2nd Dynamic: What You Plant Is Exactly What You Harvest! (apple Seeds Don't Produce Pumpkins)

Most of us are concerned with spiritual life today because we know we live in a spiritual world

, and we want to know how it works. We even want spiritual healing and spiritual growth and life transformation. We know we're on a spiritual journey.

But we are also very focused on our physical world, and we want to know how it jives with the spiritual world. We want to know how to have physical health and we somehow know that physical health is at least someone dependent on spiritual health and spiritual growth.

The word of God says that the physical and spiritual are intimately intertwined.

We Abuse Our Bodies

So many people suffer from drug abuse and substance abuse. Drug treatment and drug rehabilitation are very big business today. We know that what we put in our bodies has great impact on us. In fact, most of us know that what we eat controls us.

We are told that the most important drug we take every day is the food we eat. The search for good health food is staggering. There is an outcry today about junk food, and the obesity it causes, especially in the U.S. Obesity in America is a prime talk show topic. There is even talk of making it a CRIMINAL offense if parents don't control their children's eating habits and if they allow them to become obese.

We also read the reports about 'placebo drugs' which are really just nothing, but people are told that they are actually a drug, and how people react to it as though it were the drug they think it is. This shows that so many ways we live and respond begin in our heads with the way we think and believe.

Sowing and Reaping: Planting and Harvesting

Most of the time, in Christian circles, sowing and reaping is taught as what WE do that produces what we reap in life. And there is truth in this. Paul says, "As you sow, so shall you reap." Peter says we should bless others so that we will inherit a blessing. I view anything beginning with US as beginning in LAW. So, 'instructors in Christ,' who are law based, consistently teach these things about planting and harvesting things in life. They are principle and precept based. Again, there is scriptural foundation for it.

But the most important thing about 'sowing and reaping' is what is sown INTO US. The Parable of the Sower discusses this - the sowing of the truth of gospel seed into us, and then Paul says it is this gospel seed that produces good fruit (good things) from us (Col 1:5-6). Yes, we Christians should have good behavior, and we should strive to reduce sin. But what we often fail to see is that it is the GOSPEL of God's grace, and peace with him, that produces good behavior from us, and less sin.

The gospel begins in God, not in us. The gospel is God's power in us (Rom 1:16). So, when we receive God's power, we receive his plenty - his abundance - his glory - his presence - his favor - his blessings.

If we live by principles, this makes us see everything in light of US, and our living by principles (another term for laws). This includes sowing and reaping. But when we live by the person of God, then we see everything in the light of God. The gospel causes us to see everything in the light of GOD, not SELF. Law tends to make us 'worship the creature, or self, rather than the Creator, or God (Rom 1:25). This of course all began in the Garden of Eden with Eve: "You shall be like God" (Gen 3:5).

How the Gospel Produces Health

In Galatians 6:7-8 Paul says, "Do not be deceived; God is not mocked. For whatever a man sows, that shall he also reap. For he who sows to his flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption, but he who sows to his spirit shall of the Spirit reap life."

Do you see the focus these verses? They are not on what we sow OUT from us. Instead, the focus is on what we sow INTO us - whether into our flesh or into our spirit.

If we feed junk food into us we may become obese. If we feed law into us we will become legalistic, judgmental, critical, and unloving. This will produce anger, unforgiveness, resentment and bitterness. If we feed health food into us we will enjoy physical health. What we eat controls us. It's a no-brainer.

God's word shows us that the same thing applies spiritually. The word of God is powerful, and the gospel is the power of God in us. If we receive gospel seed, good things happen (Col 1:5-6 revisited).

When we receive gospel truth into us, spiritual health becomes ours, and thus spiritual growth. In this sequence, our spiritual journey through this physical world becomes right, and physical health is the result. Can you see the spiritual truth of this?

Gospel living is eating healthy, spiritually. Living by law is unhealthy, resulting condemnation, guilt, fear, judgment, apprehension, stress, discontent, strife, and many other bad things. The gospel is the best health food available to us. The gospel is the greatest gift this world has ever received, and this is why Satan works night and day to blind us and keep us from seeing it (II Cor 4:4). Too often, he's assisted by legalistic 'instructors in Christ' that greatly out-number 'fathers of the gospel' (I Cor 4:15).

In our human way of thinking, we best relate to precepts and principles. This is where cause and effect is born: "If I plant, then I will reap." It's the way our human thought processes work. This is why Paul says to allow the gospel to TRANSFORM our minds. Living in the gospel is seeing life through God's eyes.

In the gospel, good seeds and good roots, caused by good gospel seed, result in good fruit.

There is more! To see the rest of this article check the link in the resource box.

by: Roger Himes

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