Homer Kizer Ministries

October 24, 2011 ©Homer Kizer
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Now even the first covenant had regulations for worship and an earthly place of holiness. For a tent was prepared, the first section, in which were the lampstand and the table and the bread of the Presence. It is called the Holy Place. Behind the second curtain was a second section called the Most Holy Place, having the golden altar of incense and the ark of the covenant covered on all sides with gold, in which was a golden urn holding the manna, and Aaron's staff that budded, and the tablets of the covenant. Above it were the cherubim of glory overshadowing the mercy seat. Of these things we cannot now speak in detail. These preparations having thus been made, the priests go regularly into the first section, performing their ritual duties, but into the second only the high priest goes, and he but once a year [on Yom Kipporim], and not without taking blood, which he offers for himself and for the unintentional sins of the people. By this the Holy Spirit indicates that the way into the holy places is not yet opened as long as the first section is still standing (which is symbolic [a parable] for the present age). According to this arrangement, gifts and sacrifices are offered that cannot perfect the conscience of the worshiper, but deal only with food and drink and various washings, regulations for the body imposed until the time of reformation. But when Christ appeared as a high priest of the good things that have come, then through the greater and more perfect tent (not made with hands, that is, not of this creation) he entered once for all into the holy places, not by means of the blood of goats and calves but by means of his own blood, thus securing an eternal redemption. For if the blood of goats and bulls, and the sprinkling of defiled persons with the ashes of a heifer, sanctify for the purification of the flesh, how much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without blemish to God, purify our conscience from dead works to serve the living God. Therefore he is the mediator of a new covenant, so that those who are called may receive the promised eternal inheritance, since a death has occurred that redeems them from the transgressions committed under the first covenant. (Heb 9:1–15 emphasis and double emphasis added)

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Postscript to Section 3: One of the advantages Charles Dickens had over 20^th-Century writers was his opportunity to publish serially, and reflect his auditors’ reactions to earlier sections of his writings in later sections, an opportunity that has returned to 21^st-Century writers that e-publish their works … a point made in Part Two needs to be clarified: having access to Holy Writ doesn’t reflect a calling by God, but does make the Bible reader responsible for the contents of Scripture. The Christian who has access to a Bible, or who owns one or more Bibles, isn’t necessarily called by the Father and the Son, but this Christian is responsible to do what is written in Scripture in the same way that ancient Israel was commanded to keep the Word of the Lord without being given a second breath of life (i.e., without being given the spirit of God). In both cases, claiming to know God and the Word of God made/makes the person with access to the Word of God responsible for everything in this divine message—and makes the person who claims to Know the Lord responsible for doing, for applying in his or her life those things that are revealed in Scripture. Hence, the person with access to the Word of God must be a doer of the Law regardless of whether this person is called by God and given the earnest of eternal life.

Too many Christians believe that they have been called by God and given the Holy Spirit, or they believe that this other person has been called by God when neither case is true: if a person has been called by God and born as a son, the person simply cannot make a practice of sinning. The person cannot continue in an adulterous relationship; cannot continue to hate another person; cannot continue to be a respecter of persons; cannot continue to meddle in the affairs of others. The indwelling of Christ Jesus will not permit the person to live as a gentile heathen, but demands that the person lives as a Judean, walking as He, Jesus, an observant Jew, walked when in this world. Thus, John wrote,

See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are. The reason why the world does not know us is that it did not know him [Jesus]. Beloved, we are God's children now, and what we will be has not yet appeared; but we know that when he appears we shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is. And everyone who thus hopes in him purifies himself as he is pure. Everyone who makes a practice of sinning also practices lawlessness; sin is lawlessness. You know that he appeared to take away sins, and in him there is no sin. No one who abides in him keeps on sinning; no one who keeps on sinning has either seen him or known him. Little children, let no one deceive you. Whoever practices righteousness is righteous, as he is righteous. Whoever makes a practice of sinning is of the devil, for the devil has been sinning from the beginning. The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the works of the devil. No one born of God makes a practice of sinning, for God's seed abides in him, and he cannot keep on sinning because he has been born of God. By this it is evident who are the children of God, and who are the children of the devil: whoever does not practice righteousness is not of God, nor is the one who does not love his brother. For this is the message that you have heard from the beginning, that we should love one another. (1 John 3:1–11 emphasis and double emphasis added)

Love is the practice of righteousness as a doer of the Law—

To worship the Lord on the day after the Sabbath instead of on the Sabbath is a practice of sinning, and the person who has been born of God cannot continue in this practice but must—no caveats—begin to keep the Sabbath holy. However, another person not born of God but who believes that Scripture is the word of God and sees in Scripture the command to keep the Sabbath holy and begins to keep the Sabbath outwardly appears like the genuine son of God, the Christian truly born of spirit. To the outside observer, there is no difference between these two individuals. Usually the one not born of God but who believes a good argument looks better outwardly than does the genuine son, whom the Adversary is not blessing and has not blessed because the genuine son was foreknown from the beginning. As a result, the ministers of the former Worldwide Church of God when attending reunions of previous pastorates would be continually surprised by who was still attending the congregation and who had left; for virtually without exception, these ministers misjudged who was truly born of God and who wasn’t. These ministers had judged their parishioners on the basis of outward appearances; for often they themselves were not truly born of God.

When judgments are revealed, the person who has believed God and done what is right but who was not born of God will be saved according to Paul’s gospel: “For all who have sinned without the law will also perish without the law, and all who have sinned under the law will be judged by the law. For it is not the hearers of the law who are righteous before God, but the doers of the law who will be justified. For when Gentiles, who do not have the law, by nature do what the law requires, they are a law to themselves, even though they do not have the law. They show that the work of the law is written on their hearts, while their conscience also bears witness, and their conflicting thoughts accuse or even excuse them on that day when, according to my gospel, God judges the secrets of men by Christ Jesus” (Rom 2:12–16) … the work of the Law is to produce love for God and for neighbor and brother in the person, but the works of the Law that justify no one (Gal 2:16) are those things that the Law required Israel to do with their hands and with their slaughtering implements—

There is a phenomenon that some individuals experience: if the individual has shed enough blood of animals, of men, the individual becomes reluctant to shed blood. When it comes to killing big game animals, I have experienced this phenomenon: I have killed enough animals, dressed enough animals, that to my surprise, I no longer have a desire to hunt. If I need to take an animal for food, I will, but there is absolutely no excitement in the kill; there is only sadness that the kill had to be made.

I have observed this same phenomenon in military veterans of WWII, of the Korean War, and of the Vietnam War—those veterans who saw real actions don’t want to talk about what they did, nor are they interested in continuing to shed blood. They are repulsed by the thought of killing; by their memories of killing other men.

It was for this reason that the Lord commanded the Levitical priesthood to slaughter the daily and to make and butcher the other sacrifices: the killing of the sacrifices was to repulse Israel, thereby causing Israel to hate sin and death through having to wallow in the shed blood of calves and goats, bleating sheep and doves. But as with burning their firstborns which did not cause Israel to abhor themselves (see Ezek 20:25–26), slaughtering livestock did not cause Israel to abhor sin and death; for Israel killed for God as fundamental Islam does today. And the damage done to the psyche of Israel by their continual killing for God is being done to the psyche of Islam today, with Islam representing the majority of the third part of humankind (see Zech 13:9) that will be born of God when the Holy Spirit is poured out on all flesh (Joel 2:28).

A human male can turn off his emotions and function solely on reason, on logic for a while. This male loses sensitivity through compartmentalizing his acts, his deeds, placing what he doesn’t want to think about in a mental lockbox that will be opened sometime in the future. Thus, killing for God becomes a temporary end to itself: the enemy becomes a target and ceases to be human. The animal is a target, not a living creature. The hunter focuses on the shot, not on the damage the bullet or arrow will do to the living creature that is suddenly struck down through no fault of its own. And the hunter will take pleasure in an excellent shot … I once hit a running Blacktail buck in the head at nearly two hundred yards, the rifle (a .375 H&H) firing without me consciously squeezing the trigger. I wouldn’t have hit the hard-running buck in the head if I had consciously pulled the trigger. I hit the buck because shooting had become an unconscious reaction to certain stimuli, and I made many, many more shots like that shot in the 1960s and 1970s and into the 1980s—in dressing one buck I had just killed, I held its still beating heart in my hand, and felt the power of life that was ending. And somewhere along the way, I changed. Big game animals ceased being targets and became living creatures, breathing creatures, nephesh, like myself.

Again, hearing the Word of God, having access to the Word of God is not being called by God as a predestined firstborn son of God. But hearing the Word of God does make the hearer responsible to do what he or she has heard. Plus, hearing the Word of God does put the person who professes that Jesus is Lord and believes in his or her heart that the Father raised Jesus from death into a position analogous to enslaved Israel in Egypt … when the Second Passover liberation of Israel occurs, all who have professed that Jesus is Lord will then be born of God, and born filled-with and empowered by the spirit of God. The Christian who today strives to do right will then have the power to actually do what is right, power needed since the garment of Christ’s righteousness will be stripped off the Body of the Son of Man. And for the vast majority of Christians, this will be their first experience with what it means to be born of spirit. Only a statistically insignificant number of Christians are truly born of God today; yet every Christian is now under obligation to keep the commandments of God and to be holy as God is holy.

No Christian with access to Holy Writ can claim that he or she didn’t know the will of God when this person’s judgment is revealed; for according to Paul’s gospel, the sinner without the Law will perish without the Law (again Rom 2:12). It is being a sinner—a person who transgresses the Law—that will cause the person to perish regardless of whether the person is or isn’t under the Law.

 

4.

When the Christian’s fleshly body and physical breath equates to the Holy Place of the earthly temple, and the Christian’s now-living inner self equates to the Most Holy Place, the Christian will not engage in activities that defile either the Holy Place or the Most Holy Place; hence Christians will strive to be holy as God is holy (1 Pet 1:15–16) … Peter’s citation of Moses is from Leviticus 11:44–45, where the Lord commands Israel to eat clean meats so that Israel will be holy as He, the Lord, is holy. But being holy goes beyond what enters a Christian’s mouth, not that a true Christian would eat food/meats for which Israel would not thank the Lord—and Israel would never thank the Lord for pork and for critters that creep along on the ground.

It is what comes from the living inner self, equivalent to the Most Holy Place, that can or will defile the spiritual temple of God. Hate, anger, cursing another, lying, lust—all of these things will defile the living inner self. What enters from the outside (that is, what is of this world) cannot defile the living inner self (Mark 7:18–19) that is not of this world. But coveting what is not food/meat for Israel defiles the inner self; for coveting, say, a juicy pork chop doesn’t come from outside the Christian, but comes from the Gentile convert’s belly [flesh] ruling over the living inner self. 

For a Christian to covet food for which Israel would never give thanks [e.g., unclean or common meats] is a classic case of the woman [in this case, the flesh] ruling over the man [the inner self] as in the Christian Church, without scriptural authority, ceasing to take the Passover sacraments of bread and wine on the dark portion of the 14^th day of the first month, thus keeping the First Unleavened and the Feast of Unleavened Bread, and instead, beginning to keep Easter Sunday [Resurrection Day] while taking the sacraments daily, weekly, quarterly, or whenever the mood strikes the so-called Christian … the Woman is not to rule over Her Head and future Husband, Christ Jesus. The flesh is not to rule over the inner self. The belly and loins are not to rule over the heart and mind. So while innocently eating a pork chop does not defile the Christian, desiring a pork chop even if one is never eaten does defile the Gentile convert (an outwardly circumcised, natural descendant of Abraham would be repulsed at the thought of eating a pork chop, as would be a long-time Christian convert). And Christians actually possessing the keys of the kingdom of the heavens [plural] would never loose on earth the need for the Christian covert to be holy as God is holy. Only ministers of the Adversary would have converts committing fornication with unrighteousness, thereby having the filthy continue to be filthy and evildoers continue to do what is evil and hog-eaters continue to feast on bacon, ham, and juicy pork chops.

For as long as the earthly temple stood, sprinkling defiled persons with the ashes of a heifer would return the defiled person back to the state of holiness, but it is now the shed blood of Christ through the indwelling of the spirit of Christ [pneuma Christos] that turns a defiled person to holiness, but only turns the person one time to holiness; for the high priest offered sacrifices for unintentional sins, not willful transgression of the commandments, and offered these sacrifices but one time a year when he entered the Most Holy Place. Likewise, Christ Jesus doesn’t dwell in the Christian who sins willfully: Christ Jesus through His breath [pneuma Christos] enters into a convert one time, not many times.

Christians who deny the indwelling Christ Jesus do not get many chances to deny Christ while He continues to dwell within the person: one denial is enough. Certainly ten denials is more than will be tolerated. The glorified Jesus will simply deny the person before the Father, and salvation is over for the Christian.

Jesus told His disciples,

So everyone who acknowledges me before men, I also will acknowledge before my Father who is in heaven, but whoever denies me before men, I also will deny before my Father who is in heaven. (Matt 10:32–33)

Elsewhere, Jesus said,

Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in me. I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing. If anyone does not abide in me he is thrown away like a branch and withers; and the branches are gathered, thrown into the fire, and burned. (John 15:4–6 emphasis added)

Again, today within the Christian Church and its many divisions, denominations, and schisms are virtually no born-of-spirit sons-of-God. There are a very few, a statistically insignificant number, but enough that the Church is not dead, with these few being sufficient in number to prevent those not born-of-God from entering into God’s presence. Thus, the only way into the presence of God is through the indwelling of Christ Jesus … the person, Christian or otherwise, who does not have the spirit of God [pneuma Theon] in the spirit of Christ [pneuma Christos] in the person cannot enter into the presence of God, but must remain outside in a figurative court of the women.

The born-of-God Christian who willfully defiles his or her fleshly body through acts of the flesh from adultery to intentionally eating what was not intended to be food for Israel slips out from under the garment of Christ Jesus’ righteousness and remains defiled until the fruit of repentance ripens in the person … the preceding is a delicate subject: assume for a moment that a truly born-of-God Christian can actually make a practice of sinning as in a longtime adulterous affair. Christ Jesus will not dwell in this person; cannot dwell in this person. And about this subject, Paul wrote,

But if, in our endeavor to be justified in Christ, we too were found to be sinners, is Christ then a servant of sin? Certainly not! For if I rebuild what I tore down, I prove myself to be a transgressor. For through the law I died to the law, so that I might live to God. I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. I do not nullify the grace of God, for if righteousness were through the law, then Christ died for no purpose. (Gal 2:17–21 emphasis added)

Once a person is born of spirit, no longer does the human inner self originating in human birth live in a person, but Christ lives in the person, and Christ is not a servant of sin; therefore, at anytime the Christian can quit practicing sin, and indeed, must quit practicing sin. If the “Christian,” having been born of God, is found to continue in sin as in the case of a longtime adulterer, the fleshly body of the person is ruling over Christ, which ought not be and which will not long continue. But <long> is a subjective word: what constitutes long? From the perspective of the timeless heavenly realm, a human lifetime is not long but passes within the moment.

The existence of sin in the fleshly body of a person truly born of God differs from sin entering into the now living inner self of this person. Sin in the fleshly body will be rooted out when the living inner self has grown sufficiently in strength to overcome the flesh and its desires, but sin in the living inner self will cause Christ Jesus to take from the person the indwelling of the spirit of God in His spirit, the spirit of Christ. Therefore, a distinction must be made and comprehended between sin in the flesh and sin in the living inner self; i.e., between defilement of the Holy Place and defilement of the Most Holy Place, or between eating a pork chop and lusting for a pork chop regardless of whether one is eaten or not.

The longtime adulterer who regularly surrenders to the demands of the flesh even though he or she knows what the person is doing is wrong differs from the longtime adulterer who enjoys the allure of an illicit relationship: in the first case, the adulterer will eventually overcome the weakness of the flesh and will cease transgressing the Law—if the adulterer has been born of God, the adulterer will have no choice about ceasing his or her adultery. The indwelling of Christ will give the adulterer no choice: the affair may last seven years, but it won’t last an eighth without the person losing eternal life. But the adulterer not born of God can continue in an affair all of the person’s adult life; for inevitably, this person will become a slave of the titillation of illicit relationships, of doing what the person knows is wrong. One illicit relationship will give way to another, and another, until the person encounters health problems of the sort associated with multiple sexual partners. Then in this adulterer’s mind, he or she will relive what seemed good and right about these many occasions when more was promised by the Adversary than delivered by the flesh of another person.

Therefore, it is today virtually impossible to distinguish between the truly born-of-God Christian whose flesh temporarily rules over the Christian’s now-living inner self, and the sinner who has not yet been born-of-God. Likewise, it is virtually impossible to distinguish the truly born-of-God Christian who makes a journey of faith and enters into Sabbath observance from the alleged convert who has believed a good argument and for entirely physical reasons wants to do what is right and begins to keep the Sabbath. To the human eye, there are very few differences between sinner and sinner, or between the righteous and the righteous via self-righteousness. But the passage of time separates one from the other: truly born-of-God sons-of-God cannot continue to sin, but will, after the season of weakness (of succumbing to the flesh), cease to sin—and the self-righteous will drift away, going on to some new thing that holds excitement similar to that experienced when first keeping the Sabbath. Time separates sons of God from sons of the Adversary. And out of love for the truly born-of-God Christian, we must give time its opportunity to do its work of separating the chaff from the grain; for the flesh shall not long rule over the living inner self.

 

5.

In this present era when the first demonic king of Greece reigns over humanity through the appetites of the flesh holding sway over spiritually dead inner selves of all who have not yet been born of God, women and all that women symbolically represent [i.e., the flesh] subtly and not-so-subtly rule over men: they rule as the women of Athens ruled in Euripides’ play; they rule as Eve ruled over Adam in the Garden when she took and ate forbidden fruit. They rule through fostering unbelief in their husbands. They rule in the way that the visible Christian Church has ruled over the holy ones, the saints, through pomp and pageantry and the mysterious grotto that men seek to enter. They rule by seeming to defer to their husbands, as well as by withholding from their husbands the affection and obedience that rightly belongs to them—whatever the individual situation requires, women as the culturally visible representation of the person’s fleshly body do whatever is necessary to survive.

When Paul wrote to Timothy and said,

I desire then that in every place the men should pray, lifting holy hands without anger or quarreling; likewise also that women should adorn themselves in respectable apparel, with modesty and self-control, not with braided hair and gold or pearls or costly attire, but with what is proper for women who profess godliness--with good works. Let a woman learn quietly with all submissiveness. I do not permit a woman to teach or to exercise authority over a man; rather, she is to remain quiet. For Adam was formed first, then Eve; and Adam was not deceived, but the woman was deceived and became a transgressor. Yet she will be saved through childbearing--if they continue in faith and love and holiness, with self-control. (1 Tim 2:8–15)

and when Paul wrote,

I want you to understand that the head of every man is Christ, the head of a wife is her husband, and the head of Christ is God. Every man who prays or prophesies with his head covered dishonors his head, but every wife who prays or prophesies with her head uncovered dishonors her head, since it is the same as if her head were shaven. For if a wife will not cover her head, then she should cut her hair short. But since it is disgraceful for a wife to cut off her hair or shave her head, let her cover her head. For a man ought not to cover his head, since he is the image and glory of God, but woman is the glory of man. For man was not made from woman, but woman from man. Neither was man created for woman, but woman for man. That is why a wife ought to have a symbol of authority on her head, because of the angels. (1 Cor 11:3–10)

Paul was establishing Christianity as an anti-democratic ideology: the flesh does not have equal rights with the living inner self that is a son of God. The flesh shall not exercise authority over the living inner self, but shall learn in quietness from the living inner self as angels are to learn to remain in their place from human sons of God as the first [angelic sons of God] shall become the last and the last [human sons of God] shall become the firstfruits of the Most High God.

When a woman, the wife of one man, will not cover her hair—her long hair being a symbol that she is under the authority of God—with a fabric covering she has made with her hands, she signifies to the angels that she stands in agreement with the anointed cherub who sought to ascend to heaven, above the stars of God, and set his throne on high, on the mount of assembly. She signifies that she supports democracy, the ideological leveling of the playing field so that no one, including the Most High God, is higher than anyone else. Her naked head [cropped hair] signifies to angels that she will not submit to anyone, not even to the Father and the Son. Her uncovered long hair signifies that she is at least the equal of her husband, if not his superior, that she has usurped authority that is not rightly hers as the Adversary in the Endurance [the last 1260 days of the seven endtime years of tribulation] will usurp authority not rightly his.

To understand Scripture and why women in the Old Testament are nearly invisible and certainly oppressed by men requires the Christian to understand that women collectively represent the fleshly bodies of individual human beings; for all of humanity has descended from Adam through Eve. The flesh is of Eve, not of Adam, whose contribution can be likened to the physical breath that gives life to the fleshly body. In Greek linguistic icons, the woman [Eve] is represented by soma [the body] and the human animating breath by psuche [usually translated into English as soul]. When a person has been born of God as a son, the living inner self is represented by the icon pneuma, but until the person has received a second breath of life, the breath of God [pneuma Theon], the human person is only soma and psuche, as seen in Matthew 10:28, when Jesus sent His disciples out before the spirit [pneuma] was given to them.

A man or a woman is of Adam, symbolically represented in the icon psuche, and of Eve, symbolized by the icon soma, but a Christian, having received life from the last Adam, a life-giving spirit (from 1 Cor 15:45), is of Adam and Eve [soma and psuche] with the indwelling of Christ Jesus in the form of His breath [pneuma Christos] in which is the breath of the Father [pneuma Theon]. Hence, a Christian is tripart — soma, psuche and pneuma (from 1 Thess 5:23) — whereas the human person who has not yet received a second breath of life is only two-part: soma and psuche. And when a person is only two-part, the flesh seems to always rule over the dead inner self, as Eve ruled over her husband when she gave him forbidden fruit to eat … of course, Adam could not have eaten for he was not deceived, but any married person can imagine what Adam and Eve’s marriage would have been like from that time forward, her eating forbidden fruit and him covering her transgression by his continued obedience to the Lord as she sought ways to get him to eat as the women of Athens sought to stop their men from going to war by withholding what their men most wanted from their wives.

Women rule over their husbands through the appetites of the belly and loins: they rule by controlling the kitchen and the bedroom. They rule by flattery and by giving to the man the sense of companionship he lacks when alone, the reason for the creation of the woman (see Gen 2:18). Hence, men will seek out women for reasons other than sexual release. This is not necessarily bad, but can easily become a case of the flesh manipulating the inner self in a temptation common to all men if the man doesn’t keep reign on his emotions.

Jesus was tempted in all things as other men were, but with a difference: He was not the son of Adam, who willfully disobeyed the Lord, but the Son of the Logos, who was God and was with the God in the beginning. Thus Jesus was not humanly born consigned to disobedience as other men and women are. From the beginning, He had the choice of whether to obey God. Other men and women do not—as slaves of the Adversary, every son of Adam has been delivered into the hand of the Adversary for the destruction of the flesh through the appetites of the flesh ruling the human person; i.e., through Eve ruling over her husband in a continuation of Genesis chapter 3.

When Paul says,

I was once alive apart from the law, but when the commandment came, sin came alive and I died. The very commandment that promised life proved to be death to me. For sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, deceived me and through it killed me. So the law is holy, and the commandment is holy and righteous and good. Did that which is good, then, bring death to me? By no means! It was sin, producing death in me through what is good, in order that sin might be shown to be sin, and through the commandment might become sinful beyond measure. For we know that the law is spiritual, but I am of the flesh, sold under sin. For I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. Now if I do what I do not want, I agree with the law, that it is good. So now it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me. (Rom 7:9–17 emphasis added)

Paul reveals that sin, having come from deception, continued to dwell in his flesh; that sin was brought to life through the giving of the Law; that sin no longer ruled his mind, but it continued to rule his hands and his body, thereby causing him to do the things that he hated—and this will remain the case until the Second Passover liberation of Israel, a happening that apparently was not revealed to Paul.

The social equality movement is of the Adversary, as is the Feminist Movement—as is Marxism—for in all of these human ideologies, the flesh is equal to or superior to the dead inner self of a person. All of these ideologies deny the legitimacy of uncovered head as represented by circumcised penises … the ideological basis for worldwide anti-Semitism isn’t hatred of the Sabbath as some Sabbatarian sects have taught, but rejection of the uncovered head, with God rejecting those who uncover the fleshly head through circumcision but then cover the natural head when coming to Him in prayer. Thus, the covered men of Judaism and of Islam stand condemned before God, just as uncovered Christian women stand condemned.

The United States of America isn’t the last and best hope of humanity, but the Adversary’s best hope of salvaging the ideals of democracy, of equality between angels and God as represented by equality between women and men, between the flesh [soma] and the soul [psuche], the dead inner self.

When the flesh rules, the woman has no head, no husband, even though she lives with a man. Yet the flesh will submit to the living inner self if the flesh, the woman, is convinced that the living inner self is of God and is not like the man with whom she lives.

 

6.

When Jesus asked the woman of Samaria for a drink (John 4:7), the woman responded with a question: “‘How is it that you, a Jew, ask for a drink from me, a woman of Samaria’” (v. 9). Jesus then told the woman—again, with the woman being equivalent to the fleshly body of a Christian—that if she knew who had asked for a drink, she would ask for living water [the Holy Spirit] and He, Jesus, would have given it to her, thereby bringing her inner self to life as a son of God.

Pause and consider: Jesus had not yet offered Israel living water, a euphemistic expression for the Holy Spirit. But He told the uncircumcised woman that if she had asked of Him, He would have given her the Holy Spirit, thereby resurrecting in her a head [the living inner self] to whom she would need to submit.

When answering Jesus, the woman of Samaria thought physically as did the Jews of the temple and as do Christians today: to her, living water was found in a well, and Jesus had nothing with which to draw water from the well, so how could He give her living water? Nevertheless, she asks for this living water so that she will never be thirsty again, or have to come to the well to draw water again. And to her apparent surprise, Jesus told her to call her husband [equivalent to her inner self] (John 4:16), and the woman admitted that she had no husband—no living inner self. And Jesus told her that she was correct in saying that she had no husband, for she previously had five husbands and the man with whom she was living is not her husband … the spirit within greater Christendom is not of Christ Jesus, but is of the Adversary whom no Christian can marry and with whom no Christian can become one; for the Adversary already has a helpmate, unrighteousness. And while self-identified Christians can seek to imitate unrighteousness, again the Adversary’s helpmate, and thereby commit fornication with the Adversary, Christ Jesus has no intercourse with the Adversary and cannot dwell in the Christian who willfully practices unrighteousness that defiles the flesh, the Holy Place of the spiritual temple of God.

When Jesus told the woman of Samaria that “‘the hour is coming when neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father. You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. But the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship him. God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth’” (John 4:21–24), Jesus raised the barre for worship of God … those who worship God must worship in spirit, one thing, and in truth, a second thing, and not in any particular geographical location.

Truth is what’s no longer concealed, with the negation of concealment forming the essence of the Greek concept of truth meaning that a thing must be concealed before it can be revealed, or before truth can be ascertained. … Within the previous discussion, what conceals? The grotto conceals. The woman conceals. Thus, before truth can come to the fleshly body of a person, the sin within the person and sinful nature of the person must be revealed—the woman of Samaria previously had five husbands and was living with a man who was not her husband—but not revealed to peers but made evident to the flesh through the conviction of the spirit.

The woman of Samaria represented all of Samaria and the mountain upon which Samaria worshiped God … the woman of Samaria bore to the men of Israel a relationship analogous to the fleshly body of a human person to the dead inner self of the person: soma to psuche, with Jesus in His person representing both [soma a Jew] and [pneuma the Christ] … Jesus could not have come as anyone but a circumcised Jew; for in Himself, He represented both the dead inner self and the living inner self that is resurrected from death by the Father (see John 5:21). And this is what John discloses through this dialogue between Jesus and the woman of Samaria that occurred when John wasn’t there to actually witness the exchange.

It was necessary for Jesus to reveal to the woman of Samaria that He was the Christ—“The woman said to him, ‘I know that Messiah is coming (he who is called Christ). When he comes, he will tell us all things.’ Jesus said to her, ‘I who speak to you am he’” (John 4:25–26)—for she represented the fleshly body of every human person as the mountain upon which Samaria worshiped God represented human worship. Circumcised Jews in Jerusalem represented the dead inner selves of every human person. Therefore, without the mountain upon which Samaria worshiped God or without the temple in Jerusalem where the Jews worshiped God, it would not be possible to worship God in spirit and truth; for a human son of God first needs a fleshly body and a dead inner self [a soul] before the fleshly body can come to Christ through the resurrection of the inner self.

The existence of the earthly temple with its Holy Place and Most Holy Place—and with the author of Hebrews not considering Herod’s temple as authentic [if the author of Hebrews had thought Herod’s temple, which still stood, was authentic, the author would not have written, Of these things we cannot now speak in detail]—prevented Israel from entering into the presence of God, thereby concealing God from Israel. However, the temple in Jerusalem stood in relationship to the mountain in Samaria as the Most Holy Place stood in relationship to the Holy Place, or as the New Testaments stands in relationship to the Old Testament; for on the mountain in Samaria, those who sought God worshiped what they did not know as Israel under the ministry of death worshiped what it did not know, and the Jews in Jerusalem worshiped what they did know; i.e., Moses, on whom the Jews had set their hope (John 5:45).

Again, the woman of Samaria told Jesus, “‘I know that Messiah is coming (he who is called Christ). When he comes, he will tell us all things.’ Jesus said to her, ‘I who speak to you am he’” (John 4:25–26); yet when Peter told Jesus that He, Jesus, was the Christ, Jesus “strictly charged the disciples to tell no one that He was the Christ” (Matt 16:20). So why would Jesus tell the woman of Samaria that He, Jesus, was the Christ but then prohibit His disciples from telling anyone that He was, indeed, the Christ? And the distinction is in Jesus telling the woman that Samaritans worship what they do not know; Israel should know, without being told, that Jesus is the Christ. However, the Jews of the temple were certain that Jesus was a sinner like themselves (John 9:24). They couldn’t accept the possibility that Jesus had come from heaven as the only Son of the deity they worshiped.

In reality, the Jews of the temple worshiped a God that they did not know just as the people of Samaria worshiped a God that they did not know. The difference is that ten of Jesus’ disciples, enough to form a new synagogue, did know that Jesus was of God … it was because of these ten that Jesus could say that we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. It wasn’t because the remainder of the Jews worshiped a deity that they knew: only those to whom Jesus had revealed the Father knew God (see John 17:25–26), not all of Judaism. For Jesus said in prayer to His Father and His God, “‘And this is eternal life, that they know you the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent’” (v. 3), and Peter said to the Jews of the temple,

Rulers of the people and elders, if we are being examined today concerning a good deed done to a crippled man, by what means this man has been healed, let it be known to all of you and to all the people of Israel that by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom you crucified, whom God raised from the dead--by him this man is standing before you well. This Jesus is the stone that was rejected by you, the builders, which has become the cornerstone. And there is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved. (Acts 4:8–12)

The Samaritans that worshiped on the mountain and the Jews that worshiped in the temple—both, not just the Samaritans—did not know God the Father, or know Christ Jesus whom the Father raised from death. Historically, it can be shown that the Samaritans had their own copy of Moses that they used when worshiping God on the mountain whereas the Jews of the temple in Jerusalem had the so-called authorized copy of Moses. The Samaritans really didn’t know Moses, nor did they understand that the Lord intended to make from Moses a great nation, not from all of Israel. The Jews of the temple knew Moses, but they didn’t understand that though Moses had saved the lives of their ancestors, they were nevertheless cut off from God because of the transgressions of their ancestors in the gold calf rebellion at Sinai.

The Samaritans worshiping on their mountain formed the shadow and type of Christians in the 1^st-Century CE whereas the Jews worshiping in Jerusalem form the shadow and type of Christians in the 21^st-Century, when the Second Passover liberation of Israel from indwelling sin and death occurs—and as 1^st-Century Christians told converts that Jesus was the Messiah in a manner analogous to Jesus telling the woman of Samaria that He was the Christ, Christians in the 21^st-Century will not tell converts that Jesus is the Messiah; they won’t have to say anything for all of humankind will be baptized in spirit, thus leaving converts filled-with and empowered by the spirit of God, with the Law of God written on hearts and placed in minds so that all Know the Lord (Heb 8:10–11).

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This Commentary will be continued, with section 4 being e-published in a following work.

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"Scripture quotations are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version, copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a division of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved."

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