Tag: Beholding

Galatians 2:14 in the Crucified Life Translation (XLT, 2025)

Galatians 2:14 (XLT) ‘But this other (happened)’ when ‘I saw’ that ‘they did not walk straight-up’[1] ‘interfacing with’ the ‘un-concealed reality’ ‘of the’ ‘rosy message of it being done-well’. /

…that ‘they did not step orthographically’ (in the way of the cross, the four tassels’ crossway, and the living wheels bisecting wheels perpendicular cross pattern in Ezekiel that was upholding the resemblance of the ideal Human Son) ‘for interfacing with’ the True-Reality ‘of the’ “Best News Ever!”

‘I simply said’ ‘relationally with Cephas (the Construction Stone)’ ‘in the sight of’ all, “If you, yourself, ‘starting out from under being’ (a) Jew, actively-live ‘as a person of any nation’ and not Jewishly, (then) ‘how is possible for’ ‘you in compelling’ the ‘people of any nation’ ‘to be Jewish folk’?

[1] G3716 ortho-podeó = upright, straight up, even perpendicular + to move feet = to walk straight-lined, uprightly, in-line. This word is only used here. And given the crucified life, TJPs, and the crucified life context before and after, it is likely Paul has in mind a variety of passages with orthographic and orthogonal imagery such as the four tassels (Tzitzit) as four corners of a robe, four horns of The Altar, the bisecting wheel-rings of Ezekiel 1 and 10, and even other temple imagery such as how you enter and encamp around the four facades. There are other types of OT references such as Pro 2:7’s “walk uprightly (with integrity), but it is the orthogonal, right-angled images that speak “cross and crucified life” behind the words and stories. Literally, in this story moment, these Jews are wearing robes with tassels. And this word, and one look down towards your feet, will conflate all this imagery that silently asks “And I crucified with Christ? Am I walking as He did as “slain Lamb standing?” And the LORD said to Moses, “Speak to the Israelites and tell them that throughout the generations to come they are to make for themselves tassels for the corners of their garments, with a blue cord on each tassel. These will serve as tassels for you to look at, so that you may remember all the commandments of the LORD, that you may obey them and not prostitute yourselves by following your own heart and your own eyes (Num 15:37-39 BSB). This is an Altar inspired walk because they share the four corners (Rom 12’s living sacrifice). This is a North-South & East-West walk like how the temple was oriented and how people dwelled orthogonally in the shape of a cross relative to the temple as God’s Dwelling (Num 2). IOW, it is how we dwell together. This is the “open heaven visions of God” Ezekiel saw in Eze 1 and 10 of wheel-ring bisecting wheel-ring so that those wheels only moved in orthogonal directions North-South & East-West. The life was in those wheels as they moved – moved what? The wheel-rings carried God’s platform and throne upon which He governed in the form of a man (Eze 1:26). This is the core of God’s Dwelling Place Ezekiel has been brought into in order to see that God’s Ways are precisely in the pattern of the crucified life. Normally the high priest would enter orthogonally, but with Ezekiel, God comes to Him from the heavenly True Temple-Dwelling that the Holy of Holies of earthly manufacture merely represented. As I’ve said in Spiritual Knowledge, it is “perpendicular.” In my book, I initially meant that it was not seeable in the normal course of life and always came at us like a blind-sided revelation. Then I progress in the book to explain the cross-shaped nature of life that we can only engage in by Jesus’s Holy Spirit. Thus, when God walked in the “cool of the day” in Gen 3:8, it was really the literal meaning of “in the Spirit of the Day,” this Spirit essentially declaring “be focused on the cross as the end to a flesh living for itself.” Hearing this, Adam and Eve freshly awakened into a new state of “flesh living for self-preservation,” reacted self-defensively and hid from what sounded like death, but was the crucified life that never ceases to increase when people have everything to give for others. That leads to the life is in the wheel-rings that bisect to form a cross from a perpendicular point of view. But my emphasis here is what I believe Paul is triggering by use of this word to Peter, whether said in Greek or Aramaic-Hebrew like HaLaK ToM.

The Kingdom of God is a matter of what?

For the kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking but of righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit. Romans 14:17 ESV

God’s kingly rule and reign is not about religious efforts and rituals, but it is this other: righteousness, a peaceful wholeness, and the joyful awareness of grace’s dynamic relationally with and by the Breathing Spirit of Otherness. Holiness is otherness, which is “other than you and your default.” What society promotes is not holiness. It has a twisted idea of “no one can have fun,” much like the strawmen caricatures of Christians in popular media and shows like on the Simpsons.

Otherness is entirely other than you. In a sense it is “not you.” Another way of saying it is that every human is born with a blind spot. All our natural defaults and identities are clueless to the reality in that blind spot. We are just not aware of its existence, because the trajectory of that being and existing runs counter to our typical flow. It never comes to mind.

When we first encounter the Heart Trajectory of Jesus on the cross, it is the Holy Spirit showing us the Operational Reality inside Jesus. To “behold” the trajectory of His heart by your heart is the first sign of your union and participation with The Divine Nature (2 Peter 1:4). Some call this exposure to “as He is,” or the “Slain Lamb Standing Nature” from Revelation 5:6, or The Dying Seed, or The Crucified Life. We struggle for words, because from the outside view of people in their default, The Otherness Trajectory appears as foolishness. Regardless of what you call it, His Otherness Glory beheld is transformative (2 Corinthians 3:18). Or as The Chosen has amply shown with their image of fish swimming in a stream, you change direction. God’s Way of Being as seen in the Face of Jesus makes us swim opposite the flow of the default (2 Corinthians 4:7). It has pristine-sourced creative power.

The revelation that caused us to accept Jesus’ sacrifice for me that forgave sin is supposed to continue in dealing with me, by putting me away. The way I was born with its identities and defaults must go away. We are supposed to keep seeking that revelation of “Who He is” by sticking with Him. Psalm 63:8 says “my soul – “everything about me” – follows hard after You. It is like someone clinging on and never letting go. Yet, like Philippians 2:12-13, when I see my energy is really Him energizing me as I stay focused on Him, then you can say with the psalmist that it is His right hand keeping you going after Him. You behold the trajectory and you go after it, because only He has it. And as you stay in union, you come to realize it is Him, not an “it.”

When you encounter the “Otherness Life” for the first time, that is when you are touched by The Same Life within as if Jesus had just healed a leper. I am not talking about salvation, but a freedom realization that makes the sanctification process clearly all about Him, specifically His Image and Likeness having home and sole possession of your inner being. As far as I know, you can only get there by beholding the reality of His going into death, which is greatly helped by the Old Testament / TaNaKh pictures of this scattered about in the Hebrew Scriptures. (A place to start is John 3:14 mixed with 2 Corinthians 5:21 and Philippians 2:5-11.)

Furthermore, habitually beholding “What Kind Jesus is” is our designed daily sustenance, both with power to keep a person “no longer I” He is being alive to His Father (Galatians 2:20, Romans 6). This is why Paul calls certain Christians “bewitched” in Galatians 3:1 when they stop focusing on the beforehand graphic portrayal of Christ crucified in a finished and ongoing way. The word “crucified” is in the Greek verb tense called “perfect.” The action is complete with lingering reality. Before the cross made a way out of space-time into eternity, people lacked access to the creative source of LIFE. Death is separation from LIFE, even though living things can keep on creating new generations of living things from the afterglow of LIFE. Jesus is, by BEING, Resurrection and LIFE (John 11:25). Death is not a thing to Someone Who can make what is not come into being.

As I have said elsewhere, there is a life-begetting reason why our designed food in Genesis 1 is from trees that bear fruit with seed in it. As far as we are concerned, the seed-cycle reflects His Life-sustaining Way having place in us. It is both the grace-dynamic of God and the love of God to share with us the begetting reality of the Only Begotten One from John 3:16 and Genesis 22. He shares this Son with His unique source of life, so that He is first in the begetting of what exits out from our soul, then our face, which impacts the world. That is His kingdom BEING on earth as it is in heaven.

Types and Shadows vs. Seeing Jesus in The OT

Do you believe everything in the Bible? How many times have you heard people say something similar? “It is true, from Genesis to the maps!” Some people say it, but do they really believe it?

Take, for instance the first part of Romans 11:36, “For from him and through him and to him are all things.”

Does the “all things” include the all of the Old Testament?

Just look around at any local church, browse Christian book website, watch a little so-called Christan TV… they talk 99+% about other things, something other than Jesus being The Source, The Media and Means, and The End Object or Goal of whatever they are talking about. Count it sometime. In other words, in practical reality, 99%+ of Christians from all stripes do not believe their Bible or else you would constantly be hearing another insight about Jesus from obscure places in Leviticus, Ecclesiastes, or stories like Esther.

What Jesus said in Luke 24:27 was common knowledge with the early Church. It was commonly shared content in the first decades of the beginning Church. Deviating from Jesus as “The All” of the gathering was grounds for Paul to say things like Galatians 3:1, “O foolish Galatians! Who has bewitched you? It was before your eyes that Jesus Christ was publicly portrayed as crucified.”

Were the Galatians at the historical event of the cross? Were they at the hill of Gol-gath-a, place of the skull where Jesus was publicly crucified? No, obviously not. Then where did they see Jesus publicly portrayed as crucified? This is in the Old Testament – not merely according to the dozen or so types and shadows people generally put out on parade when the topic comes up, but all the Old Testament – like how Hebrews 10:7 and Psalms 40:7 describes it, or like how Peter 1:10-11 says it, or like how Revelation 19:10b gives us the spirit of it. Let’s look at each of these.

“… it is written of Me in the volume of the book” (Heb 10:7, Psa 40:7), or better, “whatever is between the scroll handles, like a book cover, it is written of Me.” Pick your Bible scroll-book. It is written of the Anointed One coming to do God’s will. Do you believe it? Given the long apostasy from this, most Christians do not know it, and it sounds off when you focus on Jesus showing His heart in all the stories from 1 Samuel!

“Concerning this salvation, the prophets who prophesied about the grace that was to be yours searched and inquired carefully, inquiring what person or time the Spirit of Christ in them was indicating when he predicted the sufferings of Christ and the subsequent glories.” 1Pe 1:10-11 says what was within the prophets? The Spirit of Messiah was within the prophets. Do you believe it? Is Romans 11:36 true? Who has failed to tell and show you how this True-Reality works and is so? I’d say almost every Christians you have ever known, every leader and especially the popes and their religious entourage and the slick TV preachers, who in reality highlight themselves, often feigning to know God like conversant buddies when they do not even know the first basics of seeing the Spirit of Messiah Jesus in the Old Testament. (They are not talking to Jesus!) There is the spirit of Anointed One, and then all other spirits who like to name-drop and make themselves look spiritual. There is the kind of life Jesus has, and then whatever people call life, which is death. Anything not directly in flow with Jesus’ spirit is not in the eternal life trajectory. Does anyone really know Jesus’ spirit?

“For the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy.” Rev 19:10’s last phrase takes a moment to settle in, lest you think you need to go door-to-door testifying about how Jesus changed your life. Sure, it is good to tell how Jesus gave you the peace that passes understanding, but do you know why and how? Some languages think in a reverse order syntax from English, like how German likes to put all their verbs bunched up at the end of many sentences. Elements in Greek syntax often need what is said at the end to be relocated at the front to make more sense in English. Let’s do that here and see what we get.

“Prophecy’s spirit is Jesus’ testimony.”

That is solid Bible math! But if you listen to someone talking about prophecy, do you hear Jesus’ testimony? How far have we apostatized! You know exactly what I mean if certain TV preacher is prophesying something about x, y, z and another certain end times channel is going off about a prophecy report. What is the spirit of that prophecy? What is Jesus’ testimony? These prophecy channels are devoid of prophetic reality, which is the spirit of Jesus testified to and evidenced from all the Scriptures!

In the New Testament, Jesus’ testimony, Jesus’ witness is giving evidence of Jesus from the Old Testament. The Hebrew Scriptures were composed by folks who had the spirit of Messiah in them, and this spirit congealed into the Old Testament. At the end of 2 Corinthians 3, Paul says that when a heart turns to see the Lord instead of the historical story of Moses, or whatever, the spiritual undercurrent that caused the story’s record can be seen and beheld like uncovering gold while digging. Seeing the gold of the original spirit of authorship under the story is transformative, because it is Him beaming His glory. How can this not change the one seeing Reality?

Jesus kindly chided Nicodemus in John 3 for not realizing this Testimony even though he claimed to be a teacher of Israel. Of all the Bible stories Jesus could have chosen, He singled out the one from Numbers 21:4-9 about the bronze serpent on the pole. Everyone had been poisoned from the mouth of serpents in that story. This pervasive “venomization” is analogous to all humans being poisoned by the lie from the serpent’s mouth each of us inherited from Genesis 3. The only solution was beholding and seeing one bronze serpent immobilized on a hill on a pole suspended between sky and land. It was physically transformative in that by beholding the stilled snake on the pole, by reflection from the stillness position, the snake’s poison in you was stilled. It sounds like 2 Corinthians 3:18 to me.

But we all, with unveiled face beholding as in a reflection the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord. (2Co 3:18)

This transformative reality is the purpose of seeing Jesus pictured, or as Paul said in Galatians 3:1, “publicly portrayed as crucified…” seen and beheld as already crucified in an ongoing way from the before-writings of the Old Testament. What I just wrote expresses the actual Greek action of the verb we skeletally translate as “crucified” for readability in our English renderings. The action of Greek perfect tense describes a finished action with ongoing functionality and lingering reality. It is not past tense, and missing that action is the root of much misunderstanding.

A good translation will give you something like this from Revelation 13:8, “the Lamb who was slain from the creation-foundation of the world.” It is the same with Revelation 5:6, “…in the center of the throne…in the center of… a Lambkin standing, as though slain…” Rev 13:8 describes the messianic spirit seen in the Old Testament from Genesis 1. Moreover, Rev 5:6 describes the same spirit reigning on into eternity. This specific spirit is very “crucified with ongoing reality” in the Greek perfect tense! The little Lamb reigning from heaven’s core is both slaughtered and standing in resurrection life.

I have often said that Rev 5:6 is the Answer to the Universe verse, and it is true! Herein is the entire sweep of Jesus’ spirit pictured. If we like technical terms, then Jesus and Peter described what we should be looking for in the Old Testament in Luke 24:26, 46, and 1Pe 1:11. We generally read over these technically termed “trajectories of being” that picture “slain” and “standing.”  The passages cited above use the terms, “sufferings” and “rising, glories.” Jesus began with Moses to talk about these two trajectories pictured there and Peter says these trajectories define what the prophets composed – not just the literal prophets, but the entirety of the Hebrew Scriptures was collated, if not entirely produced, by the prophets of old. And what did Rev 19:10 say? “Prophecy’s spirit is Jesus’ testimony.”

There is an action, a trajectory of BEING, to be seen and beheld from seeing Jesus’ martyr-witness spirit in the Old Testament. This is what defines a Jesus Picture in contrast to the modern notion of types and shadows, which have stripped down to the seeing of Jesus merely being predictive of His future events. It is an intellectual exercise as opposed to the means of spiritual transformation.

Like I said, do you believe Romans 11:36? Is spiritual transformation from, through and unto Jesus?

My hope someday is that people will share Jonathan’s strategy in 1Sa 14:8 for God’s victory over the uncircumcised. It is a Col 3:4 exposé. Col 3:4’s glory is not the far off future, but the rising and glory part in stories like 1Sa 14:8, which then allows what is uncircumcised to be cut down. The entire battle strategy for Jonathan, who was picturing Jesus in the story, was to let himself be seen. Jonathan’s strategy was the revelation of The Son. That is it… to show himself with the one who was with him heart and soul! That is where the mortifying of the earthly members is made real like the sickness vanquished in Num 21:9! Jesus seen and us seen with Him like the armor-bearer is transformative! It allows the mortifying action of Col 3:5 to be real, because it is not you trying, but Jesus BEING The One having come up out from death (the wadi-gully in the story).

The early church was not set up for the paid religious pulpit provider for life, but so that the assemblies could participate in this exchange of this beheld Messianic spirit with each other and then gain new insight for a period of months when an itinerate preacher would arrive to share additional insights from other Christian gatherings beholding Jesus from the Hebrew Scriptures. In the early decades, Church planting equaled assisting believers in the seeing the meaning of Christ and Him crucified in an ongoing way that worked within and among their community (1Co 2:2). The emissary represents Jesus by showing His resurrection priority as outlined in Luke 24. Any deviation off from the Author and Perfector is not Jesus, nor of His life (Heb 12:2). What spirit are you?

What Are The Jesus Pictures?

The Jesus Pictures are, as you might guess, pictures of Him in the Old-Original Testament (OT). TJPs is the abbreviation. The “T” can also stand for TaNaK / Tanach, because the pictures of Jesus I refer to are found exclusively in the Jewish Scriptures just as Jesus and the apostles said in many places.

Before anything material or of time was created, there was the spiritual. The spiritual exists and existed before the material and before time. God’s Holy Spirit moved through time and painted pictures of Jesus in people through history. These Jesus Pictures became recorded as the OT / TaNaK / Hebrew Scriptures.

Some TJPs are more obvious than others, depending on how the people in the story flowed with the Spirit of Christ, resisted the Messiah’s Spirit, or were just plain ignoring God and His Spirit of the Anointed One (1Pe 1:11). TJPs are not explicitly spelled out in the actual sentences that tell a historical OT story. Nor are the TJPs seen when you discover the moral to the OT Bible story. Rather, they are spiritually beheld. In the NT, the Apostle Paul writes about only wanting to see the meaning of, and thus know Christ already crucified with ongoing reality in and among a people (1Co 2:2). (By the way, that is exactly what the Greek means.)

Likewise, in Galatians 3:1, Christians are bewitched when they do not maintain these graphic portrayals of Christ and Him crucified – that is maintain “seeing their meaning.” The reason why is that you can learn who Jesus is and what kind of person He is by beholding the spiritual reality seen within these OT pictures. How does this work?

The same Spirit who caused the pictures to be recorded in the OT, is the same Spirit who can open our eyes to seeing them. Moreover, if we are indeed seeing them by that authoring light of the Spirit who caused them to be recorded, then the very same Spirit now seen and recognized can transform our spirits in the present (2Co 3:18). Of course, the “god of this world” strives to keep Christians blind to this (2Co 4:4). Most people do not even know why Moses with the glowing face is used by Paul as his example for this.

(Note: the “unbelievers” of 2Co 4:4 are not secular folk, but people claiming to be Christians who disbelieve this. They are redeemed people who are not spiritually congruent to Jesus as head of His body (1Co 2:16). The Spirit of His mind is not known in a personal and narrowly, specific way that is life-giving. After all that was the Corinthians’ problem with all their divisions.)

For instance, it is possible to merely read Daniel and the lion’s den as a Bible story with a moral to it. But if you share in the same Spirit of Christ that moved through Daniel’s life and his circumstances, then you can see Jesus pictured in the story. A quick overview is the opening in and out of the lion’s den. Think of Jesus’ tomb. Daniel went one-way into an opening for his death. The stone was rolled over the opening. The stone was sealed by the government. Daniel was in a place of death. But death could not keep Daniel, because he was righteous. The devourer could not open its mouth. Thus, Daniel came out the same opening with life. The king was so amazed by Daniel’s God that he wrote letters to many nations. That sure sounds like Jesus’ burial and resurrection in the NT letters, because it is a picture of Jesus’ reality.

I am not talking about predictive prophecy or types and shadows as they are commonly taught. But I am talking about seeing Jesus (Heb 2:9). The aspect of Jesus I am seeing is the same yesterday, today, and forever (Heb 13:8). Jesus is The Promised Seed, singular in Gal 3:16. In other words, He is the Promised Seed of the woman in Gen 3:15. Jesus can be seen all the way from the start with Gen 1:1 to the end of the OT.

But learning to recognize and identifying that is not the end goal. Merely seeing Jesus pictured in the story is not yet eternal reality. It needs to be more than just staring at you right in the face. The final and most important part is engaging with the Holy Spirit regarding the picture of Jesus seen. Why? Because in that spiritual conversation, there always is the potential for the eternal and spiritual glory that moved through the story of old to shine into your present times here on this earth. You cannot really control anything about this last part. it must be entirely given by the Holy Spirit showing you what kind of person Jesus is. Then you will understand why Paul only was determined to see the meaning of, and thus know only one thing (1Co 2:2, Gal 6:14, Php 3:13). What does the Holy Spirit reveal? The answer is Jesus “as he always is,” literally being unto us righteousness – not some commodity (1Co 1:30). When beholding by the spirit with heart eyes illuminated, you realize that you are united with Jesus now (Eph 1:17-18). You know as a fact that you are seated with Him now (Eph 2:5). Yes, you are knowing what kind of person He is now, was, and always will be!

I know that sounds mystical, and it better be! Because if that Mat 7:22-23 conversation happens, you won’t need to say that you did all this stuff for Jesus, but rather, He will know you, because you took the time to get to know Him. Learn to see Him “as He is.” (1Jo 2:27-3:3).

The Answer To The Universe

The Answer To The Universe is “beheld” with heart eyes in Revelation 5:6.

And I saw, and behold, in the midst of the throne, and of the four living creatures, and in the midst of the elders, was a Lamb standing, as having been slain, having seven horns and seven eyes, which are the seven Spirits of God, having been sent out into all the earth. (LITV)

“Beheld” is set in quotes to tell the reader that I mean a different aspect of the word than what is typically understood.

To “behold” is a type of seeing that you do with your heart to understand nature of being. What flows out of your heart identifies the nature of your being. By heart flow I mean your inner thought life spurned on by motivations and premises subconsciously hidden beneath like a well’s source. Every human operates by a heart trajectory that is completely inverse to and opposite of what we see in Revelation 5:6. So much so, that it is in our blind spot of awareness and life.

Hearts can detect life flow, which is why heart eyes can become illuminated (Eph 1:17-18). In the quote of Rev 5:6, focus in on the phrase: “a Lamb standing, as having been slain.” Notice that standing is a living and risen reality, while slain is a being killed and made dead reality. Said differently, standing represents a resurrection standing; slain represents the end of a dying process that makes dead. Understand this apparent contradiction with heart eyes and you can become illuminated to a type of being unimaginable without direct spiritual intervention. I’ve chosen these words carefully for your personal discourse with the Holy Spirit, Who is The Intervening Teacher and Illuminator.

Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit. John 12:24 (ESV)

A seed falls to the ground and dies… this is a trajectory. If it dies, then it bears much fruit… that is also a trajectory. So, where do we see this dying and rising process combined? We see it in a seed’s cycle. Jesus is personally claiming to be The Dying Seed and Rising True Vine. A mistake would be to assume that the first dying trajectory ended at the cross, rather than it being indicative and typical of Who Jesus always is. For what does Heb 13:8 tell us? Jesus is the same yesterday, today, and forever. Who Jesus is-being is constant. God spoke the universe into existence the same way He saves us. There is no turning of shadows in Him (James 1:17).

…giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater, so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth; it shall not return to me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I purpose, and shall succeed in the thing for which I sent it. Isaiah 55:10b-11 (ESV)

In the quote above, Isaiah was pondering and contemplating this very reality of God speaking and creating in 6 days in Genesis 1. God’s Word goes out of His mouth, expressing His being and existing. Of course, Jesus is This Word and this Seed in John 1, Luke 8:10-12, and James 1:21. By seeing and “beholding” Jesus, we see Who The Father is-being, specifically What Kind He is within (John 14:9).

By “beholding” Rev 5:6’s “slain Lamb standing” by the Holy Spirit’s confirming brightness dawning in your heart, you begin to understand the nature by which our King governs and reigns. The world calls this foolishness. Paul said it was the power of God (1 Cor 1:18-25). Know your King; rather than just doing things for a correct religion (Matthew 7:21-23).

God’s Passion – His Heated Breathing

You have heard of the “Passion of the Christ.” It is a movie from 2004 that graphically shows how Jesus willingly gave up His life to be tortured to death on a Roman cross. It is called a “passion” primarily because the Latin word for enduring suffering is passio. There is a related Greek word that perhaps explains this the best: thumos. (The hyperlink will take you to Biblehub’s definitions.)

I’d like to explain this word before I shock you with a passage from the Bible that uses this word in two seemingly different senses. Many, if not most translations, will not even translate the words the same, even though the two occurrences of thumos are only separated by one verse. Many others try to paraphrase away the intended narrative contrast – all missing the point – and all missing a VITAL opportunity to know more about Who our God is, What Kind He is.

Notice that Strong’s defines thumos as passion, specifically the outburst of passion. HELPS, a more recent source for definitions in association with Biblehub, would have us understand thumos as rushing along with heated breathing. Like many words, it has both a positive and negative sense. Getting all heated up about something rubbing you the wrong way can express wrath, fury, and anger. In a positive sense, well, I will let the Bible express it. As I said, the struggle is finding a translation that will let the thumos words be simply translated the same in the directly contrasting and scandalous sense they were intended to be seen. Below are two translations available with www.e-sword.net.

Rev 14:8  And another second angel followed, saying, “Fallen, fallen is Babylon the great, who caused all the nations to drink from the wine of the passion of her sexual immorality.” 

Rev 14:9  And another third angel followed them, saying with a loud voice, “If anyone worships the beast and his image and receives a mark on his forehead or on his hand, 

Rev 14:10  he himself also will drink of the wine of the anger of God that has been mixed full strength in the cup of his wrath, and will be tortured with fire and sulphur in the presence of the holy angels and in the presence of the Lamb. Revelation 14:8-10  Lexham English Bible

Rev 14:8  A second angel followed the first one, saying, “She has fallen! Great Babylon has fallen! She made all peoples drink her wine—the strong wine of her immoral lust!” 

Rev 14:9  A third angel followed the first two, saying in a loud voice, “Those who worship the beast and its image and receive the mark on their forehead or on their hand 

Rev 14:10  will themselves drink God’s wine, the wine of his fury, which he has poured at full strength into the cup of his anger! All who do this will be tormented in fire and sulfur before the holy angels and the Lamb.. Revelation 14:8-10  Good News Bible

All the highlighted words above, passion, anger, lust, and fury are the Greek word thumos. Babylon’s thumos is cast in the light of a prostitute or porn star, which is an extreme image of the flesh getting its satisfaction. In an unsettling contrast, God’s thumos is Jesus being Himself on the cross, also with heavy and heated breathing as the flesh gets no satisfaction. In fact, while Jesus is on the cross during his excruciating suffering, He brought the flesh of Adam’s kind into inactivity, rendering it ineffective (John 1:29, Rom 6:6, 2Co 5:21, Heb 9:26, 1Pe 2:24, 1 Jo 3:5).

See in the face of Jesus, a type of passion for us that willingly gives Himself away to free us from the fleeting and temporal passion of the dying flesh (2Co 4:6). Jesus has a way of being that is a river of life for others even though He is being slowly tortured on an execution implement. He is the Light in the darkness. The flesh getting its satisfaction is the extreme opposite – primarily concerned about its own satisfaction.

These contrasting passions are set in context of the lake of fire situated before the presence of The Lamb, Jesus, and His set-apart messengers. Rather than fall into the devil’s trap of putting off all such images into the future, embrace this last book of the Bible as the Revelation of Jesus Christ – like it says in the first phrase of the book. You see, it is when the Holy Spirit shows you Who Jesus is being through the fire of affliction, you discover that He is always the same yesterday, today, and forever (Heb 13:8). The messengers are therefore not angelic entities, but regular people like you and me who capture the heart of Jesus being Who He is by the same Eternal Spirit.

As Paul said in Galatians 1:12–16, the true, revealed Gospel is “preaching Him,” the Person of Jesus, not a teaching. The Gospel is not Jesus plus something, or even about Him – it is Him as the Good News! Learning how King Jesus governs in His kingdom reveals whether you are a law-abiding citizen of it or not. Those who resist His way of being, which is the Image and Likeness we as humans are designed to bear, express their ontological friction in Rev 14:11 as the smoke of their torment rising into forever. (Ontology is the nature of being.) Jesus called the way of His being, “Greater Love” in John 15:13. God never changes Who He is.

Therefore, this place people were never supposed to experience, simply resist Greater Love – not its intellectual attainment as a factoid, but its inner core trajectory of being. For more on this, look for the posts about Genesis 3:8, and how God has a sound of walking by His Spirit-Breeze-Breath that goes through all the trees unchanged, even the tree of knowing good and bad. Only a Spirit and Life encounter with Jesus’ Person can rescue people from this humanistic world sinking into existential despair.

Within Son… That is Reality

In the past, at many times and in various ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets, in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed the heir of all things, and made the universe through him. Hebrews 1:1-2

The quote is an amalgamation of many popular translations. My point is to show you that what this verse means is typically missed, because the awareness of The Jesus Pictures and their Hebrew root patterns are missed.

First, lets look at this phrase about, “by his Son.” In the Greek, it literally says en Huio, which is “within Son” https://biblehub.com/interlinear/hebrews/1-2.htm . You can see that the literal translator cannot resist to add [His], because they do not understand what the author of Hebrews means by comparing first with second, which is a Jesus Picture pattern. Your Bible is a first and second pattern that has its roots in dozens of first and second pairs. The five easiest to discerns are:

  • Cain (1st) and Abel (2nd)
  • Ishmael (1st) and Isaac (2nd)
  • Esau (1st) and Jacob (2nd)
  • Moses and the first exodus generation (1st) and Joshua and the second exodus generation (2nd)
  • King Saul (1st) and King David (2nd)

After mastering these, the pattern goes deeper into a treasure trove of what it means to know Jesus by His crucified life in the Original Testament (OT). This is what the writer(s) of Hebrews are getting at in their introductory statement. it goes like this:

In the first, God used a mode of various stories that pictured the reality, but did not give us The Reality. In the second, we have The Reality “within Son” – in Him Personally, in Him as new creation, in Him as high priest, in Son as a body, a house, a temple, and so on.

Then we are supposed to ask, what for, why, to what purpose? Then that is when verse 3 becomes super powerful! The Son is the radiance of God’s glory! The Son is the exact representation of God’s Nature! The reason why God only talks now to us within the realm of His Son, “in Son,” is because there is nothing outside of Him that is really living or saving us from this present darkness. Knowing the Son through The Jesus Pictures like first and second is actually leaning Jesus “as He is.” Moreover, I’m referring to the OT. Seeing Jesus in the second ones listed above is powerful. It is so powerful that the Apostle Paul had this to say:

Yes, to this day whenever Moses is read a veil lies over their hearts, but whenever a person turns to the Lord, the veil is removed. Now the Lord is the Spirit-Ruach, and where the Ruach-Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. And we all, who with unveiled faces contemplate the Lord’s glory, are being transformed into his image with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Ruach-Spirit. 2Co 3:15-18

(Look further down into the posts about the Ruach of the day from Genesis 3:8. That is what the Holy Spirit-Ruach shows you in The Jesus Pictures when you compare first with second. He is Living! He is The Way! He is the only Reality that increases with endless life!)

Seeing Jesus as in a mirror

Abraham, your father, rejoiced in that he would see My Day! He even saw it and was very thankful to have that grace favored upon him. John 8:56 XLP

Jesus says that Abraham saw His Day and was thankful for the favor and grace of that, which is what the Greek literally means here. Abraham was favored by grace; hence he was very thankful with observable joy. None of the typical translations really capture what was obvious in Greek, because readable translations only need to be good enough. Too literal can make them unreadable.

When did Abraham see Jesus in His Day? Genesis 22 is the answer. God tells Abraham to take Isaac to the future site of where the temple will be in Jerusalem and sacrifice him there. Now, if you have read any of the Jesus Pictures in Spiritual Knowledge, or 24:27, and so on, you already know that this episode in the Scriptures addresses the question of how God intends to bless the nations. How does the promised seed life in Isaac go out to bless the nations? The answer is that a father must sacrifice his only son, who quietly and willingly lays down his life in obedience to his father. Isaac even carries his own wood up the hill.

Moreover, the Jesus Pictures have noted that the ram caught in the thicket is essentially wearing a crown of thorns. The ram is in his full power and glory of strength. The ram’s horns are caught in a thicket, an entanglement of brush, which alludes back to the ground producing thorns and thistles in Genesis 3. God provided the substitute. God literally “saw to it,” which is what “provided” means in Hebrew. Thus, God provides Himself a lamb, which is so stated in Genesis 22 and can mean exactly what you are thinking: God provides Himself in the person of Jesus as the Lamb of God.

Genesis 22:3 says that on the third day Abraham looked up and saw the place afar off. In the story, it is literal. According to how we read the text (pro-graphe) by Galatians 3 and 4, it means that Abraham is seeing the future reality of God’s plan. The Spirit of Christ is within the prophets as Peter reminds us. Thus, all the Hebrew Scriptures are pointing to Jesus as rule number 1. No need to guess.

Yet this obvious reality is very beclouded today among Christians. It is as if we have been the objects of a sneak attack designed to allow anything except the seeing of Jesus “as He is” in the Hebrew Scriptures. Most of us understand that Genesis 22 points to Jesus in sort of a type and shadow reality, but I do not think we see how the Hebrew Scriptures came into existence out from Jesus showing Himself in some eternally true fashion through the very people who are designed to image and bear His likeness.

Capturing a glimpse of His eternal glory is inwardly transformative. This is Paul’s point at the end of 2 Corinthians 3. Yet, he is aware that the enemy fights to derail this seeing of Jesus in the Hebrew Scriptures. Thus, chapter 4 mentions how the “god of this world” blinds folks. Blinds us to what? The devil blinds people to the true nature of The Treasure within this jar of clay. It is carrying the nekrosis-death of Jesus in our body, which is His life manifested through the thorny flesh of people. Only Jesus knows how to be powerful through the thorns of the curse.

I think 2 Corinthians 3:18 came out from seeing Jesus in the Hebrew Scriptures through many stories, but especially Genesis 22. Not only did Abraham see afar off in the sense of space and time, but he did see Jesus “as in a mirror.” I encourage you to read Genesis 22:10-13 in multiple translations. For a father to be in a state of mind to sacrifice the divine-given son of his old age, he must have overridden every self-preservation instinct possible. It is clear in earlier stories that we know how much he loved his sons, but obedience to God was more important.

So, in those few seconds that transpired between Genesis 22:10-13, Abraham’s hand was frozen before him, outstretched with the knife ready to execute his beloved son. Psychologically, you just do not instantly shift gears from overriding every self-preservation instinct in your mind. It takes a few moments to come out of the strange trance.

And so, we read in Genesis 22:13 that Abraham looked up and saw what?  Now this is where the unbelief of good people translating the Bible comes into play. Most popular translations ignore one of the Hebrew words in the text. The word is “behind.” To them, it clearly makes no sense how Abraham looked up and then saw the substitute ram behind him. Nor, are they thinking about Jesus as the reality of the Hebrew Bible stories. Nor are they connecting this knife suspended between heaven and earth with the sword of the angle suspended between heaven earth at the same place in 1 Chronicles 21:16, “And David looked up and saw the angel of the LORD standing between earth and heaven, and in his hand a drawn sword stretched out over Jerusalem.” The language is even similar, which is evidence of narrative design. Yet, so many do not see.

The Hebrew Scriptures function in this manner of making links and connections through repeated phrases and pictures. (Thank you BibleProject.com for making this better known.) For if we would simply just believe Peter or Jesus in Luke 24:26-27, we would be in a better situation. Seeing Jesus “as He is” always is the best scenario for life in dead places.

Not only would we link the stayed knife of Genesis 22 to the sword of 1 Chronicles 21:16, we would also start paying attention to any other story that elevates things between heaven and earth. Ezekiel 28 reminds us that Eden was a mountain place, which in the ancient mind are places overlapping heaven and earth. Noah’s ark was buoyantly suspended between heaven and earth covered in a ransom price (pitch). God torah-ed / showed Moses a tree at the bitter waters of Marah, a tree that changed bitter waters into sweet waters. Moses was the deliverer at a full rest in Exodus 17 with two men to either side set up on a hill; as long as he remained there at rest with hands of faith, Joshua-Jesus had the victory. Absalom was suspended between heaven and earth where he was pierced three times. Daniel was suspended between heaven and earth in that window when they finally caught him where they wanted him in order to kill him. Haman was suspended between heaven and earth on that tree, which is sadly paraphrased away as gallows. In fact, the tool of execution meant for Mordecai, actually ended up killing Haman.

That such realities of seeing Jesus in His victory – at rest on a tool of execution suspended between heaven and earth – are not widely seen or proclaimed today is to our shame. We might have 1 Corinthians 1:25 memorized, but the average Christians today does not personally know the reality of God’s weakness being the undoing of human strength. We are more interested in getting along with the world and resisting when it does not suit our patriotic pride, which was the downfall of Israel and Judah.

Abraham saw Jesus “as He is” simply by looking up and beholding as in a mirror the reflection off the knife in his outstretched hand. Yes, Abraham saw the ram caught in the thicket behind him reflected on the tool of execution suspended between heaven and earth. Abraham saw Jesus’s Day of reigning gloriously and rejoiced in such thankfulness that God had indeed given him back his son as if he were raised from the dead!

The ram was in its full glory of strength, and so was Jesus on the cross. Jesus was reigning in such magnificent glory that even the heavens dimmed in comparison. It is up to the average Christian to ferret out what was His glory. We can only do that by simply spending time with God and talking to Him about it. If our hearts truly turn to see Him, then the Spirit of God has amazing wonders to show you.

How to hear the Bible: Two beams, Four ends.

How I approached the Bible radically changed after my vision of the cross in 2011. I had been taught the common approach that is still widely declared in many areas, especially the United States. However, what the Holy Spirit kept showing me of the Crucified Living One from all corners of the Hebrew Scriptures did not fit. As a result, I really felt that leaders of the Christian world had been misinforming me. Beholding Jesus as crucified and ongoing living reality was hyper-literally the center of all!

After publishing The Jesus Pictures, I tried to trace it back. How long has this been a problem? There had to be echoes of the reality of beholding Christ “as He is,” which exposure clearly transforms inwardly. In the end, I discovered that the disconnect was manifesting during the time of the Apostles.

In Paul’s letters to various churches, he battled this tendency to slip away into the human default comfort zone. For instance, the letter to the Galatians addresses this issue of getting circumcised in addition to what Christ had already established at the cross. Likewise, Peter, John, and Jude were all concerned about lying prophets entering into the early church and spoiling the pure faith that Paul expresses as simply being focused solely into the Anointed One, Christ (2 Corinthians 11:3). Whoever wrote the book of Hebrews also sternly warned other Christians not to drift away (Hebrews 2:1).

So, back to my vision of the cross – I know that was REAL. Looking back now over a decade, I didn’t make up the connections, alignments, templates, and trajectories. The opening with its directional flow is there! The trajectory is clearly one-way into death; and one-way out in life. And in between, in the burial, in that place of death, rest, cessation, and so on… something can be seen that flips the script on people’s lives. Even that reversal is evident all over the Hebrew Scriptures.

In my book, Spiritual Knowledge, I talk about this great tendency to disconnect from the Living Crucified One, because it makes no sense to the natural mind. It is easy to get going in the direction you think is right in life, only to find out spiritual reality is going perpendicular to every direction you turn your head. But unless you are staring this paradox of God being the slaughtered, yet risen and standing Christ, I can’t say you are seeing anything substantial at all. This paradox of the crucified life is the main course of the Bible as meditation literature.

Back around the year 400 AD/CE, John Cassian heard about a four-fold way of reading the Hebrew Scriptures. It was not common knowledge during the time the Roman Empire had seemingly become thoroughly Christian. In fact, as I read what Cassian wrote and understood about the four levels, the categories rang true to this new way I had been experiencing of seeing Christ in the Hebrew Scriptures. Yet, at the same time, how Cassian explained it seemed muddled.

Immediately, the Holy Spirit made clear that the four categories are really two related, yet distinct realms: “in Adam” or “in Christ” that overlap through the cross. The transition from one to the other is going with the Jesus’s trajectory of being on the cross. The cross is really a door out of Adam and into the kingdom life of Christ’s own ways. It is not a prayer said as “one and done,” but a continuing crucified life walk.

How one hears the Bible typically remains “in Adam”. Adopting Christianity as your religion does not change this. Getting a doctorate in religion, or being the head of religion doesn’t change this. It is easy to slip back in there – simply look at Peter in Galatians 2. The “first pope” slid back there. Even knowing in your heart of hearts that there is an “in Christ” way of hearing the Hebrew Scriptures doesn’t make you hear “in Christ”.

What I saw in my vision is what a person is supposed to hear in the Hebrew Scriptures. In fact, the Holy Spirit has reiterated this countless times, and the books I’ve produced since 2011 are evidence. There are clear patterns of the simplest of design through which we can learn His Crucified Life – the heart giving how He operates as Who He is. It is all right there in the familiar Bible stories, yet hidden in plain sight from religious Christians and Jews filled with learning from other foci.

I know that as I briefly explain the four-fold ends as two distinct beams of “in Christ” or “in Adam”, that it will be received with misunderstanding. But I truly believe that I am obeying the reality of the Great Commission here: “having gone the way, make learners” of Jesus. Toss the word “disciples”; it has too much baggage. Be a learner of Jesus.

Learn His trajectory that is pictured in baptism. He is the Lone, Dying Seed (John 12:24). Learn this Life of Love shared amongst the Father, the Son, and in us by the Holy Spirit (1 John 1:3). Jesus is with us to effect even unto the end of our present times.

Here is a barometer to help you determine whether you will hear what I am saying.

And I saw in the midst of the throne and of the four living creatures, and in the midst of the elders, a Lamb standing, as though it had been slain, having seven horns, and seven eyes, which are the seven Spirits of God, sent forth into all the earth. Revelation 5:6

What stands out? What is the picture of eternal governance? What does this “standing, as slaughtered” picture mean to you? Unless, you have heard Revelation 5:6 in such a new way to see it as the pinnacle of understanding that book, or even kingdom living in general, you might as well go back to grazing in your favorite religious field and forget this webpage. Knowing what I am about to write is dangerous to the human tendency to institutionalize what should always be vitally and spontaneously living.

“In Adam” hears the Bible as a historical or mythical story. To “in Adam”, the Bible is a library of literature genres, either explaining quite literally how God made the world in six, literal 24-hour days, or how it is a creation establishing universal functions that is in dialogue with other cultures of the ancient near east. Either way, as one thoughtfully ponders the Scriptures, they learn wise ways for living life on earth. You could say that the story has a moral to it, and by adopting these wisdom virtues, we stay in God’s good graces. Other traditions might say that the Bible is God’s handbook to life on earth. Either way the claim is to become more like, or be the image Christ in the world. This will either manifest through reaching the lost, or providing examples of social justice, or even being accepting of people expressing whatever popular personal identity society stamps on them.

The first two-ended beam hears a story from history with a moral to it. The specific terms are historical and tropological. Tropological simply means “how you turn to face situations”. It really is the moral to the story that you heard. What Jesus said and did in His earthly ministry is an appealing thing to imitate “in Adam”. And what 2 Corinthians 5:16-17 says to controvert that is puzzled over. Why?

Hearing the Hebrew Scriptures as story with a moral requires no spiritual input. The Holy Spirit is optional. Any random atheist off the street could read the Bible and see that there are morals to follow. Why do you think they are primarily atheists? It is certainly not because of lack of archeological evidence or lack of manuscript proof. Christianity has all this in abundance. Rather, it is a heart issue that cannot tolerate the logical outcome: the perceived limiting morals, especially in respect to sexuality.

The “in Christ” side of the equation follows a similar line, but is perpendicular to our natural view, meaning “always just out of sight, wherever we tend to look”. I know it is trite, but one easy way to remember the parallel is: “History as His-story” followed by “being caught up in His Story’s Trajectory”. The Apostle Paul addresses this in 2 Corinthians 3-4. One can read the Bible and only see Moses with a glowing face. But when ones’ heart turns to see the Lord, then the real transforming glory can be seen. Also in Galatians 3, after just declaring how he is dead with Christ on the cross, Paul reminds them of the source for this: the beforehand writings of the Scriptures that portray and depict Christ crucified in a perfect and ongoing way. The Spirit flows that way. Hear the Scriptures that way.

Another way to think about the “in Christ” way of hearing is how the Hebrews writer speaks of having come to a heavenly city and a great assembly. Sadly, the typical translation loses what everyone in the ancient near east understood about all-encompassing plaza (pan-agora) in verses 22 – 23 of chapter 12. Fortunately, you can still imagine it a little if you have ever been to a large plaza or open square of an older city. There are still plenty in Europe. These areas served as the daily marketplace where one would find all their needs met for life in their city. People hung out there, shopped there, got news there, and so on. The Greek term for this is agora.

When John Cassian reported what he discovered about understanding the Bible, the level typically hidden from sight involves shopping at the “other marketplace”. The Greek word for other is allos. In Luke 24, when Jesus explained the Scriptures, He set forth the reality of this “allos agora”.

What is found there, strangely matches that “slain, yet standing” picture we saw from Revelation 5:6. In Luke 24, Jesus uses the words “suffering and glory” to describe these two legs of the trajectory. In reading Philippians 2:5-11, you might recognize the same trajectory that is supposed to be our only regulating mindset. If the word allegory, (allos + agora), has too much baggage for you, switch to “other market”.

As Jesus said in Luke 24, what you see there is centered on His suffering and glory, which is not some random phrase to describe our modern idea of “types and shadows”, but expressive of a dying-living trajectory impregnated into the warp and woof of the Hebrew Scriptures. It is as if some Ancient Sower aforetime has seeded the field of history before we encounter it. So, it is.

Seeds are living, yet must die first. If you are united with the seed, the composition of its matrix sprouts up into a risen reality. This is why there is the fourth level, and why it is called anagocial. The meaning of anagogocial is simply this: “up in a completing sense” coupled with the idea of “being led or brought.” Every time you are exposed to the reality of Christ crucified as the Source for the Hebrew Scriptures, there is the very real possibility of enjoying your present union with the same Christ! This is why we are to set our hearts above where you have been raised with Christ (Colossians 3:1).

This is the reality of the New Covenant described in Jeremiah 31:31-34. You can learn His Torah-Instruction yourself from the heart. It is His anointing that directly teaches (1 John 2:27). There really is no need for me to teach you when you are properly aligned as a branch and plugged into Christ, the Living Sap. It is simple (2 Corinthians 11:3). He is the Source! Hear Him! Go and make learners of Him.