Follow the Leader

Slowly, I am learning to follow my Leader - the Lord.

I am learning that only the Holy Spirit can point me in the direction God wants me to go.  And gradually it is changing my prayer life.

I still try to force my own will through my prayers.  Often, I pick my goals and am disappointed when God doesn't give me what I want.

But, more and more, I am opening myself to seeking and hearing the Lord BEFORE I pray for specifics.

Much has been written about the importance of the Holy Spirit.  In fact, several authors I have read make the same point: Without the Spirit, prayer is useless.

Fred Hartley III, author of Prayer on Fire, writes: "We have come to a critical breaking point when we admit that we can't pray effectively on our own and that we need to rely on the leadership of the Holy Spirit."

How does the Holy Spirit speak?  In 1 Samuel 3, he speaks to young Samuel in an audible voice.  Samuel doesn't realize it is God speaking and it isn't until his master Eli tells him that it is the Lord that he enters into a conversation with God.

I remember many years ago a Canadian United Church minister heard God speaking to him in an audible voice and calling him into the ministry.  It still happens today.

Sometimes it is a vision.  In Acts 16, the apostle Paul saw a vision of a man from Macedonia in mainland Greece beckoning to him to come.  Paul obeyed and brought the good news of Jesus Christ to Europe for the first time.

More often it is a prompting - a word or a thought - that springs up in our minds.  That is the way it usually happens with me.  Something I have been puzzling about for a while suddenly is resolved by a thought driving me in a new direction.

And, of course, the Spirit works through our reading and meditating on scripture.  A Bible passage sometimes gains new meaning when I read it.

I am a writer and I find that writing to the Lord in my journal opens up answers - answers that always conform to the scriptures.

Jesus is a great example of praying in the Spirit.  His ministry on earth was confirmed by the Holy Spirit descending on him at his baptism.  Thereafter, he prayed constantly to the Father through the Spirit and was guided in everything he did.

Christ said in John 6:19: "I tell you the truth, the Son can do nothing by himself.  He does only what he sees the Father doing.  Whatever the Father does, the Son also does."

Jesus was a man just like us - with the same limits as we have.  He "saw" what the Father was doing through praying in the Holy Spirit.

Jesus' ministry was world-shaking.  Ours can be effective, too, if we follow our Leader.