Questions & Answers
by Editor(s)

Q: How can I know when I’ve moved past feelings/thoughts and am in sin?

A: The Bible says "When lust has conceived it bringeth forth sin." This describes what happens when I make the choice to do the thing that I am tempted to do. For a thought or a feeling to become sin it must first be a thought or feeling that tempts us to be or do something that the scripture says is wrong. Sin takes place when we go from wanting to do this wrong thing or wanting to hang on to this wrong attitude to making the spirit choice to do the thing or to accept the wrong attitude as the truth. To sum it up–to want to do a wrong thing is not sin, that is temptation, but to choose to do a wrong thing is sin.

Q: You say that our soul is neutral. Do you mean that my soul is some neutral place in me that is neither Christ nor Satan operated?
 
A: Our soul is the seat of our emotions, where we experience feelings and thoughts. It is neutral in the sense that no action emanates from our soul. All our actions begin with our making a choice to act, and from our choices we take action to carry out what we have chosen to say or do.

Of course we know that choice is a spirit activity. We are Christ bossed from our spirit center where we are joined to Christ, unless we fall for Satan’s lie that we are self-operated selves. If or when this happens, Satan has the freedom to boss us.

Q: I’ve read several articles in The Intercessor stating that our real self is spirit, not soul, and that in our spirit is knowledge, will (choice) and desire (agape love). That seems to leave no room for the "natural affections" that Paul refers to in 2 Timothy 3:3–like a mother’s love, a father’s protectiveness, friendship. Are you saying these soul-feelings are not real? And if these emotions are from my soul, rather than my spirit, doesn’t that make them evil?

A: The natural affections you ask about are feelings and as we discussed in the previous question they, like all our feelings, register in our soul.

Real love is not a feeling but a fixed state of self-sacrificing commitment that we choose to make toward the object of our love, be it child, friend, spouse, country. It is important to remember that choice is a function of spirit. One author that I have read puts it this way: love is willed action for others. The Bible says, "God is love." These two facts come together and make it clear that love is how we are, not how we feel. And we know that how we are is simply a by-product of who we are. And since our true self is Christ in us then all true love is Christ expressing Himself through our human selves.