What does Tribe teach about walking in the spirit?
Drawn from the messages where it was actually addressed: the words said from the front, the passages taught, and where to hear the whole thing.
At Tribe, the teaching on walking in the Spirit begins with a simple framework Brian Hunter calls the master, the manager, and the mover. Brian teaches that every person is made of three parts: the spirit, the soul, and the body. In God's design, the Lord speaks to the spirit, the spirit instructs the soul, and the soul directs the body to act. Before a person is saved, the spirit is dormant and the soul runs the operation on its own terms, whether toward obvious sin or toward tidy religious activity that still has no eternal value. When a person is saved, the spirit comes alive and the proper order is restored. Brian is direct that nothing built out of the flesh pleases God, no matter how it looks from the outside. As he puts it, "Dress it up however you will with religious bedazzlement. He sees right through it."
From there, Brian makes the case for why this actually matters in daily life. His illustration is a multi-speed bike. On flat ground you can stay in one comfortable gear and feel fine, but hills are coming, and the best time to downshift is before you hit the climb, not during it. Walking in the Spirit is the downshift that makes the climb possible. He also addresses why the flesh cannot simply be trusted to guide a person well, even a person who has been a Christian for years. The soul is selfish by nature and will do religious-looking things to satisfy itself. Brian says, "Crucifixion of your flesh always precedes resurrection of your spirit man."
The series closed by connecting walking in the Spirit to the story of Ruth and to the feast of Shavuot, showing that the pattern of following God's lead rather than your own runs through the whole Bible. Ruth followed Naomi into an unfamiliar life. Boaz told Ruth to follow his workers. Ruth told Naomi she would do whatever she said. Brian set that repeated act of following next to the way the Holy Spirit leads, drawing the through-line from Deuteronomy to Ruth to Pentecost. The thread underneath all of it is that God has always been working a people who know how to stay in step with Him, not just in comfortable seasons but when the hills arrive.
Taught from Romans 8:1-16 · Galatians 5:16-18 · Deuteronomy 13:1-5 · John 15:1-8 · Deuteronomy 16:9-12
The passage taught · Deuteronomy 16:9-12
9 You shall count for yourselves seven weeks. From the time you begin to put the sickle to the standing grain you shall begin to count seven weeks.
10 You shall keep the feast of weeks to Yahweh your God with a tribute of a freewill offering of your hand, which you shall give, according as Yahweh your God blesses you.
11 You shall rejoice before Yahweh your God: you, your son, your daughter, your male servant, your female servant, the Levite who is within your gates, the foreigner, the fatherless, and the widow, who are among you, in the place which Yahweh your God shall choose to cause his name to dwell there.
12 You shall remember that you were a slave in Egypt. You shall observe and do these statutes.
World English Bible
Messages that go deeper
- June 9, 2024 The Festival of Shavuot Brian Hunter walks through Deuteronomy 16, the book of Ruth, and Acts 2 to show what it actually looks like to follow the Holy Spirit rather than your own instincts.
- May 20, 2024 Why It's Important to Walk in the Spirit Brian Hunter walks through why walking in the Spirit matters more than religious effort, using Scripture, honest conversation, and a mountain bike analogy to make the case.
- May 19, 2024 Why is it Important to Walk in the Spirit? Brian Hunter walks through why walking in the spirit matters more than religious effort, using Scripture, cycling analogies, and honest conversation with his congregation.
- May 13, 2024 The Master, the Manager, and the Mover What does it mean to walk in the Spirit? A Wyoming church explores how body, soul, and spirit work together and what it looks like to let God lead.
- May 12, 2024 The Master, The Manager, and The Mover Brian Hunter walks through Romans 8 and Galatians 5 to explain what walking in the Spirit actually means and why your flesh keeps fighting for control.