"Born From Above": Attributes you Acquire Due to Salvation

Bible's John 3:16, in a corrected expanded translation from the inspired Greek, so you can see more of what it means than translations can show: "God Loved the entire-world-of-people so much, to-effect-that-motive He gave to it His Uniquely-Born Son, in order that ANYONE who believes in/upon Him will never perish-in-Hell, but FOREVER have Eternal Life." [The extra words in English are actually meant in the original Greek, but the Greek needed fewer words to say the same thing, i.e., Greek word "ge" refers to the world of PEOPLE. Bible translations always truncate meaning, so much of what is in the inspired, original-language text, is missing from the translation. That's why translations are so confusing, contradictory, snoozy, etc. English translation of John3:16 is okay, but the above translation is more accurate, conveying more of the original-language meaning in the inspired real Bible. Translations are not inspired. The actual Greek is quickly exegeted for you in my Youtube video, click here.]

Romans Chapters 5-8 constitute a great primer on how salvation changes the inner being of a person. 1Cor2, 2Cor5, Hebrews Chaps5-10, Ephesians Chaps3-4, are also instructive. If you are a believer, breathe 1Jn1:9 so to be online with the Spirit (aka "Filled", getting His Brains!), so you can perceive Scripture. Else you'll be wasting your time. Read it for the big-picture sense it makes, and read it over a good two dozen times in translation. No translation is good, but NIV, NASB are somewhat less fuzzy than the others. All translations screw up Ephesians 4: click on "Right" Pastor? link at Home pagetop, then once in RightPT.htm, click on the Eph4:12-16 translation, to get a corrected translation of what it means.

There's a whole lot of confusion on this topic of the mechanics of "saved". To complement the above videos, here's a brief. When you're done, click on the "God's System" link for a succinct description of your status in Christ; the longer explanation is in "Due Disclosure" link at pagetop. Holy Spirit can show you verses which help you see where Bible says the same things: use 1Jn1:9, and ask Father in Son's name to show you Biblical Authority. That's a subordination, on your part, so justifies the intimacy of Him showing you. It's faster, too, than my explaining.

So, here are just some key facts of what happens. Really, it looks like the listing should comprise about 100 items! My pastor likes to stress 40 of them, and how how all this happens in a second's breadth-of-time. I'll just list a few, though, in judicial order (though they actually happen all at once).

1. All your pre-salvation sins are blotted out, because when you first believed in Christ, you first agreed to the Divine Terms, and so Peace occurs. Thereafter, if you reject the salvation contract, you can only be in a 'state' of sin, but never again can you be an unbeliever, because you can't turn back time. "Due Disclosure" link at pagetop explains the Before, During, and After of a contract. So: Before you were saved, you were under a different 'contract': the Gospel, a salvation contract. Now that you ARE saved, you GOT the salvation contract. So, your 'before contract' status is blotted out. [It's not that the sins weren't paid for, but the person who rejects the Gospel refuses credit be granted. Basically, the belief problem is about whether the terms of payment Christ made are ACCEPTED by both parties. God says, "Yes". But the human being must agree. Which, he won't do, if he doesn't believe it. Greek Geek Note: I suspect verses like Eph1:7 and Col1:14 say the blot-out, but the schools on it are polarized; one claims that all post-salvation sins are forgiven also (which contradicts other Scripture), and one says "forgiveness" is a post-salvation structure only, distinguishing between the provision for forgiveness, and actual forgiveness (which thus fits verses like 1Jn1:9, but begs the question of what happens at the moment of First Belief). Seems to me (and I'm guessing) that verses like 1Jn1:9, Eph1:7 and Col1:14 might 'fit' as follows. If we interpret for the first belief in Christ, both apolutrosin and aphesin; but then, post-salvation, 'aphesin' stands for the subsequent structure of the 1Jn1:9 process, on the grounds that, post-salvation status is the beginning of a new contract which was born as a result of the Gospel contract being accepted (post-salvation forgiveness, as a new violation-of-contract clause). For, the Gospel operates as a pre-salvation 'contract', which upon receipt, gives 'birth' (pun intended) to the post-salvation contract, i.e., position in Christ, for Church. So, Greek-wise, whether you'd have to call Eph1:7 &Col1:14 is koine or Attic for syntactical demonstration of this fit, I don't know. Attic is how my pastor views those verses' clauses, and his reasoning makes more sense to me. Yet: would Paul deliberately use a Greek construction which can be taken as both koine and Attic, to denote the shift in contracts, from the 'common' Gospel, to our Dramatic position in Christ? Especially, since he demonstrates a fondness for deliberate double-entendres, as in Romans 5:5's subjective and objective genitive, agape tou Theou?)

2. You are therefore pronounced JUSTIFIED, so imputed with DIVINE RIGHTEOUSNESS (two types, really, Father's and Son's). 2Cor5:21 is the basis. It's a JUDICIAL imputation, due to that basis. But it is a real Attribute which really is part of you forever. Can't lose God's Attribute, since God is Eternal.

3. As a result, you are Judicially Justified to have Intimacy with God. So, next you are REGENERATED, which means you are given Eternal Life (another attribute of God's), e.g., John 3, and at the same time, a human spirit is created to 'hold' both the Divine Righteousness and EL attributes (remember, God is not spatial, so these are all attributes bound immaterially), i.e., Titus3:5.
   'Human spirit' means you are SPIRITUALLY ALIVE. It's a type of immaterial BEINGNESS which is compatible with God's Own Beingness. Thus, SPIRITUAL COMMUNICATION can occur (central theme of 1Cor2). A plant has a type of beingness. So does a dog. So does a human soul. So does God, who obviously has no body. Think of this beingness as a level of THINKING, not merely the faculty itself, but How High; so obviously a plant has no 'thinking' worth the name. A dog, marginal. A human, more. God, Total. With Whose Faculty of Thinking, you yourself are finally, compatible. You can't feel it. That's why John talks about God as Light: you can see, now. But you can't see light itself, only its effect. Like the Lord said in John 3: you can't see or feel the Spirit, only the effect He has. And that effect, like we just learned, is a PERCEPTION of spiritual things. Provided through the Spirit (covered below).

   Note further that because Divine Righteousness and Eternal Life are 'inside' this human spirit, you can't lose it. Again, because God is Eternal, and now you have two of His Own Attributes. (You cannot be Regenerated until you first believe in Christ. The faith is the JURIDICAL CONDITION for being born again, just as the Lord says in John 3. Calvinism gets the two steps backwards, but Bible never does. Faith is always listed as coming chronologically first, i.e., in John 3:16.)

4. As a result of being regenerated, you are now BAPTISED into CHRIST, a LEGAL STATUS (not felt or physical-water). This is why your Destiny is as Royal Priest to Father the second you believed, because that's Christ's Destiny, and you are IN HIM (part of Him, judicially). The rest of this "Due Diligence" section will further explore the meaning of your Priesthood. For now, just get the idea that "Baptism of the Spirit" is a legal and real status you have, not a feeling thing. (If you don't compare Scripture with Scripture all over the Bible, you screw up interpretation. Big screwups are here. People should stop using Acts to discern the Spirit's work, for all of Acts is about the to-Israel warning which even Paul got messed up in; not primarily about the Ministry of the Spirit with respect to salvation. Some verses are important with respect to His Ministry, but the narrative of what people DID is largely to show how wacko everyone was. Luke uses a lot of Attic genitive absolutes, to show that, but there's no way to translate an accusative absolute in English. Oh well.)
   This is what Paul's talking about in Eph4:5. Romans 6 explains what it means, and so does 2Cor5. Bible synonym for this Baptism is "Sealing", which was a Roman method of attesting OWNERSHIP and RESPONSIBILITY. Theology has a lot of terms for this legal position, which includes HEIRSHIP: "positional sanctification", "retroactive positional sanctification" (theme of Romans 6), "Union with Christ" (term of my pastors and some others), etc. Point is, you are united in that Divine Corporation THROUGH Christ. Forever. Because He lives forever. Again, this is a theme of Romans 6.

   SO YOU ARE UNDER A NEW CONTRACT: "in Christ". That's why you are a Priest. It's a post-salvation contract, and it never ends, because you CHANGED NATURE as a result of your first "yes", that belief-in-Christ. So there is no such thing as "after", but only during, as in "enduring" -- forever. You can 'break' the contract by sinning; re-enter it, by using 1Jn1:9; break it by not learning Bible Doctrine, because it's only via the Power of the Spirit and learning Doctrine that you GAIN the power to resist sin; and it doesn't happen, overnight, because sin shattered the soul, so it takes time to clear away soul rubble and replace it with Divine Housing, so to speak. This "Disclosure" section will say a lot more on this topic, but for right now, just know that you break the contract by sin, but re-enter if you use 1Jn1:9. I use it like breathing. Took a few years to get that habit, but worth it!

   You can also break the contract by never getting under your right pastor. "Right pastor" doesn't mean watching Christian television. It means one authority who the Holy Spirit appoints for you. So, use 1Jn1:9 and ask Father in Son's Name, to cause you to find this male (never a female) [More about the problem of female pastors is at the end of the "Disclosure" section.] The "one" means one-at-a-time. (God might 'graduate' you to some other teacher, depending on how you're growing.)

   At any time, using 1Jn1:9 re-enters the contract, gets you back online (explained in next point); it doesn't matter what sin you commit. You'll be spanked, but for breach-of-contract, not the sin itself. As you'll see later on in this section, the breach-of-contract spanking is far worse than for the sin, but since Christ Paid For All Sins, all that's left to spank you FOR, is the breach-of-contract.

   Remember: Since your Spiritual Birth Occurred Due To A Prior Contract, breaking this one has no effect on your salvation. Breakage can only effect HOW you live from now on, and how you live in Heaven. "Glory to glory" is a Bible phrase for this, so you will surely be happy after this life..but how much more, depends on how you agree to this NEW CONTRACT. More about it, will follow in this "Due Diligence Disclosure" section, after this table.

5. As a result of that, you are FILLED with the Spirit, for the sake of SPIRITUAL BREATHING and FUNCTION. It's a condition you can't feel any more than you can 'feel' saved. (Feeling is a body thing, but God is Immaterial, get it? Any feeling you have is the body's reaction to thoughts in your soul, at best, since body and soul are hooked up via brain.) The purpose of Filling is to Run Your Human Spirit So It Can Interface With The Soul. For, the soul is a different type of beingness, but it IS the real you. For, the soul is where your volition is, and you need Spiritual Information in order to decide, think, etc. So, you need a processor, so your soul can have a Spiritual Relationship With God. That's what the human spirit, does. So, only the Holy Spirit can run that interfacing. Think of this interfacing as being online, versus being offline, with God, for that's the functional effect. Much more about the role of Filling will be said later on.
   But know this upfront: just as that baby, though having free will, would soon after birth sin, so also you can't resist temptation absent Filling. So all those preachy calls to "repent, brother" cannot be done, because sin is an atom bomb, and only God's Power can (gradually, at that) counter it. So stay online, or after sin, quickly get back online via 1Jn1:9. For, just as Christ Himself didn't resist sin except through learning spiritually and staying Filled, so also, you. Take your tip on 'repentance' from Christ: don't try to do anything on your own power. [Ignorance abounds. In olde English of James I (of England)'s day, "repentance" meant changing the mind, not an emotion or even some attempt to do something. Greek word is "metanoew": meta, CHANGE; noeo, THINKING. Changing your mind. No, becomes Yes. Whether a decision to repent of eating another taste of foul food, or repent of going to the store because you have something MORE IMPORTANT, or..whatever.]

6. So, because you are a ROYAL PRIEST for Father, to best integrate you into your new forever-life, Father Son and Spirit permanently Indwell you: this is a unique level of intimacy between God and humans, one of (at least) 40 things Christ bought for you while on the Cross. (Frankly, we only get it, because Christ was born Indwelt, and we are "Body". More on that moniker follows in the "Due Disclosure" link: after you load that page, then search on the word "drooling", and start reading.) You can't lose (or feel) this Indwelling, either.
   [Details: Maybe half of the NT "in" verses which reference any one of Them and the believer in the same sentence, are on the topic of the Indwellings. The "in" is a permanent position of privilege, a permanent status, and a potential. That's why your body is made a Temple by the Holy Spirit, for John 1's "skenow" is being repeated in our bodies (Revelation 4:1, 19 and 21, plus Eph2, all tie in); see also 1Cor6:16-19; this is why you need 1Jn1:9 -- Greek word there translated "cleanse" really means "purified", and is the same word used for purifying the Temple in the LXX (oldest OT)! The "potential" use of "in" is conveyed as follows, with "Christ" being used as something to be built, formed, dwell IN you. For example, "Christ in you", in Col1:25-27, means the Building Of His Thinking, which is Scripture itself (1Cor2:16 and all Word verses, since "Word" is one of His Titles both in OT and NT.) All of 1Cor13 is a portrait of Head, His Thinking, the Legacy of Completed Canon. Of course, the translation can't convey this, because Paul plays on Greek words to show what he means: a tactic he began, way back in Chapter 2.

   On the other hand, if A Member of the Godhead is the Object of "in", you see an Indwelling statement (and a Position Statement, if "Christ" is the "God" referenced, or named). Exception is 1Jn, where John uses "in" as Fellowship (Spirit empowering "Filling" Ministry, i.e., Gal5:16, Eph5:18, 1Thess5:19, Eph4:30, etc.) For, John is saying that your spiritual life is comatose if you aren't Filled. He uses Greek word "menw", a pregnant word in Greek lit. which you should look up in a detailled lexicon of far greater strength than Strong's. You can prove the foregoing to yourself if you can search Greek text and find all the "en" verses which (five-case system) use the dative (locative, in 8-case system). Clearly I can't accurately explain such a large doctrine in a footnote, and you should really have the pleasure of discovering it yourself.]

7. The objective of your life thus changes, to learning the Thinking of Christ, Bible Doctrine, under the Filling of the Holy Spirit. So to fulfill the objective of your being placed IN Him at salvation: filling up your Divine Righteousness with His Thinking. Romans 8 covers this very topic, but its wordplay on filling and filling up, in English comes out hazy. So "Due Diligence" link at pagetop will further explain this Completion Goal. [Nerd Note: Yes, "7" is the number of perfection in Bible. Actually the term is telos, meaning COMPLETION, END. Hagiazw means "sanctified", "set apart", so "saint" means a believer, not someone canonized by men's institutions. Pleroo means to fill up, a major Bible keyword used in Romans 8 and all epistles. So also teleioo, to complete, usu. mistranslated (except in legal terms), "to perfect".]

   #5 through #7 team up to form the structural function of your spiritual life, and all blessing and punishment is for TRAINING in this function, not for anything you yourself do. Good deeds count for nothing, before or after salvation; obviously, since when you think over what people expect as a result of their good deeds, you realize with horror that expectation about good deeds simply manifests hatred of God. [To expect to get something for your good deeds is to say the only value of the good deed was your getting something for it, in which case the deed is no good, and thus God is no good. That's hatred talking. We never realize how the emphasis on doing for people is the strongest possible evidence of hatred for God. So too, hatred shows virulently via the alternate ideas of God, because we vote for good deeds, rituals, taboos, Ganeesh or Allah or Buddha (who was never a god, just a guy) or whoever. We are voting for idols, then: not God. Obviously, we don't recognize we are doing this. We don't know we are expressing hatred, and we hate anyone saying we are. We hate anyone telling us our good deeds count for nothing; and we hate anyone telling us that only the God of the Bible, is the real God. So, see? It's a hatred motive.. exposed. So think over and analyse carefully, and you'll see for yourself, that it's hatred which is expressed by good-deedism and alternate god-ideas.]

   Likewise, sins were paid for on the Cross, so now the only new 'sin' you can commit, is to not use your Divine Assets. [Sins were paid for in advance, so when you commit them in time, it's 'new' to you, but not to God. The cost of refusal was paid God, as well, but when the refusal is on, we aren't getting anything for that. Refusal is always on, for the unbeliever. ON, when a believer is in a state of 1Jn1:8 or v.10.] Hence sin's meaning for the believer, is the refusal to use Divine assets, so the punishment is now a bizillion times higher. When you were just an unbeliever, you couldn't be punished for not learning Christ's Thinking; you couldn't be punished, therefore, due to not being Filled with the Spirit Who Deposits Christ's thinking into you (viz., Rom5:5) via your right pastor. So now, the evil of refusal, is much higher. The loss, therefore, much greater, if you don't get in and stay in God's System. You were just a human being, before salvation: but now you are a Royal Priest, and are the conduit of blessing for at least 60 million other people, down here (search LvS4b.htm on the "60 million" derivation). So for that reason also you are punished far more.

   Bible keyword for anything outside God's System, whether good deeds or sin, is "adikia", a Greek word you'll find at the end of 1Jn1:9, and in Col3:25. The warning is succinctly stated in that latter verse. Term means "a" (not) "righteous." Because only God is Righteous, and you now have His Righteousness, to NOT live under the Righteous Holy Spirit's power, is a far worse unrighteousness, than when you were an unbeliever. God Does All The Work. To not use 1Jn1:9 and live in God's System means you refuse God His Own Work. Wow. Can't be a worse 'sin', than that.

   Alternatively, when you are in God's System and learning in it, you are blessed far more: 60 million times worth, at very least. In the OT, the entire earth got 490 more years of life due to believers who grew up in God's (smaller-design) system for that time: over and over again, per each such believer. Which is why the earth even continued until the Birth of Christ. Some of the 490's, just extended time; extra 490's were used to increase the quality of time, like providing for the freedom of the Jews in 1440 BC, to build the temple 490 years later in 950BC. Those were prosperous times. 490 years after that, Israel wasn't producing mature believers much, so only one more 490, just as God told Daniel in Dan9:24-27, to extend until the death of Christ in 30AD. Then HE, for all time, owns even time itself: and we are in Him. That leaves only 7 more years of time, preceding His Accomplishment on the Cross. Between His Death and that 7 years, we Church are thus inserted. Ergo, since God trains us down here on earth, the earth continues, and the potential time and quality of time He grants, is thus far higher.
   To see the importance of your spiritual life, you have to decide which method of disclosure, most 'hits' you. The websites here each use some metaphorical base to communicate that importance, for I wanted to see the importance from many 'angles'. It's a kind of due diligence: if you approach a subject from many angles and they all come up with the same answer on value, then you have the right value. So choose among the sites, what most resonates with your own sense of valuation. For most people, hard numbers which balance, hits home. So, the 490 year analogy, is used here. The 490 analogy isn't the most important way to see the extreme value of the spiritual life, but it might just be the one which makes the reality of that importance, hit home for you; then the other ways help you orient to what you come to (shockingly) know, is true.

   So on the 490 years derivation, see Godindex.htm's "A Question of .. Time?" link, Mirroring.htm, and its internal link of the "Timeline Worksheet" (GeneYrs.xls). That study will take you some weeks, but suffice it here to say that the Bible heroes of the past were used like hubs of 490-year blessings based on their births, their arrival at maturity, their deaths, or other key events in their own lives. These 490-year blessings radiated out, as it were, to those related to them, and to the world as a whole. God's data about how old a person was, the begats, etc. all fit together to show you how these 490 blessing years, work. You can prove this fact with historical dates, once you know what historical dates are the right ones: track everything backwards and forwards based on the Exodus date of 1440BC, so you won't waste time (people misdate the Exodus, and for no good reason). Bible uses Exodus date as the beginning of Israel as a nation: so you have to get that date right. You won't be able to see the 490s if you don't calculate as pre- and post- Exodus, which is the dating system God uses. [Moses wrote the first five books of the Bible, so all the numerical information he gives, uses Exodus date like we would use the beginning of 1AD. If you go backward from Exodus date of 1440BC, you'll get every pre- Exodus Bible date to match the historical circumstances, viz., you can prove even from Encyclopedia Britannica who were the Pharaohs who got Joseph as a vizier; who was the Pharaoh of the Exodus, etc. Then you won't make the mistake everyone else makes, dating events up to two centuries later or earlier than they actually occurred. Oh: and you need to know that Adam's days didn't get numbered until after he fell, so when dating Adam, the 930 years start from his fall, not his date of creation (the latter date is never given in Bible, nor is the date of the earth's initial creation in Gen1:1, given in Bible).]

   What's so phenomenal, you can do the 490 tracing based on different sources, and even different dates, yet see them all converge on the Temple, and on Christ. For example, when my pastor traces the 490 in Daniel, he uses lunar years, then corrects out the Gregorian calendar errors to go from 1006BC (David's Hebron Kingship start) to the dedication of the 2nd Temple (516BC), to Christ's death in 30AD. I use a slightly different approach, in the above websites, but get the same answer. So this is a really worthwhile study to help realize that even brushing your teeth while thinking Bible Doctrine, is of enormous value to the world. So how much more, to God? Caution: scholarship on dates is sometimes brilliant, but also, has big gaffes you can prove. Exodus and certain other key dates (like when Abram was born) will unlock how you calculate the others, but the scholarship on those dates is appallingly incompetent; worse, the Jewish calendar is badly messed up; more worse, people use the Jewish calendar, which is lunar, as if it were calendar, so they mess up the dates even more. See Exodate.htm on that topic. Use Bible to vet 'scholarship' dates, always.

   Please take this #7 seriously. Study its claims, preferably under your own pastor. Because you couldn't be facing a more dramatic life and future. Your choice.