Lena's Journalin' To John 16 Today

Every word inside of the Bible are words from God to give us faith that we will keep all the way to the end. Any and every battle we engage in or are thrust into willingly or unwillingly is about this – Faith. Whether we keep it or give it away. Everyday is a new day for that same decision in every area of life.
Do I keep my faith in God in this area, or do I give in to temptations that lead me against God’s word and will, or do I forsake my faith in the ability of My Father in me to overcome in this area?
Everyday, death and life, life and death are the choices laid before us, everyday.
One gage of whether we trust God at His word and will receive the only part of Him who is still with us now on earth in our day, is the Spirit. We believe and receive the Holy Spirit by faith, not by coincidences or by chance. We don’t receive Him in fear or because He won some contest in our souls, ones where we have weighed Him out among other offers brought our way. We believe and receive Him by faith or not. We believed and received Christ by faith, this is the only way with God. Faith is the way to Christ, God the Father and His Spirit’s involvement in our life’s situations.
Jesus was only on earth for a time as we are. He was a demonstration of One who depended upon God’s Spirit to lead Him and equip Him to do more and more of the Father’s will. He showed us THE WAY. He left us with THE WAY.
If we choose our own way, we can actually have it! God honors us (who do not deserve it, for it is His character to give honor to the will) and He lets us choose who and what we desire to choose, or not choose. If we do, it has to be by faith in the words Jesus spoke and left with us.
What can we bear? The weight of glory? Ours or His? There is a difference in the weight carried. Jesus said the Spirit will guide us into all truth, He’ll not speak of His own will, but will tell us what He’s heard from Jesus and the Father. Even the Holy Spirit is in orderly array. He does not speak His own thoughts or opinions out. He is an exact representation of the Father and Jesus just as Jesus modeled an exact representation of the Father.
Who do we represent exactly? We should represent the Father, Son & Spirit, but how can one do that if they do not know or are not yet known by the other? Well, we have some work to do, huh? Relational work, by faith. Is all that belongs to you, also your Father’s?
We have received Jesus, but He is not truly revealed to us except by the work of the Spirit. We may have started out with Jesus, but has our personal relationship developed and changed and grown since we met Him? How quickly does it grow? Do you know the rate of growth in the spirit has nothing to do with how “old” we are?
We can grow fast or slow. A person could be in the kingdom 3 years and be a Paul, or be in the kingdom 40 years, still a babe on milk. The growth time is up to us. How much do we feed ourselves spiritually? How often do we eat naturally?
It is based on obedience’s. The more obedience’s, the more growth. It is based on repentance. The more repentance and change, the more we grow. The motivator of extreme growth is love and passion. Passion drives us to repent, obey, and manifest change- quickly. The quicker, the better that He might be greater glorified in and through us; through our manifested change. That the world may know Him and see Him alive and at work in us!
This is how and when asking, we receive, anything we ask for.