It is clear that after baptism and confirmation and the bread and wine (Hebrews 6:1-6) there is the Holy Spirit and the fruits of the Holy Spirit (Galatians 5:22-23).
So my question is this: What are some of the ways to feel the Holy Spirit that you have grown to know?
1. Attending Church Services
2. For me it's serving the poor and my fellow man for God.
3. Obeying the Commandments.
ITS IS NOT ABOUT "WAYS TO FEEL THE HOLY SPIRIT"!!!
If anyone is thinking that, they are all wrong!!!
It is about knowing Jesus Christ as your Lord, which happens via the Holy Spirit!!
The one main purpose the Holy Spirit has is to get you to personally know Jesus Christ, and Him as your Lord!!!! That is what saves you!!!
So let me go over this:
Jn 6:63 “It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh profits nothing; the words that I have spoken to you are spirit and are life.
Look at the above verse: The Spirit give us life - but more specifically we read the "the words" which Jesus Christ speaks to us our spirit and are life!!!
So Jesus Christ is doing the speaking and the Holy Spirit is giving us His words!!!
So it is not a "feeling" that we are looking but rather the words that come from Jesus Christ though the Holy Spirit!!!!
If you are thinking you want some wonderful feeling you are thinking you want some wonderful instructions!! Yet a lord gives 'instructions'!! So the Holy Spirit tells you that Jesus Christ is Lord, not that He is some feeling!!!
1 Cor 12:3 Therefore I make known to you that no one speaking by the Spirit of God says, “Jesus is accursed”; and no one can say, “Jesus is Lord,” except by the Holy Spirit.
So note: saying you want a feeling from the Holy Spirit is not saying you want instructions from our Lord Jesus Christ - therefore we need to be careful of who we are listening to!!!
Ok - I understand that sometimes it just feels like I need to know that Jesus Christ is with me. Yet the best way to know that is to actually listen to Him!! His words encourage you, they comfort you, they give you direction to your life! He can joke with you and make you smile! (Isaac means humor, so the promise son to Abram was Humor)! He give you joy, and the joy of the Lord is your strength, but if there is the joy of the Lord then isn't there also joy from another source also? So we need a bit of discernment when dealing with feelings, and that discernment comes via the Holy Spirit, which comes with the Word that Jesus Christ, our Lord, has for you!!
Jn 16:13-15 “But
when He, the Spirit of truth, comes, He will guide you into all the truth; for
He will not speak on His own initiative, but
whatever He hears,
He will speak; and He will disclose to you what is to come. “
He will glorify Me, for He will take of Mine and will disclose it to you. “All things that the Father has are Mine; therefore I said that He takes of Mine and will disclose
it to you.
In the above verse we read that when the Holy Spirit comes He "speaks"!! Yet we also read that He does not speak on His own initiative, but rather what He hears He speaks!! A phone does not speak on it's own initiative but what ever the phone hears it speaks. Now the Holy Spirit is a person, but in order to glorify the Son the Holy Spirit has decided that He will not speak on His own initiative, so the Holy Spirit acts like a living telephone line directly to our Lord Jesus Christ.
SOOOO - If you pick up a phone to get communication from your boss, are you looking for a "Feeling" or do you expect "Words" to be spoken to you??
There is a serious misunderstanding about who is God and who is God's creation going on here!!!
I am not saying the Holy Spirit is not going to comfort you, but Him giving you the words of God is comforting to you!! But who listens?
Is it possible that some people are trying to treat God like a drug that can be taken to make them feel better, as opposed to say a Wonderful Counselor who will make them fell better by giving them the advice they need to do better?
And also note: I am not saying that God can not also give you feelings, like being drunk in the Spirit. I have felt Him do that to me. He has also giving me a feeling of peace at times which I just can't describe - and joy too. I have felt numerous incredible things that came from God, but did we not read about how God is not in the might wind, the fire, and the earthquake??? Perhaps things need to be broken off you, but the Lord is in the still small wind that we call the small voice - right?
1 Kings 19:11-13So He said, “Go forth and stand on the mountain before the LORD.” And behold, the LORD was passing by! And a great and strong wind was rending the mountains and breaking in pieces the rocks before the LORD;
but the LORD
was not in the wind. And after the wind an earthquake,
but the LORD
was not in the earthquake. After the earthquake a fire,
but the LORD
was not in the fire; and after the fire a sound of a gentle blowing. When Elijah heard
it, he wrapped his face in his mantle and went out and stood in the entrance of the cave. And behold, a voice
came to him and said, “What are you doing here, Elijah?”
It's about that still small voice by which we hear from the Lord. That is where He is at!!