Man is a multidimensional entity living simultaneously on multiple planes of existence, which are generated by his consciousness. You will experience what you are aware of. In other words, you experience what you believe. This implies that even if what you believe is erroneous, it will still influence your subjective experience. Our perception is thus important. In the mystical Garden of Eden, when Adam fell, he immediately saw himself exposed. The term “fell” alludes to Adam’s awareness. He believed a lie about God and himself, and he projected that lie into his existence. He saw himself naked; his faith that was designed to trust the Living God was corrupted by fear by him conceiving a lie about God.
Born within man is the prolific ability of idolatry – to fashion a God in his own image. God created man in His image and man wanted to return the favour. Human opinions of God will always change and will always be a subject of argument. Nevertheless, truth remains immutable. You are more than you can physically discern.
Our physical senses are limited. Evaluating man from material science, the highest faculty he can develop is his mind. However, even our minds are limited and underdeveloped; there are systems and a predictive programming in the world to make sure this happens. The greatest prison to keep a man captured in is the pattern of his own thoughts. Early Christianity was a threat because it revealed the Divine value of every human being by unveiling the eternal origin of man irrespective of social status, accomplishment or rank. You have to learn to govern yourself by governing your mind, but you must know that your mind is not your highest faculty.
But as it is written, Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him. (1 Corinthians 2:9 – KJV)
God loves you and He has prepared wondrous things for you. What He has prepared for you is beyond your empirical senses, beyond your rationale, beyond the capacity of your mind to imagine, and above your intellectual capacity to plan. If what God has prepared for you remains unknown, undisclosed, you will live your life in this world as though God never prepared these things for you. But the problem is we want to live by what our eyes see, what our minds can understand and plan. The things God has prepared for us are beyond our senses; they are over and above our rationale. You will have to learn to trust God beyond your understanding and walk by faith, not sight. The wondrous things He has prepared for you are not discoverable by your natural faculties and powers.
But God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit: for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God. For what man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him? Even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God. Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the spirit which is of God; that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God. (1 Corinthians 2:10-12 – KJV)
The Spirit of God has to lead the higher faculties of man by revelation. Revelation penetrates beyond empirical knowledge, beyond what we can reason. The Spirit through your spirit penetrates the heart and mind of God.
In Christ Jesus, God has reclaimed humanity. This is the meaning of redemption. Our sin did not dissuade God of what He knows about us. Your spirit constitutes everything that you are. Spirit, soul and body are not three parts or three compartments of you. They are rather different dimensions of you; they are distinct aspects that integrate. Your spirit constitutes or sums up what you are as human. The Spirit of God is that interchange between the Father and the Son. God is love; for there to be love, there must be giving and receiving. God created all things in order to share Himself with creation because His very own nature is eternal sharing within Himself. If you receive the Spirit of God, everything that is happening within the inner recesses of God’s nature has been brought into you and you into it.
We have received the Spirit of God (1 Corinthians 2:12). God’s Spirit is in us so we may know the wondrous things that He has prepared for those who love Him, the things that are freely given to us. It is not about simply knowing intellectually. The etymology of the word “know” is a variation of the Greek term “epignosis”, which means “beyond experience.” The Holy Spirit has come not just for you to experience these things, but to take you beyond your experience of the things that are freely given to us of God. He did not come to give you information but to lead you beyond your experience of the wondrous things God has prepared for us in grace in Christ. You don’t have to work for them or earn them but by the Spirit of God, you are led to perceive them. The Spirit of God has come to make you God-conscious, to educate you into God’s mode of living, which is Christ.
This article is an extract from Dr. Shawn Smith’s message titled “Discerning the Wondrous Things Prepared for Us in Christ”. Order the complete message on gcmonlinestore.com