Sermons by Mike Blume

Genesis 1:26 KJV And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.

Genesis 5:1 KJV This is the book of the generations of Adam. In the day that God created man, in the likeness of God made he him;

Philippians 2:7 KJV But made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men:

Notice that God made man in His likeness and then after man fell into sin, He made Himself into Man's Likeness.

And this was the incarnation, God manifest in flesh.
What people celebrate at Christmas time.

Let's discuss the plan and purpose for all of this.

2 Corinthians 3:18 KJV But we all, with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord.

The word GLASS in this verse is actually MIRROR.

2 Corinthians 3:18 ASV But we all, with unveiled face beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are transformed into the same image from glory to glory, even as from the Lord the Spirit.

We are said to be able to look at the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ and be changed into the same image.

This glory is in a MIRROR.
When we look at Jesus, we are looking in a mirror.
The point is that what we are looking at when we see Jesus, is a mirror image of ourselves.
This is because our baptism into His death kicked off a series of events wherein God caused us to be dead, buried and resurrected THROUGH JESUS.
All of the things Jesus experienced when He died to sin, was buried, resurrected and ascended to sit in heavenly places was suddenly in a moment considered to have happened to us.
We literally took on the history of Jesus' experiences from the cross onward when we were saved.

Romans 6:3 KJV Know ye not, that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into his death?

Romans 6:3 GNB For surely you know that when we were baptized into union with Christ Jesus, we were baptized into union with his death.

Paul spoke of a veil over our hearts that came off when we looked to Jesus.

Now that this veil is off our hearts, we are looking with our hearts to Jesus as though we were looking in a mirror.
Everyone who gets the veil off their hearts and truly and genuinely looks at Jesus with eyes of revelation, will suddenly see themselves when they see Him.
They will get a revelation that will explode in their spirits and come alive so powerfully that they will be convinced and know that when Jesus died THEY ALSO DIED WITH HIM.
When He was risen, THEY ALSO RESURRECTED WITH HIM.
And When He ascended and sat down on the right hand throne, they also ascended and they are right now, presently, in that position of being seated with Christ in heavenly places.

Compare:

Romans 6:10 KJV For in that he died, he died unto sin once: but in that he liveth, he liveth unto God.
Romans 6:11 KJV Likewise reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Until you really put your heart into this truth and really get a revelation, you are not looking at Jesus like looking in a mirror.

When he is no longer just a story and no longer the Son of God whom you know who died, was buried, resurrected and sat down on the throne all by Himself, you will see Him as A MIRROR.

You will see that YOU died, were buried and risen to sit in heavenly places when He did, because you realize THAT IS THE ENTIRE REASON HE EXPERIENCED THOSE THINGS.
Too many only see Him as having died alone on the cross and was buried to rise and go to glory to the throne.
They do not have the revelation of their co-death and co-burial and co-resurrection to experience a co-seating with Him.
They do not look at Him as a mirror.

He did not have to come to earth and die, get buried and resurrect in order to sit on the throne of glory.

He did that before He was ever incarnated in the world.
But it was because we lost that position of glory that He did this.
He cast Adam out of the Garden and removed Adam's glory and dominion from him.
And in order to get man back to this place, He came down as a man so that He could die the deaths that all of us had to experience due to our sin.

Hebrews 2:14-15 GNB Since the children, as he calls them, are people of flesh and blood, Jesus himself became like them and shared their human nature. He did this so that through his death he might destroy the Devil, who has the power over death, (15) and in this way set free those who were slaves all their lives because of their fear of death.

Philippians 2:6-9 GNB He always had the nature of God, but he did not think that by force he should try to remain equal with God. (7) Instead of this, of his own free will he gave up all he had, and took the nature of a servant. He became like a human being and appeared in human likeness. (8) He was humble and walked the path of obedience all the way to death--- his death on the cross. (9) For this reason God raised him to the highest place above and gave him the name that is greater than any other name.

But He took that death penalty AND AS TERRIBLE AS IT WAS, HE MADE IT THE MOST WONDERFUL THING WE COULD EVER KNOW.

He made our death penalty His own death penalty.

2 Corinthians 5:14 GNB We are ruled by the love of Christ, now that we recognize that one man died for everyone, which means that they all share in his death.

Since we had to die a death penalty due to our sins, He took all those sins of ours and died all our death penalties in one fell swoop instead of us.

And because He united to our deaths and united Himself to our sins, He who unites to someone also causes that someone to unite to Him.
So this union caused us to unite to His goodness and His righteousness.

2 Corinthians 5:21 GNB Christ was without sin, but for our sake God made him share our sin in order that in union with him we might share the righteousness of God.

He took our sins in this union that he never personally knew before, and we took His righteousness that we personally never knew before.

And since He died with all our sins united to Himself, that of every man, woman and child who lived or ever would live, when He died, He paid for it all.
And once something is paid for in total, it never has to be paid for again,
Therefore, because He paid this price, and because He was God manifest in flesh, HE RESURRECTED again from the dead.

And due to our union to Him and His righteousness, we resurrected right along with Him.

And when He ascended up to glory and sat down on the right hand throne, He was united to us and took us right up there with Him, spiritually speaking.
And we are presently seated together with Him in heavenly places.
That is how God sees it and is waiting us to come to see it like that as well.

When you look at Jesus with your heart, God's Spirit will affect you because you are saved, and you will suddenly understand all of this.

And in that moment, you will realize that you are in effect looking in a mirror when you see Jesus in His death, burial, resurrection and seating in glory because you will understand that if He did these things, and you are united with Him, then YOU DID THOSE THINGS TOO.
That is what it means when the Bible says we died THROUGH JESUS CHRIST.
Everything you see in what He experienced from the cross onward is what you realize is true of you as well.
So you know from that day forward that whenever you look at Jesus, YOU ARE LOOKING AT A MIRROR.

That baby was born for the sole purpose of God being a human being in order to become like us so that we would be able to become like Him.

The process of us becoming like Him is almost a reverse of Him becoming like us.

Think of it.
God made Himself in the image of man so that man might return to the image of God.
HE HAD TO COME IN MAN'S IMAGE IN ORDER TO UNITE TO US.
Only a man like us could be united to.
It was not just the fact that someone had to conquer death and sin to unite us to himself, but it had to be a man who conquered death and sin.

1 Corinthians 15:21 KJV (21) For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead.

So by coming down as man, taking our sins so that he created a union with us in order to die our deaths, His death paid for our sins.

And that means we are no longer responsible for those sins.
Once death occurs for sins, no more retribution needs to be made.
No more judgment for them is necessary.
The penalty's been paid.

And normally, when a person died a death penalty due to sin, the fact that he is dead means he cannot go out and enjoy a life free of that condemnation later -- he's dead!

If he could only rise from the dead after having paid for his sins by death, he could enjoy a life that one deserves free of sin and totally righteous.
The judge could do nothing since the penalty was paid in full by death, and he genuinely died.
But the fact is that because Jesus took our sins and died the death penalty our sins demanded of us, and then resurrected, we united to Him when He took our sins, and resurrected with Him TO ENJOY A LIFE free from sin because we're totally righteous!

All of this MIRROR IMAGE revelation and accomplishment is intended to put us in this place of SEATING ON THE THRONE OF GLORY so that WE CAN DO SOME AWESOME THINGS IN THIS WORLD that only people in this Kingdom seating in glory can do!

He is going to take us to heaven one day.

But notice that the bible teaches that before we ever get to heaven, God already worked it out that while we are down here on earth it is still spiritually true that we are seated in heavenly places.

Ephesians 1:18-23 GNB I ask that your minds may be opened to see his light, so that you will know what is the hope to which he has called you, how rich are the wonderful blessings he promises his people, (19) and how very great is his power at work in us who believe. This power working in us is the same as the mighty strength (20) which he used when he raised Christ from death and seated him at his right side in the heavenly world. (21) Christ rules there above all heavenly rulers, authorities, powers, and lords; he has a title superior to all titles of authority in this world and in the next. (22) God put all things under Christ's feet and gave him to the church as supreme Lord over all things. (23) The church is Christ's body, the completion of him who himself completes all things everywhere.

Ephesians 2:4-6 GNB But God's mercy is so abundant, and his love for us is so great, (5) that while we were spiritually dead in our disobedience he brought us to life with Christ. It is by God's grace that you have been saved. (6) In our union with Christ Jesus he raised us up with him to rule with him in the heavenly world.

Imagine what Jesus can do being seated in heaven on the right hand throne.

Well, that is exactly what we can do because we are actually there spiritually.

God needs us to come to this revelation.

All of our sinfulness that caused us to be cast out of the Garden and lose this dominion with God hindered God from using us like this.

Since he wanted his KINGDOM IN EARTH, our salvation caused us to be freed from those sins because we died our death penalties through Jesus Christ's death.
And now that we are freed from that hindering sin, and seated back in the position of Kingdom power as Adam once was, GOD CAN USE US IN THIS WORLD BEFORE WE DIE.
In fact, we need to learn about this and get with it as far away from the time when we die as possible, so we can do as much as possible IN THIS WORLD FOR THE KINGDOM.

That is why we read:

Romans 6:10-14 GNB And so, because he died, sin has no power over him; and now he lives his life in fellowship with God. (11) In the same way you are to think of yourselves as dead, so far as sin is concerned, but living in fellowship with God through Christ Jesus. (12) Sin must no longer rule in your mortal bodies, so that you obey the desires of your natural self. (13) Nor must you surrender any part of yourselves to sin to be used for wicked purposes. Instead, give yourselves to God, as those who have been brought from death to life, and surrender your whole being to him to be used for righteous purposes. (14) Sin must not be your master; for you do not live under law but under God's grace.

Now that we learn that we are dead to sin in the same way Jesus died, and in fellowship with God the same way Jesus as a resurrected man is, we must not allow sin to hinder us any more.

Because it can hinder us in a very odd way.
IF WE THINK OF OUR SELVES totally apart from our union to Jesus, we will feel an instinctive unworthiness, and that is a lie from the devil.
The devil does not want us to believe this nor understand this.
And we all know that God could not use man due to his sin.
So if we do not understand this mirror image revelation, we will invariably think we're sinful and not good enough.
And that means we will not give ourselves to God and make ourselves available for Him to use.

God needs us to make ourselves available to Him.

The King James Version says to yield ourselves to Him.
He never imposes on us.
And even if He did, if we still were not fully throne conscious and mirror image conscious, due to knowing this truth backwards and forwards and really having it in our spirits, we will HESITATE to do anything for Him.
So He waits and waits for us, seeing us completely ready for his use.
He sees us as dead to sin, and fully qualified for Him to use.

He can only use folks freed from sin.

And that means we need a revelation that we are freed.
And then, with that revelation, we will make ourselves available to Him and present ourselves to Him AS THOSE ALIVE FROM THE DEAD.

Now we have to really realize what it means to present ourselves as people alive form the dead.

Ro 6:7 says that he that is dead is freed from sin.
We need to see ourselves as criminals who died a death penalty for our sins, paid that penalty through Jesus, and resurrected back to life again with Jesus' own righteousness.
Since alive from the dead means all of that -- it means we're freed from sin -- freed from the hindering factor that made us useless to God...
We will KNOW we are NO LONGER useless to Him, and fully useful.
And we will FINALLY yield our selves to Him to use us in HIS KINGDOM POWER.

The fact is that we have been THAT useful ever since He saved us.

But without this teaching and explanation and REVELATION, we always felt unworthy and not good enough and still sinful.
But REVELATION drove that misunderstanding out of us.
We finally started seeing Jesus LIKE A MIRROR.
And after God had to wait all this time until we finally got the message, and finally yielded ourselves to Him, He IS FINALLY ABLE TO USE US IN HIS POWER TO CONQUER STRONGHOLDS OF HELL IN THIS WORLD.

He's been waiting for us to GET IT ever since He saved us.

So many never even study this out to preach it to people in many circles.
They can't make heads or tails out of Paul's' words here.
Or else they water them down to nonsense that has nothing to do with victory over sin and totally freedom from sin, that their understanding is useless.

When we get this revelation, we will be convinced we're FULLY USEFUL to God in His kingdom.

And we will tear up the kingdom of hell.

That is the entire GOAL of Jesus Christ being born one day in the world as a man.

We were made in God's likeness, and had a throne in earth as God has it in heaven.

But Adam lost that throne and dominion.
So God had to make Himself in man's likeness.
So he could UNITE TO US in our sins and required deaths.
And this union caused His death to be our death penalties, and they were paid in full.
And WE CAME BACK INTO HIS LIKENESS AGAIN, for when He resurrected we resurrected, and went to sit on the throne of heaven.

MAN MADE IN GOD'S LIKENESS THEN GOD MADE IN MAN'S LIKENESS