Hebrews 4:12
"For the word of God is living and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it pierces even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow. It judges the thoughts and intentions of the heart."
Man is created in the image of God. God is Spirit. Fundamentally, man is a spirit being, that has a soul and inhabits a physical body. The part of us that is in God's image is the spirit. The spirit is the real "me", deeper than thought and feeling and it is what relates to God. The soul is how we relate to the world around us.
Adam was good but incomplete. God offered Adam the opportunity to be completed by the fruit of the tree of life. That fruit would have made Adam eternal. The tree of life represents the uncreated life of God.
We know all too well that Adam chose the devil's alternative, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. God told Adam not to eat that fruit. That fruit brings death. It represents the life that is in the soul, the life that enabled Adam to exist in a kind of limbo until he made a choice.
Adam's disobedience brought about his spiritual death. This obviously does not mean the end of existence. It does mean separation from God. Adam and Eve tried to cover up and hide from God. The spirit of man, in effect, became submerged into his soul. The mind of man was darkened and he has gone his own way ever since. Man now lives by the principle of good and evil. But what man considers good or evil is not necessarily God's judgement. So man's ways are not God's ways and God rejects man's ways, no matter how "good" our intentions may be.
The part of the being that is born again the the spirit. When we are born again, the greatest possible change takes place. We who were dead in trespass and sin are made alive to God once more. We likely do not realise this or the implications. All we know is that something is different, even though we cannot explain it.
This is only the beginning of our spiritual journey. We are spiritual infants to begin with. So why do we need the Sword of the Spirit active in our lives? We said before that the spirit became submerged in the soul. This is amplified by education and experience growing up in the world. Very young children are more spiritually aware but lose that as the world promotes the realm of the soul, which is self will, mind and emotion. A few who get into the occult retain the predominance of the spirit, but that is rare.
God's remedy for this issue is to bring about the division of soul and spirit. Mostly we are unaware of the difference between, for example, flashing thoughts of the mind and intuition in the spirit. We will learn by experience that our thoughts may not be from God, but our own good intentions.
So how does God effect this division? What we need is revelation in our spirit being. This is something only the Holy Spirit can grant us. It was important enough that Paul would pray that Christians would receive the Spirit of Wisdom and Revelation. This is not a superficial mental understanding of the Bible. It is truth that sets us free.
We can read a passage in the Bible many times. It may not have much of an impact. Then one day, it is as it becomes alive to us. For example, we may struggle with condemnation, a common problem for new believers. We read Romans 8:1 but the problem remains. One day, we read it again but somehow it is different. We realise that it means exactly what it says. From that time on, we refuse to accept condemnation from man or devil.
The more revelation we receive, the stronger the spirit man becomes. As we live by revelation, rather than thought and feeling, our spirit man rules instead of the natural life we inherited from Adam. Our minds may well argue with us. We need to learn to reprogram our minds so that they do not contradict what we know in the inner realm of our spirit.
To be born again costs nothing. To be a spiritual man costs everything. If we are not diligent and do not seek revelation, we will shrivel up spiritually and be dominated by the soul. That leads to confusion, frustration, boredom and mere existence as a Christian. The process of growing is often a roller coaster of failure and defeat and times of rest and blessing. As we grow, the extremes become less and our experience more stable. Our circumstances may not be much different, but our response will be. And once the pressure on us has achieved its purpose, God will release it. And then He will begin to work on another aspect of our character.
We can and should come to the place called "the knowledge of the truth". This is when we know that we are born again and nothing can shake us. We know that we are dead to sin, self, Satan, the Law and the world. We know that we are new creations in Christ. We know God and we know Jesus. We are led by intuition in the spirit, not be reason, logic and emotion. It's a place of tremendous peace and contentment. Seek it with all your heart. Ask for God's grace during the trials that must come. God wants us to be free far more than we do ourselves.
"For the word of God is living and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it pierces even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow. It judges the thoughts and intentions of the heart."
Man is created in the image of God. God is Spirit. Fundamentally, man is a spirit being, that has a soul and inhabits a physical body. The part of us that is in God's image is the spirit. The spirit is the real "me", deeper than thought and feeling and it is what relates to God. The soul is how we relate to the world around us.
Adam was good but incomplete. God offered Adam the opportunity to be completed by the fruit of the tree of life. That fruit would have made Adam eternal. The tree of life represents the uncreated life of God.
We know all too well that Adam chose the devil's alternative, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. God told Adam not to eat that fruit. That fruit brings death. It represents the life that is in the soul, the life that enabled Adam to exist in a kind of limbo until he made a choice.
Adam's disobedience brought about his spiritual death. This obviously does not mean the end of existence. It does mean separation from God. Adam and Eve tried to cover up and hide from God. The spirit of man, in effect, became submerged into his soul. The mind of man was darkened and he has gone his own way ever since. Man now lives by the principle of good and evil. But what man considers good or evil is not necessarily God's judgement. So man's ways are not God's ways and God rejects man's ways, no matter how "good" our intentions may be.
The part of the being that is born again the the spirit. When we are born again, the greatest possible change takes place. We who were dead in trespass and sin are made alive to God once more. We likely do not realise this or the implications. All we know is that something is different, even though we cannot explain it.
This is only the beginning of our spiritual journey. We are spiritual infants to begin with. So why do we need the Sword of the Spirit active in our lives? We said before that the spirit became submerged in the soul. This is amplified by education and experience growing up in the world. Very young children are more spiritually aware but lose that as the world promotes the realm of the soul, which is self will, mind and emotion. A few who get into the occult retain the predominance of the spirit, but that is rare.
God's remedy for this issue is to bring about the division of soul and spirit. Mostly we are unaware of the difference between, for example, flashing thoughts of the mind and intuition in the spirit. We will learn by experience that our thoughts may not be from God, but our own good intentions.
So how does God effect this division? What we need is revelation in our spirit being. This is something only the Holy Spirit can grant us. It was important enough that Paul would pray that Christians would receive the Spirit of Wisdom and Revelation. This is not a superficial mental understanding of the Bible. It is truth that sets us free.
We can read a passage in the Bible many times. It may not have much of an impact. Then one day, it is as it becomes alive to us. For example, we may struggle with condemnation, a common problem for new believers. We read Romans 8:1 but the problem remains. One day, we read it again but somehow it is different. We realise that it means exactly what it says. From that time on, we refuse to accept condemnation from man or devil.
The more revelation we receive, the stronger the spirit man becomes. As we live by revelation, rather than thought and feeling, our spirit man rules instead of the natural life we inherited from Adam. Our minds may well argue with us. We need to learn to reprogram our minds so that they do not contradict what we know in the inner realm of our spirit.
To be born again costs nothing. To be a spiritual man costs everything. If we are not diligent and do not seek revelation, we will shrivel up spiritually and be dominated by the soul. That leads to confusion, frustration, boredom and mere existence as a Christian. The process of growing is often a roller coaster of failure and defeat and times of rest and blessing. As we grow, the extremes become less and our experience more stable. Our circumstances may not be much different, but our response will be. And once the pressure on us has achieved its purpose, God will release it. And then He will begin to work on another aspect of our character.
We can and should come to the place called "the knowledge of the truth". This is when we know that we are born again and nothing can shake us. We know that we are dead to sin, self, Satan, the Law and the world. We know that we are new creations in Christ. We know God and we know Jesus. We are led by intuition in the spirit, not be reason, logic and emotion. It's a place of tremendous peace and contentment. Seek it with all your heart. Ask for God's grace during the trials that must come. God wants us to be free far more than we do ourselves.
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