6/22/11
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There are three sources of thoughts and promptings we receive — divine, human, and satanic. We must learn to distinguish between them so as to be able to come into perfect unity with God.
We already have an understanding of how the Holy Spirit tries to teach us; and we have experience with the Enemy trying to tempt us to sin; but I believe we don’t fully grasp our own nature, and thus don’t recognize some of the ways our old desires try to hinder our spiritual growth.
In trying to preserve his position, my “old man” tries to deceive my “new man”; and even goes to the point of mimicking the voice and manifestations of God, because it knows this is the only one I wish to listen to now. Consider the implication of that — my “old man” tries to deceive my “new man”; and knowing that I now try to listen only to God, he sometimes will even try to mimic the voice and manifestations of God in order to make me do his will. I now must get to where I can distinguish between the voice of God and the voice of my lying “old man”.
Being able to distinguish God’s voice from all deceptions is an important preparation for Pentecost. Because to be misled after having Pentecost would be dangerous due to the power available to us then. Just having Pentecost and having authority given to me isn’t enough to keep one from being deceived.
Lucifer had power and authority, yet he was corrupted. Similarly, Adam had power and authority, yet he too was led astray. Their positions didn’t protect them from deception. Both were perfect creations who had been given position and authority; yet both fell from their places. With Lucifer he was led astray by himself; with Adam there was an enemy tempting him; but in both cases the deception came from within. Their downfall was wanting something different than what God had given them. They each wanted to be “in the place of God”. Lucifer wanted to take Jesus’ place; Adam wanted to “be like God, knowing good and evil”. They thought they knew better than God what they should have and what should be done.
Ja 1:14. “Each one is tempted when he lets his lusts lead him away.” One way to interpret the word “lust” is “carnal desires”. It is not limited to only “sexual impulses”; any physical desire that weakens our spiritual desire is bad. Another interpretation is, “Each one is tempted when he lets his own imagination lead him away.” This verse says that we can be deceived and led astray by our own thoughts.
Fortunately, an important key to resisting is found in the phrase “when he lets it happen”. “Each one is tempted when he lets his lusts lead him away.” When the temptation first comes, we have the power to resist it. The problem arises when we indulge the thought, and hold it and play with it; then it becomes too strong to resist. Our primary defense, then, is if a thought contradicts God’s will, we must reject it quickly & not indulge it.
Referring again to Pentecost, it is within God’s plan for us to receive Pentecost and all the power and authority that brings. So desiring this is not attempting to go beyond our assigned position; to the contrary, it is striving to attain our proper place. So pursuing Pentecost is not wrong. However, once we receive it, we will have to be careful not to let ourselves be led astray into misusing it, or going contrary to God’s will, or trying to attain to something different than what He appoints to us. Thus the importance of knowing God’s will and recognizing His voice.
We may at times be given instructions that are dramatic, and far from what we expect. When that happens we may begin to question whether we’re hearing God correctly; and thus we may choose not to obey the instruction. But doing this puts us in the same position as Lucifer and Adam — thinking we can decide something contrary to what God says. Again we see the importance of distinguishing God’s voice from our own.
As you make a point of listening to God, your ability to hear Him will grow. It is as Jesus stated, His sheep hear His voice and recognize it. Our recognition will develop as we grow spiritually stronger. Pray that you may learn to distinguish between “divine”, “human”, and “satanic”. Thoughts can be prompted by any of these sources. Learn to tell the difference between each. Pray for help; pray for discernment. But get to where you know without question when a word is from God, or from some other source. Then once you are certain it’s from God, follow it!
With prayer and with deliberate effort to discern God’s voice, you will get there. I used to watch for showers of Holy Spirit to let me know when I had a proper thought. At first these were infrequent. But as I learned and grew these showers became more regular and even commonplace.
Now the manifestation has switched from telling me when I’m right (which thankfully is much of the time), to giving me a warning when I’m about to do something wrong (which is now infrequent). Once the right thoughts were more frequent than the wrong ones there was a change in the signals, so as not to have a constant input. Therefore, by changing what leads to a prompt I don’t get overwhelmed.
This
also lets me know that my thoughts are now mostly in unity with God’s
thoughts, and my will is in agreement with His will. Now when I
speak in the Spirit, I know my statements are a correct expression of
His purpose. This gives me confidence to know that what I declare
will be done: I am in unity with my Father.
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