THE UNPOPULAR TRUTH OF THE TRUE BRIDE 

What the Church of God now needs imperatively is men able to show fearlessly what the Word of God teaches as to the future that will guide life through difficulties and dangers, perplexities and perils; also how to gain strength to be faithful and holy, and what will be the heavenly recompense; and able to show also what will be the sorrowful penalties the Christian must face if unfaithful to Christ and the word of His patience. G.H. Lang 

Scripture declares the immediate future to be that THE THRONE OF GRACE WILL SOON FADE AND ANOTHER THRONE OF AN OPPOSITE CHARACTER WILL BE SET IN ITS STEAD,THIS BEING THE THRONE OF JUDGMENT/JUSTICE. [Revelation 4; Psalms 103:19; Daniel 7:9-14] God is about to judge the habitable earth and fallen angels. [Hebrews 12:26; Isaiah 24:21] God will send forth His Son from Heaven in an unrealized character as King of kings and Lord of lords. [Revelation 19:11-16] 

Midnight will then have arrived and the call of the “Behold, the bridegroom cometh” will have been heard. And who is the Bride? Many would answer that it’s the Church, those who are born again. But nowhere in Scripture does it say so. The Church regenerated is the Body of Christ….but IT is not the Bride of the Lamb. [Read Revelation 19:7,8]  

Meeting the Bridegroom involves preparation for the wedding, which is set forth in type in Naomi’s advice to Ruth.  In the 3rd chapter of Ruth, verse 3, Naomi tells Ruth, “Wash thyself therefore, and anoint thee, and put thy raiment upon thee…”  Additionally, we have the type of Abraham sending his servant to receive a bride for his son, and of Rebecca – journeying with Eliezer to the home of Isaac – on seeing Isaac approaching, alighted from her camel and put her veil over herself.    

Matthew 22:11-14 tells of what happens to the saved who are unprepared for the wedding. Christ comes for a spotless Bride. The Bride of the Lamb are those who have made themselves ready. “For the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men, Teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly, in this present world; Looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Savior Jesus Christ; Who gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto himself a peculiar people (a beautiful jewel unto Himself), zealous of good works.” Here we see clearly that the same grace that saved us teaches us the full meaning of Salvation. That grace that now teaches us both positively and negatively of an imperative of putting off of the flesh and a putting on of Christ. [Colossians 3] 

There are those who teach an assumed righteousness in Christ, who claim and declare the assurance of (the fullness of) salvation without works in the complacent false security message of and all inclusive “not of works lest any man should boast.” There are those who have preached the prosperity message, that gain is Godliness, who have chosen against the Holy Spirit’s doctrine of servitude, and have sought riches and to rule as kings in this World out of time. [2 Corinthians 4; Revelation 3:17] Those teachers have mistaken quantity for quality. There are those Bible teachers who, no doubt with vexed souls, have set their sermons on prohibitions, democracy, socialism, state and government legislation, and like Lot, they think to reform Sodom. There are those who teach a perverted gospel mixed with Mosaic Law and Grace. And those who teach effectively the Resurrection has already come, in that they have taught of an instant inheritance and entrance into Heaven upon death.  

None of these shall enter into and share in the joy of the Lord. THEY CANNOT. They will miss the ‘well done.’ They cannot enter into the joy of the Lord. They will have no part IN THE KINGDOM OF THE THOUSAND YEARS ON EARTH. These unfaithful stewards who build out of wood hay and stubble, and those who follow their pernicious teachings shall suffer the great loss of all that is anticipated in “the Bridegroom cometh”. [1Corinthians 3]  

The Book of Galatians lays before us the Truth of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, which is faith energized by love, as opposed to the works of Mosaic Law. In it we find that it is by the Spirit we begun our race for life. And it is by the Spirit that we shall finish the race, not by works (both ritual and dependence in observance) of the law. For by loving faith only we are assured we shall not fall from empowering internal grace. Some will say: We have faith in Jesus Christ, we love Him, we believe in His Sacrificial death for our salvation AND we believe we are obligated to the Law of Moses, to keep its precepts, to observe its rituals, its Sabbaths etc. Paul does not say you are no longer the children of God, but declares you cannot finish the race by the Law which you started in the Spirit. [Galatians 3] What Paul goes on to reveal is that Hagar’s son, although the seed of Abraham, may not inherit the Kingdom of God with the Son of Promise. It is a question of ‘means to an end’ that is vitally important. Man cannot be accepted as a first born son through the law of Moses. That is to say, Paul owns that these Galatians started the race, being justified through faith in Jesus Christ, and if they remained in Jesus Christ, that is in the New Covenant loving faith, not mixing the Law of Moses with grace (as you can not run the race legally tied to both as the Divine influence is brought to bear in the observance of New Covenant laws only, less Christ died in vain. [Galatians 3:21]  

Mixing the Gospel with any false message loses its grace/power, and leaves Esau/the old man in the camp. And unless we cast out Esau/the flesh, we cannot inherit the mysterious kingdom of heavens. For the Work of the Spirit is not augmented by the keeping of the law of Moses, as it is out of accord with the laws of the Spirit/spirit of life in Christ Jesus. [Romans 8] 

Paul’s Letter to the Galatians dramatically declares that the Atonement power may not be appropriated if we confuse/mix the Covenants. [Galatians 5:4] The casting out of Esau is to effect the development of a New Creature in Christ’s Image by receiving the Holy Spirit of Christ as our Teacher/Guide/Councilor/Advocate in our body and spirit and mind to empower us in loving faith in overcoming the flesh, the World and satan. “For sin shall not have dominion over you: for ye are not under the law, but under grace.” [Romans 6:14] What is implied is if you walk in the Law of Moses, you cannot help but fulfill the lust of the flesh, for the law of Moses affords no grace / power to help against the flesh/old man. That was the very essence of the failure of the Old Covenant (Hebrews 8:8) and the reason for Jesus Christ’s Death bringing in the New Covenant.  

What most Christians are unaware of is the double cure of Christ’s Atonement. In that they rightly have seen that they have been delivered from the Wrath of Sin in Jesus Christ, but have not seen the Atonement reaches to the power of sin over the believer’s heart. They don’t see that God’s intent was not only to redeem us but to purify us through the power of the Spirit  unto a peculiar people (peculiar means; shut up to Me as My special jewel).  

Christ is known as the GREAT Physician because He not only heals the body but cures the soul’s disease and saves it. The Old Covenant blood could only cleanse the body. The New Covenant Blood reaches the cleansing/purging of the soul, through the conscience. [Hebrews 9] Those who preach but a partial Gospel and confuse the Covenants confuse the Blood, and at best remain spiritual babies. It is those who rightly distinguish this difference, and walk in the liberating Truth of it, who may prevail in maturing from babes to a mature new creature; that is in the image of Jesus Christ. This is the only means by which qualifying righteousness unto kingdom inheritance may be obtained. “For we through the Spirit wait for the hope of righteousness by faith. For in Jesus Christ neither circumcision availeth any thing, nor uncircumcision; but faith which worketh by love.” [Galatians 5:5-6] 

The Holy Spirit sheds the love of God abroad in our heart. It is following Jesus Christ in the Holy Spirit that will change us into the image of Jesus Christ (2 Corinthians 3:18) and qualify us to be the Bride.  

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Addressing the very important theology of where we go when we die…… 

What death does Scripture hold forth as representative of sin? Is it not the very nature of this earth under the curse? And as the Lord said, “…in the day that you eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil thou shalt surely die…” Yes, they did die but not physically for hundreds of years. But they did die in that day in the sense of relationship and fellowship in that the state to which they fell. The nature which they then took on that day was the condition of death/separation from God. 

TO UNDERSTAND  HIS SALVATION AND THE FIRST RESURRECTION, WE MUST PERCEIVE WHAT THE SCRIPTURES TEACH…. DEATH. Death is not a state we shed when we die physically. We still experience the death of separation after we die, because we are not yet free from the curse of death. We are yet in our nakedness clothed in death IN THAT WE HAVE NOT YET BEEN CLOTHED WITH IMMORTALITY. To that end, God Created the intermediate place of the Dead. And it is there that all humans go upon the body dying. Now it is this death that Scripture refers to when it holds forth the exhortations to righteousness on the earth. That is to say, if we are to be delivered from that death, that death in the intermediate place of the dead, to be raised up out of that place and state unto life, that is the promise of the Spirit/spirit walk. That is the promise of the First Resurrection; that is the promise of the Bride. 

LIFE IN THE PLACE OF THE INTERMEDIATE DEAD…The life of the old man is the World. And in one sense, he will not be completely dead till we leave this World. [2 Corinthians 5] And in another sense, until we are raised glorified from the dead. [1 Corinthians 15:52,53] The ritual of Baptism in one perspective is the connection between Christ’s death and our death to this World by faith while we are yet in this World. A great part of our walk in this earth is the impact of Scriptural believing in the life after this life. To consider your self dead to this World and alive unto Christ is to comprehend the life after. The flesh/old man nature is at enmity with God’s Spirit and cannot be reformed nor entirely eliminated while we are alive in this World. We will not be what we are now when we experience death to our bodies, for the life of the place of the intermediate death is completely different and without the life of this World. The old man has no life as he is literally dead, as he no longer has the “oxygen” from this World, he is gone forever. 

What life takes his place? Not glorious life. That is for some only, and that is only in the appointed time when He raises His Bride (worthies) out from among the dead at the First resurrection. [Luke 20:35 Philippians 3:11 1 Corinthians 15:23 Romans 2:7 Ephesians 1:18 2 Corinthians 5 with 1 Corinthians 15:52,53] Then what life/nature are we here experiencing in the center of the Earth? This is the intermediate life of the “dead alive”, (Luke 20:38) the first awakening reality of the Soul’s true existence, which is forever.  

A new life and more real nature we discover is now our experience. Without the Worldly flesh, the World’s influence, the devil’s lies and illusions, there is only questions and true facts that will fill our minds. Christ is declared to be present in 3 Worlds; the heavens, the earth, and beneath the earth in Hades.  Paul’s  “….to die is gain…”, ….his… “….with Christ, which is far better…”, his “…to be absent of the body, and to be present with the Lord”… place. Our surroundings cause our mind to question thoughts, and to immediately compare what we see to what we thought and received about the afterlife on the Earth. We are without the previous World’s deceptive façade to obscure our mind, to present thoughts that are a “tour” of the World pointing out all of its glorious delights, (the devil’s temptation of Christ) false thoughts that shaped our nature while we were subject to it. Once shed of it, we will now then quickly apprehend what and where we are. With a new clarity of thought, in this intermediate life, that is uninhibited by lies and illusions by the past life, we face the reality of what we really are and examine ourselves in our new surroundings in the understanding of the deceptive life we have just left behind. We will not be void of feelings/emotions/intellect/imagination/volition. Our senses are in. tact. And as we think about where we are, we will quickly review our lives on the earth with a new sense of reality and purpose.    

The realization of where we are, begins with processing, and is in direct correlation to what we thought and followed above on the earth. The mind is now going to be renewed relatively freed from all misconceptions. It is from here we will now await the Call of the Bridegroom.