A Great Mystery
Have you ever given serious thought
to the Holy Spirit?
The Spirit upon you and in you?
The Holy Spirit has always been a great mystery to me.
I am amazed that Jesus said we, too, could have the Holy Spirit.
When I read Romans 8,
I marvel that God has placed His Spirit in us
and if we do not have His Spirit
we are not His children.
I find it hard to image that the Sovereign Almighty
God
would choose to live inside of us.
I can understand my body because I can see it.
I can only begin to comprehend my soul and spirit.
So understanding God’s Spirit
communicating with my spirit
causes me to realize
I need to get more in touch
with my inter being.
(Note, I am not talking about any “new
age” junk!)
We can see that it was the Spirit
that anointed Jesus to preach and do the miracles.
I question, is God’s Spirit in me like a prison of
flesh.
Or, am I a vehicle to accomplish His will.
In Romans 8,
we read about the sufferings of man and all creation.
We find that the Spirit of God
grieves with us about suffering
and prays on our behalf.
The Spirit’s prayers come out of our groanings.
As Paul writes in this chapter,
he admits he doesn’t always know how to pray.
But we have the Spirit of God in us
praying according to God’s will
on our behalf.
Even though I find this a great mystery,
I do understand its reality.
There are times when I pray
that something rises up inside of me
that takes me by surprise.
Words and direction come from my lips
that I had never thought of before.
Yes, we do have an advocate
God Himself is closer than we think
and because God lives inside of the believer
what effects you - effects Him.
So when you pray remember:
The Spirit
of God in you prays.
If you listen, you will hear Him praying for you.
Scripture Reading
Romans 8 NIV
8:1 Therefore, there
is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus,
2 because through
Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit of life
set me free from the
law of sin and death.
3 For what the law
was powerless to do in that it was weakened by the sinful nature,
God did by sending
his own Son in the likeness of sinful man to be a sin offering.
And so he condemned
sin in sinful man,
4 in order that the
righteous requirements of the law might be fully met in us,
who do not live
according to the sinful nature but according to the Spirit.
5 Those who live
according to the sinful nature
have their minds set
on what that nature desires;
but those who live in
accordance with the Spirit
have their minds set
on what the Spirit desires.
6 The mind of sinful
man is death,
but the mind
controlled by the Spirit is life and peace;
7 the sinful mind is
hostile to God.
It does not submit to
God's law, nor can it do so.
8 Those controlled by
the sinful nature cannot please God.
9 You, however, are
controlled not by the sinful nature but by the Spirit,
if the Spirit of God
lives in you.
And if anyone does not
have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Christ.
10 But if Christ is
in you, your body is dead because of sin,
yet your spirit is
alive because of righteousness.
11 And if the Spirit
of him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you,
he who raised Christ
from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies
through his Spirit,
who lives in you.
12 Therefore,
brothers, we have an obligation
— but it is not to
the sinful nature,
to live according to
it.
13 For if you live
according to the sinful nature, you will die;
but if by the Spirit
you put to death the misdeeds of the body, you will live,
14 because those who
are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God.
15 For you did not
receive a spirit that makes you a slave again to fear,
but you received the
Spirit of sonship.
And by him we cry,
"Abba, Father."
16 The Spirit himself
testifies with our spirit that we are God's children.
17 Now if we are
children, then we are heirs
— heirs of God and
co-heirs with Christ,
if indeed we share in
his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory.
18 I consider that
our present sufferings are not worth comparing
with the glory that
will be revealed in us.
19 The creation waits
in eager expectation for the sons of God to be revealed.
20 For the creation
was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice,
but by the will of
the one who subjected it, in hope
21 that the creation
itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay
and brought into the
glorious freedom of the children of God.
22 We know that the
whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth
right up to the
present time.
23 Not only so, but
we ourselves, who have the first fruits of the Spirit,
groan inwardly as we
wait eagerly for our adoption as sons,
the redemption of our
bodies. 24 For in this hope we were saved.
But hope that is seen
is no hope at all. Who hopes for what he already has?
25 But if we hope for
what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently.
26 In the same way,
the Spirit helps us in our weakness.
We do not know what
we ought to pray for,
but the Spirit
himself intercedes for us with groans that words cannot express.
27 And he who
searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit,
because the Spirit
intercedes for the saints in accordance with God's will.
28 And we know that
in all things God works for the good of those who love him,
who have been called
according to his purpose.
29 For those God
foreknew he also predestined to be conformed
to the likeness of
his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers.
30 And those he
predestined, he also called; those he called, he also justified;
those he justified,
he also glorified.
31 What, then, shall
we say in response to this? If God is for us, who can be against us? 32 He who
did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all — how will he not also,
along with him, graciously give us all things?
33 Who will bring any
charge against those whom God has chosen?
It is God who
justifies. 34 Who is he that condemns?
Christ Jesus, who
died — more than that, who was raised to life
— is at the right
hand of God and is also interceding for us.
35 Who shall separate
us from the love of Christ?
Shall trouble or
hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword?
36 As it is written:
"For your sake
we face death all day long;
we are considered as
sheep to be slaughtered."
37 No, in all these
things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us.
38 For I am convinced
that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons,
neither the present
nor the future, nor any powers,
39 neither height nor
depth, nor anything else in all creation,
will be able to
separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
