The Correct Understanding
Greetings, brothers and sisters. This is Dr. James Perry continuing with our series where we seek to
explore the deeper meanings of our relationship with Jesus Christ. Over the years, the heavenly
Father has revealed many revelations of spiritual truth to me, and I want to share them with you. This
morning we seek to grasp the correct understanding.
And now, sit back and listen to today's message.
The Correct Understanding
"Get wisdom, get understanding: forget it not; neither decline from the words of my mouth;
Forsake her not, and she will preserve thee: love her, and she shall keep thee." Proverbs,
Chapter 4, Verses 5 and 6.
Come take my hand and walk with me,
And you will understand and see
That Truth will set you free.
Brothers and sisters, today we shall examine the problem of goal misdirection. It has been said that
a fool is guided by impulse. He is like a cannon ball shot out of a canon without regard to elevation,
distance or direction. A wise man is guided by his understanding. He is like a canon ball shot from
a canon only after calculation of the correct elevation, the distance and direction. And even though
both the fool and the wise man may have the same goal, the fool will not accomplish his goal
because he has the wrong understanding. Only truth can be realized.
During this time, there are literally millions of people moving through life with the wrong
understanding. They fail to realize that the supreme goal of earthly living is spiritual and not
material. Even religionists are guilty of the same thing. They have the incorrect understanding. They
maintain that God will assist them in this materialistic pursuit if they believe in him, and that he will
raise them from the dead for the purpose of continuing the same material pursuit, except on a
glorified level. And though Jesus has told us that His kingdom is not of this world, and that the
Kingdom of God is not meat and drink but joy, peace, and righteousness in the spirit, just like the
apostles some of us go right on believing in a material Kingdom. And even though the warning signs
dot the material landscape, they are ignored as material meanings are incorrectly understood or
worse, ignored. The hunger for truth and thirst for righteousness we feel in our souls are
misinterpreted to mean that we need to acquire more of the material trappings of life. And we
continue this materialistic pursuit even after we are not physically able to do so. Finally we die with
this same disappointing error in our minds and souls.
A supreme goal of a material or intellectual nature will never satisfy the deepest longings of man,
for the simple reason that the deepest longings of man are not material but spiritual. So why is it that
this error is not discovered a little sooner in our lives? We are material beings and it is only natural
that we should associate our relationship with God as material. After all, he loves us and wants us
to be happy. And we identify our happiness with the material things that we need or want. We are
slow to realize that the relationship with the heavenly Father is spiritual. Salvation is of our souls,
not our bodies, and our souls have no need of material things. If we would only believe Jesus when
he tells us to love God with all of our hearts, minds and souls, and love our neighbor like ourselves,
we would find ourselves happy and satisfied in the spiritual Kingdom. If we would believe Jesus,
we would follow him and submit our wills to the Father's will as revealed by Jesus. If we would
wholeheartedly follow Jesus, we would find that we would discover that the love of God is the
greatest reality that we can experience, for God is love.
If we would only understand that we are to represent Jesus in the world even as He represented the
heavenly Father when he was in the flesh. By following His Spirit of Truth which he so mercifully
gave us, we can be led into all truth. We can begin to enjoy the relationship with our heavenly Father
and experience supreme satisfaction. If we would only acknowledge the meaning of the command
that Jesus gave us: be perfect even as the heavenly Father is perfect. Instead of misinterpreting this
command, we would soon see some great and good changes in our moral and spiritual characters.
If we would only exercise our faith which need not be any larger than the size of a mustard seed, we
would accomplish amazing feats of goodness. Love, patience, mercy and forgiveness would literally
ooze out of the pores of our souls.
The heavenly Father loves us, and we are his spiritual sons and daughters. By the exercise of our
faith, we make this status real, as the fruit of the spirit flows from our souls like water flows in a
river. These fruits of the spirit would soon convince the world that the Father sent Jesus. After all,
Jesus said that if we loved one another, the world would know that he was sent by the Father. If only
we recognized that the purpose of prayer was to learn how to do the Father's will. Prayer is the way
we receive instructions as to how to recognize and execute that will.
The great spiritual purpose of the heavenly Father is that His sons and daughters should perfectly
reflect his nature as they grapple with and ultimately master the material problems of their existence.
Such is the correct understanding of life. Such a correct understanding is to be had by simply seeking
to do the Father's will. To seek that will is to know that will, for that very will resides within us. If
we would seek to do His will, we will soon discover the consciousness of loving our brothers and
sisters, for this is the consciousness of the Father, for God is love. If we would only pray and worship
in the Spirit of Truth, we will comprehend the ever-increasing revelations of the Father's will as we
discover new ways to love our brothers and sisters. And the fruits of such an effort is a satisfaction
not dependent upon material achievements, a peace not dependant upon material considerations, and
a life that is spiritually eternal.
This concludes today's message on understanding and grasping the meaning of the correct
understanding. We hope you find something in this message to ponder and pray about as you go
about your day.
Until next time, this is Dr. James Perry.
Inspirational Messages
By Dr. James Perry
Your Kingdom Come, Your Will Be Done!
The Correct Understanding
