Why Christians Miss It (Pt 2) : The Hierarchy Of God's Leading
Christians often miss the leading of the Holy Spirit when they miss-understand how God leads us. There’s an order of importance, a hierarchy in being led by the Holy Spirit.
1. Firstly, God’s Word.
All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness (2 Tim 3:16). If God has promised it in His Word, then it is His will. No need to second-guess God, He hasn’t changed His mind. I wish people would get as excited about God’s Word as they do about getting a ‘word’ some other way. You can take God’s Word to the Bank of Heaven anytime, anywhere!
2. Secondly, the Inner Witness of the Holy Spirit.
Romans 8:14 & 16 says that as many as are led by the Spirit of God are children of God, and that He leads us by the inner witness. This is the primary way that God leads Christian.
Any parent knows that if you get one child to pass on a message to another child, there’s a good chance they’ll miss part of the message. God is not in the business of Chinese Whispers and He sure isn’t into gossip. Christians need to learn how to listen to their own inward voice and the witness of the Holy Spirit, because this is the main way that God gives specific leading to His children.
3. Thirdly special words of knowledge, words of wisdom and visions, as the Spirit wills.
But to each one is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good. For to one is given the word of wisdom through the Spirit, and to another the word of knowledge according to the same Spirit … the Spirit works all these things, distributing to each one individually just as He wills. (1 Cor 12: 8 & 11)
On occasions, the Holy Spirit will reveal a fact, or knowledge, on a topic that couldn’t be known unless He revealed it. This is a ‘word of knowledge’. Especially as a pastor, I’ll have knowledge of something in the church that I could never have known without the Holy Spirit. The vast majority of the time all God wants me to do with this is to pray about it. On other occasions, we can be led to deal wisely in a situation, with a wisdom that is clearly not a natural wisdom. This is a ‘word of wisdom’. Visions are similar to words of knowledge and wisdom, only they are visual. There’s more to be said about visions but not at this time.
You can’t conjure up words of knowledge, wisdom, or visions, they are ‘as the Spirit wills’. It will be very clear that you could not have known these things, except the Lord revealed it to you. If you think you have a word from God, don’t go around saying ‘God told me’. If He told you it will be very obvious without the need to manipulate people or drop God’s name as an appeal to authority.
4. Fourthly, prophetic words.
The primary purpose of New Testament prophecy is for exhortation, edification and comfort (1 Corinthians 14:3). Notice that the Holy Spirit did not say that prophecy was for guidance. The purpose of prophecy is to encourage and build-up Christians.
There can be an element of foreknowledge in New Testament prophecy, but it is rare and generally appears in the ministry of very mature Christians. God uses prophecy to build us up and comfort us. When we judge prophecy we are to ask, "does that build me up, does that comfort me?".
In Acts 13 after a period of fasting and ministering to the Lord, the Holy Spirit said to ‘set aside Barnabas and Saul’ for their first missionary journey.
However, for Paul’s second missionary journey there is no record of any prophetic word and at other major points in the leading of the New Testament Church it appears the Holy Spirit led by the inner witness. For example, at the Council of Jerusalem, when the church was coming to terms with how to deal with Gentiles and the Law, the Apostles appeared to have been led by the inward witness (Acts 15:22).
In the New Testament believers have the enduring indwelling of the Holy Spirit and the Scriptures. Any other leading or ‘words’ need to line up with these.