We've been gleaning from 2Corinthians 5:16-17 how the believer isn't just a "forgiven sinner," but a new creation altogether. By faith and grace, we were created a new creature in and through Christ Jesus. For many years, God's family has been lied to about who we are and what we have. Once this truth is revealed to the Church, satan's days of having rule over the Father's House are over.
1Peter 1:23 (Amplified) declares that we've been born again, "Not from a mortal seed or sperm, but from the ever living and lasting Word of God." 1Peter 2:2 (Amplified) describes us as being, "Like newborn babies who should crave (thirst for, earnestly desire) the pure (unadulterated) spiritual milk (the Word of God), that by it you may be nurtured and grow unto (completed) salvation."
Hebrews 6:1-3 (Amplified) tells us, "Therefore Let us go on and get past the elementary stage in the teachings and doctrine of Christ (the Messiah) advancing steadily toward the completeness and perfection that belong to spiritual maturity. Let us not again be laying the foundation of repentance and abandonment of dead works (dead formalism) and of faith (by which you turned to God). With teachings about purifying, the laying on of hands, the resurrection from the dead, and eternal punishment and judgment (these are all matters of which you should have been fully aware of long, long ago. If indeed God permits, we will know (proceed to advanced teaching)."
Paul teaches the Hebrew Church about "going on, and going back to ritual and religion." God's family is called to grow and mature into adult sons and daughters. In God's family, like any family that is growing, there are newborns and older children who are becoming useful to Him. Where we have failed in our part of His new creation family, is that mostly our family is made up of babies. Even though they are new creation people, these babies have never grown "unto (completed) salvation," that 1Peter 2:2 speaks about.
This completed salvation doesn't refer to our going to heaven, but our maturing into who we have already become in Christ. We will always have those who are being born-again into God's family, but we shouldn't have those who have been born-again for thirty or forty years and remain babies. Satan's been good at preventing us from what Peter called "the pure unadulterated spiritual milk" that will cause us to grow "unto (completed) salvation."
When the milk is watered down and is mixed with different things, it might "fill up" the soulish part of the new creation man (the very part that hasn't been renewed), but it fails to nourish his new spirit. The new spirit must be fed on the Word of God and not the religion of man. Jesus said in John 4:24 (Amplified), "God is a Spirit (a Spiritual Being), and those who worship Him must worship Him in Spirit and in Truth (reality)." Jesus also said in John 6:63 (Amplified) that, "It is the Spirit Who gives Life (He is the Life Giver) the flesh conveys no benefit whatever (there is no profit in it) the Words (Truths) that I have been speaking to you are Spirit and Life."
"The flesh has no profit (no nourishment to your spirit) whatever." This is the watered down milk we've been taught for years. It might keep our spirit (our new creation) alive, with just a little bit of life in it, but it doesn't have enough nourishment to allow it to grow into "completed salvation." We've been nearly starved in our spirit man, by not being fed the Word of Life. Because we've been made a new creation in God's Own Image, we can never die, but we're so weak in our spirit and have no power to grow into what we were born to be.
We will be given equal place in the family and Kingdom when we enter into God's Presence, but we're too weak and feeble here to do what God needs done on earth. The church building was to be a school house where God's new babies are fed and grow. It was never to be a spiritual nursery where the babies remain forever.
Many of us attended school because it was the law of the Land. We did only what was required of us, and nothing more. Others graduate to higher education in order to learn a craft or future employment. Some, not many, will learn and become useful for the benefit of all mankind. These reflect the Body of Christ, today. We only learn what we think is required of us to "remain saved," and have no interest in becoming beneficial beyond that.
The old saying of, "We're only human," has long been a stand-by for the lack of growth in the Church. We're not only human, but are now and forever a new creation. Like most babies, we tend to spit out what we don't like and only accept what we do like. When something upsets the nursery, we cry a lot and throw little fits of displeasure, until we get our own way. Rather than upsetting the entire nursery, we've allowed temper tantrums to prevent the babies being fed anything except sugar, watered down milk and not the "pure, unadulterated milk of the Word."
Your spirit can and will grow only on God's Word and not on the soulish things of the flesh. It might minister to your senses, but it doesn't nourish your new creation spirit man at all. We're constantly made aware of our weaknesses of our fleshly house, but we're never fed anything that will overcome these weaknesses. We hear sermons about how we shouldn't drink and how "All things work together for our good," but these only affect our natural senses and not our spirit.
You've not been a natural being since you were saved. At that moment, you became a super-natural spirit, a new creation made in God's Own Image and Likeness. 2Corinthians 5:16 (Amplified) says, "Consequently, from now on we estimate and regard no one from a (purely) human point of view (in terms of natural standards of value). (No) even though we once did estimate Christ from a human viewpoint and as a Man, yet now (we have such knowledge of Him that) we know Him no longer (in terms of the flesh)."
We continually minister to the senses and flesh and make excuses for not growing up in the spirit. We've all but forgotten the super-natural things of God, in many of our churches. We've spoken out against such things in some instances, so how can we feed and nourish the babies into completed salvation, if we hold back the only thing that can given them life and growth?
When we find somethings in God's Word that we find "controversial," we simply avoid it altogether, rather than feed it in the diet of the Word. Even the Scribes did this with Jesus, any time He said or did something that challenged their teachings, they declared Him to be wrong. They wanted nothing that would bring changes in their way of doing things. They even said Jesus was a "devil," when He performed a miracle.
The more people we have coming into the churches, the less we have to say without upsetting the rest of them. Some will always be "offended" at what we preach, but we are still required to preach it, according to Jesus in Mark 16:15-20 (Amplified), "And He said to them, Go into all the world and preach and publish openly the Good News (the Gospel) to every creature (of the whole human race). He who believes (who adheres to, and trusts in and relies on the Gospel and Him Who it sets forth) and is baptized will be saved (from the penalty of eternal death); but he who does not believe (does not adhere to and trust in and rely on the Gospel and Him Whom it sets forth) will be condemned." Verses 17-20 go on, "And these attesting signs will accompany those who believe; In My Name they will drive out demons, they will speak in new languages, They will pick up serpents, and (even) if they drink anything deadly; it will not hurt them; they will lay hands on the sick, and they will get well, So then the Lord Jesus, after He had spoken to them, was taken up into Heaven and He sat down at the right hand of God. And they went out and preached everywhere, while the Lord kept working with them and confirming the Message by the attesting signs and miracles that closely accompanied it. (Amen) So be it."
Could the reason we don't see the "attesting signs and miracles" anymore, is because we do not preach them like Jesus' followers did? We don't want to preach a Word that is controversial in our churches. Don't we know that God's Word is controversial, anywhere it's preached? Those who believe and those who do not believe will find controversy in whatever we preach, at some point. So, why not just preach the Word (the pure milk) unto our babies, instead of a watered down version of the Gospel? It is the only way they can grow up in the spirit.
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