Where Two or Three Are Gathered Together (The Holy Spirit - Part 2)

Thank you for listening to this message from the ministry of Morse Corner Church in Leverett, Massachusetts.

Morse Corner is a non -denominational church that is committed to the preaching and teaching of the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Our church was founded in 1896 by two students of the famous evangelist

D .L. Moody. We seek to encourage and edify the body of Christ through the proclamation of God's word through the ministries of the local church.

If you'd like more information, visit our website morsecornerchurch .com. We hope you enjoy the message.

If we abide in Christ, His Holy Spirit will be with us every step of the way.

Isn't that what Jesus says, I will neither leave you nor forsake you? Well, Jesus is in heaven. He's gone away.

No, He dwells in us. Amen? So we have nothing to fear, but this is something the disciples, we're living on easy street compared to them.

So they knew this was a trying time, they had seen the persecution, and now their Lord is going to be crucified.

And God, through Jesus, through the Holy Spirit, is comforting them. Look at verse 26,

John 15, verse 26, Jesus says, but when the helper comes, whom

I shall send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth who proceeds from the

Father, He will testify of me. And you also will bear witness because you have been with me from the beginning.

And now we move into chapter 16, verse 1. These things I have spoken to you that you should not be made to stumble.

They will put you out of the synagogues. Yes, the time is coming that whoever kills you will think that he offers

God service. And these things they will do to you because they have not known the

Father nor me. But these things I have told you that when the time comes, you may remember that I told you of them.

And these things I did not say to you at the beginning because I was with you.

But now I go away to him who sent me. And none of you asked me, where are you going?

You would think they would ask, right? But they didn't ask. But none of you asked me, where are you going?

But because I have said these things to you, sorrow has filled your heart.

Nevertheless, I tell you the truth. It is to your advantage that I go away.

For if I do not go away, the helper will not come to you.

But if I depart, I will send him to you. And when he has come, he will convict the world of sin and of righteousness and of judgment.

Of sin because they do not believe in me. Of righteousness because I go to my

Father and you see me no more. And of judgment because the ruler of this world is judged.

And I still have many things to say to you. But you cannot bear them now.

However, when he, the spirit of truth has come, he will guide you into all truth.

For he will not speak on his own authority, but whatever he hears, he will speak.

And he will tell you of things to come. And may

God have a blessing upon the reading of his words. Such a great passage where Jesus himself is teaching on the

Holy Spirit. So we need to establish a few things, okay? These are the, this is the stuff that you just have to say when you teach on the

Holy Spirit. Because there's somebody listening, maybe not in this building later. Somebody hasn't heard this.

So this is for them. When we talk about the Holy Spirit, we're talking about what? Or who, right?

We're talking about a person. The Holy Spirit is a person. That doesn't mean he's a human being, obviously.

But he is a person in the sense that he has personality. He can think. He has a will.

He can be grieved. The Holy Spirit speaks. So the Holy Spirit is a person.

Notice Jesus uses the masculine pronoun him. Okay, so those are his pronouns, he and him.

Okay? The Holy Spirit is not an it. He is a person, he.

The theological language is he's the third person of the Holy Trinity, right?

Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. This is kind of like Christianity 101. We need to know and be able to tell people these things.

But what's the purpose of the Spirit being sent? That's kind of where people start to divide on these things.

What's the purpose? We're not getting into all of the stuff that's out there. His mission, according to Jesus, his mission in the

Gospels at the first, Is to come to give the disciples strength. His purpose is to come to be their helper.

That's the name of the message. According to Jesus, the Holy Spirit is their helper. He is our helper.

Amen? He comes to give strength and he comes to convict the world of sin and of righteousness and of judgment.

We'll get into what that means in a few minutes. So, let's go through some of these verses. Jesus says in John 15, 26, and 27.

Just flip back there for a moment. John 15, 26, and 27.

But when the Helper comes, whom I shall send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth who proceeds from the

Father, he will testify of who? Jesus. Right. So, the Spirit's ministry is not to glorify himself or to speak of himself.

It's always to point to Jesus. And you also will bear witness,

Jesus says, because you have been with me from the beginning.

So, the Spirit comes to be there and our helper. Many people are familiar with the wording of the

King James Version, where the Holy Spirit is referred to as the Comforter. And we sang that hymn.

The Comforter has come. So, the Greek word translated

Comforter or Helper in the New King James, which I'm reading from, the Greek term is

Paracletos. So, you've heard of the Paraclete, right? So, the Paraclete is the

Holy Spirit. So, the Spirit is being sent by Jesus from the

Father in order to help, in order to assist, in order to bring strength.

At this point, Jesus knows his disciples are not up to the task.

I mean, there's nothing extraordinary about these men, is there? They're fishermen. They're common, average, everyday

Joes. Nothing special about the disciples except that when Jesus came and said, follow me, when a lot of people were saying no, what did they say?

Yes. They said yes. Actually, I don't even know if they said yes. It just says that they followed him.

You know, that's what God wants. That's what Jesus wants is for people to just follow.

When he says something, say yes and follow. He'll cover the rest.

All you have to do is take that first step of faith, leave the rest to the Lord. He'll take care of it.

But the Spirit has come to give believers strength, to give help.

So, they're not up to the task. They need assistance. The Holy Spirit will be their source of strength.

So, they need to rely on him. Right now, they're relying on Jesus. Jesus is going away.

Then they're going to have to rely on the Holy Spirit. And for the last 2 ,000 years, Christians have had to rely on the

Holy Spirit. Again, living the Christian life is impossible without reliance upon the

Holy Spirit. Remember when Jesus said, without me, you can do nothing?

Remember that? Again, that's a reference to his Spirit, the Spirit of Christ.

And this isn't a completely new concept. We think of the Spirit coming on the day of Pentecost.

Oh, yeah. Yeah, the Holy Spirit came in Acts, Chapter 2. Some people think that he was never around before that.

That's not really the case. This isn't completely new. We'll talk about the new aspect of his ministry in a moment.

Zechariah, Chapter 4, Verse 6, says, Not by might, nor by power, but by my

Spirit, says the Lord of hosts. So, when the Holy Spirit came at Pentecost, he came to empower the apostles for the work of ministry.

But he's always been around. The Holy Spirit has always been here. He's God.

God is everywhere all at once. So, up until this point, the disciples, and even after Jesus is arrested, you know they're prone to cowardice.

And I know that you don't want to admit that, and none of us want to admit it, but at times we are prone to cowardice.

When we are confronted about our faith, we can shrink back sometimes.

We can back down. We don't want to say anything. Someone's going to get. We need to get over that. Amen. But Jesus knows they're not up to it.

They're prone to cowardice, but after they were filled with the Spirit, everything changed. They became bold witnesses, and as one critic said that,

These are they which have turned the world upside down. So, the

Spirit also does many other things. He causes believers to persevere.

The Holy Spirit is said to seal the believer until the day of redemption.

If we didn't have the Holy Spirit, you would fall away from the faith. And people who do fall away from the faith, that's just evidence that they don't have the

Spirit. Because if they had the Spirit, He would cause them to endure. So, the Spirit's ministry is essential in every area.

We don't have time to talk about it all today. But it's common to hear people speaking about the

Holy Spirit. And they want to talk about tongues and prophecy and miracles and healings.

When you say the word Holy Spirit, that's often one of the first things that people speak of.

Those things were primarily demonstrated by the apostles and their close associates back in the first century.

But today, this is all I'm going to say on the matter. Today, instead of seeking after signs and wonders,

Christians would be wise to first seek after the Spirit's assistance in causing us to lead an obedient and faithful life.

We should be seeking after that first. Because what does that lead to?

It leads to us being a good witness and a good testimony. And what God wants to do with us after that, hey, that's up to Him.

That's up to Him. But that is the primary work of the

Spirit to come to give us help, to give us strength, to convict the world of sin, righteousness, and judgment.

I think you know this, speaking and living God's truth in an ungodly culture is not easy, is it?

Living it out in this culture is very difficult. Accomplishing anything for the

Lord in this culture, I would say, is actually impossible. It's impossible without God's help.

Again, Jesus said back in John 15, verse 5, Without me, you can do nothing.

And that doesn't mean a little something. Not by might, nor by power, but by my

Spirit, says the Lord of hosts. One of the problems in living the

Christian life and in ministry is we're trying to do it ourselves. We're trying to do it ourselves.

Our own strength, our own intellect, our own power, which doesn't amount to much, does it?

Look at verse 2. Jesus says to them, They will put you out of the synagogues.

To put it in modern terms, they're going to throw you out of the churches. If you're following God, they're going to kick you out of the church.

That's a strange thought. You know, it's true. They will put you out of the synagogues.

Yes, the time is coming that whoever kills you will think that he offers God service.

Now, where does your mind go when you hear that? That someone would kill Christians and they think they offer

God service. Right. Yeah, biblically, you think of Saul.

Before God saved him, before he became known as the Apostle Paul, he was a persecutor of the church.

He was hunting down Christians, getting them kicked out of the synagogues, having them arrested. And at least with Stephen, Stephen was killed and there was

Paul standing by as if he was the one overseeing the whole thing. Paul was persecuting the church and even having

Christians killed. And he thought he was doing God's work, didn't he?

And these things they will do to you, Jesus says, why? Because they have not known the

Father nor me. A lot of people say, I know God, I believe in God, and here's what

I'm doing for God. And they're actually doing the work of the devil. Paul was. That's a biblical example.

But these things I have told you, Jesus says that when the time comes, you may remember that I told you of them.

So don't miss this. This is so important that by preaching and predicting the future,

Jesus strengthened their faith that when all these things took place, they say, yeah, it's just more proof.

God is sovereign. It's happening just like he said. Also, knowing that the

Lord is with us right here and right now. Do you know that the Lord is with us right here and right now?

What did he say? Where two or three are gathered together? There I am in the midst.

Thanks for listening. I'm Pastor Michael Grant from Morse Corner Church. I'd like to listen to the complete message.

If you'd like more information about the ministry, visit our website, morsecornerchurch .com.

We'd love to have you join us some Sunday morning here in Leverett. Until next time, with the grace of God be with you.