5.
at the door. But unto you shall be its desire,
and you shall rule over it”. This is a ladder to
reach to the stars. “You shall rule over it”. We
can overcome sin, bad habits and thought
patterns; sin may seek to get us, but we can
rule over it. We may well think that we can’t;
the way was set, the die cast, the destiny
mapped out, the genes determined; our back-
ground, upbringing, life path was as it was,
and so we are as we are. But we can be made
new. Sin need no longer have dominion over
us, as Paul says in Romans 6; or as early
Genesis puts it here, “you shall rule over
[sin]”. We are not debtors to sin (Rom. 8:12)-
sin is not inevitable. But most people fail to
see beyond the very limited horizons of both
their nature and their immediate life. Earth’s
curvature means that we can’t see beyond
horizons; but we can, if we wish, know what
is there. There is a doctrine of a new creation
in Christ (2 Cor. 5:17), whereby we really can
be made new people.
Environment
We are also inclined to blame our environ-
ment. Believers excuse their lack of spiritual
mindedness because… they can’t get to
meetings or Bible Schools, their neighbours,
partner, children, parents, work envi-
ronment, the society in which they
live… isn’t apparently conducive
to their being spiritually
minded. But we must give full
weight to the parable of the
vineyard in Isaiah God
wants us to bear spiritual
fruit. He would not put us
in a situation too great for
us to bear, whereby He
knows we can’t be fruitful.
In fact, the very opposite. He
did everything for that vine-
yard, which represented “the
house of Israel” (Is. 5:7). He
created, through much work, the
optimal environment for their fruitful-
ness: “What could have been done more to My
vineyard, that I have not done in it? Why,
when I looked for it to yield grapes, did it
Editorial | “To be spiritually minded ...”
yield wild grapes?” (Is. 5:4). Your environ-
ment, your life path and current situation, is
optimal for your spiritual fruitfulness. It takes
some believing. We all like to think that if we
lived there and not here, with him rather than
with her, in that ecclesia rather than this, with
his health rather than mine, in that career
rather than this… then, I would be more spiri-
tually fruitful. But the song of the vineyard
shows that’s just us making weak excuses. The
stones that hinder fruitfulness have been gath-
ered up (Is. 5:2); and the crushing, powerful
logic is that God wants our fruitfulness rather
than our unfruitfulness. From His side, He has
set up everything for us to be fruitful.
Focus on the Positive
Victory isn’t going to come because we force
ourselves, by dint of rigid self-control, with
knuckles white as we clench our minds and
bodies to resist temptation which seems so
attractive. None of us have that steel will,
that iron in the soul to achieve that. Human
nature isn’t made of such metal. The Lord who
had our exact nature was indeed tempted as
we are, yet without sin. But things we struggle
with, He maybe just didn’t feel that way
about; in the same way as if I were offered
hard drugs on the street, it would only
technically be a temptation,
because I have never done drugs
and am scared stiff of the whole
scene. I’d cross over on the
other side of the street and
get away from the pusher.
But for someone who has
struggled with these things,
it would be a hard tempta-
tion to struggle with. The
Lord’s environment of
thought, the psychological
atmosphere in which He lived
His mental life, was with God.
He was “with the Father”. But
surely there were things He was
tempted over which we have no idea of;
He engaged with sin and temptation on a far
higher level than we do.
~ continued ...
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