God's priority and our priority

We must keep in mind that our priority should be aligned with God's priority.

God's priority for Paul and his companions were not Asia or Mysia.

God’s priority was Macedonia (Acts 16:6-7).

That’s why the Holy Spirit forbade or didn’t permit Paul and his companions from going to Asia or Mysia

even though they tried hard to find a mission field.

We don’t know how the Spirit forbade Paul and his companions from going to Asia or Mysia

because the Bible doesn’t mention.

The important thing is when the apostle Paul and his companions were blocked by the Holy Spirit,

they obeyed the Spirit instead of trying to fulfill their own will.

Here, the lesson that we should learn is when the Spirit stops us, we need to know how to press the break.

In a word, when the Spirit says “Stop,” then we must say “Yes” and obey the Spirit.

But for some reason, we aren’t good at pressing the spiritual break when the Holy Spirit says

‘Stop’ because we do the Lord’s work so hard like when we press the car’s accelerator pedal too deep to speed up

so that it’s hard for us to press the break pedal.

We must know when to stop.

We must not be too busy just looking ahead and running without knowing when we have to stop.

If the Holy Spirit tells us to run, then we should run.  

But when the Spirit tells us to stop, then we should stop.

What we need here is spiritual sensitivity

If we are spiritually sensitive all the time, we can realize the guidance of the Holy Spirit.

The Holy Spirit is the God who clearly tells us the will of the Lord.

He isn’t the Spirit who lets us know the Lord’s will blurry.

He makes black and white clear and makes “yes” and “no” clearly.

Then, why can’t we understand the Spirit’s blocking (not allowing)?

The reason is because we are spiritually dull.

 The reason is because our mind isn’t sharpened with the word of God.

That’s why Paul exhorted us not to be conformed to this world,

but be transformed by the renewing of our mind (Rom. 12:2).

In doing so, we will be able to discern His good, acceptable and perfect will (v. 2).