Knowing and Growing – Being transformed – what is God doing?
Vern Peterman · Jun 18, 2017
Knowing & Growing, No. 23
Holly Hills Bible Church
https://www.hollyhillsbiblechurch.org/teaching/messages/4926559562654

Transcribed from the recording by SermonAudio, so expect the occasional misheard word.

So now we have, kind of moving along in our sequence, being transformed. We're continuing to go through the different processes that God has in place. The first one we looked at is being conformed. And our sequence as we go through this is first to define it, what is being conformed, and then what is being, what is God's part, and then what is our part. And then so last week we introduced being transformed.

What is that? It's one that is rarely used in scripture, but it is unique and it is given And as we say here being transformed what does God's doing in that so our sequence is one get the definition and Secondly, how does God carry out that process? And knowing those things, what then is our part? That will be next week. So we have being transformed, what is God doing?

And the primary passage that we have to work from is 2 Corinthians 3, 17 and 18. And so we have it at the top of page one there. Now the Lord is the Spirit and where the Spirit of the Lord is there is liberty. But we all with unveiled face beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory just as from the Lord Spirit. Now, just to kind of give some perspective here, that passage starts off being all about the Law of Moses in 2 Corinthians chapter 3.

And so we have the veil. Where is the veil in 2 Corinthians chapter 3? Where is the veil first, first mentioned? Who's the veil on? on Moses. The veil is on Moses' face, and at first, as that passage makes out in 2 Corinthians 3, at first the veil is on Moses' face because of the glory of the law is shining, right?

And it's too much for them to look at. Then what we see is a diminishing of that shine, of that glory, and so the veil then covers up the the Diminishing glory now we have here, but we with unveiled face so what that says is if the glory of the law diminishing and so or at first is untolerable then is diminishing and the veil is for that and We all with unveiled face means we're not looking at the law. We're not depending on the law for glory. We're not depending on the law's glory. We're not under the law. We all with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory.

So now the big picture here, the big picture here in this is that We said being conformed is something where God Causes all things and this so this means things that are in the physical realm things in the spiritual realm Which conform us to the image of who? Christ right This also is a process in which we are being made into the image of Christ it is a separate process parallel but in the same direction, making us into the image of Christ. So we have two very different processes, both in the same direction, making us into the image of Christ.

And is God ever going to get done with that? Or does that just keep going and going and going? What's that? It keeps going and going while we're here on this planet. But remember, conformed is predestined, right? So that when we go to see the Lord, it's completed. So we have this transforming process here.

And so one of the things that we like to bring out in the New Testament If you ever watch any of these lawyer or murder mystery shows or any of those, what do they have? They have motive, means, and opportunity, right? And so why are they doing motive, means, and opportunity? Why are they using that checklist? To prove someone guilty, right? And the reason that they're doing that is to prove Someone guilty in the courtroom But that actually has a parallel For us and that is it means you actually do it, right?

The one who was guilty actually did it they had motive they have means they had an opportunity They actually did it. And so what this means is to actually live out the Christian life We have motive means and opportunity, right? And so we have those bullet points in the middle of page one and So grace is the motive. Do this because you are already blessed in the heavenly places in Christ, not in order to be blessed in earthly ways or to avoid the threatening earthly curses. Next, means to accomplish by the Holy Spirit enabled first to fully see, but enabled, empowered and energized to carry out the works that God has prepared beforehand.

So is it our job to live out the Christian life? It's not our job. We've been fired. So it's not our job. It is the Holy Spirit's job so that we're enabled, empowered, and energized to carry it out. And so if someone says, well, I try really hard to be a good Christian, stop that. If someone is saying, you know, I tried really hard to be a good Christian, I tried Christianity, but it didn't work for me. And probably if that's what you did, that's why it didn't work for you, right? And so what happens, we will hear people say that, the truth is that they didn't try Christianity. They tried something else, but it's not biblical Christianity, right? the means to accomplish this by the Holy Spirit.

We're going to be looking at Stephen, the beginning of the introduction of Stephen. We saw him listed briefly among those who were servants. They're among the widows. And so that's his introduction. We're going to see kind of part two with Stephen and how things start getting pretty involved for Stephen. But one of the things we're going to see is this very thing.

He was very obviously enabled and empowered and energized by the Holy Spirit. Third, we have spiritual opportunity. As a work of God, we have multiple spiritual opportunities that simply not be available under the law of Moses or any principle of law. He has prepared good works that we might walk in them. So He's provided the opportunity. He's provided the enabling, the empowering, and the energizing. He's provided the motive, grace. Motive means an opportunity.

So we have this wonderful spectrum of spiritual opportunities before us. It focuses on the specific spiritual opportunity we have under gracious liberty to behold the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ, who is written word. The outcome of our beholding the Lord, the living word of God, through the written word of God, is that we are spiritually transformed. How is transformed different from conformed? Well, what we will find and the reason we covered it the way we did is God has his part and we have our part, right? If God did not do everything that he does and did, we wouldn't have any part to do, right? We could not do our part.

We do have a part in both of those things. And that's why we pause and take a look at it, and we do it in that sequence. First, we spend a week defining what is conformed, what is transformed. Then we spend a week with each, as we will in the future on other processes. We spend a week with each saying, what does God do? And then, as we will do next week here, we look at what is our part given that we know what it is that being conformed or transformed is, given that we know God's part, then what is our part? Right? So, yes. Okay, conformed. That's the one where you showed the ball being hammered. Yes. And by the way, we'll show that again this morning in the main service, but yes. The slowly formation process. Right. Conform. Yeah.

Okay, so what's your definition of transform? Transform, we gave some biological examples. Here is a, yeah, it's a metamorphosis. And so again, it's a biological examples like all those analogies or pictures, they have their limitations, right? But that helps us understand, whereas being conformed is a slow process that has this being made, into conformity to Christ being transformed Just just like the biological process and to give the life cycle of for example Here's the butterfly and going through the larva and the cocoon stage and coming out a butterfly and that that whole life cycle This is a rather miraculous process the transformation is done by whom and by God, and specifically, what does 2 Corinthians 3 say? It's the Holy Spirit. It's the ministry of the Holy Spirit. That's how 2 Corinthians 3, 17, and 18 start and end. It is a ministry of the Holy Spirit to carry out that process.

Yeah? So would you say that transforming is a creative process, or a conformist process? Yeah, let's put it this way, a quick summary. Being conformed, God uses external circumstances in the physical realm and things in the spiritual realm. He works all things together, physical and spiritual, to the end that we're being made into, conformed to, the image of Christ. So he's using things that are physical, he's using things that are spiritual to bring about our being conformed into the image of Christ. Being transformed is using the Word of God by which we behold the Lord Jesus Christ and by which then the Holy Spirit does the transforming to the end that we're made also into the image of Christ. Both being conformed and transformed are parallel processes in the same direction. Well, that's fine.

Would it be fair to say we're talking position and condition? Okay, so let's talk about this. Okay, so so here's here's a distinction and one of the reasons why we go through this That we use the terms position that is that is who we are eternally and unfixed starting from the moment we believe right and So that's position Okay, that that doesn't change. It doesn't vary. I can't enhance it nor diminish it God does that all okay and Condition is how moment by moment that is lived out or not.

So the Apostle Paul would talk about, you know, walk in the spirit. Christ would say, abide in me. Those are condition matters because moment by moment, unlike the branches on the vine, we're branches that can hop on and hop off. But abiding in Him is God's intent.

So what you have, that's a condition issue. Whenever you see an imperative, walk in the Spirit. Whenever you see the imperative, abide in Me. Or when you see an urging, I urge that you... When you see those things, that's telling us this is about our condition. Do we have an urging about our position? We don't get an urging about our position. Why not?

It's all done. God did it. All we did was what? Believe. We believe. God says, that's it. I'll do the rest. I'll take it from there. Right? We can't change it, enhance it, diminish it. Our position is something God accomplishes entirely. All we did was believe. When we come into our condition, it is also a matter of believing. And it's believing and understanding. And like I say, the form that shows up in the New Testament is an urging. And it also has to do with imperatives, when you see an imperative, right?

So now, so we have position and condition. We also have, and this is what we're focusing on in this class for about the middle six months from April on into September. What we're looking at is processes. So we have position, we have condition, we have processes. And so those processes are processes God has in place. We're being conformed. We're being transformed. We're going to look at, down the road, sanctified, growing. So those are processes. So position, condition, processes. And so that's really what we're focusing on here.

So that's a very good question because what it points to is there's position, there's condition, and now there's also process that God has in place. Though we're modifying things somewhat and giving a different context, back in 2011 we taught this as what God is doing in the life of the believer, the processes, right? So position, condition, processes.

What's God doing? So, alright, so that answer your question? Alright, Pat had a question. Yes, if I look at Romans chapter 8, 28 through 30, right, it says that God works all things together, and they all, what does he work together? Things in the physical realm, things in the spiritual realm for good. And what's the good?

It's not we don't have to pretend everything's good or have some kind of Pollyanna, you know, mindset. Some things are really awful. I mean, really, really awful. And we can say that we're free to say that we don't there's no pretending going on. It's recognizing that those some things are really, really awful.

God is working all things, including the awful things, to the end that we're made into the image of Christ. Now, so this is what's interesting. As we look at it, being conformed is God working all things together for good to the end that we're made into the image of his Son, and that end is predestined.

Being transformed is not said to be predestined as to its end result. And why would it not be necessary to predestine that end? Because the end is the same. The end is the image of Christ. We're all being made into the image of Christ by two different processes. All you have to do is predestine one of them. And that's it. So that's why He is predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son. So when we get through heaven's gates, it'll be done.

Yeah. Yes. So kind of from what you said before, it seems like the transformation process is more instantaneous. Because you said from the moment you believe you have this position. So that's not many times. Yeah, we have this position. But again, we have. And, you know, very good question that Janet had. And that is a position happens instantaneously. Right. Condition is moment by moment. You ever hear this song, Day by Day? Day by Day? The guy who wrote Moment by Moment said that's not often enough. And essentially what you have is moment by moment, I have the issue of my condition.

I can, just take it for instance, I can walk in fellowship with the Lord and then go home and get in a big fight with my neighbor and just say horrible things, and all of a sudden, in my condition, that's not walking in fellowship with the Lord. Now, so the process, however, of being conformed and being... those processes of being conformed and being transformed are processes that God has in place as we walk in fellowship with Him, as we are brought through various things, that's the conforming process, and as we are transformed, that is, beholding the Lord Jesus Christ through His Word, 2nd Corinthians 3, 17 and 18 is one of those passages. Another one, Hebrews 12, verses 1 and 2. Looking unto Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith. Yeah? Okay, and we talked about the new self that Paul talks about. The Greek there says it's created. Created is a new self. Okay. So is that the position?

Yeah, and that's getting into something we covered back in April. Let's go to the last sheet that you have. It's a supplement that I added here because, though he isn't with us here today, Pat asked a very good question about the inner man. And so I started studying that and made a discovery this last week. We've talked about the continuing person, right? And as Paul uses the term, the inner man, that is the continuing person of the believer. So, let's walk through it. As an unbeliever, you were in who?

Adam. So that's on the diagram here, on the left side. Positionally, we were in Adam. The old man was all of who you were in Adam. A part of that all of who you were was the sin nature, the inclination to think and to act. Now, there is a continuing person or continuity of person from the person that you were in Adam to who you are in Christ and that's how the Apostle Paul can look and talk back, I was, I did before he was saved. So you have that continuing person. Now, in Christ, so once a person believes they're in Christ, and who did that? Did we do that? God did it. And one of the things we've said previously is that's one time, one way. That's it.

You don't go back and forth. You don't slip back into Adam. It's not like a bad transmission. You don't slip back into Adam, it doesn't happen. It's one way, one time, God guarantees it. You are entirely in Christ, the new man is all of who you are, pleasant tense, in Christ, and you have a new nature, an inclination to think and to act, that is a part of that new man. We talk here at Holly Hills about the believer still has the sin nature. Why and how does that take place? Because you have the same body. We have the same body and that inclination to think and to act is connected to this body. We, however, are no longer under the sin nature as a reigning monarch. It will try to come back and act like that reigning monarch, but we're no longer subject to that reigning monarch. You don't have to be.

So what we find out is that there are three passages specifically where the Apostle Paul talks about the inner man. This is addressed on page two of your supplement there. And so the three passages are Romans 7.22, 2 Corinthians 4.16, and Ephesians 2.16. So those three places the inner man, this person of who we are, this is not the new man, this is not the new nature, this inner man, as Paul refers to it in those three passages, that's That's who you are, having been brought into the kitchen of the believer. And the inner man, as you say, the inner man is powerless without the Lord. The inner man is powerless without the Lord.

So, more as this makes reference in that Lesson 17 in Knowing and Growing, we did it on May 7th, So a little over a month ago of this year, we went into more detail on that subject. I was going to say, so then technically you could say the new nature here is what's actually new.

It's not just sequentially new, it's new in kind. That's why we say a new creation. Right, and so that goes with the new self, because that's the new kind according to the Greek, right? So if you really wanted to pick something out of here, the new man contains the new nature, but the new nature is actually the new self that Paul's talking about. The new nature is the inclination to think and to act, it is not the whole person. But is it the same as what Paul's talking about, the new self?

What's translated in the New American Standard, that's the same as the old man and new man, those terms. New self in the New American Standard, new man or old man are the terms out of the King James, New King James. It would be legitimate, as we said in here, to use the word person. That would be biblically legitimate as well. So yeah, that's a distinction that we made. Nature is an inclination to think and to act.

It's not the whole person. Nancy was asking about this and I said, well, why don't I go and take a sledgehammer to my neighbor's car and take paint and splash it in different colors and splash it all over their house. Why wouldn't you expect that out of Vern? Well, that's not Vern's nature.

Inclination to think and to act. So this is an important thing. A nature is an inclination to think and to act. And the sin nature is always inclined to think and to act in the same way. Yes. And I was thinking, yes, in the old man is the reigning monarch. That's good. I think a good analogy.

Yeah, I was thinking that in this diagram, you should probably put the signature of the top of the oval there. And then you should probably put the signature below that in the new nature of the top of the oval. Well, yeah, and where you put it becomes a question mark.

One of the things you notice there is the sin nature over on the right hand side as a dashed line, because the sin nature is in fact not in Christ, is it? Right? And so it is there in the believer as the believer is in Christ, but the sin nature does not become in Christ. Yes, it's a deposed monarch. The sin nature does not have the right to reign. If you give it, however, power, it will reign.

And Romans chapter 6, the whole thing from beginning to end, has military analogies. And including the sin nature will use our members, our bodily members, as military assets. The translations are often instruments. And of course, we think of different things when we think of instruments. But essentially, the word means military assets. Pardon?

Weaponry, and that means everything from personal weaponry to things used as a military team, if you will, as well as other things that are military assets. In the mindset of the time, things like catapults, the ballista would shoot You know, huge arrows. So yeah, military assets. So the sin nature will use the body of the believer as military assets.

Because why? That's how the sin nature is inclined to think and to act. So that's what nature is, the inclination to think and to act. Yes? So the think and the act, then you could say that's also the will. Okay, yeah, it has the inclination to think and act, and it, if given power, will always will in that direction.

There's one reason why we also get from Relations 5 and Romans 7 that the believer is never in a place of simply willing the right or the wrong thing to do. It is always within a nature. There isn't some neutral ground where I get to decide I'm going to do right and wrong. There isn't any place like that.

But that in fact, for the believer, the priority decision is, is the sin nature calling the shots, or is the spirit calling the shots? Is it the life of Christ lived out through me, or am I saying, I'm putting that on hold for right now, and giving the sin nature the ability to think and to act and carry that out? Okay, so let's go back to On top of page two, knowing what the Holy Spirit has done, is doing, and will do. One of the things that we note here, when it comes to the Word of God, the Holy Spirit has a ministry from its origination all the way through to our being transformed by it.

How did the men who wrote the books of the Bible, how did they write them? Did they just say, hey, I got a good idea, write it down? Through inspiration. They wrote in consistent with their personalities and what they were going through in the historical context, but they wrote through the inspiration of scripture.

This would be 2 Timothy 3.16 and 17. They wrote by inspiration of God. God did not simply, in some cases he did, but did not simply from beginning to end dictate, OK, write this down. But he wrote through these human authors.

So you can see, for example, in the Apostle Paul, his style of writing and speaking comes through loud and clear in the way he writes in his letters. John, on the other hand, wrote very differently. Paul wrote most often like a logician. This, therefore this, because of this, since this, that was the way Paul wrote again and again and again.

John doesn't write like that. John writes more like a musician. There is low points and then building up to a crescendo and then coming down. And he writes more like a musician, he uses more Hebrew poetry patterns, and he uses Hebrew symbolic patterns. So they're very different writers. Were they both inspired? Yes. But the different writing style of each was not erased or eliminated or set aside.

It was instead included in the inspiration. So now what you have is, we have their inspiration, canonization, transmission, and translation, all the way to our being transformed as we behold the Lord. The Holy Spirit, as 2 Corinthians 3.18 makes clear, the Holy Spirit is involved in this transforming process. So we have position, God's already done it.

All we did was believe. It's one way, one time. It's permanent. There's no way back through the door. We don't go whoops and slip. That doesn't happen. Instead, what we think is one way, one time, never to be undone and changed again. You're never going back into Adam. Not happening.

As we look here at this process, our being transformed is also a work of the Holy Spirit using the Word of God again. So the Holy Spirit is involved from the inspiration all the way to this transformation. The Holy Spirit is involved every step of the way. That's the point we make there.

The Holy Spirit has the Word of God written, as Paul uses in 2 Corinthians 3.18, as a mirror. As a matter of fact, it says, beholding as in a mirror.

See those words in 2 Corinthians 3.18? It's one word in the Greek. It's one word in the Greek. It's beholding as in a mirror, all one word.

So, we find the use of a mirror for the Word of God is in 1 Corinthians chapter 13, here in 2 Corinthians 3.18, and also in the book of James. Those three places are where we find it. That's in your footnote at the bottom. They give you the specific passages. So at number one there, towards the bottom of page two, when we behold the Lord through his written word is not simply reading as an intellectual exercise all in the physical realm. Those who don't believe can do that with no spiritual impact and there are those among unbelievers who do exactly that. Is it possible to get a degree in Bible, maybe even a doctorate, and be completely untouched spiritually.

When we were over in Israel, I hired a guide for one day. I didn't really need the guide for the rest of it, but I hired a guide for one day. And he was the son of the archaeologist who had excavated David's fortress there overlooking the Elah Valley where David fought Goliath. He had completed a bachelor's and was working on his master's degree in Bible.

I don't believe he was saved. It is possible to be very educated about the Bible and not be saved. It is possible to be very educated about the Bible and not be transformed at all. Can an unbeliever be transformed? No, because this is not the ministry of the Holy Spirit in the unbeliever. It's not a possible ministry. What is the ministry of the Holy Spirit to the unbeliever?

To draw. Yeah, you look at the Holy Spirit draws, the Holy Spirit, and you look at John 14, 15, 16, the Holy Spirit has a convicting ministry. Convicting, let's use the word convincing, regarding sin and righteousness and judgment. And so the Holy Spirit has those ministries with the unbeliever. With the believer, it's an entirely different set of ministries. And what would be, can you think of some reasons why the Holy Spirit would have an entirely different set of ministries with the believer?

One is there's a relationship with God. By the way, does God have any grandchildren? No. So there's a direct relationship of child, son, but child relationship with the Father. And who is our brother? We're brothers of Christ, every single one. We could put it in a more neutral term, sibling, but the idea is still there. We have a direct family relationship.

I enjoy personally studying genealogy and going back and tracing back all these different things. This person did this and wrote that and lived there and was born here, died here. Only just recently found out that my great-great-great-grandparents are buried in Colorado Springs. Really cool to find all that stuff out, but you can't have the same genealogical chart for believers, right?

At least spiritually speaking. God has no grandchildren. We all have a direct relationship with the Father. So this, as we look at it, that puts us in an entirely different position with regards to the ministries of the Holy Spirit. One more thing, does the Holy Spirit indwell unbelievers? No, not at all. The Holy Spirit has a ministry to unbelievers, but does not indwell them. With us, who are believers, as a part of our position, we are universally, every single one of us, constantly, continuously indwelled by the Holy Spirit. But now in the Old Testament it talks about David being indwelled by the Spirit and David also said don't take the Holy Spirit from me. Daniel is also noted several times by having the Spirit of the Holy God within him.

Yes, and what's different? What's different about that? One is, when we look at the Old Testament, one of the things we find, there was no assurance that everyone who was a believer would have the Holy Spirit involved. No assurance of that at all. We, however, have that. Paul says that if you don't have the Holy Spirit, you're not Christ. So it is universal and continuous.

That was not the case in the Old Testament. The Holy Spirit came and went, and so this is why the prayer, Psalm 51, take not your Holy Spirit from me. Do we need to pray that prayer? No. A lot of charismatic churches, they will even have a beginning or even a pre-service prayer time to beg for the Holy Spirit to come back. So what do they not understand? They don't understand the Holy Spirit does not come and go. They're measuring it, quite typically, they're measuring the Holy Spirit's presence by a feeling, usually, or an experience, or both.

I had one of them after I gave a sermon, oh, that was really anointed. No, the Bible doesn't talk like that. If you're a believer in Christ, you are anointed past tense. It's a done deal. The individual things are not anointed or not anointed in that kind of thing or experiences. Nope. If you're a believer, you are anointed. Done deal. Past tense. It's a part of your position.

The Holy Spirit does not come and go as he did in Old Testament things. So one of the things we have here is this diagram we've been referring to on the left side, on the bottom of page two, on the left side you have the physical realm and the spiritual realm. So what you have here is the Word of God, and by the way, the Word of God most commonly we think of in printed form, but the Word of God is something here in the physical realm, isn't it?

But it is unique in the physical realm in that the Word of God then, Hebrews 4.12, touches me at the deepest part. I can go to counselors, doctors, have operations, I can have medicine that impacts my brain and how my brain works.

I can do all those things, but none of those will touch on the spiritual side. God's Word does. So God's Word has the capacity to penetrate and touch. where nothing else does. We only have that assurance about God's Word. That it touches deeply. And it specifically touches deeply for the believer.

Okay, so let's look on page 3. I'm going to go to number 2 there. In addition to, towards the top of page three, in addition to our beholding the personal glory of the Lord through the written word of God as a result of the Lord sharing his glory with us, that shared glory increases from one level of glory to the next.

A figure of speech that the Apostle Paul uses, and I have to say so far as I'm immediately aware, I think it's uniquely him, he will talk about faith to faith, Life to life, death to death. In this case, glory to glory. That is a figure of speech the Apostle Paul uses to mean increasing. Increasing from glory to glory. I think growing would be another way to put it. See that? So, he talks about increases from one level of glory to the next. That increasing glory is in contrast to the fading glory of the Law of Moses.

You know, here's what's amazing, is the Lord has designed it so that we, as believers in Christ, as we behold the Lord through His Word, can actually have a growing glory. Now, is it glory from us? No, it's the Lord's glory, not ourselves, not something we try to generate or polish up on or anything of the sort. we can have an increasing glory. But the problem with the law, and living by the law, the problem with the law, even during the life of Moses, even while they were still out there in the desert, in a very short period of time, relatively speaking, what was the law doing with respect to glory?

It was fading. A fading glory. So, what happens to Christians who then try to live out the law? At best you're looking at a fading glory. Isn't that something? For Christians who try to live out the law, you're looking at a fading glory at best. And is that transformation, we all with unveiled face, is that being transformed something that happens in the believer who's trying to live by the law? No. So the glory fades under the law and And the law gets in the way of this transforming process.

We all with unveiled face. He said, we all with unveiled face, except for the 10 commandments. You've got to keep those. Right? No. We all with unveiled face, except for this one. I just can't let loose of this one law. Right? No. We all with unveiled face. No law. Not one.

Anytime. are beholding the glory of the Lord. And by the way, you can even behold the glory of the Lord in the law. How is that possible? That we can be beholding the glory of the Lord, looking at the law and being transformed. How is that even possible? Is the law inspired? The law of Moses is inspired writing. All 613 are the laws, individual laws. Inspired writing.

How is it that we can behold the Lord in the law and be transformed, but if we try to live out the law as a means that just messes up the works? Yeah. We can see God's perfection. Yes. Remember what Paul said about the law. In Romans chapter 7, it's holy and righteous and good. Right? So we're not dissing the law. What's the problem with the law? We see God's perfection on the one hand, on the other hand we say, hey, I'm not up to it. Right? Stan? The law focuses, making you focus on yourself. Yes. Whereas, When you're away from the law, you focus on God. Yes. If I am trying to live out the law, the focus is on me. How am I doing? How am I doing? How am I doing? How am I doing? How am I doing? How am I doing? How am I doing? The law causes me to focus upon me. If I use the law to behold the Lord, then the focus is on the Lord.

That is why 1 Corinthians chapter 9 and 10, two chapters, the Apostle Paul talks about let's learn from the law. He talks about Christ our Passover, right? Right in that context. It's the same guy writing to the same people, right? We all with unveiled face, even as we behold the law, we behold the Lord Jesus Christ under grace. Jim? It's like a runner who focuses on his feet instead of the finish line.

Yes. Or stand. Well, I was going to say, it was intended by God to be that way because the Jewish people have an earthly inheritance. And when you get to the Millennial Kingdom, it's going to be back again because those earthly blessings are going to be back again, not the spiritual blessings that the church has right now. Yeah, a good point. This is a key thing. Where's our focus?

We can look at the exact same text and see something quite different. We can look at the exact same text and one person gets all snarled up and they're beholding the Lord with a veiled face and therefore it doesn't happen. One person gets all snarled up in the law and they're looking at themselves and the other person is transformed looking at the same thing. It depends on who you're wanting to look at.

Yes? Well I guess I would have to ask the question, here again, position, condition. Transformed to me is an instantaneous done by the Holy Spirit and you're there positionally in that transformation process. The confirmation process is condition and I think every growing believer goes through that process where they try to walk by the law, and they fail because they're doing it on their own merit. And the Lord says, yeah, it didn't work, did it very well, and starts getting your focus, beholding Christ, what they're talking about here. And as you start beholding Christ, then you are conformed into that along with already being transformed. Am I on? Well, and that's where I point out earlier, that position, the condition, the process. There are three different conditions. Well, let's let's put it this way. Let's step our way through it.

Would any of these processes we're talking about be possible? if we did not have the position that we have in Christ? No. None of that would be possible. Would it be possible for us to even have the issue of our condition if we were not in Christ? No. It's not possible. There's nothing to work with.

These processes that go on over time, being conformed, being transformed, we're going to see sanctified. All these things have a positional aspect, but they're also ongoing processes. We're going to look at that, for example, in one verse in Hebrews. He uses sanctified as both a position and a process in the same verse. Those who are being sanctified process have a position that they are a sanctified position. So both of those are the case. In our position, it's already done.

And it's one of the reasons why I will commonly say, you know, we believe and the Lord accomplishes all these things in us, the believer, and we spend the rest of our lives catching up to what He's already done. We spend the rest of our lives catching up to what He's already done.

And that's what the process is, and that's one of the reasons we have this here, is we have to start with understanding our position. We have to start with understanding the moment-by-moment condition issues. In the end, seeing that God has processes in place that are based on our position and our condition. And so that's what we're looking at here in the middle of this elective for some months.

And we've run home out of time. Any final comments, questions, thoughts, exasperations? OK. Lord, thank you for what you've revealed here. We see that you have done amazing, astonishing, things, and you are in fact continuing to do amazing and astonishing things. You do it because you love us. You do it because of your mercy and because of your grace. We thank you for that. We thank you for the immense love that you have for us, shown in these things. We are just astounded, Lord, that you would care for such as us. We just pray in Jesus' name. Amen.