Reflecting The Holy Spirit in Our Lives
Welcome to the Holy Spirit Untethered. My name is Amber Beals, and it is my job and my mission to allow the Holy Spirit to speak through me, to help demystify who he is, what his role is, and to deeply encourage you to seek a relationship with him. Alright. Let's get started. Hey, guys.
Amber Beels:Welcome back to the Holy spirit untethered podcast. My name is Amber. And I know that last week, if you've tuned in to last week's episode, I had talked and said that I was gonna bring on a guest this week. Well, surprise. It's me.
Amber Beels:Me again. I will I am trying to get a guest. So I have a guest in mind for next week, and I'm hoping to nail them down so that you guys can get a break from just me and actually hear from somebody else. But and I have a topic in mind also, so I'm really looking forward to it. Hopefully, this person says yes.
Amber Beels:But so I'm not gonna name any names yet, but it should be good. And I'm pretty sure they're gonna say yes because they're pretty much very spirit led. So if I know them, they're gonna say yes. So look forward to that episode next week. But for now, you've got me.
Amber Beels:Today, I wanted to talk about outward works. Now I know that that can come off as a little religious and maybe, you know, not by grace, which is what we believe in. We believe that we're saved by grace. But I wanna mention the work side of things because really, the topic that I wanna cover is your outward life. Like, how are you living and how are you presenting yourself to other people, either to other believers or other nonbelievers?
Amber Beels:How are you living your life? Is it pleasing to the Lord? Is it pleasing to the Holy Spirit? Are you partnering with the Holy Spirit to live your life and make sure that it is pleasing to the Lord, that it is holy, that it is lovely and beautiful and all the things like what the scriptures say. So that is gonna be the topic for today.
Amber Beels:But before we get started, let's go ahead and pray. So if you can and safe to do so, go ahead and pray with me. Alright. Dear heavenly father, I thank you so much for this day. I thank you so much for this opportunity to have this podcast, Lord.
Amber Beels:I pray a blessing over every single person that is listening to this podcast, whether it's right when it comes out or years down the line, Lord. I just pray a blessing over them. Holy spirit, I pray that you would speak through me. I pray that my words would fall away, that your words would come through, that your message and your heart and your character would come through through this episode, Lord, that we would get to know you and your Holy Spirit just a little bit better this week, Lord. And we pray these things in Jesus' name.
Amber Beels:Amen. Alright. So I wanted to start out this episode with a scripture. So I am in the book of John chapter 13 verse thirty four and thirty five, and it says and this is Jesus talking, by the way. It says, a new commandment I give to you that you love one another as I have loved you, that you also love one another.
Amber Beels:By this, all will know that you are my disciples if you have love for one another. And there's a couple of other, like, versions out there that say, you know, they're they will know us by our love. What it's talking about is other people will know that we are followers of Christ based on our love for one another, based on how we treat one another, and how we treat other people just in general. It doesn't have to be other believers, but just people in general. How we operate, how we respond, how we react to things and situations that happen in this world, that's how people will know that we follow the Lord, that we are his disciples.
Amber Beels:And I think that's gonna be the foundation for this episode, this verse right here. Because I wanna encourage you and maybe challenge you a little bit and do a little assessment on your own life and say, how you doing? How are you doing in this area of your life? How are you treating other people? What are the words coming out of your mouth when you speak to other believers?
Amber Beels:What are the words that are coming out of your mouth when you're talking to people who are not believers? How quick are you to anger? How quick are you to get frustrated? Just those things, those little things. Like, where are you at?
Amber Beels:And when I'm challenging you to critique yourself, I'm not saying to criticize yourself. I'm not telling you to bash yourself and be like, ugh. Yeah. I'm failing in here. I'm failing in this part of this area of my life.
Amber Beels:I'm not doing so well. You know, I'm super quick to anger. I have kids, whatever. Like, whatever it is, I'm not asking you to assess yourself so that you can tear yourself down. I'm asking you to assess yourself so that you can evaluate and see where you are, and that will kind of help you identify where you are with the holy spirit.
Amber Beels:The Holy Spirit is your helper. Right? We've covered that in other episodes that he is our helper. He does life with us. Why does he do life with us?
Amber Beels:Because he knows life is hard. Jesus did life with the holy spirit. And if Jesus had to have the holy spirit in order to do his ministry, his calling, his purpose, and all the things that he was called to do, then how much more are we in need of the Holy Spirit to be able to fulfill the calling and purpose on our life that the Lord has placed on us? We definitely need the Holy Spirit. We need even more than Jesus did because Jesus was God.
Amber Beels:Like, yes, he was man, but he was God. Who who are we? Right? I mean, we are children of the Lord. We are children of God, but we definitely need that extra help.
Amber Beels:Right? We need that extra encouragement, that extra guidance from the Holy Spirit that other people may not have when they don't when they haven't accepted the Lord as their savior. Right? So that is why I'm asking you that question. How are you doing?
Amber Beels:And I'm asking myself the same question. How am I doing? Now for me, I am pregnant, and so I have a lot of hormones. And for me, it has been a little bit of a challenge to kind of have my filter work in my head. Sometimes things just slip out a little bit.
Amber Beels:You know? I'm a pretty even keeled person. I'm I'm pretty patient, and I just like to sugarcoat things because I'm a former people pleaser. So, you know, I have a history of that. However, since I have been pregnant, I have been having all these hormones.
Amber Beels:And so it it has been a little bit more of a challenge for me to hold back my frustration and hold back the the fact that I'm stressed or that I have a lot of things on my plate. Whatever it is, like, I have been struggling with that and that's a first for me. Maybe not for you, but for me, it's a first because normally, I'm pretty like, I can hold things back. I can filter my words. I can do those things.
Amber Beels:But now I've gotten to live on the other side where that is a little bit of an issue now where I have to be a little bit more intentional, and I have to really breathe and just be like, holy spirit, help me through this situation right now. Because I am not holding back right now like I should, and I need your guidance. I need your patience to fill in the gap where my patience is not cutting it. And so I just wanna encourage you if you're one of those people, like, I understand now. Before, I'd be like, I don't know.
Amber Beels:I'm just automatically a person that's pretty patient. No. Not anymore. So I just wanna encourage you that if you do struggle in those areas, that's okay. That is where the Holy Spirit can step in and really help you be more like Jesus and really help fill like I said, fill in those gaps where you have fallen short and your emotions are not aligning with the scripture of the Lord, he can come in and he can help you do that.
Amber Beels:And luckily, we are blessed enough that the Holy Spirit is full of mercy. Right? He is full of mercy. He is full of grace. He is full of love.
Amber Beels:I mean, he is telling us Jesus is telling us to love one another. That is the number one commandment is to love one another, is to do everything out of love so much so that other people, when they see us, they notice something's different. And what they notice is that everything we do is out of love. And, you know, if you read it through the New Testament, although all the books that Paul wrote, he is constantly about love. He's love love love love love.
Amber Beels:Like like, he he that's all he preaches is love. It's I mean, he preaches other things, but the theme of all the things that he talks about in his letters to the churches are just coded in love. Let all that you do be done in love. Like, everything is all about love. And that's because I believe since Paul, he didn't know Jesus.
Amber Beels:He didn't walk with Jesus. He was actually persecuting Christians after Jesus left Earth for believing in Jesus. He got to know the Holy Spirit on a whole new level that the disciples didn't get to know the Holy Spirit, I think, because they still reflected back to the time where they walked with Jesus. They still remembered Jesus and his words and his character and his love and all the things that when he left and now they had the Holy Spirit don't get me wrong. They they had a strong connection with the Holy Spirit.
Amber Beels:They were baptized by the Holy Spirit. They spoke in tongues. They prophesied. They did all the things, but their connection to the Holy Spirit wasn't as deep as Paul's connection to the Holy Spirit because Paul didn't have that, quote, unquote, hindrance of knowing Jesus in person that he kept thinking back to those times. He didn't have that reference.
Amber Beels:And so for him, the only person that he has was the person of the Holy Spirit. And because of that, he was able to go more deep and more intimate and know the character of the Holy Spirit on a whole new level that the disciples couldn't reach. And I remember there was a scripture Peter said, like, there are some things that even I don't understand that Paul says. Forget what scripture it was, but he basically says, like, yeah, even Paul's on a different level because and I believe that's because Paul knew the Holy Spirit and loved the Holy Spirit on a whole different level that the disciples just just didn't know. He they just didn't know.
Amber Beels:And it I think it was, again, like I said, just that hindrance where they keep thinking about the time that they walked with Jesus, that that prevented them from going deeper with the Holy Spirit. And so because Paul went through all of that, he was able to operate from a place where he wanted to please the Holy Spirit. He did everything out of obedience. Yes. He obeyed whatever the Holy Spirit told him to do.
Amber Beels:And there were some hard things that the Holy Spirit told him. Like, city after city, there was gonna be troubles and strife. Like, there was a verse where the holy spirit told him that city after city, and yet he was like, okay. I'll go. Like, he knew that he was gonna reach trials and be persecuted and be beaten and thrown into jail, and he was several times.
Amber Beels:I mean, the Holy Spirit knew it was gonna happen, and it came it came true. And Paul, he trusted the Holy Spirit and knew what he said was gonna happen, and yet he still did it. And he still did it with a humbleness in his heart and a willingness to just be in obedience to the holy spirit and to the lord. And that is what is super incredible about Paul was his heart posture, about how he how he loved the Holy Spirit. I mean, he he says he prayed in the holy in the spirit.
Amber Beels:Like, he he prayed in tongues. He sang in tongues. And when you do those things, when you pray in the spirit and you sing in the spirit, you build your inner man. You build your inner self to be able to house the holy spirit even greater by doing those things. Because when you pray in the spirit, when you sing in spirit, you don't necessarily oftentimes, you don't know what you're saying.
Amber Beels:You don't know what you're singing. You don't know what you're saying. You can get inklings. You can ask the holy spirit, like, what are what are who are we praying for? Are we interceding for somebody, or are we just praying for, you know, whatever?
Amber Beels:And a lot of the times, he'll give you, like, little interpretations of what you're saying or who you're praying for, but a lot of the times, you don't know. At least for me, I'll ask and sometimes he answers and tells me, and most of the time he doesn't. And I'm like, cool. That's fine. Like, if you are doing this, if you are praying through me and I'm speaking out loud and the Holy Spirit speak is is praying through me, then I know it's gotta be important.
Amber Beels:Like, it has to be important no matter whatever it is, whoever I'm praying for because you're using me. I'm just happy that you're using me as a vessel and that you're using my voice to be able to pray for whoever that needs prayer. And that's enough. I had to learn that because for a minute, I had been praying in the spirit, but my prayers always turned into song. So I was singing in the spirit.
Amber Beels:And I remember I was singing the same song over and over and over again for, like, over a week. Like, he just kept wanting to sing this one song, and I remember I got annoyed. I was like, holy spirit, can we can we, like, intercede for someone? Can we pray for someone? Like, why are we singing this song?
Amber Beels:Like, I don't I don't know what I'm singing. All I know is I'm keep singing this song. You really like this song because it's on repeat. And, you know, the Holy Spirit had to convict me a little bit, and he said, whatever I use you for is important. And I was like, okay.
Amber Beels:You're right. Whatever you choose to use me for, it is important because you're doing it, and it's for your kingdom. And then he gave me that verse that says, he dwells in the praises of Israel. He dwells in the praises, in worship, in singing. That is where the Lord dwells.
Amber Beels:And so just me singing that song, even though to me, I was like, man, we keep singing the same song. Could we at least switch it up, you know, do whatever? But that's what the Lord wanted. And if that's what the Lord wants, then I need to keep doing it and do it with joy. Like, because the Lord is using me.
Amber Beels:He's speaking through me. I mean, there's I know some people that struggle who can't pray in the spirit or sing in the spirit. And, you know, I need to be grateful that I I can do that, that I've learned how to yield enough to be able to yield my voice so that he can use me. So I need to not forget that and be grateful for that. And so that was a humbling experience.
Amber Beels:But going back to the topic of this episode, which is your outward self. Like, how are you operating? How are you influencing those around you? And I do wanna say you're influencing someone. Somebody is watching you.
Amber Beels:It doesn't have to be, you know, a whole audience of people or a whole congregation. Like, if you're on the pulpit, you are influencing someone in your life, whether it's your friends, your kids, your spouse, your coworkers, whatever it is, you are an influence. You are an example to the nonbelievers. You are an example for the kingdom. And I wanna tell you right now that you have a calling and you were born on purpose for a purpose.
Amber Beels:The one listening to this episode right now, you were born on purpose for a purpose. And I want you to think about that because depending on how you're acting, how you're speaking, what you're listening to, what you're watching, whatever it is, either you are going towards your purpose or you're going away from your purpose. There really is no middle ground either going toward it or away from it. And the only way to really know whether you're going towards your calling is to know what your calling is. Right?
Amber Beels:And that's one of those things where you have to really partner with the Holy Spirit and and really dig deep and ask him, like, Lord, Holy Spirit, I really wanna know what my purpose is for your kingdom. What have you called me to do? It even says in the Psalms, like, when David was writing, you knew me in my mother's womb. You knew me before I was in my mother's womb, and you knew all my days and all the things that I was gonna do. That is true for everyone.
Amber Beels:He knew you before you were in your mother's womb. He knows exactly what your calling is, and he knows your purpose. And now it's your job to figure out what's my purpose and what's my calling and how do I run towards it. Not just walk, but run towards it. And you do that not alone, but with the Holy Spirit.
Amber Beels:And so I wanna encourage you that if you don't know what your calling is or or whatever your purpose is, ask the Holy Spirit. Ask him. Like, Holy Spirit, please reveal to me what my purpose is, what my calling is. What do you want me to do? It could be that he wants you to be a stay at home mom and that you're gonna raise children that build up the kingdom.
Amber Beels:That could be your calling. And that's an immense calling to raise human beings, children of the Lord. He is entrusting you with his children to raise them up in the way that they should go and to know him and his voice. That's your responsibility, and that's a big one. It's a big responsibility to a stay at home mom or whatever he's called you to do.
Amber Beels:Maybe it's to be an accountant. Maybe it is to be a preacher. Maybe it has nothing to do with the ministry world. Whatever it is, it's tied in to his kingdom, and it's the calling on your life. So you need to know what that is.
Amber Beels:And once you know what that is, you need to make sure that your actions are in alignment with that, that you are working towards that calling, that you are pursuing your purpose, You are pursuing your anointing. And that can be a hard pill to swallow sometimes if you've been struggling. And it's okay to admit if you've been struggling, if you've been a little short-tempered, if you've been gossiping, if you have, you know, maybe been doing a white lie every now and then, it's okay to admit, like, holy spirit, I've fallen short because you know what? We all fall short. We all fall short every single day.
Amber Beels:And that is the good news of the gospel is that we have grace, that he is there. Jesus fills that gap. And when God looks us at us, he looks at Jesus and he is pleased with us because Jesus paid for your sins. He is the one that atoned and took on the cup of wrath that was meant for you and me and the entire world and took it on instead of you and me so that when God looked at us, he saw the blood of Christ. And he said, yes.
Amber Beels:You are my child and you are holy and you are righteous and you have the authority that I've given in you to be able to walk upon this earth in the name of Jesus and fulfill your purpose that I have given you. And that is awesome. That is awesome. And that is the good news. Nothing that we have done, nothing that we can do can change that.
Amber Beels:Good or bad. You can't earn it. You can't do anything. Everything your best efforts are like dirty rags to the Lord. Doesn't matter how good of a person you are.
Amber Beels:Doesn't matter how much you love your kids or you feed the homeless or you give away tons of money every year to charity. Whatever it is, it doesn't matter. It falls short. And there's nothing that you can do on the other side of that coin. There's nothing that you can do that can separate you from the love of God.
Amber Beels:There's no sin you can do that is unforgivable other than the blasphemy of the Holy Spirit. Now I have mentioned that before. That sin, I believe, is more of a denying Christ and saying, I don't believe you. I don't accept salvation. You are not my Lord and savior.
Amber Beels:And I believe that is really the blasphemy of the Holy Spirit is denying that, and God can't forgive that. And the results of that is spending eternity with the enemy and his angels. You don't wanna be there. Trust me. That is a scary, scary, scary place that was never designed for you or I.
Amber Beels:Never designed to go there. We were designed to spend eternity in heaven with the Lord to worship him forever, not with Satan and his angels. That was never designed for us. But we get a choice. The Lord is merciful, and he will not force us to do anything we don't wanna do.
Amber Beels:So if we choose to not spend eternity with him in heaven, then we get to spend eternity with the enemy. And it's not a fun experience. You could look into it. Not some place you wanna go to. Trust me.
Amber Beels:Reeling it back, when we assess where we are in terms of our actions, you know, in James, it says, works without faith is dead or what was it? You know what? Let me just look it up before I start, you know, miss quoting scripture. Yep. Okay.
Amber Beels:Faith without works is dead. Okay. This is in chapter two. Let me just find it in here. Let's see.
Amber Beels:Chapter two verse fourteen fourteen, and it says, what does it profit my brother? And if someone says that he has faith but does not have works, can faith save him? If a brother or sister is naked and destitute of daily food and one of you says to them, depart in peace, be warmed and filled, but you but you do not give them things that which are needed for the body, what does it profit? Thus, also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is done. So we need works.
Amber Beels:James says it here. And, you know, James, this is a a great book. It's a short book, but, man, is it a book for sure because it it just gives you a bunch of just hard hitter things in there like this. And so we need to have faith, obviously. In order to be saved, we have to have faith and accept Jesus as our Lord and savior with our mouth and believing in our in our hearts.
Amber Beels:And you need to have faith to be a not to be a believer. You have to. You can't do this journey without faith. But you need to have the works that back it up. And it's not from a place of, like, alright.
Amber Beels:I gotta, you know, buck up and do the right thing and do the things that I'm supposed to do. It it's not from a place of, like, I have to, I and when I fall short, I feel terrible, and I'm just, like, the scum of the earth. Like, this is all about your heart posture. It's about pursuing holy things. It's about pursuing works that are pleasing to the Lord because you love the Lord, because you love the Holy Spirit, because you want to please him, you want to be obedient to him, because you know how much he loves you.
Amber Beels:You know how much the Lord has done for you. You know that the Lord is so faithful to you and merciful and great and loving that the only thing you wanna do in response to that is be obedient and be faithful to him and glorify him and please him. And the only way to please him is through faith. It's impossible to please the Lord without faith. It says that in Hebrews.
Amber Beels:But also please him through your works through faith, doing the things that he's called you to do, loving one another. How do you love one another? It takes some action to love one another. Right? It takes some forethought.
Amber Beels:It takes some intentionality to love someone, especially if they're messy, especially if they're very unlovable in your sight, or they're just really hard to love. I've been there. There's some people that are just real hard, and you're like, holy spirit, I need your help right now because this person, they are really pushing my buttons. Those are the times that you really need to lean on the Holy Spirit and ask him to reveal to you how he views this person. Please allow me to see this person the way that you see them.
Amber Beels:Allow me to love this person the way that you love them because, obviously, my flesh can't. I can't by myself, but I can if I have that heavenly lens that only you, Holy Spirit, can give me. So Holy Spirit, please reveal to me your love for this person so that I can respond lovingly so that I can do the things that glorify you and be in obedience to you because I love you and I want to please you. And so you've called me to love people. And even though this person is really, really difficult to love, I wanna do it because you love me and I know I can be unlovable, and yet you choose to love me and you chose me to be a part of your kingdom and you chose me for this purpose and this calling.
Amber Beels:And all I wanna do is follow in your steps, So please light my path. Give me that heavenly lens. Allow me to be able to love this person the way that you see fit, the way that you want me to love on this person, Lord, and don't stop there. Allow me to keep loving this person and then the next person. And please just keep bringing me people because I want to make sure that I am known for being different because I demonstrate the love that you have for me to other people.
Amber Beels:I wanna be able to allow your love to permeate through me and allow me to love other people the way that you would love other people, Jesus. And I can only do that with your holy spirit. I can only do that with your help, with your guidance, with your wisdom, with your patience, with your love because your love is perfect. And we get to love one another because you loved us first. And then, of course, there's that that love scripture.
Amber Beels:Love is kind. You know, that that yeah. Everybody knows that scripture. Right? They say it at every wedding.
Amber Beels:But if you really analyze that scripture, love is hard to do. Love is an action. It's not necessarily a noun. Right? You could it's definitely a verb that you are doing towards someone else, and it's not always easy to do.
Amber Beels:And, again, very intentional. It's long suffering. You have to endure a lot in order to love someone, and it has to be, again, just very intentional. You have to intentionally love his sheep, love his flock, love his people, love his children, love one another, and love yourself too. I don't want you to forget about loving yourself because when I asked you to assess yourself, I didn't want you to do it in an unloving way, in a way that tears yourself down.
Amber Beels:That is not my intent. That's not the Holy Spirit's intent. It's more of an assessment of, like, Holy Spirit, where do I need to improve? Tear down those things in me that doesn't serve me, that doesn't allow me to be more like you. Please take those things away.
Amber Beels:And I'm gonna tell you right now, it hurts. It's not an easy thing. It's not an easy process to go through. Transformation is not easy. However, it's worth it.
Amber Beels:It's worth it to be able to partner with the Holy Spirit and become the person that he originally designed you to be so that you can love one love others, love yourself, and pursue the calling, the incredible calling that he has put on your life and it starts with love. And if you can't love yourself, I've I've been there. I had that huge unbelief that I was unworthy of love. I had this huge not unbelief. I I believe this lie that I wasn't worthy of love.
Amber Beels:And that included me loving myself and the Lord loving me. I wasn't worthy of it. I didn't deserve it. The Lord's like, you gotta fix that. We can't go further in our relationship until you believe that I truly love you and that you are worthy of this love, not because of anything you've done, but because of who you are and the fact that Jesus died for you.
Amber Beels:And I see you as holy and righteous. And once you accept that, then we can take the next step in your journey with me. And and let me tell you, it was very, very life changing. It was life changing, and it was so worth it. It was hard to do.
Amber Beels:But once I worked through that and made my emotions and my beliefs come in alignment with the Lord's word, things started lining up. I started pursuing and progressing for forward and being able to bless others and not focus so much on myself and my own problem, but be able to help others and equip his saints, which was the words he gave me. And that I believe is my calling for now, at least in this season of my life, is to equip the saints. And I believe right now that's letting you know who the Holy Spirit is and teaching you and and helping you understand what his role is in your life and just hopefully encourage you to include him in your life more. Be more intentional with including him in your life.
Amber Beels:Talk to him. Use his name. Talk to him daily. Include him in the mundane things. He's there for it.
Amber Beels:Jesus is in heaven at the right hand of God, and God's in heaven. So who's here? It's the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is the one that goes with you everywhere. He sees all your emails.
Amber Beels:He listens to your music. He sees what you see. He feels what you feel. Include him. Start including him in even the small things because he so wants to be involved, and he wants to help you in every aspect of your life.
Amber Beels:Alright, guys. I hope that was edifying to you, that that built you up, that taught you something, that you learned something, that you can take with you, that is something that you can actually do something about it, and I said something a lot. I mean, I hope you can use this somehow and start implementing it into your life starting today. And that's my prayer for you guys. Alright, guys.
Amber Beels:If you can, please share this episode with somebody. I know, again, it was just me, but, you know, if it helped you out, please share it and leave a review that would really help grow this podcast and just help reach the people that it needs to reach. Alright, guys. I hope you have a great week, and I'll see you next week.
