I'm going to read here verses
1 and 2 again of Acts chapter 2 and then we will pick up with
our topic for tonight. Verse 1 of chapter 13 and then
verse 2. Now there were in the church
that was at Antioch certain prophets and teachers as Barnabas and
Simeon that was called Niger, Lucius was Cyrene, and Manium
which was brought up with Herod the tetra and Saul. So there
were Simeon as we see, Niger, Lucius, Menium, and Saul. And the Lord determined that
two men would be separated to the work of the Gentiles, and
those two men were Barnabas and Saul. We read, therefore, in
verse 2, And as they ministered to the Lord and fasted, the Holy
Ghost said, Separate me, Barnabas and Saul, for the work whereunto
I have called them. The rest of the chapter is fascinating.
It has its own benefits for us in terms of the missionary work
of Saul and Barnabas. That will be great in its own
right. But before we press into that,
I want us to be introduced a little bit to the third person who is
here called the Holy Spirit. And we will kind of do just a
survey of what that work means, the Holy Spirit. Who is he or what is the Holy
Spirit? So first of all, I'll say the
God of the Bible is to be understood as a tri-personal being. This concept I have begun to
introduce to our men in our men's study and you want to grasp it
now because it is paradoxically confusing if you don't think
it through. The God of the Bible is a tri-personal
being. That is to say he is not a single
person that functions in different modes. He is a tri-personal being. He is not one individual. He is not unipersonal like you
and I are unipersonal. You are a individual person. You are not two persons. You
are not three persons. You are one person. You will
always be one person, no matter how many offices you adopt to
yourself, or how many gifts you have, or how many functions you
operate in, you will only be one person. You will be the individual
for all eternity that God uniquely made. This is what the word individual
means. You will not be a plurality of
persons. You will only be one person. But this is not true of God.
It's true of all human beings. Each man, each woman born into
the world is unipersonal. You guys understand the concept?
Tripersonal versus unipersonal is very important to understand
in this day where theology is hijacked and people don't have
a proper understanding or comprehension of, let alone theology, even
anthropology. And that's why we are tampering
so much with what God has made, is because we don't understand
our identity. And when you don't understand
your identity, you are vulnerable to or subject to someone else
defining you other than the one who made you. Now remember, the
thing made can never define itself. The thing made can never define
itself. You can only be properly defined
and rightly defined by the one who made you. The thing made
cannot define itself. Only the one who made you can
define you. And the God of the Bible, if
we submit ourselves to biblical revelation, is a God of mystery
who has revealed himself not in a unipersonal way, but in
a tri-personal way. Each individual in the Godhead,
is unipersonal, but the Godhead itself is tripersonal. What do
I mean by that? The Father is unipersonal. He
does not possess multiple personalities. He's not schizophrenic. He's
not psychotic. He doesn't have multiple personality
disorders. The Father is the Father. The
son is unipersonal and that is he is singularly a person called
the son of the living God. And likewise, the spirit of God
is unipersonal. So when we deal with the persons
of the Godhead, we are dealing with them on an individual level
as unipersonal, but collectively they are what? Tri-personal. The God of the Bible is a tri-personal
And that's the concept that you have to grasp in terms of language
and genre. He is a tri-personal being. Tri-personal being. Personal
in that there are three of them and yet there is one being. Personal,
tri-personal. And therefore because he is a
tripersonal being God actually operates or exists or functions
within what has been discovered in scriptures as a community
because they are a tripersonal being they function within a
Community you cannot have a community with one person the very word
itself communion means to have two people in union and to have
a community requires at least two. And therefore, because God
is concretely three persons, they dwell and exist or function
within what we call community among themselves. That community
is the being of God. And that being is singularly,
singularly God who exists within a tripersonal relationship interrelational
interrelationship which we call community and so we look at our
first point if we are observing our outline he is the third person
that is the Spirit of God he is the third person of what we
call the triune God you guys see that term try you Well, that
is a contracted phrase that we extract theologically when we
gather all the information from scripture that underscores the
tri-unity of the three. The three are individuals, but
they are a unit and they express themselves in perfect unity. So when you hear the term triune,
that's a contraction of the term triunity, the triunity of God. And of course, Matthew chapter
28, 19 and 20, you don't have to go there. is one of the verses
that the Master gave the early church, that once the church
starts developing and we are teaching and discipling people,
and men and women are brought into the faith by the ceremonial
and symbolic means of baptism, we are taught in Matthew 28,
19, and 20 that we are to baptize them into the name of the Father,
Son, and Holy Spirit. All three persons are to be taught
to every believer rightly represented in the scriptures so that believers
recognize, understand, believe, and commit themselves to the
tri-personality of God. He is the third person, that
is the Spirit of God. When we use the term third person,
It is because largely in the scriptures, his functional role
is that of the third person. That's why Jesus, when he gave
the formula in Matthews 28, 19 and 20, he says, baptizing them
in the name, not of the spirit, the son and the father, or the
spirit, the father and the son, but the father, the son and whom? Right. So there is an order to
these triune persons, father, son, and spirit. And when you
begin to see their work in the scriptures, you will see this
order largely kept intact. Now that there is an order does
not bring into question their equality of nature or equality
of essence. It simply means in their functional
relationships, like we all have functional relationships, you
will discover that the third person plays that role of service
to the second and the first. to the second being the son to
the first being the father you will see that that formula that
structure running all through scripture and that's why Jesus
gave the formula to the disciples baptizing them that is immersing
men and women into the doctrine of the gospel wherein God is
revealed in his proper character through the scripture as father
son and holy spirit and as I said there are each individuals They
are each persons and because they are persons, personal beings,
they have individuality. They also have what is called
self-referencing consciousness. When you are a person functioning
in all your faculties, you are aware of your own individuality. When you are a person, you are
not only aware of your own individuality, this is the egoimi of the scriptures,
I am who? Jesse. You are who? Such and
such. When you are a person, you possess
what we call referencing or indexing of self. You are aware of who
you are, which means you are also aware of who you are not. and therefore there is a subject-object
relationship with persons that are acknowledged because every
other person outside of you is not you. You are you and they
are them. I am stressing this because of
the lack soundness in reason and ration and talk especially
among Christians about the things of God when we talk about a person
we're talking about an individual who has what is called indexing
ability the ability to be aware of themselves and therefore be
aware of other so an individual will never say I am him but rather
I am what me First person singular. See, I am me. I am me. And so I am not saying that I
am someone else, because if I say I am someone else, then I am
saying that I am not myself. And so it's very important to
understand this idea of self-referencing. And so what the Bible underscores
is the tetragrammaton of God. God recognizes his own individuality. I am that I am. So the father
knows himself, the son knows himself, and the spirit of God
knows himself. Now, if they were all three one
person, they could not make that individual claim of indexation. Are you guys hearing what I'm
saying? If the father were the son, he could not say he was
the father. If the father were the spirit,
he could not say he was the father. He would have to acknowledge
that he's the spirit. And so because they are all three distinct
persons, they are able to say, I am the father. I am the son. I am what? And so we read in
Acts chapter 13, verse two, and the spirit of God said, separate
me Barnabas and Saul for the work where unto what I have called
them. This is a specific work on the
part of the spirit of God who is uniquely acknowledging his
own personal volition in the act that he's about to engage
in. He's not saying separate them unto Christ or separate
them unto the father, separate them unto me. So there's a sense
in which the spirit of God, because he is a person is aware of him.
What's himself. I'm laying this foundation down
so that you guys can be very clear of it. Again, on the point
number one, as a person, he speaks to others. Is that true? As a
person, he speaks to others. If he were a mere force, some
type of bland, non-personal entity, he could not have an intellectual
conversation with other human beings. The wind blows, but the
wind does not talk to you. Unless, of course, you live near
John George. The wind blows, but the wind
does not talk to you because the wind is non-personal. Are you guys following me so
far? So while the Bible teaches metaphors and analogies of the
characteristics and functions of the Spirit of God, those analogies
and metaphors are never to be taken as his essential essence. So when we talk about the power
of the Spirit of God, the fire of the Spirit of God, the wind
of the Spirit of God, the water of the Spirit of God, we are
talking about attributes and characteristics that describe
His function, not His person. Are you guys following me? This
is very critical for you to understand when it comes to rightly dividing
the word. As a person, he speaks to others,
Acts chapter 13, to separate me, separate unto me Barnabas
and Saul for the work whereunto I've called them. That was a
specific revelation and a specific imperative given to two specific
men. They received that revelation
either in a dream or in a vision or in some form of a manifestation. It was an explicit, articulate
expression of a command from God, the Holy Spirit to them. Am I making some sense? All right,
so we'll go on. Point number two under our first
heading, he is the third person of the triune God. Moreover,
his disposition, his disposition, his fundamental characteristic
and his function is not to what glorify himself further. However, to he further affirms
his individual. I'm sorry. Moreover, his disposition
not to glorify himself further affirms his individuality. Now, how do I argue that through?
If you will go to your Bibles, go in your Bibles to John 16,
13 through 15, where Christ speaks about the role of the spirit
of God And he says that there are things that the Spirit of
God will do, and there are things that he will not do. And within
the framework of what he will and will not do, we will see
something that's important to our reflection and contemplation
of the Spirit of God. Jesus says in verse 13 of John
16, how be it when he, do you guys see that? Third person singular,
when he, the spirit of truth is calm, he, there it is again,
third person singular, will guide you into all truth for he, third
person singular, shall not speak of himself. You see that phraseology? So now watch this. Besides getting
into the function, because I'm going to talk about that tonight,
what we see in this verse is the second person describing
the personality and disposition of the third person. He is letting
us, who are serious Bible believers, know that there are things about
the Spirit of God you can expect Him not to do. Do you hear me? He's letting us know that there
are things about the Spirit of God you can expect Him not to
do. What is one of the things that you can expect Him not to
do? Focus on Himself. Boast of Himself. make himself
the primary object of revelation and discourse and talk. The spirit
of God has always taken a role within the framework of the community
of being a servant to the son and the father. The spirit of
God has always taken a role in the community of the three of
being a servant to the son and to the father. What that means
is he has a disposition of not saying, you know what? I want
some credit. I want people to talk about me.
I want people to notice me. I want people to be enamored
with me. Christ said specifically he will not do that. Now, ladies
and gentlemen, I'm going to show you as we get into our outline,
which you have in your hands, that that will mean that unless
you are sensitive to the functional aspects of what the Spirit of
God does, you will have a hard time seeing the Spirit of God
in the scriptures. Because the Spirit of God is
a servant and does not take a prerogative role of glorifying himself, emanating
out or protruding in the scriptures in a fashion by which we are
stuck on him, you will have those occasions where you will raise
the question, where is the spirit of God? The reason you are raising
that question is, is because he does not take a disposition
of showing his person in the text, but rather his function. Are you guys following me so
far? And I'll open that up a little bit more as we go into the text. By the way, as I made the observation
that this tripersonal being called God operates within community,
that community of the three persons is revealed to us in the scriptures
so fully that it models for us as human beings made in his image
as to how we are to act with one another. The tri-personal
being of God functioning within themselves as a community is
revealed in scripture in such a prolific way as to model for
us how we are to act with one another. It is for this reason
he said, let us make men in our image. That's Genesis 1, 26,
where we get one of the first inter-conversational revelations
of the three persons talking about what they want to do. Are
you guys following me so far? And he has given mankind the
responsibility of not only ascertaining from a relationship with God,
his character on a personal level, each individual, but then collectively
how they interact and how they work together, how they commune
together, how they fellowship, how they work through issues
together, how they designate roles together, how they get
the job done together. And here the spirit of God as
the third person has taken on the role of being a servant to
the son and to the father, which gives him apparently a diminished
position, which diminished position is a calling to us a virtue. In other words, you and I are
called to be like the spirit of God in that we take on the
role of a servant. And until you and I are able
to occupy the office of a servant, we have not grasped the revelation
of God in any practical sense. And so that's one of the roles
in which the spirit of God has come to demonstrate for us that
while he possesses the dignity and the authority and the power
and the dominion and the eternality of all of the attributes and
predicates of God, He functions consistently in a role of servanthood
so that he can model for us what it means to be part of the family. This is why what Jesus said to
us in the gospel is that if you want to be great, be servant
of all. Isn't that right? You want to be great be servant
of all I'm laying a foundation So I state that his disposition
not to glorify himself further affirms his individuality Because
the son is going to be glorified, isn't he? And the father is going
to be glorified. Are they not the bible? vividly
expresses the revelation of the father through the son And the
Bible vividly expresses the revelation of the Son through the Spirit
and by the Father. Most of us know the Father and
the Son in a much more comprehensive and biblically informed way.
We are a little bit short on knowing the person of the Spirit
and that's by design. Are you hearing what I'm saying?
That's by design but you and I are going to learn some things
about the spirit of god tonight I hope that will enrich your
sensitivity to His functional role in your life in mine so
um point number three as a servant he serves to accomplish The will
of both the father and the son you guys believe that as a servant
He serves to accomplish the will of both the father and the son
again, that's going to be richly developed But look at what jesus
said about him in verse 13 through 15 of john chapter 16 When the
spirit of truth has come he will guide you into all truth For
he shall not speak of himself, but whatever he shall hear that
shall he what? See that's the role of a servant.
Isn't it? A servant does not speak from his own prerogative
from his own volition out of his own mind To say what he feels
and you know how we go. I feel you know how we do that
That's because you and I are autonomous little kings and queens
And we have the freedom to say how we feel and how we think
and what we want And all of that, but when you are a servant and
you have a master You have no right to open your mouth except
in respect to the will of your master the role therefore of
the spirit of god is to not not exhibit his own volition but
to augment and to affirm and to apply augment affirm and apply
the will of the Son and the will of the Father as you and I will
here see he is the impeccable servant notice what he says not
only will he not speak of himself or from himself but But whatever
he shall hear that shall he speak and he will show you things to
come So one of the roles of the Spirit of God grasp this One
of the roles of the Spirit of God is to reveal One of his primary
roles is that of revelation So people often ask me when they're
reading their Bibles. I see the father and I see the
son But where's the spirit and then I go do you see the father?
Yes, I Do you see the son? Yes. Then there's the spirit. Did you guys get what I just
said? Because you could never see the father, nor could you
ever see the son if it wasn't for the spirit pulling the curtains
back. His job is to pull the curtains back. Do you see the
son? Then the spirit is present. Do
you see the father? Then the spirit is present because
you cannot see without the spirit. Am I making some sense? And so
this is what he means. He will show you things to come. Verse 14. He shall glorify me. Do you see then that the primary
objective of the Spirit of God is to magnify the person of the
son? For he shall receive of mine
and show it to you. In our class, brethren, on the
role of the triune persons, you even see here the subject-object
relationship between the Son and the Spirit, right? That the
Spirit of God is bestowing upon, I mean, the Son of God is bestowing
upon the Spirit of God certain things concerning himself of
which the Spirit of God now is obligated willingly to execute. The Son says, I will give these
things to him and he will show you those things that are mine.
This then, once again, calls our attention to the interpersonal
relationship of the three persons. You guys see that? Now watch
this. He shall glorify me, for he shall
receive of mine and shall show it unto you. Verse 15, all things
that the father hath are mine. That's a subject-object relationship,
right? All things, that's content, that the father, person, hath
are mine, person, son. So now we're talking about two
persons, relating to things, all things that the father hath
of mine. Therefore said I, that he shall take of mine and show
it to you. Logic or syllogistic reasoning
would say, the things that the son gives to the spirit are the
things that the father hath given to the son. So you see this continual
interrelationship between the three persons operating for the
purpose of revelation. The immediate revelator is the
spirit of God. The central revelation is the
son of God. The source of the revelation
is the father. You guys got that? The immediate revelator is the
spirit of God. The central revelation is the
son. The source of that revelation
is the father. This is why Paul called him the
father, the father of our Lord Jesus Christ, giving unto you
the spirit of revelation and knowledge and the wisdom of God.
So all things come from the who? Father. You guys are following
me now good all things that are all things that the father hath
are mine Therefore said I that he shall take of mine and show
it unto you Verse 16 a little while and you shall not see me
and again a little while and you shall what see me Because
I go to the father. Do you understand the verse 16
wasn't? Describing Jesus coming back twice to the disciples he
was talking about his departure from them after his resurrection
and and his revelation to them in his post-resurrected, exalted
state through the ministry of the Spirit. Are you guys hearing
me? We're going to see this as we
work through the functional roles of the Spirit of God. So now
let me make this comment as we get ready to go to our next PowerPoint,
because this is going to be in your outline now. There are over
130 references in the Scriptures. Over 130 references in the Scriptures referring to the function of
the Spirit of God, his role and his acts. Now, 130 plus scriptural
references, everything from his role in creation, to his role
in the new creation, to his role in sustaining the creation, to
his role in bringing about revelation. The Spirit of God is eminently
involved in all aspects of revelation. And what I want to press home
tonight for you is enough of an understanding of the extent
to which the Spirit of God is involved in every aspect of the
things that are, so that you don't have to ask the question
in the future, where's the Spirit of God? Okay, so now when I say,
I didn't start that yet, I didn't say, so when I say 130 references
to the functioning of the Spirit of God in scripture, we are talking
about a vast study. What I want to do is break it
down into a few categories that I hope we can get through today.
So in your outline, you'll notice that I'm going to deal with the
Spirit of God's role, His immediacy of role in an alphabetical order. You guys see that? Because it's
just practical. So let's see how well you have
done in government school. All right, so for those of you
who have been part of my Greek class, how many letters in the
Greek alphabet? How many? 22? How many letters
in the Hebrew alphabet? 20 what? How many letters in the Greek
alphabet? How many letters in the English alphabet? There we
go. You were in our Greek class?
Okay, he was in a couple of them. In the English alphabet, how
many alphabets are there? 26, right? There used to be 27,
now there's 26. So what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna
just keep it sort of orderly as we go through the alphabets,
show you the functional role of the Spirit of God. This will
be a blessing to you. Keep your outline, that way you
can talk to people about it. So the first term that I'm gonna
use in the scriptures is the term abide. The role of the Spirit
of God And everything that God, the Father, God, the Son, and
God, the Holy Spirit does, his role is largely to abide. And
the term abide means to be present, to remain in order to impact. To be present, to remain in order
to impact. So he abides. That's John chapter
14, verse 16, not verse 6. John chapter 14 verse 16 and
verse 17. I want you to hear how Jesus
describes it in John chapter 14 verse 16 and 17 about the
abiding work of the Spirit of God. I'm in verse 16 of chapter
14. And I will pray the Father and
he shall give you another comforter that he may what? Abide with
who? You. How long? This is what I
meant by the idea of abiding and remaining for the purpose
of functioning. The Spirit of God largely abides
and remains in order to cause the thing or the object or the
objects upon which it abides and remains to function. Watch
this. The moment that the Spirit of
God is taken away from the world, everything perishes. He is the immediate life of everything
that exists. You guys follow what I said?
If you need a Bible verse, read it for yourself in Psalm 102,
Psalm 104. It clearly speaks to the role
of the spirit in actually producing life and sustaining life. And
when the spirit is removed, it all goes away. That's why as
a metaphor, as a sort of analogy, when you die, what happens to
your spirit? It goes away. Once the spirit
is removed death takes place. So life and the sustenance of
life is a consequence of the abiding sustaining presence of
the spirit of God look at verse 17 notice what verse 17 says
in verse 17 even the spirit of truth whom the world cannot see
Cannot see because it seeth him not neither knoweth him but you
know him for he dwelleth with you and Shall be what in you
and so the word dwelleth there is the same idea of abiding He
dwells and abides with and in you that's a critical Key to
understanding why you and I have a part in the kingdom of God
Why do we have a part in the kingdom of God because of the
presence of the Spirit of God? I'll drive that home even more
critically here down the line. Let's continue working through
the functional aspects of the Spirit of God. So He abides.
He abides for the purpose of sustaining. He abides for the
purpose of maintaining. He abides for the purpose of
access. He abides for the purpose of
anointing. And He abides for the purpose of assurance. I give
those three basic sort of characteristics Aspects of his work in your outline
for you in the redemptive sense without the Spirit of God. You
don't have access to God Without the Spirit of God you have no
relationship with God which requires anointing Without the Spirit
of God you have no sustained assurance of your sonship Without
the Spirit of God you have no access to God We all have access
by one spirit to the father. Not what the Bible says The spirit
grants us access. Without the spirit of God, you
don't have a relationship with God because in order to relate
to a holy God, you have to be made holy too. So he has to anoint
you. By the way, why we call ourselves
Christians is because we believe that we are anointed. The word
Christian has its roots in the word Christ, which is the word
for anointing. In the Hebrew, the Hebrew equivalent
is Masah, from which we get the term Messiah. Messiah is the
anointed one. Every Christian is a little anointed
one. What do we mean by that? That
there is a dynamic of the Spirit of God who qualifies you to have
access to the Father by virtue of his abiding presence with
you and in you. And it's the spirit of God that
sustains your assurance of sonship while you walk with him Are you
guys following what I'm saying? It is the spirit that bears record
with our spirit that we are sons and daughters of God Do you see
how important his presence is even under the first alphabet?
Alphabet number two he baptizes It's the spirit that baptizes.
Is that true? This is what John the Baptist plainly said in Luke
3 16, I baptize you with water, but there's one coming who will
baptize you with the Holy Ghost and with fire. And so the Spirit
of God has a role in the baptizing of the people of God are immersing
the people of God into the reality of God. There is no reality of
the father no reality of the son except by the work of the
spirit of god Are you guys hearing what i'm saying? So like there
are some people who are present probably outside of the kingdom
of god here in this room And so long as you are outside all
the things that I am talking about are simply speculative
pieces of information Until you are actually born again and baptized
into the body of Christ, brought into the body of Christ, to be
part of the body of Christ, what I am saying to you is non-experiential
propositional truth. Are you hearing me? Non-experiential
propositional truth. You may grasp some of what I'm
saying intellectually, but on an experiential level, you don't
know in the spirit what it means to be washed into the kingdom.
to be initiated into the kingdom by the dynamic of the Spirit
of God taking your filthy soul out of the dunghill of sin, washing
you into the kingdom of God by a new birth that makes you part
of the family of God. That's what I mean by baptized.
And that is first Corinthians chapter 12 verse 13. It's a symbol
of giving birth and entrance into the kingdom of God. Do you
see that? It's a symbol of giving birth and entrance into the kingdom
of God. The first thing we do with babies
when they are born is what? Wash them. Wash them. And so the analogy of washing
is pervasive in the scriptures, signifying the work of the spirit
of God, bringing newborn babes into the kingdom of God. Thirdly,
the spirit of God casts out demons. You might think that that's sort
of a ancillary point, but in relationship to the presence
of the Spirit of God, the abiding of the Spirit of God, and the
baptizing of the Spirit of God, his role in actually producing,
as we'll see down the line through other alphabets, in producing
the kingdom, he also has to protect the kingdom. His role in producing
the kingdom requires him to protect the kingdom. If he brings people
into the kingdom and the kingdom has the capacity to be invaded
by non-entities, unlawful entities, his role is to remove those non-lawful
entities. Are you hearing me? So he brings
entities in and he takes entities out. That's his role. You better
appreciate him for that. Our master said in Matthew chapter
12, Verse 28 don't go there But now if I cast out devils by the
Spirit of God, you can be sure the kingdom of God has come near
you One of the roles therefore then of the Spirit of God is
to serve as a serious Sentry for the security of the souls
who have been brought into the kingdom Are you hearing what
I'm saying for other reasons as well? I? D. So we've done
A, we've done B, we've done C. He abides, he baptizes, he casts
out demons. It's the process of purifying
and protecting the what? That's right. It's the process
of purifying and protecting the kingdom. D. The Spirit of God
is the essential means of discernment in the kingdom of God. The spirit
of God is the essential and effectual means of discernment in the kingdom
of God. Men and women do not know right
from wrong by nature. We cannot comprehend the complexity
of spiritual dimensions by human nature. We cannot see, understand,
or perceive the maniacal deceptive works of the wicked one by nature. Without the discerning work of
the Spirit of God, we cannot have the advantage over our adversary. Am I making some sense? He actually
gives discernment. He gives discernment. So Acts
chapter 15 verse 28, that's just one. Acts chapter 15 verse 28,
take a look at it. When I say gives discernment,
he is there to illumine the believer and grant them the gift of discernment
so that they can pick up on the errors. The good and the bad.
This is a phrase that we're going to take up a couple of times
in Acts 15. But here's what the apostles in their working through
how the church is gonna function in terms of the relationship
between Jews and Gentiles. We read over in verse 25, these
words in Acts 15, it seemed good unto me, it seemed good unto
us being assembled with one accord to send chosen men unto you with
our beloved Barnabas and Paul. This is when they were trying
to work through what's going on with the Gentiles. Men that
have hazarded their lives for the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. That's what it means to be an
apostle. It means to hazard your life. It doesn't mean to build
a big mansion and body of wealth and engorge yourself in all sorts
of materialism. An apostle is one who hazards
his life for the cause of Christ. You guys see that? All right,
let me go on. So here it is, verse 27, we have sent therefore
Judas and Silas who shall also tell you the same things by mouth.
What happened in Acts chapter 15 was a full counsel as to how
to define the gospel and how to function in the gospel as
the church of God. And we read now over in verse
28, Watch this for it seemed good to the Holy Ghost You guys
see that and to us it seemed good. What do you mean the Holy
Spirit approves and disapproves Of what we think and what we
do so as to guide us into the will of God I'm gonna say it
again. The role of the Holy Spirit is
to approve and Disapprove of what we think and what we do
so as to guide us into the will of God We'll say that one more
time now that you can go to first Corinthians chapter 13 are 12
and in first Corinthians chapter 12 You will see the specific
gift of discernment there as part of a litany of gifts that
the spirit gives But I'm just gonna say this in general no
true believer Who has the Spirit of God within them is a non discerning
believer? All believers are discerning
believers at some level. And as we go deeper into the
role and function of the spirit of God, you will see why that
must be the case. So when we say that the spirit
of God is the essential means of discernment is because of
his deeply involved role in our lives to get us where he has
been assigned to take us. And in that process, discernment
is critical. Are you hearing me, ladies and
gentlemen? Very important for you to know. For it seemed good
to the Holy Ghost. If it wasn't good to the Holy Ghost, they
wouldn't be able to conclude that it's right. It seemed good
to the Holy Ghost and to us, that's the apostles, which means
the apostles walked in the Spirit and therefore submitted themselves
to the impact and influence of the Spirit of God when they collaborated
as to what was biblical truth and how we were to walk in it.
This is why Paul can say in Romans chapter eight, that if we are
born of the spirit, we will then walk in the spirit. And to walk
in the spirit is to be sensitive to his authority in our lives,
so as to receive the discernment necessary for us to advance in
the will of God. You and I cannot do the will
of God in the flesh. We cannot know the will of God
nor advance in the will of God with a carnal mind. That's why
a lot of people do not make any kind of progress in the gospel
because they don't know what it means to submit to the authority
of the Spirit of God. Are you guys hearing me? Very
important for it seemed good to the Holy Ghost and to us to
lay no greater burden upon you than these things that are necessary.
Why? Because the Spirit of God is infinitely, infinitely involved
and infinitely attached to and infinitely interested in your
total eternal welfare. Going back to our outline. So
now we recognize that his work is to abide, his work is to baptize,
his work is to cast out demons, his work is to give the believers
discernment. So we say critical assessment
skills to believers for the work that they have to do. Critical
assessment skills. How many of you have been in
the faith 10 years? Okay, 10 years. Okay. So from the day
that God actually converted you to this moment here, haven't
you learned some things about right and wrong? Didn't you have
some real bad assumptions about who God was and how he worked
and how the church was and how the spirit of God had to execute
his office of teaching you and guiding you and instructing you
and reproving you and admonishing you? Is that true? This is how
you build discernment. You cannot know without having
an involved relationship with the spirit of God, the will of
God. This is a critical truth to grasp. And in fact, if you're going
to enjoy your walk with God, you have to grow in discernment
because discernment is equivalent to both knowledge and light.
Now, ladies and gentlemen, it is not fun walking around in
the dark. particularly when there are all
kinds of obstacles in the way into which not only you can run,
but you will run into them. And life is difficult when you
are walking in the dark, running into things you cannot see. Is
that true? Right. And so because we have
been translated, Colossians chapter one, out of the kingdom of darkness
into the kingdom of light, you and I are walking in the light. to the degree that we are submitting
to and recognizing and yielding to this involved work of the
Spirit of God for which he has been sent. The fifth thing is
the Spirit of God edifies. If you don't know the word edification,
it means to build up, to build up. It's a technical term for
taking material and building an edifice. That's why we call
it an edifice. And the role of the Spirit of
God, according to Ephesians 2.22, is to take every believer and
place them in the kingdom of God. We are a living, a house
of living stones placed by the Spirit of God into the kingdom.
That's 1 Peter. But Ephesians 2.22, listen to
what it says. Ephesians 2.22, the role of the
Spirit of God in His involved engagement in the work of the
kingdom of God, his essential, non-negotiable, necessary work
in the life of every believer to bring about a realization
of what Christ has accomplished for us is given to us in verse
22, in whom you also are builded together. Do you see that? You
also are builded together for inhabitation of God through the
what? Amazing. You see that the role of the
Holy Ghost is to build a house for the Father. That's verse
22, in whom all the building fitly framed together grows. Fitly framed together grows. It starts back at verse 18, where
we have access into the kingdom by the Spirit. What does he do?
He takes us and fitly joins us together so that we have a growing
body. Now, this is not primarily individual
edification. This is primarily collective
edification. Let me see if I can make you
understand that because we are so narcissistic. We really think
that the kingdom of God is us individually. No, it's not. One
individual in the church doesn't get a whole lot done because
that would be contrary to the analogy of who the three persons
are. Remember the three persons are community. and they function
as community, don't they? And they interact in a loving,
subordinate, cooperative, concurrent fashion to achieve the goals
they want. That metaphor, that analogy of
who they are and their function is transferred to us in the church
as well. So that when believers think
of themselves as themselves individually being the church, they are only
partially right. And they are so only partially
right that they're mostly wrong. But when you don't have a comprehensive
understanding of the revelation of God's glory and the person
of Christ and the body of Christ, which makes up the church, then
you don't see how God has purpose to make you and I a part of a
whole. And that insofar as you and I
engage in the whole, our part then is always in jeopardy. Until
we are committed to the engagement in the whole, our part is in
jeopardy. No one member of the body, that's
the admonition of 1 Corinthians chapter 12. No one member of
the body can make the body function as it's designed to function.
Is that true? I'll show you how this works
just in case you still don't get it. The son of God came to
model for us what it meant to be a child of God. Did he not? He was the quintessential son
of man. He came in full and total dependence
and compliance upon his father. Did he not? I always do those
things that he tells me to do. We've already learned that he
says he can do nothing of himself. But what his father says and
what his father does, that he does. Not only does he say that
he reflects what his father does so that he doesn't operate independently
on his own, but his father is the one assisting him in doing
the work. Not only is the father assisting
the son in doing the work so that the son is cooperating with
the father in the work because they are community, but the father
sent the spirit so that the son could do the work that he did
In the his manifestation as messiah as you guys remember he did not
start his ministry until the father sent the third person
So that all three persons are operating together in the work
of the son What is that that's community? And when jesus says
this is how i'm going to build my church My church will be built
on the listen inner dependence of each member in the body Recognizing
the larger objective of the work of the triune god You guys hear
what i'm saying? Very important to know this.
And so going back to our PowerPoint, so going back, I wanna try to
get through, I've got a little time, I wanna get through our
points. I need you to go, okay, here
we go. Back to edification. Ephesians 2.22 says, the work
of placing every member in what? Function or what? I'm gonna say
that one time. One more time. The role of the
spirit of God is to place you. He doesn't just open the door,
let you run into the kingdom. Choose where you want to hang
out You have added go be what you want to be in the kingdom
because this is not Babylon. This is Jerusalem Now Babylon
is the city of confusion But Jerusalem is the city of peace
and righteousness Are you guys hearing what I'm saying in order
to have peace and righteousness? You got to have order. I You
gotta have purpose. You gotta have a place. You gotta
have a role. You gotta have a designation.
The best thing you can ask God is to show you what he has made
you to do. That's the best thing you can
do. You know, folks coming in wanting
to take positions. Well, that's not your role. Your
role is not to come in and say, Lord, I want to do this. Your
role is to come in and say, Lord, what do you want me to do? Are you hearing me? You will
never be happy in Jesus ever until you are doing only what
God has ordained for you to do. You will never be happy in Jesus.
Other thing is, as we get ready to move to the rest of our categories,
you will never be happy in Jesus until you are actually doing
what God has called you to do. All right, let's go to another
set of vocabularies. So we are now at the apps. What
does he do? He feels. You guys see that?
So not only does he abide, not only does he baptize, cast out
demons, discerns, edifies, but he feels. This again is this
dynamic word that Paul uses in the New Testament, pleruo or
pleroma. And the idea of filling, I want
you to see the definition, means to supply the believer with energy
to work. To supply the believer with energy
to work. This is amazing. This is amazing. So now he comes hunt you down. We're going to see that in some
of the other vocabulary. And he brings you in. He gives
you your assignment. We just saw that. And he fills
you or equips you to do what he has called you to do. This
is why Paul talks constantly about the filling of the spirit
of God. So I quote Acts chapter 5 verse
31 Acts chapter 5 verse 31 where Peter is praying And he's asking
God to help the believers to stand in the face of persecution
Let me see, let me go back there maybe it's Acts 4 I'm thinking
it's Acts 4 Yep, it's Acts chapter four.
Acts chapter four, verse 31. And when they had prayed, the
place was shaken where they were assembled. Do you remember that
prayer that Peter prayed? After him and John and James, where
James had come out of prison, where they had been beaten by
the rulers. And here's what he says. And
when they had prayed, the place was shaken together where they
assembled. And they were all what? Filled with the Holy Ghost.
And they spake the word of God with what? That's right. So we
see that dynamic in the book of Acts several times in sort
of a visible Manifestation of this functional role of the spirit.
You know what? That means that means when you have an assignment
You ought to pray to God to fill you up to qualify you to execute
that assignment What that means is you don't want to act not
like God. I And what I mean by that is,
is if you understand now that the three persons are functioning
as community and they are voluntarily interdependent among themselves,
the son will never do anything of his own prerogative without
the strength of the father and the strength of the spirit. Am
I making some sense? If that's true for the impeccable
son of God, how much more so for you and me? So when we talk
about the filling of the spirit, we are talking about now the
advancement of his involved work and interest in your life. He
came and got you. He brought you in. He abides
with you. He gives you discernment. He
edifies you. Now he's filling you up to qualify
you to do what you've got to do. I think he's important in
our life, don't you? Going back to our PowerPoint,
going back to our PowerPoint. Oh, no, no, no. Yeah, you know,
you can stay there. I want to look at a couple of other verses.
So in Acts chapter 531, we see it illustrated where the Spirit
of God enters into the lives of the believers and gives them
boldness to share the gospel, right? Right, because the ultimate
objective of the life of every Christian is to share the gospel. Now watch this, now watch this.
I want you to hear this now. God may make you successful on
a lot of levels and a lot of practical and pragmatic things
in your life. But your soul will never be satisfied if those practical
things are not directly connected to the ultimate work to which
God has called you. No child of God would be satisfied
with gaining the whole world and watching the world be lost
because he or she was not directly involved in the preaching and
the success of the gospel. You are not a happy christian
Because you've got a lot of money in the bank. You are not a happy
christian because you're living large No christian is happy That
is not discerningly And cognitively aware that god is using them
No christian is happy who senses that god is not using them in
the sense of the kingdom of god Are you hearing what i'm saying?
You will meet christians who will practice spiritual fornication
and spiritual harlotry and spiritual idolatry, going after wealth.
And they will give you a facade that they're happy. But if you
can get them by themselves, you will discover that they are not
happy at all. Because no amount of money, no amount of prestige,
no amount of power, no amount of influence, no amount of accolades
on the part of the world can substitute a sense of the nearness
of God and the grace and power of God working in your life to
do supernatural things of which you cannot do of your own impacting
other eternity-bound souls. Are you hearing me? No amount
of success in the world This is why when many women have become
believers in times past having acquired great wealth They were
more than willing to walk away from the well Because it was
empty in terms of its ability to give them the satisfaction
that only God can give You're hearing me very important Very
important. I'm talking about the work of
the Spirit of God. His work, which we are briefly and partially
contemplating in alphabetical order. So under the fifth point,
Ephesians chapter 5, verse 18 tells us, and the emphasis in
the Greek is, continue to be filled with the Holy Ghost. Continue
to be filled with the Holy Spirit. Is that what it says? Absolutely. You read it on your own. Remember
what he says, do not be drunk with wine, but be filled with
the Spirit. It's a present indicative verb
form which means that you and I ought to have a practice of
life that engages Our soul with the Spirit of God so that the
filling is something that doesn't happen once a year Are you hearing
me? That's right. In fact As we're
gonna work through the book of Romans and understand the necessity
of our union with Christ Let me see if I can put it in a better
way the radical necessity the radical necessity of our union
with Christ and press home the dire importance of our union
with Christ, we will discover that we cannot accomplish a thing
without him. Are you guys hearing me? We will
discover nothing will get done without the presence of the spirit
of God filling us and qualifying us and strengthening us to do
what we are called to do. It won't happen. You can sit
around for years and simply be idle because you have not discovered
that your role is to recognize your identity with Christ and
to understand that in the same manner in which Christ walked
by the Spirit, depended upon the Spirit, lived in the Spirit,
served in the Spirit. So we must too. So we must too. And what that's going to do is
test your knowledge and also test your love. Am I making some
sense? He feels us. Philippians chapter
one, verse 19, the supplying of the believer with energy to
work. I want you to see one text. This text gives us more of a
graphic expression of the term. Sometimes the word feel can evade
us, but listen to what Philippians chapter one, verse 19 says, just
to help you with that. So that you see sort of an analogy
of this idea of the outpouring and infusion of the spirit of
God. Philippians chapter one, Verse
19. Are we there? Listen to what
it says. For I know this is the apostle Paul talking about talking
to the church that he knew loved and supported him until he died.
He says, for I know that this shall turn to my salvation. What
was he talking about? Being persecuted for the gospel
sake while in prison. He says, for I know that this
shall turn to my salvation through your what? Through your what?
Stop. See the inner connection? You
see the interdependence of every member of the body? So the apostle
Paul is a spearhead preacher breaking through territory and
regions that blows our minds. So God can trust him to throw
him in the midst of a jail cell and knows that he's going to
open his mouth and preach the gospel to every living soul in
that jail cell. That Paul is not going to sit
around and go, woe is me because I'm in change. Woe is me because
I'm in bondage. Woe is me because I'm not this,
that, or the other thing. He is so completely committed
to what he's telling us. Christ in you, the hope of glory.
He's so committed to the cause of the glory of God that he does
not allow his circumstances to be viewed as an obstacle of that
work. But it does not get done exclusively
by Paul. He never viewed the success of
his ministry as the consequence of him being some uniquely powerful,
strong, zealous individual. We put all that on Paul. We put
all that on Paul. Did you hear that? We made Paul
out to be a super Christian. No, we do that. Oh man, Paul's
this, Paul's that, Paul's the other thing. You better say what
Paul said. I am only what I am by the grace
of God. Is that what he said? I am only
what I am by the grace of God. By the grace of God do I do what
I do. By the grace of God, do I excel
all others? By the grace of God working in
me, do I accomplish the things that I accomplish? And he accomplished
a lot, but he knew that it was the collective work of the kingdom
of God, the presence and power of the spirit supplied to him,
supplied to him through the prayers of his brother. Is that what
the text is? Through the prayers of his brother.
So you ask yourself, if the apostle Paul depended
upon you to turn the faucet on so that the Holy Ghost could
be poured out in his life, in the midst of a prison with rebels,
would Paul be able to drink and be filled and go about the work
of preaching to every soul in that praetorium of Caesar's home
if he depended on you to pray for him. Do you see my point? Do you see my point about how
important it is for us? This is why when you hear me
pray, don't I always pray for the whole body of Christ? Do
I? For the whole body because it's
an interdependent work. It's essential for us to understand
what a privilege that God would use me to simply cut the faucet
on. Just cut the faucet on through
prayer. Are you guys hearing what I'm
saying? Lord, I don't know what your servant is doing over in
Afghanistan. I don't know what she's doing in China. I don't
know what they're doing in Africa. I don't know what they're doing in Central
America, but I'm gonna cut the faucet on spirit of God. Help
them. Somebody's gonna cut the faucet
on for me. And I'm knowing it because of the nature of the
effusion of the spirit of God, giving me the grace to do what
I do. I'm knowing somebody cut the faucet on. Are you hearing
me? This is what the apostle said, for I know that this shall
turn to my salvation through your prayer and the supply of
the spirit of Jesus Christ. Amazing. So he abides, he baptizes,
he casts out demons, he gives discernment, he edifies, he feels
or supplies the believer with energy to work. He also gathers. It's amazing. He gathers. Going back to our
PowerPoint. So we can work through this a
little bit more halfway through our alphabets, our quarter through.
He gathers. He not only feels, but he gathers. What do we mean by that? It's
the Spirit of God that is the essential power of hunting down
lost sinners. You and I, in our unsafe state,
are scattered abroad, throughout the world, lost. Is that true?
Scattered. He gathers. You know what Jesus
said in John chapter 6, verse 44? He says, No man can come
unto me, except my Father which hath sent me draw him. Do you
understand that? And Isaiah 34, 16, don't go there. It speaks of the spirit of God
bringing to pass all of prophetic testimony. And Ezekiel chapter
34 and 35 speaks of God's intentionality to hunt down every one of his
sheep. the mountains. I will both search for them and
seek them out, says God, and I will bring them back into the
fold. It's the role of the Spirit of
God through the ministry of the church to gather the saints into
the kingdom of God. The bringing the lost to Christ
through the what? The bringing the lost to Christ
through the what? And that's our text. Acts chapter
13 verse 2, separate Barnabas and Saul unto me for the word. to which I have called them to
do, right? So Paul and Barnabas cannot go unless they be sent,
right? And they're not gonna be sent
unless they're sent by the spirit of God who is going to abide
with them, anoint them, equip them, field them, prepare them
for the work that they need to do. They will see no conversions
if they go out there in a missionary task all by themselves. If you're
ever going out trying to witness the souls, hoping that God will
save one, and experienced the frustration of nobody even paying
any attention to you. You know what that's called?
You were out there by yourself. And the other thing is, watch
this now, you felt like it. You simply didn't have discernment
enough to know the difference between God being with you in
that work and God not being with you. So can I touch on that for just
a second, just for a hot second? It's a horrible, horrible thing. Anytime we try to do anything
for God in the flesh, it's horrible. The emptiness, the futility,
the powerlessness, the just debacle of the situation. The situation
is a debacle. Here you are talking about, Lord,
I'm going to witness to him. And your words fall all over
the place. and they look at you like you're crazy. And then they
might even begin to argue with you and advance their argument
over against your argument because you were in the flesh. You didn't
ask the Spirit of God to come with you, keep you, supply you,
prepare you, speak through you to bring that man to a knowledge
of the gospel, that woman to a knowledge of the gospel. You
were doing that in the flesh. Because you learned a few Bible
verses and somebody taught you how to how to give somebody the
Roman road to salvation. And you felt like you were alone
and you were sweating like a vacuum salesman. And you couldn't wait
to get that assignment over with because it was killing you. That's
right. It was miserable and burdensome. And as soon as you were freed
from that assignment, you were happy. because you were in the
flesh. Without me, you can do nothing. So the gathering in of lost sinners
is the work of the spirit of God in the life of the people
of God who are submitted to the spirit of God, having a right
gospel, but also a right heart of utter dependence upon the
spirit to not only lead them to the person, but open the door
and then give them utterance of speech. Didn't we learn that?
We have to pray for utterance of speech that we might proclaim
the gospel boldly and then not only do that We got to pray that
God gives them hearing ears and seeing eyes That God would open
their hearts like he opened Lydia's hearts that they would attend
to the things we're talking about That means that the whole of
a conversion of a sinner is the work of the Spirit of God. Are
you hearing me? This is very, very important.
That's why I'm bringing it up so that once we continue working
through the book of Acts and the Spirit of God backs up in
terms of his person in the background, you will see his function everywhere. That's what I want you to do.
So he feels, he gathers, he brings in the loss. He also helps. Isn't that good? Help. Child of God, do you need help?
Yeah, you do. I think my previous argument
substantiated that, right? But I want you to think about
that for a moment. I'm looking forward to when we get into Romans
chapter 8 in our series. We'll slow down again. In Romans
6, we are demanded to slow down because that's where we receive
our first imperative. I told you that. Commands didn't
come in the book of Romans until chapter 6, verse 11. He taught
us deeply the gospel. And then chapter 6, verse 11,
then he said, this is the way you are to think. Then he gave
us imperative. In Romans 8, he's going to tell
us, you need help. because of your sins and because
of your weaknesses. Do you understand that? You need
help. He supports the believer in the
ordained struggle of sin and what? That's right. In the ordained
struggle of sin and faith. He supports the believer in the
ordained struggle of what? Sin and faith. I love it. See, because you have this odd
couple called sin and faith coexisting within the framework of your
life experience. And that's on purpose. You have this odd couple
coexisting within the framework of your life experience on purpose. In fact, your faith is both affirmed
and strengthened by the presence of sin. He supports a believer in the
ordained struggle of sin and faith. See like if you don't
have faith sin completely rules over you It has absolute dominion
over you. This is what we're going to learn
over the next two weeks If you don't have faith sin has absolute
dominion over you because faith is informed by who Christ is
and what Christ did for us and who we are in Christ and And
once we know who we are in Christ, we have all of the resources
to be able to handle the assault of sin against our soul. Am I
making some sense? But sin is coming after you.
It's coming after you. It's coming after you. And God
has plainly said he shall not reign. But the only reason he
won't is because you take Christ seriously. Are you here? If you don't take Christ seriously,
you're gone. You're gone. He's gonna hogtie
you, bring you back into his camp, and pimp you until you're
done. That's what he's gonna do. Sin
is not planned. He's a hard task master, and
he loves wearing out sinners, and he loves dogging the saints
when they fail to take their identity in Christ seriously.
You want to play games and separate yourself from Jesus and think
you can do this on your own sin has a myriad of different faces
offices roles Schemes and plans and gins and traps and snares
sin will wait till you go to sleep to lay down the traps He
will lay traps for you in your sleep. He will catch you in the
depths of your sleep and your subconscious sin will be working
there to actually carve out a labor in to get you at the end of the
journey because you are walking all by yourself. Am I making
some sense? That's the goal of sin. And unless you take Christ
seriously, you cannot overcome sin. He supports the believer
in the ordained struggle of sin and faith. Romans chapter eight,
verse 26. You guys know that. The spirit
himself helpeth us with our infirmities. Isn't that what it says? The
spirit himself is there to help with our I love him. I love him
now watch it. He's not there to take nothing
away You know how you pray take it away And buddy don't go away
because he's not he's not there to take it away. He's he's there
to help you Walk away from it Is that good is that good Holy Spirit, Father, Lord Jesus,
just take it away. Just take it away. Just take
it away. No, no, no, I'm not taking it away. Because what
you're asking him to do is to get rid of your friend. And he doesn't get rid of your
friends. He just doesn't get your friends or your friends.
He's going to leave you with your friends. He'll help you
with your enemies, right? But they have to become your
enemies. So you're not going to play games with the Spirit
of God because he's omniscient. See, I haven't dealt with the
Spirit of God in terms of his divine attributes. I'm dealing
with him in terms of his function. If I were dealing with him in
terms of his divine attributes, you would know that the Spirit
of God is omnipotent. He's omniscient. He's everywhere
present. Is that true? Is that right?
He's immutable. He's unchangeable. He's inflexible. He is sovereign
God. So you can't lie to the Holy
Ghost. Well, you can, but that's not good. Based on what we've
already learned, that's not a good thing to do, is it? You might
find yourself in darkness because see he's not going to he's not
going to have lying believers In the camp I just want you to
know that like you're not going to be employed by the holy ghost
if you are Comfortable with lying to the holy ghost you might as
well call it a wrap this because you and it he's not gonna have
a relationship with you Why you lying to him? Because if you
can lie to God you lie to everybody else Do you hear me? so just
just Just you might as well settle this now. If you feel like you
can lie to the Holy Spirit, you probably don't have faith. And
that's what's going on in your life. You're deceiving yourself,
trying to deceive God. Nothing's going on. So when we
talk about help, his job is to support the believer in the ordained
struggle of sin and faith. When a man or woman believes
God and is assaulted by his adversaries, That man or woman is naturally
going to call on God. It's part of our nature. Lord,
help. Are you hearing me? Lord, help.
And then when he comes, he's going to assist you. That's what
the word helper means. He comes alongside of you over
against your struggle to help you get rid of your struggle
or walk away from your struggle. He's there to help you. You understand
that? Not to do it for you. To help
you. Because in helping you, He's
going to be showing you things about yourself. You understand
that? He's going to be showing you
things about yourself. And in the process of showing
you things about yourself, you're going to be educated in your
carnal nature, your sinful nature, your inclination to blaspheme
God, to walk away from God, your total weakness, the things of
God. He's gonna show you that you
have lied to yourself and what that's gonna do if you're a child
of God is drive you to prayer. It's gonna be a prayer of acknowledgement
and confession of how sinful and corrupt I am by nature. It's
gonna be a prayer of supplication and petitioning God for his mercy.
It's gonna be a prayer of humility where you take your place back
where you belong and acknowledge that without God I can do nothing.
Are you hearing me? That's what he does. And see,
for the believer, the reason why you and I have to walk humbly
before God is because anything outside of humility is not like
Christ. God always resists the proud. Are you hearing me? He always
resists the proud. This is very important for you
to grasp that this actually is dealing with the immediacy of
his presence in your life Am I making some sense the immediacy
of his presence in your life? I'm talking about I'm talking
about the Spirit of God When you have been brought into the
kingdom of God, it's so near to you He's more near to you
than your sin Because if he were not you would
not see your sin as the way you see. See, when you become a child
of God, you see your sin in the way you didn't see your sin before
you became a child of God. Well, why do you see your sin?
Because he's right there so close up on you, got the flashlight
on it, showing you every anatomical specificity of that sin that
you loving on. He said, now you see what you
see, what your lover is doing, he's he's hog tying you because
there's no liberty when you're kicking it with sin. He making
you feel good while he's tying you up and distracting you and
keeping you in bondage. I'm gonna show it to you now.
That's what the Holy Ghost is doing. He's showing it to you.
And you see it with the greatest of clarity and have absolutely
no ability to extricate yourself from it. So his job is to help
you. He supports a believer in the
ordained struggle of sin and faith. He also indwells you. This is crazy. because what you
see happening now is a penetrating work of the spirit of God going
deeper into the life of the believer. Do you guys see what I see? So
like our first letter was abide. The prepositional concept of
abiding needs to be near or around or about present. We have moved
from A all the way to I and we are now talking about the indwelling
work. Are you guys hearing me? I'm
talking about the indwelling work of the Spirit of God. So
involved and so interested is the third person in your life
that he's in your soul, in your conscience, in your mind, in
your heart. That's how deeply involved he
is. This is what Jesus meant. He will abide with you and in
you. So now he's in. See, he sold
out for you. Do you understand that? When
he came and hunted you down, he sold out. That's how deeply
and see, this is why for a person being truly born again, that
you you can never, ever be the same. When the spirit of God
comes, you can never be the same. And you will be more not the
same, the more he dwells, because he what I am describing is a
process of transformation through all of these functions taking
place in your life. You are the targeted objective
of the believer. He comes to get you of the Spirit.
He comes to get you and he works in this intimate way in your
life. And you want him to. You want
him to. Do you hear me? You want him
to be as nosy as he needs to be. You want him in every closet
of your house, every cabinet of your house. You want him going
in your garage. You want him going in your car.
You want him going in the glove box and in the trunk. You want
him going in your stash. You want him going to the job.
You want the Holy Ghost there, because otherwise you're going
to hell. Are you guys hearing me? See, if
you think about the role of the third person, only got a few
more minutes, and so we'll come back next weekend and close out
on the rest of the alphabets. Can we do that? If you think
about the role of the third person, what you have to think through
again, is the radical requirement, the radical requirement of the
work of God to get you to glory. The radical requirement of the
work of God to get you to glory. The radical requirement of the
work of God to get you to glory. It's a radical work. Think about
it. Now, the father's on this throne. He runs this universe.
It would be cool if he saved us by the justifying work of
Christ on the cross and just kind of gave us a ticket and
said, hey, you good, you good. Make your way through this world.
When you die, you go to glory. That's how a lot of people think
salvation is. Like God is so far off that you
just kind of doing your own thing. And when you die, give your ticket
to the preacher so he can eulogize you. And everybody say he in
heaven now. Right, wrong, wrong. Think about how radical it is
for the same third person who had to hover over the waters
in the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth and
bring order and structure and purpose and separate the light
from the darkness. and produce vegetation and life
and create that which God ultimately said is good. Think about the
involved work of the Spirit of God in the first creation. Now
think about him and his involved work in the new creation and
taking your heart and mine and making it new, orderly, structured,
purposed, purposeful. Purposeful see cuz that's we're
talking about our heart our inner man that that dark black blob
of chaos a putrefying source and Contamination worse than
a minstrel claw. That's what I'm talking about
a Thing that is worthy of flushing refuge. That's what you and I
are you don't think so your refuge Apart from God you're done. You
guys do know that right? I You're done. Sinners are nothing
but worms, wretched worms. You haven't been told. You're
told now. Apart from God, you and I are nothing but dying masses
of maggots. That's what sin does. The Spirit
of God had to come and take this mess and recreate it, hover on
it, dwell in it, begin to work with it, make something beautiful
out of it. And the process is dynamic. It's
dynamic. It's dynamic. It's not a small
thing. The father's love for us is not
a small thing. The son's sacrifice for us is
not a small thing. The work of the spirit of God,
his assignment to make us like God is not a small thing. Let's
pray. Father, thank you for this time.
Thank you for my brothers and sisters. Thank you for a contemplation
of your work and the work of your spirit. Cause us to submit
to you and do whatever you need to do in our life So that we
can be all that you want us to be Help us not to play games
with you. We pray it in Jesus name. Amen. God bless you guys