“NUTTY NATURES OR NEW MINDS?”
By: J.Farrell Fisher, Nov. 19-21, 2017
Interesting verses for your consideration in 1 Corinthians 15:44b-49 for Paul wrote saying: “…There is a natural body and there is a spiritual body. And so it is written, ‘The first man Adam became a living being.’ The last Adam (Jesus) became a life-giving spirit. However, the spiritual is not first, but the natural, and afterward the spiritual.
The first man was of the earth, made of dust; the second Man is the Lord from heaven. As was the man of dust, so also are those who are made of dust; and as is the heavenly Man, so also are those who are heavenly. And as we have borne the image of the man of dust, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly Man,” telling us that true manhood IS the exact image, likeness, presence of Christ in His Resurrection Presence highlighted by the Holy Spirit who, yes, “guides us into all Truth”!
But “nutty-natured” unbelievers and pretenders of religious activity? In Titus 1:15-16 Paul enlightened a young disciple named Titus, telling Him, “To the pure all things are pure, but to those who are defiled and unbelieving nothing is pure; but even their mind and conscience are defiled. They profess to know God, but in works they deny Him, being abominable, disobedient, and disqualified for every good work.” Are “nutty natured” people ‘defiled’ because they do not possess the nature and character of the Resurrected Christ? Does ‘unbelieving’ describe the atheist, the agnostic, the unbelieving, or the pretender?
Oh, but then look at Paul’s words in Titus 2:11-15! He said, “For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men, TEACHING US that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in the present age, looking for the blessed hope and glorious appearing of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ, who gave Himself for us, that He might redeem us from every lawless deed and purify for Himself His own special people, zealous for good works.”
Dare I say it? I believe I will! “It’s a ‘nutty-natured’ individual that denies the need of the “Blood Redemption” in and through Christ alone! Impure hearts deny the need of a “Redeemer”! Self-pride and love of their fallen sin-natures easily identifies ‘unbelievers’! There are those among men who live selfishly to be admired by ‘world-captured, sin-bound men, and Satan himself’, and this because they are ‘lovers of themselves’ and not God, ‘lovers of money’ rather than Truth treasures, they are boastful, fleshly proud, blasphemers of biblical truths and those who stand for Truth, being unloving, unforgiving, unholy, easily slanderous, void of self-control, at times ‘brutal’, especially some ungodly ‘bosses’, resentful of the good, easily even a traitor to friendship, vows, or oaths, headstrong rather than heart-strong, haughty, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, some even possessing ‘a form of godliness’ but deny its power, resisters of Truth, corrupt in the mind AND heart, bankrupt of any faith but experts in what God calls foolishness! (Be sure you check that very last statement out!)
Tell me: “Lately, have you heard preachers, teachers, religious leaders, even disciples, talking about God’s JUDGMENTS when He sends ‘the mighty angels, in flaming fire taking vengeance of those who do not know God, and on those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ, punished with everlasting destruction from the glory of the Lord and from the glory of His power’?” (2 Thessalonians 1:8-9). Sadly, it’s not only unbelievers we ought to be concerned about but also the uninformed, who’ve never seen, sensed, or heard one word of truth about the need of the Savior and Lord! Who is accountable for that situation?
Even as ancient, early men sought to live apart from God, even today there are those who live under a ‘cloud’ of indifference and unbelief because there still are recurring tides and strong waves of encroachment against the Author and Finisher of eternal salvation. Many men are, yes, obstinate to God and His will, His Word, and His way! ‘Self-willed individuals’, cemented and set in their own ambitions and fleshly, even religious desires, will, like the ‘religious Pharisees’ of Jesus day, live today to deny, reject, cloud over, and darken anyone’s attempts at turning them to “revealed Truth”, yes, even to King Jesus, the Promised Messiah!
Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ really laid out heavenly concerns, biblical heartaches, and personal examinations for all life situations, believers or unbelievers! In Mark 4:13-20 Jesus declared a Word you must have understanding about! He said: And Jesus said to them, “Do you not understand this parable? How then will you understand all the parables? The sower sows the word. And these are the ones by the wayside where the word is sown. When they hear, Satan immediately comes and takes away the word that was sown in their hearts.
These likewise are the ones sown on stony ground, who, when they hear the word, immediately receive it with gladness; and they have no root in themselves, and so endure only for a time. Afterward, when tribulation or persecution arises for the word’s sake, immediately they stumble.
Now these are the ones sown among thorns; they are the ones who hear the word, and the cares of this world, the deceitfulness of riches, and the desires for other things entering in choke the word, and it becomes unfruitful. BUT these are the ones sown on good ground, those who hear the word, accept it, and bear fruit; some thirtyfold, some sixty, and some a hundred.” From this parable do YOU gain understanding about “Nutty Natures” or “New Minds”?
“Nutty Natures”? That’s not only the “stars” of flesh achievement but also the “slow minded” who have no confidence at all in what it truly means to have ‘faith’ in God – both intuitively knowing, yes, ‘there is God for sure’, and they are sovereignly designed for Him but with a ‘free will to choose’ their sinfulness, their ‘shallow’ minds, and their devotion to “natural individuality”, blinding most unbelievers because they take great pleasure in satisfying their ‘tyranny of fleshliness’ with no concern for reconciliation to Holy God!
In 1 Corinthians 15:33-34 we read: “DO NOT BE DECEIVED: ‘Evil company corrupts good habits.’ Awake to righteousness, and do not sin; for some do not have the knowledge of God. I speak this to your shame,” and Paul was writing to the church in Corinth!
Oswald Chambers had Spirit-instilled understanding when in “My Utmost For His Highest” (p.59) he wrote: “If the Spirit of God detects anything in you that is wrong, He does not ask you to put it right; He asks you to accept (what) the light (exposes), and He will put it right. A child of the light confesses instantly and stands bared before God; a child of darkness says – “Oh, I can explain that away.” When once the light breaks and the conviction of wrong comes, be a child of the light, and confess, and God will deal with what is wrong; if you vindicate yourself, you prove yourself to be a child of darkness.” WOW!
In 2 Chronicles 14:9-12 Zerah marched out against (God’s people) with a vast army…(As God’s people or God’s person of faith, do YOU know about “the enemy” that comes against you and your faith?). Then Asa called to the LORD his God and said, “LORD, there is no one like you to help the powerless against the mighty. Help us, O LORD our God, for we rely on you, and in Your name we have come against this vast army. O LORD, you are our God; do not let man (the world, the flesh, the demons, or Satan!) prevail against you.”…and The LORD struck down the Cushites.”
I don’t know who wrote the following, but it is so true! “We cannot kindle when we will The fire which in the heart resides, The spirit blows and is still, In mystery our soul abides; But tasks in hours of insight willed Can be through hours of gloom fulfilled.”
And the task in you is accepting ‘the light’ the Spirit brings, exposing in you, what He needs to make right, IF you will let Him! But ‘self-effort’ of correcting ‘sin’ always fails, but The Holy Spirit convicts, convinces, yes, and corrects what He knows only He can eternally correct what is opposite the nature and character of Holy God!
The New Living Translation of 1 Samuel 17:45-47 tells us: David shouted to Goliath, “You come to me with sword, spear, and javelin, but I come to you in the name of the Lord Almighty, whom you have defied. Today the LORD will conquer you, and I will kill you and cut off your head…And everyone will know that the LORD does not need weapons to rescue His people. It is His battle, not ours. The LORD will give you to us.”
I know you’ve heard of “prayer warriors”, but I’ve wondered at times if they are also truly “trusting warriors”! Are you aware that “big ships” don’t leave shorelines at low tides? And could we say that “big believers” (which all are who are truly “born again”) are those who don’t trust themselves but are those who yield to “High-Tide, Holy God” as He says, “I’m able to handle your warring enemy – give Me My place in your “low-tide moment” – I can take care of you and defeat your Enemy of darkness, deceit, and devilishness!!” No doubt this is why Paul wrote: (Galatians 2:20b-21a), “the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith IN THE SON OF GOD, who loved me and gave Himself for me. I do not set aside the grace of God…!” And the better translation of “faith IN THE SON OF GOD”, what about “the faith OF THE SON OF GOD”? Oswald Chambers wrote: [“My Utmost For His Highest”, p.58], “This faith is not Paul’s faith in Jesus Christ, but the faith that the Son of God has imparted to him “the faith OF the Son of God”. It is no longer faith in faith, but faith which has overleapt all conscious bounds, the identical faith OF the Son of God.” AMEN?
“Nutty Natures OR New Minds”? Do I dare to say that there are those “New Minds” that displace the Resurrected Christ within them for moments, days, weeks, and years for “illusions of a self-conscious ability of self-improvement in the faith” for “Christ in you the hope of glory”? Of course it happens! Immature, young disciples, at times, betray their ‘saving faith’ for a “best-effort” mentality that they ‘think’ will free them when it’s not emancipating but enslaving them to one’s old sin-nature! Is that the ‘ancient, rampant individualism’ of the Pharoahs of the past who saw no need for the True God because they’ve invented their own or, yes, ‘determined believers today’ who are deceived they can live “Christ-like” without the Christ!
“Nutty Natures OR New Minds”? Does ‘religious thinking’ define “new-born sons and daughters”? I don’t think so! ‘Religious thinking’ apart from Holy Spirit conviction and Holy Spirit conversion leads to the establishment of ‘false religions’, even much of modern-day ‘Christian’ (?) thinking! Societal secularization can, and often is, birthing ‘false faiths’ and, yes, birthing enemies of the crucified and resurrected Christ Jesus!
David F. Wells, in his book, “No Place For Truth”, (William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, Grand Rapids, Mich. (1993),p.84) wrote: “Amid the peals of freedom, there are the modern thunderclaps of damnation.” In Psalm 87:7, didn’t the singers sing, “All my springs (my fresh springs) are in You, God”? Best-effort in Christian living is a contaminated spring – if you are His, you were “crucified with Christ”, and any hope you have for victorious living in the Faith is when daily you take the sentence of death to yourself that His Resurrection Presence be manifested in your mortal flesh – that’s Jesus being Jesus “in YOU!” “New Minds!!” How?
From the world, the flesh, or demonic bondage of darkness to the Kingdom of Life in the Lord of Light AND to the Victor over darkness and spiritual death in and through and by the Lamb’s shed blood…
From the temporal, outward beauty and pleasure of the flesh-nature-indulgence to the gift, the blessing, and the power of His Resurrection Life in one being “born again”, “born the second time by repentance and faith,” and “born again by the power of the Promised Holy Spirit who came and still comes”!!
From the darkness of the soul’s night to the Day of the Savior’s Light, from the bondage of slavery to the nature of sin and death under the devil’s and demons control TO the freedom of liberty and LIGHT and everlasting love, crucifying the soul’s drought of faith, and by the Holy Spirit giving the gift of eternal life!
From the seizure of sin, ‘self-paralysis’, and soul death to the Savior’s healing grace and “New Life’s giftings”, including a “new creation”, a “new garment of eternal righteousness”, “NEW FRUITS OF THE SPIRIT”, a “new name”, a “new heart”, a “new testimony of a re-born life”, a “new and living way”, a “new name written down and recorded in glory for even angels to rejoice in”!
It was E.Edwin Young and Gypsy Smith who wrote the old hymn, “Jesus, Revealed in Me”, (Copyrighted in 1931 and printed in London, England). It says: “Christ, the Transforming Light, Touches this heart of mine, Piercing the darkest night, Making His glory shine.
Here, Lord, I bring my heart, My love, my strength, my will; Cleanse me in every part, With all Your Spirit fill.
Life is no longer mine, I yield it all to Thee; Fill me that I may shine Until Your face I see. Triumphant peace is mine, Now Jesus reigns within; He gives joy divine, And victory over sin.
Oh, to reflect His grace, Causing the world to see, Love that will glow Till others shall know Jesus, revealed in me.”
In Psalm 16:8-9 David came to a clear, convicting, consecrating understanding of “New Minds” rather than “Nutty Minds”! He wrote: “I keep the Lord always before me; because He is at my right hand, I shall not be moved. Therefore my heart is glad, and my soul rejoices; my body also rests secure.”
One of the Verses of the old hymn, “A Child of the King”, written by Hattie E. Buell and Rev. John B. Summer, says: “I once was an outcast stranger on earth, A sinner by choice, and an alien by birth; But I’ve been adopted, my name’s written down, An heir to a mansion, a robe, and a crown…I’m a child of the King, A child of the King; With Jesus my Savior, I’m a child of the King.”
I don’t know of a better word in closing: “Nutty Natures or New Minds”!! Amen?