Jesus told us to wait and pray

This plan will give an opportunity to study from scripture how we can seek the filling of the Holy Spirit in our lives.

We should start (unsurprisingly) with the command of Jesus himself.

Jesus told the eleven remaining apostles, "I am going to send you what my Father has promised, but stay in the city until you have been clothed with power from on high" Luke 24:49 (NIV).

The apostles did what Jesus told them. They stayed in the city. They worshipped and prayed in the temple, and they were clothed with power from on high when the Spirit came on them all at Pentecost. Acts 2 describes how the Spirit came, how Peter immediately preached the gospel, and how about three thousand people were converted and baptised, with the immediate result that the church was born.

We see the same in Jesus’ own life. Jesus himself did not begin his public ministry until he had been filled with the Holy Spirit immediately after he had been baptised in water by John the Baptist.

Around twenty-five years later, when Paul wrote his circular letter to the churches – the letter to the Ephesians - he exhorted and instructed all believers to "be filled with the Spirit", and since this verb is in the present continuous tense, it means, "be being filled with the Holy Spirit" (Ephesians 5:18).

We need the infilling of the Spirit in our lives because, in the famous words of the evangelist Charles Finney, "I leak".

We need the infilling of the Spirit because, as Paul states in Romans 5:5 and then prays in his wonderful prayer in Ephesians 3:16-18, we need to be strengthened by the Spirit so that our hearts are filled with nothing less than the very love of God. This love changes everything!

Again and again in his final discourse with his disciples (John 13-17) Jesus told them that the Holy Spirit would come to them and help them, and in Acts 1:8, he again stated that they would receive power when the Spirit came and they would be his witnesses.

So I invite you to journey with me as we take this opportunity to seek again to be filled with the Holy Spirit.

Ask the Lord to help you invite him and allow him into every part of your life, and to fill you with His Spirit.

Tomorrow, we shall study the strong Old Testament basis for waiting on the Lord and what it teaches us about seeking him.

But for now, let’s take a moment in silence before the Lord and commit ourselves to seek him at this time so our whole life is filled with the presence of Jesus Christ by his Spirit.