We all have three minds: body, soul, and spirit. Each mind has different mission and a way of looking at reality. I just reread a book I wrote in 2012 called Play the Game where I identified three ways of playing the Game that I realize today in 2023 are very similar: the Player, the Winner, and the Overcomer.
Here is the lead in to my discovery now about then:
We have ended the chapter about how Moses became an Overcomer in "Play the Game" but are left with one minor problem to resolve. Earlier in Exodus God has told Moses to strike the rock with his staff and water will come out of it, and he does, and it does.
But then in Numbers God tells Moses to take his staff and
"speak to that rock before their eyes and it will pour out water." (Numbers 20:8)
Moses is peeved at Israel and before he does what God requires him to do he says to them,
"'Listen, you rebels, must we bring you water out of this rock?' Then Moses raised his arm and struck the rock twice with his staff." (Numbers 20:10-11)
Moses is angry at his family. The opposite of perfect love is not anger but fear. Moses is worn down and wonders if his family will ever get it. But his fear has made him ignore God's explicit command "speak to that rock" but Moses strikes the rock. In both Exodus and Numbers water comes out but God. But in the first case Moses has heard God and obeyed and in the second case Moses has not heard from God and disobeyed.
And so God does not let Moses go into the Promised Land after forty years of frustration? Is that fair? Or is that what an expecting father gets as double for his sins?
Reading my own book "Play the Game" eleven years later, I see that the conversation between three ways of playing the Game: the Player, the Winner, and the Overcomer represent the very same thing we have said about three minds of one's personality of Body, Soul, and Spirit (Heart).
Jesus never did anything unless he was in alignment. He had to hear from God clearly for he knew that God the author authorizes our authority which he knew that "unless the Lord builds the house the laborers build it in vain" (Psalm 127:1):
1. Player plays the Game for fun. If the Game ceases to be fun and discipline is required the Player drops out. The Body wants only to get love and if it is not getting love it represses the fear of abandonment and concludes it is not good enough.
2. Winner plays the Game to win without knowing that his competitor is his own shadow, alter ego. Soul only wants to get real and so the fear of losing overcomes the joy of playing so one either drops out of the Game or starts to schedule easier competitors whose penalty is finally boredom.
3. The initiative for the Overcomer is the Game as God's final pleasure win, lose, or suffrage (Suffering for His sake gives us suffrage to rule with Him). Spirit/Heart only wants to give love.
The argument between the Body and the Soul comes to an impasse, and it remains for the Spirit/Heart to untie this knot. The climax in any story comes at the story's "denouement" which is French to "untie."
It is the moment of creation, the "aha" moment, the thrill of being Homo Ludens rather than Homo Sapien, Man the Player rather than Man the Knower, hearing God's Word as an act of grace and generosity, always, even when it seems too punitive to the Body and not tough enough for the Soul.
Here we enter the narrative:
This seems to be a rather minor sin, but not to God. God says to Moses and Aaron:
“Because you did not trust me enough to honor me as holy in the sight of the Israelites, you will not bring this community into the land I give them.” (Numbers 20:12)
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We have observed that if there are only two options in the Game, the Game is rigged by the devil. For this reason we call on the three players: the Player, the Winner, and the Overcomer to arrive at some sort of consensus on what the meaning of all of this is.
We no longer are happy with Exodus, or Genesis, but now Arrival. We now listen in our focus group of three:
Player: Boy is that tough. How touchy is God. One little moment of pique and Moses gets dumped from the Promised Land. That is just not fair.
Winner: I knew you’d think that way. You don’t realize to whom much is given, much is expected. I would not expect you to understand. When the going gets tough, you leave the Game. Winners call themselves to a higher standard than do the Players.
Player: Oh please. Do you think Moses had any victories simply because he willed himself to victory? God was doing most of the lifting wherever Moses went. Sometimes you Winners are insufferable, even when you justify your losses.
Winner: Oh yeah. Well at least I have enough courage to hang in there even if it means to lose.
Player: That’s not courage that is simply being bull headed.
Both the Player and the Winner get into such an argument that they both forget that the Overcomer has not said anything at all. The Winner is indignant at this neutral response and in disgust says to the Overcomer;
Winner: So what do you say, Overcomer? I resent your smiles.
Player: Cool it Winner. Let’s hear what he has to say, OK?
Overcomer: OK, if you insist. On this day Moses was mad at his friend God. Moses had the freedom a friend has to say to a friend what only a friend could say. They were words that cannot be printed in the Bible, but they did not shock God as it might some Christians. When Moses’ rant was over, which were not recorded in the Bible, God might have said:
OK, so what’s your point? And then laughed.
And that would have made Moses laugh, and then think,
“Hmm…Why do I need the Promised Land when I have the Promised Maker living in me?”
Then God pointed to the other side of the river Jordan and showed Moses a picture of the future Israel going into the Promised Land with Joshua now leading things. The people are complaining again. They want to know where the water is. They are sick of eating manna. Joshua is reading “Churches Seeking Pastors.” And God turns to Moses as Moses keeps watching Joshua:
“And you thought I was punishing you by keeping you out of the Promised Land?”
Without turning to God but still hearing what God said to him, Moses speaks quietly to his successor Joshua:
“Thank God this is your turn, my friend. Not mine!
And God answers for Joshua and Himself:
“You are welcome.”
And Moses invited God to his retirement home on Mount Nebo. Not only had Moses arrived but so had God who comes to retire finally in Overcomers like Moses:
“And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Now the dwelling of God is with men, and he will live with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God. He will wipe away ever tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.” (Revelation 21: 3-4)
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God has achieved Exodus from heaven.
He can now dwell on earth like He originally wanted to do when he created "Delight" for his first two children. The Promise Maker has arrived in the Promised child, a barefoot child of 120 years old fully in play with his whole life out ahead of himself:
“Under his feet was something like a pavement of sapphire, clear as the sky itself.” Exodus 24:10
Jesus saw this as his first story of the incarnation.