Herbert W Armstrong

   And I wonder how fully we even recognize that fact that this world is totally blind. Now, probably all of us, as we began to come into God's church, made much of the same mistake. We got excited about what we were learning, and we tried to tell somebody else about it. Right? How many of you did that? All right, thank you. I wonder about the rest of you. But most of us at least made that mistake. You get excited and it's not a matter of trying to do something wrong at all or imagining yourself a preacher. It's just a matter you get excited and say, "Look at this."

   I remember one Latin couple out in San Francisco had been brought up Catholic. And she was the one who was doing most of the learning, at least at that point, and you know, coming from this Catholic background, she started reading the literature and she was so excited. And you know, her husband went off to work and he came in one day and she met him at the door with a look of shock on her face and said, "Guess what? Mary wasn't a virgin." And he said, "What? What are you talking about?" And of course she meant that Mary had several children after Jesus Christ was born, but you know it was such a shock to her. She just met him at the door with that.

   Remember another couple that was??"they were talking about how he was the one who was understanding the truth first, and they both worked and therefore the only time they had free was the weekend and she normally used Saturday for her cleaning. So he learned about the Sabbath and every time she'd start up the vacuum cleaner, he'd run in behind her and pull the cord and say, "You can't do that," and he'd read scripture to her and it was really frustrating. Now eventually they both came along miraculously, but you know, you find those things, those mistakes that people make. You get all excited about it and maybe you find someone who begins to show a little interest themselves.

   I remember one fellow as I was beginning to understand the truth, and we got talking one day at work. There were three of us were talking and this one other fellow suddenly he started saying things that I thought, "Hey, that sounds familiar." And we started talking and started mentioning things, and sure enough he'd been listening to the broadcast and reading the Plain Truth. I said, "Hey, have you read this booklet? I thought it was really exciting." "Well, no, I haven't," so I took it to him. Never heard another word from the fellow.

   Maybe it's relatives or maybe it's friends or whatever, but we've all had the experience of it and sometimes it's so frustrating because you'll read something very clear in the Bible, like let's say an example of Christmas. I mean, any of us can prove from the Bible that Christmas is not something we should keep. It's very clear; there's no way you can deny it. It's as plain as the nose on my face, you know, but yours is smaller. It's as plain as a big nose. And you can't deny the fact, and yet you can go to somebody else and you can say, "Look what it says right here, Jeremiah 10, read that," and they'll read that. "Yeah, well, what's going on at work?"

   Mr. Waterhouse was talking about how he came??"Mr. Gerald Waterhouse. By the way, he's coming to the area soon. I forgot the date, but he is coming soon anyway, and I think probably it's in January if I'm not mistaken. I'm sorry I meant to dig that out and bring it to you today. I kept forgetting to mention it, but he is coming soon, so I mentioned that. So is Christ, I know, but I mean Mr. Waterhouse??"it shouldn't be before that. So anyway, he was talking about how when he was first learning the truth and how he'd been up to the Days of Unleavened Bread, and he listened to Mr. Armstrong for seven days explaining God's truth and God's plan. You know, "This is fantastic." He went back up to his brother, an older brother. And he said, "Boy, I'm going to explain this to him and he can't miss it. It's just so clear and so logical," and he sat down with his brother??"I guess his brother is a dentist??"and he started talking with him about it for a little while. They talked for about fifteen, twenty minutes, and he just, you know, perfect logic right down the line, just repeating what Mr. Armstrong had said and just showing him this, and his brother looked up and looked over at his wife and said, "You put out the dog."

   You begin to realize I'm not getting through. The mind is closed and it's a real shock to us when we suddenly find we're beginning to understand things and others don't understand them. And finally we begin to realize, well, that's because God is calling us and God is opening our minds and helping us to understand things that we couldn't understand otherwise.

   Sometimes I guess there are people, as Mr. Armstrong has mentioned, there are some who still come around the Church of God, maybe even are baptized members of the Church of God who haven't figured that out yet. And they still feel like they're going to convert somebody else. Or "if I could just get my husband baptized" and "get my wife baptized," you know, what would you do if you had your husband baptized? You have a wet carnal husband, that's all you have, because he's not being called by God.

   So some are still taking, I guess in a sense that Protestant approach, although I think most of us have begun to realize I can't convert anybody. I can't call someone, I can't open their mind, and if God doesn't open that mind, they can't understand this. No matter who presents it, no matter how clearly, because this world is blind, totally spiritually blind.

   Now back in II Corinthians chapter 4. The apostle Paul talks about this. II Corinthians chapter 4 picking it up in verse 3, (II Corinthians 4:3). "But if our gospel, the good news message that we are bringing??"" How can anybody reject the good news message? What is the message? It's peace, it's happiness, it's prosperity. It's all the blessings you could imagine, family stability, no more divorce, no more turmoil in the world, no more fear of crime or war or want or, you know, universal education, every wonderful thing you can imagine. Sounds like a political party's national convention. Sounds like Walter Mondale, you know, promising everything, and of course you know he can't deliver anything any more than President Reagan has delivered on the things which he promised or anybody before him or after him will.

   But when you hear the message, what a fantastic message, and you can present it to people who aren't being called and they yawn and go on their way. You know, "Well, I gotta go now. I gotta get down to Gilley's, you know, and I gotta go put on my boots and my hat and look like I'm a cowboy, though I've never been on a horse. And you know, would really suffer if I had to. I've got my thing to do."

   They don't want to hear the truth, and here's a beautiful message, an incredibly exciting message. And people reject it. People are bored by it, and some people absolutely hate it. Some people despise it and attack it and would do anything to destroy the church and the apostle who spreads that message.

   So Paul said our gospel is hidden to some. If it's hid, it's hid to them that are lost or it's a present progressive in the Greek. It's those who are being lost or those who are perishing, who are in the process of going the wrong way, in whom the god of this world, as we talked about on the Day of Atonement, Satan. The god of this world has blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God should shine unto them.

   So he says their minds are blinded by Satan, so they cannot understand the wonderful truth that we have. "For we preach not ourselves." We don't go around preaching positive mental attitudes. There are those who do, who have crystal cathedrals, put on their black robes and look like a bat when they stand and speak. I won't mention anybody's name, but there are those who are that way. They preach all this positive attitude, and you have to think positively and all these wonderful things that good is within you, that all of us as human beings have this good dwelling inside of us.

   Paul says, we don't preach ourselves. We're not pointing to ourselves and saying, look at us, but we preach Christ Jesus, the Lord and ourselves, your servants for Jesus' sake. For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, has shined in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.

   Now what does that mean? God has given us the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. That what we should desire then is just to gaze upon his beautiful face. Is that what it's saying? We look at the face of Jesus Christ, we don't even know what his face looked like. We have no pictures of him. So what is it telling us? These people in Corinth to whom Paul was writing didn't know what his face looked like. What's he telling us?

   He's telling us that the way Jesus Christ lived his life, his approach, his attitudes, the way he thought, the way he lived, the way he acted, how he responded in different situations that arose, show us the glory of God. That he in living his life was not trying to attract glory to himself but was showing this is what God is like. That's why we read back there and as I read to you a few weeks ago in Colossians, was it 2:9 or something like that, that says that he is the fullness??"in him dwells the fullness of the Godhead bodily. Everything you ever want to know about God you find in the example that Jesus Christ set.

   And that's what he was striving to do??"show mankind this is what God is like. It's not the God that you're hearing from the Pharisees and the Sadducees and the phony ideas they have, and it's not the gods you're hearing today from the Baptists and the Catholics and the Lutherans and the Methodists or anybody else you want to name. He said, "I'm showing you what God's like."

   And Paul is saying that's what's been revealed to us. We look at the example of Jesus Christ and we see what God is really like. We see the glory, the majesty, the mind. The incredible mind-boggling wisdom of God by looking at Jesus Christ.

   "For we have this treasure," as he says, "in earthen vessels that the excellency of the power may be of God and not of us." So he said, OK, we have been given this knowledge. But it's only been placed, it's like taking some precious substance and putting it in a pottery jar. Because that pottery jar isn't going to last, and it's nowhere near as precious as what's been put inside of it.

   You know, if you go to the store and you buy some particular item, let's say if we were to use an item like perfume, very expensive perfume, it would cost you $75 an ounce. You go to the store, buy the perfume, $75 an ounce, take it home, dump it down the drain, say, "Isn't this a beautiful bottle?" You're buying what's inside. The container is really kind of unimportant. It may look nice or it may not look nice. What's inside is what you're concerned about. You don't go to the store and buy a can, a can of coffee so you can have the can. You want something else.

   So he says, all right, we've been given this truth, and it's placed inside of earthen vessels. We're just like pottery vessels, and we don't really matter that much, but what's been placed inside of us is what's incredibly precious. But he said the world is blind to that. Satan has blinded their minds so they can't see it. They couldn't see it when Jesus Christ was on the earth. They can't see it when Jesus Christ dwells in us today. They still can't see it. Their minds are blinded. Satan has kept them from understanding that.

   When we read that, I think some people outside, not within God's church??"I think we understand it. But those outside sometimes begin to say, "Well, what a vain and pompous group of people you must be. You think you're the only Christians." Well, yeah, that's right. We are. But it's not because I think I'm so great that I'm a Christian, and it's not because you're so great that you're a Christian, but we recognize that God called us. And as we'll see later on as we move through this subject, we'll see what God tells us about who he calls and why he calls them.

   But we don't feel all vain and puffed up and saying I'm really something super because I'm called now. We recognize all of them are going to be called, just not right now. What??"it's a terrific blessing now, but God didn't call me because I'm good. God just calls an earthen vessel, that's all he called. And he's giving me an opportunity, but that doesn't make me better than anybody else. It's just a wonderful opportunity God's given to me right now that I probably don't deserve. I know I don't deserve. I couldn't deserve it.

   But we don't think of ourselves as being really??"in the way the world looks upon us as being vain and pompous. "Oh, you're the only church." Yeah, that's right. You sure are. "Nobody else a Christian." That's right. They're very sincere, they're very dedicated people with a lot of good characteristics, but they're not Christians. They don't have the spirit of God. It's not available to them. It's not their fault, they will be someday, but they're not now.

   So we don't view ourselves in that way, but the world looks at us and they say, what a weird group of people, some weird cult. You've probably heard that from people. I have a whole file at home of things that have been written about the church. In fact, I even found a book the other day, "The Plain Truth About Armstrongism." And the fellow didn't know??"he could read the first page and you could tell he didn't know what he was talking about. Had no idea what he was talking about.

   You can go on and on with these different things and you can see all these different letters and pamphlets and so on that have been written. Probably many of you have seen the old, one of the oldest ones, "Mr. Confusion." You know, or "Herbert W. Armstrong, False Prophet," little red and white pamphlet, you remember that one. I've got a whole bunch of those at home. I'm not advocating that you collect them. I have a reason for having them, but at the same time, here are these things being put out saying all kinds of things about us that aren’t truth.

   The world looks down upon us and says, what a terrible weird religious cult. You got to look up the definition of the word cult sometime. You'll find that every religion is a cult, by the very definition of the word. So are we a cult? Yes, we are. Are we a sect? Yes, we are, by dictionary definition. So are they. But I'm sure they don't particularly want to hear that. And then I don't particularly advocate??""You're part of a weird cult?" "That's right." No, we don't go around quite in that way, but you know the accusations are constantly there.

   They can't see. Yet we say the world is blind. They can't understand, yet there's tremendous knowledge in the world, knowledge that goes far beyond what you and I have. But it's physical knowledge. When we began to study into some of the things that are now that man is now studying and the theories that man has, our minds just completely go blank. We just can't get them.

   You start trying to comprehend the size of the universe. You can't get it. Or you start trying to comprehend some of the laws and principles of physics that they have right now. You know, you've heard of black holes. You start trying to figure out what this is according to the laws of physics and your mind just goes, "Oh no, I can't figure that out." I mean you're talking about something so dense that you can't even get light out of it. You shine a light in it and it goes??"yeah. You can't understand that.

   I talked to a fellow who has a master's degree in physics. I said, "Can you explain the black hole?" He said, "No. Sure can't. No way to explain." In fact, he said, "I don't think they exist."

   So you know, you start thinking about all these things, man has this incredible knowledge that just leaves you and I behind and for that matter, if you begin going into the field of theology, you'll find knowledge that just absolutely boggles your mind. I have books at home that I use as reference books sometimes. I have one that's a nice 30 volume set, at least originally it was 30 volumes. It's 10 volumes. Now this thing takes up this much space in my bookcase, and it's an Old Testament commentary. In order to properly use it, you have to be fluent in seven different languages.

   And I thought that was bad, then I got another one. And it takes something like 13 different languages to be able to understand it fully. Now I don't understand those things in there. I don't understand 13 languages. I have trouble with English. So 14 languages, I mean, Arabic and Ethiopian and Coptic and all kinds of other languages. I don't understand those things. But I understand God's word, and they don't. Their minds are blinded not to physical knowledge but to spiritual knowledge.

   In I Corinthians chapter 2. I Corinthians 2, and we'll come back to this one again later too. I Corinthians 2. Just one verse here, verse 14 (I Corinthians 2:14). It says, "But the natural man." The normal person who exists in this world, dwells in society, carries out his normal daily existence just like your neighbors, your family, your friends. "The natural man receives not the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness unto him. Neither can he know them because they are spiritually discerned."

   So Paul tells us that it is impossible for a physical person in this world without the spirit of God, without the help of God's spirit to understand spiritual things. They can't, no matter how intelligent they may be. They can't get it. They cannot grasp it. It's foolishness to them. We begin to talk about the truth of God??""that's ridiculous. That's foolish." But they're wrong. They just can't get it.

   Now Paul puts it a different way back in I Corinthians 15. And here this chapter we're well familiar??"talks about the resurrection. It uses a term which you'll find several times in??"excuse me, in Paul's writings. He says here in verse 51 of I Corinthians 15, (I Corinthians 15:51). "Behold, I show you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, we shall all be changed."

   He uses the term mystery. Now if you come from a Catholic background, you know there are many mysteries in the Catholic religion. One mystery is how anybody can believe it, but beyond that, there are many mysteries. And essentially what they mean by a mystery is if they say something and you can't find it in the Bible but they say it's true, then you have to accept it because the truth of that is a mystery. Well, it cannot be explained. It is a mystery.

   Well, that's not what Paul is saying. He says, "I'm showing you a mystery. I am through this chapter on the resurrection, I am showing you something which in the eyes of the world is a mystery." Now what is a mystery? A mystery is something which you cannot understand the solution to until that solution is revealed to you. If you were to pick up a mystery novel and start reading through it, you would not, if it's written very well, you don't know the solution. Until you get right to the end and then it's revealed and once it's revealed, all these other things fall into place.

   Now Paul is saying much the same thing. When it comes to spiritual truth, there are things which in the eyes of the world are a total mystery. They cannot understand them. But once that is revealed to you, it's no longer a mystery. Suddenly everything falls into place. All the things that you've read begin to fall into place.

   Now didn't you have that happen as you began to understand God's truth? That you had a number of questions you always wondered about. Didn't all of us at some time or another wonder how in the world you get three days and three nights between Good Friday and Sunday morning? I would imagine every one of us has tried to count that out sometime. Maybe just put it back. "Oh well, I don't understand it." You can't figure it out.

   Didn't we all kind of wonder at times, well, how do you know that Sunday is the day we ought to be keeping? And suddenly when God began to reveal things to you, all of those things began to fall into place. You began to realize why God said certain things, why the Bible says this. Why is it that God tells us to do things in certain ways? You begin falling into place. You begin to understand because the mystery is revealed to you.

   So Paul says, "I'm revealing, I'm opening up a mystery." You'll find Paul often uses the word manifest. Manifest means to show openly, to make it right out in the open where anyone can see it. So Paul makes many things manifest, shows it in the open, and then you can begin to understand.

   So once you see the mystery. What is the mystery Paul is talking about? The mystery of how a human being can become God. How can that take place? Well, he's just been through it here in the resurrection chapter. "Now I'm showing you that." What does that do for you? "Oh well, that helps me understand all these other things that I didn't grasp. Now I know why I'm involved in trying to grow and overcome and keep God's laws and develop the mind of God, because then I can be changed into God." So the mystery is revealed to us. But it's not revealed to this world, it's still a mystery.

   So that I know sometimes we'll go out and talk with a new perspective member and maybe he doesn't have that much knowledge just yet and you know, you come across those people who they are really not all that interested. They're looking for a church that agrees with them. "They'll tell you what they think. Well, here's the way I look at it," and they tell you all about how they look at it, and you're sitting there thinking, "I don't really care how you look at it. It doesn't really matter how you look at it. What matters is how God looks at it" and you try to get that point across to them slowly, but you know they have some of their own ideas, their own concepts about it. They go their own way. They don't understand what's going on. They're not grasping those things which God is revealing to them. So they don't grasp the truth that God gives to us.

   We do. God begins to reveal to us, and we understand things that very intelligent people don't get. Now we're supposed to teach a world. A world tomorrow that's coming. Initially talking about probably 10% of the people who are alive today surviving. I would assume that that probably means that 10% of the people who survive will be fairly intelligent people. 10% will probably be people living in poverty with poor education who don't understand much, but at the same time, there will be a certain proportion of those people who are well educated and so on, we're going to be teaching those people.

   And then when the great white throne judgment period comes, all of those people resurrected. The fellow who wrote my book with 13 different languages is going to be resurrected, and we're going to have to teach him the truth. And it won't take 13 languages to do it. It'll just take one. But we're going to have to teach those people. You and I are going to have to teach people who are far more intelligent than we are.

   Of course at that time we'll be God, so we don't have to worry about that, I suppose in one sense, but at the same time, you see, we're not going to be teaching them the physical things which they in this life know. We're going to be giving them the same spiritual knowledge which God has given to us.

   In order to do that, we have to start from the right basis, the right foundation. You start anywhere else, you're going to go off base. If you assume anything that is not true, everything you build on top of that is going to be destroyed. We must start from the right foundation. We need to realize that in this world all of education is off base. Because they don't start from the right foundation. They don't understand one central important crucial point, and that point is that there is a spirit in man.

   You may not recognize that as being a crucial significant point. But because education does not understand that one point, all of education in this world is off base. It goes in the wrong direction. Because in this world, the people who are involved in education and therefore involved in every person's life??"those people are taught wrong beliefs. They're taught that man is, in effect, nothing more than the highest of the animals. They are taught to believe that everything which can be perceived must be perceived with the five senses. If you can't touch it, smell it, taste it, hear it, or see it, then it doesn't exist. If there isn't some physical way to measure it, it isn't there. They reject the possibility that there could be anything outside of our physical ability to perceive.

   Now, if you start from that assumption that everything that exists is physical. Well, the only logical step you can take is evolution. You can't possibly have a super being who causes everyone to come into existence by a special creation. You must come up with an idea of evolution. So we have the whole field of biology based upon the idea that we're nothing more than an evolved one-celled animal. That we just kind of climbed from slime as we used to say, and we have only developed just so far down the line and we're continuing to develop and we will go on further and further, becoming better and better.

   So they start from that basis, and all of science uses that as its basis for all of its studies. You go into psychology or sociology. And how do they determine how human beings learn? They watch rats. They watch rats in mazes, and they say, "See, this is how we learn." Well, that's true as long as we're nothing more than animals. As long as there's nothing in the human brain that's not in a rat brain, then fine. You're doing just fine. And they come up with all kinds of theories and treatments and approaches based upon that concept, but there's nothing different between a human being and an animal.

   You look at history, it takes the same approach. Man is nothing more than the highest of the animals. Where did marriage come from? Well, you know, there were these apes that kind of lived together as a communal thing, and then they began to separate with pairs and, you know, it just kind of became a natural thing. That's how marriage came about. Well it isn't how marriage came about.

   But if you take that approach, if you take the idea of marriage is nothing but an evolutionary product. Well, then you see it's very logical to say, well, how do I know that's the best system? Maybe it ought to be one man and three wives, or one woman and three husbands. Or maybe we shouldn't have marriage at all. Maybe we should just get back to a big communal thing. Or maybe we don't need marriage in any way at all. We can have men living with men and women with women. You don't have that happening today, do you? We have all kinds of that type of thing going on. It's the logical step to take because if marriage is only an evolutionary thing, you don't know whether it's good or not. You may as well try other things and see.

   But if marriage is a creation of God, it changes your whole perspective. You look at philosophy, you look at religion. Religion today doesn't understand that there is a spirit aspect to man. They don't grasp it. They do research, you know, there's one fellow who in his will put up, I forget how many thousand dollars it was, if anyone could prove that man has a soul. How are they going to prove it? Physical means. They want to measure it.

   They take individual human beings, I don't know if you've seen this or not. Take human beings who are at the point of dying and weigh them. And then when they die they weigh them again real quick and see if there's any difference. I'm not making that up, that has been done. To see if the soul weighs anything. Ridiculous ideas that people go through. They want to prove everything physically. They don't understand there is a spirit in man, and that concept is one of the most crucial concepts for us to understand.

   If we get that concept, then we have the foundation to begin teaching mankind what the right way really is. I know you've heard Mr. Armstrong talk about the spirit of man. You know what you're going to hear today? You're gonna hear me talk about the spirit of man. Because it's obvious that many times we don't get it.

   Again on the refresher program, Mr. Armstrong talking to a group of ministers said, "You know, fellows, sometimes I don't think you understand how important this is." And you know what? He was right. He was really right when he said that, I hope we're beginning to get it. But that knowledge, that concept of the spirit in man and what it means is vital knowledge for all of us.

   So, I'm going to go through several questions to answer them. The most crucial being what is the spirit in man? Why did God make man physical and then place a spirit within him? How does God work with the spirit in man and how does Satan work with the spirit in man, and what's the role of God's spirit? We need to understand all of those things. Because only by understanding those can we begin to have the foundation for teaching in the future as well as for overcoming the problems we have today.

   Many different areas I want to get into and speak about in this area. But we must start from this foundation, or we can never begin to properly approach the problems that we have. We can't understand the spirit in man by starting right now looking at us right now, the world right now, and understanding it.

   Mr. Armstrong has used the analogy many times of a movie, how if you walk in in the middle or toward the end, you don't know what's gone before that. It's nothing but confusion. You don't know who the people are or anything like that. So the only place you can really start is at the beginning. The logical place for understanding about the spirit of man is to go back to where God made that spirit, gave it to man for the first time. And when you arrive at that point, you find you haven't gone far enough back yet. You need to go further back. You need to go all the way back to the term the Bible uses is the beginning.

   Now, in reality, there is no such time. But you and I can't understand that. I don't understand how God can live forever. God has always been. My mind doesn't get always. I just can't comprehend that term. And I always think, well, I use the term always as well. I always think. Well, what about before that? There is no before. It's always. God has always been. Right. What was there before that? Well, there's not, we can't comprehend it. Our minds just don't get it because that's not physical knowledge. We're limited.

   God tells us that there are certain things which we can't understand, and certain things which belong to Him. We can't grasp them, but we go all the way back to where we first have any record of those that we now call God. We call them God the Father and God the Son right now, but they weren't father and son at that point. They were simply two beings who were members of a family. The God family. One was in charge, always, and one was the second in that relationship, always. We need to go back to that point so that we can begin to understand why God put a spirit in man and what that spirit is intended to do for us, and what it does do for us and how it affects us.

   In John chapter 1. We find this beginning. Now, as I mentioned in the Bible study, in Genesis chapter 1, as we'll go back to it later on, God begins to reveal Himself to a physical carnal people. Who could not understand spiritual things because they didn't have God's spirit, so he reveals himself in physical terms to those people. But here in the book of John, this was probably written sometime in the 80s A.D. And therefore the church had been in existence probably over 50 years by the time this has come into existence, so people have had God's spirit for a good period of time, and they should be able to understand spiritual things.

   So he gives us a different perspective on the beginning. He says "In the beginning was the Word. The Word was with God, the Word was God." Now again, I'll repeat some of this for those of you who weren't in Bible study. But if you'll notice there, it's in the beginning once, past tense, no matter how far back you go. God and the Word were already there. You want to go back 25 billion years? Fine. What do you do when you get back 25 billion years? Will you find that God and the Word are already there. You go back another 25 billion, already there. They've always been there.

   And what is the Word? Without going into a lot of Greek philosophy, the Greeks taught the concept of the Logos or Word or Spokesman. And that was again a part of the way they looked upon many different things, but the expression the Logos meant??"well, their idea was that an individual's word, what he spoke, was a perfect representation of what that person thought, of what he was, of what his character was. So therefore, the word of an individual was considered almost the same as that person himself. It was the perfect representation of the individual who spoke it.

   So John used that same concept in introducing Jesus Christ and God the Father. He says, here is the Word, who is the perfect representation of God. So we have the two of them who are perfect, who are exactly alike, different personalities, but exactly the same character. OK, and of course Mr. Armstrong has explained many times and we understand the concept about the Word being with God and the Word was God, that there were two here. "The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by Him. And without Him was not anything made that was made."

   Everything that came into existence came into existence by the Word of God. Now that tells us that these two beings have always existed. There has never been a time when God was by Himself and created this second being. Both of them have always been. See, he said there wasn't anything created that wasn't created by the Word, the one who became Jesus Christ. So if??"well, no, let's not get into that. We understand from this that they have both always existed, and he was the agent God used to bring all things into existence. "In Him was life. Life was the light of man," and we could go on with that, but I want to skip over that right now.

   We find here two eternal beings. One who was the one in charge, the other who was the agent of creation, the one who carried out the commands of the one in charge and did the creating.

   Now back in Isaiah 57, just a couple of quick scriptures to refer to here. Isaiah 57:15. I just don't even want to go through the whole verse. I just want you to notice one aspect of it. "For thus says the high and lofty one that inhabits eternity." So we find that God's dwelling place is eternity. God inhabits and fills up eternity. He has always been there.

   His very name. We have the Hebrew tetragrammaton, which we normally pronounce Yahweh or something along that line, Yahweh. And that means the Eternal. We talk about it as that's the way we normally pronounce it. When we come across the Bible, the word LORD in all caps, we generally say Eternal. Because that's the basic concept that's there. It means self-existent, one that goes on and on and on.

   Let me now point you to something here back in Exodus chapter 3. Here we find Moses being introduced to this great God. I want to do just a little bit of speculating here, and I think I'm fairly accurate on this. Here in Exodus chapter 3 verse 13 (Exodus 3:13), "Moses said unto God, behold when I come unto the children of Israel, and shall say unto them, the God of your fathers has sent me unto you. And they shall say to me, what's his name? What shall I say to them? And God said unto Moses, I am that I am. And he said, thus shall you say unto the children of Israel, I am, has sent me unto you."

   Now what is the meaning of that phrase? I am that I am. It can be translated a couple of other ways. It can be translated, "I will be that I will be." Which is just as accurate and so on. It can be translated in that way as well. Another translation puts it, and I think this is a very good way of putting it, "I ever shall be the same that I am today."

   In other words, it shows the eternity of God's character. God says, what I am today, is what I was yesterday and it's what I will be tomorrow. So you may always know when I say this is the way I am, this is my character, this is what I want of you, then it's what I wanted yesterday, it's what I want today and it's what I'm going to want tomorrow. I'm not going to change the terms later on down the line. We're not going to reach all the way to the point of Christ's return, and God will suddenly say, "Well, I wanted you to do this other thing, but I forgot to tell you about that." No, what God says today is the way God is for eternity.

   That's why twice in the scriptures, I won't turn to these two, but Malachi 3:6 says, "I am the eternal. I change not." He says in Hebrews 13:8, "Jesus Christ the same yesterday, today and forever." And if you tie in verse 7 with that, you'll see that that is the goal we're shooting for to be just like Jesus Christ, who is the same for eternity.

   So in one sense, God's very name is a promise to us of the stability of his character. It will not change. When God says you will not kill, that is what God expects in the past, today and for all eternity. God's character is set and unchangeable. That's an important concept for us to realize. Here is the Eternal God.

   Now back in Hebrews chapter one. He talks about this one who became Jesus Christ. And he says here in Hebrews 1:1, "God, who at sundry times and in diverse manners spoke in the past unto the fathers by the prophets, has in these last days, spoken unto us by His Son. Whom he has appointed heir of all things, by whom also he made the worlds." Again showing us that every??"excuse me, everything that exists has been brought into existence by Jesus Christ. That includes the angelic beings. We'll get to them in a moment, but it includes them as well.

   In Ephesians chapter 3. Ephesians 3:8. Paul is talking about how God has given him the blessing of understanding and spreading the truths of God, and he says "unto me, who am less than the least of all saints, is this grace given. That I should preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ to make all men see what is the fellowship of the mystery." Again, you see that mystery coming up, which is again revealed to us. To make people see what has been a mystery, "Which from the beginning of the world has been hid in God who created all things by Jesus Christ. To the intent that now under the principalities and powers in heavenly places might be known by or through the church, the manifold wisdom of God."

   You see, when God wants people to understand something, he reveals it through his church. He does not reveal it through individuals. He doesn't give people dreams in the night. You know, if you had a particularly moving dream last night, then you ought to look at what you had for dinner. Because God doesn't reveal his truth to individuals in that way today. He reveals it through his church. That's where God's truth come from. "According to the eternal purpose which he purposed in Christ Jesus our Lord."

   So Paul says that I have been given the opportunity to show this, to reveal this mystery. But that from the beginning, God has hidden it. He hasn't revealed it to mankind as a whole. And again he showed there that Jesus Christ is the one who brought all into existence.

   Now we need to back up and reason for a moment. These two God beings inhabiting eternity were living in perfect harmony and peace. We find no problem at all. They were in perfect harmony. The Word was the perfect exact expression of the character of God. Perfect harmony. Why were they in perfect harmony? Why were they able to inhabit eternity in peace? Because they were living the same way. They were living the give way. The way of love, the way of God's law.

   Now God's law simply defines that way of give in human terms. The way of give is the way God has always lived, but the law puts that into human terms so we can understand it. He gives laws, for example, that protect the sanctity of the home. He says, you are not to commit adultery. We understand that that law is far more extensive. It involves fornication, it involves lust. It involves a whole vast spectrum of possible sins.

   Now, is that because God just sitting on his throne said, "Well, all that illicit sex would be a lot of fun, but I don't want those people having fun, so I'm gonna tell them you can't do that." And seeing a cartoon a few years ago that showed Moses on top of Mount Sinai and says, you know, "The people like nine of them, but could you change the one about adultery?" And that's the way man looks at things. But all that law is, is an expression of the way of give and love, putting it in specific human terms so that that way rules the family.

   God says don't steal. Well, that is an expression of God's perfect way of love and giving to others, putting it in human terms. So God expresses that way to us through his law. Now they were living that way of the law of God. And there was such joy and peace and happiness that they wanted to expand and to grow, they wanted that way to spread. They wanted others to share in that way.

   So they devised a plan. How long it took them to devise the plan, I really don't know. Because I don't think time really has a lot of significance for God. But they devised a plan, a plan with several options. That's the way a plan is supposed to be. You have several different approaches you can take to reach your goal. They had a goal in mind, as Mr. Armstrong has stressed, and there were going to be several different possible problems that could arise, so they developed options along with that and they can still reach the goal.

   The goal is to expand their way, that way of living and the way of love for others and so on, to expand that throughout the universe. So they devised a plan. And they brought into existence for the purpose of helping with that plan and to work it out, the angelic beings.

   Now those angelic beings are not visible to man. Man doesn't believe they exist. People just don't understand that. You walk into a mental institution today and say, "Well, that person's problem is they're having a demon problem." They'll lock you in. You must be crazy if you believe such a thing. But such things do exist. There are angelic beings, and God brought them into existence, and they are composed of spirit.

   But that shows us that spirit is special in that any spirit being, once the character is set, it cannot change. It is set for eternity. Spirit doesn't change.

   In Titus chapter one. Titus chapter one. It shows us a characteristic of God here to show this point. Breaking in the middle of the thought here, but I just want to emphasize one thing. Titus 1:2, "In hope of eternal life, which God that cannot lie, promised before the world began."

   Why is it that God cannot lie? Is there some greater power than God that prohibits him? God sits on his throne and says, "Well, I want to really tell a whopper, but I can't." God doesn't lie because his character is perfectly set. And he has determined he will not lie in his spirit, that spirit is set and it will not change for all eternity. He's the eternal. He changes not. See that same principle comes back. Spirit doesn't change. God determined he will not lie and he will not for eternity.

   In Numbers 23. Numbers chapter 23. And pick up here in verse 19 (Numbers 23:19). "God is not a man that He should lie, neither the son of man that he should repent. Has he said, and shall he not do it, or has he spoken and shall he not make it good?" God is not a man who can lie. God cannot lie.

   Now there are certain things, see, people think that God can do everything. No, God can't do everything. There are some things God cannot do. God cannot lie. God cannot cheat and steal, God cannot do anything evil because his character is perfectly set, so he will not. There are many things God cannot do because he has chosen not to.

   I've heard the old thing of, you know, "Well, if God can do anything, can he make a rock so big he can't move it?" Well that's a real philosophical??"for there. And the answer is he won't. Very simple. God won't do such a stupid thing. He's got bigger things to do than that, than please philosophers.

   So we see that spirit doesn't change. So these spirit beings are created. Angels created as spirit beings. But now they are not created with character, with the character of God. The character is not set. Because character cannot be created. It's another thing God can't do. God can't create character. Cannot be created. Character can only come from making choices. Character comes from making choices.

   Now, sometimes people have the idea that it's a matter of either having character or not having character. That's not what we're talking about. You will have character no matter what. The only choice is, will you have God's character or will you have Satan's character? Depending upon the choice you make, that's the only choice.

   Now these angels came into existence, not having character, but having the ability to make choices. Being spirit beings, once they chose to obey God, that would be set for eternity. But God knew the potential was there that they might not choose that way.

   Now Satan has strength of character. But it's evil character. You can look in this world, which is Satan's world, and you can see people very strong in character. But the character isn't godly character. There are some people who are incredibly strong to do evil. You know, you read about some of the things that have been carried out in warfare. You read about the training that someone has to go through to be a part of the US Special Forces, a part of the Green Berets. You read what kind of training they go through, and that takes a tremendous character. And what do you have when you're finished? Basically, you have an animal who can kill in just about any way you can imagine. Oh, there's a lot of character, but it's evil character. It's not godly character, it's Satan's character. It's there.

   So we need to recognize when we make right choices, we are building godly character. When we, on the other hand, make wrong choices and failing to make any choice is a wrong choice. When we make wrong choices, we develop the character and mind of Satan. One or the other. There is no middle ground. Either you have the mind of God or the mind of Satan. And every choice we make affects the kind of character we have.

   Now God then took those angels and he brought into existence the physical universe and the earth specifically. The earth was to be a testing ground. Now, several years ago, someone pointed out to me an interesting quote from a Time Life book about the universe. You know, it used to be taught by the ancients that the earth was the center of the universe and everything went around it. And of course different ones have come along and shown since that point that while the earth is actually part of the solar system and the earth rotates around the sun and we have, you know, part of a great, we're part of a spiral arm of a great galaxy which is part of, you know, bigger and bigger things. We can't possibly be the center of the universe, but this one particular book said one of two things is true. Either the universe is limitless or we really are the center of the universe because everything is spread out evenly away from us.

   I have to kind of wonder if maybe we really are the center of the universe. Because after all, where else is God working? Where is God's headquarters city going to be? Right here. Where would God place his headquarters? We do like the United States and put it in Washington DC way over on the East Coast. God pretty well puts things in the center. I can't prove that, you know, somebody wants to disprove it, fine, go right ahead. I think it's an interesting speculation that the ancients may not have been all that wrong.

   Anyway, God took the earth and put the angels on it as a testing ground, an opportunity for future growth. If they had been able to establish God's way on the earth and faithfully have their character set, then they could have had much greater opportunity in the future. They would have been able to go out further and further and spread God's way, wonderful blessings. But of course we realize that didn't exactly happen.

   God's government was placed on the earth and there was a great archangel placed over it. Again, we covered that on the Day of Atonement. And then a test began. The angels may not have even realized it was that big a test at the time. But there was a test of government. God's government, will you be subject to it or not?

   Now you know government isn't a test as long as you agree with it. It's no problem. The government doesn't test your character at all as long as you're in perfect agreement. Government is a test when you disagree. When something happens and you don't think it ought to be done that way, then government becomes a test for you.

   Or you may see someone, let's say someone that has to be put out of God's church. You think, "Well, I don't think that's fair." OK, we're having a test of government. If you thought it was perfectly the right thing to do, "I wondered how long it was gonna be before they put that person out." Well, then it's no test for you, you agree with it. But when you don't agree, then it becomes a test. Will you be subject to the government of God or not?

   And of course there are many other ways when??"if you haven't been tested on that yet, don't worry, you will be. We all will be. To see if we will really be subject to God's government. If we will make the right choice to be subject to that government or instead make the wrong choice.

   Let's look back on Isaiah 14. Isaiah chapter 14, we pick it up in verse 12. We see the attitudes that began to develop here. Isaiah 14:12. "How are you fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning? How are you cut down to the earth? Which did weaken the nations. For you have said in your heart, I will ascend into heaven," where God's throne is. "I will exalt my throne." He did have a throne. "I will exalt or lift up my throne above the stars of God." Stars again being symbolic of the angels of God. "I will sit upon the mount of the congregation in the sides of the north."

   Now the mount again, what is a mountain? Government. "I will sit on the government of the whole congregation of all the assembly of all the angels that exist in the sides of the north." The Bible also tells us that God's throne is in the sides of the north. In Psalm 48:2, I believe you'll find it talks about God's throne being the sides of the north. So in essence, he's saying that I'm going to take God's position.

   "I will ascend above the heights of the clouds." Now his limit was the earth. God said, you're responsible for all the earth. He said, "I'm gonna go above that. That's not enough. I want more. I will be like the Most High," Mr. Armstrong has said, I think he even repeated at the feast. He feels that where the "like" should be eliminated. "I will be the most high. I will take over and be the ruler. My way is better." He goes on and says what's going to happen to him. But you note the attitude that began to develop in Satan in this testing ground upon the earth.

   Now let's go back to Ezekiel 28. Again, picking it up. Well, no, let's do it that way. Ezekiel 28. He starts out in verse 1 and 2, (Ezekiel 28:1-2) talking to the prince of Tyrus. Now we have often looked upon that as a reference to the physical ruler of ancient Tyre. But as you begin to study this out, I have, or at least used to have a paper, which unfortunately was written by someone who was no longer in the church, but at the time he was, and he talked about some of the changes that took place in ancient Italy. And how that you can find that when Babylon fell, the religious rulers, the leaders, the Chaldeans moved from Babylon to the city of Tyre. When Alexander the Great came along to destroy the city of New Tyre, those same individuals disappeared. They took off. But they disappear from history. And suddenly you find a brand new civilization existing on the banks of the Tiber River at Rome. With exactly the same Babylonian religion again. Same system all over again. And it seems to indicate that it's exactly the same people being moved over across to where we call Rome today.

   And in his book on The Incredible Human Potential, I don't know if you noticed the point, Mr. Armstrong says that this prince of Tyrus referred to in verse 2 is not a reference specifically or solely to an ancient ruler, but he says it is a reference to a religious ruler who will come on the scene soon in our day.

   OK, then he goes on to the power behind that ruler. In verse 11 (Ezekiel 28:11), "Moreover, the word of the Lord came unto me saying, son of man, take up the lamentation upon the king of Tyre. And say unto him, thus says the Lord God, you seal up the sum full of wisdom and perfect in beauty. You," now again, that can't be said of a human being. "You have been in Eden, the garden of God."

   Who was in Eden? Adam, Eve, God, and Satan. Nobody else. We know Adam and Eve died. And God is doing the speaking, so the only other one left is Satan. And he goes on talking about how he was created and so on. He says in verse??"at the end of that verse, "the workmanship of your tabrets and of your pipes was prepared in you in the day that you were created."

   Talked about that Bible study the other night to a limited degree that this shows that Satan was created with the ability to make music. That was a part of his creative ability. It was built within his spirit body to be able to make music. And of course when he began to be perverted and go away from God, that ability began to be used contrary to God's way. And is still used contrary to God's way in Satan's world.

   "You are the anointed cherub that covers, and I have set you so. You were upon the holy mountain or again government of God. You've walked up and down in the midst of the stones of fire. You were perfect in your ways from the day that you were created till iniquity was found in you."

   So he was created perfect, not with perfect character, but created perfect with no flaw. He was not created evil, he was created neutral. And immediately instructed in spiritual knowledge. Now he was a spirit being so he could understand spiritual knowledge. Given that instruction right away. But iniquity finally was found in him.

   He talks, I skip over verse 16, verse 17 (Ezekiel 28:16-17), "Your heart was lifted up because of your beauty," so vanity began to come in. "You have corrupted your wisdom by reason of your brightness." So he looked at himself and his wisdom, which was at one time perfect. Remember that's what God said. He had perfect wisdom, but it began to be corrupted because his mind began to turn away from God. He wasn't able to think clearly, though he didn't know it. He thought he was still perfect in wisdom.

   Much as what Mr. McGowan was talking about in the sermonette, but when we sin, normally we have some way of justifying it and feeling that we're right. That's what Satan did. He was perfect in wisdom and he didn't know when he began to have wrong attitudes that his wisdom was leaving him. He didn't grasp it at all. He says??"let's see. Well, that's far enough anyway, as far as reading about him and what's going to happen to him.

   So we see that he rebelled. He began to go away from God's way. And we find back in Revelation 12, it tells us a little bit more about this situation. It says here in Revelation 12. In this vision that John was given, especially for the church, but he also tells us a certain amount about Satan in verse 3. Revelation 12:3.

   "There appeared another wonder in heaven. Behold, a great red dragon having seven heads and ten horns and seven crowns upon its heads, and his tail drew the third part of the stars, the angels of heaven, and did cast them to the earth." And come down to a??"it's actually a later time, but it's interesting to note what it tells us here in verse 9. "The great dragon was cast out that old serpent called the devil," which again means the false accuser, the slanderer, "and Satan," which means the adversary or enemy, "which deceives the whole world, and he was cast out into the earth and his angels were cast out with him."

   So we find here this individual who was at one time called the Morning Star is now called the false accuser, the slanderer, the enemy. God changes his name because his character now has become set against God. He had to make a choice, and the choice he made was the wrong choice, and his character was set and a third of the angels went with him in that same way.

   Now he deceived the whole world. Maybe he deceived some of them. Mr. Armstrong has said that it may be a possibility that some of those demons or angels that went with Satan were deceived. And maybe God will be merciful in the sense of removing the deception and giving them an opportunity to have the character set in the right way. We don't know that. God doesn't tell us. It's his decision and not ours anyway, so in some ways we don't need to know.

   But we see the attitude that was there that Satan began to accuse, slander, spread a few half truths and lies, and then before long he became the enemy of God and the angels along with him.

   Now there's a result from that. They rebelled against God. They turned against God's way and their character was set to do evil. The others obviously had to make a choice too. They had to choose, will I go with him or will I go God's way, and evidently two-thirds chose to go the right way. And those righteous angels are still the ones that we can be very encouraged about that God has them as servants for us to help us and to strengthen us. That's why we ask the blessing last week on the little children.

   Now there's a result that comes when sin enters. In Romans chapter 6. He says here at the end of this chapter. Again, remember, as I said, the law of God defines, as we have it in the Bible, defines God's way of living, of giving, of love, it defines it in human terms. We read in the Bible that the transgression of that law is called sin. I John 3:4, sin is a transgression of the law. What is the result of breaking that law in the human realm? Romans 6:23. "For the wages of sin is death." And of course he tells us the gift of God's eternal life. We'll come to that another time, but the wages of sin is death.

   Now as long as you're physical and you can die, that applies. But what does the Bible tell us about the angelic beings in Luke chapter 20. Luke chapter 20. Let's pick it up in verse 34 (Luke 20:34). "And Jesus answering said unto them, The children of this world marry and are given in marriage." We talked about this question the other night. "But they which shall be accounted worthy to obtain that world and the resurrection from the dead, neither marry nor are given in marriage. And then he says, neither can they die anymore, for they are equal unto the angels."

   So he tells us angels don't die. That when we become a part of the family of God, we're spirit beings, we won't die either, but he tells us there that angels don't die.

   Now where man is concerned, the wages of sin is death. What are the wages of sin for an angel who can't die? God gives us at least a little hint of that back in the book of Jude. Jude verse 13. He says here, and again it certainly seems to be a reference to those angels. Well, let's go back to verse 6, (Jude 13:6-13) first of all. He says, "And the angels which kept not their first estate or rulership responsibility, but left their own habitation, he has reserved in everlasting chains under darkness unto the judgment of the great day," so they are confined in a condition of restraint on this earth until the time of this judgment upon them.

   Then we find in verse 13, he talks about "raging waves of the sea foaming out their own shame." Then he says, "wandering stars." Again, what are stars in the Bible? Stars are symbolic of angels. "Wandering stars to whom is reserved the blackness of darkness forever."

   So God seems to indicate that he's going to take those beings after this time of judgment, after they are properly judged and cast them out in total darkness. Maybe there is such a thing as a black hole, and that's where they're going to be. But totally separate from God, all the members of the God family and God's creation cast out and placed in total darkness because they have chosen to go that way. So the wages of sin for them is a little different than it is for us. It's being totally cast out away from all of what God is doing.

   Now, have you ever heard anybody in religion today telling you that the wages of sin is separation from God? That's one of the things that's taught in Protestantism today. That, well, if you are a good person, you go to heaven and if you're a bad person you're still going to live forever, but you're going to be in hell. What's hell like? Well, you're just cut off from God.

   Now where would they get an idea like that? When the Bible says the wages of sin is death, where would they come up with the idea that the wages of sin is being placed into a terrible place where you're cut off from God for all eternity? Satan and his demons are the ones who will be there. So that must be where they got the idea.

   Now as we get into understanding how they got that idea from Satan, we'll begin to understand a little bit more about God's spirit and the spirit of man. God has shown by that portion of the plan that he worked out that spirit beings without godly character cannot be trusted to faithfully carry out God's government. Even a spirit being who has spiritual understanding, if he does not have godly character, he cannot be trusted to carry out God's government faithfully.

   Now later on we'll see as well that physical Israel was an important part of God's plan to show something about physical people as well. But he showed that where those spirit beings are concerned. So he has proven a very important point. He has proven that the only one who could be trusted to live his way faithfully without fail was God. Because the only ones who did faithfully live God's way, it's God the Father and the second member of the God family, the only ones who could be trusted.

   Therefore, now, if God wanted his way to expand throughout all the universe, he wanted more and more and more beings to be in existence who would live his way and enjoy the benefits of that way. He knew it would do no good to bring all these beings into existence unless they would be faithful in administering his way of life. To bring someone into existence who would not be faithful means that he would be introducing chaos and confusion into the universe. God doesn't want that. He's a God of order and peace and happiness and light and joy.

   So the only way all of that could be guaranteed is if the beings that he brings into existence will faithfully carry out his way without fail. And if the only one who will do that is God, then there only remains one possibility. God must have a way to reproduce himself. God must make more to be a part of his family, to be God. Because only God can be trusted to carry out that responsibility.

   Therefore, to do that, God created man. But he created man physical so that change would be possible because anytime we're dealing with something physical, change is not only possible, it is absolute. As Mr. Armstrong has quoted Albert Hubbard, he said nothing is permanent but change. And in the physical world that is true. Everything physical changes. No matter how long we may think it would survive, it changes.

   You look at a solid granite tombstone and you think, well, that thing is going to last for centuries. Yes, it may. But eventually it will change. You look at some of the structures that were built a couple thousand years ago, any of that survived, and you will see, yes, there are some that survive. In Israel, there are a number in other parts of the world. I think of the great tomb over the burial place of Abraham in Hebron. Herod built that almost 2000 years ago. Still stands, quite a structure. But you can see the change. The stones are wearing, and eventually it will collapse. Everything physical must change.

   So if he brings man into existence. Now with the spirit being, once his character is set, once he makes the decision, that's it. He is set. But where man is concerned, man can make the wrong decision and then see it and change and begin to make the right choices and have the right kind of character developed in him.

   So we created man physical so that he could change and so that if he chose to go the wrong way and reject God, he could then be destroyed and no longer exist and not have to continue on in misery and suffering and pain, but instead his existence could simply be stopped.

   That brings us up to the time of man's creation and the spirit of man first being given back in Genesis chapter one. It also brings us about four minutes over time. So obviously we're going to have to go on. All of this is foundational to begin understanding why the spirit in man is given, how it works, how God works on it, how Satan works on it, and what the Spirit of God means to us. That's vital knowledge before we can understand marriage, before we can understand child rearing, before we can understand peace between peoples. We must understand the spirit of man and why it is so very, very important. So God willing, we'll continue with that next week.