2002-01-01
Good Morning Dear Ones,
I am directed to continue writing about the details of God’s plan as it relates to the spiritual warfare we must wage. Yesterday’s message was about Christ’s resurrection; today’s is about the gift of the Holy Spirit. There are some citations that give us a deeper understanding of what receiving the Holy Spirit really means to us and how it impacts on our ability to fend off Satan’s arrows. I know many of you are mature Christians, but there are some that are new in the faith. For the sake of the latter, let me review just Who the Holy Spirit, the third personality of God’s Trinity, is. God’s Spirit cannot be seen with the human eye any more than our own spirits can. And yet, it is a real Entity with a powerful impact on our lives as believers. We all know the story of the Pentecost when the disciples waited for ten days in the Upper Room and then were involved in an amazing supernatural event which we call the Pentecost. AC 2: 2-4, “Suddenly there was a noise from the sky which sounded like a strong wind blowing, and it filled the whole house where they were sitting. Then they saw what looked like tongues of fire which spread out and touched each person there. They were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to talk in other languages, as the Spirit enabled them to speak.” Such an event has nothing to do with the laws of physics, but it is real and dynamic anyway.
A question might come up about the connection between this momentous event and the other two personalities of the Trinity, and that is made clear from some citations in the book of John. We already know from JN 3: 16 and JN 14: 9 and 11, that there is a supernatural connection between the Father and the Son. Now look at JN 14: 16-17, 26 and JN 16: 7 to see the connection between the first two personalities of God and the third One. [Christ speaking], “I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Counselor, Who will stay with you forever. He is the Spirit, Who reveal the truth about God. The world cannot receive Him because it cannot see Him or know Him. But you know Him, because He remains with you and is in you…The Counselor, the Holy Spirit, Whom the Father will send in My name, will teach you everything and make you remember all that I have told you…But I am telling you the truth: it is better for you that I go away, because if I do not go, the Counselor will not come to you. But if I do go away, then I will send Him to you.” These were Christ’s words before He was crucified and resurrected. All of this was a part of the plan that God crafted at the pre-creation council in heaven before the earth was made discussed in 1 PET 1: 20-21.
The Holy Spirit indwelt in the soul of believers is a magnificent gift indeed! I believe that the Spirit visits some people even before they come to acknowledged faith in Christ, but His presence in them is intermittent and designed to bring them to the point where they will confess that faith. It is not until the person confesses faith in Christ and repents of his sins that the Holy Spirit indwells to remain forever with that person. It is the Holy Spirit which enables a believer to understand more fully the teachings of God, encourages his faith, and conveys God’s messages to him. There are some compelling ways that the Spirit serves God. RO 10: 9-10, “If you confess that Jesus is Lord and believe that God raised Him from death, you will be saved. For it is by our faith that we are put right with God; it is by our confession that we are saved.” From where does that faith come? From the Holy Spirit! RO 8: 26-27, “In the same way the Spirit also comes to help us, weak as we are. For we do not know how we ought to pray; the Spirit Himself pleads with God for us in groans that words can not express. And God, Who sees into our hearts, knows what the thought of the Spirit is; because the Spirit pleads with God on behalf of his people and in accordance with His will.”
The Holy Spirit has always been on the scene, but never in so overt a way as He is now that the church age is in progress. I also believe that it is the Holy Spirit indwelt in the believers that is “the One Who holds it [the onset of the Tribulation and the emergence of the Antichrist] back,” which will in God’s time be taken away [2 THESS 2: 7]. (The “mysterious wickedness” in that citation refers to the presence of Satan’s activity, his evil, on earth). Where is Satan in all of this? He remains as always limited by God and angry because he knows his time to do evil is short in comparison to eternity [REV 12: 12]. He also knows that his defeat at the hands of Jesus Christ is inevitable. What does that mean to us? It means that we should place our trust in the Lord and remain firmly entrenched in our faith-willing to listen for and obey God’s commands. Our Lord is indeed our Refuge and our Defender as PS 46: 1 states.
PRAYER: O Lord, how many blessings you shower upon those who love you every day! We are grateful beyond what words can express for Your provision and protection again Satan’s snares. Through Habakkuk, you expressed an essential truth, in HB 2: 4, “And this is the message: ‘Those who are evil will not survive, but those who are righteous will live because they are faithful to God.’” Habakkuk’s prayer referred to the deliverance of the Jewish people in ancient times, but it foreshadowed the deliverance from evil for all of us. HB 3: 12-13, “You went out to save Your people, to save Your chosen King. You struck down the leader of the wicked and completely destroyed his followers.” HB 3: 18-19, “I will still be joyful and glad, because the Lord God is my Savior. The Sovereign Lord gives me strength. He makes me sure-footed as a deer and keeps me safe on the mountains.” Satan and his followers are our enemies. Without You, Dearest Abba, we are left unable to defend ourselves due to our inherited spiritual poverty. With faith in You, we become strong and aligned with You when we battle the devil. Through the Holy Spirit, You give us discernment, wisdom, strength, power, and might against him. You arm us with spiritual gifts that make his efforts impotent in the long run. He may be able to give us pain, sorrow, and loss now, but these things, you have promised us in REV 21: 4, will disappear when the time comes for us to walk streets of gold with You. Today, we come before You in utmost humility and reverence to confess our sin, to present ourselves to You with spiritual vessels empty of human agendas, and with the plea that You will fill us with Your Spirit. We yield to Your leadership in our lives and pledge You our faithful loyalty, diligence, obedience, trust, glory, honor, adoration, worship, praise, and thanksgiving for sending us the Son, being present in our lives continually, and giving us the gift of Your Spirit to dwell within us. In Christ’s holy name, we pray. Amen.
Tomorrow’s message deals with who the church is, the inevitability of God’s plan being carried out, and how this will be done. Take heart, Faithful Readers, the Lord has equipped us and equipped us well to be winners in the battle against Satan and his followers despite the pain they send us! His love for us is so great that we can’t measure it. When we endure against Satan’s onslaught, we can know that each personality of the Trinity will be there for us no matter when Satan’s arrows arrive. That is all because of God’s profound love for each and every one of us. His love is constant and surrounds us. PS 91: 10-11, “Nothing bad will happen to you; no disaster will come to your home. He has put His angels in charge of you to watch over you wherever you go.” Peter and I send you our love too.
Grace Be With You Always,
Lynn