THE CONNECTION LOSING TO WIN #4

LOSING TO WIN #4

THE CONNECTION

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Years of investigation revealed the structure of the heart without presenting a cure to loss’ devastating effects.  I often cried out to God to show me the way but my hopes for recovery remained frustrated.  I remember telling my wife that if the Bible is what it claims to be, the solution has to be in it, somewhere.  (2 Timothy 3:16 & 17)  

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I knew Jesus said, “I am the way, the truth, and the life.” (John 14:5)  However I took His statement to mean He was the agent directing me to the way.  His description of the role His Father intended Him to play on Earth was that of a healer.  At the beginning of His ministry Jesus announced, “…he hath sent me to heal the broken-hearted.” (Luke 4:18 KJV) He was obviously the Great Physician.  However; with the arrival of His Holy Spirit, He became more than a doctor of the broken-hearted.  He became the actually medication.

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I wondered, “How can I have been such a mess for the past five years while the medicine was in me the whole time?”  Two decades earlier I had been born again.  Without a doubt He was alive inside me.  According to my drawing He and I had a Spirit to spirit connection.  A personal connection with God ought to provide ample power to straighten the erratic orbits of any soul.  Why then, didn’t God simply circumvent my inadequate will power and automatically heal my broken-heart?

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Allow me to address that dilemma before discussing the cure.  Much like our physical sight, our spiritual focus is mono-directional.  We see only what we fix our spiritual view on. (Psalms 25:15 & Hebrews 12:2)  The human spirit can set its focus on only one thing at a time.  To view the needs of the soul, our spirit turns outwardly, away from its central location where God’s Spirit connects with our spirit.  Therefore during the grief of loss, our spirit loses focus on the Holy Spirit.  It is, as if, we have our back to His Spirit.

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We often feel God is absent when a loss or a catastrophic event disturbs our minds and our emotions.  The Bible assures us that He will never unplug our connection. (Romans 8:38 & 39)  God also promises that He will never leave or forsake us. (Hebrews 13:5 & Deuteronomy 31:6) Furthermore the Bible promises that God will never turn away those who seek Him with their whole heart. (Jeremiah 29:13)  We, who are connected, can be confident that He will not pull the plug on His connection with us.   

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Nevertheless, the experience of God’s abandonment is a real sensation of the heart.  I call it False-Separation.  The feelings are real.  The actual fact is false. False-separation automatically produces a “double-minded” soul.  The emotional-half feels an absence while the rational-half knows better.  Thus the person is “unstable in all his ways.”  When the loss is great or the catastrophe is severe, false-separation creates an unmanageable situation for the spirit.  Not only does the spirit lack the energy resources to force reunification of the two halves but while focused on the soul the “eyes” of our spirit cannot see the Holy Spirit connected within.

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The unstable soul bombards the spirit with inordinate desires from their spheres including; power, pleasure, riches, and fame.  The desperate spirit may choose to focus on one of these as it seeks to calm the inner chaos.  This personality turmoil is common in both Christians and non-Christians.  The nominal or non-Christian may even set their focus on some kind of spiritual substitute.  The dynamics of loss does not discriminate.  Every one depends on something extra in their life to “lift” their spirit’s vitality in order to hold them together and thrive.  Any of us could latch onto a trial solution or even an addictive quick fix when our source of extra adopted energy appears to be inadequate or thought missing. Usually the trial solutions are something bigger, better and longer lasting.  However, the human heart is actually built to be satisfied with only the biggest and the best which is eternal.  That of course is God.  When God is in the center of the heart He produces no regrets, shame, or addiction like other solutions.

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In my case, I complicated the issue by allowing church ministry to crowd into the center of my heart.  And it was extremely addicting.  There are many “holy” spirit-fillers.  It could have been any God-focusing distraction: a Christian cause, a campaign for righteousness, our denominational liturgy, a church creed, some Biblical controversy, adherence to church culture.  Any of these or others can crowd into the spot reserved within the heart for God’s connection.  There is one remedy for them all.  That remedy is our perception that God is alive in our heart.

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There is a scripture that guided me before my “falling-apart”  and then took on added significance afterwards; 

    “Therefore this is what the lord says: If you repent, I will restore you that you may serve me; if you utter worthy, not worthless words, you will be my spokesman.  Let this people turn to you but you must not turn to them.”  Jeremiah 15:19 (NIV)

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As I originally entered professional ministry the captivating words in that passage were those italicized above.  The words that echo in my spirit now are those I placed in bold type…“repent” and “turn”.  Both of those words are actually the same Hebrew word, KAL.  All three carry the concept of turning around.   

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Repent has two meanings.  Unfortunately, I accepted the least important one.  It does mean to forsake or turn away from sin.  However turning away from sin cannot be successful without our spirit first turning toward God.  Emphasizing turning away from sin is an empty exercise if there is not a turning toward God.  If repentance is turning away from sin, then managing the sin is our job.  That assumes that if we really want to and tried hard enough we could just turn away from sin, at will.  When we find that it doesn’t work that way we either quit trying or think we must try harder.  But repentance is first and foremost one of the lightest burdens we will ever carry. (Matthew 11:30) For the Christian or non-Christian the required action is not to exert more human energy but to rotate our spirit’s focus in the direction of God’s Holy Spirit inside us. It is God and His Spirit’s power that transforms or weak will into a force more then sufficient to the task of managing our demanding soul.  It is merely turning to face the living God within.

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That turning of our spiritual eyes toward Jesus’ Spirit is our side of the two-way connection…Spirit to spirit.   A. W. Tozer called that process, “inwardly gazing Godward” which is the remedy for the confusion and pain of loss.  The problem is not actually sin but the blinders of a diverted focus that permits pain to corrupt.  Furthermore, painful emotions and the “worthless words” of negative thoughts are not the problem either.  Those disturbances of our soul are intended to be an alarm.  They warn us that we have turned away and need to repent.  Turning, or should I say returning, my spirit toward God’s Spirit within held the promise of a restored and satisfied heart.

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In conclusion, the underlying problem of loss as well as other life altering tragedies is our diverted consciousness from God’s spiritual connection.  The distraction of grief, accompanied with the perception that God is absent, sends our spirit restlessly searching for wholeness.  Like many of us who get locked in loss’ confusion and pain, I needed to repent (to turn around) and look at God within.  Refocusing on God satisfies our hunger for wholeness.

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However the turning and refocusing were not unconscious reflexes for me.  I was not sure “what” I was actually supposed to see or how to look inside my spirit for “it”.  I feel there must be others with those same questions.  Therefore I intend to share the process refocusing that brought God’s restoration to my heart.  The next LOSING TO WIN entry called “Seeing God Within” will address those issues.     

Man's Spirit LOSING TO WIN #3

LOSING to WIN

MAN’S SPIRIT #3

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Mapping the soul took a long time.  I intended to use the resulting analyses to plot my own loss recovery.  After all, I presumed, who could be more equipped to solve this problem than an ex-counselor and church growth consultant.  Yet efforts to correct my troubled thoughts and emotions yielded nothing. “What have I left out?”   Finally it occurred to me that the problem was not something left out but something overlooked.  I assumed as a Christian I knew all about man’s spirit …the central feature of personality.  However attempts to define the human spirit produced a very superficial description.  So I cracked open my Unger’s Bible Dictionary only to discover that I was not the only one settling for ambiguity on the subject. It defined spirit as an, “…immaterial part of man…related to worship and divine communication.” A dictionary as unreligious as The American College Dictionary provided more insightful description even though it referred to the human spirit as a principle, “mediating between body and soul” which “tempers thought, feeling, or action.” The New Standard Bible Dictionary doesn’t do much better but added that the word spirit “is used of that specific side of human nature which allies man to God.” It also contrasts spirit with the word soul which “is restricted to the secular exercises of the inner man.” It goes on to acknowledge in its treatment of spirit that the New Testament presents a more “consistent psychological theory” of the spirit than the Old Testament.  

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Even so, no scripture gives a clear definition of the human spirit.  Christian writings about man’s spirit, of which there is little, tries to deal with its ethereal qualities and ends up being little more than opinion assertions.  A lead from Wheeler Robinson, Principal of Regent’s Park College, of London suggested that an investigation into the role the spirit plays within the human personality offers a very revealing study of the human spirit.  Dr. Robinson put it this way,

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 “…we can see enough of the direction and character of ‘spiritual’ activity to ascribe this unifying function to spirit as one of its essentials.” 

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Taking his cue I found at least three significant “roles” scripture reveals the spirit plays while fulfilling its one principal task…heart unification.  It appears that holding the personality together is indeed the spirit’s main job.  Perhaps the best picture of the spirit carrying out this function is seen in the book of James.  It shows the human spirit in an almost ruthless struggle to unify the personality.  The brief exposure occurs within a dispute James was trying to resolve.  The conflict is over something two or more people want but are unable to get.  However he calls their attention to the real source of the problem,

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“What causes fights and quarrels among you?  Don’t they come from your desires that battle within you?”  James 4:1 (NIV)

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 James insists in this passage that their desire for something in the outside world is caused by the sensation of an internal deficiency.  The spirit within each of them was responding to some lack or unfulfilled desire within.  They had mistaken their internal longing for some external object or distinction.  In pointing that out James discloses the spirit within franticly trying to fulfill an unsatisfied desire within their heart.

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“Or do you think Scripture says without reason that the spirit he caused to live in us envies intensely.”        James 4:5

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James’ remedy to the outward conflict is redirected to an inward solution, saying, “…purify your hearts, you double-minded.” (James 4:8b)  This compound word “double-minded” is the same he used earlier in verse 1:8 when he first diagnosed their condition as double-minded. He pronounced the condition of the parties involved as being, “unstable in all he does.”  

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I found the word rendered “mind” in that compound word to be very important.  It was usually translated as “soul” or “life”. So James was talking about an unstable soul within which an intense struggle raged.  The passage gives us a snap shot of the soul swinging beyond its orbits.  However more to our point it reveals the spirit taxed beyond its unifying ability. The forces that render the spirit unable to perform its task become clearer as we accumulate more information about the human spirit.

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The spirit serves as a gravitational center for the personality. It carries out that task by doing three things.  (1) It subjects the longings of the soul to an ethical value grid. (2) It monitors and addresses the deficits of the soul. (3) It also energizes the soul to achieve personality fitness.  These three functions of the spirit are necessary to hold the heart together as a unit. In some ways they resemble solar system.  Whereas a solar system has gravitational pull, centrifugal force, and motion to hold it together the personality relies on the characteristics of the human spirit…Conscience, Perception, and Energy.

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(1) CONSCIENCE

(a)   The spirit automatically senses the virtue of a desire or longing of the soul.  It indorses, though not always correctly, the healthy ones and opposes the others. (Romans 2:14) “Indeed when the Gentiles, who do not have the law, do by nature things required by the law, they are a law for themselves, even though they do not have the law,”

(b)   These innately intuitive judgments of the spirit influence the thoughts and feelings of the soul. (Rome 2:15) “…since they show that the requirements of the law are written on their hearts, their consciences also bearing witness, and their thoughts now accusing, now even defending them.” 

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(2) PERCEPTION

(a)   The spirit observes the soul. “For who among men knows the thoughts of a man except the man’s spirit within him? (1 Corinthians 2:11)

(b)    In so doing the spirit is aware of the soul in distress.  “I remembered my song in the night.  My heart mused and my spirit inquired:” (Psalm 77:6)

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(3) ENERGY

    (a)The spirit allies itself with soul desires it perceives as valuable. “…your name and   renown are the desire of our hearts. My soul yearns for you in the night; in the morning my spirit longs for you.” (Isaiah 26:8b + 9a)

    (b) The spirit emits energy throughout the heart ranging from weak to strong. “…poor in spirit…” (Matthew 5:3) and “…strong in spirit…” (Luke 1:80)

     (c) There are also other forces that influence the soul, stimulating opposition to the spirit, weakening the spirit’s power within the heart. “…the spirit is willing but the flesh is weak.” (Matthew 26:41 + Mark 14:38)

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The obvious conclusion drawn from the above references is; though the spirit exerts a force within the personality it is does not carry enough power to completely direct the affairs of the heart.  One reason for its lack of power is the transformative nature of other energy sources.  The scriptures speak of four basic energy transformers which influence the currents flowing within our personality. These transforming influences are called; WORLDLY, CARNAL, SECULAR, and SPIRITUAL.   Each point of connection transmits a two-way current.  These in turn modify the current emitted by the sources represented below.                                                   The symbol < - > represents the two current. 

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               WORLD < - > BODY < - > SOUL < - > SPIRIT < - > GOD  

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The significance of highlighting this two-way current is to introduce and demystify the will of the human spirit.

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 Sense the human “will” is a force emitting from the features of the heart I was tempted to ignore its significance in the structure of a healthy personality.  However that was a mistake.  As it turns out human Will plays such a crucial role in our spiritual health that Martin Luther, the founder of all Protestant Christianity, said that overlooking its significance automatically places the believer at odds with God’s salvation.  He said that to know nothing about the “nature, extent, and limits” of our will is to, “…know nothing whatsoever of Christianity.”  He was so emphatic about agreement on that point that those who disagree in Luther’s assessment means, “…he is the Christian’s chief foe.”

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 So then, scripture speaks of the will as a force emanating from a source, like man’s spirit.  Perhaps the best way to think of the human will is as a force radiating from the heart.  That which it radiates is desire.  So we see God expressing His will through His Holy Spirit which conveys His desire to man’s spirit.  Man’s spirit can then, if it will yield to that desire, transmit that Godly desire as its very own will to the soul. If the soul, in its turn, also accepts that Godly desire then it transmits it to the body and so on.  That force has become, in the proses, the person’s unified will and ultimately is expressed in the world.  However it must be transferred through many realms each with their own desires and their own wills.  

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The lack of personality unification is what Paul was referring to when he confessed in Romans chapter seven that the reason he could not consistently obey God was sin lived in him.  In other wards one or more of these ports of transmission replaced God’s will with its own.  Paul, at that point, was admitting that his human spirit was not totally in charge of his personality, the heart.  A strengthened well-structured heart can transmit a more attractive will from the human spirit of man.  It can actually carry the energy necessary to gain the cooperative desire and compliance of the whole heart.

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However when the spirit is struggling with a soul fragmented by loss or one inappropriately reconfigured after some traumatic life alternating event, the spirit is too busy holding the personality together to successfully influence the entire person, spirit, soul, and body.  The Good News for me came as I saw my personality more clearly and by that recognized God’s Spirit within.  Armed with the recognition of God’s existence within it became easier to rule my personality. 

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In the next blog entries, as part of this LOSING TO WIN series, I hope to explain that transformative step God used to coax me out of the darkness of loss.

PERSONALITY STRUCTURE Losing to Win #2

LOSING TO WIN

PERSONALITY STRUCTURE

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Diagnosing a broken structure requires familiarity with the nature and function of its parts.  To relay the results of any investigation demands the use of accurate terms with precise meanings. To correct the effects “loss” had on my personality I first had to deal with a semantic difficulty.  Psychologists, Sociologists, Philosophers, Anthropologists, and other fields of study frequently use terms and definitions peculiar to their specific disciplines.  Unfortunately more often than not they adopt Biblical terms but alter them with none Biblical definitions. I also recognized from my study as a pastoral counselor that despite a shared vocabulary nearly all Christian Theologians use their own nuanced definitions for the same words.  The entire topic of human personality seems plagued with vague terms and fuzzy definitions.  The simple fact is the Bible was never intended to be used as a psychology text book.  Rather its purpose as stated in 2 Tim. 3:15-17 is to make us “wise for salvation” and equip believers “for every good work”.  So it should not be surprising that on the topic of human personality even the Bible varies its own wording with quite vague meanings on the subject, especially between the New and Old Testaments.

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Even so, a lot of Christian authors and Biblical scholars agree that the term “heart” means man’s personality.  The physical heart makes a great metaphor for its none-vascular namesake.  Both are composed of two regions with four functioning chambers. Naturally a case could be made for other configurations.  Yet the number of well-known authors, theorists, and Biblical as well as none Biblical scholars that use the concept in their work contribute a great deal of legitimacy to this model.  An abbreviated list of those who use the four-sided heart approach to personality includes such authorities as:  Judson Cornwall, Stephen Covey, Lawrence J. Crabbs, Ron Jenson, Peter Honey, Carl G. Jung, David Kolb, Robert S. McGee, Pat Springle, and many others.

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While grasping at the topic, I was struck by the number of instances of scriptural repetitions related to the quadrilateral nature of man’s personality…that is the heart.  Perhaps the clearest example of the four elements of man’s personality is found in Romans 15:13.  

“May the of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit,”    Romans 15:13 (NIV)

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These four components are further divided in two distinct spheres within the heart it calls the soul.  Of course Jesus describes the heart and its structure with extreme precision in Mark 12:30 and it is repeated in Luke 10:27. 

 “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.”

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Viewed as whole this pair of pairs affords a tremendous visual aid for identify the makeup of the human heart. 

I constructed the diagram below to illustrate the structure showing its components.  It pictures the “HEART” as the entire unit while the “SOUL” refers specifically to the orbits in which four interrelated elements operate.  

 Notice the Bible references do not include the diagram’s central feature, the human spirit.  That vital feature is the focus of a future blog. We must set it aside for now in order to concentrate on the soul of man’s heart.  The exclusion, at this stage of the discussion, serves to keep us from confusing the spirit’s role with that of the soul.  The differences between the spirit and soul are too important to allow their distinctions to get mixed-up. 

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 There are quite a few references that confirmed the quadrilateral structure of the soul. The most convincing ones include; Colossians 1:9-13, 1 Thessalonians 1:3, Philippians 1:9, and Ephesians 1:17-19 + 3:17-19.  Each of these is a prayer for Godly maturation in the hearts of the saints.  Taking these as a whole they provide a standard by which to evaluate the healthy resilience well-formed heart.

The elements of personality categorized in this manner helped me visualize the consequence of loss.  Without this kind of dissection into identifiable components an accurate assessment of a healthy personality would be impossible.  However with this list I believed I could (A) identify and (B) assess areas of weaknesses within me.  Such a procedure is essential for a diagnosis.  However as you follow me through this process please heed the warning of a respected expert in the field of psychology, Lawrence J. Crabb, Jr., Ph.D.

“As I discuss the various component parts of this whole person, I may give the impression that I think of a person as nothing more than an assortment of parts.  Let me state clearly that I believe a person is an indivisible whole.  My effort…is to better understand how that indivisible whole functions by looking at the key functioning elements within the human personality.”

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The components of the soul identified in the previous diagram and chart present a number of descriptive words.  I found it most convenient and descriptive to synthesize terms for those components from those words. The two main categories of the soul then became Emotion and Intellect. They could have been Instinctual and Mental, Feelings and Ideas, or something else but Emotion and Intellect worked just fine.

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Emotion is subdivided into (1) Identity and (2) Action.  “Identity” can be thought of as our inclination to establish associations with people, places, ideas, and things.  “Action” designates the element of personality that activates our capacities to confidently initiate conduct.  The two facets on the intellectual side are (1) Knowledge and (2) Understanding.  The things we think we know I recognized as “Knowledge” and the things we believe are true or real is “Understanding”.  These four combine to form what some refer to as our attitude of heart, our personality, or our heart.

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With accurate terms selected to identify these four aspects of personality I believed I was able to confront the harmful effect of loss but could now discover a workable solution and present the results in a reasonable manner. However before that I had one more key feature to identify within the heart.  That central feature is mans’ spirit.  Understanding the human spirit and the role it plays in the human heart led me as I hope it leads others to the Key which overcame the destructive effects of loss in my life.