Romans 8:6 Meditation
Text (Ro 8:6, NIV):
"The mind governed by the flesh is death, but the mind governed by the Spirit is life and peace."
Amplified Rendering:
The mental gymnastics needed to propagate the false self and all its accompanying showiness leads only to the severing of oneself from God and, consequently, one's true self. O people, don't you know your false self (the sin nature, it's effects, and its collection of dramatized, pseudo-self creations) is not you? And that it has no basis in reality?
The false self is a destructive, mental construct. It's nothing but a derivative of sin, conceived in the fires of evil, sickness, pain, and suffering. It exists nowhere but in the vanities of your own fallen imagination. You want to be known, but so long as you dwell in the chronic fear of being discovered, you'll never be known as you truly are—by God (because He doesn't "know" the false you you're purporting yourself to be), by you, or by those you love and care about. The sin in you is a poisoning and propagating evil(1), and it infects with death everything you think, feel, say, touch, and do(2).
On the other hand, those who train their minds to think and feel the thoughts and feelings of God—and do so purposefully—experience an ever-increasing, ever-deepening union with God Almighty(3). As they reach up and tie themselves to Him, they experience first hand the on-going transformation of being that comes with becoming more and more like Christ (the Second Adam[4]) and less and less like the First Adam, who infected us all with "original sin(5)."
Abandon the false self, O people! Crucify it(6)! Lay it at the foot of the Cross, and set your hearts and minds on the Face of your Creator(7). Allow Him to love you back to life. Let Him unearth and awaken the Image of His Own Beingness that was stamped in you at creation. This is life, my friends: Knowing God, and letting Him reanimate His Image within you(8). It alone brings wholeness, harmony, rest, and peace.
Consecrating Prayer (Prayed Meditatively(9):
The Lord is with me; I have tied myself to the Master...
The Lord is with me; I have tied myself to the Master...
The Lord is with me; I have tied myself to the Master...
Notes:
See Mt 18:23-35.
See He 12:15.
See Is 55, Jn 15, and 2Pe 1:4:1-3.
See 1Co 15:45.
Original Sin: The tendency to sin innate in all human beings, held to be inherited from Adam in consequence of the Fall. The concept of original sin was developed in the writings of St. Augustine.
See Ro 6:6 and Ep 2:2-3 and 4:17-24.
See Ps 16;11, 2Co 3:18, and He 12:1-2
See Ge 2:7, Jn 17:3 and 20:23 (which is a recapitulation of Ge 2:7).
I pray this particular prayer mantra many times throughout each day. It was given me by God through prophetic utterance in June 1988.
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