Walking under the guidance of the Holy Spirit is not possible if we are not paying keen attention to the Word of God.
Purpose-driven people will tell you that the demands upon our lives – our time, effort and wealth – only get bigger as you progress in life. And as these demands get bigger, the pressure on your ability to remain single-minded about your purpose in life becomes greater because the temptations from competing demands also increase.

As believers, we have a call of God on our lives both as individual believers and as communities of believers. And to be able to stay focused on the call of God on our lives, we need to be in habitual fellowship with our guide to all truth – the Holy Spirit (John 16:13).

According to the Bible, walking under the guidance of the Holy Spirit is not possible if we are not paying keen attention to the Word of God. The apostle Paul by the Spirit of God observed this point in his writing about Jesus as our High Priest: “We have a lot to explain about this. But since you have become too lazy to pay attention, explaining it to you is hard.” (Hebrews 5:11, God’s Word).

We can tell from Hebrews 5:11 above that it is not up to God to determine what level of revelation knowledge we shall walk in as believers. The level of revelation knowledge we experience as believers is directly related to the hunger and thirst in us for the Word of God.

Hunger is such a powerful drive. When people are desperately hungry, they become preoccupied with only one thing – finding food. Proverbs 16:26 says “A worker's appetite works for him because his hunger urges him on.” (Holman Christian Standard Bible)

The search for food to satisfy our hunger is, however, not as simply as it may appear. As far as physical hunger is concerned, many of us know that not all foods will do the job. Some foods smell and look so good but satisfy only for a short time; and before you know it, your hunger is back in full force. These kinds of food are generally referred to as light foods.

Other foods, however, will take you through the whole day. These kinds of foods are commonly referred to as heavy foods. If you are a hungry person who does not know the difference between light and heavy foods, you may end up being deceived by the smell and look of light foods and you end up spending all the money on you on it without finding long-lasting satisfaction.

The same thing is true when it comes to spiritual hunger. There are many attractive things that promise to satisfy our hunger for fulfillment and purpose but they are only time and space wasters. These things bring us shallow and momentary satisfaction which only serves to distract our attention from the real things that matter when it comes to satisfying spiritual hunger. In the process they leave us lazy in our attention to the Word of God — the heavy food of the Spirit.

What are these light foods that cause believers to become lazy in their attention to the Word of God? Jesus pointed them out as the cares, riches and pleasures of this life. (Luke 8:14). The cares (anxieties) of this life divert our attention from God’s Word when we focus on our abilities instead of God’s abilities. The riches of this life do the same thing when we look to them and not to God for our security. And the pleasures of this life do it when we are overtaken with indulgence in the lusts of the flesh.

Speaking of believers who substitute the cares, riches and pleasures of this life for their attention to the Word of God, Jesus said: “You claim to be rich and successful and to have everything you need. But you don't know how bad off you are. You are pitiful, poor, blind, and naked.” (Rev. 3: 17, CEV)

Now the reason we as believers substitute the cares, riches and pleasures of this life for our attention to the Word of God is usually the lack of knowledge of what life is and how to maximize it. The world has deceived many of us into believing that life is measured by affluence.

As a result, many of us have mistaken Jesus’ mission statement in John 10:10 - I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly - to mean abounding in wealth for the sake of it. Considering that Jesus also said in Luke 12:15: “…Take heed, and beware of covetousness: for a man's life consisteth not in the abundance of the things which he possesseth”, it is obvious that while wealth is important for the comfort of our lives, it is not what defines or offers life.

True life is the nourishment — the character, strength, health, beauty, glory, knowledge, rest, wealth and influence — that flows out from a living contact (fellowship) with the Spirit of the living God. That is why feeding on the Word of God is the only heavy food that can give us lasting spiritual satisfaction.

You will also be glad to know that the spiritual satisfaction that comes from paying keen attention to God’s Word brings with it all the riches that people are busy trying to seek for in their own strength and wisdom. We know that from Matthew 6:33: “But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.”

In short, we have every authentic thing to gain from fellowship with God by way of paying keen attention to His word and nothing to lose that is genuinely beneficial to our fulfillment and long-lasting satisfaction.