The Redemption Of The Body

I love to bring out the mysteries of Christ. I'm just filled up and overflowing with the wonderful revelation of God, but you can't express very much to the people in forty-five minutes. Paul preached all night long. When the Lord called Elijah, He told him to eat a lot because it would take him forty days before he finished his work. When Moses went up on the mountain, he was there forty days talking with God. When he came down, he found the children of Israel disobeying God. He threw the tables of stone down, which the commandments were written on, and had to go back up on the mountain and stay forty more days with God.

We can see why the churches are in the condition they are in today. They expect you to preach forty-five minutes and let them go home. Saints of old kept their minds on the Lord. They sold their houses and lands and had all things common. They had the love of God in their hearts and the love of the world wasn't there. Jesus said, "I have many things to say unto you, but you are dull of hearing." I'd like to speak unto you as unto spirituals, but seeing that you are babes in Christ, I can't do that. So, desire the sincere milk of the Word that you might grow thereby.

Nevertheless, it is not me speaking to you, but it is God speaking from within me, and if I allow God to speak to you, then comes forth the great mysteries of God. They are great, wonderful, heavenly treasures that God desires to put into your earthen vessels. The wicked shall not see when good comes because they don't have spiritual eyes to see. Having eyes, they see not. There was a man that came before a great man of God who was talking about the things of God and the great power of God, and he asked, "If you have this power of God that you are speaking of, why don't you smite me blind?" The preacher answered, "I don't have to. You are already blind."

I can preach to you without any problem. I can stir you up, and we can shout and have a good time. But that is like an appetizer before you eat a meal. I want to minister the deep things of God to you so you can grow in the grace and in the knowledge of the Lord. You have to come here hungry for the meat of the Word. If you go out into the world and, all day long, fill yourself up with the things of this world, then you come here, you aren't going to have any hunger for the things of God. Revelation will turn people from darkness unto light. The thing that is wrong with the churches of today is they shout, sing, and have a good time. The rain comes on the just and the unjust. They laugh and rejoice, but they haven't grown in the knowledge of the Lord. They leave church and go back out to play football, basketball, and other sports of the world and become bulldogs, red devils, yellow jackets, and that sort of thing. They know nothing about serving God in Spirit and in truth. Let's don't frustrate the grace of God.

Reading from chapter 2 of the book of Colossians: 

Colossians 2:1-3: "For I would that ye knew what great conflict I have for you, and for them at Laodicea, and for as many as have not seen my face in the flesh; That their hearts might be comforted, being knit together in love, and unto all riches of the full assurance of understanding, to the acknowledgement of the mystery of God, and of the Father, and of Christ; In whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge." 

Jesus was God's treasure chest, and God, the eternal Spirit, was the treasure. That treasure was within the body of Jesus to tabernacle there because He was the treasure chest. And now, we're the body of the Lord Jesus in the earth. We have this heavenly treasure in these earthen vessels because we are the body of the Lord Jesus, God's treasure chest. When a young lady is going to get married, she gets a hope chest. She's putting everything that she can into the hope chest until the bridegroom comes. That's the way we are. We are expecting a marriage and we want to put everything we can in our hope chest. So then, Christ within us is the hope of glory, and we begin to fill our hope chest with all these wonderful things that we're going to have in the day of our marriage.

Colossians 2:4-5: "And this I say, lest any man should beguile you with enticing words. For though I be absent in the flesh, yet am I with you in the spirit, joying and beholding your order, and the stedfastness of your faith in Christ."

Can that be possible? Can it be that Christ is with us in Spirit and not here in body? Or could it be that Paul was actually with that congregation when he wasn't there in his body. He did say, "Whether in the body or out of the body I cannot tell," but he spoke of a man, perhaps the inner man the way he expressed it, who was caught up to the third heaven.

Colossians 2:6-9: "As ye have therefore received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk ye in him: Rooted and built up in him, and stablished in the faith, as ye have been taught, abounding therein with thanksgiving. Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ. For in him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily."

Getting back to the body now. 

Colossians 2:10-23: "And ye are complete in him, which is the head of all principality and power: In whom also ye are circumcised with the circumcision made without hands, in putting off the body of the sins of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ: Buried with him in baptism, wherein also ye are risen with him through the faith of the operation of God, who hath raised him from the dead. And you, being dead in your sins and the uncircumcision of your flesh, hath he quickened together with him, having forgiven you all trespasses; Blotting out the handwriting of ordinances that was against us, which was contrary to us, and took it out of the way, nailing it to his cross; And having spoiled principalities and powers, he made a shew of them openly, triumphing over them in it. Let no man therefore judge you in meat, or in drink, or in respect of an holyday, or of the new moon, or of the sabbath days: Which are a shadow of things to come; but the body is of Christ. Let no man beguile you of your reward in a voluntary humility and worshipping of angels, intruding into those things which he hath not seen, vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind, And not holding the Head, from which all the body by joints and bands having nourishment ministered, and knit together, increaseth with the increase of God. Wherefore if ye be dead with Christ from the rudiments of the world, why, as though living in the world, are ye subject to ordinances, (Touch not; taste not; handle not; Which all are to perish with the using;) after the commandments and doctrines of men? Which things have indeed a shew of wisdom in will worship, and humility, and neglecting of the body; not in any honour to the satisfying of the flesh."

We're told in the third chapter, that we should seek those things above, where Christ is risen and sitting at the right hand of God, for our life is hid with Christ in God until the time of the change of the body. It says in chapter one, the twelfth verse: "Giving thanks unto the Father, which hath made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light: Who hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of his dear Son." I want you to notice this as pertaining to the mysteries. It says, "Giving thanks unto the Father, which hath made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light." When you say light, you're talking about understanding.

So it says, "To be partakers of the inheritance." There is an inheritance, and flesh and blood cannot inherit that inheritance. It must be an inner, spiritual man that inherits the spiritual glory and heavenly treasures. The Bible says that we are partakers of this inheritance of the saints in light, for God hath delivered us from the power of darkness and hath translated us into the kingdom of His dear Son. That is, He hath delivered us from the ignorance of man's ever learning, which is darkness, and hath translated us into light, which means godly understanding in what Christ has given us through the mind of God. Then it says: "In whom we have redemption through his blood, even the forgiveness of sins: Who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of every creature." He's the body, the fullness of the Godhead bodily. We read it in chapter two, the ninth verse: "For in him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily."

Jesus is the image of the invisible God. God, being a Spirit, is invisible. The firstborn of every creature is Jesus Christ, for by Him were all things created that are in heaven and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, dominions, principalities or powers. All things were created by Him and for Him, and He is before all things. By Him, all things consist, and He is the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning, the first born from the dead, so that in all things He might have preeminence, for it pleased the Father that in Him should all fullness dwell.

The Bible says that He has made peace for us, and here we find that we have come into light and have left darkness, and now we are saints of God in light. If you walk in the light as He is in the light, you, as saints of God, will have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ cleanses us from all sin. But, if we say that we walk in the light and yet do not fellowship with our brother and do not love our brother in deed, then we abide in death, and we are still in darkness. We are yet in the ignorance of our own understanding, and are exiled from the wonderful world of light. We see here that that the mystery of God, this heavenly treasure, as concerning this light, is hid in God. That means there is another world. There is a celestial world somewhere. 

We are living in the terrestrial world, and we have placed the greatest emphasis on things of less value because our evaluation is not proper. We expedite the cause of the flesh, which really expedites the kingdom of Satan, and we hinder the work of God, and stop the things of God when we should be expediting the cause of God and the kingdom of God. We pray: "Father, Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done in this earth as it is in heaven." Pray that it will be done. I say the law and the prophets came at Calvary. Why is it that we're not praying, "Father, now let Your will be done in my life. Let Your will be done in my body. Let Your will be done in the government. Let Your will be done in this world. You said to pray 'Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven'."

When Jesus went away, He gave the kingdom to you and me, and gave Peter the keys to the kingdom that he might open the kingdom we we could have this heavenly treasure in earthen vessels. At last, the kingdom of God is here. It's been here ever since Calvary. But, it hasn't been here to you and I until we're born into the world, until we come to our generation. We're not partakers. Those generations behind us had privilege to it, but they're all dead and gone. The entire generation of the past dies. That means there is a new world, as to the contribution of those that have given toward it, whether it be scientifically, or their ingenuity, or to building, or whatever. There is a new world for a new generation, and it isn't long before that generation all dies. And then, there is a new generation, and there is a new world, as to what that generation contributed toward the children that were coming on. So it is in the Spirit. It is the same way with the things of God."

Every preacher, every child of God, through every generation, has contributed something, and then they lay down to sleep. They did not die as the generations die, but they did lay down to sleep. As the Bible says, "He fell upon sleep." So, they lay down to sleep. They have not died. To go to sleep is to lose what they had invested, but they're going to wake up at the end of the way and possess everything that every generation, as to the spiritual people of God, have contributed to the cause, to enjoy it throughout eternity. But everything the natural man will be lost. It's gone, because he sowed to the flesh, and everything that's in the flesh is corruptible. It decays and it passes away. The world passes away. All that's in it, passes away.

The Bible says that if you sow to the flesh, whatever wealth you might have, whatever your title might be, you're still sowing to the diminishing side of life, and if you sow to the flesh, then you are sowing corruption, and all of it comes back to you as reaping corruption. If you sow to the flesh, ye shall of the flesh reap corruption, the deteriorating of all things that pass away because that's all you can get out of it. You know it's going to rust out and rot out. Something's going to happen to it, whether it's physical, or it's natural. Whatever it might be, you're going to lose it. If it's a lot of knowledge, you're still going to lose it. Education and titles and diplomas: you're going to lose it. Positions and praise and prestige: you're going to lose it. Monetary values: you're going to lose it. All of it is perishing, but he that soweth to the Spirit shall of the Spirit reap everlasting life. I sow to the Spirit, I'm going to reap a celestial body.

We read again, right here in Colossians, that Jesus is the fullness of the Godhead, bodily speaking. That is to say, He is in the realm of human physics, as to the earth, and He is the fullness of the Godhead, bodily speaking. God did not give the Spirit unto the Son by measure, but He poured the entirety of Himself into the body of Jesus and said, "I'm pleased to dwell in this body." There has never been anything that was ever done, but what God did it through the body of Jesus, before the body was ever made manifest in the world, as the expression of God or the express image of His person, before God sent a human form so that you can see what He's like. Before Jesus ever came into the world, He was with the Father in the beginning, and the Bible says that all things, whether invisible or visible, were made by Him. That is to say, Michael, Gabriel, the angels, those invisible forces, were made by Jesus. Jesus is the one that created everything. Christ came down in the human body called Jesus, and so then, we come right back to the body again.

Having a discussion on the body, we find out that the greater emphasis is placed on the body as to a bodily redemption. There is a bodily redemption, and I have been trying to tutor people for years now to bring the details of the Spirit and not drive them too fast, to let them know about the spiritual indwelling person, which the Bible calls it the inner man, that they might understand that man and they might perfect that man. I am trying to travail until Christ be formed within you, and when He is formed in you, you might understand that you cannot sin, and that inwardly, you have passed from death unto life and that you can never come into condemnation. I've had to come down hard, teaching you to get out of the world, teaching you to stay away from the evils of the world, the frolics of the world, and the gullible desires of the world. I've had to come down that trail first so you would know that you can't do those things and be a Christian. I've preached to you repentance and separation, telling you to come out of the world and be a separate people so that you don't do those ugly things, don't say those ugly things, and don't think those ugly things. You can't be like those ugly people. I taught you that if you did continue in those things, then are ye of the devil and you would perish in the fire. I taught you that to bring you out of the world. When I got you out, I began to see that you were willing to make your efforts to be holy, and to be godly, and to be clean, and separate yourself from the world. 

I know all of you haven't done that, and I know that all of you are not going to do that. There will always be spots and blemishes in this feast of charity. Wells without water, the Bible says, clouds driven about by the tempest, waves foaming out their own shame. But, there are those that did come out of Egypt, that did not look back into Egypt, that went on into the Canaan land. There are those that God raised up, who were spiritual people to that degree of knowledge that they had in that day. 

So then, we see that God has a people. He's always had a people. Even when Elijah fled and felt like that there wasn't anybody else in the land, when he said, "I alone am left." The Lord said, "I've got seven thousand that have never bowed their knees to Baal." God has always had people. Even in Paul's day, he said, "At this present moment, there is still a remnant according to the election of grace." If it be of grace, then it's not of works lest any man should boast. 

I preached that you must come out of Egypt, and you must come out from among them, to be a separate people. "Touch not the unclean things, and I will receive you," saith the Lord. When you came out and were willing to do that, though you stumbled and staggered and had problems, God, through His tender mercy, still stretched out His hand to lead you and help you to go into the wonderful Canaan of God, to come into that wonderful, celestial world.

Then, when you were doing your best, I preached that you should not condemn yourself over that thing which you allow. Happy is he that doth not condemn himself over that thing which he allowed, because there is now, therefore, no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh but after the Spirit. You weren't walking after the flesh because you turned away from the flesh, and you tried your best to walk after the Spirit. Then, I preached your eternal security to you, and I took you another step. 

The first lap on the journey from Egypt to Canaan is out of Egypt, then the second lap is into the wilderness, and out of the wilderness into Canaan is the third lap. When the serpents begin to bite you and all these things begin to happen to you, I taught you the glory of God, the blessings of God, and that you can go on into Canaan. I taught you about these wonderful things, how that God has carried you on the wings, so to speak, and how He hath suffered for you and was bruised for your iniquity, and now you are in God and you cannot sin because you have come into God. I taught you how secure you are in God because you are determined to live a holy life regardless of what happens. You're not looking back into Egypt. You're not turning back into Egypt. You're not leaning on those things or going down to Egypt for your help. It was a sure thing that you were the candidates of God for this wonderful, eternal security.

I preached to you this wonderful godship, and this wonderful eternal life, and this wonderful eternal security, and how that God had already appropriated these things and passed them on to you, and now they are yours. Because your efforts are put forth to the best of your ability, then this thing envelops you and swallows you up. The devil is no match for you, and behold, He gave unto you power over all the powers of the enemy, and nothing shall by any means hurt you. I preached these things to perfect the spiritual man on the inside of you so that the spiritual man could rise up in great confidence and say, "Well, praise God I made it! By His help I made it!" 

*As I began to preach this to you, then that brings into view the next lap of the way, which is the land of Canaan, which is to bring you into the redemption of the body. So I began to say to you, "Folks, the redemption of the body is a different thing altogether." I say the redemption of the body means God dealing with the Jews, not with the Gentiles, and that when you come thus far, Moses was taken off of the scene. The reason he was taken off of the scene was because it was showing the time of the Gentiles, and as to that end, all of a sudden, then came the Canaan land, where again the great kingdom was established, as to Israel, and they received their king. We're coming down to the Jordan, where I said to you that you have to get over death. Now the redemption of the body, now going into Canaan, now to be able to get the new harvest.

So that's what we have been doing. We've been bringing you down to this, that now this is the redemption of the body, so that brings the Jewish people in. That's why that we spoke to you about seven times going into Israel and prophesying in Israel saying, "The time is fulfilled. The kingdom of God is at hand." So then, now to Israel it is repentance. Now to Israel, the kingdom of God is at hand. It wasn't before, because Israel was blinded in part that they should not see the kingdom of God. But now all of a sudden, now Israel's eyes come open as to their generation and their reception, and now it is unto them as the kingdom of God being at hand. So then, we are preaching, "Now the kingdom of light unto them. Come out of darkness. You've been in darkness. Now come out of darkness, and come into this marvelous light." There shall be light at the end time or the evening time. Come into this marvelous light that God has given through His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ.

So we preach to you, we teach you, we try to go into the deep mysteries of God, as to the spiritual things, so that you will be spiritually adequate for the purpose. Now, we bring to you the redemption of the body, to detail things to your mind, so that you that have come out, and you that have become spiritual, and you that have made your efforts, and you that have invested your time in God, you who are willing to give up the frolics of the world and the frivolous things of the world, you are coming into these things that we have taught you, and that you are the candidates for this wonderful change of the body, which is the celestial body coming into view. 

Paul spoke of our earthly house of this tabernacle being dissolved, this one that's been going through the wilderness. This is the one that the devils have been getting a hold of, as to the serpents biting, but now, getting over the carnal mind, getting over Jordan, all of a sudden, then it is said to you that there is another tabernacle, eternal in the heavens, not made with hands, which is, of course the body of the Lord Jesus Christ. As ye have born the image of the earthly, which ye have as to the first man Adam (in Adam all die), that is the image of the earthly, but now, you are to bear the image of the heavenly, which is the body of the Lord Jesus Christ. So they say to us, "Put on the body of the Lord Jesus." Put ye on the body of the Lord Jesus, for as many as have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ. So then, we are getting our Sunday garment on now. We're getting the garment that was tried in the fire, in that Jesus went through the fire for us, and the Bible says that God suffered not His soul to remain in hell, nor His body to see corruption.

So then, we find out that here this thing about the body, as to the dispute over Moses' body, and the thing of Elijah's body, and the thing of Enoch's body. We began to study this. We began to understand this, and just as we come to it, we find out that we meet a great barrage, as to a force, that is determined that they're not going to let us into Canaan. As it was at the first, when we could have gone into Canaan, but the giants discouraged us because we were no match for evil spirits and demons and devils, so we backed off, just as it was with the Jewish people when they couldn't go in. As children, they just played around. As children, they sat down to eat and to drink, and they rose up to play, and today, they're still playing. Instead of eating and drinking at God's table, they're playing ball and they're taking the children's ball game away from them. They're doing the little silly things, and they've gotten into racing and everything, all kind of frolics. They're playing.

Now, here we are again. We have an opportunity to go into Canaan. We've come through this great wilderness and God said, "I've led you by this wilderness for the space of forty years, that I might humble you, that I might teach you, that I might make you to understand, that I might have you, not as a rebellious people, but a submissive people, that I might project My strength and go up before you and fight your battles for you." When they crossed over into Canaan, He let the angels of heaven cast the hail stones out of heaven, and He made the sun to stand still, and He brought it about as to the moon standing still so that they could have the light. Once you cross over the old intellectual darkness of the Jordan, then you're over here in the land of light. All of this we allegorically see, for we see how that they've passed through the spheres, how that Shepherd the astronaut went through, as to a door open in heaven, and we see how Armstrong went on up to the moon, and we see out here, far beyond the curvature of this world, that there's light all the time. When you get up there, there's light everywhere. There's light all the time. The world being tilted as it is, and the sun going around like this. There's light all the time, because you have excelled. You've gotten over Jordan.

So, you have an eternal day of light. You don't go to sleep and wake up, and go to sleep and wake up, which is symbolic of a man that dies and then he's resurrected. People die and they're resurrected. That's what sleep is a type of. The daystar goes down. You're over here with God, the light, as Adam, and then you get away from the light, the expulsion, and the sun goes down in your life. I said the other day, we were talking about the woman that sang, "Praise Him when the sun goes down." So then, we're in the sundown of your life, and that thing is going down, so you find that you go to sleep. You're not dead. Jesus said, "Lazarus sleepeth." And then the Lord said," I go to awake him." So then, we find that, sure enough, God is letting them go to sleep, and then waking them up. 

But now we've come over the Jordan. What have we done? We have realized that we've passed from death unto life, that we're not going to go to sleep and wake up anymore. We've passed from death unto life as to the inner man. There is no more death for him. His sins are gone. They're in the sea of God's forgetfulness. You can't find them anymore. With sin goes the sting of death. With that comes eternal life, the freedom. The Bible says that God heard the groaning of the prisoners, and in a time accepted, He succored them. He looked down and He heard the groaning of the prisoners, of those that were appointed unto death, and the Bible says, He loosed them, and some of them even came up out of the grave and witnessed to it.

So today, we're loosed. We're loosed. Our inner man is loosed from death. It was taken into captivity in the garden by the feminine part, by the weakness of the woman through the beast mind, and it has been held into captivity ever since. But now, Jesus has come down here. He's put the beast to death. He's defeated him in Satan. In thus doing, He cast Satan out and said, "I've destroyed him that had power over death and I beheld him fall as lightning from heaven." It's recorded over in Revelation chapter 12, where there's war in heaven, and right now, we're talking about the "Star Wars" about this time of age.

So then, we find out that God has defeated Satan. He says to you and I, "Greater is He (Christ) within you than he (Satan) that is in the world, Satan the prince of this world." He gave you power over all the powers of the enemy, which power is the Holy Ghost on the inside of you, God's Holy Ghost, Christ on the inside of you. You becoming one with Him. He said, "I give unto you power over all the powers of the enemy, and nothing shall by any means hurt you." So then, we know that we have power over poverty. We know that we have power over sickness. We know now that we have power over devils and demons that drive people out of their minds, and cause them to go insane. We have power over anything that would affect us in any way, physically, spiritually, financially, naturally, whatever it might be. We have all power, but the thing is, though we've got this tutoring, we didn't come into Canaan to the extent of the change of the body. Though Moses gave them all of this tutoring, yet when they got down to the Jordan, they had to cross the Jordan. They had come out from the world. They had to be a separate people. They had to kill out the carnal mind on the next leg of the journey, kill out the carnal mind, to bring every thought into subjection to the obedience of Christ, because the Jordan was symbolic of the carnal mind, and to be carnally minded is death. The reason God said, "In the day that thou eatest thereof, thou shalt surely die," was because of the carnal mind. Because of the carnal mind, the curse was over everything. The only way that the curse can be lifted, as I said, is by Calvary. The only way it can be lifted is in Jesus, but in this, even though it's lifted, you cannot be partakers of it unless you believe in what He has said. You must be partakers of it by faith, because it has never yet come to pass, as to the bodily change, and will not come to pass, as to your environment being changed, nor your body being changed, until the last week of Daniel comes in, because the Jews represent the law, that which is the body that's blinded in part.

So we find out that we have to come over the carnal mind. We have to get over the Jordan. We have to shut that out. We have to shut all that out, and then when we shut that out, we go into the redemption of the body, to get the new harvest. We don't have to have that walk of unleavened bread. We don't have to have that anymore, because that extends from the blood line as to the Red Sea, where Pharaoh or the devil was swallowed up, as we say, in the blood. It can't get across the blood, and the unleavened, as to the unleavened bread, as to the sincerity of walking with God, it extends from the Red Sea all the way through the wilderness and over to Jordan, and God has allowed you to do that, to let the body be killed out by the body of Jesus at the Red Sea, as to the blood, and that the devils and the demons are killed out with you, because if you don't partake of the body, and if you mortify the deeds of the body, then the devils cannot get to your spiritual man because they have to work through the body. Reckon yourselves to be dead in deed unto sin by the body of the Lord Jesus, and dead to the things of the world by the body of Jesus Christ. So then, you are separated from that, and you're not in the earth, as to be in the body in the flesh, but you're now in the Spirit, as to be in heaven, and you are now in the heavenly places, and therefore we do not fulfill the lust of the flesh because we're separated. The rent veil at Calvary did away with the body. That's what the rent veil was for. Calvary was to rend the body from the spirit, take the body, lay it away in death, and Satan can never touch us, because he has to work through the body to get to the spirit, and the spirit is no longer in the body. It's been taken away. It's been placed in heaven and put in the body of Jesus Christ by the foreknowledge of God, as to see it as unto a finished product. So then, we can't sin because sin is of the flesh, and the body is dead because of sin. God killed it because of sin, to take away sin and to cut off occasion from Satan.

Our inner man, our spiritual being, is the only life there is in that the body is dead without the spirit. The body profiteth nothing. It's from the dust. It is nothing. Your light is the spiritual being on the inside, and as a spiritual being, you are now hid with Christ in God whom the heavens have received unto the restoring or the change of the body. We have to wait for the redemption of the body, which we call the purchased possession, for the body, the creature, it will be redeemed, but it must be brought in by adoption. It has to be brought in by adoption, which means the law. It has to come through the law, but we can, at this present time, manifest Christ on the inside, by subduing the human form until Christ is living and we're not living anymore in that our body is dead anyway. We finally do away with all human ego and desire, and there's nothing but Christ's will and Christ's Words and Christ's thoughts and Christ's desire and Christ's deeds. So then, it's not us living but Christ, and the world sees Jesus.

This is what God is trying to get us to do, but there is much to be said concerning this, as to the redemption of the body, as to differentiate between the celestial and the terrestrial, as to whether you are terrestrial or celestial. The determining, as to whether you are celestial or terrestrial, is according to your deeds. The child is known by his deeds, which means the celestial and the terrestrial. This is made manifest, fully manifested as to the eye, by the child's deed. So we see that Jesus was the fullness of God. He fully gave Himself to God, that God was fully manifested in His life. He didn't have any personal desires. He didn't have any personal ambition. He didn't take on any projects, as to project Himself, nor did He seek to make of himself a reputation, but He humbled Himself as a servant, to wash the feet of the brethren, to serve the brethren, and to die for the brethren or for humanity. So then, God fully was manifested in Jesus, but the thing is, is it going to be part with us, or are we going to let God be fully manifested in us? Are we going to come to the full measure of the full stature, or are we going to have a reservation, as to our own things in life, our own ambitions in life, our own career in life, our own program in life? Are we going to hold something for ourselves, or are we going to surrender to God fully, that we might say that it is not us living, but Christ living within us, and the life I now live I now live by the Son of God that the world may see Jesus.

See, this is the thing I'm trying to bring you to. Why am I trying to bring you to that? Because that is the church. The ones that can come to that, as to a full surrender to the best of their ability, they're going to be the bride. No one else is going to be the bride, but they're going to be the bride. And when they come to that place, and there is a body of believers that will come to that place, then God is going to translate them out of here, and they're going to be changed in their body so as not to go by the way of the grave, and in that, the bride is going to go out of here like that. When the bride goes out of here like that, that means that it has been that the head has appeared in the heavens, and it is calling it's members to Himself. At that time, we'll not exceed the dead in Christ, for there are people that died in Jesus Christ that will be the bride. They died in Jesus Christ. They could not be made perfect without us under the law, but they did confess that they were pilgrims and strangers and looking toward our day of perfection. When that which is perfect is come, then God loosed them that were appointed unto death and that were in the graves. He went down. He preached to the souls in prison, and He gave them the white robes, and thus they crossed Calvary. They crossed death, and death was conquered, and they were on the side of the bride, but He said, "Rest." They had to rest until the rest of them go through their training, and according to their degree of knowledge of what God gave to them, that is what He expected out of them, and to whom He gave much, He expected much, and to whom He gave much, He would require the more. And so then, when they come out, they join us and the rest of them are left. The wicked dead lived not again until the thousand years are finished, and then God will call them after the millennium. He'll call the wicked dead out of the graves to judge them and to turn them into the lake of fire.

So with these few little words of exhortation tonight, I'm just telling you that there is a great mighty thing, as to the redemption of the body. How many of you are going to get over Jordan, I don't know. I don't know. But I do know one thing. There is a remnant according to the election of grace. There is a people in the world that is the predestinated of God, and these people are going to get over their intellectual reasoning, their intellectual thirst for the things of the world, and their gullible desire as to that which Satan savors. Being the prince of this world, he savors the things that be of the flesh. The saints are going to get loose from that. And in that they do, they are going to count, as Paul said, everything behind as being lost, everything to gain as Christ, and in doing that, they're going to give their bodies a living sacrifice to this extent: if they work on the job, they won't be working for the belly, nor working for the family, nor working to pay bills, but they'll be working for God. Everything they do, everything they think, in everything they plan to love Him with all of their strength, all of their minds, and to give themselves completely unto God, doing all things, even their labor, as unto the Lord, to labor that they might have to give to the weak. They're going to give themselves so completely that they're not going to have time to sit around and to joke with the family, and visit with the family, and go out and do the things with the family. They're going to have the family of God, and the only family fellowship they're going to have with those of their natural family are those that come into the spiritual family. If they go to the natural family at all, for anything, it's just going to be as God leads them to go there to testify and witness this great wonderful goodness of God.

Somebody would say, "Well I believe God wants me to go visit with them, Brother Pike. He just wants us to get together out there and enjoy ourselves." I said, "There are some thirty-fold, sixty-fold, hundred-fold." I said that some of you are going to reserve certain things to yourself, as to the flesh, whether it's visit with your family or whatever you're going to do that. And you're going to miss that much of God, and be cut off from that much of God. But there are others that are not going to do that. Somebody would say, "Well, I think that God wants us to do it." Well, He gives us what He wants us to do when He said, "Abraham, get thee out of the land of thy kindred." You don't find Abraham going back to visit with them. You don't find Abraham looking back into the land of the kindred. And when the man said, "Let me go bury my dead father and then I will follow you," Jesus said, "Let the dead bury the dead." They that are in trespasses and sin, they're dead. Let them take care of the funerals. You go and follow Jesus. So He lets us know how He feels.

So, there's going to come a time when there's going to be some people who are going to consider themselves dead in the body, as to the natural man, as to Adam, and they're going to separate themselves from everything concerning flesh, whether it's their natural kindred, as to relatives, or whether it is their kindred, as to the flesh, or the body of people, those that they've been among all their life, and they're coming out of Egypt. They're coming out of the flesh. They're going to be spiritual, and they're going to have the Spirit of revelation, and they're going to abide in this. This is the one thing that Betty and I had to learn she had to leave her folks. I had to leave my folks. We had to go our way wherever God said go, all over the different parts of the nation, of the world, and then go to visit with our relatives whenever, and our children still fuss. They still fuss. One of my daughters said, "I've had a new home for a number of years, but you've never been in it one time." They still fuss, but I would love to be with them, and as long as they can fellowship God, as long as they can come into the things of God, then we're going to spend some time together. But if they don't do it, then it's just going to be very little time that I'll get to spend with them, because I'm very busy in God. I've got lots of things to do, to be about my Father's business, and though I love them very dearly and I spend my life praying for them and trying to tell them and tutor them, or do anything I can to help them, but I go on my way for God because as it was when Mary came, she said, "I want to see my Son." They said, "Jesus, Your mother, Your family, they're without. They want to see you." He said, "Who is My mother? Who is My mother? The church. These that do the will of My Father which is in heaven. This is My mother. This is My brother. This is My sister. These that do the will of My Heavenly Father. This is My family."

So then folks, it's a little hard to get over that hump, but the children of God will eventually do that. The others won't. Thirty-fold, sixty-fold, hundred-fold, whatever it might be, of those that fall by the way, or those that reserve something unto themselves, or those that sell all and lay everything down at God's feet to follow Him, whatever it is. Somebody said, "I can't reach that far." I love you. That's your business. I'm not here to fuss with you. That's your business. Forgetting those things that are behind, I'm pressing forward to the prize of the mark of the high calling in Christ Jesus to the full measure of the full stature of the perfect man Christ Jesus to a full reward.

By Rev. George Leon Pike Sr.

Founder and first President of Jesus Christ’s Eternal Kingdom of Abundant Life, Inc.

Holiness Unto The Lord

