How spiritually healthy are your People, Associations, and Dreams?
We invite you here to examine any internal or external power in your life, to see how healthy it is spiritually. Here you can learn to see in each of your relationships and commitments which fruits of the spirit and fruits of the flesh areinvisibly flowing between you. And by frequently checking our dynamic flowchart as you look into the questions we pose below, you can see how naturally exhausting or supernaturally uplifting your commitments and relationships are,
In dealing with the nine core life issues of health, peace, love, honor, purpose, grace, sexuality, and, truth, are the PADS (People, Associations, and Dreams) you connect with draining you of those nine things? Do they teach you to take more than you give these things to others? Or do they instead cooperate with you and others to create more of those nine things, for everyone?
| To answer the questions raised here, don’t just ask yourself. Ask for the mind and heart of Christ to show you what God sees. |
How can you know people and organizations “by their fruits”?
List all the people and organizations having the biggest impact on you, including your marriage or your family. Then to learn how healthy they are for you, and as you share your life with them, how healthy you both are for the world, ask these seven questions about them:
Flesh or Spirit? Do they seem to carry around many fruits of the flesh as shown in the flowchart above, and inspire them in others? Or do they show and inspire more fruits of the flesh? To increase your awareness of them, write down under each PAD the fruits they show the most.
Whirlpool or Wellspring? Do they drain the life out of you by growing apathy, bondage, complaining, divisiveness, weakness, and decay? Or by contrast, like a wellspring for life, do they show more caring, freedom, gratitude, cooperation, strength, and growth? Write under each PAD what they seem to be showing and growing. Keep adding answers to questions below.
What does their family life say about the fruits they give and receive at home? God wouldn’t want somebody over a public ministry if everything wasn’t right at home (1 Tim. 3: 1-5), and Mt. 25: 31-46) shows that if we are faithful in little things (the ones only we can take care of: our health, family and friends), God will put us over more. Those who give their best to the public and just their leftovers to their loved ones in private cannot be blessed by God, in public or private.
What do their career choices say about the fruits they give and receive working in public? Do they serve their employees and customers, or do they expect to be served? Jesus reminds us that leaders in the kingdom must serve unselfishly instead of seeking to be served (Mk. 10: 41-45).
What does their recreational life say about how they get refreshed in privatefor their family and working lives? Do they learn, worship, recreate, and volunteer to help people less fortunate? Look at who they run around with, and the fruits those people’s lives bear, because we take on the fruits of those around us (1 Cor 15: 33).
Where does their money and power come from, and where do these go? Follow the money, because Jesus taught us in Mt. 6:21 that our hearts will follow our treasure (who they borrow from, and who they do business with). Follow the power too, because they will naturally show the fruits of whoever advises, follows, and supports them.
What are the fruits of their words, the content, tone, purpose, and outcome of what they say? Do they talk disrespectfully and vengefully about others? Do they lie, and break promises? Jesus said that calling others fools and worthless in effect kills their self-worth (Mt 5: 21-2).
How can you know your Dreams “by their fruits”?
The dream itself should have a heathy, godly, spiritual goal or purpose, such as drawing people closer to Jesus and to each other. Avoid goals that are selfish and common by nature, such as to maximize pleasure and avoid pain. Just as important is how those goals or dreams will be pursued. The third commandment warns against pursuing biblical or godly goals for selfish purposes, or pursuing them in selfish ways. 1st Cor. 13: 1-3 teaches that spiritual goals which are not pursued out of love for God, self, and others bring results that are empty and hollow. Jesus taught his disciples that if they had to be the leader and get most of the credit, their efforts would grow their own kingdom, not God’s (Mt. 20: 25-28). Likewise, if a dream requires you to force or deceive people in order to achieve success, even if it’s a noble cause, it will not have a noble result. So for chasing a dream to grow spiritual fruit and not fruit of the flesh, both the means and the ends of that dream need to be spiritual.
How can you have a healthier relationship with a PAD?
The key is to examine what level of attention you are paying to your PAD, and to make appropriate adjustments in how you regard them. Whatever you pay attention to will grow, both inside you and out. And whatever you call others’ attention to will also grow, in them, and in you. To back off from a bad PAD, scale back the attention you give them. Then you can give higher levels of attention to healthier PADs. Here are 5 levels of attention you can pay to your PADs:
Level 1 = Attention ~ deliberately focusing yourself to notice a PAD
Level 2 = Acceptance ~ deciding it’s relatively harmless, and worth exploring further
Level 3 = Affection ~ becoming charmed by paying attention mostly to its positive qualities
Level 4 = Allegiance ~ joining, subscribing, committing to be and work together regularly
Level 5 = Adoration ~ idolizing, seeing the PAD as virtually always healthy and inspired.
Use these guidelines to change both your beliefs and your lifestyle toward a PAD. To draw away from one, you'll need to draw closer to a better one, or else the boredom and loneliness will lead you back to the same type of PAD. Don't just change the way your mind works, what it believes in. Also direct your body to express those new beliefs in some new goals, and new methods for reaching those goals.
If you give or receive too much of any kind of attention from a person or group with selfish fruits, you can't just make yourself stop doing it. With any of the nine core issues in dealing with that PAD, you will need to give and receive that same level of attention with another PAD that is more spiritually healthy on these issues. Then, when the selfish person or group tries to pull you back in, fill your void by sharing your spiritual fruit with a PAD that initiates and returns the same.
Finally, don’t think you can just change your patterns of paying attention by willpower alone. You’ll need to tell others what you’re doing, tell them why, and ask for their help and their prayers.