The Coming King Tuesday 18 December 2007

The Spirit of the Lord will rest on him – the Spirit of wisdom and understanding, the Spirit of counsel and power. Isaiah 11:2

The Spirit of counsel and power was essential for a king to be successful in war: counsel to devise good strategies and power to carry them out, both in defence and attack. Without this a king would be weak and ineffective; easily overcome by neighbouring aggressors.

But of course we’re not kings and we’re not at war so we don’t need this, do we? Actually, yes, we do. We are at war but often forget it. We have a lethal enemy who will do everything possible to distract us from following and enjoying our relationship with God. God’s enemy, Satan, doesn’t miss any opportunity to destroy that which God loves, especially God’s children. So we do need God’s spirit of counsel and power.

God’s spirit of Counsel and power will make us aware of our weaknesses; the ways in which we are most open to temptation and to despair. We need to know what things make us tend to stop trusting God, or to doubt his tremendous goodwill and love towards us. With God’s help we can develop strategies to come against these attacks and the spirit of power will enable us to fight.

Jesus thought we were worth dying for, so surely our lives lived in close relationship with God are worth fighting for. A good friend of mine often laments that many of us chug along discontent with our spiritual lives but without the gumption to get up and do anything about them. We have to fight to keep our hearts true and focussed on Jesus.

What might that mean for you this advent? Maybe you really want to be on fire for God but you’ve lost heart and feel no energy to fight. Pray for the spirit of counsel and power.

Jesus fought so hard against selfishness, bitterness, hardness of heart and injustice; in fact anything that spoils life that it killed him, but even in dying he fought the last great enemy of death and got the better of even that! We have a mighty victorious king! Let’s rise up and fight for and with him, anointed with the Spirit of counsel and power.