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Appendix 1L; Turning a Spiritual Reality into the Physical​

To become like Christ in your physical body requires a second intentional, free-will decision. Once you have accepted Christ as Savior, your spirit automatically becomes holy and pure but your body and soul remain tied up in bad (unholy) habits. Changing your attitude and behavior to match your Spirit is a process that remains  your responsible for leading to complete a cognitively consistent change in your life. It's a not just a one time directional decision, but it's one that only you can make, and it's one that presents itself daily, throughout your life. God preserves your free will by adhering to your choices. For example, if one day a trigger springs up and tempts you to practice old sinful habits, you have a choice to make, each time it happens. The triggers in life won't go away so you need to defend yourself by a making a decision to stay loyal to God and to fight off the temptation to sin. Once you invite God into the scene, you can put on the armor of God as detailed in Ephesians 6:10-18. However, if you don't, you will fall victim to fighting temptation alone. You will be trying to win a spiritual battle using purely physical defenses, one of which is your will power, which can't win a spiritual battle.By not intentionally inviting God into your daily decisions, you are, consciously or not, snubbing God. 

 

Grieving the Spirit, deciding to continue your sin habits as a Christian, is a condition referred to in the Bible as unbelief and/or hardness of the heart (Ephesians 4:18, 4:30, Hebrews 3:13-14, 4:7, 1 Thessalonians 5:19). It's failing to use the mind of Christ by not following God's Holy principles (John 3:14-16, Philippians 2:5, 1 Thessalonians 5:19). It's failing to train your body on new triggers (1 Timothy 4:7-8). The more you choose to learn and to act out God's standards on earth, the more evident it will become to you that His ways are better than yours so you'll want to avoid old triggers and develop new ones (Psalm 91:1-2, Mark 4:16-20, John 10:10, 15:4-5, Galatians 6:7-9, 1 Thessalonians 5:19, 2 Peter 1:9). Love and respect generate obedience to God (John 14:15). 

Expression* of the ​mind of Christ​

(Romans 15:6,    

1 Corinthians 2:16, Philippians

2:5, 1 Peter 1:13)​

For more see on the mind of Christ  ​

https://www.allaboutfollowingjesus.org/mind-of-christ.htm ​

For a sermon on grieving the Holy Spirit, see Sermon by Pastor Charles Spurgeon delivered on October 9, 1859 based on Ephesians 4:30 @ ​

https://www.spurgeon.org/resource-library/sermons/grieving-the-holy-spirit/#flipbook/ ​

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Do you Curb Your Freedom Voluntarily?

God is sovereign, yet man is a responsible free agent. While God created you (and everyone else!) and planted the seed of love in heart, you must consciously choose to awaken it. God created you with free choice; the ability to prioritize and make decisions (Genesis 2:16-17, Joshua 24:15, Galatians 5:13). You can't awaken the seed of holy love, until you realize that your self-driven ways have not brought you soul satisfaction that you decide to repent and turn to God. When the Spirit moves in, the root of independence CAN be driven out (by being more God-dependent), but it’s up to you to decide to change your behavior to reflect this new heart attitude in your personality and lifestyle habits (1 Corinthians 10:13, 2 Corinthians 5:15, Galatians 5:1). ​

 

The second decision you need to make when you turn to God, is whether or not you'll practice God's kind of love. Will you make Jesus Lord, not just Savior? If you do, then you'll need to cultivate your spiritual seed of love and bring it into to the physical world by changing your habits-both soul and body- so you can reflect Christlikeness. This decision sets you free from the fickle ways of the world and, instead, it establishes your unshakable relationship with God (Jeremiah 32:40, Romans 11:20, 2 Corinthians 3:14). Unshakable because you are now united in Christ (entered into this relationship freely) and have access to God for everything you need to live a full life, pleasing to God (2 Peter 1:3-4, John 10:10). 


His gift of the Holy Spirit will guide your conscience into righteous thinking so you will choose to practice Holy behavior- behavior that honors God by changing your habits (John 16:13, Romans 12-13, 1 Timothy 2:4, Appendix 1U and Appendix 2L). The mind of Christ expresses attitudes and behavior that conform to God's character. This flow can be interrupted and prevented if you decide not to express the Holy Spirit in your behavior. Christian cognitive consistency is available to anyone who calls on the name of the Lord and then decides to act physically on His Spiritual truth.

 

 

To call on God and then to NOT follow the leading of the Holy Spirit, not only grieves Him but it leaves you in a state of anxiety from Christian cognitive dissonance (Proverbs 12:25, Philippians  4:6-7, 1 Peter 5:7). A lack of righteousness acted out by Christians in today’s physical world results in the psychological consequence of cognitive dissonance (anxiety) and the social consequence of dysfunctional behavior. When the Spirit is grieved continually, the desire to please God is stifled and replaced with sinful behavior motivated again by self-satisfaction (Hebrews 6:4-6, 1 Thessalonians 5:19). Don’t abuse God’s grace by allowing fear, a negative imagination, or public opinion to halt your expression of God’s truth (Romans 1:16-25). A free-will decision to act consistently with your purified heart, uninterrupted by self-consciousness, frees you from the anxiety of cognitive dissonance (Romans 10:13, 5:5, Acts 15:9, Luke 23:42-43, Proverbs 4:23, John 7:38, Hebrews 10:22).  

  • Read more about Christian cognitive consistency in the article entitled "Subdue Your Soul" in the Still Anxious tab. 

 

Don't confuse or abuse the spiritual miracle of Christ in you. This gift from God means you are not judged by God according to your physical performance because your spirit is covered by Christ’s righteousness-a gift from God (Romans 1:17, 1 Corinthians 1:30, 2 Corinthians 5:21). However, you need to be both emotionally and physically invested in the relationship with God so that intimacy emerges freely and you want to replace your independent spirit and worldly habits (Appendix 2N). ​It’s your responsibility to take God’s grace (the Holy Spirit in you) and renew your mind so you can take what is true in your spirit (God’s Spirit living in you) and have it become visible in your soul and body. When you do, your faith is seen. The seed of love, that was planted by God, blooms in your personality and produces peace and joy that comes from practicing goodness, kindness, patience, gentleness and self-control (Galatians 5:22-25). 

 

The consequences for a Christian who doesn't do this is anxiety, generated as a response to cognitive dissonance (Galatians 6:7-8, 1 Timothy 4:2). Only by implementing value-based decision-making will a Christian practice holy behavior and this consistency is what stifles the feeling of anxiety that stems from uncertainty or fear of change. If you have NOT placed God in the priority position of life, you will NOT choose to conform your behavior to His holiness standards (Matthew 6:33). For you, as a Christian, to achieve cognitive consistency, you need to receive God's gift, reorder your heart values and act them out accordingly in public.

your free will decision to surrender to God.
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​​​Being fully surrendered to God is evidenced through your decision-making and prayer life, and is shown in authentic behavior that is expressed because of gratitude for what Christ has already done for you; set you free to live in harmony with God now and forever*. As a child of God your goodness is not double-minded (like the popular saying, "What's in it for me?") but is single-mindedly devoted to doing life God's way. Thus, the natural way to relieve anxiety is to make decisions that are consistent with your beliefs and place yourself in a social environment that reinforces this value.

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Once you fully surrendered to God*, you can then relinquish control of your future to Him (knowing that everything works together for good for those who love him, Romans 8:26-28) by using your faith-empowered self-control to discipline your flesh into obedience to God's commands (2 Timothy 1:7). This is when you attain the consequences of following the Holy Spirit and can live righteously and enjoy eternal life both on earth and in heaven  (Galatians 5:16-17, 24-26, 6:8-9, John 17:3, 1 John 5:11, 2 Corinthians 4:18). 

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Choosing to act out your spiritual righteousness in your physical body eliminates anxiety because of your decision to please the Spirit by changing your A (attitude), B (behavior), which changes your C’s (consequences). A cognitively consistent Christian expresses confidence in the Holy Spirit’s ability to overcome their insecurities (insecurities driven by fear, worry, anger, shame, self-indulgence, denial, and pride induced unbelief) and replaces them with faith so action is taken consistently with God's holy standards, as recorded in the Bible. Once you decide to act consistently with the Word of God, your ABC’s are empowered by the Divinely inspired Spirit and this power propels you to reach your destiny, E  , a consequence of D(A+B) = C   (Appendix M). ​

D

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