Lesson for April 10, 2016
Spiritual Dynamics
The Formation of Spiritual I.Q.
After salvation there must be a spiritual I.Q. which provides for each one of us equal opportunity and equal privilege to execute the protocol plan of God for the Church Age. This cannot be accomplished on the basis of equality from human I.Q. It can only be accomplished through an I.Q. provided by God. There is nothing in physical birth that helps us execute God’s plan, God’s will, and God’s purpose for our lives. We are not born equal. God has provided for spiritual growth and the execution of His plan; equality that does not depend on any form of human I.Q. An unbeliever with a high I.Q., when he becomes a believer, has no advantage over a believer with a low I.Q., so that perception and metabolization of Bible doctrine is dependent on our positive volition and the teaching ministry of God the Holy Spirit.
Utilization of the six spiritual thinking skills is essential to spiritual growth if a believer expects to reach spiritual maturity. These six thinking skills are:
- Comprehension, which is the function of spiritual I.Q. under the filling of the Spirit plus metabolized doctrine circulating in the stream of consciousness.
- Memory, which is the circulating of metabolized doctrine for recall.
- Problem solving, which is the use of the Ten Problem Solving Devices.
- Decision making, which is the procedure of analyzing all circumstances of life in light of the Word of God and making decisions which are compatible with the plan, will, and purpose of God for your life. The power and ability from metabolized doctrine to understand the issues of life, to clarify in your own thinking, the solutions and to make decisions which are compatible with the will of God as revealed in the Scriptures.
- Creativity, which is mental attitude divine viewpoint which focuses on accurate Bible doctrine.
- Awareness, which is the application of extensive knowledge of Bible doctrine circulating in the stream of consciousness. You become aware of things, don’t understand them and you want to know about them. Awareness of Bible doctrine stimulates curiosity, motivates the desire for more understanding of the Word of God. The more doctrine circulating in your stream of consciousness, the greater your awareness.
- Awareness is developed in many ways. Awareness is to know and understand people, to think about someone besides yourself. You do things to avoid hurting others or making their life miserable.
- Awareness contributes to restructuring your scale of values; restructuring to give Bible doctrine number one priority.
- Awareness plus the filling of the Spirit results in increasing metabolized doctrine in your stream of consciousness.
- Awareness contributes to the accurate interpretation of Scripture, resulting in a more comprehensive understanding of biblical systematic theology.
- Awareness demands accurate and precise application of Bible doctrine to your own experience.
The unbeliever cannot understand spiritual phenomena. I Corinthians 2:14, “But the natural man [unbeliever] does not accept the things [spiritual phenomena] from the Spirit of God; for to him, it is foolishness, furthermore he is not able to understand it, because it is examined [comprehended] in a manner caused by the filling of the Spirit.” There is inequality in human I.Q. When we are born again, the inequality related to spiritual life is wiped out and replaced by the formation of a spiritual I.Q. which is not handicapped even by the most difficult of Bible doctrines. For an unbeliever, spiritual death plus whatever human thinking skills are developed do not equal understanding of Bible doctrine.
Dichotomy and trichotomy in the human race have coexisted since the fall and salvation of man. At the point of salvation, God the Holy Spirit creates a human spirit, so that we can understand spiritual phenomena. Unbelievers do not have a human spirit according to Jude 19, “These [unbelievers] are the ones who cause divisions, soulish, not having a human spirit.” Once we believe, our status becomes trichotomous, as stated in I Thessalonians 5:23, “Now may the God of peace Himself sanctify you entirely and may your spirit, soul, and body be preserved blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.”
Therefore, God has provided for all believers a system of spiritual perception based on the fact we now have a human spirit. This combines the teaching ministry of the filling of the Holy Spirit with the believer’s human spirit resulting in the metabolization of Bible doctrine. Romans 8:16, “The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are the children of God.” The filling of the Spirit is the basis for the spiritual I.Q. and based on the principle of equality. Jesus Christ stated the fact that the Holy Spirit would be our teacher during the Church Age, John 14:26; 16:12-14. Paul declared the same in detail in I Corinthians 2:9-16.
Salvation results in God giving us forty things. One of those things is the filling of the Spirit. The filling of the Spirit is the Bible doctrine whereby God the Holy Spirit guides and empowers the soul of the believer to provide the divine power necessary for the function of spiritual I.Q. The believer loses the filling of the Spirit when in a state of sin, but never the indwelling of the Spirit, which provides a temple in the human body for the indwelling of Jesus Christ as the Shekinah glory.
After salvation, there is the potential for thinking skills to be merged into a spiritual I.Q. The filling of the Spirit is the divine power that converts human I. Q. into spiritual I.Q. Spiritual I.Q. provides the equality factor which makes it possible for any believer to fulfill the protocol plan of God. Perception and metabolization of doctrine in the stream of consciousness means the formation of the ten problem solving devices and the potential of the execution of the protocol plan of God. We are held accountable by God for our very own spiritual life because we have been provided equal privilege and equal opportunity to execute His will, plan, and purpose for our lives.
The filling of the Holy Spirit combines with thinking skills to form spiritual I.Q. The filling of the Spirit plus comprehension is maximum doctrine circulating in the stream of consciousness. The filling of the Spirit plus memory results in the accurate recall of metabolized doctrine as necessity dictates. You cannot use doctrine you cannot recall. The filling of the Spirit plus problem solving devices is designed to use the privacy of your own priesthood to resolve all the problems in your own life. God’s solutions are perfect; man’s solutions are not. The filling of the Spirit plus decision making fulfills the principle of the free will of man and sovereignty of God coexisting in human history to resolve the Angelic Conflict. Decision making is a precise and correct procedure of analyzing all the circumstances of life in light of the Word of God and making decisions which are compatible with God’s plan, purpose, and will. Solutions are clarified and applied with accuracy when the ten problem solving devices are utilized.
The filling of the Spirit plus creativity means recovery of truth based on divine viewpoint of life and accurate interpretation of the Scripture. True Bible doctrine is separated from false doctrine by independent thinking related to metabolized doctrine in your stream of consciousness.
The filling of the Spirit plus awareness stimulates curiosity, motivates an ongoing desire to understand the whole realm of doctrine and to be filled with the “fullness of God.” Awareness causes the restructuring of your own scale of values to assign number one priority to Bible doctrine. Awareness sees the result of God’s will, plan, and purpose for your life, which translates into a personal sense of destiny.
The filling of the Spirit is the mechanic for understanding spiritual phenomena according to I Corinthians 2:9-16. I Corinthians 2:9 introduces the concept. There are three systems of perception: rationalism, empiricism, and faith. “But just as it stands written [Isaiah 64:4; 65:17], `What [spiritual phenomena] the eye has not seen [empiricism] and the ear has not heard [rationalism], furthermore it has not entered into the heart [stream of consciousness] of man, what doctrines God has prepared for those who love Him. But to us God has revealed them through the Spirit; for our spirit investigates all things, even the deep things from God.”
The first line of this verse is a reference to the teaching ministry of the Holy Spirit. The second line is a reference to the human spirit. Our human spirit investigates or diligently searches all information taught by the Holy Spirit. The deep things of God are the invisible assets of our portfolio, as mentioned in Ephesians 3:18. I Corinthians 2:11, “For who among mankind comprehends the thoughts of a man except the soul life of a man, which is in him? Even so the thoughts of God no one has known except the Spirit of God.”
All the understanding we have comes through our thinking skills. Spiritual phenomena cannot be understood apart from the teaching ministry of the Holy Spirit. This is one of the purposes of the filling of the Holy Spirit during the Church Age. I Corinthians 2:12-13, “But we have not received the human I.Q. [human viewpoint, human frame of reference] of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might know the things [spiritual phenomena] which have been graciously given to us by God, which doctrines also we do not speak with words taught by human wisdom, but with words taught by the Spirit, interpreting spiritual truths to spiritual persons [believers filled with the Spirit].”
Unbelievers, and believers who are out of fellowship with God, cannot be taught spiritual phenomena.
I Corinthians 2:14, “But the soulish person [unbeliever or believer in reversionism] does not accept the things [spiritual phenomena] from the Spirit of God; for to him it is absurd, furthermore he is not able to understand spiritual phenomena, because it is discerned in a manner caused by the filling of the Spirit.”
We stand or fall before God based on our knowledge or ignorance of doctrine. We stand before God on the basis of doctrine we have learned. This is a private matter between you and God and no other person has the right to judge you in this. Bible doctrine must be your judge. I Corinthians 2:15-16, “But the spiritual phenomena examines [discerns, investigates] all things, yet he himself is judicially examined by no man. But who has known the thinking of the Lord, that he should instruct Him? But we have the thinking of Christ.” We do not instruct the Lord; he instructs us. The thinking of Christ is Bible doctrine.