PAUL'S THORN IN THE FLESH - THE CARNAL MIND STRONG MAN

Anonymous Coward
User ID: 71005
1/26/2007 9:31 PM
   
Re: I Apologize: Christians ARE responsible for ALL Evil and Suffering in the World.
http://www.godlikeproductions.com/bbs/message.php?messageid=335555


I found some supporting verses in the Bible to help us understand this business about the denial-mind attached to our flesh (which was Paul's thorn in the flesh that we have no indication that Paul ever figured it out).


The next verses that I want to discuss are Jesus' responses in three different books of the bible to this accusation.


The kingdom in our bodies, is centered on our soul. If our soul is divided against our own self, then our soul will be brought to desolation. The FACT that we have this denial-mind attacking our thoughts is the SOURCE of the division in the kingdom of our body, IF we listen to and obey it.


So, and Christians please notice this, the denial mind does not care if the person seeks any of the religions of this world; even christianity. Satan will not cast out the denial mind in you, obviously. As long as the denial minds of people have polluted all the religions then there is no threat from man's religions that a person will DISCOVER the presence of the denial mind that he has been listening to and obeying.


You can see right here that faith is not enough. Faith without works is dead. A person who believes that God exists, and desires to KNOW God, will seek to hear God's voice. Certainly once a person has heard the Almighty God, He will want to learn from God and will choose of his own free will to obey God, as he is taught. None of man's religions HAS to have anything to do with this possibility or process. You dont have to join any organization or do any repeat after me's; you dont have to follow any of man's rules. And you automatically come to Christ and His shed blood for your sins.


So, back to Jesus' response about casting out devils by the power of God.


This is a hard one. I had to ask God for lotsa help and explanation. These pharisees put themselves in charge of teaching the people of God the truth, so the children in these verses are the church. Jesus is saying, if it WERE true that He casts out devils by Beelzebub, if that is what you Teachers believe and teach your children, then they must be casting out devils by Beelzebub too. Which means, that the REAL DEVILS are not being cast out at all! This is what people like Benny Hinn and many other church leaders are doing; which is imparting devils to their followers. And their followers will be the judges of the leaders, when the followers find out that they have been deceived.

And then Jesus says if you let Him cast out the devils, then the kingdom of God is born within you... however you STILL need the next verses to BREAK the power of the denial mind attached to your flesh.



Here, the strong man is the denial mind. The house is your body. The goods are all the fruit you have been bearing in your soul - good or bad. So, the only way to spoil, or clear out the bad fruit you have accumulated from listening to your denial mind, is to allow Jesus' power of God to bind the influence of the denial mind over your thoughts.

Another point here. Some christians have debated with me this week and make it a point that they have, by faith, turned their personal will, over to Christ, in the POSITION that Christ's will is now their will. But I tell you now, you DO the will of whom you OBEY. Jesus does not Sin, true. So whose will is it that is responsible for the sin that christians still do? It has to be their own will. The denial mind has no will because it is mind essence only and only uses thoughts. It is always, always the will of the person's soul that does anything, in a person. The whole point is to be able to HEAR Christ's voice and CHOOSE to obey His suggestions as to what to do or how to evaluate a given situation. You are still the one whose will is responsible for what is thought and done and said.

Another thing to notice here, is that the strong man is BOUND - TIED UP, but he is not cast out. SO, in the context of Jesus discussing casting OUT EXTERNAL demons, He is also showing us that we have an internal strong man who calls OUR BODY, its HOUSE! And that we need to ask God to BIND this strong man. Can we see the fine difference?

This same incident is told in two other books in the bible, and I want to go over another one. Btw, I hope you realize that I just like to teach. (GRIN)


This one is going to be deep. This denial mind in us, is armed with all the thoughts he needs to keep us deceived, no matter what religions we join - as Dexter explained in another thread - this 'not me' mind knows how to circumvent every effort we make to block its influence. It is armed and thinks of our own body as its palace! And all its fruits of evil are right there to condemn our soul - because we listened and obeyed - spoke and acted on its leading. You see now, the advantage it has that we do not even know it is there within us.

BUT - when a STRONGER (hallelujah for Jesus!) power, of God, who is the only One who can overcome the denial mind comes into your thought life, then God removes all the armor or disguises the denial mind hides behind.

Lets talk about these disguises. How about high intellect? Thats one of its disguises. The person says to himself, I am very smart. I can figure out what is what. Okay another one. How about religiousity, which makes the denial mind disguised as a religious spirit. With this one, the person says, I know the Word of God, I know the truth, I have faith, I know my position in Christ is of Christ only and nothing that I can do. I'm all set, I am saved, and everyone else who wants to be saved HAS to be just like me and agree with me or else they are lost.

Here is another disguise. I am not worthy. I was born in a bad situation. I have bad genes. I am handicapped. I did bad things. I can never be good. I am not smart. I am no good. Thats one of the denial mind's disguises.



God, being the STRONGER, comes in a DIVIDES THE SPOILS. This is very very telling. Anything that is still GOOD of all the stuff your soul has accumulated is SAVED. Such as, all the truth you have learned, whether christian, muslim, new age, buddhist, etc. All the smart things you have learned can be saved. But all the self-condemnation is thrown out, and all the other tricks the denial mind used on you, God will help you SORT and DIVIDE it out and off of you.... umm if you listen to God's voice and obey, learn from God, and let Him teach you Himself.


Jesus warns that if you are not obeying God's voice, then you are against Him. For example, if a christian who is disobedient to God's voice teaches other people to do the same ( ie be a christian the same way he is) , then he is scattering people AWAY from God.





So.. it looks here as though, if you are obeying God's voice, you will cast out devils out of people AND minister to the people in a sufficient manner that they will have the kingdom of God in their soul (they can now hear God's voice for themselves) and not be subject to demon possession ever again.

By contrast, if you are a christian going about casting out devils according to YOUR will, using the power in the name of Jesus Christ, those persons might be in danger of being worse off in the long run than they were at the first. Such is what can happen at the benny hinn meetings, etc.

Jesus truly is Savior to all people and His obedience resulted in God making available the free gift of His Holy Spirit to empower us to resist the denial mind and conform our will, in practice, to the perfect will that God planned for our lives and destiny. Our free will is then made Divine, by our choosing to obey God's ways on everything that we speak and do.

God's plan was/is perfect.

 

just reread this and got some more insight

I was pretty much with you ( I don't see the thorn in Paul's flesh as the carnal mind, I see it as a messenger(angel) of satan that was sent to buffet (beat)) then I hit the part where you say the Kingdom of God being upon them was the new birth and you lost me.

I will review later

eaglewise

Hi eaglewise,

the messenger of satan beating up on Paul, is the carnal mind - that denial-mind-construct that we inherited from Adam's disobedience.  That is why it is like a ball and chain, ie always there.

hope this helps,
nada

I found this site on Paul's thorn in the flesh at the top of my first search.

http://www.tbm.org/pauls_thorn.htm

eaglewise

He makes good arguments re: the health issue and that the thorn is persecution, however, he neglected to explain why Paul said it was in his flesh.  The carnal-mind-construct is in the flesh, and it persecutes our minds constantly.

I am convinced that this carnal mind is what Paul referred to, because Paul wanted to be glorified, and the carnal mind has to be burned off before the final step in sanctification.  Also you get a purified body in glorification, so you can not allow the carnal mind to stay in a purified body.  If God had granted to Paul to removed the carnal mind construct, then Paul's spirit would have converted his body to a purified one automatically, because his will was in agreement with his born again spirit, and the body follows the will.

As long as the carnal mind continues to lie inside your body, then your will is slightly out of alignment with your born again spirit, due to the buffeting of untruth existing within your being.  Once the carnal mind is burned off, which is what the coming of Elijah will do to some of us, initially, then our body will purify.

There would be no voice in our body saying, you have this ailment, you are this old, etc etc.. instead the body will just follow the will and the spirit and be made whole - complete - healed.

so, the carnal mind is the key, as Paul discovered, it is the only or last impediment to the glorification of the saints.

Look at Jesus as an example.  He put His on the cross!

oh yea

Me114

In his flesh, if anything discounts the carnal mind construct. He doesn't say in my carnal mind, you need to add that to this passage, unless you are of the opinion that Paul's knowledge of God was limited to the point he was not aware of these two minds you refer to. Doesn't add up when he spoke primarily from revelation knowledge unless he stated otherwise and he himself referred to the abundance of revelation that was given to him in this very passage.

To be frank I see the carnal mind as a product of the lie. The lie that covers the whole world and as such finds it's entrance into our being through the five physical senses of our bodies. Putting on the mind of Christ is allowing God's truth (light) to illuminate the lie and replace it with the truth. That truth constructs the image of God in us (hope), and our exercise of faith brings it into manifestation.

I believe that as God pours out the former and latter rain upon the earth in these closing hours, the knowledge of God will increase to a point that men can no longer deny the truth. They can reject it but they will not be able to deny it.

God did not grant Paul's request because suffering persecution is biblical and in Paul's case was for the manifestation of the Glory of God. Like you and I God intended for Paul to rise above the persecution that came from preaching the Gospel, and for that matter anything else that tried to exalt itself above the knowledge of God. Which I believe he did before he left the body. Until he did God told him that Grace would carry him through.

I can appreciate that Jesus bore our sins in His own body but cannot concur that He had a carnal mind.

As for Paul, as far as I can determine, the revelation of God that was given to him and expressed in the bible, was sufficient to ensure that he would not be ignorant of the carnal mind construct you talk about.

I cannot agree with you at this time based on your argument. I will continue to study your teachings and may arrive at a different position at some later date.

What I can say is I have valued my time spend on your site and I would like to thank you for the labor of love that is evident here.

eaglewise