That Which is Born of the Spirit # 28

The Rule of the Heavens (continued)

Sovereignty

Romans 8:3-6, 9; 1 Corinthians 2:6-15; 1 Corinthians 12:1; Ephesians 6:12)

Continuing our meditation on the rule of the Heavens, we have in part seen two of the great symbolic meanings of the heavens - that is, universality and sovereignty or ascendancy. Now we come to a third significance of the term "the heavens," and that is spirituality. It is an exceedingly important matter. It is really basic to all else. If it is true, as we have been seeking to show, that the last word from God's standpoint in every matter is the heavenly word and the heavenly meaning and the heavenly interpretation of a thing - the Divine thought about it, not men's thought or judgment or conception or presentation, but what God means by it - if that is final, it is then clear at once that spirituality in that sense is the great governing factor - the ruling thing.

We at best, even the Lord's children, are very materialistic in our conceptions, in our judgments, in our appraisals, in the way in which we receive things and measure things. We are so tremendously governed and dominated by these soul-senses of ours, by how things effect and impress others naturally, what their reaction is to them, just how far they carry weight among men. So the bulk, the size, is a very great factor in the eyes of men. It is jut how it impresses the world, and what others thing about it. It is a part of the real work of the Cross in us to bring us to the place where it does not matter what the world thinks. It sounds easy and it sounds as though we ought to be there, and yet there are times when we are all found out in that matter. Just how it appears to men, how it affects them, how it stands before them, just whether it would carry weights with men, what we have been "trained to call "success," all judged and decided and determined by this soul-life of ours. This is all materialism and all related to the senses, and we have come to the place where these things cease to influence us at all and where we get the heavenly viewpoint about everything - where we come to see that two or three gathered in the Name of the Lord Jesus in the Holy Spirit represent a mightier factor in this universe than a thousand or five thousand gathered together in some earthly cause.

Spirituality is a tremendous potent factor and it is true that we are tremendously materialistic even in our spiritual lives. It sounds like a contradiction, but there is no doubt about this; and what the Lord is seeking to do with every child of His who is going on with Him is to make him spiritual, to develop spirituality of His children. The new birth is a spiritual birth, and "that which is born of the Spirit is Spirit." You have in a truly born-again child of God two entities, not what the natural man calls the good and the bad but you have got this outer man, this "old man," this man who is still the man of natural reasoning, natural feeling, natural choosing. He is still with you, but inside of him there has been brought to birth by the quickening of the Holy Spirit another man, "the inner man of the heart," a new entity, and he is spiritual. That which is from God is there.

~T. Austin-Sparks~

(continued with # 29 - (God's Focal-Point of Interest)