The death of Jesus Christ was not a physical death alone! If it had only been a physical death, Abel would have paid the price for the sins of mankind. He’s the first man that died because of honouring God and His Word. He was the first man that God dealt with in a prophetic manner after the fall of mankind. Every prophet that walked the face of the earth under the Abrahamic Covenant could have paid the price if it were a physical death only.

We, as Christians, are talking about eternal life. We’re talking about the spirit of man. A spirit of a human being never dies. I don’t care who he is, when he was born, what he does – his spirit will never, ever cease to exist. When I say it will never die, I’m using the natural definition of the word “death,” or “die.” Our own physical, natural explanation of death is to cease to exist. That is not the definition of spiritual death at all, because you can’t cause a spirit to cease to exist. The whole spiritual world is a non-ending creation by God.

A Spirit created all matter. God is a Spirit, and those that worship Him must worship Him in spirit and truth. And a Spirit created all material. So, since when did the material become more real than the Creator?

How It All Began

The spiritual world is the real world, and this world is an expression of that world. This world was created by that world. That world existed without beginning and will exist without end. And a non-beginning, non-ending creature called God created the whole thing.

Man’s spirit will live, either with his Lord Jesus throughout eternity, or with his father the devil throughout eternity. Either one. He’ll never die.

He may lose his soul. If he hasn’t been born again, he’ll lose his soul, lose control over his will, mind and emotional faculties. The moment he steps out of this physical body, he’ll go unto his lord, Satan, into the pit, or the incarcerated place called hell – the jail of spirits that are alienated from God. They have to be jailed. If they were left to run loose, they would wreck and work havoc on the creation of God. And God won’t have that. Hell was created for the devil and his angels, and he’s taking men there with him.

Now, let’s talk about what happened from the time Jesus’ body, when He gave up His spirit or gave up the ghost, as the Scripture said, until He was resurrected and sat down at the right hand of the Father. I want to know what happened. Don’t you? Wouldn’t you like to know what happened and what took place in there? When you find out, it will be the very thing that brings the reality of the Christian life into your life, to the point where no one can ever take it away from you again. The power of God and the Word of God will be so solidified in your life that there’s not anyone that can take it away from you. They can’t do it. Once a man has this particular thing revealed to him, there’s no one that can take it away.

First, let’s look at the way Jesus ministered. I want to know what happened in the Garden of Eden. That will tell us some true facts that will open up the door to some things we need to know a little bit later on. The Bible says that God gave man dominion over all His handiwork. In the Book of Psalms, it talks about the stars that God made and all that He made in this universe, and says all the works of His hands and handiwork had been put under the foot of man and under the dominion of mankind.

Here’s what happened. God created a human body. Not a human being, but a human body. And He made that out of the elements of this earth. Then, from within Himself, He put life into that body. The Bible said He breathed life into that body. That was a dead thing. The spirit of man is the real man. And the light and the life of God is the life-giving source of that man. He had no lack of knowledge or of what he needed. He walked in a likeness of God – can you see God going hungry? Can you see God without enough to eat?

You’d say, “Why, no, certainly not.  If He needed any more, He’d just create more.”

Well, that’s the way He made man. Man is made in His own image and likeness, and He gave him this universe to have dominion over, and this world to live on and have dominion over this earth. By His faith and creative ability, He caused this world to feed him and take care of him in every way. Man didn’t even realize he was naked.

Then, man gave that dominion and authority over into the hands of an angel, a fallen angel by the name of Lucifer, who had his name changed to Satan when he fell out from his position as the number one angelic being of God. He was called “the anointed cherub.” He lost that anointing and was kicked out of authority because he had invented iniquity. It was found in him and he brought it into existence. He had no tempter because he created it.

Satan used the anointing of God to create iniquity. That’s why there’s no redemption for him. He used God’s power to invent, or bring into existence, a thing called sin.

The Big Takeover

Now, when Adam gave that creature the authority that God had given him, he made him the god of this world. That’s when he became the prince of the power of the air, using Adam’s authority, time scale and everything that God had given him. All of a sudden, man is limited. Now spiritual death has been lodged inside that man. The light got turned off. No inner power! No ability to create from within – only the ability to copy what already exists. And if the ground would produce, it would have to be done so, not by the creative ability from within, but by the scratching of the very hands and sweat of the man’s brow. He had to make that ground produce, because he had been cast down to its level.

A curse, the Bible calls it, had been put on him.

Where did this leave God? All of a sudden His man, His child, His creation, has a stepfather. And the Bible said that God gave this earth to the sons of men. He gave them dominion over it. He gave it to them to be god over! But when he turned and gave that dominion to Satan, look where it left God. It left Him on the outside looking in. He can’t do anything down there. He had no legal right to do anything about it. Could He manipulate and operate? No, because He’d be doing the very same thing that Satan did in the first place. And if God had injected Himself illegally into the earth, what Satan intended for Him to do was to fall for it, pull off an illegal act and turn the light off in God, and subordinate God to himself.

Satan intended to get God into such a trap that He couldn’t get out. That’s what He tried to do, and He did it with man. See, if he could get God to move illegally in the earth and do something that’s a lie – the Bible says that Satan is the father of all liars – he’d take Him because he’s the god of the earth. He has moved in with Adam’s authority and become god over this existence. And if he could get God to infringe on his territory, he’d take the rest of the universe away from Him. That’s what Satan was after!

Now you can see the complicated predicament that God’s in. You can understand why someone would say, “Wonder why God let’s all those wars go on?”

He doesn’t! There’s not anything He can do about it. He has given authority in the earth to the Christians to do something about it, and they’re not doing anything. They’re just sitting around. The devil is using Christians’ authority, and just running wild with it. We ought to be governing with the power of prayer, power of God, power of the witness and power of the Name of Jesus. That’s the way we’re supposed to be ruling this earth right now, with the love of God and in the Name of Jesus.

Now there’s coming a time when that time limit ends and Jesus will set up rule on this earth.  Praise the Lord! However, spiritual death lodged in that man’s spirit and created a situation where God had to do almost the same thing to a man named Abram that Satan did to Adam. The only difference was, God came on the scene. Instead of crawling in there on His belly like a snake, and using the body of a snake to get in, He came up to the man, tapped him on the shoulder and said, “I am Almighty God.” There wasn’t any doubt about Who was doing the talking, because it knocked old Abram right flat on his face.

God did it Himself. Because when He got through with it, the Bible says in Genesis 17, “And God went up from Abram.” He made this deal Himself. He made a contract, or covenant, with Abram.  And in this contract, simply because Abram accepted it, God changed his name to Abraham, made an agreement with him and gave him a new name. The whole world would know Abraham.

God’s Covenant with Abraham

God legally made an agreement with Abraham. He cut the skin of that man and that man’s blood was shed. Abraham gave his own blood in order to mark himself as a covenant man with God – a man that had gone into a legal agreement with God.

And God marked Himself. He said, “I’ve sealed Myself with this promise.” And everything that He wrote down in the Levitical law, everything that He gave His Word to do – all man had to do was stand on it as an agreement in faith – God would do it. Faith in what? Faith in that agreement!

Can you see that? That’s His Word. He sealed Himself with that Word. But if you won’t believe it, there’s not anything anyone can do for you. If you won’t stand for that, you’ll fall for something else. Every time. Satan makes that Word to no avail and it won’t produce if you won’t stand for it.

God agreed to do certain things for Abraham if Abraham would do certain things for Him, and give Him a way back into the earth. So he said, “All right, I’ll do it. You can use me, you can use all of my kinfolks, you can use all that I ever get.”

And God said, “Well, I’ll give you plenty. I’ll put plenty into your hand.” See, God’s funnelling things back into His own family once again. And it’s not too easy to do, because this bunch sometimes won’t listen to Him. He’s funnelling the cattle on a thousand hills back into old Abraham’s hands. He picked out a slab of ground over there that He wanted to use and had plans for, and began to funnel that into Abraham’s hands.

He had given His Word to Abraham. He had a working contract with God, and the prophets down through the years added God’s Words to it. And by the Holy Spirit there were different facets of it, different laws made and different things set up until that whole system, that whole Abrahamic Covenant, was made and completed. But there had to be a man born like that first man. God set that contract up in order to get that man into the earth.

The Grand Plan of Redemption

Let’s look at Ephesians 3:9. It says, “To make all men see what is the fellowship, or their part of the mystery, which from the beginning of the world hath been hid in God….”

The things that I’m talking about, God had these things hidden. He didn’t let Satan know everything He was doing. In fact, He didn’t let him know anything He was doing! It was hidden. And the prophets would get little glimpses of it. Abraham had a glimpse of it. They’d get glimpses of it and put it down, just enough to keep everybody going in the right direction and headed toward Jerusalem, and headed toward the cross. Because that was the centre of this mystery.

The mystery, by the way, is the plan of redemption.

Ephesians 3:10 says, “His intention in this is that now unto the principalities and the powers in heavenly places might be known by the church the manifold wisdom of God.”

You and I have the right to see into these things, because we are the born children of God. This is no longer a mystery hidden from us. The Bible says in 1 Corinthians 2, “Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard what God has in store for those that love Him. But it has been revealed to us by His Spirit.” We’re in the know! The Spirit of God has been sent to reveal these things, so we can know how to operate.

The devil doesn’t have any revelation knowledge. He cannot read into you. But he can put thoughts into your mind and make you react or respond to them, and when you shoot your mouth off, then he knows what you’re going to go do.

Jesus said not to cast that which is holy before the swine. They’ll take it and rare up and rend you with it. And the Bible said, “Had the princes of this world known, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory.”

See, the devil didn’t know. He had to kill Abel, because he thought Abel might be the one that would carry this thing out. God had given Satan just enough insight to know that if he didn’t get rid of the guy God had in place, He was going to get him.

God told Satan He was going to put His heel on his head. Satan didn’t have any doubt about that. So he’s out to stop it any way he can. And he knows if he just gets any inclination on Who it is, he’s going to kill him. He killed Abel that way – not really knowing – and he saw that didn’t work. So he just kept it up. Everyone that turned out to be a prophet, he’d go to work to kill him, thinking maybe this might be the One.

You have to remember, Satan didn’t know anything about the virgin birth. He didn’t think that could happen, just like a bunch of other guys I know that didn’t think it could happen. But it did! And really, it’s very simple when you begin to see through the mystery of it.

So God kept it hidden from Satan. He and Jesus working right on down through the line, setting this trap.

The Chosen One is Revealed

Even when Jesus was born, Satan wasn’t too sure. He knew something was up. He knew things were getting hotter, and hotter, and hotter on him. But he didn’t know Who it was, because he went down to Bethlehem and had everybody two years old and under killed there. He didn’t know exactly Who it was until Jesus walked in the Jordan River and John baptized Him. And the Spirit of the living God came upon Him, and there was a voice that came from heaven and said, “This is My Son, in Whom I am well pleased.”

Boy, the deal was on!  It didn’t last all day, because He wound up on the Mount of Temptation and Satan did everything he knew to kill him. He knew that this was Him. He knew this was the One!

Satan set out at that moment to get Him. He tried to push Jesus off a cliff and it didn’t work. He tried to stone Him, and it didn’t work. He tried everything he knew how to do, and it didn’t work.

What’s this Man doing? This Man is an Israelite, walking and ministering under the Abrahamic Covenant. He’s keeping the Covenant of God. He’s doing what God said do, and God’s honouring every moment of it.

Now, He didn’t introduce healing. Healing was introduced to Abraham in that Covenant. All the prophets operated in healing. Moses did, Elijah did and Elisha did. Elijah raised an old boy from the dead, a widow’s boy. He was staying there with them, so that’s the least he could do! Well, that sounds funny, but that’s true. He had an obligation to these people. God called on that woman to sustain him and she was doing what God said do, even though the neighbourhood probably talked awful about it. I mean, after all, him living there with that widow woman and all. I don’t imagine the religious folks thought too much about it, but nevertheless he got his job done and saved that nation!

Are you beginning to see some of the things about the way God thinks? God expected him to raise that boy from the dead. He did not expect him to sit by and let Satan rob that woman at this stage of the game. And He’s looking at you the same way. God doesn’t intend for you to sit by and let Satan steal right out from under your feet. No way!

Listen to me very carefully, because I want you to get this. There had to be a man born who could stand the test the first one had failed. Man was the key to the fall, and he was going to have to be the key to the redemption. God didn’t have a right to get involved in it and do it. Yet He was responsible, so He’s the One Who’s going to have to do it! This had to take place. There had to be a man and it had to be all man. He couldn’t just be part man, because that’s not legal. He had to be all God. He couldn’t be just part God, because that wouldn’t work. Because God created the man that fell.

See, the responsibility is in the hands of God. He didn’t have to fall. God made that man to where he was capable of not falling. He gave him the authority to stand against Satan. But he did it anyway.

So what kind of a man is this going to be? God cannot go back to the dust of the earth and make a new one, because He doesn’t own the dust of the earth anymore. The men that are operating and own the dust of the earth belong to Satan. The contract that God’s working on is only a partial contract, and it’s only good where the earth is that man’s standing on. God doesn’t have any right to butt in on it and say, “King’s X on that first one I gave authority to. I’m going to make another one.”  No, that doesn’t work!

God gave man authority and he gave that authority away. God honoured that authority and He’s still honouring it today. God is a just God.

The Last Adam

So here’s what God planned to do. He used His right that Abraham had given Him, and He caused a creature to be conceived from Himself inside the womb of a virgin. He used the Word of God, or His Covenant with Abraham, to get it done. The Word of God became flesh.

This Man is a carbon copy of the one that walked through the Garden of Eden. This Man is not an immortal Man. He is an eternal Man. Pure, clean, absolute – the very heart of God Himself walking inside an eternal body. He had complete and total control over that body, but it was not immortal. If it had been, it wouldn’t have died. Immortality means “not subject to death.” It became immortal at the resurrection of it. You’ll never touch it with death again, I’ll tell you that for sure. It’s impossible now, because it’s already been through it.

The Bible calls Him “the last Adam.” He’s a carbon copy of that first one. He’s an eternal man. Adam was built to live eternally in the physical body that he had. It didn’t have any flaws in it. It was built to live that way.

Medical science says the human body is totally recreated every seven to 11 years. Every cell in it is reproduced and recreated. And there’s no real, physical, natural and scientific reason for the thing to die if it’s never injured or hurt. It should live on forever, but it won’t. Because spiritual death came on the inside of that thing and caused malfunctions in it and brought death. The life was stopped. The life-giving source – the life, the power, the life of God was stopped – and that’s spiritual. That spiritual death will not produce life. It cannot. It produces curse and damnation, theft and destruction.

Now, what happened here? Here’s an eternal Man that has control over His entire being. He said, “My life is Mine to pick up or lay down. No man can take it from Me.” He’s ministering as a prophet under the Abrahamic Covenant. Right at the most crucial moment of His ministry, He’s ministering with the Word of God and the infilling of the Holy Spirit. He did not use any of His divine privileges to minister while He was in His earthly ministry.

He ministered as a prophet under the Abrahamic Covenant and went to the cross as the spotless Son of the living God. But here’s the part I want you to get: when He said, “It is finished,” on that cross, He was not speaking of the plan of redemption. The plan of redemption had just begun. There were still three days and three nights to be gone through before He went to the throne. Isn’t that true? What was finished?

The Abrahamic Covenant had come to a close! The final sacrifice was hanging on that cross. The priesthood had put it there. It was legal! The high priest of God hung the Lamb of God on the altar of the cross!

Click here for Part 2 of What Happened From the Cross to the Throne.

© 1997 – 2024 Eagle Mountain International Church Inc. Aka Kenneth Copeland Ministries. All Rights Reserved.

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