How do I relate to the Holy Spirit?

How do I relate to the Holy Spirit?

Peter teaches the churches he wants to influence by writing this is the letter known as 1 Peter in the New Testament:

Like newborn babies, crave pure spiritual milk, so that by it you may grow up in your salvation, now that you have tasted that the Lord is good (1 Peter 2:2).

Take the next steps of this person-to-person relationship with God Jesus has opened to you!

We have a whole new relationship with God when we accept the gift of eternal life from Jesus. It is never-ending, Spirit-to-spirit, Parent to child and full of energy for overcoming evil with good. Peter goes on to say:

As you come to him, the living Stone—rejected by humans but chosen by God and precious to him— you also, like living stones, are being built into a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood, offering spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ….But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s special possession, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light. Once you were not a people, but now you are the people of God; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy (1 Peter 2:4-5, 9-10).

In the next section of this website (Fire and Water) you can find more help about spiritual gifts and further help about spiritual disciplines. For now let’s take first steps in understanding how to relate to God Spirit to spirit.

Feel spiritual feelings

Jesus told Nicodemus,

“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).

We have a capacity to relate to God. It has been broken and blunted. We need to learn to feel: hear, love, heal, with our renewed senses.

Be convicted from a new center

Jesus told his disciples,

“Unless I go away, the Advocate will not come to you; but if I go, I will send him to you “When he comes, he will prove the world to be in the wrong about sin and righteousness and judgment: about sin, because people do not believe in me; about righteousness, because I am going to the Father, where you can see me no longer; and about judgment, because the prince of this world now stands condemned” (John 16:7-11).

We gain the capacity to see ourselves and the world in a new way. What we thought about good and evil has a new source: Jesus, and the same solution.

Act out of our new connection

Paul wrote this great prayer to the church in Ephesus that is a good model for everyone taking first steps of faith:

“I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth takes its name. I pray that, according to the riches of his glory, he may grant that you may be strengthened in your inner being with power through his Spirit, and that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith, as you are being rooted and grounded in love. I pray that you may have the power to comprehend, with all the saints, what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, so that you may be filled with all the fullness of God. Now to him who by the power at work within us is able to accomplish abundantly far more than all we can ask or imagine, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen” (Ephesians 3:14-21).

We have confidence to talk to God in pray and expect a response. We have confidence to gain strength for a life of faith and so be healed and helped. We have confidence to take our stand among God’s people. We have confidence to do what Jesus does in his hope to redeem the world and spread love and goodness to everyone.