Chapter 10: OPEN YOUR SPIRIT TO A NEW SELF
If we are honest, we might not be open the changes that the Spirit will bring.
HOW DO WE KNOW IF WE ARE OPEN TO THE SPIRIT? The telltale sign of conversion is it has changed the way you tell your autobiography. <What about people that became Christian at a young age?>
MOVING TOWARDS VISION, OPENNESS, AND THE SPIRIT. “Vision, Openness, and Spirit: A Vision of becoming a Spirit-prompted, Christlike person; an Openness to the work of God’s grace; and a recognition that the means is the Spirit of God at work in us.
- Vision of the New Ego, or Christlikeness
- Openness to God’s grace
- Spirit as the agent of transformation”
THE VISION IS CHRIST AND CHRISTLIKENESS. How does this happen? Gave into the face of Jesus and the Spirit will be there. Watch Jesus’s actions, listen to his words, and observe his character.
OPEN TO THE SPIRIT AS WE WATCH CHRIST. A sketch of Jesus’s actions in MARK 1-3.
OPEN TO THE SPIRIT AS WE LISTEN TO CHRIST. The actual words of Christ in the Bible re the best way to see Jesus.
REMAIN OPEN TO THE SPIRIT AS WE OBSERVE HIS CHARACTER. “Christians have only one thing to offer to the world, and that is Jesus himself. Christianity is about a Person. Our Vision is Christ, and our Lord is more than a system of thought or a method of redemption. Until our Vision becomes about Jesus, Christianity is nothing more than a philosophy. When Jesus is central, Christianity shifts from ideas into the Living Word of God roaming about, working, alive and active in our world.”
Quotes from: Scot McKnight & Dave Ferguson. “Open to the Spirit.” iBooks. https://itunes.apple.com/us/book/open-to-the-spirit/id1255402428?mt=11