Posted by Gold Acacia on May 03, 19101 at 09:13:15:
In Reply to: Emotions & Spiritual Development posted by Diana on April 06, 19101 at 03:59:34:
Hi Diana,
When examining spiritual issues such as this, it is probably most important to understand exactly how we are created. Man is composed of three parts, spirit, soul, and body. The body is the shell. It includes all the senses with which we contact the physical world (sight, hearing, touch, taste). The soul is the inward part of man composed of the mind, emotion, and the will. With the mind, we think, consider, examine, etc; with the emotion, we react to stimulus from the outside world; with our will we put thoughts and emotions into action. Then we have the deepest part of man, which is his spirit. The human spirit is composed of the intuition, the conscience and fellowship. For more on this, go to www.tripartiteman.org
When we contact God through His word, through prayer, and through fellowship with other saints, we should always do so with our spirit. For it is in our spirit that we have fellowship with God. the interesting thing about spiritual growth is that it spreads from our spirit into our soul. When we are reading the Bible, for example, it is most important to use our spirit to contact God in the word. However, are we not also using our mind? Certainly. Also, aren't we also usingo our emotion? When you read the account of Jesus' persecution and death, you should be emotionally touched by what He has accomplished for your redemtion.
When we have an intimate, open relationship with the Lord Jesus, through prayer, fellowship and the reading of His word, we spontaneously fall in love with Him. God's desire is to transform us through His word and through intimate fellowship with Him, to make us one with Him; to spread out from our spirit into our soul, and eventuially, at His return, to our mortal bodies. Emotion can play a big part in a persons spiritual growth, but not in an outward way. Only through the Spirit of Jesus Christ working in us, that we can express Him in our human virtues.
Hope this helps.
~G