05/05/2026
I’ve been thinking about why it was so easy for Jesus to love people, even the ones everyone else avoided or judged, and the more I sit with it, the more I realize it’s because He wasn’t looking at their flesh at all. He wasn’t reacting to their behavior or their reputation. He saw straight through all of that and looked directly at their spirit …the real person underneath the mess, the person God created before the world ever saw their mistakes.
That’s why He could look at a tax collector and see a disciple, look at a broken woman and see a daughter, look at a man on a cross and see someone ready for paradise. He wasn’t fooled by the flesh, and He wasn’t offended by it either. He loved from a deeper place.
And I think that’s what He’s calling us into too. Because when I pray for someone and my mind is focused on their flesh, I feel the weight of their behavior. But when I shift and see their spirit, everything changes. My compassion changes. My authority changes. My whole posture changes. I’m not reacting to who they are in the moment…I’m speaking to who they truly are.
Scripture even backs this up. God says that man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart, and Jesus lived that out every day. The Bible says the flesh profits nothing but the Spirit gives life, and that the things of God are spiritually discerned, which means the flesh can’t receive what only the spirit can respond to.
Paul even said we no longer regard anyone according to the flesh, because in Christ we’re called to see people through a spiritual lens, not a worldly one. And when you think about it from that perspective, everything becomes lighter. It becomes easier to forgive. Easier to understand. Easier to soften your heart toward someone you may not even have favor with. Because you’re not loving their attitude or their mistakes…you’re loving the part of them God breathed into. And the more I learn to see people that way, the easier it becomes to love them the way He does.
And it’s not a love that ignores truth, but a love that sees deeper than the surface. A love that looks past the temporary and speaks to the eternal. A love that calls people higher instead of holding them hostage to their lowest moments.
Can you imagine how different our prayers would sound if we prayed in the spirit instead of the flesh. If we stopped praying from what frustrates us or confuses us and started praying from the place where God speaks and sees. When we pray over the part of a person that can actually respond to Him, everything shifts. Our posture shifts, our authority shifts, our compassion and accuracy shift. We stop praying from our limited perspective and start praying from His. And this is why it matters so much to me, because when we pray from the spirit instead of reacting to someone’s flesh, our prayers finally align with heaven. We start seeing what God sees instead of what our eyes see, and our prayers stop circling the problem and start partnering with the solution. That’s where real change happens, and that’s where love becomes power instead of pressure.
Differences when praying in the flesh versus praying in the spirit:
Praying in the flesh looks like:
• Praying from what you see instead of what God sees
• Reacting to behavior instead of speaking to identity
• Focusing on emotions, frustration, or circumstances
• Trying to fix someone instead of partnering with God
• Speaking from your own understanding instead of His truth
• Addressing symptoms instead of the root
• Praying from offense, fear, or disappointment
• Asking God to change what bothers you
• Seeing the person as they are in the moment
• Fighting the person instead of the real spiritual battle
Praying in the spirit looks like:
• Speaking to the eternal part of them that can actually respond to God
• Calling out identity instead of reacting to behavior
• Praying from heaven’s perspective instead of your own
• Partnering with the Holy Spirit instead of your emotions
• Addressing the root, not the symptoms
• Praying with authority instead of anxiety
• Seeing who they are becoming, not who they are acting like
• Speaking truth that aligns with God’s Word
• Praying from compassion instead of frustration
• Fighting the real battle — the spiritual one — not the person
