“If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit.”
This past January we breached Jesus’ words in Mark 9 that “everyone will be salted with fire.” This mystery of Godliness reveals within us the continuing purging of our sinful clay bodies with God’s righteous decree; we are justified by faith and disciplined by His grace; this is our Lord’s way of directing us deeper into His agape love and grace!
We are now subject to God’s purifying fire; it is troublesome but it edifies! We have now become spiritual beings because Jesus purchased us by redemption on the cross; we have now become His purchased possession! We are now God’s Spiritually created children and seeking to be whom He intends us to be.
God’s righteousness is “salted” within us and we must keep His saltiness in purity! God uses this purging pattern of burning and purifying in our human experience to move us out from humanity’s secular culture of cleaving onto selfness and taking us, rather, deeper into God’s spiritual culture of agape love and grace.
Grace is God’s provision for Spiritually growing our redeemed life; He is dispensing righteousness and grace into these jars of clay we are temporarily wearing! He has placed His “treasure” of Jesus into our earthly containers to change and reconcile us in Him as a “tender new growth” within His grace culture of agape love.
Our spiritual identity in Jesus is the core of our new born-again human life! God is a Spirit; our new realm of living is Spiritual; it is HIS Life in us on earth! As far as God is concerned, our flesh is now dead because living within us is His Spirit with the resurrection power of Jesus, who is our source for overcoming the fleshliness in our clay container. We are now a Spiritual person and partakers of His divine nature.
God’s pathway is for us to walk in the Spirit while putting to death sin in our mortal bodies. We are to live by faith, in grace, so that His righteousness visibly produces spiritual fruit from our John 15 “tender new growth,” our branch in His vine, even while living in these corrupt, flesh containers.
We are now in Jesus and He possesses us! We now have the mind of Christ including His resurrection power, so that, in our jar of clay we will be a light shining out of darkness bearing “much fruit” as our yield on His vine of new life.
Jesus put it this way: “Seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.” -Matthew 6:33.
Faith is our moment by moment intentional choosing of God’s righteousness! God’s way is so much higher than our own, it is just the right thing for a created human to do; it is an agape love thing as well! God’s pathway requires our faith!
If we are redeemed, we are literally in Jesus Christ and have the mind of Christ. If we doubt, we have not grappled enough with the reality of who we really are in Christ Jesus and we are slackening in faith!!
Elisha had a new servant helper after Gehazi had been stricken with a leprosy judgment. Elisha’s new servant helper had to have his spiritual eyes opened to see “the mountain was full of horses and chariots of fire” surrounding the enemy of Syria as they threatened Israel. Like Elisha’s new servant, we (the redeemed believer) have Jesus’ resurrection power as our resource when walking in God’s pathway because we now are “in Christ Jesus!”
Living in these corrupted human vessels demands a living faith. God’s agape love is our constant companion equipping us to see “the mountain full of horses and chariots of fire.” He prepares us to perform to xcccHis calling, while at the same time, grow us into consuming His grace. Our faith will consume His grace! It’s our choice in Him!
God’s pathway for us is Spiritual; we are in Him and He is in us; His Spirit is joined to our spirit. This is done by God’s new creation within us but honed by our willful choice of trusting and believing our Lord God, rather than, placing confidence in our self-will or pride. This defines our faith; if we walk in union with His Spirit, we consume God’s grace and He will open our spiritual eyes to see His “mountain full of horses and chariots of fire.”
As we explore this tender and beautiful new spiritual leadership from within our living heavenly Father, we need to drink the milk of His word as we are learning to consume His grace. This process expands, deepens and broadens our faith.
Jesus provided us His Logos Word so that we may have an open door into His glory and eternality. The Bible is our written word (ρνμα) revealing the (λογοs) Word as an expression of Himself to us personally. The person of the Holy Spirit, within us reveals Jesus and connects us with the Father God.
If we open this door of our heart, Jesus will open the door into heaven where He now is and have fellowship with us. The Logos Word is Jesus; He was in the beginning with God sourcing for us the eternal reality of everlasting Life in Him! This is a glorious thing!
It is through His logos Word that we receive knowledge of Him leading us into dynamic culture of agape love and grace. Peter tells us:
“His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of him who has called us to his own glory and excellence.”
-2Peter 1:3.
All things pertaining to both life and godliness are ours in Jesus through the knowledge of Him. He does not say knowledge about Him, but rather, knowledge of Him which means the dynamic of a personal relationship in Him and of Him. This all starts with a “tender new growth” grafted into His vine of Life when we are created new into His living eternal Life!
We are a “tender new growth” that can mature into producing “much fruit.” This is God’s mission for us while living on this earth. In His grace, we are learning who we are in Jesus and who He is in us. Both are blended together within us as we grow in Knowing God and experincing His agape love.
In His closing hours with His disciples, Jesus leaves the upper room and crosses down into the Kidron Valley on the east side of Jerusalem, up the hill on the other side, into the Garden of Gethsemane. On the way He probably passed the temple gate where the Jewish symbol of the vine was welded into the gate design. He pauses, teaching us (John 15) about our intimate relation with and in Him. He is the vine rooted into the soil and we are “His tender new growth;” the vine’s purpose is to produce fruit and “much fruit.” The vine was the symbol of the nation of Israel! Israel is God’s vineyard and we are a tender new growth grafted into the living vine of Jesus.
God’s pathway will lead us into learning about our own selves as a way to understand others in Him. It was over 10 years after meeting the Lord, on the road to Damascus, that Paul was called by the Lord into ministry through Barnabas. Paul had much to learn about God’s pathway of faith and consuming grace from God Himself before God actually put him into active ministry.
The mystery of God to finite men comes only through God and His Holy Spirit indwelling men, but man must choose to walk in God’s pathway even after having accepted God’s gift of His Son, Jesus. Living in the Spirit and walking in the Spirit are two separate issues! Paul spent over ten years “Knowing God” before God called him into active service of producing “much fruit.” The tender new growth must mature into producing fruit and much fruit.
Paul’s inspired words to the church at Corinth were both grounded and rooted in love as well as his own personal experience.
“And God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that having all sufficiently in all things at all times, you may abound in every good work.” -2Corinthians 9:8.
Paul goes on in this passage to give us this example:
“He who supplies the seed to the sower and the bread for food will supply and multiply your seed for sowing and increase the harvest for your righteousness.”
-2Corinthians 9:10.
These and many other verses convey the intimacy of Jesus’ relationship within us. But we may not share this same intimacy in God if our faith is too weak; we are His Spiritual children. The Holy Spirit has to pray for us on our behalf because we are too immature spiritually. We are in Christ Jesus and He is in us but we don’t have a clue to the wonder and glory of this reality! Even so, He is faithful as we are in His Word with this glorious opportunity to grow in His loving agape grace while still breathing in this world!
Jesus desires of us, just as Peter instructs: “Grow in grace and knowledge of our Lord and savior Jesus Christ!”
Earth’s Contrarywise system distracts us from the “eternalview” of our new nature in Jesus. On every hand, all around us, we are continually distracted by worldviews and the effect removes our eyes from off of Jesus and our absolute dependance on HIM.
There are many reasons one should consider faith an important issue, whatsoever is not of faith is sin! The concept of faith is itself a bit illusive, the evidence of things not seen! To help us get this right, we must rely exclusively on God Himself; we have access to the Father through the person of Jesus. This is more than prayer; it is active fellowship with God the Father through Jesus, our Lord and Savior.
We could say faith is a measure of our stewardship of God’s grace. We are all called to minister and share what God has done in us! In fact, we are accountable for the grace we ourselves have received!
Grace is God’s provision of Himself into us, whereas faith is our rejection of self-reliance in preference to God’s glory in us; we are able to receive His grace, grace upon grace from and thru God the Father, Jesus His Son and the Holy Spirit … only! We must replace self-interest with the loving person of Jesus Himself!
Receiving new life in Jesus is a miracle, a new creation performed in you and me! Being born-again is an amazing new Spiritual identity, while at the same time, it is equipping us with death to our flesh. By exercising our Lord Jesus’ resurrection power, we experience victory over self-centered darkness and pride. In Christ Jesus, we are overcomers and may change human darkness into Jesus’ eternal Light, if we choose to do so!
If we find we really don’t want to overcome self, preferring rather our own self confidence and pride, then we may need to get our “want to” fixed; we haven’t then realized who we really are in Christ Jesus! Our SELF is a primary hinderance to our faith.
“If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit.” -Galatians 5:25.
When we stay on God’s pathway into faith we will grow in grace AND knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ! Our pathway into faith will put to death our unconscious self-reliance; reliance on self-will nullifies faith in God. Do we have faith in self or faith in God, or both?
We cannot receive healing of our leprosy unless we go wash in the Jorden seven times! Jesus is the author and finisher of our faith! Grace is God’s part, faith is our part … we are enabled by His grace but it is a growth process.
It sounds like a circular argument but we must remember, God the Father thru Jesus the Son by His Holy Spirit is participating in our ability to break through into the gift of His eternal reality making it our eternal reality as well!
We must look to Jesus Himself; He is our only true, viable source!
Putting off the “old man” and putting on the “new man” can only happen on God’s pathway into faith. Being transformed into the same image as our Lord Jesus, from one degree of glory to another, happens thru God’s grace provisions within our faith. Walking in faith creates an intimate relationship with the Father through Jesus!
There is an old chorus that says “Christ liveth in me, Oh what a salvation this, that Christ liveth in me.” Christ living in me is the second creation occurring inside of our first creation body when we accept God’s gift of redemption; it is personal and individual. Christ Jesus is living in ME because I am created a new Spiritual person in Him; I am now a child of the King!
I have been crucified with Christ.
It is no longer I who live,
But Christ who lives in me.
And the life I now live in the flesh
I live by faith in the Son of God,
Who loved me and gave himself for me. -Galatians 2:20.
It is through redemption we enter into this fresh new Spiritual relationship. Through redemption we are a new living Spiritual person transcending the flesh in which we walk.
Our new birth creation licenses and enables us to hear with Spiritual ears and see the Law of the Spirit of Life with Spiritual eyes. “The Law of the Spirit of Life” replaces “the law of sin and death!” We now have God’s Spirit of Life and the law of God’s life officially and permanently gifted into us.
“and it is God who establishes us with you into (ειs) Christ, and has anointed us, and who has also put his seal on us and given us his spirit in our hearts as a guarantee.” -2Corinthians 1:21.
Being “born again” is literally a miracle performed within us. Our new creation in Christ Jesus guides us into an invisible path relying on truth found only in Jesus and His logos Word. This is the ministry of the Holy Spirit living within us, ministering to our Spiritual calling and need, ministering into our new Spiritual, living, individual, person!
Praise God from whom all blessing flow!