Some Thoughts On The Holy Spirit

Not everyone cares to talk about the Holy Spirit all that much, but i feel we must. As a community of believers, as Christians, as the burning light of God in this world, we must speak not only of God and Christ, but the power that drives us, that fuels us, that energetically sets our hearts aflame and leads us.
I'm not sure the reason the Christian community overlooks the Holy Spirit. It could be due to fear of blasphemy, as blasphemy against the Spirit is said to be the only unforgivable sin.
But think thusly; if speaking ill of your father would get you kicked out of the house and left on the streets, would you do it? Of course not. Would you not talk about them for fear of it? Unlikely. You would act as though they were your parents.
Why then, when speaking about the infinitely merciful and gracious God, do we speak of His Spirit with such reluctance? We should speak of the Holy Spirit all the more, that we have not been kicked out of the house for all the other wrongs we've committed against Him!

Now, the Holy Spirit is an "all-consuming" Fire. He's not "somewhat-consuming," or even "mostly-consuming." He is "all-consuming." Beginning to end, He is there.
We speak of God, of Christ, of salvation, even of the gifts of the Spirit, but we do not speak enough -could not speak enough!- of the Holy Spirit. Speaking of the gifts but not of the source is like saying "I got a guitar," but not saying it was from your friend. It's a massive overlook.
He wants us to give Him glory, but the accreditation is often left out, or worse, given unto ourselves (especially when speaking of words of knowledge or wisdom, or of faith or of love, which are gifts of the Spirit). This attitude is a disgrace. All He wants is for us to recognize Him and say "He gave me this guitar--and He's giving me lessons on it, too."

Again i say, He is an all-consuming Fire. He burns within us passionately, and with the same passion and power as that which was in the Word that said "Let there be light!"
That kind of power is frightening. It can create or destroy with but a single word. That is where the fear of God flows from; not in a terror that pushes us away, but a fear of being on the wrong side of the power behind creation (that is often initially what drives us to Him, but love does not come from being "scared to" something). He does not align Himself with you; you align yourself with Him. And we don't always fear being on the wrong side of this force, you fear being away from this force. This fear is a dependency. And it develops into love; just as a bear cub is terrified of being away from its mother, we should be infinitely more terrified of being separated from the Holy Spirit.

The Holy Spirit is not some strange, shy thing. He is bold. He is perhaps the boldest characteristic of God.
God reigns. Christ atones. The Holy Spirit links the two together inside of us.
I say He is bold because it is the characteristic of God that makes Him real to us. Faith is a gift of the Spirit.
It's bold because it drives us to be like Christ, it drives us to love God, and it drives us to live for God. Whether or not we give this credit to the Holy Spirit, it is the reason we can preach, we can teach, we can love, we can hope, we can live.
The Holy Spirit is the invisible qualities of God mentioned in Romans 1, the undeniable aspect that makes us to be without excuse.
He's not something to tip-toe around while avoiding eye contact. It is the living force of God living within us, His Spirit, His "Breath of Life" given to Adam and Eve. It is what makes a son of man into a child of God, and transforms the dried-up bones scattering about the valley into a standing army of flesh-and-bone.

Come From The Four Winds

I've been revisiting Ezekiel 36 and 37 lately, and trying to piece together all the ways they tie in together.
In Ezekiel 36, we read that God is going to remove our hearts of stone and put a soft heart of flesh in us, and put His Spirit within us to deliver us from uncleanness and to make us feel shame for our sins and, therefore, turn away from it. For His sake, He would act (this could easily be taken to mean He would set us apart for His glory).
In chapter 37, much of it is about the valley of dry bones, where God asks Ezekiel if the bones could live again. Ezekiel doesn't say yes or no, but rather the only true answer for any question, "O Lord God, You know."* (v. 3)
He's told to prophesy to the bones, and it describes the flesh forming over them. But there is one thing lacking still.

"But there was no breath in them." (There was no הָר֑וּחַ in them.) (v. 8)

There are several translations for the Hebrew word for breath (הָר֑וּחַ).
One is breath. Another is wind. Another, get this, is spirit.
The bodies lived, but they had no spirit.

Because of this, God commands Ezekiel to prophesy again, this time to the "breath."
"'Prophesy to the breath; prophesy, son of man, and say to the breath, Thus says the Lord God: Come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe on these slain, that they may live.' So I prophesied as he commanded me, and the breath came into them, and they lived and stood on their feet, an exceedingly great army." (v. 9-10)

"And you shall know that I am the Lord, when I open your graves, and raise you from your graves, O my people. And I will put my Spirit within you, and you shall live, and I will place you in your own land. Then you shall know that I am the Lord; I have spoken, and I will do it, declares the Lord." (v. 13-14)
This entire setting is, from the prior chapter through this one, a prophecy about Christ and the Holy Spirit; through Christ we have resurrection, and then He puts His Spirit in us to live.

What i find perhaps most interesting is this: "Come from the four winds, O breath..."

He's told to tell the Spirit to come from every direction and breathe on the slain, that they may live.
He's telling the Spirit to come from everywhere. The Spirit would be spread across the earth, in every nation; in Jew and Gentile, if you will, and those will make up the resurrected and living people of God, His children. The army of Israel would not consist of a specific race, but people of all ethnicities who have His Spirit within them.

* This should be our mantra in life. As it says in the New Testament (James 4), "...yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes. Instead you ought to say, 'If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that.'"
It's not for us to even say that our next breath will come, only God knows, and only by His will can air enter our lungs.

Miracles . . .

In Matthew 12, Jesus heals a man who was blind, mute, and possessed by demons. It doesn't say how long it took this man to recover sight, but i'm assuming it was rather instant.

In Matthew 15, crowds brought the lame, crippled, blind, etc., and set them at Jesus' feet. It says He healed them. It doesn't say how long, it merely says that He healed them.

In John 9, however, there's a variation. People thought this particular man or his parents had sinned, as he was born blind. Jesus said “It was not that this man sinned, or his parents, but that the works of God might be displayed in him." This man was born blind for the purpose of becoming an example of God's ability to heal later in his life.
Not only this, there was action, though minor, required by this man. He had to go to a certain pool and wash his eyes. After that, he was healed. This strikes me as an act of faith; he could've just touched this man, said "be healed" and it be done. But no. The blind man had to keep the mud in his eyes and wash it out in that specific pool. If i were blind and someone spit in some dirt and put the mud from it in my eyes, i'd probably think they were crazy and wipe it off as soon as possible. But this required a demonstration of faith.

In Luke 18:35-43, He heals one such man who was a beggar. He told the man “Receive your sight; your faith has healed you.” It also says the man received his sight immediately.
"Receive your sight," He said. This man's faith in Jesus healed him. But the way Jesus commanded him, it was as though the man had sight within his grasp, he merely had to take hold of it. And Jesus told him to, so he did, and he could see that very moment.

There's a woman mentioned in Luke 8 who had a discharge of blood for 12 years. She'd spent all her money on trying to be healed by doctors, but none could help her. She approached Jesus and told herself, “If I touch even his garments, I will be made well.”
She had enough faith in Jesus that she believed touching His very clothes would be enough to heal her when every physician she could ever afford had been unable to. And her faith was fulfilled, seeing as she was healed the moment she touched his garment.
This is what i find interesting; Jesus had people swarming Him, and the NIV even says "the crowds almost crushed Him." He wasn't merely surrounded, He was being mobbed; people pressing against Him and crowding Him. When she did touch His garment, He asked who touched Him. Peter responded with “Master, the crowds surround you and are pressing in on you!”
If you were the reason a crowd had formed, and people "almost crushed [you]," it'd be pretty hard to discern one single contact of your shirt. And Peter knew that. But Jesus said this: “Someone touched me, for I perceive that power has gone out from me.”
He felt this woman's faith.
After she had fessed up to it, knowing it was she He was speaking of because her malady had been immediately healed, Jesus said “Daughter, your faith has made you well; go in peace.”
When this happened, it was actually while He was going to heal a dying girl, the only daughter of a man named Jairus (a ruler of the synagogue). Before Jesus had made His way to Jairus' house, the girl had died. He told them she wasn't dead, but sleeping. He took her hand, told her to rise, and her spirit returned, and she woke up.

There may be scientific explanations for many of the miracles He performed, such as maybe His saliva reacting with a mineral in that one specific pool that caused the blind man to see, maybe the woman's issue was working out and it just so happened that it stopped the moment she touched His cloak, maybe the girl was temporarily comatose and woke when He took her by the hand . . . I honestly believe most miracles to be scientifically explainable, but i don't really care if they are or not.
Just because we know the science of a child being formed in the womb doesn't mean it's any less of a miracle. Just because we breath in and know how the oxygen is dispersed into our bloodstream, that doesn't make it less miraculous. Just because there may have been a particular barometric phenomenon causing a cloud to be in front of the Israelites during the day and a fire by night, that doesn't mean it was less of a miracle. Just because we can explain how capillaries burst doesn't mean that Jesus sweating blood in Gethsemane couldn't be supernatural.
I'm not exactly the kind to have the reasoning of a child, as in unquestioning faith. I require proof in most instances. Sometimes there are scientific explanations of how things happen. Sometimes there is none. That doesn't mean they're any less wondrous or miraculous because we can understand them.

When God has the wind gathered into His fists, who am i to ask for explanation of His methods? Yet here i am . . . To quote the NKJV of Proverbs 30:2, "Surely I am more stupid than any man, And do not have the understanding of a man."

Taken For Granted

We can pray and pray and pray with no effect. Maybe to save a friend or family member's life, maybe for financial stability, for a new job, for a relationship, for a new car, etc., and we may get no answer.
God's ears are never closed to the prayers of His children. He hears your cries in the dark of night, He sees your hands raised in surrender, He knows the desires of your heart, He feels the pain you feel . . . And yet He doesn't answer. Why?
He's all powerful and merciful, and He hears every prayer, so why do some go unanswered?

We take for granted He's going to answer because He's merciful and He can.

Do you go up to someone who has thousands of dollars and helped you out before, and say "You know, you gave me $10 before, so can you give me $5 now?" and get upset if they say no? Or would the proper response be to be thankful for the $10 you got in the first place?
The key is with us taking God for granted. We don't see Him as our God, our Savior, our Redeemer, our Hope, our Friend. We see Him as one we can ask and receive from.

We've gotten to where we perceive Him to be a wishing well; throw a penny at it and make a silent wish, and hope for the best.

Instead of being upset about things He hasn't given you, be thankful for the things He's given you with expectation of nothing but thanks in return. And thank Him.

Focus more on thanking Him than making requests, and notice how your perception changes; it becomes easier to concentrate -and stay focused- on good things, reasons to be joyful, and hope in general.

Stop counting unanswered prayers, and start counting blessings you've not had to ask for . . . Like that breath you just took.