CHAPTER 1 COMING OUT OF SATAN S WORLD TO ENTER GOD S KINGDOM BEGINNING OUR WALK As we begin our walk, we can look to the wilderness of Judea and the Prophet, John the Baptist for direction. Matt. 3:1 2 1 In those days John the Baptist came preaching in the wilderness of Judea, 2 and saying, "Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand! Prophet John says we must repent. This is our first step onto the highway of holiness. We see this exemplified by Peter in his sermon delivered on the day of Pentecost: Acts 2:38 38 Then Peter said to them, "Repent, and let every one of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins; and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.
Who is Peter talking to here? Acts 2:39 39 For the promise is to you and to your children, and to all who are afar off, as many as the Lord our God will call. BEGINNING OUR WALK AS WE HEAR HIS CALL AND REPENT Sadly, much of the church today is so wrapped up in religion and blinded by the traditions of men that when new ones do hear the Father s call and they answer, they are not being taught the true meaning of repentance. Why? Because holiness is not a priority. Repentance can only come when we recognize that we are sinners and separated from God. Only then will we have the desire to turn from our sinful nature and start our walk in Holiness before the Lord. Again, if we do not realize we are wrong, how can we know to repent? And if we are not taught right from wrong, how can we be willing and obedient. Obedience and willingness to obey the voice of God must be in our minds and then to do the will of God, or obey, must be a heart condition as we hear Him call us individually to His flock. Jesus explained all this to the hypocritical leadership of His day. In fact He informed them that they were not even His sheep!
John 10:26 27 26 "But you do not believe, because you are not of My sheep, as I said to you. 27 "My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me. John tells us if we love God, we will keep His commandments. 1 John 5:3 3 For this is the love of God, that we keep His commandments. And His commandments are not burdensome. If we are His sheep, we will believe in Him who is truth and come to Him. We will not resist Him or His commandments. When we are exposed to the light of truth as the gospels are explained to us, our sin becomes apparent and we will want to change. We, like Adam and Eve, are naked before Him. We begin to open our eyes to our cunning ways and our sinful nature that is more like the Devil than God. The word tells us what we must do at Matthew 3:8 12. Matt. 3:8 12 8 Therefore bear fruits worthy of repentance, 9 and do not think to say to yourselves, We have Abraham as our father.
(This statement is for both the natural Hebrew and the Hebrew through new birth! Even if we are born again, we must grow and mature.) [John goes on to explain:] For I say to you, that God is able to raise up children to Abraham from these stones. 10 And even now the axe is laid to the root of the trees (the offshoots of the tree of good and evil: Satan). Therefore every tree which does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. 11 I indeed baptize you with water unto repentance, but he who is coming after me is mightier than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to carry. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. 12 His winnowing fan is in His hand, and He will thoroughly clean out His threshing floor, and gather His wheat into the barn; but He will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire. We must become the trees of righteousness spoken of in Isaiah 61:3. Isa. 61:3 3 To console those who mourn in Zion, to give them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness; that they may be called trees of righteousness, the planting of the LORD, that He may be glorified."
So once again today the Holy Spirit, through the voice of the Apostles and Prophets is addressing the modern day church leadership and telling them to teach the new ones to repent and bring forth good fruit. The consequence of disobedience is that they will be cast into the fire and burned as chaff. If holiness is not taught by leadership, the blood of the new born will be on their hands. All must be guided at the beginning of their walk to the Highway of Holiness. SARDIS, THE DEAD CHURCH Many new ones will come on the highway from the world, but sadly there are actually people in the church that are not really born again! Considering the current Revelation of Truth concerning baptism and the preparation for it, we find that most of the church is lying dead in the street. Apostle John saw a vision concerning these ones. Rev. 11:8 8 And their dead bodies will lie in the street of the great city which spiritually is called Sodom and Egypt, where also our Lord was crucified. God has a name for the church that has members in this spiritually dead condition.
Rev. 3:1 1 And to the angel of the church in Sardis write, 'These things says He who has the seven Spirits of God and the seven stars: "I know your works, that you have a name that you are alive, but you are dead. The truth or revelation concerning Cords, Proper Baptism, Israel and the destruction of the church in these last days is not understood by the majority of God s people resulting in their spiritual death. If we as individuals are one of those dead on the street then how do we regain our life? Ezekiel 37:9 10 gives us the clue. Ezek. 37:9 10 9 Then He said to me, "Prophesy to the breath, prophesy, son of man, and say to the breath, 'Thus says the Lord GOD: "Come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe on these slain, that they may live." 10 So I prophesied as He commanded me, and breath came into them, and they lived, and stood upon their feet, an exceedingly great army. Just as the church at the time of Jesus was told to repent through the prophet John, so today the prophets are prophesying or blowing the trumpets of warning to the church to repent and walk in holiness.
So if we want to live and be a part of this great army, we too must ask the Lord what should we do next! Jesus gives us the answer in John 3:3. But first we must understand our spiritually dead condition and have answered the call from God to come forth. Then we must repent from our sin and tell Him we desire to be a part of His great army. We have to be willing to leave our old life with its sin and iniquity and voice our desire to become a child of God. Then Jesus is only too happy to tell us how we can accomplish all this: John 3:3 3 Jesus answered and said to him, "Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God." We must be born again! Why? Here is a big key! Because Adam s race is cursed! John 3:5 6 5 Jesus answered, "Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. 6 That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.
We cannot do it as Adam s descendants. We must be born over again! The Word of God says: 1 Cor. 15:22 22 For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ all shall be made alive. Let us repeat this scripture: "In Adam all die, In Christ all shall be made alive!" To better understand, let us go back to the Garden in the beginning of the Bible. Here we will see what we are to become as we are born again into a creature much like Adam before his fall. In fact, let us look at diagram 1 that depicts Adam in his glorified state, whole, complete and created in the image of God.
So God created man in His own image... Then God saw everything He had made and indeed it was very good (Genesis 1:27,31) s Diagram 1 At this time the Lord was connected to Adam s spirit man. So Adam was privy to God s abilities, His authority and all knowledge. The voice of his spirit man (his conscience) was also connected to God s will. He was not driven or ruled by emotion or his five senses.
In this state Adam knew nothing but the fullness of God. He was at One in body, soul, and spirit with the Father. He was an immortal being in the Father s likeness, who only knew good. His thoughts were God s thoughts, and his heart was pure. Adam had dominion over all things because he was not a slave to sin. Nothing had him bound. All belonged to him. There was only one condition or one rule that God had given him: Gen. 2:16 17 16 And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, "Of every tree of the garden you may freely eat. 17 But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die." Upon eating the fruit from this tree, Adam fell from his glorified state. He lost his abilities and his dominion over the earth to Satan and the work of his hand became cursed. The works he would do would be his human efforts, guided by Satan rather than God. He would toil and sweat. There would be little rest. Even the ground was cursed for their sake. And, as God promised, although Adam and Eve did not immediately physically die, they did die spiritually. It was just a matter of time because of their deteriorated spiritual state before they died in the natural also.
Gen. 3:17 19 17 Then to Adam He said, "Because you have heeded the voice of your wife, and have eaten from the tree of which I commanded you, saying, 'You shall not eat of it': "Cursed is the ground for your sake; in toil you shall eat of it all the days of your life. 18 Both thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you, and you shall eat the herb of the field. 19 In the sweat of your face you shall eat bread till you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken; for dust you are, and to dust you shall return." They, their children and indeed all born of their race were cursed! They were no longer trees of righteousness and they both immediately lost their spiritual lives. Instead of eating truth from the tree of life (God) as they were told to do, they ate the lies from the tree of good and evil (Satan). They broke God s Law, became lawless, and the death sentence was passed. Now their spirit man once connected to God would die, and they, along with all their descendants would be forever connected to Satan. They entered into a timeline and would now only live a lifespan. They lost their immortality! This is sadly the state of Adam after the fall, and all of us as well, before we are born again. We are his descendants, are we not? Is it any wonder then that it is so easy for us to do wrong! Where Adam was once privy to God s ability and knowledge, he now was a rebel, an outcast that would function through Satan s ability and walk in his power and authority. He traded the wisdom of
the Word for the Intellect of man and the intelligence of Satan! Diagram 2 This diagram is to show Adam's condition after the fall.
We can say it this way: Since Adam was no longer connected to God, man s intellect, or the knowledge of Satan, was born. By eating the lies from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, Adam s thoughts turned to himself. He came to a place of self awareness. Now he could see and be enticed by sin like a
carrot in front of a horse. His thoughts were no longer pure, being connected to Satan and having lost the Mind of God, he was now operating in his own understanding or intellect. The creature that God had created in innocence and beauty had become perverted. Adam s spirit, no longer alive in the Lord, was now dead. He came under the influence of the prince of death, Satan, the tree of good and evil. No longer would Adam know the perfect peace, joy, or love which are the fruits of God s Spirit (or the Tree of Life), but instead he would carry the heavy yoke of sin from eating Satan's fruit. Gal. 5:22 23 22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness, self control. Against such there is no law. Adam, in the beginning, was all these things. He was the law. Now he would not only feel physical pain in his body, but the emotional pain of despair and grief as well in his mind. Through his sin, mankind was cursed. Pain, suffering and misery would continue to plague Adam s seed throughout the history of God s people. THE GOOD NEWS OF THE GOSPEL
The good news is: even before Adam disobeyed, God began to lay the foundation of His plan to redeem His people! God Himself through the body of Jesus, would be born into Adam s race and would take on the curse of sin and defeat death through His own death, burial, and resurrection. This sacrifice on His part would provide a way for us to Tabernacle with God, as did the original Adam and Eve, without ever dying a physical death. We see this promise in 1 Corinthians 15:51. 1 Cor. 15:51 51 Behold, I tell you a mystery: We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed Did you realize that all this was foreshadowed by the first Passover that was experienced by God s people while they were still in Egypt? Even as they sprinkled the blood of the Lamb on the doorpost of their house, today the blood of the Lamb of God is sprinkled on the doorposts and lintel of our hearts (God s house). As we repent of our sin and iniquity and cry out to God that we too want out of the world, He enters our bodies and we become His home. And with the blood of Jesus covering our sin, the Angel of Death will pass over us. Just like God s early people, if we no longer want to be a part of Adam and Satan, and we repent for the things we did as Adam s race, He is faithful to forgive us even while we are still in the world.
Side Note : We do not try to clean ourselves up before asking God to come into our hearts. We just repent and ask Him in and He will clean us up as we begin to walk on His Highway of Holiness. Our repentance will gain us access to the courtyard of God s Kingdom. There He will offer us the promise of eternal life, but we must continue our walk. We cannot stop here! EATING ALL OF THE LAMB The Israelites were commanded to eat all of the Lamb in Exodus 12:10, and, as stated earlier, Israel must do the same thing today if they want to begin their exodus from the world. Let us read from this account in Exodus. Exod. 12:3 3 "Speak to all the congregation of Israel, saying: 'On the tenth day of this month every man shall take for himself a lamb, according to the house of his father, a lamb for a household. Exod. 12:6 6 Now you shall keep it until the fourteenth day of the same month. Then the whole assembly of the congregation of Israel shall kill it at twilight. Exod. 12:9 10
9 'Do not eat it raw, nor boiled at all with water, but roasted in fire its head with its legs and its entrails. 10 You shall let none of it remain until morning, and what remains of it until morning you shall burn with fire. Exod. 12:12 12 For I will pass through the land of Egypt on that night, and will strike all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, both man and beast; and against all the gods of Egypt I will execute judgment: I am the LORD. Exod. 12:13 13 Now the blood shall be a sign for you on the houses where you are. And when I see the blood, I will pass over you; and the plague shall not be on you to destroy you when I strike the land of Egypt. SO WHERE IS THE LAMB TODAY? By now we should realize that the Lamb is the Word. He is the truth, He is the oracle or prophecy, and we must eat all of the meat of this word or all of the truth we are being taught. If we are prophesied to, we must digest it fully also. As stated before, we must eat all of the Lamb. He is served at each feast. This is eating all of Jesus, or all Wisdom and Truth and not eating of
the tree of good and evil. Satan however is the counterfeit. He is the goat! He is the unrighteous tree of good and evil. We should lose our taste for goat. We must inspect the fruit and leaves of the tree before we eat from it. We do not want to attend the wrong feast! In fact, his perverted feasts are what most of the church call their holidays. To list a few: Easter, Christmas, Halloween and the like. There are more people attending the enemy s feasts and devouring the lies of the goat than there are ones that enjoy a meal on revelation knowledge or the Lamb. How does God feel about the church s choice of holidays, or Satan s feasts? He says at Amos 5:21 Amos 5:21 21 "I hate, I despise your feast days, and I do not savor your sacred assemblies. In other words, God does not care for their compromising church services, and He hates their choice of holidays. Leviticus chapter 23 lists the feasts that belong to God. Lev. 23:2 2 "Speak to the children of Israel, and say to them: 'The feasts of the LORD,
which you shall proclaim to be holy convocations, these are My feasts. So, the Feast of Passover is the first feast in our life. The first taste of the Lamb causes us to want to leave the world that we are in with its sorrows and woes and ask God if we can enter into His world. The second bite takes away our sin. With this second bite comes the understanding of what was accomplished on the cross for us through the shed blood of Jesus. 1 Pet. 1:18 20 18 knowing that you were not redeemed with corruptible things, like silver or gold, from your aimless conduct received by tradition from your fathers, 19 but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot. 20 He indeed was foreordained before the foundation of the world, but was manifest in these last times for "you"! At this point also we begin to see the need we have to die to Adam's race and to repent of our sins. So we are at this time experiencing the second feast, Unleavened Bread. John the prophet pointed the Lamb out to the people as Jesus appeared on the scene many years ago.
John 1:29 21 The next day John saw Jesus coming toward him, and said, "Behold! the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!" The prophetic is pointing to the Lamb today also. John 1:1 1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. John 1:14 14 And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth. Remember what John said: "Behold the Lamb of God that takes away the sin of the world"? So the Word or truth is Jesus, and Jesus is the Lamb. It is true that we want our sins removed as we experience Passover, but we want even more. We want to Passover from time to eternity, and Jesus gave us this opportunity by His passing over from eternity to time so He could be our Passover Lamb.
First, He would have to be born into the Adamic race to take on its sin even though He Himself would never be overcome by the sin. His walk on the highway was perfect. He fulfilled every jot and tittle of the law. You see He had to be born into Adam s race to take our sins. But He also had to be born again to die in our place. Why? Because the Adamic race is not only sinful, it is cursed as well! Born through Mary, He too, like all born from Adam, was cursed! He, like us, also had to be born again. Matt. 3:13 17 13 Then Jesus came from Galilee to John at the Jordan to be baptized by him. 14 And John tried to prevent Him, saying, I need to be baptized by You, and are You coming to me? 15 But Jesus answered said unto him, "Permit it to be so now, for thus it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness." Then he allowed Him. 16 When He had been baptized, Jesus came up immediately from the water: and behold, the heavens were opened to Him, and He saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and alighting upon Him. 17 And suddenly a voice came from heaven, saying, "This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased." The sins and curses that were attached to Him from the Adamic race were
removed through His born again experience. Now He could be offered up as the sacrificial Lamb (perfect in every way) for our sin and the curses on our lives. As He has pre eminence in all things, He was the firstborn of many brethren. We see also Jesus set the example of baptism by immersion, so we too must be immersed to be His brethren. Rom. 8:29 29 For whom He foreknew, He also pre destined to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brethren. We will be conformed back to the image of God rather than Satan. Diagram 3 will help us to visually see the condition of the newborn after baptism.
We are reconnected to God, but as you can see, we are still receiving flying darts from Satan. He is a sore loser and does not give up easily. Eph. 6:16 16 above all, taking the shield of faith with which you will be able to quench
all the fiery darts of the wicked one. Many have come to the place where their sins are forgiven, and their spiritman is alive and perfect. They can operate in the gifts according to 1 Corinthians 12:8 10, and hear from God, but they still struggle with sin. They ask themselves, Why? In looking at our diagram, we begin to realize there are things still present in our lives that have not been dealt with. Sometimes these are things that people want to hold on to. Many times however, problems remain because there are evil spirits that are still there in the born again individual. However, once they are filled with the Holy Spirit, most people have the desire to be rid of anything that would keep them from being all they can be for the Lord. Many will ask: How can I be filled with the Holy Spirit and still have these problems? It is a hard concept to grasp, but the truth is that many of the difficulties people struggle with are actually evil spirits that inhabit them. Impossible you say? Well, let us look to Scripture. Mark 8:31 33 31 And He began to teach them that the Son of Man must suffer many things, and be rejected of the elders, and of the chief priests, and scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again. 32 He spoke this word openly. Then Peter took Him aside and began to rebuke Him.
33 But when he had turned around and looked at His disciples, he rebuked Peter, saying, "Get behind me, Satan! For you are not mindful of the things of God, but the things of men." Now Jesus loved Peter, but He heard the voice of Satan speaking through Peter and rebuked the devil. Another example is found at the Last Supper Jesus ate with His disciples before His crucifixion. We read in Luke 22: 3 that Satan entered Judas Iscariot, who in turn betrayed Jesus to the Pharisees. Luke 22:3 3 Then Satan entered Judas, surnamed Iscariot, who was numbered among the twelve (He was chosen by Jesus and was in His presence constantly). Even before the incident with Judas, Jesus said, Have I not chosen you twelve, and one of you is a devil? (John 6:70.) Some would say, "Well all that was before the cross." To this statement we offer the story of Ananias and Sapphira. They were members of the early Church after the resurrection of Jesus. Acts 5:1 3 1 But a certain man named Ananias, with Sapphira his wife, sold a possession,
2 And kept back part of the proceeds, his wife also being aware of it, and brought a certain part, and laid it at the apostles' feet. 3 But Peter said, "Ananias, why has Satan filled your heart to lie to the Holy Spirit, and keep back part of the price of the land for yourself?" Ananias and Sapphira paid with their lives, not because they held back the money, but because they lied to the Holy Spirit which dwelt in the Apostle Peter about how much they had to give. We must see that this took place after the cross, after Pentecost, and taking into consideration the way the first Church did things, after they were born again, baptized, Spirit filled believers. Here is what the early church taught. Acts 2:38 38 Then Peter said to them, "Repent, and let every one of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins; and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. All this had been experienced by Ananias and Sapphira, and yet they died! The devil killed them through spiritual law. They blasphemed the Holy Spirit. How? Because they did not see the Holy Spirit in Peter, they just saw the man, so unknowingly they lied to the Spirit of God. Now here is something we need to see: Peter said to them, "Why have you conceived this
thing in your heart?" If you will look back to diagram 3, you will see that in the born again state and in the beginning of our walk, we are perfect in spirit, but still tainted in our souls and bodies. We are still very capable of sinning. Why? Because we still have a long way to go as we travel on the Highway of Holiness, and much to understand concerning the feasts of God. We still have cords of iniquity binding our thinking due to false doctrine in the church. Because the world we were born into was created by the lies of Satan, we still have cords of iniquity to the systems of man and the pleasures of the world he created. Our next chapter will help us understand these cords.