As I said in yesterday׳s post, that experience with the mirror has been a source of many thoughts and ideas. I don’t share it casually. It means a great deal to me, and I hope that what I will say in this series of blogposts causes people to search their hearts deeply in order to better comprehend God’s love.
I have spoken with many people who tell me that they have tried to receive a baptism of fire and remission of sins, but it just hasn’t happened for them. Many, then, attempt to minimize the need for that rebirth.
And people don’t like to hear that (1) it’s still absolutely necessary and (2) if someone hasn’t received it, it’s 100% their fault.
That experience with the mirror came so forcefully to my recollection, yesterday, because of all of the recent posts on the gospel being something that is meant to affect our spirits. More importantly, the gospel can only have its desired affect on our spirits when our spirits first meet certain conditions.
The spirit realm has detail, depth, and dimension. The more time we spend in the spirit realm and the more familiar we are with the spirit realm, the more, and more easily, we sense this.
Most people do not spend a lot of time in the spirit realm, and, consequently, they often fail to realize the deep levels of contrition, humility, submissiveness, honesty, meekness, and commitment that must be attained before they receive a baptism of fire. They can relate to a surface-level guilt that resembles the shallow reflection of one’s physical form that one sees when looking in a mirror (and incorrectly think that should be enough), but they fail to let the glass be a window to their true self, which is separate and distinct from the body and which, when illuminated by God’s light, causes one to feel a richness of things of the spirit that cannot be attained without it.
Can you be baptized by immersion in waters that are shallow? If you can’t in the physical world, why would you assume that you can in the spiritual? The rebirth of the spirit comes only with a depth of sincerity regarding spiritual things, which can only come when you cease to wade in shallow and superficial waters and begin to venture into the depths of your own soul.