Mortality versus Immortality

Des Walter

I do not come as some superior person who has learned it all, and now I am going to teach you. I want to tell you that I have nothing that you do not have. I have come to share my personal experience walking as far as I have gone in my true identity, which is Christ. And the Christ that is in me, is the same Christ that is in you, and the same that was in Jesus. So I will be sharing, not to your mind, but from the spirit in me to the spirit that is in you. Therefore, I do not want you to just listen to my voice, but to hear the voice of the spirit within you. For the promise is that you will know the truth and the truth will make you free.

Over these days, even though I cannot tell you exactly what I will be ministering, because Father doesn't tell me in advance, I am confident he will bring forth the word that we need in this hour. What I can tell you is that the Lord has given me a burden for the release of God's people from the "land of Egypt." That is the message that I have come to America with this year. I believe that so many of us have not been delivered from slavery to "Pharaoh," who represents the carnal mind. Many, are just like the children of Israel, who had been slaves making bricks for Pharaoh for four hundred years, and yet even after they were set free, they wanted to return to slavery again. And so I am not sure that everyone has had enough of slavery to the law of sin and death, to really desire the truth that will make us free and restore our fellowship with God! However, I believe that this is not just a chance meeting for anyone of us, but a divine appointment. Even as you read these words today, I believe that God is speaking to you personally concerning freedom from all that would enslave you. So I want you to turn to 1 John 1:1 where we will begin to share the word of the Lord to you today.

1 John 1:1, "That which was from the beginning." This is where we must start. "That which was from the beginning."

The illusion of life has so much affected our lives, because our consciousness out of which we live, has been impregnated with a sense of mortality. We believe our origin is found in our natural birth, and that we were born into this world as a flesh and blood human being. In other words I was born and I am going to die. I came from the dust and I am going to go back to the dust. It is this deception that has imprisoned us and dictated the course of our life. However, Jesus declared that we would "know the truth and the truth would make us free." We have all believed the same lie that put Adam out of the Garden of Eden, that God has withdrawn his presence and fellowship from us because of our sin. This is where many Christians find themselves today, living in bondage to this false concept of life that is really "death." These people are pictured for us as Israel, God's chosen people who lived as slaves in Egypt, making bricks for Pharaoh even though God called them, "my son." There is no prospect for such people going on in God until the illusion has been broken.

So John begins his own personal testimony by saying, "That which was from the beginning." Well, where were you in the beginning? You were in God. God said to Job, "Where were you when I put the stars in space and when the morning stars sang together, you should know, because you were there." So we have got to break out of this restrictive sense of mortality, where we are limited by dates, time, age and death. But even beyond these earthly restrictions, we find our mortality has far greater ramifications in the spirit world. Flesh and blood cannot enter into the Kingdom of God, so we are prevented from sharing the blessings of living in Father's house. John in his gospel tells us that if we are "born of blood (mortal) we cannot be a son of God," John 1:13. Your mortality will never allow you to leave the land of Egypt, for this is the very thing that made us slaves to Pharaoh who represents our carnal mind. Your mortality is your prison and sets the limitations on your life. You are subject to all kinds of sickness and disease, and death has the power to determine the number of your days. As a mortal human being you are subject to the law of sin and death, and you have no possibility of being set free.

If it was a lie that put Adam into a wilderness and separated him from God, then what is required to reverse the process? The answer is simply the truth! Here is where Christendom has also deceived us, telling us that what Adam believed was not a lie, but the truth, and that God was angry with Adam and as a result cast him out of the garden. Then Christendom further compounded this deception by developing various ways by which we can appease God, and in the process we became further enslaved to the whole religious system. This is because they told us that no one can stop sinning while they are on this earth, so the best we can achieve is to believe God crucified his only begotten son on the cross as just payment for our sin. God considered that his Son's death and shed blood was then sufficient to appease his wrath, and on that basis he agreed to forgive our sins, but only if we believe.

So Christendom established the formula for salvation and sent it around the world. Believe that Christ died for your sins and repent, then ask Jesus to come into your heart and you will be saved, and be a son of God and you will go to heaven when you die. Of course this does nothing to answer the question of our mortality for it assumes that death is inevitable, and neither does it answer the question of our slavery to sin.

Now let us pursue the truth, for it is the only answer to the deception that began in the Garden of Eden.The Apostle John brushed aside all the debate and conjecture by saying, "that which was from the beginning." It is here "in the beginning" that we discover we were created in Christ Jesus, as spirit, in the likeness and image of God. There is no mention here of flesh and blood, for we were created as spirit. The truth is that God never created a flesh and blood man. It was the man created in Gen 1:26, who in chapter 2 is called the "Lord God," that "formed" (not created,) an expression of himself out of the dust of the earth, but there was still no mention of "blood." That was to come later when Adam took the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. The light of God that had energized Adam's body up to the time he ate of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, now began to congeal, forming the blood that presently flows in our veins. But as the Christ consciousness is again raised in us, the process will be reversed, and our bodies will again be filled with light, just as Jesus demonstrated on the Mount of Transfiguration. Jesus declared, "I and my Father are one," and he also said, "If you have seen me you have seen my Father." For most Christians their mortality has bound them to the law of sin and death, so that the former things have never passed away, and the "new things" cannot be imparted to them.

So John says, "That which was from the beginning, which we have heard...." How many of you have heard something that was from the beginning? When you hear something from the beginning, then your life will begin to change. It is not that which you may hear from the time when you were born into this life, nor from the time when you gave your heart to Jesus, or from the time when you consecrated your life to Christ, but what have you heard that was from the beginning. Well, what is there to hear from the beginning? John writes in his gospel Ch 1:1 (it is the same man writing,) "In the beginning was the Word." There was a Word in the beginning. "And the Word was with God, and the Word (what?) was God. The same was in the beginning with God." So we have to hear something that actually came from the beginning.

What does that mean? Before God said anything, there was a thought in his mind about something special he wanted to create. Then that thought began to develop into an idea, and in that idea God said, this creature that I am going to create will be called man.This man will be in our image and our likeness, with the ability to have dominion over all the works of my hands. Nothing will be able to defeat him and no enemy will be able to overcome this man. So this idea developed in the heart of God until the moment when God spoke it into existence. "Let us make man." And "the Word" that God spoke became the man who was the full expression of the thought and mind of God. Beloved, we are the manifestation of that Word God spoke to all mankind, in the beginning.

"That which was from the beginning which we have heard." Have you heard that Word yet? Because if you haven't, you have not discovered your true identity and will remain bound by the thoughts of your carnal mind. You have to understand, that you are that Word! You are the expression of that Word that God spoke in the beginning. If we fail to give expression to that Word we are hiding the truth from all humanity.

You are that Word! Can you hear this? You are that Word!!!

You have to know that you are that Word, and that God is still speaking to all humanity through you as the manifestation of that Word, declaring man's true identity. If Jesus Christ had not expressed that Word that he was, no one would ever have known his true identity. Why do we have the Hitlers, the rapists, murderers, and terrorists out there? Because they have not heard or seen an expression of the "Word" God spoke in the beginning. God help us to become the expression of that Word. "That which was from the beginning, which we have heard." I have heard that Word and I know today, that I am who God said I am! I am God's Word to this world! I am that Word that was in the beginning with God, and that Word which was God! Now you can stone me if you want to, just as the Jews tried to do with Jesus, but that is what the Word is, and if you haven't heard that Word then you will continue to express the illusion, which is a mortal human being.

At twelve years of age Jesus remained in the temple while his parents were on their way home, and they had to come all the way back and found him teaching the religious leaders in the temple. They said, "Son, you know you have caused us all sorts of anguish, for we were half way home and we have had to come all the way back to find you. What are you doing?" He said, "Don't you know that I should be about my Father's business?" He knew he was the Word, and that he was the true expression of what God created man to be. But the reason you have people in the world today who are murderers and all the other crazy people, is because they do not know who they are. For they have never seen a true expression of the Word that God spoke in the beginning.

John 1:14, says, "and the Word was made flesh." The Word that God spoke, which is God's word to all of humanity, has now taken on the same flesh and blood form that we have, to prove to us that the "form" does not alter the reality of what we were created in the beginning. The Word that was created spirit in the beginning, has now become flesh. So the "flesh" is now "spirit" that has been "materialized." When this happens it means that the natural laws which govern our flesh and blood body, must give way to the spiritual laws of heaven. Jesus Christ was never sick, and he could just disappear from the midst of the people. He could appear in the midst of the lake, and even cross the lake without a boat. Remember Jesus did say that we could do all the things that he did, and even greater things. But we have never believed that our body could be so energized by the spirit. We would rather retain our sense of mortality and consider that our salvation does not include our flesh and blood body.

However, Paul tells us in Rom 8:22, "For we know that the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now, and not only they, but ourselves also, which have the firstfruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body." Phil 3:21 says, "Who shall change our vile body, that it may be fashioned like unto his glorious body, according to the working whereby he is able even to subdue all things unto himself." There is nothing concerning our natural body that can prevent Christ from achieving such a victory.

What are we to understand by Paul's words, "the redemption of our body?" We know that the spirit within us is Christ, and scripture speaks about the salvation of the soul, but we rarely hear any one talk about the, "redemption of the body." The body is not evil in itself, but the problem is that it is aligned with the soul and therefore expresses soulish life, which is governed by the carnal mind. When Eve was separated from Adam in the Garden of Eden and took the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, in that new realm she had entered, she "married" the body, even though the male and the female were united in creation by God. This resulted in man becoming a living soul, and the life (soul) is now in the blood according to Lev.17:11. So the soul hijacked the body, using it as a vehicle for its own expression, instead of the Spirit expressing Christ as God intended.

This situation is depicted in the parable Jesus told in Matt 21 of the "Master of the House" who planted a vineyard, dug a winepress, and built a tower leaving it in the hands of "husbandmen" while he went away. The "householder" is our heavenly Father, who gave into our hands the vineyard he had prepared, which would provide him with a good return on his investment. This vineyard represents our body with all its faculties, having the capacity to produce fruit that would satisfy our Heavenly Father. But we have acted the same as the prodigal son and taken the "vineyard" that belongs to the Lord and made it our own, counting whatever gain it could create as our own. When the servants of the Lord sought to establish Father's claim to what belonged to him, we "despised" them and cast them out. Finally we were confronted with Christ, God’s only begotten son, who pressed his Father's claim to that which belonged to him, but we responded by "killing" him saying, "We will not have this man to rule over us." Each one of us is just as guilty as the husbandmen in the parable. However, note the judgment pronounced upon these husbandmen, "The Kingdom of God shall be taken from you and given to a nation (a people) bringing forth the fruits thereof." Matthew 7:14. "Because strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it."

Sickness disease and death cover the world in plague proportions, and Christians are not exempt from this evil. There are just as many Christians with cancer and every other sickness, as there are among the people of the world. Death continues to determine the number of our days, and Christendom has no answer for this situation. I am personally aware of a resistance among some of God's people to even consider immortality as a present day reality. Their excuse is, that immortality is already ours because it is only our body that dies, but we are spirit, and spirit is eternal and cannot die. However let me remind you that mortality and immortality relate to the body and not to spirit. The "redemption of our body" is the divine intention that God will assert his rights over his vineyard, according to the parable given by Jesus in Mark 12:1-11. Thus the vineyard (our body) will yield fruit to the glory of God.

As we establish the authority of the voice of God within us, the "book of Life" will be opened to us, revealing our heavenly state of consciousness. Jesus proved to us that a man born of a woman does not have to sin, for he condemned sin in the flesh. Jude verse 6 says that "the angels who kept not their "first estate" (their beginning or origin) but left behind their God ordained habitation, are reserved in age abiding chains as prisoners of darkness unto the judgment." So this is a warning to us that if we do not embrace our original habitation in God we will remain prisoners of the darkness that rules this world. However when we come to Enoch the seventh from Adam he says, "Behold the Lord cometh with ten thousands of his saints, to execute judgment upon all, and to convince all who are ungodly." This is the work not of a saviour who comes out of the sky, but these are the Elohim company that Jude calls the saints. This is speaking about us beloved, who have returned to our first estate in Christ.

We are told the things that are seen were not made of things that do appear, so even the dust of our being has come out of the realm of spirit. God was our Father in the beginning, for we came out of him, and God is still our Father even though we have a flesh and blood body. The "Word" that became flesh retained the same glory it had before the world began, for John says, "We beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father full of grace and truth."

I want to tell you, you are that Word. "The Word became flesh and tabernacled amongst us, and we beheld his glory." But the glory of that Word is also your glory. I want to tell you, that sitting right there where you are, you are clothed with the same glory that you had with the Father before the world began! You still have it! It has never left you, but you have not seen it, and you haven't believed because you are imprisoned by the thoughts of your carnal mind. "I was born and I am going to die. I have come from the dust, and I am going to go back to the dust." No! You were in the beginning with God! And you are today that same Word that God spoke in the beginning and is still speaking to all of humanity, and when we truly express that Word, the whole world will want to join with us. "And the word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth." That is what we are!

I was ministering in a meeting just recently in the States, and I happened to say that there is absolutely no difference between you and Jesus Christ. And a woman jumped up and she said, "Oh yes there is!" I said, "Is there, please tell me." She said, "You see Joseph was not the father of Jesus and therefore his blood was very special, because it came from God, for he had an immaculate conception." I replied, "That is very interesting because I had an immaculate conception also, and so did you." We were created in Christ Jesus therefore our "blood" or life did not come from any man.

Leviticus 17:11, and the scripture says, "The life of the flesh is in the blood." Of course the word "life" there should really be "soul." The "soul of the flesh is in the blood." But since man became a "living soul" the soul has become the life of the flesh. The soul has hijacked the body, using it as the vehicle of its own expression, instead of the spirit manifesting the Christ. It is our mortality that is being expressed by the soul through our body today. If your life is in your blood, then you are mortal and subject to every disease and all of the corruption that is in this world.

When you are sick your doctor will take a sample of your blood to send away to be analyzed. When it is returned with the pathologist's report, the doctor can tell you what is wrong in your body. However, my life is not in my blood, because my life is hid with Christ in God. That is why there is nothing in this world that can touch my life! I will not die of a heart attack, nor will I die of a stroke, and I will not die of cancer, nor any of the other complaints that go around, for my life is hid in God.

We have got to break the deception that sickness and death are simply a part of life on this earth! Jesus said, "I am come that you might have life and have it more abundantly." He did not say I am come to give you life and health, or life and prosperity, but life in abundance that cannot be affected by anything, for it is eternal. He said that we were to look and see that he has made all things new. The old things of time and sense, sickness and health, failure and defeat, life and death, have now passed away and "behold I make all things new." I have been made one with life itself, and that is God. Once we enter into this reality, we will begin to "live and move and have our being in God."

We have got to move out of this mortality that has bound us to this earth, and begin to discover who we are! I want to tell you, if Jesus Christ on the earth, believed like most of us today, he would never have done what he did. He would never have invited five thousand to have lunch with him out in a desert, or walked on the water. Lazarus would never have left his grave, and the blind would still be blind. He was able to do all these things because he knew his true identity and he was one with the Father. On the other hand, most people today are being limited by their mortality which determines what they can and cannot do.

I John1:1, "That which was from the beginning, which we have heard... and which we have handled...." What have you handled that came from the beginning? I mean have you had anything to do with that which came forth from God, complete and perfect, as a manifestation of his likeness and image? That life is a manifestation of the power and presence of God flowing as a river through us. This beloved, is the reality we need to be handling every day. This is the same reality the disciples saw in Jesus Christ. What have you done with that glorious life you received in the beginning? How many of us today, look in the mirror and say, "This is me"? Because, if that reflection is what you consider your true identity to be, then you are living out of the illusion of life, and you will be subject to mortality, with all of the limitations that it places upon you.

I was in India just recently and on a Saturday evening we caught a train in Madras and traveled South all night. In the morning as we arrived at a town, I was told that I was to minister at three services that morning, and the first one is in half an hour." So I get up and shake my head, and I said, "Thank you Lord you watched over us last night and I did close my eyes all right, but I sure didn't sleep much. This was a big church in a disused picture theater. After that service was finished there was a second one and then they drove me a little way to their international Bible school to teach the students. Fortunately that was in English so I did not have to use an interpreter.

How could I do all that after such a sleepless night? It is possible because I have "handled" that which came from the beginning. You see, I have discovered my identity to be Christ, the Son of the Living God, and he just never gets worn out. I had to learn these things, beloved. This is not just something you pick up out of a book. Because what I am sharing with you I have not read in a book. This is my life. So I was able to do the will of God that morning, not because I'm a super human being, but because Christ is my true identity, and I live out of that Christ.

In my earlier days as a pastor, if I had to preach that night, then you would not have seen me after about 3:00 p.m. that afternoon. I would have been locked in my room saying, "Give me the anointing Lord, give me a word and give me authority and power to deliver the word." This is what I would be doing, because I was a human being trying to act like I was a son of God. And I tell you that is a pretty poor masquerade, and it is impossible.

Now, when I go to India, the Philippines, Indonesia, or America, it doesn't matter where I go because I go as Christ, who is my true identity. Remember Jesus said, "Des Walter you can do anything I can do." And I said, "Thank you Lord I believe what you say." So I tell people, I can do anything that Jesus could do, because I know the secret. I know how he did what he did. John 14:10, Jesus said, "I do not do the works, it is the Father that dwells in me, he does the work." I told the Lord that I can function that way also, so I simply go wherever you send me, and do whatever you tell me to do. In this way I learned how to function as a true son, because Jesus said, "I only say what I hear my Father say, and I only do what I see my Father do."

So now I can say, "I can do all things through Christ who is my strength." Somebody asked me, "Have you raised the dead yet?" I said, "Yes, many times. I have seen those who have been dead spiritually raised up in new life." He said, "But what about physically, just as Jesus raised Lazarus?" I said, "No, I have not raised the dead literally because Father has never asked me to do so." In any case I am not sure all those in the graves are actually "dead," and I wonder if they would vote to return to this world as it is. But if ever He does, it won't matter how long they have been dead, for I will take them by the hand and say, 'Rise up and walk'."

Do you understand? Christ does not dwell in us so we can run around and "do miracles." Understand this, "Of myself I can do nothing!" Unless I see my Father do it, I cannot do it, and this is the Lordship of Christ. Jesus said, "In that day many will say to me, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy Name, and in thy Name we have cast out devils, and done many wonderful works? Then will I profess unto them I never knew you, depart from me you that work iniquity."

I want to tell you, things have changed since the days of the charismatic renewal when people went around saying, "What is your gift, brother?" And I would reply, "My gift is the Holy Spirit, what is yours?" One person says, "I have the gift of healing," while another would say, "I have the gift of knowledge or I have the gift of prophecy." However in my understanding my gift was the Holy Spirit. But people did not understand and so they said, "You cannot have the whole nine gifts, you can only have one!" They could not understand that the Holy Spirit is the gift I have received from God, and He can manifest himself any way He so desires. How many of God's people today seek for the gifts and not the Giver? Instead they seek for power and for the divine ability to perform miracles in order to build their own Kingdoms. Jesus told us, "Lo, in the volume of the book it is written of me, I come to do Thy will O God."

We have to begin to express the Word that was made flesh! Because when you were created you were spirit, not flesh and blood. God never created a flesh and blood person. Do you hear that? The only man God ever created was Spirit, and he was the only begotten Son of God, and that was Christ, Genesis 1:26. But don't get the idea that he was just an individual entity, because Paul tells us in Ephesians 2:10, "We are God's workmanship created in Christ Jesus." For when Christ was created in the beginning, all humanity was created in him. So whatever he is, that is what we are! That is the law of biogenetics, which says, whatever the parents are that is what the offspring will be. So if I am a Son of God, and God is Spirit, then I must be Spirit. However that poses a problem for many people because they have a flesh and blood body! But, so did Jesus Christ and yet he declared, "I and my Father are one!" Then one day Jesus asked the disciples who they thought he was? Peter answered, having received revelation from God, "You are the Christ, the Son of the Living God." Peter could never have discovered Jesus' true identity through his natural senses. That knowledge had to come to him by the spirit, which is Christ dwelling in him.

Peter not only discovered that Christ was the true identity of Jesus, but saw in him a reflection of himself as having the same identity. Later he declared, "Being born from above not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible seed by the Word of God, which liveth and abideth forever." So Peter recognized the "seed" from which we have come is immortal and cannot be corrupted. When we understand these things the veil of our human beliefs is rent, and the truth is revealed. Until the veil is rent we will continue to live our lives as the actor in some stage drama, changing clothes and becoming the very person or character you are playing. But now we are awakening out of the long night of sleep into the dawn of reality. Everything of the past, our birth, race, religious convictions, and human education, can now be seen as part of the Adamic dream. But as the Light of God illuminates our heart and mind, we see the divine activity uniting us with the invisible God, who fills all things. In union with God there is nothing that can hurt, harm or destroy, and we discover there is nothing to fight.

When we speak of our "mortality" we are not simply speaking about our flesh and blood body, for in itself it is not wicked or evil. Mortality is a consciousness and a system of belief sponsored by the carnal mind. This is the snake that Eve conversed with in the Garden of Eden, which convinced her God did not mean what he said, when he told Adam that he would die in the day that he ate the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Instead she believed eating the fruit would make them as gods. Adam chose to join Eve in eating of the fruit thus lowering himself from his high estate in God. His body of "light" became flesh and blood, which was suitable to the earthly condition in which he now walked. God was not angry with Adam, for he searched for him among the trees. But something changed in Adam that brought about thoughts and concepts that alienated him from God. His mind created another "world" that appeared as a wilderness in which he found himself, and now he was in conflict, with forces that seemed to be arrayed against him, and he earned his bread by the sweat of his brow.

Christendom has called this whole episode "The Fall of Man," making God the prime mover in everything that befell Adam, by casting him out of the garden, and setting up an opposition in the "seed" of the serpent, that would oppose everything Adam sought to do. This is precisely the consciousness that has brought about our mortality. What was it that actually formed this consciousness and how can it be reversed? Paul says, there are two laws that function in humanity. One is the law of sin and death, and the other is the law of the spirit of life, and this particular law functioned in Jesus Christ.

Mankind has functioned under the law of sin and death for six thousand years, so it has become firmly established in us. But when Jesus Christ came into the world he lived life on a completely different level, making him appear different from other men. Christendom has brushed aside any investigation into why Jesus Christ lived differently to those about him, by saying that he was "God," even though he was created in the beginning. However this does not explain the true difference, seeing that all mankind came out of Jesus Christ in the beginning.

Let us explore the specific issues that set Jesus Christ apart from other men. Jesus said, "Every Kingdom divided against itself is brought to desolation; and every city or house divided against itself shall not stand," Matt 12:25. This principle that Jesus stated is possibly the best clue given to us for our failure to express the Christ life. We have never functioned as a united entity, but have been divided within our being. We speak of ourselves as a trinity, body, soul and spirit, and that denotes the divisions we recognize in our being. These three parts have never been united, in fact they function in direct opposition to each other.

The flesh wars against the spirit, so that we cannot do the things that we want to do. The soul unites with the body, using it as the vessel through which it produces a manifestation of what it believes itself to be, and denying the truth expressed by the spirit. The carnal mind as an aspect of the soul, is actually an enemy of God, refusing to receive the truth that would bring man into unity and oneness. Note that Jesus declared, "I and my Father are one." This statement does not admit to any divisions within his being at all. He refers simply to the "I" as a single unit. Otherwise he could have said, "I," my spirit, soul and body, and my Father are one. Let us remember that in creation Adam was male and female. This means that the spirit representing the male, and the soul representing the female aspect of man, were united as one, and did not function independently. In view of this, Paul expresses man as a dichotomy, rather than as a trichotomy, which is commonly quoted today in Christian circles. Paul says we have an outer man that is perishing every day, and an inner man that is being renewed every day.

Now let us look at Heb 4:12, "For the Word of God is quick and powerful and sharper than a two edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart." We are not always capable of discerning that which is "of God," but the Word (the Logos) can distinguish between that which has originated in Spirit and that which has come from the soul. However, Paul does use the three parts that are commonly referred to as man in 1 Thes 5:23. "And the God of Peace himself sanctify you through and through, and your whole spirit, soul and body be preserved blameless unto the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ." Here Paul indicates that the purpose of God is to separate us totally unto himself and not just certain aspects of our being. He goes much further by emphasizing that each one of us is to be totally sanctified. Then states that each aspect of every person, spirit, soul, and body, is to be sanctified through and through. (To be preserved entire.) Paul conceives of the man being an undivided whole, and not simply a combination of three parts, which has been the concept of most Christians. This unity of being that Paul communicates to us in his writings, appears to have been overlooked by most Christians today. It seems to me that while we continue to live with this duality of having an "inner man" and an "outer man," we will remain locked into our mortality.

Paul says, "Behold I show you a mystery. We shall not all fall asleep (in death) but we shall all be changed or transformed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the sound of the last trumpet call. For a trumpet will sound, and the dead in Christ will be raised imperishable (free and immune from decay) and we shall be changed or transformed. For the perishable part of us, must put on the imperishable nature, and this mortal part of us (this nature that is capable of dying) must put on immortality (freedom from death). And when this perishable puts on the imperishable, and this (that was) capable of dying, puts on freedom from death, then shall the scripture be fulfilled that says, Death is swallowed up (and utterly vanquished forever) in and unto victory." 1 Cor 15:51-54. Amp.

How wonderful it is to contemplate that it is the divine will and purpose that the "perishable" part of us will put on immortality. The voice of the Son of God will penetrate the prison of our Adamic graves calling us forth into incorruptible life. The tragedy is that we have made a covenant with death, just as Israel did, believing that it has the right to terminate our life whenever it so determines. This is because the carnal mind cannot believe that death has already been defeated. The truth is that we died in Christ on the cross, and we were buried in Him, and that we came forth in resurrection life in Christ. Now we can say with him, "I am he that liveth and was dead, and behold I am alive for evermore and I hold in my hand the keys of hell (the grave) and death." All that can rob us of our victory over death is the carnal mind. Once our body has been released from its mortality it is free to be united with the spirit and so be incorporated into oneness with the Father.

Jesus took three disciples up on the mount, and he was transfigured or transformed before them, so that out of his flesh and blood form, radiated the divine light, brighter than the noon day sun. Hebrews 2:14, confirms that he himself partook of the same nature as mankind, so that going through death he might destroy him that has the power of death. This clearly indicates that it is not this flesh and blood body in itself that prevents us from entering into immortality. The Lord God gave form to the man created in the beginning, out of the dust of the earth, Genesis 2:7. The man that was formed was a manifestation of the Lord God himself, being energized by the same spirit. The "form" in no way robbed Adam at that time, from living in oneness and union with God, nor did it prevent him from being immortal. He was told that the only thing that could bring him into death was to eat the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. It had nothing to do with the dust out of which he was formed, but death would result from embracing the knowledge of good and evil.

Christendom has taught us that we cannot be immortal until after we die. First we have to get rid of this flesh and blood body, and then in the "sweet bye and bye," we will be resurrected and taken to heaven with a new heavenly body. But this cannot be true for several reasons. One is, that Paul tells us, we already have our heavenly immortal body right now, in 2 Cor 5:1. "For we know that if our earthly house of this tabernacle be dissolved, we have (not will get) a building of God a house not made with hands that is eternal in the heavenly realm." Notice that the word "dissolved," has nothing to do with death. However, it does mean according to Strongs, "To dissolve or to dis-unite that which has been joined together."

Jesus said, "Have you not read, he that made them in the beginning made them male and female. For this reason shall a man leave his mother and father and cleave unto his wife and they two shall be one flesh? Wherefore they are no more two but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let no man put asunder or separate," Matt 19:4-6.

Let us pause and hear what the spirit is saying to us today. These scriptures are quoted at practically every marriage ceremony. We interpret them as meaning simply, that God has now joined these two people together, which could be questionable in reality. Then we say, that no man has the right to break the bond between them. If we really believed this, then there would be no divorce. However, we discover that the Lord God spoke these words in the Garden of Eden, when Eve was brought to the man, after she separated herself from the one she was joined to in the beginning. So the reason for these words was this separation of Eve from Adam. The divine intention had already been violated, and the correction necessary was given at that moment.

In creation, we find that God had joined together the male and the female, so God called them Adam, and not Adam and Eve. However the soul and the spirit in the garden, have now become separated, and the soul has prostituted herself by becoming one with the body, defying the purpose of God in creation. The result of this change caused the body to be energized by the soul through the blood, and no longer by the Spirit, and this resulted in mortality. The Spirit that energized the body causing it to be "light," was now replaced by the soul, and the "light" became blood, through which the body was now energized. Thus was born the flesh and blood body of our mortality, and limited to expressing only a manifestation of the soul. Lev 17:11 "For the life (soul) of the flesh is in the blood!"

The carnal mind only reads the ink on the paper, and never hears the spirit speak the truth into our hearts, so we read, "The Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam," Gen 2:21. The Hebrew word used here according to Strong's concordance means, "sleep or a trance," which is derived from another word meaning, "to be unconscious." So it was while Adam was under the influence of this "trance or unconsciousness," that the soul, or female part of his being, tore itself away from the spirit to which it was joined in the beginning.

Here is a picture of the Prodigal Son, taking all that belonged to him to use according to his own will and desire, separated from his Father. The "soul" had the capacity to think, to reason and to bring forth a manifestation of itself in union with the body, but quite apart from the spirit. This is what the Bible calls flesh, which is something God never created, but is the product of the living soul. Under these conditions the image and likeness of God could not be expressed, for it is the spirit that is the image of God. So without the union of the soul and spirit, the likeness of God cannot come into manifestation.

What is it then that Paul says has to be separated to release us from our mortality? Now the answer becomes obvious to those with ears to hear what the spirit is saying to God's people today. There must be a leaving and a cleaving, before we can function as we were created in the beginning. A man (mankind) must leave his mother and father and cleave unto his wife. What is the spirit actually saying to us? Our sense of birth through egg and sperm, (mother and father,) must be abandoned, and another form of conception realized that is not of this world. The angel said to Mary, "The Holy Ghost will come upon you and the power of the Most High God will overshadow you, and therefore (because of this, immediately a conception will take place and) that holy thing that shall be born of thee shall be called The Son of God." This is an immaculate conception, without egg or sperm, by the incorruptible seed the Word of God, that liveth and abideth forever.

Just think about it, that Holy Thing that is birthed in us at that moment is the Mighty God, the Everlasting Father and the Prince of Peace, and upon his shoulder rests the government of our being and every circumstance that involves us! "For behold I create new heavens and a new earth, (speaking of us) and the former shall not be remembered nor come into mind. And they shall not labour in vain nor bring forth for trouble, for they are the seed of the blessed of the Lord, and their offspring with them. And it shall come to pass that before they call I will answer, and while they are yet speaking I will hear. The wolf and the lamb shall feed together, and the Lion shall eat straw like the bullock, (the nature of the wicked shall be changed). They shall not hurt or destroy in all my Holy Mountain saith the Lord."

Ever since the separation of the soul and the spirit in the Garden of Eden our body has been controlled by the carnal mind that Paul says is "death." The soul consists of the mind, emotions and the will, that have no input from the spirit while the soul is separated. From that time the soul has used the carnal mind to control the body, through the emotions and the will, according to the knowledge of good and evil and under the law of sin and death. For this reason Paul says, "For I know that in me that is in my flesh (my body) dwelleth no good thing, for to will is present with me ; but how to perform that which is good I find not. For the good that I want to do I do not do, but the evil that I do not want to do that is what I do. I find then a law that when I would do good, evil is present with me." This is the law of sin and death that robs us of immortality. Paul makes it clear that to be controlled by the carnal mind is death, but to be controlled by the spirit is life and peace. It is the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus that sets us free from the law of sin and death, and therefore makes us free from mortality.

So Paul makes it clear that if our body can be freed from its allegiance to the soul and the carnal mind, it can begin to function through the spirit of life in Christ who dwells within us. We are told to "be transformed by the renewing of our mind." This can only take place as the soul is reunited with the Spirit as it was in the beginning, when man was created male and female as one. Paul expresses this in Gal 3:27-28, "For as many of you as were baptized into Christ, have put on Christ. There is neither Jew or Greek, there is neither bond or free, there is neither male nor female…..for you are all one in Christ."

1 John 1, "That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes." Of course, that is not your natural eyes. 2 Cor 4:16, "For which cause we faint not, though our outward man perish, the inward man is being renewed everyday." So there are two parts to your being. There is an outer man, and there is an inner man. The Greek word "inner" is esoteric, which means hidden. Now you can have an MRI or an X-ray, but you will never see that "inner man" for it is Christ, the reality of who you are. Now many people say they have come to understand that their true identity is Christ. But it is just academic knowledge as it has never become their living reality. You can never live as Christ, until you have broken the illusion of your mortality. We have to die to our mortality, in order to live as Christ who is immortal.

So it says here, "For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, works for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory, while we are looking not at the things that are seen." Paul is saying that our focus has been so concentrated upon that which is visible to our natural eyes, that we have missed that which is invisible, our true identity. Our natural body has hidden the Christ from our view, so we continue to live out of our false identity as a mortal human being.

Matt 16:13 "Jesus came to the coast of Cesarea and said to the disciples, Who do men say that I the son of man am?" And they said that the people did not really know, but they thought he could be one of the prophets. The reason was that they only saw what their natural eyes could see and that was the outer form called Jesus. So Jesus turned the question around and looked right at the disciples and said, "Who do you say that I am?" Peter stood up having received revelation from God, looked into the eyes of this man standing in front of a him and said, "Thou art the Christ, the Son of the Living God." But what was Peter looking at standing right in front of him? He was looking at a man, who looked just like you and I do now, yet he could say, "You are the Christ!" How did he see what others could not see? Because Father had opened his eyes, and he saw into the reality of who he was. While everybody else was saying he was the carpenter's son or Mary's boy, Peter was able to look beyond the physical and see that there was a reality beyond that outer form.

Two thousand years ago Jesus Christ died on the cross. But the body that hung there was not the Son of God, which is Christ. It was the last Adam, the last of a race of people, who like Adam had become mortal, functioning out of the knowledge of good and evil, and so were subject to death. He died on the cross, and was buried, but we need to know that the body Jesus had before the cross no longer existed for it had died. It was the Christ that came forth in the resurrection, that rose from the dead, and his body was spirit materialized. That which is planted must die before the new life can come. So Jesus died that the Christ might be released in us, and the body now freed from its allegiance to the soul is energized and sustained by the spirit, making it immortal.

Did you know that your mortal body has no more life in it than a brick. Just think about it? It is something else that provides the life for your body. "And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul." A living soul must keep breathing air to exist. It is recorded in Gen 7:22 concerning the flood, that every man in whose nostrils was the breath of life, died. It was Job who said, "All the while my breath is in me, and the spirit of God is in my nostrils, my lips shall not speak wickedness." So we can see that our life comes to us through the air that we breathe, which means that it must be constantly replenished or we will die. We have no way of storing "life," and what we have is only sufficient until the next breath.

It is interesting that the word for breath, wind, and spirit is the same word in the Hebrew language, "ruwach." God is spirit and that spirit fills our universe as the air we breathe, filling the entire universe. In The New Testament the word for wind and spirit in the Greek is "pneuma." So as we breathe in the air we are receiving of God, but very few people are even aware of it. The air we breathe not only sustains our life, but we make use of it to speak and communicate. So in the beginning when God spoke, the spirit went forth to bring into manifestation that which was in the heart of God. Jesus was able to say that the words he spoke are spirit and life. Now we are better able to understand that when our life is transferred from the "air in our nostrils," to our true identity which is Christ, our life will no longer depend upon the air we breathe. For we will have the source of life itself within us, because Christ is our life. This is what Jesus said, "For as the Father hath life in himself; so hath he given to the Son to have life in himself." Beloved we read these things, but most times without understanding.

Man, born of a woman does not have life in himself, for he must continue to breathe air (spirit) through his nostrils or he will die. But the Son has life in himself, and is not dependant upon the air he breathes to sustain his life. The Son is one with the Father, who is the source of all life. So the Christ in us, who is our life, provides us with that same life which is now resident within us. Therefore, Christ is our lfie, and our body is now being sustained, not simply by the breath in our nostrils, but from the fountain of life within. The transfer of our life source from the air we breathe to the indwelling Christ brings a change to our bodies, just as Paul told us.

As we realize our true identity is Christ and we are no longer a living soul, the body is released from its sense of duality and mortality and become united as we were in the beginning. The soul and the spirit are no longer separated, so together with the body we become one, body, soul and spirit, functioning in glorious unity expressing the image and likeness of God. With the spirit within now as the source of life, the body becomes a manifestation of God. This change Paul says, will be in a moment, or in the "atoms" of our body all of which are spiritual entities. Endued by the spirit, the body will become spirit materialized, just the same as the body of the Christ.

This is what makes us immortal, for Paul says, "For we that are in this tabernacle do groan, being burdened: not for that we would be unclothed, but clothed upon, that mortality might be swallowed up of life." This means that as we are clothed upon by the spirit, then our body will be no longer be simply flesh and blood, but it will be "swallowed up of life." In other words the body will become spirit materialized, and therefore it will be immortal. So the encouraging words of Paul ring in our ears, "Behold I shew you a mystery, we shall not all sleep, but we all shall be changed, in a moment in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump; for the trumpet shall sound and the dead ( who live out of the carnal mind) shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed."

John 1:12, "But to as many as received him, to them he gave the authority to become something." It does not say, "If you receive me, you are a son of God." No, it says, "If you will receive me, acknowledging me as Lord, then I will give you the authority to become something! Even to them that believe into his name." You will have the authority to become a Son of God, but there is a proviso here, which most people have never noticed. Look at Verse 13,"Which are born not of blood." If you are born of blood you cannot be a son of God.

John says, those that are born of blood, that is, those that have been born of a woman, cannot be a son of God. In the natural there is nothing in the world that you could do, or that I could do, to make you my son, because you were never born into my family. God is Spirit, therefore his sons must also be spirit! The only way you could be a son of God would be if you were born out of God, and if God was your Father, only then could you be a son of God. Jesus told Nicodemus, "You must be born from above." But this is not a formula for salvation, but a statement of fact if you want to enter the Kingdom of God.

Let us go back to the epistle of John again. "That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, and which we have seen with our eyes, and we have looked upon, and our hands have handled of the Word of life." You see, this is not something that John was told about. This is not something that John heard Paul preaching in some great cathedral somewhere. This is John saying, "I have heard something that was from the beginning, and I have seen something that originated in God. I have seen it and I have handled it. This is my reality!" Beloved, until it becomes your reality, there is nothing that you have that will interest the world. Not until you can go out there and people recognize that you came from God!

Christ is in every man and is the identity of all humanity even though they do not know it. Beloved, you are the word God spoke into existence in the beginning, created in Christ Jesus. You are created in the likeness and the image of God, with dominion over all things! You have got to break out of this illusion that says you are just a mortal human being and the limitation which it puts upon your life, and begin to live out of the spirit which is Christ.

II Corinthians 5:16, "Wherefore, from this time on"... From this moment. Mark it on your calendar, "From this moment on, we are to know no man after the flesh, even though we have known Christ after the flesh we do not know him that way anymore." If Peter could look into the eyes of the man called Jesus and say, "You are the Christ, the son of the living God," we also must begin to see Christ in each other. That is the proof that you have begun to break the illusion. Christendom has never let Jesus go, they are looking for that same human form that walked the dusty roads in Jerusalem, to return out of the sky because they do not know the ways of God.

We read in Acts 4:12, "Neither is there salvation in any other, for there is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved." I thought that his name was above every name, and that "at the name of Jesus every knee would bow." The Greek word translated Jesus is "IESOUS," which means Jehovah is Salvation. Jehovah comes from the Hebrew "Jehoshua" who led Israel into the promised land. It is interesting that the man created in Gen 1:26, is called Jehovah Elohim, which is a compound name. It represents a union of God and man functioning as one, just as Jesus declared, "I and my Father are one." Jesus Christ was a true representation of man as he came from the Creator’s hand in the beginning, for indeed he was a God-Man. This is Christ the Son of the Living God, whose dwelling place has always been the man God created. We are the many mansions, or abiding places in "Father's House." Christ has prepared a place for us in Father's house by obtaining a perfect salvation for us, destroying him that had the power of death, releasing us from our mortality and restoring us to our original place in God in the beginning.

Jehovah or Jesus is the man-ward aspect of God, and that is what Jesus was in his life on the earth. Christ is the God-ward aspect of man, expressing himself through the body that was prepared for Jesus. In exactly the same way today Christ in us, purposes to express what he is through us, for we also have a body that was prepared for us just as it was for Jesus, see Hebrews 10:5. So we are told that God does not want sacrifice and offerings, but he wants our body to be the vehicle through which he can express himself. This is what salvation is all about, and the testimony of Christ on the earth is dependant upon our body being liberated and available to bring forth a manifestation of himself.

So today is it not simply Jesus Christ who was one man who yielded himself to become an expression of the Christ life and blazed the trail for us to follow. For now we have Des Christ, John Christ, Jane Christ etc., etc. And you can simply add your name as you come into the realization that you were created in Christ Jesus, in the beginning, and you are that Word that was spoken into existence by the Creator.

Beloved, I want you to think on these things. I want you to spend sometime in the presence of the Lord, and say, "Lord I understand I have been deceived, creating an illusion that has had me bound. But now Lord, open my eyes to see reality and give me light to see the way I must walk to follow the footsteps of the Master, to fulfill the divine purpose for which I was created." This experience will produce the miracle of change, as this mortal puts on immortality, and we find ourselves living again in Father's house. This change is nothing less than a "metamorphosis," which is the word used by Paul in Rom 12:1-2. This is the changing of the caterpillar into the butterfly, and it is a divine work. I am not telling you that you can just shake your head and change your mind and you've got it. I'm telling you that you have to begin to search for reality in God, in the Christ that is your identity! You have to see into that Christ, who is the likeness and image of God. You have to look into your own eyes and see Christ in there. You have to know that this is your true identity. You have to begin to live out of it instead of out of this mortality. And then things are going to change!

May the Lord bless you, encourage you, and set you free.

Des Walter