Have you ever come out of a church service where God’s Holy Spirit had just come down and visited your congregation in an awesome way? You want to tell the world about it and your heart is so thrilled that you just can’t wait to share it with someone, only to have Brother and Sister so and so start arguing about where they are going to have lunch! Or you just step in the parking lot to hear a group of your friends talking excitedly about “the game” that’s on TV tonight. I really wonder if we would ask ourselves some simple questions like “How big is the Spirit of God?”, or even “How powerful is He?”, would it change our lives?
How important is the Holy Spirit? The first mention of Him is found in the very first statements of the Bible. Genesis, its powerful introduction of this often-ignored member of the Trinity, first sets the stage by saying, in Genesis 1:1, “In the beginning God created the Heaven and the Earth.” Then, with no more than a hiccup, the Holy Spirit is mentioned! Moving to Genesis 1:2b, the Bible states; “And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.” As we pursue scripture further in our study of the formation of the earth, the pieces start to come together. We see that God the Father was creating the world and all that is in it through the power of the Holy Spirit.
The Website Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges under “moved upon the face of the waters” paragraph 18, clearly states referring to the original Hebrew, that the verse reveals that the Holy Spirit not just hovering but was actually moving over the face of the waters with continuous action.” This could easily connect Genesis 1:2 with Genesis 1:9; we can visualize the power of the Holy Spirit separating the water from the dry ground. Get ready! This is powerful! We see the Holy Spirit in a continuous action, hovering over with wings like a dove, opening, closing, opening-closing, opening-closing. Then scripture reveals God obviously by His Holy Spirit began to separate the water from the dry ground, all the time He was loosing His massive power on the Earth!
Imagine with me the continents immerging from the depths. Consider enormous waves recoiling as a result from all this action. The immense limitless power of the Holy Spirit could have been forming the face of the earth with His wings. I wonder which continent immerged first. Maybe the biggest, Asia? If so, the Holy Spirit of God pushed back the waters of what we know as the Indian Ocean, the Pacific Ocean and the Artic Ocean and separated them allowing the dry ground of Asia to immerge! This landmass, as it emerged from the bottom of what was then exclusively ocean floor, expanded to cover forty-four million, five hundred and seventy-nine thousand square kilometers. Can anybody say, “Wow, praise God” with me? As we examine the creation account, the Holy Spirit’s power did that! Is it any wonder that Jesus warned about blaspheming this all-powerful Spirit? I wonder which continent he raised from the deep next? Possibly it was the smallest of all the earth’s continental landmasses. Australia.
For that creative extraction of land mass, the Holy Spirit had to hold back what we now know as the Pacific Ocean, the Indian Ocean and the Southern Ocean, separating those waters from the dry ground of the continent of Australia. Australia’s land mass is approximately three and a half million square miles. If you’re starting to just get a glimpse of the magnitude of the power of the Holy Ghost, consider this. It is not only possible but also very likely that the Holy Spirit formed all the continents separating the water from the dry ground simultaneously!
Many theologians agree that every miracle recorded in the Bible, from cover to cover, was done by the power of the Holy Spirit. Certainly we can see that Jesus earthly miracle ministry began after he was baptized in the Holy Spirit. Most of the recorded miracles that the disciples did in their earthly ministry started after the day of Pentecost. Looking backwards into the Old Testament, the miraculous power of the Holy Ghost is not hard to recognize as we read through each account. Consider the parting of the Red Sea. Contemplate if you will what kind of the supernatural force it took to stand the waters of the Red Sea on end straight up in the air and even dry up the ground underneath them leaving a path wide enough for two million Jews to go across in one day! You see the Holy Spirits power is as young people say ginormous! We should never take the things He does lightly!
Do you remember that still small voice that was tugging on your heart to go down and pray following your pastor’s sermon on Sunday? It is that same Spirit that convicts you when you are taking just a little too long a look at that attractive someone, or are tempted to spend more than you should on yourself and not enough on the work of God! Then also as much as he is your “what’s up with this”, heart checking Holy Spirit, He is also the one that can reach down and engulf you in His peace when you are going through a scary time, a heart breaking time, or a time of great discouragement. As He is all of that and so much more I want us to realize that during those times are the situation where he has his Holy Spirit water valve just slightly cracked open letting out just a tiny drip of His loving power.
In all of this reverence Him with all your heart because He is God! Remember these things also the next time you are tempted, to resist his promptings, and tell Him no!
