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...New York. I don’t know if I’d want to go to New York anyway. But I tell you what, you just think of those big buildings that are there, how many people are there within - what is it – seventy-five mile radius of the Empire State Building there are twenty five million people. And the Empire State Building is like a city. And I know when we were up in Idaho, in Boise, there was one gal there, she said, “Oh, boy, I gotta move out into the country.” That means out in the boonies. I said, “Well why?” She said, “It’s just getting over-populated here in Boise.” And it had a population of about 50,000 at that time. And I’m sure that in the Empire State Building alone they may have close to that many in it at any one time. But you look at that building. You look at the things that we can do. Look at the planes; look at the rockets. And it seems as though - I was reading the other day a history of all of the failed Mars explorations, the Russians’ and ours. And it seems like every one has been a failure. So the only thing I can do is think on that, “Well, maybe there’s something that God just doesn’t want us to know that’s on Mars.” Because they’re all a failure.

So, “…Hast put all things under his feet: all sheep and oxen, yea, and the beasts of the field; the fowl of the air, and the fish of the sea, and whatsoever passeth through the paths of the seas. O LORD our Lord, how excellent is Thy name in all the earth!” (vs. 6-9). What a fantastic gift that God has given. The whole world to human beings. That’s something. That is really something. So God is not a miser. God is not a piker. God is not trying to take from us, or anything like that.

Now let’s go to Psalm 139. And this psalm is one that people turn to and say, “Aha! God is everywhere all the time; He knows everything that there is about everything in all instances at every second that there is, because God is transcendent.” That means God is everywhere all the time. “And since God is everywhere all the time, then all human beings are, and everything that God has made, is part of God.” Now what I’m giving you is Hindu theology. “And if everything that there is, is part of God, then everything is God. Therefore, you are God.” That’s pure Satanism. And that’s virtually what Satan told Adam and Eve, “You’ll be like God. You are God. Go ahead! Take it! Choose it!”

Now here in Psalm 119, it says, “O LORD, Thou hast searched me, and known me. Thou knowest my downsitting and mine uprising, Thou understandest my thought afar off” (Psalm 139:1-2). And even Job said, “No thought can be withheld from You” (Job 42:2, paraphrased). Psalm 139? Ah. Sorry. I misled you again. Add twenty to that. Psalm 119 plus twenty. Psalm 139. You knew immediately when I was reading it that that was not it.

All right. Now that we’re back on track here, now how does God know the down-sitting, the uprising, You understand my thoughts afar off, “Thou compassest my path and my lying down, and art acquainted with all my ways” (vs. 3). How is God able to know that? Is He just right there watching? Is God right there watching every human being? Is that how God does it? We’ll try and answer it. I think the answer is this: God has given the spirit of man in every human being; He’s made the human mind. He knows how we operate. I mean, to be made like we’re made has got to be planned, right? I mean, you’ve got to plan it. Now what we do to it later is not planned. We understand that. A lot of us are carrying around a lot of unplanned garbage. Baggage. But really, when you think about it, you take the smallest, skinniest person in the world, is still a person and still functions right, and you take the largest most obese person in the world, and it’s really a declaration to God how great that He really is, that human beings function at both extremes. That’s amazing. That God is merciful to let us live, though we do these things to ourselves. So God knows it because He created our minds, He knows the whole functioning of it.

“For there is not a word in my tongue, but, lo, O LORD, Thou knowest it all altogether” (vs. 4). Does that mean that God knows every word of every human being that’s spoken everywhere? Now, who is this saying this? This is David. Right? Was David chosen of God? Yes. Did David have the Holy Spirit of God? Yes. So you can’t apply this to every human being in the world. Does every human being in the world have the Holy Spirit of God? No. They have the spirit of man. But they don’t have the Spirit of God. So you can’t take this and say that this necessarily, wholly, absolutely applies to every human being. And if it did, we’re going to see how God keeps track of it. He keeps track of it by automation. He doesn’t keep track of it Himself personally. But He has all that information available at any time He needs it.

Ok, now let’s continue on. Verse 5, “Thou hast beset me behind and before, and laid Thine hand upon me. Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; it is high, I cannot attain unto it.” Why? Because the thoughts of God are higher than our thoughts, as the heavens are above the earth. And our minds, though our minds have a bit of God’s ability, our mind obviously is not like the mind of God. Now notice verse 7, “Whither shall I go from Thy Spirit?” That’s the key. That’s how God understands that. “...Or whither shall I flee from Thy presence?” God can find anyone at any time that He wants to anywhere. “If I ascend up into heaven, Thou art there: If I make my bed in hell, behold, Thou art there. If I take the wings of the morning, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea; even there shall Thy hand lead me, and Thy right hand shall hold me. If I say, Surely the darkness shall cover me; even the night shall be light about me. Yea, the darkness hideth not from Thee; but the night shineth as the day: the darkness and the light are both alike to Thee” (vs. 5-12). Now this is a way of expressing the powers that God has which are greater than ours.

Let’s see how God sees. Let’s ask the question, how is it that God sees? Does God see with His own two eyes only, all the time? Now let’s go back to 2 Chronicles 16. Now, how is it that God is able to do all of these things? We’re going to see that God is able to do them because He uses the spiritual power of those things that He has created to do those kinds of functions. And He has the angels to do it. That’s how God knows. Because God is a person, God is a being. God is, Himself, personally, has got to be in one place at one time. And being made of spirit, He undoubtedly occupies space. We occupy space. Now God created the whole universe. Is that not enough space?

2 Chronicles 16:9, “For the eyes of the LORD run to and fro throughout the whole earth,...” Now if you took that totally, absolutely, literally, then you would have to say, “Are the eyeballs of God rolling around on the earth?” No. No. But what does it mean? How does God do that? Now notice, it says, “...to shew Himself strong in the behalf of them whose heart is perfect toward Him. Herein thou hast done foolishly: therefore from henceforth thou shalt have wars.” That’s when Asa went wrong. The whole point is, how does God do this? How do the eyes of God run to and fro through out all the earth? Are they literally the eyes of God, His own two eyes? Well, we’ll find out here in just a minute. Let’s go to Revelation 5, and let’s see how God accomplishes that.

Revelation 5, let’s pick it up here in verse 6 . “And I beheld, and, lo, in the midst of the throne and of the four beasts [or that is, the living creatures], and in the midst of the elders, stood a Lamb as it had been slain, having seven horns and seven eyes,...” Now let’s just focus in on the seven eyes here, with our two eyes. “...Seven eyes, which are the seven Spirits of God sent forth into all the earth.” Now this has got to be some sort of, what you might say, remote camera-type thing as we would view it, just in an analogy from what we can do. So God knows because He has seven spirits created especially for knowing what’s going on in the earth. So therefore, God can be in one place at one time and still know all of these things that are going on because He has created special spirit beings and spirit apparatuses, if we could put it that way, to take care of the job. Now for us, we have the Holy Spirit of God within our mind. We have direct connection with God the Father. So we are an entirely different category in that particular sense.

Now let’s come back and look at some other things concerning God. How does God hear? Does He hear everything with His two ears? Now, God has ears. Let’s go to Isaiah 59. God has ears. But does He hear everything with just His two ears? Isaiah 59:1, now it tells us quite a few things here about God. It says, “Behold, the LORD’s hand is not shortened, that it cannot save;...” So God has, it talks about His hand. “...Neither His ear heavy, that it cannot hear:…” So God has ears. God hears. But he says, “…But your iniquities have separated between you and your God, and your sins have hid His face from You, that He will not hear” (Isa. 59:1-2). Now that’s pretty awesome when you really think about that. We won’t get into that to try and answer that question today.

Let’s ask a little bit more here concerning about how God, what God looks like. Let’s go to Matthew 17. Now this is really the clincher, one of the clinchers, to show what God looks like, what God the Father looks like. Remember it’s says that Jesus was made in His exact image, in the same similitude as His Father. Now this is the account of the transfiguration. Matthew 17:1, “And after six days Jesus taketh Peter, James, and John his brother, and bringeth them up into an high mountain apart, and was transfigured before them: and His face did shine as the sun, and His raiment was white as the light” (Matt. 17:1-2). Now there is a vision of Jesus being transfigured before their very eyes. Now what does it talk about? It talks about His face and His clothing. Now it didn’t say that He turned into a blob. It didn’t say that He turned into an animal. It didn’t say that He was turned into an angel. But Jesus Himself was transfigured. That means the substance of His body was changed from flesh to spirit. Now we’ll have to think on that one for a while. But this gives us the guarantee that, at the resurrection, that’s what’s going to happen to us. And that was the whole purpose of this transfiguration.

Now granted, it was a vision. Now they could understand this once they saw Jesus transfigured before them. Then they knew that He must have been the LORD God of the Old Testament. Why? Because of the accounts concerning Moses. It’s said of Moses, that Moses talked with God, how? Face-to-face. Now Moses was a man. He had a face. Now I know this is very redundant and basic and almost stupid to bring out. So if he talked to God face-to-face, it means literally, seeing each other. But Christ, when He was talking to Moses face-to-face, could not appear in His great and magnificent form. Let’s go back to the book of Exodus. So obviously, when Moses was talking to Him face-to-face, He was not in His total glorified form. He was not in His total glorified form. That’s why Moses said, “Lord, show me Your glory.” Apparently he understood that God could manifest Himself in a much more glorified manner than in talking to him face-to-face.

Let’s pick it up here, Exodus 33:18. Now after the great sin that the children of Israel sinned, here in verse 17, “And the LORD said unto Moses, I will do this thing also that thou hast spoken [I will spare them]: for thou hast found grace in My sight, and I know thee by name. And he [Moses] said, I beseech Thee, shew me Thy glory.” In other words, he wanted some encouragement here at this time. He wanted to know that, you know, God was still with him in spite of all the things that went on. “And He said, I will make all My goodness pass before thee, and I will proclaim the name of the LORD before thee; and will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will shew mercy on whom I will shew mercy. And He said, Thou canst not see My face:...” That is, in its glorified form. Because if Moses talked to Him face-to-face, He could not have been in His total glorified form. “...For there shall no man see Me, and live” (Ex. 33:17-20). Why? Because the power and the existence of God is so great that human flesh cannot exist in its presence. Now we could liken it this way: any more than you could exist on the face of the sun. In other words, the power, the beauty, the splendor, and the radiation coming from God, the radiant power coming from Him, not radiation in the sense of what we would think nuclear radiation; but it is so great that human beings cannot live in the divine presence of God.

So He said, verse 21, “And the LORD said, Behold, there is a place by Me, and thou shalt stand upon a rock: and it shall come to pass, while My glory passeth by, that I will put thee in a clift of the rock, and will cover thee with My hand while I pass by: and I will take away Mine hand, and thou shalt see My back parts: but My face shall not be seen” (vs. 21-23). Now this shows that God has everything about Him that we do: face, back, hand. But God’s existence as a spirit being with power is so magnificent and so powerful that human beings cannot live in His presence. Now that’s really something to contemplate. That’s really something to understand.

Now let’s go to John 20, and let’s see that even after the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, that He still was able to appear to His disciples in a form whereby they could see Him. They could talk to Him; He could manifest Himself to them in such a way that He would look virtually human. Virtually like flesh and blood. But He had additional powers, having been raised from the dead. John 20:19, “Then the same day at evening, being the first day of the week, when the doors were shut where the disciples were assembled for fear of the Jews, came Jesus and stood in the midst, and saith unto them, Peace be unto you.” Just appeared. Boy, as parents sometimes you wish you had that power with your kids, right? Boy, could you solve a lot of problems instantly, right? Yes. There’s Jesus right in the middle. “And when He had so said, He shewed unto them His hands and His side…” (John 20:19-20). So when He was resurrected He could appear in a non-glorified form. Just like He did to Moses, just like He did to Abraham, just like He did to Isaac. He could appear in a human form, non-glorified, because in full glory no human being can live.

Now let’s go to Acts 1. And apparently, things like this went on for forty days. Let’s pick it up here in verse… well, we’ll just pick it up here verse 2. No, verse 1. “The former treatise have I made, O Theophilus,...” And Theophilus means “lover of God.” Theophilus, by the way, was a name that a lot of the priests took. “...Of all that Jesus began both to do and teach, until the day in which He was taken up, after that He through the Holy [Spirit] Ghost had given commandments unto the apostles whom He had chosen: to whom also He shewed Himself alive after His passion by many infallible proofs,...” When I see Luke at the resurrection I’m going to say, “Why didn’t you give us just a couple of these?” It says “many.” We read just a couple there that John did, that Jesus appeared, walked through the door, showed Himself at that time to all the disciples and then later on again to Thomas. You know the whole account there. “...By many infallible proofs, being seen of them forty days, and speaking of the things [concerning] pertaining to the kingdom of God:…” (Acts 1:1-3). Now obviously, He appeared in such a way that they knew who He was, they could recognize that it was Jesus. So there again, this confirms that God is a personal being. God has a body. God has feet. God has legs. God has arms and hands, and a head, and eyes, and ears, and a mouth to speak. And also, after He was resurrected, He ate food.

Now let’s go to Revelation 1. And I don’t want to give away too much that I’m going to bring for the Atonement sermon, what it means to be at-one with God. But Revelation 1, this shows as much as possible, in language we can understand, the power of the persona of Jesus Christ as a Spirit being in full glory. And this, brethren, is what God has called us to. If you think that it’s fantastic that God created the whole earth for mankind and gave it to mankind, the things that God has promised to us are so great that the human vocabulary is most limited to describe what it is. And so, as Christ mentioned there about the difficulties they have before the feast, I think everyone has their own difficulties that come along. God will see us through it. God wants to know, “Do you think that I’m worth more than anything that there is? Do you think that I, God...” I’m just putting it in the sense that if God were speaking to you directly. I’m not trying to sit in the seat of God to try and do that. But just put it on a personal basis. “Do you think that I’m worth more than any of these things that you’re going through? Do you think that eternal life, to be in My family, is greater than any trouble you have, greater than any other human being you know? Greater than your own personal existence now?” So that’s why we go through these things. And Satan is there trying to do all he can.

But here’s what Jesus looks like in His full glorified form. Revelation 1:13. “And in the midst of the seven candlesticks [which are the churches] one like unto the Son of man, clothed with a garment down to the foot,...” That’s not so unusual. We’re all clothed down to our feet. Even have them covered with socks. “...And girt about the [chest] paps with a golden [chest plate] girdle. His head and His hairs were white like wool, as white as snow; and His eyes were as a flame of fire; and His feet like unto fine brass, as if they burned in a furnace; and His voice as the sound of many waters. And He had in His right hand seven stars: and out of His mouth went a sharp two-edged sword [which then is the word of God]: and His countenance was as the sun shineth in his strength” (Rev. 1:13-16).

Now to me, it’s all I can do to fathom just a little miniscule amount of what it’s going to be like to be as Jesus Christ is. He is a person. God the Father is a person. We are made in Their image. Let’s go back to Philippians 3. And we are going to be made, not only in Their image, but in Their glory and in Their substance. We’re not going to be greater in authority. Absolutely not. Even Jesus said that the Father was greater than He was. But we are going to be the sons of God. We’re going to see Him exactly like He is, which Moses couldn’t do.

Now Philippians 3:20, “For our conversation [or that is, the source of our conduct] is in heaven; from whence also we look for the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ:…” Now verse 21. Now here’s one to really think and understand about as much as you can. It doesn’t matter what your trouble is; it doesn’t matter what your problems are; it doesn’t matter the difficulties you are going through. It says, verse 21, “Who shall change our vile body,...” Compared to God that’s exactly what it is. “...That it may be fashioned like unto His glorious body,...” Made just like it. Fashioned just like it. So when you tie this in with Genesis 1, where God said, “Let Us make man in Our image after Our likeness...”, this verse you can tie right to it. And it also means, “...After Our kind.” After the God kind; after Elohim. “...That it may be fashioned like unto His glorious body, according to the working whereby He is able even to subdue all things unto Himself” (Phil. 3:20-21).

Now let’s go to Matthew 13 for just a minute to show that that is absolutely no stretch of the imagination at all. That is not twisting scripture. Now here’s the battle that’s going on. Matthew 13:38, talking about the parable of the field. “The field is the world; the good seed are the children of the kingdom [that’s us]; but the tares are the children of the wicked one [those are the servants of Satan]; the enemy that sowed them is the devil...” That’s what’s happening in Worldwide right now. “...The harvest is the end of the world; and the reapers are the angels. As therefore the tares are gathered and burned in the fire; so shall it be in the end of this world. The Son of man shall send forth His angels, and they shall gather out of His kingdom all things that offend, and them which do iniquity; and shall cast them into a furnace of fire: there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth. Then shall the righteous shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father.” Now here’s this little phrase: “[He] Who hath ears to hear, let him hear” (vs. 38-43). And wherever in the New Testament that is, that little phrase, it is there for the purpose of letting us really let it sink in.

And the only thing I’m worried about is that there are just so many people now who are so exhausted from fighting the physical battle, the spiritual battle. There are so many who are weakened because they haven’t studied, and they haven’t prayed, and they’ve virtually given up on God because God has not done a sign or wonder for them. They’ve surrendered their responsibility to a ministry that has been corrupted so that they will blame someone else instead of themselves. Whatever it may be. And to see this coming out of Worldwide is truly, truly, truly mind-boggling of the greatest proportion. And as I said last week, not in my wildest imagination would I have ever thought that I would hear words like that. Especially where it says that, “God doesn’t have a body. God doesn’t need a body.”

 So brethren, let’s stay close to God. Stay close to His Word and close to the things that are in the Bible. And remember, it is so that no man deceive you by any means. By any means. And the slickest means to deceive you is from within, from a ministry that is trusted, supposedly, and that would teach things that are not even in the Bible. So don’t let anyone tell you that God is not a person, God is not a being; that God does not have a body. God does. We are made in His image. We are made in His likeness. And the whole purpose of His plan is that we are made after His kind.

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