Walking in the Spirit
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1 Peter 5:6
1 Peter 5:6
Therefore humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you at the proper time,
THE POWER OF GOD
The “power” is in the Holy Spirit.
but you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be My witnesses both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and even to the remotest part of the earth.”
For indeed He was crucified because of weakness, yet He lives because of the power of God. For we also are weak in Him, yet we will live with Him because of the power of God directed toward you.
The Holy Spirit was limited in what He could do with or for the believer.
John 14:17 “that is the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it does not see Him or know Him, but you know Him because He abides with you and will be in you.”
The unsaved cannot receive the Holy Spirit.
The Holy Spirit was able to come into saints before the cross only for a short period of tim.
Saints didn’t have the Holy Spirit in the same capacity which we now have or the power of God.
Why couldn’t the Holy Spirit come in at that time to abide permanently?
The Holy Spirit was very limited in what He could do for believers.
When the sin debt was paid, this made it possible for the Holy Spirit to come into the heart and life of the saint.
“I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may be with you forever;
There is a struggle going on within Christians concerning the “Spirit” and the “flesh” (which means without the help of the Holy Spirit.
We have the help of the Holy Spirit only if we “walk in the Spirit.”
WALKING IN THE SPIRIT
How does one walk in the Spirit?
Just because one is baptized with the Holy Spirit with the evidence of speaking with other tongues, is no sign that such a person is walking in the Spirit. The mere presence of the Holy Spirit within our hearts and lives, Who provides this “power” of which we are speaking, does not automatically mean that one is walking in the Spirit.
“Doing spiritual things” is not “walking in the Spirit,” as important and good as these things might be.”
Therefore there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.
One must first “walk after the Spirit,” before one can then “walk in the Spirit.”
When we “walk after the Spirit,” this simply means that one is following after the Spirit. The Holy Spirit will always lead the person to Christ.
The Holy Spirit will always lead the believer to the cross.
As we follow after the Spirit, He will always lead us to the cross, in which we re to place our faith, and do so permanently, realizing that the Holy Spirit works and functions within our hearts and lives, strictly due to what Jesus did at the cross. The cross gives the Holy Spirit the legal right to function in our lives.
For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and of death.
This which the Holy Spirit does within us, is predicated so much on the cross that Paul used the word “law” to define this which the Spirit does.
Once we have followed the Holy Spirit, “walking after the Spirit,” which leads us to the cross, and always to the cross, that being done, with our faith there properly placed and our faith there properly remaining, we can now “walk in the Spirit.” And when one “walks in the Spirit,” one will not fulfill the lusts of the flesh, but will rather see the fruit of the Spirit developed in one’s life.
The believer must understand how the Holy Spirit works. Most Christians “walk after the flesh,” which simply means to try to live this life by our own efforts, rather than by the help and the power of the Holy Spirit.