Are You Holding The Holy Spirit Captive?
Hungry - Day 11
“If you love me, obey my commandments. And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Advocate, who will never leave you. He is the Holy Spirit, who leads into all truth. The world cannot receive him, because it isn’t looking for him and doesn’t recognize him. But you know him, because he lives with you now and later will be in you." John 14:15-17.
The Holy Spirit is the very presence of the living God. He chooses to dwell in us, with us and through us. Isn't it interesting that Jesus said the world cannot find the Holy Spirit because they aren't looking for him? Is it possible that Christians also miss the Holy Spirit's daily interaction if we aren't actively engaging with him?
Totally!
We are saved by grace. It is a free gift. No one can earn or deserve it. This is God's unmerrited love. God's accomplished work on the cross is our price for freedom; there is nothing we can do to earn salvation (Ephesians 2:8-9). But there is a difference between our salvation (which is freely given) and the Kingdom of God, which is worked out within us and taken by force on the earth.
The presence of God is the Kingdom of God. Often Christians accept our salvation but don't realize that the power of the gospel on the earth is actually the result of our submission to God's will over our own.
"So then, my dear friends, just as you have always obeyed, not only in my presence but even more in my absence, continue working out your salvation with awe and reverence, for the one bringing forth in you both the desire and the effort—for the sake of his good pleasure—is God. Do everything without grumbling or arguing, so that you may be blameless and pure, children of God without blemish though you live in a crooked and perverse society, in which you shine as lights in the world." Phillipians 2:12-15 NET.
When we accept our salvation but refuse to walk in freedom from our sin through the righteousness of Christ that's released through obedience, we hold God's promises and blessings for our lives, captive.
Question: Resolve to live under the free gift of grace, fully receiving the righteousness of Christ that marks me as his own. I will not live under guilt or shame but neither will I tolerate my sin or justify it with excuses. Rather, I will live in God's grace while violently rejecting anything in me that hinders his righteousness.
- Deanna
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