Holy Spirit Week 4
Notes
Transcript
As I shared the positive story of the moving of the Holy Spirit last week in deliverance, I wanted to let you know that in our Team meeting Monday morning that Chambers said I remember that Wednesday night, the Cameron said I do to and Kara said I remember it.
While they were not out there with us on the back sidewalk, they remember the lady before she went outside and after she came back inside. They also witnessed the work of the Holy Spirit in her.
I begin this weekend sharing with you another positive encounter with the Holy Spirit. This is a story of healing.
Dixie Terrell started having health struggles. Her and her family were faithfully attending Bridge of Faith and they were a HUGE part of the early days of Bridge of Faith.
It was her quadruplet granddaughters that were some of the first students Amy and I met when we first came to church.
Dixie would serve in many different areas of the church.
She started having health issues and they were not sure what was going on.
After testing, she was diagnosed with liver cancer.
The evidence was clear and her body started to show signs of the diagnoses. Her eyes were jaundice and her skin was getting jaundice.
It was hard to see because sometimes you here people have cancer but you don’t always see the symptoms. With Dixie you could see the evidence on the outside what the Doctors were telling us what was happening on the inside.
She had a Doctors appointment coming up in St. Louis and I can’t remember exactly how far along we were in the journey. So before the appointment we gathered on a Wednesday night and circled up around her. We prayed over her.
She went to the appointment and I vividly remember getting the phone call after the appointment was over.
She said pastor Jonathan you will never believe what my Doctor just told me. He said we have done all the checking and looked at your test results and we see no sign of liver cancer in your body!
I think the Doctor was also in disbelief and asked about her faith. I think she shared with him that her church had been praying for her.
The Doctor said, “you and God need to go have a party because you don’t have liver cancer anymore. You have been healed”
It was incredible. Her skin and her eyes had healed up.
In this instance we celebrated and praised the Lord for all he did. We did not immediately start a healing ministry. We didn’t say that someone who was in the circle had the gift of healing.
We believe that the Lord had a purpose with this healing
This is not to say that the only time we see evidence of the Holy Spirit is when healing comes. I have also seen the work of the Holy Spirit in the suffering. I have seen many suffer well through the empowering of the Holy Spirit as well.
Today we move into the New Testament in this series on the Holy Spirit.
Turn to the book of Luke. The book of Luke/Acts mentions the Holy Spirit more than anywhere else in the Bible.
11 An angel of the Lord appeared to him, standing to the right of the altar of incense.
12 When Zechariah saw him, he was startled and overcome with fear.
13 But the angel said to him: Do not be afraid, Zechariah, because your prayer has been heard. Your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you will name him John.
14 There will be joy and delight for you, and many will rejoice at his birth.
15 For he will be great in the sight of the Lord and will never drink wine or beer. He will be filled with the Holy Spirit while still in his mother’s womb.
Drink wine or beer
The Nazarite vow. means someone who is set apart
He will be filled with the Holy
Spirit/pneuma/ pneumatos:
Same meaning as Ruakh, breath, wind, personal energy of a Human or Deity. Here it is Holy Spirit. It is God’s Spirit
15 For he will be great in the sight of the Lord and will never drink wine or beer. He will be filled with the Holy Spirit while still in his mother’s womb.
While still in his mother’s womb
The Holy Spirit will fill him before even “breathes the air”. Before his first breath on this earth the Spirit is breathing spiritual life in Him.
He is so full of God’s presence before he even takes a breath of the Lord. John is going to live in God’s presence more than his own life breath.
16 He will turn many of the sons of Israel to the Lord their God.
17 And he will go before Him in the spirit and power of Elijah, to turn the hearts of fathers to their children, and the disobedient to the understanding of the righteous, to make ready for the Lord a prepared people.
This Holy Spirit will empower John to live in the spirit and power of Elijah
Spirit and Power are almost synonymous throughout the New Testament. So when you have Spirit you also have dynamis or power.
I just love this. Because when we looked at the Spirit in the Old Testament we talked about the idea of Spirit being personal energy. It was the personal energy of God being poured out on individuals for God’s glory.
Mary
28 And the angel came to her and said, “Rejoice, favored woman! The Lord is with you.”
29 But she was deeply troubled by this statement, wondering what kind of greeting this could be.
30 Then the angel told her: Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God.
31 Now listen: You will conceive and give birth to a son, and you will call His name Jesus.
32 He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High, and the Lord God will give Him the throne of His father David.
33 He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and His kingdom will have no end.
34 Mary asked the angel, “How can this be, since I have not been intimate with a man?”
Mary asked How can this be?
35 The angel replied to her: “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. Therefore, the holy One to be born will be called the Son of God.
The Holy Pneuma will come upon you.
After working through some this, our plan is to go more in depth on this passage this Christmas. So today, I will give you some highlights but we are 89 days away from Christmas and the incarnation of Jesus is a doctrine I love to cover at Christmas time.
So here are some highlights
Notice that it says the Holy Spirit will come upon you and it does not say the Holy Spirit will fill you like it said speaking of John.
Exodus 40 The cloud will overshadowed and filled the tabernacle. Same idea here with the Spirit “overshadowing” Mary.
This speaks to the incarnation of Jesus.
The union of divine and human
Elizabeth
39 In those days Mary set out and hurried to a town in the hill country of Judah
40 where she entered Zechariah’s house and greeted Elizabeth.
41 When Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting, the baby leaped inside her, and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit.
Mary greets Elizabeth
The baby who is John inside of her leaps and…
Elizabeth is filled with the Holy Spirit
Zechariah
67 Then his father Zechariah was filled with the Holy Spirit and prophesied:
He was fill with the Holy Pneuma and prophesied
Simeon
25 There was a man in Jerusalem whose name was Simeon. This man was righteous and devout, looking forward to Israel’s consolation, and the Holy Spirit was on him.
26 It had been revealed to him by the Holy Spirit that he would not see death before he saw the Lord’s Messiah.
27 Guided by the Spirit, he entered the temple complex. When the parents brought in the child Jesus to perform for Him what was customary under the law,
28 Simeon took Him up in his arms, praised God, and said:
All the Spirit being poured out here
Just in this birth story we see individuals being filled with the Holy Spirit.
If you remember from last week, then we talked about the one and the many. In the Old Testament we see individuals being filled with Spirit for the purpose of God getting glory. The individual would then lead the group.
Now here in the birth story of Jesus so many are being filled with the Holy Pneuma
Baptism of Jesus
15 Now the people were waiting expectantly, and all of them were debating in their minds whether John might be the Messiah.
16 John answered them all, “I baptize you with water, but One is coming who is more powerful than I. I am not worthy to untie the strap of His sandals. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.
21 When all the people were baptized, Jesus also was baptized. As He was praying, heaven opened,
22 and the Holy Spirit descended on Him in a physical appearance like a dove. And a voice came from heaven: You are My beloved Son. I take delight in You!
Holy Spirit descended on Him in a physical appearance
This is the same language as we see when the Spirit comes upon David.
Jesus has it all. Jesus is the Messiah
The prophecy is being filled
In Matthew, Jesus says this is happening to fulfill all righteousness.
That is this is the right thing that we are to do.
I need to keep studying this but the connection of baptism to water and deliverance. We see Israel delivered into the promised land by crossing through the waters of the Jordan River on dry ground.
So Jesus being baptized is proclaiming that God is going to rescue his people.
Also with the baptism is the voice from Heaven
The Father speaks something that is already true. You are my Son.
The trinity is also present.
1 Then Jesus returned from the Jordan, full of the Holy Spirit, and was led by the Spirit in the wilderness
So this is really cool
Jesus is filled with the Holy Spirit and was led by the Spirit
What comes with the word Holy Spirit in the New Testament?
Dynamis/Power
So think about it. Does Jesus have the right heart condition? YES ALWAYS
Every time the Spirit is present then Jesus’s heart is in line.
What about Saul? What about David?
How often does Jesus’s heart condition right as the Spirit is present?
I think this is so key when it comes to the Holy Spirit. Go back to this idea that I have been developing over shelving the Holy Spirit or treating the Holy Spirit like an event.
When the power/Holy Spirit comes, it must not be separated from the heart condition.
Is it fair then to conclude that the moving of the Holy Spirit will mimic the life and work of Jesus?
