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United to Jesus in His groans we speak the truth in love. Part II Warn and Awaken My People in the Spirit of Love At the “deepest recesses” of our hearts are our intentions. The Sword of the Spirit, Jesus Christ, desires to expose our true intention; to become naked to ourself and God; an intention that is no longer veiled with falsehood—lies, disordered desires, fears, malice, evil.  ·      “Remove from me the way of falsehood” –Psalm 119 This episode from the life of St Paul (1 Cor.5:1-8) reveals his intentions of heart and those of the Christians of Corinth. St Paul acting in Christ as the “sword of the Spirit” exposes the intentions of the people and at the same time witnesses pure love as a man transformed in Christ. The spirit of love vs. the spirit of the world  Spirit of love “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control” (Galatians 5:22-23) “Let us have no self-conceit, no provoking of one another, no envy of one another.” (Gal.5:26) ⇩ ordered tendencies ⇩ Sincerity & truth- transparency, open & fully exposed to Christ, tears of mourning(groans) for my personal misery & for that of others (“In the pure groans of Christ there is no criticism, murmuring, envy, resentment, but only love” Hector Ramos), silence  VS. Spirit of the world “Now the works of the flesh are plain: fornication, impurity, licentiousness (promiscuous), idolatry, sorcery, enmity(state or feeling of hostility), strife(angry or bitter disagreement over fundamental issues), jealousy, anger, selfishness, dissension(disagreement that leads to discord), party spirit, envy, drunkenness, carousing” (Gal. 5:19-21) ⇩ disordered tendencies ⇩ malice &evil - murmuring, gossip, hiding, separating, complaining, criticism, control, talk too much, judgments without mourning ≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈ The hypocrite has the spirit of the world but pretends to have the spirit of love. He keeps his intentions hidden even from himself, and of course from God. He lives in DENIAL, and therefore, stuck in his own darkness, chained in his own lie, he is unable to be set free. Jesus taught us to “live wrapped in the gift of self-knowledge”, and in this way, in a PERMANENT STATE OF REPENTANCE!  In order to live in the groans of Christ we must live in the groans of our misery. A litmus test to know if we are truly living The Simple Path led by the Holy Spirit is whether or not we find ourselves more and more in a permanent state of deep repentance. The sorrow of our hearts knowing and suffering our misery is expressed in continuous groans. When we sit before our Lord in adoration and the tears of our hearts swell to the surface because of our inability to love unconditionally with pure intentions, then we have come to know the groans of Christ for us and are able to live His Words, “RECEIVE MY TEARS.” We can never separate ourselves from humanity. We cannot read Galatians 5 and see others in the category of the “spirit of the world” and ourselves in the category of the “fruit of the Spirit.” This is hypocrisy. We must live in the knowledge that the spirit of the world is in each of us and that even if we have grown greatly in the spirit of Love, we can easily fall back into the spirit of the world; this is our misery.  Questions that can expose the condition of our hearts: ·      Is it difficult for me to confront others with truth, to be sincere and transparent? Specifically, with who? Why? ·      When the sins and disorders in others wound me, do I feel intense sorrow for them or is my tendency to judge, condemn, get angry, resentful, frustrated, separate from them? Am I able to see that same sin in the other person that wounded me in myself? This reveals the condition of my own heart—the darkness of evil or the light of love. It is