Sermon Tone Analysis

Before you begin your Bible study, as a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ, be sure you have named your sins privately to God the Father.

If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

(Known, Unknown and Forgotten sins) (1Jn 1:9)

 

 

You will then be in fellowship with God, Filled with the Holy Spirit and ready to learn Truth from the Word of God.

 

"God is spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in Spirit and Truth."

(John 4:24)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Celebrity-Ship of Jesus Christ

 

 

*THE OBJECTIVE OF THE CHRISTIAN LIFE*

 

     There are many super-grace heroes in Christianity, but there is only ONE CELEBRITY.

Every Spiritually mature believer recognizes the Celebrity-ship of Jesus Christ.

He is our Savior and our High Priest, as well as the King who will one day rule the entire earth.

Everything we have and everything we will ever be is directly related to the Lord Jesus Christ.

If you have made the greatest of all decisions in life — to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ (Acts 16:31) — you are the possessor, once and for all, of eternal Salvation.

This, however, does not indicate that you love Christ or that you even have the capacity to love Him.

When you were born again, you began your Christian life as a Spiritual baby and had no way of appreciating Who and What Christ IS.

The capacity to love Him depends upon the amount of Divine Thinking you have in your soul.

The Spiritually mature status, which is the objective of the Christian life, is the place where you really begin to love Christ and where you have the normal function of your priesthood.

Spiritual maturity is characterized by Occupation with Christ, and the recognition of His Celebrity-ship.

No believer has truly reached Spiritual maturity in the Christian way of life until he functions under the Divine Concept of Celebrity-ship, for this is the place where we have enough Truth so that the Principle of vindicating His Word is fulfilled.

God vindicates His Word in only two places today: by the preservation of the written Word, and in the souls of individual believers.

He vindicates the latter by super-grace capacity, which leads to super-grace blessings.

At this point, God begins to pour out blessings for the believer who has a “cup” — the capacity that results from Bible Thinking in the soul — and true happiness becomes a Reality in his life!

*GRACE-THINKING*

 

     (Php 2:3) contains one of the greatest passages in the Word of God on the Celebrity-ship of Jesus Christ.

Verse 3 introduces the background to our subject:

 

/       Nothing according to the standard of lust-ambition (Preoccupation with self) or according to the standard of ambitious pride; (Preoccupation with others) but in grace-Thinking regard one another as more important than yourselves.

(/Php 2:3/)/

 

     Lust-ambition creates factions in the local church.

Some of the most ardent church workers are operating under the lust pattern of the old sin nature.

When people receive a great deal of praise, letters of commendation or recognition of one kind or another, they often become intoxicated with approbation or power lust.

It’s like dope: they must have more and more praise in order to satisfy this lust.

The only way some people can keep their ego intact is to play “king of the mountain” — to find the flaws in others, to compare these with their own strong points and come out on top.

In other words, they try to build their happiness on the unhappiness of others.

/     But if you have bitter jealousy and selfish ambition in your heart, do not be arrogant and so lie against the Truth.

This wisdom is not that which comes down from above, but is earthly, natural, demonic.

(Satan's thinking!)

/(Jas 3:14-15) 

/ /

     “The standard of ambitious pride” refers to the pastor who encourages such practices and is therefore ignoring the great Principles of grace found in the Word of God.

Christ's-Thinking is the state of mind which submits to the Divine order and does not exalt itself; it eliminates all human viewpoint from the soul.

Grace-Thinking is regarding others better than ourselves.

Now, how can you possibly Think that some “clod,” who behaves like a moron, is better than you?

It is not done through some system of hypocrisy, hypnosis, group therapy, or the sensitivity training of “cosmos diabolicus!” (Satan's world system) Grace-Thinking is accomplished by being so Occupied with the Person of Jesus Christ and His Thinking, that in your relationships with other people you do not judge, malign, criticize, hate, lust for, ridicule or intrude on their privacy.

/     Each one not regarding the things of himself, [His own personal interests] but each one also the personal interests of others/./

/(Php 2:4)

 

     This is the Concept of respect for the privacy of the priesthood of other believers.

You cannot learn Truth when someone is trying to run your life.

The key to verse 4 is respect for the privacy of other believers.

This verse excludes “operation long proboscis.”

Minding your own business, being considerate of others and having good manners are all by-products of the Christian way of life.

“Operation Grace” allows every believer to live his own life as unto the Lord.

This is the only bona fide “sensitivity training.”

You don’t have to try to love people or to gush over them; you simply allow them their privacy.

The question is, how can you be so relaxed about other people that you keep your nose out of their business and avoid curtailing their freedom in any way?

You must find Someone who is so much better than anything or anyone else in life, that other people and other things will no longer be an issue.

Paul is setting up this Principle, under the ministry of God the Holy Spirit, to present the Celebrity-ship of Jesus Christ, and what He Thought.

The Celebrity of Christianity demands the attention of every believer!

He is so wonderful and so marvelous that Occupation with Him changes the entire picture!

Many believers are petty, bitter, jealous, vindictive, implacable and full of gossip and maligning because they have no Concept of the Celebrity-ship of Christ.

The reason so many “Madison Avenue” substitutes and ridiculous practices and programs have crept into the church, is that we have lost sight of Jesus Christ as the only true Celebrity.

This condition exists primarily because pastors are not teaching Divine Thoughts filled with God the Holy Spirit.

(Isa 55:8-9)

 

     Occupation with Christ means that you harbor no mental attitude sins toward others.

Whether or not they deserve your respect is NOT the issue; just put them in the Lord’s hands and move on!

We build our happiness on WHO AND WHAT CHRIST IS — *not on who and what we and or people are.*

There is no shortcut to this relaxed mental attitude.

It requires the daily function of the “grace apparatus for perception” (Operation Z) — the pastor-teacher consistently communicating Spiritual Thoughts and the believer learning Spiritual Thoughts on a daily basis.

(Psa 1:2-3)

 

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The only purpose for the existence of a pastor-teacher is to enable believers to advance to the highest stage of Spiritual maturity — living in the sphere of the recognition of the Celebrity-ship of Jesus Christ.

Other types of organizations are bona fide for witnessing, but the local church, (And now also the computer) is God’s order for learning the Word of Truth in the New Covenant Age.

 

*THE MENTAL ATTITUDE OF CHRIST*

 

     /Keep on having this mental attitude in you which also in Christ Jesus/.

(Php 2:5)

 

     The Greek word PHRONEO means in the positive use, “to Think Spiritually.”

When our mental attitude” meets the Standards of this word, we have arrived at the highest and noblest point in the Christian life.

Mental Attitude Divine Viewpoint — (The Mind of Christ) (1Co 2:16) — is the objective and Command for every believer.

The only way you can obey this Command is to have  THE WORD IN YOU; in the right lobe.

To do this, we must begin with Jesus Christ and the true Concept of the Word.

*THE PREINCARNATE CHRIST*

 

/     Who, although He existed in the form of God, did not regard [Think] equality with God a thing to be grasped./

(Php 2:6)

 

     HUPARCHO means that Jesus Christ always existed; there never was a time when He was not God.

He is eternal; He never grows old.

What is a “celebrity”?

Someone who is glamorous, someone who has status in life, someone with great ability or talent?

What happens to celebrities in the human realm?

They deteriorate; they lose their ability and their popularity; they grow old; their glamour fades; they die!

Did you ever see a football player ten years after he was washed up as a professional?

Three hundred pounds of flab!

Have you ever seen a movie queen after her heyday?

If she is working, she is playing character roles!

A true celebrity is perfect.

A believer with any knowledge of the Bible would never make a celebrity of a human being!

(Jer 17:5) Our true Celebrity is perfect; He has neither a beginning nor an end.

(Rev 1:8)

 

     The word translated “form” in the English — MORPHE — does not refer to outward shape but to the essence.

From eternity past, Jesus Christ possessed sovereignty, righteousness, justice, love, eternal life, omniscience, omnipotence, omnipresence, immutability and veracity.

He has never changed His essence for anyone or anything.

His essence remains intact and will continue to do so throughout time and eternity.

/“Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, and today, and for ever.”/