As you know if you read these monthly communiqués, and perhaps also watch our monthly “WWF” teachings, we plan to film our presentation titled Jesus Christ: The Diameter of the Ages from Monday, July 11 through Sunday, July 17 in Orlando FL. We expect the video to be about 20 hours. Between now and then I am immersing myself in developing the content of this unique production, which we are doing because we know of nothing in Christendom like what we will present. I am also working to rehab myself after last month’s hip replacement surgery, as well as aggressively continuing my naturopathic protocol to destroy the cancer that has been attacking me so that I have sufficient energy to film that many hours of teaching in one week.
Our producer, director, and video editor for JCDA is Franco Bottley, who did such a fabulous job five years ago on One Day With The Creator and The End Times. You may know about the physical challenge he has been dealing with for several years, which has severely hampered his ability to sit at the computer and do his graphic arts work. Last month a world-class doc told him that his only option now is a major surgery to fuse three vertebrae in his neck, but he continues to search for other means. Of course, we know that his best option is a miracle healing by the Great Physician, for which we are diligently praying. Franco says he will be able to direct the filming of JCDA, but that in his present condition he cannot do the large amount of post-production editing.
Franco and I have decided that if we each have breath in us, we will “get the film in the can” next month, and go from there as the Lord opens the doors. If he still needs surgery, he will have it right after the filming, and do the editing after he recuperates. We need your fervent prayer in order to pull off this ambitious endeavor. Our goal is to embrace the heart of our Savior and re-present as much of it as we can in this teaching, to the end that those who experience it will ever more deeply know, love, and serve the magnificent Son of God. In that vein, let’s look at a brief “Christianity 101” overview. Please pass this on to anyone you know who would benefit from it.
Once upon a time, God was all by Himself. God IS love, but He had no one to love. Pondering the situation, God realized that whatever beings He would create to love would have to have freedom of will in order to genuinely reciprocate His love. That is, they had to have the power to choose not to do so, or love would not be love. That being the case, God thought through every possible scenario as to the choices these creatures could make, and the consequences thereof—and He formed a contingency plan for each.
First He created a vast number of spirit beings (usually called “angels,” not angles) to hang out with, giving them free will. Then He created the original heavens and earth, the details of which we do not know. One spirit being proved to be particularly recalcitrant, to put it mildly, and influenced some others to go south with him. This cosmic rebellion trashed the original earth and whatever life was on it, leaving it covered with water, no doubt muddy. Then God decided to renovate the earth and populate it with what we know as human beings.
In so doing, He formed the “firmament” in the midst of the waters. We now understand that this is actually a massive bubble, but those to whom God originally gave His Word saw it as a “dome” set upon a flat earth. His heavenly throne is above the celestial sea surrounding the firmament, and the magnificent dwelling place for mankind (earth) is a planetary speck inside the firmament. But that speck is the apple of His eye, because that is where He chose to put human beings, made in His own image. The celestial sea was (and apparently still is) at least part of the spiritual battleground, and is where certain evil angelic beings are currently confined (Job 26:7-14; 38:4-11). Those are the very troubled waters between God and man.
With His boundless hope of forever enjoying sweet fellowship with these remarkable creatures, God furnished their Garden with endless delights, and then, in His crowning achievement, made the first male and the first female humans, also endowing them with free will. Love must communicate, and God did just that. He spoke His pure Word to them, letting them know exactly what to do (and what not to do) in order to fulfill His magnanimous desires for them and their descendants, and thus to live happily ever after with Him.
BUT, God’s prototype man basically spit in his Creator’s face, not only breaking His heart, but also transferring his God-given dominion over the earth to God’s arch-enemy. That one act set in motion an absolute horror show that continues to this very day, as Satan uses wicked spirits and wicked people to exert the dominant influence on earth and ravage humanity moment by moment (1 John 5:19). Adam’s disobedience also activated God’s Plan B (or “J”), another Adam. Despite fallacious Trinitarian rhetoric to the contrary (“God had to become a man in order to save mankind”), The Man was the only solution to the problem of sin and death brought on by a Man. Because the first human caused the problem, only another humancould legally solve it and satisfy God’s requirements for justice (Rom. 5:12-21).
1 Timothy 2:3-6
3 This is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior, 4 who desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth. 5 For there is one God, and one mediator also between God and men, the man Christ Jesus,6 who gave Himself as a ransom for all, the testimony given at the proper time.
A mediator is one who “brings about peace by reconciliation.” “Reconciliation” means “change on the part of one induced by action on the part of another.” The mediator connects (or re-connects) two parties who are estranged. To “ransom” is “to redeem from captivity or bondage by paying a price.” What was the price? The life of the human Son of God who willingly volunteered to first live a sinless life and then die a torturous death for all other men, even the wicked, like those who murdered him. God made Jesus genetically flawless, and Jesus took advantage of that opportunity to be behaviorally flawless, i.e., sinless, all the way to, and through, the Cross. God raised him from the dead and exalted him as His right hand Man, assigning him the task of restoring the Paradise that the first Adam lost. Every person who at one moment of his life genuinely believes that simple truth is instantly born again of incorruptible seed and guaranteed everlasting life in the Paradise to come.
To say that Jesus is the mediator between God and man relates primarily to him being our Savior, bringing us back together with God as His children forever. It also means that Jesus gives us access (“the introduction”) to God on a daily basis. We can march into the living room of our Heavenly Father, plop down on His lap, and say whatever we want to. Nonetheless, God is spirit, and thus inconceivable to us compared to our Lord Jesus, a man who was tempted in all ways as we are and who experienced all the emotions we do.
1 John 1:3 states that each of us is to have ”fellowship” (Greek koinonia=intimate partnership) with our Heavenly Father and with the Lord Jesus Christ, The Man who blazed a trail of faith to the heart of God. Moment by moment, he invites you and me to take his hand and walk that path with him, shining his light to our world. You may have come out of the same belief system I did, in which the current ministry of our Lord Jesus to us was not taught. Without Jesus Christ, “God” is basically an abstraction, like “the Force” in Star Wars. Jesus is “the image of the invisible God.” As such, he crystallizes God for us. True, we cannot now see Jesus either, but knowing he is a man makes him far more real to us, and fellowshipping/conversing with him underscores his reality in our lives, while also making God more real to us. As you and I become intimate with our Lord Jesus, he bridges the turbulent waters of life that lie between us and our Father. And that includes the tempestuous seas of our old nature, “the sin that dwells in us” (Rom. 7:18). Walking with our Lord Jesus energizes our lives with unparalleled purpose as we eagerly look forward to his coming back for us.
2 Corinthians 5:10-15
10 For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each of us may receive what is due us for the things done while in the body, whether good or bad. 11 Since, then, we know what it is to fear the Lord, we try to persuade others. What we are is plain to God, and I hope it is also plain to your conscience. 12 We are not trying to commend ourselves to you again, but are giving you an opportunity to take pride in us, so that you can answer those who take pride in what is seen rather than in what is in the heart. 13 If we are “out of our mind,” as some say, it is for God; if we are in our right mind, it is for you. 14For Christ’s love compels us, because we are convinced that one died for all, and therefore all died.15And he died for all, that those who live should no longer live for themselves but for him who died for them and was raised again.
Think about that—a fellow human died for you so that you could live forever. I want to take that very personally, and thus live my life showing him my gratitude. How about you? How often do you think about the Lord Jesus each day? How often do you talk with him, thank him, praise him, and honor him according to God’s exaltation of him? How often do you tell him that you love him?
Colossians 3:1-4
1Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things. For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God. When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.
