The Required Spiritual Mind

Recently Blogger has changed the "dashboard" look for its account holders.  Blogger, which is owned by Google, is the host for this blog.  It's very easy for me now to see which pages have the most views.  It's pretty surprising, and I don't have explanations for why certain posts are most popular.  But I believe these recent posts are absolute revelation from God, and I believe they will bless you if you meditate the Scriptures and ideas presented in them.

That probably sounds like a bold claim, but that's o.k.  There are different forms of revelation.  The form I most commonly receive is when something in God's Word is just laid bare before me.  We can spend our whole lives reading the Bible, but until we truly study and meditate its contents we won't understand them as God intends.  My meditations lately on God's will and the Holy Spirit have brought life changing revelation.  I'm so excited and I hope these posts bless you.  I'm glad the revelations I receive are the kind I can share with others.  I know that clear explanation of God's Word will help all people, and I hope that's what I can regularly deliver to you in this blog.

I've focused lately on 1 Corinthians 2 and Romans 8.  I encourage you to read our last few posts and see some basics about the Holy Spirit's importance to our lives.  I understand now from 1 Corinthians 2 that the Holy Spirit is God's key communication mechanism to His people.  If I'm going to live in all that God has for me, I must be able to receive from the Holy Spirit.  If I could simply flip a switch and suddenly have an open channel between my mind and my spirit, I could clearly see God's will and experience His full desires for my life.

Consider these points for a moment.  God's Spirit knows everything about God (1 Corinthians 2:10-11).  God's Spirit will reveal to us everything God has for our lives (1 Corinthians 2).  God's Spirit will communicate with us not based on what He thinks, but based on what He hears directly from God and Jesus (John 16:13).  Our spirits are born again, directly from God, without spot or blemish (John 3).  God's Spirit communicates directly with our spirits (Romans 8:16).

Put these ideas together.  God wants you to know everything you need to know so that you can live in His perfect, specific will for your life.  God has given you His Spirit to give you the required information.  God has perfected your human spirit so that you can have perfect fellowship with His Spirit (1 Corinthians 6:17).  God's Spirit will give all the information to your spirit.  Therefore, I need perfect hearing of my spirit man.  I know my spirit man was perfected.  I know he's communicating with God's Spirit.  But I need to get his information to my mind, it's just that simple.

You really can't do anything in this life unless your mind is involved.  I know people might debate the role of the mind in a Christian's life, but it's really an amazing gift from God.  I believe Jesus would have used 100% of His brain and would have been a genius the likes of which the world has never otherwise seen (He had no sin nature.).  It's true God will bypass your brain and deliver something directly to your spirit.  It's true that healing and even prosperity come from spiritual development.  We live from the "inside out" so to speak.  But for you to do anything in this life, even stand up, or pray, or go to church, requires mental involvement.  For your spirit to have any impact on others or the physical world, it must use your body, and your body is not doing much without your brain, at least not deliberately.  We are not God's puppets, we are God's free moral agents who choose to serve Him.

So, we need a clear channel from our spirits to our brains.  We need to get the information from God's Spirit, to our spirit, to our brain.  This is how we obtain what we might call "actionable intelligence."  I need to know God's will for my life, then I can act on it.  It's just that simple.  Now here is what I clearly see in the Word - to develop this channel, I must become "spiritually minded."

"For they that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh; but they that are after the Spirit, the things of the Spirit.  For to be carnally minded is death; but to be Spiritually minded is life and peace.  Because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be."  (Romans 8:5-7). 

"And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect will of God."  (Romans 12:2)

We know that our destiny is to be conformed to the image of Christ (Romans 8:29).  We know that God's Spirit works to bring about that change in us, as we spend time in God's Word (2 Corinthians 3:17-18).  We must realize that our part, in the conforming to the image of Christ, is to renew our minds. 

I've talked about this before, but now we can see clearly the role this plays in us living out the good, and acceptable, and perfect will of God.  I used to think that God had all these separate requirements, but we see now they weave together as one giant beautiful tapestry, which says God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life.

The original Greek word for "renew" is better translated "renovate."  We must change our thinking.  We must change from carnal thinking to spiritual thinking.  As we change to spiritually minded people, we will live more and more in God's perfect will.  Not only will we be conformed to the image of Christ and live correctly, but our spiritual minds will now be open to hearing our spirits.

Consider again the words from Romans 8.  The carnal mind is not subject to God's laws, it truly can't be.  Another translation for those words might be, "a carnal mind cannot marshal itself under God's commands or God's leading."  This is even more apparent as the chapter further discusses being led by God's Spirit (Romans 8:14).  As you give yourself to the Spirit of God, and as you become Spiritually minded, now you can follow the leading of God, which is given you by God's Spirit. 

Your mental development is key.  Become Spiritually minded, your mind is now open to receiving spiritual leading.  Glory to God.  Now that you can hear from your spirit, which hears from God's Spirit, you can both know God's will and do it.  Renovation of your mind is key to being conformed to the image of Christ and to living in God's perfect will for your life.

I'm so glad that God, by His Spirit which guides us into all truth, opens His Word to us to reveal His will.  God wants us to live in His perfect will more than we do.  The more I know God, the more I see His love, mercy and grace.  I hope to hear what God has shown you in His Word, as I know it will bless us all.  You might be asking now what being spiritually minded means.  Meditate these Scriptures and God will show you.  And perhaps I will write on that next time.  God bless you and keep you.