Life on the Highest Plane # 8

Life on the LOWEST Plane

The Entrance of Sin Into Man

It must be evident to every thoughtful person that life on the spiritual plane is God's intention for man. In God's first man the divine Spirit had direct relationship with the human spirit and through it as a channel could so control the whole being as to make and keep it spiritual. That which was God's intention for His first man was also His purpose for all mankind.

But candidness compels us to admit that the overwhelming majority of the human race today is living on the lowest plane of life - that of the natural man. In all parts of the world we see man out of adjustment with God, with his fellowmen and with himself. Hatred, war, discontent, restlessness, crime, lawlessness, anarchy, prevail.

What then is the reason for such a terrible and tragic fall? Did He initiate something which He could not execute? Or must we find a reason for the present condition of humanity in something outside of God? Does the Bible tell us how that which God created without sin and pronounced "very good" become sinful and was denounced by Him as "no good"? A Scriptural study of the history of the natural man gives a clear and full explanation.

The Condition of the Natural Man

Ephesians 2:12, "That at that time ye were without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope, and without God in the world."

The Apostle Paul is writing to those in the church at Ephesus who were then living on the spiritual plane but who previously had lived on the plane of the natural. Paul says, "At that time" - when you were living on the lowest plane - "ye were without God, without Christ, and without hope."

1 John 5:11, 12, "And this is the record, that God hath given to us eternal life and this is in his Son. He that hath the Son hath life; and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life."

Eternal life is in Jesus Christ, the Son of God. But Ephesians 2:12 says that the natural man is "without Christ," therefore he must be without eternal life. God offers unto every man the gift of eternal life which he has power to accept or to refuse. To accept it opens the way for him to the highest plane of life, that of the spiritual man; to refuse it leaves him on the lowest plane of life, that of the natural man.

Ephesians 2:1, "And you hath he quickened, who were dead in trespasses and sins."

The natural man refuses the gift of eternal life, therefore he is "dead." Every person who has not accepted from the Father the gift of eternal life, bestowed upon him in Christ Jesus, the Son, is described by God as "dead."

Perhaps the reader will think instantly of some unsaved relative or friend who seems to have abounding life and he will challenge, nay, even resent this statement regarding his condition. This person may be a perfect specimen of physical strength and energy. He may be an intellectual giant, perchance  a fine classical scholar, abounding in worldly wisdom and knowledge. He may be a model of morality, living his personal, family and civic life on a high plane. He may even be religious, occasionally attending divine service and contributing toward the maintenance of church or temple. Surely God's description of the natural  man doe not fit him for he is abounding in life! How can such a man be described as "dead"? There seems to be abounding life in his whole being.

But let a test be made in the realm of his spirit. We have seen that the human spirit is the seat of God-consciousness and that in God's first man there was a direct and vital relationship between the divine Spirit and the human spirit of Adam. God's first ma responded to God in communion and cooperation. A spiritual man delights to respond to every outreaching of God's grace and love toward him. Does your unsaved friend respond to God?

Talk with him about God and spiritual things and your very language is foreign and unintelligible to him, to say nothing of the truth you are attempting to convey. Invite him to go to God's house and he frankly tells you he prefers the club, the cinema or the guild. Give him a Bible to read and it seems insufferable dull and insipid to him and in no measure compares in interest with the newspaper or the latest novel. Invite him to spend an evening in your home in company with God's people and he is fearfully bored and out of place, not knowing how to act or what to say, and longing for the time to depart. Speak to him of his personal spiritual need, explain to him his condition and danger, urge him to accept Christ as his personal Saviour and to ally himself openly with God's people, and he either ridicules the idea or resents it.

Something somewhere seems wrong with the man. Something is wrong with him in the realm of his spirit for there is no response whatsoever to God. There is apparently no God-consciousness. There is no sense of need of God; no desire for God. Something in the man seeds "dead". Something in the man is dead. Death reigns in his spirit.

~Ruth Paxson~

(continued with # 9 - "Adam, the Channel of Sin's Entrance into the Human Race")