Life in the Spirit
Being Led by the Spirit – Part V
Scripture Reading: Romans 8:1-14
Key Verse: Romans 8:9
You, however, are not in the realm of the flesh but are in the realm of the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God lives in you. And if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, they do not belong to Christ.
God our Father determined the plan for us to be saved. Jesus, God’s Son, paid the price to make the Father’s plan available to us. God the Holy Spirit is the third person of the Trinity and is responsible for helping all believers know truth and walk in it.
The Holy Spirit’s role is to lead us, but He cannot and does not force us to follow His lead. That is why the Apostle Paul wrote in Ephesians 4:30: “And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption.” It grieves the Spirit when He leads us into new truth and we refuse to follow. New truths often require us to give up a behavior we have grown comfortable with, and that is not easy. However, if God’s Spirit leads us in that direction, it is the best way for us.
You might be asking how we know when the Spirit is leading us into a new truth. It is the Holy Spirit’s role to make the truth clear to us. He may use a sermon, a godly friend, or our reading of the Bible to direct our attention to a truth we need. The Spirit uses whatever method He knows will best get truth into our heads and hearts. As long as we don’t fight it, we can walk in perfect fellowship with God by obeying all the Spirit reveals to us.
Being led by the Spirit looks a lot like a father leading his young child by the hand. As long as the child doesn’t squirm loose, he gets to where the father wants him to go; the child must not insist on his own desires or wisdom. So it is with us — the Spirit knows how to lead us, teach us, and get us to where the Father wants us to be. Proverbs, the Book of Wisdom, tells us:
Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding;
in all your ways submit to Him, and He will make your paths straight.
Do not be wise in your own eyes; fear the Lord and shun evil. (Proverbs 3:5-7)
Why did God preserve this verse for all believers to read for generations after it was written? Because God knows we humans have a strong tendency to trust what makes sense to us, but God’s ways are higher than our ways (Isaiah 55:8-9). Never trust your ways or thoughts when they contradict a biblical truth; trust the Lord with all your heart!
Father, remind me that Your ways are always right. In Jesus’s Name I pray, amen.