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Choose to know nobody by the flesh

Choose to know nobody by the flesh


Hello everyone, welcome back to my blog. Thank you so much for being an avid reader of my posts. I love you and I pray that your heart will be saturated with the love of God, that no situation will move or sway you in Jesus name. Last week, I talked about Meditation. If you haven’t checked it out, please do so. Today, I am talking about choosing to see people especially fellow believers the way Christ sees them. Please read, leave a comment and share with friends. God bless you as you do so in Jesus Name, Amen.

There is a way in which believers ought to look at each other, through the lens of the truth who is Christ. You’ve been saved by grace, nothing you did could have gotten you salvation. This grace should also extend to the way in which we view other people. We have received the mind of Christ, we ought to start using that mind in our day to day lives. The person you are looking at and judging because of maybe their outfit or language is part of the people God so loved and thought was worth dying for.

1 Samuel 16:7 (NIV) But the Lord said to Samuel, “Do not consider his appearance or his height, for I have rejected him. The Lord does not look at the things people look at. People look at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart.

If you’ve followed my blog for a while, you will know my dislike for superiority complex Christians tend to exhibit (You can check out my post on Christians and ableism). We look down on people because they don’t look like us, they don’t go to church as much as we do, they have an interesting haircut, they wear leg chain and many more things. Frankly, the list is so long and very trivial. 

When do we start viewing each other as new creations? Some of us wait for someone to say something that will automatically classify them as “not saved enough” in our books? If you ask me, I believe this comes from a place of pride and self-righteousness. It has to stop! If you are always looking for an opportunity to issue judgement upon someone because of anything flesh-based, you have to change. We are spirits, our body is nothing but an outfit to exist in this realm.

To know someone after the flesh means to see them through flesh. This is to see their flesh rather than the new creation that they are. The real us is who we are in Christ. The real us is the one that received eternal life, not this body. When the trumpet sounds, the flesh will be destroyed forever. The real us is not based on personality, emotions or appearance, it is the one in Christ. Our true identity in Christ. The only way to see the Truth is to see Jesus Christ and to see things with HIM at the centre of our universe. When Christ is not the centre, you will see things including yourself and people from a completely wrong and distorted perspective. God wants us to view people, and life, through His eyes. And His eyes are Christ. 

The majority of this post will be the below scripture. Please read it carefully and catch a revelation.

2 Corinthians 5:14-21 The Passion Translation (TPT)

14 For it is Christ’s love that fuels our passion and motivates us,[a] because we are absolutely convinced that he has given his life for all of us. This means all died with him,
15 so that those who live[b] should no longer live self-absorbed lives but lives that are poured out for him—the one who died for us and now lives again.

16 So then, from now on, we have a new perspective that refuses to evaluate people merely by their outward appearances. For that’s how we once viewed the Anointed One, but no longer do we see him with limited human insight.[c]

17 Now, if anyone is enfolded into Christ, he has become an entirely new creation. All that is related to the old order has vanished.[d] Behold, everything is fresh and new.[e]

18 And God has made all things new,[f] and reconciled[g] us to himself, and given us the ministry of reconciling others to God.

19 In other words, it was through the Anointed One that God was shepherding the world,[h] not even keeping records of their transgressions, and he has entrusted to us the ministry of opening the door of reconciliation to God.[i]

20 We are ambassadors[j] of the Anointed One who carry the message of Christ to the world, as though God were tenderly pleading[k] with them directly through our lips. So we tenderly plead with you on Christ’s behalf, “Turn back to God and be reconciled to him.”

21 For God made[l] the only one who did not know sin to become sin for us,[m] so that we who did not know righteousness might become the righteousness of God through our union with him.[n]

The question to ponder upon after reading these verses is this, How does Christ see me? How does Christ see everyone? Is it different from how I view everyone?

If you judge by the flesh, you automatically find yourself looking down on people because you see yourself as having more going for you than they do. You may know down on them because of your depth of spiritual things, your spiritual gifts, your talents and many more. Christ does not regard you according to your flesh, why do you do that for others?

In John 5:22, we see that Jesus is the only one that has the absolute authority to Judge. However, he won’t judge anyone by the flesh or human standards as seen in John 8:15. Jesus doesn’t look at your nose piercing or leg chain or your hair locs to judge you. He doesn’t look at your appearance, your race, your gender, your experience, the family you come from, your friends, your abilities and many more. He sees you as being the righteousness of God because you believe in Him. You have to change your mind to see people the way Jesus sees them.

We have heard stories of people judging a person because they are from a broken home. We go as far as saying because of her family history, there’s a likelihood for them to break their marriage a well. We forget that generational curses and proclivities seize to replay itself in the life of the true believer because they are one with Christ. I was recently judged because I stated a desire to get my nose pierced. The person decided that I wasn't spiritual enough to have that kind of desire, they claimed to have overestimated by spiritual state all because of a desire to get my nose pierced. LOL. If a single action of a fellow believer is what it takes you to change the way you see them, you need to check yourself. 

In summary, we ought to move from a myopic definition of what a true believer looks like. 

Confession:

I choose to know no man after the flesh.
I have the mind of Christ, therefore, I see everyone through the lens of Christ.
I have chosen to reject all manners of knowing people through their thinking, their actions, their temperament.
I choose to see people the way Christ sees them.
I  choose to observe and inquire about a person by their spirit.

Prayer:
Lord, constrain us with your love that we may know all saints according to the spirit.


With love,
Bibi

Comments

  1. Christianity is a way of life and the way we live our lives should not in anyway make anyone particularly unbelievers doubt our salvation.
    Looking at the disciples, they were called Christians for one singular reason, ' they act like Christ'.
    It still extend to us as believers today to act like Him.
    Now, we know there are so many in sheep clothing and that's why unbelievers sometimes get confused of who a believer truly is. Yes, our relationship with our maker / Saviour is always the ultimate but we should remember that we are the called out from among them.

    Great post.
    Sam.

    ReplyDelete

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