The Christian Embezzler
Part Three
God gave us a soul to be developed to bring glory to Him. Using our soul independently of God, storing up ungodly thoughts that lead to ungodly actions, is what leads to spiritual embezzlement of our soul.
By prioritizing our will or plans over His, we have taken our soul that was given to us to bring glory to God, and are using it to please ourselves.
Luke 14: 26 NASB2020 reiterates this principle, referring to our soul as being our own life. Using our soul to plot, plan, and pursue a life independent of the plan of God, disqualifies us from the life of discipleship.
The development of our soul for His glory is what theologians refer to as building and maintaining an edified soul structure (1).
Note that having an edified soul structure is useless if the information within is not applied. There are many Christians that can quote the Bible from cover to cover, but consistently fail to apply what they know, to what they think, do, and speak.
This edified soul structure is what becomes our base of operation from which we have the means to make informed choices that glorifies God. This edified soul structure is built and reinforced though the daily intake of the Word of God. This edified soul structure is kept pure by frequent 2Cor. 13: 5 self-examinations and the purging it of any information that runs contrary to Scripture that we have allowed to take up residence.
There are 168 hours in every week. Spending a part of only one of them at a worship service (assuming it is one where the Word of God is actually being taught) leaves us with 167 hrs. or 99% of our time each week, vulnerable to the devil’s fiery darts (2).
Adding twenty minutes of personal devotional time, meditating on the Word of God each day, will only reduce the 99% figure by another 1%.
It is by having an edified soul structure turned on 24/7 that one can detect and address the devil’s incoming fiery darts.
During the course of each and every day, we are bombarded with information from what see and hear. Some of it is wholesome and beneficial, but much of it consists of fallout from the devil’s fiery darts. These darts are designed to distract us from being focused on the plan of God, obstruct our forward progress along the road to spiritual maturity, or to promote sin, taking us out of intimate fellowship with the Lord.
We are what we think (3). This is what makes the soul the bone of contention in the ongoing battle of the post salvation spiritual life.
We glorify God when we choose to build (4), maintain (5), and apply (6) the contents of our soul structure to ALL that we think, do, and speak. Or, or we can embezzle it and use it in an attempt to please ourselves.
Just ask yourself, “Is it His plans or is it my plans that is on my mind (soul) most of the time?”. “Am I living for Christ (7), and the things of God, or for myself, and what please me?”.
Discipleship is not something you do for a part of your day. It is a 24/7 lifestyle.
To the extent that one does not have a Biblically-edified soul structure, its empty space creates a vacuum that will suck in in human viewpoint, or worse, teachings taught by demons (7).
A doctrine taught by demons is any teaching or accompanying practice that contradicts Scripture, often promoted by wolves in sheep’s clothing WITHIN the religious establishments of Man.
Human viewpoint makes sense and appeals to the fallen nature within us, but wars against God and the things of God for control of our thoughts, which inevitably determines our actions. Teachings taught by demons are not designed to offend people, but to deceive them, leading then to believe that this is what desires.
In conclusion, we choose to either use all that God has given us to glorify Him, or we choose to embezzle it in order to please ourselves.
(1) Matt. 7: 24 (2) Eph. 6: 16 (3) Proverbs 23: 7 (4) Matt. 7: 24 (5) 2Cor. 13: 5 (6) James 1: 22 (7) Phil. 1: 21 (8) 1Tim. 4: 1