Silas
Beloved of All
Thank you for sharing this earnest prayer for your wife and for so many others who are dear to you. Your hunger for God to speak and to guide is beautiful, and your confidence in His power to save and to keep is right and biblical.
God desires fellowship with you, and that fellowship happens in the spirit. God is spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and in truth. He created us as spirit, soul and body, and when we are born again by His Spirit, our spirit is made alive. It is there, in the spirit, that His Spirit bears witness with our spirit that we are His children. When the Spirit is uppermost in our lives and we are yielding to Him, we experience that communion and we are led by Him. As many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God, and Jesus Himself, who was full of the Holy Spirit, was led by the Spirit as our example.
You asked that God would speak by many means, through the Bible, through faithful preaching, through godly counsel, through dreams and visions and signs. Scripture gives us clear direction here. The Word of God, spoken by the Holy Spirit through holy men, is inerrant and it will be fulfilled. Isaiah says to look to the law and to the testimony, and if people do not speak according to that Word, there is no light in them. That remains our test for everything. God has indeed spoken in dreams and visions in the past to Joseph, to the wise men, to others, and He is sovereign and able to do as He pleases, for nothing is impossible with God and no purpose of His can be thwarted. Yet the great and settled way He speaks to His people now is through His completed Word, applied to our hearts by the Holy Spirit who dwells in every believer.
When you believed in Jesus Christ, the Holy Spirit came to dwell in you. He is the one who drew you to Christ, for no one can truly say Jesus is Lord except by the Holy Spirit, and He now seals you as belonging to God, a down payment and guarantee of the full redemption He will complete. The waiting for the Spirit that happened before Pentecost was a one time moment in history. Once the Spirit was poured out on the church, He was given as a gift to all who are called to Christ, and we are not commanded to tarry or wait for Him again. Instead we are called to be filled with the Spirit, to be controlled by the Spirit, and to walk by the Spirit.
That filling has two sides. The indwelling Spirit works within you to conform you to the image of Jesus and to give you power to live like Christ and to put to death the deeds of the flesh. You cannot do that in your own strength, but if by the Spirit you put those deeds to death, you will live. The baptism with the Holy Spirit is the overflow of that same Spirit from your life outward in power and witness. Both are needed, the inward work and the outward flow, and both come from sowing to the Spirit. Jesus said His words are spirit and they are life, so as you sow to the Spirit by staying in the Word, in prayer, and in obedience, you will reap life.
The Spirit always bears witness to the truth, and His central witness is Jesus Christ. When the Holy Spirit has come, He testifies of Jesus and perfects the love of God in us. Any leading, counsel, dream or impression that truly comes from Him will agree with Scripture, will exalt Christ, and will produce His fruit, especially love. That is how you can test what you hear. Hold everything up to the Bible, seek the safety of a multitude of godly counselors, and listen for the Shepherd's voice. His sheep hear His voice and follow Him.
So I join you in praying as you have prayed. May the Lord keep your wife, your children, your family, your friends, your pastors and leaders, and you yourself from temptation and evil and deception, and deliver you from the evil one. May He guard you from fear and lies and bring you into truth. May you make your requests known to God with thanksgiving, and may His peace which passes all understanding guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. May He who lives forever to intercede for you, Jesus Christ who died and rose again and now sits at the right hand of God, keep you and cause His light to shine in any darkness, for darkness cannot overcome it.
Continue to seek Him first in His Word, to yield daily to the Spirit, to mortify the flesh by His power, and to ask to be filled anew. Trust that He who is able to save to the uttermost is faithful to lead you step by step as you walk with Him.
God desires fellowship with you, and that fellowship happens in the spirit. God is spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and in truth. He created us as spirit, soul and body, and when we are born again by His Spirit, our spirit is made alive. It is there, in the spirit, that His Spirit bears witness with our spirit that we are His children. When the Spirit is uppermost in our lives and we are yielding to Him, we experience that communion and we are led by Him. As many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God, and Jesus Himself, who was full of the Holy Spirit, was led by the Spirit as our example.
You asked that God would speak by many means, through the Bible, through faithful preaching, through godly counsel, through dreams and visions and signs. Scripture gives us clear direction here. The Word of God, spoken by the Holy Spirit through holy men, is inerrant and it will be fulfilled. Isaiah says to look to the law and to the testimony, and if people do not speak according to that Word, there is no light in them. That remains our test for everything. God has indeed spoken in dreams and visions in the past to Joseph, to the wise men, to others, and He is sovereign and able to do as He pleases, for nothing is impossible with God and no purpose of His can be thwarted. Yet the great and settled way He speaks to His people now is through His completed Word, applied to our hearts by the Holy Spirit who dwells in every believer.
When you believed in Jesus Christ, the Holy Spirit came to dwell in you. He is the one who drew you to Christ, for no one can truly say Jesus is Lord except by the Holy Spirit, and He now seals you as belonging to God, a down payment and guarantee of the full redemption He will complete. The waiting for the Spirit that happened before Pentecost was a one time moment in history. Once the Spirit was poured out on the church, He was given as a gift to all who are called to Christ, and we are not commanded to tarry or wait for Him again. Instead we are called to be filled with the Spirit, to be controlled by the Spirit, and to walk by the Spirit.
That filling has two sides. The indwelling Spirit works within you to conform you to the image of Jesus and to give you power to live like Christ and to put to death the deeds of the flesh. You cannot do that in your own strength, but if by the Spirit you put those deeds to death, you will live. The baptism with the Holy Spirit is the overflow of that same Spirit from your life outward in power and witness. Both are needed, the inward work and the outward flow, and both come from sowing to the Spirit. Jesus said His words are spirit and they are life, so as you sow to the Spirit by staying in the Word, in prayer, and in obedience, you will reap life.
The Spirit always bears witness to the truth, and His central witness is Jesus Christ. When the Holy Spirit has come, He testifies of Jesus and perfects the love of God in us. Any leading, counsel, dream or impression that truly comes from Him will agree with Scripture, will exalt Christ, and will produce His fruit, especially love. That is how you can test what you hear. Hold everything up to the Bible, seek the safety of a multitude of godly counselors, and listen for the Shepherd's voice. His sheep hear His voice and follow Him.
So I join you in praying as you have prayed. May the Lord keep your wife, your children, your family, your friends, your pastors and leaders, and you yourself from temptation and evil and deception, and deliver you from the evil one. May He guard you from fear and lies and bring you into truth. May you make your requests known to God with thanksgiving, and may His peace which passes all understanding guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. May He who lives forever to intercede for you, Jesus Christ who died and rose again and now sits at the right hand of God, keep you and cause His light to shine in any darkness, for darkness cannot overcome it.
Continue to seek Him first in His Word, to yield daily to the Spirit, to mortify the flesh by His power, and to ask to be filled anew. Trust that He who is able to save to the uttermost is faithful to lead you step by step as you walk with Him.
