Living the Christian Life – Chapter 4: The Holy Spirit as Our Guide

In Romans 8, the apostle Paul wrote that the Spirit of God has been sent to guide His children (see Romans 8:14). Life in the Spirit is supposed to be the norm for New Testament Christians. Scripture tells us that our steps are to be led by the Spirit:

The steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord, and He
delights in his way (Psalm 37:23 NKJV).

Your ears will hear a word behind you, “This is the way, walk in it,”
whenever you turn to the right or to the left (Isaiah 30:21 NASB).

God is spirit, and He communicates with us through our spirit. So we must learn to tune our spiritual ears to recognize His voice. Every believer needs to “learn to discern” God’s voice for himself/herself. The writer of Hebrews tells us that this discernment comes from practice.

“But solid food belongs to those who are of full age, that is, those
who by reason of use have their senses exercised to discern
both good and evil” (Hebrews 5:14 NKJV).

In His earthly ministry, Jesus continually modeled Spirit-led prayer—especially at key moments of decision. When He was preparing to choose from the large group of His followers the men who would be His 12 apostles, the Bible tells us that He first inquired of the Father in prayer:

“Now it came to pass in those days that He went out to the mountain to
pray, and continued all night in prayer to God. And when it was day,
He called His disciples to Himself; and from them He chose twelve
whom He also named apostles” (Luke 6:12-13 NKJV).

In fact, Jesus taught that He did nothing without asking His Father:

“Therefore Jesus answered and was saying to them, “Truly, truly, I
say to you, the Son can do nothing of Himself, unless it is something
He sees the Father doing; for whatever the Father does, these things
the Son also does in like manner” (John 5:19 NASB).

The Holy Spirit Gives Wisdom

So many times in life, we are faced with difficult choices. One of the great advantages of the believer is that God has promised to give us wisdom if we ask Him:

“If any of you need wisdom, you should ask God, and it will be
given to you. God is generous and won’t correct you
for asking” (James 1:5 CEV).

The apostle Paul writes of the wisdom we can receive from God by the Holy Spirit:

“Now we have received not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might understand the things freely given us by God” (1 Corinthians 2:12 ESV).

Everyone needs God’s wisdom to navigate the challenges of this world. This wisdom can only come from Christ through the Holy Spirit.