Therefore I urge you, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship. Romans 12:1.
Today your LORD (יהוה) God (אלהים) says:
The first step in changing from a sinner to a saint is receiving Jesus as your Lord, that is, believing that I put your sins on Jesus and that He was punished in your place and stead so that your sins are forgiven and gone. Jesus emptied Himself of all His merits to take on all your sins, and when you receive His offering of Himself for you, then you are filled with all the good that is in Him. He took your impurity, your sins, your pains, your failures and your diseases, He even took your darkness and gave you His joy.
For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though He was rich, yet for your sake He became poor, so that you through His poverty might become rich. 2 Corinthians 8:9.
In Him, I have called you out of your darkness into My own marvelous light. And in My light you see light for with Me is the fountain of life, eternal life.
But if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you Romans 8:11.
If you recall as He hung upon the Cross, the light turned dark, deeply dark, through an eclipse of the sun, and I turned My face away from Him because He took all sins upon Himself and My eyes are too pure to look upon sin. He took your bad—all that burdens you in spirit, soul, and body due to the corruption of the seed by sin and gave you His perfection, His health, His wealth and prosperity, and His freedom from pain and disease, in other words, He gave you His eternal life for the eternal life you lost. He restored all you lost in Adam, but He not only made you heir of the world but a joint heir with Him of all I have in Heaven and on earth.
The Spirit Himself testifies with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, heirs also, heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, if indeed we suffer with Him so that we may also be glorified with Him. Romans 8:14.
When you take Him as you Lord and are baptized into Him you are baptized into His death. I count it as if when He died to sin, you died to sin, and all your sins are gone through your participation by proxy into His sufferings and death. And that is what I mean by your suffering with Him so that you are also glorified with Him. You must accept His sacrifice, His body, was given for you, but even greater, I credit it to you for your justification. You are justified in Him as if you had fulfilled the sentence of offering an eternal life for the eternal life Adam lost.
Yet, with respect to the promise of God, Abraham did not waver in unbelief but grew strong in faith, giving glory to God, and being fully assured that what God had promised, He was able also to perform. Therefore it was also credited to him as righteousness. Now not for his sake only was it written that it was credited to him, but for our sake also, to whom it will be credited, as those who believe in Him who raised Jesus our Lord from the dead, He who was delivered over because of our transgressions, and was raised because of our justification. Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom also we have obtained our introduction by faith into this grace in which we stand; and we exult in hope of the glory of God. Romans 4:20-Romans 5:2.
You have not just believed from a distance; in Him you have participated by substitution. All He has done I have credited to you by faith. How? When you believed in the Gospel of your salvation, I sealed you in Him by My Spirit as a pledge to your redemption by possession. I have given you Jesus as My gift to you and when you believe you give Me yourself in Him as your gift to Me. Covenant—joining as one in Him. One body, as shown in the marriage covenant, when the two uniquely separate lives join in that bond of matrimony, they become united as one flesh, a new bloodline, a unique inheritance in each other’s lines which were once separate for the children they produce together become heirs of all. Joint heirs, as you have become with Me in Christ.
Therefore, my brethren, you also were made to die to the Law through the body of Christ, so that you might be joined to another, to Him who was raised from the dead, in order that we might bear fruit for God. For while we were in the flesh, the sinful passions, which were aroused by the Law, were at work in the members of our body to bear fruit for death. But now we have been released from the Law, having died to that by which we were bound, so that we serve in newness of the Spirit and not in oldness of the letter. Romans 7:4-6.
He gave you much more than you had before. But there is still more yet. Grace on top of grace. More and more of My life in you until your overflow with rivers of living water covering the earth with the knowledge of My glory as the waters cover the sea. Habakkuk 2:14; John 7:37-39.
And more there are greater levels for you to ascend. He pulled you into Me and I seated you with Him at My right hand. I sealed you in Him by My Spirit, making your body His body and His body your body.
In Him, you also, after listening to the message of truth, the gospel of your salvation—having also believed, you were sealed in Him with the Holy Spirit of promise, who is given as a pledge of our inheritance, with a view to the redemption of God’s own possession, to the praise of His glory. Ephesians 1:13-14.
And I seated Him above all things—far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this age but also in the one to come. And I put all things in subjection under His feet, and gave Him as head over all things to the church, which is His body, the fullness of Him who fills all in all. Ephesians 1:21-23.
In Him you have been born again into My family and you have received My Name as Father, Spouse and LORD. In covenant and family all take the name of the head, of the stronger and wealthier one, and that one is obligated by Covenant to bring all up to the level of the Head.
If you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved; for with the heart a person believes, resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses, resulting in salvation. Romans 10:9-10.
But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, even to those who believe in His name, who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God. John 1:12-13.
This is being born again. Why born again? You are born physically to your biological parents, but the physical seed producing your birth is corrupted because it is from Adam. He corrupted the seed by submitting and giving his body to the dominion of the devil to do the devil’s works by obeying his lies rather than the truth of My Word. It took him and all his descendants out of My Kingdom and put them into the realm of darkness.
The night Jesus was betrayed and handed over for death by His own people He called it the hour of darkness.
Then Jesus said to the chief priests and officers of the temple and elders who had come against Him, “Have you come out with swords and clubs as you would against a robber? While I was with you daily in the temple, you did not lay hands on Me; but [k]this hour and the power of darkness are yours.” Luke 22:52-53.
Why? He had accepted all your sins from the beginning to the end of time into His own flesh. But He broke that darkness when I raised Him as your sun of righteousness with healing in His rays and all who come into His Light become light as well.
But for you who fear My name, the sun of righteousness will rise with healing in its wings; and you will go forth and skip about like calves from the stall. Malachi 4:2.
Then Jesus again spoke to them, saying, “I am the Light of the world; he who follows Me will not walk in the darkness, but will have the Light of life.” John 3:12.
Jesus died to sin once for all.
For the death that He died, He died to sin once for all; but the life that He lives, He lives to God. Even so consider yourselves to be dead to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus. Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body so that you obey its lusts, and do not go on presenting the members of your body to sin as instruments of unrighteousness; but present yourselves to God as those alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness to God. For sin shall not be master over you, for you are not under law but under grace. Romans 6:10-14.
When I seal you in Christ, your body became a member of His Body the church upon earth and you joined with the entire family of believers that are in Heaven and upon the earth that are called by My Name. And the devil has no part—nothing, no place, in the body of Christ.
Peace I leave with you; My peace I give to you; not as the world gives do I give to you. Do not let your heart be troubled, nor let it be fearful. You heard that I said to you, ‘I go away, and I will come to you.’ If you loved Me, you would have rejoiced because I go to the Father, for the Father is greater than I. Now I have told you before it happens, so that when it happens, you may believe. I will not speak much more with you, for the ruler of the world is coming, and he has nothing in Me; but so that the world may know that I love the Father, I do exactly as the Father commanded Me. Get up, let us go from here. John 14:27-31.
The night He was betrayed, the hour of darkness, He gave you His peace, His light, His joy, and something so great it is unfathomable. Into these matters angels long to search. He gave you the answer to the darkness that wants to take you captive to do the devil’s will, to give you body and your dominion upon the earth for the devil’s purposes to steal, kill, and destroy as Adam so many years ago, but the corruptible seed is still producing. But you can change what is in you and what you produce.
Of what am I speaking? That night Jesus set His body apart for you and invited you to set your body apart for Him. The night you made covenant with Him and took His body into yours incorporating His nature and attributes into you to bring you to His level so that as He is so are you in this world. His body on earth, His bride the church.
I do not ask You to take them out of the world, but to keep them from the evil one. They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. Set them apart, consecrate and sanctify them in the truth; Your word is truth. As You sent Me into the world, I also have sent them into the world. For their sakes I set Myself apart, consecrate, and sanctify Myself, that they themselves also may be set apart, consecrated and sanctified in truth. John 17:15-19.
Jesus revealed the mystery of the body to the apostle Paul, whom I changed from a sinner to a saint by the revelation of Jesus to him on the road when he was persecuting My Son by attacking the members of His body, the church. But when he saw and learned the beauties of Salvation and all that was his in Christ, all else he had once counted gain became loss to him, and nothing moved him away from pursuing My high calling to him in Christ.
And he explained this wondrous mystery of the body to you in a number of ways. But first he told you how it comes about in Covenant.
For I received from the Lord that which I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus in the night in which He was betrayed took bread; and when He had given thanks, He broke it and said, “This is My body, which is for you; do this in remembrance of Me.” In the same way He took the cup also after supper, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in My blood; do this, as often as you drink, in remembrance of Me.” For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until He comes. 1 Corinthians 11:23-26.
Jesus is doing for you here what He did for Me the next day on the Cross. He is drawing you into participation in His sacrificial death by joining you with His eternal life in the flesh which will ransom you from the stronghold of sin and death that had become the sentence upon your life by the sins of Adam and all his seed, of which you were before you were born again in the risen Christ, freed from the chains of sin and death that had ensnared you.
His body offered for you heals you and delivers you from all your destructions. His blood poured out cleanses you of all sins. And through this covenant meal His body becomes yours and your body becomes His. And the greater One, who is now in you, must bring you up to His level for that is a rule of Covenant, the greater gives His name to the lesser and brings the lesser to His level, but then the lessor gives all He has been given for the purposes of the greater. Like when I gave My covenant people the treasures of Egypt as I redeemed them out of slavery the night of the Passover, and then asked them to give from those treasure to Me to build My dwelling place among them as they traveled to the abundant land I promised since My covenant with Abraham to give them freely. But I had given them such an overflow of treasures that even though they gave generously they still had much left over for themselves. But that is the beauty of freewill offerings over and above the tithe.
And my apostle Paul understood from My Son the importance of recognizing the body as you partake of communion. Not to believe in the body broken for you and the blood shed for you and apply it to all that is harmful within and without you dishonors Me. So act unworthy and not partake is an insult to the body that was given to make you whole in every area of your life—the shalom blessing freeing you from the curse, and to count the blood common is unworthy of all it cost Me and My Son to pour it out for your salvation in order to reconcile you with Me as one.
Therefore whoever eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner, shall be guilty of the body and the blood of the Lord. But a man must examine himself, and in so doing he is to eat of the bread and drink of the cup. For he who eats and drinks, eats and drinks judgment to himself if he does not judge the body rightly. For this reason many among you are weak and sick, and a number sleep. But if we judged ourselves rightly, we would not be judged. But when we are judged, we are disciplined by the Lord so that we will not be condemned along with the world. 1 Corinthians 11:27-32.
And what do I tell you to examine yourself about? Whether you know you His body is in you and you are in the Body.
Test yourselves to see if you are in the faith; examine yourselves! Or do you not recognize this about yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you—unless indeed you fail the test? 2 Corinthians 13:5.
Jesus gave His body to become your body and you give Him your body to become His body to do His works and greater upon the earth. All members of a body follow the directions of the head. The members of your body work for your head, whichever way you direct them. And so too it should be for all the members in the Body of Christ, all members working together in perfect unity to bring about the directions of the Head, who is Christ, the anointed One, and you have the mind of the anointed, Christ. 1 Corinthians 2:16. And I anointed Him with the oil of joy above all His members, and the anointing pours down on you from the Head of the Body, your great High Priest, where the members dwell in unity as One.
When you are changed from a sinner to a saint you have a job to do where you were placed in the body and the good news is you can have the direction of the head at all times, and that is the mystery of Christ in you, your hope of glory.
For even as the body is one and yet has many members, and all the members of the body, though they are many, are one body, so also is Christ. For by one Spirit we were all baptized into one body, whether Jews or Greeks, whether slaves or free, and we were all made to drink of one Spirit. For the body is not one member, but many. If the foot says, “Because I am not a hand, I am not a part of the body,” it is not for this reason any the less a part of the body. And if the ear says, “Because I am not an eye, I am not a part of the body,” it is not for this reason any the less a part of the body. If the whole body were an eye, where would the hearing be? If the whole were hearing, where would the sense of smell be? But now God has placed the members, each one of them, in the body, just as He desired. If they were all one member, where would the body be? But now there are many members, but one body. And the eye cannot say to the hand, “I have no need of you”; or again the head to the feet, “I have no need of you.” On the contrary, it is much truer that the members of the body which seem to be weaker are necessary; and those members of the body which we deem less honorable, [o]on these we bestow more abundant honor, and our less presentable members become much more presentable, whereas our more presentable members have no need of it. But God has so composed the body, giving more abundant honor to that member which lacked, so that there may be no division in the body, but that the members may have the same care for one another. And if one member suffers, all the members suffer with it; if one member is honored, all the members rejoice with it. Now you are Christ’s body, and individually members of it. 1 Corinthians 12:12-27.
Do you understand this scripture now? Therefore I urge you, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship. Romans 12:1.
As He is so you are in this world. The devil had no part in the body of Jesus. There were no germs, no deformities, no sickness, no pain in Jesus’ body when He was on earth. You can have that now if you just stand up and enforce it. How? Refuse to be afraid of any symptom or malfunction or deformity or pain, come to My throne of grace and receive mercy (healing mercies are ever flowing) and find grace (the right Word that I sent to heal and deliver you from what is attacking you at the time, for there’s life in My Word) and speak it, cast out the unclean spirit of infirmity or whatever name it has by the disease or pain it identifies with, and then cast all your care on Me to fix it for you and start thanking and praising with the voice of thanksgiving and then watch in love and joy as the wonders begin. And be sure as you stand to pray you forgive anyone you are holding anything against so My Spirit can flow through you without hindrance.
I love you. You have a whole new body in Christ. Put on Christ and sing