-Life and More Abundant Life-
John 10:10
[Part One]

The words of God are so multi-tiered, so weighty, so far-reaching in their scope and dimension that most Christians and their ministers who profess to know God and are students of his word understand little or nothing of what God is saying. Yet they preach from the minuscule knowledge they possess, which is not enough to complete a competent sermon that edifies God s people, and they never think to learn more. These are those who, unlike the wise man who lays up knowledge and loves instructions, hate knowledge and will not be instructed in understanding. [Prov.1:22; 10:14]
     I have seen old and young preachers rush into a room (the Pastor s Study) and within one hour or less come back with what they call a message for God s people. This is like a wife who serves up a meal for a husband within one hour of preparation and cannot imagine why the husband is dissatisfied with the meal or her generally. Soon the husband starts eating out before coming home because home is not home at all, but an insult to him and his position as husband that has a helpmate in his wife. And so it is with fast-food sermons of no substance they are an insult to God s people, and God identifies with His people.
     But God s word in clear, Man shall not live by bread alone but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God.  [Mat. 4:4] No minister can get a sermon worthy of feeding the people of God in one hour! What he is probably serving God s people is milk, if that. But every minister who uses milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness. The Bible says he is a babe. But these babes should not be preaching. They need to be taught, not teach others. For you see, a child cannot tutor another child to maturity or adulthood.  So are these unskilled ministers who are merely children in the word, and being children by their low skill-level in the word, they often become oppressors of God s people, as prophesied in Isaiah not allowing questions or any questioning of their interpretations, although flawed they often are. This is characteristic of highly unlearned and insecure minds because they cannot handle challenges of their notions of things godly or of things rational. [Heb. 5:12-14;Isa. 3:12]
     Since God s word is so complex and multi-faceted in its meaning and vast scope, it will take greater and more learned men than American fast food preachers to feed the flock of God, which He has purchased with his own blood. And, indeed, this is the one of the cardinal commandments of God to His ministers! [John 21:15-17; Acts 20:28; 1 Pet.5:2] But to follow this command correctly and that is the only way it can be done-- a minister must labor in the word, be taught by someone who has his understanding open, hence, someone with a right understanding of God s word, he must study constantly as a habit peculiar to academicians, and he must love truth and knowledge. Yet, in many churches and among many ministerial associations and groups there is almost a culture of ignorance and hatred of knowledge, as it is a threat to fools and foolish teaching.
     The above scripture, for example, is multi-tiered and vast in scope; vaster than most of the unlearned would imagine. [Acts 20:28; 1 Pet. 5:2] Jesus words operate on several levels: First, he states a universal principle that is rules all living things on this earth, whether animal life, plant life, or human life.*  Second, he speaks spiritually of obtaining spiritual life for mortal, sinful man while here in the earth; third his words transcend this life to another life after this earthly existence has come to its end. Allow me to explain.

Level One

     All living things want to continue to live; indeed, continuity of life is almost a prime directive built within the very tissue and DNA of all living things. Notice this truth about the continuity of the living process in human beings: human beings cannot by force of will, while in good health and full mental capacity, simply decide to stop living and cease to live any longer. Built within us is the urge, the spirit of the life-giver, the dynamism of life, and we cannot, excluding some external force, terminate our lives by force of will. Jesus, of course, could, and indeed he did that is the marvelous and almost unfathomable grace of God to take one perfect man who would willingly do the will of God perfectly in laying down his very life for all of sinful mankind. Jesus had said this, No man takes it [my life] from me,...I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it up again.  [John 10:17-18] And on Calvary, we see the multiple grace of God where Jesus laid down his life and three days later he picked it up again.** But living human beings do not have such power. Maybe our ability to extinguish our own lives is because the spirit of man is from God, and it is the candle of God, which He holds within his own sovereign power. [Prov. 20:27]
     So strong is this desire for life that living creatures will do all within their powers to stop any threat against the disruption of their living process; even to the point of killing another thing or person that threatens an end to their living. Human beings have enshrined it in their laws that one person may kill another or anything that is attempting to stop its life process. We call this self-defense. The laws of God and man allow self-defense.
     Of course, some murderous spirits have taken this concept too far and have initiated preemptive acts they call self-defense killing others based upon the speculations or assumptions of their own minds and not based on facts. Take the paranoid person; he  may do anything because he feels that everyone is out to get him. And that thought or feeling is a figment of his/her unbalanced and poorly functioning mind. This is just one of the many problems with preemptive self-defense.
    The point is this: universally, human beings have regarded one person s slaying another in defense of his own life as a legitimate act of self-defense. That is the extreme that human beings will go to in preservation of their living process. There are other acts in between this extreme cutting off a foot, arm, leg, etc., if that member threatens to kill the whole body.
     The behavior of animals toward anything or anyone who poses a threat to their lives is basically the same, if those are the only options available to them. First, an animal will flea and hide, and when that is not enough they will fight to the death of the threat or until the threat cease being a threat, as they perceive it.
      Plant life will also do all it can to avoid a threat to its life: camouflage itself; embitter its taste; prick its intruder; and produce toxic scents and odors to discourage the threat. It will do all within its power to fight off the threat because it wants to continue to live.
     This principle of protecting the continuity of life is true on the microscopic levels as well. Viruses and diseases mutate to avoid and resist drugs that would kill them out. Take the HIV/AIDS virus, it has mutated and become resistant to various assaultive drug regimens used against it. It wants to continue living. Its life is like gangrene; it will eventually kill its host, but it wants to continue living.
     And after living and ensuring the continuity of life, living things want to enhance, make better their lives; have an abundant life. This second aspect of this universality spoken by Jesus is paralleled by Abraham Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs namely to enhance our living. Jesus calls this abundant life.   

     If you observe Maslow s pyramid chart, you will see that after a person can ensure the needs of the body (food and safety) gratuitous needs manifest themselves. These are abundant life things and artifacts of this life.

     Human beings get up in the mornings and go to jobs/work to make sure we will have food and shelter. This is an American paradigm; it may be done somewhat differently elsewhere, but the same principle is at stake. We also work to have some of the seeming gratuitous needs that are often merely secure wants not needs. Certainly we send our children to school many years and we attain higher degrees ourselves at great academic, time-cost, and financial costs to our lives to enhance our living to help others also enhance their living; to buy some of the artifacts of life that make life easier or more tolerable, etc. These are behaviors that exist in all societies and among all peoples of the world. These behaviors and desires are what we call universalities things common to all mankind. And on this level Jesus  words addressed natural man.

Level Two
     On this second level, the words of Jesus refer to a spiritual life of man from his state of death without God. Remember, God sentenced man to death. That death was an immediate loss of fellowship with God (spiritual) and also a physical death within God s day; [Gen. 3:24] man could no longer stand before God without shame and sin, so he was separated from God God drove his from His presence. [Gen. 3:24; Isa. 59:2-3]
     But God is the very essence and source of all life wherever there is life. So not having a fellowship with God results in death wherever there is life but a loss of fellowship with God, because without God no life can be sustained for any significant time physically or spiritually. Adam received life when God breathed into him. [Gen.2: 7] That was his life and when he was thrown out of Eden that was his spiritual death and the beginning of his physical death also because he/they had no access to the presence of the Eternal Spirit. And this death (separation) would eventuate into a second death that is eternal, but for the grace of God. [Rev.20:14-15]
     One day, long after man had turned from God through sin, God looked down on mankind to see how far they had gone into unrighteousness and death or if there was any that did the word of God. His conclusion was that they have altogether become filthy and there was none righteous, no not one! And in their going aside from the right way of God, they had lost an important aspect of knowledge to the point of their becoming fools and questioning the very existence of God. [Psa.14: 2-4]
     This is the nature of the fool: because he is foolish in his imaginations and musings, he tends to think that others are like him and can only understand what they see, feel, hear, taste, and smell they too, like him, are brute creatures governed only by their physical senses. And if there is truth or life beyond those animalistic preceptors, they do not have the ability to perceive it. So the fool vulgarly concludes that there is nothing else but that which he can discover through his senses, including the eternal God who made him. These are men dead in trespasses and sin to the point that they have become even as the beast that was made the same day God made man the sixth day. Count the number of the beast, his number is that of a man, and that number is six, six, six!
      There is an interesting and relevant scripture in the book of Revelation, where Jesus said that he would kill the children of Jezebel with death. [Rev. 2:23] God is referring to the idolatry of the church at Thyatira, and every other church that claims to represent God, that had allowed Jezebel s teachings under the guise of being a prophetess; those were teachings that caused God s people to go contrary to his word. Jesus says there,  &I will kill her children with death.  But death is a state of being; one is normally killed by sickness, trauma, disease, etc., and taken to that state, not that state killing someone.
     A way to see what Jesus is saying in this word is to understand that to be carnally minded is death a state of deadness/absent from God s fellowship and also human existence. [Rom. 8:6] And without the fellowship of God man will certainly die, be transported to the state of death. Concerning the children of Jezebel who had been taught things that seduced them and caused them to go contrary to God s word, Jesus says this: I have given them ample space to repent of behavior and teachings contrary to sound doctrine, and they did not repent but continued in their own ways. And as they continue in their unsavory and vulgar ways, I will send them a strong delusion that they believe that delusion and all the untruths associated with it and be damned. [2Thes.2: 10-12]  And they will be blinded  to any knowledge of God by the carnality they engage in, which is death. That carnality and all the consequences an absence of any God-consciousness; an absence of any morality or guidance from God; an abhorrence of God s righteousness in preference to their own--will bring them to a state of physical and certainly spiritual death. Hence I will kill her children with death worldly carnality.
     Look further at what God is doing to Jezebel herself as well as her children: She will die and pass on, but her children will also die, and there will be no remembrance of her on the face of the earth. To kill the children of a man is to wipe out any remembrance that such a one has ever lived, ever walked on God s green earth!
     Human beings extend themselves through the lives of their children; that is why children are the blessings of the Lord. But when the anger of God is kindled, not only will he destroy the person whom he is angry with, but He may even erase any sign, signal, or symbol that such a person has ever lived, and he may blot out their name and the names of his offspring from His book of life! [Ex. 32:33; Rev. 3:5]  The great Apostle Paul said, It is a fearful things to fall into the hands of the living God.  And indeed it is! [Heb. 10:31]
     Man without Christ is spiritually dead; for Christ is the door to God, as Jesus said, I am the door to the sheepfold. One cannot lawfully come up any other way, and those who have come up is other ways have not come up lawfully. There are many supposed Christians who are Christians in their own way instead of God s way. But since getting back to God is a God devised plan, it only seems logical that the steps He has laid out for getting to Jesus, the door, are the steps that one would walk in. Yet men are Christians without the necessity of being Christians the way God dictates. 
     But Paul argues that such a thing cannot be the case. Listen to his reasoning,   &if a man also strive for masteries, yet is he not crowned, except he strive lawfully.  [2Tim. 2:5] To obey God s explicit instructions about coming to him is to come to him lawfully. And on this point, Jesus is more than clear about the way:

Verily, verily, I say unto you, he that entereth not by the door into the sheepfold, but climbeth up some other  way, the same is a thief and a robber &.Verily, verily, I say unto you, I am the door of the sheep &.I am the door: by me if any man enter in, he shall be saved, and shall go in and out and find pasture. 
[John 10:1-9]

This is as clear as anyone needs about the right way to God. Yet it is the tendency of man to think that human reasoning is acceptable with God and what a man will accept God will also accept. But that is flawed reasoning. God does not think like man and His ways are not like men. [Isa. 55: 7-9] He has stated the procedure needed to get to God and His word is eternally settled in heaven on this subject. [Psa. 119:87] Jesus, God in human flesh to do a specific act of grace, stated to Nicodemus and to all of us that one must be born again of water and spirit to enter into the Kingdom of God the sheepfold. 

&Verily, verily, I say unto thee, except a man be born of water and of the spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the spirit is spirit. Marvel not that I said unto thee, ye must be born again. [John 3:3-7]
   

Furthermore, man must be born again because he is born into sin and that is death. So he is spiritually dead at birth because of sin. Jesus indirectly illuminated this notion further when he told a young man to follow him and the young man said first he would have to bury his father. Jesus hearing that answer replied this: Let the dead bury their dead.  [Lk. 9:59-60] The young man s father was physically dead and he wanted to bury that father; Jesus also recognized the physical death of the young man s father and he also explained to us that those not physically dead were/are, in fact, spiritually dead. Hence, he said, Let the dead (spiritually) bury their (physical) dead. 
     Jesus wanted to quicken the young man spiritually but his priority, as many others today, was of this natural, physical world and not things spiritual. He had the language of spirituality, but his priority was natural and that precluded him from going with Jesus. What things preclude you from going Jesus, God s word?
     After the Prophet Nathan confronted David of his sin with Bathsheba, Uriah s wife, David wrote that he was almost hapless to do anything about himself because he was shaped in iniquity and in sin his mother conceived him. And as a result of his birth he could not help himself from his sin. [Psa. 51:5-6; Rom. 3:23; 5:12] This was the state of affairs for all mankind overwhelmed by this body of flesh. And that is why we must be born out of this world and carnal body into the kingdom of God.

    And that same Jesus who instructed Nicodemus of water and spirit rebirth also gave Peter and the other apostles the keys to the Kingdom of God, saying whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven. [Mat. 16:17-19] What the apostles said, Jesus is therefore saying, I will make it stand not only in the earth but also in heaven. Of course, He knew that they would say what He had taught them to say. [Mat. 10:19-20] God worded their mouths to speak the commands they spoke in his name.

     Concerning what Jesus told Nicodemus, He had taught his disciples, especially Peter, James, and John. And when the day came for the door (Jesus) to the sheepfold to be open, they opened it, and God worded their mouths. The day of Pentecost was upon them when the church was born and the doors first opened to the world of sinners needing to accept the grace of God.
    Oh the beauty of God s doings! Jesus had already paid the price at Calvary for our sins, He had risen to show that He could take back his life at his will and be the first fruits of those who slept waiting for Shiloh, and He had already ascended unto the Father as high priest to make complete his atonement for sin. And now on Pentecost, God established the sheepfold/the church that sinful mankind could enter and benefit from all of his doings. Hallelujah!
     And Peter, the instrument of God for opening the door to the sheepfold took the keys that had been given to him, opened the door and said here is how you come in: All mankind who wants to enter 1.) must repent of their sins and 2.) be baptized in Jesus name for the remission of those sins and 3.) they shall receive the gift of the holy Spirit. He stated that this promise of the Holy Spirit as a gift of God was for everyone who would enter, as they acquiesced to this process delineated by Peter. [Acts 2:37-42] In delineating that specific process, Peter settled all arguments about correctness on the earth and Jesus established that process in heaven.
     A careful study of John 3:3-5, will show that Peter s process of being born again is the same thing that Jesus had said to Nicodemus Water and spirit, but with greater details of how the water was to be administered and how the spirit was to come: Do the water as Peter said, and the spirit will come as God promised. This is now the established words of God for baptism, as it was for hundreds of years. Remember, however, to come up some other way, whether wrongly interpreted way or deliberately and willfully contrary way,  is not God s way. It is an unlawful way; it is another way and that is unacceptable to God!  I advise that every man must examine himself as see if he is in the faith. These words of Paul suggest that many are not in the faith. [2 Cor.13:5; 1 Thes. 5:21] Jesus came that you might have spiritual life and have it more abundantly.     

See the Conclusion of this discussion:  Life and More Abundant Life: The Conclusion

__________________
* Life and intelligence are found on many levels of existence and in many things that most of us assume they don t exist. I contend that there is life in many things that seem inanimate, and that life will respond to us were we conscious of the power and godly skills in us to communicate in such a way as to make them hear our voice. Lest you assume I have gone too far or human learning has made me mad, I source my reference points: Elisha took a stick and demanded that an exe-head swim to the stick; [[2 Kings 6:5] We never think of iron having life of any intelligence, but Elisha communicated with it; Joshua talked to and even commanded the sun and the moon to stop moving until he had completed the Lord s work; [Joshua 10:12-13]  The sun and moon are not things that normally succumb to the voice of men. They are not normally considered capable of communications, but Joshua used the God-given power to speak to these huge objects and make them do as he commanded. Of course, god was showing us in this allegory the authority and power that we, God s New Testament saints would have at our disposal. Of course, Jesus, our example par excellence spoke to trees, weather, and food and made it do as he commanded. Furthermore, he said that we could tell mountains to be cast into the sea and it would do it.

There is life and intelligence beyond what we can think or even imagine.  God is so great and marvelous in His creation and all things that he does; all His creation responds to His voice and to whomever he has given His power. We are heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ, hence, we are gods to whom the word of God has come. Therefore, God has delegated His mighty powers to men His saints! [John 10:34-35; John 14:12-15; Rom. 8:17;Gal. 3:29; Titus 3:7]

**The Bible teaches us that on Calvary, Jesus, when he knew he had completed his task, [John 19:30] cried with a loud voice saying, Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani?  [Mark 15:34] and gave up the ghost; he commended his spirit unto God and died. [Luke 23:46; 24:6] When the Roman soldiers came to the three on the cross to pierce them with their spears to hasten, Jesus was already dead. [Mark 15:44] He died at his will and when he wanted to.

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 2006