Category Archives: sin

May 18, 2013 · 2:16 pm

Believing the Resurrection in Us–How the Holy Spirit Comes Down Into Us

The everyday pressures and the stress of just living on this planet causes us much grief. The demanding bosses, the irate public, the disgruntled co-workers, the incessant bills, and the constant drain of having to deal with earthly things all day long is just too much to cope with. With all this confusion going on, the children of the King begin to feel like spiritual paupers instead of heirs to the throne.

Yes, the Father allows this to happen to His children because He wants us to finally get our fill of it and call upon His name for deliverance. He has made us “subject to vanity.” He created us, in other words, in our original earthly state to feel the futility of living on earth no matter how much material wealth we may have. “All is vanity and vexation of spirit.” Simply put, we’ve got to get sick of it.

So enough of this world’s insanity already! The answer? God, we need more of Your Spirit working inside of us. We need more of Your love abiding in us so that we can return love to those who slight us out here in this world system. We need more of You in us, more of your Spirit welling up in love, joy, and peace. We need You, God, to fill us like you filled your chosen people in the days of the early church.

Yes, that is our need, but how do we get more Spirit into us? What did You say in your word about this? It all boils down to believing in the Resurrection.

Paul lines this out in Ephesians. He is saying to them that through God’s mercy, which is based in His infinite love towards us, He has made us alive where once we were dead in sin. He has done this through the power of the resurrection of Christ. When the Father infused that dead sacrificial body of the Lamb and raised him from the dead, all sinners who believe this were raised up together with Him. “Even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ…and hath raised us up together, and made us sit together in heavenly places in Yahshua Messiah” (2:4-6).

This miraculous turnaround from the darkness of sin and sinning to light and righteousness in a person’s heart can only be realized through belief. [I know what some are thinking: “We’ve been hearing about the resurrection and righteousness and sin and belief all our lives in church. You are not telling us anything that we don’t already know.”] If what we’ve heard all our life were enough, then why are we so weak spiritually? Why aren’t we walking in the joy and victory that God has promised those who follow Him? Why? “Because of your unbelief,” the Master said.

The transformation to power in our lives is by believing what God said about the resurrection and us—that if we believe that our old life died with the Lamb 2000 years ago, that if we believe that we were buried with Him, and if we believe that God raised Him up out of the grave after three days and three nights—if we can just believe this, we can also ourselves be “raised to walk in a newness of life” (Romans 6:4-6).

We are delivered from depression and death by believing what He said He did through the resurrection and how it regenerates our hearts and consciences. For His Spirit comes into us by believing the truth of His word to us about our being raised up with him to walk in a new life.

A new life is what He has promised us. However, if we are still thinking the same way we did before our experience with God, if we are still doing the same things we did before our “conversion,” if we still are the same earthly-minded person, then how is that a new life? How does it differ from the old?

Let’s cut to the chase. If we are still lusting after women, how is that a new life? If we are still desiring another person’s material things, how is that new? If we put our own self before others, how is that new? If we are breaking any of the commandments, then how is it a new life? We were breaking them before we came to God. So what has changed?

If we are still sinning, or breaking the Ten Commandments, then we have not died, been buried, and been raised from the dead-in-sin. We have not actually believed it yet. Our need is for the Spirit of Christ to live in us. But how do we abide in Him and He in us? “That Christ may dwell in our hearts by faith…” That the Spirit of God may live in our hearts—but how? By just believing it! It is God’s word! It is the truth! Believe it before you feel it. You have to believe it first! Then the evidence of the reality will come. The trouble is that unbelief is such a part of the human condition, the human heart, that we have trouble believing what we see. “I can’t believe my eyes,” is a common statement. God is asking us to believe before we see.

We attain this righteous state not by us trying to be righteous and keep the law. No. It is a gift from God. We cannot attain the righteous state by working for it. Faith attains it and then the works we do with the help of His Spirit within witness to the fact that He in us is righteous. “By grace are you saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is a gift of God; not of works, lest any man should boast” (Eph. 2:8-9).

Actually, we in our newness of life, in our newly received righteous state with Him, are a product of His work—not our own work. “For we are His workmanship…” (v. 10). And God’s work through His own faith in us is good. He said, “Let there be light, and there was light, and He said it was good. We are His doing, His creation.

He definitely knows what He is doing. He through this new life derived by Him raising His chosen ones up with the Messiah—He has through this new life created a new creation—the second Adam, the second man. And He has created us in Christ unto good works (v. 10). I repeat: We have been created in Christ with the expressed purpose of producing good works.

Not some good works through us and some bad works. No. He has spiritually created us anew “unto good works.” We need to believe this. He has not created us unto bad works or corrupt works. No. He has made us in our new life to bear good fruit. The Master said, “ A good tree cannot bear evil fruit, neither can a corrupt tree bear good fruit. You will know them by their fruits.”

“We are his workmanship, created in Yahshua the Messiah unto good works” (v. 10). And the kicker is that God has already foreordained for us to walk in the spirit and thereby do these good deeds.

And this great treasure-life is opened to all that our God has called. For He took all the sin of the whole world upon Himself and became sin for all of us, and when He died, all of the sin of the whole world died with Him. That’s your sinful heart and my old sinful heart. And by His shed blood we all were brought close to Him. So close, in fact, that all who believe this and respond are “one new man” (Eph. 2:15). And all believers, whoever they are, through Him “have access by one Spirit unto the Father” (v. 18).

And we all are spiritually built upon the “foundation of the apostles and prophets, Yahshua the Messiah Himself being the chief cornerstone.” We are a building made by God Himself, built on this foundation. He is building us up; we are growing into “an holy temple in the Master, builded together for an habitation of God through the Spirit” (v. 22). God will inhabit us His temple. He will live in us through His Spirit.

Later Paul reveals the mystery of how God is opening up His Spirit to come down on whomever can receive it—be they Gentile or Israelite. Paul prayed (Eph. 3:15-19) that God would grant to the Ephesians power and strength by His Spirit in their “inner man.” Power, strength, and might, Paul knew, were needed in the spiritual new creation within the heart of each new believer.

And this strength was to be given how? How do believers receive this strengthening? “By His Spirit in the inner man.” But how does this spiritual power come from His Spirit into our inner being? It comes by faith. “That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith.” This spiritual anointing comes to us by us believing it. Because He said it, spoke it, and His prophets wrote down His inspired words about the power coming, we need only to believe that He is good to His word about Him giving us more of His Spirit.

We have to believe that the invisible Spirit is giving us strength, and now is the acceptable time for this to happen. We’ve got to believe it before we feel the strength. Believe it because He said to believe it, and the strength and power will come. “All things are possible to him that believeth,” the Master said. “Have the faith of God,” He also said. God believes it already about us; why shouldn’t we?

He said in Eph. 2:21 that we are the spiritual building of God, and we are in Him and He in us, and we are growing “unto an holy temple” of God. This strengthening that He does on us in our inner man is the growth of the Spirit with us. We grow in His love in us, and we grow spiritually out to others. This spiritual growth ends up with us being “filled with all the fulness of God” (3:19).

We are to finally through humility “grow up into Him in all things” (4:2). We are to be “renewed in the spirit” of our mind, “putting on the new man” wherein we walk in love and forgiveness one to another.

Paul is saying that by believing it so, we can walk in His Spirit. We can leave the pride and arrogance of the old life and walk as obedient children. His Spirit can live within us and can grow in us—if we believe. For it all happens by faith—by believing what He said about it. That is what makes it so. It is not believing in something that is not there.

This new life that God has declared is already a reality in His eyes. Our new life in Him is not an illusion, some figment of our imagination. No. Our new life in His Spirit is a reality already spoken into existence by our God. We need only believe that it is real. Through us believing it, we actualize it and witness it. It is like the priests with the Ark of the Covenant stepping out upon the Jordan River and the waters peeling back for them that they go over on dry ground. God said it; they believed it, and they achieved it. A miracle happened that day at the Jordan River.

And a miracle was done in our hearts when we believed that He had taken the old one out and had given us a new one. This is how miracles are done. Miracles will come through believing that they are already foreordained to come. The disciples asked why this impotent man was lame. Was it his sin or his parents sin that put him in this pitiful shape? The Master said, No, because of neither, but that the glory of God could be seen when he was healed by one of God’s believers.

This is not believing this life of strength and power into existence. No. This new life He has for us is already in existence. Our new life in Christ’s Spirit already exists. It is His with Him. When we believe His resurrection, that power is witnessed in us again and again. We then have the witness within our own selves. This is a miracle of transformation. Let the miracles continue. Let us all walk on, believing what He said He would do for His children and through His children. Kenneth Wayne Hancock

The Next Great Move of God

God will appear to certain individuals of His own choosing not many months or years hence. He always has; He always will.

How can I be sure of this? God’s history of His dealings with His people serves as a prophetic blueprint of what He will do next. “That which has been is now. And that which is to be has already been, and God requires the things of the past” (Eccle. 3: 15).

In fact, the Holy Bible is a record of God’s literal appearances to people. Before every great move of God, He has appeared to someone. He intervenes with His presence, shattering the dull, numbing grind of human earthly existence with His incomparable light. We humans evidently need this astounding experience in order for us to be sure that God really is real and means business.

These stupefying manifestations begin, appropriately enough, in the book of Genesis, the seed book of beginnings. There we see God speaking to Adam and Eve in the Garden. “And they heard the voice of the LORD God (Yahweh) walking in the garden,” (Gen. 3: 8). He was in a human form, “walking in the garden,” and they were afraid of His presence there. A bit later we see God having a lengthy conversation with Cain.

Before Yahweh destroyed by water the wicked, He talked it all over with Noah, who “found grace in the eyes of Yahweh” (6: 8). And “Noah walked with God.” And so it was that God confided in Noah His plans, instructed Him to build an ark, and established the Noahic Covenant with him, ensuring the continuance of His righteous seedline.

We next see Yahweh appear to Abraham, the father of our faith. “And Yahweh appeared unto Abram,” and established the Abrahamic Covenant with him, giving him and his heirs the Holy Land of promise (Gen. 12: 7). And “after these things the word of Yahweh came unto Abram in a vision, saying, Fear not, Abram: I am thy shield, and thy exceeding great reward” (15: 1; 17: 1-19). And God makes a great move and promises Abram that of his own loins he will have a son in his and Sarah’s old age, and his seed will be as numerous as the stars of heaven. And Abram believed what Yahweh told him. And it was that very faith and belief that God appreciated so much that God “counted it to him for righteousness.”

This is huge. This is a great move of God as He shows mankind that just believing God and His word will establish us in a right standing with God. Getting right with God comes from believing Him. Period. This is when faith triumphs over man’s puny attempts in his own strength to keep the ten commandment law of God.

For the law was not given to us as a goal to strive for or a moral ideal, as it were. For we in our human strength cannot successfully keep the 10 Commandments. No. The law was given to man as a mirror to show him of his own unrighteousness and sins, and to show him his innate wickedness. “The law is not made for a righteous man, but for the lawless and disobedient, for the ungodly and for sinners, for unholy and profane, for murderers…for whoremongers, for them that defile themselves with mankind, for menstealers, for liars…” (I Tim. 1: 9-10).

God granted to Abraham, because he believed Him and His promises, a new heart that keeps the commandments of God, which is when God counted his belief as righteousness, or being right with God.

What Does This Have to Do with Our Generation?

The take away for us in our generation? God has promised us a new heart and new spirit that keeps His ways and commandments if we believe Him. God commands us, “Cast away from you all your transgressions, whereby ye have transgressed; and make you a new heart and a new spirit.” How do we make this happen? By just believing His promise: “A new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you” (Ezk. 18: 31; 36: 26).

This new heart that does not transgress and break the 10 Commandments is called “righteousness” by God in the scriptures. It is the state of being right with God, and it is attained the same exact way that Abraham obtained it from God. By believing God.

And this way of receiving a new heart and new spirit from God that does not break His commandments is outlined in the New Testament scriptures. Although written in plain sight in black and white, you won’t hear those passages preached in the pulpits Sunday morning, for most pastors don’t believe it (for more on this read the “Introduction” of my book found here:

https://immortalityroad.wordpress.com/ebook-the-unveiling-of-the-sons-of-god/ ).

No, most modern day pastors don’t believe that after letting our old heart and spirit die with Christ on the cross, that God will give us a new heart and new spirit that does not sin against him. The pastors don’t think God can do that. They don’t believe that “whosoever is born of God does not commit sin” (I John 3: 9). It is right there in black and white, but they don’t think it is possible. But I thought that “all things are possible to him that believes” (Mark 9: 23).

Do We Believe God Can Do It?

Abraham certainly did not let the “deadness of his wife’s womb” keep him from believing that God was able to keep His promise that they would have a child. He was 100 years old and Sarah was 90. Which is easier to believe? That a 90 year old woman, decades past the age of bearing children could get pregnant and deliver a baby or God being able to change our hearts to not sin against Him? Yet Abram “did not waver through unbelief regarding the promise of God, but was strengthened in his faith and gave glory to God, being fully persuaded that God had power to do what he had promised. This is why it was credited to him as righteousness” (Romans 4: 19-22 NIV).

Let us not waver either through unbelief of His promise to us of being His righteous sons. We simply must believe like Abraham did. That God will give us a new clean spirit if we believe Him; He did promise it to us if we believe that He will.

And so Yahweh appeared to Abraham and promised him much and established the way for Abraham’s spiritual children–us–to walk by faith in these last days. Faith. Belief. This is what is holding us back from becoming the manifested sons of God, the princes and princesses of the Kingdom of God. If we cannot believe Him that He will give us a pure sinless heart and spirit–a new heart that He promised–then how will we ever grow up into being like Him and those men of God that He appeared to?

Time would fail me to outline all of those men and women of faith that God appeared to–Moses, Joshua, Gideon, Samuel, David, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Paul–to name just a few. He appeared to them all before a great move of His in the earth. He will do the same today, for He changes not (Mal. 3: 6).

The Criteria

Wait a minute. That will be the criteria. He will appear once again to those who believe Him for a new heart and new spirit, which is being right with God. For Christ did say, “He that is faithful in that which is least is faithful also in much” (Luke 16: 10).

For a new spirit is just the beginning, as it makes us a child of God. We must keep growing spiritually into spiritual young men and fathers. For God will bring forth in the last days His kingdom. That is the good news. And ruling with Him right here on earth will be the over comers. “To him that overcomes, will I grant to sit with me in my throne.” Some will sit with Christ on His throne. That is a promise. But it will be those who are full of faith and belief, those who have bought from Christ “gold tried in the fire,” and “white raiment” to hide their nakedness, and have “anointed their eyes with eye salve that they may see” (Rev. 3: 14-22). Those are the over comers; those are the manifested sons and daughters of God; those are the ones He will appear to in these latter days to strengthen them and encourage them for the battle to take back the earth and establish His literal kingdom and government right here on earth. K. W. Hancock

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Filed under Adam and Eve, Bible, children of God, death of self, elect, faith, false teachers, Garden of Eden, kingdom of God, manifestation of the sons of God, princes and princesses of God, righteousness, sin, sons and daughters of God, Yahweh

Tagged as Abraham, faith, Garden of Eden, sin, sons of God, Yahweh

October 6, 2012 · 8:48 pm

Who Are the Elect of God? Hint: He Has Chosen the Weak Things

This teaching that a person must willingly submit their life to the death of the cross with Christ–it seems foolish to the worldly mind. But this cross experience is the equalizer, for it places all of mankind in the same location before God. And that is a place of weakness.

To admit that you can’t make it anymore in this old world, that your old life is selfish and devoid of true love, that you are in need of someone stronger than you to lift you out of the mire of evil thoughts and actions–that is weakness.

The worldly mind would think, how utter pathetic! How weak and helpless! But it is this very weakness that God has chosen! “God has chosen the weak things of this world to confound the things that are mighty” (I Cor. 1: 27).

The apostle Paul is saying that God has chosen those who know they are weak, for the Word also declares, “God resists the proud but gives grace/favor to the humble” (I Pet. 5: 5).

How does a person know if they are one of the elect or chosen ones [“the elect” and “chosen ones” come from the same word in the Greek http://www.blueletterbible.org/lang/lexicon/lexicon.cfm?Strongs=G1588&t=KJV ]? This is an all important question, for since God does choose out certain individuals, and we are to “make our calling and election sure,” we do need to sincerely explore His election or choices to do His work in the earth. (II Pet. 1: 10).

And this leads us back to this question. Who does God choose to be in His elect? God has chosen the weak, the ones who have endured the sufferings of Christ. These are they who have willingly submitted their old selves to be “crucified with Christ” (Gal. 2: 20; Rom. 6: 6-11).

God has chosen these weak ones. They are the elect of God, chosen by Him to turn this world upside down–to “confound the things that are mighty.”

The power comes into a Christian’s life after we humble oursleves “under the mighty hand of God.”

God has chosen this extremely humbling form of death for His elect to prove them to see if they be found worthy. For crucifixion is the most humbling of all ways to die. Thank God He provided our Savior Jesus/Yahshua the Anointed One to bear the physical, literal crucifixion for us. Then it is our turn to follow our Example and yield to the spiritual crucifixion that puts an end to our old spiritual nature, to our original sinful old heart. We do this by faith and begin to walk in the new heart we receive from Him. Through study of His Word and communicating with Him, we grow in this grace/favor that He has bestowed upon us, seeking “first the kingdom of God and His righteousness.”

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Tagged as crucifixion, faith, the cross, the elect

April 21, 2012 · 5:48 pm

“Whoever Commits Sin Is a Slave of Sin”–Who Shall Deliver Us?

You hear Christ’s words quoted all the time: “You shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.” But free from what exactly? People rarely go on and finish the quote. Christ did not stop expounding after that thought in John 8: 32.

The Pharisees retorted, We have never been in bondage to any man.

Then Christ spelled it out which bondage the truth would free a man from. “Whover commits sin is a slave of sin” (v. 34 NKJV). A slave of sin. If a man is committing sin, he is sin’s slave. He is bound to do sin’s bidding. These are heavy words.

Sin is a harsh slavemaster to the natural unregenerated man, which is old man Adam, the nature we inherited when we were born into our earthly existence. Without Christ’s Spirit coming into our hearts, mankind is prey to every whim of sin that the devil, the prince of the air, wants us to do.

Sin Is the Transgression of the Law

So just who is this slavemaster that Christ called Sin? Sin is a spiritual state of a human being that breaks the ten commandment law of God. And it is these ten laws that the evil one entices lost man to break. Lying, stealing and cheating, committing adultery, murder, having other gods before the One True God, idolizing anything or anyone–these are just some of the sins that man not only does but is in slavery to.

Sin enslaves people; it has them to a point that the sinner can’t fight it. The little demonic voice says, Take it, and the body obeys as the hand snatches something just that fast. The voice whispers, Go ahead and take her; your wife won’t find out.

Paul the apsotle described this bondage to sin. Describing that time in the past when he was a slave to sin, he wrote, “For when we were controlled by the sinful nature…” (Rom. 7: 5 NIV). The rest of the chapter describes how sin enslaves a person. Paul makes this experience immediate for his readers by shifting it into the present tense. This is a literary technique used by writers for centuries.

Yet, sadly, most preachers erroneously teach that Paul was a sinner and was a slave to sin. How utterly preposterous and ignorant these preachers are! Do they really know what they are saying? They are saying that Paul raised the dead and healed the sick one day and then lusted after another man’s wife the next; That he “spoke with the tongues of men and angels” and preached the everlasting gospel, and was transported to the third heaven one day, and then was capable of having other gods before Him the next? Please. It is impossible, for Christ settled the issue with this statement: “A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither [can] a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit…By their fruits you shall know them” (Matt. 7: 18, 20). Trust me. Paul was a good tree.

I pray that God will be merciful to these ignorant teachers, for I know that He has intense grief and misery in store for them that do not repent: “Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness…” (Isa. 5: 20).

In Romans 7 Paul was making it immediate for his readers. “When we were in the flesh (the sinful nature)”–the “flesh” here in the KJV being the old sinful nature, not Paul’s earthly body.

When he had the old nature before his incredible conversion on the road to Damascus, he was a slave to sinning, doing things that broke the ten commandment law. In fact, he said that the bad things that he did not want to do, he did, and the good things he wanted to do, he could not do (Rom. 7: 19).

Who Will Deliver Me?

Recreating this lost state, Paul finally cries out to God. “O wretched man that I am! Who shall deliver me from the body of this death? I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord” (7: 24). Thus Paul completes the scene of this misery in a lost man’s life and gives the answer. It is the Lord through His sacrifice of Himself and His Resurrection.

We are freed from this slavery to sin when we submit to our own crucifixion of our sinful self. “Knowing this, that our old man was crucified with [Him], that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves of sin” (Rom. 6: 6). The crucifixion with Christ, “who was made to be sin for us,” puts an end to the slavery to commit sin! We are free! “For he that is dead is freed from sin” (6: 7).

How do you actually do this? What’s the secret in walking in this? How do you conquer sin in your life? You’ve got to “reckon yourself to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord” (6: 11). Reckon it so. Reckon it done. Count it as such. We might as well do it, for God has already done this. He has reckoned it done in our lives. He is just waiting with great patience for us to come on board. He is waiting on us to “get it.”

This is the truth! And you shall know this truth about getting rid of the old sinful nature, and it shall make you free from sin in your life!

What’s next? What comes after our deliverance from sin and sinning? “And having been set free from sin, you became slaves of righteousness” (6: 18). We are enslaved now to another Master; we are now “slaves of God.”

“But now having been set free from sin, and having become slaves of God, you have your fruit to holiness, and the end, everlasting life.”

[Some are saying to me right now, You keep talking about this sin question all the time. Yes, and I will continue until we all come to the unity of the faith, until His elect reach full maturity. For I know that we cannot come to spiritual maturity (perfection) until we get this foundation right: repentance of sin that brings physical death and faith toward God who delivers us from sin. I would like your thought and comments on this. KWH]

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Tagged as Christ, cross, death of self, sin

March 20, 2012 · 10:50 pm

Faith–How to Walk in It–How to Partake of the Divine Nature of God

How do we do it? How do we let the old self die? We reckon it done by faith/belief. How do we start walking in a brand new God-given life? We reckon it done by faith. Reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God through Yahshua Messiah our Master. Rom. 6:11.

We’ve got to reckon it done! The word “reckon” is #3049 in Strong’s. It means “to account it, to count it as such.” God wants us to reckon it so, but He does it first! When we turn to Him, then He counts us righteous in His eyes even in our imperfect state. This is the way our Creator is. This is part of His nature—faith, belief. In fact, faith is the foundation of Yahweh’s divine nature, for we are admonished to be “partakers of the divine nature” by adding to the faith once delivered by Yah to his set-apart ones, virtue, and to virtue knowledge, on through agape-charity-love, the very essence of Him. But His nature starts with Faith. It is His nature to “call those things that do not exist as though they did.” Rom. 4:17, NKJV. If He is this positive, then He would want His children to be the same.

He wants us to follow in His footsteps! God “accounted” righteousness to Abraham because of his belief—before Abraham was righteous! “Accounted” here is the same word as the one translated “reckon.” We are commanded to RECKON some things done. Now we have to reckon our sinful self gone—by belief—as though it were already done—for that is how Yah looks at it! By belief! Reckon it done through Him and His faith. He said it. Let it be done. For what saith the scripture? Abraham believed God, and it was counted unto him for righteousness. Rom. 4:3. Yahweh imputed, reckoned to Abraham the ability to live in a upright manner, keeping Yahweh’s laws and not sinning, by just believing that Yahweh had done it! We make it so hard through our hard heart of unbelief. He is looking for childlike faith, the belief of a small child. All we have to do is just believe that Yahweh has provided a way for us to actually put the old life to death and start living a new life in Him.

But the main reason that many do not want this is because they do not want to give up their old lives. Yah has provided everything for us to get the sin out of our lives, to clean out the temple so that He can take up His rightful abode. But people want to keep sinning and still be the people of God. They may claim it in words, but it is in words only and not in reality as far as Yahweh is concerned.

God must be getting tired of hearing how powerful sin is in our lives. I know that He wants to hear out of our mouths how great the power of Yahweh is—powerful enough to keep us from sinning. We must quit glorifying sin!

Do we think that Yah is pleased to hear our unbelief when we say, “I sin everyday. We all sin every day. We can’t live without sinning.” Oh, we are so quick to say that, almost as if it were an excuse that He would accept.

That’s like saying that the giants are too big; we can’t take the land. Is the giant Sin too much for us, or are we going to believe that Yahweh in us can slay that giant Sin in our life? Let not sin reign in your mortal body, that you should obey it in the lusts thereof….For sin shall not have dominion over you. Rom 6:12-14. We’ve got to reckon our old man, our old self, our old nature dead to sin in the same way that Yahweh reckoned or credited righteousness unto Abraham because of his belief in the promises. Are we going to stagger at the promise that we can live a righteous life now?

But someone will say, “But we just can’t live without sin.” Yah knows that we can’t on our own strength. The question is, “Where is God in that statement?” What happened to, “I can do all things through Messiah Yahshua that strengthens me…” What about, “And nothing shall be impossible to you.” Nothing. Which is to say in reality, “Anything is possible. With God all things are possible.” All things means with His help even living without sin. Where’s our belief in His promises?

Paul believed that we should live in a righteous manner before God right now. For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men. It teaches us to say “No” to ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives in this present age. Titus 2:11, NIV.

Some have used God’s granting of grace as a possibility to keep on sinning and still get forgiveness. Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase. By no means! We died to sin: how can we live in it any longer? Rom. 6:1, NIV. On the other side of the fence, some practically throw out God’s grace in reckoning righteousness to us by believing Him because of the “cheap grace” people. The second group believe that we have to really work at this thing; we have to keep the laws and ordinances. This is true, but it is no longer “I” that lives, but Messiah’s Spirit that lives in me! He helps me to keep His laws—by His Spirit! The sad part is that both of the above camps still are in sin.

Where is our belief, our faith that overcomes the world? “My grace/favor is sufficient for you,” Yahshua said. My favor is all you need. That’s how important it is. Him choosing us out of the dunghill before the world ever was, writing our names down before we were ever born—that’s all we need.

Don’t say with a sad countenance, “I hope my name is written down in His book on that day.” Where’s the word of faith that Paul preached in that? Where’s the confidence we have with Him? Speak the word! That kind of timidity reveals a lack of belief that your name is there.

It is very near us, even in our mouths! Say it! Speak it into existence! Be like Him! Reckon it done! Count it as such in our own lives. Which takes more faith? Him counting us righteous or us reckoning our old man dead unto sin? For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body of sin might be done away with…Rom. 6: 6, NIV. Instead of all the unbelief in His love to us, we need to thank Him for the absolute abundance of mercy and favor He has smiled down on our undeserving heads, and the power to bring forth fruit worthy of repentance.

Get off of this “we can’t do anything.” It is He that works in us! When are we going to get out of the way and let Him work in us? As long as we think it is ourselves either doing or not doing whatever, then He can’t do the job in and through us. We must decrease to nothing; He then will increase in us.

We will show our belief (faith) by what we do. We will believe Him for His Spirit, to do His laws and statutes. We are not going to impress Him, however, by doing “good Christian deeds” as if they were our duty while we still harbor doubts as to His ability to raise us up to walk in a newness of life—doubts as to the efficacy of His love and mercy and grace/favor towards us. He loves us. Loose Him and let Him go on out of the tomb of our bodies and unbind Him (the Spirit). Let him arise in our hearts, and let (we must reckon it so) the light so shine.

God who has “commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts…” (For what purpose?) “…to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Yahshua Messiah.” 2Cor 4:6.

To keep us humble now for a season, Yah has us having the Spirit, Himself, the treasure, in these old earthly bodies, that we may know that it is Him and not us that does anything good in and through us.

2Cor 4:10–Always carrying with us the fact of Yah’s earthly sacrificial death (since He died for our sins, now we die, following His example) “that thelife also of Yahshua might be made manifest in our body.” The life of the Savior may be made known to the world in our earthly body. (Now someone will say, limiting Elohim and giving glory somewhere else, “Yes, He will make known His life when He gives us our spirit body at the resurrection.” One problem with that statement; that is not what it says! Go to verse 11. “For we which live (present tense–time is right now) are alway delivered unto death for Yahshua’s sake, that the life also of Yahshua might be made manifest IN OUR MORTAL FLESH.”

There. “In our mortal flesh.” You and I are mortal, and the apostle is telling us that it is possible for us to make known Yahshua’s life in our bodies. And His life does not include sinning.

One thing, though, is guaranteed; if you say today in your heart or out of your mouth, “I can’t show forth His life in my mortal body of flesh, then you will not! And you’ll go down as a “nay-sayer,” but all the promises of Yah are “yea.” Yes. Yes. Yes. Say it. Speak it into existence. By believing what is already there, reserved in heaven for you. By faith/belief. The giants are not too big. You have just got to reckon it so.

Simplifying the Worship of God–Offering the “Calves of Our Lips”

How does God want us to worship Him? The biblical answer is really very simple, but humans lean to their own understanding and make it extremely complicated.

They put worshippers in the bondage of certain conditions and offerings and meetings three times a week where you have to come to the ‘house of the Lord’ because no other place will do and money, money, money and pilgrimages and forced prayer times and hocus pocus rituals and incense and holy water and fastings and observances and physical sprinklings and beads and prayercloths and sundayschool and bar mitzvahs and idols and images that ooze and gotta-read the Bible everyday and giving our children to be brainwashed into another manmade religion and, and…

Is that what God wants us to do to worship Him? To blindly follow what others have imagined that we should do?

God does not need us to give Him or His “ministry” money; He owns the whole earth and everything in it. The only thing that He does not have is our grateful heart. And that is all He wants. He wants us to just sincerely thank Him and praise Him for all that He has done for us.

Why do we not thank Him? It is because we do not believe that He has delivered us and saved us from a disastrous and futile existence. He has already done this; all we must do is believe it. He has delivered us from sin and from sinning. All we need do is walk in His grace and mercy. Those who do this will thank Him, for they know what a deep pit they have been lifted out of. And they are thankful to Him for His love to them.

And so they continue to call upon Him in “the day of trouble,” and He delivers them, and they thank Him, and in so doing, together they create a circle of glorification of God. God is glorified through us thanking Him (Psalm 50: 15).

We are admonished to “offer unto God thanksgiving” (v. 14) and to “offer the sacrifice of praise to God continually..the fruit of our lips giving thanks to His name” (Hebrews 13: 15).

The thanksgiving and praise we give to God are the sacrifices we give to Him now in this present age. Our offerings should not be money but thanks and praise. We now should offer “the calves of our lips” instead of the animal sacrifices under the old testament (Hosea 14: 2).

We simply thank Him now, sincerely from a broken and contrite heart.” And He hears us and has compassion on us and is near to us. This is worshipping Him in Spirit and in truth. KWH

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Filed under prayer, sin, thankfulness

Tagged as christianity, thanksgiving, worship

August 21, 2010 · 4:21 pm

Life Out of Death–The Ultimate Paradox

A paradox is “a statement that seems contradictory or absurd but is actually valid or true.” Life coming out of death is a paradox. Yet any seed must lose its identity before it will spring back to life in another more glorious fruitful form. The seed rots and dies in the moist earth and then, through a miraculous Lifeforce, it multiplies itself at the harvest. One grain of corn yields two or more ears of golden corn.

God is wanting this to play out in our mortal lives here on earth. The death of self is the only sacrifice that God will accept from us. He wants us to be a part of Christ’s body, but the only way to get that Life that lasts forever is through a spiritual death.

This death is the baptism that the apostle Paul talked about–being baptized into His death, so that like as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we to can be raised to walk in a newness of life [ 1 ]. It is His resurrection in us that is our only hope of transcending the grave. For the only pay that we will receive in our old selfish life is a certain physical death. “The wages of sin is death” [ 2]. So we need to die now and avoid the rush.

Let’s get it done. Many are teaching that you can never get rid of sin in your life. Where does it say that? I thought that “all things are possible with God.” If it is “no longer I that lives, but Christ that lives in me,” then “Is Christ the minister of sin? God forbid!” [ 3]. Let’s “present our bodies a living sacrifice,” for this is the reasonable thing to do in gratitude for all He has done for us [4 ].

Let’s identify our old self with the sin sacrifice of the Lamb of God. He took on our sins on Himself on the tree, providing a way for us to be made free from the old sinful cravings and dark selfish actions that we were a slave to all our lifetime [ 5]. We are going to pay for our sinful selfish actions sooner or later. He said we would. The upside is that He has provided a way for us to take on His Life after we let our own selfish nature die on the cross.

Most have not heard this true message of what the cross is all about. They are told that Christ is our substitute. No, He is our example, and we are to follow His steps [6 ]. This “preaching of the cross” is just a bunch of foolishness to those who are dying in their sins, whether they know they are or not [ 7]. But to us who He is calling and choosing, it is an absolute lifeline, and it is the power of God to change lives. It is the only way for us to complete what we have been put here on earth for.

What we are doing here

And what is that, you ask? He is using an elect chosen few of His redeemed ones from all of humanity to reproduce Himself through [8]. He is going to take only those who have submitted themselves to the death of the cross; He is taking them into His heart to reveal His very essence to them. They will be in awe of Him and revere His name and will bow to His magnificence as He overshadows their earthly physical plight to do His immortal work on them and then through them. Those who submit to Him will be changed into His glorious image as His own sons and daughters when He returns to this earth to set it all in order [9 ]. They will rule with Him and be in His inner circle while the rest outside wait for their word on the day’s business of the King’s Government.

Now that is the Life that He’s talking about. To be His son or daughter, to be a prince or princess by His side as He trains us up to be rulers with Him in His kingdom soon to fill the whole earth. That is the great destination, the wonderful reaping of our initial humble planting of ourselves into death with Him on the cross. For “if we have been planted together with Him” into His death, we shall also be raised together with Him in His resurrection [ 10].

Dying with Him does not make sense to the world

Yes, dying with Christ is utter foolishness to the worldly mind. But to us who He is calling and choosing, it is our ticket to the big show. And we will be on the stage of this earth, together with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and Noah and Job and Isaiah and Jeremiah and Peter and Paul and all of His sons and daughters who have followed Him in this death of self [11]. If He was good enough to literally and physically die for us, why then should we not spiritually die for Him and, better yet, allow Him to live out His life in us?

In so doing we are then made free from sin. And as we take in His Spirit into our new hearts through belief in His resurrection, sin shall not have dominion over us, for we are made free from it and its power over us [ 12].

But how?

It is just too simple and yet, too wonderful to just believe. Our small, weak, finite minds fail to grasp just how to do this. How do we get our old self to die and then receive a new life in Christ? We have to just reckon it so. We have to count it as a done deal. He has. He said that it was already done; the “works were finished” [ 13]. All we need to do is agree with Him and walk in this truth. He said that our old man “is crucified with Christ” [ 14]. Notice that is with an –ed, meaning that it is already done and over with in the past. That’s how God looks at things; that is how his faith and belief works. Now we need to believe what He believes about us. It is His faith in His own power in our lives that is the key. We just need to believe what and how He believes, and we will be changed into His image. We are now alive unto Him who said that He has raised up all who believe Him [ 15].

Life out of death is the ultimate paradox. The Savior said that very thing. “He who seeks to save his life shall lose it. He who loses his life for my sake shall save it” [ 16]. You will not hear this message in the vast majority of churches; they are trying to increase numbers–not lose membership. For “few there be to find this way of truth” [17 ]. Yet, those to whom He is granting His grace and favor to at this time will hear this and they will respond and take their old self to the cross, thereby enabling the new man to grow into His likeness. Kenneth Wayne Hancock

Romans 6: 6
Rom. 6: 23
Galatians 17-20
Rom. 12: 1
II Corinthians 5: 21
I Peter 2: 21
I Cor. 1: 18
https://immortalityroad.wordpress.com/2009/05/14/the-law-of-har…oduces-himself/
II Cor. 3: 18
Rom. 6: 5
Matthew 8: 11; Luke 13: 2
Rom. 6: 18, 22; 8: 2
Hebrews 4: 3
Gal. 2: 20
Rom. 6: 11-13
Mark 8: 35; Matt. 10: 39
Matt. 7: 14

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Filed under cross, crucified with Christ, death of self, elect, eternal life, sin

Tagged as Christ, christianity, death of self, faith, the cross

December 16, 2009 · 3:43 pm

The Fall of Tiger Woods–From a Biblical Perspective

Tiger Woods and his fall from grace has been a shocking revelation to everyone. How does one go from demi-god to goat in a few days? From a squeaky clean cultural icon to the butt of late night jokes?

Many are asking, Why? Why, Tiger, did you do it? You are worth a billion dollars. You have a beautiful wife and gorgeous kids. You own mansions in every corner of the world. You who are so high up on the pedestal of man’s adoration–what could have possessed you to do such things?

Many excuses have been offered by the press. He had lived a sheltered life. Golf was his only world, and he didn’t have a normal childhood. His “dating life” growing up was skewered because of his early celebrity.

Please. Enough of man’s sappy wisdom. What is the raw straight truth as to why he did it?

The Scriptures of truth speak of a corrupt spiritual condition we are all born with [1]. We are born with an old sinful nature. And this old heart is incorrigible. You can dress it up nice every Sunday morning, change the music that it listens to and the books that it reads, but if still alive and given the chance, it will sin. It cannot change itself. Try as we might, we cannot effect a lasting change for our old sinful nature. It has to be stopped, but we in our own power cannot change ourselves [2].

And when you add riches to this old nature, self-deception increases dramatically. In the mind of man, riches give power, and power gives license to do, they think, whatever they want to do. They think, “I have money and power and fame. I’m somebody special, and I am above the law”, especially the moral law of the universe placed there by the Creator. The “deceitfulness of riches” has tainted the rich man’s mind, deceiving him into thinking that he alone decides what is right or wrong personally for himself [ 3 ].

Like the kings of old, who did whatever came into their mind because they had the power, Tiger Woods has succumbed to the same temptations. Like a classic tragedy worthy of the name, Tiger’s tragic flaw has been exposed, and it is his downfall, even as we speak. And so we all can fall, if we are not sober and vigilant, always on guard against our formidable adversary, the devil [4]. And this enemy does not have a forked tail and horns; he has a forked tongue that lies to us in our thoughts and will lead us away from everything that we love or should love–especially our Maker.

Tiger’s sin? He confessed already his “infidelity,” which is a cleaned-up synonym for adultery. Committing adultery is breaking one of the Ten Commandments, and breaking those is sin [5]. And there is a reason why God commanded us to not do this act. For sin will bring reproach and eventually destroy a person. “Righteousness exalts a nation, but sin is a disgrace to any people” [6].

Sin is a spiritual condition that we are born in, but we are not destined to remain in it! That’s the good news. Christ’s whole message for us in the personal realm is that He came to eradicate sin out of our lives [7 ]. He did this at the cross by taking our sin upon Himself as the sacrificial Lamb of God, and dying. And when He died that day roughly 2,000 years ago, our sins, along with our old sinful nature, died with Him!

And when we believe that He rose from the grave, we then receive a new heart, a sinless heart, a new spiritual nature, a new life–in Him. And He then gives us His Spirit, and by faith in His power, He keeps us from falling. We are now “raised to walk in a newness of life”. The old sinful life is gone, “for he that is dead is freed from sin” [8].

But this will only happen when a person is sick and tired of the sinful life they have been living. And this usually happens when they hit rock bottom. When a person gets to the putrid bottom of the spiritual gutter, and they have had enough of the swine-pens of sin, then they can finally hit the Rock of our salvation.

Riches, however, prevent one from hitting rock bottom. That’s why Christ said, “How difficult it is for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven” [9]. Why? Because his riches tell him that it really isn’t that bad. Yeah, you made some mistakes, but nobody’s perfect, right? Look at me. I’ve still got my money. I’ll patch it up. Hey, life is good. Minor bump in the road. That’s all.

And so,to the rich, this truth about how to really repent from sin and sinning becomes so much nonsense and foolishness. Yet Tiger needs this message today. I’m sending it out into the blogosphere. Do you think he’ll ever get it?

Do you think anyone will get it? I do. Because of our destiny in Him. Kenneth Wayne Hancock

Romans 5: 12
Romans 7: 17-20
Matt. 13: 22
I Peter 5: 8
I John 3: 4-5
Proverbs 14: 34
Romans 6: 6
Romans 6: 4-18
Matt. 19: 23

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Tagged as adultery, cross, old nature, sin, Tiger Woods

November 15, 2009 · 12:22 pm

Conversations With the Seer–Becoming the Temple of God

(Beforetime in Israel, when a man went to enquire of God, thus he spake, Come, and let us go to the seer: for he that is now called a Prophet was beforetime called a Seer. I Samuel 9: 9)

“I’m trying to comprehend God’s plan and purpose about making us His sons and daughters, but it boggles my mind. I can’t seem to take it in.”

The Seer looked at me and told me the truth, even though he knew that it would sting. “It is because your heart, your spiritual core, is small and unable to contain at present what the Creator wants to do with you.”

“How do I make my heart bigger?”

“You cannot make it bigger. It is so typical of natural man, to think that it all depends on his actions. You can’t enlarge it to contain more of Him. Even though you sincerely desire to please God, you cannot just will it so. You cannot run the race according to your own specifications, win the prize, and then trade the prize for a bigger heart to receive more of Him. It doesn’t work that way. He is the One who draws you to Him. He shows mercy to whomsoever He desires to reveal Himself to. He is sovereign; we are not. He is the Potter; we are the clay. We have to remember that it is His ballgame, His rules, His ball park, and His ball.”

“I really do want to play,” I said.

“I know you do. He has led you here. He has placed a thirst for the truth in you. It is Him drawing you. He has His hands on you. But you must first meet Him in that special place.”

“Where is it?”

It Is Not a Church Building

“It is not in a building with colored glass windows depicting events that were written down thousands of years ago. That special place I speak of is not inside the walls of a physical building.”

“You are talking about churches.”

“Yes. The true church is not a building where people go twice a week to worship. Nor is the church those people necessarily. The church is His body, which is the temple of God. And this only occurs when humans have His Spirit inside them, leading them in their daily walk. The Holy Bible tells of this. It is a letter to us from our Father. Its thoughts are inspired by His Spirit. But without His Spirit breathing life into its words today, it is only black ink and white paper. Without God’s Spirit breathing truth afresh as to what it means, then it sits alone and mute, gathering dust in the houses of America and the world.

“Don’t get me wrong. It is God’s written word to us, and in those pages are spelled out how to get to where we need to go. But the world needs someone with God’s Spirit to bring it to life so that it can bring its light to others. It speaks of God’s glorious plan, but without a human picking it up and believing it, its greatest power rests in being a witness against those who do not study their copy of it.”

“The Bible tells us how to get to that special spiritual place.”

“Indeed. But our perspective must change. It is not a place that we go to, to meet Him. But rather, you become that special place. Or better put, the lack of you becomes that special place.”

The ‘Lack of You’

“Wait a minute. I don’t get it. What do you mean, ‘the lack of you becomes that special place'”?

The Seer became energized. He was conducting a symphony of knowledge that was now reaching a crescendo. “The ‘lack of you’ means that you must cease and desist. Your old life along with its vestiges must decrease to a point that ‘you are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God.’

“How does that work?”

“I told you before that it is His ballgame and His rules. And rule number one is ‘Obey His rules.’ He calls us while ‘we are yet in our sins.’ He commands us to repent of our sins. We can’t clean up our mess by ourselves, no matter how hard we try in our own strength. But He has provided a way. The Great God of heaven, that great Spirit that created all things, came down and walked with us here on earth for a few short years. He provided for us His own earthly body as a sacrifice that will cleanse us from sin, which is the breaking of the Ten Commandments.

“It is not just acknowledging that He died for us that cleanses us from all sin. No. That is not enough. We must rather die with Him. For ‘He was made to be sin for us’ [1]. At the moment of Christ’s physical death, your old sinful heart and mine was placed upon Him, so that when He died, our sin died with Him. When He was buried, our old sinful heart was buried. And when He arose–this is the crux of our belief–when He arose from the dead, we, too, arise from the sinful dead, and become alive unto God [2].

“And as we grow spiritually in this truth, we begin to sense that it is no longer the original sinful human staring back at us in the mirror, but an entity quite changed. We begin to see that we are that special spiritual place where God will dwell. We become that special peaceful location–a place free from a demanding ego that tries to enslave other humans to worship its whims.

“At the end of this seemingly long spiritual growth cycle, we will have the distinct sensation that we are no longer in control or trying to be in control of everything around us. The monkey chatter drowning our ear will have quieted, and then, we become that special abode for God’s Spirit.” Kenneth Wayne Hancock

2 Cor. 5: 21
Romans 6: 1-11

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Filed under Bible, crucified with Christ, death of self, resurrection, sin, Spiritual Life Cycle

July 20, 2009 · 1:11 am

“Thou Shalt Not Kill”–Usurping God’s Authority in Taking Life

The commandment, “Thou shalt not kill,” really should read, “Thou shalt not murder.” “Murder” denotes malice aforethought, a deliberately selfish act in taking a life.

“Hands that shed innocent blood” is one of the seven things that the LORD (Yahweh) hates and is an abomination to Him (1).

At the core of this commandment lies a spiritual seed. For “the law is spiritual” (2). The Ten Commandment Law comes out of the heart of the eternal Spirit’s. He is the Giver of life, and He is the Taker (3)

When someone takes a life, he has exalted himself into God’s position of being the Taker of life. God creates life, and He is the one to take life back. When one takes life, he usurps God’s position and authority and essentially thumbs his nose at God.

Homicide, suicide, and abortion then fall into this category. For who gave any of us authority to be the taker of life? That is God’s role. And make no mistake. Abortion is a premeditated act to “shed innocent blood.” For although the fetus is not breathing, it is alive. It has life. It is a living organism. God has given it life. And nobody has the right to take life, especially the innocent, helpless unborn.

But isn’t this the spiritual battle that’s been raging in the heavens since the beginning, and now rages here on earth? Satan, that wicked spirit, is now sent down here to earth to deceive and tempt mankind into doing what he did when he said, “I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God…I will be like the most High” (4).

There it is. Satan’s heart dictates usurping God’s authority and, consequently, his laws.

When humans commit murder, suicide, or abortion, they yield to temptation to usurp God’s power of life and death. It is a wickedly subtle move, but at its core, this is what is spiritually happening.

It takes a hard heart to commit these acts. This hardening is a spiritual shift from the tender faith of the innocent child to one so lifted up that they presume to dictate the lifespan of another human being. How haughty can you get?

And what will ultimately become of Satan, the usurper and those that follow his ways? “Thou shalt be brought down to hell, to the sides of the pit” (5). An inglorious yet appropriate fate awaits. KWH

Proverbs 6: 17
Romans 7: 14
Job 1: 21
Isaiah 14: 13-14
Isaiah 14: 15

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Tagged as abortion, murder, sin, suicide, Ten commandments