The three spirits in the Church
In the church today, we have three kinds of spirits that are prevalent — The Religious spirit, the Gentile spirit and the Spirit of Jesus
The Religious spirit believes in tradition and earning Gods favour through personal effort and discipline. They believe that a consistent practice of certain rituals will buy them access to special depths with God. It never does. Our pursuit of righteousness cannot earn us Gods favour or blessings, because the righteousness of Christ has already been given to us as a gift and in Christ we have obtained an inheritance filled with all spiritual blessings.
2 Corinthians 5:21 For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
This doesn’t mean we shouldn’t pursue righteousness, not pursuing it is an attribute of the Gentile spirit. This spirit sees no point to living a sanctified life if we already have been justified by God’s grace. Our pursuit of righteousness, rather, benefits us in our daily spiritual walk — it makes us Spiritually fit. Look at this way, waking up everyday and being able to live is a gift, like righteousness, it just is, as long as we have breathe in our lungs or as long as we believe in Him, everyday is a gift. We can, however, choose how we live. We can fill up our days with strength by eating the right food, managing our time with purpose, replenishing our energy through rest and exercising regularly. These activities are choices we can make to live physically healthy, in a similar fashion, we can choose to pursue righteousness daily by cultivating a spirit of gratitude, spending time in His presence in prayer, diligently searching the scriptures, praising him with hymns and songs and just generally loving Him, life and people around you unconditionally. Righteousness is a gift given to us, we can’t earn it, but like every gift, we can chose to use it or abandon it.
Here’s another way to explore this, every Christian has been admitted into a university (school of the Holy Spirit) but we all will graduate with first class honours whether we study or not because the certification is given to us as a gift from God in Christ. We do, however, reserve the choice to be knowledgeable by studying diligently and going through the curriculum fastidiously. The Religious spirit will approach this, thinking his or her effort will earn the degree, but the degree is already a gift, we can’t earn it. The Gentile spirit will ignore studying all together, seeing no point to it because we already have the degree given to us as a gift. There is power in Knowledge, and the more we know, the more we live in Truth. Truth brings illumination and illumination lights up our path as we journey so that we do not stumble into troubles that can pierce our lives with unnecessary sorrows.
Psalm 119:105 “Your word is a lamp to guide my feet and a light for my path.”
Those with The Spirit of Jesus are like the servants in the parable of the talents who multiplied their talents to yield more. They are faithful with little and faithful with much. They are like the five wise bridesmaid who oiled their lamps and waited diligently for their bridegroom. They pursue righteousness, not as a way to earn Gods favour or gifts, but as a response to Gods free gift of righteousness in Jesus. It is a love response. They have learnt to make God the delight of their souls.
To sum it up, pursuing righteousness should be a delight for its own sake. It is a daily practice of loving God. We get better at it everyday until the perfect day when we are transformed at His appearing.
