God With Us: The Holy Spirit
Sermon • Submitted
0 ratings
· 9 viewsNotes
Transcript
Sermon Tone Analysis
A
D
F
J
S
Emotion
A
C
T
Language
O
C
E
A
E
Social
Hello
Hello
Hey Good Morning Church. How’s everybody doing today?
Good, good. Less than a week until Christmas. Yeaya. Can I get some whoops whoops or something. Let’s get a little bit excited, right!
I love it. So good.
Before we jump in, let’s pray.
(prayer)
Amen
Alright. Here we are, one week from Christmas and three weeks into our “with” series. Today in the third week, we are going to be talking about the Holy Spirit.
Now before we jump in deep on the Holy Spirit, I want to spend a moment putting up the frame for today's picture. Although we’re going to talk about the Holy Spirit, of which honestly we could do a million teachings on and still have more to say, the goal of this sermon series is going to play the role of framing this look at the Holy Spirit for us. And I’m thankful for that because it’s going to help us focus in and hopefully get a chance to walk away with a new and grown understanding and relationship with the Holy Spirit.
So that frame, the “with” series.
A good place to start for this idea of us being “with” God would be Matthew 1:23.
“The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel” (which means “God with us”).
This word Immanuel is being spoken about Jesus. He, as we see here, was born of a virgin mother, Mary, and would go on to be the Savior of the world. And as we’ve been seeing these last few weeks and will continue in today, Jesus coming and being on the earth for 30 some years before he ascended to Heaven was only the beginning of this idea of “with”. Scripture doesn’t say that “God was with us” and then he went to heaven and now God is no longer “with” us. No, that whole “with” part continued, after Jesus goes to heaven, God remained with us. This presence of God, the ways in which we experience how He is “with” us in this life is experienced in the promise, the church, and as we’ll see today, the Holy Spirit.
So “who is the Holy Spirit?” That’s a great question. And, well, I’m going to tell you upfront, it would be crazy talk for me to say I can fully explain the Holy Spirit, even if I had all day. The Holy Spirit is mysterious, secret, otherworldly and indescribable by human words. BUT, that doesn’t mean that God, through the Bible, hasn’t revealed to us much about the Holy Spirit. That’s where we are going to start today, exploring some of the foundational truths the Bible tells us.
The Holy Spirit, or as often referred to in the Old Testament, the Spirit of God, is the third person of the Trinity. That means, just as Jesus and God are one, so is the Holy Spirit a part of that perfect union. That means that the Holy Spirit is God, just the same way that God is God and Jesus is God…the Holy Spirit is God. Perfect, pure, eternal, all knowing, all powerful, the creator of all things, fully divine, God.
The Holy Spirit, is often called; advocate, comforter, helper, among other names, and shows up in a lot of different places throughout scripture. From Genesis to Revelation.
Today, we are going to press into how scripture teaches that the Holy Spirit is real, inside of every believer and looking to give you the most full and complete relationship with God that we could ever imagine. Today, we will look into how the Holy Spirit is part of the great news that God is “with” us.
So where to start with this.
We know that the Spirit is discussed throughout the Bible. We see in the Old Testament in Genesis that the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters during the creation of the earth. In the Book of Joel, God tells us that on the Day of the Lord He will pour out His Spirit on all people.
Even in the Christmas story, we actually see that Jesus is borne of the Spirit through Mary.
Not many chapters later, we see that same Spirit descend upon Jesus in the form of a dove at the time of His baptism.
The Spirit is seen with Jesus and leading him many times through the Gospels.
Yet, despite the Spirit being in Jesus and Jesus teaching about the Spirit throughout the Gospel stories, the idea of the Spirit being in believers and in relationship with them hasn’t taken place yet. This is explained in John when we read
By this he meant the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were later to receive. Up to that time the Spirit had not been given, since Jesus had not yet been glorified.
In short, the Holy Spirit in believers didn’t come until after Jesus’ death, resurrection and going up into heaven.
That means, the disciples were experiencing Jesus with them in the flesh, but they were not experiencing Jesus through the Holy Spirit, since during the time of Jesus was not yet part of that “with” statement.
Fast forward to the Last Supper. Jesus and His disciples are eating the day before He is arrested and led to be crucified. These are Jesus and His disciples last moments together before His death. Jesus brings up the Holy Spirit again but tells them something mind blowing.
The reason I’m setting this scene up with the Spirit throughout the Gospels is because it’s important to note two things
The Holy Spirit was present and working prior to and throughout the life of Jesus . Spirit’s been around for forever.
As we just saw in Scripture, the Spirit had not yet been given to the church, and more specifically, the disciples.
This means that the Disciples knew about the Spirit, but more so as the Spirit of God seen in the Old Testament, and they were likely being intellectually challenged by some of the new ways that Jesus was talking about it. But, in reality, they had yet to experience the Spirit of God inside them. And before that happens, Jesus tells them he is leaving. But He tells them, it’s for their good.
But very truly I tell you, it is for your good that I am going away. Unless I go away, the Advocate will not come to you; but if I go, I will send him to you.
Let’s pause here and think about this. The disciples, who have been hanging out with Jesus, God in the flesh, for years. They just got told by Jesus, it is for you benefit that I am going , because if I don’t go away the Counselor, Holy Spirit, will not come to you. This is possibly one of the biggest “with” statements that we hear in the Bible.
Think about this. Our lives our here on earth. We all know about earth. I mean, just the last two years, we’ve got covid, racial injustice, insane political division and unrest, tik tok, shootings at schools and other public places… and that’s just the stuff that we see on the news and social media. I’m sure you’re personal list of crazy tough things going on in your life is just as long. For us, it’s easy to imagine something being better than this. If Jesus tells us he is sending a Spirit and it’s going to be good, we’re like, “yup”
But think about the apostles. Things were crazy back then as well. I mean, people were literally plotting to kill their teacher Jesus. But they had Jesus, in the flesh, sitting at the table with them.
While we’re sitting here thinking, “I hope it gets better, I hope Jesus comes near”, they’re probably over here thinking “how could anything be better than Jesus at our side, He can’t get any nearer”
… Yet Jesus says, “it will be better for you if I go”
Guys, this right here is some straight up razzle dazzle big time stuff. This Counselor is so good for us, that it is better that Jesus leaves earth so His followers can receive it. This Holy Spirit is God “with” us, and this “with” is better than Jesus with the disciples in the flesh.
It feels crazy, but we have to realize, God doesn’t want to just hang out with us. He doesn’t want to be a friend that goes home at the end of the night. He doesn’t want our relationship to be limited by the physical laws of this world. Guys, God is Spirit. He is Supernatural. And He wants a relationship that connects with the supernatural part of who we are. God doesn’t just want to hang with us, He wants to dwell IN US. As a part of who we are. To not be limited to the hearing of our ears of the speaking of our lips. No, He wants a relationship with our soul. So much so that he wants to connect WITH YOUR SOUL. He wants to be a part of the truest you. The part of you that continues on into heaven. Not the flesh that is of this sinful world.
And not only does He want to just dwell in us, Jesus says
And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another advocate to help you and be with you forever—
He wants to help us. He wants to work in us. He wants to be active in impacting your life. He doesn’t enter into us and just hang out.
And then we read verses like this out of Ephesians 3, we begin to grasp the power and purpose of the Holy Spirit.
I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.
I want that. I want to experience the love of Christ like that. I want to experience this.
How does that happen. Where do we go? Where do I get in line?
There are a few verses where Jesus talks about His love and it’s connection to the Spirit.
“If you love me, keep my commands. And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another advocate to help you and be with you forever—
Jesus replied, “Anyone who loves me will obey my teaching. My Father will love them, and we will come to them and make our home with them.
If you keep my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commands and remain in his love.
In fact, this is love for God: to keep his commands. And his commands are not burdensome,
in the Old Testament
Love the Lord your God and keep his requirements, his decrees, his laws and his commands always.
Even in the great commission
Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”
Golly Brian. Where we going with this right. I mean, Jesus Himself said, “no one is good-except God alone”, so why all this talk of obedience?
Because if we look at scripture and take seriously these verses, there is a clear connection between loving Jesus, being filled with the Spirit and obedience to God. And if this is true, than I want to know what this is talking about cause I want to experience this Spirit that Jesus says is better for me to have.
That doesn’t all of a sudden make this whole obedience thing an easy pill to swallow.
So what about marriage. Let’s shift our focus a little bit and see if we are really looking at this idea rightly
K. And I’m going to pick on myself a little bit here, cause well, I’m married, and as amazing of a husband as I thought I was going to be before I proved myself wrong after marrying my wife, she still loves me. But warning, married and dating men in this room, you might be exposed here, and I apologize. But, for the sake of context, this is me.
I call this my “Flowers for my wife” problem.
Essentially, marriages need love, and love needs acts of love. And there are things that I think that I think are really loving. Vacuuming the stairs, showering my wife with words of affection, cute little winks, looking at my wife during the cheesy lines of a movie giving her the “I feel that way about you eyes”, and of course, buying flowers for my wife. See, I want the things my wife needs to feel loved to be things that, well, I think she needs. Or I want to give. Now I know that the 5 love languages exist so everyone’s wants are different but bear with me here okay.
The point is, the love that my wife needs, the things that grow my marriage and make it deeper, well, they aren’t exactly what I want to be the things that I want my marriage to need or my wife to feel loved by. See, I have this really great plan for the ways I can love someone, and I totally think Jessie should see those things and feel loved by them. I mean, how many times do I need to start a load of laundry to help her get a jump start on folding before she realizes that that is a love giving, relationship building gesture. But she doesn’t. Cause here is the door slamming truth about my marriage. There are things that my wife needs, that our relationship needs, that regardless of how much I like them or want something else to be the thing that accomplishes said goal, I need to be obedient to those things if I want to have a good relationship with my wife. We just use different language for it. But in reality, if I’m not obedient to my wife's need for quality time, or I don’t prioritize honesty, my relationship suffers.
We look at all these things in our marriage and we realize, our relationship with the Holy Spirit, our relationship with obedience to Christ, maybe it has sort of a “Flowers for Jesus” sort of problem. For me, there are things that I want obedience to Christ to be made up with. Those, “yeah, I did that. Duh.” I totally didn’t do make that dishonest deal to close a sale at work. I definitely prayed on the way to work today. Doesn’t it count for something that I didn’t do anything “bad” today.
Who are we fooling thinking we can win Jesus over with flowers when that alone doesn’t even work on our spouses.
We have to recognize that relationships with spouses, friends, family members, anyone we are close with, might have something in common with our relationship with the Holy Spirit. They require closeness, investment of time. Listening, sharing. Vulnerability. Sacrifice. They are real relationships.
Belief and obedience go hand in hand. Our belief spawns obedience and our obedience strengthens belief. This is how the Holy Spirit chooses to work in us. And it uses things like prayer, fellowship, communion, scripture, repentance, confession, worship and service to shape and develop the belief and obedience within us.
As soon as we start seeing our relationship with the Holy Spirit as a relationship WITH the Holy Spirit, it changes us. It reveals to us how much different a healthy relationship looks compared to what we have.
You see, we gotta recognize that when Jesus says, “if you love me, keep my commands”, He isn’t turning love for Him into a checklist. Yet, how many times have we been caught doing just that. Yet you and I know that no healthy relationships start with a check list of, “okay, relationship checklist, gotta make sure I check all the boxes that make up loving my wife.” That literally sounds insane. “Oh shoot, only love my wife 7 out of 10 boxes checked today. Relationship only 70% good. At least I cleaned the house, said some nice words and didn’t yell at the kids. Tomorrow I’ll get a perfect score”
Guys, it’s crazy to think that’s what good relationships look like. But that doesn’t mean that we don’t recognize that healthy relationships have foundations and expectations that when met allow it to thrive. Honesty, faithfulness, kindness, acts of service, honoring each other, confession. No one is going to deny that those things are not valuable, I’ll go so far as to say essential, to having a healthy relationship
Yet, when Jesus associates our love for Him with obeying His commands, obeying his teachings, I know for me, there have been more times than I’d like to admit that I’ve seen that as a checklist. We don’t measure the depth and closeness our most important relationships with other humans through the measure of a checklist, so why do we assume that Jesus has a checklist for us?
If we are going to say that we believe Jesus, than we have to believe that what He said is true about the Holy Spirit and our receiving it.
“Where the gospel is not cherished, the Spirit will not be experienced… where the Spirit is not sought, there will be no deep, experiential knowledge of the gospel.” - J.D. Greear
Okay, so, obedience. This feels like a lot right. I was kind of hoping that maybe there was a really easy prayer that I could say and Jesus was just going to super charge me with mountain top experiences, good feelings and an awesome life. But I don’t actually think that the thought of obedience is the tough pill to swallow in this conversation. I think we are hesitant to obedience because we know that in doing so, we are no longer the ones who will decide who we are, who we will become and what we will do in this life.
It kind of reminds me of my early twenties. Life was changing, I wanted a wife. I was making new friends hoping that all these growing new relationships would be deep and long lasting. And I totally knew what I wanted in my new friends and future girlfriend.
I mean, the list was easy. They totally love all the same movies as me. We are definitely going to rock out to all my favorite bands in the car. They definitely will get along with all my other friends, even the old friends of mine that kinda totally stunk and were jerks. These new friends I’m going to make, they also really respect and admire they way I see life and my opinions. And they definitely know when I need time to myself and would never want to disrupt that. But don’t get me wrong, they will definitely challenge me to be my best.
----blank stare--
How’d that work out for you 20 something year old Brian? You met the woman of your dreams. Guessing she was perfectly compatible with your list and definitely didn’t cause any disruption to the perfect plan you had for what you wanted to do with life. I mean, who doesn’t love progressive instrumental metal music all the time, watch only the office on tv for the rest of their lives. Someday Jess, you will be okay with watching every season of the office multiple times a year.
Okay, but seriously, If we want this “with” the Holy Spirit, we have to recognize that like in marriage, living in relationship with the Holy Spirit is going take the focus of our life off of all the things we want and would do. That’s not to say that you say one prayer and next thing you know you’re quitting your job, moving to a third world country for mission work and are now switching political parties. But maybe the crazy fears of how God will rock our world when we think about fully submitting our life decisions to Him are a little bit of proof that this is of God, and someone is working to make us think it’s a bad choice. But that also isn’t to say nothing is going to change.
Francis Chan puts it well,
“the Spirit of the living God is guaranteed to ask you to go somewhere or do something you wouldn’t normally want or choose to do.” - Francis Chan
If you want to experience the Holy Spirit, to be in relationship with Him, healthily and eternally, you’re path in life is going to change. What you spend time on is going to change. What you prioritize is going to change. Just like in marriage or any other deep relationship, it changes things. So why are we expecting a deep enriching, love filled relationship with the Holy Spirit without it changing our world. And let’s get real, if we look at it from the outside looking in, if we look at how relationships could change us before we’re in them, our initial reaction is often “yeah, I’d love that relationship, but what if it changes ___”.
But I’ll tell you, the times in my life that I have experienced the Holy Spirit the most, it wasn’t like He came in and just supercharged everything that was already happening and doing. Every time I experienced the Holy Spirit, things changed. Obedience led to a change in my life. For the Bible tells us
So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen, since what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.
There’s one last thing that it’s important that we realize about our being filled with the Holy Spirit. Although we take part in the relationship and our obedience plays a role in its growing experience, it is only by the power of the Holy Spirit that we are filled up with and transformed by the glory of God.
And we all, who with unveiled faces contemplate the Lord’s glory, are being transformed into his image with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.
If you are sitting here today, hearing about the Holy Spirit, hearing about the Christian faith and Jesus, God. This want they have for a relationship for you and wondering, what do I do? Peter in Acts says
Peter replied, “Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. And you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.
It’s okay that you don’t have every question answered or life straightened out. It’s okay that there may be things that are great reasons for saying “not today” or “I’m not sure”. This commitment, this belief, it comes with, through and from a God who is giving you His Spirit, who will be with you and help you with those questions. All He asks from you today is to respond to His truth.
I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.
Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.