material vs spiritual

In reference to Romans 7 I see nothing to indicate that Paul is not speaking of himself. He constantly uses the personal terms me, my and I. There is no where he suggests that he is speaking of one who is under the law. It would have been easy to indicate this but such indications are absent. I can stand with the choir more firmly then ever that the plain interpretation of Romans 7 is true. I agree that he is not thanking God for letting him live in turmoil but rather thanking God that his sins will be forgiven. The process is predictable: we sin, we repent, and we are forgiven. We give thanks that we are still forgiven on the seventy seventh time. I see how this contradicts the absoluteness of some of the epistles but this is what I experience.

Something that comes to mind is that the spiritual realm is beyond sensation experience the majority of the time. We make contact with it – depending on how well tuned you are to it – but we are hardly aware of what is really transpiring. Take for example baptism. I consider it a symbolic act of death and resurrection. For some time I wondered what does it matter if you get baptized. Once you declare for yourself that you believe in Jesus that’s all that really matters, right? As I speak more and more with people who have been baptized I hear the testimonies of severe conflicts of faith due to spiritual warfare with Satan. Much like Jesus, after his baptism, it seems that for forty days those who have been baptized are tested. The Lord pulls back the hedge and allows Satan to make war on his newly baptized. It’s obvious that Satan hates this act. So while I may only see it as a symbolic ritual, the spiritual realm sees something different. I don’t see the absoluteness of the act of baptism but I hear these testimonies and I also have faith in the words of Jesus that you must baptized by water and fire and I am convinced of the spiritual significance.

I think the same goes for the cross. To on lookers it is a crazy man being nailed to a tree. In the spiritual realm everything changes. Chains are broken, curtains tear, and doors are opened. There is an absoluteness that happens here. There will be no more sacrifices. God’s love has released us from death. We are free. Now I have to be careful as I separate the material from the spiritual for when Jesus died the skies went dark. This man took something material like water and walked on it or made you drunk on it. I subscribe to Dave’s theory – and whomever he might have taken it from - that the spiritual is the governing force of energy which is matter. There is a relationship between spirit, energy, and matter yet our five God given senses are designed to detect matter. My point is that the truth of the spiritual realm doesn’t always manifest so clearly in the physical realm.

Case in point: my sinful nature. I know I’m a new creation and going to heaven because that has been promised me. That is the spiritual side. I also know my relationship is growing. Things I could ignorantly get away with last year I can not this year. I learn more, I am held to a new standard. The new standards are not easy and I don’t always want to follow. The hunger to do my own will is too great and I turn from God and say I will do what I want because it appears more pleasing to me. As I do this I know God wants me to follow his will. I also know that ultimately he is right and yet I choose my own will; I sin. This is the material. It is all to God's glory that I then humbly repent, I experience his grace, and I praise him. It has been determined, prophesized, that I am a new creation. It is what I am and at the same time what God is shaping me into being.

You remember how it says, to God a day is like a thousand years and a thousand years is like a day. You remember how by biblical chronology we’ve been here for about 6000yrs and there will be 1000yrs of rest and how that is a lot like the 7 day creation story. What if the creation of man is the lifespan of man? What if creation is a seven thousand year journey? I tend to feel that a lot of confusion falls in trying to fit our time based existence into an eternal existence. Eternity can not be comprehended intellectually. This why there is always fierce debate over the contradictory doctrines of free will and predestination.

It’s interesting that you bring up quantum mechanics here. I tend to lean with Einstein. There must be a better theory that explains light phenomenon; we just haven’t got all the facts. I also know that Einstein’s reaction is very similar to the writer of ecclesiastes, Meaningless! Meaningless! Everything is meaningless! It’s funny that Einstein would make such a statement about God rolling the dice because everything in Ecclesiastes states that God does role the dice. “As it is with the good man, so with the sinner . . . the same destiny overtakes all.” But the light and wave theory phenomenon is similar to my difficulties in what the word says I am and what I experience. It seems that both happen at the same time. But again I would like to reinforce my agreement with Einstein and possibly Nygren - that there are no contradictions. And this is why I struggle with 1 John as I do.

In reading over your last post I came across this, “but that doesn't mean it's us, it means we have to drag this shit around until physical death releases us from it.”

I’m not sure this is consistent with your previous arguments. I thought I brought up a statement like this and you said something to the point that the body is renewed as well? I’ll have to look back to confirm this. Still have read the first chapter about Body, Spirit, and Soul by Nee.