Jesus- THE SPIRIT
Jesus
by
Bryan Craig
THURSDAY- The Spirit
"When He, the Spirit of truth, comes, He will guide you into all truth. He will not speak on His own; He will speak only what He hears, and He will tell you what is yet to come. He will bring glory to Me by taking from what is mine and making it known to you. All that belongs to the Father is Mine. That is why I said the Spirit will take from what is Mine and make it known to you." John 16:13-15 NIV
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Right before Jesus died, He told His disciples that it was good that He would go away, for He was sending One to help them. This One was called Counselor, Spirit of Truth, Comforter and Jesus said this One would teach them things they needed to know. Yes, we would call this One the Holy Spirit or the Holy Ghost. He is mystical and misunderstood, but only because we don't see that He is Christ. Paul explains:
"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." Romans 8:9 NIV
Did you catch that? The Holy Spirit is the Spirit of God and the Spirit of Christ. If we believe in Christ, we have the Spirit of the Father and the Son living inside of us. Jesus died, so He could not only become the sacrifice for our sins, but so He could live within us.
Forgive me, but I'm a Star Wars fan, and I don't know whether George Lucas is a believer or not, but I'm certain he had some knowledge of the Holy Spirit. I'll always remember, as an 11-year old boy, watching the first Star Wars movie and Obi-Wan Kenobi dueling light sabers with Darth Vader as young Luke watched. Obi-Wan casts a loving glance at his protégé, lowers his weapon, and allows Darth to strike him dead. I felt the same emotions as Luke, as he screamed out, "No!!!!" But wait a minute... Obi-Wan told Darth, "If you strike me down, I shall become more powerful than you could possibly imagine." Later in the movie, we see the spirit of Obi-Wan living on through Luke, and I understood that there was purpose in his death.
That is a picture of how Christ, our Master, allowed Himself to be killed for us. And now, His Spirit lives on with us and in us. He speaks to us and guides us into the Truth. He is not mystical...He is Jesus. If you want to know more about the Holy Spirit, study God's Word and the accounts of Jesus.
This month, you might hear the term, "Christmas Spirit" thrown around. "Let's get into the Christmas Spirit." I think what we are trying to say is this... "I need the Spirit of Christ to live through me." And Paul tells us what that might look like:
"The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control." Galatians 5:22-23 NIV
That's what we need this Christmas; that's what we need all year-round. We need Jesus.