Spirit 2: Encourager, Truth, episode 61

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If you love a prodigal, you can discover help and hope for your wilderness

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journey right here at When You Love a Prodigal and also help and hope for your

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own life journey. Today we continue surveying the amazing gift God has given

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us for our prodigal wilderness journey, his very own Holy Spirit. Last week we

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considered how the Spirit is an advocate and a comforter. This week we're going to

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look at two more roles of the Spirit, encourager and truth. Be sure to jot down

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points you want to remember and apply. You'll only learn and grow as you try

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to apply something, as you learn a new truth or are reminded of one you know.

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Now, encourager, I love that word. That is actually, I think, my main gift in life is

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to encourage people. And it's really nice to know that this amazing Spirit of

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God is called Pericletos and there are several meanings. And how often do you

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find yourself saying the following, can I confront him one more time? Will I stand

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firm on the consequences we outlined? Can I go through with this intervention? Can I

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forgive again? I need more courage than I have. I have treasured those who

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encouraged me during the darkest, most challenging days of life with a

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prodigal. They listened, they shared from their experience, they reminded me of

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truths from God's Word that encouraged me. But they couldn't always be there.

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That is one of the things the Holy Spirit does for us. He encourages us and

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he is always there. The important thing to see in this word is the meaning of

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encourage. It means to encourage, that is to put courage into. One of the roles

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that the Holy Spirit plays in our lives is to instill in us the courage we need

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for the moment as well as for the whole journey. Ezra, a priest and teacher

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during the end of the Babylonian captivity, had been appointed by God and

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the pagan king of the Persian Empire to go to Jerusalem to teach the returned

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exiles God's laws and to help reestablish temple worship. Though he had

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the full backing of the government, Ezra had no idea how he would be received by

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the fellow Israelites he had to face. Many had been born in Babylon and knew

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nothing of God's law. Many had been exposed to the idols and customs of

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Babylon. Would they be calloused, rebellious, sold out to the pagan world,

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self-absorbed? Ezra needed courage. He needed the encourager. He wrote,

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because the hand of the Lord my God was on me, I took courage and gathered leaders

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from Israel to go with me. Note that he took courage. It was there in the Lord.

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It's there in the Spirit with us for the taking and then he helped himself to it.

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And so God will often have opportunities before us with our loved prodigals or

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with other things and they are too much. We don't see how we can do them.

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But he says, take courage. The Spirit of God will give you what you need. And so

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then we can do whatever it is is necessary, especially as we live through

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the hard days of a prodigal. When the Holy Spirit came at Pentecost, the 120

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disciples were filled with the encourager, the Spirit. They began to do

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and say things they had never been able to do before. They even had courage to

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withstand a trial and speak out and speak up for Christ. They knew something

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new. They had this one who instilled courage in them to do what God asked

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them to do. Luke reported when they saw the jail, the officials who were had

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arrested Peter and John, says when they saw the courage of Peter and John and

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realized that they were unschooled ordinary men, they were astonished and

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they took note that these men had been with Jesus. Later, after they were warned,

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threatened, and released, they returned to the other believers and together they

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prayed, Lord, consider their threats and enable your servants to speak your word

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with great boldness, with courage. We can ask the Spirit to give us courage to

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stand firm, to make hard choices, to keep loving unconditionally, to forgive all

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the things that we will be called on to do in our prodigal journey. And we can

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ask the Spirit to give our loved ones courage to turn from the path they are

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on, to withdraw from friends who misled them, to get help, to repent, to surrender

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to our loving God. I am so grateful our Father has provided for us needed

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courage in every challenge of this wilderness journey. The next one today is

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truth. Now, if you love a prodigal, you know about lies. Lies. One of the realities

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of living with and loving prodigals is lies. How many times have you heard, why

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don't you trust me? Or, you can trust me? Yeah, right. If our prodigal is an

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adolescent, a driver's license opens the door for deception, we don't really know

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where they are going and what they are doing. And if your prodigal is using or

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abusing, we can be sure of one thing. If he is saying something, he is probably

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lying. They become masters of partial truth, deception, manipulation. They lie

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to our faces with utmost sincerity. There are also some other liars, you know, not

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just our prodigals, we lie to ourselves. We deny the severity of their addictions.

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We are sure our good training will cause them to make good choices. We choose to

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accept their explanations rather than face unwelcome facts. We believe what they

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say they are doing and who they are with. We bail them out of jail, certain they

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will be grateful and change. But there is another liar, the father of lies.

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Satan assures us that we can trust our prodigal. Then, after trust is broken, he

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accuses us of being terrible parents. That is all our fault. He bombards us with

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hopelessness. Our loved one will never change. She is gone. The rest of our lives

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will be misery. Those are the things the evil one pounds into our heads. But there

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is one who speaks truth, the Spirit of truth. In John 14, 16, and 15, 26, Jesus

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assures us the Spirit of truth will live in us. And we also have this wonderful

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promise. When he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all truth.

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Does that encourage you? He will speak truth to us and through us. He can also

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give us discernment regarding what our prodigals tell us. We can even know

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things directly from the Spirit that enable us to intervene or rescue. Our son

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was a prodigal in the early days of kids on the internet. And I would check his

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computer often to see where he had been. And he didn't like that. So he would

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change his password. And every time he changed his password, the Spirit would

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tell me the new password. That was pretty miraculous. The Spirit will reveal to us

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the lies we tell ourselves and enable us to walk in truth. The Spirit will confound

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the lies of the devil with the truth of God. Imagine we have God's Spirit of all

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truth living in us, teaching us, guiding us. So it makes sense to be filling our

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minds with the truth of God's word, giving the Spirit of truth all he needs

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to renew our minds and change our lives and give us the wisdom we need. But we

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can pray the same for our prodigals. The Spirit of truth is pursuing them. A few

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questions. When was the last time that you desperately needed courage? Could you

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call on the Spirit of encouragement? In what area of untruth do you find

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yourself struggling the most? Your prodigal's lies? Your lies to yourself?

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Satan's lies that there's no problem or Satan's lies that the situation is

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helpless, hopeless. Then what truth do you think the Holy Spirit wants to impress

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on you right now to help end that struggle? The Spirit of truth is yours,

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living in you, walking with you, available to give you all the wisdom and discernment

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that you need. He is also the Spirit to encourage you to put courage in you and

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he also is in you and with you, walking through this journey with you, and he

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will give you the courage that you need to face the issues that are before you.

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Next week we will look at two more gifts of the Spirit, freedom and peace. God bless you.