Are we too sure of ourselves?

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carnal mind, compromise, discerning the spirits, dying in the wilderness, exhortation, experience, false spirits, fullness, satisfaction, T.A. Sparks, walking by the spirit

The following post is meant to provoke some thoughts in my readers. I could have added my own experiences as I usually do in order to illustrate the message below. However, I decided to copy and paste this exhortation by T. Austin Sparks without joining in.

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Life in the Spirit

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carnal mind, discerning the spirits, experience, good works, joy, mind, peace, prayer, rest, service, soul-life, spiritual flow, spiritual transformation, T.A. Sparks, the mind of Christ, the new self, the old self, thought life, walking by the spirit

This title might sound a bit simple to some, yet I was wondering whether it is always that easy for us to distinguish between our natural way of living and its spiritual counterpart which springs from Christ’s Life in us. Just lately I got aware of certain differences between my natural soul life’s powers and God’s supernatural powers we might receive through spiritual communion and fellowship with Him. Sometimes these two ways of living take turns within a few seconds and I am amazed at how different they really are! Even if our natural thinking, speaking, and doing is sophisticated, sooner or later we get exhausted if we remain on this level… UNLESS we can be sure of man’s approval and appreciation! If someone applauds, our soul receives new power and energy with which we can go on, even without God, and even without realizing that we left Him somehow behind.

“Who are our Brethren?” Some Thoughts on The Final Judgment

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carnal mind, discerning the spirits, experience, following Jesus, Life and Death, Michael Clark, spirit and life, spiritual mind

“But let judgment run down as waters, and righteousness as a mighty stream.” (Amos 5:24 KJV) – Photo by Susanne Schuberth

If you, like me, were raised in the RCC, and even more so, in liberal circles, you might have heard the statement that all people on earth have eventually become our brothers and sisters because of Christ. But is that true? Also, are all Christians automatically His sheep who will find themselves on that very day of the Final Judgment on Christ’s right side? Let’s read the whole story in its context.

On the Consistency of Thought and Deed

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agape, carnal mind, consistency, deeds, demons, discerning the spirits, ears of the heart, experience, false spirits, God's love, God's voice, Jesus Christ, Michael Clark, Satan's voice, The Truth, the Word of God, thought life, true faith, words, worldly spirits

Picture credits http://stores.jkmstore.org/spirits-that-hinder-the-flow-of-god-in-your-life-mp3/

Michael Clark and I wrote this blog post together, once again. As it has often been the case, I, Susanne, start with writing and share my thoughts on a certain topic with Michael and then God gives us a confirmation about writing another joint article.

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Can you force yourself to seemingly like what you basically do not like? What a strange question, Susanne! I need to admit that I can’t do it any longer although I tried. My heart won’t let me deceive myself anymore. Even if I like or love someone, I cannot like nor love what they do when their twisted thinking and doing contradicts the truth revealed in Christ. Not that I stop loving them, but my heart is grieved, often very deeply grieved. That hurts a lot indeed!  😦 In the past, I tried to do the impossible, that is, to encourage someone despite their wrong thinking and doing, simply because I liked these people. Well, God showed me how hypocritical that behavior was and how much I put myself in a state of bondage of the wrong spirits through that seemingly “kind” behavior. No, Susanne, that was not kind, it was only “nice.”

Can we be deceived?

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carnal mind, deception, experience, God's love, mysticism, Oswald Chambers, salvation, spiritual mind, spiritual power

“Can our eyes deceive us?”
(Photo by Susanne Schuberth)

I recalled having read a certain quote by Oswald Chambers quite some time ago. However, whenever I tried to find it again, I failed, since I could not remember the exact wording. Just today as I was searching the net for mystical experiences by Christians, I would find some criticism about the very word “mysticism” by T.A. Sparks and A.W. Tozer instead. Of course, there has been false mysticism in Christianity, too, but not all mystical experiences were wrong. As long as one gets closer and closer to the Living God, I would never dare to say that mysticism was a bad thing. The false mystical experience might get obvious to us when we realize that it has caused the believer to get more and more focused on his own person and “ministry” than on the person of Jesus Christ and our Heavenly Father. Pride about knowing more than others, arrogance toward not-so-spiritual believers, and sometimes even a sort of megalomania (about what God would be able to do through the little “ME”) go hand in hand with Satan’s spiritual suggestions.

What does it mean to be spiritual?

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being born again, carnal mind, children of God, faith, Martin Luther, Oswald Chambers, sanctification, spiritual mind, the new self, the old self, true faith

Crocuses in the City Park (Stadtpark Fürth, March 2015)
Photo by Susanne Schuberth

In the past I read rather often that Christians tried hard to be “more spiritual” because they had observed others who seemed to have arrived at a more mature level of spirituality than they themselves. And at that point as insecurity set in, they began to ask, “How do we get there? How to become spiritual at all or even more spiritual?”
The apostle Paul defined Christian spirituality for us. He wrote in his letter to the Romans,

How can we discern God’s voice from other voices? (updated Dec 28, 2016)

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abiding in Christ, carnal mind, discerning the spirits, eternal life, Islamic mysticism, Jesus Christ, John Wesley, other religions, peace, spiritual mind, Sufis

Seeking God in the Silence…
(Picture taken from http://www.stjosephimperial.org/stewardship)

This is another article on discerning the spirits. I hope I can dig deeper now than I could do it before on this blog site. Actually, discerning the spirits is not about thinking, “The Bible is true and everything else that comes from this world or what was written in other religions is completely wrong.” Knowing the Living God, I realized that the eternal I AM always communicated His wisdom to human beings. The difference between all those other religions which had come before the book of Genesis was written and before the Hebrews were chosen to be God’s people that was allowed to get to know Him as the only God, is simply that there was a blend of God’s truth mixed with other religious stuff and God had not yet enabled man to discern the whole truth. Before Jesus Christ’s death and resurrection it was not yet time to do so (see Acts 17:30). Only God’s chosen prophets in the OT could utter pure divine wisdom through God’s Spirit dwelling on them. However, there were always wise men in the past who shared divine wisdom as well (though not perfectly, still truth mixed with lies at times) such as Seneca, Plato, Confucius etc. pp. However, since Christ has come into this world and is risen, we may know that we only find The Whole Truth by abiding in Him who “became to us wisdom from God” (1 Cor 1:30 ESV).