growing a True Spiritual perception

by Derek
November 29, 2012
One Comment

perceive [pəˈsiːv]
vb
1. to become aware of (something) through the senses, esp the sight; recognize or observe
2. (tr; may take a clause as object) to come to comprehend; grasp
[from Old French perçoivre, from Latin percipere seize entirely, from per- (thoroughly) + capere to grasp]

RELEVANT VERSES:
(Mark 2:8 NKJV) But immediately, when Jesus perceived in His spirit that they reasoned thus within themselves, He said to them, “Why do you reason about these things in your hearts?
(Acts 17:16 NKJV) Now while Paul waited for them at Athens, his spirit was provoked within him when he saw that the city was given over to idols.
Paul writes:
“What no eye has seen, what no ear has heard, and what no human mind has conceived” -the things God has prepared for those who love him—
10 these are the things God has revealed to us by his Spirit.
The Spirit searches all things, even the deep things of God. 11 For who knows a person’s thoughts except their own spirit within them? In the same way no one knows the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God. 12 What we have received is not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, so that we may understand what God has freely given us. 13 This is what we speak, not in words taught us by human wisdom but in words taught by the Spirit, explaining spiritual realities with Spirit-taught words.[c] 14 The person without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God but considers them foolishness, and cannot understand them because they are discerned only through the Spirit. 15 The person with the Spirit makes judgments about all things, but such a person is not subject to merely human judgments, 16 for,“Who has known the mind of the Lord  so as to instruct him?”
But we have the mind of Christ.

(1 Corinthians 2:14 NKJV) But the natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; nor can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.
(2 Corinthians 3:13-16 NKJV) unlike Moses, who put a veil over his face so that the children of Israel could not look steadily at the end of what was passing away. {14} But their minds were blinded. For until this day the same veil remains unlifted in the reading of the Old Testament, because the veil is taken away in Christ. {15} But even to this day, when Moses is read, a veil lies on their heart. {16} Nevertheless when one turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away.
(2 Corinthians 4:3-4 NKJV) But even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing, {4} whose minds the god of this age has blinded, who do not believe, lest the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine on them.
(Ephesians 4:18 NKJV) having their understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God, because of the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness of their heart;
(Hebrews 8:10-12 NKJV) “For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the LORD: I will put My laws in their mind and write them on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people. {11} “None of them shall teach his neighbor, and none his brother, saying, ‘Know the LORD,’ for all shall know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them. {12} “For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their lawless deeds I will remember no more.”
(1 John 2:20 NKJV) But you have an anointing from the Holy One, and you know all things.
(1 John 2:27 NKJV) But the anointing which you have received from Him abides in you, and you do not need that anyone teach you; but as the same anointing teaches you concerning all things, and is true, and is not a lie, and just as it has taught you, you will abide in Him.
(Acts 2:16-18 NKJV) “But this is what was spoken by the prophet Joel: {17} ‘And it shall come to pass in the last days, says God, That I will pour out of My Spirit on all flesh; Your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, Your young men shall see visions, Your old men shall dream dreams. {18} And on My menservants and on My maidservants I will pour out My Spirit in those days; And they shall prophesy.
(1 Corinthians 14:31 NKJV) For you can all prophesy one by one, that all may learn and all may be encouraged.

“This is truly a vast transition in our nature. We go from being spiritually blind and without understanding, to being able to sense spiritual realities and both understand and enjoy them. We may even sense them so keenly that we are able to edify the Church. A whole new way of seeing things is opened up. This is variously called “being quickened in spirit”, “having the eyes of your heart enlightened.” or having one’s spiritual eyes and ears “opened” to spiritual reality. This work of the Holy Spirit that is quite independent of human intellect (see 1 Corinthians chapters 1-4 ). Some very intelligent people are spiritually blind while some simple folk grasp the things of the Kingdom. Jesus rejoiced in seeing simple people grasping great spiritual realities by faith alone and being obviously taught by God”. (Jeffrey Benner, a teacher on spiritual formation)

TWO OTHER POIGNANT PASSAGES ON SPIRITUAL PERCEPTION:
(Matthew 11:25 NKJV) At that time Jesus answered and said, “I thank You, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that You have hidden these things from the wise and prudent and have revealed them to babes.
(Matthew 16:17 NKJV) Jesus answered and said to him, “Blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jonah, for flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but My Father who is in heaven.

Watchman Nee writes,
“II Kings 4 recounts how the Shunammite received Elisha. “And it came to pass on a day that Elisha passed to Shunem, where was a wealthy woman, and she constrained him to eat bread. And so it was, that as oft as he passed by, he turned in thither to eat bread. And she said to her husband, Behold now, I perceive that this is a holy man of God, who passes by us continually.” Note that Elisha preached no sermon, worked no miracle. He merely dropped in and ate whenever he was passing that way. By the way he ate, the woman recognized him as a holy man of God. This was the impression Elisha gave to others.

We should ask ourselves, what impression do I give to others? How often we have emphasized the need for our outward man to be broken. If this brokenness is not accomplished, others meet the impact of our outward man. Whenever we are in their presence they are made uncomfortable by our self-love, or pride, or obstinacy, or cleverness, or eloquence. Perhaps the impression we leave is a favorable one, but is God being satisfied? Will such an impression meet the Church’s need ? If God is not satisfied, and the Church is not helped, any impression we leave is for naught.
Beloved, God’s full intention requires that our spirit bee released. It is imperative for the growth of the Church. How urgent, then, that our outward man be broken! Without this breaking our spirit cannot come forth, and the impression we leave with others will not be a spiritual one.”

II Kings 4 recounts how the Shunammite received Elisha. “And it came to pass on a day that Elisha passed to Shunem, where was a wealthy woman, and she constrained him to eat bread. And so it was, that as oft as he passed by, he turned in thither to eat bread. And she said to her husband, Behold now, I perceive that this is a holy man of God, who passes by us continually.” Note that Elisha preached no sermon, worked no miracle. He merely dropped in and ate whenever he was passing that way. By the way he ate, the woman recognized him as a holy man of God. This was the impression Elisha gave to others.

MY THOUGHTS:
The way I understand the very basic makeup of what it means to be human:
The Spirit taught it to me like this: my own spirit is where I meet God’s Spirit; my soul then expresses what my spirit receives, and my body houses it. It starts higher to lower. The spirit of man is the highest part that communes directly with God, the rest expresses what comes from, emanates out from this communion. The whole human (spirit, soul and body) matters and is loved by God, and the whole is part of what we are as humans. So even the physical body matters a lot to God, and, is, mysteriously a part of our new spiritual bodies–as we see with the recognizability of Jesus when He was walking around after His death and resurrection. There was a continuum. And in Isaiah when Christ is described, it seems there is also a physical appearance continuum with Jesus while here on earth!

The Holy Spirit bears witness with our spirits that we are children of God (Romans 8:16). This is one of the ways Paul offers for us to confirm things. But also what is implied in this verse, is that our spirits are where we meet The Spirit of God, and this is where we know from. This is our origin place of meeting.

God is Light, as John teaches us. To have spiritual enlightenment, is to enter His Light, who Jesus is (“I am the Light”). Our spiritual perceptions should then be in a growth process in Him-the dawn ever breaking open in more effulgence and radiance over the mountains and valleys of our lives, as we offer our “sight” into His, and learn the difference between how we see, and how God sees. We are to be learning to comprehend all things in our life, through, by, from and with His Spirit. That is to see spiritually. Our spiritual discernment is to be growing into Christlikeness–to see as He sees.

“Martin Buber’s I and Thou (Ich und Du, 1923) presents a philosophy of personal dialogue, in that it describes how personal dialogue can define the nature of reality. Buber’s major theme is that human existence may be defined by the way in which we engage in dialogue with each other, with the world, and with God.
According to Buber, human beings may adopt two attitudes toward the world: I-Thou or I-It. I-Thou is a relation of subject-to-subject, while I-It is a relation of subject-to-object. In the I-Thou relationship, human beings are aware of each other as having a unity of being. In the I-Thou relationship, human beings do not perceive each other as consisting of specific, isolated qualities, but engage in a dialogue involving each other’s whole being.”

God’s Perception is higher than mankind’s, but is also similar as human perception is derivative of His. As His Spirit enters our lives, we gain access to how God Perceives. This spiritual perception, both John and Paul in the NT, and all the prophets in the Old, were constantly growing in. The prophets sought to gain understanding, as we are told by Paul. Daniel, fixed his gaze to gain understanding. How people see effects how they live. To be perceiving more as God does, is one of the goals of living in Christ.

How do we tend to know things? In the west, we categorize, organize, rearrange in order to know–ie the scientific method. In the east, knowing comes through more of a beholding through intuition the essential nature of something, and then coming out to its parts afterwards. This way, looks at the core of something first, to understand its components. Both, i think, are aspects or reflections of how God knows.

God’s perception grows gradually in humans as they move closer to the Ultimate Thou-their Creator. Washed by the Son’s blood, our perceptions come clean and clearer, and we begin to see more “face to Face.” We come to see ourselves more accurately and all that is around us. How He perceives is a key for all good living. It is extremely practical to perceive accurately. People kill themselves and others because they do not perceive rightly. People perish without vision–we need accurate ways of seeing. He is not just renewing our minds, He is changing our lenses of seeing, ways of perceiving, so we can act properly in this world.

Daniel, the Jewish ruler and prophet, saw all of history against a spiritual Kingdom backdrop. He could see through things. He had true spiritual discernment at a high level. His perception was seared into God’s. That offered him more accurate interpretations of how to intervene and use his God-given authority into his particular situation. In order to act, we need to perceive accurately.

Perception has its own style of sanctification in each person. But it’s an essential component of moving forth as children and co-heirs in Christ. If we are to rule with Him, and are being trained for this task. we must come to perceive-to fully comprehend-each situation, more as He does. In short, to have our personal perceptions, fully baptized into His Perception of all things, including our own lives.

The gift of spiritual discernment includes the ability to see the source or sources or motivating factors in a situation. To divide soul from spirit; but also distinguish whether something is from God, ourselves, or the enemy. To me it is a specific aspect of spiritual perception. Different people name it in different ways, but it involves seeing things accurately against their spiritual backdrop. I think Daniel clearly had it, and John; but in a sense, i think a true spiritually perception should be growing in all those in Christ.

To perceive rightly, is to see how things actually ARE in Reality. Since God sees perfectly all He has created and is, and we have the “mind of Christ”, we are to be moving into an ever more accurate perception of what Reality is in itself. True ontology is to have more of the perception of God of His Own creation, and His creatures. True perception gives us a more accurate knowing of what Reality is. We can then live according to this truer vision. We have to take our own perceptions to the Cross daily, in order to continuously see His Reality. A sanctified perception is the key the understanding the nature of Reality. In short, true ontology or study of the nature of Reality, is ultimately hidden in God’s perception of what is. He shares this with us, through His Son’s Nature and the gift of His Holy Spirit. We should be coming into an ever more accurate ontology in our spiritual lives, so that we can live in reference to the Ultimate Reality in God.

If this sounds too esoteric, remember that how we perceive ourselves, is how we treat ourselves. If we perceive ourselves as adored children of a wonderfully kind Father, we treat ourselves much differently than if we see ourselves as orphaned abandoned kids who are rejected. How we perceive ourselves, changes how we live. Then by extension, how we see our neighbors, changes how we treat them as well. If we see them as a threat, we treat them accordingly. If we see them as amazing poems created by God for His Own pleasure, we begin to cherish them and appreciate their unique nuances of His grand poem. How we perceive ourselves and our world, has great or grave consequences in the practical day to day.

“It may be possible for each to think too much of his own potential glory hereafter; it is hardly possible for him to think too often or too deeply about that of his neighbor. The load, or weight, or burden of my neighbor’s glory should be laid daily on my back, a load so heavy that only humility can carry it, and the backs of the proud will be broken. …

“It is in light of these overwhelming possibilities, it is with the awe and the circumspection proper to them, that we should conduct all our dealings with one another, all friendships, all loves, all play, all politics. There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilizations — these are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat. But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub and exploit. … Next to the Blessed Sacrament itself, your neighbor is the holiest object presented to your senses.”
― C.S. Lewis, The Weight of Glory

biblical terms for perceive:
to gain a full knowledge of; to be completely aquainted with–epiginosko
the other word gingko–same but to know by experience and observation

“But to love another as a person we must begin by granting him his own autonomy and identity as a person. We have to love him for what he is in himself, and not for what he is to us. We have to love him for his own good, not for the good we get out of him. And this is impossible unless we are capable of a love which ‘transforms’ us, so to speak, into the other person, making us able to see things a he sees them, love what he loves, experience the deeper realities of his own life as if they were our own. Without sacrifice, such a transformation is utterly impossible. But unless we are capable of this kind of transformation ‘into the other’ while remaining ourselves, we are not yet capable of a fully human existence. “ – from Disputed Questions

God perceived the creation, and it was good. Part of knowing God, is to seek out how He perceives or sees things–how He thoroughly grasps them. For us, there is a process of comprehending something. We “come” to know. And we are in the nascent stages of coming to know things face to Face-even as they truly are!

How you perceive things is often influenced by upbringing, culture, even wounds. But He is renewing our minds so we perceive more rightly. “When You look, at the world, what is it that you see?” Bono asks in his song. How we perceive matters to God, and effects our daily behavior! Like when Phillip helps the ethiopian prince, to see the scriptures rightly. This man’s “eyes” were opened to understand, then he took action (got baptized, and presumably took the gospel to Africa).

To perceive the Kingdom of God as the setting of all history is a key Daniel, the prophet, and John, the friend of Jesus, had intact, in their “consecrated perception” of Reality. It’s to be ours also! To see all things against a Kingdom background, or backdrop–that is spiritual perception. Brother Lawrence had it also. Some have described this sight–mystics etc. But it is always there.

To thoroughly grasp something, we need to understand and experience it incarnationally. We know by faith, but we also can know by sight and contact with the Living One. We need to experience each truth in practical tangible ways in our daily lives. That is to fully comprehend or know something–to begin to live in what we are beholding. Just as a symbol participates in the reality to which it points, so we should start to participate in the truths we are given to perceive.

His perception grows in His People collectively also. Constantly, we are to be allowing Him to renew our minds, and to sharpen each other’s spiritual perceptions. The whole self, and the whole Body is under this sanctification, renewal process. In order to perceive fully, we are becoming the sons and daughters of God Himself together and ever increasingly grasping things together more fully in His Perception. We need all the parts of The Body to keep staying interdependent and activated to stay spiritually sharp in sight.

To rightly perceive, or thoroughly grasp the Truth is to know it. To perceive Jesus rightly, is what Peter was commended for! He saw the truth about The Truth! And that is the rock or core truth the whole church is built on–the identity of Jesus! We are “saved” when we grasp the basic truth of who Jesus is, and what He has done, as well as the state of being we are in, as sinners. That is the beginning of true perception; but it goes on as we grow in Him, into the desire to perceive rightly many more truths in and about who God is. His Love for us, is a major ongoing perception we must be growing in. His passion for us individually, and collectively. His Heart for the cities and nations is still another which can be perceived through meditating on His blessing to the Jews to bless all nations. To bring them shalom or wholeness and completion.

Practical: how do we perceive ourselves, our neighbors, cities and nations. Asking Him to come in and help us see rightly in each of these areas. Are we seeing as He sees, and making our choices accordingly? How does He see me personally? What is my story He is telling? How about my city? What is her narrative and how does mine connect–ie getting His perception of my personal narrative and how it connects with my city’s. How does this connect with the identity and story of my nation? What is His perception of the country I live in and her destiny? These are the types of questions which a sanctification of the perception elicits!

To do: make a self portrait in any medium about how God sees you. Dress yourself in the clothes He sees you in. Dress your city in your imagination, in her most beautiful garments, as Isaiah commanded Jerusalem to do–put on your most gorgeous outer clothes, your King is coming! Clothes can represent outer symbol or representation of the core identity of a place. In this sense, the clothing of city is her culture, or collective symbolic expression of herself. Let’s get our cities dressed in her truly most beautiful clothes! Seeing and then praying in, her true fashion!

Play around with His perception of yourself. Then try dressing as your neighborhood or city, and if you want to get really huge, try to dress as your city. What types of clothes would you dress your neighborhood in, if you were doing a true fashion shoot? The go on, and photograph yourself as your city and think of it as her self-portrait, so you can find what types of clothing He dresses her in, for her photo shoot. Make photos–tell the story of yourself, your hood and your city. Celebrate how He sees us! Or, for a journal entry, tell your own story, as if God is writing it. Try to find His tone, and pacing for the story–the way He would pronounce the tale of you! Sort of a biography of your own life, written by God. What would He say were the highlights, themes, motifs, transformational moments etc. How would He write the story of your own life? Start there, and then see if you can do your neighborhood, city and nation. Which is easier and why….think of it as how God sees “project-you”, your hood, your city, your nation. Let Him reveal His perception in dialogue as you create.

His perception is His Wholeness of knowing. We are moving towards this way of knowing, this Divine epistemology. We start by perceiving ourselves more accurately at salvation. But then go on to start to perceive others and our world-cities, nations, the earth itself, more as God does. That is the journey into true perception (our growing “I-thouing” with all of creation) . Our entire heart should be in the process of entering His Perception. Remember heart, in the Hebrew concept, included the whole person. The guiding authority within. Here is a section from Jeff Benner’s site about the meaning of heart in Hebrew.

Ancient Hebrew Word Meanings
Heart ~ lev
By Jeff A. Benner

Here is an example of our modern western culture still using a concrete object to express an abstract idea. We often associate the heart with emotions such as love and kindness as in “He has a good heart”. This is also true with the Hebrews who saw the heart as the seat of emotion. But unlike us they also saw the heart as the seat of thought whereas we see the brain as the seat of thought. To the ancient Hebrews the heart was the mind including all thoughts including emotions. When we are told to love God with all our heart (Deut 6:5) it is not speaking of an emotional love but to keep our emotions and all our thoughts working for him. The first picture in this Hebrew word is a shepherd staff and represents authority as the shepherd has authority over his flock. The second letter is the picture of the floor plan of the nomadic tent and represents the idea of being inside as the family resides within the tent. When combined they mean “the authority within”.

His perception is growing in the yielded human heart. We are taught to constantly be in His renewing of our minds, and to love Him with our whole heart. To perceive truly from the whole self is the idea with a consecrated perception! To comprehend through His Spirit from the whole of self, that’s the idea of a holy perception.  

Thomas Merton writes,
“We must begin by frankly admitting that the first place in which to go looking for the world is not outside us but in ourselves. We are the world. In the deepest ground of our being we remain in metaphysical contact with the whole of that creation in which we are only small parts. Through our senses and our minds, our loves, needs, and desires, we are implicated, without possibility of evasion, in this world of matter and of men, of things and of persons, which not only affect us and change our lives but are also affected and changed by us…The question, then, is not to speculate about how we are to contact the world – as if we were somehow in outer space – but how to validate our relationship, give it a fully honest and human significance, and make it truly productive and worthwhile for our world.“ – (From Love and Living)

How to grow your spiritual perception. We are commanded to do so. But how? Ask God how He sees something you really care about. Ask Him to discern how you see and interpret it, and how He sees it. Notice where the two align and converge. Practice this exercise over and over til you can sense both your own perception and His. Notice where you tend to diverge from His perceptions drastically. Ask Him to enter more deeply into this area.

Learn both your perception and more of His. Your personal life is a good starting point-how does He interpret your current situation? Where are you, on your trajectory of becoming? What chapter in your story are you in? What are its themes, plot, motifs etc-how fast or slow-what pacing is this chapter of your life story? If we can start to spiritually perceive our own life stories more accurately, we can by extension start to interpret our world more precisely!

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