What Measure our Response?

When I began to realize the importance of knowing and understanding covenant commitment, I began to see the importance of our response. I saw in the Scriptures that intermittent response to God mixed with unbelief and withdrawal into human reliance always meant disaster. I also saw it walked out constantly all around me and even within my own self. We rejoice in God's provision for us until circumstances test our trust in that provision. Then we return to reliance on other means found in this realm that are familiar to us. (Israel sought to return to Egypt!)

When Jesus was preparing His disciples for His departure, He began to explain the provision made for them in the New Covenant. God would not leave them, for the ministry of God in the Holy Spirit would take over in teaching and guiding as Jesus had been doing with them. The New Covenant in Jesus' Blood would allow the Holy Spirit to abide in them and lead them in following Jesus. This would not be a "different" way, but an enlargement to them of His command to "Follow Me!"

God now could come into a person to lead that person into keeping His commands with more than actions but with thoughts and emotions and change of nature. God's Nature and Person would be leading from within. The challenge to mankind was no longer external obedience. It had now become the challenge of yielding thought, reactions, and motivations. The coming of the Holy Spirit to abide within an individual became the challenge of that person to allow the Holy Spirit the control to lead to full surrender to God's Nature. Through the trial and error of learning to listen to the Holy Spirit's Voice and surrendering our own reactions and motives, we begin the process of change and the opportunity to follow Jesus into the victory of resurrection. In this process we learn the necessity of focus.

Our response to God's provision will depend on our focus. Are we so focused on our self and dependence on this realm that we cannot hear the Spirit's Voice, or are we focused on following the Spirit's guidance to lead us in Jesus' footsteps? This realm can drown out the quiet voice of the Holy Spirit. Our nature can drown out His voice. Our holding on to anger, revenge, hurts and unforgiveness can cause fatal deafness. The Blood of Jesus opened the door for the Holy Spirit to come to abide in us and only the Blood can cleanse us of those things within us that will cause us to be unable to be led by the Holy Spirit.

Do you want more of God? Do you long for that close intimacy with Him? Do you long to hear His Voice? God has already provided the Way for you to have what you long to see. Your response to His provision will measure what you receive.