Category: Holy Spirit

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Changing Life Seasons

Photo by Andreas Dress, on Unsplash.com

In a recent exploration among fellow Spiritual Companions, I described my current cycles of growth where I felt aerated—like ground broken up for planting fresh crops—good and necessary for the long term and a difficult process in the moment.

I’m getting older and am cutting back on taking on new projects. I am getting help to manage the household; all because I’m discovering that I have less energy than before. Having to make such changes is hard.

Yet, making these changes helps me focus more on my calling to share the Good News of the Kingdom of God that Jesus preaches, and help activate people at The Miracle Café in the highlands of Panama, where people learning how to minister are helping others experience miracles of healing and restoration in other areas of their lives.

Earlier, I knew a transition was in progress for me. At first, it was difficult. More recently, I knew through Holy Spirit that my spirit was confident. Even though my soul—my mind—did not consciously know what the transition was towards.

I guess that’s a sign of growth. There was a time I didn’t trust so well, and I would have tried to insist on knowing what was going on and understanding the process before I would choose to trust the process. Now I trust God more completely. (That is good progress, I am sure of it.)

Feeling like ground that was too hard and not yet ready for planting while being plowed—was still difficult though.

There will be more changes. Change is always in progress. For me, spring is not so far away now. Other seasons will follow.

A deep help for me was being asked key questions and seeking to answer Spiritual Companions and Holy Spirit. Being encouraged helped me put this into words, and I understood with greater awareness and consciousness. Support, friendship, and encouragement helped.

Spiritual Companionship is a great and necessary help for me and all of us. We go through transitions easier and better with such help, even when they are challenging.

Transition and change can be painful, difficult, wonderful, and joyous in any combination. 

Transition is much more productive as we seek help through Holy Spirit, which is often easier and faster when we have the encouragement, help, and support of Spiritual Companions.

We all go through transitions and many changes. It is easier and faster, and more joyous for us with excellent help. Yet, seeking help from Holy Spirit is easy and effective with help from Spiritual Companions.

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Changing Atmospheres Discipleship Holy Spirit

Changing the Atmosphere

Fighting Elephant Statues Under a Blue Sky – by Bert B, at Unsplash.com

With the help of Holy Spirit, you can change the atmosphere in a place. Turns out to be surprisingly easy to do!

Holy Spirit loves helping you with this.

For example, you might sense that the atmosphere where you are seems too full of conflict. Like fighting elephants, or people arguing or being mean to each other.

So ask Holy Spirit something like, “What kind of atmosphere are we in here, now?” Pause, listen, feel, see what comes to your mind.

Then ask Holy Spirit something like, “What kind of atmosphere would you like to help change this to?” Pause, and as you listen, feel, and discover what comes to your attention.

You might receive one or more Fruit of the Spirit, as in Galatians 5:22-23. Maybe something else. This is fun! (It may even surprise you in a good way.)

Now ask, maybe, “How do I pray for this?” As you listen, look for an image, be ready for an idea to come to you – and do that. This can come quite quickly and be very surprising and easy to ignore when it comes quickly, easily, and especially when is surprising. If not against the character of God, respond.

What you are doing is your response. You are “talking” to God through your action, doing as Jesus did – doing what he was shown or heard.

This is a mighty useful and extremely powerful pattern for prayer, for ministry – for having any good two-way conversation with God. Remember – prayers where you listen as well as speak are like conversations, which can give you insight, wisdom, or be a personal revelation for you. From God!

Note:

I expect there will be more articles about Changing Atmospheres. So in the future you can click on that keyword in red at the top or do a search in the search box which is near the top of the page on the right.

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Conversation with God Discipleship Faith Hearing God Holy Spirit Prayer

Faith is Easy When

See Jesus, Have Faith in Him

Too often we are tempted and try to make up faith, we try to “have” faith. Without realizing it, that’s sort of like having faith in faith. Which is close, but still misses the mark. When I do this, I experience great frustration because I know at a deep level that this cannot work.

Faith comes from hearing the Word of God. When you pray or minister like Jesus, doing what you are shown or what you hear – good results come easily. Faith comes easily when we are doing what we hear or what we are shown by God.

When you are doing what God says to do, faith is easier.

Faith that is real and effective grows easily out of a revelation you personally receive from our Lord.

When we recognize the goodness and power of God, it’s easy to have faith in God.

When God says something, and you hear this, having faith is wonderfully easier.

Faith is important because of what faith does. What is it that faith does? Faith has the effect of connecting the Anointing with a need. A need for healing, restoration, or to defeat the works of the devil.

Laying hands on someone is not practical when that someone is out of reach, is far away. But faith connects. Even at a distance. Like when Jesus spoke a word for the healing of the centurion’s servant. The centurion’s faith connected the Anointing of Jesus the Anointed with his servant, who needed healing.

Faith connects. Fresh revelation from Jesus transcends time and space. And when faith comes easily from hearing Jesus in a personal and real way, faith connects the Anointing with the need.

This is one reason why faith is so important.

Another reason faith is so important is that it grows out of hearing directly from our Lord, Creator of our universe. Wow….

Dwell on this. Meditate on this. Let this sink in deeply, so that you hear it from Jesus, through Holy Spirit and hear this for yourself.

Then faith is easy.

Dwell…. Meditate…. Ask Jesus to give you a personal revelation.

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Conversation with God Friendship Hearing God Holy Spirit Jesus Jesus's Communication Ministry Prayer

Hearing and Seeing What God has to Say with a Spiritual Director

Help Hearing God

A Spiritual Director or spiritual friend has a simple job: to help you hear God for yourself, with greater confidence and clarity, joining in a conversation that God is already having with you.

When you want to receive what God has to “say” (it’s not always in words), a spiritual director can sometimes be mighty helpful. I know, because I’ve been helped this way. Often.

Why and how can this be? What goes on? I’m still figuring this out, but my current understanding is something like this:

“Hearing” God can be hard, because:

-Our own opinions, beliefs, personal history and other “stuff” can sometimes make it harder to hear God by ourselves.

-A lot of us still need a lot more practice trying to hear from God. (Hearing is a metaphor that can include words, still knowing that is pre-verbal, seeing or feeling something, noticing thoughts in our mind that might be from God, and lots more. Whew! No wonder we can use help!)

-There are many ways God “speaks” to us, and the methods God uses have useful side effects to help us. For more on this, see: https://ministermorelikejesus.com/voices-of-god/

A Spiritual Director or spiritual friend can sometimes help:

-Your issues are not felt so deeply by another person, are not so personal, making hearing easier.

-Someone with practice hearing from God, and whose abilities complement yours can be a wonderful partner. Especially when

-They care. When you and they have a “heart connection”, connect well.

-Having someone who listens deeply and well, with their heart, helps us all clarify issues and be clearer and more ready for fresh insight.

A Spiritual Director of spiritual friend has a Helper, Holy Spirit, who

-Is the same Helper and Comforter who is helping you! We have Someone in common.

-The two humans can have a conversation, which is private and aimed at helping, and both of us have the same Holy Spirit who is communicating with you.

A Spiritual Director or spiritual friend has had lots of experience receiving such help. Knows what it’s like. Can be sensitive to issues about spiritual direction and to what may matter to you.

A Spiritual Director or spiritual friend has a simple job: to help you hear God for yourself, with greater confidence and clarity, joining in a conversation that God is already having with you.

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Church Life Disciple Making Glory Holy Spirit Kingdom of God Worship

Simon Xing on Worship

Worship – aliane-schwartzhaupt-raeSgX3u3ZA-unsplash

I once asked a good friend, Simon Xing, who lives in China, about worship. He’s a fine worship leader, with wonderful experience to share. What follows is an edited version (for readability) of our conversation.

D: Simon – I have a question…I can use your help. How might you describe different levels of worship?

S: Thanks for your questions. Personally, I would divide it into four levels.

D: Tell me!

S: The first is surface level. Just singing.

D: Makes sense. Please go on.

S: The second is when you are infected by another person’s spirit to worship.

D: Good. Go on….

S: The third is when you can worship anytime in any place.

D: Tell me more about this.

S: Just feel like God is on your side.

(D: That sounds so simple; it’s useful and profound.)

D: Wow! Tell me more.

S: The fourth, also the deepest, for me, I think is when you are the performer standing in front of God. (D: This is what your attention is full of. Nothing else.)

D: Please go on. More!

S: And angels are your audience. They are listening, and maybe even join in.

D: Ahh…I love this!

S: This is a moment of holiness. You don’t care about anything but God. You may cry. You may dance. You may sing in tongues.

D: Ahh….

S: Nothing but holiness.

D: Wonderful!

S: You will not care, in such moments, about timing. No concern or worry. Your focus is single and complete.

D: I never thought of that….

S: You just want to continue and go on – in that environment. This is just my experience.

D: Your experience in such things as this – is valuable.

S: I experienced four levels. Maybe there is a fifth. It may take time….

D: Go on…think out loud.

S: Now I don’t know…. I just hope there would be a fifth one. (D: Simon is getting ready to speak and put into words a deep intuition of his understanding, so far. Holy Spirit whispering to his spirit.)

S: Which may be that God only wants me to worship.

S: He cares about my worship most at such a moment.

D: Go on….

S: And I can feel his holy touch.

S: Not by saints, but by him.

S: (Simon spoke briefly of some Internet difficulties.) He blessed me, sent his deep love.

We said goodbye for now.

D: (This was a fascinating and lovely conversation, with thoughts from an experienced worship leader.)

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Conversation with God Hearing God Holy Spirit Jesus Learning Prayer

How I hear God More Easily – Not Buying Another Book.

Holy Spirit – from Unsplash.com

I’ve learned that when I think I need to buy another book about hearing God well, what it really means for me is that I am not full enough of Holy Spirit.

I have not asked to be more full of Holy Spirit and received by faith. It’s easy to do. I may not feel Holy Spirit, but the results are easy to notice.

Hearing from God is lots and lots easier for me when I am full of Holy Spirit. And all I have to do is ask, and receive by faith. No drama needed. I rarely notice more of Holy Spirit, except for the side effects, which are extremely obvious. Such as hearing God better.

(I mention that twice because it’s so important, and too easy to miss.)

When I follow Holy Spirit, Fruit of the Spirit is easy, and just flows. Love, patience, self-control, and other good Fruit.

I am operating out of my New Self instead of my Old self. New Self has no wounds or over-reactions. No traumas. No lack of access to wisdom and love and…other wonderful things.

Best of all, I am hearing from God more easily.

And I didn’t even distract myself by buying yet another book on the subject – because that wasn’t my issue. I just need to pay attention and ask for and receive more of Holy Spirit by faith.

Which is really easy. Even when I don’t feel it; but the results are easy to notice.

How does being more full of Holy Spirit help you with hearing from God better?

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Conversation with God Discipleship Father Hearing God Holy Spirit Jesus Lessons

Use All Your Senses

Hearing God

When God speaks to you, be alert with all of your senses. “Speak” is a metaphor for anything God “says”.

You might see something, sometimes quickly and when it’s surprising, its too easy to ignore. So pay close attention to what comes next after you ask a question or pause to listen and “hear”.

You might hear something. Still Small Voice may speak to you silently, before words.

A memory may come. An association – an idea. It can come in any good way.

And more. Events, people, book covers, songs, billboards, birds, forests, seas, lakes and rivers. Flowers. (Can you tell I love hearing God through nature?)

To get more used to this, learn to pay attention to the many kinds of “Voices of God“.

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Disciple Making Evangelize Gospel Healing Hearing God Holy Spirit Jesus Key Article Kingdom of God Ministry Miracles Success

Disciple-Making on Steroids

Miracle of Jesus Healing a Blind Man

Discipling someone, or several people, can can succeed a lot faster than most of us are used to. I call this “Disciple-Making on Steroids” because this approach is so powerful and fast.

Here’s an example to learn from, that, with variations – depending on your situation, can be done more easily and more quickly than perhaps we have ever seen.

On the street or in a supermarket or other store, or maybe a shopping mall, you see someone who obviously needs healing. Their injury or disability or pain is obvious to you.

So you walk up to them and say, “Hello. My name is ____; it looks to me like you have some” pain, difficulty, injury, disability – whatever it is. Make it easy for them to talk to you about it. Make sure you discover what it is that they cannot do or cannot easily do, because of that particular need of healing.

Ask them if it’s okay for you to pray for them. Most people will be glad for such prayer, if by then you are in rapport. If they are not willing, thank them and let them be.

You can pray for them at a distance if you like.

Keep doing this until you discover someone who is willing to be prayed for.

Pray for them, praying to Jesus, maybe something like, “Dear Jesus, help this person with ____” whatever is needed. They expected you to pray for them, and it’s easy for them to say yes to such a request. Then be sure to quietly but with authority – like when you are talking to a child or a pet and you really mean it – tell that need for healing to be healed. Be sensitive to Holy Spirit and do as seems best.

Ask them to test, to do what they could not easily do or could not do. When they succeed, give thanks to Jesus!

When that does not go well, you can be like Jesus healing the blind man who could see a bit more at first, but needed more healing and said something like, “I see men walking, but they are like trees walking”. So, like Jesus, you pray (and command with authority), healing again.

If you want to do it like Jesus did, and was so successful at healing so often (always), you can do it like this:

Keep testing the healing until it is done. Persist.

Now comes the cool part, disciple making on steroids:

Now that they have been healed, ask them something like, “Would you like to give your life to Jesus and have him as your Lord?” When they say yes, lead them in such a prayer. When they say no, just continue as if they had. Because of what happens next, they probably will.

Take the person who has now been healed and who now has Jesus (or not) in them, and go with them. Find someone else who has an obvious need of healing. Instruct them to pray for and command healing, just as they experienced. Have them heal the person in need. Pray for them and their ministry, and their good success while that do that. Help them out loud as called for and needed.

Now you have someone with you who has been healed, who has come to Jesus (or not, yet). If not yet come to Jesus, ask them if they want to make it official now, and help them accept Jesus as Lord. If not, get their contact information, pray for them, and follow up and give them encouragement and help as you are led with Holy Spirit. Just do the best you can and ask for help through Holy Spirit.

I like to ask for more of Holy Spirit before I pray for someone or minister. My prayer and ministry is more effective when I do this, and I hear God better, too.

.

I believe that this is how Jesus wants us to minister in these times. In these days. The time is short: make disciples, with Holy Spirit, on steroids!

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Discipleship Gifts Holy Spirit Learning Prayer Prophecy

Practice Using Your Spiritual Gifts

Actively Practice using Your Spiritual Gifts

A friend, who believes she has gifts as a prophetic seer and gifts of healing, asked some important questions. This may answer some of your questions, too. We need to practice using our Spiritual Gifts to we become more skillful; just like we need to practice playing an instrument even if you are gifted at music. Here’s our dialogue, lightly edited for clarity.

Q. Will be for Questioner, A. for Answerer.

Q. Will there be anything happening soon in my life?


A. Yes.


Q. Like?


A. You are learning to ask Jesus questions, and pay attention to Holy Spirit for answers.
As you learn to do this, and to act on what you learn, your life will transformed hugely.
This opens whole new worlds of doing and ministry for you.
And you will be adding even more love to your ministry. The generous, God kind of love: agape. As in 1 Corinthians 13.


Q. Amazing


A. When you minister and if someone experiences love, that is successful ministry! This is an important standard to learn.
As you learn and do this, your life transforms even more.
And sometimes you will see or learn that healing has happened (not all healing is instantaneous). You will learn to listen to Holy Spirit for how to love and how to minister; how to use your gifts more and better.
This changes everything!
And you can apply asking Jesus and paying attention to and learning to hear and see answers, and acting on them — then our Lord himself is tutoring you. Your Helper is your Teacher.
He is already in you.


Q. Amen 🙏


A. And you can ask for more of him in you. I find this makes hearing God much more practical and better. When I do this, I hear God so much more and more easily and better. Even though I don’t feel a thing – I can experience the difference, having asked for more of Holy Spirit.
And I can ask for Holy Spirit to be on me more. On me for ministry for others.
Holy Spirit can transform the atmosphere of where you are, the room you are in.
Ask how, and do as you are shown. It’s a wonderful thing to do – for yourself as well as others.


Q. I will


A. People will gradually learn that the atmosphere is better where you are. Some people will learn more quickly, others more slowly. Yet many will learn.
And this opens doors.
For more ministry.


A. People who come to my house report that the atmosphere is full of peace. That’s the Presence and Spirit of God doing that.


Q. Wow.


A. You will do this, also. You will transform the atmosphere of where you live and work. The Presence of God and Holy Spirit will transform the atmosphere of places you go. People will notice and be helped. Some even heal without your doing anything, as Holy Spirit ministers in the place where you are.
You get to be an active participant in all this!


Q. Glory to God!!
Interesting


A. You invite more of Holy Spirit. You are transformed, and Holy Spirit will do what Holy Spirit does in that place and with the people there.
Invite more of Holy Spirit. And receive with faith.
So simple; easy to forget to do. Yet Holy Spirit is literally our Helper. Your Helper.


Q. Got it


A. The same Helper that raised Jesus from the dead lives in you and will help you. Invite and call on and receive more of Holy Spirit.


Q. Ok


A. I find this stunning, I am amazed, and when I remember these things I want to call out to God in praise or even song. (Considering how much I love worship in silence, that’s amazing.)


A. And when you find a partner who will pray for you as you do these things or minister, ministry results will improve even more. And later, you can pray for them as they minister. And talk to each other about how it went. What you are learning. Encourage one another.
Jesus always sent out his disciples in pairs.
When I have no partner, I look for someone who will pray for me when asked. Then I have prayer support while ministering.
They and I can talk about it afterwards, what happened, what we’re learning. It can be exhilarating and joyous.
This is what I want for you; these very things.


Q. Oh how I want this for myself


A. Good!
This is what our Lord wants for you.


Q. God will send me some really special
A. Yes.
You can copy and paste from these notes into your prayer journal, or start one. Or other notes in a file or notebook.
Then start practicing these things and learn as you go. Learn as you ask your Helper to help you learn these things and to help you do these things.
And give you even better ideas, from Jesus. Who knows so much more than you or I.
Here’s an interesting principle, not well recognized: how much you seek God with your heart – is how much God will make himself known and present to you. And even more. He will always do the same or more, as you. (I think more; yet the more you do, the more he multiplies the grace he gives you.)
If he made himself totally known to us, our brains would fry.
So he is gentle and careful. And gives of himself in proportion to how much and how strongly you seek with your heart.

A. – The principle above is courtesy of Al Mack (Nor’west Prophetic).


Q. Amazing and wonderful!
.
A. Yes. So just practice. Look for people who need healing, ask how to heal them, and do as Jesus tells you through Holy Spirit. You will be ministering like Jesus, who only did what he heard and saw.

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Discipleship, Getting Help Faith Holy Spirit HSP Prayer Spiritual Warfare

Clean & Space = Safe

Shower

You can, by faith, ask for and receive and thoroughly enjoy a Holy Spirit Shower. A shower not of water, but of Holy Spirit. Wonderfully cleansing – of anything that does not belong.

What does not belong might be something like a thought or feeling that you’ve kept too long or something you’ve picked up from something or someone else.

.

Next, take a few moments. Imagine yourself carefully putting on a space suit. Then,

Space Suit

You can, by faith, ask for and receive a Holy Spirit Space Suit. Wonderfully safe, your personal space and boundaries are amazingly and supernaturally protected.

Notice and enjoy how you are doing, how your experience is different. Enjoy, and praise your Lord.