How are you doing, spiritually? Do you know? Would you like to know and have confidence in your relationship with God?  The Bible presents several methods of self evaluation you may like to use. This Blog presents one of these points of self evaluation: How do you know that you have God’s “Holy Spirit” dwelling in you?

When Jesus died on the cross, He accomplished much; one of these accomplishments was to provide us with easy access to God through His Spirit, known as the “Spirit of Truth,” or the  “Holy Spirit.” Jesus said that we must be born again, which means to be born of the Spirit, which means having God’s Holy Spirit dwelling in us. So, how can we be sure?

Some people will tell you that if you speak in tongues, you have the Holy Spirit; speaking in tongues is wonderful, but this is something that can be easily copied or manufactured. Some say that if you can perform miracles, you have God’s Spirit; but, again, we can be easily fooled by miracles; for instance, by magicians. Some will say that if you are righteous, you have the Holy Spirit; but, self-righteousness can be very deceiving even for the person displaying it. Notice that all these displays have the potential of giving us a false sense of acceptance by man. These points, I believe, can be proven in the following scriptures:

Matthew 7:22  On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?’

Matthew 7:23  And then will I declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.'(ESV)

 Fortunately, the Bible gives us a valid method of self evaluation, so we can know whether we have the Holy Spirit in us or not.

Before presenting this method, we need to do a little background work. We are very complex beings: we humans are composed of a soul, spirit, mind, brain, flesh, conscience, measure of faith, awareness, members, and more. As a result of these complexities, we produce something very important: thought. These “thoughts” are private. The Bible says:

1  Corinthians 2:11a  For who knows a person’s thoughts except the spirit of that person, which is in him?

Your thoughts are hidden from others. You can tell someone your thoughts, if you like, and they may or may not understand, but your spirit fully comprehends your thoughts.

This is true for God as well: only His Spirit fully comprehends His thoughts.

1  Corinthians 2:11b  So also no one comprehends the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God.

 God presents His thoughts to us in the Bible, but they are difficult, if not impossible, to understand since they are much higher than our thoughts and must be spiritually discerned. Therefore, the only way we can comprehend the thoughts of God, is to have His Spirit in us. 

1 Corinthians 2:12  Now we have received not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might understand the things freely given us by God.

1 Corinthians 2:14  The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand …

 That is it. If you put the above scripture together, you see that if we have His Spirit, we have access to His mind and thoughts. We realize His word is truth and not folly. We share His thoughts and we share His values. We become transformed by the renewing of our minds. When someone curses God, we are hurt. When someone doesn’t believe we are burdened.

 It is important to point out that even though we have the Spirit of God in us, we still have evil thoughts; do things we don’t want to do; and, in  general, disappoint ourselves. These things do not detract from knowing the mind of God, actually, the fact that we recognize these things, also proves the presence of the Holy Spirit in us, because He guides us in Truth and, always, toward God.

Note: This method of self evaluation is between you and God. Only you know, and if you have concerns, talk to God about it and get it settled – just you and God.