Juxtaposition of Past and Future

October 2, 2007 ©Dick Cole

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And those whom he [the Father] predestined he also called, and those whom he called he has justified, and those whom he justified he also glorified. (Rom 8:30).

Past tense!

For us, future tense!

As the high priest of Israel, Christ has been toiling among the thorns and thistles outside the walls of spiritual Eden, tilling the stony ground to bring forth (as heirs of the Father), those whom the Father foreknew, and predestined "to be conformed to the image of his Son" (Rom 8:29).

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PREFACE — THE BIBLE:

The Bible is an assembly of historical narratives interrupted by genealogies. Here spiritual understanding is required. The genealogies reveal the breaks in the narrative, and also become the glue that welds the narratives into a unified revelation. The Bible is not an inclusive history of even the ancient nation of Israel, or of the houses of Israel and Judah. It is a selective assemblage of narratives that allows disciples inter-dimensional vision when standing on the shoulders of typology. Its narratives are a very limited account of history.

INTRODUCTION — HISTORICAL NARRATIVES:

Each of the historical narratives reveals a shadow of a phenomenon that occurs in the heavenly realm. The presentation of each isn’t for the sake of history, but for the sake of the Lord revealing to His friends what occurs Outside of time. Humanity is, today, Inside of time. However, the glorified Jesus and His many brothers (again, from Rom 8:29) are Outside, a conundrum that requires two revelations of the same phenomenon. One from the perspective of the timelessness of heaven; that is, Outside of time. The other perspective is from the humanity side, or Inside of time. The key to understanding Scripture and especially prophecy is that in all things the physical precedes the spiritual. The significant events in the history of Israel are memorialized by Sabbaths, by time made holy by God. Humanity is NOT able to make time holy.

THE CREATION ACCOUNT:

Human beings live in time as fish live in water. But space-time is part of the created universe and doesn’t pertain to God. Disciples whom the Father foreknew have ALREADY been glorified. Christ no longer bears their sins. Christ rests on the seventh day. The creation account in Genesis 1:1 through 2:3 is the alpha and omega, the abstract and the summation of the plan of God. This creation account describes the beginning of the physical creation that was completed when the man Jesus died at Calvary. It describes typologically the entirety of the spiritual creation of those heirs of the Father of whom the Son was "the firstborn among many brothers" (Rom 8:29). The festivals of God, the new moons of the creation, and the Sabbaths of the Son are the actual shadows of a reality that is Christ (Col 2:16-17). For disciples, they foreshadow memorialized interventions of God in the affairs of men, but for God, they are real shadows cast from the spiritual realm onto the physical creation.

PREDESTINATION:

Many teachers of Israel have wrestled with predestination. Those whom the Father foreknew, He drew from the world (John 6:44, 65) before the general resurrection of humanity in the great White Throne Judgment. The Father offered salvation to those whom He foreknew. Not only did the Father draw those whom He foreknew prior to the general resurrection of humanity, but He also justified and glorified them BEFORE the first words of Genesis were written. How can that be? How can disciples be glorified before they are drawn, or even born? They can be — for time is a fluid, revealed to human beings by historical narratives, a realization that requires disciples to mentally leap outside of time, albeit briefly. There is a finite quantity of space-time created through heavy mass particle decay, and when this finite quantity has been created, the physical earth and heavens will be replaced by a new earth and heavens.

In order for a matter to have an end, the matter must necessarily conclude. Therefore, if a matter concludes, and its conclusion is known, the participants in the matter either have no free-will (but are puppets), or the matter has already concluded. If the participants are puppets, their behavior can be predicted from the beginning. But as the story of Abraham and Isaac reveals, God didn’t know if Abraham would follow through with killing his son until the knife was in the air (Gen 22:10-12). So participants are not puppets. Therefore, from the perspective of God, the matter has already been concluded: those disciples who were foreknown are with God in heaven even though from the perspective of humanity, those disciples have not yet been resurrected.

SATAN:

Look at Ezekiel’s lament over the King of Tyre:

Moreover the word of the Lord came to me: "Son of man, raise a lamentation over the king of Tyre, and say to him, Thus says the Lord God: ‘You were the signet of perfection, / full of wisdom and perfect in beauty. / You were in Eden, the garden of God; / every precious stone was your covering…. / On the day that you were created / they were prepared. / You were an anointed guardian cherub…. / You were blameless in your ways / from the day you were created, / till unrighteousness was found in you. / so I cast you as a profane thing from the mountain of God, / and I destroyed you, / …. Your heart was proud because of your beauty; / you corrupted your wisdom for the sake of your splendor. / I cast you to the ground; / I exposed you before kings, / to feast their eyes on you. / By the multitude of your iniquities, / in the unrighteousness of your trade / you profaned your sanctuaries; / so I brought fire out from your midst; / it consumed you, / and I turned you to ashes on the earth / in the sight of all who saw you. / All who know you among the peoples / are appalled at you; / you have come to a dreadful end / and shall be no more forever.’" (Ezek 28:11-19 — emphasis added)

It is usually agreed that the above passage pertains to Satan. No human being was created as an anointed cherub, so the king of Tyre is NOT a man, just as the king of Babylon in Isaiah 14:4 is NOT a man.

Scripture reveals only one angelic being that is both cast to the ground (Rev 12:9) and exposed to kings (Isa 14:16-20). That being is Satan. Therefore, the customary identification of the king of Tyre as Satan has a high probability of being correct. Ezekiel’s prophecy is addressed to this king of Tyre, and informs him that he has been turned to ashes. But he isn’t consumed by fire until:

And when the thousand years are ended, Satan will be released from his prison and will come out to deceive the nations … fire came down from heaven and consumed them, and the devil who had deceived them was thrown into the lake of fire and sulfur where the beast and the false prophet were. (Rev 20:7, 9-10)

Satan’s end doesn’t come until AFTER the thousand-year reign of Christ as Lord of lords and King of kings. Yet Ezekiel’s prophecy speaks of Satan being consumed in the PAST tense. Jesus said He saw Satan fall as lightning (Luke 10:18), but Satan isn’t cast from heaven until halfway through seven years of tribulation.

Ezekiel presents the words of the Lord as fact, which suggests that the man Jesus of Nazareth, after having received the Breath of the Father, could see into the spiritual realm without standing on the shoulders of typological exegesis, for He saw Satan fall like lightning. He could see time as the contents of a bowl that was no longer expanding. Therefore, Ezekiel prophesies that Satan WILL BE consumed by fire, AND he states as fact that Satan HAS BEEN turned to ashes. Both are true!

OUTSIDE OF TIME:

This juxtaposition of past and future linguistic tenses is acceptable only when in the supra-dimension realm usually identified as heaven, only when Outside of time and able to know the end from the beginning. Ezekiel’s prophecy requires disciples to mentally jump into the spiritual realm and stay suspended in midair for as long as possible. From that perspective, they provide the "evidence" necessary for, especially, end-time disciples during the great harvest of humanity to simply hear Jesus’ words and believe the Father (from John 5:24). The Holy Spirit will have been poured out upon ALL humanity (thereby making disciples of all humanity), when the dragon attempts to recover his liberated slaves by the physical means of requiring them to accept the mark of the beast (Chi xi stigma, or the tattoo [stigma] of Xx [Chi xi]). Those disciples who accept this tattoo of the Cross return to bondage. They also worship a dead god. Both the beast and the false prophet were thrown into the lake of fire upon Christ’s return, and the dragon was thrown in after the thousand years. The cross-shaped body of the beast was burned in the spiritual realm when Satan was cast from heaven (Dan 7:11-12 & Rev 11:15; 12:9-10). So all three arch-deceivers of humanity are destroyed by fire, what Ezekiel reveals about the dragon. Ever since the Genesis account concluded events in the spiritual realm, Satan HAS BEEN destroyed. Yet for us, he remains as the prince of the power of the air (Eph 22), for we have to live through the expansion of space-time, which is the passage of time at the rate of heavy mass particle decay, until we arrive at that period of an already concluded historical narrative at which saints are glorified. Then, disciples who are resurrected to life, as the many brothers of Christ, can escape corruptible bodies and live Outside of time.

INSIDE OF TIME:

Humanity cannot live physically Outside of time. We are completely dependant upon space-time holding the charged points of energy apart that gives substance to our corruptible body, and to all we know as "mass." Quarks require space-time between them to create the essence of mass. Strings require space-time to create tension. Therefore, it is impossible for any person to enter the supra-dimensional realm of heaven. Mentally, though, humanity doesn’t experience this same limitation, which is perhaps the best accounting of why a human brain differs from an animal’s: humanity was created in the likeness of Elohim (Gen 1:27). However, to transcend physical thought a person must be spiritually minded, which requires the addition of the Breath of God [pneuma hagion] to our human breath. A person must be born again, or born-from-above. Those who haven’t been so born will perceive spiritual matters as nonsensical discussions.

Although humanity is dependant upon time as a fish is dependant upon water, humanity experiences the passage of time differently from how a fish experiences water-currents. Humanity moves through time at the rate that time expands/passes through particle decay.

We are, in essence, stationary as we die in place.

Therefore, humanity cannot run ahead in time and arrive at that place when Satan was consumed by fire except through prophetic revelation. No human being can, from where humanity presently is, be witnesses to fire coming out from Satan’s belly although all can read an account of the phenomenon, hear the words of Jesus and believe the Father that, indeed, He deconstructed Satan.

Those individuals who worship demons even into the Tribulation (Rev 9:20) worship very dead gods.

We can hear the word of Jesus and we can believe that saints who endure in covenant to the end are the many brothers of Christ; that they won’t become the many brothers but that they are the many brothers. Past tense!

WHAT CAN POSSIBLY SEPARATE YOU FROM CHRIST?

If you hear the word of Jesus and believe the Father that ahead of you in the narrative of history you have already been glorified, then what can possibly separate you from Christ now? Certainly not a dead god who threatens your physical body!

Is this true, or will you allow a dead Satan to separate you from the love of God?

If you believe the Father that those whom He foreknew, He predestined, He justified, and He glorified (again, Rom 8:29-30); that you are glorified and have been glorified through enduring to the end—that only you determine whether you will endure—then a dead Satan should not be able to tempt or intimidate you.

Your judgment is in your hands (Deut 30:19). You determine whether you will hear Jesus’ words and believe the Father. Jesus already knows whether you did. And He will work hard to cause you to believe, but He cannot believe for you.

If you are determined not to believe, you no longer exist in the spiritual realm. You were resurrected to condemnation.

HOW WE END IS WHAT MATTERS:

There is no fatalism here, for we can, today, change our fate if we are out of covenant with God. It is how we end that matters. The mistakes we make along the way don’t matter; for Christ died for the physical death penalty attached to those mistakes, and He bears their spiritual death penalty. As a disciple, you will have been resurrected to life or to condemnation. Your choice.

Because humanity requires time for the maintenance of physical life, again in a like manner to fish needing to be in water, humanity must live through the narrative of history, past and future, to arrive at the moment when the heirs of God will be glorified. We cannot jump around in time, except mentally.

WHAT IS EQUAL IN IMPORTANCE TO SALVATION?

If the reality of the weekly Sabbath is Christ – specifically, Christ resting from His labor of bearing the sins of the foreknown heirs of God – then drawn disciples who have already been glorified in the portion of time in which they haven’t yet arrived should want to celebrate the weekly Sabbath. The size of the realization that all who endured in faith to the end will be saved, and have already been saved should humble the most able human being on the planet, especially when one knows that all of this world will pass away shortly.

Whom will you obey, especially when one knows that Satan has already been consumed by fire?

What prevents you from living within the laws of God that have been written on your heart and mind, especially when you know that your righteousness must exceed that of the Pharisees (Matt 5:17-20) and can by hearing the words of Jesus and believing the Father?

WHAT ARE YOU HEARING?

What are your teachers presenting as the way of God? A once saved, always saved gospel? A dispensation of grace gospel? A gospel about the soon-coming kingdom of God? A prosperity gospel? Or the gospel that all who endure to the end will be saved (Matt 24:13-14)? Those who endured have ALREADY been saved.

CONCLUSION:

Christ today sits at the right hand of the Father, but not in our narrative of history. In our narrative He labors as Israel’s high priest. Outside of time, He rests. The creation has expanded to its limitation. Outside, it will shortly be time for the new heaven and new earth to arrive. Then all that isn’t incorruptible will be destroyed by fire. Thus, we can date “where” in the historical narrative those who are Outside sit. That "where" is the seventh day, following Satan being turned to ashes. Christ sits at the right hand of the Father, for it is an everlasting Sabbath day; i.e., the Lord’s day.

Christ is Lord of the Sabbath (Matt 12:8), for Christ is the reality of the Sabbath. Our rest in Christ is with Him as He rests from His labor of bringing many heirs to glory. The annual high festival days of God are shadows of what Christ did in bringing these many heirs to glory; thus, their reality, especially Yom Kipporim, is also Christ in both a figurative and a literal sense. Two coverings, two goats, one sacrificed for the sins of Israel at Calvary, one toiling among the thorns and thistles outside of spiritual Eden, bearing the sins of Israel that were pronounced over its head before being lead away by the hand of a fit man – the reality of Yom Kipporim is grace.

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The Philadelphia Church

Juxtaposition of Past and Future