Spirit of Man, Part 6 Teaching

The Spirit of Man and the Leap of Faith

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The Spirit of Man Part VI
September 28th 2025

So, last week we embarked on explaining a second optional “rise cycle” some of us might choose to enter if or when we come to a place where all of our light seeking, all of our learning, all of the love we have shared in His name and all of the liberty we have experienced in the face of it cannot sustain us when we are personally confronted with what we called an X factor – which represents an illogical event in our lives in the face of our previously established views. Why is this an important step for some – we are all different and we all react to certain events in different ways and sometimes those ways cannot be, should not be, just “explained away” by rote as if we understand everything about God.

The fact of the matter is, we understand little about Him, we know even less, and it is frankly an illogical act to go to God armed with our meekly assessments of Him and impose our reasoning on Him. If you think I’m wrong read the book of Job. We also said that our facts and reasoning about God are at best “raw materials,” and in my mind believing adults are like toddlers playing with a ten thousand page manual on how to make a nuclear reactor. Remember, according to Kierkegaard and Shestov taking a leap of faith into His arms cannot be based on our logic, our beliefs, or our understanding of God because that is at best limited in scope so it's based on our admitting that we do not have an understanding of Him in the end, and this leap truly amounts to rinsing all of our preconceived notions about God away and from the mind and claiming, “I jump to you whatever you are, whatever you do and whatever your ways wind up being.” Ready? Here is the catch – “because I love and trust you as God that much.

Faith and Love

I think both Kierkegaard and Shestov ignored, lost or overlooked in their philosophy – faith is always always inextricably connected to . . . love – there is never a time where they can be disconnected. And agape love is always and forever connected to faith – in these TWO we have ONE heart. So, while we may admit that we really know very very little about God in the scheme of things, it would be impossible to leap to Him without loving Him first – we may not understand Him, we may lack an ability to really know His ways, but I maintain that to make this leap, rinsed of our so-called limited knowledge and understanding, we must love Him OR that leap is a volitional act that imposes our will from our own determination and not out of love for our creator.

The Necessity of Love in Faith

In other words, it is philosophically idiotic to leap into the arms of a being that is not loved – so love must exist – even though knowledge and logic does not. We can say this because in our walk faith and love are also inextricably connected so where real faith exists real love does too. Show me a person who claims to really have faith in Yeshua and we will always see actions of agape love present. Show me someone who does not choose to act in agape love in most things and I will show you someone weak in faith or absent of it.

In other words, if someone has legitimate faith in God She or He will love Him which is proven by Yeshua’s words where He said, If you love me, keep my commandment – which is to love as He loved. We can rinse our supposed theological knowledge of Him when we make the leap. We can rinse away all of our logical conclusions and assessment and theological beliefs, systems and ideas – NO PROBLEM. We can even in our minds grant Him the ability to do things that we will never understand but one thing we cannot erase or rise from ourselves is our love for Him. Of course this love may be considered illogical or reasonable – for innumerable reasons but either way, it must be the impetus for our making the leap because if it is not, this is a repetition - the leap is an act of our own volition, driven by something other than love, and therefore proved to be from our self, even our

The Leap of Faith

own ego, perhaps even of pride – a sublet failure I did not realize before in the Philosophy. So, love for whom we make the leap must be the driver, and the love must be present by choice – to love Him with our everything – even when we don’t fully understand Him. That is the key to participating in this second cycle. I think, again, in the face of an X factor in our lives it is entirely reasonable to rinse away our learning and rhetoric and systematic religion, washing our endless assumptions down the drain but I do not think it is possible to rinse away our devoted love for Him, a “resonation produced from our gratitude for Him inspite the pain of the X factors but therefore making “a leap” solely from a heart of genuine love for Him.

Trust and Love

And because with that love comes trust, reliance, and adoration that defies logic and reason in the face of the painful X factors we face in life, it is a leap. So, what are the ultimate ramifications of this leap in the mind of a person who has rinsed their ideas and notions away from years of thinking they know things and leaping in total faith to Him? Here you go – It means when someone asks any sort of theological question the answer is always, “with God all things are possible.” (beat) Do you think God accepts people who errantly follow the Hindu God? “If God accepts the Hindu God I accept the Hindu God because with God all things are possible.” See how this is in distinct contrast to the Greek flavored logic of certitude that governs the faith today?

“But years ago, Shawn, you said the Hindu God is not the God of the Bible!” Today I would reply, that was when I was operating by my logic and reason and understanding of the text that I had learned through my own reason and logic and the teachings of men, but having made an unconditional leap into His arms trusting that I know nothing about Him and His ways (in reality) (nor will I pretend to any longer) I now walk in faith and love alone on God alone and His ways alone – believing that with Him “anything and everything with Him is possible.” But do you believe that Yeshua is still necessary? “I believe with God all things are possible?” “Then you think it’s possible that people can die and not know or accept Yeshua and God will accept them?” “I think that with God all things are possible?” What about salvation only through Christ? “I think that with God ATAP” That the BOM can lead people to truth? With God ATAP

Rinsing Away Logic

What about Judas Iscariot being forgiven, what about what about what about what about the judgement, and the afterlife, and this and that . . . What about What about What about . . . (Beat) When you choose out of love for God to make the leap of Faith in the second cycle you have RINSED your learning, logic and reason and have chosen to strip yourself of all of your Athenian wisdom and look to the God who wants to be followed in “Jerusalem-like faith and love.” Now, remember, there are many people souls who cannot, won’t or aren’t ready to do this. They must believe that most or all of their opinions and findings are somehow right and in order and to please God they must prove to Him that they are committed to their understanding and logic is right or that “His love for them will even fail.”

The leap of Faith says your logic and reason and learning are (at best) tiny fibers of truth in a vast universe of God’s tapestry and if you think that you’ve got it all figured out you are free to cling to these notions . . . (beat) or . . . you can mature to a place where you decide for whatever reason to really trust and walk with Him and in the face of your devoted love you choose to make the leap. Here's the thing folks – and this is why taking the leap of faith is the most challenging thing a seeker can take as a freewill human being . . . When we literally choose to rinse ourselves of all the preconceived nothings that we barely understand in the first place, and we actually make the leap, what we are saying is “I do NOT rely on ANYTHING I think I know – anything –

Faith and Trust in God

only on faith in the God I choose to love unconditionally. My wisdom is faulty so I cannot trust it. Shawn’s wisdom is faulty – so I cannot trust it. I can only truly trust who I really love – and in the face of my love I leap – not my knowledge and reason.

(beat)

Tacitly – my friends – this tacitly means that you literally have placed your every notion, idea, opinion, attitude, bias, prejudice on the line and declared in your total heart toward God saying I trust and love in you, the singular “you alone” and FRANKLY AND LITERALLY I would never make a leap of love to anything else ever. You not only are the only one I leap to, you are the only one I love and trust enough to make such a leap. I leap trusting that with you ALL THINGS ARE POSSIBLE.

And in the face of this mindset, all of our myopic doctrinal positions, all of our prejudices, all of our biases, hatreds, wisdom, will-power, and intellectualism will die an immediate death because you have chosen to put everything into the hands of a God that you have made an unqualified leap toward based in your love of Him as your Creator alone. The value – the sheer value of actually taking this leap is that you have actually removed yourself entirely from being the judge or jury over any other person, people or event in life. If genuine it is deep humility. You refuse to believe you know anything about God’s intentions for anyone and humbly accept this as something entirely in His hands. If genuine this is absolute trust. You reject the Athenian idea that “you have knowledge and reason” that proves your particular position on anything (leaving all the James Whites/John McArthurs of the world to decide and proclaim all sorts of unknowable things for those searching to hear them) and having literally decided in the face of making this leap of faith guess what - you are then absolutely “free to love” as He loved as you fall into the arms of the one through who “all things are possible.”

The Cycles of Faith

Now listen, we have been talking for weeks about the ways to mature ourselves in the faith and against the teleological ethic to do things because they work in this world verses doing things based on duty and for me the only duty a believer has is to walk in faith and to love as He commanded. So, the cycles – first the wash and then the rinse - work together and in unison with each other – and frankly have overlapping principles at deeper and deeper levels depending on who the individual is in their walk and the choices they make.

Delaney pointed out that people are making leaps of faith when they decide to humble themselves and choose to seek the light, but I differ with her in the type of faith involved as the first is based in little learning and the latter is based on much. Nevertheless, both do involve talking a leap of faith, so I get her point. Initial leaps of faith that are not substantiated by garnered facts (for how can we love a God that we don’t yet know) and they are an immature expression and often nascent expression of it as proven by the principles of the parable of the Sower where initial belief occurs for some but the more they learn the more they could be offended, and having no root, are scorched and bear no fruit.

The Washing Cycle

I am not equating the two leaps as equals – which is why I see two distinct cycles as happening in a washing machine of life. Where the same motions are involved, our soul is frankly in different states and conditions and respond accordingly. The first cycle – the Four L’s – serve to wash away our human ideas and Spirit of Man notions and again, includes humbly seeking the light, learning about God and His Son and all that they have done, then practicing what we have learned through actionable love and finally experiencing personal liberty when we personally experience what it is like to drop hatred, unforgiveness, condemnation, and sin from our repertoire of human behaviors.

As mentioned last week, this Four Stage cycle is lifelong and can be set on repeat for the length of a person’s walk. But the rinse cycle serves an altogether different purpose for a matured believer, one who has obtained all sorts of knowledge and experience but faces an X factor.

Spiritual Growth Through Biblical Cycles

Akin to Christ on the cross where all the learning (and in His life, sinless living and miracles) amounts to a hill of beans in the face of the X factor at hand. This cycle helps take our hearts to places in scripture like Proverbs 3:5-6 Trust in the LORD with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding. In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths.

Or Jeremiah 9:23-24 which says Thus saith YAHAVAH, Let not the wise man glory in his wisdom, neither let the mighty man glory in his might, let not the rich man glory in his riches: but let him that glorieth glory in this, that he understandeth and knoweth me, that I am YAHAVAH which exercise lovingkindness, judgment, and righteousness, in the earth: for in these things I delight, saith YAHAVAH.

Of course to say “we know Him,” and that “because we know Him we love Him” and that “because we love Him we leap to Him alone” is admittedly a “knowing” that is at best partial, because we do see through a glass darkly in this life and everything is essentially a walk of faith. Because we live in a world where the Spirit of Man operates on a physical plane and we are greatly influenced by these so-called, realities, we see methods of personal fortification important for those who choose to believe, and because organized religion tends to always fall on the teleological and rarely will it stand with duty to Christ alone, we suggest the four cycles and the four traits are reasonable models to freely employ to fortify ourselves as followers of the King.

The First Age

So, let’s wrap our time up with a quick review. And lets look to ancient established history in the first age. Ready?

Creation of Our Heavens and Earth, Garden Two Trees of choice, The Fall, The Flood, Abraham and Sarah, Nation of Israel, Christ Life, Death and Resurrection, Spirit of Christ given at Pentecost, Bride gathered / Rescued. Christ’s Return – Jerusalem Destroyed – The New Jerusalem is established above. The end (that Paul describes) has happened and God is now all in all.

The Second Age

Creation has been spiritually reconciled. All individuals choose from which tree to eat (SOM or SOC). The effects of the Fall spiritually have been overcome. We are spiritually the children of Abraham by faith in Christ. Jeremiah 31:31-34 is at play. Patriarchy (2000 Years of Religious Failures). End of material religion is finally recognized.

The Four Cycles and Traits

The Four L’s: Light, Learning, Love, Liberty. The Four Traits: X Factor Despair, Spiritual Perspicuity, Deeper Selfless, Sacrificial, Insufferable love, Ultra-Emancipation from musts to possibles.

The Wash Cycle of Spiritual Maturity - Milk
The Second Rinse Cycle of Spiritual Maturity – The Meat

Genetics nature nurture, Choice Opportunity, Dark Light, Chance Drive Choice = Health Substances Disease, Conditioning Intellect, Conscience, Nascent Spirit of Christ, Gender Hormones, God’s hand directing.

“Knowledge” (from the tree of knowledge of good and evil)

The Four L’s

A CHOICE to pursue the SOM or the SOC

WASH CYCLE - The Four L’s HUMILITY LIGHT LEARNING = For this life, as we walk with Him, here. LOVE LIBERTY

Residue vs. X-factor

RESIDUE of SUPPOSED KNOWLEDGE contrasted with X-factor Despair

The Four Traits

RINSE CYCLE The Four Traits A Leap of Faith THROUGH LOVE DESPAIR TOTAL BROKEN SURRENDER SPIRITUAL PERSPICUITY DEEP-DIVE COMPASSION “FAITH AND LOVE ALONE”

Life by the Spirit

DRY CYCLE – “Hanging” on the line, moved by the clear open Spirit. Life by the Spirit of Christ alone through faith and love. Period. Not by our knowledge, not by our ideas, wholly and solely by His.