In the last article, “Why God Gives Man a New Nature”, I showed you how God restored your fallen spirit and gave you spiritual eyes to see a new you in heaven. But on earth you probably still see yourself as the same. The purpose of this article is to show you how you can get who you are in heaven to who you are on earth, thereby transforming your soul (mind, will and emotions).
Making the transfer is really about understanding how God goes about meeting our NEEDS. That’s because man’s limitedness creates many needs, and God wants to bring the fullness of heaven to earth in you.
God meets our needs and restores our souls through PURPOSE MOTIVATION. The world meets its needs through NEEDS MOTIVATION.
These concepts represent two different ways of looking at the world and our situation in it.
This gets back to the concept that we discussed in “God’s Method for Giving Us a New Nature”. That when it comes to the transcendent truth, God does the work, not man.
Needs Motivation is all about man chasing after his needs. His physical needs such as food and clothing. His emotional needs such as family relationships and career development. But with Needs Motivation, man has to make it happen.
With Purpose Motivation, God makes our needs happen. All you have to do is focus on the purpose He has given you to do. God handles the details of meeting our needs.
This process of Purpose Motivation is advanced by Jesus is the gospels. Consider the following scripture:
“Seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness and all these things will be added to you.”
Matthew 6:33
Through this scripture we see that our needs will be met when we focus on purpose.
What is that purpose? To advance the Kingdom of God.
But how is the Kingdom of God advanced?
As we discussed in “Why God Gives Man a New Nature”, it’s an internal/external process. God wants to take your regenerated spirit in heaven and transfer it to your mind, will and emotions (soul) on earth. Then He wants to take His Kingdom in you and change the world.
Four Steps for Advancing God’s Internal/External Purpose In Your Life
Step One — Trust vs. “Faith”
God’s Kingdom is advanced in us (our mind, will, and emotions) when we learn to TRUST Him for our needs.
This is not an easy thing to do because we have been conditioned for so long to think that WE have to meet our needs.
Even the Christian church gets confused today and tries to secure its needs through “faith”. God, I believe you for healing. God, I believe you for miracles. God, I believe you for money.
When our “faith” is simply predicated to the level of our need, then we have missed the point of Purpose Motivation. “Faith” simply becomes a religious metaphor for what everyone else in the world is doing— Needs Motivation.
This is what Needs Motivation looks like:
God’s Kingdom can’t be advanced in our mind, will, and emotions because we don’t trust Him.
This is what Purpose Motivation looks like:
God’s Kingdom can be advanced in our mind, will, and emotions because our motivation is to trust Him.
But how do we learn to trust God?
Step Two — Rest in God
Trust can only be developed when we learn to Rest in God.
Resting means that we give our fears and worries to God. We trust Him to do what needs to be done in order to “fix” it. Sometimes that fixing is in US, sometimes it’s in the CIRCUMSTANCES that surround us. Either way God says, “Trust me. Let me do the work!” This concept is reflected in the following scripture:
“Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you REST. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”
Matthew 11:28-30
Did you see the promise? Jesus (Christ) said that He will “give you rest”. The only way anyone can give you rest is if they are willing to do the work FOR you. And that’s what Jesus is saying. He’s saying, “Just give it to me (your worries and fears) and I will take care of it.” He’s saying TRUST me.
We trust God when we learn to rest in Him. But how is rest developed?
Rest is developed when we MEDITATE on the promises of God in the Bible. Meditation is not memorizing scripture. Meditation is ruminating scripture, like a cow chewing its cud. It’s rolling scripture over and over again in your mind. Gradually your mind begins to believe what it hears. That’s because God gets involved and speaks to your mind reassuring you that He will take care of it.
Meditation is also helped when you combine it with a scripture reading plan. That’s because as you meditate, the Holy Spirit combines your thoughts with other scripture further impacting the REST He wants to bring into your life.
Step Three — Agree with what God says about you.
God’s purpose is further advanced in us when we agree with what He says about us in scripture.
What does God say about you in scripture?
God says that when you were birthed in Christ, You became Him and He became you. You EXCHANGED LIVES.
God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we become the righteousness of God.
2 Corinthians 5:21
As a result God says that you became a new creation. A brand new person.
Therefore, if anyone is in Christ (having acquired the new nature), he is a new creation, the old has gone, the new has come.
2 Corinthians 5:17
God further shows us what that person looks like. We see it in the life of Christ.
The Spirit (of Christ) is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law.
Galatians 5:22
God says that because of Christ you are: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control (Galatians 5:22).
This is who God says you ALREADY are, not who you HOPE to be.
But your corrupted mind, will and emotions, looking though its physical eyes says, “No, I don’t SEE that, that’s not who I am. It might be who I want to be, but it’s NOT who I really am. If I work really hard and live a good Christian life— maybe.”
This is who I really am, I’m: sexually immoral, impure, indulgent, materialistic, superstitious, hateful, rowdy, jealous, selfishly ambitious, troublesome, divisive, envious, and a drunkard.
The acts of the sinful nature are obvious: sexual immorality, impurity, debauchery, idolatry and witchcraft; hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions and envy; drunkenness, orgies and the like.
Galatians 5:19-21
So on the one hand you see God saying you are perfect, and on the other hand you see yourself as imperfect.
How do you deal with the disparity of these two natures? How do you rectify the two?
1. You meditate on scriptures that reenforce who you really are in heaven so that your mind, will and emotions can be transformed. You agree with God about what He says about you.
Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is— his good, pleasing and perfect will.
Romans 12:2
2. You deal with sin the way GOD says.
How you DEAL with sin in your life, determines whether you stay consistent with the OBJECTIVE EVIDENCE your faith is built on. In the section Find Truth we determined that when it comes to the transcendent, GOD must do the work. If we try to do it ourselves though SELF EFFORT, we stop the purpose of God in our lives.
The way we deal with sin is so critical that I will deal with it separately in our next newsletter entitled, “Obstacles to Sanctification Through Purpose Motivation”.
Bottom line is that God has a SPECIFIC way He wants us to deal with the incongruity sin brings to our lives. If we fail to deal with sin His way, our ability to function in purpose motivation is nullified and God cannot meet our needs. When we do it His way, who we are on earth will MATCH with who we are in heaven. Not only will we change, but others will be changed as they see our lives.
What could change the world more than an inconvenienced driver who shows self control vs. road rage and anger? What could change the world more than a person who is patient and kind than one who is unruly and a drunkard?
Natural expression is one way God externalizes what He’s doing in you, but He also wants to use your gifts. This is God’s final step for advancing His purpose in you.
Step Four — Express what God is doing in you through your gifts.
God advances His purpose in you when you use your natural gifts.
The Bible explains that there are 7 natural gifts given to men.
They are: preaching, serving, teaching, encouraging, giving, leading, showing mercy (Romans 12:6-8).
When these gifts are expressed through a life that is submitted to God, great good is accomplished.
The Apostle Paul says that this is the only thing that matters, that it’s the culmination of God’s purpose in you. It’s faith expressing itself through love.
The only thing that counts is faith expressing itself through love.
Galatians 5:6
While our gifts can be used in the course of everyday life, God particularly wants to use them in the local church. That’s because the church is a BODY with many functions, each part serving the other. IN THIS WAY many needs are met.
The body is a unit, though it is made up of many parts; and though all its parts are many, they form one body. So it is with Christ. For we were all baptized by one Spirit into one body— whether Jews or Greeks, slave or free— and we were all given the one Spirit to drink. Now the body is not made up of one part but of many.
1 Corinthians 12:12-14
You, my brothers, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the sinful nature; rather SERVE ONE ANOTHER in love. The entire law is summed up in a single command: “Love your neighbor as yourself.”
Galatians 5:13-14
The body of Christ serves many needs from financial, marital, family and health. In this, we receive the fruit of God’s purpose in us, which is to meet our needs. God meets our needs through people.
But it isn’t just that people meet our needs, it’s that God orchestrates it. Nothing comes into our lives that God has not authorized, allowed or appointed.
And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his PURPOSE.
Romans 8:28
God also works though the manifestations of His Spirit to meet needs. These manifestations are expressed in 9 different ways. They are:
The word of wisdom, the word of knowledge, faith, gifts of healing, miracles, prophecy, distinguishing of spirits, tongues, interpretation of tongues (1 Corinthians 12:8-10).
Manifestations are ENABLEMENTS of the Holy Spirit that come along side your own natural gifts. They further empower your ability to serve.
Jesus used them all the time, and we can too, since we are born of Him. In the following example, Jesus uses the “word of knowledge” to generate faith in Nathanael. The word of knowledge is the ability to know supernaturally what you could not know in the natural.
When Jesus saw Nathanael approaching, he said to him, “Here is a true Israelite, in whom there is nothing false.” “How do you know me?” Nathanael asked. Jesus answered, “I SAW YOU (Holy Spirit enablement) while you were still under the fig tree before Philip called you.” Then Nathanael declared, “Rabbi, you are the Son of God; you are the King of Israel.” Jesus said, “You BELIEVE because I told you I saw you under the fig tree. You shall see greater things than that.”
John 1:47-50
Manifestations of the Holy Spirit are NOT something that we perform at will. We don’t OWN them as we do our natural gifts. They are works of the Holy Spirit that advance God’s purposes through us— supernaturally.
Jesus spent hours in prayer and meditation so that He could SEE the promptings of the Holy Spirit in Him. Then He obeyed those promptings and only did what He saw the Father telling him to do.
I tell you the truth, the Son can do nothing by himself; he can only do what he sees his Father doing, because whatever the Father does the Son does also.
John 5:19
We can also sensitize ourselves to the promptings of the Holy Spirit. As we agree with God about who He says we are through prayer and mediation, God will advance His purpose through us with the manifestation of His Spirit. We just have to be obedient and listen to the mind of Christ in us. This scripture explains our ability to know the MIND of Christ.
But God has revealed it to us by his Spirit. The Spirit searches all things, even the deep things of God. For who among men knows the thoughts of a man except the man’s spirit within him? In the same way no one knows the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God. We have not received the spirit of the world but the Spirit who is from God, that we may understand what God has freely given us. This is what we speak, not in words taught us by human wisdom but in words taught by the Spirit, expressing spiritual truths in spiritual words. The man without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually discerned. The spiritual man makes judgements about all things, but he himself is not subject to any man’s judgement: “For who has known the mind of the Lord that he may instruct him?” But we have the MIND OF CHRIST.”
1 Corinthians 2:10-16
In summary:
God meets our needs when we advance His Kingdom though Purpose Motivation vs. Needs Motivation. His internal Kingdom is advanced in us when we TRUST Him. Trust is developed through meditation. Meditation transforms our mind, will and emotions so that we can REST in God knowing that He will do the work for us. As we AGREE with God about who we are in heaven, He transforms us. We EXPRESS our transformation through natural gifts in service to others. God particularly wants us to use our gifts in the local church. God uses people to meet our needs. But it’s not just people, God orchestrates everything. There isn’t anything in our lives that God has not authorized, allowed or appointed. God also uses the manifestations of the Holy Spirit to supernaturally advance His Kingdom. What God wants to do though manifestations of the Holy Spirit become more apparent as we listen to the mind of Christ in us.
Purpose motivation is:
- Trust
- Rest
- Agree
- Express
