“The natural man, receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God,” (1 Corinthians 2:14). Perhaps, we should think a bit about that. On our own, we cannot know the ways of the Spirit; how He wishes to work, or who He desires to work through. We cannot follow the leading of the Holy Ghost, without that Spirit dwelling within us. The things of the Spirit, can only be spiritually discerned. Those who operate in the flesh, are obvious to those who are spiritual.

Paul said, that strong meat (solid food), belongs to them that are of full age (spiritually mature.) We are called at this time, to face the fact that many of us in the body of Christ, are still taking milk. It is to our shame, that we never grew up in the things of God. I didn’t say that; but the writer did. It cannot be denied, that we should be much further along in the ways of the Spirit, than we are now. There are so many exploits we could have done; we would have done many more miracles, and healed so many more people.

I believe we would not even be wondering about some of the folk we see who proclaim to be this or that, in the Spirit. We could easily spot those who are operating in the flesh; no matter what they claim to be or what position they declare they hold. Many folk are being deceived in this hour; but they don’t have to be. Many in mainstream church, do not realize how far they have drifted from what they once had; just how basically powerless, they are now.

If we choose not to follow the Spirit exclusively, we can be sure that we will follow men. Somewhere along the way, many of us stopped using the spiritual tools we were given when we received the baptism of the Holy Ghost. The scripture here, talks about our spiritual senses; things we can see, feel and know, by the Spirit that worketh in us. It’s like the physical man; if we stop exercising, stop doing the things that are healthy for us, we become weaker.

No one, can stop us from using the senses we have been given by the Holy Ghost. We don’t have to say a word, but we can know, what is of the Spirit, and what is not. But we have to use it. It is a given, that we could and would save ourselves a lot of heartbreak and disappointment in this hour, if we stayed full of the Spirit.

You see, many won’t hear this; they will dismiss it. As Paul said, it is foolishness to them.

Every spirit-filled person, is born with certain senses, already in place. But they have to be used; or exercised, in order to grow stronger. Many suffer, simply from lack of use.

For the mature, these senses of discernment, work not only in the church, but in the world also. There is an old adage that says, if something doesn’t seem quite right, it’s probably not. Our capacity to accept less, has grown more, than our desire to use what is rightfully ours. The scripture says, “save yourself, from this wicked and untoward generation.” We’ll never do that in the flesh.

The day that we are living now, urges us to know that it is critical, that we know by the Spirit. Flesh has risen up tremendously in the church as many of us know it. But we will only know that, by the Spirit.

~ Robert Blackburn

Robert Blackburn