Some Jesus Followers Have a Disconnect Between Their Faith and Actual Lifestyles Because the Holy Spirit Is Not Active in Their Lives

Some Jesus Followers Have a Disconnect Between Their Faith and Actual Lifestyles Because the Holy Spirit Is Not Active in Their Lives

MESSAGE SUMMARY: As Jesus Followers, we will be known by our fruit; therefore, we should have the fruit of Jesus in our lives. In Galatians 5:22-24, Paul describes the “Fruits of the Spirit”: “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control . . . And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.". With many followers of Jesus, there is a disconnect between what our faith is and our actual lifestyles. Why do we have this disconnect? If we are believers in Jesus, God has given us an incredible gift – the gift of the Holy Spirit. However, the disconnect is that the Holy Spirit is not active in our lives. The Holy Spirit is key to a Jesus Follower’s life, and one cannot be a Jesus Follower without the Holy Spirit.

In Luke 3:15, John the Baptist explains the relationship between Jesus and the gift, from God, of the Holy Spirit: “John answered them all, saying, ‘I baptize you with water, but he who is mightier than I is coming, the strap of whose sandals I am not worthy to untie. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire.’". In Luke 3:22 when Jesus is Baptized, He receives the anointing of the Holy Spirit for His earthly ministry.

Jesus needed the Baptism of the Holy Spirit, and we need the Baptism of the Holy Spirit too. While Jesus’ Apostles were with Him for three years and observed, directly, Jesus’ ministry, death, and Resurrection, the Apostles needed the Baptism of the Holy Spirit as described, by Jesus, in Acts 1:4-5: “And while staying with them he ordered them not to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the promise of the Father, which, he said, ‘you heard from me; or John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now.’".

As Jesus Followers, we have the Holy Spirit; therefore, the big question becomes: “Does the Holy Spirit have us?”. We receive the “Baptism of the Holy Spirit in our lives” by: 1) seeking God’s will and way in our lives; 2) repenting of our sins; and 3) surrendering and yielding our lives to the Holy Spirit. However, we run into two obstacles to living our lives in the Holy Spirit: 1) sin, because sin is death and sin “grieves the Holy Spirit”; and 2) our quenching the Holy Spirit by being ungrateful and “murmuring against God’s will”.

Have you been Baptized with the Holy Spirit, and does the Holy Spirit have you?

 

TODAY’S AFFIRMATION: Today, I affirm that because of what God has done for me in His Son, Jesus, I AM FILLED WITH THE HOLY SPIRIT. If you then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him! (Luke 11:13).

SCRIPTURE REFERENCE (ESV): Galatians 5:22-24; Luke 1:15; Luke 3:15-22; Luke 2:25; Acts 1:4-5; Acts 1:8; Acts 2:1-4; Ephesians 4:30; Romans 3:23; 1 Corinthians 6:1-11; 1 Thessalonians 5:16.

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WEBSITE LINK TO DR. BEACH’S SERMON VIDEO – “We All Need “Hope” in Today’s World of Fear, Doubt in Our Faith, and Feelings of “Hopelessness”; and God Is this “Hope””:  www.AWFTL.org/watch

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