ICS Daily Devotions
Be Conscious Of Your Spirit Being
John 14:16-17 (NKJV) And I will pray the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may abide with you forever—the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees Him nor knows Him; but you know Him, for He dwells with you and will be in you.
We are three-part beings, consisting of spirit, soul and body. We need to learn to identify and be aware of the spiritual aspect of our being in order to know how the Holy Spirit speaks and leads.
Our physical body enables us to connect with the physical world through our five senses, and it behaves according to what our soul or “spirit man” dictates. The body is temporal, corruptible and mortal. In general, people tend to focus on the body and develop the soul, while neglecting the “spirit man”. However, being driven by information that our senses feed us will cause us to be reactionary and make us susceptible to all sorts of emotions. We need to learn to tune in to what the Holy Spirit is saying to our “spirit man” because He is omniscient. Once we are led by His peace instead of our senses, we will experience peace in spite of negative reports we receive. Likewise, the Holy Spirit can also speak to us through an uneasiness in our spirit or prod us with an urgency to act even when everything in the natural seems normal.
Our soul comprises of our mind, intellect, will, emotions and personality. Unless constantly renewed by the Word of God, our mind can hinder us from hearing God clearly or trusting His guidance due to scepticism or past experiences. A tussle between what the flesh and the Holy Spirit want is expected. The soul is self-centred because it is used to reigning over and dictating our lives. Even believers can get into a rage, lose self-control or yield to temptation when provoked, thus grieving the Holy Spirit. However, we have a redeemed personality if we would allow the Holy Spirit to empower our spirit man, rather than our flesh, to reign.
Finally, the “spirit man” or the “inner man” is the heart of one who is a new creation. God is Spirit and He speaks to our spirit man. It is the heart that is sensitive to the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit can communicate with us anytime because we are connected to Him through our “inner man”, but we need to learn to identify His voice. Generally speaking, the “spirit man” is located at our belly, hence we will sense the inner witness of the Holy Spirit there, whether it is the peace to do something or an inexplicably unsettling feeling regarding a matter.
Sermon Series: How to be led by the Holy Spirit in your daily life?
