willard points out that “god did not start to bring his kingdom, the ‘kingdom of the heavens’ as jesus often called it, into existence through jesus’ presence on earth. all too frequently it is suggested that he did. but jesus’ own gospel of the kingdom was not that the kingdom was about to come, or had recently come, into existence. if we attend to what he actually said, it becomes clear that his gospel concerned only the new accessibility of the kingdom to humanity through himself.” this refers to the sending of the holy spirit by god the father and the resurrected jesus christ to indwell those who are repentant so that communion between mankind and god through his holy spirit is restored. this is an interaction that defines the “kingdom of the heavens” now accessible to the saints in christ by his sin sacrifice on the cross. . . . “so when jesus directs us to pray, ‘thy kingdom come,’ he does not mean we should pray for it to come into existence. rather, we pray for it to take over at all points in the personal, social, and political order where it is now excluded: ‘on earth as it is in heaven.’ with this prayer we are invoking it, as in faith we are acting it, into the real world of our daily existence.”

willard points out in genesis 1:28-30 that “we are responsible before god for life on the earth. however unlikely it may seem from our current viewpoint, god equipped us for this task by framing our nature to function in a conscious, personal relationship of interactive [Italics added] responsibililty with him. we are meant to exercise our ‘rule’ only in union with god, as he acts with us. he intended to be our constant companion or coworker in the creative enterprise of life on earth. that is what his love for us means in practical terms. . . . lamentably, we fell away from our intended divine context [the spiritual death at the fall] and from the task for which we are by nature fitted. we mistrusted and distanced ourselves from god and then, very naturally, from one another. in our arrogance and fear we flounder through our existence on our own.”

dallas willard cites c. s. lewis in the first chapter:

“so, c. s. lewis writes, our faith is not a matter of our hearing what christ said long ago and ‘trying to carry it out.’ rather, ‘the real son of god is at your side. he is beginning to turn you into the same kind of thing as himself. he is beginning, so to speak, to ‘inject’ his kind of life and thought, his zoe [life], into you; beginning to turn the tin soldier into a live man. the part of you that does not like it is the part that is still tin.’”

willard continues:

“. . . the rule of god is now accessible to everyone. . . . in matthew’s account of jesus’ deeds and words, the formulation repeatedly used is the well-known ‘repent, for the kingdom of the heavens is at hand’ (3:2; 4:17; 10:7). this is a call for us to reconsider how we have been approaching our life, in light of the fact that we now, in the presence of jesus, have the option of living within the surrounding movements of god’s eternal purposes, of taking our life into his life.” (and taking his life, the holy spirit, into our life as an indwelling presence and guide with whom we are in personal interaction in our time)

willard continues, “Jesus offers himself as god’s doorway into the life that is truly life.”

dallas willard stated in chapter 1, “entering the eternal kind of life now,” the following:

“god’s desire for us is that we should live in him. he sends among us the way to himself. that shows what, in his heart of hearts, god is really like - indeed, what reality is really like. in its deepest nature and meaning our universe is a COMMUNITY OF BOUNDLESS AND TOTALLY COMPETENT LOVE.”

i will be posting a number of blogs that address excerpts from the book by Dallas willard, the divine conspiracy: rediscovering our hidden life in god. our charge as christians is to grow the kingdom of god through our testimony and course of life patterned after the life and teachings of jesus christ. willard’s book addresses this charge extensively in this book. by these postings i shall present further confirmation of the dual interaction repentant humans have with the indwelling holy spirit who guides us to live a righteous life in jesus christ, experiencing in our time the blessed life to come in the new creation.

i conclude this series of blog posts with an excerpt from my second book that defines the liaison brain.

“Eccles’ liaison brain most likely corresponds with the ensemble of neural codes, ‘the immense diversity of [patterned, structured - italics added] neural activities.’ the self-conscious mind interprets from this ensemble meaning and purpose with the prospect for intended action, selected with a small probability. structure, meaning, purpose and action with a probability comprise the five components of information defined by Gitt. eccles’ microsite hypothesis gives validation to dualist interaction between immaterial and material entities in the transmission of specified information.”

information is transmitted via morse code, genetic code and neural code, and code is key. the holy spirit communes with us via encoded synaptic network activity which our human minds interpret. it is a bidirectional communion that is personal. advances in neuroscience are giving investigators an increasing understanding of the how of this process. i have endeavored to share this information in my books and many blogs. god’s communion with us is real in our time.

“eccles defined the self AS AN EXPERIENCED UNITY LINKED BY THE MEMORY OF CONSCIOUS STATES EXPERIENCED OVER AN ENTIRE LIFETIME. FOR THE SELF TO EXIST THERE MUST BE SOME CONTINUITY OF MENTAL EXPERIENCES THAT BRIDGES THE GAP OF UNCONSCIOUSNESS. SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS ACHIEVES PUBLIC STATUS BY SYMBOLIC COMMUNICATION THROUGH LANGUAGE BETWEEN INDIVIDUALS. ECCLES CONSIDERED HOW SPECIFIED PATTERNS OF NEURONAL ACTIVITY IN THE CEREBRAL CORTEX, THE PRINCIPLE SITE FOR COGNITION, CAN EVOKE IN THE MIND WHAT HE CALLED ‘PERCEPTS.’ THE NEURAL SYNAPTIC PROCESS GIVES A CENTRAL ROLE TO THE EXPERIENCED UNITY OF THE SELF. . . . THE SELF-CONSCIOUS MIND INTEGRATES WHAT IT READS OUT PERCEPTUALLY FROM AN IMMENSE DIVERSITY OF ENCODED NEURAL ACTIVITIES TRANSMITTED IN AND THROUGH WHAT HE TERMED THE LIAISON BRAIN. THERE IS DISPLAYED BEFORE THE MIND FROM INSTANT TO INSTANT THE ENTIRETY OF THE COMPLEX NEURAL PROCESSES. THROUGH DIRECTED ATTENTION, INTENTION OR WILL IT SELECTS FROM THIS VAST ENSEMBLE OF ENCODED NEURAL IMPULSES WITHIN THE LIAISON BRAIN. IT COORDINATES AND INTERPRETS IN COHERENT FASHION THE MEANING OF LINGUISTIC CODIFIED READOUTS FROM MANY DIFFERENT AREAS OF THE CEREBRAL CORTEX AND OTHER FUNCTIONALLY ASSOCIATED REGIONS OF THE BRAIN. IN THIS WAY THE SELF-CONSCIOUS MIND ACHIEVES A UNITY OF EXPERIENCE.”

AND WE RECALL THAT THE INDWELLING HOLY SPIRIT IN REPENTANT BELIEVERS ALSO HAS THE POWER TO INTERACT WITH THE SELF, TO PROVIDE ENCOURAGEMENT, DIRECTION, CORRECTION, FULFILLMENT, HOPE AND AN INDENTITY IN JESUS CHRIST.

i am posting exerpts from my book, the boundless love of god: a holy spirit story, chapter five, “commentary on the neuroscience of communion,” to provide further explanation for how dual interaction between the immaterial mind of god and mind of man occurs with the material synaptic networks of the brain.

“specified information that is encoded within the spike trains [of action potentials] emanates from the mind of a human or the mind of god. since humans were created with the unique capacity for expression and comprehension of advanced language the codes transmit linguistic information in its multiple manifestations. these include concepts, intuition, dreams, visions, discernment, verbal communication and intentions and are linked with cognitive or physical action. as with the morse code, the codes must be learned and remembered [archived in memory]. it is likely that neural codes are also actualized in the sensorimotor, reflexive and autonomic nervous systems, accounting for moving a finger, a knee jerk, the stimulation of gastric acid for digestion or feeling a bee sting.”