Perceiving the Divine Gift of the Holy Spirit

“If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit.”

 

“He would have given you living water."

Jesus and Samaritan Woman by Guercino (PD)

Listening to God, John the Baptist, heard the purpose of the coming Messiah.

(John 1:33, All scriptures NKJV.) "I did not know Him, but He who sent me to baptize with water said to me, 'Upon whom you see the Spirit descending, and remaining on Him, this is He who baptizes with the Holy Spirit'.”

To the Pharisee who came at night, Nicodemus, Jesus explains the need for the believer's divinely yielding life in the Holy Spirit.

(John 3:5-8) Jesus answered, "Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.

"That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.

"Do not marvel that I said to you, 'You must be born again.'

"The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear the sound of it, but cannot tell where it comes from and where it goes. So is everyone who is born of the Spirit."

To the Samaritan woman he found at Jacob's well, the Messiah offers a special drink.

(John 4:10) Jesus answered and said to her, "If you knew the gift of God, and who it is who says to you, 'Give Me a drink,' you would have asked Him, and He would have given you living water."

He tells her the wonderful qualities of this spiritual water.

(John 4:14) "But whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him will never thirst. But the water that I shall give him will become in him a fountain of water springing up into everlasting life."

At the Feast of Tabernacles, He identifies the living water to his disciples.

(John 7:38-39) "He who believes in Me, as the Scripture has said, out of his heart will flow rivers of living water." But this He spoke concerning the Spirit, whom those believing in Him would receive; for the Holy Spirit was not yet given, because Jesus was not yet glorified.

The World will not perceive the followers' indwelling Spirit of Truth.

(John 14:16-17) "And I will pray the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may abide with you forever--

"the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees Him nor knows Him; but you know Him, for He dwells with you and will be in you.”

The Holy Spirit will teach and bring to memory all the instructions of the Messiah.

(John 14:26) "But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all things that I said to you.”

In the unity of the Godhead, the Spirit from the Father will testify to the Son

(John 15:26) "But when the Helper comes, whom I shall send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth who proceeds from the Father, He will testify of Me.”

The Son must return to the Father to send the Spirit.

(John 16:7) "Nevertheless I tell you the truth. It is to your advantage that I go away; for if I do not go away, the Helper will not come to you; but if I depart, I will send Him to you.”

The One Spirit will manifest various supernatural works in the Followers of Jesus. God, himself, gives the true anointings and ministries of the Holy Spirit, not man.

(1Cor 12:4-11) “There are diversities of gifts, but the same Spirit. There are differences of ministries, but the same Lord. And there are diversities of activities, but it is the same God who works all in all.

“But the manifestation of the Spirit is given to each one for the profit of all: for to one is given the word of wisdom through the Spirit, to another the word of knowledge through the same Spirit, to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healings by the same Spirit, to another the working of miracles, to another prophecy, to another discerning of spirits, to another different kinds of tongues, to another the interpretation of tongues.

“But one and the same Spirit works all these things, distributing to each one individually as He wills.”

The Spirit appoints unique supernatural positions of duties in the congregation of followers. No, these are not prescribed by scripture to the same person but throughout the body as God determines. Although, some may overlap as experienced.

(1Cor 12:28-30) “And God has appointed these in the church: first apostles, second prophets, third teachers, after that miracles, then gifts of healings, helps, administrations, varieties of tongues.

“Are all apostles? Are all prophets? Are all teachers? Are all workers of miracles? Do all have gifts of healings? Do all speak with tongues? Do all interpret?”

Not least are the godly behaviors of the believers empowered by the presence of the Divine Spirit.

(Gal 5:22-25) “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, long suffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control.

“Against such there is no law. And those who are Christ's have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit.”

Seek the Face of God,

Bill Hunt

Oral Robert's Graduate Seminar on the Holy Spirit

Jesus Commands Healing

Jesus physically heals through the ministry of his people, even a brain tumor.

Jesus Also Commands His Disciples to Heal.

(Unknown Illustrator of Lillie A. Faris's Standard Bible Story Readers, 1925-28.)

Healing momentum burst forth when Mary, my wife, and other church members attended a healing conference presented by Charles and Frances Hunter. Over the years, we together experienced the marvelous ministries of several evangelists. In this case, an entire group from our little church in Central Florida attended the conference and came back beautifully primed to pray for healing.

Mary enjoyed the breakaway experience, and we were accustomed to working together in ministry. We prayed together as husband and wife when the team returned to minister in the church that coming Sunday morning.

Agnes Sanford called this anointing, 

"The Healing Light."

A suffering woman with a brain tumor whom the doctor initially diagnosed as ready for surgery asked us to pray for her. The anointing overpowered her and she fell safely to the floor. Power flowed in an amazing, direct beam from the hand held above the woman's head to her brain as she lay on the church's blue carpet. Her doctor found no brain tumor remaining that week when she returned for her appointment.

It's not always necessary to touch a person when God's healing power is flowing. People can then see that Jesus is the one who is healing. Otherwise, it is important to touch people very lightly so you don't appear to use human force.

Let God's power be God's power, 

not man's.

Surprisingly, the woman was additionally healed of arm, leg, and hip difficulties. Her legs readjusted through further prayer to their correct position. In a restaurant later that evening as she was seated, she discovered her tail bone was healed. Previously, it normally caused her discomfort, but now it did not!

Jesus is a carpenter who used tools to fashion and polish beautiful furniture. Did you ever see the tools try to claim credit for the carpenter's creation? Man speaks the word, but God performs the healing. Give the Glory to God!

The primary ingredient of healing is the sweet anointing presence of the Holy Spirit. He glides in on the Word spoken and the people's worship to cause the healing power of Jesus. A humble church body with living faith and expressive love will experience more of the healing ministries than a church body bound in religious disbelief or lukewarm apathy. Jesus commanded healing.

“As you go, preach, saying, 'The kingdom of heaven is at hand.' Heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, cast out demons (Matt. 10:7-8 NKJ).

“Freely you have received, 

freely give.”

Healing is so much God's work that we must listen for the invitation of God or the invitation of the person suffering. Yes, God responds when the humble, themselves, ask for help. The minister of healing must keep his ear attuned to both God and man through compassionate love. Often, the more impossible the situation, the more likely God will act.

The pastor must also be willing 

to protect his flock.

The Holy Spirit may pour forth a wondrous revival of the healing gifts on a church. Sometimes, jealous members will attempt to squelch the move of the Spirit. But the healing love of Jesus works through his humble disciples.

“Most assuredly, I say to you, he who believes in me, the works that I do he will do also; and greater works than these he will do, because I go to my Father. And whatever you ask in my name, that I will do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son” (John 14: 12-13 NKJ).

Mary also approached an elderly man with a foot problem. She told him to take off his special, oversized shoe. On his big toe was a hard round growth. She touched her index finger to the marble-sized growth, as we watched.

"I prayed over the growth; it went down like a balloon popping! It was no more," she said. "I was astonished to actually feel it go."

The man immediately bought himself a new pair of shoes! Jesus heals through the ministry of his people.

--Bill Hunt

Why not start a JESUS PRAYER Support Group in your home to seek the anointing of the Holy Spirit? Watch your Christianity come to life! Contact me if you have questions. 

For more information on Healing:

 

Anointed Power of Holy Spirit

Slain in the Spirit, what it is like. The anointing power of the Holy Spirit is far more universal than the limitations of man.

Christians walk in the shadow of Jesus. 

 (Art by William Holman Hunt, 1870)

“Would you like to join us in a weekly prayer meeting?” The elderly Catholic pastor and a young Baptist pastor prayed with us. Pentecostals and Catholics and Christian brothers and sisters from other denominations all over town joined us. Pete Wasco, a Pentecostal farmer who lost one arm in a farm accident, was one prayer warrior. He repaired lawn mowers with his good arm. We arranged chairs in a circle and prayed with our interfaith group on Monday nights. Together, we grew in Christ.


"The wind blows wherever it pleases.  

“You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit” (John 3:8 NIV).

We learned how willing the Holy Spirit wants to flow among the different denominations! Mary and I held a deep appreciation for the Holy Spirit's unlimited love among the different churches. Because of Him, we felt free to respond to ministry wherever we were invited. You can't put God in a box.

I can not express how beautifully Mary played anointed music on the available piano or organ. Or she sang with her auto harp and led worship in the Catholic, Baptist, Pentecostal, or Methodist churches and in neighborhood prayer meetings. She played the modern charismatic songs and the traditional hymns of Christianity. Through her anointing, the sweet presence of the Holy Spirit immediately flowed over us in worship.

We assisted the local Full Gospel Businessmen's meeting. Mary designed a huge red and white wall banner of the Last Supper to hang behind their head table. We also prayed with our dear friends Abe and Naomi, Charismatic Mennonites, at Grace Chapel. Beautiful it is, to watch the Holy Spirit work in his Love.

Mary remembers one special night as the Holy Spirit spilled over in to our home. I offered to pray for her heartfelt concerns. At first she resisted, feeling a hesitancy with our husband-wife relationship.


"So I asked you to lay hands on me
and pray over me," Mary said.

"I told God: 'Okay, just because Bill's my husband, I'm not going to resist his gift. Whatever you want to do, that's fine'. As you placed hands on my head, the anointing of God immediately came over me so powerfully I collapsed to the floor.

“For sure I was out. I lay on the living room rug for some forty-five minutes. When I fell backwards, the Holy Spirit told me to stop resisting him and to yield. As I lay there, I saw myself looking up at Jesus on the cross. I felt his blood from the cross dripping on my forehead. The Holy Spirit gave me a scripture.


'I have been crucified with Christ...  

“and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me” (Gal. 2:20 NIV).

"I just knew the experience of Jesus being the sacrifice for my sins. Then in the Spirit, I was lifted up onto the cross. I was on the cross with him, like in Jesus on the cross. I experienced what Jesus experienced when the Father looked away from him. It was the moment when Jesus took sin for me. And I felt forsaken, the darkness, the emptiness there, when Jesus died.

"At the same time, I can't tell you how this is. In my spirit I experienced the dynamite light explosion of the Resurrection, that same Spirit that raised Christ from the dead. That blackness felt like death, but then I experienced the light explosion!


“I experienced his Resurrection.
That's all I can say.  

"It was an identification with Christ on the cross, of his blood covering me, of what Christ really did when he died for me. He took my sin upon his cross. He experienced death so I wouldn't have to. He did it for me. The power of the Holy Spirit that raised Christ up, raised me up. I felt that."

"And if the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit, who lives in you” (Rom 8:11 NIV).

Mary fell to the rug-covered floor under the anointing. She rose with the experience of the overwhelming power of the Holy Spirit. She rose with an understanding of Christ's sacrifice on his blood-soaked cross for her. She rose with an understanding of the light of his Resurrection Victory for the World.

– Bill & Mary Hunt

What do you need from God?
In our House of Prayer, we will join and pray for you, no matter what your faith is.

Pray for the Freedom of the people of Iran from their Tyrants. Dictators who use violence are afraid of their own subjects. Prayer is the greatest Power on Earth.

 
For more information click: Holy Spirit
         
  

Never Suffer Spiritual Thirst Again

Holy Spirit
Jesus instructs a progressive lesson on a very special gift.


  

Woman Under Anointing of Holy Spirit, photo by Bill Hunt (c) 2010.

You've heard of progressive dinners, people going from house to house to eat the next serving of a neighborly meal. All through his ministry, Jesus served a step-by-step progressive lesson essential to his disciples, that many people miss. Here it is, in brief!

How important is it to you?

Jesus talked with Nicodemus who visited him in the dead of night.

Jesus answered, "I tell you the truth, no one can enter the kingdom of God unless he is born of water and the Spirit. Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit”  (John 3:5-6 NIV).

Jesus did not reject the woman at the well who experienced five husbands.  Indeed, he promised her a gift.

Jesus answered, "Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life” (John 4:13-14).

He publicly proclaimed the meaning of the streams of living water.

On the last and greatest day of the Feast, Jesus stood and said in a loud voice, "If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, streams of living water will flow from within him." By this he meant the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were later to receive. Up to that time the Spirit had not been given, since Jesus had not yet been glorified (John 7:37-39).

The condition for receiving the Holy Spirit 
is love and obedience to his commands.

"If you love me, you will obey what I command. And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Counselor to be with you forever—the Spirit of truth. The world cannot accept him, because it neither sees him nor knows him. But you know him, for he lives with you and will be in you”  (John 14:15-17).

Jesus leaves the Holy Spirit with us to remind us of his teachings.

“But the Counselor, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you”  (John 14:26).

The ultimate purpose of the Holy Spirit 
is to testify to Jesus.

"When the Counselor comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth who goes out from the Father, he will testify about me”  (John 15:26).


He is the divine Spirit of Truth who speaks from the Triune God.

“But when he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all truth. He will not speak on his own; he will speak only what he hears, and he will tell you what is yet to come. He will bring glory to me by taking from what is mine and making it known to you”  (John 16:13-14 NIV).

The Holy Spirit is the divine Gift Jesus offers to us, the streams of living waters welling up to eternal life.


 – Bill Hunt © 2010

NOTE:  Please let us know your thoughts in the comment box.  Have you received the empowering Gift of the Holy Spirit?

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