Where is the Holy Spirit?

Our Thursday Morning Men's Group is reading Francis Chan's book on the Holy Spirit entitled 'Forgotten God'. Pastor Chan raises several serious challenges about Christians and the Holy Spirit. I thought I would share from the book a few of these challenges, and then provide one response that might help us all out. To begin with here are three of those challenges:

• Our bodies are Temples of the Holy Spirit (1 Corinthians 6:19-20). If the Holy Spirit is dwelling in us, then shouldn't there be a huge difference in the lives of a person who has the Holy Spirit living inside of them, compared to the one who does not? (p.32);
  
• By the power of the Holy Spirit, we put to death the misdeeds of the body. Over our lifetimes, the Spirit sets us free from sins we cannot get rid of on our own (Romans 8:2). Is this really happening? (p. 75);
  
• The fruit of the Holy Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self control (Galatians 5:22-23). Who out there can see that they have all of the fruit to a "supernatural" degree? (p. 147.)
  

So these are a few of the challenges that we have dealt with in going through the 'Forgotten God' book. Although dealing with challenges is sometimes fun to do, I was really looking for an answer to these challenges as I went through the book. And here is one answer that Pastor Chan brings up that struck me as particularly helpful. He looks at the Old Testament Prophet Elijah. This is the same Elijah who raised the dead, and called down fire from heaven in taking down the priests of Baal. So was Elijah just a super-spiritual, super-holy miracle worker? That's not what was written about Elijah in the Bible:

Elijah was a man with a nature like ours, and he prayed fervently… (James 5:17 - ESV)

So Pastor Chan brings out the fact that Elijah did great miracles by God's power, despite his being a normal man with a nature just like ours. The key appears to be Elijah's fervent use of prayer. This is a great take-away application from the 'Forgotten God' book – if we want to see and do miracles for God's glory, perhaps a good starting point is to pray fervently, like Elijah did. Let's focus our energies and time asking for help from the One who has the power to change us, to give us more fruit of the Spirit, and to do mighty miracles. It seems like a great place to start.

May God through Jesus Christ our Lord give you His peace and blessings this week, Amen. /s/Tom