Yes, through Jesus, we can be resurrected from any earlier unsound choices that have been made, in which we have fruitlessly tried to satisfy ourselves with the things of the world. The Holy Spirit IS here and IS available to help us for every trouble we get ourselves into. He is available for all conditions and appearances that are in this world. He is not exempt from offering help in some areas, just because we attempt to keep them hidden. Indeed, He waits enthusiastically for us to be willing to have Him bring the buried stuff to the surface. He longs for us to give Him permission to heal and dissolve our previously unsound choices that led to false foundations in this world and our hearts. Since Jesus is our Savior, the Holy Spirit's purpose is to dispel what isn't true about us any longer, as well as acknowledge and nurture what is true about us now. Through Christ Jesus, dwelling within us, He does this unfailingly.

Now that we've made Jesus Lord of our lives, we can prayerfully go to Him and let Him take our burdens, even if we don't know how to pray. If we ask Him how, He will touch our hearts and create a prayer in us that causes our souls to yearn deeply for Him. This deep yearning for Him IS our prayer and the only one really needed.

This is one of the most important and exciting topics we could discuss. I pray that we can look at this topic of "desires" with all of the godly wisdom and intelligence that we can muster, because it deals with thoughts and feelings buried deep within our hearts and minds.

The sexual drive on this earth appears to be very powerful. So, too, the drive for money, or power, status, food, possessions, or anything of this physical/material world. We seem driven by the physical, so much so that it frequently makes us throw our hands up in despair. It is as if some very hungry machine dwells deep inside us, that makes us act crazy and do things out of a craving that is never fulfilled in any lasting sense. Are we subject to these "powers"? Are we victims of them? Not if we truly know Who the Lord of our lives, is. It is quite obvious that this world is not the place to half-heartedly accept the Lord. It's all or nothing!

What do we do, when we are tempted by this mad and hungry “world machine”? When we focus on the external for our happiness, we are really focusing on our flesh, which is drawn to Satan. Both the body and the world are external and fleshly factors. Although the body is where Christ's Spirit dwells within us on this earth, when we focus only on the physical body, we are giving credence to something that, in and of itself, has no credence; validity to something that is invalid; power to something that is powerless. The body is actually a neutral device. That is why our focus must be on God's Spirit.

We must give our bodies their purpose in Christ because otherwise Satan will take them for his purpose. We must deliberately keep our eyes on Jesus. When we do that we promote power, strength, and healing rather than dwelling on conditions and appearances in the world. We go beyond mere survival as our purpose. What we choose to give in this world, is what we have chosen is our purpose. We must decide what is to be our purpose. Are we purposed to be vessels of honor or dishonor?

From a carnal perspective, everything appears to be chaotic because the foundation, on which the carnal world rests, is chaotic. It is no surprise that we are tempted by the things of this carnal world. We, as well as our ancestors, made them for the needs and desires of our carnal bodies and carnal minds. Consequently, we love them. Now, we want to remove our investment in them. It's a choice we must make. God will never take our freedom of choice away. Fortunately, ignoring God brings eventual pain and our aversion to pain works to God's advantage. There is a limit to how much pain we can endure before we desire to hand the reigns over to God. Often we have to hit bottom before we can finally let go of our investment in things of our carnal nature. But the "bottom" line is that we can attain freedom from carnal things, whenever we choose to. We will begin inviting the favor of God upon us, when we do.

Do not view things from the world's point of view. We really must stand back from the battleground we are on and take a fresh look, through Christ's eyes. The world, too, has a purpose that we give to it. Is this a place where Christ is increasing His kingdom? Or is this a place where Satan dwells, snatching countless thousands and drawing them into fleshly passions and pains? We must remember where the real power is. It always has been in Christ Jesus. Satan is already defeated, yet he lingers on for a while, and we still are tempted by him.

The eyes of the flesh were not designed to be able to see reality as God created it. The ears of the flesh were not designed to hear God's truth as it is. But our senses can be guided by the Holy Spirit and, indeed, ultimately must be. For now, though, we need to let go of all the investments we have in our senses. We need to be willing to say, "I see this and hear this and feel this, but it has no meaning to me. Teach me, God, what is the real meaning of this?" That is how one becomes as a little child in order to enter God's Kingdom.

We were given the power of decision and consequently a degree of creativity and control over the function of our bodies, when we were expelled from paradise. In our “expelled” or sinful state, we had to find a place to live and be able to get there. God foresaw our needs and gave us legs so that we could journey from place to place, but He knew our legs would not lead us to Him unless we chose to kneel and pray, giving that function to them.

He knew our arms and backs would be very tired as we carried our necessities and other heavy burdens throughout this world, but He knew that one day, His Son would be here, carrying our burdens for us. Still, as we see, it is we who choose which purpose to give our arms and backs by choosing whether we let God carry our burdens for us or continue to carry them ourselves.

God also gave us hearts, but, once again, He gave us the opportunity, once we dwelled in the world, to choose what they beat for. Do they strive for the things of this world or does every beat of our hearts strive for Christ's love and work to distribute this undying love in this dark world?

God also gave us a mind. Again, we have a choice. Is it always trying to figure out why the world works the way it does, thereby giving undue attention and power to the carnal world? Or is it steadily focused on Christ, thereby helping to shine away the darkness and give people hope in a hopeless world, purpose in a deceptive world, and joy in a fragmented and sad world? God's mind is very powerful and, fortunately or unfortunately, this power was given to us, also. Truthfully, there is some power in the minds of the people living in and focused on the carnal world. They are quite capable of accumulating wealth and worldly goods here and, by their choice, they do this, don't they? But there is no lasting sense of purpose given to us in worldly gain. This is why it seems apparent that the rich and famous often need the help of our Lord and Savior, Jesus, more than some. Jesus said it is easier for the camel to go through the eye of a needle than for the rich man to enter the kingdom. Worldly security is false but putting all our security in Jesus, is true security, indeed the only security where eternity is concerned.

When all is said and done, the world's attractions leave us feeling empty, despondent and far from satisfied. This is because our purpose is not to placate Satan and the world, but instead our purpose is to please God and to bring Christ into eyes of the world by accepting Him whole-heartedly. We must learn to do His bidding, learn to hear the Holy Spirit, God's still, small voice, beyond the clamor of the bells and whistles this world issues in place of it.

Now we want to remove our investment in this world, as well as our focus upon it and all its temptations. That is necessary before He can lead us out of the pain that has its beginnings in the fall of the world. Again, God will never take our freedom of choice away, but there is a limit to how much pain we can inflict on ourselves, because there is a limit to our endurance of pain. Isn't that why there is suicide? If we continue to hold onto our painful way, instead of turning to God's healing and help, the future is only grim.

Compared to Christ, Satan has no power. If we focus on the world, we are giving power to Satan, the enemy of our souls who has one goal, to destroy us. Jesus says, “Come unto Me all you who are heavy laden and I will give you rest.” Anyone who focuses on the world is heavy laden and it would be highly recommended to come to (or focus on) Jesus through prayer and repentance, knowing that He will give us rest. It is when the world is at its worst, and we are feeling a heavy burden because of it, that Jesus proves it is He who best relieves our burdens. When we feel God's light burst through the vale of tears in our hearts, it is then we truly know that God does indeed relieve burdens.

When things are going “hunky-dory,” our hearts are not too keen on having Jesus remove our burdens, because we are not aware of them. Although we still have them, our deepest and most heart-felt prayers wait for the depth of sorrow that always is eventually brought on by the world, THEN our passionate prayers are flung to God quite noticeably. Why? God reads hearts and our most passionate prayers will be quickly responded to, by Him. I must note, however, that there are plenty of times when the right prayer is prayed without passion yet immediately answered by God. He wants us to know Him and trust Him. He, therefore, can use both our impassioned prayers AND our hastily spoken ones. Because He knows what we need before we do, He even answers prayers we have not uttered.

When we whine about and are offended by this crazy world, we are giving the world power over us that it doesn't really have. It is quite distressing to maintain this misconception and requires constant effort and constant justification to prove the world is unconquerable and that we must stay depressed because of this. However, Jesus said we are to be of good cheer because He overcame the world. If He dwells within us, that means that with Him, we, too, have overcome this world. A sure sign that Jesus is not Lord of our lives, is when we allow the world to rule over us and are brought down by it. Jesus said what we pray believing will come true. Is this then, what we want to pray, believing, thereby making it true? Let's not choose to be a victim of the world but, instead, let's choose to be a victor with Christ. This is done by taking your eyes off the world and focusing on Him alone.

The world is a testing place. Satan rules when we give him our attention instead of focusing on the Lord. Jesus rules when we give our attention to Him instead of focusing on Satan. Jesus said we can't worship both God and mammon. We'll love the one and hate the other. This means we are encouraged to worship only God, at all times. When we, of our own flesh, are fighting evil, we have decided to take issues into our own hands and will surely lose the battle. We are worshipping whatever our attention is focused on. When we are fighting evil in our own strength, we have bowed down to it, and have chosen to allow it to be our god, even as it whips the tar out of us. It is scripturally sound, so we are Biblically bound to turn our eyes to the Lord, hastily, whenever we are sensing a battle brewing with the world once again. Say, “Hell, no. I won't go” and turn to God instead. Allow Jesus one glance from within your soul, and His peace will steal over you. How do you do this? Ask Him to remove your perception, so that His perception can be dominant in you. Just ask, that's all.

Have you noticed that sexual conquests can be collected just like one collects coins or sea shells? Have you seen that bodies can be worshipped with the same reverence that one worships God? Both ours and others' bodies can be given an immense amount of power to make us happy, but it requires an amazing amount of energy and focus to maintain these graven images. God prefers that our bodies be used by the Holy Spirit who will transform the meaning we gave to them. He will help us recognize that these bodies are merely vessels that receive and transmit perceptions or judgments. Our perceptions can either be blessed by God or blurred by Satan (it is our choice). Christ ordained our bodies to be temples of the Holy Spirit. It is Satan who entices us to use them for lust, perversion and misdirected worship. Our choice for heaven rests in deciding whether or not we want to focus on the physical vessel or God's Spirit. As much as we'd like to, we can't have both.

I want to join with you in making a new choice in which our bodies decrease in importance and God's Spirit increases in importance. The body, no matter how beautiful, is destined for death and decay. The Holy Spirit will lead us away from the temptation to glorify physical vessels. These “cartons” of flesh will not carry us up to heaven to dwell with the Spirit of God, where sorrow of any kind no longer exists. Here, on earth, we can only see what we love. If what we perceive as light, happens to be darkness, it is dark indeed. The only light we want is God's light. He is the only one through whom we will, at last, be able to see.

Perhaps we think the battleground (this world of bodies and material things) can offer something ultimately satisfying. Can it offer us a perfect calmness, and a sense of love so deep and quiet that no loss or touch of doubt can ever mar our certainty? Can it offer us something that will last forever? No, ultimately only attributes of God's fruit of the Spirit, like joy and peace, will truly satisfy us. Let's keep that in mind.  

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