Recently, I have been doing some writing and research for my never-ending book! An idea that I have been researching recently is the idea that Christians today live improperly and show no sign of christlikeness (as the word c”christian” truely means) because we don’t have a correct understand of who we are as people.
The body is composed of three parts: body, soul and spirit (I Thess. 5:23). It is apparent through the New testament that these different parts have different functions. As christians, if we don’t have a proper understanding of each individual part, we will be living the christian life improperly.
I was talking with a friend of my a few days ago and he challenged my belief on this topic (which I always accept!). My theory largly comes from the Bible and the writings of Watchman Nee in his work, “The spiritual Man.” The idea is that humans “spirit” is the only part that can communicate with God. Our body and our sould do not communicate with God, they are just mediums that our Spirit Uses. When we become christians are spirit is awakened and regenerated into the form that God originally intended for it to be. The spirit is our inner man and the soul and body are our outward man. The soul (which is where our mind and personality are comprised) is the bridge between our spirit and our body. Moreover, each part of our spiritual being has specific functions and whne those functions are misused and imporperly used we fail to communicate with God effectively.
So my friend’s argument is that is not found in scripture and that we can communicate with God through the Bible. I have no doubt that that is true however, if I were to pray out of my flesh or out of my soul, Im not going to get a response because my spirit is what talks to God because that is what it is created for. One cannot otherwise explain why our spirit exists within us?! for example, if i pray that my friend is rid of his cancer because i want it to be that way because i hate to see him in pain. this is a selfish fleshly prayer. this isn’t a prayer out of my spirit. Our spirit talks with God’s spirit (1 cor 2) and so those are my ideas. feel free to respond and give me your thoughts.
Xavier
2 comments:
It bothers me that you think "praying" for your friend is a "selfish fleshly prayer", when it seems to be to the contrary. YOu are wishing for your friend to be free from pain and you are doing so out of sympathy because you could imagine what it would be like to go through the pain. What it seems like you are trying to say is that cancer is of god and his plan, so to wish against it would be selfish, because god intended it to be so. This is why am not a believer. Any god that would condem his people to such paradoxical foolishness (i.e to see others in pain and to know that there is a being who can do something about it, but it be selfish and wrong to ask) is not a god that I would ever want to be associated with. Now put another paradigm into play, what if the suffering person was your own daughter? Would you still be as understanding of "his plan"?
Also you say that this prayer for your friend is not of your spirit but out of flesh and soul, and that it is your spirit that knows and is connected to god, right? Does this mean then that your spirit knows no sense of sufering and sympathy? What does our "spirit" feel that is so unique, that it transcends the great "fleshy" feelings of compassion, sympathy, and mercy?
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