The Person of the Holy Spirit

The Holy Spirit.  I believe that most Christians just accept that this is a part of God but do not try to dive into what this is really.  Just considering the name alone, we would surmise that it is the spirit of God.  Spirit would be that unseen part of who we are that is not the body, therefore the spirit of God would be, if we are made in His image, that unseen part of God that is not in physical or some other form.  But what this gets translated into is a kind of energy source or some kind of invisible power that is in us but that we aren’t able to tap into regularly in our daily lives.  And it is precisely this translation that is the biggest problem in our spiritual life.

I think most Christians can relate to a time, or hopefully many times, that they were convicted of sin and the Holy Spirit sat with them as they were heart-broken over it and crying out for God to rescue them.  Many Christians can relate to some worship services where the praise and prayers were so powerful that they could “feel” an invisible God on them and all around them.  And a few Christians can point out a time when they had a peace about something they were being led to do from somewhere deep inside and afterwards they could see how it was the Spirit of God directing their paths, usually for others. 

However, every Christian I know will tell you that they do not live in the power of the Holy Spirit daily.  Why would that be?  Maybe a better question is how can that be?  Do Christians not want the presence of God in their life?  …  I think Christians want the power of God in their life, but they don’t necessarily want the authority of God in their life over everything in their life and they don’t want the absolute commitment of faith.  The absolute commitment of faith requires patience and trust.  It is knowing that God will work out what is best for others and yourself in whatever problem/event/occurrence you are aware of in your life and it most probably will not require any input on your part except to respond to how the Spirit is directing you to be the person God is leading you to be.  Most Christians have a difficult time with the simple “Trust and obey for there’s no other way to be happy in Jesus but to trust and obey.”  They want to do something.

We must know that we do not have to whip ourselves into some kind of emotional frenzy in order to have the presence of the Holy Spirit.  This is not Haitian voodoo.  We don’t have to have specific ceremonies and dance around a fire and such.  The Spirit is not there as a source of power for us to use if we just do the right worship and say or pray the right things.  In fact, any time we see ourselves thinking or saying that “if we do (fill-in-the-blank) then God will (fill-in-the-blank)” you can be sure we have something wrong. 

The Spirit is a person – yes, He is a person.  If He is in our lives then we should submit our life for His use.  We are not to live our life and use Him.  If we try this we will never ever see the power of the Spirit in our life.  We are to be used by Him so we can live our life.  When we openly and consciously realize that there is the person of the Holy Spirit, that is, the Spirit of the one and only God, in us ready to establish the power of God in our life if only we will submit our life to Him, our life will change.  The lives of those around us will change.

First, we will see conviction of sin and the need for a Savior in us and in the world.  This will overwhelm us and break our heart at the same time.  It will be so great that we will be unable to keep our eyes open to the extreme need as it hurts too bad to take it all in.  Second, we will have a love for people even with their quirks.  God loves people.  When the person of the Spirit is using our life in His power, we will love people.

Is your heart broken for the world today?  Where is your love for the others in this world, not just those you can help, but those who you … hate?  Yes, those you hate.  That father who abandoned you, the person who works against you, or the homeless who refuses to work and cusses you for trying to help.  In the flesh it is impossible, but submitted to the person of the Spirit, all things are possible.