“For it is God who works in you to will and to act in order to fulfill his good purpose.” (Philippians 2:13, NIV)
It is the Holy Spirit who seals, reveals, and deals with us in order that we may become more like Jesus. The Holy Spirit first seals us at the point of our spiritual birth, “In him you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed in him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit” (Ephesians 1:13, ESV, emphasis added). In Bible times, a seal was a type of security. It was typically used to guarantee a document or letter, indicate ownership, or protect against tampering. The Holy Spirit is our seal in every sense of this word; we are guaranteed, owned, and protected!
The assurance that we experience because of the Holy Spirit’s seal sets us free to be Converterlators in the time we have remaining in this temporary world. After the Holy Spirit seals us, he begins to reveal the things of God to us. In 1 Corinthians 2:10–16 we read:
These are the things God has revealed to us by his Spirit. The Spirit searches all things, even the deep things of God. For who knows a person’s thoughts except their own spirit within them? In the same way no one knows the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God. What we have received is not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, so that we may understand what God has freely given us. This is what we speak, not in words taught us by human wisdom but in words taught by the Spirit, explaining spiritual realities with Spirit-taught words.The person without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God but considers them foolishness, and cannot understand them because they are discerned only through the Spirit. The person with the Spirit makes judgments about all things, but such a person is not subject to merely human judgments, for, ‘Who has known the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him?’ But we have the mind of Christ. (NIV)
The Holy Spirit opens our hearts to spiritual truth. This gives us the ability to both understand and respond to God’s calling as we converterlate our time, talent, and treasure. Without the Holy Spirit in our lives we will not have the things of God revealed to us.
As the Holy Spirit reveals the things of God to us, he also deals with us. Jesus said, “It is the Spirit who gives life” (John 6:63, ESV). It is the Holy Spirit’s power that allows us to serve God’s purposes in God’s way. In the Old Testament the prophet Ezekiel recorded God’s promise to us, “And I will put my Spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws” (Ezekiel 36:27, NIV).
Have you been sealed with the Holy Spirit? What has he revealed to you? In what ways has the Holy Spirit been dealing with you?
Converterlators submit to the Holy Spirit in order to serve God’s purposes in God’s way.
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