The Person & Work of the Holy Spirit | 1 John 4:13

ThornCrown Covenant Baptist Church

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Okay, welcome everyone to this beautiful Lord's Day. If you could open your

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Bibles and turn with me to the first letter of John, chapter 4. We'll start in verse 13.

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I want to apologize for, I know the the bulletins have a different sermon title, but as I was preparing for this and studying

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I wanted to take the opportunity to stay in verse 13. So today's sermon is actually titled,

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The Person and Work of the Holy Spirit. And we're gonna see why in verse 13.

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God's Word says, By this we know that we abide in Him and He in us, because He has given us of His Spirit.

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Amen. So like I said,

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I've been wanting to, I thought this would be a good opportunity seeing how much of this letter of 1st

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John actually deals with the Spirit and His role in our lives. We've seen many aspects of the

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Spirit working in us based on what 1st John teaching teaches.

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The anointing of the Spirit, the abiding of the Spirit in us, the assurance that the

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Spirit gives us, such as from this very verse, right? We know that we abide in Him and He in us, because He has given us of His Spirit.

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The sanctification that the Spirit gives to us, all of these things and more.

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And it is sadly the Person and Work of the

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Spirit is a very neglected topic today in the church, and it's also a very distorted doctrine.

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Very highly distorted as well. So I think it would, it's important for us to have a good understanding of the

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Holy Spirit. And you know, and a lot of this is in the context obviously of love,

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God's love for us, right? And how how the

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Spirit also applies the love of God to us. The Spirit who is

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God Himself, amen? So, and speaking of love,

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I thought this was interesting in the hymn, Christ is mine forevermore, that we sang today.

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It says, come rejoice now, O my soul, for His love is my reward. And we've seen obviously, we cannot earn

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God's love. So there, it depends on how this is taken to mean, right? God's love is not a reward that we receive for something that we did to earn it, right?

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God's love is my gift. It's the gift of God, right?

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Like, because as the Catechism question says that we read, by an eternal and immutable decree, unchangeable, which originates solely from His love, from God's love, and exists for the praise of His glorious grace to be manifested in due time.

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God has elected some angels to glory, and in Christ has chosen some men for eternal life.

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It's out of His love, not because of what we did, but because of God's love for us, amen?

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And so that being said, this is kind of something that, this is what

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I've been preaching on the past few weeks, on the excellencies of God's love. And I wanted to pick up on a few things from last week, the previous

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Lord's Day, and because we saw that as believers, we are in the already not yet phase of our

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Christian walk, right? This path of our spiritual transformation, which is not yet complete, like Romans 12 to also says.

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This is the path of God's reformative love, right? God's reformative, transformative love, which refines, sanctifies, prunes, and perfects us unto glorification.

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And remember also what we mean by sanctification.

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What is sanctification? Sanctification is a work of God's free grace, whereby we are renewed in the whole man after the image of God, and are enabled more and more to die unto sin on the one hand, and live unto righteousness on the other, amen?

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So, and that's from the Baptist Catechism there as well. Now, God's reformative love, his reformative love, is also perfected in us, like verse 12 says in 1st

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John chapter 4, in this same chapter. In part, through suffering, like we saw last week.

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In part, through suffering, God's love is perfected in us. And his adoptive love for us disciplines and reforms us.

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As many as I love, I rebuke and I chasten, amen? So, this also is something

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I love, this psalm, Psalm 119, which I believe is the longest psalm in the Bible.

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Psalm 119 verse 71, if you could turn with me there, this is a very powerful, very powerful verse from God's Word.

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Psalm 119 verse 71 God's Word speak to us and says, it is good, it is good for me that I was afflicted, that I was afflicted.

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That, why? That I may learn your statutes.

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It was good for me. It is good for me that I was afflicted, that I may learn your statutes.

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Amen. So, affliction, we often think as a bad thing, but God, remember, uses everything for our good, including our afflictions.

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Afflictions are good for us who believe and trust in the Lord. Because they teach us, they help us, they motivate us, stir us, and point us to God's holy statutes,

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His decrees, His law, His Holy Word, Sacred Scripture.

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Amen. So, affliction, when it is coupled with faith, brings us closer to God, rather than away from Him.

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Because it stirs us to learn and to trust in His Word. Right?

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It stirs us to learn and to trust in His Word. It's a sort of baptism by fire.

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It purifies us. It helps us to burn that dross and imperfections.

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That's what God does. He refines us through the fire of affliction and trials. He helps us.

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It's a means by which He sanctifies us through faith. Now, I wanted to clarify something else, as well, from last week.

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Even though Christians are primarily sanctified by the truth of God's Word.

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It's primarily by God's Word, just as the psalm says. It's good for me because that way

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I can learn your statutes. Right? I learn your statutes. Rather than by works, it's not so much works that sanctify us, but God's Word that sanctifies us, as Jesus said.

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Sanctify them by your truth. Your Word is truth.

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John 17 7. And even though good works are more so the fruit of our sanctification, rather than the cause of it.

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Yet, nevertheless, God does use some of our good works and our participation in His means of grace, as well as our participation in afflictions.

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Right? Which we are called to endure with hope as secondary means of our sanctification.

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Remember, this is one of the most important lessons that the Bible teaches us. God uses means.

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God very often uses means. Rarely does

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God do things directly. He often uses means, and He, not surprisingly, uses means to sanctify us, as well.

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They are secondary means of our sanctification. And recall what the means of grace are.

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They are the sacraments, baptism, the Lord's Supper, they are prayer, right?

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Bible reading, and study, and biblical preaching, the fellowship of God's people, centered on the preaching of God's Holy Word.

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Those are the means of grace by which we are sanctified. Why is that?

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And note also that the Bible says that we are commanded to exercise ourselves toward godliness.

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Exercise ourselves toward godliness, 1st Timothy 4 or 7, right?

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Because these are all means by which we receive the primary sanctifying truth of God's Word.

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That's why they sanctifies us, because they are God's Word received and applied to our lives, coupled by faith.

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Amen? That is why. Now, I also forgot to mention a very important passage in Romans 8 28 through 30.

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I would be remiss to leave this out in the context of suffering, especially.

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So turn with me there now to Romans 8 28 through 30. And as you're heading over there, you know,

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I was looking at our church website and it's very neat, because you can categorize sermons by topic and by scripture and things like that.

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So I clicked on the books of the Bible that the sermons that I preached on the books of the

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Bible. I clicked on Romans and it turns out that the book of Romans is the book that I've most preached from or appealed to next to 1st

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John and it's primarily 1st John, because I've been preaching through the book of 1st

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John. And I thought about this. I was like, yeah, you know what? That's actually how it should be, because the book of Romans gives us the big picture of God's counsel, right?

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It gives us the whole story, the whole picture, a panoramic view. And it's important for us who teach and preach, if we're going to declare the whole counsel of God to his people, we need to make sure that we're appealing to these books like Romans constantly to give people the bigger picture.

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How does this verse tie into the rest of the Word of God as a whole? So Romans 8 28,

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God speaks to us and says, this is on the subject of God's reformative love as well, and we know, we know,

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I'm reading from the Amplified here, we know with great confidence that God, who is deeply concerned about us and loves us, causes all things, all things, to work together as a plan for good, for those who love

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God, and ultimately for our sanctification. God uses means, to those who are called according to his plan and purpose, for those whom he foreknew and loved and chose beforehand, he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his son, and ultimately share in his complete sanctification, so that he would be the firstborn, the most beloved and honored among many believers, and those whom he predestined he also called, and those whom he called he also justified, declared free of the guilt of sin, and those whom he justified he also glorified, raising them to a heavenly dignity, amen.

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So all of these stages that are listed here in our life as believers express the manifold excellencies of God's love that I've been preaching on, remember?

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So that God's, God's redemptive love, which we're going to deal with next in the next verse, God's restorative love,

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God's regenerative love, and God's reformative love, so very important, very important to understand this in light of the bigger picture, and God, so God's love transforms us by his law and gospel, by his holy means, the means of grace, and by his

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Holy Spirit, for by this we know that we abide in him, and he in us, because he has given us of his

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Spirit. Amen. God gives the Spirit to us, not by works, which we have done.

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We did nothing to earn this privilege, but by grace alone, through faith alone, in him alone, right, the rallying cry of the

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Reformation, and so God's love, this is something that gives us great assurance, beloved, because we often fail,

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God, we often fail ourselves, we often fall short, even as believers, but God's love never fails us, never, and never gives up on us, and his

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Spirit is always with us, always abides in us, and remains in us, because we have received the seal of his

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Spirit forevermore. Even though, even though, we all stumble in many ways, we all stumble in many ways, if anyone does not stumble in what he says, he is a perfect man, able to bridle the entire body as well.

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Is anybody perfect yet? Any takers? No, I didn't, I didn't think so.

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That ain't, that ain't happened yet. Remember, already not yet. We're not there yet, right?

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That's from James 3 too. Yet, yet, nevertheless, the

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Holy Spirit continually, continually works in us to perfect us, until he finally glorifies us in the resurrection, and that's something to look forward to, amen?

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That is a glorious gospel good news. Now, the, the

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Holy Spirit is the primary agent by which God's reformative love is applied to us, and not, and really not just God's reformative love, but God's love in general is applied to us.

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How are we regenerated? By the Spirit of God. The Spirit makes us born again, right?

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So, all of these things, these blessings, yes, they are because we are united to Christ, but they are often applied through Christ's Spirit, the

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Holy Spirit, the Pericle, remember? So, as, as 1st

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John 4 13 says, by this we know that we abide in him, and he in us, because he has given us of his

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Spirit. God's love is such that he gives himself to us in various and amazing ways.

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Now, there's a few technicalities here in verse 13 that I want us to bring our attention to.

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If you go back to 1st John 4 13, Gordon Clark translates the verse, he renders it this way, to kind of bring this out.

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By this we know that we remain in him, and he in us, because he has given us a share of his

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Spirit, or a portion of his Spirit. And that's curious, what does that mean?

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A portion of his Spirit. So, let's, let's dig into the whole counsel of God to kind of get some understanding here.

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The analogy of Scripture. Now, while Scripture at times describes believers as being full of the

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Spirit, right, especially in the book of Acts, you see this frequently in the book of Acts, and we ourselves are commanded not to get drunk with wine, for that is dissipation, immorality, but be filled with the

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Holy Spirit, the Spirit, as Ephesians 5 18 commands us.

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We nevertheless have received a portion of the Spirit, meaning that we always have as believers, we always have the

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Spirit as believers, though our flesh constantly works against the Spirit that is at work in us continually, like Galatians 5 16 and on.

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The works of the flesh versus the work of the Holy Spirit of God.

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So this is, there's a struggle here, there's a conflict here, and that I preached on many times over when, on the book of Romans.

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And so, we have not yet been perfected, obviously, and we still stumble in many ways.

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We still sin. We still, like 1st John tells us, if anyone says he has no sin, he's a liar.

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He's a liar, and God's truth is not in him. We cannot deceive ourselves. We still struggle with sin and with personal issues in our lives.

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Anybody still have issues that they're dealing with? Anybody care to have, and I'm not just talking about issues that other people bring on you.

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I'm talking about issues that you have. Issues that come from the man or woman in the mirror, right?

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Even as believers, we still struggle with issues in our lives that we deal with, and from our sinful past, especially for those of us who were saved later on in life, from our sinful past, from the futile conduct that we inherited from our forefathers as well, like 1st

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Peter 118 says. And I, this really, this really blessed me.

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I was reading on, through Abraham Kuyper's, The Work of the Holy Spirit, excellent, excellent treatise on the

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Holy Spirit, and he says this. He says, bad habits of a certain character sometimes pass from father to child, even where the early death of the former precludes propagation by education and example.

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Wow, so what does that, what does he mean by that? What he's saying is, basically, what 1st

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Peter 118 says, that we often inherit the bad habits of our parents, even when they are not directly involved in our lives.

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If they die, or if they leave, and we're not close to them, we don't live with them or whatever, even though that may happen, we still can inherit their bad habits.

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Fascinating, and this is because of nature of original sin, the corruption of our original nature and original righteousness.

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Because we are guilty in Adam, we are also fallen sinners with a depraved nature that gets passed down from generation to generation.

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There's no exception to that, save for one, and who might that be?

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The man, Christ Jesus. Amen? He's the only one who was born free of the stain of original sin.

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I hate to break it to Roman Catholics and Eastern Orthodox, but Mary was born a sinner, and that's why she said in her

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Magnificat, my spirit rejoices in God, my Savior. Well, Savior from what?

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From God's wrath, from her sin. We're all sinners,

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Mary included, and so apart from Christ alone.

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And this is also funny,

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I forgot to mention this, but speaking of issues, personal issues, you know, when

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I was talking about Corrie ten Boom in the last sermon, I forgot to mention that initially

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Corrie was very upset about those fleas that she eventually thanked

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God for. My kids helped me to get the story straight here because it was

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Betsy, her sister, that was encouraging Corrie to thank God for the fleas, thank

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God for everything, and she read from 1st Thessalonians 5, 16 through 18, Rejoice always, always, pray without ceasing, in everything give thanks, in everything give thanks, including trials, afflictions, suffering, tribulations, etc.

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Right? For this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus. Amen?

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So it was so funny, in the Torchlighters version of their story,

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Corrie, she's like, come on, let's thank God for the fleas. Corrie said, okay, fine.

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God, thank you for these fleas, these horrible, nasty, irritating fleas.

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But then later they realized, she realized that, yeah, the fleas, God used those fleas to keep the guards away and allow them to pray and read together the

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Bible and those things. So all things work together for our good, beloved.

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We have a glorious hope because we are in the sanctifying process of being perfected by God's reformative love working in us and through the person and work of His Holy Spirit, our

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Pericle, our advocate, because His great love is perfected in us, like 1

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John 4, 12 says. So, however, in light of what we saw, that the

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Word instructs us to be full of the Spirit, God's Son, Christ Jesus, was the only one who was perfectly full of the

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Spirit, who was perfectly full of the Spirit and never sinned because of it.

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Even though, even though He was sent by the Father in the likeness of sinful flesh, in the likeness of sinful flesh, for in Him, in Christ, all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell.

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Colossians 119, for in Him all the fullness of deity dwells bodily, and in Him you have been filled because of Christ's fullness we have been filled ourselves.

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Who is the head over all rule and authority? That's Colossians 2, 9 through 10, right?

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So, that is an amazing blessing that we get from our union with Christ, but we still deal with sin and our flesh.

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And so we have to carefully understand this. We have to be very careful with how we understand this.

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Because Christ came in the likeness of sinful flesh, yet He never sinned, in part because He was born by the

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Holy Spirit and not by corrupt sinful man through the

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Virgin Mary. He was born through the Spirit through the Virgin Mary and Christ also relied on the

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Holy Spirit perfectly to accomplish His mission on earth, His ultimate mission on earth, which was what?

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It was to serve and to give His life as a ransom for many, right?

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Like the Gospels say, Mark 10, 45, right? And I'm reading primarily from the

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Legacy Standard Bible here, which is the primary version that we use, and it's a very good version, and it's also close to the

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NASB versions as well. But turn with me now to Hebrews 9, 14.

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Hebrews 9, 14. We'll see, get a better grasp of how the

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Spirit worked in the life and ministry of Christ. This verse blew me away.

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It's such a powerful verse, and I learned it from Abraham Kuyper's excellent work on the

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Holy Spirit. Hebrews 9, 14. God's Word says,

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How much more will the blood of Christ, who, listen here, who through the eternal

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Spirit offered Himself without blemish to God, cleanse your conscience from dead works to serve the living

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God? How much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal

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Spirit of God, offered Himself without blemish to God, cleanse your conscience from dead works to serve the living

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God? Amen. I just realized that this verse is an expression of the

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Trinity, right? This verse is an expression of the Trinity. God Christ, who through the eternal

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Spirit of God, without blemish, offered

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Himself up to God, who? God the Father. Amen. Remember from Isaiah 53, like I preached a few weeks ago.

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It pleased the Lord God the Father to crush His Son, to satisfy the wrath of God due to us for our sin.

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Amen. And this also is an expression of God's reformative love, His sanctifying love that cleanses our conscience from dead works, from those dead works, those dead traditions and feudal conduct that we inherited from our forefathers to serve the living

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God in truth, in love, and in the fruit of the Spirit. Powerful stuff.

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Here is Abraham Kuyper again, has some great insight on this matter.

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He says, what Christ needed was the gifts of the Holy Ghost to enable

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His weakened nature, His weakened human nature, because He was born in the likeness of sinful flesh and tempted in every way as we are, yet without sin, like Hebrews says.

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In increasing measure, to be His instrument in the working out of His holy design.

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Of His mission. And to transform His weakened nature not by regeneration, right?

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Christ did not need to be regenerated. He was not born a sinner. He was born without sin and maintained a sinless perfect state.

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The only man in existence to ever do that. But by resurrection into a glorious nature, divested of the last trace of weakness and prepared to unfold its highest glory.

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Amen. So the Holy Spirit played a pivotal role, a critical role in the ministry of Christ on earth.

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In other words, there was never a time where Christ was without the

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Father or the Spirit. Never, because the Trinity is inseparable. The Trinity has one will.

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But in order to accomplish the work of redemption, God the

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Father sent His Son. And the Spirit worked and aided

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Christ as His perfect instrument. And Christ was perfectly in harmony, in sync with the

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Spirit of God to accomplish His mission, to serve and give His life as a ransom for many, for many.

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To redeem us, that's God's redemptive love for us. So some thoughts for our reflection here.

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If Christ, who was perfect and sinless on earth, needed the Holy Spirit, and remember, we have to be careful what we mean by that.

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It's not that Christ was a sinner, but He became sin. He became sin on our behalf.

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Huper is the Greek word. Huper, in our behalf, He became sin.

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And God the Father placed the iniquity of us all upon Him on that cross, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.

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If Christ needed the Holy Spirit to accomplish His work, how much more so do we need

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God's Spirit? How much more so do we, we who are fallen sinners with a corrupted nature, who have been graciously regenerated by His Spirit, by the work of His Spirit, and are being sanctified by Him, by the primary agent of our sanctification, the

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Holy Spirit of God, who is God Himself. How much more?

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How much more? And it is vitally important because, again, of our fallen flesh.

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It hasn't been redeemed yet, and that is why God sanctifies us progressively through trials, afflictions, through the means of His grace, the sacraments, prayer, the

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Word of God, primarily the truth of God's Word. We are sanctified by learning

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His statutes, like Psalm 119 says. It is vitally important for our sake, for our life, as believers, for us to understand the person and work of God, the

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Holy Spirit, of God, the Holy Spirit. Do we acknowledge our need for God's Spirit?

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Do we rely on God's Spirit? Do we rely on Him for our life and everything that we are instructed and commanded to do?

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Observing everything that Christ commanded us, which He said, told His apostles in the Great Commission.

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Many professing believers lose their balance and become unstable or even heretical because they are not taught well.

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They do not know who the Holy Spirit is or what it means to rely on the

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Spirit. This is not a secondary issue. The Holy Spirit is God Himself.

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It is a primary issue, and we must understand this properly if we are going to grow in the grace and knowledge of our

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Lord and Savior. By the truth of God's Word, not by a perversion of God's Word, but by the truth of God's Word.

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Rightly understood. So, remember, because like Peter warns us, some of these unstable men, untaught and unstable men, twist the scriptures to what?

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To their sanctification or to their own destruction, right? We don't want to do that.

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We don't want to twist God's Word to our own destruction. We want to believe it, the truth of it, understand it rightly to our sanctification.

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Amen? So, what does that mean?

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What does that mean? The Holy Spirit and relying on the

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Spirit. We have to understand this. Because the Holy Spirit is frequently the most slandered person of the

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Trinity. Very frequently the most slandered person of the Trinity, but especially by religious people.

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Especially by religious people who call themselves Christians. And He has often abused to justify all manner of wild imbalances, blasphemies, and heresies.

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That is the sad reality of the world today, in many churches today, and many who call themselves believers.

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Just a few examples. There's many more examples, but just to name a few that you may encounter more regularly, right?

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For Mormonism, Mormon leaders teach that the

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Holy Spirit is not yet exalted. And that He will eventually receive a body in order to reach exaltation.

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Which means that He is inferior to their version of Christ and God the Father. Because Christ and God the

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Father already have exalted bodies. And the Spirit does not have one yet, according to them.

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So the Holy Spirit is in a way inferior. And of course, Mormonism is a complete heresy.

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It's complete blasphemy. God the Father does not have a body. They should read the children's catechism.

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It's one of the most basic truths of the Bible. God is a spirit and has not a body like men.

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The only person of the Trinity that has a body is Christ the Son, the

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Incarnate God -Man. God the Father does not have a body. God the

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Spirit does not have a body, and neither of them will obtain a body. That is a contradiction of God's Word.

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It's heresy. So, this is what their

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Mormon apostle, quote -unquote, Bruce R. McConkie said, the Holy Ghost is a spirit man, a spirit person, a spirit entity who will in due course receive a body.

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It's heresy. That's a heresy. God the Holy Spirit is exalted, fully exalted, fully perfect, fully

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God. There is no exceptions to any of the persons of the Trinity in that respect.

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Equally God. So that's something to bear in mind when they come knocking on your door.

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Who else comes knocking on your door? Jehovah's Witnesses, right? Jehovah's Witnesses.

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I just had a conversation not too long ago with Jehovah's Witnesses. They deny the personality of the

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Holy Spirit. They don't believe the Holy Spirit is a person, much less a divine person. They don't believe that Christ is

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God either. Jehovah God. Heresy. And instead teach that the

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Spirit is merely an impersonal force of Jehovah. And of course, we can talk about all kinds of blasphemous heresies, wild charismatic heresies from men like Benny Hinn and all these people who claim to use

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God's Spirit to bless people when in fact they are probably demonically possessed. That is not from God.

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The fruit of the Spirit. One of them. What are the fruits of the Spirit? Love, joy, peace, gentleness, meekness, self -control.

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Self -control. If the Spirit causes you to lose control wildly and shake violently and all these things, guess what?

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That ain't the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit gives us self -control. Amen. So what all this means is that relying on the

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Spirit, being led and guided by the Spirit does not mean something subjective, pietistic, mystical, or heretical.

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Or that we should live and make decisions based on how we feel or what we experience.

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We don't govern ourselves by our feelings, our emotions, or our experiences. That is not what

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God commands us to do. That is not, and that is not how

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God's Spirit, who is God Himself, the third person of the Trinity, that is not how the

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God's Spirit guides us or works in us. Remember, remember this, okay?

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As we connect the dots here, relying on the Holy Spirit primarily means to rely on His means,

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His means of grace. What that means is we rely on the means of God's Word, God's sacraments, and prayer to God.

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That is what it means to rely on the Spirit. It's not some mystical thing where we go, Oh the

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Spirit, you know, we've had people come to our church saying God spoke to me, and He gives me visions and all this stuff, and yet they're carrying a bag with a idolatrous picture of Mary.

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Or they're saying this wild stuff that completely contradicts the Word of God. That's showing me and shows us that they are not from God, because they do not rely on God's means, the

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Spirit's means, to sanctify us, which is the truth of God's Word.

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And that's what 1st John repeatedly tells us. Those who are anointed, those who come from God, those who have the

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Spirit of God, have the Spirit of truth that is conformed to the Word, the words of God.

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That's what it means to be submitted to the Spirit, and led by the Spirit, and guided by the Spirit. That is what it means.

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Amen? So, and to close out here, today's message is,

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I love this, I love this about God the Holy Spirit. One of the precious blessings that the

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Holy Spirit gives us is the joy of our salvation, our assurance.

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The Spirit gives us assurance of our salvation, that we have been saved and belong to God, and that we abide in Him.

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After all, what does 1st John 4 13 tell us? By this we know that we abide in Him, and He and us, mutual abiding, united to God through Christ, because He has given us, because He has given us a portion of His Spirit.

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Some also take that to mean that God gives us various gifts, right? The gifts of the

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Spirit. He distributes various gifts to each other, so that we can work as a body, and complement each other as the body of Christ.

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But fundamentally, what that means is He has sealed us with a portion of His Spirit that will never leave us, nor forsake us, because God loves us with an unfailing, unchanging, immutable love, like the question, the catechism question says, that we read.

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If you back up to the previous chapter in 1st John chapter 3 verse 24, we will see a similar gospel assurance and grace here that the

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Spirit gives us. 1st

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John chapter 3 verse 24. And the one who keeps

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His commandments abides in Him, and He in Him. That's that mutual abiding again.

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We know by this, that He abides in us. So how do we know that He's abiding in us? Yes, we will show fruit, but it's by the

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Spirit, whom He what? Whom He gave us. He gifted to us, not by what we did, but by what

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Christ did on our behalf, through the triune work of redemption.

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The gospel to save us to the end. Amen. And this beautiful passage, we can close out with this passage from Romans chapter 8 in verse 16.

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Again, it's no surprise that we are finding ourselves often in the book of Romans. Romans chapter 8 verse 16.

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Beautiful passage here about God's Spirit and work of the

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Holy Spirit. Verse 16. God's Word speaks to us powerfully and says,

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The Spirit Himself. Full stop. The Spirit Himself.

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Himself? What does that mean? The Spirit Himself is a person.

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Okay? This directly contradicts Jehovah's Witnesses and everybody else who denies the personality of the

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Spirit. Because the Spirit Himself, a divine person, testifies.

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Can an impersonal force testify? No. No. With our spirit that we are children of God already.

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We are children of God. And if children also heirs, heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, if indeed we suffer with him, remember that?

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If indeed we suffer with him, so that we may also be glorified with him.

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For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not even worthy to be compared with the glory that is to be revealed to us.

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Amen. God's Word is powerful. It's a double -edged sword that cuts and pierces through the soul.

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It shows us the truth. It exposes our error and the error of those who claim to come from God and do not.

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And that's what... Because the Spirit is also the spirit of discernment. Amen.

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We've seen that repeatedly in 1 John. The spirit of truth is the spirit of discernment, of discerning truth from error, right from wrong, good from evil, and so on.

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That is a taste of the person and work of the

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Holy Spirit. It's an introduction. It's just an introduction to the person and work of the

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Holy Spirit. And in order to grow in our understanding of the person and work of the

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Holy Spirit, which is so important today, especially in light of all of these errors and imbalances and heresies and blasphemies, against the

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Holy Spirit, we must search the Scriptures carefully, systematically, and apologetically.

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Apologetically. Because studying the Scriptures in all these ways helps us to not lose our balance, to maintain the balance of the whole counsel of God's Word, and to also refute those who contradict sound doctrine, who come at our doorstep and knock and say, you know what?

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Hey, God, Jehovah, is only the Father. The Spirit is just a force. It's God's force.

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It's not a person. And yet, what does God say? What does God say? God exposes those lies in His Word.

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And we know that we are led by the Spirit if we are submitted to His Word, His means of grace.

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Do we read the Word, study the Word, pray the Word, fellowship in the

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Word with God's people on the Lord's days, Bible studies, under the faithful preaching of God's Word, under the faithful balance of law and gospel, not in a church that perverts

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God or His Word, or teaches things that are contrary to His Word, but that is faithful to the truth of His Word.

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Amen? And to top it off, I heartily, heartily recommend to you all all 600 plus pages of Abraham Kuyper's work on the

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Holy Spirit. Some good bedside reading there for you. It's an awesome work. I actually just wanted to keep reading and not do the sermon.

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I was like, man, I just want to keep reading this stuff. It's really good. Very good stuff. You'll enjoy it.

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With that, beloved, let us thank God for His Spirit in a word of prayer. Let's bow our heads.

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Our precious, merciful Father, we thank you so much, Lord, for the triune work of redemption that you have accomplished through the mediatorial work of your

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Son, Jesus Christ. We thank you, Lord, so much as well for making

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Him our advocate, Christ the advocate, our perfect righteousness, and for applying this work of redemption through the work and person of the third person of your awesome

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Trinity, the Holy Spirit. Father, please help us to grow in the knowledge and grace of the sanctifying truth of your

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Word. Help us, Lord, to apply these things to our lives, to the personal struggles that we endure and face.

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Help us to be sensitive to the Spirit and to rely on the Spirit through the means that you have given us, that you have given, that the

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Spirit uses to work and to operate in us, to sanctify us, Lord, through the sufferings and trials and tribulations.

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Help us to always filter our emotions and our experiences by the truth of your

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Word and not by a way that may seem right to us, but in fact may contradict your

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Word. Help us, Lord, to be submitted to the Spirit and to learn from the example of Christ, who was perfectly in line and in sync and in harmony with your

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Spirit. Father, we thank you, Lord, for these precious truths, and help us also,

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Lord, to share the truth and love with those who do not have a right understanding of the

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Holy Spirit. Help us to be salt and light and to share the truth apologetically, giving a defense for the faith, for the hope that lies within us,

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Lord, and to bring the truth of your Word to light in our lives, in our words, in our deeds, in our thoughts, in our actions.

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Lord, we thank you. We ask these things in Jesus' precious almighty name, through the person and work of your beloved

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Spirit that has loved us as well, Father. In Jesus' name we pray as well. Amen. Thank you for listening to the sermons of Thorn Crown Covenant Baptist Church, where the

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Bible alone and the Bible in its entirety has applied to all of faith and life. We strive to be biblical, reformed, historic, confessional, loving, discerning

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Christians who evangelize, stand firm in, and earnestly contend for the Christian faith.

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If you're looking for a church in the El Paso, Texas area, or for more information about our church, sermons, and ministries, such as Semper Reformanda Radio and Thorn Crown Network Podcasts, please contact us at thorncrownministries .com,