Well greetings friends. This is Herbert W Armstrong with the Good News of the World Tomorrow. Creation Requires A Creator Man Made A Living Soul We Must Be Born Of The Spirit Penalty for Sin Had to Be Paid Born Into The Kingdom of God
And now continuing this series on the 'Seven Rules of Success.' There is a reason why so many failures take place in life. There is a reason why some people really become successful. There are basic rules, which are merely fundamental laws, that are set in motion.
They are as alive as the laws of chemistry, the laws of physics; laws like gravity, inertia, laws that you know something about. These laws determine success or failure in life. Every single person could be a success. Yes you can make a success of your life. You can find the way to happiness, to prosperity, to the full, abundant, joyful life, but most people never do. Most people have never applied a single one of these seven basic rules that I am giving you.
Most people don't even know what they are, they've never given it much thought. Most people are just buffeted around by circumstance, they're the victims of circumstances, they don't know why they're where they are, what they're doing. They've just sort of been shoved around the circumstances and they've taken life as it came.
Most people have no more aim than just to try to be happy for the passing moment, just to enjoy pleasing sensations for the passing moment, not looking very far into the future. And so my friends, once again, pay close attention, listen carefully, jot down notes, apply these rules and see what a difference they're going to make in your life if you are really do it.
Now as I mentioned in the preceding program of this series, I am going to give you these seven rules in their time order, not in the order of importance, because, as a matter of fact, the most important of all these rules is coming last.
Now first then, in time order, is 'Fixing a Proper Goal' in life. You've got to know where you are aiming, where are you going? What is your purpose in life? Now it's more than a matter of the right job, profession or occupation. These things are merely the means of earning a living, and of course that's necessary. We all have to eat. We need shelter. We need clothing. We need the necessities of life. But that's merely a secondary goal, only a means to an end, the real big goal. But do you know what it is?
Money doesn't mean success. Money can't buy happiness. If you know how to use it, it might add to a happiness you've already found. Money's a good thing, don't misunderstand, especially if it it is used properly. But money improperly used can be quite a curse.
But money itself is not the main thing. Many men have had very little money and yet have made a great success out of life. And I've know many men that had a great deal of money. I've known many millionaires and multimillionaires who were very unsuccessful. Their lives were miserable failures, they were terribly unhappy. And they didn't take it with them when they died, and most of them are now dead.
Now what is your real purpose in life, or were you put here on this earth for a purpose? Did you just happen? Did human beings just happen to be here? Did you just happen to be born? Or were you actually designed, planned and put here for a real reason, for a definite purpose? Did the Creator actually put you here for a purpose?
"In the beginning God [God] created the heaven and the earth." (Genesis 1:1)
So God planned it all, God designed it. Now I think I've mentioned before that I was challenged as to whether there is any God, or whether evolution is the proper theory and explanation of the presence of a creation without any Creator; without any thinking, without any design, any planning. Everywhere in nature you find design. Every need is supplied. Everything that human beings need is here. Everything that the animals need and every form of life on this earth, well it's supplied, everything is here. Yes it was planned and designed.
I began to study the doctrine of evolution and it seemed rather convincing, as long as I was just flitting around out on the branches of the tree, it's a little tiny branch arguments and one thing and another. But when I got down to the main trunk of the tree, well I found it didn't stand up. It was chopped down, and all the branches went with it — the whole doctrine and the whole theory. Which is merely an atheist's explanation — or his pitiful attempt at an explanation — to explain the presence of a creation without a Creator; without any designer, without any knowledge or any mentality, or thinking, or intelligence.
And so I delved into the laws of science to see if I could prove by the laws of science whether God exists. And I have proved it. I have even proved it to atheists. I think I could prove it to any atheist whose mind is open, but unfortunately most of them have closed minds. They believe what they do because it's what they want to believe and they are going to insist on believing it and continue to believe it, true or false. Of course it is false. So that none but the fool says there is no God, and the fool usually has closed his mind (Psalm 14:1, 53:1).
But I proved by the laws of science that God exists. Furthermore I proved that God is intelligent, that He is the creative intelligence, that He even has created what intelligence we have and designed it and given it to us. And so there is design and purpose back of everything.
Now the word for God here, as I explained in the preceding program, as Moses wrote these words, they were written in the Hebrew language. It wasn't written in the English language that I am reading to you now because there wasn't any English language in those days. So this is a translation from the original tongue. And the word that Moses used was 'Elohim' for God. We call it 'God' today in the English language.
But the Hebrew word has meaning. And it means a kingdom of persons, more than one person. It's a uni-plural word like the word 'family' or like the word 'church' — more than one member, more than one person and yet one family or one church. A number of them making the one church or the one family, the one company, the one corporation, whatever it might be. Well that is how God is revealed.
And then we come down the the twenty-fourth verse:
"And [Elohim, this company or family of persons, this kingdom of persons] said, Let the earth bring forth the living creature..." (Genesis 1:24)
And there the word is the same word that is called 'soul' when it applies to men. Now the translators who translated what Moses wrote, into the English language, translated this word 'creature' when it applies to animals. But Moses didn't change the word, he used the same word. And then when he came over here to people, for instance in the second chapter in the seventh verse:
"And the [Eternal] God formed man of the dust of the ground, and [God] breathed into his nostrils the breath of life [He didn't breathe an immortal soul into him, it was the breath of life, the breath that goes in and out of his nostrils, the same breath that continues to go in and out of the nostrils of animals]; and man became a living [and Moses used the word 'nephesh' the same word he is using here for the animals, a living] soul." (Genesis 2:7)
They call it, in English when it comes to a man. Now why did our translaters do that? Why did they use the word 'soul'? I'll tell you why my friends, it's because the pagan philosophers, going back to the time of Socrates who taught Plato, and Plato wrote it in his book 'The Phaedo'. And the ancient Greek philosophers and then the Roman philosophers later, took it up and believed that a soul is something that is of spirit immaterial essence in the human being, that has everlasting life and is immortal — that is consciously immortal, that thinks and knows consciously. And that actually, the real man is a soul that is inside of a body.
Now that's absolutely pagan. It's heathen. It came from men that believed in many, many different gods and worshiped idols. And also men that were sexual perverts. It would be an utmost disgrace if they lived today. Yes, they were publicly perverts. Those are the men that originated this idea that most of you have come to believe. You've swallowed it hook, line and sinker. Do you know why?
Because you've always heard it. Because you've always been taught it, and because, just like sheep and like most of the rest of us, you have taken for granted whatever you've heard, whatever other people believe, whatever is popular with other people, that's what you want. But of course God is invisible, you don't see Him, so you don't care very much about what God thinks do you? That is most of you don't.
But God did not — as I was explaining in the preceding program — make man of the same essence or material as God, because God is a spirit, as you read in John 4:24. God reveals Himself in His word, the Bible. But the Eternal God formed man of the dust of the ground. And man is a breathing creature who sustains what existence he has by the breath of air which oxidizes the blood. And the blood thereof is the life thereof, as your Bible plainly says (Genesis 9:4).
Now then, man is flesh but God is a spirit, and that's precisely what Jesus said when He began teaching. As He said to Nicodemus, John the third chapter and the sixth verse:
"That which is born of the flesh is flesh [not spirit, not an immortal soul, Jesus said That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that's what we are]; and that which is BORN of the Spirit is spirit. (John 3:6)
But He taught that we can be BORN of God who is that Spirit. And when we are born of the spirit, when we are born of God, we shall BE God. Believe it or not! That's what your Bible says, and this is what God says. And God then is REPRODUCING HIMSELF, because, as Jesus said to Nicodemus;
"...Verily, verily I say unto [you, this is the third verse now; I say unto] thee, Except a man be born again [we have all be born once, now we're to be born all over again. Except a man be born again], he cannot see the kingdom of God." (John 3:3)
Now He certainly is inferring that when we are born again we will see the kingdom of God. Let's go a little further. Nicodemus couldn't understand it, he said to Him;
"...How can a man be born when he is old? Can a man enter the second time into his mother's womb, and be born?" (John 3:4)
Well if he did — his mother's flesh — he'd be born of the flesh again, wouldn't he? No, he isn't going to do that. So Jesus explained:
"...Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit [God says that God is a Spirit. God is a Spirit and we have to be born of God, born of the Spirit, then we shall be spirit. Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit], he cannot enter into the kingdom of God." (John 3:5)
My friends, the Kingdom of God is something we can enter into. It's something we enter into by being BORN into it. We entered into the human family by being born into that. We were born of flesh. We are flesh. We can enter into the Kingdom of God, or the God kingdom, by being born into it. And when we are born into that spirit kingdom we shall be spirit, as it plainly says here in John the third chapter and the sixth verse.
Now then, so many people think that because we were created in the image of God, that we were created out of spirit. I just read to you back in Genesis the second chapter in the seventh verse, where man — not the body he was to get into — but the man was made out of the dust of the ground. Now will you turn over to I Corinthians 15 just a minute.
I want to show you, how all of this my friends, is to show you what is your real purpose in life. Why were you born? You were born for a purpose and I want to tell you my friends, that that purpose so far exceeds and excels anything that you have ever remotely dreamed, or been taught, or heard of, that I doubt if your mind can quite contain it or understand it. God help you then to comprehend.
"...some man will say, How are the dead raised up?...with what body do they come? (I Corinthians 15:35)
Now it's speaking about those who die. Yes, man is made of the dust of the ground. He is as mortal as the animals and he dies the same death as the animals, as the wisest man who ever lived wrote in the third chapter of Ecclesiastes in your Bible.
Now speaking about those who have died — the dead — with what body do they come? How are they raised up? The dead, not the living, the dead. How are they raised up? Well here he says:
"Thou fool, that which thou sowest is not quickened [that is made immortal or energized, and always it means in the immortal sense where it speaks of being quickened in the Bible], except it die [now it has to really die, and if it dies it is dead, it isn't living]: That which thou sowest, thou sowest not that body that shall be, but bare grain, it may chance of wheat, or of some other grain [it's just like planting a grain of wheat in the ground. When a body, when a person dies and you bury that person, that dead person in the ground]: But God giveth it a body as it hath pleased him, and to every seed his own body. All flesh is not the same flesh, there is one kind of flesh of men [now notice, man is flesh. Is he spirit flesh? Is he material flesh? Is he made of spirit or is he made of matter? Now look carefully], All flesh is not the same flesh: there is one kind of flesh of men, another flesh of beasts [a different kind of flesh], another of fishes, another of birds. There are also celestial bodies, and bodies terrestrial: but the glory of the celestial is one, and the glory of the terrestrial is another." (I Corinthians 15:36-40 paraphrased)
Now it is speaking of glory. My friends, you were born to enter glory and to be glorified, but I don't think very many of you know what that means. Listen, and let's pray that God will reveal it to you, because it's the most wonderful thing that you have ever even dreamed of.
"There is one glory of the sun, another glory of the moon [which is a little lesser glory because it doesn't shine as brightly] and another glory of the stars: [and] one star differeth from another star in glory. So also is the resurrection of the dead. It is sown in corruption [that means subject to decay and rotting, corrupting. A human being then is subject to rotting because a human being is made of matter, material flesh, not immaterial or immortal soul but material flesh. Or shall we say material soul then. It is sown in corruption, but now he's speaking of a resurrection of the dead, but in a different body]; it is raised in incorruption:" (I Corinthians 15:41-42)
A different body that will be incorruptible, that is not subject to rotting, not subject to decay. Not subject to death — but immortal.
"It is sown in dishonour; it is raised in glory..."(I Corinthians 15:43) Yes, raised in glory, just as Jesus Christ has been glorified. The same glory that He has. The same glory as God. Listen my friends, God is reproducing Himself. Here it is in your Bible. It isn't blasphemous to believe what your Bible says. You know, for a long time it seemed to me that it would be blasphemous to believe such a thing, but your Bible is full of it. It's the teaching of Jesus Christ. It's the teaching of the apostle Paul. It's the teaching of God and the word of God. It was given to reveal this marvelous truth to us.
So listen:"... sown in weakness...raised in power. It is sown a natural body [natural or material] it is raised a SPIRITUAL body." (I Corinthians 15:43-44)
Now my friends, you see the body we have now is natural, made of matter, and it is sown, or buried, on death, a natural, or material, body. But it is RAISED in the resurrection, a SPIRITUAL body. Even the body will be made spiritual. It isn't talking about a person that is inside of a body. It isn't speaking of the body as being a cloak we wear, but the body is spoken of as the person. So listen:
"It is sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body. There is a natural body..." (I Corinthians 15:44)
That is what we have now, that which is born of the flesh is flesh. We are flesh. You can't, my friends, be born into the Kingdom of God as long as you are flesh, as long as you are human, until you become spirit. That which is born of the spirit — born again — IS spirit.
"It is sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body. There is a natural body, and there is a spiritual body. And so it is written, The first man Adam was made a living soul [or nephesh. There it is, that's what Adam was made and we're born of him]; the last Adam [referring to Christ now, who was Jesus Christ] was made a quickening [that means energizing, or immortal] spirit." (I Corinthians 15:44-45)
Christ then was made an immortal spirit. Christ took on Him the nature of Abraham, human nature. He was made mortal in order that He could die for you and for me. Yes, Christ was both man and God. So many people just can't comprehend that, that He could be both. He was both. No-one but God could pay the sins of the whole race, or of all mankind.
And that's exactly and precisely what Jesus Christ did do. So that took the life of the Creator, the one who created us all, who is greater, whose life is of more value than the sum total of all human lives who ever have lived. On the other hand, my friends, it was mortal humans who have sinned, and the law exacts and demands that the death penalty be paid by mortal humans. It takes the death of a mortal human to pay the penalty in your stead and mine.
And another thing, only a mortal human could die. And so there you are; so Christ was mortal and He died. But Christ was also divine, and it was also divine life made mortal, for the purpose of death. And He was raised very God, eternally existing now in the heavens, sitting right now at the right hand of God Almighty the Father in heaven as your High Priest and mine.
"...so it is written, The first...Adam was made a living soul; the last Adam was made a quickening [or immortal] spirit. Howbeit that was not first which is spiritual, but that which is natural [or made of the dust of the ground]; and afterward that which is spiritual [speaking of a resurrection]. The first man is of the earth, earthy [and that's what you are my friends. Now notice, Adam, we've been born of him, we are flesh]: The first man is of the earth [not of spirit, not of heaven but of the earth, mortal, of matter] earthy: the second man [that's Christ] is the Lord from heaven. [He came from heaven, He's gone back to heaven. He is immortal, eternal spirit. Now,] As is the earthy, such are they also that are earthy [that refers to you and me, earthy, OF the earth, OF the dust of the ground, mortal, subject to death, dying, but after this the resurrection]: and as is the heavenly, such are they also that are heavenly [now get this, this explains it]. And as WE [now it comes down to you and me my friends, WE, as WE], have borne the image of the earthy..." (I Corinthians 15:45-49)
You think because God made man in His image He made us out of spirit? Oh no, this says right here in the plainest of language, we were made mortal of the dust of the ground, earthy, of the earth. As we have borne the image of the earthy. What image then were we made in? An earthy image but the same form and shape as God, but not of the same composition. As we have borne the image of the earthy WE, and we in New Testament language means converted Christians, those begotten of God by the Spirit of God, which is the impregnating spirit that will make you immortal. Because:
"...if the Spirit of God dwell in us, He that raised up [Jesus] Christ from the dead will also quicken [or immortalize, make immortal by a resurrection], your mortal bodies by His Spirit that dwelleth in you." (Romans 8:11 paraphrased)
And that's where immortal life comes from, from God through His Holy Spirit.
A lot of people think they've been born again. If they've been born again they have inherited, they have entered into the kingdom of God. But Jesus said, flesh and blood cannot enter into the kingdom of God. You have to be born again, and when you are born of the spirit you'll BE spirit. Flesh and blood cannot enter into the kingdom of God, cannot inherit the kingdom of God.
"...neither doth corruption inherit incorruption. Behold, I shew you a mystery [oh yes it's a mystery, but can you understand it? Only if God will open your eyes by His Holy Spirit can you understand it]; We shall not all sleep [and Paul meant be dead. Now some people right here are going to say, 'Well now I didn't know Paul was a soul sleeper,' but apparently he must have been, according to what he said because he said 'we shall not all sleep,' he was referring to being dead] but we shall all be changed [that is we won't all be dead at the time he is speaking of] but we, [if we're Christians will] all be changed. In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump..." (I Corinthians 15:50-52)
Now if you know what the Bible says, the last trump is the time of the second coming of Christ. That's when the dead are going to be raised incorruptible. That's when they are going to inherit the kingdom of God. That's when Jesus is coming down and He is going to say to those on His right hand, 'Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.' (Matthew 25:34)
Are you going to be in that number my friends? Are you going to inherit the kingdom of God? God help you to understand because we're living in a very deceived world. This world has been deceived and most of you have been deceived with it. You've been believing a lot of things that are the very antithesis of what the Bible says.
They talk about the Bible saying how you go to heaven. The Bible doesn't say anything of the sort, my friends. Why don't you open up your eyes, blow the dust off your Bible and really look into it and see what it does say? It's going to be a little shock to you. It's going to be surprising. You may find your head whirling around for a while. I did mine. But listen;
"In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised [in a resurrection] incorruptible, and we shall be changed. For this corruptible much put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality. So when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, an this mortal shall have put on immortality, then [will] be brought to pass the saying that is written, Death is swallowed up in victory." (I Corinthians 15:52-54)
Then my friends, you will have come to the real goal of your life, and I'm going to show you — I see the time is up now, and I was going to show you that the one goal that the apostle Paul had, is the only goal for any of us to have — is the purpose for which you were put here — to be born into the kingdom of God. To be made immortal so you live forever and to find the way to happiness, to peace to JOY. Yes, and in this world, even prosperity. God wants you to have prosperity.
Well I'm going to continue, and I'm going to show you this goal is only the first of the seven rules of success, so listen every single day. And now listen friends, don't forget to write in for this booklet, 'The Seven Laws Of Success.' If you want to know why so many people are poverty stricken, you need to learn this, 'The Seven Laws Of Success.'
So until next time then, this is Herbert W Armstrong saying, "Goodbye friends."