Repentance gives Us a Step Up to Hear the Holy Spirit—R Fritz
Repent is a word we all should know well where most people do not want to hear or see. It will probably bring some people from reading this blog. People ask me to pray for them a lot. One person said to me that I prayed for different people and my prayer helped these people. My question to these people is ok I will pray but why don’t they pray or why does God answer me but not them? It is because they are not following God’s rules, or we do not have a relationship with the Holy Spirit. We need to keep looking at where the Holy Spirit is in our life or whether we even know the Holy Spirit. This is who was sent when Jesus died on the cross to teach us all things to live inside us. It was who would change those to be like Jesus with our acknowledgement to let the Holy Spirit be our mouth and control our actions. We choose that because God gave us freewill with those that obey and follow his rules God hears their prayers. We must also repent of our sins.
Repent means to turn from sin, it is more than saying I am sorry it is showing in our actions. It starts with acknowledging we did something wrong with the Holy Spirit by showing what we should do to right the wrong. If pride shows up, we will not acknowledge we did something wrong, pride will blame somebody else. Pride will take us away from God. Humility is where we come back to God. Proverbs 16:18-19 says “Pride goeth before destruction, and a haughty (arrogant) spirit before a fall. Better it is to be of a humble spirit with the lowly, than to divide the spoil (plunder) with the proud.” Repent brings changeand changes our attitude, it is accepting what God says instead of what we say or think. It is living by the Bible (God’s word) with the Holy Spirit giving us the answers to our questions, which is how God planned for us to be aware of how to live. If we depend on somebody else to give us their opinion on how to live, we will not know God’s truth which is the Spirit of truth or the Holy Spirit. Every day should start with us praying or talking with the Holy Spirit, so we know what has been planned or what the Holy Spirit wants for us. We need to get God’s wisdom instead of depending on ourselves, that is why we are stuck where we are in life without answers to the same questions because we do not trust God doing the same thing day after day.
Without trust we will be stuck where we are, the thing I found was to start to trust God is where our life will change for the better because we will use God’s plan for our life to make us happy where peace comes even when our days do not always go our way. It is called peace during the storm. Things are going to happen to us, it is the Holy Spirit that can change the outcome that falls on us to speak our needs to the Holy Spirit. When I ask or need something from God I speak about it during my day. Last week I was gone and went on a hunting trip to a different state. The thing most people do not understand is there is no vacation away from God. We might ask why that is? The answer is the Holy Spirit lives in us and goes where we go. Many times, as I am hunting and have conversations with the Holy Spirit as I hunt. Sometimes hunting is not the best because I am not paying enough attention to my dogs. This week I was hunting with a couple of other people. Every day I asked the Holy Spirit for the other people to get birds, and we saw birds and we shot some every day. On the last day I asked to end with a certain number of birds, which was a couple more birds. Four birds jumped up fifty feet from the vehicle where we walked an hour before where there were none. We were given the opportunity to get the total we were looking for. God wants our vacation or trip to be successful. As I have said many times it is up to us to form a relationship with the Holy Spirit to make what we do personal with the Holy Spirit. This is not a God who only cares about his agenda, remember God is love, his love which is special. 1 John 4:13-16 says “Hereby know we that we dwell in him, and he in us, because he hath given us of his Spirit. And we have seen and testified that the Father sent the Son to be the Saviour of the world. Whosoever shall confess that Jesus is the Son of God, God dwelleth in him and he in God. And we have known and believed the love that God hath to us. God is love; and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, and God in him.” God invented love so with the Holy Spirit we have God’s love. The answer for us is to embrace God’s love where our feelings do not override the Holy Spirit and his love. When we do not embrace God’s ways, we embrace our feelings who take over our actions.
Repentance is one of the reasons my relationship grows with the Holy Spirit, the others are when I hear the Holy Spirit whether I like what is said I know where it came from and follow it. These are the benefits we get trusting the words we hear and knowing the Holy Spirit’s voice. This should show those that want God in their life on their terms that it will not work. People call me with their needs with other people being the ones that need to change, then wondering why they are in the same situation where God has not changed the situation with the other person. I must remind them that my life with people is not particularly easy either. When I think people around me deserve punishment, the Holy Spirit reminds me about God’s grace and mercy on me for my shortcomings, so I hear him and apply that same grace and mercy on the people around me. None of us deserve God’s grace or mercy, we must humble ourselves and forgive them seventy times seven times. Matthew 18:21-22 says with Jesus speaking Then came Peter to him, and said, Lord, how oft shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? till seven times? Jesus saith unto him, “I say not unto thee, Until seven times: but, Until seventy times seven.” Forgiveness is required with God. If we do not forgive, God will not forgive us.
I have learned to give situations with people to God to deal with. This is why God hears my prayers, and we have the relationship that we do. People want to force their will on people and wonder why there are no results. God does not say our situation will be taken care of immediately. It requires us to do our part first because that is what will change the other person. We do not look at us first to see our shortcomings. As Peter has said, people sin against us and break one commandment. Mark 12:31 says and this is Jesus’ speaking “And the second is like, namely this, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. There is none other commandment greater than these.” When we treat people without love there are consequences. We choose how our life will be, listen to the Holy Spirit and be the one that changes and repents. God Bless.
