He had grieved the spirit of God, over a period of time, so much, that now there was no empowerment of the Holy Spirit acting in his life.
God tells us: He would never take His spirit from us. He said: “I'm always with you; I will never leave you nor forsake you”.
The spirit of God remains joined to our spirit; but that does not mean that the tangible power, and presence, and activity of the spirit, is available to you.
It's always available; but we can cause a grieving and withdrawing of the Holy Spirit, and then when that happens, like Samson, you end up losing vision; you end up in chains, in a daily grind.
Most people wouldn't think of ‘losing their eyes’, and they wouldn't think of ‘being in bondage’; but daily grind… that rings a bell doesn't it? The daily grind!
Our life is to be full of joy. Not all the time - there'll be some difficult times.
Jesus promises His kingdom, His righteousness, right relationship with God, then the outcome of that - peace, and then joy in the Holy Ghost! Wonderful joy in the Holy Ghost!
You wouldn't think that many Christians have got much joy in the Holy Ghost. If you've got joy in the Holy Ghost, you laugh a lot more, and you stop frowning as much.
Remember, joy in the Holy Ghost is not something you do; it's actually something that turns up. It's a person!
Joy in the Holy Ghost; through the spirit of: love, joy, peace and joy in the Holy Ghost. It's a joy He brings, as He is allowed to work in your life.
The peace is a peace He brings, as He is allowed to work in your life; so these things are fruits on the tree. So what fruits are showing up in your life?
Are you stressed out, pressured, uptight, anxious; wondering how you're going to make the next deadline?
Are you serious; or have you allowed the Holy Spirit to work in you? We need the Holy Ghost! You can't do life without the Holy Ghost.
Jesus didn't say: God so loved the world, He gave a book… He gave a person! Who wrote the book.
So you need the book; but you need the person - the spirit of God working in your life; and so it's possible for us to lose that flow of the Holy Spirit.
John 1:33 – “Upon whom you see the Spirit descending, and remaining on Him, that's the one who baptises in the Holy Spirit”.
The Holy Ghost descended on Jesus like a dove- a turtle dove.
A dove is symbolic of Peace. Where did they get that from? It's from the Bible, that the dove is a symbol of peace.
The interesting thing about turtle doves is: they’re a bit wary of humans. Now a pigeon - they're not wary, they'll just come - they just want food!
A turtle dove is not territorial. In other words, it's got no ownership, or anything like that; whereas pigeons are very territorial. Turtle doves won't fight and contend; whereas pigeons will fight one another and contend.
Pigeons will mate with anyone; but turtle doves mate one person, for all their life. It's no wonder they said the turtle dove is a symbol of the Holy Spirit.
He came on Jesus, and remained on Jesus. There was no: one day the Holy Ghost's there; another day He's not. There was no lifting of anointing off Jesus.
The Holy Spirit remained on Him, because His life was perfectly aligned with the Holy Spirit. The ‘resting of the spirit’ was because Jesus' life was aligned.
Ephesians 4:28, and He's talking about how to live out the Christian life. It gets really practical…
“Let Him that stole, steal no more. Let him labour, working with his hands, doing that which is good, that he may have something to give to him who has need”.