Eph 388-42 7/23/86, 146 11/3/85

DOCTRINE OF THE LIFESTYLE OF WISDOM

A. The lifestyle of wisdom emphasizes God relationship before people relationship.

1. The present trend in Christianity is to emphasize the believer’s experience with people as taking precedence over the believer’s experience or relationship with God.

2. This erroneous emphasis results in a philosophy that if you’re right in your relationship with people, you’re right in your relationship with God. This was the error made in the Garden after the man and woman had committed the original sin. This was the first sign of spiritual death. Knowing they were naked, they clothed themselves with fig leaves, adjusted to each other, and assumed that everything was alright. The assumption was destroyed when our Lord came in the Garden and they had to hide themselves.

3. Gate #5 precedes gate #6 in the divine dynasphere. Gate #5 is spiritual self-esteem, personal love for God. Gate #6 is spiritual autonomy, impersonal love for all mankind.

4. We as royal family have been born again to receive eternal life. Regeneration is the ministry of God the Holy Spirit at salvation, creating a human spirit for the imputation of eternal life, Tit 3:5; Jn 3:3. Regeneration, at the point of faith in Christ, is common to all dispensations. But from that point on, we have a challenge in the dispensation of the Church that is entirely different from any challenge ever given before or will ever be given again.

5. What makes the Church Age unique at the point of salvation is the baptism of the Spirit, whereby each one of us is entered into union with Christ. Simultaneously, God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit indwell the body of every believer under the concept of the unique life. Therefore, the baptism of the Spirit and resultant positional sanctification changes the concept of our experience in life; i.e., God emphasis takes priority over people emphasis.

6. But God is invisible, and invisible God can only become the object of our love through metabolized doctrine. This principle reveals the relationship between the unique life and the lifestyle of wisdom.

7. As long as the believer emphasizes his experience with people over his experience with God, he will always be under some form of punitive suffering, self-induced misery, divine discipline, and will never advance beyond spiritual childhood. The misery and suffering that comes from the self-induced agony under the law of volitional responsibility, and the additional and intensified misery from divine discipline is a forceful reminder that the protocol plan of God gives highest and #1 priority always to relationship with God, not to relationship with people.

8. Without this proper emphasis, believers can advance only so far, as evidenced by their preoccupation with the problem solving devices of spiritual childhood (rebound, faith-rest drill). But you have to grow up spiritually. You have to discover the greater and more extensive concepts of grace. To try to limit grace to the simplistic ideas of childhood is as ridiculous as childish souls and childish thinking occupying adult bodies. Those who still prefer basic doctrine reveal their eyes-on-people syndrome with all its accompanying problems. They spend their entire lives trying to manipulate God into doing what they want with regard to people. This is wrong priorities.

9. Relationship with God never takes #1 priority until you reach gate #5, spiritual self-esteem, with personal love for God as one of the major characteristics and your motivational virtue. From there you advance to spiritual autonomy. You will never straighten out your relationships with people and life nor advance beyond spiritual childhood until your #1 priority is relationship with God over relationship with people.

10. Experience with mankind does not produce any great, marvelous or fantastic experience with God. Christianity emphasizes right experience with God before there can be right experience with self or mankind.

11. Negative experience with God results in wrong experience with people. Wrong experience with God results in wrong experience with people. Right experience with God results in right experience with self and people.

12. Not only must personal love for God take precedence over impersonal love for all mankind, but occupation with Christ precedes all personal love relationships in life. Very few relationships in life ever succeed apart from virtue. Virtue in Christianity is gates #5 and #6. Virtue-love is the major problem solving device for the spiritually adult.

13. Therefore, the believer in Christ cannot put his relationship with people or self (which is even more subtle and evil) before his relationship with God. When you accept Christ as Savior, the first thing you must do is forget about yourself. Don’t be used for testimonies! You should forget all about what kind of person you are and where you came from. You must become aware of who and what God is by learning about Him. So you must find your right pastor-teacher who teaches about God so that you can love God.

14. To give meaning, purpose, and definition to life, we must first of all have personal love for God the Father. We must learn that He is the author of our portfolio of invisible assets, the grantor of our escrow blessings, the designer of our very own palace the divine dynasphere, and the mastermind of the protocol plan of God. We learn from the New Testament mystery doctrine that He did all these things for us in eternity past before we existed.

15. Therefore, we have to start with personal love for God; it must take precedence over everything else. We learn about the Lord Jesus Christ and what He did, and so develop personal love for Christ. We learn about the Holy Spirit and what He is doing for us, and so have personal love for the Spirit.

B. The lifestyle of wisdom demands complete inculcation regarding divine attributes.

1. If we are going to give #1 priority to God, we must start with who and what God is. Most people learn something about a person before they give complete committal to that person. Understanding divine attributes is the basis for personal love for God.

2. There are three divine attributes which must be understood by every believer before he can reach spiritual self-esteem and love God: God’s sovereignty, love, and omniscience. Though only the beginning, that’s necessary for spiritual self-esteem and personal love for God.

3. The sovereignty of God is His infinite, eternal will expressed in the doctrine of divine decrees. It is His comprehensive plan for history revealed in the dispensations and revealed to us in the protocol plan of God. Eph 1:11, “in whom also we have received an allotment [escrow blessings], having been predesigned for the purpose of a predetermined plan [protocol plan of God] from Him [God the Father].”

a. The sovereignty of God is defined as infinite, eternal, immutable, perfect divine volition. In human history, the sovereignty of God and the free will of man coexist by divine decree.

b. The sovereignty of God is related to the personality of God. Personality connotes self-consciousness and self-determination. God has eternally had these. God recognizes Himself as a person eternally and infinitely. As such, He functions with perfect integrity (virtue) and rationality. (When you have spiritual self-esteem, you also function with integrity and rationality, even before you encounter problems in relationship with self and others.)

c. God is infinite personality. Therefore, perfect holiness and virtue combine with His sovereign self-determination to define both His purpose, design, and execution of both the portfolio of invisible assets in eternity past as well as the protocol plan of God in time.

d. The sovereignty of God must be related to His infinity. By infinity is meant that God is without boundary or limitation. He unites in Himself those perfections which belong to His person and to His character. Therefore, God cannot be complicated by ignorance or absurdities, nor can mankind superimpose his silliness (such as legalism) on God.

e. God’s sovereignty cannot sin, tempt, solicit or condone sin, human good, or evil.

f. Divine motivation in the function of His sovereignty in history is for His own glory to which He has an eternal right. Jesus Christ controls history. There are no tragedies in history. Man by man’s volition brings himself to tragedies, but in reality he is following the normal functions under the law of volitional responsibility.

g. God recognizes His own glory and claims it in the interest of absolute truth. The lifestyle of wisdom begins with the glory of God (not glorifying God yet). Absolute truth is doctrine, and the lifestyle of wisdom is the metabolization of doctrine. You must learn about the glory of God before you can glorify God.

h. The sovereignty of God is never motivated by self-praise. God already has His glory, and He claims it in the interest of absolute truth.

i. Infinity characterizes all that God does: the function of His sovereign will, the function of His love and omniscience, His policy of grace, how it works and how it doesn’t work. Divine infinity is intensive rather than extensive. It gives force and emphasis. Being intensive, He has infinite energy. Under the lifestyle of wisdom, God has provided a way for us to have spiritual energy, which starts with spiritual self-esteem.

j. The infinity of God is related to three factors in addition to His sovereignty: His self-existence, His immutability, and His integrity or holiness.

(1) The infinity of God related to His self-existence means there never was a time when God did not have perfect spiritual self-esteem. He is aware of His self-existence, and He sees it in its true, eternal, infinite perspective.

(2) Immutability is described by “Jesus Christ, the same yesterday, today, and forever.” God the Father and God the Holy Spirit are also immutable and unchangeable.

(3) Integrity or holiness refers to God’s virtue and His virtue-love as a problem solving device.

k. The sovereignty of God is also related to your portfolio of invisible assets.

(1) The sovereignty of God provided your escrow blessings and the computer assets of election and predestination. The highest manifestation of the grace of God is provided in that one rom chip with the printout of election and predestination. You can’t get any higher in the field of grace than understanding these issues.

(2) Equal privilege under election is your very own priesthood; equal opportunity is your logistical grace support.

(3) Equal privilege under predestination is union with Christ, becoming royal family of God. This is one of the most fantastic, all-time greatest manifestations of the grace of God. Equal opportunity of predestination is the provision of your very own palace, the operational- type divine dynasphere with its eight gates.

l. In addition, the sovereignty of God, in providing suffering for blessing, provided momentum.

(1) Spiritual self-esteem needs not only doctrine but also undeserved suffering, providential preventative suffering, to advance to spiritual autonomy.

(2) In spiritual autonomy, with the full package of virtue- love as a problem solving device, you can pass momentum testing at gate #7. The four parts to momentum testing require that you have occupation with the person of Christ and impersonal love for all mankind.

(3) With the attainment of spiritual maturity at gate #8, God’s magnificent grace again provides suffering for blessing; evidence testing is the highest honor God can bestow upon any Church Age believer.

m. The sovereignty of God provides a spiritual gift for every member of the royal family of God.

4. The love of God is related to the computer asset of predestination.

a. God is sovereign. Therefore, His love is self-motivated and totally compatible with His divine essence.

b. God is eternal and infinite; therefore, His love is eternal and infinite.

c. God has three categories of love. He has love for self, which is His spiritual self-esteem, love for the other members of the Trinity, and impersonal love for creatures, which resulted in the provision of our salvation.

d. God’s love for self is toward His perfect righteousness, His perfect spiritual self-esteem. God the Father personally loves the perfect righteousness of God the Son and God the Holy Spirit; the same is true of the other two members of the Trinity.

e. Problem solving must occur when God deals with creatures, like angels and mankind. In problem solving, God has impersonal love toward creatures: toward angels since the fall of Satan, and toward mankind since the fall of Adam.

f. God’s impersonal love as His problem solving device is stated in Jn 3:16. “God so loved the world that He gave His uniquely born Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.” This is God’s impersonal love toward man who is not only spiritually dead but in a state of total depravity.

g. When any fallen creature believes in Christ, he receives the perfect righteousness of God, and that’s when the Father, Son, and Spirit have a personal love for that individual.

h. There is not one ounce of emotion in God’s perfect love. So don’t ever superimpose your emotions on God; that’s not part of your relationship with Him. How you feel has nothing to do with your spiritual status quo. Emotion is strictly a part of your interaction with other people. You can feel terrible and be a spiritual adult filled with the Spirit.

i. God’s love cannot increase and does not diminish. God’s love cannot be changed or altered by human failure. God’s love exists with or without an object. Hence, God’s love is not sustained by rapport, attraction, human merit, or spiritual worthiness.

j. God’s love is free from any patronizing influence by mankind. You cannot patronize or bribe God with anything.

5. Omniscience is God’s knowledge about creation, what is actual and possible. God knows perfectly, eternally, and simultaneously all that is knowable, both the actual and the possible. Therefore, there’s no limit to the knowledge of God about His creatures.

a. The omniscience programs into prom chips His knowledge about creatures. On your prom chip is recorded your every thought, motive, decision, and action. The printout at the end of your life will read either winner or loser.

b. Since God is infinite, His knowledge is infinite. Since God is eternal, His knowledge is eternal. Since God is sovereign, His knowledge is superior and in control at all times.

c. God not only knows our every thought, motive, decision, and action, but He also knows what we could have thought or decided or done. He knows down to the last generation of the Millennium what would have happened and all its repercussions if one factor in your life would have been different.

d. The omniscience of God is related to the secondary assets of our portfolio of invisible assets. In eternity past, God programmed every prom or free will of man chip.

C. Documentation for the Lifestyle of Wisdom. Eph 1:17, “in order that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of Glory, may give you a lifestyle of wisdom and revelation about Him [Father] through metabolized doctrine.”

D. The lifestyle of wisdom demands the understanding and utilization of your portfolio of invisible assets, Eph 1:18.

E. The lifestyle of wisdom is characterized by spiritual self-esteem.

1. Spiritual self-esteem is the beginning of contentment in life, which is not necessarily the realization of success and the fulfillment of your dreams and aspirations. Contentment is tantamount to capacity for happiness and tranquility of soul under every circumstance of life.

2. 2 Cor 12:10, “For this reason, I find contentment in weaknesses [providential preventative suffering], in slanders [people testing], in pressures [thought testing], in persecutions [system testing], in stresses [disaster testing] on behalf of Christ; for when I am weak, then I am strong.”

a. Paul found contentment through Bible doctrine and arriving at spiritual self-esteem. When you are content under slander from people, you have arrived at spiritual self-esteem.

b. Pressures as a warm-up for thought testing are far greater than those problems cured by faith-rest. Phil 4:11-13; 1 Tim 6:6-8; Heb 13:5 also teach that contentment begins at spiritual self-esteem, continues through spiritual autonomy, and reaches its peak at spiritual maturity.

3. Spiritual self-esteem is characterized by great mental stability, i.e., the correct and accurate application of metabolized doctrine to both adversity and prosperity. This is the stabilized mental attitude of Rom 12:2-3. “Stop being conformed to this age, but be transformed by the renovation of your thinking, that you may prove what the will of God is, namely that it is good, well-pleasing, and complete. For I say through the grace which has been given to me to everyone who is among you, stop thinking about self in terms of arrogance beyond what you ought to think, but think in terms of sanity for the purpose of being rational without illusion as God has assigned to each one of us a standard of thinking from doctrine.”

4. Spiritual self-esteem is characterized by self-assurance, which is based upon correct and accurate application of metabolized doctrine only. Doctrine not metabolized cannot be accurately applied.

5. Spiritual self-esteem is characterized by grace orientation to life. This is based on correct and accurate application of grace principles without distorting them. The tendency in spiritual childhood is to distort grace, causing yourself to be in an irresponsible situation, and then calling on God to work miracles for you and make it stop hurting.

6. Spiritual self-esteem is doctrinal orientation to reality, the maintenance of humility, the avoidance of inordinate ambition and competition, the development of spiritual common sense, the development of spiritual independence, and a sense of humor.

7. Spiritual self-esteem is characterized by good decisions from a position of strength based on divine viewpoint thinking and motivation from personal love for God.

8. Spiritual self-esteem is characterized by problem solving devices that always work, such as virtue-love and hope ² and ³. These solve problems of inadequacy, fear, emotional problems, personality identity, and niche orientation. Spiritual self-esteem is the beginning of knowing how to live and learning how to die. Dying is a part of living. Spiritual self- esteem is the point at which believers begin to die magnificently.

9. Spiritual self-esteem is the beginning of a personal sense of destiny divorced from fantasizing and arrogance. A personal sense of destiny is related to solving your problems related to God first, then to self, and then to others.

10. Spiritual self-esteem is basically where epistemological rehabilitation takes hold. Epistemological rehabilitation is all the doctrine you learn from the point of salvation to the point of spiritual self-esteem. Epistemological rehabilitation is all the doctrine perceived, metabolized, and applied by which the believer advances to the point of spiritual self-esteem.

11. Spiritual self-esteem means the believer is in command of self. He has self-control, self-restraint, poise, and self-regulation. You cannot accurately and properly communicate with others apart from command of yourself. All successful relationships in life are based on good, clear, accurate communication. Furthermore, you cannot command others unless you have command of yourself.

12. You have a new attitude toward life when you reach spiritual self- esteem. Personal love for God reverses all the priorities of life, giving you a new mental attitude and a new scale of values. Your thinking undergoes a tremendous change. The believer in spiritual self-esteem makes his own applications of doctrine to his own experiences. The believer is now qualified for providential preventative suffering which advances him to the next stage of spiritual autonomy. To pass providential preventative suffering, you must attain spiritual self-esteem.

13. Spiritual self-esteem is characterized by that phase of the unique life known as “Christ being formed in you,” as per Gal 4:19. Christ is not formed in any believer until he reaches spiritual self-esteem. Until that point, he is very definitely in spiritual childhood. Jn 10:26, “If anyone serves Me, let him follow Me, and where I am [prototype divine dynasphere], there shall My servant also be [operational-type divine dynasphere]. If anyone serves Me, the Father will honor him.” The Father honors the believer in spiritual self-esteem with providential preventative suffering.

F. The lifestyle of wisdom is characterized by spiritual autonomy.

1. Spiritual autonomy includes the continuation of the contentment begun in spiritual self-esteem, and reaches its peak in maturity. In spiritual self-esteem you begin to orient to what God has designed for you personally.

2. There is a perpetuation of mental stability in spiritual autonomy. Prov 19:8 tells us that our mental attitude, begun in spiritual self-esteem, is continued. “He who gets wisdom loves his own soul [momentum from metabolized doctrine that results in spiritual self-esteem]; he who cherishes understanding prospers [in spiritual maturity].” Phil 2:5, “Keep on having this mental attitude in you which was also in Christ Jesus.” This is fulfilled by spiritual autonomy.

3. Spiritual self-esteem provides the highest motivation which is personal love for God. Personal love for God is the basis for forming spiritual self-esteem. Spiritual self-esteem eliminates the arrogance factor in the believer’s life. Spiritual autonomy provides impersonal love, which gives you a tremendous problem solving advantage. Spiritual autonomy means you are now spiritually independent or self-directing. In spiritual autonomy you finally discover that only virtue-love solves relationship problems with God, self and others. People relationship problems can never be solved by personal love.

4. Spiritual autonomy is characterized by cognitive self-confidence.

a. With this comes another way of eliminating arrogance.

b. Self-confidence is not based on your talent, ability, success, attractiveness, admiration, or respect from others. This cognitive self-confidence is based entirely upon the metabolized doctrine in your soul, and the fact that you know exactly how to use it without any arrogance. Spiritual autonomy is an almost total freedom from arrogance because of its very nature.

c. All doctrine used in spiritual self-esteem to pass providential preventative suffering results in cognitive self-confidence. This means you have the ability to handle every problem in life, especially the difficult momentum tests, and later evidence testing in maturity.

d. Spiritual autonomy is preparation for spiritual maturity, which demands that you solve your problems and meet your day by day life on your own, totally apart from anyone’s encouragement or from any external motivation. Your motivation, capacity for life, and blessing comes from inside of you.

e. Believers have a tendency to seek doctrine through their present experience rather than to seek the Lord through doctrine. Spiritual autonomy straightens out that principle.

5. Spiritual autonomy is characterized by and understands true grace orientation.

a. The believer with spiritual autonomy doesn’t distort grace as most believers do, asking God to make it stop hurting after they make their own misery.

b. Grace is the genius of God, doctrine is the manifestation of that genius, and spiritual adulthood is the glorification of that genius. The believer who reaches spiritual autonomy glorifies the genius of God in grace.

c. Grace is logistical provision, the equal opportunity of election. Logistical grace, as God’s provision of life support blessings to keep you alive and spiritual provisions for you to grow in grace, is imputed to the perfect righteousness of God in you whether you’re a winner or a loser. Understanding this causes you to realize that grace is not to be used as a short-order miracle excuse to get out of your troubles.

d. In spiritual autonomy, grace orientation has spiritual muscle for correct and accurate application of grace principles. These grace principles are applied in momentum testing.

(1) From the application of grace principles in people testing, you have the tolerance of impersonal love for all.

(2) In system testing, you maintain poise and professionalism under the pressure of unjust treatment, and you perpetuate your high standards of workmanship during unfair treatment.

(3) In thought testing, you have the ability to maintain humility as the virtue that avoids self-effacement, self-pity, and self- abnegation.

(4) In disaster testing, you apply such principles as Job did in Job 1:21 and 2:9-10.

6. Doctrinal orientation to reality is never greater than in spiritual autonomy. Correct and accurate application of metabolized doctrine under momentum testing is the means of advancing to spiritual maturity.

7. Greater decisions from a position of strength are made so that the believer avoids the failure of fulfilling the protocol plan of God. Protocol teaches that a wrong thing done in a wrong way is wrong. A right thing done in a wrong way is wrong. A wrong thing done in a right way is wrong. Under the protocol plan of God, a right thing must be done in a right way before it’s right.

8. In spiritual autonomy you have personal control of your life.

a. You understand and accept your own limitations, and at the same time you recognize there are no limitations in advance to spiritual maturity.

b. You have personal control of your life by refraining from interfering in the lives of others. You cannot control others and at the same time maintain control your own life. The principle is very simple: one life, one priesthood.

c. In spiritual autonomy you get away from that obnoxious tendency of the weak controlling the strong, a phenomenon which pervades the devil’s world and can be seen in every area of life.

9. The believer in spiritual autonomy is in total command of himself.

a. The Greek word AUTONOMIA, or autonomy, means to live under one’s own laws so that one is independent whether he’s a slave or free, whether he’s in disaster or prosperity.

b. This independence is dependence on doctrine.

c. This independence is a system of thinking that never fails because it is the thinking of Bible doctrine in your soul.

d. Hence, autonomy means the status of being independent, free, and self-directed. Autonomy also refers to the sovereignty of reason in morals and in self-determination. Spiritual autonomy is the dynamic status of spiritual self-esteem plus providential preventative suffering.

e. Having passed providential preventative suffering, you now have self-control, self-restraint, poise, and self-regulation. If you’re alone, you’re not lonely. If you’re in a crowd, you can be sociable. You can handle any situation at any time.

f. The believer with spiritual autonomy is in command of himself from metabolized doctrine which fulfills the sovereignty of his thinking in his life.

g. In command of self, the believer has better communication with others resulting in better relationships with others. The combined restraints of humility and impersonal love remove possessiveness and abnormal competitiveness with others mentally, socially, and spiritually.

11. As a result of all these characteristics, spiritual autonomy is qualified for momentum testing.

12. Spiritual autonomy is characterized by that phase of the unique life known as “Christ being at home in your right lobe,” Eph 3:17

G. The lifestyle of wisdom is characterized by spiritual maturity.

1. In maturity the believer reaches a peak of maximum capacity for happiness, as a result of combining spiritual autonomy with momentum testing.

a. This means you have the highest contentment possible in this life. It means that no matter what your circumstances, you are content. You have perfect happiness.

b. This means you’re free from the terrible rat race of competing with others. You’re not embarrassed by what you do; you don’t feel threatened by the superiority of others. You’re perfectly and totally content and happy with your status quo in life, whether it is one highly regarded by others or not.

c. Apart from Bible doctrine, God graciously provides adversity in our experience, called suffering for blessing, that we may grow stronger and that we may find contentment in both adversity and prosperity.

2. Spiritual maturity is characterized by great mental stability. This is the ability to think doctrine and the emergence of wisdom.

a. Human I.Q. is not a factor in this characteristic. Those with low I.Q. or high I.Q. have the arrogant tendency of justifying their state, which is not necessary. We have no control over the genetics that determine our I.Q.

b. Spiritual I.Q. is provided by the grace apparatus for perception (GAP). Its use results in wisdom. Wisdom is the key to the lifestyle of wisdom. Wisdom is the mental stability that comes from the perception, metabolization, and application of Bible doctrine.

c. Just as with spiritual self-esteem and spiritual autonomy, spiritual maturity has the ability to put doctrine before experience, so that you put your love of God before your love of people. This results in a fantastic life.

d. Mental stability includes the exclusion of emotion in the Christian way of life. You may have emotional response to doctrine you learn, but that is a human response and not a part of your spiritual life. When you reach spiritual maturity, your mental stability is so great that you enjoy your emotions to the maximum, but you never include them as a part of the Christian way of life.

e. With mental stability, you have the ability to make correct and accurate application of doctrine to evidence testing as well as to every other experience in your life.

3. Spiritual maturity makes maximum use of virtue-love as a problem solving device. This puts you on a high and fantastic plane of life, for you are free from arrogance. You are different from those who succeed or prosper in life and become arrogant as a result.

4. Spiritual maturity is characterized by cognitive independence.

a. First, there is epistemological rehabilitation, which is all the doctrine learned during spiritual childhood from the time of salvation to the point of reaching spiritual self-esteem. Then a tremendous amount of doctrine is accumulated in you as you advance from spiritual self-esteem to spiritual autonomy to spiritual maturity.

b. In spiritual maturity you have the ability to apply doctrine to experience, never experience to doctrine. Experience can illustrate doctrine but should not be applied to it. Doctrine must always be applied to experience. If your experience is in conflict with what the Bible says, the Bible is always right.

c. Cognitive self-confidence in spiritual autonomy is the basis for passing momentum testing and advancing to spiritual maturity. Cognitive independence in spiritual maturity is the basis for meeting and passing evidence testing. The highest honor God can ever give you on this earth is to make you a witness for the Prosecution in Satan’s appeal trial.

d. Cognitive independence is the maximum metabolization of doctrine resulting in wisdom so that you become independent of counseling, advice, or encouragement from others. You are your own encouragement from the doctrine resident in your own soul.

e. Cognitive independence comes from passing all four parts of momentum testing: people, system, thought, and disaster testing.

5. Spiritual maturity is characterized by maximum grace orientation to life.

a. Grace thinking, grace motivation, grace decisions, and grace actions become the basis for application to experience, both in adversity and in prosperity.

b. Grace orientation avoids legalism, emotionalism, self- effacement, asceticism, all of which can extend to fanaticism, sociopathic behavior, and mental illness.

c. Grace orientation in spiritual maturity is total and complete sanity.

6. Spiritual maturity is characterized by doctrinal orientation to reality. This includes maximum capacity for prosperity, which comes in the form of the distribution of escrow blessings for time; and with it, maximum ability for application of doctrine to experience and the emergence of spiritual common sense. Spiritual maturity has the maximum ability to unsnarl every traffic jam of adversity in your personal life.

7. The greatest decisions in life are made from a position of maximum strength, that being spiritual maturity. The mature believer has established the right priorities in his life, so that he makes good decisions from a position of strength consistently and constantly.

8. The mature believer has a total understanding of the mechanics of the protocol plan of God, resulting in consistently great application of doctrine to experience. As a result, he has maximum control of his life.

a. This means the maximum utilization of the privacy of his priesthood to the glory of God. It means maximum effectiveness in prayer. It means the maximum function of virtue-love as a problem solving device.

b. There is finally the elimination of all those areas of arrogance so prone to come upon us like arrogant competitiveness, subjective comparativeness, and conspiracy from inordinate ambition.

c. The mature believer lives his life as unto the Lord rather than as unto man.

d. The mature believer always takes the responsibility for his own decisions. When given promotion or authority, he takes full responsibility for those under his command.

e. The mature believer does not seek to control or interfere in the lives of others. He is free from power lust. He will neither tamper with others’ lives, nor will he seek to coerce them.

9. The maximum life is the result of spiritual maturity. There is a maximum sense of destiny through the increase of personal love for God, through the utilization of virtue-love as a problem solving device, through the execution of the protocol plan of God.

a. Therefore, the mature believer recognizes that he has fulfilled his purpose in life. As a result, his destiny is in God’s hands right up through his dying.

b. The mature believer always dies well under the doctrine of dying grace, no matter what the circumstances. He recognizes that dying is a part of living, and that both living and dying are a part of life on this earth. Often the mature believer’s dying is prolonged and painful. He demonstrates his magnificent spiritual maturity to those in his periphery, for he still has all the characteristics of maturity. The mature believer lives magnificently and dies magnificently.

c. Dying grace is the ultimate escrow blessing for time. It is the direct result of the unique life and the lifestyle of wisdom.

10. Spiritual maturity is characterized by that phase of the unique life known as “Christ being glorified in the body.”

a. Phil 1:20-21, “According to my intense concentration and resultant hope [Hope 2 and 3] that in nothing shall I be disgraced [flunking suffering for blessing], but with all integrity, even now as always, Christ shall be glorified in my body [the experience of spiritual maturity] whether by life or by death; for me living is Christ; dying is profit.”

b. Eph 1:17, “in order that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you a lifestyle of wisdom, even revelation about Him through metabolized doctrine.”

H. The lifestyle of wisdom is characterized by momentum through testing.

1. The believer in spiritual self-esteem goes through providential preventative suffering to reach spiritual autonomy, 2 Cor 12:7-10.

2. The believer in spiritual autonomy goes through momentum testing to reach spiritual maturity.

3. The believer in spiritual maturity who passes evidence testing glorifies God to the maximum.

4. Each category of suffering in spiritual adulthood is designed for blessing.

5. The mature believer has reached the peak of blessing, having faced the greatest contingencies under both adversity and prosperity. The combination of adversity from suffering for blessing and prosperity from escrow blessing brings the mature believer to the peak of the lifestyle of wisdom.

I. The Application of the Lifestyle of Wisdom.

1. Contradictions cannot exist in the lifestyle of wisdom (i.e., protocol plan of God).

a. The lifestyle of wisdom is the winner part of the protocol plan of God.

b. All contradictions in the life of the believer are contrary to the lifestyle of wisdom.

c. Contradictions are generally caused by sin, ignorance of doctrine, or living in the dungeon of the cosmic system. God is perfect; His protocol plan is perfect. Consequently, imperfections and failures originate from the believer’s negative volition. So the lifestyle of wisdom has a minimum amount of negative volition and of reaction to Bible doctrine which hurts and cuts deeply into the soul.

d. God’s protocol plan was designed to be lived inside your very own palace, the operational-type divine dynasphere, prefabricated for you by God the Father in eternity past. This results in the elimination of contradictions in your life.

e. Either the believer will reside, function, and continue momentum inside his own palace, or he will eventually become a loser through residence in the cosmic system, with results such as apostasy, reversionism, moral or immoral degeneracy. Becoming a loser as a Christian is a contradiction to the protocol plan of God, and therefore a contradiction to the lifestyle of wisdom.

f. The lifestyle of wisdom eliminates inconsistencies and contradictions in the life through the consistent residence, function and momentum inside the divine dynasphere.

g. In order to continue in the divine dynasphere, you cannot be in a state of ignorance. You have to know how to rebound when you’re out of the divine dynasphere, and how to recognize when you’re in the cosmic system. It’s very important to understand the gates of the cosmic system, because the lifestyle of wisdom demands that you know your status at all times. You must know how to handle your failures so that they are converted into victory through the grace of God.

2. The believer in the Church Age cannot account for his motives, thoughts, decisions and actions in undefinable terms.

a. The lifestyle of wisdom means you can define the terms of Christianity and relate them to your life on a daily basis.

b. The protocol plan of God has its own technical vocabulary, its own language based on the original languages of the Scripture. Through the consistent function of operation Z which is the metabolization of doctrine at gate #4 of the divine dynasphere, the believer will master technical language resulting in the mental attitude called “conceptualism.” Losers are losers because they don’t understand their own ignorance of doctrine.

c. This means the believer’s #1 priority is cognition: perception, metabolization, and application of Bible doctrine. You learn and apply doctrine in your relationship with God, in relationship to yourself, and to the circumstances around you.

d. This means cognition of your computer assets in your portfolio of invisible assets. Each of us have equal privilege and equal opportunity to have a lifestyle of wisdom.

e. The necessity of accounting for your own life in definable terms means you must understand when you are failing and when you are succeeding.

f. Therefore, you should be able to understand what’s going on in your own life at any time. You are not dependent upon counseling from others. You learn directly from the teaching in the pulpit and then apply it directly to yourself. In this way, you maintain the privacy of your life before the Lord.

g. Just as mankind is born without knowledge and without language, rendering him incapable of thought, so the believer is born again without spiritual language, without a vocabulary, without knowledge about God or His plan. The believer’s intellect makes quantum leaps toward the lifestyle of wisdom through daily perception metabolization, and application of Bible doctrine in every circumstance of life.

3. The lifestyle of wisdom cannot be executed through the thinking, counseling, bullying, coercion, or influence of another.

a. The royal priest is designed to walk without crutches. This means you cannot think, be motivated, make decisions, solve problems, or function through the advice, counseling, or flattery from someone else. There is communication in human relationships, but the lifestyle of wisdom demands that you, as a royal priest, live your own life as unto the Lord.

b. The lifestyle of wisdom is designed for you to have the necessary resources in your own soul of Bible doctrine to meet the problems, exigencies, and blessings of life.

c. The privacy of the royal priesthood permits positive volition toward doctrine taught by one’s right pastor so that you learn the information necessary to fulfill and execute God’s plan for your life.

d. No believer can advance in the spiritual life on the soul of another believer. Every royal priest must advance on the content of doctrine in his own soul.

e. Every believer must learn to master the problem solving devices because every believer-priest must solve his own problems inside his own palace. For spiritual childhood, problem solving devices include rebound and the three stages of the faith-rest drill. For spiritual adulthood, virtue-love, hope 2 and hope 3 are the problem solving devices. The believer must use the tools of his own soul to fulfill the protocol plan of God. As a result we become spiritually self-sustaining.

4. The lifestyle of wisdom is freedom from fear.

a. The more you surrender to fear, the more things you fear.

b. To the extent that you surrender to fear, you increase the power of fear over your life.

c. The more things that acquire the power to cause you to fear, the greater becomes your submission to fear, worry and anxiety, resulting in the pattern of a loser, i.e., a believer who does not attain the lifestyle of wisdom.

d. Fear, like anger, is both a sin and an emotion, and is therefore totally irrational. Emotions are not rational unless they are submissive to doctrine.

e. Fear is lack of thinking under pressure; courage is the ability to think and apply metabolized doctrine not only under pressure, but in your daily life. Courage is not some instantaneous physiological rush that is stimulated by unusual circumstances. True moral courage is lived by the Christian hero who thinks and applies doctrine day by day, moment by moment, under all circumstances.

f. Confidence in God at gate #5, our motivational virtue, results in fantastic courage toward mankind at gate #6. If you have spiritual self-esteem from personally loving God, then you are not afraid of man or of what man can do to you.

g. With personal love for God and impersonal love for all mankind, fear as a sin and an emotion is eliminated. Emotions are not tools for cognition; they are not the criteria for the Christian way of life.

5. The lifestyle of wisdom results in both personality identity and niche orientation.

a. Where admiration exists, imitation is soon to follow. By imitating those we admire, we bury our own personality trying to be someone we are not. Some people never find who and what they really are.

b. But with the wisdom from metabolized doctrine we learn to admire people without trying to imitate their personality.

c. Many believers have neutralized their potential from their portfolio of invisible assets by trying to mimic or imitate someone they admire.

d. All three stages of spiritual adulthood are characterized by personality identity and niche orientation to life. The adult believer functions under his own personality and has comfort within the framework of God’s provision for his own portfolio.

e. This eliminates the macho/jock syndrome. This eliminates fantasizing about yourself in the hero image. It also eliminates trying to imitate someone you admire when God intends for you to be something He admires in the execution of His protocol plan.

f. Personality identity is related to finding one’s niche in life; it is also a part of the lifestyle of wisdom.

g. This prepares the way for you to function from the base of dynamic humility in advancing to maturity as you receive both suffering for blessing and prosperity from logistical grace.

6. The lifestyle of wisdom attains spiritual maturity in the following manner.

a. Gate #5, spiritual self-esteem, is the beginning of spiritual adulthood. Gate #6 is spiritual autonomy. Gate #8 is spiritual maturity, the point of glorifying God.

b. In each of these three stages, the believer advances through the perception of doctrine, which is the momentum of the Christian way of life. Added to this is suffering for blessing.

c. Spiritual self-esteem passing providential preventative suffering results in spiritual autonomy. Providential preventative suffering is made up of four different types of tests as warm-ups for the momentum tests of gate #7. Spiritual autonomy passing momentum testing results in reaching spiritual maturity. Spiritual maturity faces evidence testing which is the highest honor God can bestow on any believer, for it is the means by which the believer can glorify Him to the maximum.

d. Wisdom has a winner, and the winner has wisdom. There is no greater demonstration of wisdom than when the believer in spiritual adulthood is undergoing suffering for blessing.

7. Wisdom means knowing your wealth, knowing your invisible assets.

a. Eph 1:8, “From which riches of grace, He [Father] has made us super-rich [portfolio of invisible assets] by means of all wisdom and application.”

b. The portfolio of invisible assets are divided into three categories.

(1) Primary assets include:

(a) Escrow blessings for time and eternity. God the Father, as the Grantor, deposited greater blessings into escrow for every believer in eternity past. These are conveyed upon the believer’s fulfillment of the escrow conditions, i.e., the execution and fulfillment of the protocol plan of God.

(b) Computer assets.

(1) Election: equal opportunity is the royal priesthood; equal privilege is logistical grace blessings.

(2) Predestination: equal opportunity is union with Christ; equal privilege is the operational-type divine dynasphere.

(2) Secondary assets include:

(a) Volitional assets are related to positive volition toward Bible doctrine and toward the mechanics of the protocol plan of God.

(b) Production assets, which result from spiritual growth, relate to our service and our spiritual gift.

(d) Personnel assets refer to the distribution of spiritual gifts at the point of salvation. Spiritual gifts are not really operational until the believer reaches spiritual adulthood.

(3) Invisible impact assets include:

(a) Personal impact, i.e., blessing by association with those in your periphery.

(b) Historical impact is your pivot function.

c. In Eph 1:8b, “by means of all wisdom” refers to the lifestyle of wisdom. “And application” refers to the application of metabolized doctrine.

d. The King James Version’s use of “prudence” was a correct word to use at the time of writing. Prudence means the ability to regulate and discipline your life under the right priorities (Bible doctrine as #1), through the exercise of reason and common sense; therefore, the application of metabolized doctrine. This requires consistent residence inside your very own palace the divine dynasphere, under the enabling power of the Spirit, and momentum from metabolized doctrine.

8. The lifestyle of wisdom mandates metabolized doctrine.

a. Col 1:9, “For this reason, we also [Paul, Timothy, Titus, Luke, et al], from the day we heard [the Epaphras report], we do not stop praying for you, in fact, asking that you may be filled with the metabolized doctrine of His will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding.”

b. Paul not only prayed for headquarters Ephesus, but also for other parts of the Roman Province of Asia. Colossae was the pivot headquarters for the Lycus Valley. By praying for the Colossian church, he was also praying for Laodicea and Hierpolis.

c. Col 2:2-3, “that their right lobes may be encouraged, having been knit together by virtue-love and the attainment of all wealth [portfolio of invisible assets, escrow blessings] that comes from the full assurance of understanding [attainment of spiritual adulthood] resulting in metabolized doctrine [metabolized knowledge] of God’s mystery, Christ Jesus, in Whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.”

d. The lifestyle of wisdom cannot be divorced from metabolized doctrine. It is the accumulation of doctrine that opens your eyes to what has been provided and to the mechanics by which you attain these things.

e. Metabolized doctrine cannot be divorced from the function of Operation Z. If you decide doctrine is important, you will expose yourself to the teaching of your right pastor-teacher. You must be filled with the Spirit. Your part is to listen, a non-meritorious function. The Holy Spirit has the merit and He communicates that doctrine to your human spirit. Now it becomes spiritual phenomena. It now goes to your left lobe where the doctrine is academically understood. But it is of no value to you until it becomes metabolized doctrine, which requires the second step of your positive volition: understanding and believing the doctrine taught. Then the Holy Spirit carries that doctrine to the right lobe where it becomes epignosis.

f. 2 Pet 3:15, “Just as our beloved brother Paul, according to the wisdom given to him wrote you”; then Peter goes on to recommend the Pauline epistles as the ultimate in the lifestyle of wisdom.

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