Phil 4:19 (NIV) And my God will meet ALL your needs according to His glorious riches in Christ Jesus.The Six Biblical Principles that lead you into getting all your needs met by Jesus are: Desire, study, pray, believe, love, and take faith-action. During these last two weeks, Jesus gently took you through them. The purpose of these six things is to show you what Jesus expects and requires of you. If you have never driven a car before, it is obvious that you can’t just get in a car and drive off. Just learning how to get it moving forward takes some training. If you didn’t have adequate training, the moment you moved out into traffic could mean the end of your life.

2 Tim 2:15 (AKJV) Study to show yourself approved to God, a workman that needs not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth. Just look at the rush hour traffic; all those drivers out there are operating based on some well defined rules. Even though they may be moving at a very fast speed, everyone expects all the other people to live by certain established rules. As long as everyone lives by those rules, traffic moves along without any accidents. But, if ANYONE ignores or breaks one of those rules during high traffic time, a tremendous amout of damage and loss of life can occur.

Rom 8:5 (NIV) Those who live according to the sinful nature have their minds set on what that nature desires; but those who live in accordance with the Spirit have their minds set on what the Spirit desires.

You are moving into the spirit realm where things are very different. They aren’t like what is typically done in this human life. You have been living your entire life where people, the world in general, and Satan don’t really care that much about what you DESIRE. They have required you to STUDY things that operated on the basis of you being totally responsible for your success or failure. Never once did they lead you into PRAYING. If you were introduced into BELIEVING, you were taught to believe in yourself. When LOVE was mentioned, it went from loving a new pair of shoes to making love being a sexual relationship. FAITH-ACTION wasn’t taught, just action.

Rom 8:13-14 (NIV) For if you live according to the sinful nature, you will die; but if BY the Spirit YOU put to death the misdeeds of the body, you will live, BECAUSE those who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. Prior to you being born again and becoming a Christian, you were living according to the sinful nature, and you were dead (separated from God). NOW, if BY the Spirit YOU put to death the misdeeds of the body, you will live. So, in order for you to win over your human issues with drugs and really start living, you need to cooperate with Jesus and His Holy Spirit.

If BY the Spirit YOU put to death the misdeeds of the body: Even though you may not understand what this means, Jesus is ready to show you how to live in the spirit realm. Just like you didn’t know how to live as a human when you were born into this world, you will have to learn how to live as a child of God. When you live successfully as a child of God, you will experience supernatural power. You will experience supernatural knowledge, understanding, and wisdom. You will experience supernatural love.

Living as a child of God isn’t complicated; it is just different from what you are used to. It seems complicated like learning how to transport food from your plate to your mouth WITH A SPOON, when you were a baby. When you first tried that, there was a lot of food that landed on the floor. You found it to be a lot easier to just grab it with your hands and stuff it in your mouth. But, the rules of etiquette “forbid” that procedure as you moved into adulthood. So, let Jesus teach you six rules of spiritual “etiquette.” Jesus will use them to help you succeed over things you need to be able to do but can’t do them yet.

1. DESIRE: Jesus honors your God-given free will all the time; He will only do what you DESIRE Him to do. Are you getting any “benefits” from your issues with drugs? Being set free for a problem that is bothering you the most can be complicated. If you were to write down the good and bad aspects of you struggles with drugs, would there be ANYTHING that you could put on the good side of the list? If there is, you will need to pray and ask Jesus to help you give it up. As long as your DESIRE is contaminated with one reason for keeping your drugs issue, Jesus will NOT help you get rid of it.


2. STUDY: Jesus will only use Bible principles you are familiar with; if you haven’t STUDIED and learned a Bible principle, He won’t use it. This one is the one that takes time, effort, and patience. These studies are taking you as fast as is possible into the Biblical principles that you need. Plus, it isn’t just a matter of you knowing them; you must pray and get Jesus to explain them, help you want them, teach you how to apply them, and empower you to live on the basis of them. What Scriptures and Biblical principles have you learned so far that are helping you with your issues with drugs?


3. PRAY: Jesus won’t help you with anything you don’t PRAY and ask Him to help you with; you have to pray and invite Him into your situation with drugs. As you have been going through these materials, you have been given prayers to pray. Jesus has heard every one of them and has answered them. Just like you may not see any results from the food you ate in the past, you know that if you hadn’t eaten it, you would not be alive today. Prayer is the invitation to Jesus for taking what you studied on the first page and helping you ingest it through those prayers on the second page.


4. BELIEVE: Jesus must give you the faith you need so you can believe. Believing is required because it is your opinion about the honesty and integrity of God. As you study the Bible and Biblical concepts, you must not hurry through. If you don’t believe those things you are studying and praying about, Jesus won’t cause them to transform you. Jesus caused all the Bible words to be written; they are His words. If you doubt them, they will not help you win over your struggles with drugs.


5. LOVE: If you try to get Jesus to help you with something that is selfish and only beneficial to you, He won’t do it. It isn’t easy to have a problem as difficult and painful as drugs and not focus in on it. Your struggles, battles, and suffering have a tendency to keep you thinking about you and your problem. But, Jesus wants to help you see this journey into victory over it as a way to help others. You are learning awesome truths that will help you and help those around you. Love is very important to you being helped and healed.


6. FAITH-ACTION: You have to ACTUALLY do it! If you know it, understand it, and know how to apply it but don’t do it, you will fail to win over your issues with drugs. You must take FAITH-ACTION! All during these studies and prayers, you need to be trying to win. As you learn and ask Jesus to install these things into you life, you need to believe and take as much action as possible. You will find yourself failing; but, that is part of the learning and growing process.
   
   When you were learning to walk as a child, you fell A LOT. When you first tried to walk, your technique was really bad. But, that didn’t keep you from watching, learning, trying, and getting a little bit of success. The more you study and pray, the more spiritual technique you will acquire. But, you must test that technique in real life. These Biblical principles are perfect; you just have to trust them and doubt your application. When you fail, it wasn’t the truths you learned; it was your appication of those principles.
   
   Luke 18:17 (NIV) I tell you the truth, anyone who will not receive the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it. Most children are very determined and committed to learning things. They will take things that are totally new to them and try to apply them to their lives. When they fail, most of them will keep trying until they win at it. FAITH-ACTION is about you doing the same in your life. You are new at being a child of God; you need to apply a childlike approach to your studies and praying.