Testing the Spirit, Not the Heart

Pay attention to the spirit/Spirit.

Whatever spirit is fueling a person will be seen in their spirit.

The Holy Spirit is unique. No one can mimic Him. People can mimic people who are in the Spirit of God, but it won't produce the fruit of the Spirit.

You test the spirit, not the heart:

1 John 4:1 NKJV — Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits, whether they are of God; because many false prophets have gone out into the world.

The heart is the mind, will, and emotion. The heart is well intentioned, knows the right things to say, and can easily duplicate the behavior of a sincere follower of Jesus. If you test the heart... Someone's doctrine, their claimed love for people or God, or their desire to see God's kingdom come... You won't be able to discern the spirit. You have to test the spirit. HOW ... What way... Do they want to see Jesus' kingdom come? And what way does the thing you are following lead YOU to want the Kingdom to manifest?

The Holy Spirit is different than the world. The Spirit reveals the WAY of Jesus, not the what. The Holy Spirit is different than any other spirit. This is how He IS:

Galatians 5:22-26 NKJV — But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such there is no law. And those who are Christ’s have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit. Let us not become conceited, provoking one another, envying one another.

If you are in the Holy Spirit, how He is will rub off on you. You will become more peaceful, more patient, more kind, more loving, more GENTLE.

This is how the Spirit of God IS. It isn't how He acts. It is how He IS.

The false (tares) and true (wheat) are becoming identical in heart (how they think, how they feel, and what they want to do). BUT, They can have no commonality in Spirit. Only the Holy Spirit can produce the fruit.

If someone says all the right things but is growing impatient, harsh, mocking, sarcastic, provoking delusional emotions of going to war carnally against devils, you have to know they are not of the Spirit of Jesus:

Jude 1:8-11 NKJV — Likewise also these dreamers defile the flesh, reject authority, and speak evil of dignitaries. Yet Michael the archangel, in contending with the devil, when he disputed about the body of Moses, dared not bring against him a reviling accusation, but said, “The Lord rebuke you!” But these speak evil of whatever they do not know; and whatever they know naturally, like brute beasts, in these things they corrupt themselves. Woe to them! For they have gone in the way of Cain, have run greedily in the error of Balaam for profit, and perished in the rebellion of Korah.

I don't follow anyone who is out "demon slaying" which has become codeword for fighting a culture war against the "woke." I am not fighting people Jesus is trying to save. I resist the devil's lies, like Jesus. Jesus loves people. He isn't fighting them, mocking them, feeling sarcastic about them, denegrating them. Jesus loves people in the woke culture. Jesus loves the harshest conservative. He loves Muslims and Christians, and even me! He literally paid the highest price for all of us. He loves people, even laying down His life for them. Do you?

Satan wars against you craftily. He sets himself up as someone to be hated to draw YOU into the flesh. This will draw you into seeing people as the problem, not the object of salvation.

If you have ever seen Star Wars, it's a decent analogy of this one principle. Darth Vader wants Luke to be like himself by fighting him... "Give in to your anger, Luke..." Don't give in to your anger, fear, impatience, jealousy, pride, arrogance, hatred, etc... This how the devil gets you. Resist the devil and he will flee from you. You resist the devil in you, is the point! Re-read James 4 and you will see that is the context of the passage.

Let Jesus lead you. Otherwise, you are fighting Jesus' willingness to save YOU!

Listen to the spirit of a person to know if they are in the leadership of the Holy Spirit. Speak truth where a person isn't, listen when a person is. Fight the good fight... For your mind, will, and emotions. That is what you have complete authority in: what you believe and what you embrace. Listen and watch for the Holy Spirit to discern what and where He is leading in, otherwise, the leader you are following could be taking you into an anti-Christ spirit.

Think about Jesus. How did Jesus deal with enemies:

Human

Matthew 5:43-48 NKJV — “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ “But I say to you, love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who spitefully use you and persecute you, “that you may be sons of your Father in heaven; for He makes His sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust. “For if you love those who love you, what reward have you? Do not even the tax collectors do the same? “And if you greet your brethren only, what do you do more than others? Do not even the tax collectors do so? “Therefore you shall be perfect, just as your Father in heaven is perfect.

Satan and demons

Matthew 4:1-11 NKJV — Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. And when He had fasted forty days and forty nights, afterward He was hungry. Now when the tempter came to Him, he said, “If You are the Son of God, command that these stones become bread.” But He answered and said, “It is written, ‘Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.’ ” Then the devil took Him up into the holy city, set Him on the pinnacle of the temple, and said to Him, “If You are the Son of God, throw Yourself down. For it is written:

‘He shall give His angels charge over you,’

and,

‘In their hands they shall bear you up,

Lest you dash your foot against a stone.’ ” Jesus said to him, “It is written again, ‘You shall not tempt the LORD your God.’ ” Again, the devil took Him up on an exceedingly high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory. And he said to Him, “All these things I will give You if You will fall down and worship me.” Then Jesus said to him, “Away with you, Satan! For it is written, ‘You shall worship the LORD your God, and Him only you shall serve.’ ” Then the devil left Him, and behold, angels came and ministered to Him.

Why did Jesus let the devil take Him anywhere?! Why was Jesus friends with sinners? Why did Jesus defend the adulterous woman?

He could afford to do all these things.

Jesus could have done anything He wanted to. He could have "destroyed those devils" for real, not just in fleshy bravado. He didn't. Jesus only does what the Father is doing. The Spirit of Jesus only leads us into the same Spirit. Jesus didn't let Satan lead Himself into Satan's personality. He believed God was already victorious over Satan, who God had made through Jesus (John 1).

Fighting Satan like Satan leaves you in Satan's divided kingdom. Jesus refuses to cast out demons like Satan. He only does it in the fruit of the Holy Spirit. To war against Satan any other way than in the fruit of the Holy Spirit is to war against Jesus. If you fight in the flesh, you will be filled with more demons, not less!

Luke 11:14-26 NKJV — And He was casting out a demon, and it was mute. So it was, when the demon had gone out, that the mute spoke; and the multitudes marveled. But some of them said, “He casts out demons by Beelzebub, the ruler of the demons.” Others, testing Him, sought from Him a sign from heaven. But He, knowing their thoughts, said to them: “Every kingdom divided against itself is brought to desolation, and a house divided against a house falls. “If Satan also is divided against himself, how will his kingdom stand? Because you say I cast out demons by Beelzebub. “And if I cast out demons by Beelzebub, by whom do your sons cast them out? Therefore they will be your judges. “But if I cast out demons with the finger of God, surely the kingdom of God has come upon you. “When a strong man, fully armed, guards his own palace, his goods are in peace. “But when a stronger than he comes upon him and overcomes him, he takes from him all his armor in which he trusted, and divides his spoils. “He who is not with Me is against Me, and he who does not gather with Me scatters. “When an unclean spirit goes out of a man, he goes through dry places, seeking rest; and finding none, he says, ‘I will return to my house from which I came.’ “And when he comes, he finds it swept and put in order. “Then he goes and takes with him seven other spirits more wicked than himself, and they enter and dwell there; and the last state of that man is worse than the first.”

Right now wheat and tares are being divided. Their roots are intermingled, so they believe the same things. They want to do the same things. The only difference is fruit. One bears the works of the flesh, the other the fruit of the Spirit:

Galatians 5:16-21 NKJV — I say then: Walk in the Spirit, and you shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh. For the flesh lusts against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh; and these are contrary to one another, so that you do not do the things that you wish. But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law. Now the works of the flesh are evident, which are: adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lewdness, idolatry, sorcery, hatred, contentions, jealousies, outbursts of wrath, selfish ambitions, dissensions, heresies, envy, murders, drunkenness, revelries, and the like; of which I tell you beforehand, just as I also told you in time past, that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.

Anyone trying to build a following by using false war bravado about how he or she is going to slay all the demons isn't in the Spirit of Jesus. Jesus never said that, because He didn't believe it was necessary. Jesus made the devil. He saw Satan fall like lightning because Satan went to war against His kingdom, not vice versa.

A weak kingdom goes to war against a stronger. A strong kingdom simply defends itself against the lesser.

It's finished. Jesus has already won. If you are in His Spirit, you can afford to act like it.

Most of the church out tilting against windmills needs to actually get into the kingdom. It would feel a lot different about people, the world, and Jesus' end time plans if it did!

Ask the Holy Spirit, "what does this mean for me and the way I look at your coming?"

Luke 17:20-37 NKJV — Now when He was asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God would come, He answered them and said, “The kingdom of God does not come with observation; “nor will they say, ‘See here!’ or ‘See there!’ For indeed, the kingdom of God is within you.” Then He said to the disciples, “The days will come when you will desire to see one of the days of the Son of Man, and you will not see it. “And they will say to you, ‘Look here!’ or ‘Look there!’ Do not go after them or follow them. “For as the lightning that flashes out of one part under heaven shines to the other part under heaven, so also the Son of Man will be in His day. “But first He must suffer many things and be rejected by this generation. “And as it was in the days of Noah, so it will be also in the days of the Son of Man: “They ate, they drank, they married wives, they were given in marriage, until the day that Noah entered the ark, and the flood came and destroyed them all. “Likewise as it was also in the days of Lot: They ate, they drank, they bought, they sold, they planted, they built; “but on the day that Lot went out of Sodom it rained fire and brimstone from heaven and destroyed them all. “Even so will it be in the day when the Son of Man is revealed. “In that day, he who is on the housetop, and his goods are in the house, let him not come down to take them away. And likewise the one who is in the field, let him not turn back. “Remember Lot’s wife. “Whoever seeks to save his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life will preserve it. “I tell you, in that night there will be two men in one bed: the one will be taken and the other will be left. “Two women will be grinding together: the one will be taken and the other left. “Two men will be in the field: the one will be taken and the other left.” And they answered and said to Him, “Where, Lord?” So He said to them, “Wherever the body is, there the eagles will be gathered together.”