EPIC, How to Walk in the Holy Spirit.
Chapter 1
Faith is a journey.
When God told Abraham to leave his home and go to a land He would show him, it marked the beginning of an epic journey. Abraham was a guy, just living his life, until he heard from God. , God said, "Go to the place I’ll show you." Abraham believed God, so he went, and this is the essence of faith; believing what God said, and doing it. Faith isn’t a blind leap into the unknown, it's a responce. God told Abraham to go, and Jesus calls all who hear his voice to take up our cross and follow him. Hebrews 3:15-17 say "Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts..." Has God called out to you, did you respond in faith? There's a great adventure ahead of us if we will take that first step. Abraham didn’t know where he was going, or what it would cost to get there, he only knew that he was following God. He trusted that God wouldn’t let him down, or give up on him along the way. He believed God would take him somewhere better than he could take himself. Hebrews 11:16 says "Without faith it is imposible to please God, because whoever comes to Him must believe that He is, and that he rewards those who diligently seek Him."
Are we following Jesus where He leads, or have we gone our own way? In Genesis 12:1
“The Lord said to Abram, “Go from your country, your people and your father’s household to the land I will show you.” Can you Imagine having this conversation with your family and friends?
“Hey everyone, I’m leaving!”
Where are you going?
I don’t know yet.
Why are you going?
God told me to.
God...?
Can you imagine what Abraham’s family and friends must have thought, and what they must have said?
He’s lost his mind!
He’s hearing voices.
Who does he think he is?
He always did have an overactive imagination.
And what did they say to his wife?
You have to talk some sense into him.
This will ruin your family!
He doesn’t even know where he’s going!
It’s dangerous out there.
all your family is here!
Don’t you care about us?
Why are you doing this to us?
What’s wrong with you?
What’s wrong with us?
Hearing from God
When we set out to listen to God, to do what He says, we will run into opposition. When I think about hearing from God—in a contemporary sense—I think of the crazy people living on the streets, mumbling incoherent gibberish to themselves, or those who are locked up in psych wards suffering with mental health issues. I think of people driven to madness by addiction, but the Bible is filled with stories of ordinary people hearing from God. We can succumb to the pressure to denny God's voice, because God will call us to walk in opposion to our culture. No one believed Noah when he said God told him to build a boat. They all ignored him, called him crazy, and mocked him. It would have been easier for Noah, in the sort term, to not have listened to God, to have went along to get along, and just fit in, but where would that have taken him? Do we believe that God still speaks today? Is He speaking to you?
As we set out to follow Christ, and live by faith, we should be aware that our faith will be tested, often by our closest relationships. In Matthew 10:36-37 Jesus says, “A man’s enemies will be the members of his own household." They may not want to cause harm, but like Peter telling Jesus He would never die, but Peter's hopes and aspirations unwittingly align with the desires of Satan. Maybe Abraham’s family fully supported him on his journey, but it's likely that they tried to talk him out of it, just like Peter tried to talk Jesus out of going to the cross. Jesus said, “Anyone who loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; anyone who loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me.” If our family holds us back from doing what God has told us to do we will never experience the blessing that comes though obedience. What does such a commitment look like in our lives today? Is the church filled with the testimonies of thoses who followed Christ in spite of the oppostion they recieved at home?
Jesus was with a group of people (His followers), and He was told that His mother and brothers had come for him. They were waiting for Him, outside the meeting. They had been hearing rumors, and they were concerned, that He was embarrassing himself, and by extension embarrassing them. People were starting to talk, so they had come to take Him home. He wasn't from the right tribe to be teaching in the church. He didnt have His Min-div, he was just a carpenter from a poor family, a nobody. Jesus responds to their request by saying “Who are my mother and my brothers?" Then he looked to those seated in the room around him and said, “Here are my mother and my brothers! Whoever does God’s will is my brother and sister and mother.” These were the people who joined Him on the journey, they were going somewhere, they believed. We must choose to follow Jesus in this way. We must have growing relationships with people whom God calls into our lives. This means choosing to walk away from those relationships that become spiritually stagnate, to go wherever has calls. As we embark on this journey, we will find others going the same way. The Spirit will testify to the truth, and this is an EPIC journey. We join together as God's family, when we take up our cross to follow Jesus where He leads.
Next Step
God doesn’t give us the whole picture, but He gives us the next step we need to take, and He will go with us every step of the way. If we want to see His Church, rising to what He calls us to be, there is only one way to get there, we must be born again, we must be filled with, and led by, the Holy Spirit. 1 John 2:27 NLT Says, “But you have received the Holy Spirit, and he lives within you, so you don’t need anyone to teach you what is true. For the Spirit teaches you everything you need to know, and what he teaches is true—it is not a lie. So just as he has taught you, remain in fellowship with Christ.” In Matthew 16:24 Jesus says, “If anyone wants to be my disciple they must deny themselves, take up their cross, and follow Me. That step is clear, but where it takes us is a little fuzzy, because we don’t know until we get there. (That part can be unnerving.) We don’t know how it will turn out, we have to trust God for the outcome. We go through the wilderness, not seeing the whole picture. We know what He has promised, and the only way we can reach our destination, is by trusting Him, taking Him at His word, and following where He leads. This is how we find our place in His church.