I am standing before the altar for the atonement sacrifice. The Sword of the Spirit descends and begins to cut through me, dividing joint (or bone) and marrow (soul and spirit) as the Hebrews 4:12 scripture says. Clearly it is Yeshua who is using the knife on me in His capacity as High Priest. I know this because Hebrews is about Yeshua our High Priest, but I do not actually see Him in the vision. As the knife is cutting through me, blood begins to pour out, but I know that it is not my blood. It is Yeshua's life in me, pouring out as He divides in me through the sword of His Word, between soul and spirit. His life pours out, some on the base of the altar and some out and down on my family, friends, co-workers, everyone in my sphere of influence. I can see them around and below me with the blood of His Life dripping on them. The marrow (spirit) which He has cut away from my joints/bones is suddenly on the altar and it is being burned. The marrow is the fat that many scriptures mention as being a sweet savour to the Lord. God tells me that this is pleasing to Him, the offering He respects. God is pleased with my marrow, which in the natural is the rich source of new blood (new life). In the Spirit, the marrow is the fruit of the Spirit in me, the rich source of new spiritual life.

The remainder which has been cut away, what Hebrews 4:12 calls joints or bones (soul), is actually the same as the flesh, skin and dung of the atonement sacrifice. I hear God telling me that this is of no use to Him. He can do nothing with it because it consists of my will, my emotions, my intellect, my flesh - in short my soulish ways. Some of these ways are not evil but are merely useless because they are already dead. That is the skin which quickly becomes a dry heap with no substance. Some of these ways may seem useful at first but actually produce results that, metaphorically speaking, cause putrification in and around me. This is the flesh which initially seems to have life and viability but rots into a stinking mess without continued feeding of blood supply (of Yeshua's life). Some of these ways were always rotten, sinful from the beginning and will never be anything else. These are the areas that still need repentance. This is the dung. All of these together run the gamut from useless to totally vile and must be removed not only from my life but from the life of the Body. God told me that He can not use any of my soulish ways in bringing in the Kingdom. The soulish ways must be carried outside the camp to be burned as refuse. The camp is the congregation, on a micro level, and the Body as a whole, on a macro level. Our soulishness is refuse not only to our own congregations but to the Body as a whole. Even if we can not see the consequences, they ripple out, often to the very edges of the Body.

I don't believe this vision is over yet. I am to do a word study on each of the fruit of the Spirit. I believe that God is going to open my eyes more about what is at the heart of each of the Spiritual fruits and, also, what is not fruit of the Spirit but fruit of the soul. One more thing. This is definitely not a salvation vision. It has nothing to do, for example, with the Passover meaning of deliverance. It is definitely an Atonement vision, something that I am beginning to see more and more as being separate from Passover. I have always been uncomfortable with the way teachings on the feasts seem to collapse the Atonement feast into the Passover feast. I'm learning, I believe, that Atonement may related much more to the results of the process of sanctification (or whatever it's opposite is). I really believe, in the Spirit, that at Passover, I'm standing at the beginning of something looking forward but at Atonement, I'm standing at the end of something looking back over the results.