Walking with the Spirit Over the Long Haul

20151018 God Part III – The Long Haul

Today we are kind of wrapping up our series on the third Person of the Trinity, the Holy Spirit. Next Sunday is Pentecost, the Sunday when the Holy Spirit first came upon Jesus’s disciples and when having God living inside of us became a part of the lives of believers from then on. Next Sunday we will look at an overview of what a life lived in close connection with the Holy Spirit over the long haul looks like, but today, I want us to look at how we live a life that is connected with the Spirit over the long haul.

We’ve looked at how the Holy Spirit wants an ongoing personal relationship with His followers. We’ve seen how we have direct access to God through the Spirit, and how He works in believers individually by developing the fruit of the Spirit in us and helping us put on the character of Christ. He also works in us as a group as part of the Church by giving different people different spiritual gifts that are to be used for the benefit of others. The last two weeks we looked at some ways that we can discover the spiritual gifts God has given us. I hope some of you will be joining us as we re-launch Sunday School on June 6th with a study on how to discover your Spiritual Gifts and find out what role He wants you to play as part of the group of believers called the Church.

The reason I want to talk about the staying connected to the Spirit over the long haul is because it is much easier for us to try something new for a short period of time, but when we are trying to accomplish life change in ourselves, we need to be committed to the process for the long term, not just for a short amount of time. Here is what Paul says in his letter to the Galatians about walking with the Holy Spirit on a daily basis:

Galatians 5:16, 24-25

Galatians 5:16 NLT

16 So I say, let the Holy Spirit guide your lives. Then you won’t be doing what your sinful nature craves.

Galatians 5:24–25 NLT

24 Those who belong to Christ Jesus have nailed the passions and desires of their sinful nature to his cross and crucified them there. 25 Since we are living by the Spirit, let us follow the Spirit’s leading in every part of our lives.

In another letter that he wrote to the church in Ephesus, he says:

Ephesians 4:21-24

Ephesians 4:21–24 NLT

21 Since you have heard about Jesus and have learned the truth that comes from him, 22 throw off your old sinful nature and your former way of life, which is corrupted by lust and deception. 23 Instead, let the Spirit renew your thoughts and attitudes. 24 Put on your new nature, created to be like God—truly righteous and holy.

So, how do we do what these verses say, throwing off our oId sinful nature and putting on the new nature that was created to be like God? Let’s take a look at a few things we can do and focus on that help us throw off the old nature and put on the new nature.

If you look at the life of Jesus and at his ministry, you’ll see that often he had large crowds following him, but at different times he called those who wanted to follow Him to a life of higher faithfulness and obedience. Some people decided that they weren’t so excited about following Jesus after all. I’m sure Jesus was disappointed that some people turned away at that time, but he still continued to call people to a higher level of faithfulness and obedience anyway because it showed who really was serious about following him.

In our culture, bigger is considered better. We often measure success in terms of numbers, but when we look at how Jesus carried out His ministry, we realize that numbers weren’t the most important thing to Him.

God isn’t interested in numbers, but in faithfulness and obedience.

A week or two ago we looked at how at one point Jesus said some things that were hard for the crowds to understand and for them to commit to, and many of them walked away from Him. Even some of His disciples walked away. But Jesus understood that not everyone who followed Him when the lessons were easy and life was easy was truly committed to Him, so He wasn’t surprised when some of them left once things got more challenging. In fact, He knew that most people would not be willing to make the sacrifices of being a true follower of His. He says in...

Matthew 7:13-14

Matthew 7:13–14 NIV

13 “Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. 14 But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it.

These verses happen immediately after the verses where Jesus tells His followers to seek His kingdom first, and to trust God to provide for their needs. The way to stay on the narrow road and enter through the narrow gate requires faithfulness and obedience.

One of the reasons we need to stay connected to the Holy Spirit over the long haul is because it is in that connection that we grow in faithfulness and obedience. It is through our ongoing relationship with Christ through the Spirit that we become more Christ-like.

We need to worry less about doing things for God, and more about being like Christ.

People can make themselves do things even if they don’t understand why they are doing them or even if they don’t agree with the principle behind the action. We can all think of people that we either know personally or have heard about who might do actions that are good or helpful, but whose character we know is not good. We call these people “hypocrites”, and we often know not to trust them very far. When we only focus on DOING, we aren’t addressing the more important issue of a person’s heart. In that same passage we just looked at, a few verses later, Jesus talks about people who had done all kinds of good works for Jesus, but who Jesus claims, “I never knew you.” So clearly being is more important than doing.

When we allow God to change our hearts and not just our actions, we become more like Christ. When we focus on BEING like Christ, the actions, or DOING will follow.

1 John 2:3-6

1 John 2:3–6 NLT

3 And we can be sure that we know him if we obey his commandments. 4 If someone claims, “I know God,” but doesn’t obey God’s commandments, that person is a liar and is not living in the truth. 5 But those who obey God’s word truly show how completely they love him. That is how we know we are living in him. 6 Those who say they live in God should live their lives as Jesus did.

But being like Christ sounds like a pretty hard goal to reach. After all, Jesus was God’s Son – and not only that, He was God Himself. So how can we possibly hope to imitate the life that Jesus lived? After all aren’t we just regular people?

This is where our study of the Holy Spirit helps us. As we’ve been seeing over the past month or so, we don’t have to do it all on our own or in our own strength.

We are common people with an uncommon Holy Spirit in us.

Here at First Baptist we are just a group of regular people who are trying to follow Jesus together and become the people God wants us to be. But we are more than just regular people, we are regular people with the Holy Spirit living in us. There is something supernatural about that that makes us different from other groups of people (like the Atheist churches I told you about last week, or any group that tries to be a community that helps each other without God). Yes, we are people who have been broken, hurt, who have made bad mistakes and have sinned just as bad as anyone else, but if you have turned from your sin, admitted your need for forgiveness and asked Jesus to forgive you and be your Lord, then you are not the same as those who have not taken that step yet. You have the Holy Spirit living in you. That means that God is inside of you, and His power and strength are available to you if allow Him to act in your life and transform you from the inside out.

I know I just said that we need to worry less about doing and more about being like Christ, but when our hearts are in the right place and we have the right attitude, then there are things we can do to help us be more like Christ. With the Holy Spirit and His power in us, there are habits that some of us need to start practicing and others of us might be able to do more of that will help us be more open to hearing God and being changed by Him. These are often referred to as Spiritual disciplines.

We need to spend time studying God’s Word, fasting, serving, confessing, worshiping, celebrating , etc.

These are disciplines and habits that every growing Christian should integrate into their lives as they grow and mature in their faith. And just like many other aspects of our Christian faith, it is meant to be developed in community with other Christians through a process called discipleship. Discipleship is when one person walks alongside another person for the specific purpose of helping that other person grow to be more like Jesus. It happens in both formal and informal ways. Three Sundays from now, we are re-launching our Sunday School groups with an emphasis on discovering your Spiritual gifts. I think this is a great opportunity to get plugged into a group if you’ve never been part of a small group at First Baptist, or even if you have, because we are going to be mixing up our groups in this first phase of bringing back Sunday School. I’m excited about it because as more of our people figure out what their spiritual gifts are and how to use them to serve one another, I know people will grow in their friendships with each other and you will grow spiritually as well. So, sometimes discipleship happens in group settings like a small group or Sunday School class.

Other times, discipleship happens one-on-one or with two or three people, but in smaller groups that live life together. This kind of life-on-life discipleship happens when one person mentors another person and helps them grow not necessarily by doing a specific study together (although sometimes they do that too) but by spending time together and seeing what specific ways a person needs to grow in and be mentored in. It may be a person who comes alongside someone else they see struggling with work/life balance, for example, and helps them learn how to better balance work, and family, and church. It may be a friend who you know has gone through something you’re going through now, and you go to them and ask them to share with you how they got through that time or overcame that obstacle. It might be a friend or family member that God puts on your heart to pray for and who doesn’t know Him yet, but God wants you to invest in them over the next year and be there for them and become closer with them so that they can see how your faith helps you in life.

Discipleship is a key part of helping Christians grow, and helping churches grow, and over the next several months and over this next year, you will be hearing more about ways that we can become involved in discipleship either as someone discipling someone else, or as someone who someone else is pouring into, or both.

Another thing that we understand how to do is pray. We need to get better at it, and we need to do it more often and more intensely.

We need to Pray, Pray, Pray!

In Luke 11, when Jesus’ disciples ask him to teach them to pray, he teaches them what we now call the Lord’s prayer. If you keep reading that chapter, he continues to talk about prayer. He tells them a story about two friends.

Luke 11:5-13

Luke 11:5–13 NLT

5 Then, teaching them more about prayer, he used this story: “Suppose you went to a friend’s house at midnight, wanting to borrow three loaves of bread. You say to him, 6 ‘A friend of mine has just arrived for a visit, and I have nothing for him to eat.’ 7 And suppose he calls out from his bedroom, ‘Don’t bother me. The door is locked for the night, and my family and I are all in bed. I can’t help you.’ 8 But I tell you this—though he won’t do it for friendship’s sake, if you keep knocking long enough, he will get up and give you whatever you need because of your shameless persistence. 9 “And so I tell you, keep on asking, and you will receive what you ask for. Keep on seeking, and you will find. Keep on knocking, and the door will be opened to you. 10 For everyone who asks, receives. Everyone who seeks, finds. And to everyone who knocks, the door will be opened. 11 “You fathers—if your children ask for a fish, do you give them a snake instead? 12 Or if they ask for an egg, do you give them a scorpion? Of course not! 13 So if you sinful people know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him.”

What are some things we can learn about prayer from this passage?

We need to pray boldly.

Jesus used the example of a person who reluctantly gave his friend some bread because the friend persisted and kept knocking. That doesn’t mean that God grudgingly gives us what we ask, it’s a contrast just like the last example about a sinful parent giving good things to their children. Jesus is saying, “If even an annoyed friend will who you bothered in an inconvenient time, and you made an outrageous request of (three loaves of bread was A LOT to ask for), if even then that person will give you what you ask for, how much more will God gladly give you the Holy Spirit when you ask Him.

We need to keep asking for the things of God. We need to keep seeking His will. We need to keep knocking for Him to fellowship with us and He will let us in.

God loves showing up and coming through when we desperately need Him and rely on Him. That way He gets all the praise. If we never pray bold, courageous prayers, how can He answer them? If we never follow Him to positions where we need Him, how can He show up and make His presence known?

God loves to show up when His children call on His name and when they are trusting fully in Him to come through, whether that’s in relationships, battling sin, in strength to make sacrifices, or in endurance to be faithful in daily life. Are you living this way? Or are you surviving only by your own strength?

When we pray boldly, God gets the glory when we rely on Him and He answers.

Just like the times that God brought the Israelites incredible victories when they were completely outnumbered, and like when Jesus did miracles, feeding thousands of people with just a few resources. When we seek God and He shows us something seemingly impossible He wants to do, and we start to pray and pray and pray and move forward in faith that He will come through, and then He does come through, everyone there KNOWS that there was no way this could have come to pass without God’s help. Then God gets the glory as we thank Him and praise Him for answering our prayers and letting us be part of what He wanted to do.

When we only ask God for small things that can come to pass by coincidence or by our human effort, we are robbing God of His glory. It is scary to ask God for big things. It puts us in a tough position because if the big prayer isn’t answered then we will look ridiculous. But we need to take those steps of courage and faith and pray for God to do BIG things that can only be explained by “GOD DID THIS.” I’m not talking about asking for something big just by randomly coming up with something. No, we start by seeking God’s face, looking for God’s plan, asking the Holy Spirit to show us what God wants to do, and when God reveals something BIG and beyond what we can pull off, then boldly praying to God for Him to pull off this great thing, putting ourselves out there and risking being ridiculed if it doesn’t happen. It’s not something we do lightly, it’s something we do because we reach the strong conviction that it is what God wants to do through us so that He is honored and so that His name is made great, not ours.

Are you struggling with a sin that is just too big for you to tackle in your own strength? There are things in our lives that are battles that we cannot win alone. Are you willing to bring that to God, put it at His feet, and boldly ask God to do something? It won’t be easy, it will be HARD. But God can help you do it. You’ll have to undo old ways of thinking and living, you’ll have to build new ways of dealing with temptation and struggles, you’ll have times when you succeed and times when you fail, but if you allow God to change your nature and put Christ’s nature into you, you will find success over time.

We pray for each other, encourage one another, help each other seek God’s leading and work in each other’s lives.

I’m not talking about praying for Joe’s test in school, or Susie’s health issue, although that’s okay to pray about too. I’m talking about praying for each other to become more and more like Christ. If I know my friend is seeking God to help him become a better dad, I want to pray for Him to become a more and more godly dad. If I know a couple that is trying to obey God in being generous with their finances I am going to pray for them to have wisdom and self-control in how they spend their money. If my friend shares that he is trying to figure out where God wants to use him in the church, I’m going to pray for God to be revealing his spiritual gifts and make him aware of the places in the church where he can grow by using those gifts. If I know someone is trying to obey God by sharing the Gospel with a family member or friend, I’m going to pray for them to have an opportunity to share, and that they would have the courage to take that opportunity, and that God would give them the words to say when they speak.

That’s the kind of praying for one another that I’m hoping we will be doing more and more for each other here at First Baptist. We want to pray for each other, asking that the Holy Spirit will work in the lives of the people in our church as we walk with God on the long haul.

There’s one last thing I want to talk about when it comes to keeping our relationship with the Spirit healthy over the long haul, and that’s the things that get in the way of our relationship with the Holy Spirit.

Things that get in the way of our relationship with the Holy Spirit:

We are too comfortable.

One of the names that the Bible uses for the Holy Spirit is “Comforter.” But why would we need a comforter if our life is already comfortable? Maybe we need to get uncomfortable. We need to be careful that we don’t choose comfort over doing the things that God wants us to do. God will sometimes call us to do things that stretch us personally, or they may make us uncomfortable. That’s just part of following God. The more we accept the challenges God puts in front of us and trust Him as we pray BOLDLY for Him to help us through, the more we realize that being outside of our comfort zone is a place of huge blessing and spiritual growth.

Our life is too loud.

I don’t know about you guys, but I am busy. I have work, I have family responsibilities, I have projects at home I need to get done, and somewhere in all that I also manage to squeeze in time to relax and veg, which usually involves more “noise” when I’m watching TV. With all the noise in our lives, sometimes it’s hard to hear God. We need to take some time to get away with God in silence and without distractions. It is hard to find that time, believe me, I know. Yet somehow if you were to write down how you spend your time each day, I’m sure you would find fifteen or thirty minutes a day that are wasted time. Reclaim some of that wasted time and find a way to be alone, even if it’s alone on your drive to work or during your lunch hour, or whenever for just a little while to slow down, focus on God, and listen. Just think about God’s goodness to you, or about the things God has been speaking to you. Listen and ask God to speak to you then.

There are other things that get in our way, and there is always more that we can do to improve our long-term walk with the Holy Spirit, but for now I think we’ve got enough to think about. If you start with the things we have talked about over the past few weeks, I’m sure it will keep you busy for a while. But if you start to plug in again here at church, start getting involved in a small group or Sunday School group, find a way to use your spiritual gifts to serve here at FBC Creedmoor, you will find that there will be other opportunities to disciple others and be discipled by others.

God has great plans for us at First Baptist to make an impact in our community and to the ends of the earth. I hope you will be a part of what God is doing in us and through us.

Let’s pray...

This week, ask God to make you more like Jesus. Spend time asking God to show you how He wants you to pray boldly. Then spend time reading the Bible and listening to God. Write down your feelings and thoughts as you spend time doing this throughout the week.

Hebrews 13:20–21 CSB

20 Now may the God of peace, who brought up from the dead our Lord Jesus—the great Shepherd of the sheep—through the blood of the everlasting covenant, 21 equip you with everything good to do his will, working in us what is pleasing in his sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory forever and ever. Amen.