Deceptions Of The Mind

            In this second installment of this series, I will attempt to cover some details about deception and give you my opinion on why I view certain doctrines and concepts as being deceptive. If I was to pick out a word that was repeated most often in the responses to the first installment, it would be the word, “shocking!” This word was uttered or written consistently from our readers and it was followed by words such as, “disturbing”, “unbelievable”, and such. I do feel badly for the blunt method that I used in writing the previous article, but in order to be heard in a crowded room with a bunch of prattling noise going on, one must raise their voice to be given the proper attention. With this in mind, I purposely did away with courteous speech and scholarly statements and just said it like it was, without frills or any fancy dressing. I did offend some friends, and I regret this, but do not apologize for the message itself, as I am convinced that the Lord laid this article on my heart and I had no recourse in delivering it. I can apologize to one and all for my obvious lack of skills in communicating by the written word what my thoughts and intents are, but that apology would have to include every writing I have done in the past, due to my woeful method of butchering the proper grammatical usage of the English language, and for this, I am guilty as sin.

            I did not confer with any other person before writing the prior article, and I stand alone as solely responsible for it’s content. Even my dear wife was not given the opportunity to counsel with me concerning it’s content or subject matter, but has given me her support for sending it out. In other words, I have written this message as an individual, a single man that has heard what I have perceived to be an alarm from the spirit of the Lord to give forth a warning to the Body of Christ concerning deceptive concepts that can be destructive to the believer. The bottom line that I would like you to know about the motive behind this series, is that I am only one person, giving forth my opinion on these matters and by no means am I claiming to be without any form of deception in myself, but am fulfilling my obligation to the Body of Christ to be as honest and forthcoming as possible in what I feel the spirit of the Lord is dealing with me about. If this does not apply to you or if it does not minister to you at this time, then set it down and leave it alone. I assure you, I do not intend to make it my life’s work to sniff out deceptions amongst the kingdom ranks, to be some sort of spiritual Nazi hunter, confronting the enemy wherever he may be found. That couldn’t be farther from the truth.

            I do view this article as a warning to the kingdom ranks, an alarm that has shocked many, but hopefully will help the true lovers of truth to avoid the pitfalls that I believe are making their way into our lives. But, an alarm is only effective when it is given clearly and succinctly, and if given over and over through much repetition, it becomes nothing more than tinkling cymbals and sounding brass. I will not be mentioning this subject again in such a comprehensive manner, since there are many other subjects that are sorely needed to be clarified to the Body of Christ, and after this series is through, I will have obeyed my heart and will go on to other things in the Lord. But, I would have you to know that I believe the deceptions at hand today make up one of the most crucial challenges that has ever been put to the faith that has been so mercifully delivered to us.

            It is not my intention, in these writings, to do an expose on what has come to be known as “The New Age Movement.” To me, this movement would not be considered a serious challenge to the kingdom message, as it is readily seen as not being a part of the redemptive plan of God through Jesus Christ. If you do desire to know more about the “new age” doctrine and it’s history, I would suggest that you read an excellent series on this subject authored by Terry Crisp of Good Seed Publications entitled, “Zarah and Pharez”. This can be accessed on the internet at: www.goodseedpublications.com, or write to Terry at 672 Goodman Rd, Dawson, GA 39842. There are many other sites on the internet that one can access that would define in great detail the New Age Movement and doctrine.

            My intention in this series is to warn us of a new kind of deception, one that has aspects of new age thinking and doctrine, but is not strictly new age. In some of the responses I received from the first article, it was mentioned that questions were asked some of the ministry if they were new age and the answer was that they were not new age. Of course, this is entirely true. If you were to ask any of the ministers that name themselves “kingdom” and yet minister new age concepts if they were New Age, the answer would be the same. The fact is, true New Age believers would not accept them as being New Age because they have deviated from that doctrine to include Jesus Christ, so in the strictest sense, they are not new age. The trouble is, if you were to ask the same ministers if they are Christian, the answer would be, “NO!” In truth, they are a hybrid of what we would call “Christian doctrine” and “New Age doctrine”. Not only that, but the deception that is being introduced as “kingdom” is made up of a myriad of “truths”, so that they could actually fit in with just about any type of people. For this type of minister, there cannot be anything considered as not being the truth. Whether you are a Buddhist or a Hindu or a Marxist or a Satanist, it is all truth and it all has equal veracity in God.

            It is very interesting to note that everything being propagated today has nothing “new” about it at all. All of the New Age doctrine is a repeat of doctrines that the early church faced in the cities that they ministered to. If you were to read the history of the early church according to Eusibius, the chief historian of this remarkable time period, you would find the same concepts and thoughts that are taught today, with only the descriptive terms changed to give them an appearance of something “new.” I am going to shock some of you with this next statement, but it is true. There has not been an original thought about God since the Apostle Paul was moved upon by the Holy Ghost to frame the worlds with the faith that was passed on to him by the arisen Jesus Christ. As much “revelation” as we are supposed to have received in this enlightened age, none of us have ever come up with a concept about God that has not already been stated in ages gone by. I know that is quite a blow to many egomaniac ministers out there, but that is the simple truth. We come up with new terms to describe those concepts, such as paradigm shift, higher consciousness, corporate man, inclusion, imagery, transcendental meditation, the higher self, and on and on, but they all describe thoughts that have been in the world for millenniums. Humbling, isn’t it? With all our getting, we have yet to get anything truly original from the spirit of God that has not already been stated a long time ago.

            To illustrate this thought, I remember hearing our friend and fellow minister, Stacy Wood, give a glorious thought on the true meaning of the Ten Commandments, which he stated were not commandments as we might suppose, but were actually “promises” which give us a sure word that in the plan of God there will come a day when “Thou shalt not kill and thou shalt not steal, etc.” I thought it was the most original thought on the scriptures that I had ever heard. Sometime later, I was doing some research and since I love to read Andrew Jukes’ writings I started to scan through some of his work, which were written in the mid-1800’s and  came across a wonderful writing where Bro. Jukes states the exact same thought as Bro. Stacy brought forth. It astounded me! Especially since Bro. Jukes wrote this before the explosion of the Pentecostal movement, which I had always assumed gave us the move of the spirit and which opened the door to the spirit of revelation. It did open up my eyes to what true revelation is, the revealing of Jesus Christ. It is not about you or I, it is not about higher thoughts or higher consciousness, it is not about knowing some secret formula for a fountain of immortality, it is not about chanting or crystals or frequency healings. It is absolutely and completely about Jesus Christ. There is nothing any higher or deeper than to know Him.

            I repeat, there has not been one original thought concerning the plan of God since the Apostle Paul and there will not be a new thought in the future, not in another thousand years will there be anything truly original brought forth that would be an addition to that which has already been stated by past generations. The only “new” thing that we will come into will be the experience of God’s true substance and nature, an encounter with Him in such a way that it will fuse us together with Him in a state and condition of complete oneness. We should not be desiring a “new doctrine”, or a new concept about the sons of God, thinking that if we only could attain a new kind of thought or revelation than that would usher us into a new dimension of existence in God. That is a deception that is continually kept alive by our insatiable desire to  find a “new way” into Enchristed Life. Most of the preachers that find their way into the upper echelon of Babylon’s religious kingdom of fame and fortune have arrived there by stating supposedly original thoughts about God. They separate themselves from the pack by incorporating original marketing schemes for their ministry and by mutating the message to come up with a new twist here and a new wrinkle there, but ultimately they are only repeating hashed over processes that have their genesis in the days of the early church and some even earlier.

            So it goes, the new Bishop movement in the kingdom ranks is nothing more than a repackaging of the prior movements of shepherding and eldership, with a new wrinkle here and there. The laughing phenomenon that took place in Toronto was nothing more than a recycle of early Pentecost. I met some of the men involved in the Toronto blessing, as it came to be called, and tried to tell them that we experienced the same thing in the little Pentecostal church I was saved in 38 years ago and have even had the experience pop up at various times in the recent past, but they were convinced that it was something “new” and viewed it as the act of God to precede the rapture of the church.

            I have heard it said among those that think we are to make a “new” declaration of the “finished work of Calvary” that we have been declaring the same old message for the past 30 years and it is time to declare something “new” and call it “finished.” I find this to be the same misconception as stated above, trying to find something “new” to declare that will somehow unlock the Feast of Tabernacles and release it into the lives of the believers. There are some that feel we need to enter into a mass confession that all is finished and if we can get enough people to declare it together, than it will cause it to take place. I do not see this as being the answer to our situation at all. It will accomplish nothing to try to wrestle these things out of the heavens by our own faith or our own power to confess and possess. The name it and claim it revelation has not worked in 2,000 years and it won’t work today. There is not a preacher alive today that is anointed by the spirit of God to bring forth a new, original concept about some hidden path to glory. There is only one path and one way into the glory of the Father and that is through Jesus Christ. A new “message” or understanding of how to make it there will not bring it about. We are on the right path, right now. We are staying true to the course that was set out for us 2,000 years ago and I for one will not deviate from it. I may see it more plainly than I did in Pentecost or Passover, but it is the same path I have been on since Jesus Christ revealed Himself to me in that little Pentecostal church. All other ways are nothing but rabbit trails that will lead to a dead end and demand you to back track and find the original path that was laid out by Jesus Christ and the Apostle Paul.

            To some, I am “old order” by stating such a thing. In their eyes, they are “new order”, because they are declaring something “new” and fresh. I am not worried about being “old order”, as I believe in a progressive truth, which has a lineage to it, just as our bodies are made up of our past lineage, so truth has a line drawn through it and is constantly revealing itself throughout the ages, connecting the various points of disclosure by a thread of continuity, from alpha truth to omega truth. I am not preaching another gospel than what Paul preached. Nor am I teaching anything other than what he taught, although I am able to state it with more modern definitions and viewpoints, it is in line with the truth that he received from the arisen Jesus Christ.

The three feasts of the Lord, Passover, Pentecost and Tabernacles are related to each other and actually are meant to compliment each other. They are not in competition with each other! Passover has it’s own glory and purpose and nothing can be added to it or taken away from it. Initial regeneration of a man’s heart toward his heavenly Father is one of the greatest experiences that a person can have. All believers must know this feast and experience it’s reality, before they can go on to truly know and experience any other feast. However, once Passover is fully experienced, there is more of the same truth to be revealed or experienced. Passover leads us into Pentecost. Now, Pentecost is not just Pentecost, but it is Passover AND Pentecost, both fused together to form a compound feast. How can one be truly Pentecostal and not still have the ongoing ministry of Passover? The very reason for the gifts of Pentecost, the expression and demonstration of this feast is for the initiation of the unbeliever into the experience of Passover which will open the door for the believer to experience Pentecost. Now, we come to the feast of Tabernacles, which is not just a separate feast with it’s own individual truth, but is a compound feast made up of Passover and Pentecost now incorporated into a corporate feast, with the reconciliation of Passover, fused with the power of Pentecost incorporated into the nature of Tabernacles, which produces a “new man”, a creature of God that embodies all of the feasts into one “feast of all feasts.”

Unless we can start to see with the corporate vision of truth, the compoundment of individual truths into “the truth”, we will continue to seek for the “new” day of the Lord that we think is somewhere in a place in God that we cannot find with our present truth. That dictates that we must look for that place somewhere else than where Jesus or Paul has described to us. A certain amount of kingdom believers think that they are beyond Paul’s message and only use his teachings when they are convenient to use as a distorted proof of their abberant teachings. These are the same people that want us to believe that they are completely finished from all processing or development and that they are God, the I AM. The fact that they declare such things and still live as any other man or woman does in the earth goes a long ways in letting us know that their “truth” is only another rabbit trail that will eventually lead to a dead end if they continue down it’s path.

I want to address the “finished work” message that I believe is a deception working it’s way into the very fabric of the kingdom ranks. Again, this is a phrase that is fairly new, but it is an old concept that has popped up over the long centuries since the early church. I do want to state that not everyone that ministers a “finished work” message truly understands what they are implying, and some are stating a phrase that doesn’t aptly describe what they believe or want to be stated. Of all the “deceptions” that I listed in the first article, this was the one that caused the most concern amongst the ministry that responded to me. Some thought that I didn’t know what the “finished work” message was about, and one even stated that I needed to hear a true Melchizedek priest minister it to get another perspective.

It is true, that there many versions of the “finished work message” and I do need to clarify what I believe concerning this concept. First of all, I do believe in a finished work, although I would not term Calvary as being the place or time for this finished work to have been accomplished, although Calvary certainly was a finished phase of the total plan. I believe the finished work to have been accomplished in God before the foundations of the world were laid. Before anything was made or created, God finished His plan in Himself and then brought forth the creation itself. The very fact that God did not stop at the point of finishing the work in Himself dictates that He will continue to bring that finished work to reality in us and in the world. For some that preach the Finished Work message, they actually see it the same as myself, that Jesus did finish His work at Calvary, in Himself. To me, this is a phase of God’s plan that was finished, brought to a close, and brought a fulfillment to the law and the prophets. It was a finish and it was also a BEGINNING. To say that everything in God’s plan was stopped and completed 2,000 years ago is to ask us to enter into a colossal concept of denial. To believe that, we must deny everything around us is actually real, but is only an illusion of our carnal mind that has not awakened to the “finished work at calvary”, a denial of all of our senses and the world at hand. I don’t believe that Jesus taught us a message of total denial, but rather taught us that we are in an imperfect world that we will overcome by His life. Some literally believe that the finished work means exactly that, we are living in a world of illusion that we will awaken from in the plan of God, and we will see that death doesn’t really exist, we just thought it did, and no one really gets sick, we were just tricked by our carnal mind in thinking so, and we don’t have original sin or even a sin nature, but it is only an imagination of our carnal mind. I don’t believe this lines up with the lineage of truth that I find in the teachings of Jesus or Paul. This is a concept straight out of Eastern philosophy, imbedded in Buddhism and Hinduism. The deception with it is that we are asked to believe this concept as the “path” to being brought into the fullness of God and the reason that other generations did not come into this reality is because they believed “the lie”, that we were sinners saved by grace. This, to me, is ludicrous and attempts to disannul the gift of God’s sacrifice of His Son for our redemption.

As I say, I believe in the true, finished work, and indeed would have no hope left in me to ever come into the reality of being found in my finished state if Jesus Christ did not already produce a finished work in Himself, but that finished work is far from the finished work that I hear preached in most places. He is the Pattern Son, and that pattern is finished and forever perfected without any flaw or imperfection. If anyone knows anything about working with patterns, whether you are a carpenter, a die maker or a seamstress, you know that once the pattern is cut out, that is the guarantee that everything produced from that pattern will retain the image and likeness of the master pattern. Jesus Christ is our pattern and He is producing from that finished pattern a company of sons that will be found in His exact likeness. Glory! That is not subject to failure! I am assured, and you are too and also every man born of a woman, that we will be found in the image and likeness of God, because of the finished work of Jesus Christ. Now, let me say that at this present moment, I am still being cut upon to conform to that finished work of Jesus Christ, and I am still being processed by His operation of grace and salvation to have all of my parts put together again in a corporate form, fused together with Christ to form one, complete, new man. Until that process is complete, I stand in faith and assurance in the finished man, Jesus Christ, who is the author and the finisher of the faith, who has begun this awesome metamorphosis in Himself and will complete it in everyone of God’s children, without fail. If I did not know this, I would be of all men most miserable and without any hope in the world. There is no reason for us to go on some ego trip and say that we are now and always have been finished, and to deny that we are still in need of some serious processing and judgment.

Judgment has become a bad word for some kingdom folk. I was taken to task for my previous article on Deception for being some kind of JUDGE. Judgment is not dead and gone, but is an ongoing method of refinement and purification that will not stop until everything has been changed in heaven and earth. We are not to judge another man and stand between him and God, but we are absolutely admonished to judge every man’s words and actions as to whether they are life or death. Every time I write an article, speak at a meeting or make an audio message tape, I am asking people to judge that which comes forth from me. I wouldn’t have it any other way! If one does not want to be judged, then one should not speak or act. It is insane to tell the people of God to accept anything that anyone says as being fit for consumption. Many are sick and weak because they have not discerned (judged) the Body of Christ. Through judgment the Lord is teaching us His ways. Through judgment we are discerning good and evil and loving the one and abhorring the other. Through judgment we are developing an ear for the ring of clarity in truth, and are finally cringing at the screech of error. When we throw out judgment, God is nothing more than a vibration, without form or substance and for many this is what God is to them, a universal essence that they are.

The key to the finished work is simply a need for balance. In fact, balance will bring the whole Day of the Lord into focus and will make sense out of the confusion that comes about when men take “a truth” and make it “absolute truth.” Why don’t we use balance? Because it would take away from our need to stand out from all other competitors. Balance makes us a loaf of bread, instead of a grain of self. If we need anything today, it is to die out to our own aggrandizement. Humility is a lost fruit of the spirit in today’s atmosphere. Balance will humble you, reminding us of the fact that we are only a part of an immense plan that towers over our own self importance. Of all that has come before me and all that will follow after me, I am a vital but essentially small part of the totality of God’s plan of the ages. Balance will teach us that Jesus did put death under His feet, that He did produce a more excellent way for us to follow Him behind the veil, that He did nail to His cross all of the precepts that were written against us, and He did make an open display of His power and authority over those base things when He arose from amongst the dead and brought with Him the keys of the kingdom. Balance will teach us that He is now working that eternal work out in us, His brethren and joint-heirs, and will not leave us in a state of denial, but will lift us into His place of authority and dominion at the right hand of the Father and will empower and glorify us with His glory as ambassadors of His salvation to the ends of the earth.

Preach the finished work, but please preach it and teach it with the balance that is essential for it to become a reality in the hearts of God’s people, and not just another psychic exercise of mind over matter. We must let the people of God know that there are some things that are still being changed, that have received a sentence of death from the resurrection of Jesus Christ, but they must still be evicted and executed by that power that is still being unleashed today. Thrones must still be thrown down in the hearts of men. Healing is still taking place in our midst, men and women are still coming to know the Lord as their Lord and King, the hopeless are still finding hope and the weak are still being made strong, not by coming into some kind of new consciousness, but by partaking of a life-changing flow of the spirit that is still coming out from under the door of the  Temple. It won’t take any glitter off the message of the finished work to bring forth the balance of this awesome truth to God’s people. Many of the ministry that have ministered all is finished in them and they are no longer in the time of processing will admit that they are not really finished, that they still get sick in their bodies and they are showing their age as their physical body deteriorates. But, it is said with a wink and a nod, and only when they are pressed by those that question the soundness of their message. At times, when listening to them proclaim such ridiculous statements, I find myself musing, “Gee, I was really hoping for there to be more than this. I mean, after all of the hype about manifested sons of God, and then to be made to believe that what I see before me are the finished products of that great company of God is, to say the least, the biggest disappointment in the history of the world. Maybe my expectations were a tad too high. I thought we would at least be in better physical and emotional shape when we arrived at such a state of maturity in Christ.” I continued to sit in amazement at these meetings of Manifested Sons Of God, listening to them talk about their I Amness and how they were there at the creation of the worlds and brought it all into existence by the living Logos that they were, and I watched as they hacked and coughed in the aisles and one by one went to the bathroom to use the toilet. I can only hope that there is a good septic system in the plan of God, because it looks like we will be using the toilet throughout the eternities to come. I never would have thought that would be the case when we were truly finished, but just add that to my list of disappointments.

Is this what we have come to? Living in such deteriorated states and conditions and then asking everyone around us to ignore the obvious and see us as the great I AM? Why not bring the balance of truth to our midst? We are a spirit, finished and complete, joined to a soul, in need of a marriage and a nature change, living in a body that will be glorified by the outworking of the spirit of life that is resident within us. Until then, we are what we are by the grace of God. In one part, we are weak, and in another part we are strong, we are flesh and we are spirit. Uh oh, don’t want to admit to any of that, it might negate what we want to believe we are. I desire you to be delivered from fear, dear friend, and to be able to see yourself exactly as God has made you, a compound man, made up of many things that are not agreeable as of yet, but are destined to come together in a bond of unbreakable love and unity. What will bring this unity is balance, the lesser being subject to the greater, no more struggle for supremacy of the house, but each part giving way to the whole.

I believe in the finished work, but I believe it is as of right now, finished only in one man, Jesus Christ, our pattern and forerunner, who will bring us to where He is. We are not prolonging the Day, just letting it dictate to us it’s manifestation, and knowing that the Day will declare itself, at the set time and order. Who amongst us could believe strongly enough for such a grand thing? How could God leave it up to us, in our own strength of faith, to make it so? The truth is, He hasn’t. The Day will take care of itself and is right on time. Be still, in all of your wondering and yearning. All is well and the Master is in control. We will be found like Him, glorified with Him  and that is not a belief or a doctrine, it is a fact that we can stake our existence upon.