Title: The Holy Spirit and the Check
Contents
▒▒▒ Galatians 5:15-26
Just as we need inspections in our lives, we also need inspections in our religious life. How often do you live your life by examining your religious life? There are important reasons to check your faith. It is to live a life that glorifies the Lord. However, it is never easy to check your own life of faith. There are people who help you check your life of faith. You are the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is the one who enlightens us and guides us to walk on the right path.
Today we worship on Thanksgiving Day. There are three great festivals in Israel. The first feast is the Passover. The Passover is a festival to commemorate the Exodus from Egypt. The second feast is on the seventh day after the Passover, that is, 49 days, and the 50th day after 49 days is called Pentecost. Another word for Pentecost is Thanksgiving. Thanksgiving is a time to worship God with the heart of thanksgiving for the first crops harvested from the earth. The last festival is called the Feast of Tabernacles or Tabernacles, and it is a festival that the Israelites keep in commemoration of their 40 years of their camp in the wilderness. According to the book of Acts, the Holy Spirit came on the day of Pentecost. As Jesus poured out the Holy Spirit on the early church at this time of the Thanksgiving service today, I pray in the name of the Lord that we all have the work of the Holy Spirit.
I would like to share grace with you about a life that the Holy Spirit supervises and a life that the Holy Spirit lives with.
First, the life supervised by the Holy Spirit refers to living under the guidance of the Holy Spirit. Just as in order to make a good film, we have to move under the guidance of a film director, in order to live a life directed by the Holy Spirit, we must obey and follow the guidance of the Holy Spirit. However, when I think of the life led by the Holy Spirit, I sometimes feel vague. But there is something clear here. The Holy Spirit makes clear to us. It is a fact that always reminds us that we are children of God. Not only that, but as Ephesians 5:15-16 says, the Holy Spirit guides us so that we do not live each day in vain but glorify God. All of this is to accomplish God's will. The will of God means that God becomes our Father, and we live in a relationship as sons and daughters of God. And God's will is that beyond us who believe in Jesus, we live in harmony with many people around us, especially those who do not know Jesus.
Second, the very specific reason that the Holy Spirit is with us and guides us is to live a life of service to one another. The night before he was crucified, Jesus gathered all his disciples together, put a towel around his waist, poured water into a basin, and washed the disciples' feet. And he tells his disciples to do the same. Through Jesus, who showed us the example of service, we must live a life of service. 1 Corinthians 12 is written about the gifts. The nine fruits of the Holy Spirit are knowledge, wisdom, faith, healing, power, prophecy, discernment of spirits, tongues, and interpretation. These nine fruits are gifts given to us by the Holy Spirit. This gift was not given to show off and boast of oneself. Rather, we must not forget that it was given to us to serve God and to glorify God.
The emphasis of today's sermon is on the third, and our current faith is that we want to live a life filled with the Holy Spirit, but we do not live a life of obedience to the guidance of the Holy Spirit.
A life of service is concrete and practical. The life of service is not living according to my flesh, that is, living by my knowledge, experience, and abilities. It means to live obediently whenever you receive the guidance of the Holy Spirit. For example, there was a professor serving an intercession team. This man prayed for the Holy Spirit to lead him before he started intercession, and then he met the person who would intercede. When intercession is over, these are the words of those who have received intercession. “I think we met for the first time today, how do you know everything about me?” The reason the professor was able to hear this story was because he entrusted himself to the Holy Spirit and prayed before carrying out the ministry of intercession. This is the story of someone who works as a lawyer. This person made use of his gift to visit those who were depressed, disappointed, and sad in the church, encourage them, and give hope. There was a man who worked as a bank executive. This person came up to Seoul from the countryside and worked to help the self-sufficient students. He showed his father's love to lonely people living apart from their parents.
Ladies and gentlemen, serving is never difficult. If you look at people with a little interest, you can hear the voice of the Holy Spirit. And when we try to obey according to that voice, our service is revealed through us.
At the end of the day, we need time to review our lives before going to bed at night. Today, we must examine ourselves to see if we have lived according to the guidance of the Holy Spirit. What is clear is that when we face tomorrow while being inspected by the Holy Spirit every night, our lives today will be more Christlike than yesterday, and tomorrow will become more Christlike than today.
2008-07-11 15:37:18