The Holy Spirit is a divine person and is the third person in the Holy Trinity - God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit.
John 14, 16 says, I will ask the father and he will give you another helper to be with you forever. John 15, 26-27 says, The helper is the spirit of truth. When he comes he will tell about me too because you have been with me from the beginning.
When Jesus was baptised the Holy Spirit descends onto him as a dove and means we can also receive the Holy Spirit and follow Jesus' example after baptism. The Holy Spirit will start to produce changes in us like giving us more of the fruits of the spirit such as, love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self control. If you are new to faith you may have already noticed that you are changing for the better.
Through the Spirit of God we are gradually changing to be more like God. Wow isn't that amazing! We can receive the Holy Spirit through asking for it in prayer and reading God's word and building a personal relationship with Jesus through faith. We may receive the Holy Spirit in many different ways and there are 9 gifts of the spirit, these being, wisdom, knowledge, faith, healing, miracles, prophesy, discernment, speaking in tongues and interpretation of tongues.
Some people may receive some of these gifts but not necessarily all. I've seen a lot of people get hung up on receiving gifts, however I believe we should focus on working on the fruit of the spirit first then see what God will do. The purpose of all these gifts are to reveal truth about God's Kingdom either for individuals or a collective and they are not to be abused for own personal gain or power.
Don't feel discouraged when you don't see your gifts shining through. The gifts are not necessarily loud and obvious. The gifts sometimes are given without us realising it and one day you may be chatting to someone and a word of wisdom may come out of your mouth exactly at the time the person needed to hear it, you may begin to understand the bible a lot more than you used to and a verse or passage may suddenly become illuminated to you (knowledge), you may pray for someone and they become well again, you may understand a situation before anyone else (discernment). You may feel a strong sense you have a word from God for someone through divine intervention (prophesy), you may begin to develop a prayer language (tongues) and you may gain understanding as to what that language was meaning (interpretation of tongues).
We are told that it is difficult for persons not of faith to understand the Holy Spirit because these gifts are not operated necessarily by knowledge, rationale or intellect but come from our spiritual minds and hearts which are opened through the decision of faith in Jesus Christ. So to receive these gifts, do not rely on your own strength and abilities (as we usually do in the world), it will only happen through God working through you by the Spirit. God's spirit is often gentle and quiet like a dove. When we live right it allows the dove to settle over us, when we are in sin the dove may fly away (just something for all of us to ponder on).
1 Cor 2, 14 - The person without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God but considers them foolishness and cannot understand them because they are discerned only through the Spirit.
How does the Holy Spirit speak to us? You may sense God speaking to you through quiet conviction. We may feel led to go a certain way or to make a decision about something. We may also receive peace about a decision we have made. God often leads us gently without us realising it and we have to trust God even if we don't know all the answers and the reasons why. I know personally I've had to do this many times in my own life. I don't always know the way forward but I know someone who does and that's God. He will never let us down when we fully commit our lives to him.
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