Principles of Position, Adam or Christ?

We're now working on the first set of questions, and really what this whole class boils down to is one of these two men, Adam or Christ. And as we mentioned last time, for us as believers, is there any such thing as positional truth for us as believers in Adam? Positional truth? Is there any position in Adam that's true of you now that you're a believer? No. Nothing.

It's really important to understand that. That the cross of Christ totally separated us from this entire creation. Now we're still living in it, we're still walking around in it, and next week we'll talk about the other half of this dynamic, which is our condition, our everyday walking around existence, all of our position is in Christ. All of the information, all the truth, all everything is in Christ. All of it. None of it is in here. So I don't want anybody in the time that we're up here, even when Courtney's teaching, to say, yeah, but my experience in Adam No, no, no. This is where we are. And so that's why I think position is really important to us, okay? So, to make it simple, question number one is look up in the dictionary and define the following key words. What's a principal? It's the head of a high school, right? What is a principal? It's the way that it works. What's it?

Well, whatever you're talking about. Okay. It's a fundamental and comprehensive law, and by law I don't mean statute, I mean principle, or doctrine, or even an assumption. The laws are facts of nature underlying the working of an artificial device. Well, I got that. Yeah. So a principle is a fundamental. The word law, not statute. You know what I mean by statute? To go 35 miles an hour on the street out here is a statute. A principle is like you were describing that it functions and operates the same way every single time.

Give me an example. Gravity is a good one. Physics. Thermodynamics. Things that we have discovered through investigation that absolutely operate the same way every time. Even an airplane flies, it's operating by a different law that overrides. But if the airplane slows down, guess what happens? The law of gravity grabs it. Down it's coming.

It's the same thing that's true in the spiritual realm of things. There are principles in the spiritual realm of things that operate the same way every time. That are absolutely true and cannot be changed. Give me an example of one of those. I'm in Christ. A principle and one of the things a class goes through is different principles, spiritual principles that are absolutely true.

So as we spend time going through these things, I want you to understand that we're talking about things that are principles. And I don't care what your experience may contradict it, the principle still remains. Yes ma'am. contradict position, the principle of position would be that you're off on a condition tangent and you don't realize it. There are several reasons. One, you don't understand that there are such things as principles, spiritual principles.

Let me give you one out of Genesis. You know the principle of like begets like? What is that? And multiple alpacas make alpacas. Yeah. The evolutionists, they somehow missed this principle. You know, Donna loves to say that these amoebas got together, had a meeting, and decided they were going to be frogs. You know. Life begets life. You know, birds beget birds. I've never seen a flying turtle. He meant twenty million years. Forty million years, I don't care. And the same is true spiritually. The same is true of Adam and Christ. Whatever is true of them is true of those that belong to them. Principle, like begets like. Why were you all born a sinner? What made you a sinner? Or maybe a better question is when did you commit your first sin? With Adam. With Adam. That's right. Could you say that?

Or could you say it from all eternity? No, because you didn't sin from all... As we talked about last week, how does God see you? In Christ? Yeah. From all eternity. But He puts you in Adam in time, and you sinned in Him. Okay? So I'm watching last night... What's the little boy's name, the new baby? Atticus. I'm looking at him and he's just a sweet little boy, right? Guess what? They're not going to have to send him to sinning academy. It comes with him, right? It just shows up because it's like begets like.

It's a principle, okay? Alright, the principle position, defined position. Don't everybody speak at once. I don't want to call on anybody and embarrass them. What do you think? It's a place or a location. Okay. It can be a place. It can be a location. Source. It's a source. And we'll talk about that. Source is probably the best word, synonym of the word position.

Does that make any sense? No. I wrote down to lay down or to place a position. I like the word position because I'm a real estate guy. Location is really important to me. I have a position somewhere. I have a home somewhere. From a physical standpoint, the dictionary says the act of placing or arranging the point or area occupied by a physical object. So translate that into a spiritual definition. You could say it's the point or an area occupied by a person. The point or the area. Your position is either here before you're saved or here after you're saved. You can't live in both. You can't live in both. It's like you can't be a turtle and fly. You're one or the other. You're the bird or you're the turtle.

OK. So, like Alan said, the best synonym for the word position is the word source. Why source? What's the word source mean? How would you define the word source? I think briefly Webster said it's a point of origin. OK. Point of origin. That's why I think it's the best word for describing what a position is. What's your point of origin? We found out last week that because you're all believers, what was your point of origin?

What was it? What is it? In Christ. In Christ when? Before the foundation of eternity. That's your point of origin. My buddy who lives across the street, who isn't a believer, what was his point of origin? In Adam. In Adam, right? Now if he becomes a believer, his point of origin changes. He goes from a time-space guy to an eternal guy.

So source is really important. What's the source of your Christian life? Which means what's the source of your position? So just on those three words alone, do you think it's important to understand the principle of position and what your position is as believers? Absolutely it is. Why?

Because if you don't know what to believe in, you're not going to live by faith and you're not going to grow. Miles said that the positional truths of the Word of God, which constitute the spiritual foundation of spiritual growth. You've got to have a foundation. Faith has to have an object. Faith has to have an object, yeah.

And as we learned in the faith class, for those of you who were in it, we all live by faith. every single day. The only difference is what the object is. The object is either Christ or itself. It's how I feel and how I perceive and how I react rather than what the Word of God says. But we're living by faith one way or the other. So positional truth really can be accredited to the things of God.

That's really what they are. So as you learn them and find them out, and because they are principles, they don't ever change. Okay? You guys look confused. I was just thinking of the statement, you have to have more faith. No. Somehow that just doesn't... No. That isn't where you need more information.

It's really true. Miles says spiritual growth really begins at the top, from our position, our source in the Lord Jesus Christ on high. The secret of healthy spiritual growth is to concentrate upon God's very best as it is in Christ and thereby leaving no hunger or hankering for anything less than his best. is the best God has, right here. And He is the answer to everything. He personally. Not just information about Him, Him personally, is the answer to everything.

Okay? Any questions on that? Question number one. Definition's okay? Would you expand on them, change them? Add to them, subtract from them. You guys aren't very interactive today. Let's get with it. So the best word to describe position, we said, was source. All spiritual life and growth is based upon the principle of position. It can be summed up in one word, source.

If my buddy across the street over here is not a believer, this is his source. This world he lives in. is the fallen world from the first creation. He has a sin nature, is controlled by Satan. It's nothing but death and that's his source to draw from.

All of you I'm sure have sat down with a non-believer and just carefully given them the gospel and they just didn't get it. Why? Their source is wrong. the Spirit of God operates on them, they begin to see some things they've never seen before. Different source. Or you've sat down with other believers and you have carefully tried to explain a doctrine that's clear in your mind, that isn't clear in their mind, and they don't seem to grasp it. Why? Because they're trying to grasp it out of this source.

Which is, well, how does it affect me? I remember as young believers, Donna and I were at a Bible study one time. This was before we knew anything. I think we went to a movie, right? Oh, yeah. We went to a movie and saw, Oh God, with a bunch of single Christians. And we went back to somebody's house for a Coke and whatever. And we got in a discussion about the movie. And I hadn't been a Christian very long, but there was no spiritual redeeming qualities in that movie, and I knew it, and they're all trying to make it happen.

And this one guy says to another guy, he says, well, my doctrine and theology is different than yours, and we're both okay with that. I said, I don't think so. Source. It's either what the truth is or it isn't. And how you feel about it doesn't necessarily make it true. It has to be in God's word. It has to be in the source.

So could you real quickly just go through then, Adam, the spirit somehow reveals himself to every person and it has its source in Adam, right? Well, I'm not sure the spirit reveals himself as much as he reveals what this source in Adam is and how this person here is separated from here. What I'm getting at is that's the last choice that Adam makes is to believe...

Oh, I see what you're saying. ...who Christ is. So something happens there. Yeah, what happens there? Here's my buddy across the street and Adam. And Alan goes over and gives him the gospel. And he says, oh, wow, that's really cool. And he says, what do I do about it? Alan says, believe. He says, okay, I do.

He made that decision to believe while he was positioned in Adam, didn't he? But once he made the decision, what happened? What happened positionally to him? What happened to him? He died. What's death mean? Separation. What did he separate from? Adam and all of Adam's source. He may not ever find that out in his Christian life, but that's the reality and that's the position. So the last act of a believer or of a non-believer is to believe in Christ because the second that they do, what happens to them?

They die. They get separated. Now, they may not ever live positionally, never. Positionally. They may never live in the position that they have in Christ. They may spend all of their time trying to get Adam to act like a Christian, not ever knowing about their position.

I said this last week. I'll do it in the form of a question. What theological What system of theology today keeps you from your position in Christ? Law. And what's it called? Reform. Covenant Theology. Why? Why would Reform or Covenant Theology keep you from abiding in Christ? Too busy trying to fix up the old wounds.

There's the principle of law here. Is there a principle of law in Christ? So if I'm living under the principle of law, what's my source? Adam. The subtlety of Reformed theology to keep you from Christ and to keep you away from your position is just so subtle you don't even know it. There is no position in Christ in law. because it's from the old creation. How does this guy live over here? Grace.

Right? So whenever you hear from a pulpit or a book or a radio somebody who's trying to get you to do something that will make you more acceptable to God, you're under a lost system and therefore you're not dealing with your position in Christ. Because your position is based on one thing. Fact. Even if this person uses the word promise. How many promises do you have over here? None. Why not? You're blessed with every spiritual blessing. That's right. It's position. You have it all. in your position. So, a system based on law and promise and Old Testament and the Psalms and all of that, not that it's good for us to know those things, but those things are never going to tell us about our position in Christ. Never. Because they're not designed to. That make sense? You alright with that? I said that to a guy in California this week, and he called me back twice, challenging me about that. So you challenge me about it.

I can't see how any reformed theology that has anything to do with a law-based system has anything to do with my position in Christ, because it's based on something I'm trying to achieve when my position in Christ is a fact. I already have it. Sometimes you talk about Reformed or other things. Covenant. Covenant and all that.

I don't know any of that stuff. You do. You do know about it. You just don't know that you know about it. Okay. So, but when you kind of compare them like, oh, this is about this. Well, I'll put one up here that you do know about. Right. They do the same thing. Yeah. And you're very familiar. It's the same dance. Yeah.

I was wondering, when Jesus said, you'll find me if you search with me all your heart, it doesn't seem like it falls into position. Who is he talking to? Who is he talking to? Jews, right. And which one of these did the Jews come from? Adam. Which one? Adam. Right? They're from Adam. So when you read the Gospels, what are you reading? You're not reading here. Yeah, so that's helpful. That whole concept of the Beatitudes and all that. Oh sure, that's all here. It's all Adam.

That sort of upsets a lot of Christians when you tell them that. I got freaked out when I first heard it. So anything that's got the hint of law, anything, it's like we talked about the spiritual formation which is kind of popular today. Spiritual formation is based on the fact that you as a Christian don't know, you have to do something with their system to gain more spirituality.

Really? What do I need to do? Debbie said that I'm blessed with every spiritual blessing in the heavenlies. What do I need to do? Nothing. I just need to believe. What's that? That's it. That's it. And I gotta know what I believe. I was just wondering if it would help to break down that belief. Covenant perspective a little bit. Okay, how it works.

I think there's sure So that there's an acronym that's used called to look right I heard that yeah so to look is is it's a tool that Calvinists and Covenant theologist reform Used to help them remember how this system of theology works in their mind and it starts with total depravity and Yeah, I'm not going to write it all up.

Total depravity. And then it's unconditional election. Unconditional election. Everybody know what that means? No. That means that there is an election of people that is not based on any condition of yourself. So God elects certain individuals to be saved. That's unconditional.

And there's a limited atonement. which means that Christ did not die for everyone, He only died for the unconditionally elect. And then there's irresistible grace, meaning once the Lord, through His Spirit, chooses to reveal that you're an elect, you're under an irresistible instance of grace that you cannot deny. And then finally there's that perseverance of the saints. And that's where you see the individual focusing on trying to persevere, Adam, to be like Christ.

That's right. And it's this whole idea of being chosen, and then I'm regenerated, then I'm given a gift of faith, then I believe, and then I'm saved. So it's quite opposite to what we're saying. They start out here, by saying... What would they say again? Total depravity. Total depravity. They say that man is so depraved, that unless God Regenerates and they cannot believe. And which leads to the election beforehand.

But, you know, God so loved the world, I don't know how they deal with John 3.16, God so loved the world that he gave his only son that whosoever believed in him should not perish. As we learned in the faith class, everybody has the capacity to believe. Well they would just say whosoever means the chosen elect. That's what they say.

Even the first chapter of Romans where man is without excuse. To me that's just an unbelief. It's a thing of Jews. This is a very subtle system. If you don't know anything about position, and you're trying to create a form of theology to get everybody marching in the same direction, this is how you do it. This is really subtle. Or you do what these guys do.

Well, that's how you get like a click going, to say like, well, since you're not in our elected click, then... Sure. So that's right. Let's put our acronym up there. OK. Where do you want it? Where do you want it over here? Next to next to the D. B. D. D. B. Sorry, that's B as a boy.

R. A. S. What's that stand for? Death, burial, resurrection, ascension and seating. That's a different system altogether and that's scriptural. I thought it meant Denver Broncos. How about you know that B could be belief and burial. Death and burial. It's really subtle. If you don't know what happened here, you never get over there.

And people say, well gee, I know the identification truths and people say, well you must be spiritual. Where do the identification truths show up in the Bible? Romans chapter 6. The sixth chapter of the first book of Christianity is identification. It's normal, everyday, cut-variety, pablum Christianity. It's not big deal. Every believer should understand identification. Everyone. It's simple.

Did I die? Yeah, I did. Was I buried? Yes, I was. Was I resurrected? Yeah, I was. All positional truth. Did I ascend when Christ ascended? Yeah. Am I seated in the heavenlies in Christ now? Yeah. How do I know that? Because the word tells me. Position. If you don't know this, you're automatically stuck with this. If you don't know this, you're here. That's why position is so important for us. I guess I want to clarify when you say here, and Holly I think touched a little bit on it. I think by simple faith people believe. Positionally, it's true about you.

You may not know it, you may not live it, you may not do anything. You're still positionally, everything's still true about you. That's exactly right. You may not live it, you may not understand it. You may not ever know it. You may not ever know it.

You live under tulip. Yeah, you may be a Christian over here, that's right. But positionally, you're still in Christ. you know, by simple faith, believe, then you're over there. You may live it totally out. So it's not salvation, kind of a losing salvation or losing it positionally, even though you don't know it, you have no clue, and you're living completely opposite that.

You're still positionally there. I remember when we had a conversation one time, we were coming home from something at Denver Christian, and they were Dutch Reformed. They are the tulip tulips. Oh, is that where tulips come from? And I said to Don, when these people die and leave the planet, the ones that are believers, have they got a surprise coming. They really are going to be, really?

All of that? You mean none of this? You mean I wasted all my time? I did all of this? That's why the identification are so valuable because you then live under grace, which is free, which is unlocking all the law and all the requirements and all that. You don't have any of that. The identification truths are incredibly important for growth. If you don't, you don't have growth. You can't have growth. There's a better way to put it. You just can't.

You're living on the other side where you don't know these truths. can be on the law and this and that, and they immediately quote, which they always say, Galatians 3, 24, and read from 23 on, but before faith came, okay, before faith came, we were kept in the custody under the law, being shut up to the faith which was later to be relieved. Now 24, which they all quote, therefore the law became our tutor to lead us to Christ so that we may be justified by faith. Stop. And so the law is a good thing. It points us to Christ. It's a great thing. It's awesome.

And they stop it. Read the next verse. And it is, excuse me, but now that faith has come, we are no longer under a tutor. It basically says right there, you're not under law. And they all stop at the law part because they like it. They don't know all the identification. They'd like to live in Tulip and Adam and all that. Because that's where they're comfortable. So they stop there. It feels warm and cozy. But you're not under law.

So then could you say that if you don't understand your position, that your condition will always be an atom? Yes. Can I throw in something? No. I think the Holy Spirit though keeps on working on you even if you're in loss. That's absolutely true. You're growing continuously regardless of whether you like know that or not. I think the Holy Spirit wears down your rebellion. Continuously. You know, I'm not so sure it's a rebellion. Let's say you're in this deal. I won't say rebellion. I'll say inflexibility.

This is the way it is because I like it this way. Or lack of knowledge. I don't ever want to say that the Holy Spirit is working 100% of the time. It never gives up. He's not an it. You said it. Oh, it's 100 bucks. The Holy Spirit will not give up ever. But there isn't going to be the growth. He's working on getting you to grow by continually working on it. 99% is lack of knowledge.

There was another one of those Dutch Reformed guys in a soccer team that John was on. He came to me one day and he said, When we go to soccer practice, can we sit and maybe have a Bible study?" I said, sure. He said, what's going on? I said, well, things are pretty tough at home. So I sat down with him and every two days a week we would go to soccer practice and sit in the front of my car and I was taking him through Romans, right? And we got to Romans 6. And I talked about identification.

He was fine until I said, he did this, dad is freed from the law. He was done. We never had another Bible study after that. And he was so much under law that when I said, look at the words of God here. You know, you've been crucified, so you got separated from the law. He said, no way.

I just have a question. So we've touched on Catholicism and reform and so forth. But there's another vein that is also law based, but takes a very different turn. I don't know. Has anyone had experience or came from like charismatic backgrounds? our friends, that's who I was referring to.

They would stand in complete opposition to TULIP in a different way, but the results still end up the same. They are under law in a different way. Here, with TULIP, the end result is Adam is trying to persevere so as to never be accused of having not believed at some point in time.

Underneath the Arminian, which is where Charismatic came from, you end up with this idea of falling from grace as the final acronym. So you can lose your salvation. So you end up in a law of fear for losing your salvation. With Tulip, you end up in a law of fear for never having had it if you don't persevere to the end. Never were saved, potentially. If you're not on your deathbed, claiming the same truth and having shown some growth over your life, at risk of never having truly believed.

So you have in TULIP, you have multiple instances of believing throughout your entire life. And through Arminianism or the charismatic movement, you end up having multiple instances of believing because you fell from grace at some point in time. with God anyway, so that would be a nice surprise for them. If they're saved.

There were a lot of Plymouth Brethren that bought into the tulip thing. Not necessarily the tulip thing, but they bought into it from the Hebrews 6, that if you taste of the spirit and you fall back, they say, well those were just pretenders. They weren't really saved. That's nonsense. There are believers that come from these systems. We're not going to deny that. But they never have an opportunity to rest in their entire life. They don't get the rest. They don't get the rest because they don't know the grace.

Okay. Streaking ahead here. Question three. Does every human have a physical position or a source from which they come? What is it? Okay, is the answer yes or no? Yes. So what is it? All men are born in their position in Adam, which is their source, right? They are positionally exactly like him in body, soul and spirit. Exactly like him. In our human birth we are a product of our position, born in Adam. That's the reality. Our position is what we are and how God views us, which is reality. Positions in themselves never change. 1 Corinthians 15, 22, in Adam all die.

Ephesians 2, 3, are by nature the children of wrath. John 3, 6, that which is born of the flesh is flesh. So the principle of reproduction from the natural realm and the spiritual realm is the same. If you're from flesh, that's what you're going to produce. If you're a child of wrath, that's what you're going to produce. If you're an atom, you're dead.

One of the things that I looked at was in the natural realm, the first grain of wheat contained and complete and perfect the life of every subsequent grain of wheat to this day. The very first grain of wheat had in it all of the other wheat grains up until this day. It was in that grain. It didn't abide alone, retaining all, but fell into the ground and died finding resurrection and the true fruit of life out of death. If you look at agriculture, That whole agriculture theme demonstrates the cross, because it's all life out of death. It's death first, then life. When a seed goes in the ground, what's got to happen to it? It's got to die.

So, what about grafting? What about it? That isn't dead, right? that gets grafted onto isn't dead, it's just not producing fruit. The branch that gets grafted into, like you take a branch from one fruit tree and graft it into another tree, that branch is not the source of life. What's the source of life? The one it was grafted into. And that's the life that will start to come through the branch. The branch that's dead to what it used to be is now alive in what it's in.

Does that make sense? So, now it's your turn. Give some characteristics of your human position or source. What do you got from Adam that's really wonderful? Give me a list of them. Fear was the first one I thought of. Fear? Okay, perfect. Selfishness. Selfishness. Give me a physical attribute. Separated. Separated. Physical. How about this puppy right here? How about your body? You got that from where? You got it from Adam. And trust me, the older you get, the less good it does. What else did you get from Adam? Separation from God. And that brought what? When you got separated, there was something that replaced it.

It's a sin nature. Do you all have a sin nature? All of us do. Which means we all have this propensity to sin. It comes with the territory. Like I said about children, you don't have to teach them how to sin. They know how. We live in a dying environment. You look around and I know that the environmentalists are going to save the planet and it's going to last for eternity. No, it's not. It's dying. It's dying. We're all born dead to God in our spirits, all of us. And we're all involved in the works of the flesh.

So, would you say in question five, are all those that are in Adam, are they all the same? Sure they are. Doesn't matter male or female, how old you are, they're all. Do you think all spiritual life and growth is based upon the principle of position? We have to say yes. Yeah, and then the Holy Spirit can't grow something that isn't dead yet, right? Well, I think let's make the connection. Well, it is dead, but not spiritually dead.

God put this principle in play in the garden when he created the like begets like, and if you read Genesis 1.10, 1.11 God called the dry land earth and the gathering of the waters he called seas and God saw that it was good and then God said let the earth sprout vegetation plants yielding seed and fruit trees bearing fruit after their kind and seeds in them on the earth and so and it was so and the earth brought forth vegetation plants yielding seed after their kind okay so it's a physical principle that is in play all the time. Trees bearing fruit with seeds in them after their kind and God said it was good.

In Genesis 1.24 he said let the earth bring forth living creatures after their kind. Cattle, creeping things, beasts on the earth after their kind and God made the beasts of the earth after their kind. So it's a physical principle in Adam that reproduction is always after their kind. How about the spiritual principle? Does that hold true there too? How do you know? He does.

So God said let us make man in our image according to our likeness and let them rule over the fish of the sea, etc. and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth. And then in Genesis 5 it says this is the book of generations of Adam and the day when God created man he made him in the likeness of God. He created them male and female. He blessed them and named them man in the day. that they were created and when Adam had lived 130 years he became the father of a son of his own likeness according to his image and named him Seth. So the principle of reproduction is true physically and it's also true spiritually.

Now I know that some of you think I'm better than them. No, you're not. No, you're not. And in Christ, there aren't degrees. You're not a worse Christian than Ralph, who's a worse Christian than Wayne. You're complete in Christ. That's your position. That's who you are. You see that? So we've got a minute. List nine elements of your spiritual position. See how smart you are. Tell me about your spiritual position. What's true of you spiritually?

I wrote nine of them down. I'm made righteous. Okay, righteous is good. The first one I wrote down is based on grace. Give me another one. I'm looking for the nine elements of your spiritual possession or position. Eternal. It's eternal. It's the source of your Christian life. They're facts, not promises. You're perfect. Established in the Father's presence at the cross, this is how God sees me. They're immutable, which means they can never change. They're the objects of our faith. The Lord Jesus Christ. And it's the same for every believer. It's the same for every believer. So, which answers question eight. Is the position of every Christian exactly the same? Yes or no? Yes.

It is. So what does that teach us? Maybe we ought to find it out. It would be cool if we knew. If I knew what your position was, the same position I have. If I know who the Lord Jesus Christ is and what his position is before the Father, guess what? I'm from him. It's also true of me. That's position, and that's why it's so important. Let's close. Father, how we thank you. We do thank you that you have put into play the principle of position, and it gives us rest in our hearts to realize that you have taken care of everything and planted us in Christ before you, and we are totally accepted in the beloved Father. And we thank you. We pray in the Lord Jesus' name. Amen.