What an incredible promise! Not dependent on if we keep his commandments but on our love of God, relationship. So who/what exactly is this Helper which Jesus promises those?
The Holy Spirit is arguably the most neglected or misunderstood part of the divine trinity. As we see through this passage, the Helper AKA the Holy Spirit is both the presence of God and inward dwelling. It is like God in us, that small, still whisper which speaks to you in your thoughts. In cartoons, the Holy Spirit would be like the little angel on the person's shoulder, helping them to make the right moral decisions. If you look at the Holy Spirit in the Old Testament, the Holy Spirit was given to specific people for a specific role. However, look to the New Testament, you see those who have a relationship receiving the Holy Spirit and keep on receiving it. It really is a 'ask and it shall be given to you,' no matter who you are, if you have a relationship with God, you can receive his Holy Spirit. As Acts 2v38 states: 'Repent and you will receive God's gift, His Holy Spirit,' and what a cool gift to receive :)So what role does the Holy Spirit play?
Well as previously mentioned, the Holy Spirit can be your conscience, that little angel sat on your shoulder helping you to take the correct path. As Ephesians 3 v 16-17 states:' he may grant you his spirit in your inner being so that he may dwell in your hearts..being rooted and grounded in love.' The Holy Spirit can really be that tool to help you remain grounded in love.
The Holy Spirit also helps us how to pray. Sometimes, I just completely run out of words and can get hugely distracted. One moment I'm 100% focused on Jesus, the next I'm thinking about what slice of cake I fancy with my cup of tea (Gaz's parsnip cake is all I can usually think of .) However, God has given us our Helper! In Romans 8 v 26 it states: ' For when we do not know how to pray, the spirit himself pleads with God for us.' So when we are struggling with prayer we can just ask the Holy Spirit to help us! Awesome.
The spirit also helps us to live more like Jesus. 'The Spirit produces love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control,' (Galatians 5 v 22-23) What amazing qualities to possess and I can't think of anyone who more inhabits these then Jesus. If we have the Holy Spirit living in us, these should just be by-products, but again if we are struggling with any of these (I often struggle with patience! Which is very important when working with children and young people!!) we can ask the HS for help.
Lastly, the Spirit equips us with different gifts in order to glorify God's name and to empower his church of which I will go into more detail.
Ok so we have established that the Holy Spirit is the presence of God in us, a member of the trinity he is God but in a different form, like with water you get ice, water and steam, with the trinity you get God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit. However, I think it's important to briefly mention what the Holy Spirit is NOT.The Holy Spirit is NOT a spiritual vending machine! It makes me feel really uncomfortable in meetings etc when individual's are solely focused on what they can get from the Holy
Spirit. Recently, people have spoken to me saying 'Let's get drunk/mashed on the Holy Spirit!' The Spirit gives gifts for equipping the church. The spirit encounters individuals to help them change for the better. The spirit is NOT there to help people have a fun Saturday night and he is NOT there for individual's to hunting experiences.
So if you've never given the Holy Spirit a go, he is a wonderful tool, a great friend and an amazing gift from God- invite him into your life today!! Peace out! :) xx
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