The title of the message this morning is “Are you living by your computer?” I’m not talking about your laptop. I’m not talking about your Dell. I’m not talking about your Mac.
Turn to Genesis 1. Today we’re going to look at the first Adam and the last Adam. Jesus is the last Adam. He came to regain what the first Adam lost. Are you with me? Now to Genesis 1:26.
(26) And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.
(27) So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.
(28) And God blessed them, and God said unto them...
This morning I was trying to sleep. I’m talking about 3:30 or 4:00. Verse 28 kept going through my mind again and again. And God reminded me of something that He had shared with me. In the New Testament, you will read the word “let” a lot in the epistles. God said “Every time you let Me, My anointing flows.”
So I got to thinking about what He says in verse 26, “Let us make man.” When God says “let us” He made a decision to let His anointing flow into us. Do you see that? I feel God wanted me to give you some examples, so I wrote some verses down early this morning that talk about “let”.
For example,
• Galatians 5:26 – “If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit.”
• Galatians 6:9 – “And let us not be weary in well doing: for in due season we shall reap, if we faint not.” In all of these “lets” we have to make a decision.
• Ephesians 4:26 – “Be ye angry, and sin not: let not the sun go down upon your wrath.”
• Ephesians 4:29 – “Let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth, but that which is good to the use of edifying, that it may minister grace unto the hearers.”
• Philippians 2:3 – “Let nothing be done through strife or vainglory; but in lowliness of mind let each esteem other better than themselves.” What follows this verse?
• Philippians 2:5 – “Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus.” What we read in verse 3 tells us that this was Christ’s mindset. Isn’t that neat?
• Colossians 3:15 – “And let the peace of God rule in your hearts, to the which also ye are called in one body; and be ye thankful. ” What is this telling us? We already have it available to us. We just have to let it rule.
• Colossians 3:16 – “Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom; teaching and admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord.”
• Colossians 4:6 – “Let your speech be alway with grace, seasoned with salt, that ye may know how ye ought to answer every man.”
So when God said “Let us make man” He was releasing His life and anointing in to us. When we “let God” it releases more and more of His anointing into our lives.
God had already given me the message. This is bonus material! You guys got this just for showing up!
In Genesis 1 God says “Let us make man in our image.” Everything God is man was supposed to be with one exception – man is not deity.
“Let him have dominion” – The importance of this phrase is this: God has given us ruler ship. But He can only work through the man and woman who has the same life and nature that He has. He can’t work through someone who has dominion and is lost. That’s why God wants people saved. The more people that are saved, the more dominion God has available to Him to use – the more authority He has available to use.
Let’s read Genesis 1:27 and the first part of 28 again.
(27) So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.
(28) And God blessed them, and God said unto them...
Isn’t that neat? Hold your finger here and go to Numbers 23. This is also bonus material! This is the story about the prophet Balaam who was asked by Balak, the king of the Amalekites to curse the children of Israel. Balaam says,
(19) God is not a man, that he should lie; neither the son of man, that he should repent: hath he said, and shall he not do it? or hath he spoken, and shall he not make it good?
(20) Behold, I have received commandment to bless: and he hath blessed; (the last five words) and I cannot reverse it.
Do you see this? God has blessed us. It cannot be reversed. “But Barry, I’m not walking in the blessings.” And that’s God’s fault? God has blessed you and it cannot be reversed. So if God has blessed you and you’re not walking in it, then it behooves you to find out why? Guess what? You’re going to find out today why you’re not walking in God’s blessings or why you’re walking in parts and not all!
Now turn to Genesis 2:7 – “And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul.” What does this tell us? Adam already had a soul, a mind, but it wasn’t functioning because he had no life. The makeup of Adam, his mind, how he would think, was already there. The only thing God did was add His life to man.
Remember, man has a free will. Adam had a free will. He could think independently of God. He didn’t have to do God’s will. He had to choose to serve God or not serve God. The same is true for us today. We already have a mind and free will before we get born again. He gives us His life and nature and the mind of Christ after that.
What we see here in Genesis 2 is the same principle. God is adding His mind and His thoughts to a being that already had a mind of his own. Do you see this? It’s important. Jump down to verse 19.
(19) And out of the ground the LORD God formed every beast of the field, and every fowl of the air; and brought them unto Adam to see what he would call them: and whatsoever Adam called every living creature, that was the name thereof.
(20) And Adam gave names to all cattle, and to the fowl of the air, and to every beast of the field; but for Adam there was not found an help meet for him.
We see that God let Adam name all of the animals. Do you think he made those decisions with his natural mind only? Or was there a spiritual component that helped him out? The life that Adam received from God was the reason he was able to name all of the animals.
Now let’s look at the last Adam, Jesus Christ. Turn to Philippians 2.
(1) If there be therefore any consolation in Christ, if any comfort of love, if any fellowship of the Spirit, if any bowels and mercies, (Stop. This is not a question. It’s an assumption that these actually exist.)
(2) Fulfil ye my joy, that ye be likeminded, having the same love, being of one accord, of one mind.
(3) Let nothing be done through strife or vainglory; but in lowliness of mind let each esteem other better than themselves. (Remember when Cain killed Abel and God asks him why he had killed his brother? And what was Cain’s response? Am I my brother’s keeper? What does verse 3 say? Let us esteem others better than ourselves. Folks, we are our brother’s keeper.)
(4) Look not every man on his own things (Why? Because you are your brother’s keeper.), but every man also on the things of others.
(5) Let this mind be in you (What we just read in verses one through four. Why?), which was also in Christ Jesus:
Look at Mark 12.
(28) And one of the scribes came, and having heard them reasoning together, and perceiving that he had answered them well, asked him, Which is the first commandment of all?
(29) And Jesus answered him, The first of all the commandments is, Hear, O Israel; The Lord our God is one Lord:
(30) And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength: this is the first commandment.
What did the scribe ask Jesus? What is the first commandment of all? Look at what Jesus adds.
(31) And the second is like, namely this, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. There is none other commandment greater than these.
Do you know what Jesus was telling the scribe? If you don’t love your neighbor like you love God, you don’t love God. For Jesus, loving God was not all there was to the first commandment. Jesus says the first is not enough. “And the second you need to love your neighbor the exact same way.”
Do you remember 9-11? When the tower fell many of us, Christians, were we loving Bin Laden? Oh no. We didn’t love him. We wanted him dead. He attacked the United States. Barry wanted him dead. What does Jesus say? “I wanted him saved.” Who had the problem? Barry.
If you can’t love your neighbor like you love God – like God loves your neighbor – then you need to spend some more time with your Heavenly Father because your heart is not like His.
If there is someone right now in your life that you’re not happy with, that you are angry with, and if they walked off a Clift and died and you would not be unhappy, you’ve got some issues to deal with and you best deal with them quickly! Jesus says you agree with your adversary in the way and you do it quickly! Do you know why? Your soul is at risk not your adversary’s. Your soul!
In John 4:34 we read “Jesus saith unto them, My meat is to do the will of him that sent me, and to finish his work.” Do you see what Jesus is saying? He’s saying “I could choose not to do what My Father wants me to do. But I’m making a decision. What is important to My Father is going to be important to me.”
Joh 5:19 says “Then answered Jesus and said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, The Son can do nothing of himself (Why? Because he’s making that choice. Let that sink in.), but what he seeth the Father do: for what things soever he doeth, these also doeth the Son likewise.”
Verse 20 – “For the Father loveth the Son, and sheweth him all things that himself doeth: and he will shew him greater works than these, that ye may marvel.”
Everything God wanted done, Jesus was willing to do it. So the relationship we see in the first Adam and the last Adam is that they could hear from God. They responded to God. They did what God wanted them to do until we get to Genesis 3 and the first Adam decides he doesn’t have to agree with God’s ways.
Now, let’s look at the relationship between the spirit and soul or mind in the first and last Adams.
First, the human spirit, the life of God, was dominant. Second, the soul, the mind, took its cues from the spirit. Third, the soul, the mind, was in sync with God’s mind. Now the fourth point, and this is big ladies and gentlemen. To the soul or mind of Adam and Jesus, nothing was impossible.
But Barry, we don’t read anything in scripture about Adam raising the dead. I can tell why. There was no death in Genesis 1 and 2. But if Jesus is the last Adam doesn’t it stand to reason that if Adam needed to raise someone from the dead he could have? The whole point of Jesus birth, death and resurrection was to get us back to Genesis 1!
Now let’s talk about what happened between the first Adam and the last Adam.
In Genesis 3 the serpents creeps into the Garden of Eden. Adam doesn’t kick him out. Both he and his wife eat the forbidden fruit and die instantly spiritually.
In Genesis 3:19 we read “Wherefore then serveth the law? It was added because of transgressions.” So what happened in the course of human history that required God to add the law? Sin. Without this whole system, now listen to what I’m saying, without this whole system including the sacrifices Satan could legally wipe out the human race because we had no recourse. That’s why God set up the law.
Now First Timothy 1.
(8) But we know that the law is good, if a man use it lawfully;
(9) Knowing this, that the law is not made for a righteous man (The law was not made for the person who has the life and nature of God.), but for the lawless and disobedient, for the ungodly and for sinners, for unholy and profane, for murderers of fathers and murderers of mothers, for manslayers,
(10) For whoremongers, for them that defile themselves with mankind, for menstealers, for liars, for perjured persons, and if there be any other thing that is contrary to sound doctrine.
So, what do we see here? The law was not made for those of us with God’s life and nature because we already have a conscious that convicts us before we do anything wrong. That conscious convicts us while we are thinking the thought! But many of us violate that conscious and do it anyway. Go figure!
After Adam sinned, we had death living in us. That’s what the sin nature is. It’s death that’s alive inside of us until we accept Jesus as our Lord and Savior and receive life. And because we had death living in us, if we allow that death to rule it would cause a lot of problems. For example, we would do things that would send us to jail.
Because we no longer had God’s life and nature, our minds took over. God never designed our minds to lead us. He designed His spirit to lead us. Our minds were never designed to govern how we live. Never. But because we had a death nature, we had to be given a synthetic conscious. We had to be given laws to protect us from each other!
The mind then became the restraint. The mind looks at what will happen if we break a law and decides whether or not it’s worth it. Do you see this? The mind is deciding if breaking a law is worth doing or not. It rationalizes based on whether or not it can deal with the consequences. You wanted to do the wrong but consequences for doing the wrong were greater.
So your mind became your restraint. Your mind became your governor. Your mind stopped you from listening to and carrying out the wishes of your dead spirit. Are you seeing this? Are you hearing me?
Now let’s look at the relationship between the sin nature and the mind between the Adams.
First, the mind, the soul, was dominant. Second, the mind restrained the sin nature.
Third, the mind operated independently of God. And fourth, the mind, the soul, saw impossibilities. Remember when Nicodemus came to Jesus and said the things He did they had never seen so he must be from God? Nicodemus was dead. He had a sin nature. That’s why he couldn’t understand how Jesus could do what he did.
Your mind is your computer. We talk about faith a lot in this church and it’s all true. But we still have a mind that is separate from the mind of Christ. Now if our minds are computers, then we know that a computer can only give what is put into it.
How many of you are familiar with pop up blockers? It keeps something from getting into your computer that you don’t want to get in, right? Computers also have filters to also keep certain things out.
Well, ladies and gentlemen, your computer, your mind, acts as a filter. It acts as a pop up blocker. All those years when you were living in sin, when you had a sin nature, your computer had pop up blockers to stop you from doing certain things. Do you see the picture?
Do you know what our problem is today? (I said this very slowly.) Our computer is still stopping the spirit from doing the things of God even though we no longer have a sin nature. Our computer is stopping the life of God that’s on the inside of us from doing it really wants to do. That’s why we are wherever we are in our walk with God.
We can build up our faith, we can build up our spirit man until he’s busting at the seams, but when the mind of Christ tells the mind of Barry that this is what God wants you to do and Barry says “No”, what can God do?
Let me give you a couple of examples.
How many of you have heard of Orville Wright and his brother? Now from what I’ve been able to research, both of them were Christian men. Now let me ask you something: do you think for a minute that he came up with the idea that man could fly from his natural mind? No! It had to be something planted on the inside of him that he finally listened to and said it’s possible. Once he decided that it was possible because that spirit on the inside told him his mind went to work to figure it out! Do you see this? Orville’s mind, his computer, went to work to figure it out. God had already given him the idea.
Who was the guy who invented the light bulb? Thomas Edison. Before Thomas Edison, no one thought that electricity could be harnessed in the way he harnessed it. Let me ask you something. Do you think he came up with the idea that this was a possibility using his natural mind? God planted that in his spirit. He allowed it to rise above into his mind, his computer, and then it took his mind to figure it out. He didn’t use his computer to come up with the idea. That’s why God you your mind!
George Washington Carver. He took the peanut and found over 600 uses for it. Let me ask you something. Do you think that idea came from his computer? No that idea came from his new nature, his born again spirit. Why do I know that idea came from his spirit? Look at all the blessings that resulted. We know that the enemy of the soul is not in the business of blessing! God planted the idea on the inside of him. “I can use the peanut to do this. Hmmm. I wonder how that would work?”
And as soon as you listen to your spirit man who is listening to God, you get a little bit more on how to make it work – to use this thing, this computer. Guys, I’ll tell you something: dead people don’t produce ideas like these. But once they hear of an idea, they can take their computers to improve it and adapt it. Why? Satan is a great counterfeiter. He cannot originate ideas. He can only counterfeit. He diminishes the things of God.
The reason you are not walking by more faith is because your computer is rationalizing faith out of your life.
The reason you are not walking in more healing – your computer is rationalizing healing out of your life.
If you are struggling to get bill paid, your computer is rationalizing faith out of your life.
Anything that’s happening in your life that’s not according to God’s will and plan your computer is playing role in your not having it. If we have the mind of Christ but our lives are not producing what we see in the gospels that Jesus produced, then our computer is filtering out, blocking out, faith in our lives.
Let’s wind this up. First Corinthians 2.
(12) Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the spirit which is of God; that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God.
(13) Which things also we speak, not in the words which man's wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth; comparing spiritual things with spiritual.
(14) But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.
(15) But he that is spiritual judgeth all things, yet he himself is judged of no man.
(16) For who hath known the mind of the Lord, that he may instruct him? But we have the mind of Christ (even when we’re acting like we don’t!).
Now look at chapter 3 and verse 1. The first word is “And” so he’s continuing this thought.
(1) And I, brethren, could not speak unto you as unto spiritual, but as unto carnal, even as unto babes in Christ.
(2) I have fed you with milk, and not with meat: for hitherto ye were not able to bear it, neither yet now are ye able.
(3) For ye are yet carnal: for whereas there is among you envying, and strife, and divisions, are ye not carnal, and walk as men?
Look at Second Corinthians 10. I’m going to take a little license but I’ll still be scripturally accurate.
(3) For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war after the flesh:
(4) (For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal [They are not our computers. We can’t rationalize it.], but mighty through God to the pulling down of strong holds;)
(5) Casting down imaginations (your computer), and every high thing (and every bit of information your computer wants to spit out) that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity (You reboot your computer. You take the junk out and put in the new stuff and when you do that you will bring) every thought to the obedience of Christ. (You have to clean up your hard drive so God can reformat it with His thoughts and His ideas!)
We have to reprogram our computer. How do we do this? Some very familiar verses.
Romans 12:1, 2 – “I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice (turn the TV off, put down the IPhone), holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service. And be not conformed to this world (Stop thinking the way the world thinks.): but be ye transformed (to My way of thinking) by the renewing of your mind, that (and when you are conformed to My way of thinking then) ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.”
Turn to Philippians 4:8 – “Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any virtue (There is.), and if there be any praise (There is.), think on these things.”
This is how we reprogram our computers. We change the input. Once we change the input what also changes? The output. Once you change how your computer thinks, how your computer responds to the spirit on the inside, your computer is going to reflect more and more the mind of Christ. Isn’t this what we want?
What is our goal? Second Corinthians 3:18 – “But we all, with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord.” And this will happen as we renew our minds to agree with the mind of Christ.
So what can we learn from this message?
First, when we had a sin nature, our minds were programmed to restrain it.
Second, when we received God’s life and nature, our minds continue its “restraining program.” For some of us, that’s still happening today. There could be areas in your life where your computer has allowed the spirit of God to rise up and you’re seeing the benefits. But there are other areas that are still being restrained, that still have pop-up blockers. It’s a growing process.
Third, as we put on the mind of Christ, we remove the restraints piece by piece – we’re changed from glory to glory.
And last, once the restraints are removed, we will see John 14:12 – “the works that I do ye shall do also and greater shall ye do” – manifest in our lives.
