November 8th.

My companions saw the light, but they did not understand the voice of him who was speaking to me.

Only Paul understood, even though the others were standing right there with him, and witnessed the light, but did not hear the words Paul heard, because the message was not intended for them but specifically for Paul, and it was clear to him because that's the way it happens when the true message is being delivered. Paul assumed he was being very righteous by trying to hinder the group that seemed to be threatening his precious religion and the religion of his fathers. Paul was totally wrong but didn't know it, he assumed he actually was doing God's work by killing those who were being called to the truth he was about to receive. Now he had a serious crisis on his hands because everything he assumed was right about himself was being put into his face by the miraculous blindness that overtook him, which was a metaphor for his own total blindness that he was finding out about.

The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise.

One of the major points of suffering for Paul was the loss of his position of feeling like he was the one who was right, which was strengthened by the Jews who supported and validated that rightness in him. The animal does not want to be wrong about its own internal agreement of self-rightness, the little bubble of defense that keeps the truth from penetrating his heart. The animal wants to feel perfect so there is no need to be taught, like some little kid who needs to prove he can do something all by himself just as good as anyone else, when he can't actually do it at all. It's impossible to divorce ourselves from the evil that still lives in us to make us unclean by providing that agreement of self-rightness within ourselves that makes us pompous and self-reliant, working off the animal fear of being the one who might be wrong, the one who isn't already perfect, who may need to be knocked down and blinded so that he can let go of that animal evil that makes him crave to be the one who's right. Much of the suffering of the sons of God will be in losing that agreement of self-reliant rightness.

The Lord said to Ananias, "Go! This man is my chosen instrument to carry my name before the Gentiles and their kings and before the people of Israel. I will show him how much he must suffer for my name."

Then the already validated Son of God verified that message for Paul by sending another witness who ironically restored his his eyesight back to him, then provided instruction on what to do next. Think of the humiliation as one whom just 3 days before Paul had despised as the scum who threatened his precious life, now Paul was dependent on to be giving him back his sight, and holding his hand with the instructions about what to do next. Even though Paul was specifically chosen to be the Lord's instrument, nevertheless he needed another son to help him because he was immobilized by the Lord. He could have been just told those instructions by the same voice that intercepted and immobilized him on the road, but that's not what the Father wants for the sons who are in His family. He wants them to be dependent on the Father and interdependent with each other, to actually have to count on each other. What does love for the Father's family look like, if not giving up our life of self-reliant rightness for the cause of God, to have that spirit of independent self-rightness broken out of us so that we can actually begin to be able to love in a true and honest way. If the family is what the Father cares about, then our love for the true brothers is all the sons should be searching to be able to do within themselves, to counter and destroy the self-love that prevails because of the animal evil that doesn't just automatically go away.

I tell you that if two of you on earth agree about anything you ask for, it will be done for you by my Father in heaven. For where two or three come together in my name, there am I with them.

There are so many things in this existence that can take up our energy, time and ability to give care and concern for the true brothers. The thing that prevents us from that is the animal craving for self-rightness, the feeling that we don't need to love any more than what we already are, because we're already more than okay with how we feel about our own selves. It's quite impossible to even see, actually, because it's so incredibly powerful to blind us. We have to be specifically told about its existence, then we'll pretend we didn't just hear that because we want to feel the agreement of our own rightness as we already are. It's hardly something that can even be conveyed with words like this; it has to be experienced first hand to be able to be known.

If anyone comes to me and does not hate his father and mother, his wife and children, his brothers and sisters—yes, even his own life—he cannot be my disciple.

Having and maintaining a human identity that needs to feel like it's responsible and honorable is another sure way we'll be prevented from loving as the Son loved. The responsible father and husband is bound up to that identity which makes him a virtual slave to the maintenance of his family obligations, because of the way this culture is structured. Because of the triumph of capitalism there is this idea that any man can become like a king, in varying degrees, and the worship of money is at all levels so that what is potentially bad for the brothers is not seen as bad at all to everyone else. The humans are encouraged on all levels to become rich, relative to their opportunity which is pretty much thought of as unlimited. Rich might not be the best word to use; however many in this culture who might consider themselves just surviving would be considered very rich by the humans in other cultures.

This human identity of being a responsible father, husband and citizen is encouraged at ALL levels in this society, and reinforced around every corner. Everyone is taught that rich is good and poor is bad, responsible hard worker who spends almost all his waking hours to get things for himself and his family is good, and the opposite (what Jesus himself advocated, that the human family means nothing) is bad. And that is the human way, what the sons will have to face the shame of if they want to choose to follow the voice inside them and actually believe—if they want to be pleasing to the Father. Everything that seems to be worth anything, or which has any value to the preservation of the self and the animal identity, has to go.

Any of you who does not give up everything he has cannot be my disciple.

Those who are trying to be pleasing to God by their rituals, who think that Jesus' conception of belief means believing the correct doctrine and performing rituals, and that love is tolerating the other members and being pretend nice to them on Sunday; will also reinforce those ideas that are the human way, of the culture of man the animal who wishes to preserve what he is and has. The humans naturally think we can mix the good with the bad, and don't even know what the bad is. We think it's one thing external to our animal existence (what the bad people are, not us of course because we have the agreement of rightness in us), when it's actually our own selves, heart, character, and nature—our very identity as the evil beings that we are who must remain separated from God because of it.

The leaders of the groups who claim to know the way to God will be the first to encourage their members to sell themselves out to the culture of man while hiding behind the veneer of doing God's work; to create and maintain a respectable and honorable human identity, to work as much as they possibly can for things, and then make that their service to God because they're doing it for their family, who they naturally assume God loves so much. However they're forgetting the words of Jesus whom they claim to follow, who said that the natural family means nothing; only God's family is important, and they're not automatically the same. They make them the same because it's convenient to do that, because that's how they maintain their validation of honor and respect from the others who are doing the same thing. Even if they don't say it, their actions convey what they respect and love. If they say they love their brother, it can only be a facade because their actions say something completely different, that they can only truly love their own flesh and blood, which is the curse of the animal because by the very misfortune of being an animal one can never be enjoyed by God, because that one cannot be near Him.

That is the dilemma of being bound up to the animal nature and not even knowing it, of one the one hand perhaps being desirous of pleasing God by being right or good; but on the other, that condition being impossible to achieve because they don't even know about their identity as unclean human animal, unable to come near to the Father. Everything is a facade because it's all based on the false assumption and lies that were made up by men in the second, third and fourth centuries. The condition that the sons lived under in the first century left, and that ability to know and have what's real left with it, along with the genuineness and authority which the spirit brought to the lives of those who were the recipients of that incredible condition. Unfortunately, and as is the knowledge of pretty much no one, it left.

"My son, do not make light of the Lord's discipline, and do not lose heart when he rebukes you,
because the Lord disciplines those he loves, and he punishes everyone he accepts as a son."

Endure hardship as discipline; God is treating you as sons. For what son is not disciplined by his father? If you are not disciplined (and everyone undergoes discipline), then you are illegitimate children and not true sons. Moreover, we have all had human fathers who disciplined us and we respected them for it. How much more should we submit to the Father of our spirits and live! Our fathers disciplined us for a little while as they thought best; but God disciplines us for our good, that we may share in his holiness. No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful. Later on, however, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it.

What we know we are, where we came from, what we continue—hopefully diminishing—to be is what we are beginning to recognize as the enemy, even as Paul did because it is the very thing that prevents us from doing what makes the Father happy; that is, seeing His family of sons acting like Jesus acted toward the disciples instead of like mere animals toward one another, the human way. That is our goal, which is thoroughly unrespectable in this culture. Not to become responsible, or honorable, or be a good human animal, father, husband or any other virtue that this culture worships. To become driven by love which comes from the Father instead of the animal instincts—the two are in opposition to one another. This is the most fundamental message for the sons of the living Father.

Our goal is to be able to shed that snake's skin so that we can actually learn how to love our brother, not with words and sentiment on the outside which doesn't mean anything, because in our heart we feel that overwhelming sense of self-rightness regarding our own selves. We would only begin to be able to truly love because we truly are bound to the love of our Father and only want to see His interests and desires to be promoted. Even though every little thing we need seems so huge and creates anxiety for us deep in our souls, it actually means nothing with just the tiniest bit of the perspective that our Father has. However, "To hell with what we want" may be an easy thing to say with words but the agreement in our heart is the thing that matters, because that's where the Father sees who we are.

The same is true about all the lies that this human culture has developed and maintained about what is good, honorable and respectable to the humans—that is not the same as it is to the Father. He doesn't respect those who want respect from the humans, nor does He honor it. That is the lie the humans in Israel were susceptible to believing, which Jesus spoke out against to the disciples who were with him, whom he was taught by the Father to love and care for and about, more than his life.

When we heard this, we and the people there pleaded with Paul not to go up to Jerusalem. Then Paul answered, "Why are you weeping and breaking my heart? I am ready not only to be bound, but also to die in Jerusalem for the name of the Lord Jesus."

The first concern of the animal consciousness is to survive. The people loved Paul with a genuine love, although they were still of human stock, which is always prone to this mode. They figured one thing would be better, when Paul knew that another thing was, and that the life of God would either protect him from the Jews or not, according to what God's interactive, living purpose was for Paul, who was already of the mind that it would be better to depart from this world and be with the Lord, the sentiment reflected in his answer.

We do have a conceptual understanding that this life means little, but the way we live, what we truly love and run after, betrays us. It's not our fault, because we're just beginning to even understand what a choke hold the animal has on us to be able to do the right thing according to our Father and the Lord, who have been made into One being so we can call them either one, or both, and we're talking about the same Father, savior, teacher, counselor, comforter. Our goal is ultimately to be united into the same body so we can truly become God's house, where He lives and moves and has his existence.

In the first year of Cyrus king of Persia, in order to fulfill the word of the LORD spoken by Jeremiah, the LORD moved the heart of Cyrus king of Persia to make a proclamation throughout his realm and to put it in writing.

Nothing matters except the purpose of God, because everything's going to fall away except the things of God and the beings who are protected by the seal of His ownership on them. We can't help but attach all kinds of emotional stuff onto the side of the reality of nothing existing before Genesis or after Revelation except God and His purpose. We don't decide what that should be according to our emotional presuppositions, based on the fleeting, biased needs of the animal. For example, if it were up to us, the kingdom would be populated by us first, then with all of our family members next, then with the rest of the christadelphians and their families.

Can we get our minds around how our thoughts are biased toward the inclinations of the animal? This is important because we claim to want to follow Jesus, so we should try to understand the message for what it is, rather than what we have made it into, according to what we do to survive as animals on many levels—psychological and emotional, as well as physical.

Like the layers of an onion, we—as individual animals—are always at the core. First our selves, then our own flesh and blood, then those who are the next step removed from our own flesh and blood—those who hold the same values as we do, and so are not a threat to the core (our selves then our own flesh and blood). As animals we are so brainwashed by our subconscious needs and the way that we have constructed our world around us because of them, that we can't even imagine the reality of what we do, not to mention accept them as fact or admit to their rule over us.

I'm speaking as one who is engulfed by and entrenched to it as a prison that holds me; I know its power and domination over me. Even if I get a glimpse of this reality, I am shortly thereafter taken back by the animal consciousness and I'm once again nothing more than the animal—living for what I think I need, what I've created as my consciousness for coping with my existence. Holding on to the things that help me survive, which I've deemed worthwhile to continue to survive.

As animals we need to be able to hold on to stuff and ideas about ourselves, to feel as though our lives and our selves are meaningful and worthwhile. We constantly need reasons for living on and surviving another day—for justifying our worth. The protection of our "things" is probably the most obvious because it's a tangible idea. Protection of our family is also up there, a little less tangible because we can't just go out and buy a family, but we can protect them by buying them things that keep them safe and warm, things that won't be taken away from them. There is someone (us) who cares about them enough to keep them safe, warm and provided for.  Work and purpose is another thing we hold on to, and which nicely meshes with the other two. We can find a solid purpose in work not only because we spend so much time doing it but also because we are able to protect our families and keep them safe and warm doing it. It's something that reinforces our worth and reason for living in a number of ways.

"Things" aren't evil in themselves; they're just things in themselves. What Jesus said about things (including money and property) is that if losing them would cause a person to discontinue to seek God, then that is bad for one who is called to seek Him. The same is true for family, even to a stronger degree, as most people would lose things before family. e.g.. they would sell their house to ransom their blood if that was the only option. Jesus, though, held one thing higher than things and even family, and that was the seeking of God in the heart above all else—not theoretically but actually.

What I mean is that people oftentimes engage in only theoretically following God as long as it jives with our values and existences. The hypocrisy of the animal is fierce, which is what Jesus straightforwardly warned the disciples about—the hypocrisy of the leaders of Israel. The Abraham example is such the ultimate in Paul's mind when he was writing the book of Hebrews, and about which he defines faith in chapter 11, because it speaks of the very thing Paul knew so clearly about his own devotion to God. Abraham was willing to do the most horrific thing—in the attempt to truly follow God—one could think of regarding what he held onto as valuable. It is the extreme, because most people are not called by God to kill their own children, yet the principle is obviously important, and the sacrifices Paul and the other believers made were no less genuine than Abraham's.

The animal wants, needs, and must hold onto something in order to continue to survive and justify its existence, to feel it should keep going on—it is so integral to our nature. What the Abraham story tells us is that this allegiance to God is what He has always demanded from those who know what the truth is inside them. Even before Abraham there are stories of those who had to give up what they wanted to hold on to, what they thought was right, in order to show their devotion to God. It is the difference that separates those who merely mouth their allegiance to Him but could never give up what they consider valuable to prove it (rich young ruler), and those who truly want Him more than anything. We don't have to go out looking for opportunities to do this, as God is able to engineer any situation and circumstance in order for someone He has chosen to show that his allegiance to Him is real.

Jesus talks to the disciples about loving things and family so much that they would be unwilling to let them go in order to continue following God if the situation called for it. He knew that for many people who received the spirit's pull in their hearts shortly after his ascension, that is exactly what was required of them. We know that many did lose their possessions and families because of the truth of God, the new way of living for God according to the Messiah, and their desire to follow what they knew was true—the truth that was compelling them and pulling on their heart.

The principle is important, and all situations will be different. The testing of their faith was a common thing for the first century believers, and they took comfort in Abraham's plight as Paul reminded them. It has to be remembered that anyone who is called to comprehend the truth of God as it is will in principle have the same testing as Abraham, Jesus, Paul, and all of the sons who are called to know God. The losing of things or family may or may not be involved, as could the losing of respect, admiration, worth or purpose. But remember, the only thing that matters is God and His purpose, and what He considers valuable (not us).

The Pharisees, who loved money, heard all this and were sneering at Jesus. He said to them, "You are the ones who justify yourselves in the eyes of men, but God knows your hearts. What is highly valued among men is detestable in God's sight.

"Then the Lord said to me, `Go; I will send you far away to the Gentiles.' "

The crowd listened to Paul until he said this. Then they raised their voices and shouted, "Rid the earth of him! He's not fit to live!"

As they were shouting and throwing off their cloaks and flinging dust into the air, the commander ordered Paul to be taken into the barracks.

This is the man who teaches all men everywhere against our people and our law and this place. And besides, he has brought Greeks into the temple area and defiled this holy place.

To the Jews one thing was unclean and offensive (other humans, not Jews). Jesus told them what made a human unclean, not being something other than a Jew as they were, but being a human as everyone but the sons are. Having a heart that is born under the curse of the animals, being bound to the nature of the animal (serpent), what is the humans' dilemma, their natural being, what they all are—unclean.