We are pressing toward perfection, toward the rest of God where we delight to do His will. Many witnesses surround us in the spirit realm as well as in the present world. Let us straighten up our back and walk as sons and daughters of God. There will come an end to the program of transformation, and we shall be exceedingly glad that we endured the cross and did not choose to remain in our untransformed state.

The Law! How the Orthodox love the Law, sometimes carrying the scroll around the synagogue on their shoulders.

Because of a misunderstanding of the Apostle Paul, as he sought to persuade the Jews to look up from the scroll of the Law and see their Christ, we have created a religion, the Christian religion, that is not true to the New Testament.

We emphasize dying and going to Heaven, a "rapture" to Heaven to deliver us from trouble, sometimes such extreme ideas as "prosperity" or "faith in faith."

In America, at least, the Gospel is kept "positive." The believers are told God loves them so much they need have no fear of the Judgment Seat of Christ. The churches outdo each other in making the "services" happy times in which everyone is welcomed and promised joy in the present world as well as the next.

God is pictured as a kindly old gentleman in the sky who overlooks our unscriptural behavior and who rushes to assure us he never could be really angry with us.

Actually, the picture we have is more of Santa Claus than it is of God.

The preachers stand in line to tell us how much God loves us. But the Spirit of God is warning that unless the American Christians begin to keep God's commandments our nation will be punished severely.

One would look far and wide to find an assembly of Christians that pointed to the eternal moral law of God as being the object of salvation.

In this we are unscriptural. We of the royal priesthood have been predestined to be conformed to the image of the Lord Jesus. This means we are to become the eternal moral law of God revealed in a human being.

I think the previous two thousand years of the Church Age have been occupied largely with the pouring of the foundation of the Church, the Kingdom of God. Now that the foundation has been firmly established, it is time to build the Church without spot, wrinkle, or blemish of any sort.

For the Church to be without blemish, which is the scriptural promise, means the Church is keeping God's laws perfectly. Once this is true, the Church will be established on the earth and the saved nations of the earth will come to the Church to learn how God desires that their citizens behave.

In the last days the mountain of the LORD's temple will be established as chief among the mountains; it will be raised above the hills, and all nations will stream to it. (Isaiah 2:2—NIV)

To be continued.