The Holy Spirit lives in you. Why doesn’t it make a greater difference?

26 Feb The Holy Spirit lives in you. Why doesn’t it make a greater difference?

If you are a Christian, the Holy Spirit lives in you (“…do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you…?” 1 Corinthians 6:19-20).

Why doesn’t it make a greater difference?

If you were going to write a science fiction movie, and you were going to have a Greek god inhabit your hero, wouldn’t it make a big difference? Wouldn’t your hero suddenly take on the superpowers of the god who now inhabits your hero? Wouldn’t he/she be stronger and smarter, with extraordinary abilities? Wouldn’t it be obvious to everyone who sees the movie that your hero was inhabited by a god?

So why doesn’t it make a greater difference that the Holy Spirit inhabits us?

• Why don’t we have bedazzling power when we speak and minister to others?
• Why don’t we live life with all the right deep and unflagging convictions?
• Why don’t we stand resolute against temptation, laughing in the face of enticement?
• Why don’t we have limitless enthusiasm for the priorities of God and fading enthusiasm for the world’s?
• Why don’t we show the world unfailing peace, love and joy in the face of difficult circumstances and challenging people?

Why doesn’t the world see our superabilities and stand in awe that we are inhabited by God? Is there something wrong with us? Is there something wrong with God? Is there something wrong with the system?

All Is As It Should Be

No, it is all as it should be. And here is why.

As I wrote in a previous blog, what God wants from us is love. He doesn’t want our money, he wants our heart.  But, the test of whether or not He has our heart is if we give Him our money.  Neither does God want our self-flagellation, nor the head of His enemies on a platter.

He doesn’t want anything we can give him. He wants us. He wants our love.

Therefore, God does not coerce or manipulate us to get what He wants. Otherwise, it would no longer be love.  Rather, He woos, He pursues, He courts, He persuades.

Love is only love if we are free to reject. If we could program a humanoid robot to act as though it loved us and to talk as though it loved us, we still would never interpret its actions and words as true love. For love to be “love,” it must be free to choose.

If God took over our lives the way a Greek god might take over the life of a movie hero, if God overwhelmed us with power, conviction, and enthusiasm that did not come solely from within us, it would not be genuine.  It might impress the world, but it would not impress God.

We Have Been Dramatically Diminished By the Fall

When God leaves us free to choose Him, to choose to trust and obey Him, our response might be feebler than we think it should be, or wish it could be, because it is coming from such a weakened and corrupted fallen vessel.

Our brains have been so diminished by the “Fall,” our wills so poisoned by the world, our hearts so blinded by the enemy, that our response to God’s love is sapped, like a skeletal, cancer-ravaged athlete trying to become an Olympic gold-medalist.

So, while our response of love to God, our giving back of trust and obedience, is not bedazzling to the world, it is genuine. Genuine love. And that’s what God wants from us, our love, not merely attempts to appease Him with our money or asceticism.

God does not want us on divine steroids. He just wants who we are, what we have, what we can do… given back to him in love, in a genuine love response to the love that He first gave us (1 John 4:10).

God Just Wants Our Love

As an example, our son, in a craft class when he was small, painted a plastic plate with a picture of a basketball in the center, and then an arch of letters above the basketball that said: “Greatest Mom!” He gave it to my wife for Mother’ Day.

It is not well drawn. It is not skillfully lettered. But it was a sincere expression of our son’s love and appreciation for his mother. At the time, he was giving his mom his best. So the skill didn’t matter.  The only thing that mattered was the love behind it.

If, while he was making the plate, my wife had taken hold of his hand, and by her greater power and artistic ability, caused him to draw a better basketball than he could normally draw and write better lettering than he could normally write, it would not have enhanced the gift. In fact, it might have diminished the gift, because it would not have been a 100% expression of his love alone.

My wife didn’t need a plate with a basketball painted on. She didn’t want  (ahead of time) a plate with a basketball painted on it.  She hadn’t been looking for one to buy.

But she did want our son’s love. And our son painted the plate as a sincere expression of love for his mother. As a result, the plate is a life treasure. My wife has it on display where we can readily see it and enjoy it.  Every time I look at it, I think, “What a treasure!  What a gift!”

In the same way, God doesn’t want to come over us and make us produce something that is artificially greater than we can produce by ourselves. He doesn’t need or want any thing we can give him. He wants our love.

So when we do something for the Lord, it’s always done with less excellence than if God did it (anything we can do, God can do better) but if it’s a gesture of sincere love to Him, that’s all he wants.

Conclusion

In times past, I have been tempted to conclude that there was something terribly wrong with me that the indwelling Holy Spirit has not made a greater difference in me.  I thought I should be walking on water, absorbing life’s blows with unruffled grace and performing miracles of ministry for others.  I thought that was the level of difference it should make if the Holy Spirit inhabited me.

But I underestimated the depth of the diminishing of my fallen capacities and overestimated God’s desire to have me manifest superhero abilities to the world.  He can be in charge of the miracles.  He wants me to love Him.

So, in love, I trust Him and obey Him as best I can, waiting for the day when I will worship Him in heaven, knowing more, being more, and doing more than I ever imagined… thrilled with my (finally) bedazzling resurrection body and abilities, enraptured by the reality that, once again, God is pleased because my love is all He ever wanted.

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