Poured

Every marriage has its quirky side to it.   Ours is no exception.  When I throw something out, either in the garbage or into a recycling bin, it invariably returns, rises from the dead so to speak.  Sometimes this little dance between my wife and I will go through three or four cycles.  I throw something out, it shows up on the counter, I throw it out again, it is back on the table.  We are not always on the same page when it comes to what to keep and what to “recycle”.   A growing number of us are becoming increasingly conscious of the evils of wastefulness.  You are probably like me.  You recycle, you reuse, you repurpose.  You try not to buy items without having a legitimate reason for getting them.  This way of thinking filters down to other areas of life.  You don’t want to waste your time so when stuck in traffic you listen to podcasts, books or informational radio programs and you avoid areas where you know there will be backups and delays.  You count your calories and the minutes you waste waiting in line.  You probably were cut off by someone recently who was not wanting to lose a second by being behind you in traffic.  If someone in my family leaves a glass of milk on the counter, I am tempted to pour it back into the milk container rather than throw it out.  Maybe, you are like that too!

In an age of recycling and repurposing, there are two accounts in the Bible that come across as ridiculous. One is in the Old Testament and the second is in the New Testament.  David was a hero king.  He fought numerous battles, expanded the borders of Israel and forced several kings into subjugation.  It was not always easy; many times, he fought superior forces who had the upper hand.  In one such military endeavor, he found himself and his army surrounded by the Philistines who were bent on his destruction. Holed up in a cave, he had a craving. At that time David was in the stronghold, and the Philistine garrison was at Bethlehem.  David longed for water and said, "Oh, that someone would get me a drink of water from the well near the gate of Bethlehem!" (2 Samuel 23: 15) Bethlehem was his hometown and the water from the well there was more precious to him than the finest of wines.  Three of his mightiest soldiers decided to break through the Philistine lines and grab some of the water and bring it to their beloved king.  When they arrived back with the water, David refused to drink any of it. … instead, he poured it out before the Lord.  "Far be it from me, O Lord, to do this!" he said. "Is it not the blood of men who went at the risk of their lives?" And David would not drink it.  (2 Samuel 23: 15-17 NIV)

This was of course a colossal waste of time and effort and no one would begrudge these three men for being furious with their king for not drinking the water they risked their lives delivering to him.  Yet that is the point.  We all are heading to dust and ashes and everything we gain, hold, make, earn, save or grab will slip from our hands and either be a treasure of Satan’s or an offering to Christ.  We decide the fate of everything that comes to us; we are the judge and jury.  David realized, and perhaps you have too, that love, and courage and loyalty and devotion are bigger than this world.  They are the fabric of Heaven and no human being can hold any of them as his own.  That water was not H20, it was supernatural and could not be “bottoms up”.  It belonged to God because it came from Him.  A Christian cannot measure the worth of her life by what she possesses but only in what she gives over to Christ.  It is astounding, the emptiness that so many accept as normal.  They hold onto all sorts of things: their talents, their time, their social skills, their money and their relationships all the while failing to see what wonderful things our Lord might do with them if He had them.

In the New Testament we have the oft discussed account of Mary, a follower of Jesus, who poured out an entire bottle of expensive perfume on Jesus.  While he was in Bethany, reclining at the table in the home of a man known as Simon the Leper, a woman came with an alabaster jar of very expensive perfume, made of pure nard. She broke the jar and poured the perfume on his head. Some of those present were saying indignantly to one another, "Why this waste of perfume?” (Mark 14:3-4 NIV) Indeed, what a great waste!  And yet the Lord’s reply reveals what God thinks of such actions.  "Leave her alone," said Jesus. "Why are you bothering her? She has done a beautiful thing to me.” (Mark 14:6 NIV) He went so far as to declare that what Mary did would always be remembered and honored!  Have you ever done anything that could be categorized as eternally unforgettable?

The very nature of God is to pour out His life for those who love Him and those who hate Him, to die for the foulest of sinners and the most indifferent of unbelievers.  His life was the ultimate waste.  He was smart, holy, good, creative, beloved and a leader.  He had every reason to live and do something with His life and He threw it away for you and me.  You might argue that the salvation of the world was worth His life but that is because you are on this end of it.  If you were on the other side of the Cross, you would have seen it much differently.  The disciples did.  Peter rebuked Jesus for insisting He would soon die.  For what?

If the nature of Christ is in you, then it is a part of your personality to give up to God indiscriminately anything and everything just because you love Him.  There is no career, no home, no retirement, no friendship or prized possession that is so big you must grasp it tightly and keep to yourself.  Whenever you hold something and tell God that He can’t have it, you shrink spiritually and become a smaller person.  But when you open your hands to Christ and offer Him anything and everything you have, the size of your life grows into a supernatural one.  God takes everything you give Him and makes them is God-sized and God transformed.  We look at some of the things we do as menial, as trivial, insignificant and unnoticed.  When Christ is a part of them, He sees them another way.  He considers them sacred.  You have the opportunity at each moment to become one with God, to live in the vastness of the Holy Spirit.  Open your hands and offer Him whatever you have there.  Christ who is holy will make it holy and you will have joy in exchange.

Spirituality—an Infused Presence

Genesis 2:7 NIV

…the Lord God formed the man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being.

What Is In You?

What makes you unique?  For me it is my last name.  In high school kids made fun of it.  Often when asked my last name, I have to spell it because receptionists reflexively start writing it as Walker rather than Walkup.  Just recently I was substitute teaching at a high school and kids in two different classes made fun of it.  My son did an internet search of our last name and it turns out a descendant of ours with our last name was a member of Scottish royalty and named his castle after our name.  My wife’s first name, Mary Jo is unique in Northern California.  Combine it with Walkup and it seems inconceivable that anyone else has the same name.  Well it turns out there is another Mary Jo Walkup in the Bay Area and when we first moved here, we started getting her mail and the library confused the two of them.  Yet you cannot hide behind someone else.  You are different from every other person that has ever existed and nothing you do can keep this from being true.  You may have plastic surgery to make you look like Barbie or feign a British accent so that you sound more charming but in the end you are who you are and no one else and that cannot be changed.  You are made by God with a unique soul that no one else can ever possess.

When God put together his first human being, it was such an ignoble work.  He scraped together some dirt and formed him out of the common stuff of the earth.  It was like a child scooping up clumps of mud and patting the mess together into a shape of his own imagining.  No fanfare or shouts of acclimation greeted the new creation.  But the Lord wasn’t finished yet.  At the end of it, He did something that is difficult to assess.  The Lord breathed into Adam’s nostrils the breath of life and from that point forward he and each one who came from his line became a “living soul”.

The Hebrew term translated “being” in the NIV and “soul: in the KJV is “nephesh”.  It describes you as you, distinctly different from every other person that has ever been or will be.  Without the breath of God, Adam was just a body, an organic collection of matter.  Once though God breathed into him, Adam came alive; became “him”.  A parallel term found in the Greek Bible is “psuche”, from which is derived the English word “psyche”.    The idea of both words in their Biblical context is that they describe you as the combination of body and spirit.  Take out the spirit and the psuche or nephesh ends.  You have a body stranded without life.  James the brother of Jesus references this body without spirit condition and uses it to compare it to faith without works.  As the body without the God,spirit is dead, so faith without deeds is dead. (James 2:26 NIV)  The Apostle Paul hints at the time when a separation will take place between him and his body.  Therefore we are always confident and know that as long as we are at home in the body we are away from the Lord.  We live by faith, not by sight.  We are confident, I say, and would prefer to be away from the body and at home with the Lord. (2 Corinthians 5:6-8 NIV)

The book of Proverbs speaks of the souls (nephesh) of animals and says that the righteous man cares for the animal soul.  A righteous man cares for the needs of his animal… (Proverbs 12:10 NIV)  It is literally, “A righteous one knowing the soul of his animals.  The word translated animals is a term used for any creature other than humans and comes from a root that means “tongue tied” or without language.  It is all those beasts that God did not breathe into and make living souls.  The Bible differentiates between the spirit the animals possess and the sort of spirit people have.  Who knows if the spirit of man rises upward and if the spirit of the animal goes down into the earth?" (Ecclesiastes 3:21 NIV)  The question raised has to do with the ultimate destination of the human spirit vs. the animal spirit but the point is that they are different; animal spirit and human spirit.  What separates one from the other?  All we have and it is an important difference is that the Bible says that God breathed into the first human being and by doing so gave people something He did not give animals…something called a “living soul”.

What are we to make of this breath God put into Adam?  The only other time we see in the Bible God pushing out His breath into someone, it is when Christ during His resurrection breathed upon the disciples the Holy Spirit.  And with that he breathed on them and said, "Receive the Holy Spirit.” (John 20:22 NIV)  There are three considerations here.  The first is that this is something from God that the animals don’t possess.  Second it is spirit; something beyond physical.  Third it is of God, it comes out of Him.  In our modern age we think of anything “spiritual” as not really real.  Like a metaphor, something spiritual stands for a way of seeing, a way of viewing an aspect of life.  If it is spiritual, then that is code for this is deeply personal, it flows out of me and how I live my life.  Yet the Bible insists that the things of the Spirit are super real, are eternal real rather than temporary real.  God and Spirit are not just real, they are the basis behind all reality.  They make reality actual, not just digital imagery or something coming out of a machine.  The fact that God’s breath is in you and sustains you is why you are not just a thought; you are by God’s action, “really real”.

What is exceptional about God breathing into the first human being and the result of the breath being passed along across every generation and through every person that has been conceived is that something of God is in each of us.  The Biblical term for this is that we are made in “God’s image”.  What a marvelous miracle that is!  All of us have “Godness”; it is in a sense, in our DNA.  No matter how bad we might be, how corrupted by Satan and debased by our behaviors, God is still a part of who we are, the life behind our being.  When Jacob, after a twenty year absence finally met up with his brother Esau and found him full of forgiveness and no longer holding against Jacob his grudge, Jacob said of him, “For to see your face is like seeing the face of God”. (Genesis 33:10 NIV) Perhaps there is more truth to that statement than Jacob knew at the time.

What is possible for someone who has God a part of him or her?  Love and forgive with supernatural strength come to mind.  Author Philip Yancey in his book Rumors of Another World  reminds you and me of the great power those who have Christ in them possess.  When the transition of power took place in South Africa as the apartheid government based on racial injustice was replaced by a demographic coalition of blacks and whites led by the recently released Nelson Mandela, there were many atrocities of the past racist leaders that needed to be addressed.  The Truth and Reconciliation Commission, led by Bishop Desmond Tutu brought white policeman and army officers in to face their accusers over crimes they had committed while in power.  The rules were these: if when voluntarily facing his accusers, the officer confessed his crime and fully acknowledged his guilt, he could not be tried and punished for the crime.  One police officer told of a time when he and his fellow policeman shot an eighteen year old and burned his body to ashes to destroy the evidence.  Later the same officer returned to that house and seized the boy’s father.  While his wife was forced to watch, the police tied her husband to a wood pile, poured gasoline all over his body and set him on fire.

After hearing the police officer describe his crimes, the widow, who was also the mother, was given the opportunity to speak.  “What do you want from Mr. van de Broek?” the judge asked her.  She replied that she wanted him to go to the place where they burned her husband’s body, gather the dust and make it possible for her to give her husband a decent burial.  The police officer hung his head in shame and agreed to do so.  But then the widow added, “Mr. van de Broek took all my family away from me, and I still have a lot of love to give. Twice a month, I would like for him to come to the ghetto and spend a day with me so I can be a mother to him.  And I would like Mr. van de Broek to know that he is forgiven by God, and that I forgive him too.  I would like to embrace him so he can know my forgiveness is real.”  As she left the witness stand to go to the police officer, the widow had to stop because overwhelmed, the officer had fainted. (p. 223-224)

What can you do with God a part of you, what is possible with Him living through you?  Adam had a chance to find out just what sort of goodness could flow from him into the world all about him.  Now that we live in the age of sin and death, it is certainly more difficult to believe that we possess the love and kindness of God but we do.  The promise is still valid today.  I can do everything through him who gives me strength. (Philippians 4:13 NIV)  Today you can love like God.  Today you can forgive like Jesus.  Today you can be kind like Jesus.  Today you can get rid of your temper, be done with your addictions, leave behind your lusts and be patient in any and every circumstance just like Jesus.  With Christ a part of us, it is possible!

Changing the Environment

Matthew 5:14-16 NIV

"You are the light of the world. A city on a hill cannot be hidden.  Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house.  In the same way, let your light shine before men, that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven.

How Are You Impacting Your World?

The other day I was in a second grade classroom surrounded by children who were asking me questions and wanting help.  Suddenly a little boy next to me asked, “Why do you smell so good?”  I ignored him and kept talking with other children and he asked me again, “Mr. Walkup, why do you smell so good?”  I was so flummoxed by his question that I could give no response to the boy and was a bit dumbfounded for a few moments.  How come he noticed me?  What made him say that I smelled good?  How was I supposed to respond?  Of course you should never be surprised by what little children say whether it is good or bad.  They speak their mind and they are super sensitive to what is going on about them.  Their environment matters profoundly to them and although many of us have grown desensitized, it does to too us also.

Have you given much thought to what impact you make on others?  Not just close family members and friends but but anyone who comes in contact with you?  What part do you play in creating an environment for others?  You can ignore this question and many do.  Unless you are attracted to someone or in trouble or wanting to get something from someone, you may not think about the impact you make on those around you.  Other than pop psychologists who make lots of money teaching people how to influence others, rarely is much thought given to our impact on those about us.  There is however reason to ponder this question and take it seriously.  How do you impact the environment of others?

You have seen this phenomenon.  A strong personality alters the climate of a room and changes the culture of a workplace.  One child can completely change a classroom and one person influences how a worship service goes.  Yet you don’t have to be charismatic or loud or funny or pushy to be felt and impactful.  All you need is Christ living in you to change the world.

The Lord used interesting metaphors to talk about your influence.  "You are the light of the world. A city on a hill cannot be hidden.  Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house.  In the same way, let your light shine before men, that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven.” (Matthew 5:14-16 NIV)  The light of the world, a city on a hill; that is what He says you are.  Of course for most, that is a preposterous statement.  Who is like that?  Maybe Beyoncé or Tom Cruise or Stephen Curry!  Do you feel like when you enter a room all eyes are on you, everyone turns to hear what you have to say?  Yet you have to take seriously Jesus’ statements like this because He gives the actual situation rather than what mere appearances seem to indicate.

Now I realize we are talking about the Apostle Peter, the majestic disciple who stood above all the rest until Paul came along but it is pertinent what is discovered in Acts 5: 12 and following.  The apostles performed many miraculous signs and wonders among the people. And all the believers used to meet together in Solomon's Colonnade.  No one else dared join them, even though they were highly regarded by the people.  Nevertheless, more and more men and women believed in the Lord and were added to their number.  As a result, people brought the sick into the streets and laid them on beds and mats so that at least Peter's shadow might fall on some of them as he passed by. (Acts 5: 12-15 NIV) Even the shadow of Peter impacted crowds.  He did not have to say anything or do anything to have a dramatic effect on others.  What if this was the case with you?  Can you imagine your shadow being such a powerful influence?

Remember that Jesus declares that you are a city upon a hill, that you are the light of the world.  This is not just speaking of some great church leader or someone long gone.  He is speaking of you, that you are influential, that you change the way others see things, that when you are present, people are impacted by you being there in profound ways.  What if your shadow was just as influential as Peter’s?  What if your presence was dramatically life altering?  Could you imagine being such a person?

Paul said something that I cannot easily shake and it should make you pause   But thanks be to God, who always leads us in triumphal procession in Christ and through us spreads everywhere the fragrance of the knowledge of him.  For we are to God the aroma of Christ among those who are being saved and those who are perishing.  To the one we are the smell of death; to the other, the fragrance of life. And who is equal to such a task? (2 Corinthians 2:14-16 NIV)   Everywhere you go, the knowledge of Christ permeates those who come in contact with you.  This is not a natural work but supernatural and it takes faith to believe it is so.  You bring Christ to your conversations, to your meetings, to each place that you go.  Now this fragrance of Christ may be faint or it could be strong but it is there nonetheless and you bring it with you. 

Surely we understand at least in theory, if not in practice, that how we live our lives impacts everyone else.  A smile we share, a pat on the back, a warm handshake, something encouraging or complimentary that we say changes the climate of a room.  If we rant or rage, if we criticize, make a sarcastic comment, gossip, lie, pout, we alter the room too.  The power of our personality affects others and we certainly know that is so.  We may not live with that in mind but are aware of it.  If Christ is in you, then His presence, which is supernatural affects everyone who comes in contact with you and there is a ripple effect; one person impacted changes even slightly the next person and so on and how far the effect travels we cannot measure.  If your personality changes the lives of those about you, imagine just how powerfully the personality of the Lord of the Universe living in you impacts those who come in contact with the Christ in you.

We don’t have time to describe the impact demons have in our world today.  The Apostle Paul warned that even those who profess to be Christians would be driven from God by demons and accept the view of life they promote.   The Spirit clearly says that in later times some will abandon the faith and follow deceiving spirits and things taught by demons. (1 Timothy 4:1 NIV)  We know what sorts of brokenness the Gospels tell us demons caused and how Jesus drove demons away from people and they were healed.  How much depression, anxiety, anger, bitterness, and physical suffering is brought on by demons even now?  Is it possible that where you work, at the schools and among your friends, demons are wrecking lives and making people miserable?  Of course it is and if Christ could bring joy and peace to people in His time before He was crucified, what great good might He do today through you?  It is not preposterous to think that Christ in you can heal depression, calm anger, take away anxiety and even make the sick well!  Of course He can!

Our Lord said that to be used by the Father like He was, you must have faith in the Father too.  You must believe that Christ will powerfully work through you if you are available to God to do with as He wishes.  What might Christ do through you?  We cannot say but why would He not use you to bring peace and joy to those He has in your life?  I think that if you want Christ to change the world through your life, it starts with prayer.  James the brother of Jesus said, “And the prayer offered in faith will make the sick person well; the Lord will raise him up. If he has sinned, he will be forgiven.  Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous man is powerful and effective.” (James 5:15-16 NIV)  Pray for every person you can.  Make sure no sin is strangling your life with Christ and be available to the Father.  You too can release from demonic bondage those Christ has entrusted to your care!

Having to Wait

Isaiah 40:31 NASU

Yet those who wait for the Lord will gain new strength; they will mount up with wings like eagles, they will run and not get tired, they will walk and not become weary.

   

Are You Tired of Waiting?

The other day I forgot to make a sandwich for lunch but had a bag of walnuts and blueberries and cashews so I made that my lunch.  Walnuts and blueberries are considered “super foods” by some nutritionists and I had more than enough in my bag to satisfy my appetite.  When I got off work though and headed back to the church to build the sermon for today I was hungry.  In five minutes I would be at the office where I had soup and broccoli waiting for me but I did not want to wait.  I could not wait.  I pulled off the freeway and went to McDonald's because I had to have onions and ketchup and American cheese food and a couple of pickles with a beef patty that may or may not be all beef and two buns of white bread.  Of course there was nothing reasonable about my decision to satisfy my hunger that way; it was much smarter to have waited and had that broccoli and soup.  Not all of us are good at waiting though!

Do you ever get aggravated about having to wait?  Are you ever frustrated by the slow driver who won’t move out of your lane and let you pass?  Have you gotten uptight about someone who speaks too slowly and had to fight the urge to finish off her sentences?  Are you the one who grinds his teeth when a movie or video is buffering?  Do you ever turn to the back page of a novel because you can’t wait to see how it ends?  Are you unable to carry on a conversation without looking at your phone?  Have you ever been frustrated by more than three people in your line at the bank or the store?  What do you do when you are put on hold?  Do you wait patiently for the person to return to the line or are you ready to hang up after a few minutes?  Have you ever snapped at someone who made you wait for an unreasonable amount of time?  Is “wait” a four letter word in your dictionary?

One of the more misunderstood terms found in the Bible is “lust”.  We think of it almost exclusively as a term about sex and sexual attraction but it is much more encompassing than that.  Lust is the determination that you must have something immediately.  We lust because we are unwilling to wait for God’s order of things.  We don’t have what we want and so we lust.  The emotional reaction most closely connected to lust is anger.  You will see it in a check-out line and at the dinner table.  I don’t get what I want when I want it and I get mad.  Even the satisfying of a lust can generate anger.  Some of the most bad-tempered human beings are those who will not wait but always demand they get what they want when they want it.  You see this clearly illustrated by the son of King David who wanted his half-sister and would not wait for her to ask their father to let them marry.  Instead he raped her and immediately afterward became angry with the girl and had her thrown out of the house.  But he (Amnon) refused to listen to her (his sister), and since he was stronger than she, he raped her.  Then Amnon hated her with intense hatred. In fact, he hated her more than he had loved her. Amnon said to her, "Get up and get out!" (2 Samuel 13:14-15 NIV) Nothing is so dangerous as a lust that has been satisfied for more often than not it warps the human personality and makes it irascible.  Cain who became furious that God liked his brother Abel’s sacrifice more than his and rather than taking the time to offer a better sacrifice the next time, in a fit of rage generated by an unfulfilled lust killed his brother.  Nearly every single ungodly moment of anger can be traced back to a lust, whether it is satisfied or left unfulfilled.

We even see lust in so-called “spiritual matters”.  It is not unusual for Christian people to get angry with God when He does not give them what they want when they want it.  Countless numbers of once God-fearing people have left their Christianity behind them because they got mad that God did not answer their prayers.  When Jezebel asked her husband Ahab why he was so sullen, it was because he could not get a landowner to sell him his vineyard.   He answered her, "Because I said to Naboth the Jezreelite, 'Sell me your vineyard; or if you prefer, I will give you another vineyard in its place.' But he said, 'I will not give you my vineyard.'" (1 Kings 21:6 NIV)  How many Christian people have reacted in the exact same way to God when He would not give them what they wanted when they wanted it?

There is an enlightening verse in Isaiah that expresses precisely how God makes His people spiritually and psychologically strong.  Yet those who wait for the Lord will gain new strength; they will mount up with wings like eagles, they will run and not get tired, they will walk and not become weary. (Isaiah 40:31 NASU)  The Hebrew term translated “wait” is rooted in the idea of a rope being stretched, pulled to its limits.  Wait means precisely that.  Those who develop God’s strength and endurance wait for the Lord like a rubber band being pulled back so far it is in danger of snapping.  Throughout Scripture God’s people are told to wait for God.  Wait for the Lord and keep his way. (Psalm 37:34 NIV) I wait for the Lord, my soul waits, and in his word I put my hope.  My soul waits for the Lord more than watchmen wait for the morning, more than watchmen wait for the morning. (Psalm 130:5-6 NIV)  It is good to wait quietly for the salvation of the Lord. (Lamentations 3:26 NIV) 

The New Testament encourages God’s people to wait upon God also.  For in this hope we were saved. But hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what he already has?  But if we hope for what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently. (Romans 8:24-25 NIV)  The fundamental quality of all hope is waiting.  Without waiting, hope is not real, a concept rather than actual act of faith.  Lust and ungodliness are to give way to waiting for God.  For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men.  It teaches us to say "No" to ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives in this present age, while we wait for the blessed hope — the glorious appearing of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ, (Titus 2:11-13 NIV) Waiting though is not a passive acceptance of delays in life but an active participation in God and His personality. Keep yourselves in God's love as you wait for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ to bring you to eternal life. (Jude 21 NIV)

If we did not know that God is love and all He does with us is rooted in love, we would perhaps pass judgment on His way of dealing with us.  Just consider the pattern we see in Scripture.  Noah waited one hundred years for God to finally flood the earth.  The Hebrew people waited four hundred years for the Lord to begin to bring them out of Egypt and the terrible slavery they endured.  For seventy years they suffered from the captivity after the Lord drove them out of Israel.  Hundreds of years they waited for a Messiah to come and bring them salvation.  Forty years Moses had to wait before the Lord finally gave him his assignment of leading Israel out of slavery.  Abraham waited sixty years before he had a child and his wife Sarah waited seventy years.  Isaac had to wait until he was sixty before God let him be a father and Jacob was forced to wait more than twenty years before he could return home.  Nearly every time God wants to do something important with a person, He makes that one wait, sometimes for an intolerable length of time.

Consider again our oft quoted verse in Isaiah 40.  Yet those who wait for the Lord will gain new strength; they will mount up with wings like eagles, they will run and not get tired, they will walk and not become weary. (Isaiah 40:31 NASU)  This verse is widely misunderstood!  The common thinking about it is that if we just wait long enough for God, finally He will give us new strength and enable us to persevere in whatever task we face.  That is not at all the point of this teaching.  The wait is not the delay to getting God’s help and strength; it is the means by which it comes.  It is in waiting upon the Lord that all He has for us is put into place in us.  Isaiah the prophet makes this clear in the sixty-fourth chapter. Since ancient times no one has heard, no ear has perceived, no eye has seen any God besides you, who acts on behalf of those who wait for him. (Isaiah 64:4 NIV)  Waiting is not what brings about our transformation but waiting for the Lord is the way He changes us.  Prayer is nothing more than waiting for the Lord.  It is giving Him access to us that He might pour Himself into us and as we pray, for whatever it might be, God gives us new strength…the strength that is Christ Himself.

We wonder why God doesn’t instantly give us everything we ask of Him.  What a childish way of seeing prayer!  Prayer is the means by which God and His strengths become a part of us and as He pours Himself into us through prayer, what our Lord wants for us and for those we care about comes in His timing.  Sometimes as we pray and wait for God, our Lord makes it clear He does not want those things we are asking for ourselves and others and it is a stormy time for us as we learn to accept it.  Yet even then, God’s strength and patience and hope and peace get worked into us and we stop being impatient, self-absorbed children and grow mature in our Lord’s invading personality.   Why does God make us wait for Him?  It is because He wants us to have supernatural strength and peace and contentment and these great workings of God take time to be worked into us…the time we spend in prayer as we wait for Him to finish what He has already started.

Earthy Lives What Are We?

Genesis 2:7 NIV

…the Lord God formed the man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being.

What Does Your Earthiness Say About Your Worth?

My senior year in high school, I took the highest level of math our school offered.  Everyone in the class was planning on attending a major university and were counting on a good grade to enhance their chances of being accepted or getting scholarships.  That is, everyone except me.  I am not sure why I was in the class; I had no intention of studying, I guess I just thought it would be a fun class to take.  The teacher was the strictest in the school.  Her name was Miss Sims and she was it seemed in her seventies although looking back she was probably younger than that.  Everyone called her behind her back Sargent Sims and she definitely fit that nick name. She had a practice of each class making one of the students go to the blackboard and in front of everyone work out a problem from the homework.  Having the last name Walkup was convenient for me although I knew the time would come when eventually my name would be called.  It was.  Of course I had not done the assignment and although I listened carefully to all that went on in the class, I had no idea how to work out the problem she gave me.  I slowly wrote the problem out on the blackboard, then began to just stare at it.  I may have thought that if I stalled long enough, Miss Sims would help me.  She did not.  She left me there to “hang in the wind”.  Finally Miss Sims called to me from her throne, “Mr. Walkup, you don’t know what you are doing, do you?”  I shook my head “no” and with all the stiffness her personality possessed, Miss Sims sent me back to my seat.  My friends looked over at me with pity in their eyes, embarrassed for me.  I just stared straight ahead, feeling like dirt.

To compare someone to dirt is to imply he or she is worthless.  And if you are “dirty”, it means you are morally corrupted.  Have you ever felt like dirt?  Perhaps you were a failure in athletics or your grades weren’t good.  Maybe you loved someone that did not love you back.  Perhaps you got mad and were embarrassed afterward by some of the things you said.  Have you been fired?  You probably felt like dirt then.   You might have gotten drunk or high and afterward felt like dirt.  Maybe you took an entrance exam or a placement test and didn’t do as well as you hoped.  It could be that you don’t feel respected.  Has there been a time when you felt like dirt? 

As we started to discuss this last week, the Bible indicates that all of us should feel like dirt and for good reason.  We are.  The first of us was made out of the dust of the ground and everyone since is descended from that man of dirt.  The Lord God formed the man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being. (Genesis 2:7 NIV) Should we be embarrassed?  Does this make us automatically inadequate?  There is something critical to remember when we consider how we were created. The dirt is the fundamental building block of everything God put together for us.  The creatures are from the dirt, the plants are from the dirt and of course earth itself is from the dirt.  Unlike the angels, the demons and Satan, we are connected to everything of earth.  It is our glorious heritage to be linked to all that we see and touch and smell and taste and hear.  God could have created us completely separate from this universe, a distinct outsider but He did not.  He created us a part of it.  We will return to this but it cannot be overstated that God made earth our home by creating us a part of it.  We are perfectly fit to do what our Lord made us to do, rule over the earth and make it bend to our will.  God blessed them (Adam and Eve) and said to them, "Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and over every living creature that moves on the ground." (Genesis 1:28 NIV)  Remember, Satan was cast down to the earth: we were made part of it.

Now we must address the matter of our humiliation. Being earthy is to our glory but sin brought our disgrace.  After the Lord made us from the earth, the Lord breathed spirit into us.  Immediately we became what the Bible calls a living soul or “nephesh”: spirit and earthiness together.  We were, unlike any other being, the glory of God and the glory of earth combined.  Nothing else in the universe or beyond the universe could make that claim…not the angels, not Satan and not even God was both.  We were glorious, glorious with God, glorious with perfect earth.  To understand our humiliation, we must rethink what happened for Moses when he went before God in His glory.  The very first time Moses came into the presence of God, something about his body, his earthy body changed.  When Moses finished speaking to them, he put a veil over his face.  But whenever he entered the Lord's presence to speak with him, he removed the veil until he came out. And when he came out and told the Israelites what he had been commanded, they saw that his face was radiant. Then Moses would put the veil back over his face until he went in to speak with the Lord. (Exodus 34:33-35 NIV)  

It must have been spectacular for Moses to experience his body transformed in some supernatural way by being with God.  But why did Moses put the veil over his face after he met with God and the people saw the radiant transformation caused by God’s glory?  The Apostle Paul tells us Moses was embarrassed by how the glory faded.  We are not like Moses, who would put a veil over his face to keep the Israelites from gazing at it while the radiance was fading away. (2 Corinthians 3:13 NIV)  How very human of him; when he realized that he could not retain, due to his sin the radiance being with God provided him, Moses covered his face so he would not be embarrassed by everyone knowing it.  We assume that Adam and Eve desperately tried to cover themselves because they were humiliated by their nakedness in regard to their genitalia.  The Bible never says that.   It simply says that they sewed fig leaves together to cover their nakedness and later after handing down the consequences of their Sin, the Lord made clothes for Adam and Eve because of their humiliation in being naked. The Lord God made garments of skin for Adam and his wife and clothed them. (Genesis 3:21 NIV)

There was in the bodies of Adam and Eve something of God that may have been as dazzling as the face of Moses or of Christ on the Mount of Transfiguration.  There he (Jesus) was transfigured before them. His face shone like the sun, and his clothes became as white as the light.(Matthew 17:2 NIV) The purity of body built by the hand of God is not known to us now but could it have been any less glorious than was Moses’ body when he met with God for just a short time?  When the glory of God left the bodies of Adam and Eve, they were appalled by how horrific their fall and all they could think of doing was covering their once glorious bodies.  Sin did not make Adam and Eve suddenly naked; sin made Adam and Eve unfathomably lifeless in their looks.  What is most horrific in regard to our bodies now is that we no longer even give a thought to our lost glory as God’s special creation; we pay far more attention to is the lust our bodies generate in one another.

Now we must in a much too cursory manner describe how God’s plan for putting humanity together as both earth and spirit worked out in the undoing of all the damage Satan’s rebellion against God brought to the universe of humanity.  When God became fully human, completely earthy, He did so for one purpose.  God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God. (2 Corinthians 5:21 NIV) Our Lord became sin, not just sins but Sin in its entirety.  This could not be done spiritually; it could only take place in the earthy realm of humanity.  In the body of Christ, that earthy body, the Sin of mankind was taken and then crucified.  It was not through angels or any supernatural force that God took apart Satan’s hold on the universe but through a human being, a human being made out of dirt, out of earth that our Lord ruined Satan.  Satan, and the demons that joined him, cannot be brought out of their rebellion; as just spiritual beings and that is all, they can only be sent into hell.  But people, earthy people can have their sin taken out of them which is what God was able to do when He was crucified.  Once Christ rose from the dead, Satan was completely wrecked because he no longer has death to keep humanity from God.  The body of creation can be remade, and the resurrection of Jesus confirmed it, and so the victory of God as man became also the victory of man as earthy soul, completely remade without sin and God will do this.  Not only that, God can come into our body and join us in it so that His spirit can empower our spirit to live out the perfect life of Christ in actual ways. 

Because of what Jesus Christ did in an earthy body which has its origin in dirt you can be a perfect overcomer of sin in actuality and not in some mythical, imaginary sense.  Unlike Adam who failed in perfection and holiness, you will not fail.  You will live out every word of God’s commandments, every word in the Sermon on the Mount and you will love perfectly God and all the people you have in your life.    The Great Society of perfect union with God and all His people will come to pass because our Lord became an earthy part of us and in the cataclysmic work of His crucifixion and resurrection we all are joined in what He did.  This work of God’s salvation starts now.  With Christ our Savior part of us, we can today work out what God has worked into us, holiness and real love.  Never say you can’t when God in you says you can.  Paul was not just blowing steam when he said to you, “I can do everything through Him (Christ) who gives me strength.”  (Philippians 4: 13 NIV)   Unlike the demons and all spiritual beings in rebellion against God, you can in your glorious earthiness be made new and live a perfectly holy and good life.  In Christ, you can do what is right and have all the joy of Christ working in you.

Spirit Journey

Psalm 51:10-11 RSV

Create in me a clean heart, O God, and put a new and right spirit within me.

Cast me not away from thy presence, and take not thy Holy Spirit from me.

Do You Have a Spirit Or Are You a Spirit?

When I was ten years old I made a most terrifying journey that only was about fifty feet long.  I got out of the chair where I was sitting, stood up, and walked to the pastor who was standing at the front of the congregation of Pacific Avenue Baptist Church.  He asked me why I had come to him and I told him I wanted to become Christian.  The pastor had a few more questions for me and as the rest of the church waited, I prayed with him that God would forgive my sins and give me eternal life.  I that day put all my hope in Jesus Christ as my Savior.  About six months later, a new pastor had come to our church and in the church’s brand new baptistery; Pastor Culp baptized me on Easter morning.  I was stunned by how I responded to this.  For no reason that I could figure, I began to weep as soon as I came out of the water.  It was amazing to me because I didn’t think I was nervous nor was there any reason for me to be sad and I cannot say I was overwhelmed by any relief to get my life on track.  My spirit simply broke apart that morning and weeping was my physiological response.  Now I know that it was the Holy Spirit that came over me and after seeing this same reaction in others who have been baptized, I realize that I wasn’t weird or “just a cry baby”.  But back then, I didn’t understand what had happened and no one ever pulled me aside to tell me what I had experienced.  Some would call it a “spiritual moment”.  But what does that mean?

We speak of certain things as “spiritual” but do we really know what that means?  Is going to a Buddhist temple spiritual?  Is walking through a meadow spiritual?  Can sipping coffee at a café be spiritual?  Is it spiritual to sit in on a worship service or to read your Bible or give to a charity?  Are we spiritual?  Is there something real and discernible that we know about the spirit that we can explore and discuss?

One way to make sense of this question is to consider the part the spirit plays in life.  The Bible teaches that each person is comprised of body, soul and spirit. May your whole spirit, soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. (1Thessalonians 5:23 NIV)  More than that, our spirit is what makes us a living human being.  Until God breathed into Adam, he was just a dead body.  After he gained his spirit, Adam was a “living soul”.  God tailor makes each spirit for the particular person who receives it.  The Lord, who stretches out the heavens, who lays the foundation of the earth, and who forms the spirit of man within him… (Zechariah 12:1-2 NIV)  Without spirit, the body dies.  What we call death is when the spirit returns to God.  …and the dust returns to the ground it came from, and the spirit returns to God who gave it.  (Ecclesiastes 12:7 NIV)  Jesus, when He was about to die on the Cross quoted from Psalm 31: 5 as He gave to the Father His spirit.  Jesus called out with a loud voice, "Father, into your hands I commit my spirit." When he had said this, he breathed his last. (Luke 23:46 NIV)  In John 19:30, the spirit departing and returning to God is synonymous with the declaration, “He died”.  Jesus said, "It is finished." With that, he bowed his head and gave up his spirit. (NIV)  Death is the loss of spirit…that is the definition of death…even more so than the brain no longer functioning or the heart no longer beating.  As the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without deeds is dead. (James 2:26 NIV)  Consider the great miracle of Jesus bringing back to life a little girl in Luke 8.  She was dead but when her spirit returned to her she rose up and was alive again.  But he took her by the hand and said, "My child, get up!"  Her spirit returned, and at once she stood up. (Luke 8:54-55 NIV)  The spirit was not wrecked when the girl died but still existed…Ecclesiastes tells us it goes to be with God.  It lives even when the body and soul die.

The spirit is therefore who we are eternally.  Some would speak of it as our personality.  The spirit processes what the body receives.  John 13: 21 expresses this perfectly.  As He contemplated His coming death, Jesus in His spirit sorted out what this would entail.  After he had said this, Jesus was troubled in spirit and testified, "I tell you the truth, one of you is going to betray me." (NIV)  After Jesus told the paralytic that his sins were forgiven, in Jesus’ spirit He recognized the reaction to His words of the lawyers who overheard His declaration.  Immediately Jesus knew in his spirit that this was what they were thinking in their hearts, and he said to them, "Why are you thinking these things? (Mark 2:8 NIV)

Consider the most fascinating relationship between one’s spirit and body delineated in 1 Corinthians 14.  For if I pray in a tongue, my spirit prays, but my mind is unfruitful.  So what shall I do? I will pray with my spirit, but I will also pray with my mind; I will sing with my spirit, but I will also sing with my mind. (1 Corinthians 14:14-15 NIV) The spirit and the body do not have to work together all the time.  Our mind can be completely unaware of what is happening within our spirit.  When we talk about the unconscious, often this is exactly what we mean.  Our spirit can connect with God without our mind knowing anything about this.  But there is another possibility here also.  Our spirit can connect with the demonic realm, with Satan, and not be aware of it either.  This is a most exciting and troubling discovery.  There may be much going on with us that our mind is oblivious to and unable to process.  All sort of wants, hateful feelings and godly interests can bubble up to the surface and we wonder how they got there.  It is because our spirit can interact both with God and with Satan without our mind realizing what this is doing to us.

There are crucial ramifications to this.  There is a back door to spiritual forces that can wreck us psychologically.  But there is a tremendous benefit also.  When we pray for someone, God can open this back door wide enough for a great working to take place.  Suppose you pray for Joe whose mind is shut firmly to God.  He has no interest in Him and in fact due to some terrible things that have happened to Him, Joe has a rather intense hatred toward God.  But, the Lord can, as we pray open this back door, interact with him in his spirit and by doing so, prepare the mind for repentance and faith.  In other words, we can never assume that Joe or any of the Joes or Josephines are hopeless cases.  Even a closed mind can be impacted and transformed by an open spirit.  The back door is available for God or Satan to enter and we decide in our praying or lack of praying who gains access.

Now we must turn to the most important part of our discussion regarding spirit.  Perhaps the greatest promise found anywhere in the Old Testament is presented in Psalm 51: 10.  The English translations differ in this verse in a significant way.  The RSV has the best rendition of the Hebrew intention and so we shall use it here.  Create in me a clean heart, O God, and put a new and right spirit within me.  Cast me not away from thy presence, and take not thy Holy Spirit from me.  When Jesus told Nicodemus and the rest of us that we have to be born again, He was referring to this promise.  We do not get a new body when we are born again nor do we receive a new soul...both come much later when the resurrection of the dead occurs.  But now, as soon as we put our trust in Jesus Christ to save us, it is a new spirit God gives us and that spirit is new because it now is joined to the Holy Spirit…we become as Jesus put it, “born of the Spirit”.  The great prophet Ezekiel put the promise this way.  I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws. (Ezekiel 36:26-28 NIV)  This work of God in joining our spirit to His Spirit is made explicit by Jesus.  Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, streams of living water will flow from within him."  By this he meant the Spirit… (John 7:38-39 NIV)

So what do we have here?  We have the most extraordinary finding.  The cross of Jesus Christ has the potential to work out a miracle in you.  If we stake our lives on the forgiveness of God and His mercy to give us eternal life because Jesus Christ took the punishment of God for our sins…the Holy Spirit then becomes a part of us; our personality saturated with the personality of God.  So what is wrong with us?  Why is it that so much of us does not seem like God?  You cannot remember because you were too young but you have seen it in others; when you were a baby and even older, your spirit struggled to express itself through your body.  You spoke gibberish, you threw tantrums, you stumbled about, you misunderstood the world all about you; your disorganized thinking caused you all sorts of problems.  Your spirit was ready to take on the world but your body was young and clumsy.  When we are born again and we gain a new spirit, one joined with the Holy Spirit of God, our body and soul are not ready for it.  They aren’t trained with the new spirit, too clumsy and corrupted by sin to act right, think right.  As Jesus puts it perfectly,  “The spirit is willing, but the body is weak." (Matthew 26:41 NIV)

How do we look…how does our personality express itself if the new spirit we have is not developed in us, if we are childish and our spirit, the one joined to the Holy Spirit, is not established fully with our body and soul?  A snapshot of the untrained body is found in Galatians 5:20 and it isn’t very attractive...discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions and envy; drunkenness and the like… (NIV)  We don’t have to live like this though because we have a new spirit.  A similar list describing how we can look if our new spirit is not fully in control of our personality is found in Colossians.  …Sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires and greed, which is idolatry. (Colossians 3:5 NIV)  But how do we look if our new spirit is directing our body and soul?  But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. (Galatians 5:22-23 NIV)

How do we get our body to catch up with our spirit so that we look like that?  The spirit must express itself through the scriptures within the structure of the body.  This can only happen through faith.  We must begin to believe that what the Bible says we are to do, we can do because we have a new spirit.  Until we begin to do this actively, aggressively, we will look and act like babies…jealous, angry, given to selfishness, impure actions and thoughts, unforgiving, trying hard to get our way.  The moment we take a behavior or attitude from the Bible, something we are told by God to do, and believe that because of the new spirit we have we can do it, a miraculous change occurs in us.  God will work in us His spirit.  Our habits will look like God.  Our dreams will look like God, our spontaneous thoughts will look like God, our behavior when we think no one important is watching us will look like God.

Until we are born again, Bible thinking and doing will be annoying and impossible to continue.  The moment though we put our hope in Jesus Christ to save us, the Spirit of God will join Himself to our spirit and the Bible will make sense, become reasonable and realistic to follow.  Until then, it is mere disconnected gibberish.  But you, if God’s Spirit lives in you, will begin to look like Jesus Christ Himself if you let the Scriptures unleash the new spirit you have that is fired up to take charge of your personality.  At some point every lion must stop pretending to be a rabbit and fulfill its God ordained destiny.  Christian people are made to live Christian lives.  Why should we look like the devil when God has made His home in us?  We are too good for that!

Spirit Intelligence

Romans 8:9 NIV

You, however, are controlled not by the sinful nature but by the Spirit, if the Spirit of God lives in you. And if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Christ.

What Is Your Spirit IQ?

One of the great questions in the field of psychology has to do with intelligence.  What is intelligence?  Is it the ability to solve problems, how quick you think, your verbal skills, your creativity?  Do you have to be great at math to be considered intelligent or able to grasp spacial relations?  Are you intelligent if you have a great memory or are smart people forgetful?  How important is intelligence anyway?  Does it make you a happier person?

The Bible is adamant that intelligence is important but it takes a unique stance on it.  Psalm 53 gives us a measure or a standard of intelligence rarely considered but it is crucial for us to consider.  The fool says in his heart, "There is no God."  They are corrupt, and their ways are vile; there is no one who does good.  God looks down from heaven on the sons of men to see if there are any who understand, any who seek God. (Psalm 53: 1-2 NIV)  Perhaps we could call this “moral intelligence”” or “spiritual thinking”.  It is easy to discredit spiritual thinking by calling it impractical or just something religious people think about but it is anything but impractical.  Spiritual thinking is the most practical way of understanding intelligence because it is universal in its scope.  Spiritual thinking demands that all of our thoughts must run through the Holy Spirit or else it always comes up short.  Without God in our figuring and evaluating, we lack the most critical component of thinking, the mind that is behind the life of every mind in all creation.  It is like trying to decide what would be best to wear outside without any idea what the weather is.  In Russia yesterday it was cold and rainy despite being the middle of July.  How smart would it be to go traipsing outside there in shorts and a light blouse?  Spiritual thinking gives us the ability to think with facts unavailable to the mind without God.

Let me give an illustration of the importance of spiritual thinking from an event described in Mark 4.  Jesus was asleep in the stern of the boat when a great storm arose on the Sea of Galilee.   The panicked disciples, several of whom were seasoned sailors, shook Jesus awake when it looked like they all might drown.  Quickly Jesus reacted to the storm.  He got up, rebuked the wind and said to the waves, "Quiet! Be still!" Then the wind died down and it was completely calm. (Mark 4:39 NIV)  Without God, the mind is chaotic, wild, unpredictable.  After Jesus quieted the elements, the disciples were amazed that even the wind and waves obey Him.  When the Holy Spirit enters a mind, it gains a freedom it did not possess before.  The mind can see things clearly without the wild nature it once had.  What it never noticed because it was too spasmodic to comprehend, the mind can grasp with the Holy Spirit as part of the thinking process.  Important details are processed with spiritual thinking that go unnoticed or are unattainable for the mind without the Holy Spirit directing the elements of our thinking.

The Lord told a story that helps us get a handle on spiritual thinking. There were ten virgins, all pledged to be married to a single man.  The wedding was delayed though because the groom had to be away for a while.  But when he returned, the wedding would begin.  Part of the ceremony was to have lamps ready and lit when the groom arrived.  Without them, they could not participate in the wedding.  Five of (the virgins) were foolish and five were wise.  The foolish ones took their lamps but did not take any oil with them.  The wise, however, took oil in jars along with their lamps.  The bridegroom was a long time in coming, and they all became drowsy and fell asleep. "At midnight the cry rang out: 'Here's the bridegroom! Come out to meet him!'  "Then all the virgins woke up and trimmed their lamps.  The foolish ones said to the wise, 'Give us some of your oil; our lamps are going out.'  "'No,' they replied, 'there may not be enough for both us and you. Instead, go to those who sell oil and buy some for yourselves.'  "But while they were on their way to buy the oil, the bridegroom arrived. The virgins who were ready went in with him to the wedding banquet. And the door was shut.  "Later the others also came.  'Sir! Sir!' they said. 'Open the door for us!'  "But he replied, 'I tell you the truth, I don't know you.' (Matthew 25:2-12 NIV)

What was the difference between the two groups of virgins?  All of the virgins had the same information available to them that they had to have their lamps lit when the groom arrived.  What separated the groups was the way each group processed that information.  At the time when they all fell asleep waiting for the groom and even before that, the five of the virgins thought it did not matter how much oil they kept with them.  The other five with varying degrees of urgency believed it was best to have extra oil for this crucial night.  The first group, the group without extra oil provides a clear picture of the chaotic mind, the mind without God working through the thinking.  They did not think far enough or process the information they had with enough clarity to avoid being kept out of their wedding.  The second group had spiritual thinking at work and although they may not have known why they needed to have extra oil, they took the information they had of the coming wedding and made sure they kept with them extra oil.  The second group of virgins thought in a different way than the first group of virgins and the way each group thought was critical…life altering.

There are key moments, and we never know when they will come and rarely know their importance at the time, when we need a higher intelligence, a smarter way of thinking and that is spiritual thinking.  When Jesus came across a man who had been crippled for thirty-eight years, the man had no idea the importance of that day.  But then when Jesus healed him, he started to see God’s hand upon him but because he lacked spiritual thinking, he could not process the data correctly.  For some reason, the man did not even pay attention to who Jesus Christ was, did not bother noticing even the slightest bit of information about Him.  When the Jewish authorities found the man carrying his begging mat that day and it happened to be the Sabbath with its regulations against carrying such mats on that day, he was asked why he was violating the Sabbath.  (H)e replied, "The man who made me well said to me, 'Pick up your mat and walk.'" (John 5:11 NIV)  When the Pharisees demanded to know who told him to pick up his mat, the man did not know.  Of course it seems odd to us that this fellow did not even know the name of the one who healed him of his thirty-eight year disability but that is the sort of thing that happens when we lack spiritual thinking.  We aren’t able to process the data we have coherently so that it makes sense for what is important.  Later, Jesus met up with the man and told him to stop sinning or else something worse would happen to Him.  What that something worse was, the man never bothered to try and discover.  Instead he just ignored Jesus’ warning and went on with his life.  Without the power of God working through our thinking, we become arbitrary in our actions, disordered and unable to make sense of the most important factors we encounter.  Spiritual thinking allows us to see and think about what is most important and how to understand what we see.

When the rich young ruler who met up with Jesus as described in Luke 18, was told that if he wanted to inherit eternal life, he had to sell what he had, give it to the poor and follow Jesus, he mentally collapsed at the words.  He could not process how important it was to leave behind his wealth if he was to have a happier and more joyful life that could never be ruined by circumstances or even by death.  Jesus was not good enough for him and that was because of the inability he had to utilize spiritual thinking.  Zacchaeus on the other hand without even having to be told, as soon as he met Jesus, realized that he had to pay back everyone he cheated four times over and give up half of all of his possessions to the poor if he was to be happy.  You cannot be talked into such a decision.  Who willingly would do such a thing with a glad heart?  It is not logical in any way unless of course you process it using spiritual thinking.  Of the two men, who made the smart decision?  The rich young ruler met Jesus, looked carefully at him with all his mental acuity and decided it was best to hold on to his wealth.  Zacchaeus used the same mental skills as the rich ruler but added to it was spiritual thinking, and he decided to give away his wealth.  One famously went away sorrowfully.  The other was joyful in his decision.  Spiritual thinking determined the quality of life each gained.

There are two parts to spiritual thinking.  The first is a determination that the Bible is the ultimate authority in our decision making.  If this is not decided, we will be unclear in our thinking and unable to process rightly what we face.  Who knows what to think of the person who gossips about us at work?  The Bible gives a clear answer.  Who knows how to respond to being unemployed?  The Bible tells us.  Who knows what we should do if we can’t stand our neighbor?  The Bible has a plan for that.  The Bible has an answer for every moral decision we face.  The second part of spiritual thinking is that it thrives off a craving that borders on desperation for the Lord to direct us in an ever growing way.  To develop spiritual thinking, we must be eager to be led by God.  For us, it is a sort of Promised Land.  We can stand on the edge of spiritual thinking like the rich ruler of Luke 18 and watch as others enter into a joyful and intelligently peaceful life or we can enter in and be like Zacchaeus, glad beyond measure to be with Jesus.  Others may not think much of the decisions you make but you will know, as you let the Bible and the Spirit of God dominate your thinking, that you have a better life than they can ever imagine.