Lesson for September 16, 2018
The Doctrine of Spirituality vs. Carnality
The Doctrine of the Portfolio of Invisible Assets (cont’d)
Escrow Assets/Blessings
An escrow is a trust fund, a deed, a bond or other written agreement entrusted to a third person by the party of the first part, to be given to the grantee. All three parties are mentioned in Ephesians 1:3, “Worthy of praise and glorification is the God, even the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in heavenly places in Christ.” God the Father is party of the first part, the Grantor. Every Church Age believer is the grantee. The third party is our Lord Jesus Christ, the depositary and our escrow officer. The deposit, or escrow assets (greater blessings), are placed beyond the control of the Grantor, in that He cannot cancel them. God the Father cannot cancel what He has deposited with Christ, i.e., your portfolio, and your special escrow blessings. These escrow assets are above and beyond the forty spiritual assets that all believers receive at salvation.
These blessings are called spiritual blessings because God is spiritual. The first thing God ever did for you was to bless you! Escrow blessings are the greater blessings that only spiritually mature believers receive, both now and in eternity. These blessings are attained under the doctrinal principle of equal privilege and equal opportunity for the execution of the Protocol Plan of God and reaching spiritual maturity.
Before God the Son created the universe, God the Father actually created a Portfolio of Invisible Assets for you personally. He knew you would believe in Christ and become a member of the Royal Family of God. So, He provided fantastic, wonderful things for you and placed them in a trust fund for you.
The first thing God ever did for us by creating a Portfolio of Invisible Assets is the means of glorifying Him. Technically, no believer after salvation glorifies God to the maximum until Jesus Christ conveys to him escrow blessings, i.e, greater blessings. These are conveyed to a believer (grantee) when he executes the Protocol Plan of God, within the Divine Dynasphere and reaches spiritual maturity. When we reach spiritual maturity, Jesus Christ begins to convey to us our greater blessings. After the Rapture at the Judgment Seat of Christ, He conveys even greater blessings to us for eternity.
There are two ways in which the believer glorifies God to the maximum: 1) the conveyance of escrow blessings to the spiritually mature believer at spiritual maturity and 2) by passing evidence testing, which is the highest honor God can give to a believer. Passing evidence testing is the spiritually mature believer’s ultimate glorification of God. The condition for the transfer of your escrow blessings is the fulfillment of the Protocol Plan of God through your advance to spiritual maturity by residence, function, and momentum inside your very own Divine Dynasphere. When the escrow conditions are fulfilled (reaching spiritual maturity), a believer receives greater blessings which are far beyond anything he could ever imagine.
The escrow blessings which were deposited to your trust fund account in eternity past cannot be distributed to you until you have fulfilled the terms of the agreement, which is executing the Protocol Plan of God by your advance to spiritual maturity. Everything it takes to fulfill the Protocol Plan of God and receive your escrow assets is provided by God. We have no excuse for not receiving them.
So that each one of us will fulfill the conditions for the conveyance of our escrow assets, God the Father provided for us many additional assets so that we can execute the Protocol Plan of God. We do not have the power to do so in the energy of our flesh, so God provided the power of the Holy Spirit. Therefore, we receive at salvation at least 40 spiritual assets, which include Election and Predestination. Under Election we have equal privilege – our royal priesthood and equal opportunity – and logistical grace support. Under Predestination, our equal privilege is union with Christ and our equal opportunity is the Divine Dynasphere.
Equal privilege and equal opportunity means that every believer has the same chance to be a winner. Losers are those believers who cannot sort out their priorities, or who are never consistent in the perception and application of Bible doctrine. One of the most important things in the Christian life is consistency in both learning and applying doctrine. In order to maintain your proper scale of values there must be constant application. So first you must apply doctrine for yourself to yourself, and to your life. “Walk by means of the Spirit” (Galatians 5:16) means you must be filled with the Holy Spirit in order to apply doctrine. “Walk by means of doctrine” (II John 8) means you learn doctrine and use it to counsel yourself. This is where spiritual assets start: you make doctrine #1 priority. You don’t let anything interfere with learning doctrine, and you don’t let anything interfere with your application of the doctrine you know. You do your own walking! What a portfolio is supposed to do is use spiritual assets to create greater assets.
Escrow blessings are attained through the invisible assets of your portfolio. Without your portfolio you could not attain spiritual maturity and receive your escrow blessings. Remember I Corinthians 2:9, “However, as it stands written, [Isaiah 64:4], `things [portfolio of invisible assets] the eye has not seen [invisible], things the ear has not heard [unknown through empiricism], no mind has conceived what God has prepared for those who love Him.’”
“For those who love Him” refers to a believer who has developed personal love for God within the Divine Dynasphere and has attained spiritual self-esteem. Proverbs 8:18, “With Me [doctrine] are riches and honor [escrow blessings for time], enduring wealth and prosperity [escrow blessings for eternity].” Escrow blessings are attained only through life inside the Divine Dynasphere. Ephesians 3:20, “Now to Him [God the Father] who is able to do infinitely more than all we could ask or imagine on the basis of the power [Holy Spirit] which is at work for us [specifically the Divine Dynasphere].” You cannot imagine the blessings God has for a believer who glorifies Him, who executes the Protocol Plan of God and who reaches spiritual maturity. The power at work in us is God the Holy Spirit, but it works only for those believers who live inside the Divine Dynasphere. The filling of the Spirit, which is walking by means of the Spirit occur only inside the Divine Dynasphere. All believers have the same chance of reaching spiritual maturity.
Election and Predestination as Related to Escrow Blessings
Election is the expression of the sovereignty of God with regard to His will and personal desire for you. God desires that you have His highest and best, the greatest possible blessings that it is possible for Him to give you. Predestination is God’s provision for you with everything necessary for you to fulfill His will and to execute His plan and attain rewards in eternity.
Election
Ephesians 1:4, “Just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we would be holy and blameless before Him.” This verse teaches that election was provided before the creation of the world. We see in this verse that election relates to the experiential part of God’s plan for our lives. Holiness and blameless have to do with separation unto God for the execution of the Protocol Plan of God.
Holiness describes the mandates related to the filling of the Spirit, which occurs only when a believer is inside the Divine Dynasphere. Then the Holy Spirit controls the soul and the sin nature is restrained. A believer in the cosmic system is said to be grieving the Holy Spirit because his sin nature is in control. The issue is who controls the soul; either the sin nature or the Holy Spirit controls the soul. This is an absolute; at any given time, you’re either filled with the Holy Spirit and inside the Divine Dynasphere which is 100% spirituality, or you’re in the cosmic system which is 100% carnality. This absolute status applies to any stage of spiritual growth.
In eternity past, God made one sovereign decision, one with many aspects. That one decision was to choose you (elect you) to execute His plan, and to provide for you your very own plan (predestination) related to His plan for your life. The winner is the believer who uses his invisible assets of election and predestination. The loser is the believer who, through wrong decisions from a position of weakness, fails to learn, fails to understand spiritual mechanics, and fails to utilize these invisible assets.
The whole purpose of the doctrine of Election is to describe God’s way of providing invisible assets so that we can fulfill His will and His plan. Election is the expression of the sovereignty of God for every Church Age believer made in eternity past. God’s sovereignty wills for you the highest and the best! Election expresses this sovereign will by providing equal privilege and equal opportunity for you. So in election, God gave to each of us in eternity past two phenomenal assets, equal privilege and equal opportunity, which we must use to fulfill His plan and execute His will for our lives.
The equal privilege of election is the universal priesthood of the believer. This in itself shows that God’s plan for us in the Church Age, as royal family, is totally and completely unique. Never before the Church Age and never after the Rapture of the Church is every believer a priest and represents himself before God. This establishes a system of privacy. Under the privacy of your priesthood, you are responsible for yourself before God. This means you are responsible for every thought you think, every motive you have, every good or bad decision you make, and every action you take, good or bad. And God is holding you responsible for your own decisions. Why? Because He made you a priest so that you now represent yourself before God. As a royal priest, every believer has a direct line to God, which means he represents himself before God, he evaluates himself, and he offers prayer for himself. You have privacy so that you can learn Bible doctrine yourself. (I Peter 2:4-9)
Under the privacy of your priesthood, you must learn to define your life in the terms of the Protocol Plan of God, which means you must learn the technical language and vocabulary of doctrine. Once you do, you can analyze and evaluate your own life, your own problems and then apply doctrine and make corrections to your own life under the privacy of your priesthood. Therefore, the privacy of the priesthood demands that we learn doctrine so that we can define our situation.
The royal priest’s self-improvement is based on the function of perception and application of Bible doctrine. Any self-improvement based on the advice and counsel of others is really a set-back. To the extent that we seek counsel or advice means we’re not learning enough doctrine or we’re not using the doctrine we have learned. Initially there’s a place for giving spiritual advice to new believers, but as you grow you should begin to take control and handle your own life. You should know when you’re wrong and when you’re right, and you should be able to utilize all the doctrine you have learned to advance to spiritual maturity.
Under the privacy of your priesthood, you have the right of assembly with other believers to learn doctrine from whoever is your pastor-teacher, where your privacy is respected. The privacy of your priesthood permits both your positive volition toward doctrine plus the right to metabolize and apply that doctrine to your own experience. The only human dependence of the Royal Priesthood is the divine provision of your pastor-teacher, and consistent positive volition under his teaching ministry. In that sense, a pastor is very much like a parent, and he should be honored. Your pastor should not bully you or intrude upon your privacy (unless warranted); but he should communicate and teach doctrine faithfully. Faithful Bible teaching from your pastor demands faith perception, metabolization, and application of that teaching to your own life as a royal priest.
Life in the Divine Dynasphere is not only spiritual freedom under the filling of the Spirit, but spiritual independence as a royal priest. This means that you cannot fulfill the Protocol Plan of God by advancing to spiritual maturity on someone else’s thinking, motivation, decisions, actions, advice, or counseling. Any counseling that a believer needs should come from his pastor-teacher as he teaches accurate Bible doctrine. That’s why the first stage of spiritual adulthood is spiritual self-esteem, which is when you know how to take control of your own spiritual life and you no longer feel threatened by all the things in life that cause fear, worry, and anxiety. Your priesthood demands that you live your own life as unto the Lord and take the responsibility for your own decisions. This is your equal privilege under election.
The equal opportunity under election is the divine provision of logistical grace support blessings like food, shelter and clothing. Logistical support is designed to sustain you. Logistical grace support blessings are provided for winners and losers alike, because both types of believers possess the perfect righteousness of God. This provides equal opportunity for all believers. II Peter 1:10-11, “Therefore brethren [believers], be more motivated [perception of doctrine regarding your Portfolio of Invisible Assets] to make your calling and election a spiritual reality; for by doing these things [fulfillment of the Protocol Plan of God, perception of doctrine] you will never stumble [i.e., become a loser in the cosmic system]. For in this manner [execution of the Protocol Plan of God], your entrance into the eternal kingdom of our Lord Jesus Christ [ultimate sanctification in a resurrection body] will be richly supplied [conveyance of eternal escrow blessings to winners].”