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| Earl Gillespie |
What Is The Spirit Of God
"The Two Spirits"
Part 3 of 3
"The Two Spirits"
Part 3 of 3
Genesis 1:3-5 And God said, Let there be light: and there was light. And God saw the light, that it was good: and God divided the light from the darkness. And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day.
Please note in the above verse, God did not say, "let there be day and night". God commanded the light to come forth, thereby amplifying the opposite, which he later dealt with. From the creative aspects of God, there were certain rules that were followed. For every action, attribute or entity, there is an opposite. One is created and the other is the effect of the creation. For the light to be effective there had to be a division or separation between the light and the darkness. Good cannot exist without evil, nor can day exist if there is no night. Imagine trying to define love in an environment free from hate. Man is composed of two natures that are opposite of each other. The Bible speaks of and define the Natural man and the Spiritual man. There is the Spirit of God and there is the spirit of man. The Spirit of God modifies the Spiritual nature of man and is controlled by God, whereas the Spirit of man is subjective to the control worly influences.
There is a thin veil that separates the Holy from the unholy, it is the knowledge of good and evil that seeks to define this separation. It was the God intent to protect man, his prized creation from this strange malady, when he warned him to abstain from the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil. The knowledge of good and evil allows humanity to analyze and debate the thin line that separates what is good from that which is evil. The very presence of this knowledge allows the evil to masquerade as good and it also causes our good deeds to be accepted as evil.
A simple analogy, using day and night, the day was once set aside for work and the night was for resting and bonding with family. The knowledge of good and evil, of day and night allowed mankind to extend the working hours and reshape the waking and sleeping habits of humanity. In many instances this was not good for the family structure. Many children grew up hearing these words, "be quiet, your father is sleeping", setting the stage for the single family syndrome.
As the possessor of the knowledge of good and evil, mankind under the tutelage of an evil spirit gained the ability to manipulate the abstracts. The line that separated the truth from a lie was defined as a thin gray area and the definition of truth became relative to what side of the line you choose to stand. As knowledge began to increase God's creation began to question the things it could not see and touch. Lies began to masquerade as the truth. The ambitious professor then stated, "Truth is that which is formed within a person's mind that bring peace to his inner longing." That thin gray area is expanding and things that society once abhorred is now declared acceptable.
What we see in the struggle of the secular philosophers, the ambitious professors, throughout time is the quest for knowledge through logic and discussions. This is good, but this type of search for knowledge provide no real answers. Many have come to realize that debates and discussions among philosophers seems to produce mostly more discussions and debates. Those who escape the pitfall of an evil society are easily drawn into the philosophers creed seeking to prove or disprove the existence of God. Paul should have put this quest to rest when he stated in 1 Corinthians 2:14 "But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned."
There are many grandfather today remember growing up listening to their grandfathers tell ghost stories. They heard the stories and they believed and were afraid. As a grandfather today try telling your grandchildren about ghosts, a wink from a parent would indicate that granddaddy was getting old and senile. Our belief in the spiritual world has suffered because of our increased knowledge. This brings us to the Holy Spirit, verses the evil spirit. Once our belief in the evil spirit diminishes, it began to masquerade as the true spirit. The devil's plan from the beginning of creation was to destroy the believability of God.
There are those who claim to possess the Spirit of God, yet they cannot get along with their brothers and sisters. There are many who claim to speak with the voice of the Holy Spirit, yet they do not agree. Those that ask the hard question, (Why?) are quickly silenced and left with the impression that they are fortunate to be a part of the only group of believers in the whole world. The question of what is the Spirit of God, even though it is answerable, might not be able to be seen by those who ask the question because much of what we hear and see is detrimental to the building of our individual faith. On any given Sunday, tune in to the Christian Television broadcast, listen to the radio, observe and hear how the Holy Spirit act and what it has to say. The entertainment aspect of worship, the prosperity gospel, to a person living with cancer, there is one word that will describe it, 'confusing'.
Two thousand years ago God existed, but did he change? The Holy Spirit was in existence in the beginning, but was it seems to have been a different type of Holy Spirt that the one we have today? Did our increase in knowledge of good and evil cause God to change? What is understanding the so-call "rising and setting of the sun" prove or changes? We can debate the rising and setting of the sun or the earth revolving around the sun to the infinite degree, but it will not change the properties of day and night. We can move our clocks forward or we can move them backward, what have we changed?
Acts 9:16-18 for I* will show to him how much he must suffer for my name. And Ananias went and entered into the house; and laying his hands upon him he said, Saul, brother, the Lord has sent me, Jesus that appeared to thee in the way in which thou camest, that thou mightest see, and be filled with the Holy Spirit. And straightway there fell from his eyes as it were scales, and he saw, and rising up was baptized;
Please note in the above verse, God did not say, "let there be day and night". God commanded the light to come forth, thereby amplifying the opposite, which he later dealt with. From the creative aspects of God, there were certain rules that were followed. For every action, attribute or entity, there is an opposite. One is created and the other is the effect of the creation. For the light to be effective there had to be a division or separation between the light and the darkness. Good cannot exist without evil, nor can day exist if there is no night. Imagine trying to define love in an environment free from hate. Man is composed of two natures that are opposite of each other. The Bible speaks of and define the Natural man and the Spiritual man. There is the Spirit of God and there is the spirit of man. The Spirit of God modifies the Spiritual nature of man and is controlled by God, whereas the Spirit of man is subjective to the control worly influences.
There is a thin veil that separates the Holy from the unholy, it is the knowledge of good and evil that seeks to define this separation. It was the God intent to protect man, his prized creation from this strange malady, when he warned him to abstain from the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil. The knowledge of good and evil allows humanity to analyze and debate the thin line that separates what is good from that which is evil. The very presence of this knowledge allows the evil to masquerade as good and it also causes our good deeds to be accepted as evil.
A simple analogy, using day and night, the day was once set aside for work and the night was for resting and bonding with family. The knowledge of good and evil, of day and night allowed mankind to extend the working hours and reshape the waking and sleeping habits of humanity. In many instances this was not good for the family structure. Many children grew up hearing these words, "be quiet, your father is sleeping", setting the stage for the single family syndrome.
As the possessor of the knowledge of good and evil, mankind under the tutelage of an evil spirit gained the ability to manipulate the abstracts. The line that separated the truth from a lie was defined as a thin gray area and the definition of truth became relative to what side of the line you choose to stand. As knowledge began to increase God's creation began to question the things it could not see and touch. Lies began to masquerade as the truth. The ambitious professor then stated, "Truth is that which is formed within a person's mind that bring peace to his inner longing." That thin gray area is expanding and things that society once abhorred is now declared acceptable.
What we see in the struggle of the secular philosophers, the ambitious professors, throughout time is the quest for knowledge through logic and discussions. This is good, but this type of search for knowledge provide no real answers. Many have come to realize that debates and discussions among philosophers seems to produce mostly more discussions and debates. Those who escape the pitfall of an evil society are easily drawn into the philosophers creed seeking to prove or disprove the existence of God. Paul should have put this quest to rest when he stated in 1 Corinthians 2:14 "But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned."
There are many grandfather today remember growing up listening to their grandfathers tell ghost stories. They heard the stories and they believed and were afraid. As a grandfather today try telling your grandchildren about ghosts, a wink from a parent would indicate that granddaddy was getting old and senile. Our belief in the spiritual world has suffered because of our increased knowledge. This brings us to the Holy Spirit, verses the evil spirit. Once our belief in the evil spirit diminishes, it began to masquerade as the true spirit. The devil's plan from the beginning of creation was to destroy the believability of God.
There are those who claim to possess the Spirit of God, yet they cannot get along with their brothers and sisters. There are many who claim to speak with the voice of the Holy Spirit, yet they do not agree. Those that ask the hard question, (Why?) are quickly silenced and left with the impression that they are fortunate to be a part of the only group of believers in the whole world. The question of what is the Spirit of God, even though it is answerable, might not be able to be seen by those who ask the question because much of what we hear and see is detrimental to the building of our individual faith. On any given Sunday, tune in to the Christian Television broadcast, listen to the radio, observe and hear how the Holy Spirit act and what it has to say. The entertainment aspect of worship, the prosperity gospel, to a person living with cancer, there is one word that will describe it, 'confusing'.
Two thousand years ago God existed, but did he change? The Holy Spirit was in existence in the beginning, but was it seems to have been a different type of Holy Spirt that the one we have today? Did our increase in knowledge of good and evil cause God to change? What is understanding the so-call "rising and setting of the sun" prove or changes? We can debate the rising and setting of the sun or the earth revolving around the sun to the infinite degree, but it will not change the properties of day and night. We can move our clocks forward or we can move them backward, what have we changed?
Acts 9:16-18 for I* will show to him how much he must suffer for my name. And Ananias went and entered into the house; and laying his hands upon him he said, Saul, brother, the Lord has sent me, Jesus that appeared to thee in the way in which thou camest, that thou mightest see, and be filled with the Holy Spirit. And straightway there fell from his eyes as it were scales, and he saw, and rising up was baptized;
There are two interesting points to be made in this scripture, (1) There was a promise that Saul would suffer, (2) The laying of hands and how Saul instantly received the Holy Ghost. For I will show him, this seems to be added to encourage Ananias. He had feared Saul. The Lord now informs him that Saul, who once was his enemy, would ever after be his friend. He would not merely profess repentance, but would manifest the sincerity of it by encountering trials and reproaches for his sake.
When Paul set out opn his journey he was controlled by the natural lust of man. He was ruled by his quest for power and wealth. Paul was a highly educated man, therefore he understood the realities of life. By todays standards we could say he was blessed. As he traveled to the road to bring pain and grief to the church, he was confronted and convicted by a simple question, "Saul, why dost thou persecute me?" The persecution of the church was to suppress the workings of the Holy Spirit and allow the spirit of man to flourish. This was to allow for the creation of a religion that was alien to the Word of God.
The Holy Spirit prepared Paul to suffer in the flesh for Christ sake. In today's Christian environment, we are not prepared to suffer. We want, and we beg for the goodness of Heaven here on earth. Our prayers are a request for blessings and miracles.
Romans 8:5 For they that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh; but they that are after the Spirit the things of the Spirit.
Galatians 5:22-23 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, long-suffering, kindness, goodness, fidelity, meekness, self-control: against such things there is no law.
The thin line that separate the Holy from the unholy has been expanded and that which is unholy is now accepted as Holy.
When Paul set out opn his journey he was controlled by the natural lust of man. He was ruled by his quest for power and wealth. Paul was a highly educated man, therefore he understood the realities of life. By todays standards we could say he was blessed. As he traveled to the road to bring pain and grief to the church, he was confronted and convicted by a simple question, "Saul, why dost thou persecute me?" The persecution of the church was to suppress the workings of the Holy Spirit and allow the spirit of man to flourish. This was to allow for the creation of a religion that was alien to the Word of God.
The Holy Spirit prepared Paul to suffer in the flesh for Christ sake. In today's Christian environment, we are not prepared to suffer. We want, and we beg for the goodness of Heaven here on earth. Our prayers are a request for blessings and miracles.
Romans 8:5 For they that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh; but they that are after the Spirit the things of the Spirit.
Galatians 5:22-23 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, long-suffering, kindness, goodness, fidelity, meekness, self-control: against such things there is no law.
The thin line that separate the Holy from the unholy has been expanded and that which is unholy is now accepted as Holy.
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