Pressure On the Heart

"Thus shall ye do in the fear of the Lord, faithfully, and with a perfect heart ... Deal courageously, and the Lord shall be with the good" (2 Chronicles 19:9, 11)

Now how does this power operate? At its purest it is an unmediated force directly applied by the Spirit of God to the spirit of man.

The wrestler achieves his ends by the pressure of his physical body upon the body of his opponent; the teacher the pressure of ideas upon the mind of the student; the moralist by the pressure of duty upon the conscience of the disciple. So the Holy Spirit performs His blessed work by direct contact with the human spirit.

The Spirit of God may use a song, a sermon, a good deed, a text or the mystery and majesty of nature, but always the final work will be done by the pressure of the inliving Spirit upon the human heart.

The Spirit's first work is to cleanse us, to separate us, to sanctify us, to dedicate us wholly to God. Then as the property of God, He takes possession of us for God and uses us for His service and glory alone.

~A. W. Tozer~

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A Volatile Essence

"The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth" (John 3:8)

One meaning of the word "power" is "ability to do." There precisely is the wonder of the Spirit's work in the Church and in the hearts of Christians, His sure ability to make spiritual things real to the soul.

This power can go straight to its object with piercing directness; it can diffuse itself through the mind like an infinitely fine volatile essence securing ends above and beyond the limits of the intellect.

Reality is its subject matter, reality in heaven and upon earth. it does not create objects which are not there but reveals objects already present and hidden from the soul.

In actual human experience this is likely to be first felt in a heightened sense of the presence of Christ. he is felt to be a real Person and to be intimately, ravishingly near. Then all other spiritual objects begin to stand out clearly before the mind.

The Holy Spirit creates in us a new life and a new set of spiritual senses altogether, through which we discern, understand, and enter into the life of God and the Spiritual realm.

~A. W. Tozer~