4SpiritualSecrets

“Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” (Hebrews 11:1)

Have you ever reached the point where you were so overwhelmed with doubt that you considered throwing away your faith?  In the context of the verse above you will discover (in Hebrews 10:35) that you are not the first follower of Jesus Christ to allow that thought.  The verse above was written to professing disciples who were thinking about throwing away their faith.

The author of this verse, and the entire faith chapter which follows, is giving doubting disciples reasons why they should not throw away their faith.  In the first verse of the faith chapter he is telling doubting disciples that they should not throw away their faith because faith gives substance to their hope.

God places the seed of hope in the heart of human beings before they come to faith.  Hope is a conviction that there is something good in this world and one day that good thing is going to happen.  Every year between 25 or 30 thousand people commit suicide in America.  When social scientists study those suicides they conclude that people take their lives because they lose hope or the conviction that something good can happen to them.

God wants your hope to grow into a faith that is based on evidence.  As we will see that evidence is action.  It is what the heroes of faith did as a result of what they believed.  Are you willing to let God grow your hope into a faith that acts like these heroes of faith He introduces to us in this great faith chapter of the Bible?  Then, believe your beliefs, doubt your doubts, and apply what you believe.

“But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control.” (Galatians 5: 22, 23)

If the Spirit of God lives in us, when we look in we will find supernatural qualities of love, joy and peace coming out of our life.  When we look around we will find supernatural qualities of patience, kindness and goodness flowing out from our inward being. The same is true when we look up.  We will find a supernatural faithfulness, gentleness and self-control that are not coming from us but from the Spirit of God living in us.

Paul is writing here that we will be consistently faithful because the Spirit of God lives in us.  He writes in another place that no man can say that Jesus is Lord but by the Holy Spirit (1 Corinthians 12:3).  The concept of gentleness listed here is really the biblical word meekness.

When a powerful stallion is broken, when it “takes the bit” and submits to the will of the rider, you have a metaphor that describes biblical meekness.  That broken stallion can be referred to as gentle.  By application, we can be so very broken when we look up that we have a quality of gentleness in our life that is not coming from us.

Self-control is not self in control but self controlled by the Holy Spirit.  This is where we get the term “Spirit filled.” We are not to be filled with or controlled by wine but we are to be filled with or controlled by the Holy Spirit (Ephesians 5:18).

This Thanksgiving thank God for His Spirit Who gives us the dynamic to fill and take His prescriptions when we look in, when we look around, and when we look up.

“But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.” (Galatians 5:22)

According to the Apostle Paul, if the Holy Spirit of God lives in us, when we look in we will find unique qualities of love, joy, and peace coming out of our life.  When we look up we will discover a faithfulness, gentleness and self-control that will equip us to walk with God as we should.  Then when we look around we will find unique qualities of patience, kindness and goodness equipping us to have the kind of relationships our God wants us to have with people.

In our relationship with God patience could be described as “faith waiting.” In our relationships with people – especially our children or spiritual children – patience could be described as “love waiting.” The patience that is the fruit or evidence of the Spirit of God living in us is a supernatural quality and does not come from our genetic heritage.  We do not have this patience because we inherited a laid back easy does it disposition from one or both of our parents.  It must be emphasized that this patience is a supernatural expression of the Spirit of God living in us.

The same can be said for a quality of kindness and goodness we will discover when we relate to people with whom we are in relationships.  Kindness means that we treat people with whom we interact as if they were our kin.  Goodness means that we do good things and react in good ways in our relationships.

If the Holy Spirit of God lives in you, are you willing to find in these three supernatural qualities of the Holy Spirit a prescription that will govern your life when you look around.

“Now the works of the flesh are…but the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, meekness and self-control.” (Galatians 5: 19, 22, 23)

One of the most important New Testament passages of Scripture is found in Galatians chapter five where Paul identifies a war that is taking place in the life of every authentic disciple of Jesus Christ: the war between the flesh and the Spirit. The flesh is “human nature unaided by God.”  According to Paul our human nature unaided by God is a monster and it produces what Paul labels “the works of the flesh.”

In contrast to a list of qualities that are like an immoral “train wreck” in slow motion, Paul gives us nine qualities that are the fruit, or evidence, of the reality that the Holy Spirit of God lives in us.

When we look in, Paul writes that we will find that we have a quality of love coming out of our life.  We will also find a quality of joy and a peace we’ve never experienced before.

For a cross section of this love we should consult verses 4-7 of  first Corinthians 13.  We find it is a love that doesn’t make good sense because it is completely others centered.  This joy is a happiness that doesn’t make good sense and the same could be said of our peace because all three are not related to our circumstances.

There is something to believe and Someone to receive.  It is only when we receive His Spirit that we can win the war between the flesh and the Spirit.

“Give ear to my words, O LORD, consider my meditation.  Give heed to the voice of my cry, my King and my God, for to You I will pray.  My voice You shall hear in the morning, O LORD; in the morning I will direct it to You, and I will look up.” Psalm 5:1-3

How do you wake up in the morning?  Do you wake up holy?  I mean, before you have had your coffee are you holy?  I believe it’s possible to wake up holy but many times I do not wake up that way.  George McDonald, a man who mentored C.S. Lewis described the way I often wake up in these words:  “With every morn my life afresh must break the crust of self gathered about me fresh, that Thy Wind-Spirit might rush in, shake the darkness out of me and rend the mesh the spider devils spin out of my flesh, eager to net my soul before it wake, that it may slumber us lie and listen to the snake.”

William Barclay who taught the Bible at Edinburgh University for 40 years told us that when the Bible refers to the flesh it means “human nature unaided by God.” My human nature unaided by God is a monster.  That’s why I must break the crust of self gathered about me fresh every morning and ask the Wind-Spirit of God to rush in, shake the darkness out of me and rend the mesh the spider devils spin out of my flesh.

I have written before and repeat now for emphasis that we should have this kind of quiet meditation in the morning before we play the concert of our day rather than tune our instrument after we have played that concert.

“Oh, the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His judgments and His ways past finding out! ‘For who has known the mind of the Lord? Or who has become His counselor? Or who has first given to Him and it shall be repaid to him?’ For of Him and through Him and to Him are all things, to Him be glory forever. Amen.”    (Romans 11: 33-36)

The letter of the Apostle Paul to the Roman believers is considered by scholars to be his theological masterpiece.  He begins the most comprehensive presentation of salvation in the Bible at the seventeenth verse of the First Chapter and he concludes with the verses quoted above at the end of the Eleventh Chapter with an inspired focus on God.

This benediction begins with an exclamation regarding the knowledge and wisdom of God.  How much does God know?  Wisdom is the application of knowledge.  What we do about what we know is vitally important especially when it comes to our knowledge and understanding of the Scriptures. What is the measure of the wisdom of God? By the unsearchable judgments of God Paul means the decisions of God.  Does anyone know the mind of God?  (Isaiah 55: 8-10; Proverbs 20: 24) Is God under obligation to repay anyone?

He concludes this benediction by telling us that God is the Source of all things, He is the Power behind all things and His Glory is the purpose for all things.  By all things he means all the things of which he has written in this letter.

As he moves into Chapter Twelve He follows this benediction with the exhortation that it is our reasonable worship to offer God the unconditional surrender He deserves.

“…but you seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness and all these things will come to you as a matter of course.” (Matthew 6:33 J. B. Philips translation)

The message of the entire Bible can be summed up in just two words: “God First.” That is not easy.  In fact that is impossible without the Holy Spirit (1 Corinthians 12:3).  But that concept is not complicated.  We complicate this proposition because we do not want to put God first.  However, over and over again in the Scripture the bottom-line truth in a Psalm, in the life of a Bible character, in a parable, a metaphor, or a teaching of Jesus will come down to this simple concept: “God First”.

I was blessed to have a godly mother.  She often said to me: “If Jesus Christ is anything to you, then Jesus Christ is everything to you.  Because until Jesus Christ is everything to you, Dick, He isn’t really anything to you.” As I have studied the values of Jesus Christ carefully, I have realized that my mother had the support of her Lord when she brought my profession of faith to a verdict the way she did.

The verse listed above is the conclusion of a study given by Jesus regarding values. He taught that our heart is where our treasures are.  He taught us where our treasures and our heart ought to be.  He challenged us with questions like, “Where is your heart? What are your treasures? What is your life? What is your body?”  and “Who is your master?”

The conclusion to this marvelous treatise on values was the clarification and declaration listed above.  Think of a target with a bulls-eye surrounded by ten or twelve circles.  According to Jesus, the bulls-eye of our priority target should be that our first value is God.  We are to put Him first.  If we will do that we have the promise of Jesus that God will bless us with everything we need.

Any time we even think about the values of Christ these two words should immediately surface in our heart and mind: “God First”.

“And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose.” (Romans 8:28)

As I look back over my life since I was born in 1930, and born again in 1949, this is another verse that sums up my entire walk of faith and ministry.  According to the J. B. Philips translation, God fits into a pattern for good everything that happens to those who love God and are called according to His plan.  I like this because the implication is there may not be anything good about many of the things that happen to us.  But if we meet two prerequisites – if we love God and are called according to His plan – our loving God will fit into a pattern for good all the events of our life.

Before we personally apply the great promise of this verse we must meet those two prerequisites.  The first one is that we love God.  It isn’t easy to love God.  The Apostle John asked us how we can love the God we cannot see (1 John 4).  We can’t hug a Spirit.  Jesus told us that if we love Him we must keep His commandments.  According to the Apostle Paul quoted above, we can show we love God by being called according to His plan.

We are so self-centered we are quick to assume that the good into which God fits all the events of our life means our good.  However, when we understand what it means to love God the only good that will interest us will be God’s good.

This verse can be a summary of the walk of faith and service of any believer who meets these two prerequisites.

“You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit — fruit that will last. Then the Father will give you whatever you ask in my name.” (John 15:16)

Hours before Jesus was arrested and then crucified He held a retreat with the men He had apprenticed 24/7 for three years.  It was in that setting He spoke the words written above.

His words must have come as a shock to them because they had chosen Him and made many sacrifices as they followed Him.  But He is telling them here that He chose them and appointed them to go and bear fruit that lasts.  A paraphrase of the closing sentence in this great verse is that when they understood this God would answer their prayers.

This has become a life verse for me in recent years as I have looked back in an attempt to understand why God would permit me to suffer the loss of my faculties and become a bedfast quadriplegic.  I now realize that if it had not been for these limitations I never would have produced my life’s work of 782 radio programs or studies that I call “The Mini Bible College.”  These studies are now in 26 languages in 53 countries.

This is the fruit that lasts the risen Christ wanted to grow in my life.  As a normal mobile disciple I would not have had the discipline to write these studies.  I therefore see my limitations as the cutback of a loving Lord and not as a setback.  This verse describes, summarizes and explains my journey of faith and ministry.

Is it possible that at least some of your experiences are not a setback but a cutback?