Live a Life of Paying the Price to have the Filling of the Holy Spirit in our Soul

As believers in Christ, we need to pay the price daily to buy an extra portion of oil, an extra portion of the Spirit, in our vessel; we need to be filled with the Holy Spirit in our soul by paying the price to have the filling of the Holy Spirit into every part of our soul.

In the Lord’s eyes, we are like chaste virgins waiting for His coming; He is our Bridegroom and we are His bride.

He captured us, He captivated us, and now we are His lovers, even His loving seekers.

As we are awaiting the coming of our beloved Lord Jesus, we have two things: a lamp and a vessel.

Our lamp is our spirit indwelt and mingled with the Holy Spirit, and the Spirit burns in our spirit to keep us burning before the Lord.

Praise the Lord, our spirit is the lamp of Jehovah, and the Spirit is with our spirit, burning in us as the holy flame!

However, we also have a vessel, which is our soul.

We have oil in our spirit, and when we exercise our spirit, the divine life in us is burning. This is wonderful.

But we also need to have a portion of oil in our soul, in our vessel.

When the Lord returns, we need to have not just oil in our spirit but even more, the filling of the Holy Spirit in our soul.

Through regeneration we have the divine Spirit coming into our spirit to dwell in our spirit, mingle with our spirit, and saturate our spirit.

Our spirit is now a mingled spirit, for the Holy Spirit and our spirit are mingled as one.

But what about our soul? What about our mind with its thoughts and opinions, our emotion our feelings and desires, and our will with its decisions?

Many times we as believers in Christ discover that, unless we exercise our spirit to remain in the touch with the Lord day by day, even moment-by-moment, we think the same way the people in the world think, we desire the same things they do, and our decisions are in and for ourselves, not in the Lord.

We need to be renewed in our mind, balanced in our emotion, and subdued in our will.

We need to allow the Spirit in our spirit to spread into our mind, emotion, and will to saturate every part of our inner being.

This means that we need to pay the price day by day to seek the filling of the Holy Spirit not only in our spirit but even more, in our soul.

Every day we need to gain an extra portion of Christ in our soul by giving ourselves to the Lord to be renewed in our mind through His word, be balanced in our emotions, and be subdued in our will.

May the Spirit spread in every part of our inner being to saturate us and fill us with the divine oil a little more today!

Paying the Price to have the Filling of the Holy Spirit in our Soul Today

The word “buy” in Matt. 25:9 indicates that there’s a price to be paid to gain the extra portion of oil in our vessel.

When the Lord Jesus as the Bridegroom came, the ten virgins in Matt. 25 got themselves ready to enter the wedding feast, but five of them were foolish, for they did not pay the price to have an extra portion of oil in their vessels with their lamps.

So they asked the prudent ones to give them some of their oil; however, the prudent ones told them that they could not do this, but rather that they should go and buy the oil.

We believers in Christ need to pay the price to have the filling of the Holy Spirit in our soul today, otherwise, when the Lord comes back and we do not have this extra portion of oil, we will need to go and pay a higher price then. Oh, Lord!

No one can buy the oil for us; no one can eat the Lord for us, no one can be filled with the Spirit in their soul for us – we need to do this ourselves.

This shows that there’s a price to be paid to have the filling of the Holy Spirit in our soul.

The cost we need to pay includes things such as giving up the world, dealing with self, loving the Lord above all other things, and counting all things as loss for Christ.

If we are willing to pay the price today, we will gain the infilling of the Holy Spirit in our soul; however, if we do not pay the price today, we will have to pay it after we are resurrected (see Rev. 3:18; 2 Cor. 5:10).

We may love the brothers and the sisters and they may love us, but none of them can buy the oil for us.

The oil cannot be shared; it has to be purchased personally by each one of us.

The Lord’s salvation is free, eternally free, and when we are saved, we are eternally saved.

We don’t have to do anything regarding that except believe into the Lord Jesus and receive Him.

However, there’s a price to pay if we want to gain the kingdom. For us to inherit the kingdom of the heavens as a reward, there’s a price to pay today.

Having the filling of the Holy Spirit is at a cost, such as giving up the world, dealing with self, loving the Lord above all, and counting all things loss for Christ.

As we live at the consummation of the age today, gaining the oil requires us to pay a price.

Especially as we live in the city, country, and continent we live in, there’s no quick way to gain the Spirit, nor is there a shortcut to it; we need to be willing to pay the price.

Today we live in the world of microwave or instant food, and many people do not pay the price to grow and prepare their food but rather, they want everything right now, right away.

But this cannot be done with paying the price. To gain the kingdom as a reward, to enter into the wedding feast of the Lamb, we need to pay a price.

To pay a price involves a sacrifice. What have we sacrificed for the Lord? How much have we sacrificed? How much did we have and we gave up for the Lord?

Paying the price is against our natural man, who likes something quick.

We all have the Holy Spirit in our regenerated spirit (2 Tim. 4:22; Rom. 8:16; 1 Cor. 6:17), but we need to pay the price to gain the filling of the Holy Spirit in our soul.

It is very good for us to daily exercise our spirit to contact the Lord, but at the same time we need to give the Lord the ground in our inner being to grow in us, spread in us, and add Himself to us, at the cost of us losing our soul-life, giving up the world, loving the Lord above all, and dealing with the self.

It is good to come to the Lord in prayer concerning this not just once but throughout the day, telling Him,

Lord Jesus, we want to pay the price to buy the oil so that we may gain an extra portion of the Spirit in our vessel, our soul. We open to You, dear Lord. We open as wide as we can. Strengthen us into our inner man so that Christ may make His home deep down in our heart. Amen, Lord Jesus, we exercise our spirit to contact You and we allow You to spread as the Spirit from our spirit into our mind, emotion, and will. Saturate our soul with Yourself. We want to pay the price to have the filling of the Holy Spirit today! Amen, Lord, fill our vessel! We open our vessel to You! We do not want to have any part of our vessel that is closed to You. May we be willing to pay the price to buy the oil in this age so that, at Your return, we may have an extra portion of oil in our vessel! Lord Jesus, we love You! We gladly give up the world and its things so that we may gain more of You! We count all things loss on account of the excellency of the knowledge of Christ! Amen, Lord, we want to be filled with the Spirit today!

Our Need is to Gain more of the Spirit and Live a Life of Buying the Extra Portion of the Spirit to Saturate our Entire Being

If we read the portion in Matt. 25:1-6 and the Lord has a way to shine on us we will realize that it is better for us to pay the price today to gain the extra portion of the Spirit in our soul than to do it after resurrection.

Our urgent need today is to gain more of the Spirit as the consummation of the processed Triune God in our vessel (Matt. 25:9).

Our need is to live a life of buying an extra portion of the Spirit to saturate our entire being.

This is to be watchful in life: it is to always be ready and willing to pay the price to buy the oil.

By default, by our very nature, we are not inclined to pay the price to gain more of Christ; rather, we want to preserve our soul-life, express the self, and live in the flesh.

But when we exercise our spirit and allow the Lord to strengthen us with power into our spirit with His Spirit, we can be strong in our inner man to pay the price to have the infilling of the Holy Spirit today.

In Dan. 5:27 we see the story of King Belshazzar, who was celebrating, eating, drinking, and indulging in his lust, enjoying himself, even using the vessels from God’s temple for his drinking.

Then a hand appeared and wrote some letters on the wall, which translated means, You have been weighed and found to be lacking. Wow.

He was enjoying himself, he was a king who had everything, and he was indulging himself in all these things at the peak of his enjoyment, but he was put on a scale and was found wanting, lacking.

He didn’t weigh that much before God. Outwardly he seemed to have it all, but in God’s scale, he weighed very little. Oh, Lord.

How much do we weigh before the Lord? Do we have weight before Him?

What is our spiritual poundage, our spiritual weight? How much oil do we have in our vessel?

As Paul said in 2 Cor. 5:10, we will all one day appear before the judgment seat of Christ, and we will have to answer to the Lord concerning the things we have done in our body.

We will have to give an account to Him of how we carried out our Christian life, how we took care of our Christian service, and how much of the Spirit we gained in our soul. Oh Lord!

The Lord will one day weigh us in His scale; how much weight do we have before the Lord?

We need to pay the price to gain the oil. Today we still have time.

We are in time, we are still alive today, and the Lord still delays His coming; we still have time, but we have no time to waste.

May we see our urgent need to live a life of paying the price to buy the extra portion of the Spirit in our soul.

May we not wait or delay our paying of the price, saying that we will do it later when things in the world get worse and the signs of the Lord’s coming are more clear. Oh, Lord.

May we keep our lamp burning every day by exercising our spirit to contact the Lord.

May we pay the price to have the infilling of the Holy Spirit in our vessel by being in God’s word and by denying the self, giving up the world, and loving the Lord with the best love.

We still have time. May we not waste our time today.

If we don’t pay the little price we need to pay today, we will have to pay a higher price in the next age.

On one hand, we need to go on day by day in our ordinary life and live a daily life under the divine dispensing.

On the other hand, we need to pay the price to be under the Lord’s speaking, being in the meetings of the church and in the conferences and trainings where the Lord unveils His heart to us.

Sadly to say, we are more willing to pay the price to go sightseeing than to go to a conference, and we may be more willing to scroll on our phones endlessly for hours than spend ten minutes in prayer before the Lord.

May we be willing to pay the price every day, even in every situation, to gain the infilling of the Holy Spirit.

When we wake up in the morning, we need to pay the price to wake up a little earlier to spend some time with the Lord and allow Him to shine on us and add Himself to us (Eph. 5:17-19).

If we do not pay the price to confess our sins, spend time with the Lord, and love the Lord at the cost of losing our soul-life, denying the self, and not loving the world, then we cannot gain more of Christ.

Many of us love our bed in the morning more than we love the Lord.

Throughout the day we love many things and love to spend time doing many things, but we seem to have no time to be with the Lord.

May we come to the Lord daily and pay the price to buy the extra portion of the Spirit in our vessel.

May we be watching all day, praying that we will be filled with the Spirit in our soul.

And may we come to the Lord’s word and spend time to fellowship with Him so that He may add more of Himself to us and remove anything that is not of Him.

What we gain is not just some more knowledge about God but more of God in Christ as the Spirit in our soul.

Lord Jesus, show us our urgent need to gain more of the Spirit in our soul today! Amen, Lord, make us willing to pay the price to have the filling of the Holy Spirit in our soul! Save us from not opening to You. Save us from not cooperating with You today. May we allow You to saturate our mind, emotion, and will with Your spirit. Amen, Lord, we want to live a life of buying an extra portion of the Spirit to saturate our entire being! May we pay the little price we have to pay today to gain the extra portion of the Spirit in our soul! Oh Lord, we give You our time in the morning: we want to spend time with You to gain You! We want to remain in fellowship with You throughout the day and have set times of prayer to absorb more of Your riches. Shine on us, Lord, and show us what replaces You in our being. Show us what we love more than You. We choose You. We choose to be saturated with the Spirit. Amen, Lord, we choose to be filled with the Spirit today!

References and Hymns on this Topic

• Inspiration for this article/sharing comes from the Word of God, the enjoyment in the ministry, a sharing by brother James Lee in the message for this week, and portions from, Collected Works of Witness Lee, 1985, vol. 5, “The Way to Practice the Lord’s Present Move,” ch. 7, as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, Living in the Reality of the Kingdom of God (2024 October ITERO), week 6, Being Watchful in Life and Faithful in Service.
• Similar articles on this topic:
  – A Story of Consecration: Loving Jesus with Our Best, via, Bibles for America blog.
  – Watching and Being Ready in Order to Be Prepared by the Lord for His Second and Imminent Coming, outline via, Puget Sound Blending.
  – A Short and Very Easy Method of Prayer, via, Lamb Follower.
  – Oil, a portion from, The Kingdom, Chapter 17, by Witness Lee.
  – How Spacious is Your Christ? More via, Holding to Truth in Love.
  – Paying the price, a portion from, The Kingdom, Chapter 18, by Witness Lee.
  – Matthew (Program #66) – Prophecy of the Kingdom (5), a review of the radio broadcast here.
  – The ministry of Christ in the stage of intensification, article by Ed Marks in, Affirmation and Critique.
  – Brothers Becoming Sons of Oil, via, Living to Him.
  – The word of righteousness – the kingdom of the heavens, article via, Affirmation and Critique.
  – Those Who Are Ready Will Enter, via, New Jerusalem blog.
• Hymns on this topic:
  – We have oil in our lamps—we are burning! / We have oil in our lamps today! / To the spirit, O Lord, keep us turning, / Keep us turning, turning all the way! / But our vessels need oil for Thy coming; / We must gain a reserve supply. / So our vessels we give for the filling / That our lamps may never, never die. (Hymns #1308 stanzas 1-2)
  – Oh, let us now redeem each moment, / More the precious oil to buy, / And have our vessels filled with ointment / Ere we hear the midnight cry. / Oh, what a joy it is preparing / For our wedding with the Lord, / E’en in the tribulations sharing / For the bliss of such reward! (Hymns #1315 stanzas 2-3)
  – Lord, help us to redeem these golden moments; / Our vessels fill with ointment from above; / Help us amen each trial and tribulation; / Increase in us; make us abound in love. / He’s coming soon—these moments are so precious. / The oil is here—Oh, let us buy the more. / Amen the trials and welcome tribulations— / The kingdom’s ours through these afflictions sore. (Hymns #1307 stanza 2 and chorus)