How well do you understand the working of the Holy Spirit? How much do you allow that power to rule your life?

“Hereby know ye the Spirit of God: Every spirit that confesseth that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God” (1 John 4:2).

“Is come” should read, “is come and continuing to come” or “is now coming.” This scripture says Jesus Christ is coming in the flesh.

We must grasp this truth in order to understand what is happening in God’s Church. How can you find God and His leaders and His supporters? You have to know the Spirit of God! Every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ is coming in the flesh is of God. God is coming in our lives—coming in the flesh—and those who confess that truth are of God. So you must understand about the Spirit coming in the flesh. We must understand a lot about God’s Holy Spirit. That is the only way to know where God is.

Christ leads those He lives in. He is knocking on the door of the Laodiceans trying to get in, but they won’t let Him in (Revelation 3:20). When we let Him in, He leads us and can do amazing things through us. We see the fruits of that Holy Spirit all the time.

“And every spirit that confesseth not that Jesus Christ [is coming ] in the flesh is not of God: and this is that spirit of antichrist …” (1 John 4:3). This gross error is happening inside God’s Church!

One former Worldwide Church of God evangelist said, In the past we taught that Christ directly led His Church, but that was an error. No it was not! Christ does directly lead His Church, or nothing gets accomplished.

He comes in the flesh of His man and those who support that man—as they let the mind of Christ be in them (Philippians 2:5). Christ actually lives in us through His Spirit! Jesus Christ Himself is coming in the flesh in each one of us who are converted. Jesus Christ prophesied that just before His Second Coming, a human being would “restore all things”—all foundational truth—to the Church of God (Matthew 17:10-11). We must understand that no man can restore all things if Christ isn’t directly leading that man! Herbert W. Armstrong didn’t restore all things—CHRIST restored all things through Herbert W. Armstrong!

This is a profound subject. Truly understanding the Spirit of God is very profound. Even to understand “the spirit of the world” (1 Corinthians 2:12) requires the Holy Spirit.

2 John 7 says there are many deceivers in the world. You must know who these deceivers are and why they are deceivers. As John said, many of them are antichrist.

That evangelist also said Christ works through several branches of His Church, like the United Church of God, the Living Church of God, even the Worldwide Church of God (he wasn’t talking about the Philadelphia Church of God). If you look at all those churches, you see that they are almost totally ineffective or are collapsing. Clearly, that philosophy is not working. Christ could never accomplish anything amid such division. That is why those churches are not producing the fruits of God’s Holy Spirit. Christ is not working through different branches that have different doctrines. There is no scriptural evidence whatsoever to support such a belief.

Indirectly and by their deeds, the Laodiceans say that Christ is not coming in the flesh. That is getting close to blasphemy.

The Mystery of God

After Mr. Armstrong wrote Mystery of the Ages, he said, “I feel I, myself, did not write it. Rather, I believe God used me in writing it.” He knew Jesus Christ was the real author, and that only God could pour out all that wonderful information. Christ came and lived in His apostle!

Colossians 1:26 talks about “the mystery which hath been hid from ages and from generations, but now is made manifest to his saints.” It was hid from man for all those ages, and now God has revealed it to His saints.

Yet we find 95 percent of God’s people are not interested in that wonderful mystery today and don’t want it in their lives. Many of them actually try to blot it out! There is a confrontation, a spiritual war, going on. Satan wants so much to wipe out this mystery—but God is using His faithful saints to make sure that he does not. We saw that in the court case after the wcg sued us for publishing Mystery of the Ages in 1997; we see it in many other ways. God uses us in a powerful way.

When he wrote Colossians, Paul was sitting in jail because he proclaimed that mystery. And he was killed because he proclaimed that mystery. What a testimony to how much he loved that mystery! Do you and I love that mystery as much as Paul did? I don’t think so. I think we have a lot of growing and preparing to do. Christ also had to die proclaiming that mystery.

We must be educated! We must know that Christ is coming in the flesh, and we must know the spirits where that is not happening. We are here for a vital reason: to be educated and to lead this world. And we must love that mystery the way those great men did.

“To whom God would make known what is the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles; which is Christ in you, the hope of glory” (verse 27). That is really a prophecy about this Church. But who really would make known this mystery to the world? Was it Paul? Or Mr. Armstrong? No. God says He would make known that mystery. Only He could! He hid it throughout the ages. Christ revealed it when He was on this Earth. Now God Himself has revealed it to His people. How blessed we are! And we can have that hope of glory dwelling in us.

God lives in His leader! He has to in order to directly lead the Church. Who are those leaders, and where are they? We are God’s very elect, and He has to directly lead us.

In Colossians 2:2, Paul said he prayed that God’s people’s hearts “might be comforted, being knit together in love.” We cannot do that unless Christ is living in all of us, and we have the very love of God! If Christ lives in us, we will all be united and at peace with each other. What unity! Christ’s indwelling Spirit makes God’s very elect unified and knit together in love—because it enables us to all think like Christ!

Paul’s prayer for the brethren went on: “and unto all riches of the full assurance of understanding, to the acknowledgement of the mystery of God, and of the Father, and of Christ; In whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge” (verses 2-3). This is talking about the mystery in the context of the Father! The mystery is about man becoming God. Has that become sort of trite to us? So commonplace that we’re not moved by it? We must never allow ourselves to grow complacent about that! You are invited into that great eternal Family—invited to headquarters so you can rule with the Head of that Family for all eternity!

This mystery is so rich and awesome! Imagine Paul sitting in jail, talking about how rich he was! He wasn’t interested in physical wealth, like the Laodiceans (Revelation 3:17). He wanted the spiritual riches that have to do with becoming sons of God, and ruling the Earth and the universe for eternity! How could you have more wealth than that?

“As ye have therefore received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk ye in him: Rooted and built up in him, and stablished in the faith, as ye have been taught, abounding therein with thanksgiving” (Colossians 2:6-7). God wants us to live the way Christ lived and walk as He walked. He wants us to get grounded like a giant oak, which lets its roots become deeply embedded in the earth where it’s almost impossible to uproot. We have to be rooted and built up in Him. There is a spiritual work to be done, and we can’t do it and help Christ do it unless we are rooted and grounded and built up in Him. In other words, we must let Him come in our flesh.

Another Spirit—at War!

Mr. Armstrong explained how men were fighting against him and changed Ambassador College in the 1970s, and he said, “Jesus Christ had founded this college through me as God’s college.” When they changed it, there was another spirit right there, and it became something other than God’s college, so Mr. Armstrong just closed it down temporarily. But he said Jesus Christ raised up the college through him. Other men in God’s Church wanted to blot out that education, but Mr. Armstrong tried to bring them back to the fact that Christ was living in him. They had failed to realize, or forgotten, that Christ was coming in his flesh.

In a letter dated March 9, 1981, Mr. Armstrong wrote, “We could now qualify for accreditation both at Pasadena and Big Sandy—but we shall not, because the government of the colleges would have to be according to that which is in force in this world’s educational institutions—God’s government would have to go. We already have the highest accreditation of all—that of Almighty God!” We have God’s accreditation at our college as well.

Colossians 2:8 talks about vain philosophy “after the rudiments of the world.” Thayer’s Lexicon defines that phrase as “to invade—of evils coming into existence among men and beginning to exert their power.” The devil is warring against us, working to blot this message out. But he will never do it if Christ is coming in our flesh—because we will answer that struggle the same way Christ did and conquerthe devil!

“Let no man beguile you of your reward in a voluntary humility and worshipping of [demons], intruding into those things which he hath not seen, vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind” (verse 18). “Intruding” means to invade, according to Thayer’s. We are in a war! Can we see it for what it is? Can we see this other spirit that’s warring against your mind that has the very Spirit of God in it? If you know that Christ is coming in the flesh, you are aware that another spirit is warring against the Spirit of God.

This beguiler was in God’s Church, a man “intruding into those things which he [has] seen,” it should read, instead of “hath not seen.” He was haughtily treading on things he has seen. Yet he was used by the devil to destroy the knowledge of God, the mystery of God, and push Christ out. He succeeded because people were not discerning and letting Christ live in them! The demons won the day, and they kicked God’s people out.

We are God’s soldiers, engaged in a violent spiritual war. God prepares us to fight as He fought while He was on Earth. He fought and gave everything so you and I might understand this great plan of God.

Do we fight like Christ and Paul and the other apostles fought? Would we be willing to die before giving it up? They had that attitude. We must conquer as Christ did!

The Laodiceans can’t conquer because they won’t let Christ come in their flesh. If we let Christ come in our flesh, we are guaranteedto conquer!

“And not holding the Head, from which all the body by joints and bands having nourishment ministered, and knit together, increaseth with the increase of God” (verse 19). These people in God’s Church didn’t hold on to the Head. They said that Christ is not directly leading His Church today. Now they are headless! What could be more horrifying than that?

Does the head directly lead the body? Of course it does. And the Head of the spiritual Body is Jesus Christ. He directly guides His Church, and directly leads a man, or there would be no true Church! Can you see how satanic it is to say otherwise?

The Spirit of Loving the Law!

What joy there is in the love of God’s law and wonderful government of peace!

Look again at 1 John 4:2-3. It contrasts one group that does confess Christ is coming in the flesh with another that does not. The word confesseth really means to show that you follow Christ by words and by deeds. It means faith with works, or love with deeds.

Acts 8 describes Simon Magus. Verse 23 in the Greek says that he came in the “bond of iniquity,” or lawlessness. He was trying to convince God’s people that they needed to be “free”—by which he meant “freedom” from God’s law. Yet he was in the bond of lawlessness, perhaps even possessed. That is not freedom at all! It is the ultimate slavery!

We have to develop the opposite attitude toward God’s law—the same attitude that David had, saying, “Oh, how love I thy law!” We all need to grow in that area. God is love, and He wants us to enter His Family and think like He does. We are going to teach this whole world about God’s law of love—the true love that knits us together—and His government of peace that brings us all the joy and abundance and happiness we can imagine.

God is about to bring peace to this world! Thank God that time is almost here! Aren’t we tired of this crazy, evil world? Aren’t we eager for something far more beautiful?

“Ye are of God, little children, and have overcome [conquered] them: because greater is he that is in you, than he that is in the world” (1 John 4:4). Simon knew there was real power in that Spirit—so he tried to buy it! That shows you the spirit he was in. Peter discerned that quickly. He said, “I perceive that thou art in the gall of bitterness and in the bond of [lawlessness].” Peter knew about that evil spirit, the spirit of this world and of the devil—because he had Christ living in him. Christ revealed that to him and gave him that discernment.

Simon Magus was teaching about the way of death while he was in the bond of lawlessness. Does it make any sense to give up eternal life for eternal death? Yet the Laodiceans are dying, and 50 percent of them are not coming back.

Look at what is at stake. This is serious warfare. We are not playing a game. It’s real, and we can lose it all. We have to choose life. And we have to conquer.

The Spirit of Truth

1 John 4:6 reads, “We are of God: he that knoweth God heareth us; he that is not of God heareth not us. Hereby know we the spirit of truth, and the spirit of error.”

That is a profound statement. It’s not enough simply to know truth and error. We have to know the SPIRIT of truth and the SPIRIT of error. We must know that, and that requires real spiritual depth. When you see something, can you tell if it is the spirit of truth—or the spirit of error? God’s people will know as God reveals it to them.

John is discussing two ways of life: one where Christ is living in you, and one where He is not.

In Galatians 2:20, Paul said, “I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me.” What endless depth there is in that statement. That is how Christ lived when He was on Earth. And Paul said, He lives in me. The very faith of Christ, and the very mind of God, LIVED in Paul, and it must live in us. You can see how much we have to grow.

John and Paul went to jail, but they flourished while they were in prison. Paul wrote his last book when he was about to be beheaded, but it was the most inspiring one! That’s power! Christ coming in the flesh does that; that’s the only way it can happen.

“He that hath the Son hath life; and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life” (1 John 5:12). Mr. Armstrong said, “This means God injects His life—not only His life, but also His mind, and also His character. Also His attitude of love, of cooperation, of giving, of concern for others as much as concern for self—selflessness. God is going to make us into His own children—into Gods!” Wow! This is some calling!

As Mr. Armstrong said, this is not just a church: It is the beginning of a new world! This world is about to fall apart, and a new nation is going to burst on the scene to take over and rule this world. The Church is the World Tomorrow in embryo! It’s the Kingdom of God, and the Family of God, in embryo! What wonderful truth! God’s very elect understand that a new world is coming.

The only government that ever will last is one in which Christ is living, and God the Father is living in that Family structure. Christ is coming in the flesh. That is the solution to the terrifying problems in this world!

Christ said in Revelation 3:12 that those people who are at headquarters will go no more out. They learned how to teach the world the way of peace and love, and Christ wants them right there at headquarters, close to Him, so He can make certain that people get the right direction and the right teaching. We will help Him change this world into God’s world, and then go out into the universe forever, teaching and instructing in God’s way of life. I believe God has most of the foundation of that headquarters government in those seven Church eras. This Church will have a lot of people in that headquarters government, I’m convinced. Ephesus will also have quite a few. We will be part of the foundation for that World Tomorrow government God is building.

Let’s determine to let God wake us up more and more, and be certain we don’t go to sleep, because we have a major responsibility at headquarters in the World Tomorrow.

This is an endless vision! And we will go no more out for all eternity! You’re going to be up there on the very top echelon of God’s government forever! What a job it is, and will be for all eternity! That is something to fill you with hope! It is the hope of glory!

From the archives: Royal Vision, July-August 2012