2Corinthians 5:17-18 (Amplified) says, "Therefore, if any person is (ingrafted) in Christ Jesus (the Messiah) he is a new creation (a new creature altogether); the old (previous moral and spiritual condition) has passed. Behold, the fresh and new has come. But all things are from God, Who through Jesus Christ reconciled us to Himself (received us into favor, brought us into harmony with Himself) and gave to us the ministry of reconciliation (that by word and deed we might aim to bring others into reconciliation with Him)."
It will require obedience to the Spirit and God's Word, in order for the Church to walk naturally Super-natural. We've had this idea of our being two different persons simultaneously. We hear people teaching about "being in the flesh" and "being in the spirit," like we're constantly jumping from one to the other and it's mostly from a lack of understanding about our new creation being. We were created new in our spirit, and our natural being must be trained by our new spirit and God's Word. Your body didn't get saved. It died with Jesus, at His crucifixion.
Our soul, mind, will, emotions and intellect, must be renewed by our new spirit, in order to walk with the Father. We've learned God's Word with our intellect, but we haven't developed trust in it, by our new spirit. We're still trying to live simultaneously in two worlds. One moment, we're trying to be spiritual and the next minute, we're just mere men. We don't just have a spirit, but we are spirit. We are called to walk by the spirit in this natural world, not the other way around.
It doesn't matter what others might tell you, you are always in the spirit, as far as God's concerned. Ephesians 4:22-24 (Amplified) says, "Strip yourselves of your former nature (put off and discard your old unrenewed self) which characterized your previous manner of life and becomes corrupt through lusts and desires that spring from delusion. And be constantly renewed in the spirit of your mind (having a fresh mental and spiritual attitude) And put on the new nature (the regenerate self) created in God's Image (Godlike) in true righteousness and holiness."
If this couldn't be done, then the Holy Spirit would never have allowed the above scripture to be written. God will never instruct us to do something that cannot be done and then judge us, for not doing it. The greatest key found in the above scripture, comes in Verse 23 which says, "And be constantly renewed in the spirit of your mind." Doesn't God's Word say that, "We have the mind of Christ?" Christ then, is the Spirit of your mind. He will bring the newness of Life into our thought life and direct our steps. When we allow our minds to think with the mind of Christ, we can put on the new nature, created in His Image.
We haven't renewed our minds, to the point where we actually think God's thoughts. Most of us, think like we did before being born-again and this causes us to separate ourselves into two camps (being in the flesh and being in the spirit). One part uses carnal thinking to live by, while the other uses spiritual thinking to live by. This leads to our being like James describes in James 1:8 (Amplified) which says, "(For being as he is) a man of two minds (hesitating, dubious, irresolute) (he is) unstable and unreliable and uncertain about everything (he thinks, feels, decides)." This is faith's worst enemy. It the new creation man and woman's worst and most difficult thing to overcome.
Your spirit man is to guide your flesh, by your soul. Your soul is the go-between of your natural man and your spirit man. God was to direct your spirit by His Own Holy Spirit and His Word. Your spirit was to direct your fleshly body, by the wisdom and impulses of the soul. Your body was to communicate these impulses to your brain (the command center for the flesh) and then the body would live in the natural world, by the spirit. When Adam fell in the Garden of Eden, the communication was severed between God's Spirit and Adam's spirit. This led to Adam's soul only able to contact wisdom, by the five senses that controlled the flesh. Being taught by the lost soul of man, the body could only do what it learned from the worldly realm.
That's why we must renew the mind (the soul). Until the mind is renewed by your spirit through the Holy Spirit, the brain's catalog is contrary to God's Word. Your brain is the greatest computer that has ever been designed. It cannot simply forget, but must be reprogrammed with new data. The only source of reprogramming, is the soul (mind, will, emotions) that were created to guide it. Your spirit is now made alive to the Holy Spirit, but your soul is not. It must be renewed, in order to change the way the body functions.
A double-minded man is one who is born-again, but his old way of thinking is contrary to his new way of living. Everything God feeds into his spirit, gets filtered through his soul (carnal mind) and the conflict begins. That man has no certain direction for his body to go, because the body is steered by impulses from the mind (which is now in confusion). This man will probably comply with things he's familiar and walk in the flesh, instead of by the spirit. Simply learning the scriptures, isn't the same as knowing them. This might sound like a play on words, but it isn't. You can learn the Word in the natural and still not know the meaning of the Word in your heart. One is called "education," and the other is called "revelation." One is religion and the other brings relation. Education comes into your intellect, but has no Light. The other comes into your spirit and brings Light from and in God.
This has been the greatest battle that the new creation man might ever fight. This is truly, "The good fight of faith." Faith doesn't come from your mind, but from your born-again spirit. Even though we might "know" what the Bible says, our carnal mind will not accept it and our faith is unproductive in our spirit. We read that, "By Jesus' stripes we are healed," and our spirit believes this and tries producing faith to receive it. Our carnal minds acknowledge the words, but cannot receive the revelation and we remain sick.
It's not that "God is holding out on us" or that "healing isn't for today," but it's like James says, "A double-minded man will not receive anything from the Lord." James didn't say that God won't give us the Wisdom, but that a man who has an unrenewed mind will not accept that Wisdom. This has caused many divisions in the Church. We all agree that God's Word is True, but when we remain double-minded in it, we don't allow the revelation knowledge to come in.
It seems so simply, but it's probably the most difficult part of our Christian walk. What the Lord did in our spirit, is complete and so perfect that, He can now actually reside in us, as His Temple. The flesh has become so dominate, that it will continue walking in the things it learned and what was taught to the command center (the brain). The mind has been taught by the god of this world, though, and is determined to hold onto his control of it.
When our spirit and mind (our soul) comes into agreement, nothing can stop this new creation being from waking in victory, on this earth. Jesus and Peter both walked on water. We mentally accept this for Truth, because we were educated enough to read the Words. If we tried walking on water, however, then our carnal minds declare, "Graveyards are full of people who drowned" or "Everyone knows you cannot walk on water."
Knowledge, but no revelation. Education, but no Living Truth for the Super-natural. An unrenewed mind can't receive from God, because "The carnal mind is in enmity to the things of God and can't be reconciled to it." It must be renewed by the believer and the Holy Spirit. It must be renewed by meditating on and reading God's Word and praying in the Holy Spirit and Wisdom.
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