Monthly Archives: April 2021
Watch Out!
Acts 5:3&5 “Then Peter said, ‘Ananias, why have you let Satan fill your heart? You lied to the Holy Spirit, and you kept some of the money for yourself.’ As soon as Ananias heard these words, he fell to the floor and died. Everyone who heard about it was terrified.”
In our day, social media will literally explode with this sort of news. Imagine the headline: Pastor snuffs out member’s life for incomplete giving! Or this; Sow correct seed or fall down and die! Bad press! Peter was not in an easy place and I do not envy Peter at all. Read the rest of this entry
Mindful
Joshua 23:11 “So be very careful to love the Lord your God.”
The Holy Spirit is a person you can love and talk to. As we learn to love and learn to communicate with the Holy Spirit, it leads to us learning His moods and understanding His feelings. You need to learn His moods and understand His feelings. While there are certain things that the Lord is not interested in. There are certain areas that God wants to move in. Read the rest of this entry
Walk & Talk
Jer. 33:3 “Ask me, and I will tell you things that you don’t know and can’t find out.” (CEV)
You have to learn to communicate with the Holy Spirit. You have to talk to Him and actually expect Him to talk back to you. Do you think it is spooky or maybe even scary to expect the Holy Spirit to talk back to you? Guess what? The Holy Spirit is already talking to you, you just have not realized it. Ask Him questions and expect His answers. I do not do it as often these days maybe I need to begin to do it again as often as I used to. But years ago, when I meet someone for the first time, as I shake the person’s hand I ask, “Who is this, Holy Spirit?” and He always responds – always! It is so exciting and interactive.
I met a lady back in the day and when I asked the Holy Spirit about her, He said, “She is brutish.” I had never heard the word brutish before. So, I checked the dictionary, there was no Google at the time. The dictionary defined brutish as ‘He that causes pain.’ I understood the Holy Spirit was saying that she will cause me pain. My response? This one cannot hurt a fly. She was so sweet, so gentle, and so beautiful. How can You say she is brutish? I convinced myself that I did not get what the Holy Spirit was saying this time. The truth is that you have to give yourself some bandwidth, sometimes you will not get it right and it is fine. So, I pushed it aside, but it kept coming back to my remembrance. Fast forward two years later, the girl showed me. I could have saved myself all that drama.
With the people you employ, you can save yourself a lot of drama by just asking. The people you bring into your business; you think because somebody just has a bright idea you should partner with the person? You do not know the things that are going on behind the scene. Trust me, you have no clue. But if you ask, God will show you, God will tell you. Years ago, I was travelling, and sitting beside me was an old white frail lady. I put her age at eighty, eighty-five. If I am going to be sitting beside someone for six to eight hours, I want to know who the person is. So, I did not shake her hand or anything, I just said to the Holy Spirit, “Who is this person?” And He said, “She is a missionary.” I looked at her, “This one? How can this old frail woman be a missionary? It is a tough thing to be a missionary. So, I dismissed it.
She was struggling with her seatbelt, I helped her. I wanted to sleep but she would not let me. She kept telling me stories and I ended up not sleeping. Then, she told me that she had been a missionary in Calabar since she was eighteen. She had dedicated her life to the gospel and was now going back home at eighty-five. I was shocked. By now the plane had landed; then she held my hands and she began to pray and prophesy at the top of her voice. I was embarrassed but people that know God sometimes don’t care who is staring. Everything she prophesied has come to pass. The point is this, we need to learn to communicate with the Holy Spirit.
Prayer: Holy Spirit, please tell me things that I do not know and cannot find out, in Jesus Name. Amen!
Doting
Acts 2:2-5 “Suddenly, there was a sound from heaven like the roaring of a mighty windstorm, and it filled the house where they were sitting. Then, what looked like flames or tongues of fire appeared and settled on each of them. And everyone present was filled with the Holy Spirit… “
We sometimes mistake the symbols of the Holy Spirit for the Person of the Holy Spirit. The symbols are important because they show us the characteristics of the Holy Spirit. Fire is a symbol of the Holy Spirit, but the Holy Spirit is not fire. As a symbol, fire characterizes His cleansing, consuming, purifying, illuminating nature. But the Holy Spirit is not fire. Read the rest of this entry
Present Help II
John 16:13-14 “When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all truth. He will not speak on his own but will tell you what he has heard. He will tell you about the future. He will bring me glory by telling you whatever he receives from me.”
Jesus was real to the disciples; the Holy Spirit should be real to us. When the disciples encountered a stormy situation in Luke 8:22-25 [please read] and their boat was about to capsize, they ran to Jesus for help.That same way they depended on Jesus for deliverance and to still their storms when you have a storm, you should run to the Holy Spirit and say, “Spirit of the Living God, please help Your boy.” The disciples ran to Jesus, you run to the Holy Spirit. Read the rest of this entry
Present Help I
Matt. 28:20 “Teach these new disciples to obey all the commands I have given you. And be sure of this: I am with you always, even to the end of the age.”
I want us to start today’s devotion by worshipping God for a little while before we get into the word. Let’s sing this song together: Precious Holy Spirit. We’re in need of You, Come purify our passion. Lord, Come and make us new. We are Standing here before You oh God. Just the way we are. Please take our weakness and Let life flow again. You are brooding Over every darkness; You are causing Light to shine from darkness. I yield my heart, soul, spirit, and body to You.Amen! Read the rest of this entry
Advantage IV
2 Cor.1:22 “and he has identified us as his own by placing the Holy Spirit in our hearts as the first instalment that guarantees everything he has promised us.”
The first thing that you need to do to develop your relationship with the Holy Spirit is, you need to hunger for Him. You need to thirst for Him. If you are not thirsty, you cannot drink the water He is pouring out. You can taste the water, but you cannot really drink the water. Read the rest of this entry
Advantage III
John 14:16-18, & 20 “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… No, I will not abandon you as orphans—I will come to you. …I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in you.”
The fifth benefit of the Holy Spirit is, The Holy Spirit Gives Life To Our Physical Body. The Holy Spirit does not just give spiritual life, He makes you strong and powerful in your physical body just like Samson. Judges 15:14 “As Samson arrived at Lehi, the Philistines came shouting in triumph. But the Spirit of the Lord came powerfully upon Samson, and he snapped the ropes on his arms as if they were burnt strands of flax, and they fell from his wrists.” Read the rest of this entry
Advantage II
Acts 1:8 “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you. And you will be my witnesses, telling people about me everywhere—in Jerusalem, throughout Judea, in Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”
Yesterday, we looked at two benefits of walking with the Holy Spirit and they are: The Holy Spirit Teaches Us To Pray And Gives Us A Prayer Language and The Holy Spirit Comes Bearing Gifts. Read the rest of this entry
Advantage I
John 7:37-38 “On the last day, the climax of the festival, Jesus stood and shouted to the crowds, “Anyone who is thirsty may come to me! Anyone who believes in me may come and drink! For the Scriptures declare, ‘Rivers of living water will flow from his heart.’”
I remember years ago; I was in Northern Nigeria for over a year or thereabout. One day, I was speaking to a group of students, telling them about the Holy Spirit. They had a lot of questions like I did. Read the rest of this entry
