Programme: Writing the Vision (April Edition)
Date: Saturday, 22nd April 2023
Transcript Summary
1. Dominion refers to a place where one has influence over. God has different kinds of dominions and they are His works. Although all the works of God's hands were put under Adam, he and Eve did not have dominion over all of them, like the Angels (Heb. 2:7-8).
2. The reason Adam had dominion over the lower works of God on the earth was because he had a measure of the image of God in his soul. For a man to have dominion over all the works of God, he has to finish the course of being made in the image and likeness of God (Gen. 1:26). The make-up of the living soul (which Adam and Eve possessed - Gen. 2:7) did not have power over heavenly works, including the evil spirits that God cast out of their places in heaven and reserved in chains of darkness (2 Peter 2:4).
3. Whatsoever a man has dominion over cannot dominate him (Rom. 6:14). Evil spirits can tempt a living soul because they are framed by a law that is higher than that of the living soul. The living soul has an everlasting law of the earth while these spirits have the everlasting law of the created heaven.
4. Just as evil spirits fell from different strata in heaven, Satan also calibrated them in different strata in hell. While some retained their estates, he upgraded the strata of some others. He kept principalities and powers in their office but turned mights, thrones and dominion into rulers of the darkness of this world (Eph. 1:21, 6:12).
5. When God created the earth, He also created a world (an arrangement of life) within it, by which every soul should operate (Ps. 24:1). You cannot relate with the world without a soul. There are degrees of souls within the creatures on earth, but only the soul of man can be reckoned with because it can give account. The soul can keep records and can be written upon. Things can be formed and fashioned in the soul of man.
6. Satan has also designed a world for every soul to carry out another arrangement of life and be conformed to it. When a man undergoes the course of this world, it would be fashioned into his soul. The essence of this is to put Satan's seat in the souls of men. Therefore, the conformation of men to this world is the end work of Satan. This is how He intends to eventually place his seat in men, and rule from there.
7. A soul cannot be a friend of the world if he does not understand the course of the world. Satan does not initially introduce us to the world; he starts by introducing us to lust (1 John 2:16). The essence of lust is to culture us to know the world. Different men know the world to different degrees. As such, some men have become rulers in the world because of their knowledge of the world.
8. The enemy of the image of God is the image of this world. The intention of the god of this world is to hinder men from receiving the light of the glorious gospel of Christ (2 Cor. 4:3-4). We need light for the image of God to be formed in us, and light comes by receiving the things of God.
9. The coming of God is the coming of glory. However, God's glory cannot come until His image has been formed in us. Therefore, we have to renew the spirit of our minds through the Spirit of God (Eph. 4:22-24; Rom. 8:13). This is so that we can fully receive the light of the glorious gospel in the face of Jesus Christ and have the formation of the image of God in us (2 Cor. 4:4).
Blessings!