Seeds planted and preparation of the ground to receive the good seed have their effect.  You reap what you sow; you become a ministry, the Christ in you.  You have the flesh, but that is not the real you.  You identify with the Spiritual Man, Christ in You.  And Christ is being fully formed in you.  The extent to which Christ is formed in you is the extent of holiness or sanctification.  Holiness is closely tied to being assembled into the place in the Body of Christ to which God has called you.  There is order in holiness.  There is stability.  There is faithfulness.  We all need to discern and see the Body of Christ.  We see all the gifts, ministries, offices, and orders of the Church.  We also can discern and recognize the false.  You see the reality that you have no real identity outside of the Body of Christ.  You are in Christ, that is, in the Body of Christ.  That which is out of order is not holiness.  The Body of Christ has an order, and a real called and ordained ministry that is ministering out of order or taking authority that was never given is not walking according to holiness.  The ministries, gifts, offices, and orders of the Body of Christ are clearly given in Scripture, and they are part of holiness.

The more we walk into holiness, the clearer our vision becomes.  All our spiritual senses are heightened.  We begin to see better.  Our tastes change.  We start to see that there is no satisfaction in what is worldly or ungodly.  We see the other members of the Body of Christ as being part of our own identity in Christ.  If they rejoice, we rejoice.  If they feel pain, we actually begin to feel the same pain.  We start see the value of what is godly and real, and we begin to be drawn to it. We begin to have increasingly more love, joy, peace, patience, gentleness, goodness, faith, and stability. Anger, frustration, bitterness, malice, and all the fruit of the flesh begin to drop out of our lives as we see it for what it is.  We really see that there is no satisfaction or fulfillment there.

The assembling of ourselves together is a painful part of this process, and it destroys the fleshly nature.  (Heb 10:25)It involves submission on the part of everyone.  Hierarchical thinking has to go. Status has to go.  Rebellion has to go.  The idea that we have rights has to be replaced with ministries (the Christ in us) taking responsibility that has been given and carrying out that responsibility by the leading and power of the Spirit.  Such things as Church attendance, being on time for the meetings, the family alter, ministry, love, and respect are basic.  Without such this assembling will not take place, and the Kingdom of Heaven is not available.

Obedience by the power of the Spirit changes us in our very nature.  You begin to take on the nature of Christ to be like Him.  As you obey, you change the nature of your heart.  Your heart becomes more open to the things of God.  And good seed is planted.  As you yield, you increase discernment.

Repeatedly doing righteousness God's way is what leads us into holiness or sanctification. (Rom  6:19) This righteousness cannot be separated from seeing reality as it is.  We must discern the Body of Christ.  We must see Christ in our brother and sister.  We must let God reveal this to us.  You must see that you are a particular member.  You identify with the Christ in you.  You don't identify with your fleshly nature.  You make not provision for the flesh. You see that you have no valid identity or purpose outside of the Body of Christ. You need to see the unsaved as they really are: lost sheep without the Shepherd. You need to have a heart of compassion for them, neither hate them, envy them, nor idolize them. You need to see that the creation is the Lord's.  He gives to whom He gives and withholds from whom He withholds.  Everything is His. As you see reality and listen to God's direction, you respond to the Holy Spirit and allow the Grace of God to do the work of God through you. That is a process that goes from glory to glory and from faith to faith.  It follows the spiritual law of sowing and reaping.  (Gal 6:7-9) If you plant good seed through righteousness, then you will begin to bear the fruit of the Spirit.  (Gal 5:22-23)

If you listen to ungodly counsel, follow after ungodly celebrities, listen to ungodly music, or try to get help from ungodly sources, then you will find that the soil of your heart will become hard and unable to respond to God's good seed.  You will have no response to the Holy Spirit.  If you continually step across into sin, you will find that the soil of your heart will become stony and unable to have a depth of spiritual experience.  You will at best have an intellectual or emotional response to the Holy Spirit. If you allow the world to push you and pull you into its cares, worries, entertainments, pleasures, and ambitions, then you will find that your heart is full of weeds and God's good seed will be choked by those weeds.  You will never find satisfaction or fulfillment.

If you allow the Spirit to lead you to Spiritual music, teaching, reading, meditation, and action, then you will find that the soil of your heart becomes increasingly open to God's good seed. The weeds will slowly die out.  The fruit of the Spirit will spring up.  God will create a clean heart in you.

We can only be "in Christ" to the degree that we discern the Body of Christ. (Heb 5:14, 1Tim 4:1-2) In proportion to our ability to discern reality, the Kingdom, we can enter into righteousness and sanctification.  (1John 3:2, 2Cor 3:18)

God must test everything in us to bring about His good purpose.  Do you have a strained relationship with anyone?  How do you see them?  If that person is a Christian, are you really seeing Christ in them, or are you seeing their flesh.  Have you notices that what you see you become?  If you are seeing Christ in them, then you are seeing reality.  If you are seeing the flesh, then you are believing a lie rather than believing God.  Seeing Christ will lead you into holiness.  Seeing the flesh will lead you to death.

The same is true when you look at yourself.  Have you thought of yourself much more highly than you ought?  Have you felt that you were superior to other members of the Body of Christ.  That would cause division.  Have you fully realized the reality that you are part of the Body and are totally dependent on the Body of Christ?  Have you looked at yourself as the fleshly nature, or have you seen that Christ is in you.  The truth will set you free.  You must believe Him that He is resident in your heart.  If you think you are the flesh, then you will think, speak, and act in fleshly ways.  If you realize that you are the ministry, the Christ in you, then you think, speak, and act according to the leading and power of the Holy Spirit.  You will go from glory to glory. (2Cor 3:18)

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Last updated: Dec, 2011