Natural, Spiritual or Carnal — Dennis Kinlaw

Paul’s Gospel to the Corinthians

When I came to you brothers, remember he's writing to people that he led to Christ, he was the one who started this church at Corinth. When I came to you brothers, I did not come with eloquence or superior wisdom as I proclaim to you the testimony about God.

For I resolved to know nothing while I was with you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. He was a person of one focus. I came to you in weakness and fear and with much trembling. My message and my preaching were not with wise and persuasive words, but they were with a demonstration of the Spirit's power, so that your faith might not rest on men's wisdom but on God's power.

We do, however, speak a message of wisdom among the mature, but not the wisdom of this age or of the rulers of this age who are coming to nothing. No, we speak of God's secret wisdom, a wisdom that has been hidden and that God destined for our glory before time began.

None of the rulers of this age understood it, for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory. However, as it is written, no eye has seen, no ear has heard, no mind has conceived what God has prepared for those who love him, but God has revealed it to us by his Spirit.

The Spirit searches all things, even the deep things of God. For who among men knows the thoughts of a man except the man's spirit within him? In the same way, no one knows the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God.

We have not received the Spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we may understand what God has freely given us. This is what we speak, not in words taught us by human wisdom, but in words taught by the Spirit, expressing spiritual truths and spiritual words.

The man without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them because they are spiritually discerned. The spiritual man makes judgments about all things, but he himself is not subject to any man's judgment.

For who has known the mind of the Lord, that he may instruct him? But we have the mind of Christ. Brothers, I could not address you as spiritual but as worldly mere infants in Christ. I gave you milk, not solid food, for you were not yet ready for it.

Indeed, you are still not ready, you are still worldly, for since there is jealousy and quarreling among you, are you not worldly? Are you not acting like mere men? For when one says, I follow Paul, and another, I follow Apollos, are you not mere men?

The Cross and Freedom from Self-Interest

Yesterday we were speaking about the radical character of Paul's discipleship, that it was a discipleship that centered itself in the cross of Christ, that the cross was a determinative key for Paul for understanding how his relationship should be to Christ and how his relationship should be to everybody else as well.

He said there was a power in the cross, a power that could set a person free so that a person could be free to make another person's well-being more important than his own. He summed it up in that verse that has become a pivotal one for me, in the 10th chapter, verse 24, where he says, Nobody should seek his own good but the good of others.

He said a person can come to the place where he finds his own personal fulfillment in giving himself away. A person can come to the place through the cross where he can find his own fulfillment in what we would refer to as self-sacrifice, self-giving.

Coming to the place where we live, not with this concern first, but a concern outside of us first. None should seek his own good but that of another. Now, it would be interesting how to spell that word another, wouldn't it?

Let me intrigue you. Do you capitalize it or don't you? None should seek his own good but that of another. Maybe what we ought to do is capitalize it and then put in parentheses after it a little a and then n-o-t-h-e-r.

But we will come, maybe we can come back to that. The basis of this is found in his view, basically, of what is the difference between what some translations to King James calls the natural man and the spiritual man.

In other words, what he's talking about is what grace can do for a person and what grace wants to do for a person. You find that in this passage that we read a few moments ago. And it comes to focus in verse 14 of chapter 2 where he speaks and says, now, the natural man, if you use the King James, some other translations, the NIV is very interesting.

It translates it, the man without the spirit does not accept the things that come from the spirit of God. He doesn't understand them for they're foolishness to him. He cannot understand them because they're spiritually discerned.

The Natural and Spiritual Person

The spiritual man, so that the NIV contrasts the man without the spirit with the spiritual man. Now, if you know anything about the original text here, you will remember that it is the psuchikos man, it is the soulish man, that is, does not able to understand the things of God, and it is the pneumaticos man, the spiritual man.

And interestingly, the NIV puts its finger on the heart of it. When it gives you an interpretation rather than a literal translation, it says, the man without the spirit can't understand these things, which fits with what Mark was saying last night.

And the spiritual man is in a different realm as far as understanding goes. Now, if you'll follow that down, you will find that he says, it's a magnificent passage that so often times we have misquoted and used out of context, eye has not seen nor ear heard, neither has entered into the heart of man the things which God has prepared for those that love him.

But then he says, but they've been revealed to us. Now, what is it that has been revealed to us that natural man cannot conceive? I want to give you my bottom line ahead of time, which may not be good psychologically, but I'd hate for you to miss it.

So whether you're hearing any of the rest of what I say, I want you to hear this. What is it that he is saying? Eye has not seen nor ear heard, and it hasn't entered into the heart of man. Nobody has conceived this, what God has prepared for his own.

And what is it? It is escape from self-reference. Let me reword that a little. It is escape from the tyranny of self-interest. Now that's what God has prepared for me, and that's what God has prepared for you, and that is what grace wants to do.

You know, I never saw that passage in that context before, but I think if we look solidly at the full thrust of the book, we will find that that's what he's talking about. He says that there is a difference between the natural man and the spiritual man.

The natural one is the one untouched by regenerating grace, prevenient grace may be at work. At first I started to say untouched by grace, but nobody is untouched by grace. Everybody is touched by grace, but everybody is not touched by saving grace.

So you have to qualify it when you say the person who has never been touched by saving, transforming grace. I went and checked a number of translations. Interestingly Weymouth, Moffat, RSV, and the new RSV call him the unspiritual man.

The NIV says the man without the spirit, and the King James calls him the natural man. That's the person as he is before regeneration takes place in his life. Now that's an interesting state, and I never come to this passage about the natural man, but that I find myself thinking of Wesley's hymn.

You remember the verse, the one that most of us love so well, Long my imprisoned spirit lay, fast bound in sin and nature's night. Now that expression, that phrase, nature's night, has become a magnificent phrase to me.

I wish I were a poet. I wish I were a good writer. I'd like to see something written briefly, briskly, powerfully on nature's night, because that's what everybody lives in until regenerating grace comes to him.

And you will notice that the concepts that are behind that verse are imprisonment and blindness, or death and life with concomitant seeing and understanding. Long my imprisoned spirit lay, fast bound in sin and nature's night.

Imprisoned in sin and in darkness. Long my imprisoned spirit lay, fast bound in sin and nature's night. How does the next line go? Now I've forgotten it. Come on. Thine eye diffused a quickening ray. I woke the dungeon, the dungeon flamed with light.

My chains fell off, my heart was free. I rose, went forth to follow Thee. Now that's a very dramatic and pictorial way of describing what Paul is talking about here. The natural man is in that kind of bondage.

He's in that kind of darkness. He's in that kind of spiritual death. But thine eye diffused a quickening ray, the spirit came and something happened. Now you will notice that the person who is in that natural state cannot see capital R reality.

He sees little r reality. You get massive numbers of illustrations of that all through scripture. Just let me mention one. Jesus feeds the five thousand. The next day they chase him down and say, we'd like to make you boss around here so you can take care of us.

Jesus as the Bread of Life

And he said, you missed it, didn't you? And they say, what do you mean we missed it? We saw the bread and fish and got our bellies full. He said, that's right. You saw the bread with a little b. But that's not what I came for.

I came to give you the bread with a capital D. And unless you eat that bread with a capital B, you'll never know what life is. I am the bread of life. Now, the natural man sees the bread and the fish, but the natural man sees Jesus as a Galilean carpenter.

Who's a religious teacher, not the difference between life and death, heaven and hell, righteousness and unrighteousness. So you get a lot of illustrating. So the person who is untouched cannot see reality with a capital R, the eternal world.

He cannot understand the ways of God. Because when God comes and quickens us in prevenient grace and shows us which way to go, we say, Lord, that ain't natural. And it isn't for our natural state. We don't understand.

And we cannot relate to the one who is there whom we can't see. Now, the other class that he talks about, and so people go through life and never know that Christ is all around them. I'm sure that Caiaphas and Annas and Pilate and Herod all went to sleep on Good Friday evening, more comfortable.

Because they'd taken care of that problem. I'm sure they slept pretty well until probably along about Monday. And then the question came was, was he more than we saw? Now, the world around us lives that way.

I was that way. You were that way. He's there and we never know he's there. But he says there's another class. That's the spiritual class. That's the term which Weymouth, Moffat, the RSV, the NRSV and the NIV and the King James joined them here.

The spiritual man, the pneumaticus person. Now, what is it that makes the difference? It's not a change in us. It's another person present. It is the Holy Spirit. What Mark was talking about last night when he's with us and then fills us.

Comes into us, but there's a difference. But he says when the Spirit comes, the change takes place in the person. Now, that's the reason I think we get two passages in the book of 1 Corinthians on us being temples.

Temples of the Holy Spirit. So at the end of chapter 3, he's picking this thought up again. And at the end of chapter 6, he's picking this thought up again. What is it that makes a Christian different from anybody else?

The Spirit of Christ is in that person. That's the thing that makes the difference between the natural man and the spiritual man. The Holy Spirit, the Spirit of Christ has come into that person and is now working within that person and making changes.

The Spirit in the Life of Christ

Now, who is he? It's interesting that he's the Spirit of God or the Spirit of Christ is the key to the life of Christ. Let me repeat that because I'm saying more than just making a connector here. The key to the life of Christ is the Spirit of Christ.

He was conceived by the Spirit. He was anointed by the Spirit. That's what he's called. He's called the anointed one. Now, what's he anointed with? He's not anointed with abstract messiahship and the preacher should not be anointed with abstract ordained-ship or MDiv-ship or something else like that.

It is a personal anointing. He is anointed by the Spirit. The Hebrew word mashach, mashiach, mashiach, he is the anointed one, anointed with the Spirit. He is henceforth led by the Spirit. That's what the text tells us.

I'm not implying he wasn't led before, but the text is very explicit that when he begins his public ministry, he is led by the Spirit. He's led by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted of the enemy.

And the text tells us he is empowered by the Spirit. The dynamic within the second person of the Blessed Trinity, interestingly enough, was the third person of the Blessed Trinity. Now, what's the text?

He looked at his enemies and said, If I but the Spirit of God cast out devils, then the kingdom has come to you. And in the other gospel he says, uses a metaphor, If I but the finger of God, and I never think of that, read that, but that I remember Michelangelo's picture of the creation of Adam.

After God has formed him and he's lying there inert, God reaches out that long divine finger and from that finger goes the spark that hits the inert form of Adam and he comes alive. And it is the Spirit that makes that.

Interestingly enough, that is not a picture just or primarily of the creation of Adam. That is a picture of the recreation of the natural man. The Spirit of God bridges the gap and makes the connection.

So, I wish you would hear me. You know, my biggest problem is thinking Christian. I've been a Christian a good while. You know, I blush to say that. But the problem for me is not being a Christian. I've been one a long time.

The problem is thinking Christian. Now, the power, the dynamic within the ministry of Jesus was not the second person of the Trinity. It was the third person of the Trinity. He says, If I but the Spirit of God cast out devils, I ought to pay great attention to whether the Holy Spirit is the dynamic in my life, too, and ministry.

All right. So, in this he contrasts the natural man with the spiritual man. Now, what's the end of all this? The end of that chapter is, he says, The Spirit now can come into a person and control him.

And when he does come into him and control him, no eye has seen or ear heard, neither has entered into the heart of man. How glorious it is when the Spirit liberates and frees a person. Now, the Spirit searches all things.

He understands all things. The man without the Spirit doesn't. He says, But we have the Spirit to instruct us. In fact, we have the mind of Christ. Now, I don't know about you, but I've slid over many of these verses over the years as I've read them and never stopped to sense what cataclysmic things Paul is saying when he says that.

It is a blunt, affirmative statement. We have the mind of Christ. Now, what he's saying is the natural man doesn't. The spiritual man has the mind of Christ. Now, what is that mind for? It's to help me to think, understand, and it's to help me to act, because more is involved here than simply the cognitive.

The Four Negative Characteristics of Carnality

But now, what characterizes the mind of Christ? Those of you who have heard me many times, you're going to hear me repeat something. You'll have to forgive me. I don't know enough not to repeat some things.

And let me say, I've gotten to the place where I'm ready to do it intentionally, because I don't know about you, but hearing something one time doesn't change my thinking. It's when I've looked at it and heard it and it's been repeated again and again and again that slowly I find myself thinking differently.

I'd like to think the way Christ thought. Now, I don't think I'm going to get that through a sermon. I'm going to get that through living with the truth until it seeps through my thick head and gets down through all those layers of the onion until it's at the heart of me and it's what motivates and works out.

Now, I notice in Philippians 4, in Philippians 2, he describes for us the mind of Christ. Now, let me give you briefly what I think is in chapter 2 of Philippians when he says to the Corinthians, the spiritual man has the mind of Christ.

The natural man doesn't. Now, he says, what is the mind of Christ? In Philippians, I always thought the mind of Christ was what Paul was preaching was in verses 5 through 11. Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus.

But that's the illustration. And it's the illustration in Christ's life. The sermon in Philippians is what is supposed to be in the Philippians' life. And you only see that in the introduction to that passage and in the two paragraphs that follow it.

Now, we don't have time to take the time to do it slowly through here, so let me drop it. I find four characteristics in verses 1 through 4 and in verses 12 through 21, four characteristics of the mind of Christ.

Paul gives them in negative imperatives. There are certain things that aren't supposed to be inside of you. One of these things that isn't supposed to be inside of you, if the mind of Christ is there, the Greek term is eritheia.

Selfish Ambition and Christ’s Agenda

The NIV translates it as selfish ambition. Moffat translates it, never acting for private ends. Did you ever live with anybody who had an agenda separate from yours? Did you ever have anybody work with you that had an agenda that was in contradiction, conflict with yours?

I think what he's saying, the mind of Christ, is you get to the place where Christ's agenda is your agenda. And it's not something you pay lip service to. It's something that comes from the inside out.

Christ's agenda has become your agenda. I think this is part of what Paul is saying, when I determine not to know anything among you, say Jesus Christ and him crucified, because the cross was his agenda when he came.

It was the Father and the Holy Ghost that took care of the resurrection. Christ's agenda was the cross. Now, he's saying, the person who has the mind of Christ doesn't have a private agenda. Now, do you know why we hold on to our private agendas?

Do you know how hard it is to turn loose of a personal agenda? I'm sure that's the reason that God won't let us live alone. He sticks us with other people. And their agendas come into conflict with ours.

And then we find out who we are and what we're committed to. Now, I boil this first characteristic of the mind of Christ down to this. The person who has the mind of Christ is not under the tyranny of the question and the mindset, what's in it for me?

You've got a new job opportunity. How do you look at the new job opportunity? The district superintendent sits down and says, I think we're going to move you this year. And you say, oh, that's right, where are you going?

Now, let me ask you, do you think the typical preacher in the Methodist church or the typical Salvation Army officer, we were talking about the Army last night, when he gets the new assignment, is the first and the controlling thought, what does this have to do with my career?

Or is it, what does Christ want to do there? And what are the opportunities there? Wouldn't it be interesting if you had two opportunities in life and one of them provided significantly less salary than the other?

And when it was presented, you looked back to the guy who was presenting it and say, well, I'm really not interested in the dollars, but I am interested in what the opportunities are to extend the kingdom of God.

Now, I think Paul is saying, the Holy Spirit can give you that kind of mind. Because if he can't, you're not free. Okay. The second thing is, we don't have time to go through all these, the second thing is, he says, don't let there be any kenodoxia among you.

Vain Conceit and the Tyranny of Appearance

And kenos is empty and doxia is appearance. So don't let there be, the NIV says, any vain conceit, Moffat says vanity. What it means is basically appearance. I was interested in Mark talking last night about how, as a young Methodist preacher, the question was, how will I look?

And don't tell me you've never been tyrannized by that. Is it possible to get to the place where how you look is not the significant thing? That's changing human nature, isn't it? That's changing natural reactions.

Only the Spirit can do that. But that's the mind of Christ. You think if God had had any good sense, the second person of the Blessed Trinity, he wanted to have been born in Nazareth? And spend his early life as an illegitimate child?

Really just a bastard? Who wants to be a bastard? From the earthly point of view, that's what he was, in spite of all these stories that Mary told. Now, there is a tyranny in appearances. No person is free.

Now, I didn't say you get to the place where you don't think about those things. I said he can get you to the place where they don't tyrannize you. There's a difference between those two things. Now, the third one is, the Greek term is gungusmos, and it means grumbling or complaining.

Grumbling and Complaining

Weymouth translates it, a grudging spirit. Did you ever do the will of God with a grudging spirit? You know, the Hebrews. It's interesting, in chapter 10, Paul talks about the Hebrews on this. And he tells about how they got out into the wilderness and they grumbled.

And how many thousand of them were killed because they grumbled? It's a good thing that God doesn't treat us the way he did the Hebrews. Because that's sort of our favorite indoor sport, except when we're outside, isn't it?

Grumbling, complaining. Now, he says, God can deliver you from the tyranny of that. You don't have to complain. That's the mind of Christ. Nobody ever heard a complaint cross Christ's lips. Now, his father heard some questions, but the people around him didn't hear complaints about his life.

And the fourth thing is the Greek word, diologosmos, which means an argumentative spirit. Let me go back to grumbling for a minute. Talking about that self-reference. You know, I noticed I never complain when I get better than I thought I deserved.

Only time I ever complain is when I think I deserve better than that. You notice the self-reference in that? Now, the fourth thing is sort of the yes-but mentality. I know you're God and you're going to win on this one, and if that's what I have to do, I'll do it.

Looking to the Interests of Others

But, now that's the mind of Christ. Deliverance from the tyranny of those characteristics. Now, you know what I think is the key element in all of that? Let me look at Philippians 2. It's in the introduction to this sermon when he says, this is an astounding verse.

It's so astounding that I read over it for 60 years without looking at it. Fifty-some. Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but even to the interests of others. And do you know the only way you can ever come to that point?

Is when you've taken seriously and found the possibility of grace to do what Paul says in 1024. Nobody should seek his own good, but the good of another. Capitalize the a and then put a little a in parenthesis after it.

Because in this passage he's talking about the little a others. But the only way you're going to get to the place where you can take, be more concerned about the well-being of the little a another, the little o others, is to get the capital o other central.

Absolutely central. And that's what the Spirit of God does. He came not to speak about himself. He came to speak about the Christ and the glories of going his way. Now that helps me with what Paul is trying to say in 1 Corinthians when he says, you have the mind of Christ.

What is the mind of Christ? It fits with what Paul is saying about the spiritual man is the person who has come to the place where he can give himself for others. Now, there's another body of material in the New Testament that now I instantly think about when I think about this.

The Father’s Will in the Gospel of John

Because there are passages in the Gospels that help us understand the way Jesus thought. Now I've got a set of passages that I have in mind. I know there are plenty more. But let me tell you the ones that have been most helpful to me in my understanding.

They are the Father passages in the Gospel of John. And they come in the 5th chapter, in the 6th chapter, in the 8th chapter, in the 10th chapter, where Jesus speaks about his relationship to his Father.

Now I want to say that all of my thinking about the Gospel of John was turned upside down about five years ago when it dawned on me that the main character in the Gospel of John is not Jesus. Any more than the main character on Mount Moriah was Isaac.

Because the key word in the Gospel of John on this is the word sin. I think it's used about 44 times in the Gospel of John. And Jesus says, I'm not here on my own. I'm not the one who thought this business up.

I'm here representing somebody else. So when you see me, you're dealing with somebody else. You're dealing with the guy who sent me. And the key figure in the Gospel of John is the Father, first person of the Blessed Trinity, not the second person of the Blessed Trinity.

And as you read those Father passages, you find the way Jesus thought. And it's astounding the way he thought. Now this is the eternal Son of God, the one before whom every knee will bow and to whom every tongue will confess that he is Christ, to the glory of God the Father.

He is the King of kings. And you know, you think of a king ruling, don't you? You think of a king having a measure of independence and stand on his own feet, don't you? Then I find passages like this.

I tell you the truth, the Son can do nothing by himself. He can only do what he sees his Father doing. Because whatever the Father does, the Son does. Now as I read that, I hear two things. I hear one, possibility, and I hear secondly, choice.

Now sometimes the possibility is in my life, but the choice isn't there. He says, I tell you the truth, the Son can do nothing by himself. He can only do, he is only able to do what he sees his Father do.

Because whatever the Father does, the Son does. Now I think when he says, whatever the Father does, the Son does, there's choice in that. The Son has opted that the Father's will will be his. Because he said, I came down from heaven not to do my own will, but I came to do the will of the one that sent me.

So what's going on here wasn't my idea. It came, originated in somebody else. It originated in my Father. Because he said, you see, the bread of God, which is what you need, not this bread and fish, is the one who comes down from heaven.

And what does the one who comes down from heaven do? He gives life to the world. But you know, I always thought he gave life to the world the way the Father, you know, stuck out and the spark jumped and he came to life.

Now, how does he give life to the world? By giving his own life. And I don't believe anybody ever gets life except if somebody else gives his own to him. And so he says, I'm the living bread that came down from heaven.

This bread is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world. That's a cross, isn't it? Jesus is saying, that's what I came for. And Paul's saying, if that's what Jesus came for, that's going to be the central thing in my message.

It's going to be the central thing in my life. It's going to be the central thing in my thinking. He says, and this is fascinating in this context. Hear it. And it fits with 1 Corinthians 2 and 3. The spirit gives life.

The sarks, the flesh profits nothing. There in John, you've got 1 Corinthians 2, 14, 15 and 16. The spirit gives life. The flesh profits nothing in giving life. He says then in chapter 8, I do nothing on my own.

I speak just what my father has taught me. Jesus didn't ad lib it. I notice that even President Bush gets in trouble when he ad libs. But the son did not ad lib it through here. He says, I speak just what my father has taught me.

I always do what pleases him. Now tell me about the measure of independence in that and psychological maturity. I have not come on my own. He says, I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for his sheep.

And the reason my father loves me is because I lay down my life. I lay it down only to take it again. But let me tell you, nobody takes it from me. You know, I've taken God's will sometimes because I didn't have any option.

The son says, I choose it. I've had circumstances pin me in to the will of God. He says, no man takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. Now, many of you have heard me use this line, but it's interesting to me how a sentence or two sometimes will throw things into focus.

Jesus was talking to the priests in Jerusalem, temple priests, religious leadership. And he says, you're looked upon as the shepherds of Israel. That's what the prophets called you. You read Ezekiel, you read Jeremiah, the priests are called the shepherds of Israel.

Now he says, you're shepherds, but I'm a good shepherd. Now let me tell you the difference between you and me and the difference between ordinary shepherds and the good shepherd. Ordinary shepherds keep sheep so they can eat and wear them, or else, so they can sell them so somebody else can eat and wear them.

But I keep sheep so they can eat and wear me. And it's the difference between those two kinds of shepherds. There are many of us that take our opportunities to use, not to be consumed by. Now I know there's danger in what I'm saying, but the only way I know how to get at the truth that's there is to risk the danger of missaying it a little bit.

Because I haven't gotten my language polished enough and I don't understand enough to hedge all the corners on that kind of thing. But what he is saying is, the difference between you and me is, you use Israel for your advantage.

It's a job opportunity and security and bread and meat and a chance to fulfill your ambitions. But I have sheep so they can consume me. Use me up. Poured out water. You know, it's interesting, poured out offerings, and Paul uses this.

You know, when you pour the water out, it disappears. You know the last thing we want? I heard an interesting discussion yesterday on foundations. Somebody said foundations are the biggest farce in this country.

Because, you see, what you do is you have a lot of money left and you want to build a reputation and make yourself eternal, immortal. And so then you turn it over to a group of people to run it, to perpetuate your memory.

And then 99 times out of 100, the people who take control of it use it for something other than what you gave your life to. So your memorial becomes a memorial to something that isn't you. And this was a guy who spent his life working with foundations.

Now, the guy said, you know, it might be better just to give it all away before you go. But if you give it all away before you go, what's going to be left to tell about you? That drink offering bid is interesting, isn't it?

The Father’s Sacrifice and the Cross

Now, as I said, the son says, I came to sacrifice myself. But I want to say the big sacrifice is not on the part of Jesus. The big sacrifice is on the part of the father. If we could go back to Mount Moriah, the biggest pain is not in Isaac because he looks at that fire on the altar, but the biggest pain is in the heart of Abraham.

It's an incredible sight, isn't it? I used to preach on this occasionally, and it's interesting what comes to your mind as you see the sacrifice of Isaac by Abraham. Because, you see, there was more than Abraham and Isaac there.

You remember that was the site for the temple, the city of Jerusalem. And there were two more people there. And as Abraham gets ready to sacrifice Isaac, I can hear a conversation between the first person of the trinity and the second person of the trinity.

And the second person of the trinity says, Father, this is not the last time we're coming to this hilltop, is it? The father said, No, son, it isn't. And the son said, Father, the next time we come, it's not going to be one of them on that altar, is it?

And the father said, No, the next time we come, it's not going to be one of them on that altar, it's going to be one of us. And the son says, Father, when we come back to this hill, the next time it's going to be me on that altar, isn't it?