…but by My Spirit XIX

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Sunday 10/23/16 

Series: …but by My Spirit Pt. 19

Message – Knowing the Holy Spirit II

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Living in the Kingdom

Knowing the Holy Spirit

Review…

Point #1 Intimacy with the Spirit will give you His heart

  • What part of the Godhead has been given to us to lead us, guide us, teach us, enable us, comfort us and steer our hearts into the image of Christ? – The HOLY SPIRIT!

  • The Father & Son trust the Holy Spirit’s words to clearly and accurately represent Them. His words, leadings and teachings are entirely unique to Him – they are NOT Dictated to Him from the Father or the Son (just like the scriptures).

    • He is always 100% clearly representing the Father to us through revelation of the Son, but HOW He does it, they heart by which He expresses Himself – they depth and expression of His desires are HIS alone…

  • Therefore, we learn the Spirit by EXPERIENCING HIM.

    • Ex: Leading Bret in the Baptism of the Holy Spirit.

Point Praying in the Spirit strengthens our Trust in God’s good heart.

  • Jude 1:19-21 “(19) These are sensual persons, who cause divisions, not having the Spirit. (20) But you, beloved, building yourselves up on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Spirit, (21) keep yourselves in the love of God, looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life.”

  • Build up is epoi-kodomeo. Epi – upon & oikodomeo – to build. To build a superstructure, to edify.

  • You will only trust God to the degree that you have come to know Him as trustworthy – this is why I say “His good heart”.

  • IMPORTANT – Praying in the Holy Ghost is not limited to praying in an unknown tongue. It can mean…

  • The purpose of tongues – to enable us to communicate with God in a manner that is not limited to our own knowledge or ability to express either God’s heart or our own weakness.

Point #3 Verbal Exhaltation is JOINT WORSHIP (to kiss the hand). It is a form of intimacy probably MOST akin to “godly” physical intercourse. The two of you (Spirit & you) joined hands in verbal expressions of adoration and devotion to God.

  • Psa 50:23,“(23) Whoever offers praise glorifies Me; And to him who orders his conduct aright I will show the salvation of God.”

Introduction of new point…

Point #4 Intercession – Enters into the Father’s heart with the Spirit. It is one of the purest forms of true worship.

  • Isa 59:14-16 “(14) Justice is turned back, And righteousness stands afar off; For truth is fallen in the street, And equity cannot enter. (15) So truth fails, And he who departs from evil makes himself a prey. Then the LORD saw it, and it displeased Him That there was no justice. (16) He saw that there was no man, And wondered that there was no intercessor; Therefore His own arm brought salvation for Him; And His own righteousness, it sustained Him.”

    • Wondered – šāmēm: A verb meaning to be desolated, to be destroyed or to be appalled or astonished. Since nothing could catch God off guard – one has to believe it means His heart was wrecked, sorely grieved when He saw that there was no one to intercede. He was appalled!

  • We JUST read how the Spirit makes intercessions for us in Rom. 8:26-27.

  • 1Jn. 2:1-2, “(1) My little children, these things I write to you, so that you may not sin. And if anyone sins, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. (2) And He Himself is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the whole world.”

Each person in the Godhead is unique. Each have Their Own personality and distinctions. The Father, is said to have purer eyes than to look upon evil in Habakkuk 1:13. Though I could launch into a grammatical explanation of the text and illustrate it’s truth in other places of scripture, suffice it to say that these words essentially mean that God cannot tolerate sin, wickedness…evil – He hates it! It is reprehensible to Him and He will not endure it. While the  Lord Jesus and the Holy Spirit also hate sin, Their ability to walk among those who commit evil and practice sin appears to be unique to Them. In the heart of the Father is a deep and genuine need for justice, for integrity and honor. Sin is the complete antithesis of everything God is, and because justice is paramount to the Father, sin had to be dealt with once and for all. At the same time and beating from within the same heart is a pervasive and consuming love for mankind…God (the Father) SO LOVED the world.

This represents the conflict…the gap that existed between God and man – the NEED for an intercessor. An intercessor is one who spans the gap between two things. As we read above in Isaiah 59, God desired and looked for an intercessor and found none. There was a span between the justice heart of the Father and the wicked heart of man. Now, if that was all there was to the story, then there would have been no conflict…no need for a saving intercessor…but God SO LOVED the world – hence the conflict. Let us be clear that the conflict between justice and love was NOT due to a conflict within the nature of God, but in God towards mankind. There was a need for an intercessor and so His Own arm (an expression used many times throughout the scriptures for Christ Jesus) brought salvation FOR HIM.

Now, make no mistake, it was mankind that was lost and in need of saving, but it was God’s heart that needed rescue from the inner conflict – and Christ willingly became such FOR the Father. Notice the words, “His Own arm brought HIM salvation”. Brought salvation to WHOM? The Father! God SO LOVED the world…that He gave.

When I was a child I wondered why a sacrifice was necessary. I mean, if God created everything, couldn’t He have just made mankind so that “if” they fell, they would not need salvation but could be cleaned up and/or forgiven by some other means? Or…couldn’t God just forgive man and act like the whole thing never happened…you know, just let it go…I mean that’s what we do as humans. I did not understand then what I do now, and even now I am still looking through a glass dimly. The answer to the problem HAD to be a sacrifice not because God was not loving enough TO forgive…remember it was God Who so Loved! No, it was due to the nature of the fall and the unchangeable nature of God. God is JUST! For Him to simply act as if no offense…no treasonous affront against the Godhead took place, His actions would BE a lie, because treason HAD taken place and a real and rebellious affront to the Creators had been sustained. God cannot change and He cannot lie – He hated sinful rebellion but loved mankind – this HAD to be addressed! Man HAD to be held liable for their treason if God claimed to honor the Son and the Spirit or indeed His Own nature at all…it could not simply be ignored – God’s JUST heart could not allow that….but God so loved!

In man’s fall mankind did not just offend God, he changed and in so doing he changed the nature of the relationship mankind had with God. Man was no longer “like” God…he had taken on an nature completely foreign to his Creators and therefore there was need for a real and lasting change to the mans very nature – the core of WHO he is if there was ever going to be a restoration of man’s relationship to God. So the Son and the Spirit, reconciled man to God and so reconciled God to man. They mended the relationship not by “smoothing things over” but by means of real and tangible justice. Man sinned, and man was judged, man was sentenced with death…was executed in justice for his rebellious treason…and the Man Who did this is Christ. God’s Own arm brought salvation. He “interceded” by becoming the bridge than spanned the gap between God and man.

Isaiah 61:8,

“For I, the Lord, love justice, I hate robbery in the burnt offering; and I will faithfully give them their recompense and make an everlasting covenant with them.”

Isaiah 30:18,

“Therefore the LORD longs to be gracious to you, and therefore He waits on high to have compassion on you for the LORD is a God of justice; How blessed are all those who long for Him.”

I will here mention one more point before closing for this week and that is that the intercession is NOT over – Christ ever lives to intercede for the saints and we will talk further on this point and a few others next week.

 

We will continue here next week….Blessings! 

 

 

I hope this teaching will challenge you and encourage you to place your trust in the Lord Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord.

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Blessings!

 

Pastor Mark

View posts by Pastor Mark

Hi my name is Mark and though I am opposed to titles, I am currently the only Pastor (shepherd/elder) serving our assembly right now.

I have been Pastoring in one capacity or another for nearly 30 years now, though never quite like I am today.

Early in 2009 the Lord revealed to me that the way we had structured our assembly (church) was not scriptural in that it was out of sync with what Paul modeled for us in the New Testament. In truth, I (like many pastors I am sure) never even gave this fundamental issue of church structure the first thought. I had always assumed that church structure was largely the same everywhere and had been so from the beginning. While I knew Paul had some very stringent things to say about the local assembly of believers, the point of our gatherings together and who may or may not lead, I never even considered studying these issues but assumed we were all pretty much doing it right...safety in numbers right?! Boy, I couldn't have been more wrong!

So needless to say, my discovery that we had been doing it wrong for nearly two decades was a bit of a shock to me! Now, this "revelation" did not come about all at once but over the course of a few weeks. We were a traditional single pastor led congregation. It was a top-bottom model of ministry which is in part biblical, but not in the form of a monarchy.

The needed change did not come into focus until following 9 very intense months of study and discussions with those who were leaders in our church at the time.

We now understand and believe that the Bible teaches co-leadership with equal authority in each local assembly. Having multiple shepherds with God's heart and equal authority protects both Shepherds and sheep. Equal accountability keeps authority and doctrine in check. Multiple shepherds also provide teaching with various styles and giftings with leadership skills which are both different and complementary.

For a while we had two co-pastors (elders) (myself and one other man) who led the church with equal authority, but different giftings. We both taught in our own ways and styles, and our leadership skills were quite different, but complimentary. We were in complete submission to each other and worked side-by-side in the labor of shepherding the flock.

Our other Pastor has since moved on to other ministry which has left us with just myself. While we currently only have one Pastor/Elder, it is our desire that God, in His faithfulness and timing, may bring us more as we grow in maturity and even in numbers.

As to my home, I have been married since 1995 to my wonderful wife Terissa Woodson who is my closest friend and most trusted ally.

As far as my education goes, I grew up in a Christian home, but questioned everything I was ever taught.

I graduated from Bible college in 1990 and continued to question everything I was ever taught (I do not mention my college in order to avoid being labeled).

Perhaps my greatest preparation for ministry has been life and ministry itself. To quote an author I have come to enjoy namely Fredrick Buechner in his writing entitled, Now and Then, "If God speaks to us at all other than through such official channels as the Bible and the church, then I think that He speaks to us largely through what happens to us...if we keep our hearts open as well as our ears, if we listen with patience and hope, if we remember at all deeply and honestly, then I think we come to recognize beyond all doubt, that, however faintly we may hear Him, He is indeed speaking to us, and that, however little we may understand of it, His word to each of us is both recoverable and precious beyond telling." ~ Fredrick Buechner

Well that is about all there is of interest to tell you about me.

I hope our ministry here is a blessing to you and your family. I also hope that it is only a supplement to a local church where you are committed to other believers in a community of grace.

~God Bless!