STUDY THEME: EIGHT DAYS THAT CHANGED THE WORLD.
"RECEIVING THE HOLY SPIRIT." JOHN 14:16-17, 15:26-27, 16:5-7, 8-11, 12-15.
PLEASE OPEN YOUR BIBLE TO JOHN 14.
The lesson this Sunday continues in our series from the final words of Jesus before He was crucified. It was the night before our Lord went to the cross to save us from sin. These are extremely important words for us. This lesson seeks to answer the question, "How does God relate to me day by day." These verses comprise an extremely important passage on the New Testament doctrine of the Holy Spirit. Unfortunately, many Christians overlook or neglect to study what Jesus said about the person and work of the Holly Spirit. You may have heard and read many words about the "gifts" of the Holy Spirit which totally neglect what Jesus had to say on the subject. This is an incredible omission on the part of Christians. We need to study carefully what Jesus had to say about the work and role of the Holy Spirit.
The Holy Spirit did not originate on the day of Pentecost. Rather we believe that the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of God, the third Person of the blessed Trinity, fully divine, though omnipresent from all eternity, took up His abode in the world in a special sense on the day of Pentecost according to the divine promise. He exalts Christ. He convicts men of sin, of righteousness, and of judgment. He calls men to the savior, and effects regeneration.
He dwells in every believer, and by His baptism unites all to Christ in One body, And that He, as the Indwelling One, is the source of all power and all acceptable worship and service. We believe that He never takes His departure from the church, nor from the feeblest of the saints, but is ever present to testify of Christ; seeking to occupy believers with Him and not with themselves nor with their experiences. He enlightens and empowers the believer and the church in worship, evangelism and services. We believe that His abode in this special sense will cease when Christ comes to receive His own at the completion of the church.
The first mention of the Holy Spirit in the Bible is in Gen. 1:2 "And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters." Reference is made to the Holy Spirit all through the O.T. Scriptures, and is usually in connection with the bestowal of some gift or power. He endued men with wisdom and skill (Ex. 31:3). He imparted power for special work (Judges 14:5-6). He inspired the prophets to speak God’s message (Ezek.2:2). Peter declared that the Holy Spirit guided the men who wrote the O.T. Scriptures (2 Peter 1:21). But it is in the N.T. that we find the full doctrine of the Holy Spirit.
While these were manifestations of the Holy Spirit all through the O.T., there was to be a special manifestation of His presence and power. He was to come in a definite manner and abide in the world. Many centuries before Pentecost the coming of the Holy Spirit was foretold in Joel 2:28-29. On the great day of Pentecost, Peter quoted that promise in Acts 2:17-18 and declared that it was fulfilled in the events of that day.
It was Jesus who gave definite promises concerning the coming of the Holy Spirit. In His parting message to His disciples He said He would ask His Father to give them another Comforter that would be like Jesus and would abide with them forever. He promised in Acts 1:8 as He was leaving His disciples to return to heaven "You shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you."
While Jesus was with them He had convicted people of sin. He was their teacher. He bore witness to the truth. Now He was about to leave them as a physical presence, but the Father would send another like Jesus to be with them. This insight helps us understand the work of the Sprit. We can look at what Jesus did and see what the Spirit does.
The Holy Spirit is the Great Comforter of human hearts. When Jesus told His disciples that He was going away Jesus said in John 16:6 "Because I have spoken these things unto you, sorrow hath filled your heart." But He assured them that the Comforter would bring them peace and joy. That is part of the work of the Holy Spirit, to bring comfort to sorrowing hearts. He is One who strengthens by companionship. He has come from heaven, as promised by our blessed Lord, to assist us in every crisis, in every time of difficulty that may arise in our Christian lives.
Just as the unbelieving world did not recognize Jesus for who He is, so the Spirit of truth…the world cannot receive. The word recognizes as real only what it can see and know by its own limited criteria. Having no experience with the Spirit and being unable to see him, the world denies or ignores Him. Paul wrote in 1 Cor. 2:14 of how unaware of the realm of the Spirit is the natural man: "The natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned." By contrast, believers recognize the Sprit because they know Him through personal experience.
One of the most treasured things Jesus did for the apostles was to be with them as companion, teacher, and divine Son. Jesus emphasized that the new paraclete would abide with believers forever. Although Jesus in His incarnate form was about to leave, His Spirit was to come to be with them. Their relationship to the Spirit was not the kind of physical contact to which they had become accustomed, but it was real and true. Because of the close relation of the Spirit to the Lord Jesus, they felt His abiding presence in them and with them.
You will notice in both Vs. 16 & 17 Jesus uses the masculine pronoun, He. I do not believe Jesus would have used this pronoun if He did not mean us to understand that just as God the Father is a Person, and God the Son is a Person, so God the Holy Spirit is a Person---Three persons in One God. So we should not speak of the Holy Spirit as "It."
Jesus teaches that the Holy Spirit is not an impersonal influence, and above all, the Holy Spirit is not simply a wave of emotion pouring through the heart and mind of a man, but the Holy Spirit is a divine Person. Notice that expression "He dwelleth with you, and shall be in you." The Holy Spirit now dwells in every believer in the Lord Jesus Christ. "Upon your believing, you were sealed with that Holy Spirit of peace. It can now be said, "If any man have not the Spirit of Christ he is none of His." The Holy Spirit dwelling within makes Christ real to us.
Many people would laugh if asked, "Does the Holy Spirit live in you?’ Such an idea would be foreign to them and irrelevant to real life. Instead of being empowered by the Spirit, they base their actions on their own thoughts and experiences or on the advice of other resource people. Some even resort to magic and superstition for guidance. Believers in Christ, however, depend on the Holy Spirit who lives in them to give them strength and direction for daily living. Jesus reminded His disciples that the "world" cannot accept the Spirit because the world could neither see Him nor know Him but true believers could know Him.
PLEASE TURN TO JOHN 15.
2, PLEASE READ JOHN 15: 26-27.
The Bible teaches us that God is Father who is always beyond us, that He sent His Son to save us, and that He abides in us by His Spirit. This biblical revelation matches how we experience God. He is the Father to whom we pray, the Son through whom we pray, and the Spirit in whom we pray. The Holy Spirit is the Spirit of prayer. We must always remember that prayer is a gift from the Holy Spirit, and we can’t work it up. Take time to pray after you have expressed the
joy and power of His presence. God will be able to do even greater things in your life after you pray.
Jesus spoke of the close relation of the Father and the Son. He did the same thing for the Son and the Spirit. The work of God is the work of the son, and the work of both is fulfilled by the presence of the unseen Spirit. Thus the Spirit is the unseen presence of God and His Son with us, in us, and among us. You and I are daily involved with two contrary influences. The Holy Spirit would lead us into the will of God, while at the same time the flesh leads us to do our own will.
The main point of Vs. 26 focuses on the work of the paraclete in bearing witness to Jesus. In the previous verses Jesus had just described the hatred of the world for Him and predicted a similar hatred for his followers. Jesus had given faithful testimony to God in spite of such murderous hatred. The paraclete would bear faithful testimony to the continuing work of God in Jesus.
Vs. 27 confirms what is consistently taught in the N.T. The Spirit empowers and uses believers as witnesses for Christ. Vs. 27 applied directly to the apostles. Jesus told them "ye have been with me from the beginning."" When He called the twelve, He called them to be with Him. When a successor for Judas was sought, a key qualification was to have been with Jesus from the beginning. The apostles were a unique group of witnesses. They were eyewitnesses of Jesus’ life, teachings, and resurrection. Jesus appointed them to bear witness to the truth they had seen and heard. Their testimony continues through the N.T. itself.
Jesus, however, broadened the task of witnessing to all believers with the coming of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost. He expects believers today to be Spirit-filled witnesses. If you look up the references to being filled with the Sprit in the Book of Acts, you will find that the one thing most of these passages have in common is that they describe Spirit-filled and Spirit-led believers bearing a bold witness for Jesus Christ. This is the Lord’s commission in Acts 1:8. It is what happened on Pentecost. Many of the examples of Acts were bold witnesses in the face of threats and danger. When the believers at Jerusalem were threatened, they prayed not for deliverance but for boldness to speak God’s word. Acts 4:31 says, "And when they had prayed, the place was shaken where they were assembled together; and they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and they spake the word of God in boldness."
PLEASE TURN TO JOHN 16.
3, PLEASE READ JOHN 16: 5-7.
In Vs. 1-4 Jesus warned again of the hatred of the world against Him and against the apostles. After this solemn warning, He told them again that He as going on His way to the One who had sent Him. I was puzzled that Vs. 5 says that none of the apostles asked Him where He was gong. Two factors help us understand. For one thing, they may have already had their question answered in John 14:6. Therefore they no longer asked it. Second, they were much more concerned with what would happen to them than they were to know the details about where Jesus was going. Their response to the news that He was going away was that sorrow…filled their heart.
Notice that Vs. 7 begins with "nevertheless." The words "I tell you the truth" show that Jesus wanted the disciples to pay special attention. Although the disciples felt only deep grief that Jesus was going away. He emphasized to them that His going away was expedient for them. Expedient means "to your advantage", or "for your benefit," or "for your good." They wondered how the Master’s departure could possibly be for their benefit. Jesus explained in Vs. 7. "If I do not go away, the Comforter will not come unto you; but if I depart I will send Him unto you."
Why did Jesus have to leave for the paraclete to come? The Spirit could not come with full power until the redemptive work of the Son was finished through His death and resurrection. John 7:39 says that "the Holy Ghost was not yet given because that Jesus was not yet glorified." This does not mean that the Sprit was not already at work; it means that the Spirit’s full power came after the cross and the resurrection.
4. PLEASE READ JOHN 16:8-11.
The witness of the Spirit in the world has to do with three things: sin, righteousness
, and judgment. These are inter-related. Sin is the failure of all men, whatever name we give it. Righteousness as an ideal is admitted if the fact of sin is recognized. If here is no such thing as righteousness, there is no such thing as sin. Judgment is the principle at work, everywhere in human thinking, which differentiates between right and wrong.Jesus said, When the Spirit is come, these are the things He is going to deal with in the world, the things which constitute the cardinal consciousness of every human being, when that human being gives attention to its spiritual nature. Then He told them what the Spirit would have to say concerning these things. "Of sin because they believe not on Me." Jesus said in effect, My being in the world has created a new center of sin, and given a new meaning to sin; and the Spirit is coming to show the world that sin now, is rejection of Me. Sins are symptoms. Sin is a malady. Because of the coming of Jesus into the world, the sin which blights and blasts and may damn, is rejection of Him. All sins can be dealt with if men believe on Him.
The Spirit would also witness concerning righteousness. "Of righteousness because I go to the Father." Righteousness would now have a new interpretation, and a new potentiality, because He was going back to the Father. There was the Cross. That is the way He was going. It was in His mind all through these intimate conversations and discourses. He was going that way, and because of that, because He was going through to the Father, victorious, righteousness would be made possible. His resurrection and return to the Father was proof of His righteousness. Now Christ offers imputed righteousness to those who believe in Him. (Rom. 3:21-22)
The Spirit would also witness concerning Judgment. The Spirit was coming to show to the world that this principle of discrimination had its central manifestation in the fact that the prince of this world was judged and condemned. Sin brings judgment. This is proved by the judgment that fell on Satan, the prince of the world. At the cross he thought he had gained his greatest victory. But it turned out to be his greatest defeat. There he was judged and condemned.
In Me, said Jesus, there is the power that deals with sin. If men reject that, that is sin. In me, said Jesus, is the power that enables for righteousness. I am going to the Father, and through Me righteousness has been set forth before the world. In Me, said Jesus, the fact of the condemnation of evil and the glorification of righteousness is seen.
At this point our Lord made this revealing statement. "I have yet many things to say unto you, but you cannot bear them now." Jesus looked at them, His apostles. He had told them these things. He knew how frail they were, how faulty they were, how they were failing to apprehend His teaching. He understood it all, and yet with great tenderness He said, "I have yet many things to say unto you, but you cannot bear them now."
There were things Jesus did not tell them at first. He did not tell them of the hostility that would come. He never told them about His own Cross until He had been with them three years. And now He was going, and He said, "I have yet many things to say unto you, but you cannot bear them now." A wonderful principle is revealed there, namely that He tells us things, reveals things to us, as we are able to bear the revelation. I look back over my life. Thank God that He did not tell me all about it at the beginning. He teaches us, as we are able to bear.
Yes, but that is not all! "Howbeit, when He, the Spirit of truth is come, He shall guide you into all truth; for He shall not speak from Himself; but what things so ever He shall hear, these shall He speak; and He shall declare unto you the things that are to come."
Look at that group of men. When He left them, they had very little idea how to proceed except that they must do so in the power of the Holy Spirit. All subsequent unveilings to the Church of God as to methods of work and service, have come by the growing interpretation of the Spirit. "He shall show you things to come." In that word of Jesus we find warrant for many things the Church of God in the line of true authority, and under the guidance of the Spirit, has had to do in the running centuries, for which we have no instruction in the words of Jesus.
He will guide you. A guide always means a pilgrimage, and a guide always means a process. The whole Church of God today has a fuller apprehension of truth than had those twelve men. The Spirit has been guiding us into the truth. In Jeremiah 29:3 God says "You will seek Me and find Me when you seek Me with all your heart." The less we look for God, the more He has to go looking for us. The main thing God asks for is our attention.
Finally in this regard, the whole mission of the Spirit is to glorify Me, said Jesus, by interpretation of the things of the Father which are all Mine. The world is hostile because of its ignorance of God, and of His Son. Out into the world He sent His own, in partnership with the Spirit of God; and he ministry of the Spirit in the world is to deal with the cardinal elements of spiritual Consciousness; sin, righteousness, and judgment, and relate them to Him.
And what about the disciples? The Spirit needs them. It is through them the work must be done, and in order that the Christ may be glorified; and in the glorification of the Christ, the things which are the things of God, be revealed to the world. So the great allegory of the vine ended.
In the verses following Jesus predicted His death and resurrection. The apostles were at a loss as to the meaning of His words. Jesus then used plain speech. He closed the chapter with the beautiful words of departure in vs. 33. "These things I have spoken to you, that in Me you might have peace. In the world you shall have tribulation, but be of good cheer. I have overcome the world."
Just suppose the apostles, after praying for a week had said, "Our Lord has given us work to do. We have no time to lose. Let us go and start to work." What a failure they would have made! But when the Holy Spirit came and filled them, they went forth with transforming power and witnessed the salvation of three thousand souls in a single day. The disciples were filled with supernatural power, and neither they nor the world would ever be the same again.
Jim Cymbala, Pastor of the Brooklyn Tabernacle Church said "I discovered an astonishing truth: God is attracted to weakness. He can’t resist those who humbly and honestly admit how desperately they need help." He also said, "If you have only the Word, you dry up. If you have only the Spirit, you blow up. But if you have both you grow up."
The N.T. mentions several attitudes which people may take in their response to the Holy Spirit. (l) One may resist the Holy Spirit (Acts 7:51) (2) one may insult the Holy Spirit. (Heb. 10:29) (3) One may grieve the Holy Spirit. (Eph. 4:30) (4) One may quench the Holy Spirit. (1 Thess. 5: 19) (5) One may be filled with the Holy Spirit. (Eph. 5: 18) Sin grieves the Spirit and quenches His power among us. It is gossip and slander that grieves the Spirit.
In closing let’s repeat the fruit of the Spirit once more. "But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, long suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance, against such there is no law." Anytime people get hungry to know the Lord, the Holy Spirit quickly puts a shovel and broom into their hands.
NEXT SUNDAY FROM JOHN 17 WE HEAR JESUS PRAY THE HIGH PRIESTLY PRAY FOR HIMSELF AND HIS DISCIPLES. A.V. DAUGHERTY 3-17-02
CONCLUSIONS: