A Most Sacred Trust
I’ve often wondered how Jesus ministered healings and miracles; if He used a loud dramatic voice to express himself; if His manner was sensational and theatrical, or more matter-of-fact and down-to- earth.
When He healed the paralytic man, lowered down through the roof, Jesus, with those standing ‘round, seemed to be calm and conversational. The biblical record doesn’t indicate that He used force of speech to summon the power to heal. And yet, at Christ’s calm command, the man was healed.
Without emotional music, theatrics, or melodrama, Jesus commanded a confidence of faith, such that those sick and diseased, felt compelled to thrust themselves, by extravagant measures of courage, towards Him.
How is it then that we so often feel we need a singer, and a platform of musicians to summon into our altars the person and power of the Holy Spirit, to heal? And how often was Jesus actually in the Synagogue when performing miracles, healings and deliverance? Our Lord carried out His ministry daily, and in the course of His living and goings on. He wasn’t on a tour of pre-scheduled seminars and services.
He was in the ministry of teaching, healing, performing miracles as He encountered needs throughout the day, not in the formal structure of a weekly church service. Being led by the Holy Spirit was His DAILY practice, and therefore He was always ready to minister healing as the moments presented themselves.
If the members of the body of Christ today were completely responsive to the Holy Spirit, as a matter of daily practice, more of us would be doing what Christ did throughout the ongoings of our day. So many of us are convinced that the Holy Spirit is more near us when we feel emotionally stirred, either during prayer time, or in a church worship service. If this is what you believe, you must forsake the thought.
I will illustrate this point. When you are home with your most dearly beloved, how often do you spend time with them in a highly emotional state, either tearful, or highly excited? Most likely, not very often, especially if your relationship has been lasting and long.
Our relationship with Holy Spirit is similar in this regard. Because He is our Teacher and Comforter, we may not always feel highly emotional in His presence. We may instead feel prompted to do something, like reach out to encourage or pray for someone, confess a sin, or witness the gospel of Christ. Or we may simply feel the comforting calm presence of His peace. Like being in the company of a close friend, with whom we feel aware of and comfortable, is how it feels to be near the person of the Holy Spirit.
The Holy Spirit wants to be trusted.
... to trust a friend, we need to know them personally and intimately. We trust someone more completely because, over time, they have proven themselves trustworthy. Trust is sewn into the woven fabric of every lasting and true relationship.
And this is the case with the Holy Spirit. If we expect to trust Him to accomplish the will of the Father through us, we must be familiar with how He communicates. We must be intimately aware of what His presence feels like and what His voice within us sounds like. As with anyone we trust, knowing someone so intimately starts with familiarity.
…so how do we become familiar with the person, the voice and the presence of the Holy Spirit? My answer may fall upon you like a catch phrase, a worn out slogan bereft of power or originality. But I tell you with the greatest of confidence and conviction, there is no other way.
We learn to know Him through two very intentional acts of faith. The first is to take study of scripture, and the second is prayer.
The scriptures reveal to us the characteristics, the purpose, and the nature of the Holy Spirit. These scriptures are Romans 8: 23-26, John 14: 15-17 and verse 26, and Galatians 5:22-23. We must also study the stories in both Testaments, as they reveal the work of God through people by the divine person and power of the Holy Spirit.
As told in the book of Judges, the Spirit of the Lord came upon Gideon, and Jephthah, leading Israel to victory over their enemies; The Spirit of the Lord came upon David to be anointed as king; the Spirit of the Lord enabled Ezekiel to prophesy; the Spirit of the Lord conceived Jesus in Mary's womb, descended upon Him at His baptism, and led Him into the wilderness in preparation for ministry; the Apostles were filled with the Spirit of the Lord to speak in other languages; the Spirit of the Lord participated in creation; the Spirit of the Lord gives life to humanity and other creatures, as found in Psalm 104:29 and 30; the Spirit of the Lord strives with sinners, as described in Genesis 6:3. There are these and numerous other accounts in God’s word that describe Him to us.Our mouth is the physical instrument through which we express our faith in, not only God the Father & Son, but God the Holy Spirit. Prayer is how we come to know God, but prayer feels difficult to us because we so often fail to summon the help of the Holy Spirit in prayer. Romans 8:26 tells us that, the Spirit helps us in our weakness because we do not know what to pray for. According to the Scripture, we can expect to feel weak and inadequate in prayer unless the Holy Spirit helps us pray. Effectual prayer only comes about with His assistance. Just as the sinner is saved through faith in Christ by admission of guilt, so is the one who knoweth not how to pray, aided by the Holy Spirit, when he or she admits this weakness. Prayer is much easier to do when, at the start, one makes to Him this confession:
“Holy Spirit, I want to pray for _______________, but I don’t know what to pray. You understand that this is my inadequacy and my weakness. It is for this and other reasons, that the Father sent You. Help me in my weakness. Pray the Father’s will through me now”.
Once you verbally acknowledge this weakness, you will begin to realize the direction and purpose of your prayer as it wells up in your heart and out your tongue. It may be a language you don’t recognize; it may be groanings too deep for words, or it may be the clearest of words drawn from the surest place in your heart. In those sweet moments, however, you will find yourself praying with strength and divine confidence, and blessed assurance. Be it long or short, you will know that you have experienced the Holy Spirit, and that He through you, has prayed God’s will. In all your ways, having acknowledged Him, He will have surely directed your path.
In our innermost, we will, through the continuity of daily prayer and scripture, ascend the heights and depth of understanding and begin to recognize, not only the gentle presence and whisper of the Holy Spirit, but our oneness with God’s will. As we come to desperately rely on His assistance, we will intentionally set our attention and our affections upon Him, and there will be no moment outside of His presence that does not feel to us, strangely uncomfortable. If, in fact for one moment, we are separated of that blessed union, our hearts will, like a small child does the moment he recognizes he is lost, urgently cry out to be rescued and reunited to Him.
If we love God, then a trust so sacred is the trust we must set upon this Person, the Holy Spirit. His divine assignment towards us is established in heaven. Just as He hovered over the waters, before God ordered Him into creative action, He is hovering over and dwelling in our hearts, ready to carry forth God’s purposes and will through you and me. All things we desire, the hope for which we patiently await is accomplished through Him. There is nothing about God’s work or God’s blessings towards us, no spiritual prize we can hope to attain, without His assistance.
If ever we trust in the arms of the Father, and rest our fears and longings upon the love of Christ Jesus, let us walk with the Holy Spirit, ever mindful of His good intentions toward those of us, to whom the Father has sent Him. After all, what’s left but the dung pile ready to be burned, if we pursue the desires of our own will? There is no other good will upon which we can assuredly rely, from which spring forth in us the fountains of life, fulfillment and peace, except that will which is God’s.
If our goal is life everlasting, blessed and eternal fulfillment, and the trusted hope of salvation; if we aim to know the mind of the Father and do the works of Christ, then God the Holy Spirit, must be our Teacher, our Advocate, and Guide.
