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Spirit vs. Flesh
22 February 2014
Episode #377
With Martha Kilpatrick and hosted by John Enslow
Special guests: Jim Pierce, Jacquelyn Nawrocki and Carole Nelson
(J) And the spiritual man can judge what is spirit and what is not.
(M) Good.
(J) And also can judge God’s response. Because it may not be what you think it is.
(M) That’s brilliant, thank you. I hadn’t thought of that, but one of my favorite passages is, ah, I think it’s 2 Cor.2. I’m determined to be in second Corinthians. “But the natural man does not receive the things of God, they are foolishness to him.” In fact it goes on to say, the natural man, that is the soul man, opposes God, sometimes in the guise of serving Him. “The spiritual man…” What Jim?
(Jim) What you just said was a definition, or seems like, was a definition of, uhm, to me I was listening to what John was saying about worship and, I’m just very rarely affected by songs wherever I hear them or if I’m experiencing them live. And a lot of that is just my internal, well I believe it’s internal, I judge; the Lord’s working on that in me every day. What you just described was what’s going on; we’re rebelling, so there’s really not a lot of real worship going on because there’s too much rebellion going on all the time, and so it’s foolishness but we don’t even ‘get that’. We’re just going on with it. I’m just ‘go along with it’. And I try to find, I’m trying to find my, a connection place for me, my spirit. If I don’t know what that is, or even have an understanding of it, I’m going along with the rest of everybody else, because they’re really, and in their defense, they don’t know any different because they’ve never been taught or shown or seen or desired to know. I don’t know what it is. So it’s just foolishness. I wanted to say a minute ago too, and I can’t find where I was reading, but something you wrote, I don’t know if it was in the booklet, or if it was in “All And Only” where you talk about trees, I think in the very beginning. Anyway, that Adam and Eve chose the tree of knowledge over really, revelation, over experience with God. What a foolish thing to do; and that’s what we all, that’s where I’ve lived my life. I didn’t know I made that choice. I was tricked.
(M) Well John you brought up the natural man versus the spiritual man, and it’s, it is 1 Corinthians 2 (Martha laughs) 14, “The natural man”, that’s the soul, that’s the ‘self’; that’s your human natural ‘self’, we all have it; it’s the Adamic nature. “The natural man does not accept the things of the Spirit of God.” Even those who think they’re saved, one way you know they’re not saved is they don’t ‘get’, they can’t hear, they can’t ‘get it’, the things of God. They may try, and then they think they do and then they think they’re saved. It’s a self-deception rather than, than being tricked. But never the less, the natural man, “they are foolishness to him and he cannot understand them because they’re spiritually appraised. But he who is spiritual appraises all things, yet he himself is appraised by now one.” And the Amplified is fabulous about this. It says, “The spiritual man knows all things, appraises all things, and can know all things and understand all things, but no one can get an understanding of him.” The New American says, “He is appraised by no one.” “For who has known the mind of the Lord.” So the spiritual man, I think it’s Spark’s that says, it’s just a man led by, dominated by the Spirit; same definition here. If the Spirit is the source of what you know and are, then you are a spiritual man, and you can get it, you can understand everything because the Spirit will explain it to you. So, so thanks John.
(J) Well we have a new blogger; Aaron is actually doing a series of those exposing his own pharisaical choice. And he basically in his posts, reveals how basically he was choosing knowledge, and gathering of knowledge over relationship with Him; and actually at the core of it is choosing knowledge over Him, and that goes back to what Jim said with the tree of knowledge. And that’s what Adam and Eve did, they chose knowledge over Christ; they chose knowledge over God and dwelling with Him. And isn’t that what a Pharisee is, is someone who chooses knowledge over the actual Person of Christ.
(M) “You search the scriptures because in them you think you find Me; but you will not come to Me.”
(Jacquelyn) Do you choose knowledge over repentance?
(M) I think that’s true.
(Jacquelyn) Because for me, I tried and tried and tried and tried, and had the delusion that I was doing it.
(M) Tried what, to know, or to repent?
(Jacquelyn) Tried to know, tried to ‘be’, tried to be a good Christian. But the answer was repentance; because when you ‘try’, that’s knowledge. That’s going to the Word and saying, ‘I know’, I can do it, and I don’t need Christ. In order to need Christ I have to repent of not needing Him.
(M) I believe that was relevant. (Martha, giggles)
(J) Well if I’ve, if I’ve offended somebody I’m in relationship with, I have to go and ask their forgiveness and deal with them on it. But if it’s knowledge, I just know, but repentance is relationship. And that’s what we’re saying, do you prefer, you know, knowledge over, over Him, well that would include wouldn’t it, relationship and repentance because of the fact that if you’re dealing with a Person, I’m human so I’m going to be stumbling and bumbling and I’m gonna have to be repenting because I’m dealing with a person. If I’m dealing with a book, I don’t have to deal with, I don’t ever have to really repent, because it’s all concepts; I can just suggest them; and I can just adopt them; and I can’t just speak them. But if I’m dealing with a Person I have to deal with how my actions affected them, how they were hurt by me, how I, you know, disappointed them, whatever it is. Does that make sense?
(M) I have never heard repentance put like that John, never. I never thought of it like that, that because it’s about, it’s about a Person, and the Person you offend is Christ, and the Spirit. Goodness, that’s amazing; in knowledge you can live isolated and not be challenged. If you know, you gather yourself a people who know the same thing you know, and so you’re never challenged. That’s the function of the Body of Christ is it’s a check’s and balance that’s healthy. That’s awesome. And so the Body of Christ is relationship too, the people, the people who live by knowledge tend to isolate themselves so they won’t be challenged, “don’t challenge my knowledge!” So, that’s brilliant.
(Carole) The scripture that’s rolling around in my head, and I can’t remember exactly, you talked about the purpose of God, and the first thing that came to my mind was, in the New Living translation, Ephesians 1. “God has now revealed to us, His plan concerning Christ; a plan to fulfill His own good pleasure. And this is the plan, at the right time He will bring everything unto the obedience, under the authority of Christ, everything in heaven and on earth.” So it’s an issue of authority. And you cannot have a relationship without authority. You do not have a relationship without authority. And then I thought of 2 Cor. 10:3-5, “For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through the pulling down of strongholds, and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of Christ; and bringing every thought unto the obedience of Jesus Christ.” So again, it is relationship, and the relationship is a relationship of authority. And I wonder for me, I have been independent of Christ, when not under His authority, when I am not in the Spirit it’s because I am independent of Christ and not under His authority at that moment.
(M) So it’s what Jim said. If you’re in the soul, you’re in rebellion. Two things we think, we think there’s good in us, we think we can do good, and then we think we can know without God.
(Carole) And so it’s really, being in the flesh is being absolutely presumptuous. We presume that we know something, or someone that we don’t. I presume on my goodness, my own goodness, and speak out of that. If I have judged it good, then I speak out of that and not out of my relationship of submission, ask and surrender to the Lord and His authority.
Thank you for podcast and amazing comments.
Listening to the podcast this morning I can attest to the incredible move by our Father when we put ourselves under His delegated and designated authority. For many years I have been the decision maker/mom while my husband travelled for work. Our grown daughter was living out of town. She called me to tell me about how miserable she was, how she wanted to come home. I was astounded at how unhappy this lovely, successful and popular young woman was! The crux of the matter was–she had learned rebellion from me and was paying the price. But God has been faithful to bring authority into my life as I have repented deeply over the cost to His Son and keeping those in my life from knowing Him by my religiousness and rebellion to my husband’s authority. So I took a deep breath and asked my daughter to put it to her dad and obey whatever his decision would be. He is very stern and hardworking and she insisted that he would not want her to give up her successful position. But she agreed to abide by any decision from him. To her amazement, as soon as he heard her plea, he began–with no hesitation– arrangements for her to return home! He said he would come and get her that moment–
Our loving Father is the same.
so much in this podcast!
it made me think of the times the surface of a person is seen and either accepted or rejected, but the heart of the person is never heard or known … how we can read a book and accept it or reject it without ever knowing the heart of the author … it is knowing the heart that brings understanding to the words spoken, whether in a book or by a person …. this holds true as well for scripture … it is knowing the heart of the Author that makes all the difference ….it is knowing His heart that brings life to every moment of every day .. it is knowing His heart that keeps us from slippimg into rebellion … so much here to ponder …. thank you for feeding me so well! such wonderful fresh warm bread!
Could someone please explain the statement “it is not possible to have a relationship without authority”?
I am thinking of my own relationships and I don’t see where authority comes in.
I think that Carole was talking about how everything will come under the authority of Christ. Every relationship is about God in some way, and God is my Authority in everything, especially in relationships. This whole podcast reminded me of an awesome article series Martha wrote called “Our God Reigns.” She goes into great detail on how authority works, and I’m inspired to read it again. I just saw it on ReadMK.com if you want to read it, too.
Hey Sheila, thank you for commenting. How is Malawi? Really grateful for Lynn’s response as we are snowed preparing for the conference. I do completely agree with her and the reference she mentioned is awesome. I can also recommend “The Separator” for more about how authority operates in relationships, it’s a must-read.
Bless you John!
http://www.readmk.com/the-separator/