The Holy Spirit is the Spirit of Truth, the Comforter.
The Holy Spirit lives in the believer.
The Holy Spirit searches the heart of God and reveals the will of God to the child of God so the believer can go in the way of God in dealing with the issues of this present life.
We, as people of God, have a tremendous advantage in life because God has given us HIS Spirit to guide us.
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We once lived according to our own ideas. We followed our own flesh, hating others, trying to outdo everyone and exalt ourselves, having great fear of what might happen and of the power of other humans, attempting to gain more money and things of this world, seeking the approval of other humans, and such.
But after God revealed HIMSELF to us, we were changed and since that time we are continually recreated in the image of Christ as we seek the will of God in the issues pertaining to this life and as we choose to go in the way God shows us by HIS Spirit.
The Holy Spirit does the following for us:
- HE teaches us all things (John 14:26)
- HE reminds us of all Jesus, The Word, has said to us (John 14:26)
- HE guides us into all truth (John 16:13)
- HE shows us things to come (John 16:13)
John 14:26 But the Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in my name, he shall teach you all things, and bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you.
John 16:13 Howbeit when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth: for he shall not speak of himself; but whatsoever he shall hear, that shall he speak: and he will shew you things to come.
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We pray, asking God to help us and show us what to do as we have problems.
God, by the Holy Spirit, guides us into the way of God and the will of God.
Usually a gentle thought will come into our mind concern the issue at hand. Often we have never thought of "that" in regard to the problem.
But how do we know if "that" is the idea from God?
Ideas come from our own desires, from devils, from ideas of other people and the thinking of other people ... and from God.
(God is always right of course ... God knows what is coming in future and God sees the end from the beginning so we want to be able to choose that idea which we believe to be from God.)
So how do we identify those ideas that are from God?
The following scripture tells us what to look for.
James 3:17 But the wisdom that is from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, and easy to be intreated, full of mercy and good fruits, without partiality, and without hypocrisy.
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* The plans from God are pure ... without preconceived prejudice.
Sometimes other people will say something and we will end up trapped in their thinking without even realizing that has happened to us.
Pam Padgett decided to remodel a portion of her house, creating a downstairs bedroom and full bath.
She was thinking of moving her 1/2 bath to the place where her laundry was located creating laundry area into a full bath. But it was also possible to add a shower to the 1/2 bath making that into a full bath. A decorator had suggested this to Pam.
Then I became involved in the issue.
Pam had a type of resistance to this idea of turning 1/2 bath into full bath.
Finally she realized years ago, when she first bought the house, a man said to her the 1/2 bath was in a "strange" location.
That concept had apparently lodged in her thinking and was distorting the building concept.
I kept hearing to put the shower in the place where the 1/2 bath was located.
But I didn't want to tell Pam this.
Finally I did tell Pam exactly what I had heard, believing it was the leading of God. "Put the shower in the small bathroom."
She did this.
It saved her a good deal of money and unnecessary construction effort. It was a much easier plan.
It is amazing but this is the exact area that I live in today at Pam's house and I find everything wonderful in the arrangement.
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* The wisdom from God is ... peaceable
That spirit that would drive you is not usually the Holy Spirit.
The Holy Spirit doesn't make you do anything.
The Holy Spirit "leads" you by bringing a concept to your mind.
The Holy Spirit doesn't take over your body, as some think, and cause you to do gyrations.
There used to be a church group in USA called "holly rollers" ... They rolled about the floor and thought that was "the spirit". It was a spirit alright but not the HOLY Spirit.
In the 1990's, I visited a non-denominational church in the city where I lived. The pastor was teaching the Sunday school class. All of a sudden, one woman jumped up and ran around the room waving her arms into the air and shouting. The people became all excited. They thought this woman had "the spirit". I was horrified! She had a spirit but not the HOLY Spirit. The Spirit of God would never interrupt the teaching and take over this way.
I Corinthians 14:26 Let all things be done unto edifying.
edify:
- to build faith in God.
- to strengthen spiritually
This woman's actions did not strengthen us spiritually. She did not cause us to increase in our knowledge of God.
This was simply her own flesh taking over and breaking up the message which the pastor was bringing to the church.
32-33 And the spirits of the prophets are subject to the prophets. For God is not the author of confusion, but of peace, as in all churches of the saints.
40 Let all things be done decently and in order.
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At a church group I once attended, our Bible teacher would always ask, "Does anyone have a word from the Lord?" At that time, if we did, we were free to speak that word one by one.
Decently and in order ...
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Usually the concepts brought to mind by the Holy Spirit are so gentle I almost miss them, even failing to recognize I've had such come to mind. They are like a "fact", a piece of information, usually something I didn't know before.
In December, 2018, after an accident at my house, the ambulance workers were rolling me on a gurney and when we passed the front door of my house, the following came into my mind: "You'll never see this house again."
I knew that was truth and from the Holy Spirit. It did not disturb me. It was just a fact. And it was true.
2 1/2 months later, the day I was dismissed from the rehabilitation hospital, I flew directly from hospital to my new home in Colorado. The season for me to live in that house in Texas was over. I knew it because God had revealed it to me that day by a word from HIS Spirit, The Holy Spirit.
John 16:13 Jesus says ... Howbeit when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth: for he shall not speak of himself; but whatsoever he shall hear (from God), that shall he speak: and he will shew you things to come.
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A man in our little church group, went into his backyard and began thinking about his overflowing storage building. "Maybe I'll build another storage building to store my stuff," he thought.
But the Holy Spirit brought the following thought to him with another concept.
"Why don't you just get rid of the stuff?
Great wisdom from God: For at that time this man was in mid-70's. He had heart problems. He didn't need to be dealing with more stuff and more buildings. A short time after this, he became very ill and then died.
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At one point, I bought a lot on a golf course in Clovis, New Mexico. The lot cost me $13,350 on a golf course.
"easy to be intreated" ? Yes! I had more than enough saved to pay for this lot. I felt it would be a good buy at that price and could later be sold if I didn't use it.
Approximately five years after this, I decided to build a house on this lot and move my mother into that house with me. This was the last decade of her life.
After we moved into the house, there was one obvious problem that surfaced. The kitchen was very small. My mother and I kept bumping into one another when we were in there together.
Unknown to me, the builder had reduced the planned size of the kitchen. The lot was not large enough to accommodate the house plans we had designed so he cut down the kitchen.
I began praying immediately asking God what I could do about this problem.
Approximately 4 years passed and every time I went into the kitchen I prayed about the problem.
One day as I entered the room, the solution came into my head ... all I had to do was to move the built-in pantry into the attached garage and put the refrigerator where the pantry had been. This allowed for 4-5 more feet of cabinet space to be attached and even opened up the traffic area for a small, rolling island/cabinet to be added.
It was relatively inexpensive to do this ... thus "easy to be intreated". The workers were available for the project.
The Holy Spirit had showed me what to do and that is what I did.
Most people delight in their own wisdom.
But we delight in that wisdom that we believe to be from God, for it is so simple when it comes that we marvel at God and laugh that we didn't see it before.
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* The wisdom that is from God is: ... "full of mercy and good fruits, without partiality."
In 2019, a woman who had been in our little church group since 1980, began to tell me off for grievances she had accumulated against me during the past years.
She said it was like I had been "throwing rocks" at her for many years.
I had been trying to get her to share (in a timely way) with our church group, word of wisdom and word of knowledge, which I felt she had been given by God on various subjects as they surfaced in our group.
Often when things happened in our group, this woman would say, "I thought of that."
But usually she did not share those thoughts at that time, when it would have helped the group or me.
I felt it was God giving her spiritual gifts of word of wisdom, word of knowledge, but that she was holding back from sharing them with the church.
After this woman's' accusations against me, I had to be judged by God and reestablished in the ministry by God, so I turned to God and asked HIM to judge "me".
That same night, God gave me a dream. I opened the front door to my house to find someone had dumped bags of garbage at my door and all the way across the front of the outside of my house.
I felt God was showing me that which this woman had said to me was her stored up "garbage."
(Pam Padgett witnessed part of this railing because the talk became so bad on phone that I said to this woman, "Wait until I can get Pam on the extension so she can hear this and moderate this conversation.")
The following scripture was called to my attention by the Holy Spirit as I prayed about this happening.
I Corinthians 5:11; 13 But now I have written unto you not to keep company, if any man that is called a brother be a fornicator, or covetous, or an idolator, or a railer, or a drunkard, or an extortioner; with such an one no not to eat ... Therefore put away from among yourselves that wicked person.
Railer is defined as one who speaks with bitter, vehemence.
This is exactly what we heard coming from this woman who was in our church group at the time.
We knew we would have to separate from this woman, which is what we did.
Now I feel I have been told this: "Do not try to get her back. If she comes saying how sorry she is she did this then receive her."
It is the mercy of God to the church group to remove such from the congregation until such time as true repentance is displayed ... for a little leaven leaveneth the whole lump, says Paul.
I Corinthians 5:7-8 Purge out therefore the old leaven, that ye may be a new lump, as ye are unleavened. For even Christ our passover is sacrificed for us:
Therefore let us keep the feast, not with old leaven, neither with the leaven of malice and wickedness; but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.
(At the time of this publication, this woman is separated from our church group.)
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* The wisdom that is from God is ... "without partiality".
We have witnessed the Catholic church hiding sins of child abuse and transferring offending priests from one city to another, from one church group to another. This has been going on for decades.
We cannot protect the congregation by hiding sins that are committed in the church group or by the ministers who speak to the church groups.
We cannot allow ourselves to "be partial".
All the church, ministers and congregation, are subject to the rules of God and the Holy Spirit.
When they stop being, this is antichrist in the church ... opposite to Christ.
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* The wisdom that is from God is ... "without hypocrisy".
Several years ago, I was returning to Dallas from a one week TV guest appearance on a religious talk show in Detroit when I heard the following words from the Holy Spirit.
"Don't do any more TV talk shows."
I had two more TV shows scheduled at the time. One in Dallas and the other in Phoenix.
I was thinking of what I might say to the TV hosts when I cancelled, when I heard in my mind, these words from the Holy Spirit.
"Why don't you just tell them the truth?"
The TRUTH! OH NO ... we don't want do to that! But I did.
Hypocrisy, pretending, play acting, alterations are not the wisdom that is from God.
The truth can really get us free and keep us free but even though we pray to be free sometimes we don't actually want to be free.
This happened to Pam Padgett. She was engaged. At one point Chuck began speaking of his adult aged son who was going to marry a divorced woman. Pam gave him scriptures showing that if the son did this, he would commit adultery.
Matthew 5:32 But I say unto you, That whosoever shall put away his wife, saving for the cause of fornication, causeth her to commit adultery: and whosoever shall marry her that is divorced committeth adultery.
After Pam told this to Chuck, he wanted no more to do with Pam, although he said he was a Christian.
Pam said she often held back rather than speaking with Chuck.
But then when she did speak, Pam became free.
I know many hold back because inwardly they know their words might cause division.
Luke 12:51 Jesus said: Suppose ye that I am come to give peace on earth? I tell you, Nay; but rather division:
Several years ago, I was returning to Dallas from a one week TV guest appearance on a religious talk show in Detroit when I heard the following words from the Holy Spirit.
"Don't do any more TV talk shows."
I had two more TV shows scheduled at the time. One in Dallas and the other in Phoenix.
I was thinking of what I might say to the TV hosts when I cancelled, when I heard in my mind, these words from the Holy Spirit.
"Why don't you just tell them the truth?"
The TRUTH! OH NO ... we don't want do to that! But I did.
Hypocrisy, pretending, play acting, alterations are not the wisdom that is from God.
The truth can really get us free and keep us free but even though we pray to be free sometimes we don't actually want to be free.
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This happened to Pam Padgett. She was engaged. At one point Chuck began speaking of his adult aged son who was going to marry a divorced woman. Pam gave him scriptures showing that if the son did this, he would commit adultery.
Matthew 5:32 But I say unto you, That whosoever shall put away his wife, saving for the cause of fornication, causeth her to commit adultery: and whosoever shall marry her that is divorced committeth adultery.
After Pam told this to Chuck, he wanted no more to do with Pam, although he said he was a Christian.
Pam said she often held back rather than speaking with Chuck.
But then when she did speak, Pam became free.
I know many hold back because inwardly they know their words might cause division.
Luke 12:51 Jesus said: Suppose ye that I am come to give peace on earth? I tell you, Nay; but rather division:
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Matthew 11:28-30 Come unto ME, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.
Take MY yoke upon you, and learn of ME; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls.
For MY yoke is easy, and MY burden is light.
Take MY yoke upon you, and learn of ME; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls.
For MY yoke is easy, and MY burden is light.
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Additional examples of changes authored by The Holy Spirit.
I Corinthians 2:12 Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit which is of God; that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God.
* One day, I was stopped at a red light at an intersection. A pickup truck pulled along the side of me in the left lane. He had a flatbed trailer, loaded with fireplace wood. As I looked at the firewood, I thought, "I wish I had a wood burning fireplace." (The fireplace in my house had gas logs and I hardly ever turned it on because it didn't seem interesting to me.)
As I thought about this, the Holy Spirit brought the following to my mind: "You can have that."
I had never before considered that I could change from gas logs to wood burning.
But the fireplace was originally constructed for either wood or gas.
I called a local business that specialized in fireplaces and arranged to have the gas logs removed and stored in the mechanical room. They added a log lighter, and firewood rack on my porch, and I bought fireplace tools.
By the following week I was burning real wood!
Was that plan from God?
James 3:17 But the wisdom that is from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, and easy to be intreated, full of mercy and good fruits, without partiality, and without hypocrisy.
pure: never before had I considered doing such a thing.
gentle: not a driving, pushing concept ... just truth
easy to be intreated: yes ... I had the fireplace ... it was relatively inexpensive to make the change ... I had the money for the project ... the workers were available.
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* A few years ago, I made a very bad decision concerning the purchase of a TV. The unit had a streaked picture. It was an expensive TV, Runco plasma. The dealer promised to calibrate the picture and make it right but he never did. The company wouldn't fix it either.
I had no way to deal with the situation.
Often I would try to help the picture by setting various options on the remote. But I was never very successful.
One day, when I was struggling to make the picture better, I heard: "You don't have to put up with this."
"That's right!" I thought.
I had more than enough money in my savings account to buy another TV.
Although I had that TV less than a year, I went immediately and bought another TV and arranged to have that defective TV carried away by the men who installed the new TV.
Is this the wisdom from God?
It is certainly not wisdom to struggle daily and to be frustrated daily when I had the money to deal comfortably with the issue!
Isaiah 55:8-13 For MY thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways MY ways, saith the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are MY ways higher than your ways, and MY thoughts than your thoughts.
For as the rain cometh down, and the snow from heaven, and returneth not thither, but watereth the earth, and maketh it bring forth and bud, that it may give seed to the sower, and bread to the eater:
So shall MY word be that goeth forth out of MY mouth: it shall not return unto ME void, but it shall accomplish that which I please, and it shall prosper in the thing whereto I sent it.
For ye shall go out with joy, and be led forth with peace: the mountains and the hills shall break forth before you into singing, and all the trees of the field shall clap their hands.
I Corinthians 2:12 Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit which is of God; that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God.
* One day, I was stopped at a red light at an intersection. A pickup truck pulled along the side of me in the left lane. He had a flatbed trailer, loaded with fireplace wood. As I looked at the firewood, I thought, "I wish I had a wood burning fireplace." (The fireplace in my house had gas logs and I hardly ever turned it on because it didn't seem interesting to me.)
As I thought about this, the Holy Spirit brought the following to my mind: "You can have that."
I had never before considered that I could change from gas logs to wood burning.
But the fireplace was originally constructed for either wood or gas.
I called a local business that specialized in fireplaces and arranged to have the gas logs removed and stored in the mechanical room. They added a log lighter, and firewood rack on my porch, and I bought fireplace tools.
By the following week I was burning real wood!
Was that plan from God?
James 3:17 But the wisdom that is from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, and easy to be intreated, full of mercy and good fruits, without partiality, and without hypocrisy.
pure: never before had I considered doing such a thing.
gentle: not a driving, pushing concept ... just truth
easy to be intreated: yes ... I had the fireplace ... it was relatively inexpensive to make the change ... I had the money for the project ... the workers were available.
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* A few years ago, I made a very bad decision concerning the purchase of a TV. The unit had a streaked picture. It was an expensive TV, Runco plasma. The dealer promised to calibrate the picture and make it right but he never did. The company wouldn't fix it either.
I had no way to deal with the situation.
Often I would try to help the picture by setting various options on the remote. But I was never very successful.
One day, when I was struggling to make the picture better, I heard: "You don't have to put up with this."
"That's right!" I thought.
I had more than enough money in my savings account to buy another TV.
Although I had that TV less than a year, I went immediately and bought another TV and arranged to have that defective TV carried away by the men who installed the new TV.
Is this the wisdom from God?
It is certainly not wisdom to struggle daily and to be frustrated daily when I had the money to deal comfortably with the issue!
Isaiah 55:8-13 For MY thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways MY ways, saith the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are MY ways higher than your ways, and MY thoughts than your thoughts.
For as the rain cometh down, and the snow from heaven, and returneth not thither, but watereth the earth, and maketh it bring forth and bud, that it may give seed to the sower, and bread to the eater:
So shall MY word be that goeth forth out of MY mouth: it shall not return unto ME void, but it shall accomplish that which I please, and it shall prosper in the thing whereto I sent it.
For ye shall go out with joy, and be led forth with peace: the mountains and the hills shall break forth before you into singing, and all the trees of the field shall clap their hands.
Instead of the thorn shall come up the fir tree, and instead of the brier shall come up the myrtle tree: and it shall be to the Lord for a name, for an everlasting sign that shall not be cut off.
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