We are created in the image of God with an innate desire to worship. The questions become – What will we worship? What will be our life’s photograph that others will remember us by, when we breathe our last breath in this fleshly body? More importantly, What will our soul and spirit look like when we stand before our Creator?
When you begin to examine your life, looking at all the experiences of life through the lens of hindsight, you realize one thing; each decision was regulated by affection and reasoning.
Each choice that we make we use these two words. I balance the pros and cons with my affection for the choice, whether it be a thing, person, or action, with my arguments for and against why I should or should not carry out this choosing of the thing, person, or action.
We each have made good and bad decisions. We each have experienced feelings of completeness and fulfillment over the good choices; and feelings of dissatisfaction and unfulfillment over the wrong or bad choices. We each have used our reasoning powers to weigh all the factors that went into making those decisions, either accusing ourselves, or excusing ourselves for the end results.
What do you have affections for? What are you repulsed by? These become the picture of your god. What does your god look like? What will your god look like when you stand before the Judge of all flesh?
When you drive through a city, you begin to feel the spirit of your surroundings. Do you like what you are feeling? What is your spirit picking up? What is your reasoning telling you to do about your feelings? Lock the doors? Drive faster to get out of that area or city?
When we walk into a room full of people, we either make or avoid eye contact with certain ones. Our spirit is feeling comfortable or uneasy, depending on the person or persons we are around. Our reasoning kicks in to tell us what we should do about entertaining or dismissing that or those individuals, to stay or leave the room.
God created us in His image. God is a Spirit and they that worship Him must worship Him in spirit and truth. The only body that God’s Spirit has is the body of Jesus Christ. God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto Himself. Christ is the image of the invisible God. A ghost or spirit does not have flesh and bones as Jesus. If you see Jesus, then you see His Father; for He and His Father are one. Jesus is the very image of God. Jesus is the sum of all God’s affections and reasoning. In the beginning was the Word and the Word was God and the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us and we beheld His Glory as the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.
When Jesus spoke, He spoke in agreement with His Father. When Jesus made a choice, He made those choices in agreement with His Father. When Jesus had feelings, He allowed or dismissed those feelings in agreement with His Father. The reasonings, thoughts, and arguments of the mind of Jesus Christ was in agreement with the Word of His Father. The affections, feelings of desire or repulsiveness was in agreement with His Father. His Father spoke as the dove-like Holy Spirit overshadowed Christ, saying, “This is my Son in whom I am well pleased.”
Our body is carnal, enslaved to sin and the desires of this world. Paul said that the things he wanted to do, those he didn’t do, and the things he didn’t want to do, those he did. His flesh was always at war with his soul. His soul was always at war with his spirit. His spirit desired to do the right thing. His soul reasoned that this was the right thing to do, but when he went to behave in a right manner, he found himself doing what his flesh wanted to do; and that his soul had betrayed him into arguing that it would be best to allow the body to have its way. Paul called his flesh a body of death and went on to say that only Jesus Christ and the power of His Holy Spirit could deliver him into life and peace.
Lucifer was created with more authority and beauty and talent than all the other angels. Instead of giving God credit for all of these gifts with a thankful and contrite spirit, he exalted himself to godlike status and went on to not only desire the worship and credit that only belonged to God, but slandered God to all the other angels, laying out a plan of how he could ascend above the throne of God and sit in His tabernacle. Does this sound like anyone you know? What do you see when you look at the leaders of this world, and at all the mind and heart influence that comes out of Hollywood and the music world?
We all have met people like this in our lives; at work, at school, at home, at play, at the store, and everywhere there are people. This is because when Adam disobeyed his Creator, and obeyed Satan, he passed on his spiritual genetics to all of us and we pass them on to all who follow us. We are born rebels with a repulsiveness for the Word of God, and use our own gifted reasoning thoughts to excuse ourselves for disobeying the one who gave us our gifts in the first place. Self-justification leads to unfulfillment and dissatisfaction. Only Christ’s Justification leads to fulfillment and contentment.
Jesus said that He is the Light and Truth and that the devil is darkness and lies. Jesus enlightens and opens our spiritual eyes to what is pleasing to the Father and what is fulfilling for ourselves and those around us. The devil deceives us into choosing to follow whatever the flesh desires, no matter how much damage it does to our bodies, minds, and souls, disregarding the hurt it brings to those around us. Self-exaltation to god status, without the rules of God’s government over our lives of disobedience; all justified by what feels right to the darkened reasoning of our minds. We don’t care if it leaves us unfulfilled and dissatisfied, as long as we get to have our own way and do our own thing, without anyone judging us with Christ’s convictions of what is pleasing and displeasing to our heavenly Father.
Give me my independence, quit judging me, let me make my own idols to worship, after all I am a god. Has not my affections and reasonings convinced me that it is so? Isn’t the Bible just a man-made book of myths? After all there is no hell, and no man has a right to tell me that my choices are wrong, let’s agree to disagree, but you have to accept me as I choose to live, even if that repulses your God-created spirit.
Does this sound like the prodigal son, who ended up going from living in comfort and a loving home, to eating the slop of pigs and smelling like the pig pen he swore would never be a part of his life, if only he could use his inheritance and gifts the way he reasoned and affected?
Just like the father welcomed back the prodigal son, your Heavenly Father is ready to welcome you back, and give you a spiritual cleansing with blood-washed garments to cover the wrong choices of your rebellious life. Open your heart and allow Him to minister the power of His satisfying and fulfilling love today. Jesus Christ will baptize you with His Holy Spirit to give you power to desire and obey the Word of the Father.
The devil uses shame and guilt and the condemnation of others to keep us from believing that God can love or forgive us for the sins we have done. God uses conviction to lead us gently but persistently to Christ who removes all shame and guilt and condemnation as He judges our sins and wrong choices in the power of His Blood, not to hold them against us, but to wash them away and not to be remembered ever again. The devil lies. God speaks Truth. Your spirit created in the image of God agrees with God’s Word. Your body and carnal mind agree with the devil and his lies. God wants to transform and renew your mind into the mind of Christ, so that you are a new creation and a new man, who desires and agrees with your Heavenly Father and have the liberty and freedom to make right choices.