Here I share things about myself that you’ve never heard before because I don’t normally share them. I’m no longer ashamed though it took a while for the Lord to work that out in me. I worked it out with bravado—I had no other tactic available as far as I knew. I do not recommend this tactic. I was out of my mind as the Lord dealt with me.
For me my defining moment happened six months after I was filled with the spirit. As you may recall from earlier posts, I was born again out of a life of fine art, drugs, and occult practices in early 1974. I was smoking pot every two hours as I had for the previous seven years. I was dropping acid (LSD) once or twice a week. I had hundreds of acid trips by this time. I quit counting sometime after 600 trips. Somehow, in my drugged stupor, I called my dad (on his birthday—January 15, 1974), and said, “I need to get filled with the spirit.” I had no idea what that meant and as far as I knew at that moment I had never heard that term before.
My father came over and bundled me in the car and took me to his bible study of the night (it happened to be a Roman Catholic Charismatic group that night). They all laid hands on me. I renounced the world, the flesh and the devil. They prayed to break the power of the enemy in my life, and then prayed that I would be filled with the Holy Spirit in power.
I was so stoned, it took several days before I even noticed anything. The only religious event I incurred was the one mentioned, the laying on of hands for the Baptism of the Holy Spirit. That group accepted infant baptism as valid (they weren’t planning on leaving their church), so I did also.
I felt nothing. I was too stoned. I kept doing my drugs. As with all my spiritual adventures, I got into it fully (as much as I could in my intellectual arrogance). I gave Jesus six months to prove himself. I accepted the Bible as truth. The first indication that something had changed was the note on my wall calendar/journal a couple days later that “I feel strangely peaceful”.
I joined my dad every night at the various bible studies all over the Twin Cities area with which he was involved. I started reading the Bible starting with John, then the epistles, then the gospels, then the prophets, then the epistles again, and so on.
The next month I actually started working again—day jobs. In March, walking home from work as a cook in downtown Minneapolis (as I did every day) I was praying and singing like I always did. My songs changed to an unknown language and my songs became joyful worship. I had received tongues—quietly and naturally. I had been told to expect it.
I never did have an emotional experience of conversion. My Baptism in the Spirit happened that way also. I have no explanation for that other than the possibility that my emotions were so tied up in drug experiences that the Lord knew He could not use emotions to get through to me. All I know is that there is no standard religious experience for any of this or any of us.
I devoured Dad’s library of Watchman Nee, Andrew Murray, Smith Wigglesworth, Oswald Chambers, Hudson Taylor, Rees Howells, Derek Prince, and many more including all the fashionable charismatic books of the day. By 1975 I had read several hundred Christian books. I would read two or three a day plus many chapters of the Bible. I couldn’t get enough. I just poured the data into my drug-ravaged brain. [I was taught how to speed read in high school— 3000 words a minute, and I had a photographic memory.]
In that first six months I read the bible cover to cover several times, still doing drugs (pot and acid). My friends, all but one, kicked me out because of Jesus. The focus of Dad’s teaching was Romans 6 and accepting your personal crucifixion.
I have no explanation or excuse for that. My old man was entrenched. I do not recommend it. Drug-crazed is simply an accurate descriptive term for me at that time. It was stupid, at best. However, that’s the way the Lord dealt with me. He is sovereign. Take it up with Him. I don’t think He worries about stuff like this nearly as much as the church does.
What He is looking for is that transaction of the will of a man or woman when they decide to repent and give Jesus His proper place in their lives. The variations are startling to the religious mind. God is endlessly creative.
I didn’t get around to dealing with Romans 6 until some time in June, 1974. At that point I accepted that my death was deserved and that the Lord had covered it when He brought me into His body. It was the next major step in my spiritual growth. I simply prayed, “Lord, make my death real in my life.” He did—of course.
Our entire Christian life seems to be focused on laying down further areas of our old self so they can be replaced by the life in the Messiah. In this way we are continuously enlightened to the character of God. As He produces that fruit in us we can see it for what it is and learn to recognize it in His dealings with us.
This helps us identify His voice better. It helps us understand what He is asking us to do better. In many ways it improves our personal relationship with Jesus.
Giving permission
It is really wonderful to watch His life grow out of us as we give Him permission to do that. Though we are dead, we are still regularly required to kill off new areas of our old self which are still struggling to stay alive. No, there is no way we can do that. BUT, we do have to give Him permission to make it real in our lives.
In all things, God’s love, kindness, and gentleness do not allow Him to run rough shod over us and make blanket changes without our permission. Remember, His goal is clear, open communication with a separate person who has been given the ability to choose and say no.
Of course, it is stupid to say no for many reasons. It is also true that [as I have mentioned many times] I didn’t have this choice before I was born again and set free by dying to my old self. [I was under the control of demons and their lies before Yeshua set me free.] This is part of the equipping God provides automatically at rebirth. Nevertheless, as an individual saved by grace to communicate and relate to the Lord, I must continually offer myself up for pruning and cleansing.
I plead with you, dear brothers and sisters, to give your bodies to God because of all he has done for you. Let them be a living and holy sacrifice—the kind he will find acceptable. This is truly the way to worship him… let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think. Then you will learn to know God’s will for you, which is good and pleasing and perfect. Romans 12:1–2 NLT
We must offer ourselves as a living sacrifice so that we can be transformed. Like many areas of the Christian walk this is a continual process throughout our growth. It is not optional, but necessary.
Our old minds cannot hear him
The transformation I am talking about is imperative because we can get into real doctrinal trouble by filtering what we hear from God through our old thought processes. Our mind really needs to be renewed.
One of the best passages of scripture to talk about this is in Ephesian 4 beginning at verse 17. It starts out with a strong admonition:
Now this I affirm and testify in the Lord, that you must no longer live as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their minds; 18 they are darkened in their understanding, alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, due to their hardness of heart; 19 they have become callous and have given themselves up to licentiousness, greedy to practice every kind of uncleanness. Ephesians 4:17-19 RSV
This is where we start. In fact, this is where we return again and again. I suspect that most of you are like me and want to believe that our rebirth eliminated the old man and we no longer have to deal with it. That is an obvious error.
In fact, it is a farce to think we are fixed completely at the moment we are saved. Our dance with the flesh never ends until we get our new body. We have to be continuously turning it over to death. Suicide is not an option. We have to ask the Lord to do it in us and then let him do it without fear.
Paul goes on with this explanation of the process of mind renewal. Ephesians 4: 20, 22-24 RSV
20 You did not so learn Christ!…22 Put off your old nature which belongs to your former manner of life and is corrupt through deceitful lusts, 23 and be renewed in the spirit of your minds, 24 and put on the new nature, created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness.
Of course, the problem is that it is difficult to put on something that we barely understand and can not really comprehend. This is why it is a gradual process. Our life in Jesus is a continual revealing of His nature and what we need to do to allow Him full rein.
Paul continues with a glimpse of his understanding of the issues we must deal with. But you will need to make these personal to deal with your inner person. He tells us not to lie; not to let anger cause us to sin, not to steal, not to speak corrupt words.
He tells us not to grieve the Holy Spirit. But often we are so ignorant and self-deceived that we don’t even know when we are grieving the spirit. As usual, we need to ask the spirit to tell us how these things apply to us today.
“What do you want me to deal with today, Lord?”
This needs to be your regular attitude in prayer. He finishes chapter 4 with these verses that I will quote from the NKJV:
Let all bitterness, wrath, anger, clamor, and evil speaking be put away from you, with all malice. And be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God in Christ forgave you. Ephesians 4:31–32
After some more talk about stupid sinful things we can do and should stop doing. Paul puts it into perspective (as he commonly does) with the simple statement of 5:10
Carefully determine what pleases the Lord.
He concludes this little discussion with another of my favorite verses in the Epistles.
15 Look carefully then how you walk, not as unwise men but as wise, 16 making the most of the time, because the days are evil. Ephesians 5: 15–16
This is a serious thing we are involved with. No, we cannot make things better by grit and determination. We cannot pull ourselves up by our own spiritual bootstraps. But, on the other hand, we will find our lives are much more fulfilling if we are constantly expecting opportunities for growth in the spirit. We will find out about these opportunities by talking with our fiancée, Yeshua Messiah.
The Lord has a plan. You probably do not have a clue what it is exactly. I’ve been walking with the Lord for over 50 years and I still only have clues about where to look for the opportunities I am certain He will provide in due season.
This article is like that. When I started, I had no idea I was going to be talking about acting like the Bride we are—or who I was.
One of the glorious things about coming to know the Lord intimately is that we come to learn who we are also. As we enter into that close communication with the Lord, He lets us see what He designed when He made us. This is one of the really nice benefits of a tight relationship with the creator of the universe.
His wisdom, joy, and sense of infectious fun are marvelous. Open up your heart to Him who loves you. He will never lead you astray. He will only do wonderful things in your life—even if many of those changes are only seen in hindsight. Like your fingerprints, you are unique. God loves that about you. The more you understand what you were designed to do, the happier you and He and the rest of Body of Christ will be. It is a real joy to see a member of the Body inserted into their proper place and functioning in the freedom of the Lord of Lords & King of Kings—the glorious Messiah.
We can know Him!
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