Every electrical appliance you purchase comes with a trouble shooting guide. The purpose of this guide is to instruct you what to check for if the appliance is not running. The number one item is usually, “Ensure that the item is plugged into an electric outlet.” Here again, this must be a rather common problem. It’s like the story of the man who purchased a chainsaw.
A lumberjack goes into a shop and buys a chainsaw. Two weeks later he returns the chainsaw and says to the shop assistant: "2 weeks ago I bought this chainsaw and you said that it would chop down 50 trees in an hour. I can only manage 2 trees in an hour."
The shop assistant says, "Let me see", and starts the machine up. BRRRRRR!!!
The lumberjack jumps back in surprise and says "what's that noise?!?"
With many things in life we need to know how to connect with and operate them. This is also true with the Holy Spirit. Today I thought we would explore the person and the purpose of the Holy Spirit. Let’s read where the Holy Spirit is introduced to us.
John 14:17 “He is the Holy Spirit, who leads into all truth. The world cannot receive him, because it isn’t looking for him and doesn’t recognize him. But you know him, because he lives with you now and later will be in you.”
Some very critical truths about the Holy Spirit are evident in this passage. First the Holy Spirit is declared by Jesus to be a person as opposed to an “it.” Twice we see the noun “he” and four times the pronoun “him.” The Holy Spirit is not a powerful force like in Star Wars but rather a powerful person.
When people pursue the power of the Holy Spirit rather than the relationship of the Holy Spirit, they are like Simon the Sorcerer found in Acts 8.
He had been amazing the people of Samaria for years. He was often referred to as “the Great One - the Power of God.” due to his magical tricks. When Philip arrived on the scene telling others about Jesus many become believers, including Simon the Sorcerer.
He was amazed by the signs and miracles that followed Philip.
When the word got back to Jerusalem about the Samaritan believers, Peter and John were sent to baptize them in the Holy Spirit. When Simon witnessed the power that the Holy Spirit gave he offered to buy the ability to give this power to others so that they would still marvel at him. Peter was quick to condemn him for his request and to point out that his heart was not right with God. In fact Peter informed him that he was jealous of the power of the Holy Spirit and it was jealousy that held him captive to sin.
Simon had become a believer in his mind but not in his heart. Rather than pursuing the power of the Holy Spirit he should have been pursuing the relationship with the Holy Spirit.
We are also informed that the Spirit is holy. That means He is “set apart.” When we become believers, He takes up residence in our inner being. He comes as one who is “set apart” from our flesh. When we sin He convicts, not condemns, us of those sins. He attacks our conscience in an attempt to confess our sins and repent.
Also Jesus equated the Holy Spirit to himself. Remember Jesus would say that the Father and He were one. Basically Jesus declared himself to be God in flesh. Here He declared to be the Holy Spirit. Notice He said, “He lives with you now and later will be in you.” Jesus is the one with them now. The Holy Spirit would be the one to live inside of them later. Thus we are introduced to the Holy Trinity; God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit.
Now that we know the person of the Holy Spirit, let’s discover more in detail the purpose of the Holy Spirit.
He is our Advocate.
John 14:16 “And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Advocate, who will never leave you.”
The word “Advocate” in the Greek is paraclete. It was translated in the King James Version as “comforter.” And in the NIV it is translated as “counselor.” But the word means much more than any of these.
The Holy Spirit does come to be our counselor; directing our judgment and conduct by giving us his holy opinion and instruction. He is also our comforter; soothing, consoling, and reassuring us in the midst of sorrow. He is there to deliver the peace beyond understanding that is offered to us. He is our advocate, pleading on our behalf when we sin. And our intercessor, pleading on our behalf when we are facing difficulty or trouble.
He is our helper. He provides us with what is necessary to accomplish a task or satisfy a need. He gives us the strength or means to achieve our goals. He will always render assistance to us when asked. He will cooperate effectively with us in our daily walk. He is there to aid and assist us in our every need. He will never leave us.
Notice Jesus spoke of the Holy Spirit as being exactly like him? Jesus never rejected any of his followers, including Judas. But many of his followers rejected him. And when they did, He never chased after them. The Holy Spirit is just like Jesus. He will reject no one but He will not pursue those who reject him.
He is our Reminder
John 14:26 “But when the Father sends the Advocate as my representative—that is, the Holy Spirit—he will teach you everything and will remind you of everything I have told you.”
Debbie and I suffer a lot from memory loss, as we all do. You meet someone in public and can’t remember their name because they are out of the element you are accustomed to seeing them in. You try to remember words to a favorite song or the name of a favorite TV show but it just won’t come to you. Debbie has a theory that with each new memory an old one gets pushed out. But reality is most memories are there and simply stored away. So here is your science lesson for the week.
The human brain consists of about one billion neurons which help store memories. Each neuron forms about 1,000 connections to other neurons, amounting to more than a trillion connections. If each neuron could only help store a single memory, running out of space would be a problem. You might have only a few gigabytes of storage space, similar to the space in an iPod.
Yet neurons combine so that each one helps with many memories at a time, exponentially increasing the brain’s memory storage capacity to something closer to around 2.5 petabytes (or a million gigabytes).
To help simple minds like mine understand, if your brain worked like a digital video recorder (DVR) in a television, those 2.5 petabytes, which is your brain’s memory capacity, would be enough to hold three million hours of TV shows. You would have to leave the TV running continuously for more than 300 years to use up all that storage.
Think of just useful information that bombards your brain. You must remember things for your job. You must remember things around the house. You are constantly recalling details to function in everyday situations. How to drive a car. How to go to work or the grocery store. How to get home from work or the grocery store. Minute details that are extremely important.
Then added to all that is every sermon you have heard me preach over the last six years. How many of those sermons do you remember? Yet they are all stored in those neurons in your brain along with every scripture you have ever read or heard spoken.
And within us we have the greatest teacher and reminder of all. When we are struggling the Holy Spirit will bring into remembrance a scripture once read or a sermon once heard. We know God’s will for our lives through scripture that the Holy Spirit will present to us so we can be certain to follow his will.
We are called to be witnesses to those around us but might be reluctant to do so for lack of knowledge. The Holy Spirit promises to bring into remembrance the words we will need at the proper time. In fact, Jesus told his disciples that when they would be arrested they would have the right words at the right time.
But just like a DVR, you have to record TV shows to watch them. A blank DVR is of no use for its purpose. We have the responsibility of getting God’s word and teaching into our brains so that the Holy Spirit can bring them to remembrance.
He is the Glorifier
John 16:14 “He will bring me glory by telling you whatever he receives from me.”
Jesus will be glorified through the Holy Spirit. One way this is done is through the Bible.
He glorifies Jesus through the written word.
1 Corinthians 2:11 “No one can know a person’s thoughts except that person’s own spirit, and no one can know God’s thoughts except God’s own Spirit.”
God had to have a venue to express his very thoughts to man. He decided to use man as the tool to accomplish this by inspiring him to write a series of historical records, prophetic records, and letters to one day be to gather as the Holy Bible. We are told that God inspired man to write this book. We are told that the prophetic words written in this book was not the will of man but rather written as they were moved by God. Within the pages of the Bible are God’s deepest thoughts because they came from within his own Spirit. And those thoughts glorify his Son.
He glorifies Jesus through the salvation of people.
John 16:8 “And when he comes, he will convict the world of its sin, and of God’s righteousness, and of the coming judgment.”
While the Holy Spirit does not dwell in the hearts of every person, He does move upon the hearts of everyone. What people label as their conscience is often the Holy Spirit’s convicting voice.
Paul said that even those who do not have God’s written law, show that they know it when they instinctively obey it, even without having heard it. They demonstrate that God’s law is written in their hearts, for their own conscience and thoughts either accuse them or tell them they are doing right.
The Holy Spirit also magnifies the righteousness of God and warns of the coming judgment. He does this in partnership with us. His desire for us is to allow him to use us as a tool to accomplish these two goals. Once He has convicted a person of their sins, the opportunity may arise for us to share the Good News of Jesus and the warning of what happens if He is rejected. It is then that we find ourselves in partnership with the Holy Spirit. This leads to another purpose of the Holy Spirit.
He glorifies Jesus through reproduction of the spirit of Christ.
Romans 8:11 “The Spirit of God, who raised Jesus from the dead, lives in you. And just as God raised Christ Jesus from the dead, he will give life to your mortal bodies by this same Spirit living within you.”
We are trapped in mortal bodies. These mortal bodies are prone to sin. There is not much we can do to escape that fact. But the actual problem is not the external side of our mortal bodies but rather the internal side. So the Holy Spirit decides to take his residency in the midst of the turmoil.
The power He brings with him is the same power that raised Jesus from the dead. We now have the power necessary to overcome sin and reflect the love of our risen savior.
When we face temptation, the Holy Spirit declares to us that this temptation is common and shows us a way to walk away from it. He reminds us that He is greater than any temptation the world would offer. But we have the choice to ignore him and thus not glorify Jesus or to listen to him and glorify Jesus by being more like him. If we think we can’t, He will enable us to do so.
He glorifies Jesus by enabling us to serve.
Acts 13:2 “One day as these men were worshiping the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said, ‘Appoint Barnabas and Saul for the special work to which I have called them.’”
Barnabas and Paul was about to turn their corner of the world upside down. They began on the Isle of Cypress preaching the Gospel. In the city of Paphos, they met a false prophet calling himself Bar-Jesus, which meant the son of Jesus. Like Simon the sorcerer, he tried to buy the power of the Holy Spirit from them.
From there they traveled to Perga. It was here that John Mark got homesick and left them. Barnabas would have spoken gently of John Mark’s departure. Paul would have been a bit less understanding.
When they left the Island of Cyprus, they went to another city called Antioch of Pisidia. It was there that Paul would contract malaria. Yet in spite of his illness, many Gentiles became Christians. Therefore, the Jews stirred up a riot and ran them out of town.
They traveled to Iconium, then to Lystra. In Lystra, Paul was stoned, drug outside the city, and left for dead. After he recovered, they stopped at Derbe than back to Antioch from where they had been sent.
Through all of their perils and troubles, the Holy Spirit enabled them to complete their task. We are all called to a task. That task is to reach that corner of the world where the Holy Spirit has sent us. We are to join with the Holy Spirit to glorify Jesus by imitating him in our lives. We are to join with the Holy Spirit to glorify Jesus by leading others to accepting him. We are to be empowered by the Holy Spirit by spending time in God’s word. We are to seek, trust, and pray to the Holy Spirit because He is our companion. Those things will connect us with the power of the Holy Spirit and lead us to a more peace filled life.
