Tag Archives: learning

Living And Learning!

Live in the Spirit!

Do you ever have something the Spirit is teaching you and you get it, but you just can’t seem to communicate it?  It’s in your heart and in your head, but you just can’t seem to find the words?

The Lord has been teaching me something pretty incredible lately.  It’s one of those things that I have known what the Bible has to say for a long time.  I could even quote the verse and I may have even gotten the gist of it, but now God is taking me deeper and I still don’t totally have it, but I am beginning to get it after a lot of lessons.

We often work so hard to try to make something obvious in the physical and the harder we work, the more hard work we have to do.  It’s almost as if it is a never-ending battle.  But in the spiritual, you don’t have to make anything obvious, because the Spirit does all the hard work for you.  In the Spirit, the obvious is obvious to those in the Spirit!

When you are working hard in the physical to try to make something obvious, you often can’t see and have no understanding of the spiritual, because you are so focused on the physical.  You don’t want to see and don’t want to understand the spiritual, because it would reveal how wrong and what a waste of time and energy your life has been in the physical.

I know this is all a little complex, but I believe it is a big part of what the Spirit has been trying to teach me over the past several months and what the Spirit was talking about when He said in 1 Corinthians 2:14 “14 But a natural man does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually appraised.”

Sometimes, I find myself trying to explain spiritual things to people and I think to myself, “this should be obvious to them”, but I am assuming they are spiritual, because they say they are spiritual, but if they are really as spiritual as they say they are, then I would not have to explain it, because the Spirit would and is making it clear and obvious.  Many times in my own life, I have missed the spiritually obvious, because I was stuck in the physical.

So many of our conversations and discussions are a total waste of time and energy because we are wasting physical energy, while we should be living powerful spiritual lives or we are wasting spiritual energy on people who are stuck and not budging in the physical.  Jesus said in Matthew 7:6 “Do not give dogs what is sacred; do not throw your pearls to pigs. If you do, they may trample them under their feet, and turn and tear you to pieces.”

Now does this mean that we become so heavenly minded that we don’t do any earthly good?  Of course not.  We will do earthly/physical good, if we are heavenly/spiritual minded, because it just comes natural in a spiritual kinda way.  Galatians 5:16 puts it simply: “So I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh.”

I do not totally have all of this, but the Spirit is giving me new insight almost everyday and this is a very cool thing, because I have found that physically my arms and hands have come down by my side and I am experiencing a peace that words cannot explain, because I am finally beginning to understand what Jesus was saying when He told His disciples in Matthew 10:14 “Whoever does not receive you, nor heed your words, as you go out of that house or that city, shake the dust off your feet.”  It’s not your job to convince, but if you are convinced then you will find that living in the Spirit is so much better than anything physical!

10 Questions!

Life Is Amazing! Many years ago, when I was a teenager, I read a book by Leo Buscagalia called “Living, Loving & Learning!”  I then had the opportunity via PBS to hear him lecture on a number of different occasions.  A few weeks ago, I came across a hardback copy of “Loving Each Other!” and it took me back to those magical days, when I made some great strides in my spiritual journey.

Intersections! I grew up in Church and had been taught the Scriptures from a very early age.  I knew the teachings of Jesus and they had challenged and changed my life.  When I heard Leo Buscaglia, his teaching helped me to take what I had been taught and exercise it in the daily living of my life.  He helped me to put feet to my faith!

The Amazing Gift Of Love! This amazing love that has been given to me as a gift is something that I get to share and in its sharing, love becomes so much more powerful and meaningful!  Below are a few questions that Dr. Buscaglia challenges us to think about.  These are not his exact questions, but my adaptation of some of the encouragement and challenge that I have received from his teaching and writing. I would encourage you to ask yourself these questions every day as you embark on this journey called life!   I hope you enjoy and learn to love and be loved!

1.) Did I share happiness or did I steal happiness with my actions and reactions?

2.) How did I express love and show kindness?

3.) Am I looking for what is right or for what is wrong in others?

4.) Do I laugh and help others to laugh?  (Is joy a by-product of my life?)

5.) What have I done today to build and make stronger my relationships?

6.) Have I worried over the trivial or celebrated the triumphant?

7.) Have I accepted forgiveness and given forgiveness?

8.) Have I learned something new and have I taught something new to others?

9.) Do I know and believe that life (mine and yours) matters?

10.) Will I let this make me better or bitter?

Don’t Miss The New Thing!

The past is good and tradition is good, as long as we do not get stuck in it! The good thing about the past and tradition is that they can instruct us into a better and more productive future, if we are paying attention and learning for what they are teaching.

It is very easy to get “set in your ways”. We restrict ourselves from the forward progress that God has for us because we get stuck in our personal perspectives.  If we are not careful, we will find yourself in a rut of our own making, because we have gotten stuck in our own thinking!

Remember This! It is very important to remember that our God is a Creator!  As a creator, God is always doing something new.  But God can’t and won’t accomplish something new in and through our lives, if we are not willing to change.  We must be ready to enlarge our vision and expand our thinking – if we are to experience the new creation of our Amazing Creator God!

Don’t Miss It! In Isaiah 43:19  God says: “Behold I am doing a new thing!  Do you not perceive it and know it?” God wants to grow you!  God wants to promote you!  God wants to give you increase!  God wants to do something new, magnificent and unexplainable in and through your life.  God wants to do a new thing in and through you!  Did you notice the question in Isaiah?  It says:  “Can you not perceive it?”  If you can’t from your perspective, see the new thing that God wants to do in and through you, then you need to change your perspective!

Learn And Grow! Learn from the past and appreciate tradition, but don’t get stuck there, because if you do, you will miss the new thing that God is doing!

A Pray To Pray! Thank you God for our past and for helping us to learn from our mistakes and failures!  Thank you for tradition and for how it reminds me of Your faithfulness, goodness and grace!  Help us Lord to appreciate, but not get stuck in these places.  We don’t want to miss the new thing that you are doing.  Please let us be right in the middle of Your perfect will!