Walking with God

  Prior to our life here on earth we were spirit beings. The Bible  says God knew us before the foundations of the earth were laid. I believe we knew Him also. The disconnection we feel now is because of circumstances out of our control. God’s ultimate plan is a sinless creation where there is no evil. A place where violence and hatred are not found. A place without sickness and disease. A place where all of us live in harmony. The Bible says, “God created light and God created Darkness.” Sin came into our world from a fallen being named Lucifer.  He spread his sickness to the human race, and all of us have been infected ever since. We have all fallen short of the mark that God created us to reach. This is why we all need a Savior to pay our sin debt for us, because we are incapable of paying for it ourselves.

The journey you are about to  embark on through this article is not for everyone. As a matter of fact, the overwhelming majority of people will not be willing to make the sacrifice necessary to break away from the habitual imperfections of ordinary life.  Many people will begin the walk of toward virtue through church membership, baptism, and minimal Bible study. Most of us will, however, fail to enter the narrow gate because of a lack of courage, unwillingness to relinquish our will, and through ignorance. Others try to commune with God, but have no one to direct their steps and to teach them how to proceed in their spiritual growth. How sad it is to see so many wounded souls unable to advance  to a closer walk with God.

  The ultimate goal of this article is a total transformation of your will into the will of God in such a way that every moment you are alive you will be living under God’s loving influence. We will attempt to remove any obvious imperfection that is contrary to our Heavenly Father’s love. Perfection is impossible in this lifetime. We can only strive to achieve a union of likeness with the Son. It is a supernatural union which takes effect when our two wills, the will of God and the will of the soul, are united becoming one. The more we love our Heavenly Father and the more we love others the greater the communion with God will be. It is nothing we do of ourselves, but rather a natural transformation that is a gift from God. All we can do is make ourselves available for the transformation by living according to His word.

To follow Christ is to deny yourself and to seek to be one with God.  For us to escape sin. For us to escape the control it has over our life we have to surrender that sin, our life, to Christ. It is an unnatural act, because the natural person on this earth is possessed by sin. So we need to give over ourselves so that Jesus Christ may possess our hearts, minds and souls. When He has completed this task there is absolutely nothing left in us because all of what we were was sin. Now when we surrender our life, our emotions, our will and our possessions to Christ we become empty. This is the only way God can re-create us in His own likeness. There millions of people who believe there is a God, but are unwilling to lose what they deem as control of their life. People are fooled into believing that they are in charge and the older we get the more we are controlled by Satan, the harder our heart becomes to the gospel, the harder it is to surrender control. They believe in Christ, but they do not give over their life to Him so that He can purify their hearts from sin. It is an amazing thing, we have to surrender to become free, we have to give ourselves away to gain control through Jesus Christ. There is no middle ground. You are either controlled by Satan, or you are saved through faith in Jesus Christ.

And about the ninth hour Jesus cried out with   a loud voice, saying, “Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani?” that is,  “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?” KJV Mark 27:46   This most amazing message is where God separates Himself from Himself. During these few minutes  where the Son and the Father are separated for the first time in all eternity room is made for you and me to be reconciled with God.  The greatest miracle He wrought on this earth is our salvation from sin. He brought us back to reconciliation and re-created the union we had with Him before time began. He annihilated Himself in all things and was brought to the lowest esteem of men when He hung dying from a tree.  There is nothing our imagination can conceive or mind comprehend what Jesus Christ did for us when He sacrificed His life on a cross.

There is no human knowledge and conception in our mortal life that can serve us to reach a union with God.  The only action we can take is an attempt to obey His will, but even then we are incapable of understanding the comprehension of His grace. We simply make ourselves available to Him by denying ourselves  the lusts of this cruel world. As we contemplate our relationship He enlightens our understanding , and this is called the mystery of theology, that is, the secret wisdom of God. It is clear to us that the understanding we seek is blind to the path we walk along in order to be one with God. We cannot assume anything because we are powerless to do any more than take the first step. We have been given some basic guidelines to follow and when we use these methods correctly God will have a work inside of us. I can’t explain to you how it works, I just know from experience that daily Bible study, and prayer transforms us into servants for Jesus Christ, and a son or daughter of God.

  Our first step in this direction is to become an Overcomer.   Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world – the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life – is not of the Father but is of the world.  And the world is passing away, and the lust of it; but he who does the will of God abides forever. 1 John 2:15-17    How do we overcome? He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. For whatever is born of God overcomes the world. And this is the victory that has overcome the world – our faith. 1 John 5:4 We overcome the world and its lust through faith. And how do we receive faith? So then faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God. Romans 10:17 NKJV  We overcome the world through a personal relationship with Jesus Christ through daily Bible study and prayer. When we accept the fact that the Bible is true, and we believe that Jesus is the Son of God, we are changed through the washing and regeneration of the Holy Spirit as we grow in faith through daily Bible study and prayer.

Our next step is to gain control of our mind by, “casting down arguments and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ,  and being ready to punish all disobedience when your obedience is fulfilled.”   2 Corinthians 10:5 NKJV The word imaginations in Greek is logismos. The word means to take inventory of our minds. Most of our thoughts come from the world around us and are contrary to God. There are two powers of the imagination. One is a discursive act by means of imagery, forms and figures brought on by the senses. The other is a picture of ourselves standing at the feet of Jesus while we gaze at the throne of God. All of our former imaginations are to be emptied out of our soul so that we may obtain a divine union with our Creator. The more we advance our spirituality the more the previous things of this world melt away into oblivion. We concentrate our thoughts on the purest form of the word of God.

Now to our daily Bible study and  prayer we add meditation.  We find a comfortable quite place where we begin with prayer. We thank our Heavenly Father for the things He provides for us. We spend time with Him discussing the problems that we and others have. We ask Him to open our spiritual eyes so that we may see and to open our spiritual ears so that we may hear and understand the word of God. We study our Bible passage so that it might be revealed to us the deeper meaning of scripture.

Meditation is looking at a Bible passage in a thoughtful way, giving your complete attention to only one thing for some time and refraining from forming an opinion. We contemplate the meaning, however we let God reach the conclusion. When we have completely studied the subject carefully we empty our mind  and allow the divine light of God to enter our souls. Random thoughts will enter our mind, but we continue with our focus on a thoughtless mind. In time God will lead us on a supernatural knowledge of contemplation, losing all track of time and place. At first our mental habits will keep bringing us back to conscious thought, but we are to push our own thinking aside so we may advance our state of meditation to a higher level. With the help of the Holy Spirit, through time, we will reach a degree of understanding. As many as times we practice to obtain a union with our soul and God we will eventually enter into a contemplative peace without even being conscious that we are meditating. Our greatest goal is to find a peaceful attendance with God.  When we attain this state of mind meditation ceases and our faculties labor no more. We contemplate the love we feel for God and we feel or see nothing further. It is important that we take care to receive the pureness of divine light and that no other knowledge, forms, or thoughts distort what is the pure and divine wisdom of the Son of God.

I want to say with respect to impressions of imaginary, visions, or what other forms of images that may present itself as knowledgeable forms, we must be wary of Satan and his calculating scams that we are not influenced wrongly and cloud  our understanding. We are still a creature of sin and it is important we test  these things with Biblical fact. The main part of visions that are spiritually infused will elude our soul’s grasp and is beyond our ability to comprehend. Spiritual visions do not reach our understanding by the way of the physical senses. The soul sees what it understands through the eyes of the mind and receives new things through internal hearing.  Our mind can also receive things through other mental senses like spiritual taste and pleasure. From all this understanding comes the intelligence of a spiritual vision. These things are communicated to the soul by the supernatural works of God.

A revelation from God  is the disclosure of a hidden truth, revealing a mystery. We relate to our Heavenly Father and delight  in what He reveals to us in the deepest sense of His characteristic personality, His unlimited power, and the sweetness of His love. When our souls feel His healing touch,  we experience a little bit of heaven on earth. Our soul sees so clearly  that afterwards it is impossible to describe in general terms.  The divine knowledge of God never relates to particular things because it is languages unfamiliar to us and cannot be explained. Unless it pertains to some truth that is revealed to us in the Word of God then it can be explained. These things are only available to souls that are in union with God, and where we have relinquished our will  becoming capable of this wonderful knowledge. Through this loving relationship God can be felt and tasted so extremely that it penetrates the inner most workings of our soul. Satan can not interfere with or produce anything close to it because there is no other experience like it. This knowledge of eternal life gives us the power to endure hardship and all the sufferings of this life. It gives us courage and makes us generous in our dealings with other human beings.

  In our divine state God gives thoughts to us with remembrances of Himself and the relationship we enjoyed before the beginning of time.  Sometimes these thoughts are sudden happening even when we are occupied with our daily lives. There are times when the thoughts are so strong they make our body quiver and at other times they are so gentle and quite they remind me of that still small voice that Elijah heard on the mountain top. These divine thoughts come with such a wonderful sense of love and understanding that it humbles me to be in the presence of the Lord. These blessings are not given to anyone who clings to any of their own will. It is an illumination for a purified and Biblically enlightened mind.  I remember the first time the Holy Spirit spoke to me. I was 15, heading over to a buddy’s house to drink homemade beer. He told me, just as plan as day, in an audible voice, “ Don’t Go!” I looked up and to my right and said, “ Don’t worry I can handle it.” That was the biggest lie I ever told because as time went on I learned that anything that was not in God’s plan for me will have undesirable consequences.

Please be aware the awakening of the soul may cause ideas, thoughts, and imaginations from spiritual sources. We have to try these sources and make sure they are from God. “Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God: Hereby know ye the Spirit of God: Every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God: And every spirit that confesses not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is not of God.” 1 John 1:1-3 KJV  Some people report quickly receiving large amounts of information so it is important that we focus our meditation on Bible study and prayer.  We want to enhance our relationship with God and not be led astray. There are many cults that are involved in meditation today who show results in what the Bible calls familiar spirits. These spirits are not for us to mediate with. This is how psychics can foresee past events and communicate with the dead. We are only interested in one spirit, the Holy Spirit of God. An om is a sacred sound that is repeated over and over to bring us into a meditative state. At no time are we to let another human give us our om.  The Bible says that if it be the will of God, Jesus Christ will give us this sound to communicate with Him. Whether He does that here on earth or He waits until we are in heaven is up to His discretion.

There are clues to living a surrendered life. God will reveal spiritual things to some in one way and to others a different way. One of the awakenings of the soul is the spiritual world that is around us every day. Have you ever noticed movement out of the corner of your eye, looked, and there was nothing there? Well pay close attention next time because you are seeing glimpses of a spiritual being. I remember the first time I saw a complete spirit being. I was on my twentieth day of a fast similar to the one described in the book of Daniel and I had abstained from meat and sweets. The sun was shinning through the garage door so I left the lights off as I worked at my bench. I caught a glimpse of  movement out of the corner of my eye. As I turned and looked, there was a tall, very slender person walking by my garage door. He was carrying something very similar to a ipad tablet, except it was smaller and opaque. You could see completely through him/her/it, I am not sure. There were waves of energy resonating from its back like its body was slicing through the atmosphere.  It had arms and legs and a head with some similar facial features. It was hairless and their outer shell or clothes is formed to them so tightly it may not even be clothes at all.  They are thin and extremely fast-moving creatures because they are not affected by gravity and did not need muscles to deal with the atmospheric pressure on earth. As I turned to get a better look, the being noticed me sitting there. Then it realized that I could see it, and it bolted around the corner of the building and disappeared. It had this amazing look on it’s face when it realized I could see him. It was a look of total shock, and then there was great fear in his eyes.  I know now that he wasn’t afraid of me, but the Holy Spirit that resides inside of me. Several times I saw glimpses of this creature inside and outside of my home. Each time he would run from me so fast that he would disappear almost instantly.  I became concerned about his presence so I prayed to my heavenly Father, “If this creature be of Your doing, Father, then he is welcome to stay, however if this creature is in league with Satan then I ask you to remove him from this property. In Jesus Christ’s name I pray, Amen.” I never saw it again.

There is an entire race of people living on this earth that we can’t see. They live in our homes, ride in our cars and influence our lives on a daily basis. They are not what the movies have made them out to be. They are not grotesque monsters that eat human flesh, vampires or werewolves.  There is nothing physical about them at all. I have, however, witnessed several anomalies over the  years. None of them were more complete of a person than this one. I believe that through Bible study, prayer and fasting the spiritual world that exists along side of our world can be evident.  There are stories in the Bible that tell us that we should err on the side of caution because confronting some of these spirits can be dangerous. “No one  should practice witchcraft, or a soothsaying, or one who interprets omens, or a sorcerer, or one who conjures spells, or a medium, or a spiritualist, or one who calls up the dead.  For all who do these things are an abomination to the Lord, and because of these abominations the Lord your God drives them out from before you.” Deuteronomy 18:10-12 The good news is if you are a daily Bible study student, you are well-connected to the Holy Spirit these demon spirits recognize His Presence, and flee. He, the Holy Spirit, is truly the person we should spend our time with. Listening for that still, small voice can be the most rewarding time we can have on this earth, and it is  important we spend time developing our testimony, because this is one of the ways we can defeat Satan. We should make our lives an open book using our faults and mistakes to lead others to Christ.  And they overcame him (Satan) by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony, and they did not love their lives to the death. Revelation 12:11

Fasting is primarily an extension of prayer  and is mentioned eleven times in the Bible. When we go without eating it intensifies our prayer life. Fasting should be taken on slowly and with caution. Some of the adverse symptoms can be dizziness and headaches, However I have found it a rewarding experience. An easy fast that I have undertaken many times is the fast that Daniel undertook in Daniel 10:2-4,  ^“In those days I Daniel was mourning three full weeks. I ate no pleasant bread, neither came flesh nor wine in my mouth, neither did I anoint myself at all, till three whole weeks were fulfilled.” On this fast I go without meat and sweets for 3 weeks. It simply becomes a diet you will need to plan ahead for. Complete fasting has some remarkable stories in the Bible where Jesus and Moses went forty days without eating. There have been modern-day stories of men accomplishing this feat, but I do not believe it is for the average person. In Matthew Jesus tells us that if we had the faith of a mustard seed we could simply move a mountain by speaking to it. He continues, “the casting out of demons takes fasting and prayer.” David says, “fasting humbles and improves his soul.” In the Bible one of the synonyms for fasting is the afflicting of the soul. The apostles fasted when they sought out the Lord for direction. However, we are never commanded in the New Testament to fast. My recommendation is to go from one evening meal to the next evening meal. Allow yourself to drink plenty of water. Set aside a special day so you will have plenty of time for Bible study and prayer.

 There are many truths that can be revealed to us through Bible study, prayer, meditation, and fasting. Some of these truths are meant for us specifically and that is what makes a relationship with God so wonderful. Thanks be to Jesus Christ for His tremendous sacrifice that He made for you and for me. There are many things that will not be revealed to us until we are in heaven. However there is at least 100 lifetimes of knowledge that await us, through our relationship with our Heavenly father, while we are still here on earth. The secret things belong unto the Lord our God: but those things which are revealed belong unto us and to our children for ever, that we may do all the words of this law. Deuteronomy 29:29 KJV

  So this I say, and affirm together with the Lord, that you walk no longer as those of this world walk, in the futility of their mind, being darkened in their understanding, excluded from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, because of the hardness of their heart; and they, having become callous, have given themselves over to sensuality for the practice of every kind of impurity with greediness. But, you did not learn Christ in this way, if indeed you have heard Him and have been taught in Him, just as truth is in Jesus, that, in reference to your former manner of life, you lay aside the old self, which is being corrupted in accordance with the lusts of deceit, and that you be renewed in the spirit of your mind, and put on the new self, which in the likeness of God has been created in righteousness and holiness of the truth. Therefore, put away all lying. Speak truth each one of you with his neighbor, for we are members of one another. Be angry and yet do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your anger, and do not give the devil an opportunity. He who steals must steal no longer; but rather he must labor, performing with his own hands what is good, so that he will have something to share with one who has need. Let no unwholesome word proceed from your mouth, but only such a word as is good for edification according to the need of the moment, so that it will give grace to those who hear. Do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by Whom you were sealed for the day of redemption. Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice. Be kind to one another, tender-hearted, forgiving each other, just as God in Christ also has forgiven you.  Ephesians 4: 17-32 NASB