Resources – Life in the Holy Spirit

We are so glad you are partaking of the Fall 2020 Course called Life in the Holy Spirit.

This lifestyle of living in the Holy Spirit will keep you attuned to the Lord’s guidance in those sacred moments of life change.

You will discover the excitement of participating in moments of God’s work through you to advance His Kingdom.

Galatians 5:25, commands us to “keep in step with the Holy Spirit.”

What might that look like in real life? That is what you will learn in this course.

This course will explore what it is to cooperate with the Holy Spirit.

“Life in the Spirit” is a six-week online class that introduces you to the basics of walking with the Holy Spirit.

Each 90-minute online class will feature a time to:

• Discover: Brief teaching from people who live this ministry lifestyle.
• Practice: Small group prayer activities and fellowship times.
• Debrief: A brief time of evaluating any experience you may have had.

Learn from practitioners who experience moments of life changing ministry and how they discovered what it means to walk in cooperation with the Holy Spirit..

Week 1: Upon and Within

A motif that appears throughout Scripture:

• The Spirit Upon a person for action or empowerment.
• The Spirit Within a person for salvation and sanctification.

We believe it is most faithful to Scripture to maintain both these truths we can see used by the different words for filled:

1. Every Christian already has the Spirit within them, and to encourage them to be increasingly filled with the Spirit (Ephesians 5:18) so that a Christlike character may develop and mature.
2. Every Christian needs the Spirit upon them, to be clothed with power, and to encourage people to receive and co-operate with that empowering presence of the Spirit whenever necessary.

Interview with Pastor David Pleuss:

Bonus Interview:

Get the ebook mentioned after providing your email address. Click the image:

From our course “Dunamis Basics“, watch as is Dr. Brad Long gives more details about Jesus as our Spirit-Empowered model, after a short review of 3 elements of the prophetic hope:

Watch: David’s Testimony: What’s been happening in his church, recorded in January 2019, after attending a PRMI Growing the Church Conference.

Ponderings:

1. Do you have any questions about the framework of within/upon to describe how the Holy Spirit works with us?  Who remembers the Greek word for “upon”?
2. Often this upon/within grid helps people to see that they have had experiences of the Spirit upon them for power – to propel them forward in an “assignment” for Him.  Does any experience come to mind where you perhaps experienced the Spirit upon you?  What was the action you were moved to take?  What was the result?
3. What do you think of the idea that Jesus fulfilled the offices of Prophet, Priest and King as a human empowered by the Holy Spirit?  How does Philippians 2:6-8 shape this view?  Had you ever thought about the fact that Jesus did no power ministry until after His baptism?
4. What might the implications of this be for us as His disciples??

Week 2: Filled with the Spirit

We discussed two Greek words for filled. What does ‘Filled’ with the Spirit mean?

There are several distinct, but related Greek words for full that with the context lead us to conclude that filled with the Holy Spirit has two distinct meanings.

One belongs to the outward work of the Spirit upon us for power.

The other belongs to the inward work of the Spirit within for changed character and relationship with God.

Pletho/Pimplemi, (πληθω, πιμπλημι): Filled short term, episodic actions outward the Holy Spirit upon

Pleroo And Pleres, (πληροω and πληρησ): Filled long term, saturated, permeate – the Holy Spirit within

Download: Summary chart of word usage

Read more:

• Can I be filled with the Holy Spirit?
• Seven principles to receive Empowerment of the Spirit

The video lesson below comes from our course: Gateways for Congregations and Small Groups. This link is the PDF of the small group material that supports the d

Additional Resources

• The Walk of Prayer: Fulfilling Acts 1:8 Today.
• Book: Receiving the Power
• Dunamis Video Course 1: Gateways to Empowered Ministry
• Gateways for Congregations and Small Groups
• Video Course: Introduction to the Holy Spirit
• How can I be filled with the Holy Spirit?

Ponderings:

1. As you reflect on how God has worked in your life this week, how would you describe what He has done? What has been the outcome for you?
2. Are there events that you might characterize as the work of the Spirit upon? Are there other events that might be characterized as the Spirit within?
3. What criteria would you use to distinguish between the two?
4. Do you see any challenges for yourself as you open yourself more to the work of the Holy Spirit?
   a. How would you rank those challenges?
   b. What reasons would you give for your rankings?

For the Week Ahead

1. Pray that you will grow in being filled with the Spirit within and the Spirit upon.
2. Invite God to work in you in powerful, Spirit-led ways so that you can know Him in whatever ways He comes into your life.

Week 3: Now but Not Yet

To gain a biblical view and experience of the work of cooperation with the Holy Spirit, we must have three essential things from scripture:

1. A map of where we are in the Kingdom of God.
2. A certain knowledge of who we are in the Kingdom of God.
3. A practical knowledge of who we are in the Kingdom of
   God

What does the Holy Spirit do in the “in-between time?”

• The Holy Spirit makes the Father and the Son real on earth and brings to us all that Jesus Christ won for us on the cross.
• The Holy Spirit enables people to enter into the Kingdom of God through the new birth and to have God’s life within them.
• The Holy Spirit brings forth the fruit of the Spirit in the life of the believer.
• The Holy Spirit calls, empowers, and gifts us to be witnesses to Jesus Christ in this time of struggle and conflict.

If we are to live in the in-between time or the time of the Holy Spirit we must know about His gifts and manifestations.

Spiritual gifts are:

• Common ways the Holy Spirit has expressed His power and presence through born-again people.

• Tools that we need to work on God’s spiritual and supernatural building project—the Kingdom of God.

Ponderings

1. What do you do with this biblical concept that we are living in the in-between time?
2. Does this conform to your actual experience of evil in the world and struggle to be a Christian?
3. If I am a new creation why do I feel like unworthy at times?
4. What gifts or manifestations of the Holy Spirit have you experienced in your own life?

For the Week Ahead

1. Pray that you will grow in being filled with the Spirit within and the Spirit upon.
2. Invite God to work in you in powerful, Spirit-led ways so that you can know Him in whatever ways He comes into your life.

Week 4: Kairos Moments of Cooperation

Cooperating with the Holy Spirit is like the unfolding steps of a dance:

1. God initiates. The Spirit moves in a kairos moment.
2. He gives us (His) love for the people involved and faith as the springboard for His activity.
3. The Holy Spirit speaks to us, illuminating what He is doing in the moment, or often bringing a deep awareness of His presence and intention to move. 
4. We discern, we seek Him, we listen
5. We “step in” in obedience.

As we speak or act, the Spirit takes our obedience and connects it to what He is already doing in the person or group. The kingdom of God goes forth! 

This ‘dance of cooperation’ with the Holy Spirit is not a formula, technique, or checklist.  It is a dynamic for understanding the believer’s relationship with God as He seeks to extend His reign through us.

Our participation in this dance of cooperation is made possible by both the inward work of the Holy Spirit, as well as the outward work. We need both the fruit and gifts in balance.

Resources:

Download From the Dunamis Video Course Manual: Lesson 3 : The Dynamics of Cooperating with the Holy Spirit

The book, Growing the Church in the Power of the Holy Spirit, address this issue of how your church leadership can learn to cooperate with the Holy Spirit using these same concepts you’ve been learning.

Ponderings

1. How did the descriptions of ‘watching for the nudge’ and God moving in kairos moments help you make sense of how the Holy Spirit invites us in (to God’s work)?
2. As you heard the teaching and the interview, did anyone realize you’ve had this experience of cooperating with the Holy Spirit, but perhaps you didn’t have a framework for describing it that way?
3. Have you experienced elements of the dance?
4. How did you find yourself working together with others in this process of cooperating with the Holy Spirit?
5. What fruit of the Holy Spirit do you find that you contribute in times of ministry or in doing the work of the Kingdom?
6. What spiritual gifts does the Holy Spirit most often choose to express through you? (List out and share in detail a specific occasion when you saw one of these gifts in operation).

For the Week Ahead

Next week, the conversation will be around ways God gives us guidance to act upon, and how we can discern if that guidance might be from the Lord or from our own imagination.

1. Pray that you will grow in being filled with the Spirit within and the Spirit upon.
2. Pray for Kairos moments to happen in your life where you can see cooperation in action.
3. Invite God to work in you in powerful, Spirit-led ways so that you can know Him in whatever ways He comes into your life.

Week 5: Receive Guidance from God – the Invitation to Cooperation

Receiving guidance from the Lord is where the invitation to cooperate with the Holy Spirit begins. 

 The conditions for receiving guidance:

1. Being born again and having the Holy Spirit dwelling within you
2. A will set upon doing God’s will
3. A foundation in Scripture
4. Being an active member in the Body of Christ
5. Maintaining a life of prayer.

In Scripture, we find that God speaks two ways:

• revealing true doctrine
• giving guidance in our day-to-day lives and specific situations. 

The revelation of true doctrine ceased when the Bible was written; the Holy Spirit continues to guide believers in day-to-day situations.

Example of Guidance in Life

The Spirit told Philip, “Go to that chariot and stay near it.”

Acts 8:29

How did the Spirit tell Philip to do this? This could have been a nudge, a thought that came to him, or just an awareness that that is what he needed to do. The Spirit also could have whispered in his heart, “Go to that chariot and stay near it!”

Read more:

• Six Ways to Hear God’s voice
• From Dunamis Video Course 2: PDF File on Receiving Guidance

Watch

Ponderings

1. Why are there conditions for being able to receive guidance? (What do these ‘conditions’ really describe?)
2. In your own life, what preparation do you need to undertake to better hear from God?
3. What are some of the ways the Holy Spirit may speak to us? 

For the Week Ahead

Next week, the conversation will be around how to discern the if guidance might be from the Lord or from our own imagination.

1. Pray that you will grow in being filled with the Spirit within and the Spirit upon.
2. Pray for Kairos moments to happen in your life where you can see cooperation in action.
3. Invite God to work in you in powerful, Spirit-led ways so that you can know Him in whatever ways He comes into your life.
4. Ask the Lord to invite you into a ministry moment with someone this week, where you can experience cooperation.

Week 6: Discernment, Context of Love and Intercession

How do we know something IS really from the Lord? 

With any guidance that we think we receive from the Lord, the issue becomes: 

“How can we be sure that the guidance we are getting is actually from the Holy Spirit and not just our imagination or even from the devil?!”

 Here are Four questions that have served us well:

1. Does it Give Glory to Jesus Christ? 
2. Is it Consistent with Scripture? 
3. Do Other People Who are Filled with the Holy Spirit have a Confirming Witness?
4. Is there Confirmation in Objectively Verifiable Events or Facts?

Ponderings:

1. In the story of the raising of Lazarus, how does love form the context for the powerful miracle Jesus did? 
2. We have described this ‘dance step’ as “Divine Love draws us into participation.”   God actually gives His love to us for a particular person or group to set the stage for His work.  Have you ever had this experience of being filled with love, which you knew was from God? How did God then work in this relationship?
3. Why is it so important that love be present as we seek to grow in power ministry? 
4. Sometimes one person or group feels moved to intercede another person is called to speak or act.  This is the beauty of cooperating with the Spirit as a team or group. Describe a time when you had an urge or a calling to pray for a person or situation.  How did your heart change as you prayed?  What happened?