18. One Verse to Rule Them All

 “One Verse to Rule Them All” – Genesis 3:5.

For God knows that in the day you eat of [the tree of the knowledge of good and evil] your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”

The subtlety of these words follows immediately after the direct in-your-face LIE spoken by the serpent to Eve – “You will not surely die.” This big lie, however, is not the lie that would replace Christ in the hearts of all humans. Rather, the serpent spoke it as a psychological device intended to overwhelm the human soul and thus prepare the way for the real lie to come.

Of course, the big shock-lie is also reversed in the age of the Church (as well as the claim that death is actually “life forevermore”). In the beginning, God said, “You will die,” and the serpent said, “You will not surely die.” In the present time, God says, “You will live and not die,” and the serpent says, “You will not surely live because death is salvation.” That is – “Losing your physical body is the ONLY thing that will make Christ the only life you are.”

Nonetheless, in the same way as before, the BIG lie (salvation is being dead) serves only as the shock that allows the real lie to be spoken, which, as we will see, is “Christ is not your life,” followed by the real curse, “You have a ‘life’ not Christ.”

For God knows. Wow. Okay.

Exactly what did this angel know about what God does or does not know? Did he know Jesus as a Man stumbling under a cross He could not carry, carrying all things inside Himself through death and into life? No, he did not. He knew that God is Spirit, yes, and he knew the outer things of God towards the heavenly realms, but that’s not knowing what God knows or even what He is.

Okay, I see what he is doing. He is presenting himself as the resident expert on “God.” He is being the spokesperson for “God,” that is, he is “representing” God.

God knows what? God knows that –.

You see, “You will not surely die” is a direct and open lie. But “God knows” is a huge but much more subtle lie. “I know what ‘God’ knows. My knowledge is ‘god’ to you.”

But what does this angel actually and truly know? He knows only one thing; he knows himself, as he imagines himself to be inside his own story told inside his own bubble of self-awareness. He does not actually KNOW anything outside of his bubble, because God has not entered into the knowing of his bubble and he has not entered into the knowing of God’s bubble.

We know God because God is inside of our own bubble of human self-awareness. And God knows us because we are inside of God’s own bubble of Spirit self-awareness.

You see what I mean about digging out nuggets of truth?

These three words, then, “God knows that,” show us that the serpent is placing himself before Adam and Eve as the definition of “what God looks like.” The serpent is saying one thing only – “I am ‘god’ to you.”

“In the day.” There is only one day ever, and that is Today. And so we see that “today” is as important to the serpent as it is to Jesus. Placing the account that we give to God into some “future” date is entirely false. There is only Today, and the account we give today is the only account we give.

That does not mean that our account cannot change, for otherwise there would be no salvation. It means that we give a new account only and always inside of a very present Today, that is, right now we believe that God is telling us the truth.

And so we see that in spite of all the lying and fakery in his words, the serpent is divorcing nothing from present practical reality.

“You eat of it.” That is, “you eat of the knowledge of good and evil.”

The depths of meaning found inside of this metaphor are profound.

We eat our nourishment, that which sustains us. We eat what we become. The substance of the soil is converted by plant life, or by plant life becoming animal life, into food. By eating the food, we are eating the dirt of the earth converted into a form that becomes physical life to us.

Our body is made up entirely of the atoms which we have eaten or drunk or breathed into ourselves over the last seven years. Your body of seven years ago no longer exists. You ate your present body (your molecules inside your food) before it became your present body.

The Biblical summation of food is the metaphor of “bread.” The bread of life is one of the strong metaphors of Word. Tree of life is thinking, but bread of life (the fruit of that tree) is the words spoken. And thus the bread which we eat, being the flesh of Jesus, means that we eat the Word made flesh, that is, we eat Word that becomes us.

I am seeing even greater wonder inside our eating of Christ, but specifically inside the ritual of Communion, what is really happening that Jesus refers to by the simple words, “Remember Me.” Or, as the Greek actually says, “Bring Me into your mind.”

Then consider this line from Paul – You are severed [separated] from Christ whoever seeks to be justified in law (Galatians 5:4).

Law is also word, but word that is never known as Christ Jesus (except for those like David, who were always connecting directly with God anyway).

To eat of the knowledge of good and evil, right and wrong, correct and incorrect, is to create in yourself a complete story of self out of the ideas that are inside of God, only with utterly false definitions and sticking those ideas into all the wrong places.

It is a horror. It is death. It is gehenna.

The Person of Jesus alive in our hearts as that Word is the ONLY thing that gives true definitions and that positions every Word into its place.

So, in place of Jesus as the Word God speaks, the person receiving the words of law, defined as God’s ideas separated from the Person of Jesus and held as human ideas in the mind, then knows him or herself by those words. And what does the law always speak to those who hear it? – The law speaks death – you are fallen short of God.

“I am fallen short of God,” then, is the word inside, a word of accusation that creates the fantasy of the false self.

Okay, I understand it now. The ideas of God, as ideas, are pure and holy and good, as Paul said. Nonetheless, when those ideas, expressed as the law, enter the human mind separate from the Person of Jesus, they result in one thing only inside that person, and that is lawlessness.

Why? Why does the law become lawlessness the moment it enters into human intellect and agreement? That is so easy. – “So you think you can DO God?” And the moment you can’t “DO God” in your own self, you fall.

You cannot love; only God can love. For love to be expressed through you, it must be God expressed through you.

Law as the ideas of God, pure and holy and good, the moment it enters the human creates one enterprise ONLY – you can be “like God” if you try.

The expression of the law is a bunch of humans trying to be “like God” without God. And that was my entire Christian life before – trying to be “like Christ” without Jesus.

But what comes just before humans trying very hard to be “like God” without God? – “Your eyes will be opened.”

After the Tsar of Russia abdicated in 1917, Vladimir Lenin was smuggled through Germany to St. Petersburg on a sealed train. Upon arrival in S. Petersburg, Lenin attempted to set up his own political party inside the newly formed legislature that was now trying to govern Russia through a massive losing war. Lenin and his “Communist party” were opposed by all. Nonetheless, during the ensuing year-and-a-half, Lenin spoke one thing over and over by voice and by pamphlet. “I will give you peace. I will give you land. I will give you food.” Lenin would never have been accepted in the Russian parliament, however, except that all of his opponents fought each other to a standstill, until Lenin was the only voice still speaking the same thing.

Because Lenin did not vary his message, at about the lowest point in Russia’s history, people started listening to him. “I will give you peace. I will give you land. I will give you food.” And at that point, enough people were willing to let him do what he said. Of course, by that time, Trotsky had joined him with thousands of Bolshevik shock troops from New York City.

The moment Lenin and Trotsky had the majority in the Russian parliament they set about implementing three things upon the Russian people – war in a horror the Russians had never known, famine to the death of millions, and the removal of all land from everyone, to be owned only by the “party.”

He had lied. – “Your eyes will be opened” turned immediately into human sight being blinded to all heavenly reality.

Some would claim that the eyes of humanity were “opened” to the endless possibilities of the human self! Nonsense. As I know Christ my only life, so my eyes continue to open to the endless possibilities of what it means to be human. When I knew only “my self,” all I could see was the tiny space at the front of my nose.

When Adam and Eve’s eyes were “opened,” they saw only shame where before there was only glory.

And yet the serpent places this pathway in-between eating of God’s ideas as mental knowledge and pretending to “be like God.” Eat your own knowledge – eyes open – pretend to be like God, or for us, like Christ.

“Eyes open,” then, must include the experience of God’s words divorced from Jesus and under human control.

You know something (and I am thinking, here, by writing) – I mentioned my first attempt at writing a book in the mid-nineties that I titled “The Unveiling of Jesus Christ.” In it you will find the revelation of Jesus Christ that I presently teach, except that it is divorced from Jesus and under human control. My eyes were “opened,” but I could not see.

You see, the New Testament word, “godly,” has become in the Christian mind, by definition, “try very hard to pretend to be ‘like’ God.” In contrast, I have placed it entirely as God-ly, that is, know that you are filled with God Himself in Person.

So, when I say that I am God incarnate, I am not trying to be like God at all. Rather, I am placing God Himself as God inside and all through my very limited human frame. But when fellow Christians say, “You must be godly,” they mean, you must pretend to be like God. They are the ones pushing the serpent’s dope; I am the one honoring God as God. For apart from Him, I can do nothing.

And that gives me what I am reaching for through the fog – the definition of “your eyes will be opened.” – “You will have your own sufficiency in yourself. – You will bear full responsibility for yourself upon yourself. – You will be your own person.”

Yet here I am sitting in my chair inside the precious knowing of God in me and of Jesus utterly responsible for me. In fact, as I started writing this morning I was “feeling” responsible. But the moment I realized that, I turned to Jesus and said, “You carry all that I am entirely inside Yourself.” Immediately I entered complete rest and that is why I sit here now inside the tangible knowing of God in me.

And as I see now, here in this place, I am utterly my own person. Before, when I once believed the lie, I was anything but my own person. Now I have all-sufficiency; before I had none. Now I am all that God created me to be, and the joy of an endless life, an endless unfolding of excitement and adventure, peace and love. These are now my only view of myself; before I lived only in a hollow and empty shell, frightened out of my wits.

“You will be like God.” This is the real zinger. This is the lie. EXCEPT – the LIE in these words is not found in their surface form. Yet the real LIE is really, really strong by these specific words.

Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness… So God created man in His own image; in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them (Genesis 1:26-27).

The image of God is the Lord Jesus Christ. Adam and Eve already were the expression of Christ – except, God forces nothing on anyone, and thus the opportunity of eating of Christ was right there at hand, a LIFE that had drawn them into the center of the garden, a life that Adam was contemplating deeply even as he heard the serpent’s words out of the corner of his ear.

It was a “close run day” for the serpent. If Adam had simply wandered over to the tree of life, climbed up into its branches and eaten of Jesus Himself, already Adam’s only life, now entering into his knowledge through faith, then the entire universe, the angel included, would have been sealed into life. The serpent’s lust to be “what God looks like” would have passed like a vapor, and the angel himself would have been given and would have accepted a lower place.

Those words entering into Eve, the same words that enter into most congregations from their pastors, turned into this thought inside of Eve. “Oh, I thought I was already like God, but if this anointed speaker says I’m not, then maybe “like God’ means only something that I could become someday, if I get it right.”

Let’s translate the words “You will be like God” as they mean. – Christ is NOT your life!
But that great lie also includes inside itself the greatest curse of all. – “Okay, so if I am not yet the image of God, but I ‘can be,’ that is, if Christ is not yet my life, but He can be, where does that leave me now? How do I now live? If Christ is not yet my life, then I must have a life that is not Christ.”

The Lie – Christ is NOT your life. The Curse – You have a life NOT Christ.

The serpent did not preach – “You already are the revelation of Jesus Christ.” He preached, “You can be the revelation of Jesus Christ someday.” Any preacher who teaches that you can and ought to be “like Jesus” is preaching the same gospel of the serpent. That preacher is giving you God’s ideas, divorced from Jesus Himself alive in your heart and now under your own control, ideas you must implement yourself as you TRY to be godly, that is “like God.”

“Knowing good and evil,” then, is the complete giveaway, the mighty desperate throw of the dice. Either those four words will work everything, or they will crater everything.

Here is what he is really saying, the only thing any astute observer would hear. In fact, the only person who did not hear these words correctly was Eve; Adam was not deceived.

“Knowing good and evil” means – “I am ‘God’ to you.” And as you become “like” me, so you will become arrogant and so you will hold all those lesser Christians out there in the utmost contempt.

When the translators willfully and deceitfully insert the words “of Us” into Genesis 3:22 – like one of Us who knows good and evil., two little words that are NOT in the Hebrew, they are doing so only through contempt.

Now, I could spend much time showing how the words “knowing good and evil” define God and the universe by death, but I will not do so here.

Now that we have combed through these words of the serpent in this present consideration, let’s bring back in the seven points I had discovered when I wrote the first “Anti-Design.”

The Seven
1. We consider everything “God” says analytically and with the human intellect. The Bible is not God’s creative word, Christ, being spoken into us through our faith, rather, it is an instruction book upon which we are to take a position and about which we argue.

2. “God” by his nature and being “knows” evil, and thus the evil in god is always mixed together with the “good.” Out of this god comes a universe split between good and evil, with good and evil at war with one another over every created being. (This splitting apart is death.)

3. More than that, by this god filled with good and evil all mixed together, the consummation of all things is a place of all evil forever and a place of all good forever, utterly separated from one another. (This splitting apart is also death.)

4. Every word God speaks is a distant possibility only, something that is not yours except by human performance. – Let God be a liar until every man make Him true. (The phrase “you shall be like God” is overwhelming in its power. God said, “You are like Me.” The serpent said, “You can be.”)

5. Man as he is, then, is contemptible. Only by self-improvement will he become “better” than his present sorry condition.

6. Since God does not look like man, then another must take man’s place. And thus the image of the highest of created heavenly beings takes the place of man as “what God looks like,” an image of outward perfection, of external superiority.

7. The task placed upon man is to know what is good and to do it and to know what is evil and to refrain from doing it. (By “choosing” to do good, humans commit themselves to a fake “moral” living and thus to the constant possibility and practice of doing wrong.)

1. Interpret the Bible with your human intellect.
2. See god as a “moral” being, knowing good and evil.
3. Split salvation into all good and all evil.
4. Do not presume that god is speaking of you.
5. When you see “god,” know just how low and despicable you really are.
6. Worship a “god” and a “Jesus” of superior outward appearance.
7. Work hard, that is, try to make yourself “better.”

~~~

Let’s now attempt to merge the two approaches to Genesis 3:5 and see if we can create a more complete structure of the One Verse to rule them all and in the darkness bind them.

Let’s order our structure in this way, then. I have said that I must KNOW four things. I must know God. I must know me. I must know the Connection between God and me. And I must know the purpose of God for me. In other words, I must KNOW God, man, Christ, and salvation.

Then I have also said that the serpent gave an opposing definition of each of these four. And thus, the God of Nicene theology is a “God” known through the image of the serpent, that highest angel of heaven showing us “what God look like.” The “human” then becomes a despicable worm and an arrogant controller, both at the same time, not half and half, but always all of both.

The connection between God and man is some form of human performance, even that performance that is called “grace.” And the purpose of God for man is self-improvement, that is becoming a better person, becoming “like” a Jesus we do not know, the Jesus of our imagination.

Having taken apart his verse, we now see clearly what the real question is. It is the question Jesus asked – Who do you say that I am?

And so, really, as the serpent understood, the first and primary question is – What is the connection between God and me, that is, what is Christ?

Here is my answer. Christ is the Lord Jesus alive in Person inside of me, my only life, and written as every Word God speaks upon all the pathways of my human heart.

Let’s create a chart that will allow us to see all these things laid out. This chart, then, gives us the order of the answers offered by the serpent in the One Verse to rule them all. Notice that salvation, in fact, has two parts. The first part is implementation, that is, eating, and the second part is consummation, that is final destiny. The first part of salvation is stated clearly by the serpent, the action he wants Eve to do. But the second part of salvation comes into view only after God and man are defined, and thus I have placed it last.
 

Four Questions	By the serpent	By Jesus our life
What is Christ?	Did God indeed say? Jesus did something back then and will do something “someday,” but right now He is far away “in heaven.” In His place, God has given you the Bible and the ministry. The Bible is God’s instructions to you that you must obey. The ministry will tell you what the Bible means and correct you when you fail to obey.	A letter of Christ written upon the heart. The Lord Jesus alive in Person inside of me, my only life, and written as every Word God speaks upon all the pathways of my human heart. Christ is my life; I have no other life.
What is salvation? (Part 1)	God knows – eat the knowledge of good and evil. Read your Bible carefully so that you can know what is right and what is wrong. That way you can implement God’s words yourself in your own life. Christian theology allows you to be born again and even filled with the Spirit, nonetheless – You are saved by “hear and obey.” Word as the ideas of morality – always falling short.	Abide in Me and I in you. Read your Bible as Jesus alive in you now fulfilling all Word as you. Make the words of Christ your story and yours His. Walk in confidence that Jesus directs your way and give thanks.
What is man?	You will be like God. You are NOT what God looks like now. Why? Because you are little and weak, because you are puny and contemptible. Because you are stupid. More than that, you have your own sorry life that is NOT Christ at all. And you must be punished for being such a sorry person and for not being successful at pretending to be like Jesus. You are a mess that cannot be fixed (except by your death); you are a loser.	Christ who is your life. You are what God looks like, the embodiment of God in creation, the revelation of Jesus Christ. – Father revealed. You are God’s perfection as you are right now, for God’s perfection always looks like a mess until you and God together turn all things into goodness and blessing.
What is God?	Knowing good and evil. God is arrogant; He thinks more highly of Himself than He does of anyone else. And if you want to be like God, that is, like “me,” then you will become arrogant, for “I” am arrogant. God knows good, yes, but He also knows evil just as much. That knowledge makes God a “moral” person, that is, God always has to choose between doing what is right and doing what is evil. God will force everyone to do His will; He is all about external perfection.	Learn of Me. God is the All-Carrying One, meek and lowly of heart. As you are like God already, so you know Father loving others through you. God thinks no evil; He always energeoes all things by what He is, life and love. God never forces His knowledge on anyone. - He had done no violence (Isaiah 53).
What is salvation? (Part 2)	You will not surely die – because – Being dead is the only real “life.” God hates the way you are; therefore, in order to please God, you must become a better person. Because you have God’s word, you must improve yourself by human performance. Since you are such a loser, however, the only way you will become better is by death. “In heaven” you will automatically be a better person. Your real savior is death, and being dead forever is salvation. In the end, then, everything is split apart like God, with a universe split forever into unlimited goodness without faith, that is, by force, and unlimited evil without hope.	He who believes into Me shall never die. Age-unfolding life is knowing God; the consummation of everything is God known by all through you. This revelation of God, however, is through you together with other believers in Jesus, that is, the Church, which is the fullness of Christ. In the end, Jesus restores all things to the Father that God might be all in all.

 
There is so much more that could go inside this frame. What we are after is clarity, however, so that we might see clearly the great issues of wrong thinking under which our brethren labor. As we know the light set forth against the darkness, so we are able to gently remove the fine root hairs of the tares without once disturbing the fine root hairs of the knowledge of Jesus as He is inside of our brethren.