The Scourge Of Racism
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Since God has purposely planned for His sons to inhabit eternity with Him to fulfill roles and purposes of His design, then this should be revealed in some measure in His Word as has been the case with His mortal plans. Truly, it is as Scripture teaches: faithful Christians on earth are now receiving a radical make over inwardly that will also thoroughly affect what bodies we have for eternity. This edited part one is the first of a three part previously published 2013 celebratory treatise briefly exploring the resurrection to immortal glory first accomplished by the Father in His only begotten Son, Jesus Christ, and promised also to His followers at His return to earth!
Originally Published April 2013
Besides the creation of man by God, the permanent, bodily resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead is among the greatest displays of divine power in history! Coming on the third day after His death on the cross, His spirit that had departed returned to His lifeless body and it lived a second time; no more ever able to die. While He had previously displayed the divine power to raise others from the dead, they eventually died again. Jesus Christ, however, is the first and only Person until now to die, be raised to immortality and glorified after ascending to Heaven (Daniel 7:13-14; Luke 24:26, 50-51). He wills that all of His followers have His experience (John 6:40, 17:22).
As the Lord led me to write in a June 2012 Commentary titled, Man As God Designed Him, it was the divine intent that human mortality be only temporary. The possibility of immortality through the “tree of life” was already in the Garden of Eden when Adam was brought to it by God (Genesis 2:8-9, NKJV). All he had to do was eat from it which was not forbidden until after he sinned (Genesis 2:16-17; 3:22-24)! Clearly, mortality was the divine intended stage one of human existence to allow for death as the consequence for foreknown sin (Revelation 13:8). Truly, contrary to the consequential pain and grief it has caused us from Adam, physical death is an act of divine mercy!
He who foreknew Adam's fall and planned for it, also forever dismissed the prospect of his living forever to father children of sin when "the LORD God sent him out of the Garden of Eden," (Genesis 3:23, NKJV). Thus, the original divine directive to man as male and female to “Be fruitful and multiply; fill the earth” remained in effect as a mission of mortality in a temporary age of mortality dominated by death (Genesis 1:28, 3:16-19, 5:1-5, 8:20-9:1, NKJV). So used to the temporary routine of mortal life and death is mankind that many--including professing Christians--live hopelessly as though this is the eternally inevitable norm (Ecclesiastes 1:2-15, 2:1-24; Isaiah 22:13b, 56:12).
However, God who knows the end from the beginning permitted this routine of mortal life and death as part of His important plans for man and his salvation, for the Creator of man created him seeking eternal sons upon which to confer the inheritance of His eternal riches. Sin and death interrupted but did not finally thwart His plans. Therefore, God has been working during this mortal age to bring forth sons in the number of His will through Christ (Genesis 22:15-18; Romans 8:14-17; Galatians 3:7-29; Ephesians 2:4-7; Hebrews 2:10-16; Revelation 21:7). Indeed, He is the "firstborn from the dead" (Romans 8:29; Colossians 1:9-23; Revelation 1:4-8, NKJV).
The Lord's permanent, bodily resurrection from the dead was of monumental magnitude concerning immortality and opened a wide vista of consideration about it. While God did not reveal every detail about immortality and His future plans in His Word, there is enough information provided by the prophets, Christ and His apostles to keep us who believe joyfully thinking about it like dreamy eyed children lying in bed on Christmas Eve until the Lord returns. As with every other aspect of this eternal life we have in Christ, the redeemed sons of God are expected by Him to search out by the Holy Spirit the instruction in His Word related to our immortal future (1 Corinthians 2:9-12).
Authors down through the centuries and Hollywood more recently have either struggled to grasp or purposely took improper creative license with how Christ exited the tomb. The now false consensus that the stone was rolled away and he walked out in shining glory is popular, but not Scriptural. The New Testament accounts have folk arriving to find an empty tomb with angels in three of the four Gospels announcing the Lord's resurrection (Matthew 28:1-6; Mark 16:1-6; Luke 24:1-7; John 20:1-10). Why does this matter? It matters because the truth reveals that after His resurrection, the Lord stayed long enough to carefully fold a burial item, then in His immortal body, vanish from the sealed tomb as He did later seated amid disciples (Luke 24:30-31).
Clearly, the laws of physics, space or time did not limit the immortal body of the Lord as is powerfully seen too in His ascension into the spiritual dimension where Heaven is located above this present universe (Acts 1:9-11, 9:3-7; 2 Corinthians 12:1-4). Yet, in His immortal body, He could eat food and be touched (Luke 24:36-43; John 20:24-29). The resurrection of Jesus Christ into an immortal body matters because it is the eyewitness anchor of the Gospel that saves those that have believed and hope in His promise that we too shall be raised from the dead into immortal bodies (1 Corinthians 15:1-23, 29-34). The risen, living Christ continues His cry among American churches, "Who is on the Lord's side?"
In my book, “The Strong Man Of God, Back To Basics,” I write in some detail about the temporary roles and activity God has assigned men and women in this present mortal age. Satan, sin and self has done so much to corrupt the understanding of those roles and activity that in these latter days a “battle of the sexes” not sanctioned by God is underway creating confusion and destroying lives. This evil battle will end forever at Christ’s coming, but the eternal roles and activity God has designed for man, His creature, will continue solely with His saints. As I point out in this edited 2012 Commentary, this eternal design is exceedingly greater than that which is mortal!
Originally Published June 2012
Many professing Christian men live as though their present mortal experience is the greatest of all possible experiences in their eternal existence. While they claim to believe in "life after life," they live like "this is as good as it gets." As a result, they deny themselves nothing that they desire and are too focused on and consumed by the temporary experiences of this life including the over acquisition of material things. Teaching in many churches and Christian media are responsible in major part because prosperity is their emphasis. Even those concerned with helping men speak almost exclusively to their mortal roles as husbands and fathers. But man as God designed him is more.
That God has greater plans for man than his mortal existence is hinted at in Eden and loudly heralded by Jesus Christ (Genesis 1:26, 2:7-9, 3:17-19, 22-24; Luke 20:27-40; John 10:10, 11:25-26, 38-44, 14:1-6). Mortality was always only intended to be a temporary, stage one of human existence. The "tree of life" which in its fruit provided instantaneous immortality among the trees of Eden could have been accessed by Adam. In his mortality, however, the man was tested as to his willingness to obey his Creator, failed and was driven from the garden (Genesis 2:16-17, 3:6, 22-24). But God was not done with man for He had created him to live in a body and serve His purposes forever!
Millennia later, out of the context of unrestrained praise to God for the excellence of His name in the whole earth and glory beyond the physical universe (Psalm 8:1-3), Israel's king David marvels and asks Him the rhetorical question of creation's ages. He wants to know, "What is man that You are mindful of him, and the son of man that You visit (give attention to, care for) him," (Psalm 8:4, NKJV)? The question is followed by David's recognition of man's exalted role and responsibility in God's created order as ruler over all the works of His hands and a restatement of praise for the excellence of God's name in the whole earth (Psalm 8:5-9). Truly, man's eternal destiny is great!
While being a man as God designed does involve for most being husbands and fathers in this present age, these roles are temporary; partial preparation for and a foreshadowing of the ultimate rule to which God created us to serve. To that end sin and death did not alter God's purpose that man should be immortal. Bodily resurrection is now God's primary bridge to immortality. It is about rising to die no more. This is stage two of human existence leading to rule over all the works of His hands. All who ever lived and died will be raised from the dead to immortality, but not all will enjoy God’s eternal life and glory brought to light by Jesus Christ (John 5:24-30; 2 Timothy 1:8-10).
Every aspiring strong man of God should be fervently living out our mortal lives to please God while eagerly looking forward to the hope of immortal glory through Christ who has gone on before us and is soon to return (Colossians 1:9-18, 24-28; Titus 2:11-14)! Our mortal experience swallowed up in immortality will be in time by roughest comparison like a grain of sand at the universe’s center; in quality, no comparison! The apostle Paul teaches us to live now as if Christ has already raised us to immortal glory. This being the case, we are to set our minds on and value the things important to Heaven where Christ is already seated in immortal glory (Colossians 3:1-2).
This does not mean as some charge teachers like me teach that to please God we must withdraw from the world and take a vow of poverty. Conversely, it certainly does not mean that we sell our souls out to pursuing pleasure, money and things to the point Kingdom priorities in the Gospel and this life are lost to us (Luke 12:15-21; Colossians 3:3-6). I have known too many professing Christians that have allowed the pursuit of riches to ruin their otherwise promising spiritual walk as the Bible forewarns (1 Timothy 6:6-10). Nevertheless, I am a living witness of the gracious provision God extends to the man who puts Christ and His Kingdom first (1 Timothy 6:11-16).
Therefore, let every aspiring strong man of God in the image of Christ be the husband to his wife, father to his children and son to his parents God's Word requires in the power that our eternal Companion, the Holy Spirit supplies. However, know He is not just concerned for our fruitfulness in those temporary roles, but also as God designed in our eternal roles as sons, disciples and servants of God and fellow man. In all our roles the Spirit prepares us for eternal service as rulers with Christ over every creature and created thing our God has made as part of our glorious inheritance in Him (Romans 8:15-23; Revelation 22:1-5). Do not miss out seeking after yours now! The risen, living Christ continues His cry among American churches, "Who is on the Lord's side?"
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