Holy Spirit
My last two blogs have been about how God’s showing Himself
to me through peace and prayer. This blog is about how God has very
clearly
shown Himself to me through the Holy Spirit, and I believe really helped
me
experience the peace I’ve talked about so often.
Before I started the World Race process I wouldn’t exactly call myself familiar
with the Holy Spirit. I knew He existed – I mean the Trinity isn’t exactly a
trinity with only the Father and Son. I think I might have even experienced the
Spirit a couple of times during some really good worship sessions, but that’s
about it. However, I feel that God began to bless me with more of the Holy
Spirit as soon as I submitted my application for the World Race. I don’t know
if he was blessing me for my faith or knew I’d need it this year and figured I
could use a head start.
I was accepted by the World Race in February and shortly after this I was
telling a couple of friends about it and how it worked. Somehow the topic of
team formation came up and I uttered the statement “There’s these things
called team leaders, but I don’t have to worry about that. I’ll never be one of
those.” My friends asked me why I felt that way and told me I’d be a good
leader. I thanked them for their thoughts but thought they were very much wrong
and after our conversation ended hopped in my car. I hadn’t been in my car for
more than 30 seconds when I heard what I knew could only be the Holy Spirit talking to
me. It wasn’t an audible voice, but I knew something was different – it
definitely wasn’t me thinking these things. It told me I should really consider
what my friends had just said – that me being a team leader wasn’t as crazy as
I thought. This same thing happened to me several times throughout the next few
months: sometimes when I was talking about the WR, other times out of nowhere.
Each time, however, it got stronger. It was so strong that going into training
camp I was 98% sure I was going to be a team leader, and the 2% was the fear
and doubt I was letting reside in me. This voice told me for a fact I was going to be
team leader and that leading a WR team was only the first step in something
great God had planned for me. I still don’t know what that is, but it excites
me. I’m so grateful for the clear word the Spirit provided me for the days
where leading is difficult or not fun because I always know that I’m where God
put me and since he put me there He’ll provide for me.
So it would probably be awesome enough if that was it for the Holy Spirit,
right? I mean He talks to me about something months in advance and it comes
true. Pretty cool stuff. But He wasn’t finished yet.
Beginning at training camp I have actually experienced the physical presence of the Holy Spirit on multiple occasions in the last few months. At first this definitely scared me somewhat. It was so unknown. (Here’s a good representation of how I felt from Muppet Christmas Carol http://tinyurl.com/256s6ha, and considering the food we ate at training camp this definitely seemed possible.) I have felt His physical touch, I’ve felt Him stir inside of me and lead me to action I never could have done alone, and He has given me the spiritual gift of being able to have the Spirit speak through me.
Since these things were so unknown to me at first I began to investigate. I looked up all the Scriptures in my Bible pertaining to the Spirit and fortunately I had brought Forgotten God, a book by Francis Chan on the Holy Spirit, with me and I read through it. I could talk about the things I learned for days, but here’s the most important thing I gained. We’re better off having the Holy Spirit than Jesus. Jesus says so Himself in John 16:7 – “But I tell you the truth: It is for your good that I am going away. Unless I go away the Counselor will not come to you; but if I go, I will send Him to you.” How awesome is that!? As believers, we’re better off because the Spirit lives in each of us (1 Cor 3:16), and is always with us. The Holy Spirit, a part of the trinity, resides in our body. He lives with us and in us. He guides us and even prays for us.
After I realized this, my desire for the Holy Spirit grew even more. I pray for more encounters like the ones I’ve had – where I open my eyes from prayer and worship to see who it was touching my hands and see nobody there, where I find myself dancing for the Lord, or where I find myself being led to lay hands on others while I pray for them and feeling my body tingle as the Spirit’s power flows into them as I pray. If it’s for my own good that Jesus left departed this earth and left us with the Spirit in His place then why wouldn’t I want to experience the Holy Spirit as often as possible? If Jesus Christ were walking the earth right now we’d all do whatever we could to see Him, touch Him, speak to Him. But there’s even better news than that: the Spirit of Truth is here and we can speak to Him any moment we please.
So that’s how the Spirit is moving in my life in addition to my experiences with peace and prayer…and I’m not even 7 weeks into my trip. I can’t wait to see how I’m going to be stretched and grown in my remaining 9 months. All I know is it’s going to be incredible. Why? My roommate the Holy Spirit already told me so.
