The Positional Change

THE THOUGHT WAR II - THE POSITIONAL CHANGE

LESSON FOUR

The Old Covenant of the Bible uses natural occurrences to give a picture of what would happen in the Spirit under the New Covenant. The natural events, as well as some of the prophets, were only shadows and types of what was to come in the New Covenant. For the law having a shadow of good things to

come, and not the very image of the things, can never with those sacrifices which they offered year by year continually make the comers thereunto perfect (Hebrews 10:1). For example, the story of Joseph foreshadows him as a type of Christ.

RULE: Shadows and types are only copies of the spiritual, and not the very image of the spiritual.

Another example of a type would be the tabernacle that God instructed Moses to build. It foreshadows what God was going to do in man at salvation. A new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you (Ezekiel 36:26). The tabernacle was built to be fashioned as a man. The outer court was typed as the body, the holy place was typed as the soul, and the holy of holies was typed as the spirit/conscience. This is a very good type of the salvation that was to come. That’s why God gave Moses the pattern for building it. The holy of holies is where God came once a year. The only person who could enter that area was the high priest. After sprinkling himself with the blood, he offered the sacrifice for himself and the people. If God accepted the sacrifice, he was then able to enter and commune with God.

Man was to be the tabernacle that God would dwell in under the New Covenant, and His Spirit would be the new spirit put in man. Hebrews 4:12 shows that man is a triune being: body, soul and spirit. I John 5:7 verifies that God is a triune being as well, Father, Word and Holy Ghost. Thus, the tabernacle was built as triune. To be a triune being means that there are three persons in one, with no divisions among them. There is no division in God.

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

St. John 1:1

The Holy Ghost is the Spirit of God. When we entertain any person who is begotten of God, we have entertained the entire Godhead (Father, Son, and Holy Ghost). Jesus said that He was going back to the Father, however, He and the Father would return and sup (commune) with us by way of the Holy Ghost.

Receiving the Holy Ghost gave us the fullness of the Godhead bodily, which means everything that God is, dwells in us. With that being said, let’s define “positional change”. Adam was created a living soul who resided in a body that was used to express himself. When we entertain a person, the only thing we see is the body, however, inside the body is a personage or personality called the soul.

SOUL

Whatever goes on in the soul is reflected outwardly through the body. When a person physically appears melancholy or sad, the body is only manifesting what is actually happening in the soul. Depression is when the soul is going through a period of darkness and it sees itself as unworthy. It doesn’t do anything to satisfy itself and it may not even give the body personal hygiene. There are some things the soul can experience that could result in harm to the body. The principle here is that the body only follows the dictates of the soul. In other words, the soul is in charge of this being.

THE SPIRIT

The spirit is the conscience of man and it is also known as the “knower” or co- perceptor (able to perceive both good and evil). The conscience was given divine intellect for the purpose of judging between good and evil. It was the conscience that understood when God told Adam not to eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil (Gen. 2:17). Because of his conscience, he understood the laws of God. Before Adam and Eve sinned in the sight of God, they were “in the flesh”. This term must really be understood, because throughout the Bible it is used interchangeably, and in certain verses it may mean something totally different. Here, it means the soul (the actual man), who has a spirit, lives in a body (the soul does not live in the Holy Ghost). The spirit of man is the candle of the Lord (Proverbs 20:27). The spirit is the candle of the Lord, because it has divine intellect. It is the judge.

1 Corinthians 2:9-10 9

But as it is written, Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him. 10 But God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit: for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God.

It is the Holy Ghost who searches all things that pertain to God. He searches out the Word of God, as well as the mind of God. He knows what’s in the mind of the Father toward us. The Holy Ghost searches and knows the things that God has prepared for us, such as salvation from the beginning of the “Mystery of Godliness” to its end and also the Faith and its boundaries. The Spirit knows the Word of God, because the scripture declares that the Word is Spirit (John 6:63). They are one. There is nothing pertaining to God that the Spirit does not know.

1 Corinthians 2:11

For what man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him? even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God.

Just as the Holy Ghost searches for the things that pertain to God, our spirit searches for the things that pertain to our soul and body. It knows everything that pertains to us and will not lie. This is one of the attributes that show we were created in the image of God. Our spirit knows everything about us and identifies the deeds of our flesh as righteous or unrighteous, because he’s the knower. It would have been unlawful for Adam and Eve to be penalized, if they did not know what sin was. They knew that their initial death would be separation from God, if they disobeyed Him. The soul and spirit are also known in scripture as the “inward parts”. Again, the soul is the man who has a spirit and lives in a body.

For the most part, people live in houses, however those houses do not tell people what to do. A house does not dictate to you. If you want to soundproof a room so that no one can hear you when you enter that room, the room won’t soundproof itself, you have to do it. In this case, we can liken soundproofing a room to pride. Pride will not allow you to hear. It will cause you to decide you don’t want to ever hear God again or that you don’t want to hear Him regarding a matter that is contrary to your desires. Remember, it is the soul, not the body that will stand before God and account for the deeds done in the body.

IN THE FLESH

We have learned that the term “in the flesh” means the spiritual parts are in a body. In the tabernacle of the Old Covenant, God only entered into the holy of holies once a year. He did not enter into the holy place or the outer court. However, when Jesus was on the cross, the veil that separated the holy place from the holy of holies was torn in half, allowing the mercy seat to be exposed to the holy place. This was a type of what God was going to do in the New Covenant; He was not only going to impact the spirit; but the soul as well.

POSITIONAL CHANGE

We have this treasure in earthen vessels…

2 Corinthians 4:7

The light of the Holy Ghost shines in our hearts. That which was once filled with darkness, is now filled with light. The positional change involves the body, the Holy Ghost, the soul and spirit: the soul and spirit now live in the Holy Ghost, and the Holy Ghost is in the flesh (body).

If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit (Galatians 5:25). For in him we live, and move, and have our being.

Acts 17:28

Salvation has taken us out of the flesh; and placed us in the Spirit (the positional change). This is God’s grace in our lives. Now, grace can be defined as God’s influence in the heart that is reflected in the life. In other words, the Holy Ghost has influence in our inward parts and it is His life that is now manifested in the flesh.

The life which I now live in the flesh, I live by the faith of the Son of God.

Galatians 2:20

This is living “in the Spirit”. Note that in this lesson we only discussed Adam as being in the flesh before the fall; and we fast forwarded to being in the Spirit after salvation. We will discuss the fall of man; and the need for salvation at a later time.