Getting The Lay Of Your Spiritual Land

by Kevin Burton

   This fourth-period class at the Earthly School for the Spiritually Blind is one many of you will not be familiar with.

   At the school for the blind we had a class called “Orientation and Mobility” to teach us how to navigate our surroundings safely with the use of certain tools and technology. There was a similar class for younger students called “Sensory Training.”

   For the sighted world it’s just “watch where you’re going!”

   Or maybe driver’s education is the closest equivalent. Anyway, what to expect in the spiritual world and how to safely navigate it, that is our focus here.

   “The Bible teaches the existence of an immaterial, spiritual reality, unseen by human eyes,” reads a passage on www.gotquestions.org.

   “The Bible says that the spiritual realm consists of both good—God and the holy angels—and evil—the devil and his demons. The Bible also teaches that humans were created by God in His image, which means we have a spiritual component (Gen. 1:27). We are more than physical entities; we possess a soul/spirit destined for eternity.”
   “Jesus claimed to be God’s Son, the One who came down from heaven. He made this fact quite clear: ‘You are from below; I am from above. You are of this world; I am not of this world’” (John 8:23), reads the website.

   With all that in mind, here’s some advice on how to proceed from the Apostle John:

   “Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits, whether they are of God; because many false prophets have gone out into the world. By this you know the Spirit of God: Every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is of God,and every spirit that does not confess that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is not of God. And this is the spirit of the Antichrist, which you have heard was coming, and is now already in the world.”

   “You are of God, little children, and have overcome them, because He who is in you is greater than he who is in the world. They are of the world. Therefore they speak as of the world, and the world hears them. We are of God. He who knows God hears us; he who is not of God does not hear us. By this we know the spirit of truth and the spirit of error” (1 John 4:1-6 NKJV).

  This is amplified by the Apostle Paul in his letter to the Ephesians:

   “For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of ^[the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places. Eph. 6: 12 NKJV).

   If that sounds like a dangerous place to be, it is!

   How blessed we are then, that as we by necessity traverse this spiritual territory, that we can hold the hand of our Heavenly Father.  The closer you stay to Him, the better off you will be. You’ll be better able to receive instruction from His Holy Spirit.

   God is no mere tour guide, familiar with the area, but the creator, owner and arbiter of everything.  You are safe with Him. Apart from Him, you are relying on your own wits, not a good plan.

   Here’s a picture of the difference between staying close and not staying close to God:

   “Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor stands in the path of sinners, nor sits in the seat of the scornful; But his delight is in the law of the Lord, and in His law he meditates day and night.”

   “He shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, that brings forth its fruit in its season, whose leaf also shall not wither; and whatever he does shall prosper.”

   “The ungodly are not so, but are like the chaff which the wind drives away. Therefore the ungodly shall not stand in the judgment,
Nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous. For the Lord knows the way of the righteous, but the way of the ungodly shall perish. (Psalm 1, NKJV).

   Class notes, fourth period, Orientation & Mobility: Having a safe spiritual journey means staying close to God as He rules in your favor over spiritual wickedness you are powerless to fight in your own strength.

   One for the spiritual road: Psalm 23:4 NKJV, “Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil; For You are with me; Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me.”