We talk to the new people about the things of the Spirit that are coming to pass. Those who join our church, we want to orient those who come into a service like ours to the overall picture.
Sometimes you can magnify things to such a point that the details suddenly seem all out of proportion.
There is no reason why we should get upset over the little ways of ministry and so forth. But I know visitors coming in become upset by it because they don’t stop to think, well, this church is built just like any other church. The same kind of carpets, same kind of seats, same kind of people, everything is just pretty much the same.
We sing a lot of the same songs. We preach from the same Bible. We emphasize the same Christ and Lord and all the rest of it.
But they won’t stop to think of 100’s of things that are similar in our worship of the Lord. But they’ll point out one thing. Well, they laid their hands on them, or they blessed them in a certain way. Well, we don’t understand that.
The little things, sometimes you say, well, why do those things then? Well, we don’t really have to, and I suppose a lot of them will be discarded in time.
But when you’re leading people into something different, Actions that express their faith and the direction of their spirit are often very beneficial.
But for those that are coming in to visit or coming to receive a blessing, it would be very easy for you to emphasize a point of difference instead of seeing the basic points of agreement.
But the thing we must see is that the real basic difference is that the emphasis in the Church here is on the human spirit recreated in the image of God, and communicating with God, and how that your spirit can be better linked to your conscious mind, and so forth.
There’s no question about it that we are constantly taking the tree and cutting off the limbs, trimming off the leaves, and say, now we have a perfect tree. Because we’ve cut off the limbs, there’s no more bad fruit coming forth, no more unsightly leaves. We don’t have anything. We just have a tree and a few bare limbs hanging out there.
Well, then the rain keeps coming, and it isn’t very long before more branches come, and there’s more fruit. And that’s been the problem many times the churches have had.
They’ll say, let’s cut this off and cut off that and cut off the other thing, instead of recognizing that the human spirit is the very root of the matter.
Remember what John the Baptist said at the time he introduced Jesus? Now is the axe laid to the root of the tree?
And you can prune the tree all you want to because the fruit is obnoxious to you.
But you’re going to get someplace when you lay the axe to the root of the tree. Then the tree is going to die. And the things that grow in our lives, the things in our personality, our habits, the different things that we do that we want to change, our ways of thinking, our attitudes, sometimes these we’re going to work on. But these are all effects in our life.
They are, of course, the causes of things, but there’s a prime cause behind that. And the real cause is what is in the human spirit.
If the human spirit is bad, then there’s a lot of evil that comes forth in your life.
I think that both the Old and New Testament was very explicit in using the word heart to express more than just the emotions and feelings and everything.
I think that the heart also includes the human spirit and all that is affected by it.
Because there are times that you see the heart is referring to the decision and will a person makes. Their heart is set on God.
Another time, the heart is singing, Make melody in your hearts to the Lord. The heart would express emotions and depth of feeling.
But always, the mainspring would be down in the human spirit. Now, this is what God is trying to teach us now.
If we could be blessed in our spirit, then we can go out and expect to overcome the things that oppressed us.
And if we’re blessed in our spirit, we can be affected in our physical bodies, not only for healing, but for the very processes of the physical body.
If we can be blessed in our spirit, then God not only could take care of, say, friction between two individuals, but He deals with it on the level of the human spirit so that the animosity is broken down. That’s a great deal of difference.
Somebody comes to me and says, Pastor, I’d like to have you settle this difference between my husband and I, and they start in.
He said this, and she said that, and he did this, and he did that, and back and forth it goes, and back and forth. What are you supposed to do? Stand there with a whistle and blow. As a referee there is another five-yard penalty for you, 10 yards for you. Who needs that sort of thing? That isn’t the way that I ever want to counsel people.
Now, what do I do? Well, any of you that have come to me for counseling know that I listen as patiently as I’m capable of to the problem, and then I get down to business and try to deal with the thing in your spirit.
And the minute I’ve dealt with the thing in your spirit, the other things come off. because, you see, the things, the circumstances, the problems, all the questions are just side effects.
The basic thing is if there’s a unity of spirit, those things clear up.
Now can you begin to see why I have a much better approach than to just deal with the externals, to deal with the things in people’s relationships, to deal with the circumstances.
Or to just emphasize that we’ll pray for the sicknesses of people’s body, because we’ll deal with the human spirit.
Suppose they are of an anxious heart, an anxious spirit, they’ll be given way to spirits of fear, spirits of worry and other effects? They may have ulcers, they may have nervous headaches, and many problems.
Shall we just deal with the ulcers? Shall we just deal with the nervous headaches and see them healed?
Because they are anxious of heart, they will make some more ulcers for themselves. They’ll make some more fears for themselves because you’ve got to get at the thing that is generating and causing it.
You can’t just deal with the effects. Therefore, isn’t it wise that we come on together and we bless one another’s spirits?
We deal with one another’s spirit. And consequently, there’s no condemnation. Somebody comes over, Brother, why don’t you deal with this thing or deal with that thing?
We really are, we’re laying an axe to the root of the tree.
Many a person comes up, and we could tell them how wrong they are, you did this and you said that, and the other thing, but what good is that going Because they just get their feelings hurt and they go out trying to justify themselves.
But if we can bless their spirit and let their spirit open up a little bit more to God, those things begin to change.
I’m so convinced that most of the problems in the church, and I would say about 99% of the problems that are handled in this church are handled by ignoring the problem and ministering to the person’s spirit.
And when you do that, the problem changes. The problem has a solution within the person themselves, and you never have to talk about the problem.
I am very much in favor of helping people outgrow their problems. If they’re spiritually immature and they’re having problems with this and that and the other thing, if I could just open up their spirit to grow, to feast on the word and so forth, pretty soon those things just drop off like old dead leaves.
And that’s a much, much better way to see the thing handled.
So many times, the pastor that is so eager, that he’s going to set things straight and see that things are going to be just right in the church, he’s like a man that burns down the house because they found a couple of termites. The cure is far worse than the disease.
And I think every one of us has something wrong with us.
And with all these things that are wrong with us, we can constantly be critical of ourselves. We can be self-conscious. We can be given to self-condemnation.
But if we keep our eyes on the Lord, we can say this: Thank God for how far I have developed and grown in the Lord.
And by faith I see what is going to happen in my life. So, I accept under protest the present limitations or failings, knowing that God is working a thing in my spirit that will eliminate even these.
And when you do so, you can take a very objective attitude towards stumbling.
Now, if a man was an alcoholic and he had accepted the Lord, got born again this is the attitude to take.
Because if every time he relapses, we will begin to condemn himself, oh, I’ll never be able to serve God. He’s going to drive himself right down into a rut and get stuck.
Every time he fails, his self-condemnation is going to minister unbelief to him. But if he looks at it and says, well, thank God for how far I’ve come.
So, this time it was a mistake. But I’m looking to God, and this thing’s going to be eliminated because my spirit is changing, and it’s going to continue to change.
Well, he’ll drop that thing before you know it, because everything within him is an expression of faith in God, faith that’s going to grow. And you must have that kind of faith to become an overcomer.
I know that people don’t understand this, and a lot of them don’t want to go along with it, but I’m just not in favor of you being hard on yourselves or anybody else when the sincere intent is to walk on with the Lord.
Just overlook it. Just overlook it. Try to make the best of the thing and rejoice in it because things are going to change.
They are changing, and they’re going to continue to change, and they’re going to be better.
You say, but it seems like I’m getting worse. Well, it’s like soup.
How was the soup? To tell you the truth, I wish I hadn’t stirred it.
Now, many of you are in the same position. How are you doing? Well, I just wish the Lord hadn’t stirred it up. I didn’t know that it was in the bottom. I didn’t know there were these sediments in there.
But you see, a lot of the things in your heart remains dormant until you get into a walk with God and the Lord’s constantly stirring you.
You say, it seems to me like I’m worse off than I ever was.
You’re better off than you ever were. Why?
Because at least you’re developing self-knowledge, a self-awareness of your need.
You’re developing a divine consciousness of God. You’re becoming aware of Him.
You no longer let things just lay at the bottom of the pot. There’s no superficial illusion or lie.
There’s an honesty in your heart and a reality that you face and you’re going through a constant state of change in God dealing with everything that He stirs up. That’s a good thing. Hallelujah.
I wouldn’t want the seed of defeat to be down in the bottom of my heart and never know it until some problem came up and then I said or did something I should not have.
And just at a crucial moment, the devil would hit me on that point. And I had the seed of defeat and failure in me all the time.
You see, God isn’t producing another thing like happened in ages past. I’ve read the lives of many men. And you see, they come up to a certain point. Then suddenly, there’s some collapse in their life. There’s something terrible. And so now it comes out.
Wouldn’t you rather God keep stirring the pot up, and if there’s anything there, He keeps refining you and taking off the dregs?
So, everything that’s happening to you is a good sign. It is a good thing. You’re going to have to face it. You’re going to have to overcome it.
You come to the river, and you back off, It’s too cold, It’s too wide. I can’t swim in it.
Okay. You don’t have to today, but that river is right in the line of your progress. And You’re going to have to cross over it sooner or later.
So, you’ll come back to it, and you’ll keep coming back to it until you go on. And that’s what God keeps doing. He’s not letting any of you be evasive. He’s dealing with things in your spirit.
And when He’s dealt with it, there’ll be healing for you, there’ll be blessing for you, and you’ll go on in the Lord to better things.
That’s why you just say, Lord, your will be done and open your heart and walk on with the Lord.
Did you learn a few things about what’s happening to you? Did you? Amen.