Three months have passed with a lot of drastic changes in my life. Looking back, the journey was all about God the Holy Spirit. When I first started I never expected the shift moving of events and transforming power of the Holy Spirit. I was full of my own ideas of doing some religious services on my own. However, as I went through them, day after day, I realized that they were not as simple as I initially thought. For example, the momentum would have slowed down and died off if I had to carry on depending on my own effort to live Biblically and interceding as a church member performing his religious duty.
Thank God it was not like that. The Holy Spirit began to emerge and take charge as I continued to seek Him. The Holy Spirit took charge of the time, the length of time, the contents, the forms (methods), and the outcome. The Holy Spirit was the teacher, the motivating factor, the initiator, the power supplier, the master. It was indeed an exciting journey.
Most of the events happened in the inside. Some manifested in the outside of my being. Signs and wonders. For example, prior to the transformation, I dreaded singing. During church worship most times I maintained my silence. Occasionally I sang when the songs were familiar and meaningful to me. In the past three months I developed a liking for singing and even sing songs in the Spirit and some are really nice to my ears.
Another area of dread was prayer (when I had nothing to pray for). I stopped joining a group of business men who met during lunch time to pray, many years ago, not because I could not spare the time, but because I did not quite believe that those prayers worked. Many years ago one brother in Christ made it a point to come to my office during lunch time to pray and we were enthusiastic for awhile. After sometime we reduced the frequency and finally we stopped the prayer session entirely. I had led cell groups for years and prayed the routine prayers week after week, month after month, until none of us felt them really helping much. Singing and prayers became part of the rituals we did as part of the religion.
When the Holy Spirit took over, I was revamped inside out. Songs and prayers could stretch from one hour to two and half hours! All by myself! Sleeping four hours and not feeling tired the next day was not rare. How did the Holy Spirit take over?
I believe it started when I started to take God seriously. My early morning worship time helped me to be focused on God and the more focused I was the more I could sense the reality of His presence. At first I used faith to believe whether I sensed anything or not. Then I learned to appreciate the songs I sang. Then I became bold enough to ask the Holy Spirit to choose songs for me and subsequently prayers for me. Lately I asked Him to show me verses to read. God helped me a lot in this progress. He let me see some pictures, some words, and hear some tunes in my mind/heart. As I received messages through all these mediums (words, pictures, dreams, songs) I grew bolder and more confident of receiving the guidance of the Holy Spirit and answers from God.
Yes, it takes time and effort to seek God. However, it is worthwhile to give all to this quest. I never thought I could hear God’s voice before. But now I can even persuade others that they too can hear God’s voice. Believe me, it is wonderful.
Jesus has promised very clearly the following:
1. He will show Himself to those who love Him.
2. He will come and stay with those who love Him (those who keep Jesus’ commandments).
3. God will send the Holy Spirit to teach us all things and about what Jesus has said.
John 14:21 “He who has My commandments and keeps them, it is he who loves Me. And he who loves Me will be loved by My Father, and I will love him and manifest Myself to him.”
John 14:23 “Jesus answered and said to him, “If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word; and My Father will love him, and We will come to him and make Our home with him.”
John 14:26 “But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all things that I said to you.”
AAA Jack
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