Some suggestions on BEING LED BY THE SPIRIT
It is clear that the Holy Spirit of God can communicate with Christians in their spirits. 1 Cor. 2:10; John 16:13-15; Romans 8:16; 1 Cor. 12:8-11
The verses I have listed show different ways in which the Spirit communicates with us: teaching, showing, equipping, witnessing, leading. It is not a complete list. There are more. I would like to focus on the leading of the Spirit because understanding this valuable ability can really help us to be useful Christians. (Notice that the English Bible uses lower-case “s” to spell the human spirit and capital “S” for the Holy Spirit.)
Do you know your spirit? Every person has a spirit. Do you know what yours is like? Have you ever used it? Is it the same as a soul? We can go to our minds and remember and think about issues but can you go to your spirit, as it says in Romans 8:16, and hear the Holy Spirit witnessing to yours that you are a child of God? I think the easiest way for EVERY Christian to know what his spirit is like, is for him to remember the time when he asked Christ to be his saviour. You know, we only ask for forgiveness and salvation when the Holy Spirit communicates with our human spirit and convicts us of our sin, as it says in John 16:8-9. We hear Him and respond and accept Christ.
We can identify our spirits as what it is in us that reacts to truth from the Word of God.
Either it reacts with acceptance, or it rejects. The Bible says that the Spirit reproves the world of sin. And, since the Spirit speaks to our spirit, the part of us that is touched must be our spirit. If a Christian can remember that time in his life and remember what it was like to communicate, at that time, with the Holy Spirit in his human spirit, then what I am saying will make a lot of sense.
The human spirit is a real thing. Scientists may be able to explain emotions, ideas and interests in terms of hormones, nerve synapses and brain chemistry. God certainly made all of that. We cannot open a person’s skull and find the parts in there that could be put in a jar and labeled “human spirit” but those parts certainly play a part in the operation of our spirit. But we are simple people. We need to be able to just use our spirit without necessarily knowing what it is made of. The spirit is what gives the body life. Luke 8:55; Luke 23:46. In Genesis 2:7 it says that God breathed into the man he made out of dust and that man became a living soul. The Hebrew and Greek words for “spirit” in the New and Old Testament are the same as for breath or wind – air that is moving. What God breathed into man was spirit.
We know that the human spirit knows the deep things of a man (1 Cor.2:11) and that it can search out the things that we don’t know about ourselves (Proverbs 20:27.) In 1 Cor. 2:9 it tells us that we cannot understand the things God has prepared for us through sight, hearing or imagination but that they are made known to us by the Spirit of God. Singing and praying in the spirit (1 Cor 14:15) is contrasted with doing those things with the understanding so we can see that knowing something in our spirit is not intellectual. Using our spirit to communicate with God is not based on understanding. In fact, if we remember the exhortation of Proverbs 3:5 it says not to lean toward our own understanding. But, this does not mean that we will not understand with our spirit. If we communicate with God in our spirit, we will have true understanding. Yes, we are to understand with our spirits things that our minds cannot comprehend.
Continuing in 1 Cor. 2, the ability of man to use his mind is contrasted with the knowledge God gives by his Spirit. What it teaches here is that natural, or non-spiritual men cannot know the things of God, but spiritual men know them by the use of their spirit in connection to the Spirit of God. This enables them to understand and make godly decisions. Practically speaking, when I need to decide something, I can count on God’s Holy Spirit to remind me of things that are in the Bible and to help me apply them to the present situation. This means that I must read the Bible a lot. The promise in John 14:26 is that the Holy Spirit will bring to our remembrance all the things that Christ has said. If we have never heard or read the things that Christ has said we can not be reminded of them. So, I must read the Bible a lot. I can also expect the Spirit to give me abilities to do God’s work, and to direct my path in that work. I can expect him to be at my side, a paraclete, to counsel me and bring to my mind truth about things I am thinking about (John 16:13). He will make it possible for me to understand the Bible. I cannot understand the Bible without him (1 Corinthians 2:13-14). The Spirit gives me spiritual understanding beyond my natural mind so that I can have the understanding that is not based in normal logic or visible proof. Instead it is based in faith – the evidence of things unseen.
So, someone may ask, what do we actually do? What is first? What is next, etc.?
The safest way to begin to understand about being led by the Spirit is to look into the Bible and see examples there. There are many instances of men and women being directed by God in the Old Testament. But to make sure that we are teaching doctrine that is unquestionably “for the Church” let us look only in the New Testament.
In the Acts there are many things that were done by men who were directed by the Holy Spirit. But, again, these men were the fathers of the church. It was Paul, Peter, Timothy and many other Apostles or people with special missions. In order to be sure that we are teaching what is for the average member of the Body of Christ we will confine ourselves to what is said to people in the letters to the churches.
In the letters of Paul, Peter and John there are many behaviors that are done in the Spirit. Here is a list that may be incomplete: We can do these things “in” or “through” the Spirit:
Exist; begin; be made perfect; walk(behave); pray; live; wait for hope; sow and reap; grieve; despise; quench; fellowship; love; obey; use the Bible(sword)
And, the Holy Spirit does these things “in”, “with”, “for”, “to”, “through” us:
Is given to us; bears witness; makes intercession; reveals things; gives manifestations (gifts); baptizes into the Body of Christ; is earnest for us; leads us; produces fruit; gives us access to the Father; provides a means for us to be a habitation of God; strengthens us; fills us; speaks; sanctifies; quickens
In none of these places is it told how a person who does the things in the Spirit, or has the Spirit act in him, recognizes that he is functioning in the Spirit or at the leading of the Spirit. It doesn’t say he can see it, feel it, prove it by evidence or deduction. So, then, how can a person know that he is actually operating in concert or connection with the Holy Spirit? The answer is found in the teaching about the human condition in Romans 6.
Let me begin with some comments on verses 1 – 12.
We are free from the power of sin. We died with Christ. We were baptized in water as a demonstration of this truth. Sin has no more power over us. We should consider ourselves dead to sin and in a new life with Christ as our only resource. Christ died to sin and arose again. So then we also have the privilege to be in the same condition. We should not allow our bodies to sin.
Verses 13 – 15
We should not yield our members to the sin nature. Above, we were told not to allow sin to rule our bodies. This is now more specific. We should not yield our body parts to the sin nature. The arms, legs, brain, tongue, eyes, ears, and all other parts that we have control over (not heart or lungs, etc) should be yielded to God. It doesn’t say it here but what actually happens is that we offer up our bodies as a living sacrifice (Romans 12:1). Which person of the Godhead accepts them? Well, the Holy Spirit is living within us, so it must be Him.
Verse 16
We can consciously yield to “obedience” (the Holy Spirit) or to sin. This is our responsibility. We have a free will. Before we were born again we did not have any freedom at all. Jump to verse 20 and see that we were “free from righteousness” when we were servants of sin (unsaved). We didn’t have the ability to do anything but sin. Now, we are able to yield our members to the Holy Spirit. Notice the teaching of verse 16: “Do you not know that to whom you yield you will obey?” Do we know this? It is automatic. If we yield to sin, we will sin. It is easy! Very natural for humans! But the principle works the other way too. If we yield to obedience, we will do righteousness. That is automatic too. And why? Because the Holy Spirit will meet us at that point and take control. We never yield our members up to a vacuum. We always yield either to sin or God. And either one will take us immediately and keep us until we withdraw. When we realize we are in sin and withdraw ourselves from that behavior, we find that we have the power to do that. We have power over our members. So, too, if we have yielded up our members to God, we can also withdraw them and be disobedient at anytime. We have the power to make decisions. But we should KNOW, as it says in the verse, what it is we are doing and the seriousness of it.
Verses 17 – 23
God sees us as perfect in Christ. The work is finished. We need to work out our salvation but these last verses speak as if we already have done that. God speaks to us here in the past tense. We have been made free and we are now His servants. We are producing fruit and enjoying eternal life.
In this 6th chapter of Romans is found the only clear test as to whether YOU have yielded your body to Christ. That test is in your will. You know who you are yielding to and so does God. You can have feelings about this. That is fine, but feelings are not the test. “Feeling spiritual” is not proof that you are behaving in the Spirit. It is necessary for you to be honest with yourself and decide if you are currently yielded to the Lord or not. Check your will. And then if you have yielded, then you can be sure that He has taken control and as long as you don’t withdraw from Him, your ministry, your love, your work, your prayer, your worship, your housework, your business, your relations with your neighbors and colleagues, all are being led, by the Holy Spirit
Speaking realistically, I must say that the time we actually are consciously yielding to the Spirit of God is often interrupted. We do it for a few minutes and then we slip back into being yielded to self or sin and we are no longer useful to God. Then we are called on to minister or to make a major decision and we know we need the Spirit’s leading in this so we yield to Him again. Then after a time we slip back into our old ways. I do not believe that we are yielded to the Spirit if we are not actively willing it. If we are not making a conscious choice to yield to Him, I think we normally slip back into self and sin. Maybe we do not do any big sins, but we are not useful to God while in this state. We are just wandering along in the flesh. The flesh cannot please God. So, being led by the Spirit is something that we need to concentrate on and learn to do over a long period of time. God knows this. He is patient. This is the promise of Philippians 1:6 and 2:12 -13. The chief way the Bible gives for helping us stay in this yielded position is found in 2 Cor. 3:18, Hebrews 12:1-2 and also in Colossions 3:1-2. It is dependent on where our focus is.
The verses I have listed show different ways in which the Spirit communicates with us: teaching, showing, equipping, witnessing, leading. It is not a complete list. There are more. I would like to focus on the leading of the Spirit because understanding this valuable ability can really help us to be useful Christians. (Notice that the English Bible uses lower-case “s” to spell the human spirit and capital “S” for the Holy Spirit.)
Do you know your spirit? Every person has a spirit. Do you know what yours is like? Have you ever used it? Is it the same as a soul? We can go to our minds and remember and think about issues but can you go to your spirit, as it says in Romans 8:16, and hear the Holy Spirit witnessing to yours that you are a child of God? I think the easiest way for EVERY Christian to know what his spirit is like, is for him to remember the time when he asked Christ to be his saviour. You know, we only ask for forgiveness and salvation when the Holy Spirit communicates with our human spirit and convicts us of our sin, as it says in John 16:8-9. We hear Him and respond and accept Christ.
We can identify our spirits as what it is in us that reacts to truth from the Word of God.
Either it reacts with acceptance, or it rejects. The Bible says that the Spirit reproves the world of sin. And, since the Spirit speaks to our spirit, the part of us that is touched must be our spirit. If a Christian can remember that time in his life and remember what it was like to communicate, at that time, with the Holy Spirit in his human spirit, then what I am saying will make a lot of sense.
The human spirit is a real thing. Scientists may be able to explain emotions, ideas and interests in terms of hormones, nerve synapses and brain chemistry. God certainly made all of that. We cannot open a person’s skull and find the parts in there that could be put in a jar and labeled “human spirit” but those parts certainly play a part in the operation of our spirit. But we are simple people. We need to be able to just use our spirit without necessarily knowing what it is made of. The spirit is what gives the body life. Luke 8:55; Luke 23:46. In Genesis 2:7 it says that God breathed into the man he made out of dust and that man became a living soul. The Hebrew and Greek words for “spirit” in the New and Old Testament are the same as for breath or wind – air that is moving. What God breathed into man was spirit.
We know that the human spirit knows the deep things of a man (1 Cor.2:11) and that it can search out the things that we don’t know about ourselves (Proverbs 20:27.) In 1 Cor. 2:9 it tells us that we cannot understand the things God has prepared for us through sight, hearing or imagination but that they are made known to us by the Spirit of God. Singing and praying in the spirit (1 Cor 14:15) is contrasted with doing those things with the understanding so we can see that knowing something in our spirit is not intellectual. Using our spirit to communicate with God is not based on understanding. In fact, if we remember the exhortation of Proverbs 3:5 it says not to lean toward our own understanding. But, this does not mean that we will not understand with our spirit. If we communicate with God in our spirit, we will have true understanding. Yes, we are to understand with our spirits things that our minds cannot comprehend.
Continuing in 1 Cor. 2, the ability of man to use his mind is contrasted with the knowledge God gives by his Spirit. What it teaches here is that natural, or non-spiritual men cannot know the things of God, but spiritual men know them by the use of their spirit in connection to the Spirit of God. This enables them to understand and make godly decisions. Practically speaking, when I need to decide something, I can count on God’s Holy Spirit to remind me of things that are in the Bible and to help me apply them to the present situation. This means that I must read the Bible a lot. The promise in John 14:26 is that the Holy Spirit will bring to our remembrance all the things that Christ has said. If we have never heard or read the things that Christ has said we can not be reminded of them. So, I must read the Bible a lot. I can also expect the Spirit to give me abilities to do God’s work, and to direct my path in that work. I can expect him to be at my side, a paraclete, to counsel me and bring to my mind truth about things I am thinking about (John 16:13). He will make it possible for me to understand the Bible. I cannot understand the Bible without him (1 Corinthians 2:13-14). The Spirit gives me spiritual understanding beyond my natural mind so that I can have the understanding that is not based in normal logic or visible proof. Instead it is based in faith – the evidence of things unseen.
So, someone may ask, what do we actually do? What is first? What is next, etc.?
The safest way to begin to understand about being led by the Spirit is to look into the Bible and see examples there. There are many instances of men and women being directed by God in the Old Testament. But to make sure that we are teaching doctrine that is unquestionably “for the Church” let us look only in the New Testament.
In the Acts there are many things that were done by men who were directed by the Holy Spirit. But, again, these men were the fathers of the church. It was Paul, Peter, Timothy and many other Apostles or people with special missions. In order to be sure that we are teaching what is for the average member of the Body of Christ we will confine ourselves to what is said to people in the letters to the churches.
In the letters of Paul, Peter and John there are many behaviors that are done in the Spirit. Here is a list that may be incomplete: We can do these things “in” or “through” the Spirit:
Exist; begin; be made perfect; walk(behave); pray; live; wait for hope; sow and reap; grieve; despise; quench; fellowship; love; obey; use the Bible(sword)
And, the Holy Spirit does these things “in”, “with”, “for”, “to”, “through” us:
Is given to us; bears witness; makes intercession; reveals things; gives manifestations (gifts); baptizes into the Body of Christ; is earnest for us; leads us; produces fruit; gives us access to the Father; provides a means for us to be a habitation of God; strengthens us; fills us; speaks; sanctifies; quickens
In none of these places is it told how a person who does the things in the Spirit, or has the Spirit act in him, recognizes that he is functioning in the Spirit or at the leading of the Spirit. It doesn’t say he can see it, feel it, prove it by evidence or deduction. So, then, how can a person know that he is actually operating in concert or connection with the Holy Spirit? The answer is found in the teaching about the human condition in Romans 6.
Let me begin with some comments on verses 1 – 12.
We are free from the power of sin. We died with Christ. We were baptized in water as a demonstration of this truth. Sin has no more power over us. We should consider ourselves dead to sin and in a new life with Christ as our only resource. Christ died to sin and arose again. So then we also have the privilege to be in the same condition. We should not allow our bodies to sin.
Verses 13 – 15
We should not yield our members to the sin nature. Above, we were told not to allow sin to rule our bodies. This is now more specific. We should not yield our body parts to the sin nature. The arms, legs, brain, tongue, eyes, ears, and all other parts that we have control over (not heart or lungs, etc) should be yielded to God. It doesn’t say it here but what actually happens is that we offer up our bodies as a living sacrifice (Romans 12:1). Which person of the Godhead accepts them? Well, the Holy Spirit is living within us, so it must be Him.
Verse 16
We can consciously yield to “obedience” (the Holy Spirit) or to sin. This is our responsibility. We have a free will. Before we were born again we did not have any freedom at all. Jump to verse 20 and see that we were “free from righteousness” when we were servants of sin (unsaved). We didn’t have the ability to do anything but sin. Now, we are able to yield our members to the Holy Spirit. Notice the teaching of verse 16: “Do you not know that to whom you yield you will obey?” Do we know this? It is automatic. If we yield to sin, we will sin. It is easy! Very natural for humans! But the principle works the other way too. If we yield to obedience, we will do righteousness. That is automatic too. And why? Because the Holy Spirit will meet us at that point and take control. We never yield our members up to a vacuum. We always yield either to sin or God. And either one will take us immediately and keep us until we withdraw. When we realize we are in sin and withdraw ourselves from that behavior, we find that we have the power to do that. We have power over our members. So, too, if we have yielded up our members to God, we can also withdraw them and be disobedient at anytime. We have the power to make decisions. But we should KNOW, as it says in the verse, what it is we are doing and the seriousness of it.
Verses 17 – 23
God sees us as perfect in Christ. The work is finished. We need to work out our salvation but these last verses speak as if we already have done that. God speaks to us here in the past tense. We have been made free and we are now His servants. We are producing fruit and enjoying eternal life.
In this 6th chapter of Romans is found the only clear test as to whether YOU have yielded your body to Christ. That test is in your will. You know who you are yielding to and so does God. You can have feelings about this. That is fine, but feelings are not the test. “Feeling spiritual” is not proof that you are behaving in the Spirit. It is necessary for you to be honest with yourself and decide if you are currently yielded to the Lord or not. Check your will. And then if you have yielded, then you can be sure that He has taken control and as long as you don’t withdraw from Him, your ministry, your love, your work, your prayer, your worship, your housework, your business, your relations with your neighbors and colleagues, all are being led, by the Holy Spirit
Speaking realistically, I must say that the time we actually are consciously yielding to the Spirit of God is often interrupted. We do it for a few minutes and then we slip back into being yielded to self or sin and we are no longer useful to God. Then we are called on to minister or to make a major decision and we know we need the Spirit’s leading in this so we yield to Him again. Then after a time we slip back into our old ways. I do not believe that we are yielded to the Spirit if we are not actively willing it. If we are not making a conscious choice to yield to Him, I think we normally slip back into self and sin. Maybe we do not do any big sins, but we are not useful to God while in this state. We are just wandering along in the flesh. The flesh cannot please God. So, being led by the Spirit is something that we need to concentrate on and learn to do over a long period of time. God knows this. He is patient. This is the promise of Philippians 1:6 and 2:12 -13. The chief way the Bible gives for helping us stay in this yielded position is found in 2 Cor. 3:18, Hebrews 12:1-2 and also in Colossions 3:1-2. It is dependent on where our focus is.
posted by Biblical Christianity at 2:17 AM
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