Jesus came to this world, lived on this earth and died on the cross with one single aim to do the will of the Father. In order to do the will of the Father he always denied His own will. John 06:38 “For I have come down from heaven, not to do My own will, but the will of Him who sent Me”. Jesus established the New Covenant in His blood. His life was fully surrendered to the will of the Father. Heb 10:09 “then He said, “Behold, I have come to do Your will. He takes away the first in order to establish the second”. By denying His will completely and obeying the Father’s will, Jesus fulfilled the law, removed the Old Covenant and established the New Covenant.
When God decided to dwell with the Israelites under the Old Covenant, He told Moses to make the tabernacle for Him to dwell in. The tabernacle had three parts namely Outer court, Holy Place and Most Holy Place. God was present only at the Most Holy place. Only the High priest was allowed once a year to enter into the Most Holy Place. The Most Holy Place was separated from the Holy Place with a thick veil. The same order continued in the Jerusalem temple. 1 Thes 05:23 “Now may the God of peace Himself sanctify you entirely; and may your spirit and soul and body be preserved complete, without blame at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ”. So a New Covenant believer consists of body, soul and spirit. God is spirit and man can have God’s presence only in the spirit and that stands in the same place of Most Holy Place in the Tabernacle. God confirms this in 1 Cor 06:19 “Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you”.
Soul consists of the mind, the emotions and the will. God gave man the freedom to exercise his will. He can reject God or accept God. Acts 07:51 “You men who are stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears are always resisting the Holy Spirit; you are doing just as your fathers did”. Emotions and mind (intellect) are part of the soul and these are not what God is interacting with or wants to dwell in. Animals and spiritually dead ones are controlled by the soul. Many Christians are misguided by the soulish life as the life from God. God is working with our spirit and not with our soul. Rom 08:16 “The Spirit Himself testifies with our spirit that we are children of God.” We have seen that Jesus denied His will to do the Father’s will. Jesus tells us in Luke 09:23 “If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself, and take up his cross daily and follow Me”. So to do God’s will we have to surrender our will completely.
A true Christian life is the one build by the obedience to words of Christ
Heb 04:12 “For the word of God is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword, and piercing as far as the division of soul and spirit, of both joints and marrow, and able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart”. The Holy Spirit is making it clear that the word of God can divide between soul and spirit and judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart. So man in his free will should allow the word of God to control his spirit. This will happen by faith in God. Rom 10:17 “So faith comes from hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ”.
Jesus says in Mathew 07:24-27 “24Therefore everyone who hears these words of Mine and acts on them, may be compared to a wise man who built his house on the rock.25 And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and slammed against that house; and yet it did not fall, for it had been founded on the rock.26 Everyone who hears these words of Mine and does not act on them, will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand. 27 The rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and slammed against that house; and it fell – and great was its fall.”
A true Christian life is the one build by the obedience to words of Christ – hearing and acting on the words of Christ and that is faith (Rom 10:17) “the righteous man shall live by faith.”(Rom 01:17). Jesus said that such a life is like a house which is built on the rock. A Christian life built on emotions, intellect and human will is like a house built on sand. Many believers are building their Christian life on emotions, intellect and human will, which is not going to stand on tribulations and testing.
May God help all of us to live a New Covenant life with total surrendering of our will and doing God’s will by His power for His glory.
