The Most Important Things

In 1 Thessalonians 5:19, Paul instructs, “Do not stifle the Holy Spirit.” The NKJV says, “do not quench the Spirit.”

This verse has been rolling around my spirit lately. And I have been asking the Holy Spirit what exactly does it mean? While I don’t purport to have full revelation on this verse (or any other for that matter), I did want to share some thoughts about what this verse means.

First of all, not quenching the Holy Spirit is not about an individual liking or disliking something(i.e. room temperature, certain types of music, etc.). That has more to do with distraction of the mind rather than a quenching of the Spirit. Whenever we get into the spiritual realm we must realize that time ceases to exist. God dwells in eternity, which in Hebrew means “time outside of the mind.” So, in the spiritual realm we must be aware that things that we have in our modern day society to compliment a moving of the Spirit have only been around a short time. Read the bible and you will see that Jesus performed mighty miracles on the streets with no piano playing softly in the background nor was there any microphone. There was not even any air-conditioning! Once we understand this, it helps to understand the Spirit even more. In other words, the Spirit can move anywhere, anytime for any reason!

In light of that, how is He quenched then? One of the way the Holy Spirit is quenched is when we tease someone for being spiritual. Ever been in the flesh and somebody was getting into the Spirit and you kind of tease them for being “so spiritual” or “super-spiritual?” Guilty as charged! Sometimes, people have been praying in the Spirit or singing worship songs and in my heart I was opposed to that. How fleshly can I be?! I know you have never done that before. But the Holy Spirit convicted me and said, “how dare you attempt to quench what I am doing in someone else’s life!” Why would we ever keep someone from being spiritual? Or, perhaps someone was going to read their bible and you convinced them to do something else. Or, maybe you were just joking about how the Spirit moved in the “old days(laughter, rolling on the floor, etc).”

Another example of stifling the Spirit, is this current wave of “transparency” that is sweeping through the church. I believe accountability is much needed in American churches, I am all for that! But I am against the carnal cravings and confessions of pastors and Christians. It’s a lowering of the bar in the Spirit. One could say, “well pastor so and so listens to ____.” Or, “pastor such and such infatuates about this celebrity, so can I.” Many times, I have read a tweet or something of that nature and thought that is so carnal. And in that very instance, my own self would say, “stop being so spiritual!” I rebuke that lie. If we are not being spiritual, the only other alternative is carnal. I would rather be “super-spiritual” on twitter, facebook, at home and in church. Christians being carnal only gives us justification and license to continue in our powerless carnality. I think we have enough of that without the body of Christ contributing. Paul said he knew a man who was caught UP in the SPIRIT! Paul was not caught in the carnal realm, he was caught up in the Spirit!

Have you been carnal? Would you like to stop stifling the Spirit in your life and walk in His power? Pray this prayer from your heart and make a decision to live in the Spirit.

Forgive me Lord for quenching the pursuit of the supernatural in my own life and anyone else’s life! I am going to get caught up in the Spirit. I am going to set my mind on things above (in heaven) and not on this earth. I will not quench the Spirit. I release the Holy Spirit to flow in my life!

In the title (right above) I am not talking about the book of revelation, so much as I am referring to revelation that helps us mature in our faith. Paul says in Philippians 3:16: “Nevertheless, to the degree that we have already attained, let us walk by the same rule, let us be of the same mind.” Or in the NLT, “but we must hold on to the progress we have already made.” In other words, we are responsible for the revelation that has been given to us. At the same time that verse was rolling around in my spirit, I came across this quote: “the trouble with many of us (christians) is that we have hard hearts and soft feet.*”

I wonder if one of the real problems we have with spiritual maturity is the inability to deal with spiritual pressure. It’s not that we don’t want to mature in Christ, in theory. Perhaps it’s that we don’t want to be responsible for that next level of revelation. Paul says in Romans, that he would not have known sin if it were not for the law. (I imagine it sort of like the road runner and Wile E. Coyote. Wile E. Coyote runs off the cliff and hangs there, suspended in mid-air, for a moment. Then road runner hands him the book “laws of gravity”, Wile E. Coyote reads it, gets a revelation and then plummets to the ground below.) Perhaps, ignorance is bliss. I don’t think so, especially when ignorance takes the place of true spiritual maturity I strongly disagree.

Back to that quote about hard hearts and soft feet. We really should  have hard feet, to assist us on our lengthy christian walk. And we should have soft hearts, also to assist us on our lengthy christian walk. Yet we have it backwards. We have tender feet which causes us to moan, whine and question God as to why we are walking. And we have hard hearts that make us insensitive to the voice of the Spirit and filled with selfishness. Let it not be so! Let’s take the road Paul took. Though it was filled with many struggles and triumphs, he was able to say this: I have fought the fight, finished the race and I have remained faithful.

Those three elements are all equal to this: a soft heart and hardened feet. My prayer today is that my heart would be sensitive to the still, small voice of God and that my weary, hardened feet would carry me on to my finish line. What’s your prayer?

*Quote by Jackie Pullinger, a missionary who spent more than 20 years in Hong Kong working with prostitutes, heroin addicts and gang members.