Person of the Holy Spirit

We are rapidly approaching the end of the school year and I am again amazed at how quickly things have passed.

Much of our conversation lately has been in relation to the Holy Spirit and His work in the life of the believer.  It seems we fall on one extreme or the other when it comes to His working in our lives.  Either we are so intimidated at the thought of engaging the Holy Spirit on a daily basis that we forgo the activity all together or, in our excitement we overcomplicate the relationship to the point of our own exhaustion.

In my own life I have found a simple understanding which brings me back to a healthy and natural relationship with the Holy Spirit.  It is simply that the Holy Spirit is a person.  By using the word person, I don’t mean He is human.  Rather, He is a person with a personality, temperament, likes, and dislikes.  Our departure from this truth seems to be our greatest detriment in establishing a consistent and healthy relationship with Him.

God created humans as relational creatures.  We were made for community with God and for community with one another.  Community with God comes as we have RELATIONSHIP with the Holy Spirit.  If our interaction with the Holy Spirit becomes too mechanical, we will miss all the elements of an authentic relationship.  We will be too worried about doing things right and we will miss the conversations God desires to have with us as we go through our day to day life.  If our intimidation keeps us on the sidelines we will, in the very same way, miss the beauty of getting to know God in the context of an interpersonal relationship.

I spoke with a young man the other day and he told me he was concerned at times when he would go to pray and he didn’t feel like the Holy Spirit was “speaking” to him.  I asked him to imagine a time when he has taken a road trip with a good friend.  Before getting in the car were you worried about what you were going to say? Were you worried that your friend might not say anything?  Did you think about what moments of silence might mean about your relationship? Of course not! The reason those thoughts didn’t come up is because of the relationship you have with that person.  A relationship isn’t only defined by conversations.  Relationships consist of many moments of simply being with one another.  Sometimes it’s in the silence where we grow closest to one another.  He had forgotten that the Holy Spirit was a person and His desire was to have relationship with my friend and not just talk at him.

I don’t know how else to explain it, but my whole spiritual journey began to shift about four years ago when I took all of the pressure out of my relationship with God. I realized the power of simply relaxing and engaging the person of God in the Holy Spirit.  As we engage Him, He will speak to us, and sometimes He will be silent.  As we engage Him, sometimes He will convict us of sin and other times He will encourage.  As we engage Him, He will engage us in a powerful relationship which is intended to transform us into the image of the Son.

My prayer for you is that you would take a deep breath and realize you can do this.  You were made for intimacy with God.  For a believer, nothing should be more natural than living in communion with the Sprit.  It requires a daily desire to drive back our flesh and a willingness to, with great trust, engage the person of the Holy Spirit.

Shalom,
Kendall McDonald