December 6 - People without a Soul

The Lord was having a dispute with the people of the land, taking issues with the inhabitants in three areas that were related to the soul of the people. First, there was no faithfulness. Their faculty of decision-making was wrong for they could not decide to follow God but rather poor judgments were made for them to go after idols. Second, there was no steadfast love. They followed their lusts and succumbed to the spirit of adultery. There was no true love but the place was filled with lust. Third, there was no true knowledge of God in the land. Since the fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge, their knowledge was not from God and their thinking was polluted.

In a word, the inhabitants of the land were without a soul, they use their soulish functions to satisfy their own needs, giving no place to God. As a result, swearing, lying, murder, stealing and committing adultery, bloodshed and lawlessness abound in their communities. The sins of the people had an impact on the land they lived on. The land, because of what was happening, mourned. The inhabitants languished and even the beasts of the field and the birds of the air and the fish of the sea were taken away. Sin has a way to destroy, to kill and to take away all good things. The sins of the people brought curses to the land, the animals and the human.

Discussion and debates in the religious community would do the land no good. Even the priests and the prophets were falling apart due to the lack of knowledge of God. Like priest, like people. If the leaders were in sin, the people would follow. People were perishing for lack of true knowledge about God. They could not control their passions and lusts. The people became rebellious, not following the commands of God. Their souls were given over to the demonic, filled with the spirits of whoredom and adultery.

But the Lord would not give up His place. He would return to His place until the people acknowledged their guilt and sought His face. In distress the people would earnestly seek God. Repentance and returning to God is the only way to heal the people, the land and the living things on it. The key is the people repenting, not through any debate or arguments within the believing community. Whatever happens in the natural has always a corresponding spiritual cause.

Are you a person without a soul? Is your soul given over to the Lord and the Holy Spirit? Are you thinking according to the knowledge of God? Do your feelings come from a Christ-centered foundation? Is your every decision from the will of God? Let God take over your soul now and have godly thinking, feeling and willing. This is what is being filled with the Holy Spirit mean, let Him have full control now.