Spirit Empowered Living

John 14

I remember talking with a children ministry pastor about this crazy event I had witnessed. I was sitting in a canoe with a kid that was about 9 years old and it suddenly started to rain, and I was just about to call all the leaders to paddle to the shore because of the rain.

However this kid suggests we should pray the rain away and I responded with of course, I am never one to say we should not pray. I let him pray and to my shock it stopped raining, it actually didn’t rain at all that weekend, with over cast predicted there was no rain.

I was in shock about how this kid was filled with the Holy Spirit and did this.

My Children's Ministry Pastor then responded with this

“there is no child size Holy Spirit, there is one Spirit and it comes in full power”

Maybe you might feel small because of your age or how much grown right now, and you may feel that even though you are just a teenager that you cannot do great things as a Christian.

However I really hope tonight you see that it’s not your size or age that matters but it is rather the Holy Spirit who works through you and how you live off that relationship with Him that really matters to how you are seen by others.

The Holy Spirit is God in us and is our topic tonight, as Marion talked about him two weeks ago we must see that there is something important about the third part of the trinity, that we cannot just focus on the Father and Son but the Holy Spirit plays a vital role in our faith today.

Lets dive in to John 14:

John 14:15–17 NIV

“If you love me, keep my commands. And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another advocate to help you and be with you forever— the Spirit of truth. The world cannot accept him, because it neither sees him nor knows him. But you know him, for he lives with you and will be in you.

Jesus promises us that when we follow him that we will receive the Spirit of truth, that being another name for the Holy Spirit. When we follow Christ that we would receive the Holy Spirit.

Later on he refers to the Holy Spirit in a few different ways, but the main point I want us to look at is three things,

1. Who gets the Holy Spirit

2 & 3 What is his purpose, although there is more purposes for the Holy Spirit in our life this is two ways he says it in John 14.

The first piece we need to see is that the Holy Spirit is someone not something, this someone is God and resides in us with his power. As Jesus said he will give the spirit of truth to us, that the Holy Spirit maybe with us as we live our life.

The Holy Spirit cannot be seen by the world and the world cannot have him, only those who follow the commands of Jesus.

So if you are a follow of Jesus then you are who he is talking about. if you made the decision for follow Jesus you have followed his commands, it does not matter if you accepted christ two minutes ago or 2 years ago, you are at the point of being able to be filled with the Holy Spirit.

The filling of the Holy Spirit is just a prayer, and I will get into that after I explain a bit about what the HS does for us.

The Holy Spirit is like a guide,

John 14:26–27 NIV

But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you. Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.

That first the Holy Spirit would be with you and give you instruction from the father. So the Holy Spirit brings this out of world wisdom in to your each and every day, that when you walk through life that the Holy Spirit will being acting in your favour to show God’s handiwork to you and his handiwork from you. That he would not control you, but rather partner with you to help build up your life for Christ and impact the world on his behalf. It’s a huge blessing.

The other half is that the Holy Spirit gives peace, as Jesus said peace I give you.

The Holy Spirit gives off peace that we do not know with out him. It’s an unnatural peace that there could be a storm of whatever kind, physical or a mental storm happening in your life but yet you feel peace in it all. There has been many times in my life and others Christians lives where they will go through the gutter and have the worst experiences, but feel this unreal sense of peace in their life.

That is two of the things that the Holy spirit does, and there is more that we will look into as we continue to meet over the year,

things like the fruit of the spirit or the gifts of the spirit or even how the Holy Spirit worked through the apostles in the book of Acts.

There is so much more but I actually want to look at how we receive the Holy Spirit

When you confess Jesus as Lord you receive the Holy Spirit, but for some of us that might not feel true. You might have been feeling through my message like that is something that you want. If that is the case, Paul in Ephesians writes that the way we have the Spirit is that we believe we have the Spirit.

So if tonight you are feeling like you do not have the Spirit, like you are missing sense of peace or you want to receive that guidance, you want to be empowered as a Christian, then I want to invite you to talk to me or your small group leaders who have all been given anointing oil, they will put some on your for-head and lead you through a prayer and then also pray over you that you would receive the Holy Spirit.

Have you ever heard of the Holy Spirit before? Where?

What do you think the Holy Spirit is?

How do you think the Holy Spirit can help you in everyday life?

For those of you who have made a commitment with Jesus do you feel like you have the power of the Holy Spirit?

Does anyone want to receive the Holy Spirit today? It’s ok to think about it, we will ask later in the year as well for those who are not sure right now.