The Spirit of life
..is one of the names given to the Holy Spirit, and unlike Shakespeare’s take on the rose - each name given to the person’s of God reveals something true and helpful for our understanding of that Person.
“I have come that they may have life, and that they may have it more abundandtly” (John 10:10)
“It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh profits nothing. The words that I speak to you are Spirit, and they are life” (John 6:63).
“The law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death” (Romans 8:2)
“The Lord is the Spirit; and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty” (2 Cor. 3:17)
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Perhaps they’re not so original lyrics - but when writing my first song in response to the faithfulness of God I had witnessed I sang “I feel life in me again, I’m brought to life”.. “Your faithfulness fills me with hope”.
This wasn’t an emotion that came one day and left the next it was the sovereign Spirit of life within me pleased with my choices and choosing to bless me with life in the Now.
“I believe that only one person in a thousand knows the trick of living in the present. Most of spend 58 minutes of every hour either living in the past, regretting for lost joys, or feeling shame for things badly done (both utterly useless and weakening); or living in the future which we either long for or dread. The only way to live is to accept each minute as an unrepeatable miracle, which is exactly what it is - A miracle that will not be repeated”
I’m not a masterpiece just yet - but I am being transformed from the inside out and I want those who know me to be able to be a witness to the greatness of God. “Mark, You better make good on what you’re talking”.
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I’ve undergone much change already and each day presents a fresh lesson from the Holy Spirit as I pray and read the Word. Here’s a couple of his works in me:
- He made Jesus and the Father real to me
- He made me hungry for the Word
- He became my friend and counsellor
- He put in a song on my lips
- He convicted me of sin
- He gave me the power to overcome that sin
- He’s giving me understanding
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I have been so very thankfull every time I hear news of my friends encountering God in fresh ways - and my prayer is that every believer would start a relationship with the person of the Holy Spirit. It’s not taking our eyes off Jesus, He spoke of Him saying “He will testify of me”. It sounds a little odd as the word tells us that “he dwells within us”, but for me it’s only when I began to get to know Him for myself did I really recieve the great promise that is within me. We spend so long ingnoring him and pushing him away that we don’t even know he’s there. It’s true that when we sin He withdraws also - That’s where the pulling feeling is coming from when we are being tempted and choose to sin. During temptation though He is the power we have to overcome.
“A new heart also will I give you and a new spirit will I put within you: and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh and I will give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes, and you shall keep my judgments and do them. ” (Ezekiel 36.26-27)
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Through the Holy Spirit we can absolutely live the true Life that Jesus spoke about.
July 21st, 2008 at 10:48 am
“for you who revere my name, the sun of righteousness will rise with healing in its wings. And you will go out and leap like calves released from the stall. Malachi 4:2 NIV”
As I read this passage and mediated on some of the comments in this posting, I could not help but compare the Journey that God has put me on in the past twelve months.
God certaintly has away of humbling you when your open to the leading of his spirit. I certaintly have found this out the hard way with recently having moved to a new area away from family and friends to persue a new Career.
Upon moving I experienced a real unsettling in my spirit. I initially put this down to moving into a new environment and I therefore ignored it. At the time I had no doubt that God wanted me here as it was something we had prayed about. Never the less this feeling did not go away.
I went to church to hear the local minister speaking on acts 7, specifically where God had said to “Abraham to leave is native land and family and go to the new land I will show them”. He then went on to talk about how Abraham didn’t fully listen to God as he brought Lot with him. The Crux of the sermon was about “what aren’t we letting go of to recieve gods promiseses in full.”
Although I was encouraged by this message I still felt unsettled in my spirit. 1: That this church wasn’t to be my new home, 2: about new Job.
That night I had an incredible personal encounter with God within my prayer time. He had opened my eyes to the meaning behind the message that day. Before moving, I had prayed to God that i was prepared to move if needed, but with conditions. (Don’t we all) God had given me the desires of my heart, but in doing so was showing me that my desires wern’t his desires and I needed to let go of what I new regarding my career path. There is a little more to this, but that’s it in a nut shell.
“It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh profits nothing. The words that I speak to you are Spirit, and they are life” (John 6:63).”
These words have true meaning to me