Weinland Berates Perverted, Distorted Minds of Bloggers et al.

More from 5/24/08 un-sermon;

"...So, again, this is all quite specific and if I am God's prophet then he's going to make it clear. That's where it stands. The timing has and always will be in the hands and control of Almighty God. That's where our lives are. If it turns out I'm not a prophet, I will simply have to place myself before the mercy seat of God, as I have said, and seek repentance and understanding. But I do want to say something else, and more for the critics and just...and kind of goad them a little bit, some of the mockers, different ones out there; No matter what happens, the Church of God PKG will continue on, whether I'm a prophet or not. Johnny and Wayne will be real busy, but hey (wheeze ha ha ha ha)".......

About a year or two ago he was looking on the net "and was dumbfounded at the hatred, and the depth of hatred, people had for Mr. Armstrong, and I thought; 'he died in 1986' and people out there were still so filled with hatred... it blew my mind, that after being dead that long, that it's still out there, so pervasive, page after page on the internet....Oh man! I can't believe the hatred thats out there, the twisting and the distorting. And, uh, I understand why he didn't address certain things now. What's the point? What is the point of addressing the accusers of things they say and twist and distort.
And a lot of you, over the past few weeks, you've had things said about you, and distortions made. I think it wasn't too long ago, there was some stuff out there about Johnny. It was...all of it...I don't want to say what it was, uh, like to say what it was, but I'll hold myself back...twisting and distorting things and, and people so often, they know full well that they're BIG FAT LIARS! They truly do. They know they're making up a bunch of ...BULL! and stories about people.
Amazing what people will go to because they hate something so much. A truly, satanic, demonic mind. They even work in human beings, that will lie like it does. And they were trying to find things on Wayne but they just couldn't find other names that were close to his in Australia I guess, enough to malign him too much, but they made certain accusations. You know, attacks are made on some of you on the internet...it's happened to some of you. Some of you have experienced those things...of the depth that people will go to..because they so hate something. They don't even know why they're stirred up sometimes, to hate, and to be embittered to the degree they are." [How about destroyed lives? Lives that never had a chance to get off the ground?] "You ought to be in awe of that spirit, and that mind...That it could go that far, that it can be that evil and that cruel, and yet that is the mind that God has been dealing with for six....thousand.....yearrrrss. And only a few has he drawn out, to work with to mold and fashion..."

Ron reads an e-mail between brothers, which he says; "it shows an attitude of mind."

'If you don't believe Ron is who he says he is, then move on.'

"That's why I marvel...why do people...after 22 years still have the kind of bitterness and hatred they do toward Mr. Armstrong? " [Because after MORE that 22 years, lives are STILL damaged and never got started] "Move on with your life.[Yep, clean up the ruins and move on. Right! How many times has that been attempted to no avail?!] "But for some... that IS their life...STILL is their life" [That's what you call wreckage Ron] "...I'm dumbfounded...The person goes on to say here, in answering their relative..."

'Why are you so obsessed? You said several times that you need to go back to the book to prove him wrong. You aren't looking for truth, your looking to find fault. If you want to hang yourself, I'm sure God will supply the rope.' Audience giggles. 'Instead of listening to Ron's sermons trying to find the truth, you have read all the garbage off the websites you can find...'

"That's an amazing thing to me. The willingness of people to believe anything that somebody writes out there. And yet, I've heard story after story from some of you of things that have been written out there. And some of them about YOU. And people are willing to believe it because it's written down," [Kind of like your literature Ron?] "and it's against you, because that's really what they want." [In other words; he's telling them; It's the chosen, against the evil world] "That's what they want to believe. So, what they're looking for, is something against God's People, against ANYONE they can, to find fault...and yet they're willing to believe it, and they don't know who they're believing. [You can, however, believe your BIBLE! Something this blog repeatedly emphasizes!] "Perverts! Distorted minds of people whose lives are sick and putrid. Cuz I can tell you...people who write some kinds of things, their minds are so distorted and twisted up to have such bitterness and evil in their hearts and their minds. Get on with your life, find some joy someplace." [You think that's not the DAILY battle of Armstrong survivors?!] "Are you finding joy in such distortion and trying to find fault... your life, is revolving... it blows my mind...it's an amazing thing, isn't it?" [Such DISTORTION? YOU are the ONE who twists, lies, and distorts the truth! God's truth! We present the Word without any re-definitions, of the simplicity of God's Word. And, insist people don't allow another person to come between them and God, and to verify ALL things. We read our Bible, unlike you, who spends most of the time reading from YOUR books or defending yourself and your time line. You don't even give sermons, all you do is hold damage-control press (church) conference's.]

Sick, Sick Minds

5/25/08 sermon

"HWA is dead! People have such hatred for him. He died over 20 years ago. Move on. Do you get joy from this? People are willing to believe what they read on the internet from people they don't even know! Sick, sick minds."

Yes, Herbert is dead, but his work is STILL being carried on by his disciples. The damage is still here. Lives have been destroyed. Some of us don't even KNOW what normal is, because WCG was a sick, sick, twisted, organization that twisted and brainwashed the minds of adults and the developing minds of children.

The people doing the talking, are those who lived it. They were part of the WCG and/or one or more splinter groups. Personal experience.

It doesn't matter what you say Ron. The FACTS REMAIN:
You are a false teacher, a false prophet.

YOU HAVE ROBBED CHRIST JESUS OF HIS IDENTITY!

YOU HAVE DENIED HIS HAVING COME IN THE FLESH!

Ron, go pick up your interlinear.
Go to 1 Tim 6:13. Read it Ron. READ IT! What does it say?
It says GOD. GOD, was MANIFESTED in FLESH!

May God have mercy on YOU, Ron.

The Mirror

I was asked to write something to help some people see the difference between what the bible says, and what the HWA Mini-Me’s were teaching. I’m inclined to think it was an exercise in futility, but I did it anyway.

I started crawling out of my mind trap around 1989 when I began researching authority, because I had a so-called minister that was making my life a living hell, as if it wasn’t that already. I abandoned the church before it changed its doctrines because I had already found gaping holes in their arguments. Because of this, it has appeared to me that arriving at a different theological view is the singular route to getting the O.C. shackles off, so it has seemed logical to concentrate on this. But I find the personal accounts far more interesting.

Someone keeps asking me if I’ve read the current Armstrong Survivor post, saying, “you’ve got to read it, it’s amazing how much you have in common with AS and Aggie A.” So maybe I’ll begin talking a little more from the witness perspective since the bible proofs are pretty much huffing and puffing against a stone wall. The only ones that can save the deluded are themselves.

Beyond the general sense of futility, it seems blogging can be cathartic, so maybe there is some reason to continue. Talking to real live human beings, however cloaked in pseudonyms, is a new experience for me. I definitely have my tortuous-shell defenses engaged if I need to interact with another person in the real world. This is a remarkable place where one can approach honesty in a way that has no precedence, at least in my experience.

My nerves were pretty well fried before I hit puberty; frequently, at church, my right leg would quit working, and I’d have to lift it with my hands to get across the floor. My face was probably bright red with embarrassment. The congregation looked at me out of the corners of their eyes, and closed up their little huddles to present me with a wall of backs to isolate themselves from the church outcast.

It was the same story in all the church areas I attended; Olympia; Tacoma; Spokane; Seattle; Phoenix; Pasadena; and to the Canadians, credit, Vancouver BC was almost OK. They might not have wished to show discourtesy to the jittery American since I was a guest in their country. The similarity in behavior, in different areas says; the ‘cause’ was their common beliefs.

Church philosophy didn’t believe in psychological disorders, apart from spiritual corruption. So I’m sure I was a demonic presence as far as they were concerned. The church believed psychologists to be on the same level as voodoo priests. The church thought they were the only ones with all the answers. They would teach crap that caused people to create an environment of tension and a world of paranoia, poverty and shame for their families, and deny any of the human-collateral-damage, qualified help.

Actually, kids in general ostracize other kids who are “weird,” but not to the extent of OWCG kids. You’d think that adults would mature out of that kind of superficial judging. They certainly didn’t in the church of Herbert. I was too weird to have friends at school, and any kid who so much as talked to me at church would have lost substantial social status. I never did have a friend as I grew up, and never once did a single one of them waver from their attitude of disgust and condescension.

Now I have to ask the question; whose fault was it? This is a no-brainer. Kids learn and perpetuate the cultures they absorb from their environment; so when you have condescending, know-it-all, self-important leaders; you get condescending, know-it-all, self-important lay members; and of course kids of lay members.

Someone once said, “If you want to know how you really are, look at your children, they’re a mirror that hides no flaw.” It is a weightier flaw, the church of Herbert had, than the flaws they focused so much upon, (strain out a gnat, and swallow a camel). And I had a broad enough sample to conclude that the mirror reflected the same hideous image regardless of where the church of Herbert might have been located.

Food For Thought

I was reading the May 10, 2008 post; Can I hear an Amen?!!!, on the Post WCG Life and Theology blog, which led me to the Would Jesus be a Christian?, post on the TILL HE COMES Blog, and found two statements I really liked in the comments.

The first was from a commenter; Mark, who, regarding Christianity and works, said;

“In short, works is not a good theology,
but sound theology is never devoid of good works.”

This seems to be one of the Old/New Covenant (Contract) stumbling blocks for Herbertites. They confuse the two Contracts and don't really understand ‘Works’ & ‘Faith without Works.’ They put the 'horse before the cart.' I won't go into all that since there are already a few articles posted on the subject.

The second was a quote that Jim, another commenter; left which was that of;

C. H. Macintosh, who said;

“God has not confined Himself within the narrow limits of any school of doctrine – high, low or moderate. He has revealed Himself. He has told out the deep and precious secrets of His heart. He has unfolded His eternal counsels, as to the Church, as to Israel, the Gentiles, and the wide creation. Men might as well attempt to confine the ocean in buckets of their own formation as to confine the vast range of divine revelation within the feeble enclosures of human systems of doctrine. It cannot be done, and it ought not to be attempted. Better far to set aside the systems of theology and schools of divinity and come like a little child to the eternal fountain of Holy Scripture, and there drink in the living teachings of God’s Spirit.” (C.H. Mackintosh, The Mackintosh Treasury, Miscellaneous Writings by C.H. Mackintosh, (Loizeaux Brothers, New Jersey, 1976), 605.)

God is not a religion. Religion is man’s version of God’s Word, a set of rules based on mans interpretation of God’s Word.

This is an important issue. We should NEVER permit another person to stand between us & God, between us & the Kingdom, our salvation, & never rely solely on your source of information, trust your Bible; it’s YOUR responsibility to validate information. You cannot ride someone else's coattail into the Kingdom. God teaches us all things;

Jesus said; Jn.6:45 “It is written in the Prophets: ‘They will all be taught by God.' Everyone who listens to the Father and learns from him comes to me." (Is.54:13).

1 Jn. 2:26-27 "I am writing these things to you about those who are trying to lead you astray. As for you, the anointing you received from him remains in you, and you do not need anyone to teach you. But as his anointing teaches you about all things and as that anointing is real, not counterfeit-just as it has taught you,-remain in him.

Ben-Ariel's Religious Bull From Babylon

Here is another example of what I used to be, not by my own choice;

Thinking everyone else was so stupid, and always being the odd man out, I applied the analogy of Noah to my venerable leader, and of course, to myself. Noah being ridiculed while he built the ark was familiar fodder for my own fantasy. I lived in a world on the other side of the looking glass where the facts somehow didn’t line up with everyone else’s, and certainly not with the Bible. Here’s the example; an excerpt from an article by David Ben-Ariel; HWA was ahead of his time.

1) “Why don't you just be honest and admit you hate Herbert W. Armstrong because he spoke the plain truth that CANNOT be refuted?

2) that your traditional Churchianity is merely baptized paganism the Bible condemns as part of Mystery Babylon?

3) For exposing your SUNday as a pagan counterfeit of the biblical Sabbath; your pagan holidays you've sought with your replacement theology to replace the biblical festivals; that sheeple like you bleat they're born again and don't have a clue what they're talking about, since we're born again at the Resurrection only; that God is not the sadist traditional Christians make Him out to be;

4) that the meek inherit the Earth - not float off to Heaven; that you're not an immortal soul, eternal life is a gift from God; the wicked will be destroyed, ashes under our feet;

5) we can become literal God-beings, members of the Kingdom-Family of God?

6) Why don't you just confess and forsake your sins of murderous hatred against HWA for slaughtering your "sacred cow" and exposing it as religious bull from Babylon?

[Rather than repeating, I'll address the points & you can look back at the list to see the subject's details.]

Point one; Herbert can't be refuted: Herbert and Weinland alike follow legends and rumors and present them as fact. His ideas have been refuted, and his corner stone philosophy of British Israelism should cause humiliation to any who continue to buy it; but like the naked Emperor, these people are oblivious to the fact that they are exposed.

Point two; Christian churches are false: This idea comes from the book, The Two Babylon's or Papal Worship proved to be the worship of Nimrod and his wife, by Rev. Alexander Hislop. HWA used the presumption that the Catholic Church is the great whore; and the extra-Biblical belief in church eras, taken from the letters to the churches in Revelation. The lesson of the churches imperfection contained therein needed to be discredited, and replaced by the idea of the church as being a single physical body of believers under a single ruler; himself, instead of many united by one spirit. From Herbert's view only one church, (defined by being under a single administration, and teaching Old Testament law) could exist at any given time because the Bible speaks of one church and one body, so it follows from his purely carnal way of thinking that these churches couldn't have existed simultaneously over the ages, but could only be types, serially, through time. HWA's presumption is the basis of his proof of the church era theory. This provided HWA justification for his authority, and it's the same excuse used by Weinland and all the other disciples of Herbert.

The churches in Revelation chapter 2 and 3 existed simultaneously at the time of the writing and they all lacked perfection. But they had the most important possession; they had the testimony of Jesus. The churches existed simultaneously then, and the archetypes exist now. Just like children have varying degrees of understanding and kinds of faults, so do Gods children. Herbert had nothing but a presumption base on a physical minded perspective of what, "one church, and one body," means. The churches are united as one by the Holy Spirit, not by legalistic perfection, or singularity of administration. The lesson of these churches is that imperfection does not make them false churches. There's no such thing as a perfect person, and therefore, no such thing as a perfect church.

I'd like to touch briefly on a subject that alone could use up many pages. Ancient theological books such as the Vedas and the Shasta-Bad are older than the Hebrew Bible, and they contain remarkably similar accounts, and allusions to the birth of a coming Redeemer. Even the roots of Vishnu, Shiva and Brahma, appear to have their roots in accounts of Noah and his sons. Consider the Magi who saw the signs of the newborn Messiah, and came to find Him, as recorded in the gospels. These were most likely Persians, and philosophical descendants of the Egyptian; Hermes-Thoth, their original lawgiver. (Not Hermes the Greek god. To Herbert, names with similarity in phonemes meant synonymy in person or nation etc.)

These Magi had some revelation from God that, at least in part, proved true. Here's a quote from Hermes from the Pymander; "Thought is God the Father; the Word is the Son; they are indissoluble in eternity, and their union is life." This was written approximately 2800 years before Christ, as is the following in the beginning sentence of the Shasta-bad, the oldest of the Magi's sacred books; "God is one, creator of all things, the sphere of the universe, without beginning, without end. God governs everything by providence and by unalterable laws. Seek not for the essence and nature of the Eternal which is one, indivisible, ineffable: your seeking would be in vain and sinful. It is enough that day by day, night by night, you should adore his power, his wisdom, his goodness, in all his works." This could be right out of the pages of your bible.It's also interesting that in the ancient writings, and inscriptions,the Magi described God as, "He is because he is," the same description God gave Moses to use, to identify who had sent him to them. It seems that people generally understood who's name this was.

I suggest to you that the ancients had knowledge of the plan of God, and you can find remnants of this knowledge within pagan religions. In other words, pagan religions borrowed from the knowledge revealed by God. As an example; similarities between Christian and pagan symbology, of a mother and child's significance in human salvation, are from a root of revealed truth, and not originally pagan.

Point three; Sunday is a counterfeit sabbath: "Sunday worship is worshiping the sun god," say the disciples of Armstrong. These people are applying the Old Covenant law to what day's people keep, and they expect to not look ridiculous. The Sabbath is Saturday (Saturn's day; are they then, worshiping Cronus the Roman god associated with Saturn? Not anymore than Sunday worshipers are worshiping the Roman Sun god. Everyday of the week has a Roman god assigned to it.); the New Covenant has no Sabbath command. There are no days sanctioned in the New Covenant, or they would be spelled out in the contract; and there are no days one could institute, that wouldn’t fall on a day without some pagan name on it. Writings of the early church refer to Sunday as the eighth day. Eight is the number of new beginnings. It was always on a Sunday (the eighth day), when the wave sheaf offering was made, according to the Mosaic Law. In other words, it’s the day Jesus presented himself to the Father after His crucifixion. The day is not any more polluted than Saturday is polluted by worshiping God on Saturn's day.

In the Old Covenant, to eat meat offered to an idol was a strict no-no. You could be defiled by contact in a number of situations. This is not the case with the New Covenant. Paul's view was strictly modern; 1Cor 8:4 “We know that an idol is nothing at all.” The meat is just meat, but the actual sacrificing is a different story; 1Cor10:18-20 “Do not those who eat the sacrifices participate in the alter. 19 Do I mean then that a sacrifice offered to an idol is anything, or an idol is anything? 20 No, but we know the sacrifices of pagans are offered to demons, I don’t want you to be participators with demons.” It’s the same thing with a day, unless, on the day you worship some demon, a day is just a day. 1Cor 10:25 "Eat anything sold in the meat market without raising questions of conscience, for, "The earth is the Lord's, and everything in it." In spite of what HWA, Ben-Ariel or Ron Weinland say, no one is worshiping Nimrod on Sunday.

Herbert defined true worship by Holy Days, Sabbaths and Feasts. This is, strictly, an Old Covenant view. What a day might have been in the past, can’t hurt you. Some churches try to get kids to come to church and do something Jesus-oriented instead of going out and participating in Halloween. They give it a different name. It’s a replacement, it’s not Halloween. And because it’s on the same day doesn’t mean demons are being memorialized. The kids who might feel left out, no longer do, so the temptation is neutralized. All I can say is; more power to them.

We were never allowed to wear a cross, in OWCG, because of its pagan origins; but what was a horrific symbol of evil became the instrument of our salvation. Misconceptions can pollute your mind, but your mind can’t be polluted if you are like Paul who said; 1Cor 2:2 “For I resolved to know nothing while I was with you except Jesus Christ and him crucified.” We used to hold people in contempt who expressed themselves like this, just like Weinland does today. I wouldn’t doubt that Paul might have worn a cross. Gal 6:14 “May I never boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ.”

Point four; no one goes to heaven: These people seem to be completely ignorant of what churches teach. I’ve heard plenty of them refer to the rulership of Jesus and his saints on earth. The Armstrongists get so riled up and sometimes virtually scream, “no one goes to heaven,” but even Satan went before the throne of God in the book of Job. Is a child of God less than the devil? And what of the numberless multitude in the book of Revelation? They're clearly in heaven. Does it even matter? Old covenant people were defiled by a host of rather innocuous things. These Armstrong worshipers get bent out of shape by non-salvation issues, and I guess it provides an excuse to be self-righteously indignant.

Point five; the elect of God become gods: The idea that you shall become like God was Satan’s first lie. Shouldn’t that embarrass people who one up the devil by believing they become God. The scriptures speak of human kind becoming the children of God, apparently this isn’t enough for them.

God has many names in the Old Testament: Hebrew; El: mighty one or a deity; Elah: object of worship, H430 Elohim: gods in the ordinary sense, occasionally applied by way of deference to magistrates, and sometimes as a superlative: angels, great, judges, mighty; Eloah: object of worship; Yahweh: self existent or eternal; G2316 Theos: a deity, (with G3580) the supreme divinity; fig. a magistrate.

The question is, which of these definitions of God do these people want to be? The Bible uses the phrase, “you are gods,” three times, in Psalm 82:6, and Jesus repeats the verse twice in John 10:34-35. The Greek has only the one word for God, be it in the greater or the lesser sense, so any Hebrew name of God is converted to the one, which is less precise. It just happens that in the verse Jesus quoted the word god is from H430 Elohim which can be applied to a judge. Why would any one extrapolate from this that they can become God in the greater sense. This little scrap is all Herbert had to formulate one of his foundational teachings; and this is supposed to be proof? Paul said, 1Cor6:3“Don’t you know that we will judge angels,” elohim and theos both apply, since both can mean a "judge".

The definitions of God are; All Mighty, All Knowing, Omnipotent, Omnipresent, Creator, Eternal, Love (the personification of), Ruler of the Universe, and "I am". There's not a single one of them that we can cast a shadow upon, He can share some limited aspect of his qualities but, we will never match his definition, so we will never be God as the English word is defined, since it has no applications for anything less than the Almighty.

Gods names are all descriptions of Himself; And God can make us similar to himself in some remote fashion; he judges and so can we; he rules and so can we; But to be self existent, no; to be eternal (meaning both forwards and backwards), no; and who is arrogant enough to think that they should become an object of worship, apparently HWA did, and his disciples do today. I have literally heard it stated from the pulpit that; "as a god, you will be entitled to worship."

And they like to point the finger screaming, “You pagans!” but how often in the books of the prophets does God say, “I am God, I will not give my glory to another.” God says in Isa 43:10 “Before me no God was formed, nor shall there be one after me.” David Ben-Ariel would have us believe Herbert over the Bible. The disdain that Ben-Ariel has for people, because they don’t believe they will become objects of worship, is kind of sick.

Point six; those who are anti HWA are filled with murderous hate: Just like Herbert, Ben-Ariel forms opinions by jumping to conclusions, forming wildly disproportional ideas from the scantest of evidence. "People, who are anti-Armstrong, have a murderous hatred," you say. This demonstrates classic OWCG paranoia. Sure, I know, the devil is at work in everyone who doesn’t except his BS. My problem is, I don’t like to be lied to. That really ticks me off. I don’t like the fact that so much of my life was wasted on Herbert’s nonsense. And I don’t want anybody to be where I was. I don’t want anyone to follow any of Herbert’s Mini-Me's, and that includes David Ben-Ariel and Ron Weinland. It actually would have been nice if Herbert could have repented before he died. There’s no way he could have made up for the damage he wreaked, but Jesus can, and Jesus did die for anyone who repents.

WHAT COVENANT ARE WE BOUND TO?

MY COMMENTS ARE IN CAPS &/OR [BRACKETS]:

WHAT COVENANT ARE WE BOUND T0?

An Illustration From Marriage (NIV)

Rom. 7:1 Do you not know, brothers—for I am speaking to men who know the law—that the law has authority over a man only as long as he lives?

2 For example, by law a married woman [THE CHURCH] is bound to her husband [PHYSICAL JESUS] as long as he is alive, but if her husband [PHYSICAL JESUS] dies, she is released from the [OLD COVENANT/PHYSICAL ] law of marriage.

3 So then, if she marries another man while her husband [physical Jesus] is still alive, she is called an adulteress. But if her husband [PHYSICAL JESUS] dies, she is released from that [O.C./PHYSICAL] law and is not an adulteress, even though she marries another man [SPIRIT JESUS].

4 So, my brothers, you also died to the [O.C.] law through the [PHYSICAL] body of Christ, that you might belong to another, to him who was raised from the dead [SPIRIT JESUS], in order that we might bear fruit to God.

5 For when we were controlled by the sinful nature, the sinful passions aroused by the [O.C.] law [the motions of sins, which were by the law (Authorized Version)] were at work in our bodies, so that we bore fruit for death.

6 But now, by dying to what once bound us, we have been released from the law so that we serve in the new way of the Spirit, and not in the old way of the written code.

THE OLD COVENANT REVEALED SIN:

Struggling With Sin

7 What shall we say, then? Is the law sin? Certainly not! Indeed I would not have known what sin was except through the law. For I would not have known what coveting really was if the law had not said, "Do not covet."

YET WE REALIZE, BY IT, WE BORE FRUIT FOR DEATH:

8 But sin, seizing the opportunity afforded by the commandment, produced in me every kind of covetous desire. For apart from law, sin is dead.

9 Once I was alive apart from law; but when the commandment came, sin sprang to life and I died.

10 I found that the very commandment that was intended to bring life actually brought death.

11 For sin, seizing the opportunity afforded by the commandment, deceived me, and through the commandment put me to death.

12 So then, the law is holy, and the commandment is holy, righteous and good.

13 Did that which is good, then, become death to me? By no means! But in order that sin might be recognized as sin, it produced death in me through what was good, so that through the commandment sin might become utterly sinful.

WE KNOW THE O.C. WAS TEMPORARY, FADING AWAY:

2 Co. 3:7 Now if the ministry that brought death, which was engraved in letters on stone, came with glory, so that the Israelites could not look steadily at the face of Moses because of its glory, fading though it was,

8 will not the ministry of the Spirit be even more glorious?

9 If the ministry that condemns men is glorious, how much more glorious is the ministry that brings righteousness!

10 For what was glorious has no glory now in comparison with the surpassing glory.

11 And if what was fading away came with glory, how much greater is the glory of that which lasts!

12 Therefore, since we have such a hope, we are very bold.

13 We are not like Moses, who would put a veil over his face to keep the Israelites from gazing at it while the radiance was fading away.

14 But their minds were made dull, for to this day the same veil remains when the old covenant is read. It has not been removed, because only in Christ is it taken away.

15 Even to this day when Moses is read, a veil covers their hearts.

16 But whenever anyone turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away.

WE KNOW IT'S PURPOSE WAS TO LEAD US TO CHRIST:

Gal.3:21 Is the law, therefore, opposed to the promises of God? Absolutely not! For if a law had been given that could impart life, then righteousness would certainly have come by the law.

22 But the Scripture declares that the whole world is a prisoner of sin, so that what was promised, being given through faith in Jesus Christ, might be given to those who believe.

23 Before this faith came, we were held prisoners by the law, locked up until faith should be revealed.

24 So the law was put in charge to lead us to Christ that we might be justified by faith.

25 Now that faith has come, we are no longer under the supervision of the law.

WE KNOW WE CAN'T INHERIT THE KINGDOM UNDER THE O.C.

Hagar and Sarah

Gal. 4:21 Tell me, you who want to be under the law, are you not aware of what the law says?

22 For it is written that Abraham had two sons, one by the slave woman and the other by the free woman.

23 His son by the slave woman was born in the ordinary way; but his son by the free woman was born as the result of a promise.

24 These things may be taken figuratively, for the women represent two covenants. One covenant is from Mount Sinai and bears children who are to be slaves: This is Hagar.

25 Now Hagar stands for Mount Sinai in Arabia and corresponds to the present city of Jerusalem, because she is in slavery with her children.

26 But the Jerusalem that is above is free, and she is our mother.

27 For it is written:"Be glad, O barren woman [GENTILES - CHILDREN BY FAITH, who bears no children,break forth and cry aloud,you who have no labor pains;because more are the children of the desolate womanthan of her [ISRAEL] who has a husband [JESUS]."

28 Now you, brothers, like Isaac, are children of promise.

29 At that time the son born in the ordinary way persecuted the son born by the power of the Spirit. It is the same now.

30 But what does the Scripture say? "Get rid of the slave woman and her son, for the slave woman's son will never share in the inheritance with the free woman's son."

31 Therefore, brothers, we are not children of the slave woman, but of the free woman.

WE KNOW THAT BY KEEPING THE O.C., WE ALIENATE OURSELVES FROM CHRIST JESUS. BUT BY THE N.C. WE BEAR FRUIT TO GOD:

Freedom in Christ

Gal.5:1 It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery.

2 Mark my words! I, Paul, tell you that if you let yourselves be circumcised, Christ will be of no value to you at all.

3 Again I declare to every man who lets himself be circumcised that he is obligated to obey the whole law.

4 You who are trying to be justified by law have been alienated from Christ; you have fallen away from grace.

5 But by faith we eagerly await through the Spirit the righteousness for which we hope.

6 For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision has any value. The only thing that counts is faith expressing itself through love.