Four Characteristics Of A Strong Human Spirit Series

Intro

My objective for the next two messages is to instruct you on how to care for your spirit. Much is said about caring for your body. We need to eat right and exercise regularly if we want a strong, healthy body. Most of us know something about that, even if we don’t do what we know to do.

But the condition of your spirit is much more important than the condition of your body. And it is something we hear very little about. In his admonition to the church at Rome, Paul told those believers to be affectionate toward one another in brotherly love, “not lagging in diligence, fervent in spirit, serving the Lord” (Rom. 12:11).i Are you fervent in spirit? Is your spirit strong? In Ephesians 3:16, Paul prayed for believers to be strengthened “in the inner man.” His prayer was that they “be strengthened with might through His Spirit in the inner man.” The innermost part of your being is your spirit. We know from previous studies that God’s life-giving strength normally comes to us by his Spirit into our spirit—into our inner man.ii To do God’s will in this life, we must have a strong spirit. What can a Christian do to maintain strength in his spirit? How do we take care of our spirit?

To maintain anything, we must know what condition it is supposed to be in. To maintain a child’s bedroom, we must know where the toys are supposed to be; we must know the right location for the clothes and shoes; we must know how the covers are to be arranged on the bed. We begin the maintenance process with a vision in our mind of what the room should look like, and we proceed from there.

To maintain an automobile, we need to know what the tire pressure should be. We need to know what the oil condition should be. We need to know what the maximum temperature of the engine is. The reason we have gages on the dashboard is to alert us when any of those factors need attention. In the same way, God has given us ways to monitor the condition of our spirit.

What should be the state of your human spirit? What qualities does God desire in your human spirit? In this message we will process four characteristics of a strong human spirit: Functional, Free, Filled, and Fervent.

I. Your spirit should be FUNCTIONAL.

We learned in previous studies that the spirit in an unbeliever is not functional. That person operates entirely on soul power or natural strength. He is not alive unto God. In his spirit, he is not drawing life and vitality from the Lord. You might say he is living on borrowed time. God has given him biological, natural life. But his spirit is dead in trespasses and sins (Eph. 2:1-5).

The spirit in a Christian is alive. But not every Christian has the same strength in his spirit. If they did, Paul’s prayer for the Ephesians “to be strengthened with might through His Spirit in the inner man” would make no sense. If every Christian had the same fervency for God in his spirit, Paul’s admonition to the Roman Christians to be “fervent in spirit” would not be necessary.

Every Christian is alive unto God in his spirit, but not every Christian is walking in the Spirit (Gal. 5:25). We have talked a lot about that. Every Christian has the Holy Spirit joined to his spirit, but not every Christian is filled with the Holy Spirit.iii That is why Paul exhorts the Ephesian Christians to “be filled with the Spirit” (Eph. 5:18).

The human spirit in a Christian is perfect in its nature because it is born of the divine seed (1 Pet. 1:23).iv But that does not mean that it cannot grow in strength and maturity. That does not mean it requires no maintenance. A newborn baby may be born with a complete, healthy body. It has five fingers and five toes. It has a heart that pumps the blood throughout the body. It has a digestive system that can process milk, but that is not yet developed enough to process meat.v Every mother knows that baby requires some maintenance. The point I want you to see is that our human spirit does require some maintenance.

A strong human spirit is actively directing the soul and the body through the soul. This is true in varying degrees among Christians. A spiritual Christian operates this way most of the time. A carnal Christian does so only occasionally (1 Cor. 3:1). When the human spirit is strong and functioning according to God’s plan, guidance is received from the Holy Spirit in the human spirit. Then the human spirit directs the soul to fulfill that guidance. In this way, the will of God is being done.