I like to imagine what it would be like to have a conversation with certain people in the Bible about their experiences with God. I hope that one day in heaven, I’ll have the time to ask some of the heroes of the faith what it was like to experience some of the things they faced.
I would love to ask Adam and Eve what it was like to walk with the Lord in the garden in the cool of the day. I would love to hear what Moses was thinking and feeling when he saw the Red Sea split in two. I wonder what it would have been like for David to watch the enemy flee after Goliath fell to the ground. However, if I ever get the chance to ask any of those questions, I imagine each of them will look at me perplexed and respond, “Forget about that! You tell me what it was like to have the Holy Spirit living inside you!”
We don’t realize the advantage we have over everybody in the Old Testament to have the Holy Spirit indwelling us. The Holy Spirit was definitely around in the Old Testament, but His interaction was very different. He would, for a time, come down on a person, but at a certain point He would remove His presence. Ever since the day of Pentecost, believers have had the Spirit living in us, and He never leaves.
This is why, in Psalm 51:11, David prayed that God would not “take Your Holy Spirit from me.” David woke up each morning knowing it could be the day that the Holy Spirit left him. He watched it happen to his predecessor, Saul, and he knew it could happen to him.
In the Old Testament, we see men and women take amazing stands for God. We cannot imagine experiencing the things they experienced, but we have something they would have given anything for: the very Spirit of God living inside of us. As we go forward, let’s not take His presence in us for granted.
“…that is, the mystery which has been hidden from the past ages and generations, but has now been manifested to His saints, to whom God willed to make known what is the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory.” Colossians 1:27–28