The believers, in accordance with the word in Acts 5:32, "the Holy Spirit, whom God has given to those who obey Him," think that they ought to "obey the Holy Spirit." Because they do not follow the commandment in the Bible to examine and discern the spirit of truth from the spirit of error, they consider every spirit that comes upon them as the Holy Spirit. Therefore, they passively obey the spirit that is upon them. Their entire being merely becomes a machine. Whatever the spirit upon them instructs them to do, they obey accordingly. Whenever they do anything, they first turn to their bodies to wait for a commandment. As time goes on, this passive state gradually worsens, and the spirit upon them is able to directly take over their members, such as their mouths and their hands. The believers think that this kind of obeying the Holy Spirit is pleasing to God. Little do they realize that this verse never tells us to obey the Holy Spirit. Rather, it says that we should obey God the Father through the Holy Spirit. The apostle told us in a preceding verse (v. 29) that we should "obey God." If the believer takes the Holy Spirit as his object of obedience and forgets God the Father, he will be led to follow a spirit within him or around him and not obey the Father in heaven through the Holy Spirit. This is the beginning of passivity, and this affords evil spirits an opportunity to practice falsehood. Once a person goes a little beyond the Bible, he faces many dangers!
We have said in another place that God disciplines our spirit through the Holy Spirit and that our spirit governs our body, our entire being, through our soul (i.e., will). A casual glance at this word does not seem to reveal anything of importance, yet the spiritual relationship it implies is very crucial. The Holy Spirit only makes His will known to us by affecting our intuition. When the Holy Spirit fills, He fills only our spirit. He does not directly govern our soul or our body. Neither does He directly fill our soul or our body. This point must be well noted. We cannot expect the Holy Spirit to think through our mind, feel through our emotions, and propose through our will. Rather, the Holy Spirit manifests His will in the intuition so that the believer himself thinks, feels, and proposes according to His will. Many believers assume that they have to offer their mind (their head) to the Holy Spirit and allow Him to think from within them. Little do they know that this is the biggest mistake. The Holy Spirit never directly replaces man or uses man's mind in this way. The Holy Spirit never requires man to consecrate passively. He wants man to work with Him. He will not work for man. The believer has the power to quench His move. He does not force the believer to do anything.
The Holy Spirit will not directly rule man's body either. In order for a man to speak, he himself has to use his mouth. In order for a man to move, he himself has to lift his feet. In order for a man to work, he himself has to use his hands. God's Holy Spirit never infringes on man's freedom. Besides working in man's spirit, that is, in God's new creation, He will not move any part of man's body independent of man's own will. Even if man is willing, He will not substitute for man and move any part of his body because man has a free will. Man must be the master of himself; he must use his own body. This is God's law. God Himself will not transgress His law.
We often say that "the Holy Spirit controls man." If we mean that the Holy Spirit works within us, making us obey God, this expression is correct. If we mean that the Holy Spirit directly controls our entire being, this is absolutely wrong. Based on this we can distinguish between the work of evil spirits and the work of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit dwells in our spirit in order to show that we belong to God; evil spirits cleave to our bodies for the purpose of driving us like a machine. The Holy Spirit asks for our cooperation, while evil spirits seek complete and direct control. Our union with God is in the spirit, not in the body or in the soul. If we mistakenly think that our mind, emotion, body, and will should all be directly "moved" by God, evil spirits will bring in their counterfeit work. It is true that the believer should not act according to his own thoughts, emotions, and will. But when he receives revelation in spirit, he should use his mind, emotion, and will to carry out the order of the Spirit. Forsaking one's soul and body and expecting the Holy Spirit to directly use them is the initial step to demon-possession.