who can tell the wind where to blow?
He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. (Revelation 2.7)
Lately, I have been reflecting on the person and ministry of the Holy Spirit— frequently described as the “shy member” of the Trinity. His purpose is to be “another Jesus” and to execute the purposes of God (Father and Son) in the Church and in the world (see John 14.16ff; 15.26f; 16.4-15).
The Spirit is distinct from the Church. Nowhere in the New Testament is He called the "Spirit of the Church." No church or individual can possess or own Him any more than she can own the air she breathes. He must own us. Someone has observed, “If you think of Him as an influence, you'll be anxious to have more of it, but if you think of Him as a person, you will desire that He may have more of you.”
In the first and second centuries a group of people called the Montanists experienced great blessings of the Holy Spirit, but they went wrong when they claimed to embody the Holy Spirit. They dismissed other Christians as carnal and shallow and refused to allow their teachings to be subject to the testing of Scripture. Consequently, the Church and the Montanists had nothing to do with each other except to indict each other with aspersions of heresy and demonic influence. As we seek to be filled with the Holy Spirit, let us learn a very practical lesson from history: we must beware not to write off those who do not have the same spiritual experience as we do nor to discredit the empowering of the Holy Spirit because of the attitudes, errors or excesses, we see in some individuals or churches. Scripture is clear: every congregation — every Christian— needs the life support system of the Holy Spirit to live abundantly and with complete joy (see John 10.10; 15.11; 16.21f). The true life we hunger for cannot be experienced without Him!
Since He is not tied to the Church, no single congregation, individual, group, or denomination can monopolize Him.
We cannot
tame Him,
coax Him,
coerce Him,
bargain with Him,
flatter Him,
order Him,
or manipulate Him.
All we can do is
ask Him,
yield to Him, and
surrender before Him.
He will not fit into our well-ordered systems or methodologies. How He works in one situation will not be merely duplicated in another. As Jesus said, “He is like the wind, and no one can tell the wind where to blow.” (John 3.8) — all we can do is hoist our sails!
May I ask you, dear reader, to take a moment right now to pray for a fresh empowering of God’s Holy Spirit in your life— that you might intimately know God’s love, power, peace, and courage at work within you. This next week, I will be praying for a fresh reception of the Holy Spirit throughout our Western District… would you join me?
