SPIRITUAL ~~ INSIGHTS

The first thing we understand is the garden has two phases of reality. It is a natural garden filled with delicious fruit bearing trees. And it is a metaphoric garden with the tree of life producing the fruit of immortality. Also, we want to realize that our Father and God is omniscient and has perfect knowledge of good and evil.(Gen.3:22) He knows the intricate nature, expressions, and devious patterns intrinsic in evil, and yet, he is Holy and Righteous all together.

The Lord desired, thought and designed a prototype angel called Satan to be the chief adversary in his master plan. And the diabolic angels were developed from this original mold of evil, as well as Cain's spirit-intellect, which of course was the progenitor of all the Devil's "vessels of wrath fitted for destruction." Spirit-intellects incarnate with their corporeal bodies at birth with the very essence of evil, and programmed with their individual parameters of destiny. Therefore, we can understand the Devil is perfectly and absolutely evil from the very beginning. The Devil minus the capital "D" is evil, and that one word tells his story completely.(1-Jn.3:8-12)

The Lord meet with his chief adversary in a summit that is mind boggling to religionist today. It was God's "authority and command" that each of them would create a man in their own image and likeness. God said, "let us make man in our image and after our likeness." So God formed Adam's corporeal body out of the dust of the earth and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and Adam became a living soul.

The word soul in the Hebrew language is nepesh, and it defines a complete human being with a spirit-intellect as a living biological and physiological person that is self-aware through the senses and brain. Adam being a "living soul" does not mean human beings consist solely of physical matter. When God breathed the breath of life into Adam's nostrils, this creative action was more than "filling his lungs with air" to start the breathing process. It is a metaphor of course. And it was more than imparting a 'living spirit principle' to energized his brain and body to action. The Lord formed Adam's spirit-intellect, or spirit-mind from an attribute, and since God is the omnipresent Spirit of Life, the 'breath of life' was the spirit-intellect fused with the corporeal body, and Adam was divinely energized when this event occurred and he became a living person.(Eph.1:3-10, 1-Cor.2:10-16)

The spirit-intellect of Adam was part of the total expressed image of God as the WORD or Elohim-Jesus, and his corporeal body was the "image of the earth." (1-Cor.15:49) Adam was linked with a physical affinity to his environment through his senses and brain, and he could think, rationalize, and form concepts to articulate his love and thanksgiving to Elohim Jesus who was expressed in a theophany in the garden in the cool of the day. The serpent-creature was the highest animal created by God (Gen.2:18-19), and this creature walked, talked, and worked with Adam until woman was made. The Lord took a rib and the DNA from Adam's body and formed woman's corporeal body for her spirit-intellect, also a part of the total designed and expressed image of God.

The first immortal man and woman on the planet started their existence almost six thousand years ago, and their "conditional physical immortality" was sustained by the 'fruit of the tree of Life' in the garden of Eden. This metaphoric tree and its fruit was the partial revelation of Jesus Christ, and it constituted the intellectual substance and sustenance of their natural life. Were they absolutely perfect and complete like God? No! They were innocent, naive human beings placed on planet earth to experience the knowledge of "good and evil", and to repopulate and eventually subdue the earth with the God-kind, a feat that is in progress right now. Did they have a so-called "free moral agency", or the freedom to choose without any intrinsic or external influence? No! A free will is impossible as the Devil knows. The intellect of people must and will be determined in their choices, decisions, and goals in life by their natural desires, or by the divine nature of God.

The "purpose of God" reveals that through the temptation and sin by the woman, the Satan could bring a man in his own 'image and likeness' into the world to overthrow the people and plan of God. The Devil is not a creator and so he must pervert the reproductive process of God through the serpent-creature to accomplish his agenda. So the Devil possessed the serpent-creature and with his intricate knowledge of evil he created doubt in the woman's mind and deceived her. Woman was mesmerized with the idea of being a god, and she judged the words of the Devil to be true, and this word-seed determined her mind in her choice. (1-Tim.2:11-15) The scripture calls this innate influence the lust of the flesh, the mind, and the pride of life.

The sexual encounter that followed brought the corporeal body of the Devil's man into the world. Later, woman shared this carnal knowledge with her husband and he made loved to his wife. Now the woman is pregnant with fraternal twins. The first born is Cain, and his father is the Devil. (1-Jn.3:8-12) Abel's father was Adam whose spirit-intellect was the image of God. Now you can see, it was not an apple in the tree, but a pair on the ground.

The transgression of the command of God opened their minds to the new paradigm of life, and condemnation flooded their conscience when they lost their innocence. The 'metaphoric seed', the knowledge of evil was perceived in their minds where the partial knowledge of only good resided, and their spirit-intellects, the 'metaphoric garden' was contaminated. The moment the consciousness of sin entered their minds, the fruit of that seed was manifested and took complete control of their lives.

The sin, and the curse of sin brought the process of physical death, not only to their natural lives but, to the human family as well. Now everyone is born into this world under the dominion of original sin. "It is appointed unto humanity once to die but, after that the judgment.(Heb.9:27) Some people ask the question, why did God permit sin to contaminate the lives of the first human beings on this planet and bring sin, sickness, disease and physical death? The answer is given by the Lord and revealed to us today, and onced received, it is simple but true. It was God's predetermined will and purpose for woman to sin, and by the way, Adam sinned incognito in woman, because they were both made of the same flesh. The reality that God has perfect knowledge of good and evil, and yet, he is Holy and Righteous altogether, is the secret purpose for his people to be likewise. When the battle is over, the saints of God will possess the knowledge of good and evil with no condemnation, and yet, be Holy and Righteous altogether just like their Father. (Gen.2:21-25 ** 1-Tim.2:11-15 ** 1-Cor.15:19-28)

This sovereign desire, design, and choice of God intrinsic in his eternal purpose was to initiate the spiritual warfare and the bitter tug-of-war between the people and forces of good and evil. And since that day you can hear the death-cry being drowned in the battle roar, and the scattered lives on the bleeding ground. The serpent-creature is still doing his work today in perverting the truth of God, but in the form of preachers laboring mostly for financial gain, and to build their own kingdom. But thank God, there is victory and hope in the dynamic power of Jesus Christ, and the saints will overcome and rule this planet for a thousand years.