Romans, 1978 - Part 1 — Norman Grubb

Romans 1:16 and the Good News of God

All right, well, we all know that Paul's letter to the Romans was his most complete and comprehensive presentation of what he spoke of at the beginning of the Romans here as the good news of God for the human race which centers around, it says here in chapter 1 -3, it centers around his son, who was demonstrated to be his son, it says, by the spirit of holiness, by the resurrection of the dead and the relationship of his grace to humanity, the human family, which came out of that.

Now, I can't hear properly, it's a problem. In other words, it's a letter, so it had to be tightly presented. It couldn't expand too much, so it's a letter which has all the great facts of this good news of God, but it's somewhat in shortened forms.

He often doesn't expand on great basic facts which are mentioned. It probably couldn't be one letter. They expanded upon it in other letters, and in the whole Bible, and in the other writers' letters.

Sin, Law, Grace, and Redemption in Romans

So, I'm going along with Romans, but where I feel it would be good to expand, quite often, are some of the great main issues which are just kind of introduced, maybe by one word. Issues of sin, law, grace, redemption, the walk in the spirit, which, as you mentioned, my plan would be to stop, and sometimes quite at length, go back and look a little further into what is meant by those great words.

In what sense are they real to us? So, I shall deviate, to some extent, from the letters we go on, and then come back to it, so we do cover it chapter by chapter, not by any means in total detail, but in somewhat of a survey fashion, linking it to, as I say, the more thorough explanations of some of these great facts presented to us in the letter.

So, it's from that angle that we're approaching it. After he'd made his preliminary words of welcome and introduction to the Roman Church, whom he's writing, he moves straight into his presentation in the 16th verse of the first chapter, that he is ready to preach the gospel to Rome also, and not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, which is the power of God unto salvation to everyone who believes it, the Jew first, and also to the Greek.

Then he starts off by presenting the fundamental fact that there is a living God. Now, the first year of Scripture, we're told he's spirit, and presents us to him here as in a relationship to us in which we can know of him, because it says that the truth of God, in verse 19, may be known to us as manifesting in us, not to us.

So, straight away he presents the fact that he is spirit, and in other scriptures we find that our true self is our inner person's spirit. Therefore, there is in all humans this basic means by which we can be in a relationship to him.

His goodness is our foundation here. And that the way by which he manifests himself is spirit manifests through form. And so it says in this 20th verse that he is the invisible person, makes himself known by his visible forms which we call creation.

And all the visible forms around us are the evidence to our inner self that there is an invisible person manifested by these forms. So we're able to see something of the wonder of him, perfection, power, beauty, what God calls his power and his very deity, it says here, manifesting to us the visible manifesting the invisible.

Therefore, in that sense, with all the art of truth, we are able to know that all that we see, feel, touch around us are the outer forms of the one person in the universe, whose spirit manifested in created forms.

Humanity's Disharmony and the Wrath of God

He then goes on to say that instead of being in harmony with him, we're in disharmony. He being harmony, everything is basically in perfect harmony. We are in a discordant relationship with him, disturbed relationship, which he speaks of as being in the rough element of God, not the grace element.

So it says, straight away, the rough of God's divinity. Rough is where things have gone wrong. Where things have gone wrong in us produces disharmony. So we have a distorted relationship, not a harmonious relationship.

And he goes on to state there the fact about the human race, which needs further explanation. That is, that something so happens to us, that instead of our thankfully, worshipfully relating all things ourselves, and that that with which we are joined is to him, and therefore worship and glorify him, we're relating to ourselves.

Something so happens that our attitude to creation is bringing it into reality by our own opinions, what he calls our vain imaginations, where we profess ourselves to be wise. So there's an element taken over in the human race of self-appreciation, self-explanation of our universe.

And so far as we find in our universe that which we feel we must worship, self-forms, human forms about which we worship, the kind of thing we are. Self-conditioning. Therefore the gods that this human race has made are gods which are themselves expressions of humanity in its fallen desires.

And so they're gods or images which have Christian sense of special action, or in perverted spirit action of hate and jealousy and revenge and so on. They're the gods which we worship, which are really self-images, because that therefore permits us to do those kind of things ourselves.

So it has a consequence because we've made gods, gods of flesh, gods of lust, gods of hate, gods of murder, gods of fear, we ourselves fulfill those same things in our natures. And so he goes on then to describe in the first chapter in the most drastic form how we run into perverted sex, because all is love, God being love, everything therefore is a form of love.

If our love has come apart from God who is self-giving love, has become in us a form of self-loving love, we express it then in terms of self-gratification. And therefore the strongest physical form of love being sex, we express it in perverted sex.

So it gives the strongest description in the Bible of the men and women in their perverted sex forms in those early verses in chapter 1, when God gave them over to uncleanness, to the lust of their hearts.

And then having described some of the excesses of perverted sex, running right into what's so common today, when we talk about the sexist homosexual forms, he then moves on to our spirit discourse. And then in verse 28 he says God gave them to pervert his mind as well as a perverted body.

And to pervert the mind he gives a whole list of what comes, hates, murders, rebellions, unthankfulness, cruelty, a whole list of them. And he says the kind of condition in which we've gone into is we delight in doing these things.

Though there's a death path, it says in the end of that chapter on earth that not only do we say we have pleasure in doing these things, we find out how to destroy delight in self-pleasing self, instead of being in relation to God who is self-giving.

Yet, Paul also says we throw man his, he gives us over. He gives us over to those things, he's still his, he's just given us over to be torn to pieces by these expressions of God's wrath, by these misuses of the human self.

And the best description we get of the consequence which is the operation of the wrath of God in us is in that segment at the end of the 27th verse, where he says those who do these things receive in themselves that recompense of their error which is meat.

It comes out into us, the wrath operates in ourselves. Our discordant spirits or our corrupted bodies produce a corrupted effect for the spirit or flesh in ourselves. We receive in ourselves this recompense of this error which is meat, that's the wrath of God.

It operates in us because we're beings of God, we're made in his image, we're misusing his image, we're seen in his image. Therefore being in his image, we misuse the image, the wrath is in us, because it's in this image form of God that the discourse is taking place.

Not in the harmonious, not in the only harmonious self. He follows on in chapter 2 by turning his attention to those who, by the operations of God's mercy and grace through the centuries, have come into some light.

Romans 2: The Ethical Self and the Need for Repentance

Because if you know God apart from the Bible, the light of God has dawned, has been shining on the human race right from the very beginning. Right from the time of the fall itself. And right through Abel and Abraham and on through the nations to which God began to reveal himself in grace and truth, grace and law.

So there are, therefore, the whole area of people, knowing through these revelations something of God's ways and God's truth, still in selfhood, have conformed themselves to those, still in selfhood, a better way of being a self.

Not knowing him, still conforms to his better way of being a moral self. So there's the hedonistic self, pleasure-loving self of Romans 1, and there's the ethical self of Romans 2. But they're both self.

They're both self-affirming, self-pleasing, self-gratifying self. Now, he says the proof of that is, when you're like that, you think yourself superior to those who do rotten things and you judge them.

What you're really doing is you judge yourself. For this reason, that we all do these kinds of things in different ways. We may pretend we're not. The only people who can be capable of judging, I also mention in chapter 2, are those who have found a way of repentance.

They found, as it says in verse 4, if you despise the goodness, the forbearance of God, then the goodness of God leads you to repentance. And then to a new purpose in life. Therefore, he says there are those who, being a fallen self, have no wish at all to be a fallen self.

Whether in ethical pride or physical corruption. And repented of being such, and sought a way of mercy. Where they're such, they never judge, because they say, I'm just like that myself. So, judging too, you should not be like that.

Because if you've been yourself, a repentant person is the only person who simply says, I'm just like myself, I'm just seeking to find a way out of that. Whether they find a way to mercy or just seeking it.

So, he speaks of those who have sought the right way of life. In verses 10, talking about patience, patience, well doing, seek. And they've found a way to find it. Seek the glory, honor, and immortality that they have in the pursuit of eternal life.

So, if you're a judge, you can't run those. The judge shows you, because you only judge because you do those things yourself, but you competently don't. So, you hide it, you put your finger down the person doing it.

The person doing that is really judging themselves. Because if you are a person who has moved out from this false way of self, you don't judge it. Because you've been that yourself. And you know it's only helped you, it's only mercy and repentance.

And so, you look upon those who do those things just like yourself, perhaps they haven't yet found the way of repentance and mercy you have. Indeed, he goes on to say, in the middle of the section, there are those who have never known the ways of the law of God.

Who we call Gentiles. Who have that law somehow written in their hearts. And they too have been the such. Who have sought a better way of life, knowing they shouldn't be this wrong kind of person. And he does say, he slips in a way, a word of mercy for them.

Because he says, it's only God who knows the secrets of men. He says that they will become a God whose secrets are known by Jesus Christ, according to the gospel. And so, they can leave their destiny with him.

Circumcision of the Heart and Inner Religion

So, the second chapter is a turnaround on the ethical people. And so, you hide your fallen nature, your self-gratifying, self-seeking nature, under this pretense of being a higher kind of person. You're still a self-person.

It's true that you're running to your end in your way, being proud of what you are. But you do the same thing to yourself. And he actually turns then on the Jewish people and says, Are you obeyed in name?

Believe in God. He says, Are you obeyed in name? God is blasphemed by you. Because people just see you. You're not being consistent with what you claim to be, which you can't be. Because self-care only follows its own way.

And finally, he ends with a little touch of that second chapter. By saying, because only an inward change is truth. By saying, what changes you is truth. Not what changes your conduct. If you're a fallen person, it's still self-conduct, whatever for.

It's moral conduct or immoral conduct. It's still self-conduct. Therefore, outer religion, outer law is no more helpful to you than false forms of living. And so, he ends by saying, you're in true circumcision.

It's circumcision of the heart. It's in the outer law that changes you. So, it says, He is not a Jew, verse 38, who is one outwardly. Neither is that circumcision which is outward in the flesh. He is a Jew who is one inwardly.

Circumcision is done in the heart, in the spirit, not in the letter. Which places you not in men, but in God. Straight away, he strikes in. He says, truth is inner, because truth is spiritual. The heart and the spirit.

The heart is the express purpose of the spirit. God is spirit and we are spirit. Only in a relationship can there be the truth. Finally, he gathers it all up together in the presentation of all men in the grip of what he now begins to call sin.

Romans 3 and the Total Depravity of Humanity

He didn't call it sin, he called it ungodliness at first. It now comes under the name of sin. And he begins to use that word in chapter 2. He heads it up in the first part of chapter 3. Various quotations in the Old Testament.

The final declaration of the total depravity of this fallen human race. Because depravity is self-loving self, whatever form it takes. Because of this, it comes out in all full of cursing bitterness.

Feats swift to shed blood. Destruction, misery in our ways. A world of peace we don't know. No fear of God before our eyes. So to no persecutor. Those are quotations in chapter 3, verses 12 to 18. Which is all that goes out of the way.

All that comes off of it. Name that title of sin. We've become into contact with the law. Until there has been no law, we've been doing those things. We haven't learned how to understand the sin. When law comes in, then it says in verse 19.

Every mountain is stopped and the world is guilty. Recognize that all have sinned. And come short of the glory of God. Now that takes us back. As I said, sometimes I'm moving off from the actual written descriptions given in the Roman letter.

Seeking to put conditions into the human race. And God's relation to the human race in the more complete form. Which he couldn't give in the shortened. He had told us where sin began. By a brief reference in his fifth chapter.

When he says that by one man. Sin entered the world. And death by sin. So death passed upon all men. For they all have sinned. Verse 12. That takes us back. For a moment. Into the original purposes. And where we as a human race could live those purposes.

God's Eternal Purpose: A Family of Sons

Where we've gone wrong. And later on, how we can come right. And we find from other scriptures. That it always was the purpose of God. To have a vast family of sons. That we find, for instance, in the first chapter of Ephesians.

Where he says, we have been chosen in him. To the adoption of sons. Chosen before the foundation of the world. For the adoption of sons. Then when we go back to the origins of things. As given in other scriptures.

Right back to their first historical presentation. In the early chapters of Genesis. We find that this one living person in the universe. Was in the beginning. Who we're told of by Jesus' spirit. We're told by John.

His total character is love. Which means he's a person. Who is just for others. That's true love. The nature in us. In which we exist to perfect everything and everybody within our reach. The outgoing drive of our being.

Into service for others. Rather than the pleasing of ourselves. And it always was. From eternity. It always had been. The means by which he could manifest himself in eternity. By his manifested form. Which is his son.

So the universal. Unknowable. Invisible. Unapproachable father. Can be known by unknowable and invisible and approachable form of himself. Which is his son. The only begotten son of God. What we speak of as the manifested form of the deity.

And it always was his purpose. Through his son. To bring into being. A vast family of sons. God in reproduction. Manifestation. Is God the spirit. Through the father. From the father through the son. God the spirit comes into being.

So the creation of the spirit moved upon the face of the waters. And all the creation came into being through the creation of the spirit. The final form of creation. In the process of creation. Bringing into being.

Of the son family. In his own image. We then follow that through. From other scriptures. And we find that. His ultimate purpose. Which has been a fixed sacrament of eternity. Is that his son. Should both bring into being the universe.

And then. He as it were. Has the universal to his son. As his inheritance. And therefore the son is the one. Who will be the agent by which the father will fulfill. Whatever it's eternal purposes are.

Through eternity in the whole universe. That's told us. When we tell. Other scriptures being. One particular one in Hebrews. One. Speaking of this son. It says. Whom he has appointed heir of all things.

Hebrews 1 .2. We are then told. In the scriptures which later on. Relate us up. To him through grace. As co-sons and brothers. We also co-heirs. Therefore. What he inherits. We inherit. Therefore if his eternal purpose always had been.

That the invisible one. Should merit. To his visible form. Especially himself. As love. Invisible form. That one. And then the ones joined to him. Should be the. Eternal love expressions of the father.

In fulfilling whatever his ultimate purposes are. In the universe. Being love. All his purposes of. Perfection and completion. That all should be. What is meant to be. In harmony. The given taken love.

Love relationships. And this. Is. To be fulfilled. Through eternity. By his son family. We are then moved on. To the. Historical. Description. Of the. Creation of the son family. The human family. And the.

Creation, Opposites, and the Meaning of Personhood

First means by which. This person. Made his image. Beginning. Person. Of which. We become established as persons. By that I mean. That the Bible means. That. There can be. No manifestation. In the nature of things.

Except. By a relationship between opposites. That's the very statement made in the Bible. The very beginning. Is dark and light. Because everything can only be known by its opposite. So the very first.

Word is Genesis. We read. Darkness was upon the face of the deep. Then the spirit of God said. Let there be light. And there was light. The reason being. Which we can. Recognize of course by our own. Normal faculties.

I think it can only be known by its opposite. Light can only be known. If it isn't dark. Truth can only be known. If it isn't a lie. Love can only be known. If it isn't hate. Sweet can only be known. If it isn't bitter.

Yes can only be known. Because it didn't know. And so on. And the relationship between the two. Is. That the positive. Swallows up the negative. And finds out it's basically true. It swallows up its negative.

Love is love. Because it's not hate. It swallows up the possibility of being hate. And all that possibility. It moves into the potential of love. And so through all. The pairs of negatives. Thus the Bible says in.

2 Corinthians 5. Life swallows up death. Life is known. It swallows up death. Its strength is. That. It replaces the possibility of death. By life. Therefore. A person. Can only be a conscious person.

When he's confronted with the. All the opposites of life. And. Gets him into that relationship. Where the positive. Is swallowing up the negative. And making it safe by swallowing it up. The. Supremest.

Or the farthest revelation of that character as a person. Is in our own personhood. Starting with God's personhood. If a conscious person. If we're conscious persons. Made of love. For God is love. Love is desire.

Now if I'm a conscious person with desire. I'm affected by myself. I've got a. I can't be a conscious person. Now I'm. Confronted with the two alternatives. Shall I. Desire. Love. And satisfy myself. Satisfy myself.

By getting everything from myself. Being a self getter. A self seeker. A self accumulator. Or. Shall I satisfy myself's desire. By being a self giver. By being. The means with which other people can have their needs met.

Will myself find his answer. In being a person who always meets my own needs. Or meets my own needs. No matter what happens to others. Or will my. Myself be satisfied. In being one. Who can. The means with which other people can have their needs met.

God's Inability to Lie and the Nature of Self-Giving Love

And that's why such a profound. Revelation in the Bible. That this eternal person. Is stated. Had. Something in his own eternal nature. Which he couldn't do. Which is. Very. It's past except the nature of him.

Who is the source of all things. If he's all things. He can do all things. Can't he? If he's omnipotent. Omniscient. Omnipresent. Can he do so? Yet here the Bible comes out twice over. In. Titus. Chapter one.

And in Hebrews. Chapter six. And it says that. One thing in himself can't do. He can't lie. In Hebrews six. It's impossible for him to lie. Verse eight. Hebrews six. Verse eighteen. Hebrews six. Now here.

Is. A confrontation of the two opposites. In God. Being a former person. Who's going to get his own ends. At any price. To his neighbor. He's going to get his own ends. When therefore it says God cannot lie.

It's saying that. There. Is. In the very being of God. A settlement. Between the opposites. In which. As a being of God. Being a self. Affirming. Being self affirming. The. Being of the universe. The I am of the universe.

He could have been a person. Who'd get everything for himself. Everything would be for his own ends. A self. A self pleasing self. Because that's what a liar is. Or he. Can be the alternative. Which is a self giving self.

And. But all his. His. Self. Is. Pleasure. Is self giving. Rather than being a self pleasure. Is self getting. That's why. One of the. Men who. At the. Greatest insight. May be. The being of God. Ever lived.

The great German mystic. Jacob Böhmer. Always. Wrote. A diagram. Not of Jesus Christ. But of the eternal God. With a cross in it. For his. Eternal death. In the eternal dream. But he could have been. A God.

With self for self. It says. That he determined. A God. With self for others. He's died. Being. Being. What we say. The negative self. To be the positive. Because if we say. God is perfect. What he is.

Is positive. Therefore. If he's perfect in love. Only love is positive. Self loving. Self giving love. Is positive. Self loving love. Is negative. Self giving love. Is life. Self loving love. Is death.

Self living love. Is total fulfillment. Self giving love. Self loving love. Is total fulfillment. Self loving love. Is total corruption. So we have. We have our basis. Of our. Of our. Our revealed universe.

In the. In the revealed person. Whom the universe. Is of. Infinite. Infinite forms of manifestation. Therefore we now see. That if this person. Always had been. By. His own. Begotten son. And through his own.

Begotten son. To have him. To have him. Being a vast family. Who'd be leveled up. On the level of his son. As co-sons. As co-brothers. By whom he'd. Fulfill his. Eternal manifestations. Eternal expression of himself.

In whatever power. Love. Operations. That there are still to be. Those persons. Themselves. Must be settled. In the same. Reality of being. In which he's settled. They all. Also must be as fixed. As. In their love.

Which is a self giving love. And in them. Must be the same cause. As a death to. Be the. Possibly. A people. Of self loving love. If therefore. That. Had to come. Into being. Whatever we. If we use such terms.

As an eternal fact. In the. Eternal deity. It certainly has to come. Into being. In us. Who are temporary forms. That is therefore. Why. We have. In the. The. First. Historical. Presentation. Of the. The birth.

Of the. Creation. Of the human race. We call it. The birth of the human race. The father. Putting. His son. His first. First. Member of that family. Into a garden. In which. Everything expressed. His.

Unending. Givingness. All. All that he could. It all was theirs. To benefit by. But he had. Also to put. In that garden. An alternative. Because they must discover. That. Life is only known. By its alternatives.

And then relating. A relation. Of the two. Of the. Of the two alternatives. Therefore. It had to have in it. The symbol. Of the two trees. That. One tree. Symbolized. The inception. Of eternal life. The other one.

To do. These things. We surely die. Eternal death. And that is why. I have also given us. This remarkable revelation. That before there ever was. A human race. There was. There were other beings. They were made as sons.

Sometimes spoken of. Seraphim. Angels. We don't know much. Spirit beings. Spirits in heavenly places. At least some of whom. Who had the same quality of choice. That we have. And there was one. Who has given us the Bible.

He has often spoken of the Bible. In different terms. He is called. The spirit of error. He is called. The prince of the power. That is in. 1 John 4. He is called. The prince of the power of the air. That is in Ephesians 2.

He is called. The god of this world. That is in 2 Corinthians 4. And other terms like that. Or in actual titles. He is called. Satan. Or the devil. Or the. Revelation. The accuser. The prisoner. His. Pre-existence.

Is revealed to us. In those two. Famous passages. By prophecy. In. Isaiah 14. And. Ezekiel 28. Usually. Prophets. Had. The future. Unveiled. They would see forward. And. The future. Occasionally. A prophet.

Would have the past unveiled. And see back into the past. And. These are two occasions. On which the prophet. Isaiah. And prophet. Ezekiel. Had the. Background veil. Opened. And they went back. And saw.

The. Origin of evil. As a person. Created. In. Relation. To the father. And. To be. The. Agent. By which the father. Is married. To be. There. Of light. Light. Is what manifests. He. To be. The one. Who manifests.

The Fall, Satan, and Humanity's False Self

The father. In his love. This is the end of side one. Please stop your machine. And turn the tape over. As a person. Although we don't know what. Kind of person. Go on. Go ahead. 14. One. That had the consequence.

Of a rising conscious desire. Only by conscious desire. Can we. Come to know. Who we are. And by their conscious desire. Adam and Eve. Came to know. They had appetites. That. They had. The gift of sight.

The person to look upon. Redevelopment. That they had mind. Which. By no other means. Could they find. They had. Human potential. And mind. Confronted. With the two alternatives. And the way in which a self.

Could be a self for itself. Or could be a self. For others. In that case. Because we. We see. That the whole universe. Is. Fixed in this fact. That the. Author of the universe. Is fixed in the self. Giving self.

The opposite. Can only be evil. That's why love is good. Self. Giving love is good. Self. Loving love is evil. And so here they. Moved. Partly by deceit. In their own evil side. As Paul said. Evil deceit.

Partly by deliberate choice. As Paul said. And. Freely chose. To a significance. Two alternatives. Being presented. In the form of. Fruit of the tree. What you eat. Therefore. By the. By the. Invitation to eat of the fruit.

What you eat. Goes within you. Therefore. If they had done. Which we by another process. Not usually. Not usually. On the symbol. Of the fruit of the tree. We by the process. Later on. Of Jesus Christ.

That we see Jesus Christ. If they had taken. Of the true fruit. The. Genesis. We know. The fruit on the symbol. Cause we know eternal life. Was the living person. God in his son form. He is the life. If we know the.

Fruit symbolized. To receive eternal life. To receive him who. Is eternal life. Therefore if we see. The white fruit. To receive him who. Is the symbol. The symbol of him. Is the. Eternal life. To see the wrong fruit.

To see. Him who is the symbol. Of the opposite. The evil. Life, which is really the death life, because all that isn't God in love is death, although we call it life. There is a true life, which is forms of self-giving love, which is God.

All other forms of self, in self-loving form, is death, although we call it life. There is present corruption and ultimate destiny. So we see this fundamental fact, referring back to this self now, that Paul spoke of in Romans 1, it's compulsively a self-for-self, but basically it's not its own self, it's a human self expressing its divine self.

The false is calling himself a deity, he's called the God of this world, because he's only a creature, but God in the sense of the original, the important being, a quality of a person, which was unknown in God, a person, a self-for-self, and therefore he's called the God of this world.

Therefore humanity became a container, the deity of self-centeredness, that's an important fact. The deity you contain, you express, because the whole universe is an expression of deity. Only inanimate things only automatically express deity, a tree is just a tree, we may say God in a beautiful tree form, but it can only be a tree, a person, like God himself can have an illimitable form of expression of the three selves.

But we are always expressing the deity whom we contain, and that's why all the words as we move on about the relationship of man to God, whichever God it is, are the relationships of a container, that's the one whom he contains.

That's why, as we see later on in Romans 9, all humans are called vessels, a vessel is a container of the living, of the water and energy, so a vessel is called then, in Romans 9, a vessel of wrath, a vessel of mercy.

Wrath comes from a discordant life, a saddening life, that means a vessel contains the God to whom the discordant life comes, which ends in a lost eternity. A vessel of mercy is the same vessel that contains him to whom harmonious life comes.

So where we see the human is always a vessel, or later on Jesus speaks of the human as a branch, and therefore speaks itself in relation to the human as the true vine, the branch expressing the life of the true vine, the personhood of the true vine.

But that implies that it's a false vine, if he said I'm a true vine, the implication was that Satan was like a false vine of which we as humans were expressions of that satanic nature. As we have shown, it might be good in the sense that we are just independent selves.

He himself claimed to be independent, the creature of God, he claimed to be independent. He infected the human race with that same primitive events. So the human race doesn't know in a false tradition that they contain the spirit of error.

They just think they're people living their own lives their own way. And that leads on, which we'll deal with later on in later chapters and Romans. It's also important to note and understand by the history of the happenings of the gods of Eden that there's a fundamental difference between the deity person, the false deity, who is a symbol of fruit, entered into humanity, became his vessel, and us humans ourselves.

Because the Bible has shown us in Isaiah 14 that this original person, in the original sense that he fixed himself to be his own god. He became fixed to the self-loving self, just as God fixed himself in himself, cannot lie.

So Satan fixed himself to the self-loving self who cannot be true. He said he's a liar from the beginning. His nature is self-loving self. Now, the human race did not cast God out of my inner center.

That's why it's important that he was deceived. She didn't know what we could know by hindsight, by beyond our minds. She didn't know she knew about her father's love, but she didn't realize in any real sense the implications of what happened if she followed the invitation of this serpent.

Nor did Adam, because Adam really only followed Eve, which may have been bigger to do with us. As Eve went that way, he was not supposed to defy God as to remain with his mate. The importance of that being, therefore, the fall of man was in the flesh, while the fall of Satan was in the spirit.

The Promise of Redemption Through the Seed

Now, that affected the spirit of man. It affected the whole man. So he got captive. We hadn't given our spirits over to Satan. We followed the flesh, and of course the flesh belongs to the spirit, and in that sense, he's the spirit of error, and so he took all of our spirits.

But he didn't, he wasn't able to unite our spirits to himself. So the Bible never talks of Satan in union with humanity. It talks about a spirit that works in the spirit of evil, working in the two of them, working in, not totally united to.