Do you ever feel confused and conflicted when you’re looking for direction from the Holy Spirit? Do you ever wonder how you’d recognize His answer if it came?
I believe that, as Christian highly sensitive people, our feelings can give us clues about the Holy Spirit’s leading.
Although the Holy Spirit speaks English just fine, I’ve observed that He rarely answers our requests for guidance with clear English messages straight to our conscious minds. Even when the early church was evaluating whether or not the Gentile believers needed to follow the Jewish Law, all they could say was, “It seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us…” (Acts 15:28).
My underlying assumption is that the Holy Spirit, because He indwells the followers of Jesus (John 14:17), communicates constantly with the inner human spirit. And our inner human spirit understands His intentions and desires far easier than our conscious minds ever will.
Rule of Thumb
I have a rule of thumb developed from lots of trial and error over the decades. A “yes” from the Holy Spirit:
- Does not feel desperate or grasping.
- Does not feel excited or pushed.
- Does not have a heavy, stoic, practical feeling.
- Does have a very calm, peaceful, “Ah, of course; I get it” feeling.
And Your Understanding Will Mess With It
Beware though. Your understanding will mess with it. That’s why Wisdom says, “Trust in YHWH with all your heart and do not lean on your own understanding” (Proverbs 3:5). It is with our heart that we trust, not with our understanding.
Our understanding is well-trained and well-practiced in spiritualizing, rationalizing, and justifying, and speaks fluent shoulds, oughts, maybe’s, and buts.
Below is a little graphic example of what we often do to our answers to prayer.
This is your answer to prayer at last revealed in your heart. Such lovely clarity in that elusive heart of yours.
This is your understanding. It likes to dominate and be in charge.
This is what your understanding will do with that answer to prayer. Spiritualize, rationalize, justify. Should, ought, maybe, but...
Now try making sense of this.
Understanding is useful, but not as useful as it likes to think.
Blessings!
Gail Ruth
P.S. No eggs were squandered in the making of these photos. This one went into our fried rice :-)
{ 7 comments… read them below or add one }
I very much liked the article. The pictures brought it home:)
I’m sure that i will come back here. Well written articles !
Just have bookmarked your blog, and waiting for the next interesting article
I like your site design. What template did you use ?
It’s a WordPress theme called
Thesis Theme. I explored many options before discovering this one. I really like it. Unlike most themes, it gives me a lot of control over the appearance of my site, and it has great support. After using it for many months I decided to become an affiliate for it and recommend it to other people. There’s also a link to it in my far right sidebar. Blessings!Good Afternoon Gail. I am happy to have met you at Loraines party this past monday. I just got through going through your site a bit. When I have more time I should like to throughly look into it. Your card you gave to me was appreciated. Thanks.
Hi Grace, welcome to my site. It was a great pleasure to meet you. I hope to talk with you more Jimmie Sue’s retreat this Fall if you go. Blessings!