t repent. And if I don’t do it, God Almighty will. I know that.

For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh. That’s what wraps up their life. Their life is wrapped around physical things, physical relationships. You know, it’s one thing to have relationships, friendships in the world, but if they start pulling you away from what is true, regardless of who it is, if you don’t stand for what is right and do what you know is right it’s a dangerous place to walk.

For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh. You get too physically minded in your life and things that pull you away from God, if it starts pulling you away. Now, we live in a physical world, so we deal in a physical world, but if they start separating us from thinking and a relationship with God then we’ve got dangerous things on our hand.

But those who live according to the spirit, the things of the spirit. For to be carnally minded is death, but to be spiritually minded is life and peace. It comes from God. It’s so simple. Because the carnal mind is enmity against God. What an incredible thing. He created us this way so He could create Elohim. Would seem like a contradiction of means to build something – pick something that fights you and resists you all the way and then you give a calling and ability to begin to see and make a choice and here is the help if you want it, and this is what you must do if you want it. You can’t just come as you are. You’ve got to change.

For it is not subject to the law of God, nor indeed can be.

I’m just going to read this one right quick like here: Jeremiah 17:9—The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked. Now, too often we look at the world and think, “Yeah, that’s the way of the world. Their heart is desperately wicked, and they can’t see. It’s deceitful, the heart is deceitful.” No, no, no, no, no. Our heart as human beings is this way. That’s what it works toward. But there is a growth and a change that takes place if we yield ourselves and want God’s spirit in our life. Because that’s what He’s offered us. And we can change, the mind can change. But our motivation? Different degrees as we grow.

I, the Eternal, search the heart. Beautiful! Because He’s revealing to us, showing to us He’s the only one who can show you your deceitfulness. Someone or some who are not of a meek spirit, who believe they are right, and they have certain grounds, because after all, “It’s all out there on the internet. I’ve done my research. I know; I know what’s healthy. I know what’s good for me. I know what things I can take and put in my body and that are healthy for me. And I’m not going to listen to you, I’ve done my research. I know what’s good, and I’m going to hold on to the good because I trust in God!”

People are using that and saying, “I have faith and trust in God because that’s the way I’m living.” And then go opposite of what God is instructing us? “Well, that’s not God. That’s you.” That’s a big separation from ways, and total lack of understanding of how God is working in His Church.

After all this time, after all that’s been revealed, after all the truths. They are testimony and proof of this ministry! Paul had to say the same thing. I think Peter said something of the same nature. Can’t we learn? Do we not know now why we know what we know, how we received it? That’s what Herbert Armstrong gave. Everything that he gave, in that respect, of those truths God gave it to him to give to the Church. How did we learn it? That’s why it says, “Never forget from where you learned it?”

How about through Laodicea? Anything learned from that era? Yeah, what not to do. Because it wasn’t led by God’s spirit. There was no evidence of any truth, of anything given. On the contrary, just that of taking away from what was true. We learned from that, too. Not an apostle. Oh, that makes a little sense. Yeah.

So again here, I, the Eternal, search the heart. I try the reins, even to give to everyone according to their ways, according to the fruit of their doings. So again here, that’s why we have to go to God and say, “God show me what’s inside of me. Show me my thinking. Help me to see where I’m wrong. I want to change. I want to continue to grow. Chasten me wherever need be but have mercy.” I learned that early on, that “have mercy in chastening me.”

Proverbs 16:25. Again, we know these scriptures, but God wants us to hear them again in the context of what we’re looking at, in the context of everything we’re saying, and the context of where we are in God’s Church right now, in the context of Covid and the context of everything else that’s going on, in the context of people rubbing around on the ground in their bare feet and walking through the grass and hugging trees and whatever might be out there, or chemtrails shooting across the sky.

If any one of you talk about chemtrails, if I hear it one more time, you’re out of God’s Church. You want to believe that crap?! Because I’ve heard it since. You want to believe that stupidity?! You want to talk about it? You shouldn’t even talk about it. So, anyone who does, understand you’re disfellowshipped from God’s Church. That’s it. It’s still going on after everything I’ve said!

“I think the earth is flat.” That’s how we should see it. It’s that insane. And maybe start believing that? Is that possible that someone could start believing the earth is flat? It’s happened. (I’m sorry, and I’m not.)

Proverbs 16:25—There is a way that seems right to a person, and so many seem “right” when they do these things. And today because “I’ve done my research. It’s out there on the internet. It’s in Wikipedia.” “It’s a great source.” Sorry! Stupidity! Insanity to not understand the source of things that are out there.

Everything in the world is sick, distorted, it’s not balanced, it’s not sound. So, what do we look to? To that which is spiritual, and fight for that in the best way we can and not to let the other things lead us away to something that might resist what God is leading us in.

With that we’re going to end Part 1. “O wretched man that I am.” Beautiful thing to understand, difficult thing sometimes to see.