eInspire 2: Being filled with and empowered by God’s Holy Spirit
Do you find it difficult to walk with Jesus each day? When you stumble and fall, how do you get back up and carry on? Understanding how to walk in the Spirit can transform your Christian experience!
It is very rare to hear a comment that you remember for the rest of your life. But I had such an experience just a few weeks after opening my heart to Jesus. A Christian meeting me for prayer and Bible study said, “It’s not hard to live the Christian life. It’s impossible. The only one who can live it is Jesus. But He will live His life through you if you let him.” Paul says it in Galatians 2:20, “I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I now live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.”
Jesus said, “I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit. Apart from me you can do nothing.” John 15:5
Jesus clearly said we can’t do it on our own. To follow Christ is not to try to be like Him in our own strength. Rather, it is learning to trust Him to work in and through us by His Spirit. According to His own evaluation, everything we do, including our jobs — if done through His life and power in us — will be fruitful.
In the end, we don’t want to hear Jesus say that all the time and effort we invested in life was worth “nothing” because we lived it in our own strength rather than in His.
So how do we make sure we’re walking with Jesus in His power rather than our own?
Make sure there is no unconfessed sin in our life. Read and memorize 1 John 1:9.
Prayerfully yield our life to Jesus’ control.
- Ask Him to fill us with His Spirit and to take control of our lives. See Romans 12:1-2.
- Know that such a prayer is in accordance with His will, and know with certainty by faith (not based on feeling or on experience) that He has answered this prayer according to His promise in 1 John 5:14-15.
- Daily ask Jesus to live His life through us. “Dear Jesus, my life is yours. See with my eyes, hear with my ears, touch with my hands, speak through my mouth and walk with my feet. Live through me today.”
Seek and take opportunities to reveal Jesus to others through our words and actions. Jesus promised that His Spirit would empower us to be His witnesses in word and deed. See Acts 1:8.
Seeing Jesus live His life through us is liberating, strengthening, comforting, fruitful and adventurous all at the same time! “I came that they might have life and have it abundantly.” John 10:10
Are you walking in the Jesus power right now? Do you need to take a moment to pray?
Unless otherwise noted all scripture is taken from the New International Version, ©1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.