November 15th.

Therefore, as God's chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. Bear with each other and forgive whatever grievances you may have against one another. Forgive as the Lord forgave you. And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity.

Love is the opposite of love. Love is letting go of love in order to be able to love. Love is not pretending to love. Love is agreeing that love is not possible. Love is being able to be what you truly are not, which is a being that is free from being helplessly in love with its self, without even an awareness that that is possible except in the extremes. There is no point in trying to love while the animal still has such a grip on us, because that which prevents us from such an extraordinary thing as genuine love is, will be hidden deep inside us to keep us from it. Love isn't necessarily something you do; it's more what you become when you start being set free from what naturally lives in the heart to keep us from being free to not continually and without thought, love and take good care of our selves.

But you must return to your God; maintain love and justice, and wait for your God always.

The real NT miracles aren't those which happened in the moment to create a supernatural undoing of a natural thing, like a sickness being stopped. The great miracles are those which are hidden beneath what words can't describe. However, that miraculous condition can be inferred by the urgings of those like Paul who wrote about love and care for the brothers, because that was what Paul became—a creature who unbecame what he was before so that he became like God, not like a human naturally, always is and must be.

The humans in their natural state are no different than any animal, except for their level of the ability to hide that they actually are just like them. The sons of God cannot be humans who love, because the only love that is in the humans is for their own selves, which is a condition they are bound to, not one they choose, or are even able to choose to exist in or not. There are eastern type religious inquiry into trying to move away from the naturally existing conditions that they perceive holds them back from finding what they are looking for, some kind of escape from the physical, their bondage to the earth. These are the ones whom the western type religious inquirers mock, because they don't adhere to correct doctrinal mind sets—they don't know the right facts so they are doomed.

The son's journey to the Father is the incorporation of both of these things, more or less loosely put. He has to have a conception about what things mean first, before he stumbles out into it (so he won't be stumbling, but walking toward the Father). A knowledge about what's true is only the one foundational component about the next part of the journey, which is to become what the theory is teaching him. The theory isn't the becoming in itself, but it does allow for the understanding of where he's going, so he isn't haphazardly going wherever his animal mind thinks is best. But also, the looking at it and talking about it (beholding the theory) lasts as long as the teacher sees fit, then the process of becoming the theory begins. That's when the son is ready to accept what he is intended to become—that is, not an animal like he was before.

Put to death whatever belongs to your earthly nature: sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires and greed, which is idolatry. Because of these, the wrath of God is coming. You used to walk in these ways, in the life you once lived. But now you must rid yourselves of all such things as these: anger, rage, malice, slander, and filthy language from your lips. Do not lie to each other, since you have taken off your old self with its practices and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge in the image of its Creator. Here there is no Greek or Jew, circumcised or uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave or free, but Christ is all, and is in all.

The animal heritage (serpent) is the story of sin, curse and the sinful nature that the NT writers spoke about, that foundational condition from which they were trying to become separated. It isn't as much about the details of the rules, but the foundation of the corruption that these details were trying to address. Paul wouldn't have thought that just not doing certain things was any good, but sometimes details are necessary to identify what causes the problems, which bring the need for the details (don't do this or that to each other). The preceding thought to the above is more of a foundational detail about what to do and not do:

Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things. For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God. When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.

An understanding that the life of the son is not a human thing is the most necessary detail. In Paul's mind, these are not just abstract words he intended the humans to spout out at each other, then go an fully engulf themselves in whatever earthly thing they have given themselves over to. Trying to combine the things of above with the earthly is to always bring the good down into the bad, where they're both made bad. The separation from what contaminates is a formula that is found all the way back in the beginning, and runs through the words that give a direction about where to go. That's why we say that if the calling is not there, then there's no point in trying because that would mean the mixing of the two is inevitable. The teacher must be living in the human body in order to teach and guide. He is not just some enveloping mass of blanketing presence that extends into everyone and everything. He is an entity with a purpose, and the purpose has to be set into a body he inhabits. There is a reason that the phrase "chosen people" exists so often.

Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, since as members of one body you were called to peace. And be thankful. Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom, and as you sing psalms, hymns and spiritual songs with gratitude in your hearts to God. And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.

Living out a life of peace and love, not for ourselves but for the community we believe has been chosen to wear the name of the true God, is a worthy aspiration. There is a specific point and purpose to that calling, which doesn't begin and end with the animal self, which is the earthly dilemma. To the animal nature it will seem like not a very good thing, because the animal is all about the me, plus perhaps the little group of its own brood that comes out from its own body. That's just an extension of the self, and doesn't count as anything extraordinary at all in the animal kingdom for a parent animal to take care of its offspring. Therefore that is not what love is according to the Father, since it's done by more of an instinctual compulsion than something extraordinary. Becoming unlike a common animal and like the Father, which must happen as a cooperative effort of choosing—a covenant if you will between the Father and a chosen son—is a truly extraordinary and miraculous thing, the most profound and lasting miracles of the first century.

The atheist followers of communist movements, and eastern religious aspirers are more like God wants to see in humans than are the religious leaders who advocate the shallow, superficial community involvement, while the real and only genuine commitment is to their nuclear family, what good little animals all aspire to by instinct (not real love but love by compulsion). However, the instance of true community existing amongst the human animals can only ever be theoretical, like the ideals that the communist dream was driven by, because no idealistic endeavors can ever overcome what the animal nature compels the humans to do and be. That is individualistic, independent, self-promoting and preserving, only able to love—in its purest form, which is to be driven toward care and concern—its own self. It sees its own self in its replicants, because they have a significant piece of the parent in them; its own actual, physical DNA live is them so again, they are themselves, easy to love because of the instinct within them as animals to do just that.

Paul was a leader of the most perfect communist movement that ever existed on the earth. The only reason it could exist was because of the love that was put in the hearts of those who were under the new covenant, like Paul, who could actually and genuinely spend their live in service to the brothers—God's possessions, His sons, the purpose of His will from the beginning. Cooperative living experiments exist all over the place; the reason for their existence is what's key. Social and ecological responsibility might be a main driving force behind many of them, as well as a general resistance to the greed that drives capitalism, what some see as a reason for so much oppression. The compulsion to self-promote, if it's repressed on the level of obvious and observable, will surface in other ways which may be easier to hide, like the egotistical cravings which are every bit as powerful as the materialistic.

That is how and why the animal nature, what is instinctively, innately in all the humans, is bad according to God. That's why it is what Paul terms the sinful nature. The reason being that it ensures that the humans will never be able to act as God requires His sons to act, with that unheard of level of love, concern and care for His other sons as Jesus had for the disciples. They lived as a community, and he took care of them. For 3 years he showed them how in so many ways their Father would take care of them. But they had to stop hiding, doing what the animals do best, assuming that what they could see with their natural eyes was the only reality, because of the many miracles done for their sake so they could believe. Eventually they became for others what Jesus was for them. They took the responsibility of feeding the sheep—those who were not necessarily their own flesh and blood—which is the opposite of what the animal nature compelled them to do.

Also a dispute arose among them as to which of them was considered to be greatest.

This is what the animal nature compels the humans to be and do, and it doesn't matter how holy one self-professes to be, or appears to be. That is an act, because no one escapes the rule of the animal except Jesus, which is why he is the only one worthy to open the scrolls and administer God's justice. All the religious leaders who appear to even be leaders, who stand up in front of a crowd of humans and assume to teach them, are fakers and have to be, because of the life they live in their heart, hiding what they are from those humans they profess to teach. The animal nature is programmed to hide, which is the curse it's under. They may very well not even know what they're doing, which isn't an excuse, just another reason for the sons to stay away from their influence, pretending to be something good and validated by God, when they're only self-approved and validated by the others who hide by keeping them hidden, which is the hypocritical conspiracy of the humans to hide one another behind the guise validation, playing on fear and ignorance. Here is the proof: if they were honest in their heart before God, they wouldn't be standing in front of other humans assuming to teach them. It is the egotistical cravings that burn within them which motivate them to do that—to be noticed and adored, set apart from the rest, effectively standing on the altar in front of the worshippers, being worshipped by them.

The animal nature compels the humans to be the one who is singled out as the one who is right, who has the answers, who controls the situation, by which the humans think they're being granted that position. When the humans think about Jesus, they think of him standing before crowds of people who love and adore him and are obediently listening to every word he said. That's the corrupting work of human emotions, making the truth into some sentimental lie, for their sake. Their conception of Jesus doesn't often default to him appearing to 7 reluctant men, who were abandoning what he had told them to go back to their old lives, barely hanging on to the community Jesus commanded—although to their credit the disciples did agree to go with Peter.

The third time he said to him, "Simon son of John, do you love me?" Peter was hurt because Jesus asked him the third time, "Do you love me?" He said, "Lord, you know all things; you know that I love you." Jesus said, "Feed my sheep.

This is the aspiration that Jesus wanted his followers to have. Not to provide for their families, or find and maintain their human identity in their profession or activities. There were to be no aspirations except that which was taught to them by their master, not mouth babble or meaningless theory, but the reality of how Jesus lived and what he did—as a sacrifice for their sake. He put aside all of what he could have claimed for himself (substance of the temptation account), and laid down his life for those men. They were to seek the gift that he was soon going to give them, which was himself in another more powerful form, able to actually live by the power he would soon have, in their hearts to teach them to be as he was, to transform them from their helpless animal state into sons of the living God. And what was the marked characteristic of a son—to be special, powerful, honorable, respectable, wealthy, noble, revered? No, the only mark of a son of God was to love and care for God's sheep, as they were their own children. That's what would make them valuable to the Father, same as Jesus.

The reason my Father loves me is that I lay down my life—only to take it up again.

Only to take it up again so that he could love them even more, by transforming them from dead animal, unable to love (what all humans are) to son of God—leader and shepherd of His sheep—whom He intended to redeem so they actually could live as Father and son forever.

I tell you the truth, when you were younger you dressed yourself and went where you wanted; but when you are old you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will dress you and lead you where you do not want to go." Jesus said this to indicate the kind of death by which Peter would glorify God. Then he said to him, "Follow me!"

The kind of death by which Peter glorified God wasn't his physical death, that actually means very little in our understanding of what's true. The death Jesus is talking about is death to his self, as per what Jesus is already talking about in this conversation. "Don't go back to your human identity, your old life of fishing and taking care of yourself as you did before I came, all the humans know how to do. Feed my sheep instead, and give up your animal aspirations, what you've been driven by all your life. Be my shepherd, be concerned about these men, take care of them like I took care of you. That was my most important message for you."

If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even the tax collectors doing that? And if you greet only your brothers, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that? Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.

Here's the important part: that is utterly impossible for the humans to do, because they are always completely ruled by the animal nature. So at the time Jesus told him, Peter was unable to fulfill what he said. It is why Jesus was special, because he could say no to it. However, when that life of Jesus later came back to live in the bodies/hearts of these men (as Jesus promised them), it was then that they were able to be for the others as he had been to them. They were able to be perfect, as he was perfect, but only after that new creation of the Father/Son made one being came back to live in their hearts.

I spoke to the prophets, gave them many visions and told parables through them.

There's no theoretical love that God will recognize. There's no actual love for Him or His family of sons unless that gift has been given which can effect the transformation, because there is no love in the animal except a love that is pure only in regards to itself. It's why they're all unclean, because they cannot take care of His possession or truly be concerned about His sheep. This is the only aspiration the sons can have, and what they should pray for.

My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends.

Ephraim boasts, "I am very rich; I have become wealthy.
With all my wealth they will not find in me any iniquity or sin."