If you're like many believers, you have no difficulty in remembering that God the Father is all around you. We see His creation, pray to Him, read His bible, and even talk to other people about Him a lot. We are... or should be... troubled when we hear His name taken in a disrespectful and unholy way. We tell people how much we love Him. We are quite tuned in to God the Father.
Jesus, God the Son, is certainly easy for us to stay mindful of as well. His cross is worn as an adornment around the neck and on t-shirts. There are hundreds of very fine and memorable songs that have been written about Him. We read the gospel accounts and learn about His birth, we see his parents confusion by his need to be in His Father's house at 12 years of age, we learn of His last three years of His life when He revealed who He was and why He had come, and we read of His death, resurrection, and ascension. Thousands of paintings have been painted depicting Him in hundreds of different ways. We have so many visual, written, and oral reminders of Jesus that He is even easier to picture in our mind than God the Father.
But what about the Holy Spirit? In some circles the Holy Spirit is the person of the trinity who really makes you do seemingly bizarre things, like speaking in tongues. In other groups the topic is avoided altogether because we certainly wouldn't want to be "one of those", would we? How many pictures of the Holy Spirit have you actually seen. Other than in a church service, have you ever heard a song about the Holy Spirit? He has no movies that I am aware of, and no musicals on Broadway either. So, who is the Holy Spirit, what is He doing, and how should we think and speak of Him?
The Holy Spirit is the third person of the trinity, who, as described in Galatians 5:17-25, helps us overcome the desires of the flesh. He lives in us, working through us, filling our life with Himself, and providing us with a changed life that is characterized by fruit in our life. According to v. 22, that fruit includes "love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control". Compare that to your life before you became a follower of Jesus Christ. Without the Holy Spirit in your life you may have been characterized by the works of the flesh talked about in v. 19: "sexual immorality, moral impurity, promiscuity, idolatry, sorcery, hatred, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, selfish ambitions, dissensions, factions, envy, drunkenness, carousing, and anything similar". As you can see from these verses, a person who is filled with the Holy Spirit will enjoy a much happier life. Most other people will be more drawn to a person who is filled with the Holy Spirit; even if they are not a believer yet.
Jesus explained to His disciples in John 16:7 that He must go away so that the Holy Spirit could come. When Jesus was with His disciples, He could only be one place at one time. He had limited His own omnipresence. However, in leaving here and ascending to the Father, He sent the Holy Spirit to believers. The Holy Spirit has the ability to be in everyone and in every place where there is faith in God's Son. The Holy Spirit works to empower us, to intercede on our behalf, to fill us with the fruit mentioned above, to keep us from evil, and to guide us in all wisdom.
Francis Chan wrote a book recently entitled "Forgotten God". His point throughout this book is that the Holy Spirit is the person of the triune God that we have too often ignored and failed to allow into our life as we should. But we can't continue to do that. If we are followers of Jesus Christ, the Holy Spirit is to us what water is to the physical body. We must have water to continue to live. The follower must be filled with the Holy Spirit to live the life God intended. Simply sucking air and eating and sleeeping and going through life is not what God intended for you. He has big plans for your life. He has incredible things he wants to do through you but can only do it if you are filled with the Holy Spirit. This happens when we die daily to self and ask God to fill our life with the Holy Spirit. Run to the Holy Spirit and ask Him to fill your life. Be filled daily. Enjoy all that the Holy Spirit wants to do through you. He's ready to give you the life God intended.
