304 The Spiritual Man
in his heart, his natural inclination, his perfect reason, or his
rationalization, he is but activating his old man again. God’s will is
not to be so known; He reveals Himself solely to man’s spirit. What
is not revealed there is purely human activity.
The head is where God’s will is understood, but it is never the
source of His will. The will of God originates in Himself, Who by
His Holy Spirit reveals it to the spirit of man. In turn the latter causes
the outward man to understand through the mind what the inner man
has known. Thus the Christian is able to practice God’s will. Now if
instead of seeking His purpose in the spirit a Christian should daily
search his mind, he will be confused, since thoughts often change.
He who follows his mind is not capable of saying at any moment, “I
truly know this is the will of God.” Such deep faith and assurance
emerges only when one has received revelation in his spirit.
The revelation of God in our spirit is of two kinds: the direct and
the sought. By direct revelation we mean that God, having a
particular wish for the believer to do, draws nigh and reveals it to the
latter’s spirit. Upon receiving such a revelation in his intuition the
believer acts accordingly. By sought revelation we mean that a
believer, having a special need, approaches God with that need and
seeks and waits for an answer through God’s movement in his spirit.
The revelation young believers receive is mostly the sought type; that
of the more matured ones is chiefly the direct kind. We should
quickly add, however, that these are not exclusively so, only
predominantly so. There lies the difficulty with the young believer.
While he ought to wait before the Lord, denying his thought, feeling
and desire, he often becomes impatient waiting for His revelation and
substitutes his own disguised will for that of God. As a consequence
he falls under the accusation of his conscience. Granted that he
genuinely has a heart to follow God’s intent, he nonetheless
unwittingly follows the thought of his mind because he lacks
spiritual knowledge. Who can avoid mistakes if he walks without
revelation?