In this
third teaching about the postures of prayer we will highlight the importance of
seeking our maturity in the things of the spirit for we are required to exercise
our senses and be clean, set apart to walk in holiness. Holiness is who we are
called to be, and it is not a thought or suggestion, but a command from our
Lord to us. He is holy and does not mix anything of who He is and the ways of
His Kingdom with the things of the world or its ruler. Therefore, some other
things to consider and become strong at as believers in our walk as a mature
bride include:
Discernment
– It is the
supernatural ability of the Holy Spirit to distinguish between the
manifestations of the Holy Spirit, demonic spirits, or human spirits. When we
discern in the atmosphere around us or when a person is speaking, we are to be
able to tell the spirit in operation. This comes with practice. Hebrews 5:14
says,
“But
solid food is for the mature, who by constant use have trained
themselves to distinguish good from evil.” NIV
Isaiah
11:1-4 also says,
1”And there shall come forth a
Shoot out of the stock of Jesse [David’s father], and a Branch out of his roots
shall grow and bear fruit.
2 And the Spirit of the Lord shall
rest upon Him—the Spirit of wisdom and understanding, the Spirit of counsel and
might, the Spirit of knowledge and of the reverential and obedient
fear of the Lord—
3 And shall make Him of quick
understanding, and His delight shall be in the
reverential and obedient fear of the Lord. And He shall not judge by
the sight of His eyes, neither decide by the hearing of His ears;
4 But with
righteousness and justice shall He judge the poor and decide with
fairness for the meek, the poor, and the downtrodden of the earth;
and He shall smite the earth and the oppressor with the rod of His
mouth, and with the breath of His lips He shall slay the wicked.” AMPC
In its
basic explanation, by the Spirit of the Lord, we are to discern as He overshadows
us with His wisdom, knowledge, and understanding, and with His counsel about
the situations or the people we are dealing with, or what we are seeing in the
spirit realm about someone or something when we are interceding. The spirit of
the fear of the Lord on us also leads us to make the right judgment about these
things.
It is
the righteousness of Jesus that leads us to make these judgments to whether we
are seeing something that is divine, demonic, or human, so when we open our
mouths to render the right assessment or judgment about it in prayer, it is not
from self-righteousness which could give us the wrong view about what we are
seeing or hearing. This is especially important if we have been wounded or
offended and have not sought to be healed. The enemy would use those areas in
our soul that are not healed to cause us to see the wrong things, instead of
seeing with the eyes of love like Jesus. So, when our filters are healed, we
can then see clearly.
An
example of this comes from King Solomon, who rendered a rightful judgment for
two harlots that came to him disputing over a baby. The baby of one of them had
died and this woman switched the dead baby for the baby of the other woman who
was alive. When the mother of the living baby noticed that the dead baby was
not hers, she argued with the other woman all the way to the king’s court to
try to get her baby back. But the king did something rather unusual to uncover
who the real mother of the living child was.1 Kings 3:24-28 says,
24 “Then the king said, “Bring me a
sword.” So they brought a sword before the king. 25 And
the king said, “Divide the living child in two, and give half to one, and half
to the other.”
26 Then the woman whose
son was living spoke to the king, for she yearned with compassion for
her son; and she said, “O my lord, give her the living child, and by no means
kill him!”
But
the other said, “Let him be neither mine nor
yours, but divide him.”
27 So the king answered and said,
“Give the first woman the living child, and by no means kill him;
she is his mother.”
28 And all Israel heard of the
judgment which the king had rendered; and they feared the king, for they saw
that the wisdom of God was in him to administer justice.” AMPC
In the
New Testament, Jesus also used discernment. A paralytic man had been brought to
Him and He healed the man, but also told him that his sins were forgiven. This reveals
that the man’s sinful living brought the sickness Jesus healed him from. But
many around him started calling His actions and words a blasphemy in their
minds. Jesus, discerning their thoughts said in Matthew 9:4-8,
4 “But Jesus, knowing their
thoughts, said, “Why do you think evil in your hearts? 5 For
which is easier, to say, ‘Your sins are forgiven you,’ or to say, ‘Arise
and walk’? 6 But that you may know that the Son of
Man has power on earth to forgive sins”—then He said to the
paralytic, “Arise, take up your bed, and go to your house.” 7 And
he arose and departed to his house.” AMPC
We can
see that as Jesus exposed the root of the sickness and forgave the sin that
brought the manifestation of the sickness, He then declared the man healed and
the manifestation of His words to the man came immediately after rendering the
right judgment about the person and what it would take for the healing to
manifest.
1
Thessalonians 5:19-22 also gives us some indication of our responsibility as
believers to learn to discern righteously. It says, 19 “Do
not quench the Spirit. 20 Do not despise
prophecies. 21 Test all things; hold fast what is
good. 22 Abstain from every form of evil.” AMPC
Cleaning
our hearts – Keeping
our hearts clean is also important to help us see the answers to our prayers.
Luke 6:45 tells us,
“A
good man out of the good treasure of his heart brings forth good; and
an evil man out of the evil treasure of his heart brings forth evil.
For out of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaks.”
This can
be reflected in the way we pray and for that reason we need to keep a forgiving
heart towards those who have hurt or offended us. It is true that many times,
it is hard to forgive others, but our right response is to seek God to heal us
from the hurt in our hearts because every sin committed by us or by others cuts
at our soul until we leak out unrighteousness in its various forms. Some of
those forms may be unforgiveness, gossip, slander, anger, or pride, which are
all rooted in fear. This fear could have us put up walls that keep others out
to prevent them from hurting us further. But it also keeps us in as in a siege
that will not allow us to heal from what hurts or easily offends us. For this,
seeking the healing of our hearts (soul) is essential.
This is
also important because the filters in our hearts keep us from seeing clearly
like when the filter in the drier is not clean which causes the clothes to take
longer time to dry. It also forces the machine to work harder at doing the job
it was designed to do. So, just like the drier needs the up-keep of the filter
cleansed after each use, we need to seek God for our healing from hurts and
offenses continually so we, in turn, can see clearly the things of the spirit
and judge the people and situations we see fairly and with the love of Jesus
and not like the devil would, with accusations and rejection when that is not
necessary.
Another
thing we need to be mindful of is the things we allow to get through our gates
which are our eyes, ears, nose, mouth, and sexual organs. When we put bad
images, dark movies or dark music with the wrong kind of language, or when
there is drug abuse or alcoholism or other kinds of substance abuse, or sex
outside of marriage, all of those defiling, abominable, or deceiving things get
in the way of our righteous judgment on things, and therefore, keep us from
seeing the answers to our prayers if they are other than repenting and asking
God to help us be set free from the bondage. In other words, living
unrighteously does not get us the answer for more money, or for health, or for
peace, or for favor or the right relationships in our lives.
Revelations
21:8 explains, “’But the cowardly,
unbelieving, abominable, murderers, sexually immoral, sorcerers,
idolaters, and all liars shall have their part in the lake which burns with
fire and brimstone, which is the second death.’” NKJV
Galatians
5:19-21 also lets us know that, 19-21 “It is obvious
what kind of life develops out of trying to get your own way all the time:
repetitive, loveless, cheap sex; a stinking accumulation of mental and
emotional garbage; frenzied and joyless grabs for happiness; trinket gods;
magic-show religion; paranoid loneliness; cutthroat competition; all-consuming-yet-never-satisfied
wants; a brutal temper; an impotence to love or be loved; divided homes and
divided lives; small-minded and lopsided pursuits; the vicious habit of
depersonalizing everyone into a rival; uncontrolled and uncontrollable addictions;
ugly parodies of community. I could go on.
This
isn’t the first time I have warned you, you know. If you use your freedom this
way, you will not inherit God’s kingdom.” MSG
Revelation
21:27 also admonishes, “But there shall by no means enter
it anything that defiles, or causes an abomination or a lie, but only
those who are written in the Lamb’s Book of Life.” NKJV
Cleaning
our homes – One
other thing to do is to clean our homes from any object that represents
idolatry and the occult. These things keep a person in bondage and keep the
blessings of God from manifesting. Many manifestations of the enemy come from
those objects and God calls us to abstain from those objects and keep our homes
free from this kind of leaven which represents the bad kind of influence in our
lives from demonic spirits. Some of those items can be books, skeletons and
figures that have skulls or skeletons such as in our clothes or jewelry. I have
seen how these things have become fashionable, but they call death to the
wearer.
Furthermore,
those who practice the occult, and there is no such thing as good sorcery or
witchcraft, are opening themselves for the spirit of the Antichrist to cause
them to behave like him. This spirit only wants to kill, steal, and destroy
others. But the bad thing about it is that as the golden rule states in Luke
6:31, “And as you would like and desire that men
would do to you, do exactly so to them.” AMPC. This
goes both ways, if we bless and always want the best for others, we are sowing
that to come to us, but for those who choose to want and do evil towards
others, that is what will come on them who practice such evil for their own
selfish gain.
Exodus
12:19 tells us, “For seven days no yeast is to be found in your
houses. And anyone, whether foreigner or native-born, who eats anything
with yeast in it must be cut off from the community of Israel.”
This passage
speaks of the Jewish preparation for the feasts which included cleaning their
houses from anything defiling, abominable, or deceiving as mentioned in this
post. This is an important ordinance because in the same way that God asks us
to take care of our hearts, He also commands us to be mindful of what goes on
in our environments that could derail us away from Him and of His ways. So
other things to remove from our midst that are not pleasing to God include amulets,
charms, statues, altars to false gods, pictures, CDs, DVDs and everything that
God shows you is not pleasing to Him. The same goes for relationships He does
not approve of, TV programs He may command to stop watching, and so on.
1
Corinthians 5:6-8 says, “6 Your boasting is
not good. Don’t you know that a little yeast leavens the whole batch
of dough? 7 Get rid of the old yeast, so that you
may be a new unleavened batch—as you really are. For Christ, our Passover lamb,
has been sacrificed.8 Therefore let us keep the
Festival, not with the old bread leavened with malice and wickedness, but with
the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.” NIV
Luke
12:1 also relate to us the warning words of Jesus to His disciples about the wrong doctrines
and teachings that come from the contamination with the things that oppose the
truth of His word and the holiness (set apart to live for Him and His ways as
representatives of His Kingdom on earth) He wants to live by.
“[Beware of Hypocrisy]
In the meantime, when an innumerable multitude of people
had gathered together, so that they trampled one another, He began to say
to His disciples first of all, “Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees,
which is hypocrisy.”
To Him
alone be all the Glory. ■
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