The Gospel of the Kingdom of God-Part III-The Holy Spirit

I Thessalonians 5:19 - "Do not quench the Spirit."

This very short verse Paul spoke holds such great power and insight.  Yet, it has often been used with limited revelation or overlooked, altogether.  Many have used it to say we should not hold back praise as we feel the fire of the Spirit in our bellies when we are in a church service.  This is true.  Others have used it to say do not hold back a prophetic word when you feel it in your spirit.  In many cases this is correct. Yet, the timing of the release must be discerned.  Still, others may feel something at various points during their day but not recognize it as the Holy Spirit.  They just call it "something".

The Holy Spirit is more than a feeling and more than just something.  The Holy Spirit is God.  He is the person of God with us.  The Holy Spirit is the one that performs the will of God the Father in the earth through all that He created.  God the Father gives the command and the Holy Spirit carries it out.  "In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth."  The beginning of what?  The beginning of time.  Time has not always existed, eternity has.  God always was and is and He will always be in the now.  Therefore He says He is, "I Am that I Am." (Exodus 3:14).  Time was one of the creations of God (Genesis 1:5)

John 1:1-4 says, "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God.  All things were made through Him and without Him nothing was made that was made.  In Him was life, and the life was the light of men."

As I mentioned in Part I of this series, God the Father speaks the command and the Holy Spirit is the Word that comes from Father's mouth and fulfills it.  Because the Holy Spirit always fulfills the Word of the Father, no word that comes from God's mouth falls to the ground.  It is always performed and fulfilled, meaning the intent or purpose of the word God speaks is carried out. Why?  Because the Holy Spirit is life.  The Word cannot die because it is life, itself.  No darkness can understand it or remain in its presence (John 1:5).  In the beginning, God breathed into man's nostrils the breath of life, not the breath of existence...  You see, so many things were created by God through the Holy Spirit so that they then existed.  But it is only man whose nostrils He breathed the breath of life into so that he would become a "living" being (Genesis 1:7).  What is life? The Holy Spirit, as we just read in John.

When the Spirit was breathed into Adam and Eve they were in constant communion with God because God lived in them. It was from this place they received dominion over all the earth (not other men).  Once they fell, the fall was their separation from the Holy Spirit.  God still spoke to them, but He no longer dwelled in them.  Christ came to restore the Holy Spirit back into man so that He can be reconcilled to God and retake His place of Dominion over the earth.  What is the Holy Spirit dominion that He seeks?  The Kingdom of our God should rule and have dominion over the Kingdom of this world.  Those that belong to the Kingdom of God must be filled with God, the Holy Spirit, which is the Spirit of Christ in you.  This same Spirit that created all things needs to dwell in you so that through your mouth and body He can establish God's Kingdom, His authority, over everything and circumstance in this world.

As long as you accept Christ and His Spirit in you, there is a hope that God will be glorified in the earth through you (Colossians 1:27).  That hope is fulfilled when you don't quench the Holy Spirit but allow Him to move through you.  When you let God move through you to speak or do whatever He commands, you are exercising your dominion and establishing the Kingdom of God over the Kingdom of this world.  This is why all sins will be forgiven except the blaspheming of the Holy Spirit (Matthew 12:31-32).  If you deny the Spirit, absolutely nothing can happen for you or through you.  God moves through faith.  Doubt or denial stops His movement.  If you deny the Spirit, you are opposing the will of God for the earth.  You are opposing His Kingdom and its manifestation.  For your own sake, be filled with His Spirit and do His will.  For the sake of God's glory and the building up of His Kingdom, let the Holy Spirit fill you and use you to execute His will in the earth.  Seek God's face continually and be led by the Spirit.  This is the coming of the Kingdom of God in power, authority, dominion and love.  Let peace abide.  Love the Lord God-Father, Christ the son and the Holy Spirit.  Amen.

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The Gospel of the Kingdom of God-Part II- Spirit versus Flesh

I promised to do a five week series on the Kingdom of God.  With a heart full of intent to do so, I faced hefty challenges over the last three weeks that I allowed to keep me from completing my weekly goal. However, during that time I developed a new charge to push ahead and accomplish all that God has commanded of me.  This battle of the spirit versus the flesh is the topic of the second part of this series.  My "absence" from this blog for the last few weeks will serve as one example that can be used to demonstrate this topic.

Man is a three part being: spirit, soul and body.  Your spirit is who you truly are. God is a spirit and, with His Word, He made you to be like Him (Hebrews 11:3).  Your soul includes your emotions and mental capacity to store and recall information, make decisions and direct your body. Your body gives you ability to act out and manifest in the earth realm (including the waters and skies that we see) the decisions of your soul.

What we see, our bodies or flesh, is the least part of our being.  The body is a suit that houses the spirit so we can function here on earth.  If you were to go into a different atmosphere (the moon for example) you would need a different suit, what we call a space suit, to function there.  The same is true if you want, as a human, to live in the sea.  You would need a suit with greater functionality than our current diving suits to contain your spirit in that environment.  God placed us in the earth to dwell while walking in relationship with Him.  Since humans are not the only beings on earth, God charged us to further subdue, have dominion over the other things (not each other) in the earth and to multiply.  God rules over all, the heavens and the earth.  Under His leadership and hand, we are, as mankind in our multiple varieties, to have rule over the earth.  We are spirits as God is a spirit.

In part I, we spoke of how our communication with God must be done Spirit to spirit, in the eternal realm (John 4:24).  Time is a convention God created for earth and all His creation.  He does not live in it nor is He bound by it.  Time lives in and is controlled by Him.  Therefore, everything that will ever be already is.

We are reconciled back into right relationship with God through the Spirit of Jesus Christ.  The physical blood that He shed for our redemption pardons the sins committed in and through our bodies so we have a right, through the righteousness of that blood sacrifice, to be reconciled.  Our faith in Christ is what justifies our claim to sonship through Christ.

The enemy fights to keep us from coming into reconciliation.  But once we are in that place of right relationship, having accepted who we are, children of the Most High God, the enemy fights to disengage us from our rightful place in the Kingdom.  How does he do it? In the one way that he can; through our flesh.  He engages in deceit, manipulation and lies to get you to forget or never come into the full knowledge of who you are in God through Christ.  He attacks our minds with thoughts of the flesh including circumstances, relationship issues, financial woes, physical ailments and any other stresses that cause us to focus on what's happening in the flesh so that we forget who we are in the Spirit.

But if we stay mindful of who we are in the spirit, the realm where nothing is impossible but all things are possible, none of the enemy's tactics against us would work.  Rather, we would continually unsettle and overthrow him and his demons.  You see, we have no need to fear the devil.  He fears us because he knows how powerful we are through Christ.  He fights us with distractions to keep us from knowing it.

I encourage you to walk in the spirit not in the flesh (Galatians 5: 16-18).  Remember who you are; a spirit that is a child of the true and living God with all the power, rights and privileges of sonship.  As you maintain this Kingdom perspective you will be positioned to bring the Kingdom of God into existence in the earth so that it overtakes the kingdom of this world.

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