Tag: Holy Spirit

Umbilical Cord Christianity

 

“I thank Christ Jesus our Lord, who gave me strength, because he trusted me and gave me this work of serving him. In the past I spoke against Christ and persecuted him and did all kinds of things to hurt him. But God showed me mercy, because I did not know what I was doing. I did not believe.”

1 Timothy 1:12-13, NCV

 

Coming out and thanking God is a critical way we can grow.  Paul thanks God out loud.  He has in mind, through a modern metaphor, God as a power plant, providing him with everything he needs.  He is now being energized by God, and this infusion enables us to do some amazing things that others consider quite exceptional.  (Handling this piece of understanding is critical to fitting into the Kingdom.)

Umbilical cord Christianity is the way Paul seems to view his walk and ministry.  He seems himself connected with the Holy Spirit which transforms him and his work.  Without this deeply vital connection, Paul becomes open to all kinds of evil and atrocity.  It’s fascinating, but we actively expand darkness if we are not attached.  We will end up doing all kinds of evil.  There are many who can’t see this truth.

In these verses we find another issue–that of forgiveness of self.  Paul had an ugly past.  He had once been an effective tool in the evil one’s hands.  On a logical level, this should taint him completely and irrevocably.  Paul was marked to be a wicked presence in the early Church.  Everyone knew him and braced themselves against his personal darkness.  They all thought that Paul was completely evil.

But in a dramatic moment, Paul is converted to Christ on the Damascus Road.  This is a radical shifting in the early Church.  Paul points to the mercy that God has, and makes it very clear that God has exclusively arranged and administered this miracle.  He points to the Spirit’s work that has intrinsically changed everything.  Paul is now completely altered by the Holy Spirit.

Another vital point; it was Jesus Himself who was hurt, when His children were hurt.  All of Paul’s viciousness and meanness was really directed against God.  We seldom think this way.  We may admit sin, but we will rarely view it as against God directly.  There is an old Yiddish proverb, “If God had a house, people would come and break His windows”.  In my own desperate and personal war against the Almighty, I often strain and strive to strike at His children.

There is an immense mercy and grace for sinners like Saul.  And nothing is irrevocable.  Grace insists on that.  All we can do, is change our mind and our heart (repent).  Then, we must tether ourselves, reviving that umbilical cord, and connect to Him our very lives (sanctification).  The very presence of Jesus will change everything.

 

I have a definite sense that there are things in this teaching which are touching hearts.  I have very few ways to help you.  But I can pray, and hold you up to our Father.  Let me know, ok. 

 

 

 

How You Make it Work

Therefore if you have any encouragement from being united with Christ, if any comfort from his love, if any common sharing in the Spirit, if any tenderness and compassion, 2 then make my joy complete by being like-minded, having the same love, being one in spirit and of one mind. 3 Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves

Philippians 2:1-3

 

Being connected to Jesus sets us up for a way so much more then we thought.  Encouragement comes from being comforted.  It makes us stand back in amazement.  We are brought to this wonderful place, and personal growth begins to show exceptional results. 

There are a lot of ‘anys’ that are imbedded in these verses.  They take us to a point of extracting something of eternal value and worth, and then seeing it translated into our lives.  I certainly couldn’t come up with this on my own.

We grab this basic fact, we are just devoid of anything of real value.  We simply do not have the roots that will sink down into these wonderful things.  Our connection into Him however, puts us into a completely different place.  We discover we have this incredible ability from drawing out life into our beings.  He sets us up so we extract ‘life’ from our silly, feeble efforts.

We draw so much from the presence of Jesus.  When it’s hooked in, our ‘abundance meter’ kicks us up several notches.  Paul is asking us to draw out significant things from our contact with these things of wonder.  Verse 2 develops for us a sense of unity with our brothers and sisters.  Truth had better deal with us in this way. 

My newfound faith means I must connect with others in a new and a powerfully exceptional basis.  The Gospel had better effect me in this capacity, because, whether we know it or not, faith just doesn’t connect me with God– it connects me to His people.

‘One love, and one spirit and one mind’.  The unity that is to be developed springs from a knowledge of who we really are spiritually.  There is an idea of ‘commonness’, that suggests that we all have a direct unity with each other.  We all are drawing from the same source.  Just the very idea of this should, and could break down barriers and walls that exist.  It seems to be a new awareness of having all our extension cords using all the same electricity.  There is never any shortage, but we do need to consent to being hooked up to the same root.

This realization of the dramatic unity of Christ’s work should bring us to a deepness of the Spirit that has eluded us for generations.  Quite simply, He is the well spring that we all draw from.  Deep down, He is who we connect to, our roots extend to Him.  Baptist, Assembly of God, Anglican, Lutheran, Pentecostal, and Roman Catholic and more.  The big bunch of us have plunged our roots into Jesus.  We all draw from Him, and He imparts to us life that lasts forever.

Humility has become the virtual currency of the Kingdom.  We are issued as much as we need.  But we must act with what we take.  Our brokenness over our self (and our arrogance) must drive us to a gentleness with each other.  We simply don’t have the resources and the intellect to make the decisions that we have been making.  Humility is the wonderful key that will open the doors to the King’s castle.  If you have it, you get in.  But without it, you will go nowhere.

Pride on Rollerskates

 

  Our foolish pride comes from this world, and so do our selfish desires and our desire to have everything we see. None of this comes from the Father.

1 John 2:16, CEV

 

You and me– We are trying very hard to escape from the evil found everywhere in this world system.  Satan’s access point is our own ‘built-in’ pride.  He can reach right into our hearts using that particular spot.  We all have this thirst for recognition and worship (of course, with a small ‘w’).  John calls this ‘foolish’.  And we are fools!  And yet it is so hard for us to be small.

‘Our selfish desires’ are very difficult to unplug.  We have a thirst for things and we will spend a great deal of time and effort to get the ‘item of the moment’.  We see something new or novel, and we must get one for ourselves.  It’s like a compulsion.  When we get our prize, it starts to collect dust in our closet.  It rarely lives up to our lofty expectations.  Funny thing, is we feel deprived if we can’t possess it.  Even though the consistent pattern is to lose interest in our ‘prize’ once we have it.

‘Our desire to have everything we see’ is John’s evaluation of people in general.  It’s been thousands of years, but John is timeless.  He ‘zaps’ us and lifts the curtain to what is really inside our hearts.  WE WANT IT ALL!  Everything that ‘tickles’ our fancy, is to become ours.  I want all of it!  If I see it, desire it, it is mine.  Step back, and think about the wickedness of this.  If we ‘x-ray’ pride, do a CAT scan on it, we will discover 1 John 2:16 opened up and wiggling right there in front of us.

We must come to the place were we want to look at who we are, deep down.  We can so easily avoid truth.  ‘Just keep moving’, and don’t think about it.  And then we run right smack dab into this solid marble pillar of 1 John 2:16.  We pick ourselves up, check for broken bones, and start to wonder about this thing that can’t be eroded away.  It stands, untouched through time.  That stands before us as eternal truth.  It causes us to come to the point of making a real decision.

Is John making sense?  Is he communicating clearly?  I believe he is.  I have no significant reason to set aside his observations.  As a matter of fact, he confirms my suspicions and gives me some intelligence and guidance on how life unfolds.  This verse, all that it is contains, is the property of the Holy Spirit.  It is a completely saturated ‘sponge’, that is overfilled with the presence of the Lord.  I must encourage you, the reader, to look again at John.  Let that book press into your very being.

Spirit Technology

We get our new life from the Spirit, so we should follow the Spirit.

Gal. 5:25

 

Since this is the kind of life we have chosen, the life of the Spirit, let us make sure that we do not just hold it as an idea in our heads or a sentiment in our hearts, but work out its implications in every detail of our lives.

Gal. 5:25, The Message

 

I have heard it said, ‘If you want drive out evil, you must let good come in.’  This recognizes a spiritual displacement.  In fluid technology, or even hydraulics we first find out that a vacuum is a very rare condition.  And we see that different liquids separate naturally.  The lighter density will always go to the top.  My dear wife loves her oil and vinegar dressing on her salad, but she has to shake it before she pours.

We have it in Paul’s counsel: “Walk by the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh.” If allow the Spirit leads us, we will be moved toward more and more of Christ; for He will kindle in our hearts more love for the Saviour, and we shall become more and more deeply interested in the things Jesus is doing.  The Spirit is not only the source of Christian life but also the only power to sustain Christian life.

The result will be that we shall care less and less for the world.  But we should say what the Bible says, ‘It’s all about Jesus, who is a Lord and King over all.’  Light will always drive out darkness.  And love pushes hate away.  And goodness will always sends hate packing.