The Person and Work of the Holy Spirit lesson 31 cont.
Miles Driedger · Aug 7, 2022
Holy Spirit (2021-23), No. 73
Holly Hills Bible Church
https://www.hollyhillsbiblechurch.org/teaching/messages/4926192802981

Transcribed from the recording by SermonAudio, so expect the occasional misheard word.

All right, so I texted the guys after last week and I said, I think I'm slower than Courtney at going through questions. So I'm saying something. I was going easy on you. I wasn't going to say anything. Yeah, I realized that after last week and I looked down and thought, oh boy, we're getting to the end of question three after two weeks. I'm glad I'm now the metric for this class. So I will quickly recap what was question three.

That was, should we wait for the Spirit to come to us and give us power? And of course that question is based off of what we saw the disciples, you know, Jesus commanded them, you know, go to Jerusalem and wait for the Holy Spirit to come and give you power.

And of course, RINO, and I quoted Watchman Knee as well, and they talked about, you know, tarrying, and that was a thing back in their day that, I mean, is that a thing at all down in Colorado? People do tarrying meetings and so forth? That's not something that fits in my generation's vocabulary. Anyway, I did mention last week that something similar that I experienced was sort of the worship nights and that kind of thing that go on.

I'm sure a very different spiritual understanding behind that in a sense as well, and yet the whole concept is to bring the Holy Spirit. You hear that kind of a phrase quite commonly. And that's basically equated with a very dramatic experience. It's a very experience-based kind of event. And so I kind of connected a little bit that with this question. And we said that no, we don't wait for the Holy Spirit to come and give us power, but that we have the constant presence of the Holy Spirit with us.

And I didn't quite get to but I had Galatians 3 5 written down here as a way to kind of Cap off that and this is where did I say this last week? I don't think I read this first, but It's where Paul is he's rebuking the Galatians and he says So then does he who provides you with the spirit and works powerfully in you do it by the works of law or by hearing with faith and And encapsulated in that verse, he assumes the fact that you have been provided with the Spirit.

So that's number one, you have the indwelling Spirit. Number two is for It's for the powerful working in you. So I said the power for service. And number three is by hearing with faith. That's the implied answer there. Rhetorical question. And so we have the spirit. That's assumed true. The spirit is provided for the power of service. And that happens as we walk by faith in what's been provided.

Any other thoughts or comments on that question before we move on? I would recommend a book to read called Waiting on God by Andrew Murray. And what's great about that book is that there are times that the spirit sort of puts you on the shelf for a while because he just has things to tell you and there's a real benefit or use the imagery of being in the waiting room with the Lord for however long, preparing you for what's next.

And so I don't think that if you're waiting necessarily that you're sort of not spiritual enough to move on. That's not the point. The point is that If it isn't the Spirit of God energizing the work, then it's out of the flesh. You don't get to do it in neutral. Yeah, that's a great point, Mike, and I appreciate that. That's something the Lord's been teaching me in the last stretch of my life as well.

You gave me that book, actually. I haven't quite read it yet. I read into it a little bit. You gave me a lot of books, so I've got a stack there. working through. But, you know, I definitely have seen that, right, where there's a lot of waiting in the Christian life, but not in the sense that we, I think, we see in some of those, the sense that that's often used, like waiting for some sort of experience, some sort of, you know, essentially trying to what's the right word to use, um, make the Holy Spirit come, you know, um, trying to through some sort of, uh, exercises of, of the flesh to try to, um, make that happen.

Um, but, uh, but yeah, absolutely. There's a lot of, of waiting for him to do what he's going to do. There was a lot of that through the time of my life where I was really involved with athletics. There would be a lot of prayer for the Holy Spirit to energize and empower and all for the purposes of both the attitude probably as well as the physical aspect of what they're doing in the game.

But yeah, there's different methods that people use to kind of conjure up a temporary power or something along those natures. And we know the Lord, I mean, it's not that He doesn't empower us, but it's not an event that is requested upon and performed temporarily and then, you know, you kind of go back and get your dose of the Holy Spirit another day, you know. That presence that word presence that you used is really the difference. This is a personal presence. It's not like a force That that gives us the ability to wield the lightsaber better than we could if we didn't have it, you know, so yeah, I was just gonna say that there's there is a lot of that even in a the Christianese, we use that term to kind of talk about popular conversation and evangelicalism and how we get wrapped up with certain words.

And sometimes it is a matter of kind of getting to the heart of what a person is thinking there. It may not be a confusion, it might just be a terminology issue. Um, which is what, you know, you find with kids going to different Christian concerts or, you know, being in different events, different youth groups. Um, so it's important to sort that all the way back to this power is related.

It's not just a power in the sense that it's not a, we're not talking about a person, you know, because that's absolutely what we are. Some interesting thoughts there just based on stuff we've been doing with the kids and some of my background with sports and stuff. Awesome. Thanks.

Yeah, I think the thing is that, I mean, the Holy Spirit is never not powerful. And he is always indwelling us. And so that you know, if we think of the Holy Spirit as the source of power on which we depend, that's an always present source of power. But, you know, there is always a question of, you know, His timing and all, you know, His things and what He intends to do.

I think one of the things we'll find is that, you know, we're going to look at a verse here in a minute that the glory belongs to Him. And that kind of becomes an earmark, I think, of when, you know, you see some powerful activity in someone's life or what's perceived as a very, you know, powerful or spiritual thing. But when the Lord is giving the glory, that's a bit of an indication, I think, of where it's sourced. So let's go to question four.

What is the difference between being indwelt by the Spirit and being filled by the Spirit? Um, and, uh, yeah, this is a great, uh, somewhat challenging question to answer because of, um, language. I mean, honestly, the two things in English sound kind of similar, you know, um, you know, are you filled or are you indwelt, you know, or both or, um, but, uh, We know that every person who receives the Gospel, i.e. a Christian, is indwelled by the Holy Spirit permanently. That's clear. So the question becomes, is that different than being filled by the Spirit? And if you turn to John 14, 16-17, this is a pretty familiar verse here, and Jesus speaking.

He says, I will ask the Father and He will give you another Helper, that He may be with you forever, the Spirit of Truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it does not see Him or know Him, but you know Him, because He abides with you and will be in you. So there's a couple of really key things in there.

Of course, he's talking about the Holy Spirit. He says the world cannot receive, because it does not see Him or know Him. But you know him because he abides with you and then the clear contrast that he will be in you. So Jesus is speaking about a change that's going to happen. These guys are believers that he's speaking to, primarily, and that's who he's addressing in these words. And he says the world can't receive him, but you can.

And He's with you and He will be in you. And I think that's a key indication of the forthcoming indwelling of the Holy Spirit. And then, of course, there's Romans 8-9. Sorry, forthcoming from his time. Romans 8-9, this is, again, a pretty familiar verse.

However, you are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you. But if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Him. So, there Paul is assuming that as believers the Spirit dwells in you. And the idea here comes from the Old Testament indwelling of the tabernacle, the temple. In 1 Corinthians 6 19 we see that he says there do not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit Who is in you whom you have from God and that you are not your own? So that's a few a few verses Scripture that kind of connects some some dots there in terms of the fact that you are indwelt And And it also points out that there's a difference between what happened prior to the church and what is going on in the church. Especially the fact there that the temple was the dwelling place of God under the the previous dispensation in a church, you have, we have become the temple of the Holy Spirit, individually and corporately.

And the word temple there in 1 Corinthians 6.19, zodiades, as naos, how you pronounce that. It comes from the root word that means to dwell. The temple itself, he says, is the heart and center of the whole sacred enclosure called Hieron. The Naas was the Holy of Holies. So you are the Holy of Holies, the dwelling place, the presence of the Holy Spirit. So that kind of gives the biblical snapshot of the indwelling of the Holy Spirit in the church. So then we look at filling.

Is filling the same thing? Is filling the same thing as that, or is there a difference? Now, I know I've kind of taken the whole... I haven't left any room for comments here yet on this question. So, I'll open it here. Is there a difference between the filling and indwelling of the Holy Spirit? Miles, I think, at least on mine, it's the difference between position and condition.

And position is the indwelt part. We're all indwelt by it. I think whatever the word of filling is, which you'll get into, is I think more related to walking in the Spirit or more the conditional side of the Spirit's work in us. He's always working 24-7. That's the filling part, if that whatever the word is, which you probably didn't do on what filling is, but I think the indwelling is positional and whatever we determine as filling is more conditional. Awesome. Yeah, I think that really captures the idea there pretty succinctly. Yeah, I have two points here on the filling. So, We said that, now this, I'm going to leave myself open here to as much criticism as you would like to give me.

But I'm going to say that only the church is indwelt by the Spirit. Okay? But we see that in the Old Testament, the Spirit fills many. Now, in looking into this, I did find comment that there are a few places in the Old Testament where it speaks of a spirit indwelling someone, or not really indwelling, but in. But in looking at even those few verses where that could be, there iffy at best. There's one where Nebuchadnezzar is talking about Daniel and says, oh, a spirit of the gods is in him.

Clearly coming from the lips of a pagan king at that point, he's not talking about the Holy Spirit, you know, indwelling this guy. This is just quoting his words, right? So, in what I discovered, I don't think there's any reference to the Holy Spirit indwelling an individual in the Old Testament. I could be wrong on that. Like I said, I'm open to critiques on that.

But we do see, of course, the Holy Spirit filling many. The second point I have is that the Holy Spirit, as it's connected, only indwells believers, but filling, this is an interesting thing, filling can be even for an unborn child, like we see in Luke 1, with John the Baptist. And this is going to tie into one of the later questions, asking whether John the Baptist was in the church. but he was clearly filled with the Holy Spirit, and so were Elizabeth and Zacharias in that same chapter. There's a lot of filling, and in fact, actually, Mounts pointed out that it's Luke who uses the expression of being filled quite regularly. If you want to, I'll give you a few references to it that you can look at later.

Luke 4.28, talks about being filled with wrath.

Luke 5.26 talks about being filled with fear. 6.11, he talks about being filled with anger. And then in Acts, in chapter 3, verse 10, he talks about being filled with wonder and amazement. And there may be a few others, but So, it's also in the Book of Acts, in Luke's writing, where we see this, of course he's describing the early days of the church, where we see this filling of the Holy Spirit explained and talked about quite a lot. And so it's very much Luke's language for what's going on here.

Miles? Yes? Would you say that when David went to the Lord after he'd had Uriah killed, when he said, don't take your spirit from me, was he filled with the spirit or indwelled by him? Yeah, that's a really good question. That's one of the key passages, I think, for the Old Testament question of where people indwelt or filled. And again, like I said, I'm not sure that I can say dogmatically that no one was indwelt by the Spirit, but There's something different, clearly, because David had the possibility of losing that indwelling. Just like the Old Testament temple. The presence of the Lord left the temple as well, right?

Yeah, go ahead. My thought is that believers in the church age are permanently indwelt by the Holy Spirit. It's a permanent thing. The second thing about that is that that indwelling require, well, maybe put it this way, that indwelling includes all of what we know to be the identification truths, being baptized by the Spirit into Christ. None of the Old Testament, obviously, saints were baptized into Christ, death, burial, and resurrection. So the indwelling for the believer now is a far more expansive thing And that's why I think that indwelling is important for us to understand as believers that we are indwelled and all that goes with that. But when it comes to serving the Lord, it takes the filling to do that.

And along with that is the discussion about every believer has a spiritual gift, a gift that is designed to edify the body of Christ and that takes the work of the Spirit to pull that off also. So I think that we look, sometimes I think we look at the being filled with the Spirit as some sort of fireworks display when in fact you have to be filled with the Spirit just to live the life.

To live the life. Exactly, yeah. So it's not, you know, you may be gifted in a certain way and the spirit is the one who's preparing you for the use of that gift and he's going to be the one who manifests his strength and power and life through you, but just to walk by faith takes the work of the spirit. Just as simple as that sounds. Yeah, yeah, no, that's really good.

You know, on that note there about the fact that the Holy Spirit filled John the Baptist from his mother's womb, you know, even just to kick Elizabeth in the womb, you know, when Mary shows up. That was the Holy Spirit working in this little unborn child, you know. We know an unborn child isn't aware in himself of who's showed up to visit, but the Holy Spirit in him is. And he energized him to kick his mom, you know?

And it's pretty neat to see. And I think that's actually you know, kind of a key little piece when we were talking on the phone, like, you know, talking about this, we can't say that John was a believer at that point, you know, and so we see the Holy Spirit there filled even an unbeliever by, you know, and we see that that is, you know, empowering even a fairly, what we'd kind of consider a fairly mundane activity, like a baby kicking.

Um, and, um, and that's kind of the, what I, um, was coming around to see in, in this and in that Galatians three, five that I shared, it's, you know, whatever, um, whatever the Holy, whatever the Holy Spirit is going to do through you, um, you know, is, is, is, is how to say that better. Um, Whatever you do, in anything, it can either be empowered by the Holy Spirit, or it can be coming out of the energy of the flesh, right? There's only two sources. And that's what we're talking about, like Courtney mentioned there, this is the conditional thing, this is the filling. You know, you can be operating by the Spirit, or you can be operating out of your own source.

And that begins to connect with Kind of what Rite Out says on page 165, he says, thus when we speak of being filled with the Holy Spirit, we simply mean that he has complete control of our whole being. I thought that was a really, really key sentence. He says he occupies the entire man. So, yes, we have the indwelling, always, permanently, but he doesn't always have complete control of our whole being.

That's the conditional question. Courtney, were you going to say something? Yeah, I think kind of going back to the conditional side, maybe it's just my interpretation of being filled. To me, it's the inward working and the outward manifestation of the Holy Spirit conditionally. That the Holy Spirit, you're walking by the Spirit, and then it's the outward manifestation of that is when you hear that somebody is filled with the Spirit, or walking by the Spirit. It's typically that the Holy Spirit is, yeah, the work inwardly in an individual and then it's manifested outwardly, you know, in a Christ-like manner. So that, again, kind of the conditional side. And that's just my interpretation of that word being filled or walking by the Spirit. Yeah, I think that's right on. I really do. In fact, now here, Mike, this was in the part you sent me. I'm pretty sure this is from right out. I just have to find it in the book.

But he says, as has already been remarked, this manifestation of the Spirit's presence must be distinguished from the presence itself. So the manifestation of the Spirit's presence has to be distinguished from the presence. He is always present, but he does not always manifest it. That's, again, really, really key. He's always present there, but it's not always going to be seen outwardly.

And when is it seen outwardly for us as believers is, I think, as we walk by faith, right? And on that, something I'd written down, It's actually just a text I sent to Alyssa as I was working on this and thinking this through, and I said, the most powerful place for a believer is trusting or resting firmly on the facts of what is true of you. Because that's faith, resting on the facts. And when you're resting on the facts of what is already true of you, that's when it becomes outwardly manifest in your walk.

So, that's... And one other, what time are we at here? I wanna get through more than one question today. But... I sense a new metric being made right now, which is really happy for me. Yeah. That question, there's a lot of meat there, so. There's my making excuses now. But I was, you know, just this morning, Ephesians 3, 14-21, let's just read through this as a way to close that question. But, because it really answers to a lot of this. So, Ephesians 3, 14-21.

So here, Paul is praying for believers who are indwelt by the Holy Spirit. He says, For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth derives its name, that he would grant you, according to the riches of his glory, to be strengthened with power through his Spirit in the inner man. So he's praying for them to be strengthened with power through the Spirit, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith.

Again, so we see it's through faith that this happens. And that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend I underlined that, to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth and to know, underlined that as well, to know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge. So you get to know something that surpasses knowledge. That you may be filled up to the fullness of God. Now to him who is able to do, and I underlined that, it seems insignificant, but it's connected here with Doing and it's him who is able to do far more abundantly beyond all that we ask or think So again here we talked about what we what we think and it's beyond that According to the power that works within us to him be the glory in Christ and in a church and in Christ Jesus to all generations forever and ever so That was just absolutely packed and answered to a lot of this stuff, which is the Holy Spirit working in you, through faith, to do His work to His glory. And I just thought that really summarized what we were talking about here.

You know, Miles, this is one of those verses that, you know, I think where people who don't know identification, don't know the co-crucifixion, don't know 2 Corinthians 5.17, we're new creatures in Christ. that Christ may dwell in your hearts. This is where the asking Christ into your heart, that this verse is what I think they get mistaken on, that it's not just asking Christ into your heart, it's all of, you know, mistaking all of what's in Romans 6 and, you know, all of the things about the identification, and again, the Galatians 2, when I've been crucified with Christ, it's no longer I live, you know, it's all those verses. get omitted by this verse that says Christ, you know, may dwell in your hearts. This is a side comment that, you know, I wondered where everybody got where the dwelling in your heart, you know, invite Christ into your heart. I think it's without all the other verses.

Yeah, that's probably the one or two places where that is even kind of mentioned. And interestingly, it's a conditional thing, not a justification thing. And in fact, I was gonna, I thought, well, for the sake of time, I'll admit this, but now you brought me back to it, so I've got to go to it.

In Luis' Spanish translation of that verse, he says that the Christ might finally settle down and feel completely at home in your hearts through your faith. That's really good. You know, he's already present in you, but so that he might settle down and feel completely at home. And that's, he can't feel at home in a heart that is striving and attempting to produce something out of the flesh, because he's at home in a heart that's completely dependent on him.

And that's what the Christ in your heart is really about, not how we get saved, it's how we walk by faith. So, all right, let's get into question five. We got five minutes here. So, what is the most important aspect of Stephen's power? Interesting question. Who comes up with these questions? That's a good question. I thought, I don't know. Like, what was important about Stephen's power?

Page 149 in Rideau's book, he says, power was characteristic of the new work by the Spirit, and Stephen, full of faith and power, did great wonders and miracles among the people. And the opposing Jews were not able to resist the wisdom and spirit by which he spoke. Here, both in extraordinary work and in the usual testimony of the truth, we see the power vouchsafed Stephen's faith.

I had to look in a dictionary for vouchsafe. That was just to reveal or disclose. So we see the power revealed Stephen's faith. And that's interesting, because that's exactly what we said. When you walk by faith, the power is worked out through you. But what thoughts do you have on the most important aspect of Stephen's power? First of all, was it Stephen's power? was the power of the spirit in him. And what I find interesting about that quote is that the opposing Jews, the scholars, the guys with all the degrees, they weren't able to resist the wisdom and the spirit by which he spoke. We've talked about a lot that the words themselves have power in them. But it's interesting that it has to do with being able to handle opposition openly and do it powerfully and to the point where even your opposers can't resist what you're saying.

Yeah. Yeah, it's really, if you turn to Acts 5, 38 and 39, this is just before Stephen's speech, and it's Gamaliel speaking, and he's warning, this is really neat, what he says here, warning the other He says, so in the present case, I say to you, stay away from these men and let them alone. For if this plan or action is of men, it will be overthrown. But if it is of God, you will not be able to overthrow them, or else you may even be found fighting against God. And those words there, I think, are very true. And, you know, it's interesting to hear truth coming from from the mouth of one of the enemies of the church, but on this point he had wisdom.

And Luke placed that there very intentionally because you turn over one chapter into Acts 6.10 and his commentary is that, but they were unable to cope with the wisdom and the spirit with which he was speaking. and cope there is to withstand or resist or to oppose. And so it's precisely playing off of what Gamaliel said. Gamaliel said, if this is of God, you will not be able to withstand it or resist it. And then Luke turns around and tells us, and they were not able to resist it. And not just, and it wasn't Stephen, it was the whole, it was the spirit with which he was speaking, that they were not able to resist. Miles, one of the things, you know, what is the most important aspect of Stephen's power?

I think, I don't know what page it is, I have a Word document, so I have no idea what page, but it's in this area. I like how Right Out puts it, and I think the most important is, of Stephen it was said he was full of faith and power. It was also said he was full of faith and of the Holy Ghost in Acts 6, 5. I think the key in all of Stephen's power was his faith. That's the key to his power. He believed it. And with that, that gave him power in the Spirit. The key aspect is faith. If you believe it and trust in what God says is true, you have power. And the Spirit works mightily through you. Exactly. Yeah. Yeah, very good. I wrote down another little piece, a write-out from page 152 in the print book.

He says, he was filled with the Spirit, talking about Stephen here, he was filled with the Spirit for caring for widows. He was full of the Spirit as he gazed on Jesus in glory. And what he's pointing out there is that the filling of the Spirit is for any work that the Spirit would do through you.

It might be feeding widows. It might be giving this mighty defense in front of the nation's leaders. But whatever work the Spirit would do through you, it's by faith. And that's really, really important. Well, I got through two questions today, so we're on a roll here now. I'm feeling good. Yeah. I'm glad I could do that for you.

Let's close in prayer, and then we'll finish off next week. Heavenly Father, thank you so much for this opportunity to study your Word about what you have done for us with the indwelling that you've provided each one of us with. and the opportunity that you've given us to walk by faith and have your powerful work carried out in our lives for whatever it is that you intend to do. And that's just everything, every moment of the day can be walked by faith and be your Your work your life lived out through us. We thank you for that and we pray that we would just learn that that truth all the more Deeply this this coming week in Jesus name. Amen