The Spirit as Power - A.W. Tozer

So I love to read Tozer. I am currently reading God's Pursuit of Man. I read this paragraph yesterday and thought I'd share. It comes from the chapter The Spirit as Power so keep in mind that he's talking about the Person of the Holy Spirit.

One meaning of the word "power" is "ability to do." There precisely is the wonder of the Spirit's work in the church and in the hearts of Christians, His sure ability to make spiritual things real to the soul. This power can go straight to its object with piercing directness; it can diffuse itself through the mind like an infinitely fin volatile essence securing ends above and beyond the limits of the intellect. Reality is its subject matter, reality in heaven and upon earth. It does not create objects which are not there but reveals objects already present and hidden from the soul. In actual human experience this is likely to be first felt in a heightened sense of the presence of Christ. He is felt to be a real Person and to be intimately, ravishingly near. Then all other spiritual objects begin to stand out clearly before the mind. Grace, forgiveness, cleansing take on a form of almost bodily clearness. Prayer loses its unmeaning quality and becomes a sweet conversation with Someone actually there. Love for God and for the children of God takes possession of the soul. We feel ourselves near to heaven and it is now the earth and the world that begin to seem unreal. We know them now for what they are, realities indeed, but like stage scenery here for one brief hour and soon to pass away. The world to come takes on a hard outine before our minds and begins to invite our interest and our devotion. Then the whole life changes to suit the new reality and the change is permanent. Slight fluctuations there may be like the rise and dip of the line on a graph, but the established direction is upward and the ground taken is held.

A little over halfway through the paragraph is the part that stands out the most to me. The realness of the Holy Spirit. The change that comes through Him. His nearness. Things, life takes on a whole new meaning. We have become stale. I am so guilty of head knowledge without change. Dying to self is a phrase we often hear and read but rarely do in our day-to-day activities. May this "Christianity thing" be more than a label, more than a Sunday morning activity. May we embrace and live out what the Word actually says. May we invite the Holy Spirit to change us and share that with others so that they may know the sweetness of the grace and love and mercy and peace of our Savior and be free from sin!

Walk in His truth today.