One of the great secrets of true Christianity is that if you’re going to derive truth, it has to be from the transcendent world. The transcendent world is the uncreated world. God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit (the Trinity) are uncreated and they are infinite in their love, wisdom, power and presence. The Holy Spirit is responsible for truth. It appears as if our brain and our intellect derives the truth, however, the Holy Spirit’s actions are miraculous and supernatural, but, for the sake of appearances, truth appears to be derived by our brain. No one says “Jesus is Lord” without the presence of the Holy Spirit performing his function as the revealer of Jesus and God the Father. The fundamental truth of Christianity is that God causes everything. Whenever any individual states “God caused it”, The Holy Spirit is performing his function of revealing truth and the event is miraculous.
The Father, the Son and Holy Spirit are created positions and they each perform a function within creation; the Father planned creation, the Son carried out creation according to the plan, the Holy Spirit reveals truth according to the plan.
Jesus said that John the Baptist was the greatest of all possible Old Testament prophets but he was the least or less than any of the members of the Kingdom of God. Why? His message was less. John’s message was “the Messiah is among us” but those that are in the Kingdom of Heaven have a message that says the Messiah came and died for us. Jesus told his disciples (and us), in John 14, that they (and we) would do greater works than him. The physical miracles of feeding thousands and healing the sick are in an earthly realm. The messages of true Christianity are greater miracles because they are a product of the Holy Spirit and Jesus said you will do greater things than I did.
I have always lamented that Jews got to perform physical miracles with the gifts of the spirit and that the gentiles never got to do these at the level of the Apostles and the Old Testament Prophets. However, our message is much greater than theirs. Even the Apostles said Jesus died for our sins as their message, however, we know we join the love of the Trinity for all eternity and that we have a thought pattern of the consciousness of Christ. Our message is far greater. Would I rather heal somebody or reveal the truth of Christianity to them? You're darn right I'd rather heal, however, that only has earthly consequences. Sharing the truth of Christianity has eternal and infinite consequences.
When Jesus stated: “greater works than these will you do”, he was talking about the supernatural revelations of truth to the Saints by the Holy Spirit. No one is going to do more miracles than Jesus did in a physical sense. However, it is God's responsibility to reveal himself to the world and on occasion God gives us the opportunity to do that via the Holy Spirit.
I don't believe in conversion. The Book of Life was written before the foundation of the world and it contains all the names of those people who are going to Heaven. God, and only God, not only knew who was going to Heaven but He planned it and Jesus caused it. When I was under the misconception that we were supposed to help convert others, there was great pressure to get agreement. Now I tell people that God loves them and is going to love them for all eternity and that we are in the love of the Trinity. They can agree or not. I don't care! They've heard the truth and God is responsible for manifesting himself on this earth, not me! True Christianity should be free with no pressure. Conversion puts pressure on people and it's really a dead work. However, proclaiming the love of the Trinity is no pressure. The freer is the truer. It is freer just to proclaim the gospel of God rather than having to get agreement on the truth; rather than get an agreement on the Gospel of God. If they don't agree, it is God's responsibility and it makes no difference about their eternal destination because their names are either written in The Book of Life or not written in the Book of Life. You're not going to change that and neither are they.
Wayne J. Bentley