Morning by Morning Daily Prayer Journey with Tommy Hays of Messiah Ministries

"Filled with the Holy Spirit” in Preparation for the Birth of Jesus - Morning by Morning, December 12, 2025

Tommy Hays | Messiah Ministries

Send us a text

“Now Mary arose in those days and went into the hill country with haste, to a city of Judah, and entered the house of Zacharias and greeted Elizabeth. And it happened, when Elizabeth heard the greeting of Mary, that the babe leaped in her womb; and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit” (Luke 1:39-41).

Freshly written and sent out immediately "morning by morning" from the morning prayer time of Tommy Hays each day.

God bless you and you have a great day!
—Tommy Hays | Messiah Ministries

http://messiah-ministries.org



Morning by Morning, December 12, 2025 – “Filled with the Holy Spirit” in Preparation for the Birth of Jesus

 

Good morning, Lord Jesus. You are with me always—right now and every moment of my day. ...

 

“Now Mary arose in those days and went into the hill country with haste, to a city of Judah, and entered the house of Zacharias and greeted Elizabeth. And it happened, when Elizabeth heard the greeting of Mary, that the babe leaped in her womb; and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit” (Luke 1:39-41).

 

In reading through the Gospel accounts of the Christmas story leading up to the day we celebrate the birth of Jesus, I’m moved by how often I see this phrase:

 

“Filled with the Holy Spirit.”

 

Elizabeth was “filled with the Holy Spirit” when Mary came to greet her (v. 41).

 

The angel Gabriel declared Elizabeth and Zecharias’s son John would be “filled with the Holy Spirit, even from his mother’s womb” (v. 15).

 

Once Zacharias affirmed the miracle of his son’s birth from Elizabeth’s once barren womb and named his son John in obedience to the word of the Lord, Zacharias began to prophesy when he also was “filled with the Holy Spirit” (v. 67).

 

Three times in three people, all in the first Chapter of the Gospel of Luke. Everyone around Jesus was being “filled with the Holy Spirit.” And all this was thirty-three years before the day of Pentecost.

 

Hearts being “filled with the Holy Spirit” was such an expression of our Father’s heart preparing the way of the Lord for the coming of our Savior into our world. 

 

Father God, as we prepare our hearts for celebration of the coming of Jesus, fill us with Your Holy Spirit. Fill us with the “joy and gladness” that accompanies Your Holy Spirit (v. 14). For this is a mark of the outpouring of Your Kingdom of God within us—“righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit” (Romans 14:17). In Jesus’ name I pray. Amen.