“When the Spirit of Truth comes… He will Glorify Me (Jesus)” – John 16:13-14)

Greetings to you Friends!

To say that the work of the Holy Spirit is an indispensable part of the Christian life, is a gross understatement to say the least. For the Christian life has no legs to stand on without the Holy Spirit, plain and simple. (Rom.8:9) Yet, about half (49%) of all who say they are Christian do not believe the Holy Spirit is real, according to the research group called “Barna Group” (https://www.barna.org). It also found that “Americans are constantly trying to figure out how to make sense of biblical teachings in light of their daily experiences,” without realizing it’s the absence of the Holy Spirit which leaves this vacuum in their Christian life. Let’s discuss this vital aspect and see what exactly is the work of the Spirit in the Christian’s daily journey. There are many facets of His work, but we’ll discuss His basic foundational role in this post.

The Holy Spirit is given to those who believe and trust in Jesus as the prophesied Messiah because He is the Son of God sent by the Father to be mankind’s Savior. (Act.2:38-39) Through faith in Jesus the Holy Spirit is given as a gift where He comes and dwells in the heart of the believer, and man becomes His temple: “Do you not know that you are a temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwells in you?” (1 Cor.3:16; also John 7:37-39; 1 John 4:13; 1 Cor.6:19, NLT). The work of the Spirit is to sanctify and bring the Love and life of God to man. A temple is a place of worship where God and man meet. The Bible says, “If anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, they do not belong to Christ” (Rom.8:9). This tells us that God is Trinitarian, so, you cannot have the Holy Spirit without Christ, and you cannot have Christ without the the Holy Spirit, for the purpose of the Spirit is to unify you to Jesus, who in turn unifies  you to the Father.

Dove – Symbol of The Holy Spirit (Wiki Commons)

Shortly before Jesus was taken to be crucified, He told the disciples about the role of the Spirit, “I still have much to tell you, but you cannot yet bear to hear it. However, when the Spirit of truth comes, He will guide you into all truth. For He will not speak on His own, but He will speak what He hears, and He will declare to you what is to come. He will glorify Me by taking from what is Mine and disclosing it to you. Everything that belongs to the Father is Mine. That is why I said that the Spirit will take from what is Mine and disclose it to you” (John 16:12-15). Yes, the Spirit’s sole purpose is to reveal Jesus, for Jesus is the revelation of God’s glory in humans. His purpose is to reveal all that Jesus means to you as a person in God’s purpose and destiny for you.

Jesus told the disciples He was about to leave them, but He would was not abandoning them. He did not want them to feel lost and forsaken. He said, “I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you… The one who Loves Me will be Loved by My Father, and I too will Love them and show Myself to them… I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Advocate to help you and be with you forever— the Spirit of truth” (John 14:16-18).

The role of the Spirit is to mentor people to become true believers of Jesus and becoming like Him. Jesus said, “The Friend, the Holy Spirit whom the Father will send at my request, will make everything plain to you. He will remind you of all the things I have told you. I’m leaving you well and whole. That’s my parting gift to you. Peace!” (John 14:26-27, MSG). The operative words are to “make everything plain to you.” So, if you are a believer and things like the work of the Spirit is not plainly understood, it may be that you are not letting the Spirit guide you. Many times we let others explain things to us, but we are still left with questions.

Recall what one of the New Covenant provision affords us, “And they will not need to teach their neighbors, nor will they need to teach their relatives, saying, ‘You should know the LORD.’ For everyone, from the least to the greatest, will know me already” (Heb.8:11, NLT). John reinforces the work of the Spirit in this regard, “But you have received the Holy Spirit, and He lives within you, so you don’t need anyone to teach you what is true. For the Spirit teaches you everything you need to know, and what He teaches is true–it is not a lie. So just as He has taught you, remain in fellowship with Christ” (1 John 2:27, NLT). Look, can a human reveal what your personal calling in God’s plan for you? No human can do that, only the Spirit will do it for it is His work to reveal your gift that’s tied to your individual calling. 

The Tri-Personal God of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit Always at Work to Bring Man to Immortality. Rublev’s Famous Icon of The Trinity (Wiki Commons)

Let’s ask, who is Jesus fundamentally and effectively to those who believe and receive Him? He is the first human ever who lived a sinless life, and now exists in His human glorified divine form. When Jesus was crucified, resurrected, and ascended back to be with the Father, He took our humanity with Him, and glorified it and made it part of God forever. Jesus made this possible because He was and is always the homoousios part of the Triune Godhead in heaven. Jesus was the prophesied Immanuel, God in the flesh, for the purpose of making man into the divine image of the Triune God. (Gen.1:26-27) He is the example the Father want for man to emulate so humans may enter into His Loving presence by becoming glorious and immortal themselves like His Son. Hence, we read Paul saying, “For those whom He foreknew, He also predestined to become conformed to the image of His Son, so that He would be the firstborn among many brethren” (Rom.8:29-30, NASB).

The Son stands first in the line of humanity God restored and fashioned in His image and likeness. (Gen.1:26-27) Jesus is the only human who was glorified and made immortal, and the role of the Holy Spirit is to make Jesus’ reality happen across the board in all of humanity. Paul affirms this, saying, “And if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you, He who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies because of his Spirit who lives in you” (Rom.8:11).

God reveals how He will make this reality we see in Jesus happen, “I will live with them and walk among them, and I will be their God, and they will be my people” (2 Cor.6:16; Lev.26:12). What this says is God will Himself guide and walk us to the reality we have in Jesus. And how does He do it, through the gift of the Holy Spirit. The Bibles reveals “We are the temple of the living God” (2 Cor. 6:16a). Paul says, “Don’t you realize that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, who lives in you and was given to you by God?” (1 Cor.6:19, NLT; also, 1 Cor.3:16).

But here is the crossover many cannot and have not fathomed, including Christians: If God walks in us, and He is holy and sinless, then it stands to reason that the believer is also holy and sinless. You see, God and sin cannot co-exist. Can virtue live alongside sin? Can righteousness and wickedness live together under the same roof? Can light and darkness be bedfellows? The two conditions are poles apart. Nothing could be more diametrically opposite from each other, and the exact antithesis of each other. So one has to go! Paul’s closing words in his discourse with the Romans is, “If God is for us, who can ever be against us? Since He did not spare even His own Son but gave Him up for us all, won’t He also give us everything else?” (Rom.8:31-32). Can the sin condition stand against us? No!

If the Spirit is “Holy” and lives in man as His temple, then it’s logical to conclude that man is also “holy.” The light of God’s Love snuffs out all darkness. This is the role of the Holy Spirit – He is called “Holy” because that is what He does. All He touches, He makes “Holy.” He is the “sanctifier” of man. Let me give you a metaphor to help explain this. It’s not perfect, but I hope it serves the purpose. Think of a dark room in your home. You enter the room and close the door behind you. It’s as dark as black can be. You move and feel your hand along the wall to the light switch, and turned the lights on. What just happened? Electricity turned the bulb on, and now you can see in the dark. Yes, but more than that, what really happened was light swallowed up darkness and made it disappear and ineffectual. Darkness disappeared in the face of light. Light is virtue, while sin is darkness. In the same way, when we come into God’s presence through the Spirit, we come before light where there’s no darkness or sin. Sin has been taken care of once for all time through Christ, the true Light. Jesus said, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows Me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life” (John 8:13).

Light Swallows the Darkness of Space and Unveils the Earth in Ever Increasing Brightness of the Rays of the Sun         (Wiki Commons)

What is the spiritual mechanics of making this reality happen where the believer is made forever “holy” in the Father’s presence? Think about this, if the Spirit is intrinsically of one substance with the Father and the Son in heaven (existing as One Trinity from eternity), and He also lives and walks in the believer as His temple, then it’s logical to conclude that wherever the Spirit is the believer is with Him – in heaven and in God’s holy presence. If sin can never prevail with God, then man also is holy and is in a sinless state. There’s something else that we may not have realized, since Jesus has glorified our humanity in Himself and brought it into the life of the Trinity, then the Spirit automatically becomes part of mankind by this inherent union. Man was spiritually birthed into the divine by Jesus’ life, death, resurrection and ascension, and through the doctrine of substitution, when we express faith in the Messiah we are likewise reborn spiritually just as Jesus explained to Nicodemus. (John 3:5-8; Eph.1:13) The all-inclusive expression of this spiritual birth will occur in the future resurrection from mortal to immortality.

Therefore, the role of the Spirit is to constantly and forever transport man to the heavenly courts before Jesus and our heavenly Father. The Holy Spirit sanctifies the believer by bringing him or her before Jesus as High Priest in heaven. Jesus in turn mediates all the inadequate human responses and shortcomings of the believer, and presents him/her before the Father perfect and acceptable every time, and always! (Rom.8:26,34) This is the ongoing process of salvation that never stops until God’s purpose in mankind is completed when we are resurrected to immortality like Jesus. All of this is encapsulated in the words of Paul, “He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness (sinless) of God in Him” (2 Cor.5:21, NASB). This is the process of salvation we are forever experiencing in the Spirit and in Jesus. Benjamin Franklin said, “Ladies and gentlemen, we must hang together, or most assuredly we will hang alone.” 

One might say, “But I sin all the time.” Yes, that’s exactly the point of the Spirit’s role, we live in sin always because of our fallen human nature. If we have been made perfect at any point, then we won’t need the Spirit, for the responsibility of the Spirit is to sanctify man. (John 16:8-11) And sanctification takes place where trespasses exists. That’s why the Holy Spirit is given to man – because we are trespassers, period. David said we have “secret sins” we cannot see and don’t know about, let alone repent of. (Psa.19:12) The point is not that we become perfect in this life, but we are brought before the “Light” of Jesus where all darkness is extinguized instantly.  If God should enlighten us about a wrong in us, He will do so and grant us the repentance to go with it. (2 Tim.2:25; Act.11:18) Man’s propensity to sin is no excuse to live licentiously, but to enlighten man of his need for a permanent Mediator in Jesus, and the Sanctifier in the Spirit.

Trespasses are snuffed out like darkness is swallowed up by the light. Of course, this doesn’t give us license to do what we like and live irresponsibly (sin) – we do not commit sin because we know we are going to be forgiven anyway. Those who live like that are still living in darkness. No, the key is to maintain an ongoing attitude of repentance, realizing that we still sin even with our best efforts to be morally good. We are kept in Jesus’ prayer to daily seek the Father’s forgiveness because we live in our fallen fallen and depraved humanity. (Matt.6:12) If it were not for the Holy Spirit we would remain in our spiritually corrupt condition. Paul said, “But you are not controlled by your sinful nature. You are controlled by the Spirit if you have the Spirit of God living in you” (Rom.8:9, NLT).

What a wonderful and beautiful life God our Father has brought to live in His Son Jesus by the power of the Holy Spirit. Be ever grateful and praise Him always!

If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to write me in the space provided below, or email me on bulamanriver@gmail.com. Thanks for visiting!

Blessing: 

Until we meet again in my next post, may the blessings of the God who ceaselessly expresses Himself in His dependable Triune Love, be with you always. May the Spirit enliven your spirit and make all things concerning you possible as you live the “Triune Life” as a  Bulamanriver.*  Be strong in the Lord’s joy.

Kiang,  

* Bulamanriver” is the metaphor describing the union of man with the Love of the Triune God flowing in humans, making possible the “Triune Life” – the source of the miraculous life in man. To read the many facets of life of the Bulamanriver, go to my website www.bulamanriver.com where you can order a copy of my Book.

All scriptures are taken from the NIV Version 2011, unless stated otherwise.

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Greetings Friends!

As I greet you, fall (autumn) is upon us. However, the temperature seems to carry a different message, summer is not ready to leave just yet, not for now!

I would like to share a question that seems to plaque good-hearted people from time to time. It is this: I want to do God’s will for my life, but how do I know this present life is what He wants me to do? How do I order my life to suit His purpose and design for me? A fair question! This world is falling apart at the seams, and we need more people to project a more objective, caring, and responsible attitude toward life. One can say, the cause of so much evil in this world is quite elementary – humans are not living their God-given purpose on earth. (Gen.1:26-29) All of us, in our own unique way, make our mark which contribute to the condition we find ourselves in the world today. The onus will always be upon each of us to take up our own life’s burden, and like a jig-saw piece, make it fit into the fabric of human society, and hopefully contribute to a kinder world with a richer legacy for our children. Let’s begin! 

Is This Work God’s Will for Me (Photos: Wiki Commons)

How do I order my life? How do I know this is the job God wants me to do? How do I know this is the course of education He wants me to take up? Should I make this move to another state or another country? We are often left with a dilemma about what to do, and we pray it seems like God is not listening, much less answering.

First things first: I presume that if we are seeking to order our lives to befit God’s will, it is because we believe He is Love, and Love is the place where mutual benefit is the prime and only concern over our own selfish ways. When we live this way, no one takes offense for there is no law against it (Love). (Gal.5:22-23) We live as Paul proclaimed, “Owe no one anything, except to Love each other, for the one who Loves another has fulfilled the law” (Rom.13:8, ESV). In this life of outgoing concern for God and my neighbor, the Psalmist promises, “The Lord is my shepherd, I lack nothing” (Psa.23:1). As long as we live a surrendered life and make Him our Caretaker He promises to feed, guide, and shield us out of His abundance. (Psa.37:25; 48:14; 28:7)

Second, many of us have the mistaken idea we were born with goodness in our hearts to do something for God. Nothing could be further from the truth. This mindset finds its source in self-righteousness. The life of Love He offers comes from Him, and does not proceed from us. As the Bible says, “We Love because He first loved us” (1 John 4:19).

Third, life will be lived well where we find joy and strength in His purpose, if we remain open to God’s invitation to His calling for us. (Neh.8:10) He invites us to His enterprise, not the other way round.

God’s Enterprise

That being said, the question is, has God invited humans, you and me, to His enterprise? If yes, let’s ask, what is God’s enterprise? God’s enterprise has been known since the creation of man. Man can’t claim ignorance to His purpose which He made abundantly clear from the beginning. After recreating this earth for six days to make it habitable for humans, He openly and unambiguously spoke His enterprise, “Let Us make mankind in Our image, in Our likeness, so that they may rule (over creation).” So God created mankind for a purpose – to live and exist in His Love: “Let Us make human beings in Our image, make them reflecting Our nature (Love) so they can be responsible for the fish in the sea, the birds in the air, the cattle, and, yes, Earth itself, and every animal that moves on the face of Earth.” (Gen.1:26-27, MSG). Yes, it is called God’s Human Enterprise! Human purpose is to be responsible for all creation. So God created humans in His image so they will live like He does – “In His image and likeness.” This is not rocket science for it is simple and straight forward. There’s no ambiguity whatsoever.

God’s human enterprise is for man to rule and have dominion over this earth and all life forms upon it as God would – according to “His image and likeness.” Paul says the same thing in our Christian context, “For we are the temple of the living God. As God has said, “I will live with them and walk among them, and I will be their God, and they will be my people.” (2 Cor.6:16; Lev.26:12). Yes, in carrying out our dominion (living our life-gift) on this earth, our primary purpose is to ensure we allow Him to walk in and through us. God is Love, so Love becomes our nature too and is the most powerful and influential spiritual element which inspires all our thoughts and actions. Most of all, Love motivates our relationship with each other. “Dear friends, let us Love one another, for Love comes from God. Everyone who Loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not Love does not know God, because God is Love” (1 John 4:7-8).

Who Is God?

It’s vital we get past a couple of basic details from the creation account:

a) It is imperative we understand “God” in His Being and existence, so we know what we speak of, who we are faced with, and how to relate with Him in His human enterprise. Ignorance is not an option. All religions of this world view God differently and we see their beliefs in the way they worship and live. The word for “God” in the creation account is Elohim, which speaks of a uni-plural Being. Elohim is translated “gods” in other verses, like Genesis 35:2, “Get rid of all the foreign gods you have with you.” But the key here is what God said about Himself. By saying, “Let Us make man,” and “in Our image and in Our likeness,” it reveals God is not solitary, but pluralistic. And, when seen in the light of other passages of the Bible, He is Trinitarian. One such passage is Matthew 28:19 “Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.” Another is 1 John 5:7-8,  “For there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Spirit: and these three are One.” (Also, 2 Cor. 13:14; John 14:26, besides others)           

Rublev’s Famous Icon of The Trinity (Wiki Commons)

God is a Tri-Personal Being. He is three Persons in One Triune Godhead, commonly called, the Trinity. So we see why God said, “Us” instead of “Me,” and “Our” instead of “My” in the creation account. This explains why “God is Love” in His Triune nature. (1 John 4:8). He is not made of Love – He IS Love! It’s impossible for Love (God) to exist in isolation by and in Himself. For Love, must of necessity engender relationships, hence, He is Tri-Personal in His One Being. Love is outgoing. True Love can never Love Himself. That’s not what Love does. Love can only be Love when others exist to receive, give, and be showered with it. Hence, man is made to reflect His Creator. Each human is unique in personality for he is fashioned after the three Persons of the Trinity. I am using Love interchangeably as a noun and verb, because God is both – Love is who He is – His name – and Love is what He does.

So, man’s first purpose is to conform and become united with God’s pluralistic, yet One Triune Being. Just as God is unique in the three Personalities within the Godhead, so is man unique in the gift conferred upon him which reveal his purpose. So, whenever “God” is mentioned it always conveys His nature of Love and Triunity. He is not solitary and self-centered in Himself, for He cannot be God who is Love without being the Father, the Son and the Spirit. We’ll see how God makes a way and invites man into and live as He does in His Loving Triune Being – this is what I have termed in my blog posts as the “Triune Life” in my book and blog posts.

Man’s Purpose

b) Man, having fundamentally conformed himself to God’s primordial Triune Love nature, can now rule all creation as God would have him. But here is where man has lost the plot and moved away from God’s will and purpose on earth. Man has failed to live by God’s Loving Triune nature in the exercise of his God-given dominion over this earth. Instead, he ruled through his own solitary self-centered, fear-based mindset. It’s clear from the creation account that God wanted man to adopt His Loving Triune nature (“likeness mandate”) before exercising governance over this earth. By doing so, man would be blessed in all he does.

How did man lose the plot in the first place? Recall, Adam and Eve, our first parent, lived happily with purpose in Eden and experienced God in His Triune Personality. Jesus was the LORD of Creation, the Spirit was the Friend who personified the Love of God symbolized by the fruits of the “Tree of Life” from which they were free to eat. The Father was Overseer Father in heaven. We know the story, our first parent was evicted from Eden because they rebelled by eating the forbidden fruit. (Gen.2:15; 3:1-24) As consequence of their expulsion from Eden they lost all contact with the true God, and thereby were separated from God’s Triune Being. They now took up residence outside of Eden in the devil’s accursed world living solitary, self-centered, lives driven by fear – no longer Love as it was in Eden. Their actions had initiated  and dispensed curses upon all three – Satan, Adam and Eve. (Gen.3:14-24)

This is central to the whole story of human purpose – that we recognize Adam and his wife were given the freedom of choice to follow God’s Loving Triune way of life,  or the devil’s solitary, fear-based self-centered mode of living. Their decision will decide how they will administer their God-given dominion upon this earth. This became a parting of ways for our parent and for all humanity. Adam chose the devil’s solitary self-centered way. From the time of Adam’s eviction from Eden man has conducted his earthly dominion through Satan’s solitary self-centered spirit. The tragic events of man’s inhumanity to man has dominated the landscape of human suffering.

Man – “Cleveland Museum of Art – Damaged Thinker” by Daderot – Own work. (Wikimedia Commons) 

But the Creator did not leave man to the unfortunate fate he has chosen for himself through the devil’s cunning and deception. He promised to send a second Adam to put right Adam’s wrong. (Gen. 3;14-15; 1 Cor.15:45) From then on, man’s salvation, physical and spiritual, hinges upon the advent of the Messiah sent by God to save man from Satan. (1 Cor.1:30)

New Covenant

God’s promise as it relates to His human enterprise is framed in what the Bible calls the New Covenant. A covenant is a promise. It is based upon the promise God makes with man to provide a Messiah after the fall of our first parent. A promise is between two parties who are free to agree or disagree. God tells man, “‘Come now, let us reason together,’ says the Lord, ‘Though your sins are like scarlet, I will make them white as snow’” (Isa.1:18). The word “sin” has become so religionized that it has lost its authentic meaning. It simply means to live in a way contrary to the way of Love – who God is. (1 John 4:8) Love and freedom goes hand in hand, and fits like hand to glove. There is no Love without freedom, and no freedom without Love. Love never coerces nor does it pressures another by any means to its own will. We were made to embrace God’s likeness by freely choosing His way of life.

The covenant gives man a choice, like our first parent was given a choice between two trees. This is important for you and me, because in the covenant we decipher God’s purpose for man today, and our choice to harmonize ourselves with Him, or continue Adam’s rebellious path of following the devil. 

So, back to the original question, how do you find God’s will for your life? It begins with God’s covenant. We hear Him out and reason together, and decide freely if we choose to go with His plan. I don’t see why we should disagree because we know this world is badly in need of His Love, and so do we, even though we may not realize it. Let’s read it, then agree with it, because we know Love is the place where we want to be because we can exist through mutual benefit in His Love, and He may honor us with His abundance. (Psa.23)

Let’s read His plan (New Covenant promise):

“But this is the new covenant I will make with the people of (spiritual) Israel on that day,says the LORD: I will put my laws in their minds, and I will write them on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be my people. And they will not need to teach their neighbors, nor will they need to teach their relatives, saying, ‘You should know the LORD.’ For everyone, from the least to the greatest, will know me already. And I will forgive their wickedness, and I will never again remember their sins” (Heb.8:10-12, NLT, emphasis added).

A Look Inside a Replica of Ark of The Covenant in Timna Valley, Israel (Wiki Commons)

Holy Spirit

This is not a plan written on paper or chiseled in stone like the ‘old covenant’ made with physical Israel, but one carved into the hearts of the people of spiritual Israel. (Heb.8:9) This plan fulfills God’s main purpose for making man into “His image and likeness.” By saying, “I will put my laws in their minds and write them on their hearts” (V.10a), and His people will not be schooled by humans about His way of life (V.11), He is pointing to a different process He will utilize to get us to know and impart His Love in us. It will not be like the legalistic ‘old covenant.’ Believers will get to know Him firsthand through this process, and it will touch all from the least to the greatest of them. This can only mean God has His miraculous means of teaching us which does not require human input.

How? Through the power of the Holy Spirit! The Spirit is the presence of God (Love) in humans who have chosen freely to follow Him. Paul told the Romans, “For we know how dearly God Love us, because He has given us the Holy Spirit to fill our hearts with His Love” (Rom.5:5, NLT). Paul said believers are “temples” or dwellings for the Spirit, “Don’t you realize that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, who lives in you and was given to you by God?” (1 Cor.6:19, NLT; also, 1 Cor.3:16).

So, the process of imbibing the knowledge of His purpose for our lives is the responsibility of the Spirit who resides in us – not human teachers. (John 16:12-15) That’s why a person who is given the role of a teacher must understand he or she is the instrument of the Spirit’s work. Peter’s powerful preaching by inspiration of the Spirit on Pentecost is a fine example. Jesus said this to His followers before He was taken to be crucified, “I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Advocate (Teacher, Helper), who will never leave you. It is best for you that I go away, because if I don’t, the Advocate won’t come. If I do go away, then I will send him to you” (John 14:16; 16:7, NLT, emphasis added). The Advocate is none other than the Spirit who first came to believers on Pentecost under the umbrella of the New Covenant. (Act.2:1-4)

The process is the deposit of God’s nature, His Love, in the hearts of humans by the Holy Spirit. The Bible speaks of this miraculous way of guiding us through the Spirit, “Your own ears will hear Him. Right behind you a voice will say, “This is the way you should go,” whether to the right or to the left” (Isa.30:21; 42:16; Psa.73:24). It is not an audible voice, but we hear through the ears of our minds, and speak through our hearts.

Perhaps an analogy might be of help. Think of the force of physical gravity in our physical environment, as the counterpart of the spiritual gravitational pull of God’s Love in His spiritual world. In other words, what gravity is to our physical environment, Love is to our spiritual environment which governs spiritual/human relationships. Naturally, we compensate for gravity as we grow up until we live with it intuitively and become second nature. We take gravity for granted. Here is my point, all our actions also answer to another, equally real gravitational force – the spiritual gravitational pull of Love (God). Just as gravity becomes ‘automatic’ and we become ‘unaware’ of its affect on all our actions – so is Loves’ spiritual gravity. I would like to think Paul was referring to this gravitational force of Love when he said, “For it is God who is at work in you to make you willing and able to obey His purposes” (Phi.2:13). Most of all the spiritual gravity governs human relationships. If we break it, gravity does the same to us – unequivocally. Human suffering is proof of this unseen spiritual gravity (Love) being broken repetitively because it governs human relationships.

Of course, no metaphor, no matter how elaborate, can adequately explain God’s grandeur, majesty, and glory –  “To whom then will you liken Me That I would be his equal?” says the Holy One” (Isa.40:25). He is not gravity, it is simply a helpful tool for our limited human minds understand spiritual realities that’s beyond our discernment. The Bible says this about the work of the Spirit, “But it was to us that God revealed these things by His Spirit. For His Spirit searches out everything and shows us God’s deep secrets” (1 Cor. 2:10). Yes, the Spirit imbues us with the faith of Jesus to comprehend what is physically incomprehensible. (Eph.2:8)

Dove – Symbol of The Holy Spirit (Wiki Commons)

With man’s solitary pathway firmly entrenched in man through Adam’s fall, we see why human suffering has dominated the human landscape down through the ages and continues to our day. All the evil we see in the world arise from the broken unseen law of the spiritual gravity of God’s Love which governs human relationship. Note the distinction, our physical gravity inhabits only our physical earthly sphere, but God’s spiritual Love-gravity inhabits space, time, and all eternity. On one hand physical gravity is unseen but felt, while spirit gravity is unseen and not felt immediately. Hence, we read, “When a crime is not punished quickly (like physical gravity), people feel it is safe to do wrong” (Eccl.8:11). God is Love and He is omnipresent and omniscient, and you can be sure He is real and can be felt and experienced. (Isa.46:9-10) I hope this clarifies the process by which God works with those who agree to walk with Him. (Amo.3:3) The purpose of life is to live and harmonize our lives with His Spirit and His Love.  (You may read my Blog Post titled, “A Penny for Your Thoughts” in which I explain how this Love works in us individually. Posted on March 18, 2014)

Jesus – Man’s Mediator

I am explaining the process (Covenant) in reverse here, for the giving of the Spirit is criterion to another aspect and preceding provision of the New Covenant which says, “I will forgive their wickedness, and I will never again remember their sins” (Heb.8:12). Recall, Jesus said, “Unless I go away, the Helper (Spirit) will not come to you” (John 16:7). What He said was the Spirit can’t be given to man unless and until human transgression arising out of Adam’s fall is taken care of once for all. Jesus must first be installed as mankind’s High Priest in heaven to mediate between God and sinful man. (Heb.7:6-7) We saw that sin means to live contrary to the way God is – Love. Where there is sin, it has to be atoned for, hence we read, “For God so Loved the world that He gave His one and only Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through Him” (John 3:16-17). So, here we see the Father giving His Son as Savior and Mediator to make possible the gift of the Spirit.

Jesus Walking on Water to Peter and Disciples (Wiki Commons) 

Immortality

This passage from John also emphasize another aspect of the New Covenant – the Spirit is the deposit of God’s gift of immortality to man. The words of the Covenant simply states, “I will be their God, and they will be my people (children)” (V.10, my emphasis). The ultimate meaning of being God’s people is to be immortalized. (2 Cor.1:21-22; Eph.1:13-14) Jesus said this about the message He brought from His Father, “For My Father’s will is that everyone who looks to the Son and believes in Him shall have eternal life, and I will raise them up at the last day.” (John 6:39-40) So, the Spirit has the dual role of being the Personification of God’s Love in man, and is the power that will resurrect humans to life everlasting. (1 Cor.15:51-57; Rom.8:11, 29) Therefore, we hear Jesus declare Himself as the doorway to eternal life, saying, “I am the resurrection and the life. The one who believes in Me will live, even though they die” (John 11:25).

God the Father

The ultimate picture of restitution where mankind is brought and made one in Love with the Father is uttered by John in a vision, “And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Look! God’s dwelling place is now among the people, and He will dwell with them. They will be his people, and God Himself will be with them and be their God. ‘He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death’ or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away. He who was seated on the throne said, “I am making everything new!” Then he said, “Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true” (Rev.21:3-5). If there is “no more death” in the new world order of God, then it must of necessity mean human mortality will cease to exist, and human immortality will be man’s legacy. At long last, the words God uttered at creation, “let Us make man in Our Image,” is brought to reality. Jesus is the first human who made this transition from mortal to immortality, and opens the gate to everlasting life for mankind. (John 10:9-10) What happens after this is not revealed to us, but you can be sure as the Author of creation, our heavenly Father has great things in store for us. To quote from a Shakespearean play, “The world is your oyster,” will now be, “The universe is your oyster,” for we will no longer be imprisoned to this earthly by our human mortality. (Rom.8:18-21)

And that in a nutshell is God’s human enterprise and our purpose for existence in it. Wherever we find ourselves in life, the work we do within the bounds of law and order, let His Love be the motivating force. As long as we keep His human enterprise a priority in life and order our lives to that end, we are living God’s purpose for us.

If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to write me in the space provided below, or email me on bulamanriver@gmail.com.

Blessing: Until we meet again in my next post, may the blessings of the God who ceaselessly expresses Himself in His dependable Triune Love, be with you always. May the Spirit enliven your spirit and make all things concerning you possible as you live the “Triune Life” as a  Bulamanriver.*  Be strong in the Lord’s joy.

Kiang,  

* Bulamanriver” is the metaphor describing the union of man with the Love of the Triune God flowing in humans, making possible the “Triune Life” – the source of the miraculous life in man. To read the many facets of life of the Bulamanriver, go to my website www.bulamanriver.com where you can order a copy of my Book.

All scriptures are taken from the NIV Version 2011, unless stated otherwise.

Note: All information is copy-write. Any information obtained from this website that is used for publication should be acknowledged by citing the website address, date of acquisition and information pertinent to original authorship. For general guidelines regarding web citations see The Guide for Citing Electronic Information.

Greetings Friends!

In this post I would like to recommend a book to you my readers. The book is called, “The Trinity And Human Personality,” by John Tal Murphree. If you are interested in a book about the Christian belief in the Trinity, this is a must read. I will quote from Murphree’s introduction,

“Most of the Christian church historically has embraced the doctrine of the Trinity, though often attempting to conceal embarrassment over what appears to be an irrational creed. In the church today, many thoughtful persons concur with philosopher Emmanual Kant that the tenet has no practical value.

“It is my conviction that the central and necessary place of the Trinity of all of life has not been adequately shown. This volume is intended to help rectify this deficiency.”

Book Cover

Of course most of my readers have known by now how I have attempted to do just that – the best I know how at explaining the Trinity – in my writings in this blog site: Bulamanriver, The Miracle of Triune Living. You may read my last installment as a sampling, titled, “Love – The Answer to Evil in This World.” I have coined a term you may not have read anywhere else like, “Triune Life,” to help make sense of the Trinity in practicable terms to my readers. There is no human analogy we can use to liken a God who is Trinitarian. They will always remain analogous and inadequate for a God who is Triune and greater than our minds can satisfactorily explain.

Be that as it may, God has not left Himself totally incomprehensible nor inapprehensible. That would be self-defeating for we were created in God’s Triune image so we can come to know and have a meaningful and personal relationship with Him. The main ingredient which explains His Oneness in His Tri-personal Being is His Love. “God IS Love!” (1 John 4:8). Without Love the Trinity would be just a shell. God is not made of Love, He IS Love! God is uncreated, while everything in the spirit and material world was created. He had no beginning of days nor end. He has been and will always be Love and Trinitarian from eternity into everlasting.

For me, one of the more poignant portion of Murphree’s book is his description of the Trinity where each Person “occupies” the others’ personalities and hence their Oneness. And in this we witness the manifestation of God’s unifying nature – Love! This occupation explains how Love works and brings about a relational Oneness which we can share with the Triune God in Christ. We enter the life of the Trinity in and through Christ, there’s no other way. Hence Paul wrote, “For those God foreknew He also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, that He might be the firstborn (into the Trinity) among many brothers and sisters” (Rom.8:29, my emphasis). Each of the three Persons of the Trinity becomes “home” for the other two. So do we when we enter and live the “Triune Life” in Christ. (1 Cor.6:19) As each inhabits the others, each is host and guest to the other in this Triune lifestyle and existence. It is so reciprocal that each one feels more at home with the others’ personalities than His own. The Trinitarian Person, which we have become through and in Christ, do not exist in isolation; they live in and through one another, and their personalities become relationally Love. Each has intimate access to the others’ deepest thoughts and feelings always. Of course, I do not mean this in a human way because man does not know how to live like this way unless Jesus unifies him to it. God is Spirit. God is three Persons in One substance (Greek, homoousios – “of one substance”). The substance of their nature is Love. Love makes the act of One the act of all Three, making them singular and unified. Love makes their oneness a reality.

When Jesus prayed to the Father, “Not My will, but Yours be done,” it was the only way Jesus could have responded because He’s divine substance is Love. Of course, Jesus was not locked into Love that He had no choice in the matter. He was free to choose like any human would. Where there is Love, there must of necessity be freedom. Love and freedom are opposite sides of God’s nature. Paul makes this clear, “Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom” (2 Cor.3:17). Jesus said this about His crucifixion, “No one can take my life from Me. I sacrifice it voluntarily (freely). For I have the authority to lay it down when I want to and also to take it up again (freedom). For this is what My Father has commanded” (John 10:18). Paul said, “It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery” (Gal.5:1). In Jesus’ freedom He chose Love, so do we.

They cannot act solitarily but inclusively and collaboratively in freedom – always. One of the reasons humans find the Trinity hard to grasp is because they have never known any other way but the “solitary” self-centered mode of thinking and living, which is diametrically opposed to the free collective “Triune Life.” Man have been living this ‘solitary’ self-centered way since Adam’s fall. So it will take a little bit of time and experience to have the “Triune Life” sink into the human spirit and consciousness. Man has never seen this Triune way of life manifested in human experience until Jesus came on the scene and revealed the Father and the Spirit more than two thousand years ago. His miracle-working and sacrificial life was a summary of this Trinitarian way. Only One who emanates from the Trinity could live “Triune Life” and thus impart it to man, and that was Jesus’ mission given Him by the Father.

 Rublev’s Famous Icon of The Trinity (Wiki Commons)

Hence we read Jesus’ declaration of this “Triune Life” of occupation: “Don’t you believe that I am in the Father, and that the Father is in Me? The words I say to you I do not speak on My own authority. Rather, it is the Father, living in Me, who is doing His work” (John 14:10). We become one with the Father through our union with Jesus who took our humanity in Himself and glorified it in the Trinity through His life, crucifixion, resurrection, and ascension. Note how Jesus prayed to the Father for His followers in this triune vein, “I have given them the glory You gave Me—the glorious unity of Being One, as We are— I in them and You in Me, all being perfected into One” (John 17:22-23). It’s a life that’s never lived solitarily, but collaboratively, each inhabiting the other as host and guests in Loving relationship. Man will only live to his detriment without this shared “Triune Life.”

The power which makes this kind of living possible is God’s divine Love.”God is Love,” and God is Freedom. (1 John 4:8; 2 Cor.3:17) Personally, I believe that much of the dilemma of human existence as it pertains to our origin and destiny, of the joys and sufferings of human reality, owes in no small part to how we take up God’s divine Triune image in the sense of living it from day to day. I encourage you to obtain a copy of Murphree’s book from an online bookstore.

It is my hope this book will expand on your understanding about belief in the Trinity, and that you will find it most instructive and edifying as it has been for me.

I should mention that my book, “Bulamanriver – The Miracle of Triune Living” (see cover below) is also about the Trinity and God’s work of Love in the world today. It’s available on Amazon and other online bookstores.

Book Cover

Until we meet again in my next post, may the blessings of the God who ceaselessly expresses Himself in His dependable Triune Love, be with you always. May the Spirit enliven your spirit and make all things concerning you possible as you live the Triune Life as a Bulamanriver.*  Be strong in the Lord’s joy.

Kiang,  

* Bulamanriver” is the metaphor describing the union of man with the Love of the Triune God flowing in humans, making possible the “Triune Life” – the source of the miraculous life in man. To read the many facets of life of the Bulamanriver, go to my website www.bulamanriver.com where you can order a copy of my Book.

All scriptures are taken from the NIV Version 2011, unless stated otherwise.

Note: All information is copy-write. Any information obtained from this website that is used for publication should be acknowledged by citing the website address, date of acquisition and information pertinent to original authorship. For general guidelines regarding web citations see The Guide for Citing Electronic Information

Greetings Friends everywhere!

The answer may not be as absurd as you might think! I’m talking about the evil in our world which seems to continue unabated. There is a simple yet profound explanation for it. As we look around us, things seem to be in disarray and beyond our power to control. It seems like we are headed in a downward spiral to oblivion and we can’t do much about it. Terrorism dominates our psyche every other day. Our capitalist world doesn’t seem to contribute to a better world we thought it might give us – how can it, if it has greed as its agenda? According to scientists, our planet earth we call the ‘blue marble,’ is dying a slow death through man’s excesses and lack of environmental responsibility. The world is filled with problems—disease, pollution, poverty, ignorance, religious confusion, rape, war, terrorism, crime, violence, racial tensions, hunger, immorality, slavery, oppression, political upheaval and much more. Even nature seems to be against us in the natural disasters we see around the globe. The future for mankind can best be described as uncertain and on shaky ground.

Montage of War on Terror (Wiki Commons)

Yet, there’s never been a time like ours in terms of man’s advancement in education, in science and the arts, in technological wonders, in transportation, in engineering, and just about every sphere of endeavor. Yet, evil has kept pace with man’s progress. It seems with every step forward he countermands it with two steps backwards. What’s behind this paradox? The well-known presidential historian and columnist Peggy Noonan summarized mankind’s history: “In the long ribbon of history, life has been one long stained and tangled mess, full of famine, horror, war and disease. We must have thought we had it better because man had improved. But man doesn’t really ‘improve,’ does he? Man is man. Human nature is human nature; the impulse to destroy coexists with the desire to build and create and make better” (“America’s Age of Uncertainty,” Knight Ridder, Nov. 9, 2001). Why  is the “impulse to destroy coexists with the desire to build and create?”  

Natural Disasters (Wiki Commons)

I can give you my personal solutions to the problems, so do others from every which where, but they will be to no avail. So, let me give you the Trinitarian solution. You have read me always defray to the “Triune” solution to everything and every issue in my blogs. Jesus lived this way and said, “I don’t speak on my own authority. The Father who sent Me has commanded Me what to say and how to say it” (John 12:29, NLT). The solution to the problems of humanity are not found in humans, except to those who tap into a divine source outside of themselves, as Jesus prescribed. Albert Einstein supports this vies saying wisely, “We cannot solve our problems with the same level of thinking that created them.” Jesus said that not only was He given what to do, but how to do it, by His Father. So I hope to be able to convey the same solution on the subject of evil, with the help of His Spirit.

First and foremost, man’s beginning originates from a Being who is Trinitarian in His makeup and character. (Gen.1:26-27) Man is the anthropomorphism of a God who is Love and Triune. (1 John 4:8) The Father is not God without the Son and the Spirit. Nor is the Son God without the Father and the Spirit. Neither is the Spirit God without the Father and Son. Because of this basic truth of God’s Triune nature, we were made to live and function like He does in His Tri-Personal Being. That’s to say, in the Trinity, each Person “occupies” the others’ personalities. This occupation brings about a relational oneness or “Triune Life” as I often refer to in my blogs. As each of the three Persons of the Trinity becomes “home” for the other two, so do we when we live the “Triune Life” in Christ. (Rom.8:29) As each inhabits the others, each is host and guest to the other in this Triune lifestyle and existence. It is so reciprocal that each one feels more at home with the others’ personalities than His own. Trinitarian persons, which we have become through and in Christ, do not exist in isolation; they live in and through one another, which makes their personalities relational. Each has intimate access to the others’ deepest thoughts and feelings perpetually. This makes them equals, free personalities, and united in Love. Hence we read Jesus’ declaration of this “Triune Life”: “Don’t you believe that I am in the Father, and that the Father is in Me? The words I say to you I do not speak on My own authority. Rather, it is the Father, living in Me, who is doing His work” (John 14:10). It’s a life that’s never lived solitarily, but collaboratively, each inhabiting the other as host and guests in Loving relationship. Without the “Triune Life” man will live life to his own detriment. The power which makes this kind of living possible is God’s divine Love. “God is Love,” and Love is God. (1 John 4:8)

The Trinity, After Whose Likeness Man Was Fashioned (Wiki Commons)

Man was not born with this Love, but he has the potential to be given and receive this Love through a spiritual rebirth by God’s Spirit. Jesus said, “You must be born again of the Spirit” (John 3:5-8). The Spirit is the personification of God’s Love deposited in man. (Rom.5:5) Love is the glue which makes the “Triune Life” possible. “Triune Life” means a believer who lives the 3-dimensional life inhabitation within the Triune God, as opposed to the ‘solitary’ 1-dimensional life man lives in himself. Love engenders and means trust. Stephen Covey said, “Trust (Love) is the glue of life. It’s the most essential ingredient in effective communication. It’s the foundational principle that holds all relationships.” When Adam disobeyed God, his human spirit died. “You will surely die,” God told Adam if he ate the forbidden fruit. (Gen.2:17) Adam’s spirit died because he sinned, for “the wages of sin is death” (Rom.6:23). Sin is the opposite of and contrary to Love. The devil took reign of man’s heart for he is the originator of sin, rebellion, and death. (Ezek.28:15) Man’s fallen and dead spiritual state of being now becomes the basis of his thinking process and the trigger for human suffering we see in the world today.

It’s crucial to understand Jesus when He said, “Life is spiritual. Your physical existence doesn’t contribute to that life” (John 6:63, God’s Word T.). This is fundamental in Christian thought, and Paul spells out Jesus’ meaning when he said, “Our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the power of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms” (Eph.6:12). That’s to say, what we see in man’s physical world is the result of the goings-on in the spiritual realm animating human actions. (see Job 2:1-4) This means man is not free as he likes to think he is. How can he, when he has been dead spiritually from Adam? Spiritually, he is incarcerated in the devil’s prison due to Adam’s deathly choice. But Paul tells us the freedom we are given to enjoy as believers, “through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit who gives life has set you free from the law of sin and death” (Rom.8:2). The Holy Spirit brings back to life man’s dead spirit through Christ, and man is made one with God through the Spirit’s presence in man. (John 3:5-8) This speaks of the Spirit’s “condition” in which our mind is made to think and behave. The “condition” is either sin, incarceration, and death, or God’s Spirit, Love, freedom, and life. 

The human mind is the seat and center of man’s spiritual life. Of all creatures God made, only man was created with the mind to enable him to have a spiritual existence. Through the human mind, man was made to communicate with God in whose likeness he was fashioned. The human body is entirely homosapien except for the brain which houses the human mind and elevates him to God’s level (likeness). (Gen.1:26-27; Rom.8:29) The Psalmist said, “I said, ‘You are “gods’; you are all sons of the Most High” (Psa.82:6). At creation God gave Adam the authority to name the animals and other creatures. This proves that man was special and different from other life forms. (Gen.2:19-20) Man did not evolve from animals, he was fashioned in his Creator’s image. The brain is given its mind power when God breathed into man the ‘human spirit’ no other creature in creation possessed: “Then the LORD God formed a man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being” (Gen.2:7). That is the difference between an animal and human being – the human mind! It gave him the consciousness of himself and his actions. It gave him the human mind so he can evaluate his actions. The source of all man’s actions, be they good or evil, originates from a spiritual source – the human mind. Paul says, “Dear friends, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world” (1 John 4:1). To believe or disbelieve is the activity of the human mind. This passage speaks of a truth we often are unaware, since the mind is spiritual by nature, thereby, various external spiritual forces can enter man and influence his actions – depending upon which spirit we allow to influence our actions. That is why we “test the spirits” and decide who we believe, and who we discard and disbelieve.

Man is a free moral agent, therefore, he has to choose which spirit to submit himself. This is the root cause of evil in our world – we have given our minds over to the wrong spirit to influence our thought process and thereby bring forth evil actions. There you have it – it is as simple as it is profound. The cause of all evil in this world is man’s mind and the thoughts he allows to germinate and ultimately bring forth into action which affects those around him. We shall see how to deal with it. Paul warned, “You know well enough from your own experience that there are some acts of so-called freedom that destroy freedom. Offer yourselves to sin, for instance, and it’s your last free act. But offer yourselves to the ways of God and the freedom never quits. All your lives you’ve let sin tell you what to do. But thank God you’ve started listening to a new master, one whose commands set you free to live openly in his freedom!” (Rom.6:16-18, MSG).

As humans, we fail to guard the door of our minds from intruders (wrong spirits) who mean us harm, as we would guard the door of our homes to protect ourselves and our loved ones. Yet, we must come around to value what we permit to influence our minds more than anything else in life. As we saw earlier, “we are not fighting against flesh-and-blood enemies, but against evil rulers and authorities of the unseen world, against mighty powers in this dark world, and against evil spirits in the heavenly places” (Eph.6:12, NLT). This is first base, friends, this is for keeps, a life-or-death fight to the finish. If we fail here we become slaves to those we have given our minds to control our thought process, and we would have aborted our opportunity to contribute to a better world. (Rom.6:16)

 The Human Mind – We Ask, Which Spirit Is in Control of Our Motives? (Wiki Commons)

What is Love and how does it move in the lives of people and their actions? How do we know Love when we see it? In order to understand we have to go back to the original dominion mandate given to man at creation in Genesis. Let’s hear the mandate once more. After God created teems of living creatures in the oceans, and every winged creature, the beasts of the earth and everything that creeps, each after their kind, He said, “Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; and let them rule (have dominion) over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and over the cattle and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them. God blessed them; and God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth, and subdue it; and rule (have dominion) over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and over every living thing that moves on the earth.” Then God said, “Behold, I have given you every plant yielding seed that is on the surface of all the earth, and every tree which has fruit yielding seed; it shall be food for you; and to every beast of the earth and to every bird of the sky and to everything that moves on the earth which has life, I have given every green plant for food”; and it was so. God saw all that He had made, and behold, it was very good” (Gen.1:26-31). The words I have italicized in the passage above spells out the “dominion mandate” over this earth the Creator God gave mankind through Adam and Eve, our first parents.

Please note, there was not a word mentioned here of humans having dominion or rule over other humans. The passage speaks of man’s dominion over all creation, except another human. This was quite deliberate, why, because there is only One Ruler over man who is made in the Creator’s likeness – God, who alone Personally directs man by His Spirit. No human is superior to another human because they bear the same image of God which makes them all equals. Then God places unique gifts in each man, woman, and child, and through those gifts directs His human children in His Love. Yet, as humans, while we have absolutely no power to confer gifts upon another human (perish the thought), we have the audacity to selfishly and thoughtlessly rule and dominate them, despite being clueless as to who they are in their God-given gifts? Paul makes God’s divine authority in man clear, “In a marriage relationship, there is authority from Christ to husband, and from husband to wife. The authority of Christ is the authority of God.” (1 Cor.11:3, MSG; also Heb. 8:10-11; Isa. 30:20-21). The family is the foundation of human society replicating God’s Triune character, hence Paul uses it as the basis for revealing divine sovereignty over mankind.

Divine authority begins with God the Father and flows down. So, ultimately the head of every man, woman, and child, is God, and He has never relinquished this role to any human. The prophet Ezekiel, quoting God, said, “For everyone (all people) belongs to Me, the parent as well as the child–both alike belong to Me” (Ezek.18:4). Modern church leaders are grossly culpable by unwittingly (or wittingly) stepping into God’s shoes and usurped authority over people that’s not rightly theirs. Yes, they can play god by dominating the flock through forms of legalism, but they can’t be God. (read Ezekiel 34) Church leaders must remain faithful intermediaries, heralds, conveying God’s truth and Love by helping bring believers into the “Triune Life.” If we fail to do that we have disqualified ourselves from being overseers of God’s people. God makes His sovereignty profoundly clear in the way we live daily, “We can make our own plans, but the Lord gives the right answer” (Pro.16:1). We all seek success in every plan we embark on in life, but a wrong answer will spell failure and disaster for us and our loved ones. Only God has all the answers. No church leader is capable of giving all the “the right answers” to the members of his congregation. But if we acknowledge and allow God to weigh our motives, intents, and purposes, then He rules over us and leads us to success, victory, and happiness. Only God has gifted every human who has ever lived and thereby knows the intents and purpose of each person, and how to lead a person to his/her destiny. So, why do humans seek to rule over and dominate other humans and infringe upon God’s direct personal area of responsibility? Do we dare act upon what we are unqualified and woefully incapacitated to do? Dominating others blinds us to the truth of who we are because we’re not living in God’s likeness or the “Triune Life.” We lose our humanity when we seek to dominate others, for we are made to live the “Triune Life” as equals. When we see others as equals and not dominate them in the sight of God, we are tapping into the source where all gifts originate, and we put ourselves on the path to self-discovery about our ourselves, and those of others, which we would not otherwise achieve. Even God does not dominate humans – He Loves them and gave His Son as ransom for them. The truth is people dominate other people because they have taken on another spirit, not God’s Spirit.

It is crucial as much as it is pragmatic that God gave Adam the original “other” human, Eve, to live the role of a “suitable helper” with him. So, Eve was not created like Adam from the dust of the ground, but out from Adam’s body, depicting the basic Trinitarian nature of the personal co-habitation of oneness and in one another. (Gen.2:20-24) When Adam said of Eve, “This is now bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called ‘woman,’ for she was taken out of man,” the Spirit inspired him to utter the basic Trinitarian image of co-habitation of persons as one being, like the Tri-Personal Being of God. Children are birthed under the same Triune pattern. Mankind come from one man through multiplication – Adam. Though the primary context for this “helper” decree to Adam and Eve was matrimonial, Eve epitomizes every human. Since Eve was the only “other” human besides Adam, by extension she also represented our “neighbor,” whoever he or she may be. For the “helper” decree can be applied in every context, not necessarily matrimonial. Hence, the mandate is to “help” not rule our fellow humans.

Paul explains this “helper” decree we’re to have toward our fellowmen: “Owe no man anything, except the debt of Love” (Rom. 13:8; Gal. 6:2; Rom.5:5). Again he said to the Corinthians, “We are helpers of your joy” (2 Cor. 1:24, KJV). Yes, we ought to be a source of joy to others – that’s what Love does. Why, because God created us and owes us the same debt of Love, and lived by it when He gave His only Son to die for us. John said, “Dear friends, since God so Loved us, we also ought to Love one another” (1 John 4:11). Yes, this is a debt we owe every human who walks this earth: “the debt of Love,” but never to dominate and rule another human which is God’s prerogative alone. Jesus said it this way, “love your neighbor as yourself” (Mark 12:31). That means your neighbor is your equal – you can’t dominate anyone who is your equal, you can only Love him or her. Human domination is forbidden irrespective of station, color, nationality, culture, or whatever walls of division humans are likely to set up. So, the original Genesis “dominion mandate” given to man precludes our domination over another human.

And this, right here, is the true source of evil in the world today. We have forsaken the “dominion mandate” given us by the Creator to Love, help, and be a source of joy to our neighbors. It is Love that will change our thought process to think differently and more highly of our fellowmen. It begins here, it begins with God’s divine Love, if evil is ever to be reversed in the world.

Divine Love, Not Man’s Love (Wiki Commons)

Those who channel the “dominion mandate” selfishly are spontaneously forced to make greed and avarice their way of life, instead of God’s Love. This is where evil and human suffering takes root. They think the only way is to compete and control, not realizing that the “dominion mandate” given to man precludes our domination over another man. Everything created is given to man to have dominion and rule with the exception of human beings. When we live the “Triune Life” and treat everyone as equals, a whole new world opens up we never knew existed.

“You are unrealistic,” one might say, “people are employed to serve under other people who are above and dominate them. So how do we apply this principle in real life situations?” Yes, a valid point. Every company operates under this ‘master/servant’ relationship where there’s employer and employee. So did Jesus when He walked this earth, yet He lived by the “dominion mandate” set by God, never domineering nor dictating His followers. In fact, He served His followers, never lording it over them. The leader is the greatest servant, he is servant to his followers. Jesus said, “You know that the rulers in this world lord it over their people, and officials flaunt their authority over those under them. But among you it will be different. Whoever wants to be a leader among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first among you must become your slave. For even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve others and to give His life as a ransom for many” (Matt.20:25-28). Yes, His ultimate act of leadership was to dies for His followers. He said, “There is no greater love than to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.” Then He taught his followers, “This is my commandment: Love each other in the same way I have loved you” (John 15:13,12). What a profound statement about authentic leadership of which the world has little or none.

Jesus asked His disciples, “Do you understand what I have just done?” What did He just do? He performed the most menial task a servant can do – getting down on His knees and washing the disciples’ feet. He told them, “You call me ‘Master’ and ‘Lord,’ and you are right, because that’s what I am. And since I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you ought to wash each other’s feet. I have given you an example to follow. Do as I have done to you” (John 13:12-17). You see, you can be a manager of people and still be the greatest servant of all. How? You have to frame every person in the context of God’s Love – as owing everyone the “debt of Love” (Rom.13:8). The Spirit impresses God’s Love into your subconscious mind so your thought-process and actions is motivated by Love. Once Love becomes the central motive in your relationship with people, your paradigm changes and your actions will change to support it. That’s how God behaves toward us, the least we could do is to act likewise with others. 

Jesus, Washing The Disciples’ Feet, Showing Leadership Through Love and Servanthood (Wiki Commons)

Zig Ziglar said, “Your attitude, not your aptitude, will determine your altitude.” For many Love is not the central theme which leads their lives, yet, it is the most profound singular measure by which you will determine your altitude in life. The greater part of our success and happiness or lack of it depends on our dispositions and not our circumstances. Marcus Aurelius said, “When you arise in the morning, think of what a precious privilege it is to be alive – to breathe, to think, to enjoy, to Love.”

Why don’t you turn to Jesus today, and ask Him to deliver your mind from all forms of evil thoughts through the gift of His divine Love. The Scriptures says this to you directly, “May you experience the Love of Christ, though it is too great to understand fully. Then you will be made complete with all the fullness of life and power that comes from God” (Eph.3:19). May God bless you!

If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to write me in the space provided below, or email me on bulamanriver@gmail.com.

Blessing: Until we meet again in my next post, may the blessings of the God who ceaselessly expresses Himself in His dependable Triune Love, be with you always. May the Spirit enliven your spirit and make all things concerning you possible as you live the “Triune Life” as a  Bulamanriver.*  Be strong in the Lord’s joy.

Kiang,  

* Bulamanriver” is the metaphor describing the union of man with the Love of the Triune God flowing in humans, making possible the “Triune Life” – the source of the miraculous life in man. To read the many facets of life of the Bulamanriver, go to my website www.bulamanriver.com where you can order a copy of my Book.

All scriptures are taken from the NIV Version 2011, unless stated otherwise.

Note: All information is copy-write. Any information obtained from this website that is used for publication should be acknowledged by citing the website address, date of acquisition and information pertinent to original authorship. For general guidelines regarding web citations see The Guide for Citing Electronic Information.

Greetings Friends!

In my last post I spoke about the “Triune Life.” I explained that it’s man’s union with the Triune God which makes the “Triune Life” possible. It means a believer who lives the 3-dimensional life with the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, as opposed to the ‘solitary’ 1-dimensional life man lives in himself apart from the Triune God. The “Triune Life” is made possible by the Son of God, Jesus, who Himself is one in substance and reality with the Father and the Spirit from eternity. Jesus made it possible because He took our humanity in Himself and glorified and unified it into the very Being of the Triune Godhead, thus fulfilling God’s first purpose of creating man – to make man in “His image and likeness” (Gen.1:26-27).

“Triune Life” Means Living Honorably as The Triune God Does in Their Existence (Reblev’s Icon of the Trinity, Wiki Commons)

There is one distinguishing attribute we take with us into the “Triune Life” relationship with God the Father, the Son, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit: “honor!” Honor means to hold in the highest esteem possible. It means veneration, and utter reverence. The first command given to man as it concerns his relationship with other humans has to do with his physical father and mother. And the first word uttered in that relationship is, honor – “Honor your father and mother” (Exo.20:12). The patriarchal human father figure is the physical representation of our true Father in heaven, and to whom we give “double honor.” (1 Tim.1:17; Rev.5:13, ESV)

The first step toward Love is honor. We enter the Father’s Love through the doorway of honor in Jesus. Jesus honored His Father in every way and everything He did when He was a man who went about doing good, so we are called to conform to the image of His Son. (Rom.8:29; Acts 10:38) Honor begins with the father in the home and thereby honor undergirds our place in the greater human society. We honor our fellow humans for they are made in God’s image. To dishonor is to show disrespect as to impugn one’s humanity and God’s likeness. All weakness and sins enter through the door of dishonor. To Love is honorable, to sin is dishonorable. The term “honor among thieves” means even corrupt people have a sense of honor or integrity that’s skewed. (Isa.64:6) We bring true honor into the Love relationship with the Father, and obtain His favor and perfection – to hold our relationship with veneration and the highest esteem. Honor is what gives Love its glow.

Medal of Honor – Awarded for Personal Acts of Valor Above and Beyond the Call of Duty. Honoring God is a Call to Duty Because He First Honored Us With His Love Above & Beyond We Deserve (Rom.5:8-10; 1 John 3:16) (Wiki Commons)

This blessed state of living the “Triune Life” articulates the personification of honor which is so vital to how we live as humans and displaying the same honor to one another. Unfortunately, we live in a world where honor is virtually non-existent in society because it is not instilled in the modern home. According to the Bible, the whole world will one day in the future come to understand and give God the honor due to Him, “And then I heard every creature in heaven and on earth and under the earth and in the sea. They sang: “Blessing and honor and glory and power belong to the one sitting on the throne and to the Lamb forever and ever” (Rev.5:13).

Of course honor cannot exist in isolation as if living a one-way street – honor is a two-way street. That’s how Love works. We honor God because He first honored us by saving mankind. “But God demonstrates His own Love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Rom.5:8). Again, “This is how we know what Love (honor) is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers and sisters” (1 John 3:16). God always takes the initiative and shows honor first because He is honorable in His Triune Being. And He continues to honor us    with His unfailing Love each and every day, and every moment of time. From this vantage point, we can reciprocate likewise with honor to God and our fellow humans. Hence we read, “Then call on Me when you are in trouble,and I will rescue you, and you will give Me honor” (Psa.50:15, NLB). The work of God (Love) in mankind is all about rescuing us from the physical and spiritual dangers and uncertainties of life which we are unaware, let alone understand. And how do we honor God in return? The same passage answers, “He who offers a sacrifice of thanksgiving honors Me; And to him who orders his way aright I shall show the salvation of God” (Psa.50:23).

There’s nothing we can do in this world to repay Him for His Love for He is Creator of all we see and don’t see. But there is one thing we can give that’s not entirely His – He’s given us our free will to be ours alone, and through it to cultivate a generous heart and give Him thanks. He gave man freedom for He is free Himself in His Tri-Personal Being. The Father, Son, and Spirit, are three free Personalities existing in Love within One Triune Godhead. Through freedom and generosity we too can give Him honor through Love and thanksgiving.

Why don’t you turn to Jesus today, and ask Him to rescue you from all the uncertainties you face in life. He says this to us, “Behold, the LORD’S hand is not so short that it cannot save; nor is His ear so dull that it cannot hear” (Isa.59:1, NASB). Yes, our Loving heavenly Father waits with open arms.

If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to write me in the space provided below, or email me on bulamanriver@gmail.com.

Blessing:

Until we meet again in my next post, may the blessings of the God who ceaselessly expresses Himself in His dependable Triune Love, be with you always. May the Spirit enliven your spirit and make all things concerning you possible as you live the “Triune Life” as a  Bulamanriver.*  Be strong in the Lord’s joy.

Kiang,  

* Bulamanriver” is the metaphor describing the union of man with the Love of the Triune God flowing in humans, making possible the “Triune Life” – the source of the miraculous life in man. To read the many facets of life of the Bulamanriver, go to my website www.bulamanriver.com where you can order a copy of my Book.

All scriptures are taken from the NIV Version 2011, unless stated otherwise.

Note: All information is copy-write. Any information obtained from this website that is used for publication should be acknowledged by citing the website address, date of acquisition and information pertinent to original authorship. For general guidelines regarding web citations see The Guide for Citing Electronic Information

Greetings once more from a typical warm and balmy day in Texas! You have heard me speak of the “Triune Life” often in my blogs. Let me delve deeper into the term, and make it more plain for you.

What is the essence of the “Triune Life” which I write so much about in my Blog, Bulamanriver, The Miracle of Triune Living? It speaks of community in relations. “Triune Life” means a believer who lives the 3-dimensional life with the Triune God, as opposed to the ‘solitary’ 1-dimensional life man lives in himself. It means God, as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, lives and walks in the Bulamanriver* who lives the “Triune Life.” Man’s union with the Triune God, makes the “Triune Life” possible. It’s made possible by Jesus, who Himself from eternity, is one in substance and reality with the Triune God, who took our humanity and glorified it in the very Being of the Triune Godhead.

What is this life we share with the Triune Godhead which I call the “Triune Life,” or “Triune Living?” I think author John P Murphree best articulate what goes on in the life of the Trinity we are privileged to share, in his book, The Trinity and Human Personality. He says, “In the Trinity, each Person “occupies” the Others’ personalities (Father, Son, and Holy Spirit). This occupation is what we have called relational oneness. Each of the three Persons becomes a “home” for the other two. One is Host and the Others are Guests. As each inhabits the Others, each is Host to the Other two, and each is a guest to the Other two. It is so reciprocal that each one feels more at home with the Others’ personalities than His own. Trinitarian Persons do not exist in isolation; they live in and through one another, which makes their personalities relational. Each is “at home” with the Others. In this occupying relationship, each has intimate access to the Others’ deepest thoughts and feelings at all times” (The Trinity and Human Personality, Pg.135, emphasis added).

The Trinity Community Bound by Persons in Loving Relations. Human Relationship is Based upon the “Triune Life” of God. Rublev’s Famous Icon of The Trinity (Wiki Commons)

The very foundation of the “Triune Life” we are privileged to live through and in Christ by the Spirit’s power is a Loving relationship with the Father as described above. Murphree goes on, “Our being filled with the Spirit is patterned on the Trinitarian model, but the pattern shifts a bit, making the analogy asymmetrical. In the Trinity, each person fills or occupies the Others in the same way. But we do not fill or occupy the Spirit of God in the same way that He inhabits us. There is an important sense, however, in which we do occupy the personality of Christ. His personality becomes our emotional and spiritual home. When we are wrapped up in our own personalities, we feel like aliens, estranged from our emotional home. We are made to reside in a brighter personality than our own.” (Pg.135)

As I said on more than one occasion, as humans we stress much of what we do as to the right and wrong of individual actions, instead of seeing them as arising out of a “conditional” response. That’s the foundation from which actions are generated. This kind of autonomous thinking arises principally from the human “solitary” state of existence as opposed to the “Triune” state of being. So, the concept of spiritual occupation we read above, refers to a person being controlled by an occupying force, thus creating the “condition” which in turn generates human activity. When we are occupied by the Spirit in the flow of His Love, we come under His control. If we are occupied by the spirit of fear of the devil we come under his rule.

United in Love, believers become the Christian community or church, emulating the Trinity, hence the “Triune Life.” Like the Trinity, we discover the fullness of our identity in the discovery of each other through Christ. It is Jesus who makes our relationships personal, one-on-one, and one-in-one, creating a community that’s occupied and bonded in God’s Love.

Humans – Created to be Free and to Find Meaning In Relationships (Wiki Commons)

Beware, because of the lopsided and skewed influence of the “solitary” state of existence of humans in the world, we can get caught unawares and find we have drifted away from the life of being centered in people through Christ’s Love, into a community as a group organism. (2 Pet.3:17) One’s identity shifts from people on a one-on-one Love-basis, to a group as a group organized and dominated by the legalism of rules and do’s and don’ts. In turn, the community loses the essence and quality of Loving relationship in the Spirit, to where the group has become society. This is how religion and denominationalism, provincialism, nationalism, racism, sexism, and disruptive idealism arise and take over and rule the community.

What happens is individual freedom is lost in pursuance of the corporate ideal. It becomes more compelling than our commitment to persons, personalities and the gifts of individuals, where respect for each other’s freedom in the Loving relationship of the “Triune Life” is left on the wayside and eventually forgotten. This is how “religion” as a corporate body has taken over the group, and Jesus becomes powerless. Jesus said this about the religious leaders of His day, “Their worship is a farce, for they teach man-made ideas as commands from God. These people honor Me with their lips, but their hearts are far from Me” (Matt.15:9,8, NLB). Thus, Love is numbed and life succumbs to gradual emptiness.

We are not led by men to form cliques with humanly motivated convictions. We are led by the Spirit, as John tells us clearly, “But you have received the Holy Spirit, and He lives within you, so you don’t need anyone to teach you what is true. For the Spirit teaches you everything you need to know, and what He teaches is true–it is not a lie. So just as He has taught you, remain in fellowship with Christ” (1 John 2:27). Also the Covenant says, “No longer will they teach their neighbor, or say to one another, ‘Know the Lord,’ because they will all know me, from the least of them to the greatest” (Heb.8:11). This passage does not speak of an “every-man-for-himself” platitude, but rather it points us away from self-serving men to our true leader in the Spirit who lives in you. The unity of the Church of all Spirit-led believers are united by the Spirit, not men.

I hope you will answer the call of your Savior Jesus and participate in the inter-personal “Triune Life” He offers all humanity.

If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to write me in the space provided below, or email me on bulamanriver@gmail.com.

Blessing:

Until we meet again in my next post, may the blessings of the God who ceaselessly expresses Himself in His dependable Triune Love, be with you always. May the Spirit enliven your spirit and make all things concerning you possible as you live the Triune Life as a Bulamanriver.*  Be strong in the Lord’s joy.

Kiang,  

* Bulamanriver” is the metaphor describing the union of man with the Love of the Triune God flowing in humans, making possible the “Triune Life” – the source of the miraculous life in man. To read the many facets of life of the Bulamanriver, go to my website www.bulamanriver.com where you can order a copy of my Book.

All scriptures are taken from the NIV Version 2011, unless stated otherwise.

Note: All information is copy-write. Any information obtained from this website that is used for publication should be acknowledged by citing the website address, date of acquisition and information pertinent to original authorship. For general guidelines regarding web citations see The Guide for Citing Electronic Information

Greetings once more friends. My hope is you are walking in the path of God’s light and all is well with you and your loved ones.

Sin has become such a religious word it has lost its true meaning. It’s important we understand what sin is, so we’ll know where God is coming from when He impeaches mankind of it, and the reason why He sent His Son to save us from its evil grips. Let’s begin…

The Bible says that “rebellion is the sin of divination.” (1Sam.15:23) In one statement, the Bible tells us what sin is and its source. Sin is rebellion, and has to do with divination, or the spirit world. Divination has to do with Satan and his fallen angels who sinned by rebelling against God’s rule over them, see Isaiah.14:12-15; Ezekiel. 28:13-15; and Jude 1:6. Rebellion is knowledge alternative to God’s Word which holds man captive from seeing the light which leads to a blessed life from God. That’s how Satan deceived our first parents saying, “the day you both eat from it (forbidden fruit), then your eyes will be opened and you both shall be like gods, knowing good and evil.” To “know good and evil” simply means extraneous knowledge through man’s self-determination of what’s right and wrong, which is rebellion or sin against God.

Lucifer (Satan) Cast Out of Heaven Because of Rebellion/Sin (Paradise Lost, Wiki Commons)

When Adam rebelled by eating the forbidden fruit, God told him, “you will certainly die” (Gen.2:17). God did not mean physical death, Adam did not just drop dead. So what died? Adam and Eve died spiritually. What died was the spirit of life (human spirit) God breathed into Adam at creation which made him a true “living being.” (Gen.2:7; Eph.2:1-7; Zek.18:20; 1 Tim.6:17-19). Through rebellion/sin he became a false “living being.” That is what rebellion of alternate/self knowledge does – it kills the human spirit. As long as Adam and his wife Eve lived in the presence of God (Eden) they remained true “living beings” both spiritually and physically (well-being). However, after they rebelled and were expelled from Eden and God’s presence, they became spiritually dead, but remained physically alive (ill-being).

Jesus said, “Life is spiritual. Your physical existence doesn’t contribute to that life” (John 6:63, God’s Word T.). But both lives are intertwined and inter-dependent, even though the physical contributes little or nothing to the spiritual. The human body is simply a house for the spirit we allow in to influence it through the choices we make with our minds (spiritual). Paul therefore explains, “Our struggle (with rebellion/sin) is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the power of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms” (Eph.6:12). Therefore, what we see in man’s physical world is the result of the toing and froing in the spiritual realm. (see Job 2:1-4) So there’s the spirit life and the physical life, yet not separate but connected.

However, Paul speaks of the irony of both these elements being in conflict with each other, “The flesh desires what is contrary to the Spirit, and the Spirit what is contrary to the flesh” (Gal.5:17). He speaks of ‘flesh’ and ‘desire’ in the same breadth. It’s not ‘flesh’ in terms of human tissue, but of the the ‘heart’ and mind of man which expresses human ‘desire.’ So, here we see Paul uses the word “flesh” to depict both the physical and spiritual aspects in a single expression. The ‘desire’ can be good or evil depending on the spirit which resides and influences man’s body through his actions. The ‘body’ is simply a ‘temple’ which houses the spirit man allows to influence his physical actions. (1 Cor.6:19) The spirit in turn creates the ‘heart’ which expresses good or evil ‘desires.’  The ‘flesh’ merely expresses the fallen state of existence, or the ‘heart’ of man, which articulates evil ‘desires.’ The foundation of the ‘flesh’ is the dead spirit inherited from Adam.

The ‘heart’ can change depending on what spirit we allow to influence it. Paul says, “Do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God” (1 John 4:1). The opposite of the ‘flesh’ is the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit refers to the state of existence arising from man’s reborn living spirit. God promotes His nature of Love and life through the Holy Spirit to remake us into the image of His Son (Rom.8:29). The devil instills his nature of fear and death stems out of an imprisoned life he has incarcerated human kind. (1 John 4:8; John 13:34; Act.13:10; John 8:44).

“For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Rom.6:23) (Wiki Commons)

With the demise of Adam’s spirit, he was powerless to hold his dominion over the earth given him by God. (Gen.1:26-30) Satan, now holding sway over Adam and mankind, wrests earth’s dominion and brought darkness and death through rebellion. (Matt.4:8-10) Rebellion becomes man’s way of life. The Scriptures say, “God is not the God of the dead, but of the living” (Luk.20:38). Satan is not the god of the living, but of the dead. Adam chose his lot with him, albeit by the devil’s cunning and deception. So Adam and Eve were expelled from the presence of life in God (Eden), and took up residence in Satan’s world where death reigned through sin and rebellion. Man’s access to the Holy Spirit symbolized by the “tree of life” was cut off. (Gen.3:22)

After Jesus sent the Spirit on Pentecost He reunited man back to God by reviving his once dead spirit since Adam’s rebellion. (John 16:7; John 3:7) The Spirit gave the dead human spirit a new birth through man’s faith in Jesus as Savior and Mediator. Jesus said, “You must be born again of the Spirit” (John 3:3, 5-7). Only a living human spirit regenerated and sustained by the Holy Spirit will empower man’s spirit to relate and communicate with God. Recall, the Holy Spirit was inaugurated into man’s existence through the second Adam, Jesus, when the Spirit rested upon Him after His baptism in the Jordan by John, and more broadly upon His followers on Pentecost. (Matt.3:16-17; Acts 2) Then He was led by the Spirit into the wilderness to enter into a titanic battle for man’s freedom against Satan. What Jesus did was to once and for all defeat rebellion at the very heart and core of rebellion itself – Satan and his deathly realm! (Matt.4:1-11) The final deathknell to his dark world came when Jesus died as mankind’s Savior on the cross. Satan’s dominion, ruled by his cohorts of rebellious fallen angels succumbed to the power of God’s Love in Christ. The evil spirits of this dead world, the powers and authorities of rebellion which reigned and held sway over mankind since Adam, was defeated and Jesus sets mankind free forever. 

Sin, rebellion, and death, has no power over man, for Christ has defeated sin in our place. We are no longer in the “sin condition” which condemns us. We are in the “Spirit’s condition” which saves us. (Rom.6:14, 12-13, NLT) Paul said, “God made Him (Jesus) who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in Him, we might become the righteousness of God” (2 Cor. 5:21). Paul explains how this is done and made possible,”You, however, are not in the realm of the flesh but are in the realm of the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God lives in you. And if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, they do not belong to Christ” (Rom.8:9). God’s ultimate promise to believers is He will bring them into immortality in His presence in His realm and Kingdom.  (1Thes. 4:16-17; 1Cor.15:12-58)

The dominion over this earth is now retaken by Christ and His Kingdom, and is His alone – “far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every name that is invoked, not only in the present age but also in the one to come” (Eph.1:18-21). That age of life and freedom is here, but its full manifestation is yet future at God’s appointed time of complete restitution. That means rebellion and death still reigns over this world as God allows, and man’s only hope is Jesus through whom we receive the Spirit who brings the Love of God to revive the human spirit and replace the rebellious heart. (John 16:7; Rom.5:5) Yes, in the Spirit’s power, a living spirit and Loving heart now reigns in the lives of believers. Satan will be put away from the presence of mankind. (Rev.20:1-3)

“For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Rom.6:23) Fountain of Eternal Life, Downtown Cleveland, Ohio, USA (Wiki Commons)

The prophet tells us what the devil has done to the heart of man making him adversarial and rebellious toward God, “The human heart is the most deceitful of all things, and desperately wicked (rebellious). Who really knows how bad it is?” (Jer.17:9) Yes, the devil has made man’s heart deceitful like his own. This speaks of human personhood, of the “false self” living the “solitary life” under the devil’s influence, and speaks of the darkness of the human soul and how the Spirit defeats it by bringing in the light of Jesus’ life and Love. The prophet says, “We look for light, but all is darkness; for brightness, but we walk in deep shadows…we are like the dead… Our sins testify against us.” (Isa.59:9, 10, 12)

Rebellion is the essence of the “false self” in human personhood. The prophet proclaims, “The people walking in darkenss have seen a great light; of those living in the land of deep darkness a light has dawned.” (Isa.9:2) Love is the light of God’s own heart which shines into the darkness of the human soul. And from the glory shone out of the light of Jesus’ life, man can live in the ever increasing glory of His brightness which recedes and ultimately extinguishes the darkness in our rebellious hearts. Like every work of God in man, it is a process, and will be the practice of decision-making as we live our “true self” in Christ. As humans, we can change, unlike spirit beings like fallen angels. Beginning with a rebellious nature we can change to have a fuller appreciation of God’s divine Love. Paul said, “So all of us who have had that veil (of rebellion) removed can see and reflect the glory of the Lord. And the Lord–who is the Spirit–makes us more and more like Him as we are changed into His glorious image” (2 Cor.3:18, emphasis added, NLT).

So what is the true definition of sin? Jesus reveals it plainly to us. Speaking of the role of the Holy Spirit in our lives, he said, “He will convict the world concerning sin because they do not believe in Me.” There you have the true definition of sin: our basic sin is man’s stubborn refusal to believe God’s provision of a Savior to save mankind from sin and rebellion. That Savior is none other than Jesus, His Son. Sin will never leave us in our fallen and dead state of being, no one can revive the human dead spirit we inherited from Adam except God. Sin is not wrong-doing, if you understand what I’m saying. Sin is the “condition” or state of existence of the dead human spirit living under the influence of the devil’s dead spirit, which cannot communicate nor relate with God. Holiness is not right-doing, either. The “forbidden fruit” produced “good and evil” acts – but the “good” was human goodness which can’t save us. Only God’s goodness saves. What saves us is the “condition” of the reborn human spirit living under the Holy Spirit which can now relate with God and produce Love. God sent His Son to give us a new birth through His Spirit – to live again with a spirit discovering true knowledge in Jesus, from the false knowledge of sin and rebellion. Only through Jesus can man be saved.

I call upon you my readers to pray a simple prayer and receive Jesus as your personal Savior, experience the rebirth of your dead spirit through the Holy Spirit, and to “live life that is truly life” (1 Tim.6:19). Read the materials I bring in this blog site to keep you spiritually alive.

If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to write me in the space provided below, or email me on bulamanriver@gmail.com.

Blessing:

Until we meet again in my next post, may the blessings of the God who ceaselessly expresses Himself in His dependable Triune Love, be with you always. May the Spirit enliven your spirit and make all things concerning you possible as you live the Triune Life as a Bulamanriver.*  Be strong in the Lord’s joy.

Kiang,  

* Bulamanriver” is the metaphor describing the union of man with the Love of the Triune God flowing in humans, making possible the “Triune Life” – the source of the miraculous life in man. To read the many facets of life of the Bulamanriver, go to my website www.bulamanriver.com where you can order a copy of my Book.

All scriptures are taken from the NIV Version 2011, unless stated otherwise.

Note: All information is copy-write. Any information obtained from this website that is used for publication should be acknowledged by citing the website address, date of acquisition and information pertinent to original authorship. For general guidelines regarding web citations see The Guide for Citing Electronic Information

Greetings again Friends! I hope this post find you in good health and in the best of spirit.

Money is important to everyone. Without it we cannot get far in life. But if we have lots of it, we can just about do anything we wish – well, almost anything! So we spend our time trying to acquire more and more of it. Let’s talk money today.

US ONE HUNDRED DOLLAR BILL (WIKI COMMONS)

Definition

What is money? Let’s get a brief definition before we start. The world’s economy revolves around it, without money the world as we know it will come to an abrupt halt. Money is a medium of exchange which we all agree to accept for making transactions. Each country has its own money, or currency, that is used as a medium of exchange within that country. Whereas the money system was based on the gold standard or silver standard or some combination of the two, today’s money system is based on fiat money. That means money derives its value by being declared by a government to be legal tender; that is, it must be accepted as a form of payment within the boundaries of the country, for  all good and services, all debts, public and private. This legal practice causes fiat money to acquire the value of any of the goods and services that it may be traded for within the nation that issue it. The currency of one country can be exchanged for the currency of another via a currency exchange. The current exchange rate determines how much of one currency must be used to purchase a specified amount of the other currency. (http://economics.about.com;  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Money; http://www.investopedia.com)

The reason I want money is because I know other people want money, so I can use my money to get goods and services from them in return. Everybody works for money because it is the medium of exchange for making transactions which affects almost every facet of their lives. So in the sense of defining life, one can say that money liberates, protects, rescues, and even regarded as a ‘savior’ for it saves us from just about every imaginable situation and circumstance – well, almost all!  If I believe that money will have a value in the future, I will work towards acquiring it. So, people sell their labor (work) to acquire money now to purchase goods and services they desire both now and in the future.

Market Where Money Is Exchanged For Goods (Wiki Commons)

The Christian & Money

Here is the connection between the Christian believer and money: If money ‘saves,’ and we have seen that it does, and we believe Jesus is man’s Savior, then money and Jesus is synonymous. In other words, they exhibit the identical ‘saving’ quality. You can say,  they are one and the same. Well, not exactly the same, because there is only one Savior, not two. Money is a savior invented by man. Jesus alone is the everlasting Savior of mankind. People worship money because it has this ‘saving’ quality. The Bible states, “You cannot worship God and money” (Matt.6:24). In other words, a Christian cannot have two “Saviors.”

To worship something means it has a powerful hold over you that you have dedicated your time and life to its values. So, the passage presents a choice to the believer who to worship: God or money? The Bible says this of Jesus, “Salvation (i.e. in a saved condition) is found in no one else (except Jesus), for there is no other name under heaven given to mankind by which we must be saved” (Act. 4:12, emphasis added). This is what the Bible says about the money-god. There will come a time when people “will throw their silver into the streets, and their gold will be treated as a thing unclean. Their silver and gold will not be able to deliver (save) them in the day of the LORD’s wrath. It will not satisfy their hunger or fill their stomachs, for it has caused them to stumble into sin” (Ezek.7:19, emphasis added). It’s obvious from this passage that money has its limitations and cannot save us completely, most of all not spiritually. In fact, when money is worshipped, it becomes a curse instead of a blessing. It’s a curse because it pretends to be a savior. Only Jesus is the complete Savior. His name, Jesus, means Savior, and He saves both physically and spiritually.

But here is the interesting side of money we have not seen,  money can save if it becomes the impersonation of Jesus. That means Jesus becomes the personification of money. Once that happens, then Jesus and money are one and the same, not two distinct entities. When the Bible says, “You cannot worship God and money,” it is not saying money is evil and you should not have any of it. Remember, the source of all riches is God who created them, including money. When God finished creation  of the earth He  pronounced creation, “very good.” Listen to God’s claim on all riches upon the earth, “The gold is mine, and the silver is mine, and the cattle upon a thousand hills, the fowls and the wild beasts are mine, the earth and its fullness and all that dwell in it” (Hag. 2:8; Ps. 24:1; Ps. 50:10-11). It simply means because riches originate from the one Source but man has made the mistake of separating it from God into a separate entity of worship. We must choose not to turn money into a god in its own right. God does not want His people to worship lifeless objects which can’t save them. All inanimate things like money and other material things cannot and will not save us, just as an idol can’t save because it has no life in itself. Listen, “Whoever loves (worships) money never has enough (lacks); whoever loves wealth is never satisfied (or happy) with their income. This too is meaningless (worthless)” (Eccl.5:10, my emphasis). (Read Eccl.5:10-20 in Appendix 1 below)

Those who spend their lives in search of money, thinking money is the answer to everything and bring the fulfillment they seek, will instead discover emptiness to their disappointment. It is the wrong use of money which creates evil and make a false god of money. The only way is for God and money to become One – this is a Trinitarian principle. Nothing exists in isolation, solitarily, but everything is inter-dependent, collaborative, and united like God’s Triune nature. Money does not save, Jesus does, therefore only Jesus is to be worshiped for He is God, not money. I can’t let money be my master and Jesus too, “for I’ll hate one or the other, and become devoted to one and despise the other” (Matt.6:24). So, when I see money as Jesus Himself, then money becomes a divine attribute. When this happens, what is usually a curse brought about by the money god, now becomes a blessing from Jesus Himself. It is a question of personal leadership in my life. (Read article “Money is A Curse” by Sheldon Drobny in Appendix 2 below) 

How do we do this? How do we merge the two so that Jesus and money become a single expression and a true blessing in the believer’s life?

To worship Jesus means to take on Jesus’ Person. (Matt.6:24) I live life vicariously in Him. He said, “Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls” (Matt.11:29). Paul said, “Examine yourselves to see whether you are in the faith; test yourselves. Do you not realize that Christ Jesus is in you?” (2 Cor.13:5). I think of money as a servant of Jesus. Money becomes a blessing coming from and through Him as the offshoot of my relationship with Him. Anything that’s a blessing (the good money can buy) in my life is the reflection of God’s grace in my life. James says this, “Whatever is good and perfect comes down to us from God our Father, who created all the lights in the heavens” (Jam.1:17). Grace is the presence of His Spirit in my life. (Heb.10:29) The Spirit’s role is to magnify Jesus in my life by enhancing my Love relationship with Jesus, so I am being conformed into His likeness as the Son of God. (John 16:14; Rom.8:29) Herald (Holy Spirit) is the One who gives me the wisdom and empowers me to make money become an expression of Jesus Himself. God tells us, “But you shall remember the LORD your God, for it is He who is giving you power to make wealth, that He may confirm His covenant which He swore” (Deut.8:18, NASB). The Bible quotes God as saying, “Not by might nor by power, but by My Spirit,” says the LORD of hosts” (Zech. 4:6) Yes, it is not the power of money and what money can do that counts – the Spirit (grace/Love) of God and what He can do in me and for me. (Rom.5:5) So, this merging of Jesus and money begins with God’s grace through the move of His Spirit in my life. It is what I often refer to as the “Triune Life.” That’s to mean, that all of life is interconnected, and nothing exists independently by itself.

The following passage shows clearly that God and money are one and the same: “The blessing (grace/Spirit) of the Lord brings wealth (money and what it can buy), without painful toil for it” (Pro.10:22; also see Psa.24:5). There’s a far-reaching point being made here, i.e. it identifies money in two broad categories. When money is part of, and comes from Jesus, it brings an abundant life with peace, joy, without pain. It produces true life. But when money comes from the money-god then it brings the opposite effect – fear, depression, curses, pain, and ultimately death. When I merge money with Jesus and see them as One, I uncover and find genuineness in my humanity because I am able relate with Jesus on a person-to-person basis in Loving relationship. When I worship the money-god I am relating with an idol, and I lose my humanity because I cannot speak nor relate with an inanimate object (idol). Relationships only happens between persons, like what’s taking place between the three Persons of the Trinitarian God. Man, who is made in God’s image, live relational lives because God is relational in His Tri-Personal Being. Many lives have been destroyed because they can’t see this crucial difference – an inanimate idol, like the money-god, cannot relate, so fallen man is dominating the one-way dialog. And man in his depraved nature is influenced by the devil who is the author of confusion. Only a living Person, Jesus, saves.

International Money Exchange (Wiki Commons)

By saying money will come to the believer “without painful toil for it (money),” or, as another translation put it, “and hard work adds nothing to it (money)” (Prov.10:22b, emphasis added), it is saying my labor is not what “brings the bacon (money) home,” it is the grace of God in my life, His blessing, He is the first-cause, the trigger effect, directing my footsteps to His abundance. His grace is the undergirding safety net I tread upon throughout my life. There’s something else this passage conveys to me: the kind of life Jesus brings does not come with all the stress of negative repercussions, heartache, and broken dreams and pain, for it has nothing to do with my toil and performance. The truth of the matter is, this is not “my” work; this is the grace of God in action in my life.

It has to do with God’s unconditional love for me. By freely giving and sacrificing His Son, the Father brought mankind into union with Him to make this abundant life possible for me. Does the “living waters” of His Spirit of Love flow in my life because of my effort (toil), or does it flow freely immaterial of my performance? (John 7:37-39) Grace is the free gift of God flowing from the depth of the Father’s Love. Paul asserts, “For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; (nothing to do with my labor/toil) it is the gift of God” (Eph.2:8). As someone said, of what consequence is my performance, if I am not placed on an assured path which leads to and guarantees my success? If I’m on a path which leads to doom and failure, no amount of effort and performance will save me, no matter how grandiose it may appear.

Life is like riding a train, it depends upon which track I take. In life, there are only two tracks, one leads to true life and the other to false life or death. If I worship the money-god, then I’m riding a train-track which ends abruptly like an unfinished road, plunging me into a deep ravine to my death. Everything I have worked for and done with my life, represented in the train engine (me) and all the cars it’s hauling behind it, will all be for nothing. If I believe in Jesus then He puts me on His track with the Spirit leading me to my destination with a glorious future. Here’s God’s promise to me and those who take hold of His Son, “I know what I have planned for you,’ says the LORD. ‘I have plans to prosper you, not to harm you. I have plans to give you a future filled with hope. (Jer. 29:11, NET).

Life Is Like a Train Ride-It Depends Which Track You Take. The Mountain in the Backdrop is Symbolic of God’s Overarching Sovereignty and Presence, Guiding Us by His All-Embracing Love  (Wiki Commons)

It’s About Relationship

As intimated earlier, it is about who we choose to relate with: Jesus or money? The following passage tells us how to merge the two into one expression of life, “They (God’s people) will receive the Lord’s blessing (money) and have a right relationship with God their Savior” (Psa.24:5). So, it’s all about relationship – my relationship with Jesus brings abundance (money as part of it). That’s how money and Jesus is made One. My Love for Jesus must be the primary focus of my relationship with everything else, including money. I can’t have relationship with inanimate things, like money, jewelry, gold, land, real estate, cars, my job, boats, hobbies, pet projects, etc. But they are filtered through my relationship with Jesus. In fact, when I have relationship with inanimate things, the Bible calls it idol worship. Idols has no life and cannot respond in any form of relationship. Only Jesus alone who is the manifestation of God’s Love is the One we have relationship. When I see all the material riches, including money, I see them as the by-product of my relationship with Jesus, and it is never separate from it. I am never in love with money and things, my first motivation is to Love Jesus, and everything else become offshoots of my relationship with Him.

It is sad, as much as it is true, but people choose to have relationship with these inanimate things (money and material stuff) which cannot save them, but brings curses instead. People think money will supply and sustain them physically, provide for their security, and furnish the riches they dream of. But it is a fool’s paradise. They don’t realize, let alone understand this ludicrous form of relationship with money which brings curses and pain. The saying “all that glitters is not gold,” rings true. They spend their whole lives in aggressive pursuit of money, building up and bolstering these relationships with inanimate things, when God wants them to have relationships with Him, His Son, and with our fellow humans through His Love. The truth of the matter is, all these created inanimate things are simply the personification of the One who created them – Jesus. Yet He is Spirit and does not need to be defined by them to prove His abundance. Jesus is super rich! In the same way, my life does not need to be defined by things. I only need to be defined by One Person with whom I can have personal relationship – Jesus. He is the Personification of all wealth. (1 Cor.3:21-23; Rom.8:17)

The prophet says this, “Come, all you who are thirsty, come to the waters; and you who have no money, come, buy and eat! Come, buy wine and milk without money and without cost. Why spend money on what is not bread, and your labor on what does not satisfy? Listen, listen to me, and eat what is good, and you will delight in the richest of fare” (Isa.55:1-2). Yes, it speaks of a promise of being sustained physically, materially, and in every other way, without money. The answer is my relationship with Jesus.

US DOLLAR COIN, SUSAN B ANTHONY DESIGN, MINTED 1979. NOTE PHRASE, “IN GOD WE TRUST.” TRUST GOD, NOT MONEY (WIKI COMMONS)

What Defines You?

Answer the above question as true as your heart can in your spirit: am I defined by things and money, or, am I defined by Jesus who is the Personification of creation and abundance. Listen, when you give something to your children, like a toy, don’t you think it odd if the child thanks himself/herself or even the inanimate toy, for bringing him/her happiness, and ignores the source of his joy, you, the parent? Yet, we do this all the time with God when we lack faith. A wise child will realize that to keep his/her joy sustained will depend upon his/her relationship with the source of joy – the parent. Not the child herself, and certainly not the toy!

Learning to Wait

The Spirit which governs my actions defines who I am. One is He gives me power to make me “wait on the Lord.” Many don’t know how, or don’t want to, or lack the patience to, “wait on the Lord.” Again the Psalmist, “Rest in the LORD and wait patiently for Him; Do not fret because of him who prospers in his way, Because of the man who carries out wicked schemes.” (Ps.37:7) Yes, many times I look at the next person, my neighbors, those I work with, and compare myself with them and what they have in terms of money and material stuff. This is the most unwise thing to do, and many have fallen into the money-god’s trap of anxiety and impulsiveness. There is only One with whom I am called to compare myself – Jesus and none other.

Faith

What it comes down to is faith. I live and act upon what I believe will bring me and my loved ones happiness. Do I have an unwavering faith in Jesus as the source of all true wealth, not false riches acquired by the money-god through selfish means? Jesus warned that everything happening in this world is working against my faith in Him and in the true riches He desires to give me. So, He instructs me to live one day at a time, for each day will bring ample doses of money-drug called “filthy lucre” which debilitates me with narcissism and self-love. And the aim of money-god is to keep me from reaching my dreams. (Matt. 6:33-34; 1 Tim.3:3) But the truth about my life of faith is I’m not alone, the Spirit is with me to empower me in my relationship with Jesus. Jesus says to me as He did with Paul, “My grace is sufficient for you, for My power is made perfect in weakness” (2 Cor.12:9). Further, he said, “Don’t worry about anything; instead, pray about everything. Tell God what you need, and thank Him for all He has done. Then you will experience God’s peace, which exceeds anything we can understand. His peace will guard your hearts and minds as you live in Christ Jesus” (Phi.4:6-7) 

Faith takes me further and brings me to the reality of my calling and God’s purpose for me. Many unbelievers view the Christian faith as a cop-out, an excuse for facing up to the reality of life. Is it, or does faith actually guide me into the reality of life? The Bible says, “Without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is and that He is a Rewarder of those who seek Him” (Heb.11:6). That’s another way of saying, without faith I don’t have a footing to stand in discovering my relationship with God, and thereby my life’s destiny. Listen, Jesus said, “Life is spiritual, your physical existence doesn’t contribute to that life” (John 6:63). But both lives are intertwined and codependent. What I see in the physical world is affected by what’s happening in the spirit realm. (Eph.6:12) And if a person does not have God in his/her life, then that’s a cop-out and evading the reality of life. To have a calling is a gift from God our Father, and Jesus, and it takes living faith to believe that my gift is activated from the divine source. Here is the crux of the matter: real money which truly blesses comes through my gift and calling, from the spiritual Source in Jesus, not a physical source in me.   

Calling & “Life-Gift”

He blesses and gives me rest within the context of my purpose and “life-gift.” (Psa.37:7) That’s the important thing to remember about ‘Jesus and Money.’ A person’s “life-gift” defines the valleys and people he or she has been called to flow through life and where He or she will find abundance. God gives me abundance (money) through His purpose for my life. Material wealth must be funneled through my gift and dream-life, for God’s blessing comes through each man’s gift to glorify Him. I do not seek money for money’s sake, but wealth comes through the passion for my gift and calling in Christ.

God Use Our Gifts For His Glory and to Bless Us (Wiki Commons)

When you live your God-ordained purpose (Bulamanriver), all your life’s activities are magnetizing to your gift and dream-life, like Joseph of the Bible. Remember this: for a blessing to be true it must be a holistic blessing comprised both of spiritual and material/physical aspects, or, ‘Jesus and Money.’ You can’t have one without the other. This is what abundance as defined in God’s Love means. It is not just spiritual without the material/physical aspects, neither is it vice-versa. When that happens, miracles become part of your life because the Spirit flows in you. ‘Jesus and Money’ can’t travel in separate  and different direction, they are of one and the same essence and existence. So, we see why it is about relationship because the two are connected – one cannot do without the other.

If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to write me in the space provided below, or email me on bulamanriver@gmail.com.

Blessing:

Until we meet again in my next post, may the blessings of the God who ceaselessly expresses Himself in His dependable Triune Love, be with you always. May the Spirit enliven your spirit and make all things concerning you possible as you live the Triune Life as a Bulamanriver.*  Be strong in the Lord’s joy.

Kiang,  

* Bulamanriver” is the metaphor describing the union of man with the Love of the Triune God flowing in humans, making possible the “Triune Life” – the source of the miraculous life in man. To read the many facets of life of the Bulamanriver, go to my website www.bulamanriver.com where you can order a copy of my Book.

All scriptures are taken from the NIV Version 2011, unless stated otherwise.

Note: All information is copy-write. Any information obtained from this website that is used for publication should be acknowledged by citing the website address, date of acquisition and information pertinent to original authorship. For general guidelines regarding web citations see The Guide for Citing Electronic Information

APPENDIX 1:

Riches Are Meaningless – Ecclesiastes 5:10-20

“Whoever loves money never has enough;
whoever loves wealth is never satisfied with their income.
This too is meaningless.

¹¹ As goods increase,
so do those who consume them.
And what benefit are they to the owners
except to feast their eyes on them?

¹² The sleep of a laborer is sweet,
whether they eat little or much,
but as for the rich, their abundance
permits them no sleep.

¹³ I have seen a grievous evil under the sun:

wealth hoarded to the harm of its owners,

¹⁴     or wealth lost through some misfortune,
so that when they have children
there is nothing left for them to inherit.
¹⁵ Everyone comes naked from their mother’s womb,
and as everyone comes, so they depart.
They take nothing from their toil
that they can carry in their hands.

¹⁶ This too is a grievous evil:

As everyone comes, so they depart,
and what do they gain,
since they toil for the wind?
¹⁷ All their days they eat in darkness,
with great frustration, affliction and anger.

¹⁸ This is what I have observed to be good: that it is appropriate for a person to eat, to drink and to find satisfaction in their toilsome labor under the sun during the few days of life God has given them—for this is their lot.¹⁹ Moreover, when God gives someone wealth and possessions, and the ability to enjoy them, to accept their lot and be happy in their toil—this is a gift of God. ²⁰ They seldom reflect on the days of their life, because God keeps them occupied with gladness of heart.”

APPENDIX 2:

“Money is a Curse” By Sheldon Drobny 

Posted: 05/09/2006 12:46 pm EDT Updated: 05/25/2011 11:50 am EDT (an excerpt)

A few days ago Bill Gates was quoted as saying that he wished he were not the richest man in the world. For a society like ours that admires wealth so much, this statement seemed to be strange. Yet in fact, the endless accumulation of money for its own sake is the worst thing that can happen to a person and for the society in general.

I have observed many people who have become extremely wealthy since I am a financial advisor, CPA, and venture capitalist. In most cases, those who become very wealthy lose their psychological motivation to provide the means of support to their families. People who no longer have to earn money to survive unwittingly must turn to other things in order for them to seemingly have a purpose in society. And most of these other purposes are bad. Once anyone has achieved wealth, they usually turn to achieving power and influence in society and they are usually ill prepared to do things in the best interest of humankind. Rather, they turn to family wealth accumulation to create legacies much as the Pharos did in ancient Egypt.

In the musical, Fiddler On The Roof, Tevya is told by his future son-in-law Perchek, that “money is a curse.” Tevya responds by saying that “God should smite him with this curse.” Perchek was an early 20th Century socialist who understood the exploitation of the masses by those who had money and power. Tevya then sings a song called If I Were A Rich Man. One of the great lines of that song is, “…when you’re rich they really think you know.” And that is the trouble we have with rich and powerful leaders. People really think they are wise because they have money and power. My experience is that wisdom and competence are inversely proportional to the desire for wealth accumulation

The qualities of good leadership have nothing to do with money and wealth accumulation. Occasionally wealthy people have qualities of good leadership, but that is only coincidental. There are many factors that make for a good leader. Many people have written about the subject and it is an extremely rare talent. Unfortunately, the choices of leaders are based mostly upon wealth and influence and accordingly we are stuck now with many corporate, community, and political leaders who are incompetent.

Money is essentially a “zero sum game.” Most people do not understand that. The obscene salaries of many corporate executives are not going to the rank and file workers or the shareholders. That is why the middle class in America is struggling so much. And without a strong middle class, the U.S. will be heading towards an eventual insurrection as we almost had during the Great Depression. And the current political situation has exposed the corruption and cronyism involved in wealth accumulation.

A few years ago I visited my daughter in Spain while she was an exchange student. One of our tour guides was politically savvy and asked me why the rich and powerful in America are insensitive to the needs of the masses. He explained to me that after the death of Franco in 1975, the emerging socialist movement gave the wealthy classes two possible choices. Plan A was an insurrection in which they would lose all their property. Plan B was that they pay higher taxes to create the safety net needed by the masses and more fairly redistribute the wealth. Given that choice, the wealthy in Spain chose plan B.

I am afraid that in our country, it may come to the fear of losing everything through an insurrection that will finally convince the wealthy class that it is time to make a change. But, it will take a massive grass roots effort to make that happen. Hopefully the very wealthy will recognize this before they self-destruct.

Greetings Friends!

In this post I would like to share with you the Mission, Vision, and Values of the BULAMANRIVER Ministry. My purpose is to give our readers in a clear and concise explanation of who we are, what we do, and how and why we do it. Let me first explain what the name of this blog site, BULAMANRIVER, means. As a beneficial side issue, you will find the message relevant to the freedom we celebrate on the upcoming Independence Day on 4^th July.

Cover of Book: “Bulamanriver – The Miracle of Triune Living”

The etymology of BULAMANRIVER comes from three words: ‘bula,’ ‘man,’ and ‘river.’  Bula is a Fijian word which means “life.” (Fiji is an independent South Pacific Island nation). Man is God’s creation in whom God breathed the “breadth of life” or the spirit of life in man. (Gen. 2:7) River is the metaphor for God’s Love flowing in humans. (John 7: 37-39)

Therefore, Bulamanriver, conveys the meaning that “man has true life walking in God’s Love.” Of course, these three words also have biblical derivative: ‘life’ (bula) is a gift from God to humans (Gen.2:7); ‘man’ was created in God’s image and likeness (Gen.1:26-27), and ‘river’ pictures the flow of God-life in the human-life. (John 7:37-39) So, the Bulamanriver can be summed up from the following passage of scripture:

“If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink. For the Scriptures declare that rivers of living water shall flow from the inmost being of anyone who believes in me.”  He was speaking of the Holy Spirit, who would be given to everyone believing in him” – John 7:37-39. 

The above passage expounds BULAMANRIVER scripturally as follows: man is the riverbed, who is the receptacle for the “living waters” of the Spirit of God (God-life/Love), which brings true life he    shares with his fellow humans. (Rom.5:5) Therefore, BULAMANRIVER is the depiction of the believer. You, are the BULAMANRIVER. You are the riverbed, God’s receptacle, in which the “living waters” of the Spirit (Love) flow giving true life to your once dead spirit which the devil gave humans through Adam’s fall. (John 3:3,5; Gen.2:17)

Having explained the meaning, and having seen that You are the BULAMANRIVER, let me now spell out its Mission, Vision, and Value statements.

Mission

The Mission of the Bulamanriver Trinitarian Ministry is founded upon the words Jesus commissioned His followers shortly before He was received by angels to return to His Father in heaven, “All authority in heaven and earth has been given to me. Therefore, go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them into the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.” (Matt.28:18-20)

The Trinity-Man Called to Enter and Live the “Triune Life” in Christ (Rublev’s Icon of Trinity, Wiki Commons)

The thrust of Jesus’ mission is founded upon what this passage authorizes the disciples and His followers to do: to “baptize humans into the Name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.” It means to immerse or saturate humans into the Life and Being of the Triune God. It means to bring believers into the “Triune Life” of God. The image and Being of the Triune God is hardwired into two basic characters of His divine nature: Love and Freedom. The Bible declares, “God is Love” (1 John 4:8). And, “If the Son sets you Free, you will be Free indeed” (John 8:36). God is not a ‘solitary’ God as many assume, He is a Tri-Personal God. Because God is Tri-Personal in His Being, He is three free Persons living in unified relationship of Love. The human personality is fashioned after the three free Persons of the Tri-Personal Being of God

Man was robbed of this “Triune Life” when Satan deceived Adam, and, introduced his own deathly “solitary life” of Fear and Bondage through sin. From then on, man was living the “solitary life” of the devil in place of the “Triune Life” of God. The “solitary life” means man does what is right in his own eyes, in place of the collaborative “Triune Life.” (Prov.12:15; 30:12; 21:2).

So, the Mission is to enlighten the human mind of the Triune nature of God, and His call to be immersed in the “Triune Life” and so be fashioned and conformed in God’s image of Love and Freedom. (Gen.1:26-27) God’s creation is immersed in His Love we see all around us including man, but unlike everything created, man has to use his mind to reciprocate to His Love; thereby, man has to exercise his God-given Freedom and choose to Love God through Christ.

Jesus at the Last Supper with His Disciples (Wiki Commons)

Vision 

The Vision explains the why and how of the Mission. The Vision is to bring humans into the nature of Love and Freedom of the “Triune Life” of God by freeing man from the prison of Fear and Bondage, the “solitary life,” Satan has incarcerated man ever since the fall of Adam. How is this done? Through faith!

Paul said, “He (God the Father) is so rich in kindness and grace that He purchased our freedom with the blood of His Son and forgave our sins” (Eph.1:7, NLT). By believing in Jesus Christ as personal Savior, man is immediately and directly freed from the bondage of Satan, and brought into God’s Loving union. In the realm of God, faith produces miracles. (Eph.1:13-14) Faith makes the reality of God happen in the spirit world. Just as faith imprisoned man because Adam and Eve believed the devil’s deceptive word, so we are freed from the devil when we believe in God’s Word (Jesus). This is the way God the Father has pre-arranged to bring man back to Himself – for “it is impossible to please God without faith” (Heb.11:6). Jesus said, “I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life. No man comes to the Father except through Me.” (John 14:6) Jesus is the way to Love and Freedom.

So, the Vision of our work is to continue the work of Jesus to Free mankind from Fear and Bondage to the Love and Freedom man can experience in the “Triune Life” of God through faith in Jesus.

The Value

The Value explains how we share and carry out the Vision the Bulamanriver Trinitarian Ministry. Paul said, “If anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, they do not belong to Christ.” (Rom.8:9b) God is a Tri-Personal God, thus, if you receive Jesus you receive the Holy Spirit as well, for both are hypostatically One God with the Father. The Holy Spirit is the core ingredient of BULAMANRIVER’s (man’s) Value.

Again quoting John, we see how the values of the “Triune Life” is inculcated in the believer through the Spirit’s move, “If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink. For the Scriptures declare that rivers of living water shall flow from the inmost being of anyone who believes in me.”  He was speaking of the Holy Spirit, who would be given to everyone believing in him” (John 7:37-39).

Dove, Symbol of the Holy Spirit (Pic: Wiki Commons)

With the Spirit as the core of the believer’s Value statement, He moves in us to accomplish God the Father’s purpose in His Son, “God knew what he was doing from the very beginning. He decided from the outset to shape the lives of those who love Him along the same lines as the life of His Son. The Son stands first in the line of humanity He restored. We see the original and intended shape of our lives there in Him. After God made that decision of what His children should be like, He followed it up by calling people by name. After He called them by name, He set them on a solid basis with Himself. And then, after getting them established, He stayed with them to the end, gloriously completing what He had begun” (Rom.8:29-30). Paul explains the Value the Spirit brings in the Love chapter of 1 Corinthians 13. This is the heart and essence of the Values we have in Christ which the Spirit makes happen in the believer. (John 16:14)

So man’s intrinsic Value is the act of surrendering to the move of the Spirit in his life, and allow Him to conform the personhood of man to the image of Jesus, God’s Son. (Rom.8:29)

Today, the Spirit moves in believers to make known the Gospel of Jesus Christ to the whole world – the primary mission and vision of the BULAMANRIVER Ministry. Man uses various forms of media to publish and make the “Triune Life” of Jesus known to the world. The “Triune Life” is the Gospel, for from it we obtain all that’s necessary to make the Gospel work come to fruition. Jesus said this in His prayer to the Father before He was crucified about the “Triune Life” they shared from eternity, which the disciples have now embraced, which will become the cornerstone in their lives to make known the Gospel known, “That all of them may be One, Father, just as You are in Me and I am in You. May they also be in Us so that the world may believe that You have sent Me (Gospel work). I have given them the glory that You gave Me, that they may be One as We are One (“Triune Life”)— I in them and You in Me—so that they may be brought to complete (Triune) unity. Then the world will know that You sent Me (Gospel work) and have Loved them even as You have Loved Me (from eternity)” (John 17:21-23, my emphasis throughout). The Spirit moves in man which makes this unity (“Triune Life”) possible, and demonstrates BULAMANRIVER’s value proposition in the Spirit’s life.

An abbreviated version follows:

Mission: To immerse and saturate humans into the Life and Being of the Triune God who is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. (Matt.28:18-20) Mission reveals the Love of the Father! (John 3:16)

Vision: Jesus is the One who Frees us and makes us live in the Love and Freedom of the “Triune Life” of God, rescuing us from the prison of Fear and Bondage of Satan. (John 14:6; John 3:16. 8:36) Vision brings the Freedom of the Son! (John 8:36)

Value: The value of the Gospel is the message of the “Triune Life” the Spirit brings to man. Man is the riverbed, and the Holy Spirit is the living waters which make us BULAMANRIVER – the personification of the “Triune Life” (“the Spirit of life in man walking in God’s Love”) (John 7:37-39; 1 Cor.13) Value activates the work of sanctification of the Spirit! (1 Pet.1:2)

And so, in all we do, and whatever we teach, in whatever forms fo media, we are commissioned to accomplish this three-fold objective of the Mission, Vision, and Value, of the BULAMANRIVER. 

(Web Site Address:  http//bulamanriver.com)

If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to write me in the space provided below, or email me on bulamanriver@gmail.com.

Blessing:

Until we meet again in my next post, may the blessings of the God who ceaselessly expresses Himself in His dependable Triune Love, be with you always. May the Spirit enliven your spirit and make all things concerning you possible as you live the Triune Life as a Bulamanriver.*  Be strong in the Lord’s joy.

Kiang,  

* Bulamanriver” is the metaphor describing the union of man with the Love of the Triune God flowing in humans, making possible the “Triune Life” – the source of the miraculous life in man. To read the many facets of life of the Bulamanriver, go to my website www.bulamanriver.com where you can order a copy of my Book.

All scriptures are taken from the NIV Version 2011, unless stated otherwise.

Note: All information is copy-write. Any information obtained from this website that is used for publication should be acknowledged by citing the website address, date of acquisition and information pertinent to original authorship. For general guidelines regarding web citations see The Guide for Citing Electronic Information

Greetings again Friends!

People think of death mainly in a physical sense. We mourn the death of loved ones, family, and close friends. We grieve the demise of our leaders, people we admire and respect, and those we look up to. But there is a death more real than physical death. It is a death that is spiritual and more deadly than physical death. Although spiritual, it is a death we experience physically and its effect is seen and felt all around us today. Most don’t know what this death looks like because they can’t see let alone understand it for what it truly is, and what it is doing to them. Death is not just the end of physical life, for as we shall see, we experience death’s consequence in everyday life. So if death reigns in the human experience, then what must life look like? It must be something out of this world. Indeed, it is!

God revealed to man from the beginning what this death is, what it looks like, and what it truly means. After Adam and Eve ate of the forbidden fruit, disbelieving God’s word for them over what Satan the devil said about the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, He summarily told them what the outcome of their decision was: death! (Gen.3) This is where death began, its origin began with Satan and Adam’s decision. Death is not just the mere end of human life, but the negative effects of human experience is part and parcel of death. Jealousy, rage, greed, covetousness, hatred, war, sicknesses, selfishness, etc, etc. Imagine a world where we no longer live in an environment created by these negative triggers.

But it was an evil scheme hatched by Satan to wrest man’s dominion of this earth given him by God. (Gen.1:28, KJV; Matt.11:8-10) It was not a death that was physical, Adam and Eve did not just drop dead, physically speaking. His spirit became in a dead/sinful state. The Bible tells us, “The wages of sin is death,” spiritually speaking. Adam died spiritually – the spirit of life in him died. In that state, Adam did not have the basis upon which to hold his dominion on this earth. How can he, for his dead spirit means he’s disconnected from God who gave him dominion over earth. God is the “God of the living not the dead” (Mark.12:27). Adam will not have legs to stand on to resist the wiles and deception of Satan. In fact, from here on man becomes Satan’s prisoner. Thereby man is deprived of his dominion upon earth, for now Adam lives under the influence of the devil, held in the chains of bondage and death. This is what true death looks like, to be a prisoner of the devil.

Arlington National Cemetery. Death is More Than Physical. There’s Spiritual Death. (Wiki Commons)

God gave Adam and Eve adequate prior warning, listen to the account: “Now the Lord God had planted a garden in the east, in Eden; and there he put the man he had formed. The Lord God made all kinds of trees grow out of the ground—trees that were pleasing to the eye and good for food. In the middle of the garden were the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil…The Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it. And the Lord God commanded the man, “You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat from it you will certainly die” (Gen.2:8-9, 15-17). If God say “certainly” or “surely” then you know absolutely a part of man died. God does not play with words, “Your word, LORD, is eternal; it stands firm in the heavens” (Psa.119:89). His word is sure and dependable.

Paul told Timothy, “Adam was not the one deceived; it was the woman who was deceived and became a sinner” (1 Tim.2:14). Recall, the instruction was given to Adam before Eve was created. So she most likely got the instruction about the tree of life and the forbidden fruit from Adam. But Adam took responsibility because God made him leader and in charge. “Adam was formed first, then Eve,” Paul told Timothy. (1 Tim.2:13) Something happened to our first parents when they rebelled against God’s clear instruction, “When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it. Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realized they were naked; so they sewed fig leaves together and made coverings for themselves” (Gen. 3:6-7). They were naked from day one of their creation, what made them “see” their nakedness now? Let’s read the dialog between God and mankind’s first parents.

Garden of Eden (Wiki Commons)

“Then the man and his wife heard the sound of the Lord God as he was walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and they hid from the Lord God among the trees of the garden. But the Lord God called to the man, “Where are you?”  He answered, “I heard you in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; so I hid.” And he said, “Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree that I commanded you not to eat from?”  The man said, “The woman you put here with me—she gave me some fruit from the tree, and I ate it.”  Then the Lord God said to the woman, “What is this you have done?” The woman said, “The serpent deceived me, and I ate.”

“So the Lord God said to the serpent, “Because you have done this, “Cursed are you above all livestock and all wild animals! You will crawl on your belly and you will eat dust all the days of your life. And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; he will crush your head, and you will strike his heel” (Gen.3:8-15). God told Satan, and promised man, a second Adam will come to deliver man from the prison of death the devil has incarcerated mankind.

God told Adam directly and unambiguously, “The moment you eat from that tree you’re dead” (Gen.2:17, emphasis added). The question is, what died? Adam and Eve were still alive and well, physically speaking, other than being conscious of their nakedness, and fearing God for their disobedience. What died was Adam’s spirit. In other words, whereas his spirit was alive when he and his wife related with God in the beautiful Garden of Eden, now his spirit became dead because of his decision to disobey God. Adam’s rebellion was sin, and sin brought death. Paul asserts this truth, saying, “The wages of sin id death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Rom.6:23). They were expelled from Eden and from life which emitted from God’s presence. The ‘spirit of life’ in Adam was given to him by God at creation giving him authority to relate with God through Love (Holy Spirit, Rom.5:5), “Then the LORD God formed a man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being (soul)” (Gen.2:7). Through Adam’s disobedience his spirit became in a sinful/dead state, and passed from him to mankind generationally through multiplication to our day – today: “And God blessed them, and God said unto them, ‘Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion’  (Gen.1:28).

Jesus said something vital about life and death, “Life is spiritual. Your physical existence doesn’t contribute to that life. The words that I have spoken to you are spiritual. They are life.” (John 6:63, God’s Word T). If your physical life doesn’t add a smidgen of spiritual vigor in your life, what does? Answer, the Holy Spirit! Man’s human spirit does not exist independently, it is spawned and bred by and in the Spirit of God. (Gen.2:7) So, Adam’s fleshly (physical) life don’t amount to much if his spirit is dead. How can Adam’s spirit offer life, physical and spiritual, if it is dead? Man’s spirit is either alive through the Holy Spirit’s Love, or dead through Satan’s deception. Hence, man has become the devil’s prisoner, for he is the author of darkness and death. The “death” of the ‘spirit of life’ God gave man simply means man’s physical activity in every sphere of life is now motivated by the devil’s rebellious spirit which leads to ultimate physical death. But God’s promise is immortality by a resurrection. (1 Cor.15:50-57) No amount of good intentions will rescue us from this deathly spiral to spiritual and physical extinction. On the other hand, the spirit of life in man “lives” when he is driven by the Holy Spirit. The wisdom of Solomon makes this plain, “The human spirit is the lamp of the LORD that sheds light on one’s inmost being” (Prov.20:27). From this, we understand the physical activities in man’s world is triggered by the toing and froing taking place in the spiritual realm. (Job 2:1-4) Hence we read, “Our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the power of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms” (Eph.6:12). The spirit-world is more real because it affects the material world we see around us.

Paul affirms this generational diffusion of man’s spirit in its dead state of existence, “Therefore, just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, and in this way death came to all people, because all sinned… Consequently, just as one trespass resulted in condemnation for all people, so also one righteous act resulted in justification and life for all people. For just as through the disobedience of the one man the many were made sinners, so also through the obedience of the one man the many will be made righteous” (Rom.5:12, 18-19). The evil we see all over the world today is proof of man’s state of death (sin) in his spirit under the devil.

The Earth Given to Man for His Dominion, But Usurped by The Devil. (The Earth Seen From Apollo 17 – Wiki Commons)

When Adam’s spirit died he became spiritually naked, but it manifested physically – they “realized they were naked (physical).”  God is making a point: i.e.our actions resulting from a dead spirit (unseen) has negative physical consequences (seen). Everything we see around us are manifestations of the condition of man’s spirit-life, and what happens in the spirit-world. To kill, steal, and destroy, are physical manifestations of our dead spiritual condition. (Eph.6:12). God says, “Whoever finds Me finds life” (Pro.8:35).

Only in death man is physically laid naked to return to the earth from which he was taken, hence, they “realized they were naked.” Jesus said, “I counsel you to buy from Me gold refined in the fire, so you can become rich; and white clothes to wear, so you can cover your shameful nakedness” (Rev.3:18). Man’s spirit when it’s alive in the Spirit’s power is not naked. John said of believers, “It was given to her to clothe herself in fine linen, bright and clean; for the fine linen is the righteous acts of the saints.” (Rev. 19:8) So, we can see from these biblical metaphors that Adam’s spirit was naked and spiritual dead in sin. We have inherited the same dead spirit from Adam. As we read earlier, Jesus said, “Life is spiritual. Your physical existence doesn’t contribute to that life” (John 6:63). Your physical existence is merely a reflection of your spiritual life, be it dead or alive.

As long as Adam and Eve remained faithful to God’s command, their spirit was alive and living under the influenced of His Love. The moment they expressed disbelief in God’s command they disconnected themselves from the Spirit of God which gives life (Love) to their spirit. Once they expressed belief in Satan’s words of deception, their spirit succumbed to the devil’s dark world of wickedness and their spirit died. Metaphorically, man becomes the “walking dead” – alive physically, but dead spiritually. This does not mean God has left mankind to the whims of the enemy, for He promised to rescue man by sending a second Adam, the Messiah, who would come to right what Adam wronged. (Gen.3:14-15; 1 Cor.15:45) God’s sovereignty over all, including His enemies, remains unquestionable. (You may read Ezekiel 36 where the words “Sovereign Lord” is used 7 times in seven verses).

But freedom is part of the Triune God’s nature as much as Love is. Love cannot preside over a relationship where there is no freedom to choose. (Gal. 5:1; Rom.8:2) God wants our hearts, not our legalistic and mechanical obedience. Adam was given freedom even to rebel, if he chose to follow such a path. And he had experienced God’s Love, so he had a choice between life and death, he was given the freedom of choice. But God tells us to choose wisely: “This day I call the heavens and the earth as witnesses against you that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life, so that you and your children may live” (Deut.30:19). Freedom comes with the responsibility to Love, and we will certainly lie on the bed we choose to make.

As a passing observation, this tells us how important our faith is in life. We act upon what we believe to be true (faith), therefore, it is imperative to guard the door of our faith vigilantly, for John warns us, “Dear friends, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world” (1 John 4:1). (Read my installment on “Jesus Faith” posted on 07/26/2014) 

The Second Adam

It was not until Jesus Christ, the second Adam, came on the scene over four thousand years later, that He revived man’s dead spirit back to life by the power of the Holy Spirit. (1 Cor.15:45) He was the Immanuel (God in the flesh) who took our humanity upon Himself to regenerate it and bring new life to our once dead spirits. (Isa.7:14; Matt.1:23) Paul told Titus, “He (Jesus) saved us through the washing of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit” (Titus 3:5). When Jesus told Nicodemus, “You must be born again,” it was about bringing back to life man’s spirit that was in a dead state through Adam’s disobedience (sin). He said, “No one can enter the kingdom of God unless they are born of water and the Spirit’ (John 3:7, 5). It is the Spirit who brings the spirit of man back to life as God gave it originally to Adam. Jesus said the Spirit is the “river of living waters springing from our innermost being” giving life to our once dead spirit. (John 7:38-39) (For our reader’s information, the title of this Blog Site is called, Bulamanriver. The word is a metaphor for life and living in the Spirit’s power. The etymology of Bulamanriver comes from three words: ‘bula,’ ‘man,’ and ‘river.’  Bula is a Fijian word which means “life.” (Fiji is an independent South Pacific Island nation). Man is God’s creation in whom God breathed the “breadth of life” or the spirit of life in man. (Gen. 2:7) River is the metaphor for God’s Love flowing in humans through the Spirit. (John 7: 37-39. Rom.5:5) 

Paul wrote, “But God is so rich in mercy, and He loved us so much, that even though we were dead because of our sins, He gave us life when He raised Christ from the dead. (It is only by God’s grace that you have been saved!) For He raised us from the dead along with Christ and seated us with Him in the heavenly realms because we are united with Christ Jesus” (Eph.2:4-6). This is not about the afterlife, it speaks of the believer’s state of existence through the Spirit today. Whereas Jesus came and took our humanity upon Himself to bring us life and retake our dominion of this earth, Satan’s devilish scheme was to put man to death to wrest his dominion and keep it for himself.

So, Jesus came and defeated Satan in the temptations, accomplishing what Adam failed to do (1); He lived a perfect life in the Spirit doing nothing but good (2), and died as the sacrificial lamb for man’s sins (3). He was resurrected an immortal divine/human Son, and ascended to sit on the Father’s throne in heaven as mankind’s High Priest (4). Before He was crucified, He promised the disciples to send the Holy Spirit to be with believers “forever” (5). In other words, what happened to man through the first Adam, Jesus has reversed once and for all and restituted all things to God (6). Satan’s defeated means the end of his reign of death over mankind once for all time (7). Paul comforts us with these words, “What, then, shall we say in response to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will He not also, along with him, graciously give us all things?” (Rom.8:31-39). Such is the depth of God’s Love to give us life and save us from death!  

(1) Matt.4:1-11 (2) Acts 10:38; Matt.9:35, 12:15 (3) Rev.13:8; John 3:16 (4) 1 Cor.15:4; Heb.7:16-17, 10:12 (5) John 14:16; Eph.1:13-14 (6) Acts 3:21 (7) Rev.20:2).

Spirit in Man – Dead or Alive? (Wiki Commons)

The work of the Spirit to revive man’s spirit is revealed in God’s ‘covenant promise’ to man as follows, “I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh” (Ezek.36:26; Heb.8:10). Yes, the heart of stone is the dead spirit Satan activated through Adam’s rebellion. And yes, the Spirit will bring man’s spirit back to life, and keeping it alive, like a fountain of living waters gushing from our innermost being. It must be by the living human spirit, energized by the Holy Spirit, that the flesh is to be saved from eternal death.(Rom.8:13)

Man’s spirit of life (human spirit) alone, which God breathed into Adam at creation, was given to define his humanity authorizing and enabling him to communicate with God His purpose and man’s destiny. When God said, “My Spirit shall not always strive with man, for that he also is flesh: yet his days shall be a hundred and twenty years,” (Gen 6:3) it means as long as God’s Spirit is communicating with man’s spirit, then man remains alive – both spiritually and physically. The moment God ceases to strive or preside over man’s destiny, then man ceases to exist and is dead. By saying “My Spirit shall not always strive with man,” means God is always striving (working out His purpose) with man unless something prevents His purpose occurring. So, soon after uttering the above words, God brought the flood to end all life on the earth with the exception of the eight in Noah’s ark. And God gave His reasons for bringing the flood, “the wickedness of man and every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was evil continually” (Gen. 6:3).

God has wrapped all of creation in His Love – Love is His life, for “God is Love” (1 John 4:8). The only place where His life (Love) is missing is in man’s heart because he chose the way of death through Adam. Jesus, the second Adam, has repaired that. The spirit of life in man was given to forever connect us to God’s purpose of making us into His image and likeness of Love. (Gen.1:26-27) And this happens when man’s spirit is alive to the Holy Spirit, not dead to the devil. Jesus said of His Father, “He is not the God of the dead, but of the living” (Mar.12:27). Jesus also said, “But the time is coming–indeed it’s here now–when true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and in truth. The Father is looking for those who will worship Him that way” (John 4:23). The word ‘worship’ has been couched in so much legalism we have lost its authentic meaning. Worship is not about coming to church once a week every Sunday. It means simply to have an authentic Loving relationship with our heavenly Father through Jesus, which we choose with our free will, that’s energized by the Spirit. We worship what and whom we freely Love. 

Of course the spirit of life in man is not self-sufficient, it needs God’s Spirit to guide and help him, and ultimately to bring him to immortality, for that’s God likeness – He’s immortal and eternal! Only the Holy Spirit can change man from mortal to immortality. (1 Cor.15:12-58) So, man’s spirit plus God’s Spirit, amounts to immortal humans. The prophet Ezekiel quotes God also saying, “You shall surely live” (immortality). Note, “And if I say to a wicked person, ‘You will surely die,’ (as was said of Adam) but they then turn away from their sin and do what is just and right...they will surely live” (Ezek.33:14,16). No human on his own can turn away from his sin – the only way is to be forgiven of all sin in Jesus’ blood, and then be continuously sanctified, or, “do what is just and right,” through the work of the Spirit. (1 John 1:17; 1 Thess.5:23; 1 Pet.1:2)

Only Jesus is the first human who has attained to this glorious purpose of the Father – the resurrection of humans to immortality. He is the firstborn of immortalized humans of others who will follow in the resurrection of the dead. (Rom.8:29) Paul said this of the Holy Spirit and man’s immortality, “And you also were included in Christ when you heard the message of truth, the gospel of your salvation. When you believed, you were marked in Him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit, who is a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance until the redemption (immortality) of those who are God’s possession–to the praise of His glory.” (Eph.1:13-14, my emphasis). Yes, the Holy Spirit is God’s “down-payment” in you guaranteeing your immortality. Again, emphasizing the centrality of faith, “when you believe” – the Spirit is the gift of your faith in Christ, your Messiah. (Rom.8:9)  As for those who died in the faith, Jesus said, “I am the resurrection and the life. The one who believes in Me will live, even though they die (physically)” (John 11:25). That is God’s final answer to death and sin – immortality!

The Resurrection to Immortality – God’s Final Answer to Death (Statue of Fountain of Eternal Life, Downtown Cleveland, Ohio, USA – Wiki Commons)

Last Word on Death

The last word on death is revealed in the Bible, and goes as follows, “I tell you this, brothers: flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable. 51 Behold! I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, 52 in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we shall be changed. 53 For this perishable body must put on the imperishable, and this mortal body must put on immortality. 54 When the perishable puts on the imperishable, and the mortal puts on immortality, then shall come to pass the saying that is written:

“Death is swallowed up in victory.”

“O death, where is your victory? 

“O death, where is your sting?” 

56 The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. 57 But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ” (1 Cor.15:50-57). What comforting words about the final demise and defeat of man’s public enemy #1 – death!

The question is, are you dead or alive in your spirit… is the Spirit energizing your spirit life so death does not reign, and has no place, in your life? God is “the God of the living, not the dead.” If you believe with all your heart that Jesus is God’s One and only Son, that He came as the second Adam to rescue us from Satan’s prison of death; that He defeated the enemy for us in the wilderness of Judea, and was sacrificed on Calvary for our sins; He was resurrected and ascended to heaven, and He sent us the promised Holy Spirit to revive our spirit which was dead and make us alive in Him, then you can live again in your spirit, and through God’s Spirit, live a life that’s truly life, and be guaranteed immortality in the Father’s presence forever. (John 3:16; 1 Tim.6:19) This is the Gospel!

I hope you have been greatly encouraged by these words from our Father and the God of all mankind – “the God of the living, not the dead!”. (Mar.12:27)

If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to write me in the space provided below, or email me on bulamanriver@gmail.com.

Blessing:

Until we meet again in my next post, may the blessing of the God who ceaselessly expresses Himself in His dependable Triune Love, be with you always. May the Spirit enliven your spirit and make all things concerning you possible as you live the Triune Living as a Bulamanriver.*  Be strong in the Lord’s joy.

Kiang,  

* Bulamanriver” is the metaphor describing the union of man with the Love of the Triune God flowing in humans, making possible the “Triune Life” – the source of the miraculous life in man. To read the many facets of life of the Bulamanriver, go to my website www.bulamanriver.com where you can order a copy of my Book.

All scriptures are taken from the NIV Version 2011, unless stated otherwise.

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