PENTECOST Devotional
You want to live passionately for God? Great! His Spirit will fall all right, but there’s a unique part for you to play within it all as well.
[embed width="760" height="427" class="leftAlone" thumbnail="https://i.ytimg.com/vi/TdioQL3HWLM/hqdefault.jpg?r"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TdioQL3HWLM[/embed]
'So I say, live by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh.'
[Galatians 5:16]
Thought:
Paul tells us to ‘live by the Spirit’. It’s a good phrase. In those four little words there’re enough power and purpose to guide your whole life. It’s the kind of phrase that might even look nice tattooed in Greek up your arm. But that’s a whole other discussion.
We need to talk about grammar.
Other translations use the word ‘walk’ instead of ‘live’. ‘Walk’ is OK, I guess, but there’s something juicy about ‘live’. Especially (and please excuse the nerd-fest) when you pause to focus on the fact that, in the NIV UK translation it’s written in the present tense - yet it could equally have been written 'go on living'.
‘So, I say, go on living in the Spirit…’
It has a certain ring to it, no?
Invitation:
The beautiful, life-changing, world-shifting truth about following Christ is that we are invited to be a part of a bigger picture: a glorious painting with the Holy Spirit as the brush.
We're not supposed to tap into the Holy Spirit every once in while, to get one big fill-up at the start of the year and leave it alone the rest of the time. Here we finding the key to Christian living: to be continuously looking to the Holy Spirit for guidance and promptings, inspiration and power.
Daily. Continuously. In every moment of stress or triumph. With every interaction. With every breath. We are invited to intertwine our lives so fully with God’s Spirit, that life itself relies upon Him.
Prayer:
Father God, thank you for your open arms. Thank you for your mercy that overcomes my failings, for your Spirit who guides my steps. Teach me what it means to go on living with you. Amen.