Tabernacles Central

Discern The Lord’s Body In Order To Be Worthy Of This Cup

Paul says,

“For he that eateth and drinketh unworthily, eateth and drinketh damnation to himself, not discerning the Lord’s body. For this cause many are weak and sickly among you, and many sleep.”

1 Corinthians 11:29,30

Here Paul asks us to discern or “judge rightly” the body of Christ.  Often times, when the apostles spoke about certain topics or circumstances they drew their conclusions from greater experiences.  Here we see Paul talking about being sensitive to others in the body of Christ and the consequences thereof.

Connected in love

As I go deeper into connection love, I find that there are actual spiritual experiences associated with many scriptures.  For instance, the other day I felt like someone had punched me in my spiritual gut.  I immediately discerned, by the spirit, that my spiritual connection was being attacked by demons.  I spoke with her and gradually she revealed that indeed she was under attack.

Some, in their natural minds, think that attaching scripture to whatever they do keeps them “safe.” In fact many, without scripture to back up what they do, will not move an inch in God. However, those who wrote the scriptures did so from the vantage point of profound experiences in God.  When they wrote that we should “discern“, they did so from a spiritual experience of discerning that goes far deeper than what we know.  Therefore, when Paul says to discern the Lord’s body in the instance of holy communion, it is the application of a much larger truth.

The Holy Spirit helps us discern

The experience Paul is talking about is “knowing” what is going on with your brother or sister through the Holy Spirit. It is “feeling” what is happening to those you are connected with through Divine Love.  As happened with my supernatural knowledge of Esther’s struggle the other day, we are to be so connected with each other that we know, by the Spirit, what is happening with them.  That is not to say we don’t take care of needs that we know of through daily life, of course we should. What I am talking about is things we can’t know through natural circumstances or communication.

What the unity of the Spirit really is

Likewise, when scriptures speak about the unity of the Spirit, they reveal something so vast and deep that, unless you experience it, you don’t know what they mean.  Being as we lack the experience to correctly interpret the verses we read, we tend to gloss over what we do not fully understand.  To most, the unity of the Spirit is brotherly love and harmony.  Yet, the reality is that the unity of the Spirit is spiritual connection with the Body of Christ where you dwell in them and they dwell in you. Literally speaking, our spirits unite and co-mingle until we are literally one in the Holy Spirit.  This is what it means to be “one” body.  Only when you experience true spiritual oneness can you finally come to understand what the unity of the Spirit really is.

Experience comes before understanding

Doctrine, to a very large extent, is natural mined people trying to understand spiritual things that they know little about.  The most accurate doctrine that the church teaches is about salvation because many have personally experienced these scriptures. However, the further that theologians go from actual experience the more distorted their doctrine becomes.

This is why the doctrine of the nature of God is so flawed, most have never met God personally.  Their relationship with our Father is theoretical and therefore when they speak about who He is they get it wrong. No one who has actually been around God believes He is three separate and distinct persons, yet somehow one.  Anyone who has experienced “oneness” with God cannot believe in the trinity.

Talking of spiritual things

I commented to Esther,

“I think that the way I felt in the spirit this morning when you were having a difficult time is what it means to discern the Lord’s body. Perhaps, this is just a by-product of the closeness we share in the spirit. Maybe most, if not all, scriptures have a much deeper and more profound experience associated with them than we realize.”

that’s the thing….with discernment.  You feel “with” each other being a connection, but also separately you feel it being a member of the body. I used to know what other members of the church were going through even though I didn’t have an intimate connection with them like I do with you.

Swimming in the deep end

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