16. The Chosen Ones
Genesis reveals that Adam and Eve, in believing the Serpent’s lies, tore themselves away from the authority of God’s Word. That means they severed their spiritual connection and that of their offspring, from the Creator and Sustainer of all created things! So instead of remaining God’s image and likeness in their spirits, they allowed the Serpent to ‘decapitate’ them spiritually. Thus humanity became spiritually ‘Head-less’ and therefore – dead. Without their Head, God’s living Word, they were blind and deaf to knowing God or hearing His voice. All that remained in them was a vague, dim sense of His existence, but they were dead to knowing Him personally and intimately as they did when they were still His image and likeness…before Sin killed their connection with Him.
“Therefore, just as through one man sin entered into the world, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men, because all sinned—for until the Law sin was in the world, but sin is not imputed when there is no law. Nevertheless death reigned from Adam until Moses, even over those who had not sinned in the likeness of the offense of Adam, who is a type of Him who was to come. (Romans 5:12-14 NASB Emphasis added.)
The damage done to human nature was unspeakable. Prior to the fall, they were not only connected to God and knew Him and His heavenly realm intimately, but they were also beautifully connected to and in harmony with all of His Creation. But now they were ‘the living dead’ spiritually speaking… limited to personal isolation and temporal, earthly, self-centered viewpoints, thoughts and urges. Nicodemas was such a man. His fallen intellect, will and the sensibilities of his soul had been highly developed and cultured by his Torah studies and he had become extremely religious, but when God’s living Word stood before him in the flesh, He had to spell out the basic facts of Genesis for him. Nicodemas had not been able to grasp and understand what it really said, thanks to his decapitated state and the false assumption that his religious efforts to improve himself would be enough to justify Him in the sight of God and save him:
Jesus answered and said to him, ‘Truly truly I say to you, unless one is born again (united to Me …under My Headship) he cannot see the kingdom of God.’ (John 3:3 Amplification added.)
God’s Full Self-Revelation to Man – Yeshua
Because God is perfect and His eternal Word never changes, He sent His Word to seek men out after the fall, to restore anyone whose heart would be willing to return to his Creator on the Creator’s terms. The Word was sent to reconnect all humans to His Father and reveal His ways to them once more. The living Word is thus the only Way back to God and His Eternal Life.
So pay close attention to the following texts. They express the dismal post-fall reality into which humanity fell. They also reveal that the living Word of God is the emissary or messenger God sends to us. He is the vitally essential connecting link between God and the entire fallen human race:
“They heard the sound of the (Word of the) LORD God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the LORD God among the trees of the garden. Then (through His living Word) the LORD God called to the man, and said to him, ‘Where are you?’ He said, ‘I heard the sound of You in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; so I hid myself. And He said, ‘Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree of which I commanded you not to eat?’ (Genesis 3:8-11 Emphases added.)
“But He (the Word of God) said (to Moses), ‘You cannot see My Face, for no man can see Me and live!’ Then the LORD said, ‘Behold, there is a place by Me, and you shall stand there on the rock; and it will come about, while My Glory is passing by, that I will put you in the cleft of the rock and cover you with My hand (living Word) until I have passed by. Then I will take My hand away and you shall see My back (another aspect of My living Word), but My Face shall not be seen.’” (Exodus 33:20-23 Emphasis added.)
God reveals Himself to the fallen Sin-full world, exclusively through His Word. To do it, He chooses certain humans to whom He initially reveals His Word. They are like the ‘beachhead’ of His redemptive invasion into the fallen, Serpent-possessed human world. If these respond to God’s Word in obedient faith and allow Him total access, the Word can re-attach them to Himself and enable them to share and partake of His own eternal Life. Then, from that ‘beachhead’ He has established, through them, He begins to proceed ‘inland’ to reach, save, teach train and equip other decapitated people in the same way.
Invading the Darkness and Deception
The chosen ones serve as the Word’s ‘points of entry’ and ‘bases of operation’ throughout the advance of His Invasion process. To equip them, God also provides His written Word, the Scriptures. The written Word reveals the living Word and explains His purpose and significance to them, since they are now one with Him and interact with Him in real life. God’s Holy Spirit makes the living and written Word of God real and dynamically active to, in and through these disciples. As they submit to the Word and come under His authority, He becomes their Head and they become His Body on Earth. They share in His eternal Life, love nature, character, disposition and redemptive activity. And this is what the Word made flesh was referring to when He said:
“Yes Father, for this way was well-pleasing in Your sight. All things have been handed over to Me by My Father; and no one knows the Son except the Father; nor does anyone know the Father except the Son, and anyone to whom the Son wills to reveal Him. (Matthew 11:26-27 Emphasis added.)
Jesus (the living Word that God sent to the world)*said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father but through Me.” (John 14:6 Amplification and emphasis added.)
So Scripture reveals that God sends His living Word to speak, act and interact with fallen humanity. Genesis and the rest of the Torah reveal this. Thus the Word reveals the Father, and the Father reveals His Word:
“In the beginning God (through His Word) created the heavens and the earth. The earth was formless and void, and darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was moving over the surface of the waters. Then God (through His Word) said, ‘Let there be light’; and there was light. God saw that the light was good; and God (by His Word) separated the light from the darkness.” (Genesis. 1:1-4 Emphasis added.)
“For the Word of God is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword, and piercing as far as the division of soul and spirit, of both joints and marrow, and able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart. And there is no creature hidden from His sight, but all things are open and laid bare to the eyes of Him with whom we have to do.” (Hebrews 4:12-13 Emphases added.)
The Living Word Revealed
God speaks and His Word comes forth to obey and cause whatever Father wants, to come to pass (Isaiah 55:6-11). The Word creates and provides; He sustains, heals, liberates, revivifies, reunites and transforms Sin-damaged Creation. And the Bible, God’s written Word, reveals this dynamic world-changing work of the living Word in a variety of ways. The beginning of John’s Gospel makes this continual revelation and pre-eminence of the living Word blatantly clear by linking the introduction of his Gospel to the introduction of Genesis, the first book of the Torah of Moses. Both reveal and explain the same person – the living creative Word that comes forth from Almighty God Himself. And the apostle John makes it clear that the living Word Moses wrote about in the Torah is the same Word that later became flesh and dwelt among us, as Rabbi Yeshua of Nazareth.
So in our post-incarnation era, we can know God’s living Word in His fullest, most comprehensive New Covenant manifestation (See Jeremiah 31:31-34; Ezekiel 36:22-28). God’s living Word actually lives in His New Covenant disciples and operates through them by the Power of God’s Holy Spirit. But the same Word was being revealed right from the beginning…to Adam, Eve, Cain and Abel and so on. His revelation is given in various ways and forms from Genesis through Revelation.
“For the Law (Torah) was given through (the Word revealed through) Moses; grace and truth were realized through (the living Word who is) Jesus Christ. No one has seen God at any time; the only begotten God (Yeshua) who is in the bosom of the Father, He has explained Him.” (John 1:17-19 Amplification and emphases added.)
“You search the Scriptures (the menu) because you think that in them you have eternal life; it is these that testify about Me (the real, living Feast); and you are unwilling to come to Me so that you may have life. I do not receive glory from men; but I know you, that you do not have the love of God in yourselves. I (the Living Word) have come in My Father’s name, and you do not receive Me; if another comes in his own name, you will receive him. How can you believe, when you receive glory from one another and you do not seek the glory that is from the one and only God? Do not think that I will accuse you before the Father; the one who accuses you is Moses, in whom you have set your hope. For if you believed Moses, you would believe Me, for he wrote about Me. But if you do not believe his writings, how will you believe My words? (John 5:39-47 Emphases added.)
Yeshua said it point blank: Moses was writing about Him! In other words, He is the same living creative Word of God that was first revealed in Genesis and the rest of the Torah. He is the one that dealt with Adam and Eve, Cain and Abel, Noah, and Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, Moses and Joshua!
So despite what many say today about Jesus being a charlatan, or a false prophet, or a revered historical figure and wise spiritual teacher, thanks to the gift of the Holy Spirit that can now operate as promised in the Word’s New Covenant disciples, we can know Him as He really is!
“And He said to them, ‘O foolish men and slow of heart to believe in all that the prophets have spoken! Was it not necessary for the Christ (Messiah) to suffer these things and to enter into His glory?’ (See Isaiah 53) Then beginning with Moses and with all the prophets, He explained to them the things concerning Himself in all the Scriptures (The Tanach).” (Luke 24:25-27 Emphasis added.)
“While they were telling these things, He Himself stood in their midst and *said to them, ‘Peace be to you.’ But they were startled and frightened and thought that they were seeing a spirit. And He said to them, ‘Why are you troubled, and why do doubts arise in your hearts? See My hands and My feet, that it is I Myself; touch Me and see, for a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have.’ And when He had said this, He showed them His hands and His feet. While they still could not believe it because of their joy and amazement, He said to them, ‘Have you anything here to eat?’ They gave Him a piece of a broiled fish; and He took it and ate it before them.
“Now He said to them, ‘These are My words which I spoke to you while I was still with you, that all things which are written about Me in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled.’ Then He opened their minds to understand the Scriptures, and He said to them, “Thus it is written (in the Tanach or Old Testament) that the Christ (Messiah) would suffer and rise again from the dead the third day, and that repentance for forgiveness of sins would be proclaimed in His name to all the nations, beginning from Jerusalem. You are witnesses of these things. And behold, I am sending forth the promise of My Father upon you; but you are to stay in the city until you are clothed with (Holy Spirit) Power from on high.” (Luke 24:36-49 Amplification and emphasis added.)
He is God’s living Word who became flesh in the fullness of God’s timing (the first century CE). But He is and always will be the eternal living Word of God, revealed from the beginning through various other manifestations, given to certain chosen people throughout the Torah era and the days of the Wisdom writers and the prophets of Israel. So the Word reveals His Father and His ways; and the Father reveals His Son. God is forever ONE with His living Word and His Holy Spirit!
“Hear, O Israel! The LORD is our GOD, the LORD is ONE! (In Hebrew: Echad) (Deuteronomy 6:4 Emphasis and amplification added.)
“In the beginning (Genesis or Bereishis or Bereshit) was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through Him, and apart from Him nothing came into being that has come into being. In Him was life and the life was the Light of men. The Light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it.” (John 1:1-2)
“And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us, and we saw His glory, glory as of the only begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth. John (the Immerser) *testified about Him and cried out, saying, ‘This was He of whom I said, ‘He who comes after me has a higher rank than I, for He existed before me.’ For of His fullness we have all received, and grace upon grace.” (John 1:14-16 Emphasis added.)
Progressive Manifestation
In the following Follow Me meditations we will see a progressive manifestation of God’s living Word begin to unfold. God will continue to summon men and women to follow His Word as devoted disciples and servants. And through the Holy Spirit, Yeshua continually abides with those who obey. And now He is here to abide within us, to teach and train us in His New Covenant ways. And we are to be trained to serve as His disciples at the New Covenant level of fulfillment.
But before any of that can happen we must get to know our Master and His ways and purposes with authentic Biblical accuracy and precision. To do that, we must be able to see the fullness of His Biblical revelation…from the beginning of Genesis to the end of the Book of Revelation. If we do not see Him in His Biblical fullness, we’re robbed of major portions of the revelation treasury God gave concerning His Son. The more that happens, the more of a Stranger will our Master be to us and the more distance we will allow to exist between us. And the Serpent would like nothing better than for our understanding of Him to be skewed, flawed and misleading. If he can’t eliminate Him entirely from our minds and hearts, he will at least try to morph, twist and distort Him beyond recognition. So we can’t afford to be naïve in this matter and assume that we can have a comprehensive understanding of our Master merely by reading about Him in the New Testament. That will disfigure Him and cut us off from major portions of God’s Self-Revelation and grossly distort our understanding. Then our presentation and proclamation of the Messiah of Israel will also be grossly distorted and woefully incomplete.
The Word Who Interacts With Us
The Word of God was on the Earth, interacting with men, long before He became flesh and appeared as Yeshua of Nazareth. When we realize this, we can begin to look for Him…and see Him as He reveals Himself throughout the Hebrew Scriptures (Tanach). Then we will receive a much more complete and accurate and heart-penetrating understanding of the purposes underlying the Torah and what the Wisdom writers, psalmists and prophets were inspired to write and to do. Because God’s revelation of His Word runs throughout all Scripture, His revelation is a perfect seamless garment that permeates every book, from first to last. God’s Word is perfectly consistent with Himself. God is one with His Word; and through His Word He deals with all fallen flesh in the same way, for the same reasons.
The Word created the heavens, the earth and all the created hosts that inhabit them. He is at the heart and soul of everything God says and does throughout the Bible. Once we know this, we will see our Master with much more accuracy and precision. And we will fathom at much deeper levels, more of His enormity, magnitude and depth. The apostle Paul tried to articulate His preeminent magnitude in these mind-boggling terms:
“He is the Image of the invisible God, the Firstborn 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 through Him and for Him. He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together. He is also Head of the Body, the Church (in Hebrew: ‘Qahal’) and He is the Beginning, the Firstborn from the dead, so that He Himself will come to have first place in everything. For it was the Father’s good pleasure for all the Fullness to dwell in Him, and through Him to reconcile all things to Himself, having made peace through the Blood of His Cross; through Him, I say, whether things on Earth or things in Heaven. (Colossians 1:15-20)
Reattached to our Head, and all that comes to us from Him
So although we cannot at this time know and see God face to face, we can nevertheless connect with and know God personally, intimately and accurately, by receiving, embracing and obeying His living Word, Yeshua. He is the living Word that God spoke to us. If we allow Him (the real Feast) to pierce, penetrate, impregnate us, as we learn about Him through the written Word (the menu), God will re-attach us to Himself through the Holy Spirit and the Spirit will make Yeshua real to us and active in us. Then God’s Word will truly be our Head and eternal Life and Wisdom and Righteousness, and we will truly be His living embodiment and revelation to the decapitated world around us.
Hopefully the awesome Reality and Truth of God’s Word that we’ve already seen in Genesis 1-11, will become even more real and true to us as we begin exploring Genesis chapter twelve and beyond. We will see how God began to reach out to the fallen, demon-possessed post- flood world of fallen men.
Perhaps what we’ve learned so far will help us recognize more of the significance of Yeshua of Nazareth. God does everything through Him. He is the living Word of God revealed in the Torah and beyond. He has always been in the forefront of everything God did in the past, and is doing in the present, and ever will do in the future. From eternity to eternity, Yeshua, the living Word of God, is ALL in all! Many decapitated people in our world may deny and reject Him…nevertheless…He is the Eternal Word of the Living God…and no one comes to the Father except by, and through, Him.
Getting Equipped
Knowing this equips us to better understand and interpret whatever portion of Scripture we consider. As mentioned, Scripture is like a menu God gave to the world. By learning what the ‘menu’ says, we know what to expect from the living Word of God as He actually abides within us and interacts with us in daily life. He is the real Living Feast to whom the Biblical menu directs us. His Resurrection Presence is here to become more and more real and dynamically effective…to us…in us…for us and…through us. That doesn’t happen when we limit ourselves to an intense study the menu. It happens when we actually do what the menu tells us to do…when we actually believe, accept, embrace, submit to and begin to interact with the living Word who is here to be our indwelling Life and Eternal Feast!
So let’s ponder the following ‘disciple-training’ text that is given to the ‘royal priesthood’ company of disciples, for all of God’s Jewish and non-Jewish New Covenant Family:
“Hear, O Israel! The LORD is our God, the LORD is one! You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. These words (which reveal God’s living Word), which I am commanding you today, shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your sons and shall talk of them when you sit in your house and when you walk by the way and when you lie down and when you rise up. You shall bind them as a sign on your hand and they shall be as frontals on your forehead. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.” (Deuteronomy 6:4-9)
The Disciple Job Description
Do you recognize the above text? It is called, in Hebrew, ‘The Shema’. It is the first word of that text. It means, ‘Hear!’, or, ‘Obey!’ For centuries God-loving Jews have tried to make the first statement of that text be the last thing they utter with their dying breath. But I ask you to begin to think of those words not only as your last affirmation of your faith in God, but as your daily, ongoing, disciple ‘job description’!
God required post-Exodus Israel to impress these words on the heart and soul of every descendant of Jacob. All Israelites were called and commissioned to be disciples of God’s living Word, in spirit and in truth…disciples in their hearts, minds, wills and affections. And that Covenant requirement will never change. God requires modern day disciples to do the very same thing. Our Master Yeshua is the same living Word that was revealed to Moses and his generation. And He deserves the very same wholehearted acceptance, devotion and obedience from all of us, whether you’re Jewish or not. Regardless of the age or era in which we serve God, we must all be trained to respond to God’s Word…just as Adam, Eve, Abel, Cain and the patriarchs of Israel were required to do. It always was, and always will be, a matter of the obedience that flows from authentic faith in the living God. But before this can happen…God’s living Word must be able to appear to us from out of the pages of Scripture…and, by the Power of the Holy Spirit…actually pierce and penetrate our hardened stony hearts and break them open…so that He can then be free to enter our innermost beings and impregnate us with His indwelling Presence, Righteousness and Eternal Life!
This is what God always wanted from the moment He sent His Word after fallen Adam and Eve in the Garden. And this is what He was after throughout the first eleven chapters of Genesis and what He was after starting with chapter twelve when His Word appeared to Abram and this is what He is after all the way through the rest of the Bible! Understanding this, helps us understand our disciple ‘job description.’ Our post-Ascension, Spirit-filled, New Covenant task as disciples of the risen Messiah, looks like this:
1. Disciples live with the risen indwelling Word of God, day and night. Thus they get to know Him and His ways intimately and thoroughly and are on call to do His bidding.
2. They live with each other as His personal family members, as brethren.
3. They memorize their Master’s words and embody His teachings.
4. They follow His understanding and interpretation of the Scriptures.
5. They learn to embody His Spirit-empowered and Spirit-led indwelling activities and lifestyle.
6. They eventually transform into His living image and likeness. It becomes increasingly difficult for others to know where He ends and they begin.
7. They allow apprentice disciples to watch them interact with the Lord so that the apprentices can learn to be and do with the Lord what they see their veteran role models being and doing with Him.
8. After His Ascension back into Heaven, our Master imparted the gift of the Holy Spirit to all disciples. And through the Spirit, He becomes our indwelling Life. So we deny and forsake our former worldly lives, so He can be free to live His Life from within each of us. Thus we serve as His actual embodiment on the Earth. Through us, like a Heavenly Vine, God’s living Word will produce His fruit on the Earth, as only He can do it. And we, like living branches, bear His fruit for Him…to our Father’s eternal glory.
This is what image and likeness of God disciples do, regardless of what ethnic group, nationality, culture, age, religion or region that are originally born into. God sends the same Word to call us out of our naturally inherited, decapitated life in this world…and restores us to Himself and repairs the damage that was caused by Sin in all of us. Then through us…He sets out to do the same for everyone else that we will ever encounter in this life.
The Serpent’s Strategy and God’s Answer
The Serpent caused the fatal separation between God and mankind by deceitfully severing us from our one and only Life Source, God’s living Word. And he and his minions never stop trying to take the place of God’s Word in human hearts, minds and lives. They do everything they can to erase or twist and distort Him so that they can create separation between us and our Head, thereby making Him less effective and replacing Him in the awareness, affections and activities of as many humans as possible.
Scripture, beginning with Genesis and ending with Revelation, reveals the tremendous spiritual war that rages between God’s true, real Word and all the false, deceptive cheap counterfeits that the Serpent tries to foist on unsuspecting humans. Disciples must learn to stand their God-given Covenant Ground and resist the Serpent’s lies at all costs. But because of God’s eternally perfect nature, and because His perfect Word eternally possesses all Authority in the heavens and all across the Earth (Matthew 28:18), no matter what the Serpent tries to do to prevail and escape his coming eternal doom, he will never succeed. The matter was settled in eternity, even before time and space began, before the Serpent was created. Only God is God; and His Word, once He speaks it, prevails and endures forever. No created demon or human in time and space will ever come close to having what it would take to stop the eternal Lord from doing what God sent Him to do. There is only one who is Almighty; and He is Perfect; and Perfection never changes!
So we must allow God’s Spirit to train us to know God’s Word and His ways as intimately and accurately as possible. The Holy Spirit is the one that will train, equip and prepare us to withstand combat with the powers of Darkness and to prevail. The powers of Darkness must be dealt with first. Then the triumphant celebration and rewards, commendations and eternal commissions the Lord has in store for His victorious warriors and co-heirs will follow. For as the Master promised:
1. Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
2. Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.
3. Blessed are the gentle, for they shall inherit the earth.
4. Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.
5. Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy.
6. Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.
7. Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God.
8. Blessed are those who have been persecuted for the sake of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. (Matthew 5:3-10)
The same Word of God that gave the 10 commandments on Mt. Sinai, later explained, on another mountain in Israel, what obeying those commandments leads to. This is what He was teaching in what is called, ‘The Sermon on the Mount.’ He continues to articulate the Word-obeying agenda (given from the very beginning). Obedience leads fallen men back to God. And it’s the exact opposite of the death-dealing radically independent and rebellious agenda of the Serpent who deceives and drags people away from God. Disciples are here to be the living proof and demonstration of what our Master’s eternal Resurrection Life does when He invades the world of the living dead and takes over. Death can’t stop Life; Darkness can’t stop Light. And the Serpent can’t stop our risen Lord and Master, as long as He is fee to live and act from within us…for His is the Almighty Living God…the Lord who speaks and His Word performs whatever He wills!