MONDAY March 18th
Romans 8:16
‘The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God’.
I want to take from this sentence for today the words ‘The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit’, and although here it is a confirmation that we are the children of God, we can also conclude from the word of God that the Holy Spirit witnesses to our spirit in other ways as well.
The Holy Spirit has not only been given to us for equipping and empowering but also to give us a witness in our spirit regarding spiritual matters and to the outworking of our Christian life. If we are willing to seek it and to ask for it, he gives to us inner confirmation, toward that which is God’s will for us.
In the book of Acts, we have an account of Paul along with Timothy and Silas embarking on a mission, but the Holy Spirit gave to them a witness, we do not know how, which was sufficient to stop them from preaching the word in Asia and prevented them from going to Bithynia. As a result, they came down instead to Macedonia, where they entered one of the leading cities, Philippi, resulting in a new Church being established. As a result, we have in our Bible’s today, a letter that Paul would later write to them, which has encouraged believers down through the centuries ever since.
It is vital that we also listen out sensitively for the leading and the prompting of the Holy Spirit, asking him to give us witness in our spirit that we are acting and living according to what he is desiring for us. Waiting for the witness that may give us a yes or a no, the witness that may say wait awhile or act now, the witness that will if we are truly sensitive toward it will stop us when we are heading the wrong path and put us in the right direction.
In Galatians, after Paul has spoken about the fruit of the Spirit, he continues to say, ‘If we live by the Spirit, let us also keep in step with the Spirit’.
May we learn to live by and keep in step with the Spirit, listening to his promptings, as he moves us forward in our daily walk, allowing him to witness with our spirit, this is the way, walk in it.