Mark Carey writes:
I’ve been thinking about the Holy Spirit.
The Holy Spirit isn’t all about being excited and experiencing emotional ‘highs’ – actually, the Spirit, as Todd Hunter says, “has a very different feel - a sense of peace, groundedness, quiet confidence, and stability."
Isaiah 40:31indicates that receiving and living in the power of the Holy Spirit means we soar on “wings like eagles” – it is a benefit of putting our hope in God. Now – to be completely honest, a lot of the time I feel like I’m more like a Penguin than an Eagle! I need to be filled with the Holy Spirit so that I am able to ‘soar’ – it sounds odd – but the Holy Spirit both ‘grounds me’ and enables me to ‘fly’. Soaring with him I gain God’s perspective; I am more stable and secure. You, and I – we need the Holy Spirit.
Let me leave you with a little challenge this week. Don’t settle for the occasional encounter or ‘filling’ by the Holy Spirit. D.L. Moody, the 19th Century Evangelist once said:
"A man can no more take in a supply of grace for the future than he can eat enough today to last him for the next 6 months, nor can he inhale sufficient air into his lungs with one breath to sustain life for a week to come. We are permitted to draw upon God's store of grace from day to day as we need it."
In other words – day by day we must position ourselves to receive God’s grace – His Holy Spirit – admit we need God and draw from His resources of strength.
How are you positioning yourself today, this week, to draw from the great resource of God’s grace – the Holy Spirit?
ISAIAH 40:28-31
Do you not know?
Have you not heard?
The LORD is the everlasting God,
the Creator of the ends of the earth.
He will not grow tired or weary,
and His understanding no one can fathom.
He gives strength to the weary
and increases the power of the weak.
Even youths grow tired and weary,
and young men stumble and fall;
but those who hope in the LORD
will renew their strength.
They will soar on wings like eagles;
they will run and not grow weary,
they will walk and not be faint.
The Rev Canon Mark Carey - Christ Church Bridlington Network