The Holy Spirit is the Biblical name for the presence of the Living God, the Maker of heaven and earth, the LORD God (whose Hebrew name is Yahuwah Elohim).
In the Gospel of John, in chapter 15, verse 26, and then in John 16:13-14, Jesus Christ (whose Hebrew name is Yahushua Messiah) told us at least 7 things about the Holy Spirit:
When the Comforter (the Holy Spirit) is come, whom I (Messiah) will send unto you (Messiah’s disciples) from the Father (God), even the Spirit of Truth (the Holy Spirit), which proceeds from the Father (God), He (the Holy Spirit) shall testify of Me (Yahushua/Jesus). (John 15:26)
Howbeit when He, the Spirit of Truth, is come, He will guide you into all truth: for He shall not speak of Himself; but whatsoever He shall hear, that shall He speak: and He will show you things to come. He shall glorify Me [Messiah]: for He shall receive of Mine, and shall show it unto you. (John 16:13-14)
- The Holy Spirit is the Comforter.
- The Holy Spirit is the Spirit of Truth.
- The Holy Spirit is the Spirit of the LORD God, the heavenly Father
- The Holy Spirit is Sent to the Children/the Disciples of the LORD (Yahuwah).
- The Holy Spirit will Guide God’s Children into all Truth.
- The Holy Spirit is Sent to us By God’s Son, Jesus Christ (Yahushua Messiah).
- The Holy Spirit will Always Glorify God’s Son, the Messiah.
An important thing to understand from the above list is Number 4 — the Holy Spirit is for those who, with a sincere and repentant heart, have become one of the LORD’s children by adoption and have thus been birthed into God’s family. This is known as being Born-Again, also known as the New Birth. Sometimes referred to as Regeneration (see John 3:3-8; John 14:17; 1Corinthians 2:14).
- If you are not sure if you are Born-Again, please see the article: Good News!
The Holy Spirit’s Mission
What is the Holy Spirit’s mission? His mission is two-fold:
- He will guide God’s children into all truth (John 16:13)
- He will glorify God’s Son, Jesus the Christ (Yahushua the Messiah)
Since the Holy Spirit’s mission is to lead us into all truth, then He will always guide us according to, and in agreement with, the WORD of God [the Bible]! Messiah, as well as the other prophets of the LORD, confirmed to us where we will find The Truth:
Jesus (Yahushua) said, O Father,… Sanctify them (the disciples) through Your truth: Your Word is Truth. (John 17:17)
Righteous are You, O LORD (Yahuwah), and upright are Your judgments. Your righteousness is an everlasting righteousness, and Your law is the truth. (Psalms 119:137,142)
You are near, O LORD (Yahuwah); and all Your commandments are truth. (Psalms 119:151)
So we need to always remember this about the Holy Spirit:
- The Holy Spirit’s Guidance Will Always Be In Agreement With God’s Word because God’s Word is Truth!
And, the Holy Spirit’s extremely important part of His mission is to reveal and confirm the testimony of Jesus Christ (Yahushua Messiah) and to glorify Messiah! This is a very important principle in recognizing the Holy Spirit’s guidance! The Holy Spirit does not promote Himself, or anyone else. The Holy Spirit seeks to glorify only the Son of God, the Messiah [the Christ].
Any guidance that does not glorify
the truth and purposes of Jesus the Christ
is NOT guidance from the Holy Spirit!
A Map & A Guide
In the pilgrimage of our life, the LORD has lovingly provided us with a ‘Map’ – the written Scriptures [the Bible, God’s Word]. The pages of the Scriptures contain the Eternal Truth of who God is and what His ways and plans are! So it is very important that we learn God’s Word for ourselves. If we want to gain wisdom, understanding, discernment, and guidance, then we must always look to the Scriptures – our Map!
Our Father God [the LORD] has also lovingly provided us with a ‘Guide‘ – The Holy Spirit! The Holy Spirit is our Comforter and our Personal Guide.
First, as our Comforter (our Helper), there are countless times, every day, when the Holy Spirit helps us! He helps us in our weaknesses, our frailties, our confusion (Romans 8:26). Usually we do not recognize half of His enablements, yet when we do have eyes to see the Holy Spirit’s help and intervention, it is remarkable!
Then, as we saw in Our Amazing Comforter, the infinite, all-seeing Holy Spirit, is the “eye of the LORD” who searches throughout the whole earth, looking for those who love the LORD (Yahuwah), in order to show Himself strong on their behalf (2Chronicles 16:9a; Romans 8:27)!
This showing Himself strong on our behalf is indeed a comforting work, for it reveals that God knows our situation, our needs, He hears our cry, and answers us in our distress!
Second, the Holy Spirit as our Guide, is sent to us to help us stay in God’s Pathway of Truth. Because Father loves us, He wants us to know His Pathway! He does not want us stray away. Therefore, He gives us a Guide: the Holy Spirit, the Author of the Scriptures, who will bring God’s Word to our rememberance to show us the Way wherein we should go!
And, it is the Holy Spirit’s job to be our Guide/Assistant in helping us to understand the ‘Map’, as well as understanding the deep things of God (1Corinthians 2:9-10).
The Spirit of God
Let us also remember that when we receive the gift of the Holy Spirit, we are receiving the person of the LORD God (Yahuwah Elohim), the Holy One of Israel:
Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but [we have received] the Spirit which is of God. (1Corinthians 2:12)
For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God. (Romans 8:14)
The Spirit of God (the Holy Spirit) is the LORD Himself! This is amazing!! The Spirit of the living God dwelling within us to guide us and to lead us! If we will only ask Him: “If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children: how much more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask Him?” (Luke 11:13)
Yahuwah [the LORD] is very willing to give us this personal Guide, His Holy Spirit, to those who ask Him! What great love He has for His children!
- (If you are not sure if you have received the Holy Spirit, please see Have You Received the Holy Spirit Since You Believed? Part One)
But now, let’s consider this: Is there something we can do to begin to recognize the Holy Spirit’s guidance??
Love God’s Truth
Yes! Since the Holy Spirit is the Spirit of Truth, and He wants to guide us into all truth, then we must cultivate a LOVE for the truth!
If we want the Holy Spirit’s guidance, then we need a deep, gut-level conviction to love the truth!! As we saw in A Way That Seems Right, loving the truth means a loyal, firm conviction to finding the truth no matter the cost, no matter the pain.
So if we purpose to love the truth, then that means we will love and obey what we read in the Word of God. And, loving the truth means we will love our Saviour, Messiah Yahushua [Christ Jesus].
Loving God’s truth means we will learn God’s Word for ourselves because the Word of God [the Bible] is the ‘Map’ for our journey. The Holy Spirit’s mission is to guide us according to the ‘Map’ – the Word of God.
Loving God’s truth means will always look to the Scriptures for understanding and guidance. We will consistently seek to obey the guidance of God’s WORD!
And, always remember: the Holy Spirit’s guidance will always be according to and in agreement with God’s written WORD! (Psalms 119:169)! This is how we begin to learn to know the guidance of the Holy Spirit.
[At times, we will need to establish the Holy Spirit’s guidance through the principle of two or three witnesses (see Deuteronomy 19:15b), which will always be in agreement with the Scriptures. (Witnesses being two or more Scriptures, and the providential witness of our circumstances.)]
Loving God’s Word [the Bible] IS Loving The Truth!
King David declared the truth of God’s Word many times:
Your righteousness is an everlasting righteousness, and Your law (the Torah) is the truth. (Psalm 119:142)
You are near, O Yahuwah [LORD]; and all Your commandments are truth. (Psalm 119:151)
Your Word is true from the beginning: and every one of Your righteous judgments endures forever. (Psalm 119:160)
As these verses teach, Loving The Truth IS to Love God’s Word. This is a foundational key to avoiding delusion!
As we saw in Thy Torah Is My Delight, King David loved the Word of God with a passion! Which is why he could say: “I have chosen the way of truth” (Psalm 119:30a).
Our conviction must be fixed throughout our entire lifetime — that we believe ALL of the Bible, from Genesis to Revelation. The Word of God is faithful, true, unchanging, and endures forever!
The LORD’s truth does not change from one age to another! His Word is always true from the beginning, never becoming out-of-date or invalid! We need to guard against any teachings of God’s Word that undermines or weakens the unchanging nature of His Word!
We can completely trust the Word of the Mighty God of Israel, because He is the LORD God of truth! His truth endures throughout all generations! His Word IS as He IS: “For I am Yahuwah [the LORD], I change not” (Malachi 3:6)!
LOVING God’s Word [which is truth], is an essential, first step to knowing the guidance of our personal Guide, the Spirit of Truth!
Loving God’s truth means we will maintain our relationship with the Father through our secret prayer times, asking His help to love His truth and love Messiah. This is important to becoming a mature child, able to discern His guidance. This is how we learn, little by little, to know the guidance of the Holy Spirit!
Recognizing the Truth About Ourselves
When we love the truth, then we need to begin to be totally honest to ourselves, and about ourselves. We must love the truth to the point of also recognizing who we are, what kind of person we are, and accepting our inadequacies and limitations and sinful nature.
The Holy Spirit knows each one of us intimately. He knows everything about us — our successes, our strengths, our failures, pain, and weaknesses. And, He knows our sins. We can not hide from the Holy Spirit! So if we are to be guided by Him, then we need to learn to be honest to ourselves and sensitive to the Holy Spirit’s nudges because He desires to cleanse us and purify us of selfishness, pride, hatred, or delusion!
One way we learn to be honest with ourselves is to see and accept ourselves as the Word of God describes us! This is an on-going process, a lifetime process. We must consciously work at being honest with ourselves, and in recognizing the truth within ourselves. This is why we find such prayers as Psalms 19:12-13 – Who can understand his errors? Oh make me pure from secret faults; and keep Your servant back from presumptuous sins; do not let them rule over me; then I shall be upright, and I shall be innocent of great transgression.
Speaking The Truth in Our Heart
Speaking the Truth in our heart is not easy because many of us have a tendency to over-look or deny what is true about ourselves. We have a tendency to tell ourselves things that make us feel good. If we do not love the truth, then we can be easily fooled by our own thoughts and estimations about ourselves.
King David knew the importance of embracing truth deep within himself. He acknowledged and admitted his shameful sin (Psalms 15:1-2; see all of Psalms 51). King David made the decision to be honest about his failures and not deny the terrible truth about what he had done.
Speaking the truth in our own heart is a choice we make that helps us begin to mature. If we will love the truth of God’s Word, then the Holy Spirit will help us cultivate the habit of speaking truth in the depths of our heart.
However, when we are confronted with truth about ourselves or any issue, the test of our Love for the Truth will come! We are tested in our love for the truth in our hidden, intimate thoughts – in our reasoning! “… for the righteous God tries (tests) the hearts and thoughts.” (Psalms 7:9b)
The question is – Will we reason ourselves away from the truth or toward the truth? What do our reasoning skills lean toward?
Do we side with the Holy Spirit who is seeking to guide us into all truth?
Do we hinder or do we help the Holy Spirit’s guidance for us?
Truth Can Be Very Painful!
Truth can be painful at times because it can be a form of chastisement. Yet, if we will choose the Way of God’s truth in the hidden part of our heart – that is, in our reasoning skills within ourselves – then that choice will yield the peaceable fruit of righteousness (Hebrews 12:11).
As we saw in No Discipline Seems Pleasant, the Holy Spirit is always working within us to bring us further into knowing God’s love and guidance. Choosing truth will always bring us into a greater understanding of God’s Word. Choosing the truth of God’s Word will always be good for us, even if the choice seems difficult or painful.
Choosing to be truthful to ourselves will often be the pathway of humility and self-denial. But that is also the pathway of maturity and receiving God’s enabling grace (see Psalms 138:6; Proverbs 3:34; James 4:6):
The Way of the LORD (Yahuwah) is strength to the upright. (Proverbs 10:29a)
Will we be faithful to love the truth of God’s Word, as well as love the truth of what God’s Word says about us?
It is the little, hidden things that we are tested on – the little, hidden things that often we ignore or reason away. Such things may seem little, but this is part of the ways of the Holy Spirit. He desires us to be sensitive to His leading and learn to speak the truth to ourselves in our inner thoughts, in our heart.
We need to have regular, secret prayer times, as well as study times of God’s written Word – at least a little bit every day – throughout our lifetime, so that we maintain an openness to learning and obeying His ways! God’s Word is the sharp, two-edged sword that helps us discern the truth about ourselves, exposing our thoughts and motives (Hebrews 4:12).
Speaking the truth in our heart is a KEY step to knowing the intimate, personal guidance of our loving, all-knowing Guide, the Holy Spirit.
Let Us Be Exceedingly Grateful For God’s Holy Spirit!!
Father God’s guidance for us by His Holy Spirit is grounded in His immense and extravagant LOVE for each one us! Therefore let us be among those who choose to show honour to our loving heavenly Father and walk in the fear of the LORD who is our loving Master!
Oh the great goodness of our heavenly Father!! To give His children so many wonderful gifts — the Gift of His precious WORD, our MAP, and the Gift of His precious Holy Spirit, our personal GUIDE — guiding us into all truth!
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(For more insight on this subject, see Preparing Our Heart to Seek God and Lead Me In Your Truth: Part 1 – The Basics and Guard Your Heart With All Diligence! – 4 Tips)
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Related Articles:
- Have You Received the Holy Spirit Since You Believed? (Part 1)
- Thy Torah Is My Delight – a look at King David’s secret
- The Word — or The Spirit? – is there a conflict between the Holy Spirit and God’s Word?
- Under His Wings I Shall Trust
- The Key To Gaining Understanding
- Lead Me In Your Truth: Part 1 – The Basics
- Lead Me In Your Truth: Part 2 – The Ancient Paths
- Water the Dry Ground of Your Heart With the Rain of the Spirit! – teaching video (1½ hr) by Natan Lawrence
- E-Sword.net – a very good, free resource for studying the King James Version Bible, on your computer
- Why the KJV is the Best – one hour audio teaching by Dr. D.A. Waite
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Cold Waters to a Thirsty Soul
Cold Waters to a Thirsty Soul 
Deborah,
I enjoyed reading your thoughts on His Ruach and how He is sent to guide us in all truth.
I have found that since my eyes were opened, I have absolutely no problem keeping Torah, for it is a delight. It is not grievous…but…just like King David, even those of us grounded in truth still wrestle daily with our own thoughts and desires. If we chose not to listen to His guiding Spirit, we can convince ourselves that “wrong” is “right.” That is why I thank Him daily for His guidance, to keep me on the “Narrow Path.”
I’ve been keeping Torah for for several years now, and needless to say, I am now the oddity in my family, and have learned the hard way that unless someone really wants to know “truth,” they cannot accept truth. I’ve learned that no amount of scripture can wake someone up unless they have their eyes opened by Yahuwah.
No, people are perfectly content walking in blindness. Most are not like the Bereans, they do not want to know that what they are doing is contrary to Yah. The words of Yahushua in Matt. 13:57 really hit home when you find that those you love most in this world refuse to listen.
May Yah bless you and your family.
Mike
Thank You, Mike, for your visit and for your encouraging words! It’s great to hear from others who delight in keeping Torah, by His Grace!
Blessings to you and your Household,
Deborah
Are you familiar with the teaching of Ian Clayton? My roommate is following his teaching and I’ve told her it isn’t sound biblically, but I don’t know how to lovingly refute it. Do you have any words that I could say to her?
We have never heard of this teacher, but after looking at some of the material on his web pages, we can make several conclusions.
He appears to be into some form of new age type doctrine. In the little we looked at, He does not appear to mention the Saviour’s name Yahushua/Jesus, nor even the need for a Saviour. What he does not teach, is more telling than what he does teach.
Anyone who promotes “releasing the potential” within yourself, or “time travel” or travel in the spirit realm, is clearly not promoting the Kingdom of Messiah. These ideas are “new age” concepts not found in Scripture.
These concepts are not new, but ancient — and form part of the modern “mystery religion” of Babylon. These ideas are creeping in today among the churches, in the form of “new age mysticism” disguising itself as part of Christianity.
This teacher appears to be just another (spiritually) blind leader of many (spiritually) blind followers.
You might see whether your friend is open to repentance from all that is false, so that you may encourage, pray with, and minister deliverance to your friend.