The Holy Spirit is described as a river, a force that does not sit still, but pours out and runs through flowing strongly, and has power wherever it goes. The Holy Spirit is not a passive observer but the Spirit of our God who created all of heaven and earth.
The problem we have is never God’s limit of giving, but rather it is our limit of receiving. To receive, we must believe. The only power in the universe that can limit God’s power through us is us. Jesus said, “‘He who believes in Me…out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.’”…He spoke concerning the [Holy] Spirit, whom those believing in Him would receive…” (John 7:38-39 NKJV).
The flowing of the Holy Spirit requires first the filling of the Holy Spirit, and the more filled you are, the greater will be the power in the flowing. No person can contain the Holy Spirit, and no person can prevent the outflow from the Spirit of God within them.
You need the Holy Spirit in you for the purposes of God to flow from you. “And my speech and my preaching were not with persuasive words of human wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power” (1 Corinthians 2:4 NKJV).
This flowing of the Holy Spirit begins at the spiritual level, but it touches the natural, such that you can feel the spiritual power flowing through your natural body. Never underestimate the power of the Holy Spirit that can move through you.
Where is the power in a river? The power in the river is the water in motion. The same is true with the Holy Spirit inside of you. The power is when your life allows the Spirit to flow through you. Jesus promised, “The Holy Spirit will come upon you and give you power” (Acts 1:8 CEV).
Years ago, I had the great privilege of ministering alongside an anointed young man. He and I would get so filled with the Spirit of God that the spiritual outflowing would be tangibly felt by those who would stand between us. We would both hold out our hands, and the Spirit would flow from us like rivers.
A river’s strength is not in the size of its banks, but in the source of its waters. This is the same for the Christian. “God is our protection and source of strength. He is always ready to help us” (Psalm 46:1 ERV).
When someone would get between us, they would get a double portion of the flowing of the Holy Spirit, and barely remain standing. It is a blessing to be poured into like that, and it is a blessing to be humble enough to have the Spirit of God pouring out from you.
The proof of the Holy Spirit in you is the Holy Spirit through you. The waters are not still, but flowing. The Lord Jesus said, “He who believes in Me, as the Scripture has said, out of his heart will flow rivers of living water” (John 7:38 NKJV).
By yourself, filled with the Spirit of God, you can have a filling of the Holy Spirit that is so full that it produces an outpouring that is so strong that those you touch will feel the Spirit of God coming through you. The rivers cannot be held back.
You cannot force the power of the Holy Spirit from you, because you are not the source. It is only when you surrender in the natural that His supernatural can flow through you. “God poured out the Holy Spirit abundantly on us” (Titus 3:6 GNT).
I remember one time in a church and a man of God went to pray over me and he lifted one hand as he did so. As his hand stretched out to me I felt the Holy Spirit flowing through Him and onto me. The Spirit in you can feel the Spirit from another.
The more that you let the Holy Spirit change you, the more He will. “Then the Spirit of the Lord will come upon you, and you will prophesy with them and be turned into another man” (1 Samuel 10:6 NKJV).
There are some people who are unable to receive the flowing of the Holy Spirit. They may be saved, but not yet spiritual, and so in their natural self they have no capacity to receive anything spiritual. You must have the Holy Spirit moving in you to be spiritual.
Power flows where resistance is least. Rivers choose the weak dirt clog over the strong granite rock. The Holy Spirit in you is the same. “Now do not be [hard headed and thick skulled], as your fathers were, but yield yourselves to the Lord…” (2 Chronicles 30:8 NKJV). What you yield to has you.
There are other people who are so filled with the Holy Spirit, that any additional pouring in of the Spirit of God overwhelms them in the most amazingly wonderful way. You can’t ever have too much of God, but nobody can remain standing filled in His fullness.
Stop only being slain in the Spirit, and get back up and walk in the Spirit. “I say then: Walk in the Spirit…” (Galatians 5:16 NKJV).
The danger we have in ministry is not that some would have this outpouring of the Holy Spirit, but rather that some would desire it so they could bring attention to themselves. Pride is an obstacle to the Holy Spirit flowing through you.
Your motives are more important going in than any outcome you might accomplish. “All the ways of a man are clean and innocent in his own eyes [and he may see nothing wrong with his actions], but the Lord weighs and examines the motives and intents [of the heart and knows the truth]” (Proverbs 16:2 AMP).
To be a vessel of the Holy Spirit requires that you know you are but the vessel. You don’t pour out the Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit pours Himself out through you. You are not the power but merely the conduit through which the Holy Spirit power flows through.
Many think their weakness is a barrier, but it is a gain. The river flows through the weakest part of the land. The Lord Jesus said, “…My strength is made perfect in weakness…” (2 Corinthians 12:9 NKJV).
Proud men cannot do humble things because it goes against the nature of who they are. The Holy Spirit cannot fill the proud man because that man is full of himself. The first step to being used by the Holy Spirit is seeing how utterly useless you are without Him.
Growing in your faith is not like swimming upstream in the river, but letting go and trusting the river knows the right way to go. It is in the river where we prove whether we are relying upon our strength or His. “The Lord is my strength and my [impenetrable] shield; my heart trusts [with unwavering confidence] in Him, and I am helped” (Psalm 28:7 AMP).
Many Christians know about the Holy Spirit but don’t what it means to live their live with the Holy Spirit. Many will build a powerless theology that agrees with their powerless life and then in their pride criticize the ones who are actually filled with the Spirit of God.
A stagnant pond never pours out. It just keeps to itself. It becomes stale. It becomes dead. It becomes unfruitful. But a river always moves. It is always pouring out. It never stops, it just keeps flowing. It brings life. It gives life. God promised us, “I will clear a way in the desert. I will make rivers on dry land” (Isaiah 43:19 GW).
Don’t build your doctrines around what you can do on your own, but let the Word of God be your guide to understand the heavenly doctrines of what is possible when once you are filled with the living and flowing power of the Holy Spirit.
Why do you keep going back to the well, when the river flows within you? Being filled with the Spirit is not for a moment, but forever. The Holy Spirit is not limited, but by you. Jesus said, “the water that I shall give him will become in him a fountain of water springing up into everlasting life” (John 4:14 NKJV).
Child of God, you haven’t seen anything yet. Go after what the Spirit of God has planned for those who would dare to ask Him to fill them to the brim, and then to start pouring out rivers onto those around them. Be the vessel.
You pour out whatever fills you. The Holy Spirit cannot flow from empty jars. The Lord Jesus said, “‘He who believes in Me, as the Scripture has said, out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.’ But this He spoke concerning the [Holy] Spirit, whom those believing in Him would receive…” (John 7:38-39 NKJV).
Blessings to you always,
Paul Balius
Flowing rivers are such a prophetic picture of the power and life in the realm of the Spirit. Like many a believer I have talked with Ezekiel Chapter 47 always stirs my spirit and sends Holy shivers through me. A meeting I attended many years ago the guest speaker was a living miracle. He had been a Hells Angel tried and convicted of murder and was serving a long jail sentence. The prison is the place that God came into this felons life in power after an open vision of the flogging and crucifixion of Jesus. The former Hells Angel made a commitment to spread the gospel the rest of his life if released, impossible in the natural, quite possible for God! The speaker picked me out and prophesied from Ezekiel 47 admonishing me to go deeper and become awash and thereby out of my own control in the flowing of that Ezekiel 47 river. To date this has ben the most impactful feet on the ground encounter in the Spirit. Oh that we would relinquish control and come awash with Him.
Apologies for replying back so late on this. Your experience that you had, being prophesied over, these are the experiences that God will give us from time to time and He uses them to help form us into something that He can use. He starts with one person, in this case the man who was in the Hells Angels spending time in prison, and then from that man he brings an experience to you, and then through you He’s gonna bring an experience to somebody else. God works in mysterious ways! God bless you God bless you!