Author: Hal Hollister Ministry

David recognizes all righteousness belongs to God. He knows there is nothing in his human being worthy of God. David also praises God for His righteousness throughout the day.

The Christ follower is sealed with the Holy Spirit. He is the life of Jesus. He is your source of righteousness and discerning good from evil.

The Holy Spirit has initiated a plan to transform you from a mere human being into a new creature in Christ Jesus. This is a lifelong process.

The reason we cannot think or act like God is because we are designed to live for self and God has no ego. He never thinks about Himself or His needs.

How do you stay on track with the righteousness of God?

Pray everyday for the will of God in your life. The Lord wants to be a lamp unto your feet and a light unto your pathway.

Be open to the conviction of the Holy Spirit. The only way you can be perfect before God is by the blood of Jesus.

Read the Bible under the auspices of the Holy Spirit.

Listen for the voice of God. He has given you the mind of Christ.

Learn to rest in God and allow the Holy Spirit to go before you. It is not by might nor by power but by the Spirit.

Make you priority to be in oneness with the Living Christ. This is more important than any form of religion.

The Holy Spirit has been speaking to me for several days about Psalm 11. This narrative is built on the precepts in this scripture.

When the foundations of your world are shattered, the tendency is to run away or panic. However, God tells a believer to trust Him and stand firm without fear or doubt.

There are no coincidences for a Christ follower. The hand of God is over your every action. He engineers both the good and difficult moments of life.

God may be allowing Satan to attack or destroy but your refuge is in Him. God has power and dominion over the heavens and earth.

How can a believer cope in what seems like a helpless situation?

The Lord is in His holy temple in heaven. The eyes of God see everything and at times He chooses to test the righteous with adversity.

God hates the wicked and those who are disposed to do violence. He will rain burning coals and a fiery wind upon your oppressors.

God is holy and He loves those who walk in His footsteps. God’s countenance upholds the upright.

The countenance of God is His facial expression. God looks at the troubled believer with a heart of love and comfort. He desires to provide believers with wisdom, protection and peace during a time of turmoil.

The purpose of God during the trials of life is to strengthen your faith when all you see is chaos. This is a catchall phrase used by many teachers but does not really probe into the mind of God.

The agony and pain experienced in a time of crisis is designed for a believer to identify with the emotions of Jesus on the Cross. In reality, you are being baptized into the death and suffering of Jesus. You are facing the work of the Cross to transform your life from a human being into a new creature in Christ.

We sometimes tend to look at God as a spiritual being who punishes believers and acts in cruel and harsh actions. This is a character of God at work in different seasons of life and is exemplified many places in the Bible.

There are several reasons for God’s actions.

God wants to strengthen your faith when He seems absent. He wants your unabridged loyalty and obedience regardless of your circumstances.

God responds with retribution. He blesses and He curses. He punishes believers who stray into darkness by worshiping false gods or idols.

God knows you better than you know yourself. He has created a perfect plan to deal with your personality and character defects. Your journey with God is perfect even though it may seem very distant from your concept of a loving God.

God is preparing a very special ministry but you must endure the refining fires of God to operate with the character of Jesus. There is no way of escaping this preparation by God.

Don’t give up on God. There is no one like Him!

I would have lost heart unless I believed that I would see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living.

Last night God told me we all have an impoverished soul and the Holy Spirit is how we can find the truth and righteousness of God.

Jesus said the Holy Spirit will take what is mine and declare it to a believer. He desires to share the fullness of His life with you.

The Holy Spirit will guide you into all truth and He speaks under the authority of Jesus.

The Holy Spirit is the life of Christ embodied as a Spirit in all believers. He is the only way you can be filled with the life of Christ.

The Holy Spirit performs three roles in the life of a believer. He convicts you of sin, righteousness and judgment.

The sin is rejecting the fullness of the teachings of Jesus. This is not just about making a decision for Jesus but living out the precepts of God. The requirement is to seek first the kingdom of God above all else.

My goodness is nothing apart from you

Secondly, we must be filled with the righteousness of God. This comes directly from Heaven through the Holy Spirit. The righteousness of God is a gift from Jesus and belongs to Him. It is designed to bring glory to God. You cannot take ownership of the holiness of Jesus or claim this for yourself.

The third work of the Holy Spirit is judgment. The ruler of the world is Satan and He has been judged and defeated by Jesus. He has no power over death for a believer.

Satan wants to steal, kill and destroy. As a believer, we cannot not be rooted in the things of the world. This will bring conviction and judgment upon you.

The Holy Spirit desires to fill you with wisdom, strength, joy and protection. These attributes of Jesus come directly from Heaven. They cannot be found on the earth.

Come to the Holy Spirit each day through prayer. Ask Him to fill you with the character of Jesus and give Him authority over your life.

The Holy Spirit has given you the mind of Christ. Listen for the voice of God. He wants to instruct you, fill you with His goodness and make you a powerful witness for Jesus.

The Holy Spirit wants to be a lamp unto your feet and a light unto your pathway.

Walk with Jesus by faith believing in His powerful promises.

Remember, it is not by might nor by power but by the Spirit of God.

Learn to live in oneness with Jesus by yielding to the Holy Spirit.

The Holy Spirit creates new life for a believer and desires to be a light unto your pathway. The question is are you giving Him authority over your life to take you on His journey?

As a believer, Jesus wants to guide your footsteps under the authority of the Holy Spirit. You lose control of your life and God takes you to new places.

The Holy Spirit is miles ahead of you when you wake up in the morning. He is an omniscient God and sees every moment of your future.

This is not necessarily about a radical change like Abraham encountered with God. It is letting God take you to new places in your current lifestyle. It is not living a rigid lifestyle but giving God the freedom to order your life in His divine fashion.

The Holy Spirit wants to protect you and let you see the beauty of the Lord. He knows where the opportunities are to be a witness for Jesus.

Think about the two men walking on the road to Emmanus. They were in the right place to meet Jesus and their life would never be the same.

Phillip, a disciple of Jesus, was taken by the Spirit to meet the Ethiopian official. He led the man to Jesus who became a Christ follower.

Your life will be filled with the reality of God by yielding to the Holy Spirit as you deal with the moments of life which sometimes seem very boring.

It is not by might nor by strength but by My Spirit. The Holy Spirit wants to open your eyes today to see your pathway with God!

Jesus has a surprise for you today!

The hierarchy of God consists of three persons. They are God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit.

It is impossible to worship God directly. He wants nothing to do with you because you are contaminated with sin. You cannot draw near to God.

The presence of God creates a terrifying fear and a power unlike anything in the world. This is why God told the Israelites to stay away from His presence on Mount Sinai. The Israelites were so frightened by God they would only deal with Moses.

God refers all people to Jesus who is the Son of God. This is the only way you can come into the presence of God. The sacrifice of Jesus on the Cross offers forgiveness of all sin through the blood of Jesus. You become born again into a new person filled with the character of Jesus.

Think about the hierarchy of God this way. Jesus and God have lived in oneness from the beginning of creation. God has assigned Jesus power and dominion over the heavens and earth. There is no power greater than Jesus in the world we inhabit.

The journey with God begins with your decision to live for Jesus. There is no other way.

Now we come to the sticky part of dealing with God. As a new believer, you have to choose to either seek the Living Christ or enter through the religious channel. If you choose religion you will be bound by laws and works. Religion wants to control you and God wants to set you free.

Jesus is not a religious sect or a denomination built on laws. He spent most of His ministry confronting the falsehoods of religion.

In reality, Jesus hates religion and was executed by religious leaders.

So how do you find the Living Christ without being tarnished by religion?

Make a decision to live for Jesus above all else. This means you let go of your independence and goals. The priority of your life must be to vigilantly seek the will of God.

This will open the door to meet the Living Christ.

You will discover in dealing with the personality of Jesus that He is a very jealous God. His jealousy is like a consuming fire. Jesus wants all of you and does not want to share you with other gods or idols.

Jesus wants to have a personal and vibrant relationship with you. He wants to speak with you, fill you with His life, and teach you His values. He wants to be your best friend and live together in a symbiotic relationship.

Unfortunately, you can’t sit down and have coffee with the physical being of Jesus or interact directly with Him. This is because Jesus lives in Heaven.

The question is how do you come in contact with the reality of the Living Christ?

God has provided an excellent solution to this dilemma. If you are a believer, God has sealed you with the Holy Spirit who is the life of Christ. He is a living person embodied in the form of a Spirit.

The Holy Spirit is how you experience the reality of Jesus. The secret is to give Him authority over your life. Jesus will become alive in every moment of your life. The Spirit will fill you with the thoughts of God, give you supernatural wisdom and guide your decision making.

Jesus is omniscient and His wisdom will protect you from evil and wrong doing.

Jesus will literally become a lamp unto your feet and a light unto your pathway. He will bring the order of God into your life.

Jesus does not think or act like you. As a Christ follower you have to let go of human logic and walk by faith not by sight.

Jesus tests believers. He is looking for your obedience to His instructions regardless of the cost or the lack of any common sense.

Jesus can do for you what you can never do for yourself!

Jesus spoke the words above about asking Him for your desires. I have heard many interpretations over the years about this text and none really made much sense to me.

There are criteria developed by Jesus relating to asking. First, you must be abiding in Him. This means you are walking in oneness with Him in prayer, reading scripture, listening for His voice, and genuinely seeking His will for your life. And, you are living under the authority of the Holy Spirit.

Secondly, you must be a doer of the Word. This means the Words of scripture are engraved in your heart and you are attempting to live by them to the best of your ability.

You must be in touch with the reality of the Living Christ and hearing His personal promises and prophetic words. This happens to those who are abiding in Jesus and yielding to the Holy Spirit. The Spirit of Christ is sealed in all believers and He speaks to believers. You have the mind of Christ.

Thirdly, God creates different seasons for believers. There are times of abundance and times of deprivation. So you must understand where you stand with God. It does no good to ask for prosperity in times of deprivation. You will just keep hitting a brick wall. Job was restored in God’s perfect timing.

There is also a direct relationship between asking and waiting upon God. Many times God hears your prayers but He asks you to wait upon Him by faith.

There really is no delay from God in asking for wisdom, strength, joy, and protection as long as you are abiding in Him and covered by His blood.

God looks at your heart in responding to your prayers!

God has constituted things on the basis of redemption. By means of our asking, God gets processes into work whereby He creates the thing that is not in existence until we do ask. Oswald Chambers

There is only one gateway to the reality of the Living Christ. You must surrender yourself to Jesus without any conditions. You agree to give up the rights to yourself and give God permission to do with you as He pleases.

This is not a surrender to religion, keeping laws, or doing works for God.

You agree to give up your independence for Jesus. This is a decision of the will. God will not force Himself upon you.

The surrender to Jesus will merge your personality into oneness with Him.

Jesus wants your absolute loyalty to Him without compromise.

This decision will trigger the work of the Cross. You will be crucified with Christ. And, your life will belong to God.

The born again believer lives in a personal and embracing relationship with Jesus. He will be in all your thoughts, words and decision making.

The beauty of Jesus is that He forgives all your sins and covers you with His blood. You can stand blameless before God.

You will hear the voice of God consistently. Jesus fills you with His attributes of strength, wisdom, joy and protection. These precious qualities come from Heaven and cannot be found on earth.

Jesus reveals His truth to you and shows you how to operate with His values.

You will experience signs and wonders and live in the presence of powerful angels.

The Holy Spirit will heal your physical afflictions and protect you from evil.

The Holy Spirit will give you supernatural strength and the ability to meet all the challenges of life.

The Holy Spirit will perform inner healing from past hurts and make you whole. He will teach you to forgive others and give you freedom from past emotions.

You will be created in His workmanlike for good works.

Jesus knows you better than you know yourself and will create a perfect plan for your life.

Surrender to Jesus is the beginning of a new and robust life!

I have been studying this biblical precept for several months under the auspices of the Holy Spirit. The definition of dying to self is the process of becoming refined into the character of God.

This is a lengthy and never ending period of time. Jesus is crucifying your natural life. You cannot escape this transformation because it is divinely ordained by God.

If you are serious about God expect deeper refinement along with severe testing and trials.

In reviewing the writings of the great spiritual pioneers they all use scripture, personal testimonies, and analogies to describe this surgical work of God. But the result is the same. They all agree we have to deal with sorrow, loss and pain.

If you are a believer you have entered into this process of natural death. This will be accompanied by pain and suffering at times.

You cannot hurry the process along because it takes a lot of work to get the barnacles removed from your personality.

God sees everything about you. He knows all your vulnerabilities and weaknesses. He sees the depth of your natural life which is mostly hidden from you.

The refinement of the Cross touches every aspect of your thoughts, words and decision making.

God wants believers to walk in oneness with Him and live by faith and not by what they see with their eyes. This happens by giving the Holy Spirit authority over your life and learning to listen to the voice of God.

The Christ follower must learn how to operate like God without the influence of ego and pride. You must also learn how to reject worldly wisdom and actions which are engrained in society.

God wants your loyalty and obedience even though it may be very costly and painful.

It is impossible to live for Christ without experiencing the death of self and the purification of your inner self.

Dying to self gives you the fullness of the life of Christ!

Good Morning,

The Holy Spirit gave me the title for this narrative along with words describing His most important priority in gaining loyalty with Jesus. He told me a believer must accept the unabridged version of the words of Jesus without editing or rejecting any script. Many believers accept what they like about Jesus and reject the hard and more difficult precepts. This is also widely practiced by many religious leaders.

God understands the precepts in the Bible contain some very tough instructions. Jesus just wants believers to just be open to learn how to appropriate His truths into your life. This is a lifelong process and does not happen overnight.

The primary condition for securing the loyalty of Christ is to be willing to lay down your life for Christ. You must be willing to give up your freedom and desires to live for Christ above all else.

Jesus speaks and the believer obeys without delay or questioning His wisdom. He wants obedient and loyal believers regardless of the logic or cost to comply.

Abraham gave up everything and moved to a foreign land at the request of God. This is why he was blessed as the Father of many nations and was favored by God. Abraham was far from perfect but He was obedient to the voice of God.

Loyalty is believing in the promises of Jesus and walking by faith not by sight. Faith is believing your help comes from the Lord who created the Heavens and Earth. David lived by this principle and this is why he was anointed with the favor of God. And, David made many mistakes in his lifetime.

Loyalty comes by centering your life on Jesus through prayer, reading the Bible, and listening for His voice.

Loyalty to Jesus is achieved by submitting to the authority of the Holy Spirit and committing your works each day to Him.

Religion does not build loyalty to Jesus. It will lead you into keeping laws and doing works. Religion presents a superficial view of Christ and does not teach a believer how to live in the reality of our almighty God.

Loyalty is a process of dying to self and living for Christ. You enter into the baptism of the crucified and resurrected Christ. Your life no longer belongs to you. It belongs to Jesus who can do with you as He pleases.

Who is going to write the script for your life?

The Holy Spirit has recently been speaking to me about Satan and his tactics.

Satan was created by God. He is a very powerful spiritual being. At one time he was very loved by God. The Bible tells us Satan was God’s anointed guardian.

Satan wanted to be like God and have authority over all things. For this reason, God threw Satan and his multitude of followers out of Heaven.

Satan is alive and at work on the earth. He wants to destroy the presence of Christ and cause human beings to turn away from God. He is the enemy of all Christians and wants to steal, kill and destroy believers.

Satan has a command structure of many demons. Each demon is assigned an evil power like sexual lust, greed for money or power, alcohol and drug addictions, lies and deceit, and mental health dysfunctions. Any other evil you can think of there is a demon assigned to harass believers. They attempt to entice you to walk in darkness. And, many times they are successful in creating a stronghold over a human being.

There are religious demons who have been very successful in denigrating the scriptures and the purposes of a Christ follower.

Satan can put evil thoughts in your mind and knows your weaknesses. He attacks humans by trying to tempt you into pursuing an evil action. He attempts to convince you everyone does this and don’t worry about God. Remember, Satan is a liar.

Satan also works through the adversities in your life to disprove the love and protection of God. He plants the idea why would a loving God allow this to happen and discourages you from seeking God.

Satan is actively at work behind the scenes and overtly trying to deceive you with lies.

As a believer, you must turn away from every temptation and walk in oneness with God. Commit your works to God and give the Holy Spirit authority over your thoughts, words and actions.

Pray vigilantly seeking the will of God. Test every Spirit when in doubt by yielding to the wisdom of the Holy Spirit.

Put on the armor of God and rebuke Satan with the promises of God.

You might want to read The Screwtape Letters by C. S. Lewis. This classic book gives insight into the dark world of Satan.

There is no neutral ground in the universe. Every square inch, every split second is claimed by God, and counterclaimed by Satan. C. S. Lewis