Our Part

From yesterday…

'The Practice

We have just seen how the High Priest operates if we accept the cross. We shall consider next the practical side; that is, how we may arrive at the experience of having the Lord Jesus divide our soul and spirit.

(1) Know the necessity of having the spirit and soul divided. Without this knowledge no such request will be made. Christians ought to petition the Lord to show them the abhorrence of a mixed spirit-and-soul life and also the reality of that deeper walk in God which is wholly spirit and uninterrupted by the soul. They should understand that a mixed life is a frustrated life.

(2) Ask for the separation of soul and spirit. After knowing, there must be a genuinely earnest desire in the heart, a requesting that this mingled soul and spirit be cut apart. Just here the question rests with the human will. Should believers prefer to enjoy what they themselves consider the best life and not desire to have their soul and spirit divided, God will respect their personal rights and not force them into such experience.

(3) Yield specifically. If believers definitely desire the experience of having their soul and spirit separated, they must consign themselves to the altar of the cross in a specific manner. They must be willing to accept totally every consequence of the operation of the cross and be conformed to the death of the Lord. Before they encounter the cleaving of soul and spirit believers need to bend their will continuously and incessantly towards God and actively choose to have this cleavage. And as the High Priest accomplishes this division in them their heart attitude should be that He should not stay His hand.

(4) Stand on Romans 6.11. God’s children need to watch lest in seeking to experience the separation of soul and spirit they fall back into sin. Remember that this separating is built upon their having died to sin. Hence they should maintain daily the attitude of Romans 6.11, considering themselves verily dead to sin. Additionally, they should stand on Romans 6.12 and not permit sin to reign in their mortal bodies. This attitude will deprive their natural life any opportunity to sin through the body.

 (5) Pray and study the Bible. Christians ought to search the Bible with prayer and meditation. They should let God’s Word penetrate thoroughly into their souls so as to enable their natural life to be purified. If they actually do what God says, their soul life shall not be able to continue its free activity. This is the meaning of 1 Peter 1.22: “having purified your souls by your obedience to the truth.”

(6) Daily bear the cross. Because the Lord desires to sever our spirit and soul He arranges crosses in our everyday affairs for us to bear. To take up the cross daily, to deny self at all times, to make no provision for the flesh—not even for a moment, and to be shown constantly by the Holy Spirit what are the activities of the soul in our lives: this is spiritual life. Through faithful obedience we shall be led to encounter the dividing of soul and spirit so that we may experience a pure spiritual walk.

 (7) Live according to the spirit. This is a condition not only for our preservation but also for a distinct cleavage between spirit and soul. We must seek to walk by our spirit in all respects, distinguishing what is of the spirit and what is of the soul and resolving as well to follow the former while rejecting the latter. Learn to recognize the working of the spirit and follow it.

 These are the conditions which we on our side must fulfill. The Holy Spirit requires our cooperation. The Lord will not be able to do His part should we fail to do ours. But were we to discharge our responsibility, our High Priest would tear apart our spirit and soul with the sharp Sword of His Spirit in the power of His cross.'  --  The Spiritual Man  by Watchman Nee

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7 Musts-

1- Understand why we have to have the soul and spirit divided.

2-Ask to have our soul and spirit divided.

3-Accept whatever it takes to have our soul and spirit divided.

4-We must be dead to sin, and alive to Christ. We must not let sin reign in us.

5-We have to pray to God and study the Bible.

6-We must bear DAILY crosses.

7-We must distinguish between the soul and spirit in our life- once distinguished we must follow the spirit.

Truly the Holy Spirit does require our cooperation.

Truly the Lord cannot do His part if we don't do ours.

The High Priest- Jesus Christ our Lord- will divide our spirit and soul.

The Bible explains WHY we have to have our soul and spirit divided-  the natural man and the spiritual cannot both rule.

Rom 8:5  For they that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh; but they that are after the Spirit the things of the Spirit.

Rom 8:6  For to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace.

Rom 8:7  Because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be.

Rom 8:8  So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God.

Rom 8:9  But ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his.

We must ask-

Luk 11:13  If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children: how much more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him?

We must accept whatever we are called to do-

Eph 6:11  Put on the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil.

Eph 6:12  For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.

Eph 6:13  Wherefore take unto you the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand.

We must be-  dead to sin.

Rom 6:11  Likewise reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Rom 6:12  Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, that ye should obey it in the lusts thereof.

We must pray and study-

Eph_6:18  Praying always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit, and watching thereunto with all perseverance and supplication for all saints

2Ti_2:15  Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth

We must bear our own cross - connected to the cross of our Savior-

Luk_9:23  And he said to them all, If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow me.

We must constantly choose spirit over soul-

Luk 14:33  So likewise, whosoever he be of you that forsaketh not all that he hath, he cannot be my disciple.

Rom 7:24  O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?

Rom 7:25  I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord. So then with the mind I myself serve the law of God; but with the flesh the law of sin.

Gal 5:16  This I say then, Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfil the lust of the flesh.

Gal 5:17  For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh: and these are contrary the one to the other: so that ye cannot do the things that ye would.

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Satan would have us believe there is so little we can do when in truth we can engage in the battle, we MUST engage in the spiritual battle before us as those who would belong to our Savior.

Jesus did not leave us comfortless- our comfort can be found in the Spirit.  When we seek comfort anywhere else we are seeking comfort from the flesh, from the soul not the spirit.

Is it any wonder we are led to despair so often, we are seeking hope in fleshy things, in soulical things, not spiritual. Our hope must be in Christ, not in this world or things of this world.  All things that give us happiness that are of the flesh, that are of the soul, even things we deem wonderful are things that will keep us from the spirit.  We are told this--

Luk 14:26  If any man come to me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple.

Luk 14:27  And whosoever doth not bear his cross, and come after me, cannot be my disciple.

Mat 10:33  But whosoever shall deny me before men, him will I also deny before my Father which is in heaven.

Mat 10:34  Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not to send peace, but a sword.

Mat 10:35  For I am come to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter in law against her mother in law.

Mat 10:36  And a man's foes shall be they of his own household.

Mat 10:37  He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me.

Mat 10:38  And he that taketh not his cross, and followeth after me, is not worthy of me.

Is it any wonder that we must live in the SPIRIT first and foremost or all our soulical love we have for others is only harmful to them, and not true love at all. We truly believe that we love from a good place, but that good place could be a trap set by Satan for us.  We must LOVE with CHRIST'S love, not our own soulical love!  There will never be a time we shouldn't love others, never! But that love if a love coming from Christ, from the Spirit, may be revealed in ways others would deem heartless. Does this seem contradictory when we are told to 'hate' others?  The hate we are to have is the sin in others, the sin in ourselves- the Godlessness that prevails, the soulical that exists.  We are to recognize that CHRIST in us must be first and it is with HIS love we can TRULY LOVE.

By God's grace may we grow in HIM and HIS TRUTH, allowing the soul and spirit to be divided in us, seeking only HIM and HIS truth, His LOVE!

In Jesus Christ our Savior always!!!!