Our spirit generally falls into one of two categories. It is either an objective spirit or a subjective spirit. Usually this can be seen in a child soon after he is born. The objective spirit tends to be spiritually scientific in its approach to things; whereas the subjective spirit tends to be more emotionally religious in its approach.
By knowing what kind of spirit you are you can grow spiritually and serve the Lord more effectively. This understanding also helps you to relate to other people.
The third and fourth chapters of John present classic examples of an objective spirit and a subjective spirit. The way the Lord dealt with Nicodemus was entirely different from the way He dealt with the Samaritan woman at the well. Their spirits were different, and the Lord approached each one differently.
People who are predominantly religious are quite subjective and tend to behave more like Pharisees than spiritual people. They tend to have legalistic rigid standards of “do’s” and “don’ts” which they expect others to measure up to.
There is a general tendency for religious people to be subjective in their judgment of others. This does not mean that God does not love them. In fact, He must love them because He made so many of them.
Regardless of what kind of spirit one is, each of us goes through a different approach in God’s dealings, until eventually all end up in the same category: dedicated worshipers and bond servants of the Lord, doing His will with all of their hearts.
A subjective spirit enters into worship more easily, although he may not be quite as dedicated.
Conversely, worship is difficult for an objective spirit, but he has the potential to become very dedicated. What is easy for one type of spirit to attain is more difficult for the other. Eventually, all will come forth as dedicated worshipers.
John 3:1–7, 9–10 reveals Jesus’ approach to Nicodemus’ objective spirit. Now there was a man of the Pharisees, named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews (notice that he was a man of substantial authority); this man came to Him by night, and said to Him, “Rabbi, we know that You have come from God as a teacher; for no one can do these signs that You do unless God is with him.”
The other Pharisees were plotting to kill Jesus, but not Nicodemus. He was being very objective about Him. He called Jesus “Rabbi”; so he knew that He was a teacher. He reasoned that Jesus must be from God to be able to do all of those signs and wonders. He had it all reasoned out, objectively and scientifically. He was a scientific spirit.
Jesus answered and said to him, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.” Jesus did not ask, “Nicodemus, why did you come by night?” Nicodemus was not a coward, though he may have seemed so then. In the final analysis, when most of Jesus’ disciples had forsaken Him and fled, Nicodemus begged for the body of the Lord. He was not afraid to stand up and be counted when it was time to be counted. He was a man of great courage and great principle, but it did not seem important to him to make a public show of visiting Jesus.
At this time he realized that there was no point in his jeopardizing his position as a ruler of the Jews. Therefore Jesus did not censor him for coming by night, or ask him to become His disciple. Instead He said, “You must be born again.” Jesus shifted the focus of the conversation to the truth He wanted to convey.
Because an objective spirit is always wanting to reason things out, he must be moved from reason to revelation. That is why God deals with an objective or scientific spirit by putting him in a situation where he cannot reason his way out, or even find a good reason for what is happening to him. If he could reason it out, it would not be a test. God has to bring him to the place where he seeks God until he receives a revelation of why he is going through that testing.
That revelation must be greater than his capability to reason. God will not let a man who seeks to walk with Him be ruled by his reason. In effect, God tells such a man, “I know that you want to reason things out, but I won’t let you. You will not be able to find a reason for what I am doing to you. You must believe Me and trust Me, and I will reveal Myself to you.”
The objective spirit responds naturally to principles and truths. From the time that he grasps a revelation of the truth, he becomes dedicated to it. He starts by grabbing hold of the principles, and then moves up to a deep, worshipful communion with the Lord.
Nicodemus followed this same path. The Lord laid before him a principle: “You must be born again.” Nicodemus said to Him, “How can a man be born when he is old?” In other words, “Come on; let’s be sensible.” “He cannot enter a second time into his mother’s womb and be born, can he?” As the revelation was coming to Nicodemus, he still wanted to reason it out. Jesus answered, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not marvel that I said to you, ‘You must be born again.’ ”
Nicodemus answered and said to Him, “How can these things be?” He could not reason it through, but God had given him revelation. Jesus answered and said to him, “Are you the teacher of Israel, and do not understand these things?”
Jesus pointed out to Nicodemus that as a ruler, it was his obligation to know these answers. That is the way to deal effectively with an objective spirit. Show him that he is supposed to know these truths.
This Word should open up the way of winning souls and dealing with people. First figure out which type of spirit a person has, and then approach him accordingly. The conventional soul-winning method of passing out tracts is often very ineffective. However, Jesus was very effective in His work, because He moved by revelation. He knew all about the individuals He met, and how to deal with them.
God must bring us to the place where we have that same revelation in the way we deal with people. Today’s move of God’s Spirit in the earth is leaving the preparation stage and is entering into the harvesting stage. To a great degree many hearts are prepared; all we have to do now is to be led by the Spirit of the Lord. When we say, “led by the Spirit of the Lord,” we mean actually to be carried into a situation with great revelation.
An objective spirit like Nicodemus can be very sincere, but if he is not sincere, he will tend to exploit and take advantage of other people.
A subjective spirit seems to be very religious, but he can become very vicious, too. Remember that Jesus was crucified by religious people. The scientific people wanted to wash their hands of the situation and were not allowed to. It was the Pharisees and the rulers of the Jews who demanded that Jesus be crucified. They had been plotting for a long time, and they went about it with a viciousness.
The subjective spirit analyzes a situation by feeling, rather than by the facts. Nicodemus saw things as they were, but the religious people of his day acted upon their feelings. Because their own system was being touched by Christ’s teaching and they feared that their little kingdom was being upset, they reacted according to their feelings.
Religious people can be very vicious. Every time a move of the Spirit comes forth and God begins to lead people on into a new step of revelation, the people who have made the greatest advance with God up to that time are frequently the ones to persecute those who take the next step. They are religious or subjective in their spirits and in their emotions; therefore, when they see other people going on with God, they accuse them of splitting the church and upsetting everything. They react with very deep feelings.
The difference between God’s end-time walk in the Spirit and other churches is the fact that it has a completely objective approach. People who reject it are usually subjective and religious by nature.
There is objectivity in those who walk with God by the Spirit. Worship of the Lord in today’s New Testament churches runs the whole scale from deep, quiet worship to bombastic jubilee worship of God. People are being freed from religious ruts, and they are expressing that freedom very objectively, without making any excuses. It is good for you to understand that religious people must cross quite a gulf to come into this kind of freedom and survive.
The fourth chapter of John presents a picture of a woman who was very religious, and also immoral. People who are very religious tend to assume that they have the final Word from God. Then they proceed to make their own rules for their behavior. The Samaritan woman had had a number of husbands, yet she was very religious, very subjective—just the opposite of Nicodemus.
There came a woman of Samaria to draw water. Jesus said to her, “Give Me a drink.” For His disciples had gone away into the city to buy food. The Samaritan woman therefore said to Him, “How is it that You, being a Jew, ask me for a drink since I am a Samaritan woman?” (For Jews have no dealings with Samaritans.) John 4:7–9. This Samaritan woman immediately raised the issue of the racial conflict between the Jews and the Samaritans, because she was a very religious person.
Religious people tend to keep racial prejudice alive. They tend to accept segregation and discrimination. The true Church does not have any racial discrimination, because there is an objectivity in seeing one another as members of the Body of Christ.
The prejudices of religious people cannot survive today’s walk with God because of its scientific, objective approach to the principles and truths of God’s Kingdom. Every prejudice is left outside the door. Each one who comes in finds it possible to relate with anyone else who comes into the Body, regardless of race. God grant that we shall never have any indication of the hypocrisy of religious people; rather, we shall be open to everyone whom God brings into our midst.
Ignoring the racial issue, Jesus answered and said to her, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is who says to you, ‘Give Me a drink,’ you would have asked Him, and He would have given you living water.” Verse 10.
There is a way by the Spirit to bring religious people into a walk with God. Do not at first tell them what they are going to become; tell them what they will experience.
You preach experiences to a religious person.
You preach becoming to an objective person; you tell him what he can become in the Lord. The objective spirit is not motivated by the experiences along the way; it is the end result that matters most to him.
Regardless of where we start from, God grant that we all come to the realization that God has called us to become sons. The issue is our calling in God.
God’s end-time move does not use this approach: “This is the old-time religion. Here you will have a glory-filled shouting time. Here you can be filled with the Holy Spirit. There will be times when you shout and rejoice because you are being so blessed. At other times you will have visions and dreams.” These are the experiences that a religious person is looking for.
But the objectivity of a mature walk with God dictates that the experiences in God remain only as incidental stepping stones. The goal is to become sons of God who walk in full maturity.
Rather than limiting a meeting with God to a specific place or church, we should be appropriating a meeting with God all the time. Our walking with Him is to be a continual experience.
Our awareness of Him should not be limited to an occasional breakthrough and experience. There should be a continual awareness of who we are before Him, and of who He is to us.
John 4:11–19: She (the Samaritan woman) said to Him, “Sir, You have nothing to draw with and the well is deep; where then do You get that living water? You are not greater than our father Jacob, are You, who gave us the well, and drank of it himself, and his sons, and his cattle?” Again she brought up the same racial issue. Jesus answered and said to her, “Everyone who drinks of this water shall thirst again; but whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall become in him a well of water springing up to eternal life.” In other words, “What an experience you are going to have!”
The woman said to Him, “Sir, give me this water, so I will not be thirsty, nor come all the way here to draw.” He said to her, “Go, call your husband, and come here.” The woman answered and said, “I have no husband.” Jesus said to her, “You have well said, ‘I have no husband’; for you have had five husbands; and the one whom you now have is not your husband; this you have said truly.” That did it! She came all the way through from her religiosity to the revelation that Jesus had been trying to bring to her all the time. The woman said to Him, “Sir, I perceive that You are a prophet.”
Jesus brought the Samaritan woman to a revelation of Himself through a different approach than He used with Nicodemus.
Regardless of the course each person must take, it must lead to a revelation of Jesus Christ.
The objective, scientific spirit must lay aside his reasoning for a revelation, and the subjective religious spirit must lay aside his religious prejudices for a revelation. It all comes through a revelation of the Word of God.
What type of spirit are you? Chances are, you are not exclusively one type of spirit. In walking with God, the subjective religious spirit becomes more objective, and the objective spirit becomes more open to worship and communion with the Lord.
Objective spirits are scientific in their approach to God. Although it is difficult for them to enter into worship and personal communion with the Lord, it seems easy for them to reach a place of dedication. When a goal, a great cause with great principles, is set before them, they become dedicated to it very easily. Objective or scientific spirits are eager to receive teaching on divine order and the restoration of the Church.
It is the best bait that can be given to objective spirits who are hungering for a deeper walk with God. However, they move into revelation only when they have overcome their reliance on reasoning and enter the great battle of faith. These objective spirits are capable of a great deal of faith, but first God must move them from their dependence upon reasoning to a position of faith and trust in the Word of God. They must come into a faith that is beyond their own understanding. An objective spirit always expresses his dedication by faith. At times his faith for his dedication even precedes his faith for his own walk with God.
Objective spirits are rarely given to emotional experiences or to an approach to God through the soul channel. They may be rather tolerant of the ecstatic reactions of others to the blessing of the Holy Spirit, but that approach does not especially move them. In contrast, when a religious, subjective spirit sees someone being blessed by a spiritual experience, he desires to have that experience also.
An objective spirit tends to take for granted relationships in the Body of Christ and in his family, whereas a subjective or religious spirit tends to have problems with relationships in his family and in the Body of Christ because of his emotional nature. The soul channel is too real to him.
When parents have religious spirits, they tend to become too emotional in raising their children. They want the children always to present a proper image of them. The best way for a family of predominantly religious spirits to avoid harmful emotional tension in the home is for the parents to pretend that their children belong to the neighbor. Likewise, the husband and wife probably should treat the other partner as though he (or she) belonged to the neighbor. Perhaps then they would be more polite to each other and eliminate some of their problems.
Divine order is more slowly established in families which have not developed an objectivity in their relationships; they remain subjective. Even after a spiritual love for the brothers and sisters in Christ has been established, there will be tension in the home if they have not left the soul channel and its subjectiveness in relating to one another.
The subjective spirit is basically religious in his approach to God. Personal experiences with the Lord come to him very easily, but they are often rather shallow, because he is not thoroughly grounded in the principles of the Word.
A religious, subjective person tends to interpret the promises of the Scriptures in a very religious sense. Let me illustrate. After a serious heart attack, a religious woman received her healing by standing on the Scripture, “Let not thy heart be troubled.” She did not understand the underlying principles of that verse, but it was a promise that emotionally, in her soul, she could lay hold of; she could express her faith in it, and God rewarded her faith even though her interpretation was not the best.
Dedication is difficult for religious people, because they tend to feed on blessings. It is very difficult for them to become rooted and grounded in the Word. Their spiritual level moves in a cycle. When they feel a little low, they gravitate to a prayer meeting to be blessed. They enjoy re-consecration services where they can go down to the altar and be filled with the Spirit all over again. There is not much faith in their actions, but the emotional approach encourages their soul and sustains their dependency on blessings. God allows them to survive spiritually for a limited time. Then He begins to dry up the blessings, so that they are forced to reach in with faith and feed on the Word to become rooted and grounded in the Lord.
Religious, subjective people often rely on personal revelations which again tend to be rather shallow. Because there is not the dedication or depth of perception to accompany the revelation, they can change courses very easily. Such individuals should be steered away from a mystical involvement which they are not spiritually capable of handling.
How do you minister to a subjective person who has recently left a church with an emotional atmosphere and strict religious standards and teachings? Since he may have been dominated by legalistic rules and regulations, do not challenge his dedication, but appeal to his religious sense of duty: “Don’t you know that you are supposed to walk with God?” Present the will of God to him in a decisive, imperative manner, and he will respond much quicker than if you entreat him.
Because the subjective spirit is addicted to experiences, introduce him to a blessing that he can experience. Say to him, “God will meet you, just as He has met many others who had deep problems. Just enter totally into the flow of worship with the rest of the Body. You will attain higher levels of communion and the revelation when you become truly dedicated to the Lord.” Incite him to take his next step in God. Explain to him the value of listening to a tape of the living Word many times if he wants to have the deeper revelations unveiled to his heart.
A person with an objective, scientific spirit is open to God, but he does not make an outward display of it. He has not had any great experiences, nor has he been seeking them. Let me suggest various approaches to use in challenging such a person. “Do you hear the call of Christ to dedicate yourself to His Body coming forth in the earth? The restoration of the Church has been progressing for five hundred years. Don’t you want to learn the great principles that God is restoring today? You have a ministry, a function, and a purpose in God to fulfill. God wants to accomplish His will in the earth through you. Walk with the Body and serve them, even when there is no appreciation.” Stir up his dedication to God and to serve the Body of Christ. Make the objective spirit aware of responsibilities to be filled in the church. When the Lord reveals to his heart that he ought to be doing a certain service, he will be willing to work.
Through the same approach, encourage a diligence in the objective spirit to live in the Scriptures and to listen to tapes of the living Word that is coming in this hour. Objective, scientific people grasp and feed upon spiritual principles. They are dedicated to see them work in their lives.
Once the objective spirit has become dedicated to the principles and truths concerning what God is doing in the earth today, he will find that God wants more than principles in his mind and a dedication to them; God wants him to walk with Him, to love Him, and to commune with Him. God wants a worshiper.
The Holy Spirit may prophesy through one of His prophets that God will soon meet a certain man. Suddenly that one will find God putting him through trials and testings that he cannot understand. God puts the scientific spirit in circumstances for which there is no reasonable solution outside of God. Of course, that man finally reaches up to God in desperation. Now his only recourse is to walk by faith. The minute he opens his heart to walk with God by faith, God reveals Himself to him. God has shifted that objective spirit away from his addiction to his own reasoning to the place where he has faith in God. When he has faith and walks with God, then God reveals Himself to him. Thus God moves him from a position of reasoning to one of revelation. God orders tests for which there is absolutely no logical reason, except that they strengthen that man’s walk with Him. One thing you can say about God’s dealings: they really work!
God finds ways of demanding submission and worship in the objective spirit. Because the objective spirit tends to be somewhat independent, God has a way of demanding that he have relationships with members of the Body. He cannot be just superficially friendly to them and remain uninvolved. God will place him in a situation where he needs help, thus demanding that he create relationships with other members of the Body. He would never do this unless God shoved him into it.
How does God lead a subjective, religious person into a closer relationship with Himself? He dries up the flow of blessings, so that the subjective spirit does not have any “blessed feeling” to bolster his faith. God brings him out of his subjectiveness, because he must accept his relationship with God by faith. A religious person does not tend to reason things out, and so he is not driven to understand all that he is going through. When the emotional blessings are dried up and he is unable to break through to God by feelings, then he is in the position where he must exercise absolute pure faith. This is the beginning of his true walk with God.
Because the subjective person is so dominated by his feelings and by the soul channel, he is tempted to judge or to react with negative feelings against another member in the Body. The temptation to judge is great for the subjective spirit when he is slighted or criticized. His only alternative is to accept relationships by faith. When you come to the house of God, you must overcome those emotional reactions in order to worship with the brethren.
God demands submission and unity of subjective people. To the objective spirit, authority is the most important thing. To the religious spirit, revelation is most important. In reality, authority takes precedence over revelation.
A man may be completely blind to the spirit realm, but if he walks in a great deal of authority, he will still be able to bind the work of the devil. God puts the subjective spirit in a position where He demands that submission and a spirit of unity take precedence over his own revelation and independence.
A subjective spirit who abandons his walk with God usually feels that he has had a revelation from God, when in truth God did not talk to him at all.
Submission to authority over you is always more important than your own personal revelation or your own independence. Great discernment and perception of all the faults in the elders may be only a suspicious, religious quality which God must remove before a dedication to the Lord can be established.
For the objective person, a scheduled devotional life and a very consistent daily practice of waiting on God will benefit him most. He must discipline himself to be spiritual, to pray, seek God, and study the Word; and consistently stay with it. The objective person tends to be just as spiritual as he has to be, and no more. So it is necessary that he make himself become one who is devoted to the Lord, who praises and worships the Lord. When the principles of God become his dedication and his way of life, he is led into worship and communion with the Lord. The objective person responds well to a concern over his spiritual life. He loves responsibility. Therefore, he should be given a responsibility that will challenge him to his full capacity. An appeal to his dedication to suffer with the Lord will open up a communion between him and God.
` People will truly repent when they understand the danger of loose moral standards, after it has been explained to them objectively. Fornication is not merely a sin against the human body. Paul said in I Corinthians 6:15–16, “Shall I take the members of Christ and make them members of a harlot? God forbid that the two become one flesh.” Thereby a bond with the other person and an open channel to oppression can be created.
Worship and service to God can be drastically hindered when an unlawful sexual bond has been formed. An awareness of this truth gives birth to a genuine love for righteousness and an abhorrence of the wrong kind of bond. The objective approach triggers the motivation to be bonded to the Lord as one sanctified Body.
A subjective person tends to be like a roller coaster. A good time to prophesy over him and bless him is when his spirit is up. At a low time, tell him that you are standing with him, and encourage his faith. Ask him to take responsibility for a religious assignment, such as praying for a special need. This is particularly helpful when he does not seem to be making progress in obtaining a spiritual breakthrough for himself. Get his focus off himself and onto the need of another. Once his concern has shifted to his brother’s hunger for more of God and off his own impasse, God can break forth upon him because his faith has become objective. Those who become frustrated in their search for a meeting with God will find their prayers answered more quickly if they refuse to focus on themselves for a period of time.
Another good way of helping a religious person is by appealing to his religious drive to reach dedication through suffering, through becoming a martyr. Encourage him to really seek God and to have God meet him so that he can reach a dedication that would enable him to die for the Lord.
There is one level and one moving whereby every spirit can come into a flow from God and be met, and that is by entering into worship with a whole heart.
The worship service is so designed by God that even if one person has a soulish approach and another has a spiritual approach at the beginning, if one is motivated by a desire for feelings of blessing, and another from dedication, the collective worship of God flows together until there is an element of common communion with the Lord and a flow of unity together. One of the greatest benefits to every type of spirit is worshiping in the Spirit.
Each believer requires whatever approach most compels him to seek God. Start with the level he is on; then provoke him to take another step toward God. He will understand himself better, and begin to understand the dealings of the Lord better. May God write the truths of this Word on your heart, and enable you to help many people whom God has marked for His own. You will know how to encourage them to present themselves perfect in Christ.