Good Morning, Mike,

WOW!! What a MEGA message you have been chosen to bring to us! First let me say HOW VERY VALUABLE this message of Christ identifying fully with His people is. It is beyond valuation.
Like many I have suffered so greatly and so long being deceived by the false doctrine of “Christ is holy and you are a dirty sinner, why would he even talk to you, it must be someone else he died for, because he is too holy to even look your way, let alone include you in his eternal purpose”
In this letter you have shot that lie so full of holes that I hope it will never fly again in this ‘airspace’ (but i will try to remain vigilant with my Heb 4:15 anti- aircraft gun just in case). All I can say is that as usual you are bringing to me a working understanding of the scriptures as they reveal the Son of man in us, and I hope to continue looking for a working understanding till I leave this body of death because only the true understanding works.

1Jn 3:2 Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is.

I have been shown that Christ is in my body of sinful flesh suffering and dying with me, feeling every pain and disappointment sharing every joy and He will continue, remain and abide into completion in me if i remain and am not moved away from the hope of the gospel.
Your life- giving letter reminds me so much of this important fact: HE FULLY IDENTIFIES WITH HIS PEOPLE!! HOW FULLY DO YOU WANT?!
I can conceive of no greater way One can identify with His people than to take up residence in them and feel EVERYTHING they feel; all that shame, all that pain, all that fear and terror, all that joy, all that hope, all that growing and experience, the doubt, the rejection, the separation, the comfort, the victory, the resurrection to newness of LIFE!!
The message that Christ Jesus IS right now in a body of sinful flesh and that body is your body and it is my body, and He is transforming it as we speak; put to death in flesh made alive in spirit
I may have said it wrong in my haste to try to get across a response, but I somehow know in my very deepest part of myself that He is here with me in all my distress (which distress seems to have subsided somewhat under this extreme comfort)!

Psa 139:15 My substance was not hid from thee, when I was made in secret, and curiously wrought in the lowest parts of the earth.
Psa 139:16 Thine eyes did see my substance, yet being unperfect; and in thy book all my members were written, which in continuance were fashioned, when as yet there was none of them.

I rejoice in learning this MEGA truth that will result in my deliverance if I remain not moved away from the hope of the gospel, that blessed hope, Christ in me the hope of glory.

1Co 15:43 It is sown in dishonour; it is raised in glory: it is sown in weakness; it is raised in power:

You and I are the dishonor He is conceived in and Lord willing (and I believe He is) we are, have been and will yet be raised in the power and glory… speaking of power and glory

Mat 6:13 And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil: For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever. Amen.

Mike, as usual I feel like I am apprehending 0.0001% of what I might one day apprehend but the vision emerging from the rubble of the first man’s destruction is already starting to just stupify me in amazement.
No wonder He says:

Rev 1:17 And when I saw him, I fell at his feet as dead. And he laid his right hand upon me, saying unto me, Fear not; I am the first and the last:

Talk about baby sitting!!
The FIRST AND LAST, not the first OR last. The LAST is increasing in the First until there is no more FIRST left.
He that has this hope purifies himself. Christ in me HAS this HOPE and HE is purifying himself that is me; I am a member of His body, HIS hope is steadfast. I must walk in the spirit as I learn obedience by the things I suffer.
Thanks from the bottom of my heart for continuing to share what is saving my sanity, and so MUCH MORE!!

Col 1:5 For the hope which is laid up for you in heaven, whereof ye heard before in the word of the truth of the gospel;
Col 1:6 Which is come unto you, as it is in all the world; and bringeth forth fruit, as it doth also in you, since the day ye heard of it, and knew the grace of God in truth:

F____

Hi F____,

I think that your observations of how Christ identifies with His creation by taking up residence within us is absolutely revealing. You have laid hold on the meaning of “the first and the last.” As blasphemous as it sounds to those whose lives and doctrines revolve around keeping Christ exalted above and separated from His creation, His words still ring in my ears:

Heb 2:16 For verily he took not on him the nature of angels; but he took on him the seed of Abraham.

The fact that this same book declares the our high priest is holy and separate from sinners, in no way denies that He was made sin and dwelt among us and suffered the same pulls of His “seed- of- Abraham” flesh which we suffer.

Heb 7:26 For such an high priest became us, [ who is] holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners, and made higher than the heavens;

Being “separate from sinners” didn’t keep Christ from eating with publicans and harlots while He was in His body of flesh. So it surely does not preclude His association with such people while He is dwelling in us. “Separate from sinners” in no way denies that Christ was made sin. It certainly does not make Him any less the “seed of Abraham.” “Separate from sinners” is what Christ is in us who “were all by nature the children of wrath.”

Eph 2:2 Wherein in time past ye walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience:
Eph 2:3 Among whom also we all had our conversation in times past in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind; and were by nature the children of wrath, even as others.

It is Christ who made us what we are. He did so for the very purpose of changing us exactly as He Himself was changed from sinful flesh into a glorious spiritual body at the resurrection of the dead.
Ours is a glorious calling. It is the greatest calling any man has ever been given. It is only if we fail to see that He Himself identifies with us that we will be unable to see that it is our very weakness with which He identifies and from which He intends to deliver us. It is only if we can see that He overcame His sinful flesh and blood that we, too, are capable, with His residence in us, to also overcome our sinful flesh and blood and receive life, even as we dwell in this marred vessel of clay which He created for the very purpose of replacing with a new body:

Jer 18:4 And the vessel that he made of clay was marred in the hand of the potter: so he made it again another vessel, as seemed good to the potter to make it.

You captured the process in these words:

The FIRST AND LAST not the first OR last. The LAST increasing in the First until there is no more FIRST left.

As always, your words are a comfort and a confirmation of what God’s spirit is saying in His Word. Stay in that comforting word. It will see you through any and every trial.
Your brother in the Christ,
Mike