But the natural (soulical) man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God. (1 Corinthians 2:14)
When you look at 1 Corinthians what a lot of
soulicalism there is: this wisdom of words, this wisdom of the world, these
likes and these dislikes and preferences and partialities and antipathies, and
then their jealousies. That is no good on this foundation. Do not bring your own
soul-life into relationship with Christ; it will not tally and it will not go
through, it will go up in smoke. Are you trying to make your Christianity a
matter of how you feel? You will have a composite kind of Christianity of so
many varieties, nothing consistent at all, a perfect patchwork. When you think you have arrived at a very good logical conclusion
about a matter, something will come along and upset the whole thing....Your soul in the
realm of its mental exercises and conflicts will never tally with Christ. And as
for our own soul-will, strength to do, we may feel very strong, we are never
going again to be caught like that, never going down that street again! It is
not long before we are there. Oh, how ashamed our souls make us! How ashamed we
have been because of the instability of our feelings or our wills or our
thoughts. Ashamed! Ashamed! Ashamed! Our souls are making fools of us all the
time. “He that believes on Him shall not be put to shame.” Paul says
that this soul-life business must not come on Christ. It is a contradiction. It
is not what you are, it is what Christ is.
When you cannot see and understand and work it
out mentally, when you cannot feel anything, no feelings at all, or when they
are very bad feelings - that is one realm, that is just what we are. Christ is
not that, and we have at such times to say, "Lord, this is my infirmity, this is
how I am, but You are Other; I transfer my faith to You from myself and from
these things." Christ is the foundation, and all that we build on the foundation
has to be Christ Himself. He is not only the foundation, but He is the whole
building in every part.