The Holy Spirit - Who is He?
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Good morning Harmony!
The past few weeks now we have been in this series titled Heresies, and we’ve been looking at those things that cause people to fall outside of what the Gospel says about some things. In the first week we looked at really examining our beliefs and making sure that we went to the Word of God to determine what is and is not heresy.
We looked at Titus 2:1 and 2 Timothy 3:16-17 and we determined that and how heresies are these things that we as a church see as salvation level beliefs - and that means that we as a church are saying if it falls outside of these lines, then it is heretical.
And our definition of what is and is not a heresy is simple - it’s any belief or practice that explicitly undermines the gospel.
And that same week a fairly local church made national news for stating something that the Bible doesn’t say about those that are mentally handicapped. He essentially said that these handicaps are a result of demon possession.
Now the problem with that is that it does two things - it says that demons are responsible for suffering or for the things that make life hard or challenging, and it minimizes the work of Christ because it minimizes the results of sin entering the world in Genesis 3. It reduces the impact of the Gospel.
Does that make this person a heretic? Possibly so, because this sort of statement minimizes the power of the Gospel. At best he is just plain wrong, that I am confident about because that isn’t anywhere in the Word that sickness or disabilities are a cause of demons.
That was like three weeks ago.
Last week we talked about how Jesus had to be both fully God and fully man. he says so, it’s in His Word and He literally said it. We looked at that Greek word for are and how it meant “to be” and how that was an active, present tense, I and the Father are One, and how the Greek here doesn’t mean relationally one but how they are actively in sync of being the same entity while also being two separate persons as God the Father and God the Son.
And then Sunday after church I get a text about another local area pastor, this one even closer, that is spouting all sorts of false teaching and heresy. He’s talking about there not being a hell, saying the history of the Old Testament didn’t happen, all sorts of off the wall things.
And I tell you those two local pastor stories to tell you that these things are happening right here in our own back yard. So if you are wondering why we are talking heresies, it’s for two reasons. One, because I planned this late last year for this series, so it’s not I suddenly said there are heresies going on and we need to course correct, and two because I believe the Holy Spirit knew this was coming and placed it right here in the right time for our church.
Now today we are going to be in John 14, and we are going to talk about the Holy Spirit. Our main point for today is that:
Main Point: The Holy Spirit is a person of the Trinity who indwells and empowers every believer.
How may here would say that they enjoy Star Wars, or at least have seen it?
There’s a famous line that comes from that movie: “Use the Force, Luke!”
The quote is etched into the mind of every Star Wars fan. Luke Skywalker hears the voice of his teacher Obi Wan Kenobi, telling him to use the force instead of his technology when destroying the Death Star. Within the movie the force is a universal element that binds all things together. It is something that is impersonal and it’s actually rooted in Eastern mystical religions that view everything as god.
While many of us might enjoy Star Wars, the force cannot relate to the personal God of the Bible.
But like last week, in that survey conducted by Christianity Today 59 percent of Americans view the Holy Spirit as a divine force and not a person.
Now like we have the past two messages in this series, we’re going to take a look at what the Bible has to say about the Holy Spirit, who He is and how He is a part of the Trinity of God.
Now I’m not going to try to compare the Trinity to an egg or to water or anything like that, because none of those comparisons really work. If you’d like to know a good book to read on explaining the Trinity that takes Scripture and shows the evidence for the Trinity, I can recommend a couple of them to you, but that’s not what today is going to be about.
Today we are simply going to look at John chapter 14, verses 15 through 26, and we are going to examine what Jesus says about the Holy Spirit.
Beginning in verse 15:
15 “If you love me, you will keep my commands.
16 And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Counselor to be with you forever.
17 He is the Spirit of truth. The world is unable to receive him because it doesn’t see him or know him. But you do know him, because he remains with you and will be in you.
18 “I will not leave you as orphans; I am coming to you.
19 In a little while the world will no longer see me, but you will see me. Because I live, you will live too.
20 On that day you will know that I am in my Father, you are in me, and I am in you.
21 The one who has my commands and keeps them is the one who loves me. And the one who loves me will be loved by my Father. I also will love him and will reveal myself to him.”
22 Judas (not Iscariot) said to him, “Lord, how is it you’re going to reveal yourself to us and not to the world?”
23 Jesus answered, “If anyone loves me, he will keep my word. My Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him.
24 The one who doesn’t love me will not keep my words. The word that you hear is not mine but is from the Father who sent me.
25 “I have spoken these things to you while I remain with you.
26 But the Counselor, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and remind you of everything I have told you.
Would you pray with me
From our passage today we are able to see Three attributes of the Holy Spirit:
The first attribute is that:
1. The Holy Spirit is A PERSON.
The Holy Spirit is a person.
Now what exactly does that mean?
I think many out there would say that a person has a body of some sort, but that is what makes a person a human, not necessarily what defines a person.
So like most things we’re going to have to define what a person is.
Here’s what Merriam-Webster’s dictionary has to say in reference to person:
First it does talk about being a physical being, a human, then it says this:
“One of the three modes of being in the Trinitarian Godhead as understood by Christians”
And then it sort of talks about people again. This is one area where it wasn’t really all that helpful to go to a dictionary, because it’s that definition of a person as part of the Godhead that we are actually striving for.
So let’s look at how we would normally address a person. Chances are, we wouldn’t call a person “it,” and if you are then you shouldn’t, because a person will have a personal pronoun associated with them of either he or she, especially in the Greek.
I just offended a whole lot of people probably somewhere, but that’s all there is, he or she.
Here in John chapter 14, Jesus is speaking about the Holy Spirit as a Counselor that He will send when He goes to the Father. Here Counselor is masculine, not neuter or without pronoun, and verse 17 explicitly says “He”.
He’s going to be the Counselor that Jesus sends. He is the Spirit of Truth. The world can’t receive Him because the world doesn’t see Him or know Him, Jesus says.
And that’s true today, if you don’t know the Holy Spirit, If all that you have ever done is show up in church or prayed some sort of prayer, and there has been no movement of the Holy Spirit in your life, no growth, no desire to follow Him, no change whatsoever, if you don’t know the Holy Spirit, then there may be a problem.
Look, if all you ever did was show up in church, that doesn’t save you. If all you have ever do is give money or stuff to the church, that doesn’t save you.
If you mouthed some words that someone else told you to say, and you were never convicted and never had any desire to follow the Lord, to listen to Him and obey - not listen to others, but listen to Him and hearing His voice and obeying that voice - if that’s all you ever did and there has been no change in your life, then according to Jesus right here in this passage, you don’t know Him because you are of the world.
Verse 19 drives this home more, Jesus says in a little while the world will no longer see me, but you will see me. That’s because there is personal interaction with the Spirit.
Verse 26 says that He, the Holy Spirit, will teach you and will counsel you - that requires personhood. We don’t take instructions from robots or from mysticism. We don’t take instructions from something that isn’t personal.
And this isn’t the only place the Holy Spirit gets these personal pronouns. We see them in Acts chapter 10, verses 19-20
19 While Peter was thinking about the vision, the Spirit told him, “Three men are here looking for you.
20 Get up, go downstairs, and go with them with no doubts at all, because I have sent them.”
The Holy Spirit uses the pronoun “I” when He’s telling Peter to go with these men to see Cornelius.
In chapter 13, the Holy Spirit uses the word “me” when calling Paul and Barnabus:
2 As they were worshiping the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said, “Set apart for me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them.”
In John 16:13-14 we see Jesus again referring to the Holy Spirit as a “He”:
13 When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth. For he will not speak on his own, but he will speak whatever he hears. He will also declare to you what is to come.
14 He will glorify me, because he will take from what is mine and declare it to you.
The Holy Spirit is a person.
The second attribute of the Holy Spirit is that:
2. The Holy Spirit is GOD.
This gets back to that Trinity part. Look at verse 20 of chapter 14 again with me:
20 On that day you will know that I am in my Father, you are in me, and I am in you.
It’s the Holy Spirit that is that “I am in you” part. Again, this verse gives us a glimpse of how these three distinct persons make up the totality of God.
Jesus says I am in the Father, that goes back to last week where we talked about Jesus being both fully God and Fully man, and then He goes on to say that you, meaning His followers, are in Him, and because God the Son, Jesus, is returning to God the Father, God the Holy Spirit will indwell the life of the believer and God will be with us.
And we can go back to Genesis and see how the Holy Spirit is God. Genesis 1:2 demonstrates His creative abilities:
2 Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness covered the surface of the watery depths, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the surface of the waters.
He has the omniscience and the omnipresence of God 1 Corinthians 2:10-11:
10 Now God has revealed these things to us by the Spirit, since the Spirit searches everything, even the depths of God.
11 For who knows a person’s thoughts except his spirit within him? In the same way, no one knows the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God.
and Psalm 139:7-8:
7 Where can I go to escape your Spirit? Where can I flee from your presence?
8 If I go up to heaven, you are there; if I make my bed in Sheol, you are there.
Our missional verse, Matthew 28:19-20 has the Holy Spirit listed within who we baptize in:
19 Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,
Paul speaks of the Sprit as part of the Godhead.
He says in 2 Corinthians 3:17-18:
17 Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.
18 We all, with unveiled faces, are looking as in a mirror at the glory of the Lord and are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory; this is from the Lord who is the Spirit.
And the word used here in the Greek is Kurios. Now this is an important Greek word. And it’s important because this word was a specific word that was used to translate the name Yahweh into the Septuagint, the Greek translation of the Old Testament.
Now this word could be used for master or lower case lord, but context in Paul’s use wouldn’t make any sense. Paul is speaking about God here.
In our passage today, this is massive.
Verse 17, He is Truth - God.
Verse 18, I am coming to you - talking about the Holy Spirit again, God.
Verse 19 you will see me because you know me, talking about the Holy Spirit dwelling within the believer in Christ, again, God.
Verse 20 we covered a minute ago, verse 21 I will reveal myself to the believer that keeps my commands, the only way to do that is by the power of the Holy Spirit, again, God.
Each verse has this undergird that demonstrates that the Holy Spirit is God and is the only one able to place us in oneness with God.
The Holy Spirit is a person, the Holy Spirit is God, and the third attribute of the Holy Spirit is that:
3. The Holy Spirit is WITH US.
If you are a believer in Christ, then the Holy Spirit is with you.
Verse 18 says I will not leave you as orphans.
He’s not just going to say follow me, and then leave you at the doorsteps to figure it out.
I love verse 23:
23 Jesus answered, “If anyone loves me, he will keep my word. My Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him.
My Father will love him, and WE will come to him and make our home with him.
That is a powerful statement.
If we love Jesus - if we trust Him, believe in Him, and allow Him to be the Lord of our life - If anyone loves me, they will keep my Word by that power of justification and the immediate sanctification that happens in that moment, and because we are justified and sanctified by believing in Christ, Jesus says My Father will love him, and WE, that is God, will come to him by the way of the Holy Spirit and make OUR home with him.
Jesus says look, if you will believe in Me and love me and follow me, then We will come and make our home with you.
But Jesus doesn’t stop there, verse 26:
26 But the Counselor, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and remind you of everything I have told you.
Not only are We going to come and make Our home with you, we’re going to clean up the mess, because you can’t do it of your own power.
The Holy Spirit comes in and He continues the sanctification in our lives to prevent us from going backwards!
How does that work?
Speaking to a large audience, D.L. Moody held up a glass and asked, "How can I get the air out of this glass?" One man shouted, "Suck it out with a pump!" Moody replied, "That would create a vacuum and shatter the glass." After numerous other suggestions Moody smiled, picked up a pitcher of water, and filled the glass. "There," he said, "all the air is now removed." He then went on to explain that victory in the Christian life is not accomplished by "sucking out a sin here and there," but by being filled with the Holy Spirit.
Jesus says that if you love me, you will keep my commandments because I have set up residency within you, filling you with the Holy Spirit.
It’s not by good works or giving or karma or any of that that we are saved. It’s only by the indwelling of the Holy Spirit that we do good works, and the only way to know the person of the Holy Spirit is to know Jesus Christ as Lord.
Ephesians 2:8-9 says:
8 For you are saved by grace through faith, and this is not from yourselves; it is God’s gift—
9 not from works, so that no one can boast.
Saved by Grace through faith means that you have accepted God’s grace through Jesus Christ, who came as God in the flesh to bear the burden of all of your guilt and shame, and that you have placed all of your faith in Him as the only one able to redeem you, and now He dwells in you as the Holy Spirit, guiding and directing your life.
The Holy Spirit is a person of the Trinity who indwells and empowers every believer.
Would you stand and pray with me?
Prayer - Holy Spirit, you are welcome here. Lord, fill this place and draw us closer to you. Fill each of us with Your power, cleanse us from our sins, overflow us with your indwelling.
Lord, let us be filled today.
As decisions are being made right now, do you know the love of Jesus today? Do you know the Holy Spirit? Is He the Lord of your life? verse 23 again says “If anyone loves me, he will keep my word. My Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him.”
Has the Lord made His home with you?
Do you know Him today?
As we prepare to sing, right now, if Jesus is calling out to you to hear His voice and to follow Him, you can do that today. You can simply step out from where you are right now or you can catch one of us after service today and we will share with how you can do that today.
Lord if there is anyone here today that doesn’t know you, I pray that right here, right now, You speak to them, and that you call them into that relationship with you today. To know You and the righteousness and faithfulness of walking with you.
As the ushers are coming forward to receive today’s offering, if you’ve got a prayer request or if there’s just something that you need to talk about after today’s message and you’d like to talk, I want to encourage you to either fill out that connect card that is attached to your bulletin or to text that number on the screen. We’d love to hear from you and add you to our prayer list.