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The Spirit of God dwells within us--our guide to Spirituality
To understand the spiritual life, it is vital to understand the role that must be attributed to the indwelling Spirit of God.
Although few are aware of it, it is referred to in the Bible's New Testament in at least 25 of its verses, e.g. "Know you not that you are the temple of God, that the Spirit of God dwells in you" (1. Cor. 3:16), and, "If we love one another, God dwells in us." (1 John 4:12). It was also known among the ancient Egyptians, Persians, Hindus, Sufis, and other followers of Islam.
This indwelling Spirit is the source in our minds of all true meanings and values of a non-material nature. Thus it is the source of true morality, beauty and goodness, and all revealed and non-material truth.
So, one way or another, all true revelation is from God--regardless of the means of its apparent origin. But the recognition of this truth is an individual function, crucially dependent upon the personal relationship between the individual and the God-Spirit within. Empirical truths of science may appear to be different, but basically, they are not.
The great goal of our human existence is to attune to the divinity of this indwelling Spirit. The great achievement of our mortal life is the attainment of a true and understanding consecration of self to the eternal aims of the divine Spirit who waits and works within our mind. And our ideal life is one of loving service to our fellow travelers.
While it may be true that a God in heaven would not feel our pain, our joys, or our sins, nevertheless this cannot be true for the God-Within, who must know everything that we know and feel everything that we feel--including even our most secret thoughts, good or evil.
Jesus of Nazareth was approaching thirty years of age at the time of his baptism by John, the time when he began to be certain that he really was indwelt by the Spirit of God. As their relationship grew, Jesus also became aware that this same Spirit of God indwells all of his earthly children as their mentor and guide.
Jesus realized that he had been given the task of making known the fact that God desires to indwell and guide all of his earthly children; hence he lived his life in the flesh so as to inspire us ever to seek to know and do the will of this indwelling Spirit of the heavenly Father.
If the Spirit dwells within us, potentially we are free and liberated children of the Spirit. The secret of self-mastery is faith in our Indwelling Spirit which ever works by love. If then we are born of the Spirit and led by the Spirit, we are forever delivered from a life of self-denial and watch-care over the desires of the flesh and are translated into the kingdom of the Spirit--whence we spontaneously show forth the fruits of the spirit in our daily lives. These fruits include: love, joy, peace, gentleness, goodness, faith, righteousness, truth.
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