The common mistake of Christians is to separate the spiritual from the material.
This habit leads to living two lives; a sort of schizophrenia. While we live in a natural, material world we are meant to live as spiritual creatures, looking to and heeding the spiritual, not the material. Prophets brought spiritual light into a darkened, material world and their messages made a profound impact. Jesus, an unremarkable man in His appearance, had a remarkable and dramatic effect on His hearers; they were amazed at His teaching (Matthew 7:28). The reason was that He spoke with authority – spiritual authority – bringing eternal truths into a confused and lost world. That is always how we know that we have received a rhema; it brings light where there was only darkness. It is spiritual rather than material and natural.
Another common mistake of Christians is to seek comfort and rest in this world. We must surrender such hopes and face reality; in this life we are sojourners in a hostile, material and demonic world. The place of rest upon which we should fix our eyes is not in this life or this world; we are called to be citizens of a different world and a different city. Like Abraham, we have been called out of our natural place into a life of sojourning in temporary dwelling places en route to that heavenly city to which we are called to be citizens.
“By faith Abraham, when he was called to go out into a place which he should after receive for an inheritance, obeyed; and he went out, not knowing whither he went. By faith he sojourned in the land of promise, as in a strange country, dwelling in tabernacles with Isaac and Jacob, the heirs with him of the same promise: For he looked for a city which has foundations, whose builder and maker is God” (Hebrews 11:8-10).
This is the life of the true believer.
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