April 17, 2010
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Authority of the Believer to cooperate and work with the Holy Spirit by Pastor Don Moore
Who is doing what? In ministry you can get to where you are operating so fast that you can get outside of what the Holy Spirit is doing.
People pray, not realizing that they are praying against what the Holy Spirit is saying in our prayer life. Too often we do things then ask God to approve of what we are doing, but it may not be what God wanted us to do. It is hard for us to accept waiting and making the necessary changes in our lives that God wants.
Romans 8:12-14 Therefore, brethren, we are debtors—not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh. For if you live according to the flesh you will die; but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live. For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God.
There are two deaths – we need to die physically and spirituall. The definition of a son of God is being led by the Spirit of God. Therefore we get confused when people talk the talk, but they don’t live and walk their talk. The way you can tell you are led by the spirit is your love of the brethren. We cant hate the people of God.
We can get ahead of where God is leading us. If we are plowing a difficult field and we can’t get anywhere, it could be that God hasn’t led us to that particular field. God does have work for us and He has prepared a field for us. When we get to the right place that God wants us to be, He will have people ready for us. He has prepared the field.
Romans 8:15 For you did not receive the spirit of bondage again to fear, but you received the Spirit of adoption by whom we cry out, “Abba, Father.”
Abba means “Daddy”
Romans 8:16 The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God,
How do we know we are led? The Spirit HIMSELF bears witness with our spirits, He manifests in us, in teh follower. What we do will bear fruit, and there will be a sense in us, in our innward witness, that it is the Holy Spirit leading us. The witness tests or manifests.
When we do stupid it is because we didn’t consult with what is in us. The inner witness wants to direct us, but when we are led by the flesh we will cancel with the Inner Witness is telling us to do. We are SHEEP, and sheep are dumb. You can’t become smart until you are aware of how stupid you are. IF YOU GIVE YOUR FLESH THE OPPORTUNITY, YOU WILL FALL. Go back and look at mistakes you have made. You will find where you didn’t listen to your inward witness. Pride is what causes us to go wrong.
Make an intelligent, spiritual decision. Tell yourself, “I am going to cooperate with the Holy Spirit. Let me consult God here. I am going to let the Holy Spirit lead me in this situation.” When we are led by the Holy Spirit in humility there are no buttons that people can pus in us to cause us to do something wrong. Judge the situation by asking, “Holy Spirit is this a good decision or not?” Then be led by what the Holy Spirit tells you. We want our spirit to accept it before it registers on the brain. The Ego and pride will not want to yield to the action God wants, so we need to let the Spirit lead. We fear correction, thinking it is a put down, but when God corrects us it is because He loves us. Correction is good for it helps us to prevent us from falling into some hole.
Listening to the Spirit has to be developed. Ye choose to yield to our Spirit. When we do, we are going to change. Pastor Don gave the example of Darth Vader who, after contacting his son, could not kill his son.
The decision to follow the spirit eminates from the inner man. How can old slewfoot bring everybody down? Ask for discernment to figure out why. Do they have a yielded spirit? King David understood the importance of the Spirit, for when he sinned, he prayed, “Don’t take Your Spirit” from me.” Saul allowed his spirit to become darkened, did not do what Samuel told him to do, and then made excuses, not asking for forgiveness for his actions. Saul chose to listen to the people, not to what God directed him to do.
Our human spirit is under construction. Jesus spoke to the people in parables for some things were not given for the Israelites to know. Other people shut down their spirits. Some people are so victimized by life that they can’t get out of their victim mentality. You are the one that will pay with troubles if you do not do somethinga bout your inner man. We can’t make effective change only working on the outside, we need to also change or inner man.
Pastor Don sang part of a song, “Jesus on the inside working on the outside. Oh what a change in my life.”
We are told that we will have what we say, and what we say comes from what we think. As a man thinketh…
1. The Spirit man says it
2. Our brains obey or don’t obey – and obedience is what refinse our soulish reaction. We can choose to not listen, or deal from our emotions, from our intelectual pride, or we can tell ourselves to stop and not do what the Spirit does not want us to do. We need to be humble of heart and obedient, then our flesh will begin to be corrected. If we choose to not listen to the Spirit then we move from excuse to excuse.It is very difficult to get a damaged person to the place where they see that their actions were wrong. That they received what they did because they refused to be led by the Spirit. The Spirit will never have you put the reality of the world over God, and the Spirit will never cause you to disobey God. Disobedience comes from a different realm.
The Spirit of God on the inside will confirm to us that we are His Children. He will lead and we will follow.
We need to have compassion and patience because some people have been so abused that they keep their wall up for both the evil and the good. It is hard to et them to change their spriit, for they stay in fight and flight mode. The will disobey out of fear. You can tell them to go right and they will go left,. There is fighting in their Spirit and they signed up for the struggle.
Romans 8:26 Likewise the Spirit also helps in our weaknesses. For we do not know what we should pray for as we ought, but the Spirit Himself makes intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered.
