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3:23 pm
May 21, 2009
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Jaque
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I just returned from Louisville Ky and the group at Christ our Life Ministries. Sylvia Pearce and her husband Scott have a yearly conference under a tent on their property. This group of people were students under the teaching of Norman Grubb (which was really Christ in His Norman form) until he passed away. Norman taught extensively regarding our identity in Christ–to the point that people were actually SET FREE by the Gospel that was preached, evidenced by an inner victory that is unprecedented in much of Christianity today. At the conference a banner was in front of the stage which read, "The Whole Gospel to the Whole Man to the Whole World." As the weekend proceeded that banner was sealed in my heart. This too is my heart's desire.I personally know this victory and am now a bond-slave to the Whole Gospel. As Norman said, "Prayer may, but intercession must." Once we hear the Whole Gospel we must, and we know it.
We begin with the Whole Gospel, which is nothing less than Christ IN us, living His life as us. Galatians 2:20, Philippians 1:21–and on and on. Scripture is full to the brim with the evidence that Christ is the very life of every new creation.
We hear it and think we know it, but until we recognize ourselves as spontaneous, free and confident people we are still stuck in separation consciousness.
The evidence of our problem with separation is seen in our attitudes about performance. Saying we are dead to the Law but still slaves to the commands rather than to the Person of Christ…we live as though we are still slaves of Satan even though we are not.
How do you relate? Would you care to comment or ask your most gut wrenching questions to see if the Whole Gospel really has answers? Bring it on. Let's see what happens…I'm in for the BIG haul.
 Jaque
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Living 'loved' by keeping myself in His love… Jude 21 |
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3:45 pm
May 21, 2009
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Jaque
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Please enjoy the following words I found in the Newsletter section of http://www.theliberatingsecret.org site.
Spirit is Reality
Paul E. Billheimer
"Destined for the Throne"
(Number 1 note from Chapter 4 page 69)
To many people this constitutes an impossible enigma, and incomprehensible riddle, and impenetrable mystery. How can we be organically united with Christ and seated with Him in the heavens when our feet are pressing "terra firma" and we are engaged in the prosaic occupations of daily life? Paul gives us the key to this mystery in I Cor.6:17: "he that is jointed to the Lord is one spirit." In some philosophical systems, spirit is considered to be "essential reality." Material is said to be accidental, that is, it derives its reality from its relationship to spirit. For instance, when the spirit leaves the body, the body disintegrates. It loses its structure because it is dependent upon the spirit for its organization as reality. The spirit has independent reality. The body has only relative reality. It is the spirit that gives life to and sustains the body. This is what we mean when we say that the spirit is essential reality and that material is only accidental, or has only relative reality. In order words, your spirit is the real "YOU." The real person. Therefore, a person who is joined to the Lord as one spirit is, in his essential being, seated with Christ in the heaven; While the body is here, the real self is there. While a body may occupy only one place at a time, spirit is not so confined. Because "he that is joined to the Lord is one spirit." Therefore, since Christ is exalted and enthroned, the Church is exalted and enthroned with Him.
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Living 'loved' by keeping myself in His love… Jude 21 |
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12:11 am
May 30, 2009
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SaraMcD
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OK Jaque,
I will have a go at asking my questions. Its not easy to word this so please bear with me.
You said in a previous post under The Son Speaks topic: "I saw that I didn't always agree with the way Norman said it but I could not argue with what the Bible said of itself. As I continued I realized why I didn't like it; the message intended to lead me to a greatly feared abandonment to Christ, for this is what a total identification with Him means–abandonment where He is all."
I understand that I resist the teaching that I am in union/one with Christ because I resist total surrender so I can truly let him live through me by my obedience.
But that's not really the issue that blocks me. The semantics DO bother me, because I want to be able to say it as clearly and accurately as possible. I balk at saying "I am Christ in my form" (Appendix A Emphatic self point #17) I am not Christ, He is 100% God and I never will be be but I can surrender to Him living His life through me so that we are in unity. That may end up amounting to the same thing in practise.
I can see and say "Christ lives in my form, as me" but I cannot begin by saying "I am Christ"
This is where it truly gets into semantics because it depends on the emphasis you give when you say it . E.g.
"I am Christ in my form" ie this is the way I live with Christ flowing though my form, He has increased and I have decreased to the point where I am truly merely a vessel.
but not "I am Christ in my form" ie I am Christ which sounds as though I am saying I am God.
Your disclaimer on pg 29 is reassuring since it says "All of God is in us but we are not God." So doesn't that also mean all of Christ is in us but we are not Christ. We are still a human vessel.
I like the sentence from Appendix B: "There is a unity fixed, eternal, inwardly realized- in which He, the Positive, the the Real One living; and I, the negative, am also real, but really the expression of Him."
Also Pg 186 When we follow Casme, life works.
These two sentences point out that even though we are in union, there is still me in my humanness as well as Him in His humanness and divinity.
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12:42 am
May 30, 2009
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SaraMcD
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Oops, I posted that before I was finished by mistake.
Just to round it off, I hope you can understand what I am trying to say with the emphases etc. Although the end result of "it is no longer I who live but Christ lives in me" (Gal 2:20), is that I am Christ in my form, since he is the one living through me, I prefer to say that I express Christ. Even Jesus who was 100% God and 100% man didn't say "I am the Father" did he? He did say "I and the Father are one" and "if you have seen me, you have seen the Father".
On pg 179 you say "We need to embrace our humanness and accept is as a very humbling process."
Sylvia says in appendix B "We have a marvelous Saviour living in us. However it is a far deeper truth to know that we have an equally total and complete human self containing and expressing our wonderful Saviour." This is the union I see. He is the unique and wonderful one and I am complete in Him when I live to express Him.
Please anyone comment on my thoughts!
Love
Sara
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10:43 pm
June 1, 2009
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Jaque
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Hi Sara,
In this first draft (to begin answering your question) a few thoughts come to mind. I'll share what's here with me right now. The Scripture declares in effect (I believe it's in Isaiah 45) "I am God, and besides me there is no other."
The truth says: God is ONE. God is ALL. In Him we live and move and have our being…we…being the vessels, branches, wives, etc. We then are created humans who "contain" the all in all…the one IN whom all things are "summed up."
When we gaze on a beautiful flower do we not behold the glory of God–the One who created everything and holds it all together…can we not say that the flower is an expression or an "expressed form" of God and of His glory? The flower can't take credit for anything, can it? And neither can we; if we could, there would have to be something "other than" God who, as we just read, proclaims "BESIDE" me there is no other."
We are not separate from God…(beside Him)…never have been and never will be. But…we have been under Satan's delusion which deceived us into thinking we are separate or beside Him..and that is why we keep TRYING TO BE beside Him while still looking "like" Him.
Yes, it is semantics that shake us Sara, BUT I believe our religious minds need to get stuck so God can "shake the tree" and rattle our brains out of their religious modes until we, at last, come into the purchased experience of complete victory in Christ–intended by His atoning sacrifice. (I'm not saying by "complete victory" that we won't experience suffering–I'm saying that even in suffering we overcome by the blood of the Lamb and the word of our (His) testimony (in us as us).) Without a shaking of the tree (our religious mind sets) we will invariably keep running the same erroneous treadmill of works (independence) and end up only more religious and increasingly less victorious. This was never our Lord's intention.
A new way of speaking the truth will hopefully help usher us into a radical  faith…the intended faith of our Savior. If this kind of faith is yet to be known by us we are going to have to take a leap of faith that may feel like a crisis. It's like walking a plank. At the end we face blackness (the incomprehensible something out there) where we will be asked to leap.
I believe the Gospel presents such an invitation. It doesn't end at being born again…no…as matter of fact that's just the beginning.
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Living 'loved' by keeping myself in His love… Jude 21 |
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7:26 am
June 8, 2009
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kovalchekj
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Okay, I'm going to pipe in on this, because I like the substance and the tone of it.
I agree, it’s about semantics and love what Jaque said “A new way of speaking the truth will hopefully help usher us into a radical faith…the intended faith of our Savior.” AMEN!
Sara said, “I am Christ which sounds as though I am saying I am God.”
To this I want to add the reminder that Christ is not Jesus' last name, it means anointed of God (i.e. Jesus the anointed of God). I am not Jesus, I am not God and I don’t think that’s what Casme means. (Please correct me if I’m wrong I feel as though I’m beginning to grasp it.) I am okay saying “I am a vessel of the anointing of God, because God is leading me into a true reality where the anointing (and glory) of God will be expressed and evidenced in all that I am and do as I become more and more dependent on God as my all in all.
Side note: I like vessel and expression better, too.
Jaque said ”The flower can't take credit for anything, can it? And neither can we; if we could, there would have to be something "other than" God who, as we just read, proclaims "BESIDE" me there is no other." In being a vessel of the anointing of God, I’m reassured that I’m not trying to take credit or glory. My concern, however, is that I don’t settle for a terminology that feels more comfortable, but will not allow for a true grasp of the essential reality that God wants for me.
juls
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1:14 pm
June 8, 2009
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Jaque
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Julie,
I so agree that we should never settle for terms that feel comfortable, but we should seek to know (by experience) the essence of what Christ gives. In the previous quote by Paul Billheimer, "To many people this constitutes an impossible enigma, and incomprehensible riddle, and impenetrable mystery. How can we be organically united with Christ and seated with Him in the heavens when our feet are pressing "terra firma" and we are engaged in the prosaic occupations of daily life? Paul gives us the key to this mystery in I Cor.6:17: "he that is jointed to the Lord is one spirit."
I like the word mystery and understand as time passes that it is a scary word for the most part. We human Christians have a desire to control God and not allow too much mystery. After all, what "might" happen if we allow the unknown to scramble our brains and mix up our religious theology?!
I think perhaps just a tiny segment of Christians really sense the true meaning of Jesus's prayer in John 17. Yet, the cry of His heart was for us to know (in an intimate way)our oneness in Him and the Father.
Colossians 1:27 also speaks of "mystery" which is: "Christ IN you, the hope of glory" I like to say, "the hope of knowing who we are–knowing who He is–knowing Him in us as us–that is, Christ expressing through us the glory of the Father!
I think that when something sounds like a mystery our carnal mind balks! We (our true inner self) might catch hold of something it (the carnal mind) cannot grasp–nail down–or get a theological (intellectual) handle on! (Oh we are sooooo religious apart from HIS Spirit). Thank goodness, in our innermost beings, we are joined to His Spirit.
I believe Jesus wanted (more than anything) for us to grasp the concept of what I refer to as Casme. Remember when He said to Phillip when asked to show him the Father, "Don't you know Phillip, that if you've seen Me you've seen the Father?" Religious Christians usually reply, "Well, yes but THAT was Jesus" and unknowingly they dismiss Him and His prayer in John 17.
Why would He ask that we may be one AS HE and His Father are one?
Enough for now.
Much love,
Jaque
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Living 'loved' by keeping myself in His love… Jude 21 |
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7:31 am
June 10, 2009
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kovalchekj
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Jaque, I enjoy these conversations with you. I often have the experience that we're watching a movie together, that you've already seen. Part of me wants you to tell what happens, and part of me doesn't, I want to see it for myself. And here we are again, in another conversation, that I want to find it for myself.
HOWEVER…I'm just not finding it. So, please be patient with me, I want to start over, so that we can check my bearings, and make sure I'm looking at this from the same angle you are.
1. Growing up, one of the primary illustrations in the salvation message, that I was exposed to, is Jesus, standing at the door of our hearts, knocking. We have the opportunity to invite Jesus in to be our Lord and master and our spiritual lover. And by in, we mean in our physical person as well as our spiritual person.
2. Through the refining process, as we move from glory to glory, the realization that we are the righteousness of Christ seeps into our entire selves. And the realization that we have become born again, manifests itself in layers as we daily work out our salvation. (I’m picturing awareness like water seeping down into the ground through the different layers and colored water being drawn up into a flower to change the color of the stem and petals.)
3. Paul laments that he is unable to do what he wants and stop doing what he doesn’t want. To me, “Christ in me, the hope of glory.” Is a promise that little by little the righteousness of Christ, in me, will assuage the struggle with sin. My hope to live free from the power of sin in death (my idea of glory), is Christ living in my heart, mind, and soul.
4. For this to become a reality there is nothing more I need to do. I invited Jesus into my heart, he is the anointed one of God, and the work is done, as I will come to see over time, because only my realization of it is left to be done. Now, it is for me to remain/abide/rest in Him as he remains/abides/rests in me. (Like the washcloth in the bathtub analogy.)
And that’s where the working understanding of it stops for me. I’ve read the scriptures. I went back today and read through Appendix B again and re-read the CASME chapter, and still I can’t make the leap of understanding from Christ in me to Christ as me. I’m going to go through our CD’s today, I’m pretty sure I have a teaching of yours, from last year, that is on CASME, so I might have more to say later. But that’s all for now.
Here’s what I’m asking for. Do you see a flaw that’s stopping me from making the next leap of understanding? Or am I just putting too much stock in the idea of CASME? (am I making this harder than it needs to be?)
Thanks for your patience and time. I love you,
juls
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