Character of Christ (3)

6. DIVIDING SPIRIT AND SOUL

Lets turn our Bible to the book of Romans chapter 5. We have been teaching on
Christian character and how to develop Christian character.

Rom.5: 1-5, “Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our
Lord Jesus Christ, through whom also we have access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and
rejoice in hope of the glory of God. And not only that, but we also glory in tribulations, knowing that
tribulation produces perseverance; and perseverance, character; and character, hope. Now hope does
not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit who was
given to us.”

We have mentioned that the word perseverance found in verse 4 is the word hupomone. And we have
touched on the fact that there are two Greek words for the word patience. One is the word hupomone
and the other is the word makrothumia. Makrothumia comes from a combination of two words, makro
and thumia. We have also mentioned that makrothumia relates to the work of the Spirit of God in our
life, the development of the human spirit. Hupomone has reference to the development of the soul.

Last week we talked about dokime, which is the Greek word for the word character. Think of dokime as
a document. We are the document of God. We are the epistles of God. The Word of God becomes
flesh and people read our lives. The more your character becomes a dokime in God, the more you
become an epistle of Jesus. Not all of us are 100% epistle in our lives. All of us can live a kind of
Christianity, a Sunday Christianity, or once a week or twice a week kind of Christianity, where people see
our lives only one or two days. But the test of true Christianity is when someone lives with you 24
hours. Then they will see whether you are a real Christian or just a plastic Christian. We all need to
grow until our lives are the same inside and outside. What we are in public and what we are in private is
consistent in our walk with God, in our principles we hold to. The more consistent we become in our
lives, the more the glory of Jesus, that is dokime, building the character of Jesus in our lives.

We have mentioned also last week that there is a word for trial and testing. Sometimes the word trial
comes from the word dokime, which is not just a simple temptation. The word temptation, which
sometimes is translated as trial comes from the word piraso. That is just talking about the situation,
whereas the word testing is sometimes translated as trial that has to do with the work of hupomone and
makrothumia coming out and becoming permanent in your life. Not just once in a while but permanent.

And we have quoted II Cor. 8, how the Macedonians and the great trial of affliction. The word trial is
not the word for temptation. There is some confusion in the translation. Sometimes the word piraso
has been translated as trials, sometimes as temptation. But that word trial in II Cor.8 in reference to the
Macedonian churches is from the root word dokime. It has to do more with something coming in their
life. How they remained strong and firm, in season and out of season they continue to bring forth the
character of Jesus.

The true test of your character is not when there is no pressure, its when the pressure is on, that’s
when your character is tested. It is that kind of trial they were having. Where everything outside look
like its bad but because of the consistency they were still able to give to God. Sometimes people give
and they are steady givers. Only when they have good times, but the test of whether you are a real
giver is not whether you have a good time. It’s when you are in affliction and yet because of what you
have vowed, what you have promised to God, you keep giving into the Lord.

The test of your giving is living a life style of giving. For example you made a covenant with God that
you be a giver. Sometimes you have abundance, sometimes you have needs in your life, but because of
your integrity, what you said you still give. May be you are supporting a missionary, may be you are
supporting people in the ministry. Whether you have abundance or not, one of your priorities is that
what you promised you will perform. You will give what you have promised, whether you are in need or
not. We do that to our children. We do that to our loved ones. Why can’t we do that for the Kingdom
of God?

I know parents who will sacrifice whether they are in need or not in need. Whether they
have enough food or finances for food or not, they will always sacrifice in order that their children would
have enough. If there only enough food for their children and not for them, many parents would be
willing to sacrifice and fast in order for them to eat. If we could do that for the family, if we could do
that for our loved ones, we should be able to love Jesus more. And we do that because we love Jesus.
That is character in our lives. Where in season and out of season you remain the same. You remain
steadfast and that is the dokime kind of trial. It is not the trial that determine your success. It is what
you have on your inside that determines the success in a trial.

An interesting development and we were teaching on how God will deal with our emotions and our life.
And I made a statement where I gathered from my own studies and from the studies of the Word of
God that I do sometimes in my private scientific research and I have reached some conclusion. Like for
example some of the things I get curious about is if people live in outer space and a child is born in outer
space or lets say they colonize one of the moons of Jupiter which has a very great gravitational pull.
What kind of development would they have? How tall or how short will they be? My personal
evaluation is that if someone is born in a place without much gravity that they will be very small in size.
If someone is born in a planet with heavy gravity they will be big in size because of resistance. These are
some of the things.

Among other things that I have done research in is that in the Word of God emotions as we have shared
two weeks ago plays a role in decision making, and in fact I have studied the structure of the brain and
in the brain stem are the deepest recesses of the brain that contain the emotional faculties. The
intellectual part is more in the cortex area where the lower animals do not have and I have mentioned
that our emotions are the root of our realizing. For example if you have fear about certain things in your
life, because of your fear your mind will tell you 10 reasons why you need to be fearful, but when you
remove your fear and replace it with faith, your mind will work with your faith and tell you 10 ways in
which you can achieve what you need to achieve.

Supposing that there are two students one with fear and one with faith who are both struggling and
have the same circumstances, same finances and same amount of talent. One is full of fear and gives 10
reasons why he cannot continue his studies. Another is full of faith and gives 10 reasons why and ways
in which he can continue his studies. The difference is not because of the ability, not because of the
talent, not because of the circumstances. The difference is their emotions. One has allowed the
emotion of fear to dominate their lives. The other has allowed the positive work of faith to dominate
their lives. Their mind is just a servant. Their intelligence, their I.Q., their ability to reason is just a
servant to their emotion and their emotion to their spirit. How we need to not only to renew our minds,
we need to renew our emotions too in order to be successful.

Believe me, people struggle trying to remember things, trying to have a good mind. The secret is in
enjoying what you are trying to do. You never struggle to remember something you like. And the key
to getting your children to remember facts that they learn is to help them to enjoy study. If they enjoy
study and enjoy Mathematics, they will never struggle to study. The key is more the emotional factor
that will stimulate their minds.

Now, recently last week there was an article from Times Magazine. Quoting from July
1995 Time Magazine issue, it says something about a connection between the emotion and the
intelligence.

There is a man named Elliot, Elliot was an intelligent businessman who has a record of
success. To all outward appearance Elliot is a perfectly normal middle age businessman. Despite an
operation a decade ago for removal of a brain tumor, the size of a small orange, he remains intelligent
and rational. The operation did not touch any part of his brain that affects his intelligence or his rational
thought. Yet after his operation, his behavior makes it clear that there is something very wrong. After
years of rock solid competent Elliot now has trouble keeping appointments, making decisions, etc. He
has squandered much of his life saving on a series of bad investments. And strangest of all the very fact
that his self-destructive behavior doesn’t seem to bother him. And he keeps on making the same
mistakes.

What happened to this Elliot? His intelligence was unaffected by the operation, but
something else was taking place which I like to quote from.

What happened to this Elliot is this: Elliot has an operation of his brain tumor and as the tumor was
removed part of the brain that controls the emotion was affected. Elliot was not able to feel emotion as
he used to.

Let me read some of the things about Elliot and some of the research they have done on
the connection between emotions and intelligence. It seems that No.1 when you have an emotional

shock it can actually affect your memory physically not just mentally. They have found that it actually
physically destroyed your neurons. Emotions are powerful. It can actually physically destroy your
emotion. People who allow themselves to sink into hatred, rage and all the wrong emotions can
actually destroyed their capacity to think and to function. Physical trauma can distort memory
presumably by destroying all or part of one of these memory-processing structures.

But other sort of shocks strong emotions for example can do the same. Virtually any
American over the age of 10 when John F. Kennedy was shot in 1963 or when the challenge Space
Shuttle exploded in 1986 remember precisely where he or she was when the news arrived. Why,
because of the emotions. Severe stress can change the way your brain function biologically. I have said
that emotions can affect your intellectual functioning. Now they go further than that. The emotions can
actually affect the biological function of your brain.

Lets quote a little bit more.

It stands to reason that human will have a specialized region of the brain for processing emotional
perceptions. Lets look at this Elliot character. Why was he a normal businessman who keeps
appointment competent, rock solid and able to do investments correctly, suddenly he squander all his
life saving, misses his appointments and then, worse than that he doesn’t even fear any remorse and he
keeps making the same mistakes. After a brain surgery Elliot cannot behave rationally even though his
intelligence was not affected by his tumor. That part of the brain destroyed by invading tissue was in
the region of the pre-frontal cortex essential to decision making. But what ever Elliot lost
psychologically, psychological testing revealed that he lost the ability to experience emotion. Elliot lost
the ability to experience emotions.

Emotion is the key element of learning and decision-making. It is when you enjoy reading
the Bible and feel the emotion of it that you will remember what you read. We will look at God’s Word
afterwards. Let me quote you from natural examples first. Here are statements that are important. If
an investment goes sour, you feel bad about it and act more carefully next time. Something that Elliot
could no longer do after his injury. See that’s what makes you making the wrong decision. When you
missed an appointment and people are disappointed you also feel bad. So you make sure you don’t
miss your appointment. When you make a bad investment and you feel the emotion, you lost some
money. And because of your emotion, you try to be more careful and don’t do the same mistakes again.
But Elliot was not able to feel all these things. He could feel no emotion when he does something that is
a mistake. And therefore he keeps doing the same thing and repeats the same mistake. He lost all his
money and he doesn’t feel anything. If a lot of people lose their life’s saving they will feel bad.
Something in them feels very rotten, stupid or bad or just something terrible. But he couldn’t feel all
these things and therefore he became a different person. His intelligence, his ability to analyze was not
affected. So if an investment goes sour you feel bad about it, and act more carefully next time.

We can’t decide whom we are going to marry if you don’t feel emotion. You can’t decide what saving
strategy to adopt, I mean if you have several. And you don’t feel good about any. Your can’t decide
where to live if you don’t feel where its good to live. Your feeling still comes in. Why is it that you buy a
house in a certain area? Not only your mind, your mind can argue and rationalize, but something on
your inside feel nice. You like the place. None of you will buy a place you don’t like, unless of course
you don’t have a choice. But supposing that you have multiple choices, your emotion still affects your
buying decision. Where you are going to live, why do you live, where you live? Some people live where
they lived because they have lived there all their life. Why is it so hard for people to move from one
town to another? That is an emotional tie. If you argue rationally and intellectually almost every place
has is pros and cons. In the end your emotion has to make the decision where to live. We don’t make
the decision of where to live, what saving strategy to adopt, whom to marry base on reason alone. We
do it based also on emotion. That’s just what science is saying.

As we examine the Word of God we have realized that emotions play a role in our decision-making and
in fact a greater role. Emotions come first and then the intellect. Remember we have said that pattern
before. In order to make a decision or hear God’s voice we need to smooth or calm our emotions first,
and not let our emotions be unruly or let our minds go astray in all directions. Only when the Spirit of
God calms your emotions can the Spirit of God and the Word of God renew your mind and after that can
you really hear God. Which is why it is very difficult to hear the voice of God in an area where you get
emotional about, because when you get emotional about that area your reasoning will also support your
emotion. Our reasons support the emotion.

As we look at the Word of God, God says something about how to handle all these emotions and
intellectual rational function in our life by the Spirit of God.

Heb.4 How do we handle all these things and get renewal from the Word of God? Heb.4: 12 “For the
word of God is living and powerful and sharper than any two edged sword piercing even to the division
of soul and spirit and of joints and marrows and is a discerner of the thought and intent of the heart.”

There is something that it says of the Word of God. The Word of God separates all the integrated parts
of your soul and your spirit, of your bone and of your marrow. It separates the different parts of your
physical biological process and the intents of the thought processes of your heart. All these things are
vital. As you look at this question here in Heb.4: 12. Look at the statement of fact. It states here as a
fact, that the Word of God separates soul and spirit. It separates between your thoughts and intents to
help you discern or help you to know each one of them. The question here is this: if we have the fact
presented that way, our next question is this. Why do we need them to be separated? Why do we need
to separate between the spirit, the soul and all our different thoughts that arise from different parts of
our being? Why do we need to separate them? In order to exist and allow the right kind of spiritual
guidance from our human spirit that God has given new birth to and our character development we
need to separate them.

In order to understand why we need to separate them, let us show you how the devil work. The devil
works the opposite. He confuses and he tries to merge your spirit, your soul and your body together so
that what comes from your body you can’t discern. What comes from your soul you can’t discern. He
will give a soulish reason to pursue the spiritual thing. He confuses between the spirit and soul.
Remember the devil does the opposite and he causes your reasoning to be befuddled so that you
cannot discern which is spirit, which is soul.

Now the reason God separates them is not that God reduces us to a creature of spirit without soul
and without body. As long as you are on this earth, you have a body and you live in a body. You have a
soul and we just need to put it in its proper place. There is nothing wrong with your soul or your body.
As long as you live with the Word, we just need to put it in its proper place. Renewal is not removing.
Renewal is putting something in its proper place. You can’t remove your body. The key in Christian
development and character is in putting your body in its proper place. For example, you may be having
a craving in your physical area. It could be sex, it could be an area of food, but somehow you gain
control over those things. And you put it in its proper place. You say look in this occasion it is not viable
and it is not correct and you may tell your physical body. Your physical body may be mad about alcohol,
mad about certain food. Maybe all you struggle with is you are mad about bread. In case you didn’t
know it, Kenneth Copeland was mad about bread and buns. He couldn’t go to a bakery before he was
successful in the ministry without stopping by and eating a few loaves. In fact Kenneth Copeland now
you see him nice and fit, before that he look like a big round fellow. You wouldn’t believe it, but that
was how he started. Bread was his weakness, he couldn’t resist when there’s freshly baked bread. You
know how good bread smell when it’s fresh. He doesn’t just take a small slice but he eats the whole
loaf. He struggles but he learns to control that appetite of his body. He learns to put that in its place.

Noel Hayes does it differently. Noel Hayes shares how sometimes he eats some food that he likes and
in case some of you are wondering why we are talking so much about eating. Do you know that the
first fall is through eating? Noel Hayes mentioned that he liked coconut pie and how God had to deal
with him. One day as he was eating coconut pie, he took one piece, oh that’s nice and he couldn’t resist.
Instead of just buying one he bought one whole basket. He ate it and the rest of the week he got sick
and his body said: give me another one and he told his body shut up, one coconut pie is good enough for
you. We have to know where all these desires arise. What happen if Noel Hayes does not know that,
that is his body and he hears this voice from his inside. His desire rising give me another one. He thinks
that the Lord is speaking through his spirit that he needs to eat more coconut pie and he says thank you
Holy Spirit for your guidance. What happen if he doesn’t discern where all these desires and thoughts
were rising from? His character would be twisted.

So, Satan works by confusing spirit, soul and body, merging them into one so that we cannot
differentiate which is which. But God develops our character by teaching us how to divide where each
one of the things come from, which of your desires come from which section of your being so that you
could put it in its proper place. Renewal of our emotion and character is not very hard. I know some of
you struggle and you say O God it takes so long to change. After 15 years I only changed so much. I
would need another 120 years and I don’t have 120 years because now I am 70 years old. Renewal is
not hard. Don’t let the devil deceive you that is very hard to have a good Christian character. The secret
is to put everything in its proper place. You have been trying to overcome instead of trying to classify.
You will not yield to it. If you know a desire or a thought is arising from a wounded part of your soul or
from a inordinate craving from your flesh, it’s easier to resist and put it down. You could renew your
mind and your mind will have all the reasons to say no to that unlawful desire. It’s not will power but its
spirit power.

Let me show some Bible examples of Satan confusing people with their thought. He tries to mix it
up together. Acts 8; this person called Simon the magician. What was his problem? Why was he this
kind of character? Even after he was born again and baptized in water, Acts 8:13 tells us that Simon
believed and he was baptized. That tells you that Simon was now a Christian. Although he was
Christian, he was still a worldly Christian. Let me tell you that there are a lot of Christians who are
worldly Christians. The way they think, the way they talk, the way they function, they are still worldly.
Their characters have not changed.

Here is Simon, why is his character not changed? You can see that he still had the desire for
attention, desire for self-glorification, because once upon a time in verse 11, he used to do sorceries and
everyone would say this is a great man. He is used to that life style. Now after he was born again, those
things that he had fed on are still there. I believe Simon had paid a lot of money for that. He must have
used money to buy his way to learn different types of witchcraft from the masters and buy the
necessary accessories to perform his sorceries. He has been using that process, using his money.
Money was his god. He got used to that kind of thinking.

And now he is born again, baptized in water and he saw Peter, John laying hands on people and people
receiving the baptism in the Holy Spirit. He straightaway began to desire for this power in verse 19.
“Give me this power that also anyone on whom I lay hand may receive the Holy Spirit.” What was
wrong here? He had carnal desires for spiritual things and has confused the spiritual method with the
physical method using money to get the spiritual gifts. All these are wrong. There is confusion here.
Using carnal principles with a carnal desire for spiritual gifts. All these are mixture. And Peter says here
in verse 21, “Your heart is not right.” See his motives, his intentions are not divided. He hasn’t
separated the spirit and soul. Maybe Simon thought that now he is a new Christian, every desire in his
life would be of God. I mean he can use money to do this. He may be thinking of really using the gift to
get people to be baptized in the Spirit, but at the same time he also get some glory. He may have been
mixed up in his thinking. This kind of thinking is a confusion of spirit and soul and body. He is not
dividing all his desires correctly.

How do we divide all his desires correctly? No.1: His desire for spiritual power can be harnessed for the
Kingdom of God. But he must learn that the desire must be a desire to help people and not just to gain
attention. Power to help is not power to dominate and rule and get attention. Let me tell you frankly,
his desire may actually be from God but have been mixed up and confused with the soul. Paul says in
the book of I Cor.12, “desire after the best gift.” Your desire for spiritual things is fine. His desire for
spiritual gift is fine, but that desire was confused by the soul. His soul desires for attention. His soul
wanted to use money to get the spiritual gift. So there was the wrong motive. There was a right desire
but a wrong motive and a wrong method. There are all mixed up. This is his character. Wrong
characters are people who do certain things wrongly and everybody knows that is wrong except them,
because they justify it. They think it’s from the Spirit of God or some principles that come from their
spirit but that actually came from their body or soul. If they could divide it by the Word of God, there
would be no mixture in their work for God. This is why the Word of God is important. When the Word
of God comes it lay bare our heart. You can hide from people but you can’t hide from God. Every time
you pray, God will say deal with that area in your life. That is not right in My sight. There are other
people who confuse all these other areas too. Let me quote you a few more.

I Sam. It tells us here I Sam. 8:4-5 “Then the elders of Israel gathered together and came
to Samuel at Ramah, and said to him, ‘Look, you are old, and your sons do not walk in your ways. Now
make us a king to judge us like all the nations.” The thing displease Samuel when they said give us a king
to judge us so Samuel prayed to the Lord. Verse 7 “The Lord spoke to Samuel, heed the voice of the
people in all that they say to you. For they have not rejected you. They have rejected Me that I should
not reign over them.” What had happened here? The people’s desire for a king could be correct. It
may be time. Actually it is time for a monarchy coming up but their reasons for wanting a king was
wrong. You know what they should have done? They should have just come to Samuel and say look,
your sons are corrupt. Can you do something about it? Can you find an alternative? Can you find
another way of doing this, so that we can get justice? The people could have approached Samuel that
way instead of suggesting a solution that was carnal. You know their desire for a king was carnal. Their
main reason is so that they can be like all the other nations. There is a mixture of carnality with spirit.
The desire can be of God, but the reason for the desire is wrong.

How do I know that God may desire for them to have a king, because God said it in the
Bible. In the book of Exodus He even prepare for time that there will be a kingdom. There was a proper
time. Lets say your son comes to you, your son has grown up and say to you, daddy, get me a car like
your car. It was a desire. You say, no, why do you want a car? Your son said, so I can show all my
friends. That’s the wrong reason for the desire. But the desire to drive a car can be harnessed. He can
be told look, now you are too young and you know the character of the son. You know he can’t handle
this yet. You want to postpone it to another 3 years. Teach him to handle a little bit more responsibility
and you have reasons for that but he may not know. So he may be confusing the right desire because
when it comes time for them to grow up, they may need to do certain things on their own. It may be
good for them to be adventurous, to go forth to launch their life. It is their life that they must build up.
You cannot keep them in the children coop all the time until they are 30 and open the key and say now
you can go. By then they are too old. They have not seen the world. They have not experienced things
for themselves. They need to experience a lot of things to be adults. You need to prepare them but to
give them the freedom to make their decision. They have the right desires but will struggle with the
wrong reason for the desire and the wrong ways to achieve the desire.

Now here the Israelites came and they actually wanted to be like all the nations in the
world. Samuel kept trying to tell them to reason and say, look if you have a king, this will happen, in
verse 19. They still refused. You know what I believe. It was a wrong timing. Why, because they
insisted. God says they have rejected Me.

Lets look at a different situation. Let say it is like an organization and the president is the head of the
organization. There is a time coming for the president to retire and another one to be elected to be
president. What happens if people get impatient and replaced the president sooner than expected.
They could have waited until it is the proper time. But they were in a hurry. Maybe it could be true.
That fellow is getting old and cannot lead properly and its time to replace him. But there are some
people who wants the replacement done for the wrong reason because they want to be the president
themselves. If you get the wrong people to do it, they are president not because they want to help the
company but because they wanted that role. When such persons become the president you begin to
feel the wrong domination coming down on you because people who are in a hurry to replace others
are not patient and do have hupomone. They do not wait on God. Instead of allowing God to work on
the circumstances, they do it themselves for the wrong reasons. This is where the character is a fault.
They don’t divide all the different desires.
 Every wrong thing that is done many times there is some right elements in it. Why do a lot of people
get deceived into the wrong thing? Because there is some right in it. The problem is the confusion of
spirit, soul and body; they are all messed up. And people don’t discern carefully. Personally I believe we
must only do the right thing at the right time in the right method with God’s guidance. If God doesn’t
say it, it means silent, it is time to exercise hupomone and makrothumia. We need to learn to be patient
with God and with people. We don’t take things into our own hand.

Verse 22, the Lord says get them a king and in the end a king was chosen. Saul was
chosen. But Saul made many mistakes. So they found that Saul also make mistakes. Samuel’s sons
made mistakes. Now they have Saul the king and Saul started making blunders. See, if you get in a
hurry to replace something, you may put somebody wrongly and they will make as many mistakes as the
first one. Which is why I don’t believe in getting in a hurry to make any decision. I believe that when
you solve something it must be solved permanently and a permanent solution need to be prayed over,
brooded over, meditated over and it must come from God.

When Saul started making mistakes God rejected him. In chapter 16 of I Samuel, God chose David
and anointed him. God started promoting David and we know the rest of the story how David slew
Goliath. In Sam.18: 1-2 “Now when he had finished speaking to Saul, the soul of Jonathan was knit to
the soul of David, and Jonathan loved him as his own soul. Saul took him that day, and would not let
him go home to his father’s house anymore.”

At first Saul liked David, but then things started happening and in verse 5 David went out wherever Saul
sent him and behaved wisely. But one day when he came back in verse 6-7 that the women were
dancing and rejoicing and they were singing Saul slays his thousands and David his 10 thousands. Verse
8 Saul was very angry and the saying displeased him. He said they have ascribed to David 10 thousands
and to me they ascribed but thousand. What more can he have but the kingdom. Verse 9 so Saul eyed
David from that day forth.

Lets look at the two situations. David served God with the right heart and served Saul with the right
heart. He never wanted the kingdom. God may have given to him but he will not have it by his own
hand. And all the time when Saul chased him, two times which were recorded, David let Saul go. Not
only that, he says his servant David, he humbles himself and what was the problem with Saul? He began
to see reasons why David should be eliminated. He began to think and brood over those things. What
has happened? Saul still has his intelligence and his mind. His emotions have now been affected. Saul
felt emotional displeasure over one incident but he allowed the emotional displeasure arising from the
one incident to be his life force. And from that day onwards, he was jealous.

Then in verse 12, he was afraid because he saw God was with David. There developed a mixture of
jealousy and a mixture of fear in Saul towards David. In verse 15, when Saul saw how he behaves very
wisely, he was afraid of him - jealousy, envy and fear. Let me tell you, one more thing is coming now.
He began to plot evil. He began to wish that David would die. In verse 17 onwards it tells you how he
offer his daughter. He was not really offering his daughter. He was offering his daughter as the bait. He
wanted David to be killed by the Philistines. Look, jealousy, envy, and fear, when you are afraid of
something, there are two reactions. Attack your fear or run away from your fear. You can attack
wrongly. When you are afraid of people, there are 2 things. You either avoid them or if you act
wrongly, you try to get rid of them by the carnal way. Saul reacted by trying to get rid of David. He is
afraid David will take his kingdom. Get rid of David and you will have not more fear. Instead of dealing
with his fear, he deals with circumstances out of emotional fear and jealousy and he used his reasoning
to justify his actions.

Look at that. He is quite intelligent. He plotted, he strategies but it’s springs from an emotional
base. He was confused, mixing right desire with wrong desires, right thought with wrong thought.
Spirit, soul and body has become one. He has no more purity of his heart. To be pure means to allow
only the pure things that God put in our life to come out. Put down every other thing. Put it in its
proper place. In the end, those thoughts became thoughts of anger.

In chapter 19 verse 17, Saul said to Michal, why have you deceive me like this and let David escape.
So he got worse and worse. Do you know what happen in the end? He actually destroyed his own life.
Look at it this way. What’s the benefit of having a bad character? What’s the benefit of doing the right
thing in the wrong way? In doing that we destroy ourselves. What’s the benefit of trying to argue and
win an argument and lose your own peace? It’s better not to argue. Because if you win an argument,
you are hot temper and you are shouting, you actually have lost yourself. You won the argument but
you lost your character. Which is more precious, character or just one incident? See, we need to learn
to divide spirit, soul and body. Saul was not able to divide.

You see verse 17, he accused Michal of deceiving him. Now, who was the one being deceived? He
said, why did you deceive me and let David escape. He never saw for once that he was the one who was
wrong. He accuses others of deceiving him when he himself is being deceived by his own emotion.

As we look on, when David escapes him in chapter 22 verse 7, Saul was becoming more and more
carnal. He told his servant when David escaped. Hear now you Benjamite will the son of Jesse give
every one of you, fields, vineyards, make you all captains of thousands and captains of hundreds. He is
using his position now wrongly. As king, he is using bribes to win over people to his side against David.
Be on my side and I will make you captains. Be on my side and I will give you vineyards. He is now
trying to use power and money to get his own way. The problem was that his own way of doing things
was wrong. There are a lot of people out there in the world who use their power and position to get
their own way.
 What happen if your own way is wrong? Let me tell you brutally and honestly and firmly I
respect everyone regardless of his position, title, or wealth. But I will not respect the person who
throws his weight around, uses his position to intimidate others and flashes money to buy people up in
order to have his own way. In the Word of God, in the principle of God, in the church of Jesus Christ or
the principles of the Spirit of God, it is important for us to know that carnal methods and ways are still
carnal whether 1000 people agree or disagree, it is just carnal. We need to be brutally honest to
understand this fact, that power and position should not be used because of emotion. A lot of people
are using their power and position because of their emotional need to get their own way, to punish, to
justify. Whatever it is, don’t use all those methods. Keep emotions in their proper place. Saul was using
power and position to win loyalty. In the end it’s a false kind of loyalty. If you let people love you and
be loyal to you because of your enticements the day will come that they will drop you like a hot potato
when you run out of candies. Why have false friends when you can have true friends?

Look at verse 8. He accused them, all of you have conspired against me. No one
conspired against him. Many people should go to the mirror and say mirror, mirror on the wall, who is
the one who is really wrong? The mirror will answer the one who is looking in the mirror now. Learn
this principle. Every emotion in our life that is wrong arises from a fault in our life and not in other
people’s life. When we can be honest with one self and look in the mirror and say the real person to
deal with is you, not your foes. Jesus said, love your enemy. Your real enemies are not your enemies.
Your real enemies are the wrong things in your life. Don’t trust any reasoning when you feel the wrong
emotion, because when you have an emotion, your reason will let you down. Think of the emotional
rejection that Saul had, he thinks people are against him. I think he needs help. He needs counseling.
Do you know that right now you can believe that there are people who are against you and it may be
false but it is you who are having a problem? It is your fear nerve that is sensing wrong things. In the
end Saul showed symptoms of anger. What had happened is he has confused his soul with his spirit.
The Bible tells us that its alright if you feel all the various expressions of your soul. But keep them in
their proper place. Bible says in Eph.4, “Don’t let the sun go down on your anger.” It implies that you
can feel angry and irritated and all these human emotions but you put them in their proper place. You
learn how to ensure that they don’t get out of the box that they are supposed to be in. Let God deal
with the root causes of them all.

The secret of dealing with these areas is to learn how to get the good emotion working for
you. You see, we say the Spirit of God leads us; the human spirit guides us. We also say we are like a
train. Faith is the engine of the train. Your emotions and your feelings are the other carriages that the
train pulls. Let me be honest with you, my friends. It is still important that you feel good when it is
good. We are creatures of emotion. We can’t do things without emotion. Our emotions need to be
renewed. The secret is to learn to get rid of wrong emotions and replace them with good emotion.
When you feel down, you learn to pray yourself up. When you feel discouraged, you learn how to
encourage yourself. When you feel bad or you have done some wrong things, you learn to confess your
sins and pray through and meditate on the Word until you feel good again. Do you know that inside
each one of us there is a feeling of goodness and there is a sense of well-being? There is the fruit of the
Holy Spirit, love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, meekness and faithfulness. The key
thing about Christian life and Christian character is you learn how to generate the good emotion
yourself with the Word of God and prayer.

You don’t need to get it from anywhere else. I know people who try to feel good. Why do people turn
to alcohol so that they can feel good? Drown all their wrong feelings and feel good. Why do people
relax by unlawful things? Long ago I met a man of God, a pastor. I stayed with him in Australia and after
ministering he went back and he sat in front of his TV and just watch, I said: shouldn’t w pray first? I am
not against TV if we know its proper place, but he is watching all these dumb programs. And do you
know what he told me? This is my way to relax. I don’t know about your way to relax. My way to relax
is to go for a prayer walk. Pray in tongues, meditate on the Word. That’s my way of relaxing. My way of
relaxing is not going to a pub. Not going to do all these worldly things. We must learn the right way to
get our emotions in line. Its just like, its hard to get rid of a wrong thought. The best way to get rid of
the wrong thought is to replace it with a good thought. You can’t have an empty mind. You can’t have
an empty emotion. The best way to get rid of wrong emotions is to generate the good emotions. How
sometime when you go to deep worship and you worship God. You really give yourself to worship God
and you praise God. How good it is after you prayed in tongues one or two hours. You sense the
emotions are being tuned to. Although you pray by faith, and when you started praying, you don’t feel
like praying but after praying in tongues for an hour or two, you feel on top of the world. You feel good.
When you feel good about your well -being, you will be good to others.

The reason why we cannot have good character and we failed other people, we react, we lose our
temper, we lose our cool is because you didn’t feel good in yourself. If whatever happen on the outside,
you feel this peace, love, joy and goodness, I don’t think you could ever be angry. You are angry
because something inside snapped. When you learn how to generate the good emotion from the Word
of God and from the Holy Spirit of God, first you need to divide that from the wrong thought that are
generated by the wrong emotions. These wrong emotions need to be dealt with. Separate them and
allow God’s Word to come and God will say all right his desire is correct. But this thing is wrong here.
This one is wrong. This is from your soul. This is from your body. This is from your own mind. And you
know where it all stands and then you pray in God and allow God to generate all the right emotions on
your inside. And you learn a key secret in Christian life, how to feel good in the presence of God. Pray in
tongues, meditate on the Word. Whenever you have a bad day, don’t go and sit in front the TV until you
feel good and get over. That’s not the way. You will get worse. Go aside have some time of prayer or
go for a walk. Go for a prayer meeting or a worship service. At the end of it all your emotions will get
dealt with. You feel good. The key is being Christ like 24 hours is in learning how to keep that goodness
flowing in your life. That sense of well - being. So that in every situation that sense of well-being is
flowing on your inside and you could deal with every situation with the character of Jesus Christ.