Monday, October 6th, 2003 - Manifestation of the Holy Spirit

After choosing to follow Christ, I went through the rest of High School "trying" to live the Christian life as best I could. I use this term because I relied on my own human strength for much of that time, although I didn't realize it. Later, I would experience the manifestation of the Holy Spirit within me (some term this "Baptism of the Holy Spirit"). This event doesn't necessarily have to be separate from receiving the Spirit; I believe that a person may choose to follow Christ and be baptized in the Spirit all at once. There was an interval of time in between these two events for me, however.

I went off to college in the fall of 2002, where I met amazing people who are some of my dearest friends. One of them showed me a book by John Ortberg titled "The Life You've Always Wanted" which I took back to my dorm one night and started reading. I read the first 3 chapters (which takes me hours, I'm a slow reader) right away since it was so good that I couldn't put it down. It completely changed my perspective about so many things that I wouldn't be able to list them all here.

It was around this time that through reading the Bible (or the Word) and talking with God that I understood the Holy Spirit much more than I had before (what little our human minds can comprehend). I don't remember exactly what I said to God, but I expressed my desire to Him to have the Holy Spirit be completely manifested within me. Only looking back do I realize that not too much later, God granted my request. I didn't realize it exactly when it happened, for it doesn't necessarily have to be a feeling or anything that is felt. I base this on impressions from God and the fruits of the Spirit that followed this period of time.

The Spirit was wholly manifested within me... what does that mean, you might ask? The fruits of the Spirit (Gal 5:22-23) are more completely produced as a result, for one thing. The change that I recognize most clearly is in my capacity to love: to love myself, to love other people, and most importantly to love God. I immediately made a much more conscious effort to show others how much I loved them; this has been such a wonderful gift that God keeps continuing and He has brought my younger sister (Katie) and I extremely close through it. She is an amazing bundle of joy, and I pray that every one of you who reads this may get to meet her some day, if you haven't already. She's the cutest thing ever.

I describe this time for me because it brought about such a huge change not only in my lifestyle but within me... my heart was transformed to greater reflect my soul. I have since shared such an immensely greater intimacy with God.

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