Love Forms Life-Supporting Attachments.
Without Love, People Die.
By Ken Raggio
"Ye have heard that it hath been said, Thou shalt love thy neighbour, and hate thine enemy. But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you; That ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven: for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust. For if ye love them which love you, what reward have ye? do not even the publicans the same? And if ye salute your brethren only, what do ye more than others? do not even the publicans so? Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect," Matthew 5:43-48.
LOVE is the force of life.
Compare these two statements:
1. Love is a force unto life.
2. Hate is a force unto death.
Do you agree?
I intend to show that LOVE is the strength of life and that the ABSENCE OF LOVE is harmful to life and health.
There is an invisible force called love that pulls living creatures together. In the absence of love, they will eventually separate.
Paul wrote, "Above all these things, have love, which is a bond of the perfection," Colossians 3:14 (Young's Translation).
The Bond Of Perfection.
Love is the perfect glue. And for what it is worth, love is the nature of God. God is love (I John 4:8,16). God is the mysterious, invisible adhesive force that holds the entire universe together. And He works in US by LOVE. Love is God's miraculous adhesive glue.
The Spirit and nature of God is love. In the presence of love, things live and grow stronger. In the absence of love, things degenerate, deteriorate, and die.
I believe that the ABSENCE OF LOVE is the cause for the largest part of all tragedy and loss among humans.
Consider this comparison.
People who do not respect the laws of acceleration and momentum end up with broken bones.
People who do not respect the laws of love create sickness and death.
The evidence of that last point is all around us, in the form of countless failed marriages, dysfunctional or hurtful relations, neglected children, unfulfilled ambitions and thwarted dreams.
I also believe that a LACK OF LOVE is the biggest single hindrance to the overall health and well-being of the Church of Jesus Christ.
Churches which FLOURISH in the LOVE OF GOD are healthy and prolific. Churches which do not manifest love become sickly and dwindle.
If you will take the time to consider this with me, I believe you will find that it is a worthwhile pursuit, to explore and study the nature, power and effects of love.
What are the similarities and differences between LOVE and ATTRACTION?
What is the miraculous, mysterious force that attracts one living creature to another?
Scientists have uncovered the powerful effect of hormones on living creatures. Pheromones such as estrogen and testosterone have long been known to cause physical attraction between the sexes. Certain scents are known to trigger chemical reactions in the brain, and produce largely predictable behaviors.
But love is infinitely more than just the stuff of pheromones.
Pheromones alone do not create or sustain true love. If they did, the number of divorces and separations should be much lower than it is.
Love is more than chemistry. Love is an invisible force of a different kind. It is a spiritual force.
God has endowed us humans with enough of His nature that we are capable of experiencing this mysterious thing called love. Yes, we are created in the image and likeness of God. Because His divine nature is the model for our spiritual nature, we have this spiritual capacity to love.
God has shared that ability with many of the higher species of His creatures.
We are created by our Creator to love one another.
We are born with an invisible force that attracts us to others, which is completely different and apart from the physical, sexual attraction that is caused by hormones.
You have probably seen or heard puppies cry for their mother after they have been removed from her litter. Those puppies miss their mother. But why? Why is it apparently painful for those puppies to be removed from their mother?
Separation Anxiety
People who study these things call it "separation anxiety." But why do we feel anxiety, or emotional pain, when we are separated from someone who is important to us? How do we explain such invisible attraction?
Prairie dogs are among the most distinctly monogamous of all creatures. They are faithful to their mates for a lifetime. What makes prairie dogs faithful to their mates? Do they love their mates? What is the biological explanation for their invisible attraction, while so many other creatures are not so strongly attached to their mates?
How do people “connect” invisibly?
What is the mysterious force that causes humans to get intuitive rapport with each other? What force attracts one person to another, one creature to another, even humans to animals, and animals to humans? How do humans relate to each other without even speaking?
These questions draw attention to the phenomenon of invisible "attraction" and "connectivity" between creatures.
There is mysterious connectivity between cells inside our bodies.
Anybody knows that we are physical, organic creatures. From head to toe, we are made of nearly 100 TRILLION cells that ALL interact simultaneously for the entire duration of our lives on earth.
Yet there is an inexplicable connection between all 100 TRILLION of those cells!
When you cut your finger, the white blood corpuscles in even the farthest extremity of your body INSTANTLY KNOW that there is an emergency elsewhere in the body! They INSTANTLY begin to rush to your finger! How did they know to do that, and how can that connectivity among living cells be explained?
I believe that it is because we have a HUMAN SPIRIT.
Spirit is the invisible force that presides over everything in our bodies.
Our human spirit is far more influential in who we are and what we do than even our BRAINS! It is because we were created by God, and we are spirit creatures after His kind, that these miraculous things occur in the invisible realm.
Naturally, some skeptic wants scientific proof, or will not believe. That is the wonder of it all. God has forever hidden the spirit world from the material world. That which is flesh is flesh, and that which is spirit is spirit.
Like it or not, SPIRIT has dominion over MATTER.
Matter is made of created atoms and molecules.
All Spirit originated and came from God. The Holy Angels exist because they are created spirits. Demons are angels who rebelled against God, yet they remain as eternal spirits. God, angels and devils all have a direct spiritual effect on human spirits.
Living things are invisibly connected by spiritual forces.
Not only are the 100 trillion cells INSIDE your body connected, but also OUTSIDE the human body, we have a SPIRITUAL connection to other living things. Every person is both a physical creature and a spiritual creature.
We tend to think in un-spiritual terms. We separate and isolate the territories of our bodies, from our minds, and from our spirit. We isolate physical things from mental things and from spiritual things. But in reality, they are NOT really isolated or disconnected.
Jesus said, "That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit," (John 3:6).
They are two distinct realms. Flesh. Spirit.
Paul added, "For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh: and these are contrary the one to the other: so that ye cannot do the things that ye would," (Galatians 5:17).
But although the flesh and the spirit are CONTRARY does not mean they are not capable of influencing each other.
It may seem, at first consideration, that the flesh and the Spirit are disconnected.
But God, the Eternal Spirit, who is also defined as "LOVE" (God is love), DOES CONNECT with humans - even those who have never been born again.
God speaks. He touches. He manifests His presence. Humans can somehow sense the presence of God, although their flesh is vastly different from His spirit.
Take note of this:
The SPIRIT and LOVE of GOD is what connects HIM to an unregenerate sinner.
LOVE is a SPIRITUAL FORCE (of which God is the prototype) that BRIDGES the perceived gap between GOD and MEN.
LOVE, being a spiritual force, can also bridge a gap between one HUMAN and other HUMANS. Love can enable humans to connect with many of the higher creatures, like dogs, and horses, and other mammals, thereby creating an invisible BOND that is as strong as glue.
(Why else are dogs called "a man's best friend"?) A dog can relate intuitively to a human, sensing and responding to a wide range of emotions, as well as verbal and non-verbal communications.
Spiritual things have dominion over physical things. Spirit is an infinitely higher form than matter. A SPIRIT has infinitely more knowledge and intellect than human brains (or computers for that matter).
Let me talk briefly about the biology of our minds.
Inside the human brain is an utterly amazing network of individual cells called neurons. In the purely physical sense, the human brain is a physical organ, not unrelated to a kidney, a liver or a heart.
The cells in your brain conduct high-level communications with each other, in what is called CELL-TO-CELL SIGNALING. Brain-cell signals are both electrical and chemical. Certain molecules, called neurotransmitters, never stop shuttling chemical messages around the brain from one cell to another.
The chemicals that you take INTO your body can affect those brain chemicals. Coffee, tobacco, alcohol, marijuana, LSD, and many other commonly used prescription and over-the-counter drugs have a wide variety of effects on the human mind and body because of their chemical properties.
Certain other chemicals that occur in nature can significantly improve brain function, such as the fatty acids EPA and DHA, Acetyl-L-Carnitine, Gingko Biloba, Serotonin, Phosphatidyl Serine, CoQ-10, and others.
Doctors often say that the natural levels of certain neurochemicals can get out of balance.
When someone has a mental or emotional malfunction, doctors often quickly conclude that it is because the chemicals in the brain are not in balance. They tell us that all kinds of mental and emotional disorders (i.e., depression, anxiety, panic attacks, schizophrenia, psychosis, traumatic stress disorders, etc.) are at least partly caused by chemical imbalances inside the brain.
Too often, human behavior is blamed TOO MUCH on chemical imbalances. Sometimes, the approach used by therapists suggests that mental or emotional problems are a "DRUG DEFICIENCY." (I am being facetious.)
Then they attempt to modify those balances by introducing other chemicals into the brain to alter the neurotransmitters. Doctors prescribe chemicals like Ritalin, Valium, Prozac, Zoloft, Haldol and countless others to both young and old to modify thoughts, moods and behaviors. Many cases are helped by large doses of the naturally-occurring salt Lithium, especially in its organic, non-metallic form.
The wrong balances of certain chemicals in your brain can affect your vision, your memory, your thoughts, PAIN, consciousness, emotionality, and GET THIS ---- LOVE. Yes, chemicals can affect LOVE.
But the CHEMICAL transmissions in your brain are only ONE SEGMENT of your NATURAL mental activity.
The OTHER SEGMENT is your ELECTRICAL circuitry. And those electrical circuits can misfire or overload and produce SEIZURES, phantom sights and sounds, even comas. Some doctors and hospitals still use high-risk electrical shock treatments in an effort to jar an insane person back to sanity. The results are highly unpredictable.
WHY does your brain operate the way that it does?
First of all, GOD made it to work that way. Secondly, He made it for your SURVIVAL. Your brain controls every single physiological, biological, even emotional function of your body. Almost nothing happens in your body that does not either directly or indirectly involve your brain. The better your brain works, the longer you are likely to survive. Science has shown that higher intellect almost always translates into better health and greater longevity.
On the other hand, all of life cannot be attributed to a good brain. The most prolific life form on earth doesn’t even have a brain: A BACTERIA. And one of the largest and oldest life forms on earth doesn’t have a brain, either: THE GIANT REDWOOD TREES - at 4000 years old.
The point here is that BRAIN-POWER DOES NOT REIGN SUPREMELY among life forms. In the final analysis, all life is the creation of Almighty God. And in the deepest core, ALL LIFE is supported by the SPIRIT OF GOD, working to sustain and maintain everything He has created.
So, that is why I say again...
Spiritual things have dominion over physical things.
A typical human brain is made up of over 100 BILLION NEURON CELLS. It is the most powerful brain among all earth’s creatures.
Vast numbers of in-bound messages come TO your brain FROM your eyes, ears, nose, and nerve endings all over your body, and produce a flurry of activity; from picking up a fork to feed yourself, to swatting at a fly, or running for your life.
But your brain does infinitely more than just think and direct activity.
Your very heart of hearts is in your brain.
I will show you why I believe that.
A healthy human actually has three different brains compartmentalized within one cranium (skull).
From one of these three principal regions of your brain, the seat of all activity can be seen. (Not all doctors agree with this view, but the premise deserves to be discussed.)
1. The Reptilian Brain
2. The Limbic Brain
3. The Neocortex
The FIRST region of your brain is its most primitive part, called the REPTILIAN brain. It is the smallest and deepest region of the brain, at the top of your spinal column in the back and center of your brain. Like a reptile brain, it controls the “instincts” of courtship, mating, aggression and territorial defense. Your reptilian brain controls your fight or flight responses. It keeps your heart beating, your lungs breathing, and your water and sodium levels regulated.
When the doctor declares someone “brain-dead,” it ordinarily means that both the neocortex and the limbic brains have ceased functioning adequately. BUT because the reptilian brain continues to function, the heart and lungs continue to function. There is no more conscious thought or emotions.
The reptile brain has no emotion. Watch a lizard or a snake stand by while their young are devoured without ever batting an eye. Watch a crocodile trample or devour 9 out of 10 of its young. Watch a street gang of young human hoodlums beat up and kill another young person simply because they wore a blue shirt instead of a red shirt. That is an example of a human being using only his REPTILE brain, by-passing all human reasoning and emotion.
The SECOND brain, or the SECOND region of your brain is clearly demarcated inside your head. It is about the size and shape of a frog, and sits on the top of your reptilian brain. It is called the LIMBIC LOBE – or simply the LIMBIC BRAIN.
The LIMBIC brain is the brain that distinguishes MAMMALS from REPTILES.
There are many significant differences between REPTILES AND MAMMALS. Mammals grow hair instead of scales. Mammals are self-heating, therefore warm blooded, while reptiles rely on the sun to regulate their body temperature. Mammals give live birth to babies, whereas reptiles lay eggs.
But the most notable difference between reptiles and mammals is their orientation toward their offspring.
A trademark of a reptilian brain is DETACHMENT and DISINTEREST.
A trademark of a mammalian brain is ATTACHMENT and INTEREST.
Mammals have elaborate, if not subtle interactions with their young. They bear their young live. They nurse, defend, and rear them as long as they are immature. THEY TAKE CARE OF THEIR OWN.
Mammals form close-knit social groups called families, where they touch, nourish and care for one another. A mammal will often risk and sometimes lose its life to protect a child or mate from an attack.
A garter snake or a salamander watches the death of its kin with an unblinking eye.
The LIMBIC BRAIN of mammals causes them to sing to their children. Vocal communications between mammals and their offspring is universal. Remove a mother from her litter of kittens or puppies and they begin an incessant yowling – the SEPARATION cry – shrill distress signals that makes you NOT want to adopt that orphan puppy.
The KOMODO dragon watches silently as its young are dragged away and devoured. Baby KOMODOS don’t cry, because in the reptile world, a distress sound is a call to dinner. They are avid cannibals.
Mammals are emotional. They play with each other. They chase, and toss and tumble. They tug and fetch, and lay down and roll over. All these behaviors are forms of physical poetry. These are emotional brains creating pleasant behavior for their entertainment and the pleasure of their kin.
Then, the third and largest brain, or the third and largest REGION of the human brain is the neocortex. Neo- means NEW. Cortex means rind or bark. The neocortex is the new rind, new bark.
The cortex is the THINKING BRAIN, that the other mammals have little or none of. A possum has a very thin layer of cortex, and he is very, very dumb by human standards. Cats and dogs and monkeys have some of the largest and best thinking brains of all mammals, which helps explain why we have so much attraction to them. Their brains are closer to ours than any other creature.
It is our neocortex that allows us the luxury of SPEAKING, WRITING, PLANNING and REASONING. With our neocortex, we are able to make music, play instruments, write poetry, invent gadgets, paint pictures, and engage in an infinite spectrum of ingenious activities unknown to any other creature on earth.
A flood of miracles occurs every time we pick up a cup of coffee, greet a stranger at Wal-Mart, catch a softball, or play a guitar.
One of the finest functions of the neocortex is SELF-AWARENESS. We are able to know ourselves and understand ourselves on a level that no other creature is capable of.
Modern science uses the ENCEPHALOGRAPH device to measure electrical waves in the brain. We can actually WATCH thought in progress. We have learned, for instance, where the centers of speech and communication are.
Above your left ear, you hear and understand speech. Just inside your left temple, you form speech. But that is not the end of it. You must be able to understand an unlimited number of emotional components of speech as well. People can say one line a thousand ways by using emotional inflections both auditory and physical.
If you cannot discern the emotions of a sentence, you may not know exactly what the meaning is.
For instance:
The sentence: “That’s a nice haircut.”
If the barber says that matter-of-factly, you can take it as a compliment.
If the punk rock dude says it, it may be sarcasm or an insult.
If the pretty girl says it, she may be coming on to you.
You need to be able to interpret the EMOTIONS of what is being said.
So on the RIGHT side of the brain, above your right ear, is your EMOTIONAL INTERPRETER.
Behind your RIGHT TEMPLE is your speech / emotion device, which puts your emotion into your speech.
There are more things we DON’T KNOW about the BRAIN than what we DO KNOW.
But one thing is sure. Our neocortex – our thinking brain – doesn’t control everything.
As marvelous as the human brain is, it does NOT control the highest form of thought or emotion.
THE BIBLE SAYS, as a man thinketh IN HIS HEART – so is he.
It didn’t say, as he thinketh in his MIND, or in his BRAIN, but in his HEART.
Paul said, “I serve God with my mind.” So PAUL reveals that he forced his brain into subjection to God’s Spirit, which (other scriptures reveal) resided in his HEART. God puts His Spirit into a man’s heart.
In another place, he said, “We have not come to you with ENTICING WORDS OF MAN'S WISDOM,
But in the demonstration of the Holy Ghost and with power.”
I want to make a major point here that all three areas of our brain have some control us, but not to the same degree.
Our human will is not always controlled by conscious thought.
Paul tried to control his will, but confessed,
“That I would not, that I do, that I would, that I do not.”
Paul recognized that conscious thought alone cannot and will not always keep me from doing right or wrong.
There is a DEEPER SEAT IN THE HEART that has MORE CONTROL than the conscious, thinking brain (neocortex).
Scientists watched the brain on an encephalograph to see when and where the motor controls took place. They wanted to see what the brain was doing in correlation to physical activity.
They found that as a conscious experience of PHYSICAL MOTION was actually taking place, the brain was already at rest. The command to make a motion had PRECEDED the motion by a split second. The neocortex brain had
already relaxed, even as the motion was being carried out without conscious thought.
Moreover, many of our actions occur instinctively or spontaneously without any conscious thought.
We often act without pausing to consider the right or wrong of our actions. Sometimes, the demands of the moment force us into split-second decisions that we may later regret.
WHAT IS THE SIGNIFICANCE of that fact?
At least some actions are committed while the brain is at rest – if only a microsecond.
One thing it means is that...
If you really don’t want to do a particular thing,
you had better get it into your HEART,
Because if you don’t get it in your heart
you may not have time to think about it before you do it,
and your brain may subconsciously instruct your body
to do a thing without taking the time
to CONSCIOUSLY decide to do it!
Are 100% of all your actions carefully thought out, and wisely decided? I think not. All of us are subject to doing things and saying things with very little, if any, forethought.
If we are pre-disposed to always do only the things that are acceptable to God, then our behavior will certainly be affected by that pre-disposition.
How often are our choices, our decisions, or actions governed by God, by His Spirit, or by His word?
Does God’s Spirit have a say, or have an effect on our actions? Does God’s Spirit exercise any kind of force over our thoughts and actions? Yes, if we will it to be so?
All these things make convincing evidence that WE NEED TO BE FILLED WITH THE SPIRIT OF GOD!
Knowing how I am predisposed to act upon sub-conscious, even unconscious thoughts, it is EXTREMELY IMPERATIVE that the Holy Spirit is working in the depths of my heart to MAKE SURE that all my INSTANT DECISIONS are PRE-DIRECTED by the PRESENCE OF GOD in my heart.
If a man has a DEVIL inside, that EVIL SPIRIT will pre-determine many of his impulsive actions.
However, if the Holy Spirit of God is dwelling inside a man, the Holy Ghost will provide a righteous pre-determination that is far better than any other predisposition!
For this reason, and many others, EVERY man, woman, boy and girl should be filled with God's Spirit - the baptism of the Holy Ghost!
The $64,000 question, in my opinion, has always been, “Where and how does the Spirit of God interface with the Human Brain?” I’ve been telling my audiences for years that one day I would preach a sermon on the SCIENCE OF THE SPIRIT. I’m getting closer to that, but I am not quite there yet. This is version 1.0. Wait till I get to version 5.0.
I believe that humans have an eternal soul because the Bible says so.
Man HAS a body, but he IS a soul.
Even if you die, and your body turns to ashes, you still ARE a soul.
Not so with other mammals. They have a body, but they DON’T have a soul. There will be creatures in heaven; look for yourself and you will see them in Ezekiel and Revelation and other places in the Bible. But they are heaven-bound creatures. They did not come from earth.
ONLY HUMANS CAN BE BORN OF THE SPIRIT AND ASCEND FROM EARTH TO HEAVEN.
That is because God made humans different from all other animals.
The functions of the outer brain, the cortex – the words, good ideas, logic, abstractions of drawing, inventing, imagining – all these functions are meaningless to the LIMBIC BRAIN, the MIDDLE BRAIN.
I believe the MIDDLE BRAIN is the seat of the HEART, and I will tell you why. The MIDDLE BRAIN determines our ATTRACTIONS.
The LIMBIC BRAIN attracts a mother to her offspring. It attracts offspring to their mother. It attracts males to females within a species.
All our emotions spring from the MAMMALIAN BRAIN. You can see it in your house pets - joy, sorrow, anger, fear, panic. Because a dog has a mammalian brain, it can tell when you are really down, and will come lie down beside you to comfort you. It can also tell when you are angry, and it will stay away from you.
You can read emotion on the faces of a monkey or a dog: loneliness, worry, joy, boredom. These emotions with their facial expressions and body languages all spring from the inner brain.
The FURTHER QUESTION is HOW DO WE AND ALL THE OTHER CREATURES HAVE THESE EMOTIONS?
Where do they come from – exhilaration, longing, grief, loyalty, fury, LOVE?
They are INSTINCTIVE – INBORN – INHERITED! Given by GOD in the CREATION, and PASSED DOWN FROM GENERATION TO GENERATION among each distinct species!
Now here is an enigma.
Animals and people who train their young in the proper use of emotions produce healthy, thriving children as a rule. Animals and humans who fail to tend to their offspring properly produce sickly, emotionally disturbed offspring, thereby threatening the future generations of the weaker, emotionally deprived types, and AT THE SAME TIME, the emotionally and physically HEALTHY are those who reproduce and thrive.
It is IMPERATIVE, especially among humans, that children receive the proper EMOTIONAL AND PHYSICAL UPBRINGING to INSURE THEIR SURVIVAL, and their future generations.
Here is a fascinating aspect.
I already said that a mammal doesn’t have an eternal soul, but that is not the same as saying it doesn’t have a spirit, because animals DO HAVE SPIRITS, just different from the HUMAN SPIRIT – the HUMAN SOUL.
In Numbers 16:22 and Numbers 27:16, the Lord is called the GOD OF THE SPIRITS OF ALL FLESH.
All living flesh has spirit. I Corinthians 15: 39 says “All flesh is not the same flesh: but there is one kind of flesh of men, another flesh of beasts, another of fishes, and another of birds. (KJV)
The GOD-GIVEN INSTINCTIVE POWERS OF BEHAVIOR seen in humans are mind-boggling.
Let me illustrate...
In the 13th Century, historian-chronicler Salimbene wrote an account about the Holy Roman Emperor, Frederick II. Frederick was a brilliant intellectual, albeit a religious skeptic. He was noted for several controversial human experiments which he conducted. One of those experiments is now referred to as a "language deprivation experiment."
Some say that Frederick theorized that Hebrew was the instinctive language of all human beings. At the least, he wanted to know what language might have been imparted by God to Adam and Eve. To develop his theory, he commanded that all orphaned infants in his kingdom be taken to the king’s special home for children and raised without benefit of any human language or interaction.
In his Chronicles, Salimbene wrote that Frederick bade "foster-mothers and nurses to suckle and bathe and wash the children, but in no ways to prattle or speak with them; for he would have learnt whether they would speak the Hebrew language (which had been the first), or Greek, or Latin, or Arabic, or perchance the tongue of their parents of whom they had been born. But he laboured in vain, for the children could not live without clappings of the hands, and gestures, and gladness of countenance, and blandishments."
In other words, THE CHILDREN DIED. The experiment completely failed to prove his point, because every single baby died. In the absence of human communications, every baby withered and died.
Children starve mentally, emotionally, even physically when they are not properly taken care of by their mothers.
One of the biggest tragedies of modern life in the 21st century is that we have an entire generation of children who have been abandoned by their materialistic parents. Babies are being dropped off at daycare centers and left there 10-12 hours every day. The children are being severely deprived of the benefit of Maternal (and Paternal) instincts.
As a result, we have more heartless, emotionless children than the world has ever seen. Volumes have been written on this subject.
A newborn baby can read the facial expressions of its mother and immediately detect joy or anger. It will respond positively to a positive emotion from its mother, and will react in fear and crying to an emotionally upset facial expression. It also learns to make use of those expressions in communicating with others as it begins to grow.
If a child is not properly programmed by its mother in its formative stages, it may never be able to properly manage its emotions as it grows older. Often, if a child injures itself, it will immediately look to see what kind of reaction mother has. If mother is alarmed, baby is alarmed. If mother is comfortable, baby is comfortable. If mother does not react, baby becomes insecure and emotionally unstable.
Emotional disorders have also been shown to have a definite PHYSIOLOGICAL EFFECT on children, causing them to have weak immune systems, less disease resistance, altered metabolism, and a whole host of physical disorders.
One important point here is that SPIRITUAL ISSUES have CREATIVE AND DESTRUCTIVE POWERS on our bodies, especially our CHILDREN.
You know how that grief can destroy a person.
Time and again, I have seen old people die within days after their spouses die. As I edit this article, a dearly beloved and elderly minister is lying in state to be buried on Friday. Within twenty-four hours of his death, his wife also died of natural causes. The funeral will now be a double funeral.
Those two were so intricately connected for most of their lives, that the absence of one has obviously precipitated the death of the other.
In a more ordinary case, two puppies were born and raised together to the age of 10 years. One got sick and died. The healthy one died mysteriously only a week later, without any known physical cause.
Contemplate this statement for a moment before you move forward:
“Spiritual and emotional forces have dominion over physical and material things.”
SPIRITUAL THINGS REALLY DO CONNECT WITH PHYSICAL THINGS, and have an enormous impact on the physical world.
Bats can sense a mosquito in a pitch black night because of sonar, and actually consume about 600-1000 per hour. Even though it is an invisible connection, nevertheless, it is a quantifiable physical connection between the bat and the mosquito.
In the ocean, an eel can detect the presence of other sea creatures because it has an incredible electricity-sensing device. Although it is an invisible connection, still, it is a known physical connection.
Our eyeballs can detect electromagnetic radiation that we call light. We do not necessarily feel light, but it still is a physical contact, a physical connection.
There are many lights which we cannot see: ultraviolet, infrared, gamma rays, x-rays, etc. Nevertheless, our entire physical well-being is affected by all these waves of light.
Our ears can sense pulse waves in the air. We call it sound, but it is another means of communication. Our eardrum is physically moved by molecules of air set into motion by sound.
Science is providing more and more evidence every day that both mammals and humans have miraculous abilities to communicate invisibly, (i.e., heart to heart).
I PERSONALLY BELIEVE THAT LOVE is a physical force that originates in God. Just as certainly as the first light originated in God, the first love also emanated from God and attracts mankind to Him.
Love, among other things, is the physical, albeit invisible, manifestation of God among all living creatures.
We cannot yet produce a verifiable image of love with a camera, an x-ray, a CT scan, MRI or other instruments. But it is there – never doubt it. If there was no God, there would be no love in this universe.
If there was no miraculous, inexplicable attraction among living creatures, there would be no life in the material realm. If males and females of a species were not mysteriously attracted to each other, there would be no perpetuation of the species. Sex hormones, pheromones, testosterone and estrogen notwithstanding, they do not, by themselves explain the powerful forces of attraction. Attractions can form via telephone conversations and emails, even when two people are never physically together and not influenced by the presence of the other’s hormones.
God is LOVE. Love enables us to communicate with fellow humans on a level that no other creature on planet earth is able to communicate.
Greater than the ability of a mother deer to nurture and protect her offspring, God gives humans MIRACULOUS ABILITIES to administer healing, health, and well-being through entirely INVISIBLE forces.
The Song of Solomon (8:7 NIV) says, "Many waters cannot quench love; rivers cannot wash it away. If one were to give all the wealth of his house for love, it would be utterly scorned."
When someone loses his partner and says that he feels like a part of him is gone, he is more correct than he realizes. A portion of his neural activity depends on the presence of that other living brain. Without it, the electric interplay that makes up HIM has changed. Lovers hold keys to each other’s identities, and they WRITE NEUROSTRUCTRUAL ALTERATIONS into each other’s networks. Their LIMBIC BRAINS allow each to influence WHO the other is and becomes.
Here are a few of the important conclusions I have reached about love.
GOD'S LOVE alters our brains.
A PARENT’S LOVE alters our brains.
A SPOUSE’S LOVE alters our brains.
A PASTOR'S LOVE alters our brains.
A CHURCH’S LOVE alters our brains.
WE LITERALLY BECOME a different person because of the force of love.
LOVE IS A CREATIVE FORCE.
The emotional future of children is inextricably bound to the ability of their parents to LOVE ONE ANOTHER.
The spiritual future of the CHURCH is inextricably bound to the ability of the saints to LOVE ONE ANOTHER.
The ultimate goal for every new prospect and new convert is to establish a spiritual and emotional BOND OF LOVE with other true believers WITHOUT FAIL, to establish them in the family of God.
THE CHURCH OF JESUS CHRIST IS THE MOTHER OF US ALL.
MOTHER CHURCH births new children into the Kingdom of God.
MOTHER CHURCH has a supernatural ability to communicate with her newborn.
GOD GIVES US THE GIFTS OF THE SPIRIT.
He gives us Discerning of Spirits, so that we may be sensitive to the spiritual needs of others.
To look into the eyes of the people we minister to and see their hurts, to get miraculous rapport with them, to understand what they are going through, to reach out to them with healing affections, and produce miracles in their lives by entirely invisible forces. Although every one of our brains are very, very different, and function almost entirely differently, yet we all seem to interface with one another with spectacular, even miraculous finesse.
IF THE CHURCH OF JESUS CHRIST FAILS TO CHANGE THE WORLD, IT ONLY FAILS BY IGNORING THE INHERENT, INSTINCTIVE ABILITY GOD HAS GIVEN US to LOVE one another. If we would LOVE others as we should, Almighty God has already created our love to produce an invisible, cohesive result, thereby bringing those we love into a perfect bond of unity with the Church.
GOD so LOVED the world that HE GAVE. His LOVE attracts us to Him.
GOD SO LOVED YOU that HE SAVED YOU. His love toward YOU attracts you to Him.
GOD SO LOVED YOU that He gave you a Pastor. The love of your Pastor also helps to bind you to the Church.
GOD SO LOVED YOUR CITY that He gave it a CHURCH. The Church in your city is the extension of God's love, and should help create a bond between you and God.
Who do you need to show your love to today?
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Here is the song "SWEET LOVE OF JESUS"
By Andrae Crouch and the Disciples. Enjoy.
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Ken Raggio
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From one of these three principal regions of your brain, the seat of all activity can be seen. (Not all doctors agree with this view, but the premise deserves to be discussed.)
