By My Spirit

"Not by might nor by power, but by my Spirit, says the LORD of hosts."  Zechariah 5:6

This is a very powerful statement to seize upon by meditation.  There is contained within these words a message of reassurance for the hungry soul.  Look around you, not in a merely curious manner, but look deeply into the culture that has taken hold of you.  The culture around us seeks to trick us into believing that it is all that we need for life satisfaction.  Cultures are deceptively mythic.  In truth, our culture needs our collective support to continue its psychic reign over us.

Long ago a perceptive writer noted that the cathode ray tube (television) is not the screen, but our minds are the screens upon which the culture inscribes its controlling myths.  It is indeed hypnotic and intoxicating.  The subliminal messages are fed to us beneath the conscious level and we in turn see what they want us to see.  Control of our beliefs and values are in the manner of a soft dictatorship.

The religious culture likes to believe that it is somehow exempt of this soft tyranny, but it too has fallen into believing controlling myths.  Systems, programs, demographics, and spiritual mapping have replaced healthy dependence upon the Spirit of God.  The divine culture has been set aside for the culture of man.  Not consciously, of course, but in a manner that does not displease either.  It is the culture of double-think.

The world of the Spirit of God is different.  Divine culture is different.  God is not in competition with the world.  We are to be in the world, but not out of the world as a source.  Our convictions are centered in the Word of God, or they should be.

Zechariah spoke to a people who needed to be encouraged about the power of God in their lives.  They needed re-assurance that even though the outer circumstances seemed not to speak to their perceptions.  God was there for them, but in a different manner.

Their preconceptions held them captive, and God had moved on to something new.  They wanted the familiar and the comfortable, but God had other plans.  God is not disposed to fit himself into our plans.  Culture takes away that awareness, and replaces it with self-satisfying and godless beliefs.  The Spirit of God created the world in Genesis One.  God's Spirit transformed a desolate, dark and bleak wasteland into life by the power of His Spirit.  I note that at no time did God seek a consult.

God is still transforming souls without consult by his Spirit.  In the midst of spiritual ruin in a culture that hides ruin God is giving new life.  By His Spirit, God is transforming lives by the power of Grace.  By the Spirit of God you may be made new qualitatively. This newness cannot be bought.  You may only acquire it by saying "yes" to God.

The Spirit of God moves into the sin-sick soul and gives new life.  The Spirit of God moves into the hurting soul and gives new life.  The Spirit of God moves into the anxious soul and gives new live.  The Spirit of God gives hope where hope has fled.

Blessings to you.

For more information about Dr. Rich and his teaching ministry, please follow his blog and visit his website.