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A Biblical Self Check
(Picture taken from https://goffwilson.files.wordpress.com/2012/02/self_check.jpg)
We should be aware that the devil does not sleep. Last Thursday as I checked my blog “Entering the Promised Land” on the cell phone when I was sitting at the hairdresser, I saw four ads popping up beneath one of my articles which I normally do not see when I am logged in on WordPress. One of these ads showed a sort of pornographic picture. We who may use WordPress for free, that means, all who are logged in on WordPress as bloggers ourselves won’t see those often offensive ads other visitors might be confronted with.
Just last week I also found several comments with links to mainly Asian pornographic sites in the spam file of my blog. These occurrences are truly both saddening and of satanic origin, for sure. Everything the devil wants to do is to discourage us so much that we cave in and stop telling the truth publicly. I just wanted you all to know that I won’t stop here because of such ridiculous attempts to drag the Christian message, aka the Gospel, through the mire. Since I believe what Satan meant for evil, God meant for good (cf. Gen 50:20). You will see. 😉
Whether it’s on Facebook or other public platforms and all through the media, the pornographic, violent, and consumption-oriented spirits behind these attacks (ads, posts, videos) obey the Prince of the Air who wants to destroy the work of God in the believer. However, the dark realm only achieves success in doing so as long as they find carnal lust and desires in worldly Christians. The crucified believer, instead, whose self was killed and who has risen to a completely new life in Christ cannot be touched by those attempts of the evil one any longer. The apostle Paul in his letter to the Galatians offers us a spiritual health check of sorts through which we could find out whether we are more carnal or more spiritual.
“But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. For the desires of the flesh are against the Spirit, and the desires of the Spirit are against the flesh, for these are opposed to each other, to keep you from doing the things you want to do.
But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law.
Now the works of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.
But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law. And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.” (Gal 5:16-24 ESV)
We just read that those who are led by the Spirit (aka God’s sons, see Rom 8:14) are not under the law. That means, if we might feel accused after reading the first and particularly the middle part of this passage above, there might be one or more areas in our lives that have not been surrendered to God as yet. There is nothing to worry about, though, since God loves us just the way we are, even unconditionally. And that which is not yet perfect will be brought forth through the Holy Spirit’s work in us. Is there anything to do for us, though? Yes, it seems, since the apostle Paul admonished the Philippians and, more specifically, the Colossians in the following verses to
“…work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure.” (Phil 2:12-13 ESV)
“Put to death therefore what is earthly in you: sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry. On account of these the wrath of God is coming. In these you too once walked, when you were living in them.
But now you must put them all away: anger, wrath, malice, slander, and obscene talk from your mouth. Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have put off the old self with its practices and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator.” (Col 3:5-10 ESV)
Entering the Promised Land 
Paul wrote to the Romans,
“Owe no one anything, except to love one another; for he who loves his neighbor has fulfilled the law. The commandments, “You shall not commit adultery, You shall not kill, You shall not steal, You shall not covet,” and any other commandment, are summed up in this sentence, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” Love does no wrong to a neighbor; therefore love is the fulfilling of the law. Besides this you know what hour it is, how it is full time now for you to wake from sleep. For salvation is nearer to us now than when we first believed; the night is far gone, the day is at hand. Let us then cast off the works of darkness and put on the armor of light; let us conduct ourselves becomingly as in the day, not in reveling and drunkenness, not in debauchery and licentiousness, not in quarreling and jealousy. BUT PUT ON THE LORD JESUS CHRIST, AND MAKE NO PROVISION FOR THE FLESH to gratify its desires.” (Romans 13:8-14, rsv).
Susanne, do you have any thoughts on how we “put on” Christ?
Michael
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How wonderful you shared exactly THIS Scripture with me here, dear Michael, since it is a confirmation of what the Lord has been doing in my spiritual life lately (“the night is far gone, the day is at hand,” for instance).
At first I thought I should look on the net for a great quote by another author about how to put on Christ, but you asked me about MY thoughts. 😉 So, here they are.
Just recently I saw that the bondage of the will which Luther described so properly (the state of the Romans 7 believer) is not an “eternal” thing which I thought during my dark night of the spirit. Indeed, there is a day when Jesus really sets us free from all the bondage of our will regarding thoughts and behavior which were strongly connected to our old self. There is a time when all the chains are broken and God asks us whether we want to be truly free of our Old Adam nature (of course, we want!!! 🙂 ). He who is tender and gentle never forces the new creation on us. Instead , He asks whether we want to have our minds renewed by offering up our old thought habits to Him. This is a struggle at first since we are used to think within the frame of our old hamster wheels. But as soon as we let go of anything He nudges us to do, the past and the pressure to think this and that are gone.
It is the same with “putting on Christ” which I understand to refer to our behavior. Our old self is used to “react” and not free regarding any decisions. As we see that God gives us freedom, eventually, to act according to His will instead of our old self’s, and we surrender area after area of life to Him, His will and ours become completely ONE. I am not yet through and I am still learning, my dear brother, but I am intrigued about how unfathomable God’s ways with us are. I want to close with Paul’s words here which I now think express my current condition quite well.
“Not that I have already obtained this or am already perfect, but I press on to make it my own, because Christ Jesus has made me his own.
Brothers, I do not consider that I have made it my own. But one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.
Let those of us who are mature think this way, and if in anything you think otherwise, God will reveal that also to you. Only let us hold true to what we have attained.” (Phil 3:12-16 ESV)
Every blessing to you,
Susanne 🐱
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Dear Susanne, Please forgive the length of my reply for what you have written on here has got me stirred up once again. 🙂 You wrote, “the night is far gone, the day is at hand,” and how this spoke to you in the passage I shared from Romans 13. Isn’t it wonderful when the dark night is over and we emerge out of that time with new vision in the light of God and authority in the Spirit of Christ that is no longer subject to our flesh and the subterfuge of the enemy?
It is interesting what Paul wrote in the context of this passage that salvation is closer now than when we first believed? How could this be? Churches teach us that we are “saved” as soon as we say “a sinner’s prayer,” and slip one finger in the air for the pastor to see “with every eye closed and every head bowed.” Yet, Paul makes our salvation sound as if it is a progressive work that God is doing in us as that part of Philippians you quoted also speaks. He seems to link the sign of that perfecting work nearing completion in us as being manifest by the love of God working freely in and through us and being our only motivation for what we do.
As part of putting on Christ I just noticed that Paul wrote that we should “put on the armour of Light!” Susanne, I know from reading your testimony that you have had many encounters with Jesus and the Father appearing to you cloaked in light and even have experienced that same light coming into you and filling your body. John wrote that if our eye be single that our whole body will be filled with light. This is a divine act of God that we can only yield to and pray that He purges out of us all that is of satanic double mindedness (the “spirit of confusion”) and of our soulish darkness.
My dear sister, you wrote that as God continues to do His work in us that His will becomes our will. Paul wrote, “The spiritual man judges [discerns] all things, but is himself to be judged [discerned] by no one. ‘For who has known the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him?’ But we have the mind of Christ.” (1 Corinthians 2:15-16, rsv). Wow! Eventually as our Father continues to do this ever deepening work in us, HIS thoughts become our thoughts as well! The mind of the flesh is of no use to God for it rebels against His will at every turn. More and more, you and I have have experienced two things along this line as we have fellowshipped and written together. On the one hand when God is not speaking to or through us our minds go blank and though we both feel His presence, there is just nothing to say! And the other thing we have both shared in this wonderful walk we are on is how we both are hearing the same things from Him, even at the same time! What a wonderful flow this is when it happens in the unity of the Spirit of God! It seems like an extraordinary thing to us, yet Paul speaks of this one-mindedness as foundational to the unity that is ours in Christ as members of his body…
Dear Father, please continue this perfecting work of Christ in us all. Continue to go ever deeper into our hearts until there is nothing left in us that is not of your Son and the unity of His great love. Amen.
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Amen to your prayer, Michael.
Thanks so much for sharing your deep thoughts on here. Beautifully written and explained, my dear brother! ⭐
This STST (same time same thought) thing that often happens to us is both funny, since it reveals God’s humor, as it is a confirmation of being in His will. Regarding blank-mindedness, well, I think this only serves to empty our minds of all things that are not from God but still spring from the old self. Finally, He will fill our minds with His thoughts as you so wonderfully described in your response.
Your comment was a real blessing for me, Michael! Thank you once again! 🐱
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Yes, so true, Jack! ⭐
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This post is so timely, Susanne. Another friend wrote me extremely distressed by the same pornographic images on her blog. On the public stage, ISIS has orchestrated the attacks in Paris. Truly, if our focus is the world, we can be greatly discouraged. But our focus as Christians is not the world. It is Christ.
Love,
A. ❤
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Anna, I am glad to hear this post is timely. 🙂
Yes, our focus should be Christ, more and more every day. God who is able will help us to stay focused on Him, for sure!
Love,
Susanne ❤
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