The Holy Spirit

SERMON: 2016-09-04--ac16159--the-holy-spirit-part-2 SOURCE DURATION: 00:33:37.000 PROPOSED CUTS: 1 CONFIDENCE: 0.95 APPROVED: false REASON: The recording begins with the continuation of a theological exposition (the sermon) and concludes with a prayer/benediction, both core components of the main sermon material. ACOUSTIC EVIDENCE: available ACOUSTIC MUSIC INTERVALS: none ACOUSTIC SPEECH OVERLAP: no ACOUSTIC BOUNDARIES APPLIED: none Inline CUT markers identify each proposed audio boundary after the relevant word. --- ORIGINAL TRANSCRIPT WITH PROPOSED CUTS MARKED --- So I want to pick up this morning then where we left off last week and we were looking last week at the person of the Holy Spirit and saw that he is the agent of the Godhead through whom the plan and purposes of the Father and the Son are carried out. And so if the Father is the generator and the Son is the wires and we are the light bulb, then the Holy Spirit is the electrical power who lights up all of creation both in the original creation story and in the redemption story. Or to use another analogy, if God the Father is the architect and the Son, and remember Jesus was God before he ever came into the world as a baby, the Son is the general contractor, the Holy Spirit represents the trades who makes it happen. And we saw last week that in the story of creation all three persons of the Godhead are involved. It's God the Father who decides that he wants children in his image and in his likeness with whom he can share his love. It is the Son who takes that desire of the Father and who brings about the creation of the universe including the human race. The Bible says all things were made through him, that is through Jesus. The Holy Spirit then is the agent who hovered over the waters, who breathed into Adam's nostrils the breath of life. The Holy Spirit is the one who actually makes it happen. If you want to see what that looks like, then all you have to do is read the first two chapters of the book of Genesis and you see Adam and Eve in perfect relationship with God, perfect relationship with each other, and perfect relationship with all of creation. That's why we say they lived in paradise. God finished creating, what did he say? It was very good and he rested. Not because he was tired, but because it was as good as he could make it. Now we know from scripture that that goodness of creation, that representation of the heart of God in all of the universe and in the human race didn't last very long. The serpent came along, deceived Adam and Eve. They opted for independence and the world plunged into sin. And you and I today live with the consequences of that. And if you want to see the full force of that, look at nation rising against nation. We talked earlier about the horrors of Aleppo, that little boy pulled out of the rubble, absolutely dazed, hate to think of what's going to happen to him when he grows up. That's the world we live in. God could have left us there, I've said this many times, but he chose not to. Why? Because he wanted to demonstrate his love in our redemption. And that's why the Bible says in Romans 5 verse 8, God demonstrates his love for us in this while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Salvation was not an afterthought on the part of God. We cannot make him responsible for our fall into sin. But God chose to allow sin so that it could reveal the side of his character that simply creating us could never show. God could never show his mercy without our sin, could never show his patience without our rebellion, could never show the greatness of his love without having to sacrifice his son. And so after the fall, as you know, the rest of the Bible from Genesis 3 on till we get to the closing chapters of the book of Revelation is the story of redemption. It's the story of restoration. It's the story of how God comes to a rebellious universe, loaded down under the curse of sin, and aims to fully restore it and bring it back to himself. And just as in the story of creation, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit all played their role together, so in the story of redemption, the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit all play a role. So in the story of redemption then, what is the Father's role? Well, the Father's role is to restore all creation to himself. When he sees the mess that sin has brought about, rather than turning his back on it and saying, "Well, you made your bed, lie in it," he said, "I've got an idea. I want to bring this universe and the people in it back to myself, and in that plan I'm going to show the greatness of my love by sending my Son into the world so that this alienated human race, at least some of them, will be restored to fellowship with me so that one day they will again inherit a new heaven and a new earth." So the Father so loved the world that he sent his Son. What's the role of the Father? He's the architect of redemption. What's the role of the Son? Well, the role of the Son is to carry out the Father's plan. The Father's plan is to restore humanity to God, because you've got to remember the big issue for God is how can he be a God of love and a God of justice at the same time? Rehabilitation is a thing, the Bible says, into which angels long to look. Why? Because nobody can figure out in heaven before the cross how in the world God was going to hold on to his sense of justice, which demands sin be punished, and his sense of love that says, "I want to bring people back to myself." So God's plan was the gift of his Son. The Son says, "I'll carry it out." How does he carry it out? Well, he comes into the world as a baby. Theologically, this is known as the kenosis, the self-emptying of God. Here is the second person of the Holy Trinity through whom this whole vast universe was created by the word of his mouth. And now he steps into the world as a helpless little baby whose life is in danger because of the political and the religious powers of his day. Talk about a step down, would you not say, but that was necessary for our salvation. So he comes into the world as a baby, he lives our life, as you know. He teaches the way back to God, dies on the cross, gets raised from the dead because death cannot hold him, ascends into heaven, sits down on the right hand of God the Father, and today has the name that is above every name. And what Jesus does, he is the author and the pioneer of our salvation. He has walked that journey so that by faith in him, you and I can be delivered from the power of sin, delivered from hell, delivered from Satan, and be restored one day to our position of glory, sharing with Christ in authority over God's new heaven and new earth, whatever that will look like because it's beyond our present comprehension. So the Father plans redemption, the Son paves the way by doing the work that is necessary for salvation to be a possibility, and what does the Holy Spirit do then? Well, he makes happen in actuality in the world and in our lives the purposes of God the Father and the purposes of God the Son. It's the Holy Spirit who comes along and who applies the benefits of Jesus' death and resurrection to our lives. He's the one who in real time delivers us from sin and death, breeds life into these dead bones, empowers us to become the children of God, and makes us worthy to inherit God's eternal kingdom. Now get this, the same power that was manifest in the creation of the universe, and we talked a little bit last week about how big that universe is and the sum total of the energy in it, that energy, which is the energy of God through Jesus Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit, the same power that breathed life into Adam's lifeless body made of the dust of the ground, that same power that raised Jesus from the dead, exalted him in heaven at the right hand of God the Father, that's the power that God has unleashed through the Holy Spirit on the church to bring us from darkness to light. If we can put that slide back up for just a moment, that power of the Holy Spirit takes us out of this situation under Satan's bondage, alienated from God, bowed down under the curse of sin and selfishness and conflict, and he restores us to paradise regained, and how successful you and I are in living the Christian life is largely a function of the degree to which we have received revelation of that reality. Here's how Paul puts it, interestingly enough, in his prayer for the Ephesian church later on. Listen to these words. He says, "I pray also that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you." What is the hope? The hope is eternal glory in a new creation, the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints, and his incomparably great power for us who believe. That power is like the working of his mighty strength, which he exerted in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly realms far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every title that can be given, not only in the present age, but also in the age that is to come. What's the answer to the struggles that we experience in our lives, in our journey with God? What's the answer when we feel dusty and dry and dead bones on the inside? What's the answer when we feel the darkness deepens and the world is going to hell in a handbasket? Well, it's the reality and the experience of the Holy Spirit who lets us share in the benefits of Christ. In the time that remains this morning, I want to give you the first of three ways in which the Holy Spirit works that out in the life of the believer. And the place to start is with the realization that what the Holy Spirit does for us is He points us first and foremost to Jesus. He points us first and foremost to Jesus. Now without belaboring the obvious, let's think about that for a moment. Because who's Jesus? Well, He is the long-promised Messiah. He's God's answer to everything that ails the human race. He's the one anointed by God or ordained by God to solve all the world's problems. He is the offspring of the woman who crushes the head of the serpent. He is the son of Abraham who inherits Abraham's covenant blessings which is to inherit all the earth. He is the son of David who's going to acquire the kingdom over the nations of the world. And He is God's solution to everything that ails you and me. He is the one who has the power to deliver us from Satan's power. He is the one who has the power to restore us to God. He is the one who one day is going to come back to judge the heavens and the earth. He is the name that is above every name, that at the mention of His name every knee should bow. He is the stone rejected by builders, a cuss word for most people, but in God's sight extremely precious and chosen because He is the first fruits of a whole brand new harvest. Do you get it? That's Jesus. You know, reminded of that video, how does that go? I wish I could describe Him to you. I wish I could describe Him to you. Now that's Jesus. And if that's who Jesus is, then what is the most important thing in all the world for any given individual? Is to know Jesus and have a relationship with Jesus because no one can come to the Father except through Jesus. That is the teaching of scripture. To be saved you must know Jesus. But there's two things that get in the way of that. Number one, Jesus is not physically present in the world. So you have to receive Him by faith. Not only that, but remember we're spiritually, we're dead in the trespasses and sins in which we walk. And so we can hear the stories of Jesus and we can read the stories of Jesus and half the time it doesn't click because it doesn't register to us and Jesus seems irrelevant to the real situation. As I said, He was the stone by builders rejected. He came to His own home and His own people and nobody recognized Him for who He was. That's how conceited we are in our humanity. We look everywhere for solutions except to Jesus. So what's the first job of the Holy Spirit? Remember He points to Jesus. First job of the Holy Spirit is to help us know who Jesus is so that Jesus can transform and change our lives. How does He do that? Let me backtrack and quote you two verses from John's gospel that illustrate just how it is that the Holy Spirit points always to Jesus. John 15 26, "When the counselor comes whom I will send to you from the Father," remember the counselor is the Holy Spirit, it's the periclete, the one who comes alongside to help us running the race. When the counselor comes whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth who goes out from the Father, what's His job? He will testify about me. He will bring glory to me by taking from what is mine and making it known to you. All that belongs to the Father is mine. That is why I said the Spirit will take from what is mine and will make it known to you. If you're here this morning and you know Jesus, then the only reason you know Jesus is because the Holy Spirit somewhere along the line came to you and opened your eyes to understanding that He's not just a historical figure, He's not just a great prophet who lived many years ago, no, He is the Son of God come to redeem and save the world including you and me. So how does the Holy Spirit do that? Again in the time that remains I want to give you three things the Holy Spirit does to bring us to a point of surrendering to Jesus as Lord and Savior. The first point is this and it's sort of counterintuitive for a lot of us and that is the fact that He shows us our true condition. Listen again to these words from John's gospel, "When He comes," that is the Holy Spirit, this is Jesus teaching His disciples before He leaves, "He will convict the world of guilt in regard to sin and righteousness and judgment, in regard to sin because men do not believe in Me, in regard to righteousness because I am going to the Father where you can see Me no longer, and in regard to judgment because the Prince of this world now stands condemned." The Holy Spirit begins by showing us our true condition and our true condition is that we are dead in trespasses and sins. Our true condition is that we are rebellious against God, we don't know Him, we don't want to know Him, we just go our own way. And it's very important to understand that the Holy Spirit begins by convicting us of sin because sometimes we have the mistaken notion that the first job of the Holy Spirit is to make us feel better, bring God closer, make us feel more spiritual. And yes, the Holy Spirit will do that, but He usually begins on the other end, He begins by opening our eyes to our true condition. I am a lawbreaker, I'm alienated from God, I am rebellious, I'm selfish. And this can run the whole gamut from my whole life is falling apart and I know that I need help and nobody can provide this help for me except God and so I cry out from the depths of despair, "God, help me." It can range all the way from there to, you know, I'm sitting on top of the world but there is this satisfaction at some level. There's got to be more to life than what I'm experiencing. Am I missing something? When the Holy Spirit comes along and He begins to demonstrate our true condition, God cannot feed us until we are hungry first. And I believe that happens not only in the starting point of our journey in Christ when He brings us to faith, any time in the Christian life when the Holy Spirit wants to reveal more to us of who Christ is and bring us closer to the Father, He almost always begins by showing us a new level of hunger, a new level of brokenness, a new level of is this all there is? And sometimes we think that means God has abandoned us, sometimes it makes us think as if there must be something wrong with my spiritual life and sometimes there may be. But it's a hunger that God creates because the promise of scripture is, "Blessed are those who hunger and thirst after righteousness," and what will happen? They will be satisfied. So don't be surprised when in your Christian journey you find yourself in a place of dryness or in a place of spiritual despair even. And don't just think that God has abandoned you. It may in fact be the sign of His favor because He wants to show you more of Himself. So the Holy Spirit begins by showing us our true condition before God. Then secondly, He helps us hear and understand the Gospel. In other words, Gospel, as I'm sure you know, means good news, and the good news is that God was in Christ not holding our sins against us but reconciling the world to Himself. You'd think the whole world would happily embrace that kind of good news. If I came up tomorrow with a solution to cancer or to some other profoundly incurable illness, the whole world would be beating a path to the door because that's what we're looking for. Yet Jesus, we avoid. Why? Well, because He makes demands on us that we don't know how to meet. Not only that, but there's lots of people that have not heard the story of Jesus. And as I said earlier, there are many others who have heard the story of Jesus and it goes in one ear and out the other. God, the Holy Spirit, has to give us understanding. He has to open our eyes so that we see Jesus for who He really is, so we can fall down at His feet and worship Him as God's answer to everything that ails us and everything that ails humanity. I was thinking about that the other day as I was reading up on the Temple Institute. I mentioned a couple of weeks ago how out in Israel, the Temple Institute is gearing up in preparation for the Messiah. And they are ready to rebuild the temple. And just in the last two weeks, they appointed a high priest to be able to officiate at the sacrifices that are needed to welcome the Messiah. And these people are studying the Old Testament and they are studying the Old Testament prophecies and they keep talking about, "Won't it be great when the Messiah comes?" And of course, you and I, from a Christian point of view, know the Messiah has already come, but they don't know it. They don't see it. Why? Because their hearts are veiled. Paul puts it this way, 2 Corinthians 3, "Their minds were made dull, for to this day the same veil remains when the Old Covenant is read. It has not been removed because only in Christ is it taken away. Even to this day, when Moses is read, a veil covers their hearts, but whenever anyone turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away." What does the Holy Spirit do? He helps you hear the message of the gospel and instead of going in one ear and out another, it connects with your condition. And when you're sick, it dawns on you that maybe Jesus can heal me. And you hate your own self because your heart is filled with pain and with bitterness and anger that you don't know how to solve. The Holy Spirit comes along and he shows you that maybe, just maybe, Jesus is big enough and he can actually transform me from the inside out. And when you are in anguish over the bitterness and the pain of suffering in the world, the Holy Spirit comes along and he points you to Jesus and he says, "I know the pain is great and I know the darkness seems insurmountable, but let me tell you something. Somebody has already overcome it and it's only a matter of time. The trumpet of God is going to sound. The dead in Christ will be raised and God will usher in a new heavens and a new earth." That is faith and that is hope and it is imparted to you by the Holy Spirit. That's his job and you can count on him to do that. And the purpose for all of that then is, of course, to bring us to faith in Christ. Have these words in John's Gospel, John 1, 12, and 13. This is preceded by the verses that said, "He came to the world and his world didn't recognize him. He came to his own home and his own people didn't want him. To all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God, children born not of natural descent nor of human decision or a husband's will, but born of God." That's the new birth. The new birth happens when we are in touch with our brokenness. Our eyes get opened to Jesus and we say, "Jesus, have mercy on me, a sinner." And it can be as simple as the murderer, the thief on the cross, who didn't know a lot of theology, who couldn't have explained to you the way of salvation, but who understood three things. He was guilty, Jesus was not, and Jesus was the one who could save him, and he cried out, "Lord, help me." And that's the third function of the Holy Spirit to bring us to Jesus. He enables us to make that leap of faith so that we put our hope and our trust in him. So here's the question. As you look at your Christian journey, has the Holy Spirit shown you your helpless state? Number two, has he shown you Jesus? And by God's grace, have you jumped into the wheelbarrow and trusted him for time and eternity? If you haven't, now is the time. If you have, then you can rest in the assurance that the Holy Spirit is yours, and the next thing that he's going to do, and we'll talk about that Lord willing next week, is he's going to apply to your life and to my life the benefits of Christ's salvation. And in preparation for that, if you have time this week, read the first portion of Ephesians chapter one, underline the phrase "in him," because Paul repeatedly in that passage tells us what in Christ we are. And then ask yourself, how does the Holy Spirit make that real in my life and in my experience? Stand with me as we pray please. Father the gospel in so many ways is so simple, and yet it's its very simplicity that is often offensive to our human striving and our human ideas of how the world should work. Thank you so much that when we fell into sin, you chose to redeem us. Thank you that you sent your Son to make that possible, and that you've given us the Holy Spirit to apply this to our lives, so that on one hand we can see how broken we are and how far we fall short of your glory, and how on the other hand that points us to Jesus as the answer to our sin, and how then you give us grace to climb in the wheelbarrow and trust him for time and for eternity. Lord if that's never been a step that we've taken, I pray that you help us take that step today. If that has been a step that we've taken, then Lord help us to renew that commitment and to believe that the work that you've begun in us, you will bring to completion, so that one day we will stand before you without wrinkle or blemish or spot in the glory of your new creation. Thank you for hearing us. [PROPOSED CUT 1 START at 00:33:31.120; remove through 00:33:37.000] We pray in Jesus' name, Amen. [CUT] [CUT] [PROPOSED CUT 1 END at 00:33:37.000; resume after this marked segment]