Every human being is primarily a spirit that possesses a soul and lives in a body thus a man must learn to develop himself with the consideration of these three spheres. Over the years a lot of importance has being placed on the development of the human body in the form of eating good foods and maintaining the maximum level of satisfaction at the expense of the development of the mind and the spirit. For clarity, the mind's development is a function of which ever you feed most; the spirit or the body.
Now you may be questioning the possibility of feeding the spirit which is what we shall be analyzing briefly. The moment you give your life to Christ your spirit is regenerated and you are as fresh as a new born babe that needs to be fed and nurtured to maturity.
What is food? There are two types of food that we shall be considering in this piece
Physical food. This is any substance we eat to aid the growth, development and maintenance of our body and
Spiritual food. This unlike physical food is any spiritual activity carried out to boost and develop the spirit man.
For clarity and specifics again, we are considering the dieting of the “spiritual food”. The physical food is classified in to six classes being; carbohydrates, protein, fats and oil, vitamins, salts and minerals and water of which some possesses some detrimental effects when over used. We shall be attempting to draw out a sample similarity between the classes of physical and spiritual food below;
Fasting. This is very important but useless without praying and study of the word. It’s more like the fat and oil in the physical food. It deactivates the holds of the flesh on the soul and puts the spirit in control of the soul vis-à-vis the mind hence creating a platform for accessing revelations.
Praying. It’s a necessary activity that every believer that desires spiritual power must engage in. it’s the act of communicating with God in words. A “prayer-less” believer as we usually say is a powerless Christian. It’s like the carbohydrate that energizes a man for exploits. All this notwithstanding the praying activity yields effective spiritual growth better when anchored on the word of God.
Word study. This is the most important although the others are very very important. It’s important because every other spiritual activity finds their root in this. It’s a deliberate choice of studying the revealed word (logos/letters) with the main purpose of accessing the unrevealed rhema or spirit behind the logos. This is like the spiritual protein of the believer. Unlike the excess of protein that could result in liver issues the excess of this if there is puts you in authority.
Speaking in Unknown Tongues. This is another very important spiritual activity that edifies the spirit. It’s very crucial and it’s expressed as communicating with God in unknown tongues. It’s similar to the water in the physical food classification.
Associations. This is another spiritual activity that is carried out in the physical. It entails selection of relationships with the consciousness of the fact that iron sharpeneth iron. This can be likened to the minerals and salts in the physical food
Singing praises and worships. This is a practical spiritual activity that brings you into the presence of God. And access to the presence of God entails automatic growth and increase in grace. It’s like the vitamins in the physical food
Dieting advice
These activities should all be well carried out simultaneously for effective spiritual growth with equal value placed on them at any point in time. In physical food priorities are set considering the fact that some of the classes of food could be detrimental. The good news in spiritual dieting is that, if you practice all the activities above well you will discover that there is almost no excess of any of them.
