"The soul who sins is the one who will die." It's always been this way. Back when I was a "good Christian" in my pew, without a vital relationship with Jesus Christ, I knew I was going to heaven. As with many of you, there was no question.
But then, one day, the Lord (which is something I didn't know Him as) sovereignly gave me a passionate thirst for His Word. Since 1996, I have studied it, listened to it throughout the day, and spoken it out loud. By 1999, still without the baptisms, I had seen clearly, from cover to cover that we can't go on sinning and that my Christian religion was a sham. And everything I did certainly wasn't done to His glory or in His name. The revelation was so obvious, I was suicidal, and I had it planned out.
But God transformed my life. The specific sin that was compulsive for me had become demonic - I had no control over my actions. I was addicted and every addiction grows out of a frustration. But I was delivered, praise the Lord. Once I was free, the 3 elders didn't ask me if I needed a tissue, they asked if I needed a towel! My life was transformed. Now, no longer compelled, the Lord ministered to me what was written, just accepting things like Romans 6 just the way it is written. The word translated in our Bibles "forgiveness" is the Greek word "aphesis". It actually means freedom. And when you understand Jesus' view on sin, He came to set us free from its control not to simply forgive us. The word "forgive" occurs over and over again in the book of Leviticus. We were slaves. We had to keep coming back to Him for forgiveness. Now, however, we have the Way of holiness Isaiah spoke of; the Way in which Jesus walked.
So, I was baptized in water (again) and I got way more than wet this time. I was powerfully changed just for taking God at His Word and not limiting Him by my tiny mind or by "the herd." I was baptized with the Holy Spirit, and among other things, I can clearly hear His voice, just like you see happen in the Bible! And then I got the wilderness experience, growing up, going on to maturity in a life lived by, through and in the Holy Spirit. Learning to live humbly and not from "under the sun." He humbled me, causing me to hunger then feeding me with manna, which neither I nor my fathers had know, to teach me that man does not live on bread alone, but on every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God.
Jesus said that He is the real manna that the father sent. Like Paul was worried about in 2 Cor.11:3,4, there is a different Jesus, gospel and spirit. I had previously come up in them. In my previous religious life, Jesus didn't require me to deny my soul. I lived based on what I thought, wanted and felt; what Isaiah called "light fires and provide for yourselves flaming torches.." in chapter 50:10,11. The 2 ways are repeated endlessly and in countless different manners of saying it throughout the Bible: the way of the soul vs. the Way of the Spirit. All of us today are either "soulish" (northern European languages have a word for that: it gets translated in our Bibles as "natural") or spiritual. One of the 2 is how we live. And it is intensely down to earth and practical. In fact, it's why my temple is healthy. Jesus bought it. I submit to Jesus. He leads me. And being in His Word all the time, it is health to all my flesh. He bore our diseases and sicknesses on the cross. And the preaching of this Gospel of the Kingdom was always accompanied by healing. To have to type that in the past tense is tragic beyond measure.
The soul who sins is the one who will die. I adore Ezekiel 18. I teach it as "the great aphesis chapter of the Bible." Appearing to His disciples after His resurrection, Jesus took the disciples throughout all of the Old Testament showing Himself to them, and we see the Gospel here as well. Getting "a new heart and a new spirit" is New Covenant. The chapter shows a life turned around and God promises to remember none of the offenses such a one committed previously. The Bible is supernatural. The New Covenant is supernatural. Our bodies are living sacrifices today and our minds get renewed, so that we are able to test and approve what God's will is - His good, pleasing and perfect will. Today if you will hear His voice, don't harden your hearts as they did in the wilderness.
But then, one day, the Lord (which is something I didn't know Him as) sovereignly gave me a passionate thirst for His Word. Since 1996, I have studied it, listened to it throughout the day, and spoken it out loud. By 1999, still without the baptisms, I had seen clearly, from cover to cover that we can't go on sinning and that my Christian religion was a sham. And everything I did certainly wasn't done to His glory or in His name. The revelation was so obvious, I was suicidal, and I had it planned out.
But God transformed my life. The specific sin that was compulsive for me had become demonic - I had no control over my actions. I was addicted and every addiction grows out of a frustration. But I was delivered, praise the Lord. Once I was free, the 3 elders didn't ask me if I needed a tissue, they asked if I needed a towel! My life was transformed. Now, no longer compelled, the Lord ministered to me what was written, just accepting things like Romans 6 just the way it is written. The word translated in our Bibles "forgiveness" is the Greek word "aphesis". It actually means freedom. And when you understand Jesus' view on sin, He came to set us free from its control not to simply forgive us. The word "forgive" occurs over and over again in the book of Leviticus. We were slaves. We had to keep coming back to Him for forgiveness. Now, however, we have the Way of holiness Isaiah spoke of; the Way in which Jesus walked.
So, I was baptized in water (again) and I got way more than wet this time. I was powerfully changed just for taking God at His Word and not limiting Him by my tiny mind or by "the herd." I was baptized with the Holy Spirit, and among other things, I can clearly hear His voice, just like you see happen in the Bible! And then I got the wilderness experience, growing up, going on to maturity in a life lived by, through and in the Holy Spirit. Learning to live humbly and not from "under the sun." He humbled me, causing me to hunger then feeding me with manna, which neither I nor my fathers had know, to teach me that man does not live on bread alone, but on every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God.
Jesus said that He is the real manna that the father sent. Like Paul was worried about in 2 Cor.11:3,4, there is a different Jesus, gospel and spirit. I had previously come up in them. In my previous religious life, Jesus didn't require me to deny my soul. I lived based on what I thought, wanted and felt; what Isaiah called "light fires and provide for yourselves flaming torches.." in chapter 50:10,11. The 2 ways are repeated endlessly and in countless different manners of saying it throughout the Bible: the way of the soul vs. the Way of the Spirit. All of us today are either "soulish" (northern European languages have a word for that: it gets translated in our Bibles as "natural") or spiritual. One of the 2 is how we live. And it is intensely down to earth and practical. In fact, it's why my temple is healthy. Jesus bought it. I submit to Jesus. He leads me. And being in His Word all the time, it is health to all my flesh. He bore our diseases and sicknesses on the cross. And the preaching of this Gospel of the Kingdom was always accompanied by healing. To have to type that in the past tense is tragic beyond measure.
The soul who sins is the one who will die. I adore Ezekiel 18. I teach it as "the great aphesis chapter of the Bible." Appearing to His disciples after His resurrection, Jesus took the disciples throughout all of the Old Testament showing Himself to them, and we see the Gospel here as well. Getting "a new heart and a new spirit" is New Covenant. The chapter shows a life turned around and God promises to remember none of the offenses such a one committed previously. The Bible is supernatural. The New Covenant is supernatural. Our bodies are living sacrifices today and our minds get renewed, so that we are able to test and approve what God's will is - His good, pleasing and perfect will. Today if you will hear His voice, don't harden your hearts as they did in the wilderness.
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