A Day Out At Goodwood Festival of Speed

Hosted for 20 years by Lord March of Goodwood House, near Chichester and the Rolls Royce plant, the Festival of Speed is now huge. Listed among UK Premier annual events.
The central theme of the gathering is a Hill Climb course upon which all manner of sports and racing cars, and motorbikes do timed runs.
Classic  and modern sportscars, formula 1 vehicles from the past and present.
The former and current stars take the cars for their spins.
Today Jenson Button, Lewis Hamilton and Alain Prost were among the hundreds who took part.

But so much is going on at these events that to really fully appreciate them you have to be present for more than just one day. RallyCross is also taking place high up in the woods, to which you are ferried by tractor and carriage carts. We did not do that section today.

On the way up you can pay to do RallyCross....anyone can learn to drive....and other activities including rough landrover courses.
You can pay to go up in a helicopter.
Huge numbers of giant stands from all the manufacturers and anybody else remotely to do with cars.
There's a new stadium area for stunt biking and other stunt activites.
Hill climbs are interspersed with stunt displays on the main track.

Like any top notch UK venue, the catering is very special, in large marquees, but also a huge variety of other foodvans and beer and wine tents.
Everyday there are air displays thrown in. Yesterday was the Red Arrows. Tomorrow is a Eurofighter.
There is comedy from the Wacky Races. Lord March has actually commissioned scale working models of the complete collection in the last 10 years or so.

Style et Luxe is different every year, but feature's many of manufacturer's one offs....to show off their designer's skills with wonderful prototypes. This year is the Queen's Jubilee, so Lord March managed to collect up a huge collection of the Queen's own specially designed vehicles for State and personal use here and all over the world.  Each year a whole team of design oriented judges pick their favorite designs. people like Nicky Haslam, Kevin of Grand Designs....many well known and recognised people. George Lucas (Star Wars)was one of the judges last year.

One year, my son Ben accidentally elbowed Jay Leno. People from all over the world are walking around, and some are extremely well known.You are free to walk around the pit areas and examine the cars close-up.



Mercedes Benz Film on a proper Video Camera, including some trackshots.
Their YouTube Clip.



A Video on a related theme
Stripping an engine
in 3000 pictures

Noam Chomsky leaves his notes behind in the hotel

Noam Chomsky ~ Global Hegemony  , The Facts, The Images



The above clip is quite recent, April 2011 and is "off the cuff", because he forgot his notes.

"US Military spending is off the chart. The healthcare system is a scandal, about twice the price per capita of any other health service in the West"

Other Video series by Noam Chomsky
Creating A New World order Series
Part 1

The Lying Elites Series
Part 1



Manufacturing Consent Series
Part 1

Victory over Death ~ Daniel Yordy

The defeat of death in the physical body is the third level, the third feast, the fulfillment of the Covenant, the culmination of the Gospel.

 24. Victory over Death  (Daniel's series numbering)  
Listen as you read 

PDF Version for printing out

The culmination of the Kingdom, the culmination of the Gospel, the culmination of the Covenant, the proving point upon which all of it hangs and through which all that God speaks MUST pass is

- the Defeat of Death.

By death, I mean the demise of the physical body.

The Greek word 'thanatos,' usually translated 'death' in the English Bible, has at least five completely distinct and different meanings as I shared in "Christ Planted in Death." Let me list these five definitions here, you can peruse the other article for references and explanations.

1. The physical death of the human body.
2. The mind that lives separate from God in ignorance.
3. The fallen human spirit, called the 'old man,' which is (was for us) a body of death.
4. The total elimination of that fallen human spirit at the moment we were born again.
5. The death of the atonement, which is not death at all, but glorious life, yet it is a 'death' in a very peculiar and different way, completely other than the first four definitions of 'thanatos.'

NOTE: The relationship between Thanatos and Hades in the gospel is very, very different from the illusions conjured up in Christianity.

Thanatos is not Hades and Hades is not Thanatos. Hades is the first realm of heaven where those who are Thanatos have their being, devoid of both physical body and spirit-body, vague whispering souls, ghosts in the darkness.

Thanatos, really, has three parts. It is the darkening of the spirit body upon Adam's sin, the loss of the physical body at death, and the ignorance of the mind in-between.

Both Thanatos and Hades are cast into the Lake of Fire at the end of the next age, that is, they are swallowed up completely in the Love and Light of God.

Death is not real separation from God. There is no such thing. In the end, death is imaginary only. When I say that, I do NOT mean it in a 'Christian Science' way. Sin really drives a wedge between a created being and God. God does not know sin. And Death really intends to kill you. But the Atonement of Jesus has already swallowed up every sin before it was ever committed. And any created being can turn by the Atonement and in one moment be swallowed up in it. God hardens the hearts of many for His purposes for a season. But the testimony of the gospel is overwhelmingly clear and not to be annulled even by those who hold to the Roman darkness and to Jerome's hideous sin. All creation returns to the Father as Jesus brings all things into submission to Himself.

Death is defeated. Death is swallowed up in victory.

People can spiritualize death all they want, considering themselves to be 'deeper truth' Christians. People can shout "Love, love," and "Grace, grace," till they are blue in the face. People can preach "no condemnation" until they are leaping to the sky.

Physical death laughs in their face, thinks nothing of all their theology and words, and takes them out. They are then only in the heavens and not in the earth, missing half of themselves, DEAD in Christ, waiting in all hope for salvation.

Physical death IS the condemnation. There is no other condemnation. Norman Grubb died by condemnation. Sam Fife died by condemnation. The Apostle Paul died by condemnation. Yes, they died in faith, but they died by condemnation. You and I will die by condemnation - EXCEPT death be defeated in our bodies.

God has made it so.

God has focused ALL the PROOF of His Word on one thing alone - the defeat of death in the physical body.

That's the only Christ there is; there is no other Christ. John calls that other so-called 'Christ,' anti-Christ.

God is never revealed either to heaven or to earth apart from FLESH. The only God creation can know is God manifest in the Flesh.

The Holy Spirit fails utterly, as any sort of guarantee, apart from the defeat of death in the physical body.

Jesus, the Word God speaks from the beginning, falls into ruin and nothingness apart from the defeat of death in the physical body.

God the Father will never be seen, never be known as He is, apart from the defeat of death in the physical body.

God HAS MADE IT SO.

It is the resurrection, out of all the steps of the Atonement, that most specifically shows us the Father.

Everything that comes before finds its meaning and purpose ONLY in the defeat of death in the physical body. Everything that is to come, comes ONLY out of the defeat of death in the physical body.

ALL the Desire of all the ages, both those that have been, and those that will yet be, is found ONLY in the defeat of death in the physical body.

It is here and here alone that God proves Himself true, that His Word fulfills the purpose for which it was sent and thus returns to the Father complete. It is here and here alone that the guarantee called 'the gift of the Holy Spirit' turns into the full inheritance.

The defeat of death in the physical body is the third level, the third feast, the fulfillment of the Covenant, the culmination of the Gospel.

Now, all this is clear and written openly on the pages of the New Testament. Yet the veil of unbelief has sat upon the minds and hearts of almost all Christians until today, and they have willfully refused to believe what God so clearly says.

They have willfully refused to believe, but instead have bent the gospel and the covenant and the words of the New Testament to bow in homage to that 'undefeated' master, Death - triumphant, evil-filled, and sick.

Christians proclaim openly the victory of Death over the saints (heaven is our home), having turned that horrific lie into the very gospel itself. What a perversion! "Death is that wonderful friend who takes you to heaven and to Jesus." What a demonic deceit.

Gross unbelief and in-your-face accusation against all that is holy and God.

I do not read, I do not listen to anyone who pushes the big lie. They may say many things that are true and Christ, but when push comes to shove, they reject the victory of Christ made personal inside of them and bow themselves and the gospel before the fountain of all wickedness and opposition to God - Death.

They will not stand against the giants, but run into the grave before the whips of sin and death. Their proclamation of Christ ceases when death enters the equation, and they bow before that giant and call it 'God.'

David had enough trouble with his brethren sitting in fear of Goliath. But at least he did not have to contend with an Israel on their face before Goliath, having renamed him 'YHWH' in the way we must deal with.  

Saul had no problem recognizing that Goliath was not YHWH; Christians do.

Christians call death, 'God.' Can you believe that? They fight death tooth and nail in all the power of the flesh, running to the doctors, knowing it is evil, yet the moment it defeats their neighbor in a gory paroxysm of agony, they call it 'God'!

Understand that I am NOT speaking in any way against those who are carried through that dark passage in utter trust in Jesus and in incomprehensible peace. My own mother went in just that way recently.

JESUS CARRIES US and there is nothing else for us. We walk utterly by faith, disregarding ALL that we "see" or "feel," including physical death should our times include it.

Yet death stands as the enemy of God, and God intends to prove Himself in our bodies by the defeat of death, entirely together with us.

There is no resurrection apart from faith; there is no resurrection apart from us.

"By man death, by man also the resurrection of the dead."

Look at that line in 1 Corinthians 15. If you have the right Bible, you will see that the word 'came' was not in the original, but forced in by the unbelief that filled the hearts of the King James translators. (I am planning an article on "The King James Destruction" in my series on The Covenant.)

"For this mortal must put on immortality."

So, Yordy, just exactly how do you plan to defeat death?

I have no idea.

But I do know the God who fills me, that He is life.

Knowing God is a much bigger deal than defeating death. Defeating death is a normal and natural outcome of knowing God.

How do I know God? That beyond wonderful gift, I can explain, step by step, so let me simply replace how I know God with how to defeat death. Then, I will tell you more plainly out from my resurrected body; then, I will take you by the hand and show you.

But for now, I will speak figuratively, just as Jesus did.

All things begin with a word spoken by God. The defeat of death in the physical body begins by a word spoken by God. Before we continue, let's assemble that Word. NOTHING exists except God speak it.

The dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God and those who hear shall live.

He that lives and believes in me shall never die. Martha, do you believe this?

But if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you.

We groan within ourselves, waiting eagerly for the adoption, the redemption of the body.

For since by man death, by man also the resurrection of the dead.

For this corruptible must put on incorruptibility, and this mortal must put on immortality.

Thanks be to God, who gives us the victory (the defeat of death) through our Lord Jesus Christ.

Not that we should be unclothed, but further clothed, that death should be swallowed up by life.   

That I may know Him and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death, if, by any means, I may attain to the resurrection from the dead. 

The Lord Jesus Christ will transform our lowly body that it may be conformed to His glorious body, according to the working by which He is able even to subdue all things to Himself. 

Jesus has destroyed death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel.

Just AS it is given unto man once to die, SO Christ was offered ONCE to bear the sins of many.

Do not be afraid, I am the first and the last, and the living One; and I was dead, and behold, I am alive for the ages, and I have the keys of Thanatos and of Hades.

Of all these verses, each powerful and important, I think that the most important for us is 1 Corinthians 15:57, "Thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ."

The act, the moment, the power, the reality of the defeat of death is a gift from God given to us. It is our possession. Then, 2 Corinthians 5 tells us that the Holy Spirit is the guarantee to us that this experience of our victory over death MUST BE ours, that our dying physical body be swallowed up by life. 

NOW - most preachers and teachers of the Bible will then say, and I have heard it in many different ways.

"Sure, Yordy, we know God says all these things, we can read them in our Bibles as well. But whatever they mean, none of it exists until AFTER Jesus returns. And what makes you think, Yordy, that these verses refer directly to you? And WHAT MAKES YOU THINK that these verses apply to you NOW? Everybody dies. Paul died; all kinds of people down through the centuries shouted about all these verses and they are all DEAD! Who do you think you are?"

 The PROVING TEST standing before every man, woman, and child on this planet is what do you do with the word God speaks. 

There is only one way by which we honor that Word. Anything else we might do with it is to spit upon it.

More than that, I am well aware that almost all Christians who might read my letters or hear me share would think and say very similar things, each in their own way, against my presumption and against what I teach.

Let me share my present response to this challenge. Remember, the word God speaks is Jesus, and Jesus is the only life I know.

I feel the pain of this challenge pressing into my brow, I feel its whips slashing across my back, I feel its spit sliding down my cheek. I stumble under its pressure and I give thanks for my inability. I see my precious brethren, so blinded by the tree of knowledge about God and my heart, the heart I share with my Father, swallows them up into the God who carries me. "Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing to the Son of Your love."

To dishonor the word God speaks by shoving it out into the cold, far, far away from us right here and right now is to spit in God's face.

God is such a peculiar Fellow; He allows anyone to do anything they want against the Word that He speaks, against His Son, against Himself. He even allows His own to put that very Word to death in all shamefulness. And even as they mock Him, spitting upon the Word that He speaks, He carries them, inside Himself, all the way into life.

What a God it is that fills us full!

God is in me, reconciling all these who spit upon His word to Himself.

Let's start with the bottom line, with the in-your-face finger of God. What is it that YOU do with the word God speaks? You have two choices; there is no third choice. You can honor that word or you can spit on it. If you do not honor it, you do spit on it and drive it from you with whips.

Two things are essential to honoring the word God speaks. I make it personal to me and I make it right now, in the only moment that IS. 

The most adventurous possibility standing before our God right now is for Him to take out death inside the weakness of the human frame through hearts who simply dance and sing for joy in believing all that He says.

God is infinite and God is eternal. Now, I just heard someone prophecy with these words, "I, who live in eternity, speak to you . . ." And instantly I felt the God in me being shoved out into the cold, shoved far, far away from us.

Christianity has always given the words "infinite" and "eternal" the very opposite definition of what they actually mean. (Of course, neither word does God ever use, but they are still useful to us when we know that.) Christianity has always defined these words as a Being who is far far away from us finite and temporal lowly worms. That is the opposite of what those words mean.

Eternal means right now all the time. Infinite means right here, personal and real.

Faith deals with God NOW. Faith deals with God HERE. There is no other God. An eternal God is always NOW; an infinite God is always HERE, personal in me.

God spoke to me the other day, "Son, because you honor My Word, I will honor you." Since that moment I walk in His honor of me, I will never know anything else.

The PROVING TEST standing before every man, woman, and child on this planet is what do you do with the word God speaks. There is only one way by which we honor that Word. Anything else we might do with it is to spit upon it.

God, you mean PERSONAL in ME! God, you mean RIGHT NOW, this moment!

God IS in no other way.

And then we pay no attention whatsoever to what our blindness does not see or what our ignorance does not know.

We believe what God says, all that He says, as He says it. We believe.

When we believe what God says, personal and now inside of us, we honor the Son of His Love. And when we honor the Son of His Love, God Himself, the Father, shows up inside of us. And when God shows up inside of us, suddenly, for the first time in our lives, we know Him. That knowing of God never ends. It never ends because we simply do not believe our "eyes" or our "feelings"; we believe only the knowing of God.

This God, then, who fills us with ALL of Himself is Love and Light and Life. He is also incredibly adventurous, and adventure, to be fully satisfying, requires risk.

My son, when, at age 4, he discovered that two wheels beneath him meant wind-in-the-hair and sailing through space faster than he had ever known, could not be contained. We discovered later that he snuck out at one in the morning to sail down the street and to know the glory of adventure, a glory he could not stay away from. My son is like that because God made him just like Himself.

God simply loves to prove His stuff; He likes to hear us say, "God, You are just something awesome."

God loves adventure.

The most adventurous possibility standing before our God right now is for Him to take out death inside the weakness of the human frame through hearts who simply dance and sing for joy in believing all that He says.

It's quite risky to defeat death through dying. There is no story if the Hero cannot lose. We're talking about supreme adventure. 

God speaks His word into weakness that His word might prove God true. Our part is two things: we give thanks for all our weakness, knowing that God has made us so, and we rejoice in absolute confidence in the expectation of God. That is the faith through which the Word passes as He proves His Father true.

My body CANNOT stay dead. What an absolute impossibility!

People can disbelieve God all they want, but tell me, how on earth can they prevent or even slow down His exuberant joy as He reveals Himself through hearts who simply honor Him?

I see the defeat of death.

I see God.

I see the celebration of my 1000^th birthday right here on this earth.

I see God.

"The thief comes to steal, to kill, and to destroy. But I am come that you might have LIFE and that you might have it in ALL ABUNDANCE." Jesus, the Word God is always speaking.

Now, I am running into a problem as I write. I keep starting new letters before I finish the ones I have already started. I wrote the first 4+ pages of this letter while at Upsala, a Christian community in Canada. Since I wrote these pages, I wrote another unexpected letter, and now I have already started an additional one this morning. Thus my perspective continues to increase and the glory of God gets all mixed up from one letter to the next.

My children get their love of adventure honestly; I am made the same way. God will always be taking my breath away.

God is birthing a universe of LIFE through us. He has granted to us the awesome privilege of shaping that universe together with Him out from our shared heart, the same heart we share with one another and with Him.

That's what it means to be granted to eat of the tree of Life.

Now, there is another startling thing, one of many, many, that we discover as we know that God shows Himself as He really is only through the path of the Atonement. And forgive me for capitalizing so many words; the God who fills us full is just too exuberant to contain or to restrain. He is poking out in every direction all the time; we simply are out of breath.

The life of God that fills us full is a particular kind of life. God-life, as it really is, revealed for us to know, is an Out-From-the-Dead Life. God is not just Life, He is Resurrection Life.

Now, in the present creation, as things work as we presently know them, if you want to build a new building on the site of the old, you must demolish the old and clear the site before you can begin building the new. This is not how God births the new.

God is the God who is always arising out of death into life. If Jesus arose from the dead in a moment of time, then He is simply showing us for real the eternal, the infinite, the always nature and being of God. But just hours before, this same Jesus, this same God, entered into death, carrying all of His creation inside Himself. Thus, as He is always arising into life, creation is always arising anew inside of Him.

Therefore we were buried with Him through baptism into death, that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life. For if we have been united together in the likeness of His death, certainly we also shall be in the likeness of His resurrection . . . Romans 6:4-5

Now, let me restate this in the way I suspect God meant it.

Therefore we ARE buried with Him through baptism into death, that just as Christ is raised from the dead by the glory, the being, the Person, of the Father, even so we also are always walking in newness of life. For as we ARE united together in the likeness of His death, certainly, we ARE also in His resurrection.

Now we see the incredible importance to us and to God of Romans 8:11.

But if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you.

Again, it need not be translated "will give," but "gives." God is not "future," He is always now.

These words are the showing, the proving, the demonstration of God to all creation.

Thus God does not eliminate one thing before creating the next. No, He births the new, and then, through the new, He swallows up the old into Himself, arising into life and we in Him.

Thus the life of God is always resurrection life; it is always a "swallowing-up" life. It is always a becoming life, a carrying life, an arising life.

So you see, it is not "how to defeat death" that we must know, but rather, God. When we know God, it is absolutely impossible for us to keep Him from swallowing up the death in our physical bodies and transforming them in a moment to a body just like His glorious body. It is not something God does, it is who He is.

What we must do is to stop treating God in the cold and hurtful way we have treated Him in the past. To say, "After Jesus returns" or "after we 'go to heaven'" in the separated way most people treat God, is to kick Him where it hurts most, right at His Word.

On the other hand, when we say, "Here am I, God, I belong to You, let every single Word You speak - Christ Jesus - be fulfilled in all fullness personally in me right here and right now," we honor Him in the highest way any created being could ever honor Him.

Then look out, cause there ain't no way of stopping this Fellow. He is always doing far, far more than we could ever think or even imagine. And all that He is, He does with open exuberance and unrestrained joy.

All who say, "Not me, not here, not now," in any possible way concerning any word God speaks, including and especially the visible defeat of death in our physical bodies, place a hard, cold, iron barrier of separation between themselves and any knowing of the God who carries them.

God knows all about this barrier, and He is most excellent at the business of melting it. Yet He always begins with a seed, a firstfruits, His elect, chosen by Him without regard to human ability. Then, when death is visibly defeated and on the run, many, many, many who were once fearful and unbelieving come rushing in, their swords swinging, sharing in the victory of the God who fills us full.

Death is no more.

A universe, both heaven and earth, in which death is no more, is a universe no created being has ever known or contemplated.

That universe is birthed right now in our hearts and comes flowing right out of our bellies.

Believe in Jesus!

Covenant and Genesis 15 - Pastor Dave,Carlos Iggy Shelton and a question from me.

Cutting and Covenant: A Christological Look At The Abrahamic Covenant ~ Pastor Dave

Usually when we think of an agreement or contract we are thinking of two people making a pledge and a pact to honor an agreement. While there are elements of this notion within the Biblical word “covenant” it’s not an exact corollary. O. Palmer Robertson, in his classic work, defines the Biblical covenant as “a bond in blood sovereignly administered.” He adds:

When God enters into a covenantal relationship with men, he sovereignly institutes a life-and-death bond. A covenant is a bond in blood, or a bond of life and death, sovereignly administered. (The Christ of the Covenants, 4)

This is an important distinction to make. God is the one administering these covenants. While the covenants do speak of man’s responsibility, there’s no sense in which they are actually bilateral covenants. God is the one who is responsible for implementing and managing these covenants. Such news is startling when we consider the nature of “cutting a covenant” in ancient cultures. For in making these covenants God does not simply agree to keep His word, but He submits Himself to being killed if He doesn’t.  When we see, however, these covenants in light of Christ we are confronted with an even more startling picture: Christ both keeps God’s word and is killed.
The Abrahamic Covenant in Genesis 15 serves as a great case study and example on this point. Abraham is an old man when God comes to make a promise to him of children. In fact Abraham is so old that the Apostle Paul says he is as good as dead (Romans 4:19). He had one foot in the grave and no children, yet God promises to give him exactly that. It will be all of God’s giving, in fact the very covenant sign of circumcision is a way of saying to an old man that his progeny would not come from his long since “dead” genitals, but from God’s grace. Certainly God calls Abraham to faith and obedience, but what we see in the actual covenant in Genesis 15 is that God is the only one committing to it. Abraham is asleep when the actual covenant is confirmed. “As the sun was going down, a deep sleep fell on Abram. And behold, dreadful and great darkness fell upon him” (Gen. 15:12). We read, then, in verses 17-20:

¹⁷ When the sun had gone down and it was dark, behold, a smoking fire pot and a flaming torch passed between these pieces.  ¹⁸ On that day the LORD made a covenant with Abram, saying, “To your offspring I give this land, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the river Euphrates,  ¹⁹ the land of the Kenites, the Kenizzites, the Kadmonites,  ²⁰ the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Rephaim,  ²¹ the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Girgashites and the Jebusites.”

God (portrayed as the smoking pot) passes alone through the cut pieces of the animal sacrifice. Walking through the cut pieces of the sacrifice was a custom among parties making a contract. It was a way of saying “may I end up like this sacrifice if I don’t keep my word” (see Jeremiah 34:18). Robertson writes:

By dividing animals and passing between the pieces, participants in a covenant pledge themselves to life and death. These actions established an oath of self-malediction. If they should break the commitment involved in the covenant, they were asking that their own bodies be torn in pieces just as the animals had been divided ceremonially. (130)

But note here that it is God alone who walks through the sacrifices. God alone commits to keep His word or be subject to destruction.

 God makes the commitment, God takes all the risk, and when we screw up God takes all the wrath. O, what great depths our God will go to to keep His word and to keep His people!

Of course the history of both Abraham’s descendants Israel in general is one of regular covenant unfaithfulness. They regular disobey God and break His covenants. God is always faithful, even where they are faithless (2 Tim. 2:13). God always keeps His word. In the New Testament we see Jesus is the fulfillment of God’s word to Abraham, and yet we also know that the story of Jesus’ faithfulness to God ends with His crucifixion. Jesus keeps God’s word, we have failed, and yet it is still He who is cut and sacrificed. But that, of course, is not how the covenants were supposed to operate.
It is those unfaithful to the covenant who are to be cut down. But Jesus steps in to be cut down for our sake. He who was faithful, who never did wrong, who was righteous, took our place. Jesus keeps the covenant and He also takes our punishment for failing to keep it. God makes the commitment, God takes all the risk, and when we screw up God takes all the wrath. O, what great depths our God will go to to keep His word and to keep His people!

Thoughts on the Abrahamic covenant by Carlos Iggy Shelton

Been a while since I did a blog post so I figured I submit this. This is from my class discussion at Regent University. The topic was our thoughts on the Abrahamic covenant. 

One highlight of the Abrahamic covenant is that it showed that while one of faith may sin, grace still abounds.  The example I refer to is the issue with Hagar and Ishmael. ^[1]  While Sara had a lapse of faith and Abram may have had other misplaced judgment, God not only blessed Abram, but gave grace and changed Abram’s name to Abraham and gave a greater promise. ^[2] Though, I somewhat smile that initially the covenant was one sided, later Abraham was told to circumcise himself and whole

One highlight of the Abrahamic covenant is that it showed that while one of faith may sin, grace still abounds.

household, which makes me cringe whenever I read it. ^[3] My smile is from wondering how connected the tie between circumcision and the issues with Hagar and Ishmael were.

The similarities between the Abrahamic and Mosaic covenant is the extension of grace and expansion of the initial covenant. Like with the Abrahamic covenant God extends grace to a people who did nothing but are descendants of Abraham. ^[4] God keeps his promise to Abraham as now the Hebrews are a great nation. ^[5]  The differences between the two covenants are that of community separation and individual separation to be holy unto God. As I recall from my past studies, both covenants were based on a type of contract. ^[6] Abram’s cutting of the carcass was a type of contract used at the time. Likewise the Mosaic covenant was based on ancient Near Eastern vassal treaties with some differences. ^[7] Again, the overall theme is God’s grace to both a person (Abraham) and a nation (the Hebrews). For me, this shows God’s overall worthiness to keep his word. This theme is displayed from Genesis after the fall and even to Cain after slaying Able. While man progressively steps further from God, his hands of grace reach more and more out to his beloved created image. This theme that fully is seen later in Christ Jesus fulfilling the covenant by not only His life and death, but his resurrection.

---------------------------------------------------

1.  1.     (Genesis 16 n.d.)

2.   2;    (Genesis 16; 17)

3.    3/  Ibid

4.   4.    (Genesis 17: 9-10)

5.    5.   (Exodus 2:25)

6.    6.   (Bibletools.com 2012)

7.    7.   (Hill 2009)

Citations

Bibletools.com. Covenant, Symbolized by Divided Carcasses. 2012. http://www.bibletools.org/index.cfm/fuseaction/Topical.show/RTD/cgg/ID/6867/Covenant-Symbolized-by-Divided-Carcasses.htm (accessed 6 21, 2012).

"Genesis 16." (NIV)

"Genesis 17." (NIV)

"Exodus 2: 25." (NIV)

Hill, Andrew E and Walton, John H. A Survey of the Old Testament,. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2009.  


 An Interpolation ~ How much do Professors Know? Are they simply working backwards, revising history based on  what "appears to be so now" ?   Comment to Iggy's Blogpost.


Chris Welch - 07000INTUNE said...I just don't know.
Know what?
Whether the carcass thing was related to other covenantal things at the time.
or ......Do the other inhabitants of earth indulge in covenantal stuff because it is a distortion of God's pattern with the first ever peoples?

Like the Jews not drinking milk in their coffee after a meal is a distortion of not boiling a kid animal in its mother's milk. Give a few hundred years and developing Coffee mate and bob's your uncle.

It's one of those chicken and egg questions.

I have noticed that people who study in college as you have just done, introduce these "carcass" type bits of knowledge with the assurance that because some college professors have consensually agreed it to be so, then it must be so. What's their authority? Sometimes they have some. But it's good to be objective enough to stand back and ask.

Sometimes it's good to think how God has worked in our lives and work backwards....

I mean , Abraham looked up at some stars...and God spoke to him.

perhaps the whole carcass sequence was just as Divine from start to finish.....
certainly I bet other people's doing similar practices never has a flaming pot flying in the air between the animal pieces....

not your average human practice to arrange there.

I'm busy reassessing everything.
As a good charismatic I spiritualised the whole Nephilim thing....and thought Derek Prince rather carnally minded to say that real fallen angels were having sex with human beings to produce large human beings....what became gods in our mythologies.

Turns out ALL the New Testament writers thought this and referred to the Book of Enoch more or less as a divine text. And all Jewish rabbis pretty much thought the same too....it's only our modern revisionism that can't accept anything beyond a cornflakes packet.

Interesting I have noted how many of the civilisations that have alternate views from Greco-Roman ones, have already been slaughtered or drastically reduced like native Indians to a mere few thousand well contained folk.

Someone, unlike most professors of this period, who does know what he's on about is Bill Cooper in "After the Flood". Not many professors have spent 30 years trawling proof texts on records of genealogies. I can't think of many things more tedious. What he found,the world over, is that apart from only a few minor niggles....the genealogies from various people groups are incredibly concurrent.

Something that no Rothschild/Rockefeller induced professor would stand by...but then they haven't done the study and only believe the perpetual lies of everybody else.

Why is it that history only begins really with the Romans? Bill says there is more than we think on 1000BC - 0 AD.

Removing the Veil by Juan Carlos Ortiz

Extract through Merrill Thompson and his painstakingly retyped library of gems. Connect with him on Facebook.
The old covenant is described as a ministry of death. It was a glorious covenant because it contained many beautiful laws. But it ministered death to those who tried to keep those laws because they couldn't do it. For that reason Paul called the old covenant "the ministry of condemnation."
The people who lived under the covenant had a veil over their hearts. And I have to say with sorrow, but also with hope, that for many years I too read the Bible with a thick veil on my heart. I was no better off than the people in Old Testament times because of the veil. I saw the letter and nothing else. I didn't see the Spirit. So the letter was like a veil. I couldn't see God's intention behind the letter. I saw just the lifeless demands of the law--demands that no one has ever been able to fulfill.  

Now I understand why Paul called the old covenant, condemnation and death. I tried to live by the law, and I taught others to live by it. But we always felt like failures. We could never do it! So we felt condemned, and we lived with a continual feeling of guilt. A great many believers are terribly discouraged with trying to live the Christian life because they have the old and the new covenants mixed up. 

They know that under the new covenant we are not under the law, but they still try to live according to the law. When they find they can't do it, they feel condemned. It makes me sad to see so many people trying to live the Christian life but finding they are unable to. But it also gives me hope. Yes, hope! 

Now that may seem like a paradox.  
But in my own life it was only 

when I came to the end of self-effort--when I saw

 that I couldn't do all the things that Christians 

are supposed to do--that I gave up and turned to the Lord. 

When a man turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away. When we stop trying to do it ourselves and rest in Jesus, trusting Him in us to live the Christian life, we are no longer blinded by the veil. We get ourselves in focus and see clearly. Listen to Paul's words, "But we all, with unveiled face beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord . . ." If you remove the veil from your face and look in a mirror, you will see the glory of the Lord! In other words, when you remove the veil of the law from your life and look into a mirror to see who you really are, you will behold the glory of Christ in your own face.  

taken from Living With Jesus Today by Juan Carlos Ortiz

Impossible looking faith ~ Brian Coatney

Posted on June 22, 2012 on Facebook  
via Lovers of God  group, Nancy Gilmore 

In Luke chapter 9, we meet the woman who for 12 years had suffered from an in curable blood flow. 
 
Along comes Jesus, and wouldn’t you know it, he is thronged. 

Ordinarily, an approacher would step up, greet, and request. The crowd around Jesus made that impossible, but she knew that healing power was flowing from him and that she had to get to him, even if in an unnoticed way to touch a part of his clothes that would most likely go unnoticed and not get her in trouble for cutting into line.

So she formulated a hope 

about power 

extending to one’s clothes

 and rewrote the book on manners.  

Critics could call her superstitious and presumptuous, but Jesus knew that an unusual faith had plotted carefully with intense desire and sought him out at great risk of rejection or humiliation.

 He rewarded that faith. 

What no man had been able to do, 

Jesus did simply 

by having a desperate person 

draw it out of him. 

Jesus is the same yesterday, today, and forever according to Hebrews. 

 The Gospel is not a transition, an historical record that has given way to a different Jesus. 

He still responds to those who take all risks and draw out of him what they need, and He isn’t fussy about society’s rules for gaining access. 

His one rule is desperation, desire, and stepping up. Seek and ye shall find.

Manners may send someone to hell; faith will never fail.

Waiting on…us? ~ Rich Novek

Posted: 21st June 2012 by novek7@gmail.com in Blog

We are seeing uncanny examples of what seems like “God waiting on us” as we move into this life of “no longer I but Christ!”  A life that is centered on “living for one another” according to the true meaning of Covenant!

And why wouldn’t we, isn’t this the true definition of Love?

No greater love has ever existed than the One who lays down his/her life (what He perceives as his life independent of God) for another!

This is laying down a conciousness of duality, just as James spoke about:

The good/evil tongue, the fresh/polluted river, and the double mind!  He then goes so far as to say this kind of “seeing more than God” leads to only one place!  Which is a life of self absorption that results in quarrels, jealousies, and wars, and even to the point of murderous thoughts and actions!

No man can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon. Therefore I say unto you, TAKE NO THOUGHT FOR YOUR OWN LIFE, what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink; nor yet for your body, what ye shall put on. Is not the life more than meat, and the body than raiment? (Mathew 6:24-25)

From whence come wars and fightings among you? come they not hence, even of your lusts that war in your members?  Ye lust, and have not: ye kill, and desire to have, and cannot obtain: ye fight and war, yet ye have not, because ye ask not.  Ye ask, and receive not, because ye ASK AMISS, that ye may consume it upon your lusts (life). (James 4:1-3)

I think it was Spurgeon who said if we are to ever finally grow up IN Christ we have to forever remove the words what, where, when, why, and how, from our modern day vocabulary.

Moving into maturity is all about “I only do what I see the Father doing” and then realizing there is no other Christian Life but the One Christ himself is longing to live through the heart that is completely His, the “Single” heart that has no other rival lovers!

How can one look at Mathew 6 (take not a thought for your life) and passages like it and conclude anything but seeing that “asking amiss” means a continued focus of a relationship with God that is centered on asking for myself?  Especially when we see the REAL Jesus NEVER taking one thought for His own self preservation!

Isn’t He the One who is living that same life through us?  Isn’t He the One who initiated the Covenants of promise?  The very meaning of Covenant being “I no longer live for myself but for my covenant partner?”

I am finally discovering after a lifetime of so much loss, pain, and disappointment, the only reason I am here is for others…period!

This is why God brings so much tribulation to the heart that has decided it’s “damn the torpedoes and full speed ahead!”  The heart that sees losing to gain, dying to live, and being blinded to see can be the only option for the true believer who desires ALL of what God has for him/her in this life!  He is taking us into those firey places, those places of blackest darkness for one purpose, which is to reveal our One true purpose IN Him!

This is the “Good News” of the Gospel; being freed from a life of a wrong perception of life as we abandon ourselves to the “other lover”  Christ IN us!  (Covenant Love) has NOW become our One and only Hope of Glory!
It’s in this place of seeng as He sees where we NOW discover there is really only one question that needs to be asked?
How long will we NOW make Him wait…on us?
Only God only NOW!

Rich Novek,Linda Novek and Joan Reilly are "Rich in Christ Ministries".  

What We All Need - Jim Marjoram

We all need to be loved


Absolutely, every single person ever created needs to be loved - 

• The girl in the call centre who just keeps quoting the fixed responses to you
• The policeman who just pulled you over for not signalling when you have 3 screaming kids in the car and have just had the worst day of your life
• The redneck bigot shouting racist abuse in a protest
• The teenager that just gave you the finger
• The young black guy that stole your bag 
• The politician that just made the most blatantly stupid policy change the nation has ever seen
• Your mother in law
• Hitler

All they need is love. That's it. 

They don't need to be told how bad they are - 

• How rude
• How unforgiving
• How thoughtless
• How selfish
• How evil

They need love.

I need love. 

I don't respond well when my faults are pointed out - in patronising innuendos.

Yeah, sometimes I need to be reminded, when I tread on a toe or two. But I need to laugh more than cry, I need love to heal the pain. I need total unconditional love no matter what.

God IS love. Jesus is what love looked like in the flesh.

He cleared away ALL laws/religion/sin before the foundation of time - revealed the fact 2000 years ago - and left room for nothing else but love.

Everything that isn't love can be banished by love. 

• We renew our minds by love
• Resist evil by love
• Stand strong in love
• Relate to all mankind in love

There is no law, at all, any more, ever.

• No wisdom principles
• No guiding morals
• No 10 commandments
• No golden rules
• No 4 spiritual laws
• No two greatest commandments

There is only one thing left:

LOVE

1 comments:

Marie-Louise CassidyJune 22, 2012 12:44 PM

Amen ♥

Reply

How good is God? by Chris Kimmell

 Facebook on Wednesday, 20 June 2012 at 16:38 ·
Sometimes I look back at my life in wonder and awe. The scenes play through my mind as a movie. Examining what I was and all that I have been through. I see the interactions with my parents and siblings. I view my mother through the eyes of a child that hides behind a clothes basket as the wicked witch in The Wizard of Oz, laughs evilly. I laugh with my father as I sit on his lap while we watch The Flip Wilson Show. I see my sisters slinging their purses at my adversary in my first schoolyard fight. The scenes glide past to High School and I view my first encounter with alcohol, and the joys and pain of social acceptance. College life moves into view and my experimentation with drugs. My first love is smiling at me and then I am crying in my mother’s arms for a love that is lost. The scenes fade to a four year stint in the Marines and to the unbreakable bonds that were formed in adversity and sharing of life. Suddenly I am viewing the birth of my first child and then the pain of divorce.



The emotions become all too real yet again. The faces and the connections swell in my heart. Joy and pain, laughter and tears, all the moments of my life come back in quiet recollection. The joy has become magnified now, and the sorrow has become more bittersweet, as I view the goodness that God imparted through it all. I see the boy that once hid, grow into a man that moves forward and faces adversity. The heart swells with thankfulness for all of my life, not just what was then perceived as good.



A new chapter in my life has begun. Again what I thought was adversity and heartbreak, has become the greatest gift of all. As the clouds of another divorce give way to the brilliance of the blessing contained within, I fall to my knees in praise. As God brings me back together with my first wife in a wondrous relationship, I again see the goodness He has given me in all of my life. As I collapse to my knees and look to the heavens, I am impelled to exclaim;



Daddy, how unbelievably good you are!

Psalm 34:8 (The Message)

Open your mouth and taste,

open your eyes and see,

how good God is.

Blessed are you who run to him.

Phatfish - Bournemouth 2012

In case the jpegs  do not show up on mobiles:

Phatfish

Higher Tour
Fri 29th July
7.30pm
Wessex Christian Centre

Flavours of Havant Church

The point of this video clip is to give you a flavour of what a "soaking atmosphere" is in a main church meeting.
Don't watch this particular bit with outstanding music in mind, or outstanding lyrics....you'll hardly make them out....just let the music and the atmosphere waft over you as you wait on God.
This is a new existing song around the lyrics of the Lord's prayer,which is being amended spontaneously on the hoof. Notice how the music builds in the middle of the clip. Also notice how different members of the Body are moving around as led, to pray for others.  We can't hear, but you can bet your life some are sharing real words of knowledge,Holy Spirit keys, scriptures, prophetic impressions. I could tag this video with names and testimonies about what some of these guys have been through recently....but just know...some of it has been extremely heavy duty. One of the most vocal ladies is responding to the Lord after about three years of battling for her full grown son's cancer and losing the battle recently.Others are still in the battle.
You should be aware that the music is being led by the young people incredibly sensitively according to the flow in the meeting. Gone are the days when they would sing for the church, and we would encourage them, but really this was a bit of a performance event. These guys now know how to take meetings forward themselves. Note also there is no main leader present in this meeting. Both the senior pastors, who travel a lot anyway, Peter and Mariette Stott, and the actual main pastors, John and Wendy Wilbraham are all away on separate holidays this week. Paul Butcher is designated to lead, as one of the co elders of the church.
Unfortunately as this is being seen the world over, to protect the young people, some of whom are under 18, I am not free to film them up close.







Helen Rubio is one of the main worship leaders, taking the week off this week to share the Word about developing our inner life.

For more about Helen Rubio's ministry visit her blog and resource centre

This is the page for her CD "Costly fragrance"

Deification is NOT NEW - Joseph Black

Deification: Did the Early Church Teach That Christians Would Become God?

by Joseph Black on Sunday, 17 June 2012 at 19:22 ·

I appreciate and love the fact that one of only few denominations in America, that I know of, have stuck with at least a partial view pointing to the full statement of the Gospel. There may be some more, like the Quakers who teach the light of God in every man. So, there are those in America who are not restricted to the false gospel "of man is lesser then the God who made them." and is only a sinner and will always be.. always subordinate to this lesser position.separated as humanity from God. ( THE LIE).I remind YOU of this Scripture:
Philippians 2:4-6
Young's Literal Translation (YLT)

4 each not to your own look ye, but each also to the things of others.
5 For, let this mind be in you that [is] also in Christ Jesus,
6 who, being in the form of God, thought [it] not robbery to be equal to God,So, I share this article with you, may your heart and mind be ONE!
Deification: Did the Early Church Teach That Christians Would Become God?
The doctrine that many Protestants seem to indicate identifies a group as a "cult" is the teaching that Christians are to become deified. Or worded another way, Christians are to become God.
Although this belief is normally considered to be "unorthodox" and outside of "mainstream Christianity", it probably should be pointed out that the Eastern Orthodox Church teaches it, so the term "unorthodox" seems not to fit.
The reality is that both the Bible and writings of early professors of Christ demonstrate that the idea that Jesus became human so that humans could become part of the family of God is not new nor "unorthodox". However, since most who claim to be Christian are not familiar with most of the early writings, they simply do not realize that deification is not an "unorthodox" view and it was held by many.
This brief article will attempt to provide documented proof that this deification is both biblical and historical.
Does the Bible Teach That Humans Will Become Part of the Family of God?
Jesus taught deification:

Jesus answered them, "Is it not written in your law, 'I said, "You are gods" '? If He called them gods, to whom the word of God came (and the Scripture cannot be broken), do you say of Him whom the Father sanctified and sent into the world, 'You are blaspheming,' because I said, 'I am the Son of God'? (John 10:34-36, NKJV throughout except if otherwise noted).

And this was not only referring to His deification as He quoted from Psalm 82:6 which also is in the plural:

I said, "You are gods, And all of you are children of the Most High..." (Psalm 82:6).

The Apostle Paul specifically taught "we have the mind of Christ" (1 Corinthians 2:16)--we do and strive to have that more. Paul also wrote that Jesus was to be the firstborn of many brethren:

For whom He foreknew, He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brethren (Romans 8:29).

If God is our Father, we are to be "conformed to the image of His Son", Jesus is God, Jesus is our brother, and are we not to be in the family of God and truly be deified?
Notice what happened with Jesus is supposed to happen to us:

20 But now Christ is risen from the dead, and has become the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. 21 For since by man came death, by Man also came the resurrection of the dead. 22 For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ all shall be made alive. 23 But each one in his own order: Christ the firstfruits, afterward those who are Christ's at His coming (1 Corinthians 15:20-23).
Of His own will He brought us forth by the word of truth, that we might be a kind of firstfruits of His creatures (James 1:18).
These were redeemed from among men, being firstfruits to God and to the Lamb (Revelation 14:4).

For if the firstfruit is holy, the lump is also holy; and if the root is holy, so are the branches (Romans 11:16).

Christians are to be firstfruits like Christ. As a firstfruit, Christ is divine.
Notice that the Bible does teach that there is a whole family which is named after God the Father, and that we are to know the love of Christ so that we can truly have the fullness of God:

For this reason I bow my knees to the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, from whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named, that He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with might through His Spirit in the inner man, that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the width and length and depth and height-- to know the love of Christ which passes knowledge; that you may be filled with all the fullness of God (Ephesians 3:14-19).

The Apostle Paul also taught:

The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God: And if children, then heirs; heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ; if so be that we suffer with him, that we may be also glorified together (Romans 8:16-17, KJV).
17 Now the Lord is the Spirit; and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. 18 But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord. (2 Corinthians 3:17-18)
18 'I will be a Father to you, And you shall be My sons and daughters, Says the Lord Almighty." (2 Corinthians 6:18)
Do all things without complaining and disputing, that you may become blameless and harmless, children of God without fault in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, among whom you shine as lights in the world (Philippians 2:14-15).

Notice that "the children of God" are to be "glorified together" with Christ as "joint-heirs" and are to be transformed into the same image as God. And God wil be a Father to His sons and daughters.
The Apostle John taught:

But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, to those who believe in His name (John 1:12).
Behold what manner of love the Father has bestowed on us, that we should be called children of God! Therefore the world does not know us, because it did not know Him. Beloved, NOW we are children of God (1 John 3:1-2a).

The children of people are people, the children of cows are cows. What are the children of God?
The Apostle Peter taught deification:

His divine power has given to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of Him who called us by glory and virtue, by which have been given to us exceedingly great and precious promises, that through these you may be partakers of the divine nature (2 Peter 1:3-4).

Are not those that are "partakers of the divine nature" somehow deified?
Do the Books of Genesis and Revelation Support the Idea of Deification?
Did the Bible teach that humans were to be God from the beginning? What about at the end?
Scripture is clear that from the beginning God made humans in the image and likeness of God. Notice:

Then God said, "Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth" (Genesis 1:26-27).

What is man? Notice what the Psalms teach:

What is man that You are mindful of him,
And the son of man that You visit him?
For You have made him a little lower than the angels,
And You have crowned him with glory and honor.
You have made him to have dominion over the works of Your hands;
You have put all things under his feet (Psalm 8:4-6).

Thus humans were made to have all things under their subjection.
Also notice what the Book of Hebrews teaches about the above passage in Psalm 8:

For in that He put all in subjection under him, He left nothing that is not put under him. But now we do not yet see all things put under him. But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels, for the suffering of death crowned with glory and honor, that He, by the grace of God, might taste death for everyone.
For it was fitting for Him, for whom are all things and by whom are all things, in bringing many sons to glory, to make the captain of their salvation perfect through sufferings. For both He who sanctifies and those who are being sanctified are all of one, for which reason He is not ashamed to call them brethren, saying:

"I will declare Your name to My brethren;
In the midst of the assembly I will sing praise to You." And again:
"I will put My trust in Him."
And again:
"Here am I and the children whom God has given Me."

Inasmuch then as the children have partaken of flesh and blood, He Himself likewise shared in the same, that through death He might destroy him who had the power of death, that is, the devil, and release those who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage. For indeed He does not give aid to angels, but He does give aid to the seed of Abraham (Hebrews 2:8-16).

Thus the Bible clearly teaches that God made humans to be in the image of God and rule over all things, that this has not yet happened, but because of Jesus becoming human, that humans will be God's children and that all things will be subject to them.
Notice that the Apostle Paul confirmed this:

This is a faithful saying:

For if we died with Him,
We shall also live with Him.
If we endure,
We shall also reign with Him (2 Timothy 2:11-12).

This rulership is also discussed in the Book of Revelation:

And we shall reign on the earth (Revelation 5:10).

Over such the second death has no power, but they shall be priests of God and of Christ, and shall reign with Him a thousand years (Revelation 20:6).
And they shall reign forever and ever. Then he said to me, "These words are faithful and true" (Revelation 22:5-6).

Thus the idea of being deified and reigning with Christ is taught throughout the Bible.
Do Second Century Writings Show That Christians Believed They Would Become God?
In the early second century, Ignatius of Antioch wrote:

For it is not my desire to act towards you as a man-pleaser, but as pleasing God, even as also you please Him. For neither shall I ever have such [another] opportunity of attaining to God...It is good to set from the world unto God, that I may rise again to Him...Suffer me to become food for the wild beasts, through whose instrumentality it will be granted me to attain to God (Ignatius. Letter to the Romans, Chapters 2,4).
He is the door of the Father, by which enter in Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, and the prophets, and the apostles, and the Church. All these have for their object the attaining to the unity of God (Ignatius. Letter to the Romans, Chapter 9).

Polycarp of Smyrna, who knew Ignatius, wrote:

But He who raised Him up from the dead will raise up us also, if we do His will, and walk in His commandments, and love what He loved, keeping ourselves from all unrighteousness, covetousness, love of money, evil speaking, falsewitness; "not rendering evil for evil, or railing for railing," or blow for blow, or cursing for cursing, but being mindful of what the Lord...may He bestow on you a lot and portion among His saints, and on us with you, and on all that are under heaven, who shall believe in our Lord and God Jesus Christ, and in His Father, who raised Him from the dead (Polycarp's Letter to the Philippians. Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 1 as edited by Alexander Roberts & James Donaldson. American Edition, 1885. Sections 2,12).

Polycarp is teaching that what happened to Jesus will also happen to true Christians. And that is also what New Testament writers taught.
Theophilus of Antioch also taught the humans were to become God, though several passages need to be looked at to make this clear:

In like manner also the three days which were before the luminaries, are types of the threes of God, and His Word, and His wisdom. And the fourth is the type of man, who needs light, that so there may be God, the Word, wisdom, man (Theophilus of Antioch. To Autolycus, Book 2, Chapter XV. Translated by Bob Thiel).

(Note the above is often mistranslated, for details see the article Theophilus of Antioch).
What Theophilus is teaching is that now man is a fourth, but will become part of God, the third part, when humans become God's offspring. And that he seems to see this as the wisdom of God's plan.
Lest anyone suggest that I am reading something into Theophilus that he does not mean (and since he often writes poetically, he is a bit hard to follow), he verifies what I concluded when he wrote:

...if I call Him Mind, I speak but of His wisdom; if I say He is Spirit, I speak of His breath; if I call Him Wisdom, I speak of His offspring (Theophilus of Antioch. To Autolycus, Book 1, Chapter III. Translated by Marcus Dods, A.M. Excerpted from Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 2. Edited by Alexander Roberts & James Donaldson. American Edition, 1885. Online Edition Copyright © 2004 by K. Knight).
For if He had made him immortal from the beginning, He would have made him God...so that if he should incline to the things of immortality, keeping the commandment of God, he should receive as reward from Him immortality, and should become God...For God has given us a law and holy commandments; and every one who keeps these can be saved, and, obtaining the resurrection, can inherit incorruption (Theophilus of Antioch. To Autolycus, Book 2, Chapter XXVII. Translated by Marcus Dods, A.M. Excerpted from Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 2. Edited by Alexander Roberts & James Donaldson. American Edition, 1885. Online Edition Copyright © 2004 by K. Knight).

Theophilus teaches that we are to be God's offspring and become God. We are to be God in the family of God.
Do Roman Catholic, Protestant, and Eastern Orthodox Writings Show That the Belief in Deification Was a Widespread Belief?
It is also true that some of those that we in the Living Church of God consider to have been heretics (even though most quoted in this section are considered to have been saints by the Roman Catholic and/or Eastern Orthodox churches), also had some understanding that Christians were to become God. Several will be quoted in this section.
Although he held to heretical beliefs, Irenaeus (who claimed to have known Polycarp) understood that while humans were not God now, nor immortal now, that they would be later:

...there is none other called God by the Scriptures except the Father of all, and the Son, and those who possess the adoption (Irenaeus. Adversus haereses, Book IV, Preface, Verse 4. Excerpted from Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 1. Edited by Alexander Roberts & James Donaldson. American Edition, 1885. Online Edition Copyright © 2004 by K. Knight).
For we cast blame upon Him, because we have not been made gods from the beginning, but at first merely men, then at length gods; although God has adopted this course out of His pure benevolence, that no one may impute to Him invidiousness or grudgingness. He declares, "I have said, You are gods; and you are all sons of the Highest." But since we could not sustain the power of divinity, He adds, "But you shall die like men," setting forth both truths—the kindness of His free gift, and our weakness, and also that we were possessed of power over ourselves. For after His great kindness He graciously conferred good [upon us], and made men like to Himself, [that is] in their own power; while at the same time by His prescience He knew the infirmity of human beings, and the consequences which would flow from it; but through [His] love and [His] power, He shall overcome the substance of created nature. For it was necessary, at first, that nature should be exhibited; then, after that, that what was mortal should be conquered and swallowed up by immortality (Irenaeus. Adversus Haereses (Book IV, Chapter 38, Verse 4).

Like Irenaeus and Polycarp, Hippolytus of Rome was also some type of a binitarian and also taught humans would become God. Hippolytus, in the early third century, wrote:

And you shall receive the kingdom of heaven, you who, while you sojourned in this life, knew the Celestial King. And you shall be a companion of the Deity, and a co-heir with Christ, no longer enslaved by lusts or passions, and never again wasted by disease. For you have become God...
And God called man His likeness from the beginning, and has evinced in a figure His love towards you. And provided you obey His solemn injunctions, and becomest a faithful follower of Him who is good, you shall resemble Him, inasmuch as you shall have honour conferred upon you by Him. For the Deity, (by condescension,) does not diminish anything of the divinity of His divine perfection; having made you even God unto His glory! (Hippolytus. Refutation of All Heresies (Book X, Chapter 30) Copyright © 2007 by Kevin Knight).
The Father of immortality sent the immortal Son and Word into the world, who came to man in order to wash him with water and the Spirit; and He, begetting us again to incorruption of soul and body, breathed into us the breath (spirit) of life, and endued us with an incorruptible panoply. If, therefore, man has become immortal, he will also be God. And if he is made God by water and the Holy Spirit after the regeneration of the layer he is found to be also joint-heir with Christ after the resurrection from the dead (Hippolytus. The Discourse on the Holy Theophany, Chapter 8. Copyright © 2007 by Kevin Knight).

Clement of Alexandria (mid-late second century) wrote:

And now the Word Himself clearly speaks to you, shaming your unbelief; yea, I say, the Word of God became man, that you may learn from man how man may become God (Clement of Alexandria . Exhortation to the Heathen (Chapter 1). Copyright © 2007 by Kevin Knight).

In the early third century, Origen of Alexandria wrote:

But both Jesus Himself and His disciples desired that His followers should believe not merely in His Godhead and miracles, as if He had not also been a partaker of human nature, and had assumed the human flesh which "lusts against the Spirit;" but they saw also that the power which had descended into human nature, and into the midst of human miseries, and which had assumed a human soul and body, contributed through faith, along with its divine elements, to the salvation of believers, when they see that from Him there began the union of the divine with the human nature, in order that the human, by communion with the divine, might rise to be divine, not in Jesus alone, but in all those who not only believe, but enter upon the life which Jesus taught, and which elevates to friendship with God and communion with Him every one who lives according to the precepts of Jesus (Origen. Contra Celsus, Book III, Chapter 28. Copyright © 2007 by Kevin Knight).

Thus, Origen is teaching that Christians are to rise to be divine, to become God.
In the 4th century, Ambrose of Milan taught:

Then a Virgin conceived, and the Word became flesh that flesh might become God (Ambrose of Milan. Concerning Virginity (Book I, Chapter 11). Copyright © 2007 by Kevin Knight).

In the late 4th century, John Chrysostom wrote:

...the man can become God, and a child of God. For we read, "I have said, You are gods, and all of you are children of the Most High" (John Chrysostom. Homily 32 on the Acts of the Apostles. Copyright © 2007 by Kevin Knight).

The 5th century Bishop Ibas of Edessa allegedly taught:

I do not envy Christ His becoming God, for I can become God no less than He (Labourt J. Transcribed by John Fobian. Ibas. The Catholic Encyclopedia, Volume VII. Published 1910. New York: Robert Appleton Company. Nihil Obstat, June 1, 1910. Remy Lafort, S.T.D., Censor. Imprimatur. +John Cardinal Farley, Archbishop of New York).

In the 13th/14th century, notice what the following from a famous German Dominican theologian Meister Eckhardt (c. 1260–c. 1328):

Meister Eckhardt said that in union with God we become God (Fanning S. Mystics of the Christian Tradition. Routeldge, New York. 2001, reprinted 2006, p. 219).

In the 16th century, notice what even Martin Luther taught:

“For the Word became flesh in order that the flesh might become Word. That is, God becomes man in order that man might become God (On the Word Became Flesh Martin Luther, 1483-1546 From: Sermo Lutheri in natali Christi, [December 25, 1514]) _D. Martin Luthers Werke. Kritische Gesammtausgabe_ (Weimar: Hermann Boehlau, 1883) Vol. 1, p. 28).

In the 20th century, Pope Paul VI taught:

My brothers, do you understand the Grace of God our Head? Stand in admiration, rejoice; we have become Christ. For if He is the Head, we are the members; He and we are the complete Man . . . therefore, the fullness of Christ is constituted by the Head and Members Ecclesiam Suam Encyclical Letter on the Ways in which the Church Must Carry Out its Mission in the Contemporary World His Holiness Pope Paul VI, Section 35. Transcribed work by Bob Van Cleef. Promulgated on August 6, 1964. Copyright © 2007 by Kevin Knight).

And while "some believe" we have not yet "become Christ", even the late Pope John Paul II taught:

In order for man to become God, the Word took on humanity (Joannes Paulus II. Orientale Lumen: Apostolic Letter on the Eastern Churches His Holiness Pope John Paul II, Section 15. Promulgated on May 2, 1995. Copyright © 2007 by Kevin Knight).

In 1988, Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger (now Pope Benedict XVI) taught:

Man can become God, not by making himself God, but by allowing himself to be made 'Son'. (Ratzinger J. Eschatology: Death and Eternal Life. 1988. Cited in Kurz W. What Does the Bible Say About End Times? A Catholic View. Nihil Obstat: H. Kistner. Imprimi Potest: F. Link. Imprimatur + C. Moeddel, July 19, 2004. St. Anthony Messenger Press, 2004, p. 89)

Near the end of the 20th century, Orthodox bishop Timothy Ware wrote:

Such, according to the teaching of the Orthodox Church, is the final goal at which every Christian must attain: to become god, to obtain theosis, 'deification' or 'divinization'. For Orthodoxy our salvation and redemption mean our deification...deification is not something reserved for a select few initiates, but is something intended for all alike. The Orthodox Church believes this is the normal goal of every Christian without exception. Certainly we shall only be deified on the Last Day; but for each of us the process of divinization must begin here and now in this present life" (Ware, T. The Orthodox Church. Penguin Books, London, 1997, p.231,236).

In the 21st century, the Orthodox Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew of Constantinople taught:

The patriarch said that at the center of their pastoral work was a recognition that humanity is "called to know and to become God," the call to holiness which the Orthodox term "deification." (Pope, Orthodox patriarch meet privately, pray together.CNS News - March 6, 2008. http://www.catholicnews.com/data/stories/cns/0801277.htm).

Hence the idea that Christians are to be deified like Christ is not some weird new cultic idea--it is an idea that has been held by many throughout the centuries.
Why Did God Make Humans According to the Living Church of God?
Herbert W. Armstrong wrote,

WHY did the Creator God put MAN on the earth? For God's ultimate supreme purpose of reproducing himself--of recreating himself, as it were, by the supreme objective of creating the righteous divine character ultimately in millions unnumbered begotten and born children who shall become God beings, members of the God family. Man was to improve the physical earth as God gave it to him, finishing its creation (which sinning angels had deliberately refused to do) and, in so doing, to RESTORE the GOVERNMENT OF GOD, with God's WAY of life; and further, in this very process FINISHING THE CREATION OF MAN by the development of God's holy, righteous CHARACTER, with man's own assent. Once this perfect and righteous character is instilled in man, and man converted from mortal flesh to immortal spirit, then is to come the INCREDIBLE HUMAN POTENTIAL--man being BORN INTO the divine FAMILY of God, restoring the government of God to the earth, and then participating in the completion of the CREATION over the entire endless expanse of the UNIVERSE! That incredible potential of man will be fully explained in the pages that follow in this volume. God shall have reproduced HIMSELF untold millions of times over! So, on the sixth day of that re-creation week, God (Elohim) said, "Let us make man in our image, after our likeness" (Gen. 1:26). Man was made to have (with his assent) a special relationship with his Maker! He was made in the form and shape of God. He was given a spirit (essence in form) to make the relationship possible (ibid).

Notice what the Living Church of God specifically teaches:

How can you not be filled with ALL of the 'fullness of God' and not be God?" "This is the final fulfillment of the Gospel of Jesus Christ--the ultimate Good News--that man can be born into the God Kingdom, the God-level of existence" (Meredith, Roderick C. Your Ultimate Destiny. Booklet. LCG, 1996; p:33)
...man becoming God...is an awesome event...We will be part of the Family of God (Meredith R.C. Christ and the Passover Sermon. Charlotte, North Carolina, 20110219).
God’s purpose is that He is reproducing Himself and that those converted, ultimately, become full members of the Family of God, under the authority of the Father and the Son (1 John 3:1-3). They will share divine glory in the resurrection (Official Statement of Fundamental Beliefs. LCG, 2004).
God is reproducing Himself...we will not be a lessor form of existence...He put His very divine nature in us...in the process of reproducing Himself...that is why we are alive. That is the ultimate purpose of our existence (Meredith R.C. Last Great Day Sermon. Clearwater, Florida, 20051025).
We can be changed into--actually born--of spirit as a literal son of God! God is reproducing Himself! He, the Creator and Ruler of the universe, is begetting human beings through His Spirit to be born as His sons--to be in His family and inherit eternal life (Meredith RC. How to Know God. Tomorrow's World Magazine, September-October 2007, p. 7).
We should never forget that God has called us to become His full sons and daughters, to share His level of existence with us for all eternity. Just as these characteristics— amazing power, access to all of the universe and perception of all things—apply to Christ and the Father now, they one day will apply to us! (Smith, Wallace. God and the "Three 'O's. Living Church News, Sep-Dec 2007, pp. 10-12,20.)
Our potential...we will be God...We have a lot to be thankful for...When He is done we will be exactly like Him (Way H. Being Thankful. LCG Sermon, SLO County, 12/01/07).
We teach...man becoming God...The ultimate human potential is to be in God's family (Meredith RC. Are You a Conquered Christian? LCG Sermon, Charlotte (NC), 07/11/09).
Revelation {3:9} They will worship us when we are gods--when we are in God's family (Meredith RC. Where we have been, where we are going. LCG Sermon, Charlotte (NC), 12/26/09).
Genesis 1...We are to be part of Elohim....Malachi 2...He seeks godly offspring (Lowe J. Dating and Marriage. LCG Sermon, Panama City (FL), 09/29/10).
We are to be resurrected, fully God, in the Family of God (Bardo R. Seeds of Faith. LCG Sermon, Glenwood Springs (CO), 10/16/11).
We are made in the image of God...God is, in fact, reproducing Himself...We will be like He is someday (Meredith RC. Last Great Day Message. LCG Sermon, played 10/20/11).

God is reproducing Himself to have additional members of His family, as "He seeks godly offspring" (Malachi 2:15). You can be part of it!
We are to be children of God. The Bible teaches that repeatedly. By being God's children, we are clearly to be part of God's family. That is why God made humans!
Deification is the destiny of men and women (some additional details are in the article The Cherished Christian Woman: Duty and destiny.
Concluding Comments on Deification
The Bible makes it clear that God's plan included making humans in the image of God and that ultimately all would be put under the control of deified humans.
But it needs to be pointed out that just as the Son is subject to the Father, Christians will not be above either the Father or the Son. The Father is greater than the Son (John 14:28) and both will always be greater than spirit-born Christians. Also, while God is eternal (Deuteronomy 33:27), all humans have had a beginning and thus will always have been around for a finite time. Thus, deification does not mean that Christians will be equal to God, but will be His true sons and daughters (without gender issues).
The Bible teaches this from Genesis through Revelation if one will simply believe what the Bible is actually teaching. And those who professed Christ in the early centuries after His resurrection also taught that.
And the Living Church of God teaches that today. The view that Jesus became human so that humans could be in the family of God is not a cultic view, but is a biblical and historical one.That was the view of one.. the "Living Church of God"... called a cult by many..  but I am not a member of them, and never have been and this is the first time, I have read anything written that they may have written,  but they had the closest to the truth, that I have seen within the "church" context for a time on this. Except like many they are still afraid to go one more step over the line of FEAR, to know Paul's admonition I gave in Phillipians 2:4-6We that are professing that "WE ARE THE CHRIST," are considered heretics by most, but we are only declaringbearing THE TRUTH of what GOD SAYS ABOUT US, not what MAN's judgments may say about them or others.. Now that I know WHO I AM and WHO YOU ARE... we ARE HUMBLED BY SO GREAT A LOVE AS THIS:
John 15:13
Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.Now for the rest of the verse in Phillipians... it's time.. now that you have been awakened to THE TRUTH of YOU AND OTHERS:
7 but did empty himself, the form of a servant having taken, in the likeness of men having been made,
8 and in fashion having been found as a man, he humbled himself, having become obedient unto death -- death even of a cross,
9 wherefore, also, God did highly exalt him, and gave to him a name that [is] above every name,
10 that in the name of Jesus every knee may bow -- of heavenlies, and earthlies, and what are under the earth --
11 and every tongue may confess that Jesus Christ [is] Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
12 So that, my beloved, as ye always obey, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, with fear and trembling your own salvation work out,
13 for God it is who is working in you both to will and to work for His good pleasure.
14 All things do without murmurings and reasonings,
15 that ye may become blameless and harmless, children of God, unblemished in the midst of a generation crooked and perverse, among whom ye do appear as luminaries in the world,

LOVE BEGAT LOVE and LOVE BEGETS LOVE! BE LOVE...   What man thinks is of importance, God disdains.. RELIGION IS NOT YOUR CALLING!  UNION WITH CHRIST IS!
I Corinthians 2:11-1611 For what man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him? even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God.
12 NOW WE HAVE RECEIVED (past tense), not the spirit of the world, but the spirit which is of God; that we MIGHT KNOW THE THINGS THAT ARE FREELY GIVEN TO US IN GOD.
13 Which things also we speak, not in the words which man's wisdom teacheth, BUT which the Holy Ghost teacheth; comparing spiritual things with spiritual.
14 But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.
15 But he that is spiritual judgeth all things, yet he himself is judged of no man.
16 For who hath known the mind of the Lord, that he may instruct him? BUT WE HAVE THE MIND OF CHRIST.
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Chris Welch Writes
We don't "become God"
We are at all times a manifestation in outer form of His very life.

Godliness...is just being conformed to this One Central Life that is going on continually in the Universe. We cannot become God, and we cannot become godlike...this was the devil's first lie.

It IS GOD'S ACTUAL LIFE that we share...the mystery of how it operates if followed to the nth degree is described in fairy tales like Cinderella, and  the Snow Queen.....the latter ofcourse being a tale of how we can have God's life subverted through lies.