Rocky Mountain Baha’i

It is important to understand the resurrection. The Christians claim that Jesus is God because starting out in the first chapter of John it says, “In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God.” This is a very bad translation from the Greek. This was initially written in Greek and the Greeks were into logic. In their logic they had what was called the “Logos.” The Greek translation of the word “Logos” is: “The thought of a man as expressed in a word.” John, at this time, was in a Greek country. He was in Ephesus, where they spoke Greek and they were into the Logos. But also the Hebrews or the Jews were into the Logos too. But their translation of the word Logos was “the thought of God as expressed in a word.
 
The Christians say that because of what John says, “In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God,” and later it says, “And the Word became flesh,” they say this means that Jesus was the Word. They do this in order to make Jesus God, to deify Him. In reality, however, this means the thought of God became expressed in a revelation, or in the words Jesus spoke.
 
So the Christians maintain that Jesus resurrected physically or bodily out of the grave, and that He is up someplace in the sky. They say when He comes again He will come down from the sky. But no place in the Bible does it say that He went up into the sky. It says He went up into heaven.
 
Jesus said that He came from heaven, but He didn’t come out of the sky. He came from the womb of Mary. So if He is going to heaven, that doesn’t necessarily mean that He is going up into the sky, because He came from heaven and that heaven wasn’t in the sky.
 
Of course there’s the visible heaven with the sun, moon and stars, and then there’s the spiritual heaven which isn’t confined to space or time or place. Jesus said: I came from heaven, I’m in heaven and I’m going to heaven; and He said these things while He was on earth (John 3:13 KJV; John 6:38, 51). So heaven isn’t a place.
 
Now turn to the 12th chapter of Matthew, the 38th verse:
 
“Then some of the scribes and the Pharisees said to him, ‘Teacher we wish to see a sign from you.’”
 
OK. What does it mean, “We want to see a sign from you?” When they say they want a sign, this means they want Him to show some kind of miracle or something like that, so they might believe. It’s like they were saying, “If you’re the Christ, give us a sign, something that we can make sure that you’re the Christ.” Jesus then says:
 
“An evil and adulterous generation seeks for a sign; but no sign shall be given to it except the sign of the prophet Jonah. For as Jonah was in the belly of the whale, so will the Son of man be for three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.” (Matthew 12:40)
 
Now Jesus was crucified on Friday: Good Friday. It was just before the sun went down. They had to take Him down off the cross because they weren’t allowed to keep a Jew on the cross on the Sabbath. The Jewish day starts at sundown. It was Friday and the Jewish Sabbath, which was Saturday, would start at sundown. So they broke the legs of the thieves on each side of Him, so they could take them off the cross. When they came to Jesus He was already dead. This was just before the sun went down on Friday.
 
Mary Magdalene was at the tomb on Sunday morning. It was dawn but the sun hadn’t come up yet. It was light. They could see but the sun hadn’t come over the horizon. So how long is it from Friday night until Sunday morning? …Two nights and one day.
 
Jesus said: An evil and adulterous generation seeks a sign. I’ll only give you one sign. As Jonah was for three days and three nights in the belly of the whale, so shall the Son of man be for three days and three nights in the belly of the earth. The Christians say: See, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, three days! But that’s not three days and three nights; it’s two nights and one day.
 
Why was the tomb empty after two nights and one day, if that’s His only sign? Why wasn’t He in there for three days and three nights, if that’s the only sign that He’s the Christ? Why wasn’t He in the tomb for three days and three nights?
 
The reason He wasn’t in there was so that you, and you, and you, and you would not believe that His physical body resurrected. The physical body did not meet the criteria of the only sign He gave, which was the three days and three nights. He didn’t want people to think that the physical body resurrected because there were pagans all around who worshiped physical idols and who would corrupt His religion. So He gives them the only sign that you can rely on: His word that it would be for three days and three nights. And Friday night until Sunday morning is only two nights and one day.
 
Now does that mean Jesus wasn’t the Christ, if this is the only sign?
 
No.
 
Well, what about it then? I mean, this is the only sign that He was the Christ.
 
OK. The body of Christ is the believers: the church, the ecclesia. It says this in Ephesians and Colossians, that the body of Christ is the church. In one place it says that Jesus is the head of that body. So the body of Christ is the believers.
 
On Thursday night, the night before the crucifixion, Jesus and the apostles were up on the mountain. Jesus said to them, “Tonight everybody in the world will disbelieve in Me.” And Peter says, “Oh Lord, if everybody disbelieves in you I’ll still believe in you.” Jesus said, “Peter, before the cock crows you will deny me three times.” This was fulfilled right afterwards.
 
That means this. That night, there were no more believers in Jesus Christ. Therefore the body of Christ was dead. Why did they stop being believers in Him? Why didn’t they continue to believe in Him? Peter said he would, but then he denied Him three times. Everybody disbelieved. Jesus said: Everybody will disbelieve in Me. So we have to take His word that everybody is going to disbelieve in Him.
 
It was because they didn’t understand which Messiah He was. That’s the whole thing. They thought that He was the redeeming Messiah who was going to redeem Israel and establish it over all the countries of the world (see Isaiah 9). Jesus was not that Christ. He was the suffering Christ who was to suffer for the sins of the people (see Isaiah 53).
 
The apostles thought that Jesus was going to somehow get an army; that He was going to get a white horse; that He was going to sit on it and go out and conquer the Roman Empire like David did, because the word “Christ” meant a descendant of David. They thought He would conquer the world and set the Jews up in ascendancy. But after the last supper He said to them, “I’m going to be arrested and crucified. They’re going to come and arrest me and they’re going to crucify me.”
 
The apostles started murmuring among themselves, “What kind of a Christ have we got? He can’t establish the Kingdom being dead.”
 
So when Judas came, they were on the mountain. Judas went and kissed Jesus on the cheek because he had told them: The one that I kiss on the cheek is the one you want to get. Judas betrayed Jesus. He kissed Jesus on the cheek and they came and arrested Him. The apostles knew then, that it was certain. They knew He was going to be crucified. So they all became disbelievers in Him that night. See, so the body of Christ was dead. There was no body of Christ. There had been believers but they all died on Thursday night; or more specifically, their belief in Jesus died.
 
According to the scriptures, on Sunday night when the doors and windows were closed, Jesus came and stood among them and He breathed on them a breath of the Holy Spirit, and they became alive. They became believers again. So the resurrection of Christ was the resurrection of the body, which was the resurrection of the belief of the believers. Thursday night until Sunday night is three days and three nights.
 
Thus the first thing the Christians don’t understand about Christ is that His being the speaker of the Word of God doesn’t mean that He is God or that He is a physical son of God. The Christians think that God was Jesus’ physical father.
 
Let’s turn to the first chapter of Romans in the King James Version. Start with the first chapter, the third verse:
 
“… concerning His Son Jesus Christ our Lord, which was made of the seed of David.”
 
What is the seed of David? It’s the sperm! Mary had an ovum. Jesus was made of the sperm of David. What came down from David was a line of male kings. All the kings were male and they all had sperm. Joseph’s father was of that line. Joseph had sperm, or the seed of David.  Mary had an ovum. In the Greek version of the Bible, it doesn’t even say “seed” of David, it says “sperma,” indicating the male lineage, not the female lineage through the ovum.
 
After Paul explains that Jesus was of the sperm of David according to the flesh, he then goes on to say that Jesus was only “designated [or declared] to be the Son of God” (Romans 1:3).
 
Now what do you think this means? The Christians think that Jesus is the physical son of God. But God doesn’t have a sperm. If God was Jesus’ father, Jesus could not be the Messiah because the word Messiah means the anointed, sperm descendant of David. God is not a descendant of David. Jesus couldn’t have been the Messiah, and He couldn’t have been the Christ if God had been His physical father.
 
So what are we talking about when we talk about the Son of God? In the Bible it says that Jesus is the Son of God.
 
The way Jesus was the Son of God is this: The revelation He gave was in the station of the Son of God; As compared to the revelation of Abraham whose revelation was declared to be “the friend of God,” and Moses, whose revelation was designated as “the interlocutor,” and Muhammad, whose revelation was titled “the comforter.” You see, each revelation has a title. Jesus’ revelation was titled “the Son.” It was a greater revelation than that of the others and therefore it was entitled the revelation of the Son.
 
Romans 1:1-3 was the beginning of Paul’s letter to the Romans, who were famously pagan, meaning they believed in gods and goddesses. Right out of the shoot, Paul was emphasizing some basic points in order to make sure they understood that just because Jesus was designated to be the Son of God, this did not mean he was a god on earth, or the physical son of God. Rather, Paul wanted to make it clear that Jesus’ physical heritage was of the seed or lineage of David.
 
Now how did it happen that Jesus was designated to be the Son of God? It says in the Bible that after Jesus was baptized by John the Baptist, the heavens opened and the Spirit of God descended upon Jesus as a dove. Then there was a voice heard from heaven saying, “This is my beloved Son with whom I am well pleased.” So the Christians say: See, it says that He is the Son of God. But that isn’t what came down from God out of heaven. What came down from God out of heaven?
 
…The Holy Spirit.
 
Yes. It was the thought of God that descended upon Jesus and He expressed it in a Word, which is the revelation. This revelation holds the station or title of “the Son.”
 
When the ice cream man comes down the street ringing his bell they say, “Oh, it’s the ice cream man.” Is he made of ice cream or is he ice cream? Why do they call him the ice cream man?
 
…Because he sells ice cream.
 
That’s right. When the mailman comes, why do they call him the mailman?
 
…Because he delivers the mail.
 
That’s right. And when the grocery man comes, is he made of groceries? No. He delivers groceries.
 
Jesus delivered a revelation that was in the potency of the Son of God. Because He gave that revelation, He was called or designated the “Son of God;” Just like the ice cream man is called the ice cream man because he delivers ice cream. It says in Romans that Jesus was designated the Son of God because that was His revelation, the Son of God.
 
The Logos, or the thought of God expressed in a revelation titled the “Son of God,” descended upon Jesus as a dove. The revelation is what descended upon Him. It entered His mind. At that point Jesus’ mission as a prophet began, because he had a message from God to deliver to the people. This message would make them as close to God as if they were God’s very own sons. Therefore, whoever believed in the revelation of the Son of God also became sons of God:
 
“But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name.” (John 1:12)
 
In other religions, this moment when the revelation descended upon their prophet is referred to as the moment of their enlightenment. For Buddha, this happened while sitting under the Bo Tree. All the major prophets of God have the Holy Spirit inherent within them from the time of conception. That is why they astound their teachers at a young age, because they are inherently superior human beings, due to the fact that they have the Holy Spirit. But the purpose of them having this is not known until the moment of their enlightenment, when the Holy Spirit descends upon them, e.g. “like a dove,” and God reveals to them a message that they are then responsible to deliver to mankind. It’s like a television set. It picks up on a channel that you can’t pick up on. Similarly, the prophets who have the Holy Spirit can tune into the “thoughts of God” or a particular revelation when it descends upon them.
 
Up until the coming of Baha’u’llah, the greatest thoughts of God or “Logos” that man could have access to were those in the revelation of Jesus. The message of the Son of God was the closest thing to God because it brought the believers as close to God as if they were God’s very own sons. We know God through His revelation. Furthermore, Jesus’ revelation was a Universal revelation, meaning it was meant for all mankind, rather than for a particular tribe or group of people, such as Moses’ revelation, which was meant for the Israelites, Zoroaster’s revelation which was meant for the Persians, Muhammad’s revelation which was meant for the Arab tribes in the Arabian Peninsula, and so on.
 
So of all the past prophets, the greatest thought that we could have of God was through the revelation of Jesus Christ − until Baha’u’llah came. The word “Baha’u’llah” means Glory of the Father. The Father is greater than the Son.
 
In the Bible, Jesus asks, “Who will testify against me?” Read it from John 14:26:
 
“These things I have spoken to you while I am still with you. But the Counselor, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things” (John 14:26).
 
All right now. . He is going to teach you all things. Jesus said, “I have many things to tell you but you can’t bear to hear them now. But when He, the Spirit of Truth comes, He shall lead you into all truth” (John 16:13). Here He talks about the Spirit of Truth who is coming, who will teach you all things, meaning He will teach you the things that Jesus didn’t. Paul said Jesus fed you with milk and not with meat because you would have been unable to bear it. Well, milk is a good food for babies, but meat is a more solid food which is better for grown-ups. So Jesus says He only gave them milk. But Baha’u’llah comes and gives you the meat of the whole story. He gives you the whole meal.
 
So Jesus’ station was that of the Son, and Baha’u’llah’s was that of the Father. That doesn’t mean that either of them are God. It just means that these are the potencies of their revelations. These titles refer to the revelations, not the people. They are called the Father and the Son because they delivered those revelations. Their titles pertain to their revelations.
 
For instance in the 4th grade, is the teacher 4th grade? She teaches 4th grade. Is she 4th grade? No. She is called the 4th grade teacher because she teaches 4th grade − but she isn’t 4th grade. The history teacher teaches history, but is she history? No. She teaches history. The chemistry teacher teaches chemistry but he’s not chemistry. He only teaches chemistry.
 
Jesus taught a revelation in the potency of the Son of God. When you believe in it, you too become a son of God. But Jesus also said His kingdom was not of this world, and that he goes to heaven to prepare a place for you, in the Kingdom of God in heaven. But Jesus also promised that one was coming who would “teach you all things.” Baha’u’llah’s revelation is of a great potency because it is for the unification of all the peoples into the Kingdom of God here on earth. He is the Second Messiah, the one who establishes the Kingdom of God on earth.
 
So that takes care of that verse. Now read Luke 24:36:
 
“As they were saying this, Jesus himself stood among them.”
 
Now this is after the crucifixion.
 
“But they were startled and frightened, and supposed that they saw a spirit. And he said to them, ‘Why are you troubled and why do questionings rise in your hearts? See my hands and my feet, and it is I myself; handle me, and see; for spirit has not flesh and bones as you see that I have.’”
 
In other words, He is saying that He is not a spirit as he stood before them.“And while they still disbelieved for joy, and wondered, he said to them, ‘Have you anything here to eat?’ They gave him a piece of broiled fish, and he took it and ate before them.”
 
How many loaves of bread and how many fish did Jesus have that time when He was on that mountain? …Two fish and five loaves, or something like that. He fed 500 people with a couple loaves of bread and a couple of fish, and they had bushels left over. In Mark He says, “Everything is in parables” (Mark 4:11). He said, “There is nothing that I say to you that isn’t in parables” (Mark 4:33).
 
So you have to use some insight to understand the meanings of the stories or parables. When Jesus went up on that mountain He gave them a lecture, a talk, about spiritual things, and this caused the people forgot about their hunger. They were filled with spiritual food and there was lots of it left over. After that He departed and got in a boat and went out in the ocean. Jesus went out to talk to them on the ocean, and a storm came up and He walked on the water and everything else. They said they were hungry. He said, “Why don’t you eat some of these loaves and fish that were left over?” And they said, “What loaves, and what fish?” Well there weren’t any physical loaves and physical fish left over.
 
So now, after His crucifixion, here He is standing among them and He is not appearing as a spirit and he says a spirit doesn’t have bones, and things like this. This is because “bones” and “fish” and these things refer to His words, His teachings. Jesus said the clergy are in whitewashed tombs with dead men’s bones, meaning they have beautiful churches, but inside the teachings are dead, they don’t lead you to God. They lead you to worship Jesus as a deified god, and so on.
 
If you read the sixth chapter of John you’ll find that Jesus said, “Eat of my body and drink of my blood. They that don’t eat of my body and drink of my blood are dead. But those who eat of my flesh and drink of my blood will have everlasting life.” When He said this, the disciples got up and left. They said: We’re not vampires, we’re not cannibals. What’s He talking about? The man must be nuts to say, Eat of my flesh and drink of my blood.
 
So then Jesus turned to the twelve apostles. He said: Are you going to leave me too? They said: Where would we go? He knew that they were troubled by His foolish talk. You know, “Eat of my flesh and drink of my blood.” He said, “The flesh is of no avail; the words that I speak to you, they are spirit and life.” They are spirit and life − the words that I speak.
 
All of these things are symbols. Bread and bones are symbols of the words that He spoke to them, because what is His revelation? It’s the thought of God expressed in a Word, which comes down through the Holy Spirit. Now read Luke 24:44, which is right after the place where he ate the fish:
 
“Then he said to them, ‘These are my words which I spoke to you.’”
 
Now what is He talking about? He is talking about that fish. He is talking about those bones. He is talking about the things that transpired in the paragraph before. He said the fish, the flesh, and the bones are the Words that I spoke to you when I was on the mountain. In other words, these are the things I have been telling you. It’s all symbolic.
 
But the Christian clergy teaches that He comes back with a physical body. But the physical body didn’t resurrect. The body wasn’t in the tomb for three days and three nights. The body of Christ was the believers who resurrected in their belief after three days and three nights of disbelief.
 
The Christians have a lot of misinformation. They have Jesus resurrecting physically − bodily, and going up into the sky. They say He is up there in the sky someplace. Do you know how cold it is ten miles straight up from here? 240 degrees below zero. He’d freeze to death up there. Besides, there is no food up there. There is no air. There is no water. Unless people were in a capsule, shot up there by a missile, they would freeze. They would die of thirst and hunger. There is nothing up there to sustain life.
 
This type of mythology is for little children. People can’t think in the abstract. Jesus gave them all these symbols so they could understand. He talked to them in symbolic language so the people could understand. But they take the symbols to be the things that are important, rather than the meanings that the symbols convey. Jesus tried to explain spiritual things. He tried to explain things to people so they could understand. People hadn’t evolved to a place of comprehending this stuff before. Moses didn’t go into this stuff. The other prophets didn’t go into it. The Jews believed there was life after death but they didn’t understand a lot of these things. And Jesus started to explain a lot of things to these Jews in order that it would evolve them to a greater spiritual comprehension.
 
The apostles evolved but the Christian religion got taken over by a clergy class that made a business out of it. You can get more money selling a god than you can get by selling a prophet. So they had to deify Jesus, make a god out of him − make Him the god who became incarnate, which is absolutely ridiculous. God pervades the entire universe. He is always present. He is closer to you than your own jugular vein or your own breath. He is right here and He is all over the rest of space and He is All-knowing and All-Powerful. He is Omniscient, Omnipotent and Omnipresent. He is always present. If He had a physical body He wouldn’t be able to do that.
 
If Jesus has a physical body, when you prayed, how would He hear your prayers? He couldn’t. How could He be all over the whole world hearing everyone’s prayers at once if He had a physical body?
 
The whole thing of the church is so ridiculous, even little kids get suspicious of it. Only the people who have become dummies by getting their brains knocked out by the battering of the clergy throughout a lifetime, start to believe the stuff that the preachers put forth. If you had never listened to the preachers and then you read this verse here spoken by Jesus, you could figure it out. He says: You have to be like a little child, because a little child becomes suspicious of these things. Grownups are so used to lies. Every time the President opens his mouth he lies. He couldn’t tell the truth if he wanted to. He is the best politician this country has ever had and that’s because he’s the biggest liar we have ever had for a President. He tells people so much so people believe he is sincere, but he is just a liar.
 
People are used to lies. They’re used to the preachers lying to them. When they go to court they’re used to their lawyers lying for them. The doctor writes the prescription in Latin because they don’t want the people to know what he is giving them.
 
If they knew they wouldn’t take it.
 
The whole world is built on the fabrication of a bunch of lies. How can the Christians miss this? Now read on, continuing where we left off, where Jesus says the fish are His words, verse 44:
 
“Then He said to them, ‘These are the words that I spoke to you, while I was still with you, that everything written about me in the Law of Moses and the prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled.’ Then He opened their minds to understand the scriptures….”
 
In other words, He is opening their minds with these parables for them to understand the scriptures. He is giving them a lesson. He is teaching them, using the fish and the flesh and the bones, which are the words that He spoke.
 
“…and said to them, ‘Thus it is written, that the Christ should suffer and on the third day rise from the dead and that repentance and forgiveness of sins should be preached in his name to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem.”
 
So you see now that the three days and the three nights started on Thursday night, when peoplThe e became disbelievers in Him. On the third day, or on Sunday night, He rose from the dead, meaning He had believers in the world again. But instead of them believing He was the reigning Messiah, the redeeming Christ who would establish the Kingdom of God on earth, He said they should “preach salvation, and the repentance and forgiveness of sins.”
 
On the third day, Christ’s body of believers started once again to believe in His words. This made them alive again (John 6:63). The believers now understood for the first time that Jesus was the suffering Messiah, and that He suffered in order that the peoples’ sins would be forgiven. They understood that He did this rather than establish the Kingdom of God on earth. This verse makes it clear what His mission is: “to suffer and on the third day rise from the dead, that repentance and forgiveness of sins should be preached in his name to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem.” He said this so they would understand that He was the suffering Messiah and not the Reigning Messiah.