Natural to Spiritual

NATURAL TO SPIRITUAL

NB: (I use the term ‘man’ in the sense of mankind)

We must understand something. Many do not.

There is the natural man and there is the spiritual man.

The spiritual man is firstly – one who has accepted Christ Jesus into his life.

This happens when we respond to God’s message. Yes – He has left a message for man to hear or read.

This is the most important ‘message’ in the form of ‘messages’ that exist on the planet.

Stop and think it over (Selah) – how God has chosen this means.

Written words that are more than written words. Words that are ‘spirit and life’.

John 6/63: Jesus says:

…The words I have spoken to you—they are full of the Spirit and life.

And now the words He spoke, are recorded for all to see. These words must travel to all the world, down through the ages – before the end of this present age, will come.

It is the duty and privilege of every Christian to proclaim these words – often to an uninterested, bewildered or belligerent public.

Part of the multi-faceted message is the fact that all are natural beings.

And all need to become spiritual beings.

Jesus spoke to a ‘religious’ person and said: (John 3)

Jesus answered and said to him,

“Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.”

He was referring to the new birth – the natural man – born natural – must be born again and become spiritual through encountering Christ by encountering the Holy Spirit in a born again experience – available to all who will seek it 100%.

First we are natural. Then we become spiritual.

The person Jesus said these words to was religious. Yet he had no idea about this truth – that all are natural beings and need to become spiritual beings.

So like this man Nicodemus we need more than religion.

In the context of this truth – what good was his religion, when he missed the only way to become spiritual?

You see your spirit is dead because of your natural sinful fallen nature, the nature that dominates mankind, the nature you and I inhabit. The one we were born with.

So your dead or insensitive spirit needs to become ‘born again’. Rising from the prison of your sinful nature.

Coming alive to the reality of Christ and His Presence waiting to come into your spirit.

Jesus said: Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and dine with him, and he with Me.

It’s all about ACKNOWLEDGEMENT – acknowledging that Jesus Christ is God who inhabited the body of a man.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT – Acknowledgement of this untamed and often out of control sinful nature that is running rampant across the world expressed in all sorts of diabolical acts.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT – on a deeply personal level that we too are indeed trapped by this sinful/selfish nature.

Turning to God in prayer and ACKNOWLEDGING OUR state of sinfulness and apologising for living by its dictates and ignoring Christ.

ACKNOWLEDGING that we need Him to come  into our lives permanently, and show us His divine nature within our beings.

How should we pray?

Something like this:

Lord Jesus I see clearly that I am sinful, I sin in small ways and big ways. I confess my sins to you. Please forgive me. I realise that my punishment for sin is gone if I acknowledge you took my sin and it’s punishment on the cross. Come to me today and make yourself known by the Holy Spirit coming to me. I put my faith in you. Come into my spirit and ‘cause me to be born again.

Thank you that you will. (So be it).

Wisdom

WISDOM

The dictionary definition of the word deliberation is this:

Dict:- 1 long and careful consideration or discussion:

In all our deliberations. In all the examination of situations in life, and in our endeavour to reach perfect conclusions, we must balance our thinking by the fact that there are no perfect conclusions.

To see something perfectly from every angle is to have The mind of God Himself. And the bible says ‘We know in part’, not in full, as God knows. (I Cor. 13/9,13)

Solomon exercised wisdom by suggesting the baby be cut in two – thus revealing the true mother’s heart. But don’t think that – that was the only solution to the situation. (I Kings 3)

Why not receive a ‘word of knowledge’ instead?

[supernatural knowledge given by God directly, rather than acquired knowledge by examination or communication of facts] I Corinthians 12/8 NKJV

as to who the right mother was? Instead he received a ‘word of wisdom’ as to how to EXPOSE THE WRONG MOTHER. God knew that would work (I Corinthians 12/8) NKJV.

The bible says in Proverbs 4/7:

Wisdom is the principal thing;
Therefore get wisdom.
And in all your getting, get understanding.

The bible also speaks of ‘foolishness’. In fact it mentions it and companion words over 308 times. God equates foolishness with sin.

Today how much wisdom is present in world leaders?

Moral principles are cast aside for all kinds of other things, oneupmanship, and a hunger for power with career opportunities as the chief motivational factor in a man/woman stepping up to supposedly make a difference.

So what does the wisdom look like, – that we should all seek after?: Here it is James 3/17. Look it up for yourself.

Any deliberations we make, should be made before God in prayer.

Where we can get His enablement and help. In fact He says:

James 1/

5 If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all liberally and without reproach, and it will be given to him.

In this day and age, as wisdom flies out of the window to be replaced by bickering and fighting, rudeness, negative pulling down of those who are not in our camp to the degree where there is no room for coming to agreement. As a madness falls over the corporate mentality of the world.

We must flee to the Saviour’s side and seek His wisdom and knowledge from above, to win the day for us.

…And in all your getting, get understanding.

Blind to blindness

BLIND TO BLINDNESS

There’s a blindness of the mind

In which – many cannot see

But with eyes wide open they look to perceive

And have no problem with what their eyes believe

They grasp readily – what is available

But examine nothing on the spiritual ‘table’

Life’s too busy to spend time on the hereafter

Preferring to remain at the secular altar:

“My mind’s made up with earthly guff

Don’t give me none of that god stuff”

For this they are willingly ignorant

Preferring to remain belligerent

They turn away from reason – based on fact

And look away from the God-man to act

Walking in the darkness with their back to the light

There is coming a day when they will receive such a fright

When suddenly the light will come into view

As they pass from earth into heaven’s queue

Goat’s from the sheep will the separation be

No person will escape the judge’s final scrutiny

‘Depart from Me’ or ‘approach in My Grace’

All Christians will go to their prepared place

So now is the time to let the light in

It must happen now to rid you of sin

Come to Jesus and ask The Master to approach

He is willing to come and wipe away your reproach

See it – that you don’t see

And you will be

On your way to getting a new mind

Where the gospel of ‘Seek and you will find’

Is your salvation and that by none other

Than Jesus Christ Your Lord – Saviour – and Brother

Is God hiding?

IS GOD HIDING?

God has to hide Himself from human beings.

He is completely different from mankind, in His nature, character, thinking and manifestations.

“No one has seen God at any time…”.

 We are told this, by one of the men God has chosen to communicate what is on His (God’s) mind. In this case the man’s name was John.

John 1:18

18 No one has seen God at any time…

There is a second part to that verse. We shall look at that later.

God sees mankind in his rebellious state of being. Rebellious by choice.

He gave mankind that gift of volition. Man is not a robotic being, programmed internally to do exactly what God says.

One of the latest developments in art – is AI (artificial intelligence). There is much controversy over this subject. 

Including copyright debates, and artists losing their jobs as they are displaced by AI -generated art.

AI operates by accessing millions of images and re-inputting them, as it where, into a new creation.

Artists of course, have been doing similar things for centuries. There is nothing new under the sun.

But human artists are more than machines. (They are body, soul and spirit).

God having given mankind a brain and cognitive ability, does not want man to be programmed to draw upon fixed images or ideas to artificially produce something else, when it comes to spiritual matters.

Especially ideas gathered and embraced from others in the human race. What certainty is there in this when it comes to spiritual matters? None.

Only those who…

5 …have tasted the good word of God and the powers of the age to come…(Hebrews 6:5)

can know of anything to do with the Living God and the things of eternity.

And so, we have those specially chosen to write God’s thoughts, as He elevated their human thought-ability to the divine level, imparting His revelation, and thus giving us the Pure Word of God.

 Proverbs 30:5

Every word of God is pure; He is a shield to those who put their trust in Him.

God wants mankind consequently, to draw from God’s thoughts to find a pure life. 

Mankind has, this freedom-of-choice-mechanism, built-into him.

You can put tomato sauce on your chips or not – it’s up to you – you decide.

In order for man to walk with God, he must respond to what He says.

But mankind is busy being too-busy, uninterested, too caught up with what pleases him/herself,  and therefore no time to listen to what could possibly be, God communicating to him/her.

If mankind won’t listen or take the time to find out how God has or will communicate. How can God make Himself known?

After all, God is well mannered. He won’t interrupt. God tries to get a word in edgeways, often to no avail in the case of the obstinate heart.

So then, even if God is willing to appear from His hiding place, and make Himself known – mankind is pre-occupied with other things, and doesn’t wish Him to do so.

Wrongly pre-occupied with vainly trying to appease his troubled conscience with the idea, scientific or otherwise, that God doesn’t exist.

God will try and try and try again to get man’s attention but too often, to no avail. 

This ignorant behaviour, this rejection of God, this no time for God syndrome, is responded to by God with what the bible refers to as ‘the long-suffering of God’.

I Peter 3/ Speaking in the context of the deluge, the flood that God sent to cover the earth, referring to those days we read:

20 who formerly were disobedient, when once the Divine longsuffering waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was being prepared, in which a few, that is, eight souls, were saved through water.

Notice:

…long-suffering waiting.

That’s an attribute of God right there.

Many believe that it is ok to not know God exists, and therefore it’s ok to live in a state of so called agnosticism. (A kind of Ignoramus-ism).

Even if God was to suddenly communicate in a way, that He sees fit, He often finds that mankind’s mind is already made-up: “No thanks God”.

Amongst mankind there is a ‘Please Do Not Disturb’ sign over the heart and mind of many, and therefore over the conscience, and mankind’s understanding remains uninformed, unenlightened, dull, dead, and blind.

Billy Graham the late American evangelist quoted the words of a sign at a political Rally. 

One devotee to a particular political persuasion carried a sign that read: “My mind is already made-up do not disturb or bother me with facts”. (Or words to that effect).

So we have a scenario where it is not so much God is hiding, as those to whom He wishes to communicate, wish themselves, to remain hidden from what God wishes to say to them.

“I’m enjoying my sin too much – Do not disturb”. Hiding just like Adam the prototype man and his wife did in the garden (see Genesis 3/8).

And of course if we are asleep after a ‘hard day’s night’, we don’t take kindly to being disturbed. Leave us alone and let us sleep on.

But as these things are so, we have to ask who is doing the hiding?

Now it is true that as no man can see God and live, (Exodus 33/20) – God had to find a way to reveal Himself to mankind, desirous as He was and is – to communicate with the human race.

So the second part of the verse we began with says this:

18 No one has seen God at any time. The only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared Him.

John 14/

8 Philip said to Him, “Lord, show us the Father, and it is sufficient for us.”

9 Jesus said to him, “Have I been with you so long, and yet you have not known Me, Philip? He who has seen Me has seen the Father; so how can you say, ‘Show us the Father’? 10 Do you not believe that I am in the Father, and the Father in Me? The words that I speak to you I do not speak on My own authority; but the Father who dwells in Me does the works. 11 Believe Me that I am in the Father and the Father in Me, or else believe Me for the sake of the works themselves.

So God who was hiding – appeared!

Appeared in a way that man could understand and essentially therefore, have no excuse for ignoring.

God entered a prepared body in the womb of a virgin. Impossible – But true. (Luke 1/37) And that’s your first stumbling block to get past.

And there are many ‘illogical’ stumbling blocks for your intellect to get past. (Often referred to as miracles)

But if your head is filled with every unbelieving reason to reject God who has appeared in His Son Jesus Christ – you will not hear Him.

There is coming a day when you and I will stand before God in the life hereafter. There will be no doubts then as to who the supreme ruler of the universe is, and what His name is.

He will appear in all His resplendent glory, as He exactly is. This observing of The Eternal God, can only be experienced by passing through death into the eternal heaven of heavens.

It is God’s desire however, to make Himself known to you now. For that to happen He must obtain your co-operative attention.

This post might be the  beginning of your search.

Faith comes by hearing the Word of God. Faith arises in your heart and mind as you hear – then you see that:- God

4 …will have all men to be saved, and to come unto the knowledge of the truth.

5 For there is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus;

6 Who gave himself a ransom for all, to be testified in due time.

So we must start from the place of inadequacy that we all share. And from there take steps to search, to seek, to knock, to ask, all descriptive terms for starting on a journey. 

Beginning with the highway of holiness code of The Bible.

We start investigating in other words.

Some folks are already investigating, but they have not started with the only hand-book, (the Holy Bible) and therefore drift into by-path meadows.

Where are you on this journey to eternal life?

Sounds like…

Sounds like…

Once upon a time the cure was found.

But no one believed the doctor – so they all suffered-on.

The cure was stockpiled and left out for all to see.

A message went out: “come and partake of the cure”.

But no one believed the message. All thought – it was madness with a multitude of reasons not to accept that it was true.

So everybody died, – except the doctor and his family.

This sounds like Noah and the ark – does it not? Noah was the ‘doctor’ who was a preacher of righteousness and he sent out the message: ‘Repent and believe’.

Today the message is sat upon or ignored by ingenious methods.

Reasoned away by the prideful intellect of man.

The cure of the gospel message is sent out – but…

What will you do with Jesus – the great physician?

And so the old adage…

Life is short, – death is sure – sin the cause – Christ the Cure.

Spiritual or secular

SPIRITUAL OR SECULAR?

Now I can go secular or Christian

In my communication to you

What do you think I should do?

My spiritual language you say doesn’t ‘fit’

Without letting me know what you really think of it

                             ***

You turn away wishing it to be avoided

While I share my wholesome thoughts 

Less taught – more caught – with suggested ‘aughts’

You aught to listen – aught to learn – aught to follow

Aught to discern

But let’s leave it all for today (?)

                            ***

Let’s talk in a different way

Fine looking house you have

And those curtains fit and hang well

That’s a genuine Matisse on the wall –  I can tell

                           ***

Those four chairs at your dining table

Were you long here – before you were so able

To afford such luxuries – all posh and fine?

                           ***

You display nice taste – harmonies in rhyme

In your choices of earthly arrangements ’n stuff?

                           ***

Can I return to spiritual talk or do you

Find that too tough?

                           ***

We got away from the big

Conscience questions

                           ***

But once I try to return I can tell

You would rather stay with the secular talk

If I get too spiritual you’re dismissive –

As you gawk or balk

                           ***

I’m laughing –

But it’s not really a laughing matter

Which will you embrace

My secular or my spiritual – patter?

Knowing

KNOWING (spiritual realities)

When we are young we can yield quickly to the temptation to conform to the opinions of those around us. We like to be accepted. So we pay lip-service to the mind of the crowd, the gang.

Deep down inside we aren’t so sure. This is how young men and women are peer-pressured into doing what their conscience screams out – not to do!

Our lives are like tree trunks – layers and layers of mental thought and experiences. Thus our personalities and characters are formed, from our youth.

Such a hodgepodge of thought, memory and emotion all combined to present us as we are to others.

“If you really knew me…” can be an oft repeated phrase.

(Maybe we all think this way?)

“If you really knew me – you wouldn’t say that…” is what we offer to those perhaps falsely accusing us of some misdemeanour.

But of course to really know someone is impossible in the perfect sense.

The bible tells us there is an ‘organ’, of true knowing. And it is not the brain per se.

Here is what we read: I Corinthians 2:

King James Version:

11 For what man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him? even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God.

Amplified version:

11 For what person knows the thoughts and motives of a man except the man’s spirit within him? So also no one knows the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God.

When it comes to spiritual realities, the same realities experienced by all Old and New Testament writers, there is an aspect of it that cannot be comprehended by those who do not have the advantage of the spiritual revelation these writers were given.

I’m conscious that I refer to this often in my spiritual writings. But it can’t be gotten away from: There is no other way to know the spiritual realities of God in Christ, than by receiving them from the hand of God, namely from Christ Himself. (Through the instrumentality of The Holy Spirit the executive of the godhead on earth)

They are given by The Holy Spirit of God to those who ask, and they are revealed to the inner man.

Prayer: “Lord please open the eyes of our inner man to comprehend the things of God. We know this can come from no other than Jesus Christ The Lord.”

Revelation (or if you prefer illumination) on the scriptures can only come from the hand of The Holy Spirit. We will be perfecting the sureness that He is speaking to us – for the rest of our days.

Hebrews 10/22

let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water.

Revelation 19/10.

And I fell at his feet to worship him. But he said to me, “See that you do not do that! I am your fellow servant, and of your brethren who have the testimony of Jesus. Worship God! For the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy.”

Instant or brewed?

INSTANT OR BREWED?

A lot of people just can’t ‘get’ prayer.

For them prayer should be a case of press the button and down falls the chocolate bar, so because the bars aren’t immediately falling they dismiss the idea even of praying at all.

The Lord Jesus Christ – time after time after time – sent His communication to His Heavenly Father and almost instantly the result of His communication manifested in the prayed-for-need being met.

As believing Christians – those who believe that God answers prayer, we too love the press button/result prayers, but it doesn’t only work that way. John 11:

41 So they took away the stone. Then Jesus looked up and said, “Father, I thank you that you have heard me. 42 I knew that you always hear me, but I said this for the benefit of the people standing here, that they may believe that you sent me.”

43 When he had said this, Jesus called in a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out!” 44 The dead man came out, his hands and feet wrapped with strips of linen, and a cloth around his face.

The above passage of scripture, telling us of the Raising of Lazarus from the dead, may seem like an ‘instant coffee’ answer, but it wasn’t.

First when Christ heard of the death of Lazarus – he had probably been dead for two days, already.

Secondly Jesus waited another two days before going to the scene of the burial.

Before the prayer was answered – Jesus went through various internal spiritual experiences with His Father, (as always), that came through constant prayer and we are told also that …v33

…he was deeply moved in spirit and troubled…

So for four days Jesus carried the need, and then His prayer was answered – the man Lazarus rose from the dead.

In the Old Testament Elijah was wanting rain. So he prayed about it – but his servant had to go and look 7 times (7 nothings!) before the prayer began to be answered and even then it was a cloud the size of a man’s hand – not yet the rain. The rain eventually came of course. (I Kings 18)

The early church prayed for Peter in Prison – the time factor coming into play again – before he stood outside released after angelic intervention.

And so we could go on. Jericho – round and round the walls before prayer needs were met and down came the walls.

The Lord Jesus in the garden went three times before He came away with the definitive answer from His Father – go to the cross. (Luke 22)

To sum-up (something that could be elaborated on much more) – the bible exhorts us to

1 Thessalonians 5:17

17 pray without ceasing,

I often think of how we are exhorted to (Matthew 7/)

7 “Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you.

To my mind the first one describes the instant result, the second suggests time delay. When we seek it takes time to find, and the third similarly suggests time and waiting – to knock, is to wait on the door being opened.

That’s two out of three involving prayer that is not instant coffee or falling chocolate bars.

Lamp to…

The Lamp – wax crayons by Ken Riddles

LAMP TO MY FEET

In the dark a lamp is very handy

Now we can see where we are going

                      ***

Then the darkness of death arrives

– A valley of shadows

                      ***

Many say:

“I don’t know where we are going”

                      ***

They have no lamp

No guide for their spiritual feet

                      ***

No lamp to light up their path

The path to eternity

                      ***

They choose not to think of it

Put it off to another day

The human response of ignorance

                      ***

But now I reach for the book

Open it and turn it’s pages

                      ***

A lamp I do find

A guide for me

                      ***

My feet will run swiftly to The Lord

As in prayer I repeat

The very words of the pathway guide

                      ***

Speaking to the author while I abide

He knows every Word He has inspired

And in it – His guidance I find

                      ***

So my future is in the light

The brightness of His Coming

                      ***

If I pass before then

I will meet on that other shore

Where there is no offered similitude

But eternal reality to explore

**************************************

Your word is a lamp to my feet
And a light to my path.

Psalm 119:105

Do unto…

DO UNTO…

😎 You have heard it said:

‘Do unto others as you’d have

them do unto you’

But what if others do unto you

What you would not have them to do?

Do you do unto them what they do unto you?

If you do unto others what you’d have them do unto you

You are not able to do unto the hurtful what they just did unto you

As what they did unto you – you would not have them do

Where does this leave us on our ‘to do’ list?

Matthew 7/

12 So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets.

The Stalwarts…

THE STALWARTS ARE LEAVING

The stalwarts are all leaving

Many of them already gone

My generation gathered in the queue

To join the everlasting throng

                         ***

I can’t grasp it – it’s slipping out of sight

Trying to embrace this ‘slip sliding away’

I stop to think it over –

But then another is gone before I can say –

                         ***

That there is answers beyond the grave

Of this I have no doubt

But I’m so used to seeing the stalwarts

I can’t get it – that they are no longer about

                         ***

One after the other

At eighty, ninety, sixty, forty – all disappear

One’s I know are ready

To go beyond the stratosphere

                         ***

With Christ in the vessel

They can smile at the storm

Rising to their everlasting habitation

A place way beyond the norm

                         ***

As sadness approaches my wailing heart

I picture them reaching the summit

And the smile they must express

In their new mansion – they just love it!

                         ***

We have no idea what it will be like

Except that the atmosphere is heavenly

All love – with tearless abundance

God’s blessings distributed evenly

                         ***

So be reminded you will be among those gone

While you grasp each breath and carry on

Jesus is the answer to every need

Take Him and make Him your saviour indeed

                         ***

(For my old friend and brother in Christ:

Tom McCorry gone to Glory on 22 April 2023)

Good

GOOD

Is it true that most folks want to be good, decent human beings?

Those who genuinely do, and make it a priority as a motivational factor in their lives, usually carry out good deeds to help reach or establish this goal in their lives.

Then someone annoys them – and they don’t act so ‘good’ anymore.

Next – conscious of acting in a bad way (e.g. perhaps coming to blows) – the comparison game starts, as a means of appeasing their conscience: “Well I’m not as bad as that guy…”

‘That guy’ being whoever they wish to compare themselves with.

Thus an attempt is made to appease their bad conduct or to appease their sense of guilt, having acted in a bad and perhaps hurtful way to others.

Then perhaps they engage in yet another good deed, again for the benefit of someone else.

This bolsters their self esteem again, after acting so badly on a previous occasion.

Until the next time, where in the interests of self-gain, they make inappropriate choices that violate their own moral code.

This is covered up with excuses. As someone once said an excuse is the ‘skin of a reason’ ‘stuffed with a lie’.

What is missing is that their guilt is never dealt with by an authoritative tribunal. 

So some, setting out to be good, are eventually pummelled enough by the bad behaviour of others, that in the end, they think it’s a case of survival now, rather than being ‘good’.

The conclusion becomes: Self-preservation in an obviously morally corrupt world.

They are buffeted so much by other humans, that the quest to be good, stay good, do good is lost somewhere, and protecting themselves by any means becomes the new goal.

This behaviour eventually can produce our resident crooks, thieves, cheaters, criminally insane, liars, violent, in a dog-eat-dog world.

Humanly speaking we must protect ourselves, avoiding the perpetrators of the self-indulgent, self-absorbed ‘outa my way’ types seemingly running rampant in our society.

The so called ‘survival of the fittest’ idea, as the mafia-like dictators dominate.

This creates alienation. And Covid or no Covid  – many are happy to keep themselves to themselves, just to survive.

Humanly speaking this is as good an answer to survival as any. Reclusion or seclusion.

Christ Jesus came to set an example of how created mankind should live.

He authenticated His person, ‘doing good’ (like none before Him):

Acts 10/

 38 How God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Ghost and with power: who went about doing good, and healing all that were oppressed of the devil; for God was with him.

The scripture says:

…there is none good but one, that is, God:

Only the one and only ‘good person’ has the power to forgive sins and to cleanse us from our guilt.

Having taken our sin and our guilt on His body on the tree – setting those who are ‘good intentioned’ free from their sin and guilt to attend to Him – devoting their lives to God who is good.

We note in the above (Acts 10) quote that Jesus Christ was able to do good by the enabling power of the Holy Spirit.

That’s why we all, who are not good – become good in Christ, by receiving Him through repentance and faith. Thus we too are enabled to do good.

II Corinthians 5/

20 Now then, we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were pleading through us: we implore you on Christ’s behalf, be reconciled to God. 21 For He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.