A Word in Season: When the wind blows (John 3:8)

I woke up this morning to the sound of a not quite mighty but still rushing wind outside. It wasn't quite a storm, but it was definitely something of an event. The wind was whipping across the grass, it was blasting through the branches and the leaves on the trees, it was rattling the windows and banging the tiles on some of the roofs.

The wind itself was invisible, but its effects were manifest. No one could deny that something was taking place, the wind was having an impact upon everything that it touched. I love that kind of a storm, I delight in the sights and the sounds of the wind and the rain, but the Lord Jesus uses this imagery of a mighty wind to describe the operations of the third person of the Godhead, the Holy Spirit.

The New Birth and the Wind of the Spirit

He talks to a man called Nicodemus in John chapter 3, and he's telling him the necessity that a man must be born again if he is to enter the kingdom of heaven, and he describes the operations of the Spirit in this way.

The wind blows where it wishes and you hear the sound of it, but cannot tell where it comes from and where it goes. So is everyone who is born of the Spirit. There's a sweet sovereignty in that declaration.

We cannot see the Holy Spirit, but we can see his effect upon those in whom he is at.

Work.

We don't know where he comes from, we don't know where he goes. He comes unbidden by us at the sovereign pleasure of the triune God. Where he goes, we cannot say and we cannot trace, but while he is present with us, his effects are undeniable.

The Spirit's Work in the Dead and the Living

The Lord Jesus is referring particularly here to his effects in those who were dead when he came. When the Spirit begins to work, using the same sort of imagery that Ezekiel saw when he was in the valley of the dry bones, when the wind begins to work, when the Spirit begins to operate upon those who are dead in their trespasses and sins, then life stirs.

Not an innate life in those who were dead, they are dead, but the life that the Spirit brings, the life that the Spirit gives, that same life which is in the risen Jesus Christ. It is that instinct, it is that divine reality that the Holy Spirit brings.

And when the dead start to live, it is undeniable that something is happening. The spiritual vigour and vitality that before was utterly lacking is now manifestly present. Now we don't know why the Spirit works in some and not in others, except that God is pleased to do it that way.

We don't know why there are times when more are converted and other times when less. We don't know why there are some times and places when the Holy Spirit seems to be working in distinct acts of saving power.

We don't know why there are times when our hearts are lifted heavenward by his sweet operations in our souls. We don't know why some sermons are so manifestly striking upon the consciences of the people who hear, both saved and unsaved.

Sovereign Saving Operations and Prayer for Revival

We know that it is the work of God the Holy Spirit, but where he comes from and where he goes, that belongs to him and to him only. What is undeniable is that when he is present, we can hear what is happening.

He comes in sovereign, saving demonstration of divine power and while and where he wills, he accomplishes all his glorious saving purposes. So the next time you see the effects of the wind, the next time you hear that rushing sound and you notice the branches being stirred and the grass being whipped about and the impact of the wind's presence wherever you may be, let us not forget to pray to God the Holy Spirit, to pray to the Father and the Son to send him forth in saving operations, to bring him to us that he might work among us, to bring us out of darkness and into light, to bring us from death to life, to stir our hearts, to make us lively in Christ Jesus and to keep us walking closely with God himself.