![[The Good Seed]](../images/thegoodseed.gif)
Seeds of Reality - Number 2
By Lloyd Ellefson
The meaning of the words APPEARING and UNVEILING is basically the same. APPEAR means to come into sight and to UNVEIL is to bring into view something that was hidden. Various words in the New Testament express the concept that some things are veiled and need to be unveiled. When the Lord Jesus walked on the earth physically, His body veiled His true spiritual identity. Since humanity is limited to seeing natural things, it could not recognize the Son of God in Jesus Christ. The manifestation of God's Son comes to us spiritually.
The veil that was over the hearts of people kept them from understanding the spiritual meaning of the words of Jesus. Their interpretation of His words was on the natural level; Jesus spoke from the awareness and consciousness which He had received from God. People could hear the words, but the words were on the same wave-length as their eyes. Their natural eyes saw the physical man, and their minds only received natural concepts.
Jesus was dealing with the soulish Adam man; this man cannot receive the things of the Spirit. (2 Cor. 2:14) In the King James version and other translations it reads NATURAL man instead of SOULISH man, but the meaning is the same. The same Greek word is used in 1 Cor. 15:47-49 where it is translated EARTHY.
After Christ ascended to the Father, there were two MEN - not two ANGELS - who gave the disciples a message. I think these two men represent the natural and the spiritual man; both were testifying of who the Christ really is. As the Son of God, He dwells in the Word. He dwells in the cloud of witnesses which are a testimony. As I have mentioned, all the patriarchs of the faith were also at the Jordan River in the presence of the Spirit. I believe Adam represents the Adamic consciousness - the consciousness that is in all humanity. Christ in His identification with humanity, also identified with that, yet without sin. Abraham is called the father of all who believe; in spirit he represents the consciousness of those who receive righteousness by faith. Jesus, in reference to John the Baptist, said that Elijah had already come. Elijah was not present bodily in John the Baptist, but in the consciousness that represents repentance. The reference to Jesus sitting on King David's throne, does not refer to David's physical throne. Jesus Christ sat down in the heavenlies, for He said, "I am going back to My Father from whence I came."
The word PAROUSIA, meaning PRESENCE, has often been mistranslated as COMING in the King James and other versions. PRESENCE is very different from COMING. When someone is already present, it is obvious that we no longer wait for him to come. Here are a number of references which demonstrate this mistranslation: 1 Cor. 15:23, 1 Thess. 4:15, 3;13, 2:19; 2 Peter 3:13. This gives us wrong concepts and leads us to believe that He is coming visibly. But Jesus said, "The world sees Me no more." This means that He will never again be present in a physical form which the world can see. Jesus Christ, the Son of God is present within us in the essence of His being, and God is also ever-present within us. Christ is a life-giving Spirit; He quickens and awakens us from sleep.
We are not to know Christ nor others after the flesh any longer - that is, the way the flesh sees Him and others. (2 Cor. 5:16) We need to receive a spiritual realization of where we and others are living in the spiritual realm. We can never really determine the spiritual level of another unless we are on an equal basis - learning from one another and teaching one another. The things people do and say, and their desire for truth (or lack of it), reveal where they are spiritually.
"But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, even to those who believe in His name." (Jn. 1:12) After children grow up and reach a certain maturity, they are given authority to be over the household. (Gal. 4:2) This also happened to Jesus. Although He was an heir of all, He was under the law for thirty years. Then God placed Him as a Son. This is called the adoption. It has nothing to do with adopting the Gentiles into the family of God, for the circumcision and uncircumcision are made one new man in Christ. (Eph. 2:11-19)
Our confession of receiving Christ is only valid when we receive Him the way God has explained and revealed Himself in Jesus Christ. Those who receive Him are born, not after the will of man nor of the flesh, but of God. These are given authority to become children of God and are participants of the divine nature. Otherwise the word FATHER would just be a meaningless formality and become a rote expression.
"Behold, I stand at the door and knock; if any one hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him, and will dine with him, and he with Me." (Rev. 3:20) Hearing His voice is so important, for in John 5:25 Jesus said that those who hear the voice of the Son of God shall live! Christ is not knocking on the door of the church and asking to come in, for the church is His own body. His body was what He confessed to be. Although He took on flesh, flesh was not His true nature. The body of Christ is a body of truth - a body of true understanding in the Spirit. That is why Jesus Christ could say, "I am the truth, I am the life, I am the resurrection, before Abraham was, I am...if any man hears My voice I will come in to him."
In this passage it is readily comprehended that the Lord Jesus Christ is knocking at the heart's door of individuals. When this door is opened we become conscious of His presence. Doesn't this constitute the coming of the Lord? John chapter 16 clearly explains His coming. He said, "But I tell you the truth, it is to your advantage that I go away; for if I do not go away the Helper shall not come to you; but if I go, I will send Him to you...for He shall take of Mine, and shall disclose it to you." He comes to us in the Spirit!
The law was our schoolmaster until Christ came, but now the Holy Spirit is our new teacher! He is the anointing who teaches us all things. We are to walk in the newness of the Spirit, not in the oldness of the letter. The letter kills, but the Spirit gives life! The Holy Spirit breathes life into the the dead letter of the Bible!
"He that has an ear, let him hear what the SPIRIT is saying to the churches." The scriptures are a wonderful witness, inspired by the Spirit! However, they are not the reality of our life - Christ is our life; He is our reality! Even as Christ did not live by the letter, neither should we. The dead letter is not the basis for our truth and for our proof of truth, for Jesus Christ is the truth. The Spirit was Christ's life, His instruction, and the basis for everything He did. He said, "Be of good cheer, for I have overcome the world." Christ has overcome it! How? Not by fighting nor by destroying it. He overcame it by the presence of God within Him!
Jesus Christ is omnipresent, so He can only come to us in our understanding and realization. Have you ever thought of where the right hand of God is - the place where Christ sits? He is spirit, He is invisible, and Christ is the exact image of the invisible God. How can God have a right hand when He is omnipresent? God's right hand represents His strength and authority. By giving Christ a place at His right hand, God gave Him His authority.
Paul said, "Test yourselves to see if you are in the faith: examine yourselves! Or do you not recognize this about yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you - unless you fail the test?" (2 Cor. 13:5) Christ is our life! God lives in unapproachable light, and natural man cannot approach it. We have to have His Spirit before we can live in the light or the enlightenment of immortality that He lives in.
Christ is our life, and when He appears we shall appear together with Him. His appearance in the earth is always veiled by the flesh. When we speak out of the Christ within us to the unregenerate Adamic man, the soulish nature will not understand. Those who do not know Christ cannot accept His presence, for it is beyond the ability of natural man.
2 Cor. 3 brings light on this subject. "But to this day whenever Moses is read, a veil lies over their heart; but whenever a man turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away." (vv. 15-16) The Israelites only saw Moses as their glory; they did not understand him. By putting on that veil, Moses showed that the glory of the law was very temporal; its light was going to fade away. Israel did not believe that, so Moses just kept the veil on as a sign that Israel would not accept the fact that in Christ the law ended. This inability to understand was not unique to Israel; all the nations are included in this kind of thinking; Israel was only a showcase for it.
The Adamic man was subjected to death. He is not to be redeemed, because that man is a wrong image; he is only a fleshly image of God. In Adam all die. Christ is the last Adam, so Christ's coming is the end of old Adam. Christ is a new man, a new image of God! Our physical Adamic fleshly body came from the ground of existing creation. God formed Adam from the earth and said, "You are from the dust, and to dust you will return." Our sense of being, our awareness of life and mortality comes through the senses of the body. The things man experiences are interpreted by his body - this includes his sense of life, and his dependence on air, food and water. Without these things, the body would cease to function and he would lose consciousness.
Although I cannot find a verse in the scriptures which says that resurrection is for the physical body, it is quite unpopular to say that it isn't. Romans 8:23 speaks about the redemption of our body, but this does not refer to the physical body, for the word OUR is plural, and BODY is singular. I believe the body of Christ is being redeemed from the disruption of the rule of God that took place when Adam and Eve sinned. The word RESURRECTION comes from the Latin RESURRECTUS, which means to rise again. I believe we were standing in the presence of God at one time.
Jesus said, "I am the resurrection" before He was put to death. This means He is the One who raises us from the dead. Death brings separation from God - for in Adam all die. The correct translation of many verses, reads that we will be raised from among the dead. So resurrection is not historical nor physical - it is simply an awakening. Jesus was awakened from the sleep of Adam at the Jordan River. That was where He, as an Adam man, ended. After He received the Holy Spirit, He began to confess that He was the Son of God and God was His Father. That meant His life was immortal; it could never, never die, no matter what happened to His physical body. His conception of life was immortality in God the Father.
Being baptized into the body of Christ by the Holy Spirit means that we are placed into the body of Christ - the body of truth and life that dwelt in Jesus Christ. This is the consciousness we receive. We are being raised from the separation death had brought and from the sleep that was in Adam. This had been prophesied by Isaiah, "You who lie in the dust, awake and shout for joy." (Is. 26:19) Paul refers to this passage in Eph. 5:14, "Awake, sleeper, and arise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you." That was said because Adam was still sleeping when Christ came.
In the natural, DEATH and SLEEP do not have the same meaning. However, Jesus used the words, DEATH and SLEEP interchangeably. I don't believe we have the same concept of death He had. When someone dies we don't think of that person as sleeping. In Matt. 9:24ff we read that Jesus came to the house of Jairus, whose daughter had died; yet Jesus said she was sleeping. The Jews laughed at Him scornfully! Jesus awakened her, even as He awakened Lazarus. When Jesus told the disciples that Lazarus was sleeping, they thought it was a good thing. Then Jesus told them Lazarus had died. Sleep and death had basically the same connotation for Him, because He did not see death as man views death. To Christ, death was a temporal state of unconsciousness which can be compared to sleep.
1 Cor. 15:20 says that Jesus Christ was the firstfruits of those who slept. His sleep was only a temporal death or separation from God. By coming back, He testified that death and the grave could not hold Him! Since Jesus was the firstfruits of them that slept, we become part of the firstfruits when we are awakened. I believe our resurrection is an awakening from Adam's sleep by the quickening Spirit, and being raised into Christ's life.
In Luke 20:37-38 Jesus talks about the resurrection, and shows us that Abraham, Isaac and Jacob have been resurrected, for "God is not a God of the dead but of the living." They testify to us that they have been raised from the sleep and death of Adam into the life and the quickening Spirit that is in Jesus Christ. In the strict sense of meaning, God was not really a God of Adam, because "He is not a God of the dead but of the living...and all men live unto Him." Adam has left us with a legacy of the belief in a physical, temporal life of mortality and death. This is a delusion for it does not bring us into life. God is a God of those who have the life of His Son - the life of Christ.
We cannot have God without His Son, who is the Christ; nor can we have the Father without the Son. These are one. Though Paul realized that we live and move and have our being in God, the pagans did not. (Acts 17) Paul had come to this realization in Christ, but the pagans who did not know Christ, did not have any understanding of this. This makes a great difference. If we are raised up to an understanding of life among people who do not have this understanding, we are raised up or resurrected from among the dead. In the New Testament there are many references to Christ having been raised from among the dead. Some of these are: Acts 3:15, 4:2; 1 Cor. 15:12,20; 1 Peter 1:3 (Concordant). They testify to Christ being raised from among the dead. The dead are those who are dead in Adam, and not all have been raised yet.
In 1 Cor. 12:31 Paul wrote, "And I show you a still more excellent way." He had written about the gifts - and gifts are great. Gifts are an expression of love or appreciation, or a basis for bribery. They may represent a relationship between the giver and the receiver; but it is only a representation or a token; it is not the reality. Gifts are unimportant and insignificant if they are not prompted by love.
In chapter 13 Paul tells us what charity or love is. "Love never fails; but if there are gifts of prophecy, they will be done away; if there are tongues, they will cease; if there is knowledge, it will be done away. For we know in part, and we prophesy in part; but when the perfect comes, the partial will be done away. When I was a child, I used to speak as a child, think as a child, reason as a child; when I became a man, I did away with childish things." There is nothing wrong with being a child, but a child must grow, and God has made provision for growth.
The imperfect is done away with when the perfect has been established. Through prophecy the secrets of an unbeliever's heart are disclosed, and he will be convicted, fall on his face and worship God, declaring that God is certainly among those present. (1 Cor. 14:25) The perfection of prophecy is in its fulfillment. After fulfillment, prophecy is no longer needed and the partial is done away with!
The gift of tongues is not to be addressed to men but to God. It is not a literal translation, but rather an interpretation of the spiritual meaning. When the perfect comes, we can hear the Spirit and understand what He is saying spiritually; then there is no further need for tongues. Intercession in tongues is not necessary when there is spiritual communication, but when the mind of the Spirit is not known, tongues are important.
Natural knowledge only causes people to become proud and arrogant. Many are so full of natural Biblical knowledge, that they actually live in the delusion that this knowledge is life. Christ is our life! In Christ we have all true knowledge; He is our wisdom and He is the storehouse of all the wisdom of God! He is present in us all the time! So we are living in the fulfillment of many of these things.
True judgment is a gift that comes in Jesus Christ. In Christ we begin to see reality - something we never saw before. Natural man has false judgment, therefore he is not to judge. The saying, "You mustn't judge", is true for the natural man. But if you are in Christ, your life and words will judge others. Paul wrote, "Don't you know that the saints shall judge the world?" They shall judge matters pertaining to this life and they shall judge angels. Many mistakenly think that angels, as spoken of in the book of Revelation and other parts of the Bible, are winged beings. "Angels are ministering spirits, sent out to render srvice for the sake of those who will inherit salvation." (Heb. 1:14) The word EVANGEL means messenger, and it contains the word ANGEL. So you see, if you hear Christ and pass on the message, you are a messenger - you are an angel. Those who bring a false message, are false apostles, deceitful workers; they are disguising themselves as apostles of Christ, even as satan disguises himself as an angel of light. (2 Cor. 11:13-14) Those who come in Christ bring true spiritual messages because Christ is the perfect expression of God.
John 1:1-2, "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God." People talk about the logos and rhema word of God; about the various kinds of love - agape, phileo, eros, etc. Once we see that God's love is the true spiritual love, then His love will be applied to every area of our life, regardless of which word is used. Man does not have any love without God! Any word that is not of God - is not even partly of God. It is either of God or it isn't!
In Matt. 13:19, the seed is the word of the kingdom. The seed brings forth the fruit of the word according to God's intention and understanding, although we do not see the fruit in its maturity. God does not necessarily speak to us in natural words, but in a spiritual realization. It is much better to have a spiritual realization dawn in us, than to think that an oral message in our native tongue is the ultimate.
"All things came into being by Him; and apart from Him nothing came into being that has come into being." (John 1:3) In Col. 1:15-16 we read, "And He is the image of the invisible God, the first-born of all creation. For by Him all things were created, both in the heavens and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities - all things have been created by Him and for Him." Then in Heb. 11:3, "By faith we understand that the worlds were prepared by the word of God, so that what is seen was not made out of things which are visible." The way we see or perceive things in the natural is not the reality. The word of God is the reality; the seen things are made out of the word! Jesus came to take us into the dimension of reality.
"In Him was life, and the life was the light of men." (v.4) Jesus said, "It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh profits nothing; the words that I have spoken to you are spirit and are life." (Jn. 6:63) It is the Spirit who gives life; God's life comes to us in the Spirit. "And the light shines in the darkness; and the darkness did not comprehend (or overpower) it." (v.5) This darkness was evident in Israel at the time of Jesus. He began teaching after He received the Holy Spirit at the Jordan River. He taught according to the light which was in Him, but the Jews did not receive it. The Adamic, soulish humanity, is limited to the natural carnal mind, and therefore cannot perceive spiritual things. Since the mediation of the Spirit originates in the Christ, the natural man cannot receive it. His darkened mind could not receive this enlightenment before Christ's death, resurrection, and the pouring out of the Spirit!
Eph. 1:10 states: "...the summing up of all things in Christ, things in the heavens and things upon the earth..." Can you fathom the mountains, rivers, the whole earth and all the people with their hatred, greed and goodness being gathered into Jesus Christ? How can this be possible? The only way this can happen is when we see that Jesus Christ is the truth. When everyone is brought into truth, everything is in its proper perspective, and can be gathered into Christ. Even though we only know in part and are only scratching the surface, you and I are gathered into the Christ and receive His understanding. The knowledge of everything in truth is present in Jesus Christ, for He said, "I am the truth." Therefore, if we know Him, it is sufficient for us.
John came to bear witness of Jesus Christ. "He came for a witness, that he might bear witness of the light, that all might believe through him. He was not the light, but came that he might bear witness of the light. There was the true light which, coming into the world, enlightens every man." (Jn. 1:7-9) Jesus lived for 30 years without really exhibiting this light because of His identification with Adam. But He didn't sin, so the corruption of sin was not in Him. In this respect He was different. HE CAME INTO THE PLACE WHERE WE WERE, TO TAKE US INTO THE PLACE WHERE HE IS. So He walked in the law, in the shadow of darkness without the enlightenment of the Spirit until He came to the Jordan river. There His identification with the Adamic man disappeared. He now began to embrace and exhibit the light. Through the understanding that light brings, He began to operate in a union, obedience and manifestation of God the Father.
In the first chapter of Mark we see the beginning of His ministry and the content of His message. The Jews were waiting for their Messiah to bring deliverance from foreign rule and to establish a kingdom of their own. When Jesus began to teach that "the time is fulfilled and the kingdom of God is at hand", it must have struck a sympathetic chord in the hearts of the people! However, Jesus did not mean what they thought He meant. Jesus was saying that the kingdom of darkness, the kingdom of this world would no longer have full sway. The time was fulfilled for the kingdom of God to be presented through Jesus Christ.
Now the kingdom of God does not come with signs to be observed. The mysteries of this kingdom are given to us. "To you has been given the mystery of the kingdom of God; but those who are outside get everything in parables." (Mark 4:11) To the natural man, the kingdom of God is a mystery. This explains why many think the mystery has not been made known. They think the kingdom of God will be ushered in physically, with the man Jesus as the King.
The word KINGDOM comes from the combination of the two words, "king's domain". The kingdom of God is eternal; it is the rule of God. He rules in the Spirit because He is Spirit. The kingdom of God has been in operation all the time, but human thinking did not recognize it, and therefore distorted, abused, and rejected it. Because they had a false image of the kingdom of God, they set up their own ideas of God, behavior patterns, etc. We have to be born into the kingdom of God and be generated of the Spirit before we can operate in the kingdom of God. The parable in Matt. 21:33-46 shows us that the kingdom of God was already in operation at that time. Jesus said Israel was not bearing the fruit of His kingdom, for they were killing the prophets and even killed His Son! Therefore, the kingdom of God would be taken from Israel and given to a nation bearing the fruit thereof.
In Isaiah it says the kingdom was born in a day. The day Jesus Christ stepped out of the Jordan, He was released from His identification with us, and the rule of God was born into humanity - even though it was only in the body of one identifiable physical being - in Jesus. The kingdom of God could not bear fruit in natural humanity. The rule of God comes to believers in the Spirit, and it is the Father's good pleasure to give the kingdom to them!
The kingdom of God is not meat and drink. Let's paraphrase that. The RULE of God is exercised in the kingdom of God; it does not consist of the food we eat. The natural food we eat is important for the well-being of our physical body, but it has nothing to do with the kingdom of God! It does not sustain spiritual life. God's kingdom is righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Spirit, and He rules us by His Spirit!
At the last supper (Luke 22), Jesus said that He was not going to eat of the bread and drink of the fruit of the vine (the represention of heavenly food) until it was fulfilled in the kingdom. By His death that communion, or last supper, has been fulfilled in the kingdom and is not to be brought down to this earth anymore. We are to be taken into the spiritual realization of what it is. By this participation, we are sharing the blood and the body with one another, in the Spirit of Christ. We have true communion as we constantly receive our spiritual nourishment from Christ, and share this in our fellowship with one another in the Spirit of Christ. So the eternal kingdom of God now operates through the Spirit who is given by Christ.
The kingdom of God is an eternal spiritual kingdom, and it began to be preached when Jesus came from the Jordan river, telling people to repent. "The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe the gospel." (Mk. 1:15) They were to repent of the rule and government of satan under which they were living. The kingdom of darkness was to be dispelled by the appearing of the light of Jesus Christ. The kingdom of darkness showed its hatred and deadly venom at the cross. The power it exercised was a God-given power, for Jesus said, "This is your hour and the power of darkness".
In John 3 the Greek word for "birth" is GENNAO and it means to procreate, to generate. There are generations of the flesh and generations of the Spirit. These all come from God; nothing begins in us! Natural genealogy goes back to Genesis 2, and God is the originator. The spiritual kingdom also goes all the way back to God. It's a generation of spirit out of God. The natural man thinks that life is in the flesh, but it is actually in Christ. As we have birthed the image that is produced in the fleshly sense of being, we shall also bear, birth, or manifest the image of the heavenly. This is possible since we have a new covenant, a new life, a new way, a new sense of being, a new consciousness, a new sustenance, a new source of supply. This understanding is basic to erasing our wrong thinking, so that we can be free to operate in the spirit of sonship.
Understanding our oneness with God comes in answer to Christ's prayer in John 17 - something the natural man cannot understand nor receive. But we are not natural man, so we CAN receive the things of the Spirit. The anointing can teach us all things. The Bible is a witness in the letter; by itself it does not have the ability to bring life; it can only be a testimony. We must come to Christ!
Jesus said, "I have given them Your name." His name reveals the nature of the Father, and Christ portrays the Father. Then when we receive the Father, He again reveals the Son to us. Jesus said, "You are not of this world." We are not of the rule of this world; we are not of this kingdom of darkness. The world does not operate in Christ, so being in Christ causes the kingdom of God to operate in us! It supersedes the kingdom of darkness - the delusions, lies, fears, and imaginations of natural man.
Christ came to bring us into unity with the Father and with Him, thus showing we are one with one another. In other words, He is bringing us into a true sense of being, causing us to recognize that we really are in God. He does not expect us to prove anything; it's a matter of letting this oneness appear in our consciousness, so we can walk and live in harmony with God. Since He is not imputing sin to us, there is no condemnation in Christ. We know that God in Christ is giving us a consciousness that takes death, mortality, evil, the world, sickness and sin away from us. Even though we walk in this physical body, we live by the word that lives in us!
Many of the things discussed here, are probably new to many. Nevertheless, I believe they are steps of progressive revelation, bringing the answer to the prayer of Jesus in John 17:22, "That they may be one, just as We are one." Amen and God bless you!