A revelation is always a memorable moment. Especially when it’s a fresh understanding of the good implications of something you thought you always ‘knew’.

‘A full equipment is to be filled with the Holy Spirit. And how simply it is to be attained.’

- Hudson Taylor

That statement kind of sums up my mini-revelation.

For years, the Holy Spirit was an abstract or unexplored concept in my understanding of how to live the Christian life. I knew it was a good and important thing, and that it was mentioned a fair bit in the Bible in relation to living an obedient and empowered life.

I knew it was often ‘invited in’ at corporate gatherings and was also responsible for imparting divine understanding when the Bible was read, revealing the living nature of God’s word. It was a thing, though. A thing that I didn’t actually acknowledge too much in my head or heart. A ‘thing’ I didn’t actively pursue in greater depth.

It was one day, in very ordinary circumstances that the penny dropped and landed loudly. The predictable cycle had started again. I’d recognised and acknowledged the feeling that I’d been dragging around: guilt. I connected the guilt with my avoidance to spend time with God, favouring housework and things from which I’d likely get a ‘visible’ and product result, at least.

The next stage involved embracing the guilt and commencing this self-reprimanding stint-tame, but something along the lines of: ‘You call yourself a Christian? You have no discipline. You can’t even put aside time with God, knowing that the investment will help your relationship Him?’

In finishing the cycle, I’d let the questioning fade after confronting my ‘offense’ from a few angles, or, quite often, when I’d moved on to my next thought. I’d then either follow that up by actually spending some time with God, or, realise I’d then run out of time again. So it went.
But then it didn’t. It struck me: going through the motions using this inwardly focussed cycle was fruitless. Not only was it repetitive, it was flawed. The time spent going through those motions took away the opportunity to ‘achieve’ the very thing I’d set out to do in the first place: commune with God.

Recognising my consistent inability to achieve that goal was about the only good thing going on in that cycle.

From that that moment, truth shifted from head to heart. Externally, nothing remarkable accompanied this, although I know I did feel lighter. It hit me, with absolute clarity, that Jesus now dwelled in me, through His Holy Spirit.

What did this mean? Somewhere in the construction of my cycle, I’d neglected to fully embrace the gift of a new and perfect cycle; one that drew me into immediate union with Jesus himself and my shortcomings that were dealt with by His sacrifice at the cross.

While the exchange seemed grossly unjust, I was filled with an absolute peace and joy I hadn’t known before. The gift of instant forgiveness was available, by His grace. Instant!

1) ‘A full equipment it to be filled with the Holy Spirit’ 
So the Holy Spirit is the comprehensive equipment needed to do life and to do it well by acknowledging His presence, His power and His purpose in all circumstances. Because God sees Jesus in me, the Holy Spirit dwells right there: I’ve got access to continual instruction, revelation, discernment, wisdom, refining, testing and lots more. Through faith, I’m benefitting, and fully equipped!

2) ‘…and how easily it is to be obtained’
The fact that the Holy Spirit is available to be received so freely and easily, though faith, by grace, for all, is perhaps where I went wrong with my system. Repeated forgiveness is what I needed and each time I launched into my self-constructed cycle I missed out on acknowledging the One who filled me with His Spirit and made me righteous in His sight.

“The one who trusts God to do the putting-everything-right without insisting on having a say in it is one fortunate man: Fortunate those whose crimes are carted off, whose sins are wiped clean from the slate. Fortunate the person against whom the Lord does not keep score”

Romans 4:6-8

Through this revelation, failure and guilt look and feel different. In the fresh cycle, those convictions are backed up immediately with the instant freedom only He can give.

The Holy Spirit can’t be abstract, nor an optional extra to be discovered when time permits. His revelation to me was essential to truly embrace His goodness and character and move forward in knowing Him and crucially, sharing Him with others.

Being fully equipped is pretty exciting. Hudson sums it up another way: ‘There is immense power in majorities, and no one can escape that power. But God is the majority, and if we are are with Him, it does not matter though all the world is on the other side. The man who stands alone with God is with the majority’.

‘Holy Spirit’ is my word this year. It took a while to identify, but with a few people involved in its discovery, it was cool the way it was confirmed.

It’s because of this that I’m praying that God is known in an intimate way as the ultimate equipper, the majority that we can run to and the realiser of the truly amazing and redemptive plan orchestrated in Jesus; from which forgiveness and restoration are given abundantly through His Spirit.