The power of God is not selfish. The Father did not give the gift of the Holy Spirit to puff up or bring glory to any person or personality. The power of God is holy. It is to empower us to do as Christ did. Jesus himself, after being made manifest at his baptism by having the Spirit descend like a dove and remaining on Him, and having the voice of the Father commend Him, went into the synagogue on the sabbath day and quoted from the book of Isaiah and said, “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised, to preach the acceptable year of the Lord.” Luke 4:18-19
John said in 1 John 4:17 that “…as He is, so are we in this world.” We live in the power of the Holy Spirit to bring Glory to God by doing the works that He did as unto Him and in His name. If our Christian walk is simply to try and clear our conscience for death, we have missed it.
To be born of Him is to live from Him. From the life He has given. From the place we now have in His kingdom and for His purpose and glory and not our own. It is a place of complete humility, self-denial, and of complete and total surrender. It is a life lived for Him alone.
If all we do brings glory only to ourselves or fame and fortune for vain imaginations, we are doomed. Through the Holy Spirit, we have tremendous power to affect our world and all those around us. But we can grieve the Holy Spirit. He can be misrepresented and misused. He is given for the distinct purpose of preaching the gospel, healing the brokenhearted, bringing deliverance to those bound, sight for the blind and liberty for the bruised, and preaching the Lord’s favor over your years.
That is what we should be busy doing. Jesus instructed us in Matthew 10:8 to heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the diseased and drive out demons. He told us He freely gave all of this to us so we could freely give it to others.
Let’s not waste another day or even another moment. If we say we belong to Jesus, let’s get busy looking like we do and bring glory to His wonderful name. Invite the Holy Spirit to baptize you as He did Jesus, and let’s turn this world upside down one more time!
This is an updated edition of a post originally published on Jaime Luce
Featured Image by PublicDomainPictures from Pixabay
