Spirit

Look around where you are right now. What do you see? Unless you’re somewhere unfamiliar, you know where you are and to some degree, there’s probably a sense of safety and freedom from distress (other than what may be going on circumstantially and emotionally).
However, do you realize that your world is made up of much more than what you see?
Even scientifically speaking, the idea of Dark Matter, which can’t be seen, makes up most of the universe and a hundred million particles of it have passed between you and this blog post since you began reading.

Think about the food we eat. For the most part we interact with food firstly from an immediate sensory understanding, but we do know that there are many foods that affect our moods. “Mood” is less physically substantive, but still, a very real concept. Coffee drinkers are a good example; it’s coffee beans, grounded and filtered through hot water. It creates a desirable tasting beverage (if that’s how you roll) but there’s also something bigger that happens beyond sight, smell, touch and taste –

Coffee appears to affect a number of neurotransmitters related to mood control, so drinking a morning cup could have an effect on your general sense of wellbeing. Research has also shown that coffee triggers a mechanism in your brain that releases BDNF, which activates your brain stem cells to convert into new neurons, thereby improving your brain health. Interestingly enough, research also suggests that low BDNF levels may play a significant role in depression, and that increasing neurogenesis has an antidepressant effect!
      (http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2014/01/02/food-affects-mood.aspx)

We know coffee alters mood, but without extensive study, it’s probably difficult to understand or communicate just how that happens. Bananas are amazing mood boosters as well.

And that is exactly my point: Spiritually speaking, there’s more to our world than what we see and this unseen realm has way more of an impact than we can fathom. Without extensive study, it’s difficult to operate effectively in the truth of such a large and weighty impact on our experience. I’m a big fan of Angelology and it’s amazing to me when you discuss the realm of ‘the spiritual’ – just the amount of real things going on just beyond your ability to perceive it.

The following is one of the most intriguing verses in all of Scripture to me. It’s a discussion on how to handle an issue on earth concerning the demise of the evil King, Ahab and it looks like a committee meeting where at the conclusion, this spirit speaks up and God approves of his recommendation and the plan is enacted. Now just to clarify, I believe all of the beings in Heaven are ‘spirits’ but not all fall into the same categories – Angels are spirits but have a different specialized function than other spirits.


Here’s The Word:

1 Kings 22:21-22 And there came forth a spirit, and stood before the LORD, and said, I will persuade him.22 And the LORD said unto him, Wherewith? And he said, I will go forth, and I will be a lying spirit in the mouth of all his prophets. And he said, Thou shalt persuade him, and prevail also: go forth, and do so.

John 4:24 God is a Spirit: and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth.

Exodus 28:3 And thou shalt speak unto all that are wise hearted, whom I have filled with the spirit of wisdom,

Proverbs 20:27 The spirit of man is the candle of the Lord, searching all the inward parts of the belly.

Isaiah 11:2 And the spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the Lord;

Hosea 5:4 They will not frame their doings to turn unto their God: for the spirit of whoredoms is in the midst of them, and they have not known the Lord.

Luke 4:33 And in the synagogue there was a man, which had a spirit of an unclean devil, and cried out with a loud voice,

Romans 8:15 For ye have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear; but ye have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father.

1 Corinthians 2:12 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.

Ephesians 2:2 Wherein in time past ye walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience:

Ephesians 4:23 And be renewed in the spirit of your mind;

2 Timothy 1:7 For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind.

1 John 4:6 We are of God: he that knoweth God heareth us; he that is not of God heareth not us. Hereby know we the spirit of truth, and the spirit of error.

Sorry, I know that's a whole lot of verses. It was hard to whittle down a list of verses as there are MANY that talk about “spirit”. Remember, its the bigger part of our world.

I In Hebrew, spirit is commonly translated ר֥וּחַ (Ruah….roo-akh), in Greek, its translated πνεύματι (pneuma – noo-ma) and both boil down to wind, breath or spirit. But when we see the impact of the spiritual realm on our natural one, it stands to reason that words as simplistic as wind or breath don’t capture the fullness of what spirit really is.

So if you are of "The Spirit", I pray that your curiosity has been raised, that you are now hungry for more and will start down your own path of ‘extensive study’ to turn on spiritual eyes. To hopefully and prayerfully begin to perceive that unseen, yet impactful realm that exists alongside you, dealing with some pretty heavy issues. The good thing is that God does not want to remain hidden, The Bible in Acts 17: 27-28 That they should seek the Lord, if haply they might feel after him, and find him, though he be not far from every one of us: For in him we live, and move, and have our being; as certain also of your own poets have said, For we are also his offspring.


In Him,
Cros