The Work of the Holy Spirit — R. Edward Miller

Holy Spirit, we welcome you. Come into our midst. Take control of this day. Draw our hearts to yourself. Move upon us and find us desiring you and welcoming you. We need you more than we can ever understand.

Not only do we need you, at least in some hearts, we want you. We desire you. For you bring heaven to us. Your very presence and in your presence is fullness of joy. In your presence is fullness, quickening powers.

It makes everything come alive. And without you we are so completely devitalized, so completely helpless, so human. You have come to us in great grace and great mercies, brought us out of darkness into glorious light.

And to us it's so glorious even though it's just the beginning of light, just the faintest rays of eternal dawn, so wonderful. We couldn't handle anymore. It's all we can stand now. But increase our capacities, enlarge us, until you're able to form within us far greater desires to draw near to you and to know you, more hungries and thirstings after you.

Oh, that it would become like Enoch of old, until it was so great that we could no longer stand these separations or the desires outreaching distances. Come to us this morning again. Come to us this day again.

Quicken our hearts. Cleanse us from all the debris. The world has fastened on us through these days. Quicken us with new vitality to be able to look forward with anticipation and joy, even joy for the battles that are ahead of us.

Not fear, desperation, dismay, but anticipation of victories. And to see you work out for us the maze of our own problems. Holy Spirit, I need you. And I thank you that you have come. We invite you to take over this service, these services, this day.

You may be seated. Spirit of the living God, fall fresh on me. The most wonderful thing that ever happened on earth is the coming of Jesus Christ, and the next most wonderful thing was the coming of the Holy Spirit.

The Holy Spirit and the Restoration of God's Kingdom

God came to earth, an earth that had gone outside of his kingdom, an earth that had elected another king and rejected the rightful king. But he's very jealous of his kingdom, and he doesn't like usurpers.

And he came in might and power to reestablish his kingdom and do it in his own way, not our way. And the Holy Spirit came after the cross, and we'll go back to that in a moment. He came with a dual purpose, and we must never forget that it is a dual purpose, a twofold operation.

One does not depend upon the other, but if they are separated, they will cause problems. It takes two tracks for a train, doesn't it? If they get very much separated, there's problems, isn't there? The train gets derailed.

We need both of these works of the Holy Spirit to flow together. The first one is bringing us into faith, bringing us out of sin, bringing us into repentance, bringing us into the redemption that Jesus Christ has purchased for us.

Then working on from there into sanctification, changing us into his image, bringing us into his holiness, for he is the Holy Spirit, and to take his place within us, to do his marvelous work of preparing us for heaven itself.

That's what he came to do. He is a sanctifying work. He is taking us out of sin and into righteousness. He has not come to live with us in sin. He's come to live with us taking us out of sin. He is the Holy Spirit, and he is not at all at peace with sin.

He has made no armistice with it. He has made no league with it. He hates it just as much now as he ever did, but his love for us is so great that he will stoop so low as to be with us while we are yet sinners, but with only one purpose, and that's to bring us out of sin.

And whenever we stumble into it by some temptation, whether it's visible sin or invisible, whether it's inner sin or outer sin, when we stumble into it, he will go to work immediately, bringing us back into repentance, bringing us back into the conviction that we are wrong, to cleanse us and reestablish us into fellowship with himself.

That is one work of the Holy Spirit, very important, and it is a work that must ever go on. We must never get the place. We are so doctrinally informed and so well taught and so established in our ways and so nicely involved in our church that we think we are above that work sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit.

We go from grace to grace, from faith to faith. It is a development. It is a continual development. In fact, all five ministries—apostle, prophet, teacher, evangelist, pastor—are all given for the development of the Christian life, for the church.

You'll find that in Ephesians 4, 11 and 12. That's the purpose of them. God wants us to develop and go on, develop our life with Christ and our relationship with Christ, to more and more put the world and all of its fantasies and all of its vanities out of our hearts and out of our minds and out of our lives.

That's his purpose, that he will never give in. He will always insist that we take another step forward. He'll always bring us farther out. The Lord knoweth them that are his. Let them that take the name of Christ depart from.

That's one of his great work, is getting us to depart from, further, further, further from, and closer and closer and closer to God and his holiness and his kingdom. That's the work of the Holy Spirit.

He's the one that brought you to Christ. Without him, you would never, never have come to Christ. He's the one that brings conviction. Jesus said, when he comes, he will convince the world of sin and righteousness and judgment.

He's the one that does that. He's the one that opens your heart to the Word of God. He's the one that's able to move in to the human being and work in the inmost secret places until he's able to take the heart of stone and melt it like wax in the flame.

And yet he does it without, in any way, bringing us into any, how shall I say, without injuring us, without hurting us. And yet there is a hurt. I started to say without hurting at all, but there is a hurt.

That's why there's tears, because suddenly he causes the hurt of love to come into our heart, to realize that we have offended his gracious and to be ashamed and turn against even the evil in our own selves.

This is the work of the Holy Spirit. But there is another work of the Holy Spirit. He comes to baptize us. He comes to anoint us, to anoint us for service, to empower us, to inflame us, to use us. We might be able to be a blessing to others.

The Spirit's Twofold Work: Holiness and Empowerment

They are two separate works. People can have one without much of the other, I'm sorry to say. And that's why the world sometimes is greatly offended when people have been greatly used, and yet the work of holiness in their life is sadly lacking.

And it brings confusion to those that do not understand. The Holy Spirit will work in both sides, and he wants to do them both at once. And so that's why he came. There had to be a cross before he could come.

We mentioned that before. Because he's the Holy Spirit, there had to be some way, there had to be a dealing with sin before he could come and remain in you. Now, he'd come upon people before this. He'd come upon Samson, he'd come upon Saul, he'd come upon David, and so on.

But he had never come to remain in them and make it his abode. No, he's not. Your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit. Now, he came to come to be with us and in us. And before he could take his abiding place within us, something had to be done with the great essence of sin that's within all of us, the basis of iniquity, the tendency that always takes us downward.

We change governments, and we change rulers, and we change places, and we change environments. But regardless of what change we make, we're always going downward without the help of God. So, he's coming to us in the twofold way.

And before he came, God had to deal and seal the work of sin on this planet. He had to work with it as he promised it way before, that there would come one, there would come a Savior. And this day that was announced by the angels is this day a Savior is born.

That's what he had to wait for. And he did wait for it. And Jesus said, it's necessary. I can't send the Holy Spirit. He will not come until I go away. Now, we mentioned the fact that the devil knew that the cross was afraid of the cross.

And so, he tried his best to get Jesus to bypass the cross in different ways. He tried to take his life several times before that could ever be worked out, to destroy the whole plan of God and his plan of salvation.

He tried to get him to bypass it in a temptation. Even of his own disciple, Peter, tried to get him to bypass the cross. And on the temptation in the wilderness, Satan said to Jesus, I'll give it all to you.

Why go through the cross? Why take that long, hard, agonizing journey when I'll just give it to you? Just worship me. And of course, as we know, that was not successful. But he had another plan involved.

Satan's Confidence in Defeating Christ

Satan, in his arrogance, in his pride, in his power, and in his might, because the gifts of God are without repentance, then the gifts of power and might and cunning and intelligence and all such things, gifts of God given to Lucifer, were not taken away.

And in this immensity of his own being and in his own pride, he thought that he could even attack God. Well, we know that failed. But when Christ, who was God in flesh, came to earth, we find God in his weakest, weakest form.

He never before and never will again become so weak. In fact, he was a baby. And if you remember, there was an attempt on his life in those very first few weeks, weren't there? A month to Herod. And in this weak state, all the self-imagined glory and possibility of attempting his great desire, which was to be like God, awoke once more in Satan.

He really believed that he was able to bring to destruction Jesus just as he had Adam, and just as he had every son and every daughter of Adam since that day. He had not failed once, had he? Or had he?

Do you think he had? Was there one righteous beside Jesus Christ? I read it was none righteous. No, not one. He hadn't failed. Like the picture of David with Goliath. And Goliath vultured for 40 days, which typifies 4 ,000 years.

Who can fight with me? Who can win against me? Who is able to resist sin in the flesh? The descendants of Adam, descendants of Eve. If I won over Adam, who was absolutely righteous? And people think to this day that if we just had the right environment, if we could just prepare the right environment, we would be wonderful people.

But I don't think there's any better environment than the Garden of Eden. I don't think it's possible to have a better environment, so pure and so clean, as the Garden of Eden. And there he fell, didn't he?

And Satan was encouraged. If Jesus ever comes to earth, God ever comes in flesh, he's my meat. Because I know the subtleties of sin, he doesn't. I know the subtleties of flesh, he never has been here.

I know their weaknesses, how they fight for life, how they're fighting to kill each other, if they're hungry enough. That's why he said at the 40 days of fasting, if you be the Son of God, you're hungry now, make, take this stone and make some bread, didn't he?

Wasn't that how Jesus fell? Something to eat, wasn't it? Oh yes, he knew flesh. He knew flesh as it really was. He knew that he could win over flesh. And he also knew that Jesus, if came to be a sacrifice, would have to be without sin.

And so he was quite confident. He was quite confident. He felt, really felt sure, I can win now. And through his life he tried, only to be defeated time after time. But you see, like he said about Job, he said, you protected him, but if you really let me touch him, let me bring him into pain, let me bring him into shame.

Oh, two things. We'll do anything possible to avoid pain when it gets deep, aren't we? We'll do anything possible to avoid shame and public humiliation. For some people that's worse than disease. Some people, many people in fact, will kill themselves rather than suffer shame.

Won't they? Let me touch. And when it came time for the cross, Satan was still quite confident. Now, now he is weakened more than ever because he took the cup of sin. And now he has taken our sin into his own body.

Now he is the sinner. And I know how sin weakens you. I know how sin destroys your faith. I know how sin destroys your hope. I know how sin brings you into thinking no good of yourself. Doesn't it? He says, I have power.

Come ye hosts of hell. See me. See me triumph. See my victory. I have powerful weapons. And now in his foolishness, thinking he's so great, he can take the sins of the whole world. He's become the greatest sinner that ever was or ever will be.

He's taken the sins of the whole world. Now I only need to give one more. That's his own sin. Just one more. And that's what he said about doing it. That's what he said about doing injustice. Taking before the justice, the best justice there was in the world, which was before Rome.

The Cross, Scourging, and Christ's Sinless Endurance

And Rome says, I don't find any evil in him. Take him out and scourge him. That's just the thing. I don't find anything wrong with him. So go ahead and scourge him. Look, the whole world was upset because one lad got three stripes.

Okay, scourging brings you almost to death. I don't find anything wrong with the scourging, the anger, the hatred, which should have come because that's the natural reaction, isn't it? That's flesh's reaction, isn't it?

Anger and hatred, self-pity. And then add on to that the humiliation towards the public bargain. And add on to that the rejection. Add on to that all the demonic forces attacking his mind. It's just like bees invasion.

And yet it wasn't enough. And so he took him into the cross for death. All he had to do, all he had to do was get off that cross. And everybody said it. You've gone far enough. Don't take it on. Don't die.

You'll never see your father again. He's abandoned you. You're a sinner now. You'll never see him again. And the chief priest said, if you be the son of God, come off the cross. The soldier said, if you be the son of God, come off the cross.

The people said, if you be the son of God, come off the cross. Everybody said it. That's our way. That's our way. Now we'll prove it. But he didn't. And then he said one thing. It was that Satan was totally defeated.

Father, forgive me. Not one ounce, not one grain of resentment, but anger, just love. And Satan was totally defeated. And he who had taken our sins and died in Gethsemane, really, he had died. And he had an angel come to strengthen him, or he would have never made it to the cross.

And there in our sin, he died a felon. And then three days, three days. As it were, for three days, the world was without God. And that's why the resurrection is so wonderful, because that proved it all.

That's what made the people so mad in Jerusalem. When he said, you kill him, but he rose again. And that proved that everything was right. And then after the resurrection, Jesus said to his disciples, tarry in Jerusalem until, didn't he?

Until he's going to come. He's going to come. I've made the way. I've dealt with sin. I've buried it. I took away sin off the world. He said, well, people still sin. As far as God's concerned, it's all on Christ.

He took the sins of the whole world, 1 John tells us, and not only the past sin. It doesn't say that, does it? And open the door. Open the door. Tarry in Jerusalem, friends, he said to his disciples. Wait, he's going to come now.

I've done it. I've done it. Oh, what triumph! What certainty! What reality! Now all my plan will be fulfilled. Now the Holy Spirit will come, and he will do what couldn't be done until now. He will bring you into the conviction of sin.

He will bring you in realization of judgment. He will bring you into senses of morality. He will bring you forth by church. He will develop each one. He will prepare you for heaven. He will prepare you to live in the kingdom of God.

He is coming, and oh, how we need him. And now we should open and welcome him, because the door is open. Hallelujah. He did it. And he said, now wait for him. He's going to come. I made the way. I've been successful.

It's all over by my own strength. I didn't need you, Peter. You tried to get me not to do it, but I did it. I didn't need you, John. You take care of my mother. I did it alone. I did it alone. By my own power, by my own immensity, for even in his smallest, even in his weakest, even in his flesh, even when he had dealt with our sins about him, he was still almighty.

He was still God of God and Lord of Lords and King of Kings. And to this day, there's one thing he hates. He hates the cross. And one thing he hates is because he knows, he knows he was totally defeated.

And he hates to be reminded of it. He hates to be reminded of it. And when we stand in the blood of Jesus Christ, and when we're washed in the blood of Jesus Christ, as much as he hates us. Hallelujah.

Salvation, Cleansing, and the Holy Spirit's Indwelling

And I tell you, something he wants to do is do his best to get us mocked up and sin again, so he can get at us again. But he underestimated the work of God, because when he worked through the cross and brought us salvation, he sent somebody else to live with us and in us.

And if we do fall, he picks us up and says, come on now, come out, come over here to the lavatory. I got a little washing up to do, but I'm not going to move away. I'm going to stay with you. Hallelujah.

He is wonderful, isn't he? He brought forth our salvation. He brought it forth so we don't have to fear. Oh, how wonderful is the Holy Spirit. He is God in flesh now, in your flesh, in my flesh. We need to have that wonderful sealing of the Holy Spirit, because when he comes, he seals us after we believe.

We need to have that anointing of the Holy Spirit that we might be used. We need to have the flow of the Holy Spirit. We need to have the joy of the Holy Spirit. We need to have the faith of the Holy Spirit.

In other words, the anointing is the Holy Spirit working at work within us or through us. That's why he came. He says he's not only going to baptize you in water and cleanse you, he's going to baptize you with the Holy Spirit.

Hallelujah. He's going to baptize you with the Holy Spirit. He's going to have that wonderful Spirit come and live right with you and live right your house and live right with you when you go in your car and be right with you when you go to your office or when you go to your work.

He's not going to stay home. Hallelujah. Because we're his now. We're his now. We're his. He calls us saints, holy ones. Holy ones. Maybe you think God has a sense of humor. Holy ones, he says, because I have made you holy.

I have given you my holiness. I took your sin. I give you my righteousness. Hallelujah. And he is made unto us wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, says the first Corinthians. He's made unto us, isn't he?

Oh, how wonderful. How wonderful. Satan was totally defeated. He thought he could win over God. Oh, he didn't know what a wonderful God we have. How mighty, how powerful. Even in his weakest, weakest, weakest.

What a great estate. Excuse for you. He's too strong for me, too. He's too strong for you, too. He wins when he sets himself out to win. He wins. And oh, welcome. Welcome, Holy Spirit. I need you. I need you.

Not only I need you, I want you. Oh, I'm so thankful that God was in Christ. God was in Christ reconciling the world unto himself. And I read again that by the Holy Spirit, he was offered up as a lamb without blemish.

You know, it wasn't only Jesus on the cross. It wasn't only his pain. Do you think the Father didn't suffer? Oh, yes. Do you think that God wasn't suffering? Oh, yes. They were all together working it all out for us.

And Jesus said when he comes, he said, we're going to all come. The Father, he said, the Fathers will be there. He said, and when he comes, I'll be there, too. I'll be with you. I won't leave you. That's what the Holy Spirit does.

He brings that wonderful presence of God. He doesn't just bring us into the presence of one of the triune Godhead. You're not conscious when he comes in that wonderful presence. Sometimes you're conscious of Jesus.

You're conscious of the Father. You're conscious of God. You don't really separate. It must do you. Because he's all there. And thy presence is fullness of joy. And Jesus said, I'm going to be with you.

And he said, I want my joy to be in you. And I want to have that fullness of joy. Because everything is taken care of. We don't have to walk in a mitigated condemnation. We don't have to walk trembling under the wrath of God that might come any minute.

It did come. But it came on Christ. It came on the cross. We can walk into his presence. And though he's wonderful, and that presence is so awesome, we're still welcome. And I know it's much mitigated, that presence.

We couldn't stand too much yet. But we're just beginning. We're just on our very beginnings. But he said, in that great day, that great day of the feast, he said, if any man thirsts, let him come unto me.

Didn't he? If any man thirsts, let him come unto me and drink. He that believeth on me, as the scripture has said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water. But that he spake of the spirit which that believeth on him should receive.

For the Holy Ghost was not yet given. Because Jesus was not yet glorified. It had to be. It had to be. It wasn't yet, Jesus said. It wasn't yet. It was going to be. And we're on the other side looking back.

We're on the other side looking back. It already is. It already is. Oh, what a wonderful age to live in, isn't it? I wonder at the faith of Abraham. I wonder at the fellowship of Enoch. I marvel at the faithfulness of Noah.

I wonder at David and all those men of God. I'm so glad I live now. I don't know how they did it, but I know I couldn't do it if he wasn't here. I couldn't do it if I was left on my own like Enoch was.

No. And if I had to stand against all the world like Noah, and I was the only offbeat person, and me and my family and the rest of them, or they thought we're absolute kooks. I mean, what's my opinion against one million others?

So I'd believe them, wouldn't I? No, I didn't. I know one thing. I wouldn't have been a Noah. Oh, no. I would have been one of those others. But the Holy Spirit knew that. He knew we couldn't get along without him.

He knew that he couldn't give us one tremendous impulse of blessing and grace and come and show us all the miracles, all the things could be, and say, now I'm going. I hope you make it. No, he didn't.

The Necessity of the Spirit for Christian Life and Service

And I wouldn't have made it if he had. And I don't think you would either. But he said, I'm going to send. I'm going to send the Holy Spirit. He said, I'm going to ask my father. He'll send a comforter.

He said, he's going to come. He can't come yet, because I've got to leave. I've got to fulfill this work. But after that, he's going to come. Wait for it. If you haven't received the Spirit, the Holy Spirit in your life, I'll tell you something.

Romans 8 tells us we don't belong to him yet. We're not of his. He that hath not the Spirit of Christ is not of his. And if you haven't received the baptism of the Holy Spirit, your life is going to be very useless, because only he can use it.

Only that anointing that can flow through your being. We need both. We need that anointing of the Holy Spirit, and we need that indwelling of the Holy Spirit. We need the Holy Spirit to come upon us and use us.

Come Holy Spirit. Come Holy Spirit. I need you. Come sweet Spirit. I put in your grace. Come in your own inimitable way. I need you. Oh, I'm so thankful that God made a way that God could come. No wonder Paul says, don't you know?

Don't you realize? Don't you understand that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit? He dwells within you. Don't you realize that you are his? You belong to him. Don't you know that you don't belong to this world?

You are bought with a price. Don't you realize that you have nothing to do with those that live in the flesh and live in the world? Don't you realize you are a separated people? Isn't it written, come ye apart from them and be ye separate, says the Lord?

Yes, we're separated. Yes, we're different. But if we are, I think it's going to look like it, don't you? I think we're going to begin to act like it, don't you? And when we don't, we're going to repent and feel terrible and say, oh God, get to work on me a little more, because I want to reflect your image.

I want to reflect your holiness. I want to bring out into this world so they can see, yes, we are different. We are different because he dwells within us. And something else took place. Paul realized it.

He recognized it in Galatians 2 .20. I'm crucified with Christ. I'm crucified with Christ. I'm dead. I live. But I don't live. Christ lives in me. And the life that I now live in this flesh, I live by the faith of the Son of God.

Even if I don't believe it, He does. By the faith of the Son of God who loved me. And I live. But it's another spirit that comes in to live in us. Come, Holy Spirit. Come take over. Bring me into the kingdom.

The kingdom does not meet and drink, but peace and righteousness. Bring me into that kingdom so that I can live and walk as one that carries the name of Jesus Christ and is not ashamed of. He came to work in our lives.

He came to change us. He came to help us. He is the helper. That's His name. The comforter. That means helper. Walk alongside the help. The paraclete. He's the Holy Spirit. He couldn't come until sin was dealt with.

That's how much God hates sin. He couldn't come and live in me. And He still can't stand it when I fall into some sin or another or some temptation or another. I get myself dirty. He can't stand it. A rhyme I learned when I was a boy.

In deep and almost liquid mud, I lost my only dime. I didn't find it. But oh, I had a gorgeous time. Now if I fall in the mud, I don't have a gorgeous time. Wait until I can get to some water and soap and clean up.

Isn't that right? Something in me now hates it. Whereas once upon a time, I loved it because someone else did that die. Holy Spirit, I need you. Come, Holy Spirit. I need you. I need you so much. I need you to do your work in me.

I need you to seal me or I need you to anoint me or I need you to cleanse me or I need you to change me or I need you to illumine me. I need you to establish me in your kingdom. I need you to add grace upon grace.

I need you to add faith upon faith. I need you to bring me forth for, Lord, the things I long for. And yet I'm not there. There's things I wish for and there's things even I've said, oh God, I'm going to leave this.

And yet, and yet, and yet, I didn't leave it. I thought I would, but I was strong in my own flesh. I was strong in my own intention. I was strong in my own valorization and my own strength. I couldn't change me.

Oh God, you know, I tried so hard. I tried so hard, but I couldn't. I need help. Come Holy Spirit. I need you. Come Holy Spirit. I need you. I need you to bring me into the cross. I need you to bring me into that cross so that he can come and live in me.

I need you to deal with all the things in me that he can't tolerate. And change me. Bring forth thy cross in me. You told me to pick up my cross and follow you. For the cross is death, death to all the demands of the flesh and all the demands of the world, but alive unto Jesus.

Come into the cross and into the blood and let it wash me and wash me and wash me again. That's why you came to earth and I will welcome you and welcome you and welcome you. I will not fight you. Oh, I have you with me until all the resistance and all the fighting of your wonderful work is put out of the way.

In the secret places of the come Holy Spirit. I want you spirit. I welcome you because I can't do it without you. Like I want to live without you. I can't manifest Christ to the world without you. I can't speak the word living without you.

You are the living word. You are the fire. You are the anointing. You are the word of life.