^“Seeing you have purified your souls in obeying the Truth through the Spirit unto unfeigned love of the Brethren, see that you love one another with a pure heart fervently: Being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the Word of God, which lives and abides for ever.” 1 Peter 1:22-23

Through the Spirit of God, our souls are purified by obeying the Truth.  By looking unto Jesus Christ, the Author and the Finisher of our faith (Hebrews 12:2), we are able to love one another with a pure heart.  Our faith being authored is tried by fire, precept upon precept and line upon line, drawing us nearer to our Lord Jesus Christ.  This faith that is birthed from the fire is more precious than gold or silver.  It is falls out to praise and honor unto Jesus Christ as He works all things for our good.

It is through the Spirit of God, the Holy Spirit, that this work is done in our hearts and lives…not our disciplines, intellect or abilities.  Being born of the Spirit, we are Born Again…a new creature IN Christ Jesus, He lives and abides with us forever; His Word alive in our hearts; His Laws written on our hearts…we know, that we know, that we know, that HE IS ALIVE and that one day soon and very soon that if we don’t go by way of the grave that we will meet Him in the clouds and behold His Face.

THIS is the victory afforded us by Jesus Christ at Calvary’s Cross.  The ministry of the Holy Spirit is to superintend the work of God in our hearts and lives when we are Born Again.  The Holy Spirit will not work outside of the parameters of the Cross of Christ.  When we look to vain philosophies and humanistic psychology cloaked in Scripture for victory, our faith is deceitfully placed in those vanities which invoke our flesh to do something…to be a part of our victory and we make the victory afforded us at the Cross of Christ Jesus of no effect.  We have the same result as the world has when we partake in the world’s methods for victory over the world, the flesh and the devil.

Spiritually defeated by not obeying the Truth through the power of the Holy Spirit but through the power of our own self efforts, our unfeigned love of the Brethren falls short.  It was born of corruptible seed and not of the Spirit of God.

There is a joy unspeakable afforded us by the Cross of Christ.  With our faith placed solely and exclusively in Jesus Christ and Him crucified; not in ourselves, our ability, our intellect, etc., we are afforded the ministry of the Holy Spirit Who creates in us a new heart…a new creature where we are are changed into the same image of Jesus Christ from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord.

If you are not being constantly changed from glory to glory by the Spirit of the Lord, you are not growing in Grace but are withering…dying spiritually.  Grace, nor sin for that matter, is not stagnant; you’re either growing in one or the other.

Come back to the Cross of Christ.  Deny yourself and pick up the victory the Lord Jesus Christ afforded you at Calvary’s Cross and continue following Him; walking with Him daily…growing in the Grace and the knowledge of Who He is and what He has done for whosoever will believe.  He is Alive; the Word of God is alive and therefore inexhaustible.  Seek Him while He may be found.  Allow the Spirit of the Lord to do the work in your life He is commissioned to do.  Be determined to know nothing else among you save Jesus Christ and Him crucified.

-Donna Clark Warren