Writing What I Have Seen and Heard

 "...what we had heard, what we had seen with our eyes, what we watched happen and our hands felt..."

When I talk about submitting to and cooperating with the Spirit of Christ, and my inability to do anything else but error or malfunction when operating from my own devices, I am not writing from theological theory or hypothesis. I am not just rehashing what some other spiritual writer or theologian has said. While I may occasionally quote others, when I speak about these things, I am speaking from experience. I am talking about "...what I have heard, what I have seen with my own eyes, what I watched happen, and my hands have felt..." I think this needs to be made clear if it hasn't already. I am speaking about what I myself have experienced, and what others have commented on when they have seen me in both states, functioning from the Spirit of Christ and functioning from my own malfunctioning flesh, both before and after my neurofeedback treatments. I am writing from my own observations as well as the observations of others.

     When I am operating from the malfunctioning flesh (which is far more often than I like or want, but I too am still working towards staying put in the Spirit of Christ on a constant basis; I'm not there yet, it's still more intermittent then I want), I am operating from my own fear, and the personal traumas, cravings, likes or dislikes which trigger that fear. I get angry, jealous, offended, judgmental; I can start yelling, I can even become physically violent, though thankfully that is generally directed towards inanimate objects like walls. I can get resentful. I can get argumentative, factious, depressed, scared, and all of this comes out to affect those around me negatively, triggering their own flesh responses of fear, anger, and bodily cravings. I am neither a nice or sometimes even safe person to be around when I am operating from my own malfunctioning survival responses. From my own devices, I still have a lot of difficulty reading others, or socializing, and get overwhelmed way too quickly thus also feeding into the fear, frustration, and anger. Put simply, I cannot do anything else but error or malfunctioning responses when I am operating from my own malfunctioning brain or mind.

     When I am operating from the Spirit of Christ, my thoughts may still be rampaging, but as long as I do not engage with them, my responses are kind, patient, self-controlled, loving, giving, self-sacrificing, forgiving, trusting, and so on. When I am submitting to and cooperating with the Spirit of Christ, what people see is Jesus Christ with my face. What people hear is Jesus Christ with my voice. As long as I do not re-engage with my own fear, aggression, or bodily cravings, and continue to be engaged with the Spirit of Christ, it is Christ who acts and speaks through me, and not my malfunctioning ego/mind/identity.

     This is what salvation and deliverance through Jesus Christ is all about. This is what it means. Not that somehow I become "holier than thou," not that somehow I myself do everything perfectly, but that I step back and work with Him so that it is He who is in control, and not me myself. It is a dichotomy of personality in some respects. There are two psychologies at work, one based in the neurological framework of the physical, fleshy brain, and one deeply rooted and originated in Jesus Christ, and through Him, God the Father.

     It is the fundamental purpose and goal of discipleship to practice staying put in the Spirit of Christ and disengaging from the malfunctioning flesh based mind in order to ultimately be able to remain there without breaking from it, just as Jesus remained in His Father without breaking from it. This is what we strive to do and to be. And this is why I harp on it all the time. Not because I found it in a book and thought it was cool, but because this is what I myself have experienced, seen, heard, and felt with my own senses.