"For bodily exercise profits little: but godliness is profitable to all things, having promise of the life that now is, and of that which is to come"
"For those who are according to the flesh, the things of the flesh do mind; and those according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit; for the mind of the flesh is death, and the mind of the Spirit - life and peace"
I know many do not agree with the following trend of thought regarding the mind and the will, but it is one which I personally find all-encompassing and easy to understand, and I apologise about its length but when one attempts to minimise explanation too much, things can be misunderstood.
Man today and in the past - except for the very few - has always placed so much dependence on what he can feel and see with his physical body. And bound as he is, it is difficult indeed to so extricate himself from its toils, that he can dispassionately view the world and the seemingly concrete things all around and say: 'This is but a semblance of the real!'
The mind of the body and the mind of the spirit function differently during one's daily life. The mind of the spirit is that which is intensely conscious of its God; and what man has deemed the active, workable side, is as a sleep from which one day the owner will be awakened. That is the contrast.
The Real Self is out on a journey, and as the different experiences are undertaken, so the equipment is provided by the Heavenly Father, and that which has served its day is, by and by, laid aside, forgotten - except for the results it has produced.
It is wise not to confuse that physical body or that physical mind with the Real Self within. Could the eyes but see, there - in all its splendour - would the spirit within each one be revealed to doubting man; could he but extricate himself from that limited sphere of thought, he would indeed be conscious that within there were resources - untouched, undiscovered and unused in the Master's service.
In ones simple life, one longs to do something beautiful for God or for loved ones: to create beauty in sound, in colour, or in the hearts of others. This is the spirit struggling to get free from that which has buried it - the physical mind.
It will be found that the motive power behind all creation is Love and Love alone. When free from the limitations of the mind of the body, one will mourn with intensity those things brought into being which emanated from the mind of the body alone.
For the sake of the spirit within, it is wise not to kill the desires for this and for that, but to spiritualise them, to bring them up to some standard of holiness, so that when the body is laid aside there - free, untrammelled - they will be able to work out, in detail, that which the spirit longs.
There are few desires or thoughts which pass through the mind of the body, which have not their spiritual counterpart. It is, as it were, that something sweet and sacred had been dropped in the mud, and there it has lain over the time which has sped until the owner, at last, recollected its loss, and sought not only to recover it but to bring it back to something of the beauty which it once possessed.
The desires of the physical mind can be viewed in this wise: The craving for ease, that desire for possessions, is but the mutilated instinct, on the one hand, for the peace which passeth understanding, and on the other for those priceless gifts of the Spirit which will allow one to work for God.
This may appear to be stretching illustration to breaking point; but one must recollect that one is a child of God.
With all attributes, all instincts, all desires, one can trace back the myriad of experiences gone through, what has been accumulated, what has been thrown on that which is pure and holy, that which lighteth every man that comes into the world.
Regarding to the mind of the body and the mind of the spirit, it is possible that even in one's daily life, so one can hand over all into the keeping of the mind of the spirit in a way which will seem to astounding when spiritual sight is one's own.
Here is the area of the 'will' - that will which is associated with that which binds, and that freed will which, linked to God, can make the unity between Father and child complete, even during the physical stages, even while cabined within that which seems to some as a prison house indeed.
The greatest test of a strong will is the ability to hand over that will into the keeping of someone wiser, older in experience. So difficult from the earth view, so alien to the physical mind. Those in the world boast far too often of the strength of their physical will; when they are released from the physical body they will see with shame and anguish that it was the weak link in their armour through which the enemy was able to wound and maim.
That will of the body can do far more damage than one can understand, yet even here it is wise to destroy it not, seeking rather to blend it with the will of God, when it shall work for the God in Christ within - for the Real Self within - in a way that a good servant should, and in a way which will bring one into happiness when the body is no more.
Those children of humanity who, as yet, have not developed strong feelings, strong opinions, strong desires, strong wills - these, as it were, are in the babyhood of spiritual growth. Yet one should not allow the will to be used as a tool by the destroyers who wish to mar the plan.
Those who are capable of holding on in spite of opposition, those who have the capacity to stand firm while the rest forsake - that indeed is a tool which one shall never be asked to lay aside; and as the days go on and the warfare between right and wrong continues, so that will, so that resolution, must be developed to withstand the oncoming forces.
Care should be taken that the will of the spirit is not chained or fettered by the will of the body. That self-will - the will which is centred on selfish desire - that in time to come must be mellowed and refined into the will of the spirit, into that will which allows one to say without reservation: 'Use me; not my will but Thine be done!'
These things need to be thought out for oneself, one must face facts as they are, one brings things into being by realising thoughts, then acting - creating by thought - which is within all, and which at some time will find full expression as the thoughts of the God in Christ within are realised, because it is not the Father's will to withhold anything from His children.
The Creator, the King of kings, the Lord of lords, thought out the scheme of mankind - all those myriad conditions necessary for His children. Out of the Mind of Love so Love took expression, and as that expression became life, so a gift was entrusted in that life to His children.
The gift - so precious - has not been used aright, and man has lost and not gained, he has stifled and not developed; but the time is coming when the Spirit of God will descend upon man and the scales will be struck from his eyes.
The spiritual mind and the spiritual will can work for God in a way impossible to estimate in words. The physical mind and the physical will, under the influence of the destroyers, can not only impede one's progress but indeed can throw one back once again into those stages from which one has extricated oneself by the desire to learn.
This is a solemn thought and linked to it is that of personal responsibility. By resisting evil, by conquering temptation, by standing firm in face of adversity, so one in turn is building resistance which can be used for those as yet far down that hill of attainment, bound by the chains of self, unconscious of their bondage.
For The Spiritual Peace That Passeth All Understanding