Monday, December 31, 2007

Training


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Christian spiritual training is this: "Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. But he said to me, 'My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.' Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me". (2 Corinthians 12:8-9). Paul wanted the thorn removed but God wanted to teach Paul that "the sufficiency of His grace" in the worst of human circumstances is that when a person is weak in a temporal sense while the person is strong spiritually by God's Grace in eternal sense. If I keep forgetting the basic meanings of God's grace, I would become a bitter, angry, and cantankerous person just because things are not going "my way". Grace teaches me that I am to continue to rejoice and praise God even in the midst of my trials and suffering in this earthly life! This is related to the Beatitudes of a "happy paradox" to focus on God's power to control my thoughts. So, how I do I endure through my trials? Paul wrote in 2 Corinthians 12:9-10: "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness. Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me. That is why, for Christ's sake, I delight in weaknesses (i.e. illnesses), in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong." When I am forgetting God and His grace, I am confused between flesh with my spiritual life. The characteristics of my flesh are independence and self-will which hinders my spiritual growth. God have been pushes me to the limits of my flesh where a choice must be made. The choice is either to say, "I will not surrender," or "I will surrender" which is submitting to Him is breaking the hard shell of my flesh, which allows my spiritual life to emerge. The Holy Spirit narrows it down every time to one thing (see Matthew 5:23-24 ).

What have we learned in this "life" is that we are to have spiritual fruits.
a. Fruit of Patience: Hebrews 10:36, James 1:3
b. Fruit of Joy: Psalm 30:5, Psalm 126:6.
c. Fruit of Knowledge: Psalm 94:12
d. Fruit of Maturity: 1 Peter 5:10

Trials come to test the strength of our faith because they assist us in the knowledge of our own faith. (Genesis 22:1-18, Malachi 3:3-4, 1 Peter 1:6-9). Trials come to us to reveal what we really love. Trials including disability which teaches us that the greatest good of the Christian life is not absence of pain, but Christ-likeness and to do His will. Trials including disabilities teaches us that God is more concerned with the character He is building in us, He comforts us in His arms through His power of Grace on the journey to His destiny for us as Paul explains: Not only so, but we also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope.” (Romans 5:3-4) If we don’t take care of ourselves it’s because we don’t think we have time. Yet no one else can take responsibility for our private lives. Health is mental, emotional, physical, and spiritual wholeness. Health is a gift from God, but we are responsible alone to create a proper balance with rest, recreation, nutrition, and exercise.
How do I allow the Holy Spirit to transform my life?

Holy Spirit will convict me to make such amendments as the circumstances demand.

We can always trust the moving and the leading of the Holy Spirit in our lives and experiences, but we cannot always trust our human leanings and our fleshly and carnal desires. A.W. Tozer

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