[0:00] Good morning, everyone. Please turn with me in your Bibles to John chapter 14. John chapter 14.
[0:16] This is a second part of a two-part series on the teaching of the Holy Spirit.
[0:30] And of course, it kind of fits in together with our study of the life of Christ. It's kind of that last night in the upper room, and Jesus is connecting with his disciples, and he's telling them something.
[0:48] He's told them that he's going to leave their heart broken, but he then makes these promises to them, and the first promise, if you remember, is that the works that I've done, you will go on to do greater works.
[1:03] Those works are not manifestations of power and spectacles, but it's the work of the gospel, that you will go out and spread the good news of what I've been teaching.
[1:18] Everything that I've been teaching you for three years, you're going to go and teach others. And thereby, the gospel will move throughout all the earth.
[1:32] And if you just think about that, if we were just simply given that task to strategize and make that happen, we'd probably have an aneurysm or something. But so he promises, I'm going to give you guys a couple things to help you.
[1:46] One, I will be your mediator in heaven. I have to go, and I will be in heaven with my Father. So everything that you ask in my name, I will do.
[2:00] So he's going to be there connecting, mediating, making sure we're at peace with God as we deliver his message. And then the last promise that he gives them is he will give the disciples a helper.
[2:14] The word is, from the Greek, is also translated as comforter, advocate, someone who will come alongside of you.
[2:29] Now, as I said before, this isn't their only teaching that they've ever heard on the Holy Spirit, but this is the first time they've ever heard the teaching of the Holy Spirit that he will come to you.
[2:42] He will be your helper. Before this, this had never been mentioned in the pages of Scripture. We've seen the Holy Spirit act as an anointing factor, but to be in the everyday life of the believer, this was new.
[2:58] So if you were here last week, I kind of picked up, I began with a bit of an introduction on an overview of how different groups in different churches kind of begin to speak of the Holy Spirit.
[3:16] If you were here, I spoke about the difference between cessationist churches and non-cessationist churches. What that means is there are some who teach that for the most part, many of the works of the Spirit, that we see in Acts, the book of Acts, the signed gifts are no longer in use, and then on the other side of the spectrum, all the gifts are in use, and they're working just as strong today as they were 2,000 years ago.
[3:50] And I talked about the reason Christians disagree on this is, one is the understanding that the kingdom has come now, and that background holds to an understanding that when Jesus came and that he healed all disease and sickness, that meant his kingdom had entered now on earth and it's supposed to continue on from there on in.
[4:18] And I explain, I don't hold to that position. I think we've got a taste of that kingdom, but it's not complete until Jesus comes again, right? So Jesus was the one primarily doing that work.
[4:31] Then the other thought process I shared with you is some people look at the book of Acts and they believe it's descriptive, meaning everything that they see in the book of Acts, whatever happened there, is supposed to happen here.
[4:45] And then there's some that believe that it's, or the descriptive, it's a description of what the Holy Spirit was doing, but that does not necessarily mean everything happens now.
[4:57] Then on the other side, it's the, those that call it the prescriptive, whatever we see in Acts is commanded for day as well. You with me on that? If you're confused in any way, I explained it a lot better last week and I took more time.
[5:13] But I made a mistake last week. Yes, it's true. I do. I do make mistakes. I know that's crazy talk, but it happens.
[5:25] And the mistake that I made is I forgot the punchline to my sermon. Okay? Now the reason I talked about the sign gifts and all those type of things is that when I usually say, or someone says, the works of the Holy Spirit, their minds usually go to the spectacle works of the Holy Spirit.
[5:48] You know what I'm saying? They usually think about miracles, healings, speaking in tongues and those type of things. So when you automatically say the works of the Holy Spirit, often that's where our minds go.
[6:02] But what I'm, and that is why there's so much confusion on the subject. But what I really want us to know and what I'm studying here is that Jesus Christ is actually explaining to us from this text what the purpose of the Holy Spirit is, right?
[6:25] So remember, the first point I made last week was to enlighten blind eyes. Amen? Like that is a very important work of the Spirit. that unless the Spirit opens your eyes to the truth of Scripture and the truth of who God is, you can't figure it out.
[6:44] That is a much more desirable work of the Holy Spirit than to be on the spectacle type of work. And you can hear my whole sermon last week, I'd go back, but sometimes we just go to the sensational, the spectacle.
[7:00] And I've seen that happen. I remember at one of the churches services I was at, one of my friends makes a point saying, you know, you guys need more of the Holy Spirit.
[7:12] And I asked, what do you mean by that? And their translation was they needed to see more emotionalism, more engagement with the music, whether it be more clapping or dancing or those type of things.
[7:27] That's a celebratory response. But that's not the sole work of the Holy Spirit. There is joy to be found in the Lord. Amen? But worship, when we come together, is also a function of being under God's Word and it reveals things in our hearts.
[7:46] And all those things in our hearts aren't always good. So it's an opportunity in our worship to pray to the Lord, confess our sins.
[7:57] to contemplate the works that the Spirit is dealing with us. And sometimes it can be sobering as well as celebratory.
[8:14] So, that is one of the reasons why when you bring up the subject of the Holy Spirit, it gets confusing because people begin to think of the signs and those being the only works of the Spirit rather than some of the other works of the Spirit that we're studying here today.
[8:40] Does that make sense? Is everyone lost? I hope not. But if you are, please stick with me. Hopefully, I'll make it less confusing for you.
[8:54] So this morning as we get into these works of the Spirit, the works of the Helper that God was sending to us, I want us to see that they're certainly worthy of deep and manifest worship.
[9:13] And there's something that we should be praising God all the day long for. So before I say another word, let us pray. Holy Heavenly Father, we just, I pray for your Helper.
[9:28] I pray for the Holy Spirit to come here today. I always say come. You're always here. You promised to indwell us, O Father. But we're praying that you'd function to bring clarity where there's confusion.
[9:40] Some of us have grown up in different church backgrounds and sometimes our minds are drawn to what we perceived earlier. sometimes it's good, sometimes it's not so good.
[9:54] A lot of times it's just not complete. So Father, when we talk to those, talk about the other views that people have hold, we just set that aside now because that's not what we're talking about.
[10:07] We're not talking about the sign gifts that prove anything, but we're talking about the specific work of the Helper and what that Holy Spirit will do in our lives that Jesus was speaking to his disciples about so that they would understand that they will no longer be alone.
[10:33] That when Jesus leaves them, they are not alone. That when Jesus leaves them, that they will indeed have a helper, that he will be mediating for them.
[10:50] So Father, we just thank you for this word of God. May it lighten our eyes and our souls. In your most holy and precious name, amen. Amen.
[11:02] All right, so this morning's sermon is essentially titled, Seven Ways the Holy Spirit Works in a Disciple's Life. Seven Ways the Holy Spirit Works in the Disciple's Life.
[11:14] And the Disciple is just as much the eleven disciples, the apostles that were around him on that day, and today if you are a believer in Jesus Christ, you are a follower of Jesus, these same promises hold true for you.
[11:30] These are just as relevant for our time today in our believer's life as it was 2,000 years ago. So as I said just earlier, the first action we see is, and look, if you look at me with John 14, 17, it says, the world cannot receive the truth, it neither sees him nor knows him.
[11:53] It means that we cannot identify truth until the Holy Spirit opens up our eyes to truth. So the first point is the Holy Spirit reveals spiritual truth. It reveals that you and I have a need for a Savior.
[12:07] Savior. You and I have a need for a mediator. You and I have a need for Jesus Christ. Amen? That we cannot make ourselves right with God unless the Holy Spirit reveals that truth to us.
[12:26] And we've seen this acted out in the ministry of Jesus Christ so clearly. Every time he's teaching, he's doing all the signs more than anybody else.
[12:38] But some people still weren't compelled to believe in him. In fact, scholars assume that as soon as we get to Acts chapter one, there's maybe only 500 believers in Jesus Christ.
[12:56] It's ludicrous. he wiped out disease. He wiped out suffering in the northern part of Israel. He spent almost three, he spent over a year and a half.
[13:11] Everybody was testified. We read in the Gospels that people came from Syria and Syrophoenicia to see him and then it also tells us Edumia, which is the southern part below Israel.
[13:27] All these people had heard the great works that Jesus did. And if you've been with me through the life of Christ, some of the more incredible miracles of faith were from those outside of the Jewish religion, were they not?
[13:47] Remember the woman in Syrophoenicia who begged and begged and begged, Jesus, please heal my daughter. There was the Roman centurion in Matthew chapter 8.
[14:01] He says, my servant is sick. And Jesus says, take me to your servant. He says, you don't need to come. You just need to say the word and he will be healed.
[14:13] And Jesus says, no greater faith have I seen that he understood that Jesus commanded the power of God. God. The fact is we are spiritually blind people and we need the power of the Holy Spirit to unmask our eyes.
[14:33] Ephesians 3.5 says that until the Holy Spirit opens our eyes, Jesus Christ is a mystery to us. So when you talk with your friends or your loved ones about Jesus Christ and they'll say, hey, he was a rabbi, good teacher, he was moral, all those wonderful things.
[14:54] But if you really got down, no, Jesus didn't claim to be any of those things. He claimed to be the Son of God. That idea will be a mystery to them until the Spirit gives them eyes to see.
[15:11] Now take a look at John 14, 17. This was our second point we talked about. The Holy Spirit binds us to God. Binds us to God.
[15:22] It says, you know him, for he dwells with you and will be in you. So there's a present action and a future action.
[15:33] The present action is that binding, that moment of salvation. It's part of the new covenant. Ezekiel 36, 27 says, and I will put my spirit within you and cause you to walk in my statues and be careful to obey my rules.
[15:53] That the Holy Spirit will have an ongoing power and effect in how we walk and follow Jesus. And the last part, we read out of Ephesians 1, 13, it said that the Holy Spirit seals us.
[16:08] Because once the Holy Spirit comes into us at that moment of salvation, our nationality changes. Jesus. We are no longer people of earth, we're people of heaven.
[16:20] We are no longer people of Adam, we're people of Jesus Christ. We are born again. There's a new citizenship involved.
[16:31] And the Holy Spirit, not only does it reveal at that moment we become saved, it seals us for eternity. We're part of a different family now, and that family we are now a part of forever.
[16:43] Amen? Nothing can take it away. You may think you can walk away, but you will not be able to walk away with a clear conscience. You will have the Holy Spirit nagging you like there's going to be this tattoo on you that burns when you try to live your own way, when you try to follow after sin.
[17:04] It's just going to continue to burn because you know you're someone else. You are not this person living this life trying to live outside of God's boundary.
[17:16] You know that it's directing you back towards God. You are sealed. This protects and guarantees our salvation.
[17:29] That is a supernatural sealing. When people always ask me, can someone walk away from that? Can they choose not to believe? Really? You've got the joy? You think you can remove a seal that the Holy Spirit has placed on your life?
[17:45] That's why I can firmly say that once saved, always saved. Because you are saved, you will persevere till the end. And the reason being is because you now have the Holy Spirit living in you.
[18:01] And he is changing how you think, how you, your attitudes, your desires. And we're going to get into this in a moment. So we see that the Holy Spirit reveals truth, and the Holy Spirit binds us to God.
[18:14] So this is the first truth we looked at last week. So we're going to continue, and this is all new. And the third point is the Holy Spirit gives us the presence of Jesus. The Holy Spirit gives us the presence of Jesus.
[18:29] Check out verses 18 and 19. It says, there's so much beauty in this passage. And it reflects the intimacy that God has with those he loves.
[18:49] And I don't want you to skim over these pages and miss that intimacy in your own life. So just this first phrase, I will not leave you as orphans.
[19:03] you're not going to be fatherless, you're not going to be motherless. What a fearful position that is for the child.
[19:13] Jesus Christ has just said that he's leaving. And the text here is telling us that's how they're going to feel. Jesus who's walked with them day by day for three years, the intimacy of that relationship.
[19:31] They're going to feel as orphans without parents. And he says, I will come to you. Yet a little while, and the world will see me no more, but you will see me.
[19:47] So this binding, this unity of the spirit that we have from the last point, is kind of like the function of the Holy Spirit. spirit, but the idea here is that through the Holy Spirit that there is a spiritual presence of Jesus Christ in our lives.
[20:06] That's why we say that reference, Abba, Father. In the Old Testament, the word was Yahweh. You spoke of Elohim as God on high, but Yahweh was the God that knew his people.
[20:24] unparalleled intimacy. Remember, their lives are being disruptive with the news that Jesus is leaving them, and yes, Jesus, we've explained that he has to leave them physically so he can accomplish his work on the cross, but he assures them that through the Holy Spirit, they can have the spiritual presence of Jesus with them.
[20:49] And this is the mystery of the Trinity. We can't perfectly explain, but we understand in verse 17 says the Holy Spirit abides in us.
[21:01] Colossians 1.27 tells us that Christ indwells us. 1 John 4.12 says God is in us.
[21:15] And here in verse 19, Jesus says, because I live, you will also live. What Jesus is referring there is to the resurrection.
[21:30] Because I live, because I conquer death through me, death will be conquered. Now, what Jesus is referring to is eternal life.
[21:43] And I thought this was a very important point that I was thinking about. When we think of eternal life, we think of a life that never ends, right? Like, it just, but sometimes we're thinking in two dimensions when we think that, or one dimension.
[22:02] This isn't this life that we get to live eternally. We get to live, speaking of the quality of the eternal life, you with me?
[22:16] It's not important that we live forever. forever. It's important that we live with the presence of Jesus Christ forever. You with me on that? That's the intimacy, that's the true intimacy that we will have in the next life when Jesus' kingdom is fully realized.
[22:40] And the thing about eternal life is it just doesn't happen when we die. it happens at that moment when we're born again, when our spirit is made new. And it does begin today as we walk with God.
[22:56] And some of you who've been living this Christian life for a while can attest that as you walk with Jesus, there's a joy that you can have even in hard circumstances.
[23:09] Amen? Trials of life. Just this week, and I'm letting you a little bit in my personal life, my mom has had cancer for a while, and they did another test, and it turns out it's moved to her lungs, and it's in her lymph nodes, right?
[23:28] So it's getting a lot worse than what it was before. So they've got surgery primed, and just talking to her pastor and friends about it this week.
[23:40] My mom is still joyful in this. If this is the Lord calling her home, she's ready. Her bags are packed. And you guys haven't had my mom visit here very much.
[23:56] My mom loves Jesus. She loves him. I used to buy her those nice leather Bibles, but I found they went to waste because they'd fall apart for how much time she used to spend in them.
[24:08] And it was just better to get her a smaller one or the cloth ones that I didn't have to waste $150 of. Hey, it's really nice goat skin. She doesn't care. You know, just that reliance on God and spending time in God's word.
[24:21] But that is the closeness, it's the understanding of where we are. And that is a closeness to the Holy Spirit. And perhaps if I would say what is the prime role of the Holy Spirit in the believer's life, I would say this.
[24:41] It's to point us to Christ. The Holy Spirit's role is to point us to Christ. And this is sometimes why I balk at churches that make a really big deal of the Holy Spirit, because the Holy Spirit in the pages of Scripture is kind of the part of the Trinity that'd rather be silent.
[24:59] I'm not looking for the fanfare, I'm not looking at the adulation, I want you to look at Jesus, because Jesus is the one who's bringing glory to God the Father. Everything to Jesus.
[25:11] That is why we sing songs, worship songs to Jesus. The Holy Spirit is never worded that we're supposed to pay that worship to him, the worship goes to Jesus.
[25:24] You get that? That's where, and that is the work of the Holy Spirit. Spirit, right? The Holy Spirit is not looking for fanfare, he's not looking for adulation.
[25:37] The Holy Spirit's ministry is to point us to Jesus Christ. Jesus is the one who saves. The Holy Spirit opens our eyes to the need of Jesus.
[25:50] The Holy Spirit seals our souls for eternity, and the Holy Spirit takes us to Jesus. So that's the third point, that the Holy Spirit gives us the presence of Jesus.
[26:08] Fourth point I want you to see is the Holy Spirit gives us understanding of God's plan. Understanding of God's plan. This is a bit of a confusing title, but if you look at John 14, 20, it says, in that day, you will know that I am in my Father, and you in me, and I in you.
[26:32] And later on in John 16, Jesus is going to bring up the Holy Spirit again all over for him. And 16, 20 says, truly, truly, I say to you, you will weep and lament, but the world will rejoice.
[26:46] You will be sorrowful, but your sorrow will turn to joy. Why will that happen? He's talking about his death, right? There's going to be this sorrow, you're going to be broken hearted, but wait, there's a plan, and that understanding will happen.
[27:04] Everything will seem lost. You will scatter, you will not understand, but the promise is through the power of the Holy Spirit, you will know and understand why I need to go.
[27:19] When we visit the book of Acts, Jesus will deny him and they will unfold.
[27:31] They didn't believe him. Finally, when we get to the book of Acts, we see the disciples in a very different light.
[27:44] Let's take Peter, for instance. Jesus tells him, hey, you're going to deny me three times. not only is he going to deny him to some teenage girl who is calling him out, but Jesus Christ, later on, we're going to learn, calls him to meet with him, and Peter just doesn't even show up.
[28:04] Right? That Jesus actually goes chasing him because he's gone back to fishing. Peter had left everything, and now that Jesus is dead, he's so discouraged, he's leaving the plan, and he's going back to fishing.
[28:19] I'm just going back to that old life, man. And Jesus confronts Peter, and then when we get to the book of Acts, is that Peter anymore?
[28:32] Peter's a preaching machine, right? He is bold, he is strong, he's courageous, before he was fearful of little girls, now he's standing before the religious leaders, and he's telling them, hey, you need Jesus too.
[28:49] You need to know that he was the son of God. But what does understanding give us? Take a look at verse 27.
[29:04] It says, peace I leave with you, my peace I give to you. When the Holy Spirit gives us peace to the plan, have you guys ever been there when life's kind of in chaos, you feel disruptive, and you just want to know the plan, right?
[29:24] Just tell me the plan, because then I know the purpose of what I'm going through right now, and once I know that purpose and understanding, there's a peace. You guys, am I the only one like this?
[29:36] No, I'm not. Thank you. All right, I got two. Thank you, guys. I appreciate it. Not a freak. But that's generally how it is. We just need to know the plan.
[29:46] Even though we can't change anything, there's just peace and knowing. That's why Dave, when he read to us out of Galatians chapter 5, it tells us that one of the products of the fruit of the spirit is peace.
[30:05] It's a peace that is spirit born. It's not manufactured within ourselves. It is a peace that gives us understanding. It is why Jesus says over and over and over, so my father may be glorified.
[30:25] One author simply states it like this. It's a peace that knows that our poor and needy hearts will become the residence of the triune God.
[30:40] Just this week, a friend on Facebook, it's a seminary, a man I went to seminary with many years ago, his wife passed this week. And he was just sharing his testimony, and his wife had the words, Jesus has this, Jesus has this, Jesus has this.
[31:00] And the reason why she was saying Jesus has this was not because she had any great fear for where her eternal salvation was.
[31:11] She was a very strong godly woman. She was not worried about the death or her eternal state of her soul. What her biggest anxiety was, was her husband and her children.
[31:24] Right? And her prayer was, Jesus has this. It's like, Lord, I have to give you this. During the time, one of my friends, she was dying of cancer, diagnosed, and she would send me her heart's concerns.
[31:42] And one of the things that she asked me before she died is, will I be able to pray for my kids in heaven? You know, and the good news is, I said, no, I don't believe you will, because you're already going to know everything.
[31:57] You're going to a place of perfect knowledge, and you're going to know. But that is what everyone's concern is, right? Just tell me what's going to happen. So that's the fourth one.
[32:09] And then the fifth principle that comes through the Holy Spirit is through the Holy Spirit, and this is amazing, we will be loved by the Father. Another way to put it, through the Holy Spirit, we are known by the Father.
[32:26] This is beautiful. Through the Holy Spirit's power, we will walk with Jesus, we will keep his commandments, we please and are known by the Father.
[32:37] That's what it says here in John 14, 21. Whoever has my commandments and keeps them, he it is who loves me, and he who loves me will be loved by my Father.
[32:50] and I will love him and manifest myself to him. And this is the third question that I talked about many weeks ago that comes up, and Judas, who is not Iscariot, said to him, Lord, how is it that you will manifest yourself to us?
[33:08] How will you show yourself? And Jesus answered, if anyone loves me, he will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him, and make our home with him.
[33:24] Isn't that beautiful? Because it's the Spirit who works in our actions, in our thoughts, as the Spirit unites us, the Son of God's work reconciles us to God, the Spirit works in us to do good works, changes our status completely.
[33:42] It's interesting, and under the Old Testament, God dealt with God's people at a national level. What we're seeing here is God dealing with us at a personal level.
[34:02] And some of you guys might remember being teenagers, I remember at camp, do you guys know what a DTR is? Okay, you guys who have been to camp know what a DTR is, eh? Okay, DTR is called Define the Relationship.
[34:16] And the reason I always had at camp, because you're at camp, there's guys and girls, you're hanging out the whole summer, you're maybe running the canoe program together, or you just kind of like each other, but at the end of the summer, someone's like, I think we really need to define this relationship.
[34:29] Is this a friendship or are we getting married next month, right? You know, you need to know, right? And when you bring that up and she's like, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, I would never marry you, but I still like you as friends. Okay, we'll be friends for the next 30 years.
[34:42] Anyway, but you had to get to that point, right? There was this uneasiness. You had to define the relationship. Where are we going here?
[34:54] Well, this is Jesus Christ defining the relationship for us with the Father. There's no more guesswork. Because in the Old Testament, when you were, remember, like, let's take Daniel, a good, righteous, godly man.
[35:11] Guess what? He lived in exile. He was punished alongside of the disobedience of the nation. You with me on that one? That judgment he had under that nation.
[35:27] It doesn't happen like that. There's that one-to-one relationship that we now have God, through the power of the Holy Spirit, we are now united with God.
[35:38] And our blessings are seen in our obedience to God. this whole theme is going to be magnified because I'm thinking next year we're going to get into Romans.
[35:52] And this really comes to life in the book of Romans like nothing else. But here we are right now, the important point is that the Holy Spirit redefines our life.
[36:05] I don't have to ask where I am with God. The fact that I am born, I am his child, I am sealed, my relationship, my status with God is good.
[36:18] You see, through the power of the Spirit, Jesus is promising to disclose himself and the Father to us. The question that Judas asks is, why on earth would Jesus or God himself disclose himself to people who do not want God?
[36:42] And this goes back to Romans a bit. God has already made himself clear. There is nobody who walks the face of this earth and believes there is no God.
[36:58] There is not one. If you understand atheists, they fight to disbelieve. Now, some people might not have a clue, but they know there is some power greater than themselves.
[37:14] And they, some people think about it, some people don't think too much about it, some people like the idea of God, but they certainly don't want God's opinion on their life.
[37:31] They do not want to obey God. They do not love God. The question is, why would God reveal his purposes to them?
[37:43] The theological point here is quite simple. God manifests himself to those who want God, who love God, who obey God.
[37:56] him. God reveals himself to, through the power of the Holy Spirit. So that's the fifth working.
[38:07] The sixth working of the Holy Spirit is that through the Holy Spirit we have what is known as a supernatural teacher. A supernatural teacher.
[38:18] Take a look at verses 25 through 26. It says, These things I have spoken to you, why I am still with you. But the helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said.
[38:36] Okay, this is one of the biggest struggles that I hear in Christians in understanding what this verse means. Notice it says all things.
[38:47] When I become a Christian, I do not know all of a sudden how to fix my car. I don't. Right? And some people do. And that doesn't mean you automatically become an expert in the Bible.
[39:01] And I've had guys in my church get saved. I remember this young man, very zealous for the Lord. He got saved through another ministry. And he just wanted to fight everybody because he now had this understanding of God's word that came through him.
[39:16] Notice how Paul's talking about. He says, he will teach you all the things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said. What he's referring to is, remember, and I'll take you to the verses.
[39:27] The first one is John 12, 16. And it basically states, his disciples, Jesus' disciples, did not understand these things at first.
[39:39] But when Jesus was glorified, then they remembered that these things had been written about him and had been done to him.
[39:50] So what had happened is, they had been taught something, they didn't get it, and now they get it on the other side. You with me on that? So there's two ways to look at this, and I want to explain it.
[40:03] But what happens is the Holy Spirit is active to bring the truth to their minds. Now often, some people believe it brings truth to things that they haven't studied yet or don't know yet.
[40:17] And there's a segment of Christians that say, it's just me and my Bible, just me and my Bible, and I'll go away. So there's this theological principle called sola scriptura. What it means is scripture alone.
[40:31] And what the reformers meant when they coined that phrase is, it's not simply you and the Bible and the Holy Spirit coming up with your new ideas.
[40:43] When you're part of the community of God, you're also a part of your history, right? You're a part of the people who came before you. You are a part of a church.
[40:54] So some of you who've grown up in a church a long time, who's heard of the Bereans? Come, put your hands up, right? Some of you guys have heard of the Bereans.
[41:05] If you don't know who the Bereans were, it's in the book of Acts, and the apostles were teaching, and they met this group of people, and they weren't really getting on the whole Jesus fan train right at the moment.
[41:16] And they said, hey, we need to go back, and we need to study the Old Testament to make sure what you're saying is indeed true. Okay, you with me on that?
[41:27] That is a good, wise thing. Some people think, when I say the Bereans, they're the Berean that goes back and they make the decision. No, the Bereans were a functioning community of people.
[41:39] pre-existing church, so to speak, who knew and understood what the Old Testament said, and were able to compare the notes against that to know, hey, this is, this was the Messiah.
[41:52] This was the predicted Messiah. Messiah. And then they believed. You with me on that? Too often, people go alone, and they come up with all sorts of silly thoughts.
[42:05] And they say, well, the Holy Spirit brought it. Every major cult to this day is usually started by one person who had an idea that's outside any church teachings, and they get a whole bunch of people to agree with them, and away they go.
[42:20] So, you and I are a part of a lineage of 2,000 years of biblical teaching. Amen? There's been faithful teachers this whole time.
[42:32] And like, when I study this, I don't know if you guys know, like, I look at commentaries. Some of my commentaries go back hundreds of years of what the early church wrote.
[42:43] If I think I've got a new idea, that new idea is usually a bad idea. Right? Because the Holy Spirit's been at work for 2,000 years in God's people.
[42:54] And he's been guiding them in this teaching. And this is the one where people internalize to a point where they think they get a special word on something.
[43:07] Now, I'm not going to discount that totally. Just bear with me. So there's two ways that happen. I believe the first is the external. What I'm talking about is the understanding, what I've just explained to you.
[43:20] It's the understanding of what the passage says. But there's also the principle where the Holy Spirit helps you understand a text in a new way to apply it to your life.
[43:36] And it usually happens in two ways. One, you're reading your Bible, or two, you've heard hearing it preached. Amen? And it's all of a sudden, you need to make a new decision. And you know it's the Holy Spirit that's doing that work in you.
[43:51] You're seeing how, oh man, I really need to apply this differently in my life, this truth. It's been kind of there. And what informs the power of the Holy Spirit?
[44:05] The Bible. The more, you know, one of the things that we do in Every Man a Warrior, that's the men's group that we're doing, is they have to memorize a verse every single session.
[44:18] And those verses pertain to what we're learning in the class. And as we fill our minds with God's words, God's promises, that's kind of the fuel for the Holy Spirit, so to speak.
[44:33] The Holy Spirit takes you to that verse. Anybody been there before? Right? That's the whole power that's going on. So when a new believer shows up and they don't know anything and yet they want to express all these new ideas, you know, usually you just smile, nod along, right?
[44:52] Yeah, bless you, brother. But there's going to come a time when they're going to grow in maturity and then they're really going to come under God's word as other people disciple them and show them.
[45:03] And then they start to apply that truth. And I'll say why the Holy Spirit is so wonderful at this. Let's just say you just become saved, you've been a Christian for five years.
[45:16] And this still happens to me. I'll get a thought of something from way back in the day where I was stupid, unthoughtful, and I'm like, Lord forgive me.
[45:30] Do you guys ever have that? Like, I don't even know where it comes from. And it's just something I don't need to pursue that person from 30 years ago. Whatever I said in classroom, I was kind of rude to them.
[45:44] You know, but it's Lord, forgive me for that. Because imagine that the moment of salvation and the Holy Spirit brought to mind every single sin that you'd ever done. You'd be crushed.
[45:55] But in his grace, he seems to bring them at the right times to almost help us grow through that to say, like, who here ever wants to admit they're prideful?
[46:08] Right? Besides me. No, but it's true, right? And then, but you can say, man, I was prideful back then. And like, if they're good friends, I can say, you know, yeah, I was a jerk to you during that five-year phase when you were going through and I was selfish and I wasn't there for you, please forgive me.
[46:28] And they've already forgiven because I'm still in their life. But that's the other power, I think, of the Holy Spirit because he's bringing those truths to our hearts and we're seeing how he teaches us to relate to one another, to love one another, to encourage one another that we possibly didn't do before.
[46:51] So the first one, he brings the truth of scripture in our life and understanding in the inward way is how we apply that to our lives.
[47:03] And sometimes it means going back in our life to apply that truth. And another one with that, and we know this truth, this is Hebrews 4.12, this is one of the verses that we memorize at seminary.
[47:17] For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of the soul and of spirit, of joints and marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart.
[47:32] We lie to ourselves all the time. But when we have that moment before God, we can't hide. We're reading our Bibles and we understand whether it, how to love my wife, how to lead my children, how do I handle my finances.
[47:50] There's just these different areas that are there. And we know once we're before, then we got, Lord, I need your help. How do I apply this? How do I work this out?
[48:03] So the, and the other thing that I was thinking about is sometimes, and I've seen this in new believers, the Holy Spirit sometimes works just enough to say, stay away from that person.
[48:16] They may say they're opening God's word, but there's this early spark in you to know you can't explain that there's something wrong, but you know there's something wrong and you need to get out.
[48:27] And then other times I really believe the Holy Spirit testifies, no, this is trustworthy. This is good. Come in and learn. And then, so that brings, that's my sixth point and my seventh point today is through the Holy Spirit.
[48:43] And I've been saying this over and over again. We have the power to obey and follow God. We have the power to obey and follow God. The fact is before receiving the Holy Spirit, the apostles were not very good at understanding doing right.
[49:02] But when we read the book of Acts, we read how bold, courageous. Acts 1.8 says, this is the promise. Jesus says, but you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all of Judea and Samaria and to the end of the earth.
[49:28] Once you've been saved, you do not need any extra power. When you've grown for another five years, you don't have to pray for an extra spiritual blessing. The fact of the matter is you were given everything that you will ever need at that moment of salvation.
[49:46] That's why Ephesians 5.18 says, be filled with the Holy Spirit. And I've taught to you that that's an idea of a sail on a boat. It's a wind that is constantly moving you across the water.
[49:59] It's not like a bottle that's filled and it overflows. It's something that to keep you going. Colossians 3.16 says, let the word of Christ dwell in you richly.
[50:13] What is the word of Christ? It's the power of the spirit and the word. It powers your attitudes, your relationships, your actions. Here's a hint. If you want to be more like Jesus, hang out with people who are more like Jesus.
[50:28] Who your friends are will determine who you are. I've got this good friend when I lived in Ontario and he's Irish. And I love the Irish accent.
[50:40] I'm hanging out with him for like a half day and I'm coming back and my mom's wondering what in the world are you speaking to me? You know, it's just one of the accents that easily picks up and it takes over.
[50:53] And I think about that. How easy? I just hung out with him for half a day and I'm already speaking like I'm right out of Belfast or something. Right? You know, it's not the way it's supposed to work. But you obviously want to pick on good people.
[51:06] That's why we talk about what we stand for. The exhortation, the equipping, and the engaging. The exhortation is we want to be around people who worship God. We want to be around people who equip us and people we can equip.
[51:20] And we want to engage and we want to work with those who want to share the good news of Jesus Christ. Amen? In conclusion, I think it's easy to understand why we get attracted to the spectacular, the signs and those gifts.
[51:43] And I get why some of my brothers and sisters are attached to them. They make a big deal. But I believe that through the pages of Scripture, it's these pages that reassure us that it's important for us to understand the work of the Holy Spirit truly makes us who we are.
[52:06] And although it's quiet and it's working, it's certainly powerful. Amen? So next week, just take a look at the last words of John 14.
[52:18] The words are, rise, let us go from here. So Jesus is now leaving the upper room with his apostles and he's heading down to the Garden of Gethsemane where he will pray and he will be met by the Roman soldiers and taken to be our ultimate sacrifice.
[52:44] Let's pray. Dear Lord, Heavenly Father, I just thank you for your Holy Spirit. All the things that it does bother it just so amazing just to read these words and to be connected with your truth and understand how your Holy Spirit brings it to mind when we're needing your word.
[53:08] Lord, whether we are tired, whether we are suffering, whether we're going through a trial. There's so many promises that you give to us and a lot of those promises are built on our obedience.
[53:29] Are we knowing your word, O Father? Are we wanting to know your truth for our lives? In John 15, Jesus is going to give a warning to those that simply hear the good news but don't abide in you and the dangers that are inherent with such a decision.
[53:51] Father, I pray that we would confess our sin, that we would resolve before our husbands and our wives, even our children, that we will commit to these truths that you have given us in your word.
[54:10] Just even as Dave prayed earlier, to use this power of prayer to pray your will into our lives.
[54:24] Father, it is my firm belief that the prayer for this church is that every family here would be a worshiping church, a blessed church, an anointed family.
[54:36] Whether they're one or many, there's decisions to be made that can truly lead to blessings of grace in the families, even families that still do not know you.
[54:50] Even if there's one person in that family who's pursuing you, there is much grace to be found there. That is favor and blessings from you, oh God.
[55:04] Father, you know us, you know what we're capable of, and we thank you for your patience in each and every one of us. Pray that you continue to work in our sanctification process, growing us to be more and more like you.
[55:22] We ask these things. We thank you for your word. In your name, amen.