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Dr. Irwin "Rocky" Freeman
Good evening, ladies and gentlemen, we're going to be starting a series of thoughts concerning the fullness of the Holy Spirit, the normal Christian life, the abundant life, the life of fullness, or the Christ life.
Whichever term you want to apply to this life, most of us will agree that there is a Christian life that is far beyond that, on a higher plane than that, and it seems to be that for which most Christians desire, but yet never attain.
And we want to speak of the relationship of the Holy Spirit in the life of the believer. We know that when a person becomes a Christian, they are given the Holy Spirit. Christ comes to live his life in their life by the Holy Spirit.
We know that in the book of Romans, chapter 8, verse 23, it says,. And not only they, but ourselves also, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves, grown within ourselves, waiting for the adoption, that is, the redemption of our body.
And then it says in verse 26,. Likewise the Spirit also helping our infirmity, for we know not what we should pray for as we are, but the Spirit himself maketh intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered.
And he that searches the hearts knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because he makes intercession for the saints according to the will of God. This passage, amongst many others, tells us that we have the Holy Spirit of God.
We are living under the dispensation of the Spirit. He who does not know God, the Holy Spirit, cannot know God at all. To the church, he is the source and supply of wisdom and power. The church is the body of Christ, indwelt and controlled by the Spirit.
The Holy Spirit directs, energizes, and controls. This dispensation in which you and I live is the dispensation of the Spirit. But I want to pose a pertinent question to our hearts this evening. Do we really believe in the doctrine of the Holy Spirit?
Let's first of all consider under that topic the fruit of neglect. The church again and again affirms its faith in the Holy Spirit. But my question is, does the church of Jesus Christ really believe its belief?
Modern writers are contending that the name is nothing more than a figure of speech for spiritual atmosphere. They regard it as one of the misfortunes of the Christian faith that personality has been claimed for the Spirit, that the Holy Spirit is a person.
The life of the church witnesses to the same attitude. We deny the thought, but we witness the same attitude. The things of the Holy Spirit are ignored as of no account. Atmosphere is valued. Is it a peaceful atmosphere?
Is it aesthetic atmosphere? Does the organ and piano play correctly when it's the time of prayer? Religious assemblies give a large place to silent pauses which produce nothing but emotional excitement.
Spirituality and silence are wedded together as was revivalism and rowdiness in the olden days. Both types are emotional, but most revivalists in that day did believe their work was on the Holy Spirit.
The quietest, those who emphasize the silence, cultivate psychological influence. Now in this fruit of neglect, we'll find the blunders and disasters of the church are largely, if not entirely, accounted for by the neglect of the Spirit's ministry and his mission to the church.
The morass speculation about the Bible takes no account of the Holy Spirit. It regards inspiration as negligible. I'm speaking of those people who do not believe in the infallibility and the inerrancy of the Bible.
It takes no account whatsoever of the Holy Spirit. It regards inspiration as negligible and insists upon interpreting revealed truth by no standards except those of history and literature. Prophecy is dismissed without inquiry.
Revelation is ignored without reason. Our Lord spoke of the Holy Spirit as the Spirit of truth and promised that he would guide his people into all truth. He spoke by the prophets. There were many writers, but he is the author and the Bible can neither be accounted for nor be interpreted, but by his guidance.
He holds the key because he is the key. Revealed truth can be known only through the revealer. Ignoring this, many scholars and historians, grammarians and antiquarians, critics and agnostics are blind in the midst of a brilliant life.
Men are seeking to interpret Christ in the terms of reason, history and philosophy. The Christian faith begins in a new birth in the power of the Holy Spirit. Regeneration is brought about. It is developed under his guidance and sustained by his presence.
But ignoring the Spirit, it becomes only a matter of education and evolution. The church is the body of Christ begotten, unified and indwelt by the Holy Spirit. But forgetting the Spirit, men wrangle over limbs, functions and orders.
The Christian faith becomes hopeless without the Holy Spirit. And so there's been a great neglect and this is the fruit of that neglect in the ministry of the Holy Spirit. But let me pose another problem.
What about the problems of the church itself? As in true, so it is in the service. If we have problems in truth, we shall have problems in serving. The church is helpless without the presence and power of the Holy Spirit.
The church never talks so much about itself and its problems. That is always a bad sign. The lust for talk about work increases as the power for work declines. Conferences and committees multiply when the work fails.
The problems of the church are never solved by talking about them. The problems arise out of basic failures. There is no need to discuss the problem of reaching the masses, so long as the masses are being reached.
There is no problem of empty churches, so long as churches are full. There is no class meeting question, so long as the class meeting throbs with life and ministers to the manifold needs of heart and life.
The power to attract is in its attractiveness, and it is useless. I say it is useless, ladies and gentlemen, to advertise the banquet if there is nothing to eat. It is futile to invite people to the church if they're not going to be fed the Word of God in the light of the truth, ministered by the Holy Spirit.
We are acting as though the only remedy for our difficulties were new methods, more organization, and compromise. The church is failing to meet modern needs, it is failing to grip the modern mind, and it is failing to save the modern life.
The saints are the ordained rulers of the earth according to God's Word, but they do not rule. Indeed, they have dropped the scepter and repudiated the responsibility and refused to involve themselves.
The helplessness of the church is pathetic and tragic, and yet I hear all the time the church is alive and well, the church triumphant is the song, and yet we're baptizing fewer people every year. We're reaching fewer people, and there are fewer Christians on the planet earth today than ever any time in Christian history in proportion to the population.
So the pathetic struggle is there, and it is tragic. And one of the reasons is that believers are trying to live the Christian life without the manifest ministry of the Holy Spirit having freedom in their life.
Christian people know quite well both the reason and the remedy for failure. The human resources of the Church of Jesus Christ were never so great as they are today. The opportunities of the Church of Jesus Christ were never so glorious as they are today.
The need for the work of the Church of Jesus Christ was never so urgent as it is today, and the crisis is momentous, and the church is staggering helplessly amid it all. Churches are struggling just to stay even.
Many are in financial difficulties. Their testimonies are being torn to shreds in the communities because of their financial difficulties. Christians know perfectly well what is the matter. It is sheer absurdity to seek the explanation in changed conditions.
Things are different today, and today is a new day, and things aren't like they used to be. When were conditions ever anything else? The church has lost the note of authority. It has lost the secret of wisdom and the gift of power through persistent and willful neglect of the Holy Spirit of God.
Confusion and impotence are inevitable when the wisdom and the resources of the world are substituted for the presence and power of the Spirit of God. There are many proofs that abound concerning this matter.
The New Testament furnishes examples of churches filled with the Spirit and the churches without the Spirit. The differences are quite obvious. The church of which Apollos was ministered had not so much as heard that the indwelling of the Spirit had come.
The church in our day has no such excuse. Ours is the sin of denial. He, the Holy Spirit, has been shut out of the province in which he is indispensable. There is no denial of the supernatural. No, we wouldn't deny the supernatural is real, but it is insisted upon time and again that the supernatural must conform to natural law, method, and organization.
The emphasis is upon the man, and in that emphasis there is reason to rejoice. But the strange thing is that in the intense interest in Jesus the man, the uncertainties about him that come through the Spirit have been lost.
It is a doctrine without practicality. The church still has a theology of the Holy Spirit, but it has no living consciousness of his presence and power in most instances. Theology without daily experience is like faith without works.
It is dead. Oh, I know there are exceptions, but let's not justify the coldness and the indifference and the impotency that is in the average church because there are a few churches and very few that are aflame for God.
The signs of death abound. Prayer meetings have died out because men do not believe in the Holy Spirit of God. They are very sparsely attended and prayer meetings are the least attended program in the weekly service unless it is a business meeting.
There is a drought of conversions because faith about the new birth as a creative act of the Holy Spirit has lost its grip on the intellect and the heart. Again, confusion and impotence are the inevitable results when the wisdom and resources of the world are substituted for the presence and power of the Spirit.
These things flourish on impoverished soil and dung hills. They are the works of the flesh and the product of spiritual death. The remedy is not in reproach and bitterness, my friends, but in floods and rivers, winds and sun.
The answer is a demonstrated supernatural faith and the only way to a supernatural faith is in the abiding presence of the Spirit of the Living God. Please permit me to read 1st Corinthians chapter 12 verse 13.
For by one Spirit were we all baptized into one body, the body of Christ. Every Christian has the Holy Spirit of God, whether we be Jews or Gentiles, whether we be bond or free, and have been all made to drink into one Spirit.
Again, in Ephesians chapter 4 verse 30, very familiar,. And grieve not the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you are sealed unto the day of redemption. Now the question is, do we really believe in the Holy Spirit of God?
If we do, where is the Shekinah? The word Shekinah is a beautiful Hebrew word that is not in the Bible, but it means the manifested personal presence of Majesty. We could entitle our thought the church without the Holy Spirit.
The church is the creation of God by the Lord Jesus Christ through the Holy Spirit. It is a community of believers who owe their religious life from first to last to the Holy Spirit as he is sent by the Son from God the Father.
Apart from him, there can be neither Christian nor church. The Christian faith is not institutional, but it is experimental living. It is not a fellowship of common interest in culture, virtue, or service.
Membership is kept in heaven. Christ is the door. He knows them that are his and they know him. May I say to you with all the love I have in my heart, ladies and gentlemen, young people, listen carefully.
The church role, the role of church membership, and the Lamb's Book of Life are not always identical. Confession of the Lordship of Jesus Christ is the first condition of membership in his church. The one essential equipment of the church is the Holy Spirit.
He is the one who gives the church its equipping to accomplish the purpose to which it was sent forth into this world. Nothing else avails for the real work of the church. For much that is undertaken by the church, he, the Holy Spirit, is not at all necessary.
The Holy Spirit is no more needed to run garage sales, social clubs, institutions, and picnics than he is to run a circus. These may be necessary for the modern church, but it is not for power to run these things we need.
Religious services and organized groups do not constitute nor make a Christian church. Let's think for a moment about the life of the body, the body of Christ. Again in Ephesians chapter 4, it says in verse 4,.
There is one body and one spirit, even as you are called in one hope of your calling, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is above all and through all and in you all. The work of the Spirit in the church is set forth in the promises of Jesus Christ on the eve of his departure, and it is demonstrated in the acts of the apostles.
The Acts of the Apostles, the book of the Bible, tells us of all that he continued to do and to teach after the day in which he was received up into the presence of the Father. Acts 1, 10, and 11, You men of Galilee, why stand you here gazing?
This same Jesus that you saw go shall in like manner come again. Now the Holy Spirit is active. He is the administrative agent of the glorified Son. He is the Paraclete, the deputy, the acting representative of the ascended Christ.
His mission is to glorify Jesus Christ by perpetuating his character, establishing his kingdom, and accomplishing his redeeming purpose in the world. The church is the body of Christ and the Spirit is the Spirit of Christ.
He fills the body. He would direct its movements, controls its members, inspires its wisdom. It supplies its strength. He guides it into the truth, sanctifies its agents or messengers, and empowers them for witnessing.
He calls and distributes. He controls and guides. He inspires and strengthens. Now, ladies and gentlemen, the Holy Spirit has never abdicated his authority nor relegated his power. Neither Pope nor Parliament, neither President nor Congress, neither Convention nor Conference is supreme in the Church of Jesus Christ.
The church that is man-managed instead of God-governed is doomed to failure. I suggest to you that we may already be on that sidetrack. A ministry that is seminary trained but not Spirit-filled works no wonders in the world.
The church that multiplies committees and neglects prayer may be fussy, noisy, enterprising, busy and active, but it labors in vain and spends its strength for nothing. It is possible to excel in mechanics and fail in dynamics.
There is a superabundance of machinery. What is lacking in our lives and the lives of our churches is spiritual power. To run an organization needs no God. Man can supply the energy, enterprise and enthusiasm for all things human, but the real work of the church depends upon the power of the Holy Spirit.
Yes, the presence of the Holy Spirit is vital and central to the work of the church. Nothing else avails apart from him. Wisdom becomes folly. Strength becomes weakness. The church is called to be a spiritual house and a holy priesthood.
Only spiritual people can be its living stones and only the Spirit-filled its priests. I believe in academic training. I believe in scholarship. But scholarship seems to be blind to spiritual truth until he reveals that truth.
Worship remains idolatry until he inspires it. Preaching is prowess if it is not a demonstration of his power. Prayer is vain unless he energizes. Human resources of learning and organization, wealth and enthusiasm, reform and philanthropy are worse than useless if there be no Holy Spirit in them.
I suggest to you the church always fails at the point of self-confidence. When the church is run on the same lines as any business organization or religious club, there may be crowds, there may be music, there may be excitement, but there is no Shekinah.
There is no manifested presence, personal presence of Almighty God. That is why prayer is the test of faith and the secret of power. The Spirit of God prevails in the prayer life of the individual. The carnal mind can argue, but it is the Spirit that convicts.
Education can civilize, but it is being born of the Spirit that saves. The energy of the flesh can run sales, fellowships, parties, organized groups and activities and raise millions of dollars, but it is the presence of the Holy Spirit that makes a temple of the living God.
I believe the root trouble of the present distress is that the church has more faith in the worldly methods and the flesh than in the Holy Spirit and things will get no better till we get back to his realized presence and power and it only comes by prayer.
We are constantly concocting new methods and new gimmicks and new ideas and new attitudes trying to reach the people. The people won't come. The young people won't come. If you only preach the Bible, if we only preach the Word of God, then they'll not come.
This is what we hear time and time again. Yes, the scripture tells us having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof. We think about the form and the Spirit, our form of worship and the Spirit.
The church in Laodicea, you recall in the book of the Revelation, was rich and respectable, prosperous and influential, complacent and confident, but it was blind to the tragedy on the doorstep. Their worship was faultless in form and passionless in spirit.
There was no heresy in their belief. They believed correctly. There was nothing wrong with their doctrine, but there was no fire in their souls. The Spirit of Christ was on the outside. Yet, when we go study the book of Ephesians, we find the church at Ephesus had the advantage of a distinguished and brilliant preacher.
He was a man of great scholarship, who had one distinction at a great university. No preacher can have too much learning, and the Bible gives due recognition to the fact that Apollos was a learned man.
In addition to the wisdom of the schools, the scripture says, he was mighty in the scriptures. Now, I believe in academic achievement. I believe a person ought to be as prepared as they can be. Many preachers have finished their ministerial training with the confession that they had learned less about their Bibles than any other subject.
But this man of whom I speak had been taught the scriptures and instructed in the way of the Lord. His teaching was scriptural, orthodox and careful. To scholarships, he added passion. This accomplished scholar, scriptural in doctrine, careful in his exegesis of the Word of God, literally boiled over in the Spirit, the scripture tells us.
But may I say that enthusiasm does not often accompany scholarship. Much learning has a tendency to make cold, dry preachers or proclaimers of the Word. This was a rare type of university, seminary trained preacher.
His fervor survived success in study, and he came through his course intense and scholarly, fervent and accurate, faithful and accomplished, courageous and cultured. It seems hardly credible that such a minister could lack the very things essential for the work of the Christian ministry.
But he had neither gospel nor power. In his preaching, there was no cross, no resurrection, no indwelling power of the Holy Spirit. He preached Jesus, but he did not know Christ crucified. Eloquent, learned, scriptural, impassioned, faithful and courageous.
Apollos had no gospel. Carefully trained, well instructed, a courageous learner and an effective teacher. He had no vision. He had no power. The schools had given him their best, but they left him ignorant of things vital and destitute of the Holy Spirit.
Let me read you, lest you question what I'm saying to you. May I read to you from Acts chapter 18, verse 24. And a certain Jew named Apollos, born in Alexandria, an eloquent man and mighty in the Scriptures, came to Ephesus.
This man was instructed in the way of the Lord, and being fervent in the Spirit, he spoke and taught diligently the things of the Lord, knowing only the baptism of John. And he began to speak boldly in the synagogue, whom when Aquila and Priscilla had heard, they took him unto them, and expounded unto him the way of God more perfectly.
Now here's an interesting side play concerning this, if I might mention it, in chapter 19 of Acts. And it came to pass that while Apollos was at Corinth, Paul, having passed through the upper borders, came to Ephesus.
Now this is where he was. And finding certain disciples, and these are the men that Apollos had been preaching to, he said unto them, have you received the Holy Spirit since you believe? And they said unto him, we have not so much as heard whether there is any Holy Spirit.
And he said unto them, what were you baptized? And they said, unto John's baptism. And then Paul preached unto them the gospel of Jesus Christ. When one reads 1 Corinthians 1, verse 12, you find that Apollos was even involved in the cliques that were in the Corinthian church.
Again in chapter 3 of 1 Corinthians, verse 4. So what I'm saying is, one may be fervent, and one may be effective, and courageous, and a good learner, well-instructed, well-trained, have no vision and no powers.
Yes, the schools had given him their best, but they left him ignorant of things vital and destitute of the Holy Spirit. I find this is true, and I've talked to student after student after student, and I myself, who have degrees from three different seminaries, find the same to be true that in some of our schools it is tragic that the things of the Spirit are not guided forth into the heart.
Like priests, like preachers, like people. Like ministers and pastors, like the member. Truth comes through personality, and the level of a preacher's experience determines both the range and level of the sermon.
It also determines the level to which he can help other people. To Paul's keen eye, there was something lacking as he came into the borders. There were devout, orderly, very reverent, but it was not Christian worship and experience.
Their heads were bowed, their faces gave evidence of discipline, but they were not radiant in the Lord. Their lives were marked with great integrity. They were quite honest. They were as fervent as they were upright, and as religious as they were conscientious.
Their religion was marked by a spirit of deep penitence and godly fear. They were upright in life, fervent in their religion, devout in spirit, faithful in service, yet without spiritual power. Their religion was external observance, not an indwelling presence.
They lived by rule, not by illumination. God saves from within, does he not? They disciplined themselves from without. They carried their God on their backs instead of in their hearts. Well, what a difference the Holy Spirit makes.
The commonest, most ordinary bush, ablaze with the presence of God, becomes a miracle of glory. Under its influence, the feeble become as David, and the choice mighty as the angel of the Lord. The ministry energized by the Holy Spirit is marked by aggressive evangelism, social revolution, and persecution.
Holy Spirit-empowered preaching led to the burning of the books of the magic arts in the book of Acts, and it stirred up the opposition of those who trafficked in the ruin of the people. Indifference to Christianity is impossible, for the preacher is a flame of fire.
By the Holy Spirit to the church, to each came illumination of mind, assurance of heart, intensity of love, fullness of power, and exuberance of joy. This is the lot of every Christian. While even demons know the difference between the power of inspiration and the correctness and instruction, uninspired devices end in defeat.
The only power that is adequate for Christian living, Christian life, and Christian work is the power of the Holy Spirit. That we are agreed upon. But the work of God is not by might of man, or by the power of men, but by His Spirit, the Word of God tells us.
It is by Him the truth convicts and converts, sanctifies and saves. The philosophies of men will fail, but the Word of God, in the demonstration of empowerment by the Holy Spirit, always prevails. Our wants are many, and our faults innumerable, but they are all comprehended and understood in lack of not being filled with the Holy Spirit.
I say that the resources of the church, according to God's Word, are in the supply of the Spirit. The Holy Spirit is more than the minister of consolation. He is Christ without the limitations of the flesh and the material world.
He has resources of power. May I share with you what I see Him to be? He is the Spirit of God. He is the Spirit of Truth, the Spirit of Witness, the Spirit of Conviction, the Spirit of Power, the Spirit of Holiness, the Spirit of Life, the Spirit of Adoption, the Spirit of Help, the Spirit of Liberty, the Spirit of Wisdom, the Spirit of Revelation, the Spirit of Promise, the spirit of love, the spirit of meekness, the spirit of sound mind, the spirit of grace, the spirit of glory, and the spirit of prophecy.
He is these and more than these, and each of these is a message within itself. But it is for the Church itself, for Christians, to explore the resources of the Holy Spirit. The resources of the world, organization, and the business world are futile in the life of the Church.
The resources of the Church herself are inadequate. In the fullness of the Spirit, there is abundance of wisdom, resources, and power. But a man-managed, world-annexing, priest-pretending Church can never save people or fulfill the mission of Christ.
My brethren, let's stop using the Church like a business or some democracy, bringing the Constitution of the United States into the body of Christ. Instead of bringing these things into the body of Christ, my thought is, let's stop doing this and let's try God's ways, through Christ, by the Holy Spirit.
May God grant that it be so. Let's look together in this evening and moment that we have together, and I want to direct your attention to the book of Genesis, chapter 1, and let's just read the first five verses that are familiar to us, and I want to share with you some thoughts, and I want to direct your attention with just these words, the five facts of man, the five facts of man.
Chapter 1, verse 1,. In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth, and the earth was without form and void. And darkness was upon the face of the deep, and the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.
And God said, Let there be light, and there was light. And God saw the light, that it was good, and God divided the light from the darkness. And God called the light Day, and the darkness He called Night.
And the evening and the morning were the first day. It says that the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters. It says the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters. This is interesting because the word moved is from the Hebrew word brood, b-r-o-o-d, brooding.
The Spirit of God was brooding upon the face of the waters. After the creation by God, it became a subject to vanity by reason of Him who subjected it. We had an earth which was without form and void.
No living thing existed in the sullen waters. The house of life was being built. Dense clouds enveloped the entire globe and excluded a single ray of light. Darkness was upon the face of the deep, and the reign of chaos seemed to defy control.
The only alleviating trait in the entire scene is cited in the extraordinary announcement that the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters. All else was dark and dismal, gloomy. The word moved, as I've said, the margin in many translations substitutes the word brooded.
In the year 350 of the Common Era A .D., an old father of the church whose name was Basil preached on this passage. He said, and I quote, these words form the portico of the Bible, the forecourt of the sanctuary, in the inner holy of holies of which Jesus Christ is to be found, end quote.
He goes on to say that the word should be translated broods. How sublime this simple image is. When God would utter His greatest thoughts, it is in the simplest imagery. And here it is, the bird brooding over her nest until her vitality is communicated to the eggs.
Over the darkness and chaos there was brooding the warm bosom of God's love. And that moving stage by stage from that beginning, he was able finally to say, let us make man in our image, after our likeness, and he shall have dominion.
Chapter 1, verse 26 of Genesis. The use by Paul of this particular passage in 2 Corinthians chapter 4, verse 6, where he says, for God who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.
This suggests that Paul saw a parallel between these verses in Genesis and their spiritual analogies. The analogy between the work of the Holy Spirit in reconstructing a chaotic world and His work in the human heart, this is of which I speak.
The Spirit of God prepares the way for the word of God. Before God speaks the creative word, the Spirit of God must make ready His way. He hovers, He moves, He broods over the heart as a hen over her young.
Before the sinner awakes to grace out of the world of chaos in which he has been living, an uneasiness comes over him, we call this conviction, it is the brooding of the Holy Spirit. After a time of brooding in the scriptures, we read that God said, let there be light, and there was light.
The Holy Spirit moved before God spoke, and when God speaks, there is light, God's word is light. Some strong angel, perhaps, who had been waiting for the command, rolled back the curtain of cloud, and the light broke in removing the chaos, and the storm that had reigned so long was gone.
This gave hope. This division of the light from the darkness revealed a new principle, the light was good. Why? It came from another sphere. It was a revelation of possibilities. It was good in God's sight.
God said that it was good. Why? It was akin to His own nature, for God is light, and in Him is no darkness at all. His Son said, I am the light of the world. So when the action permitted the flood of light to enter, the particles with which the inner space was filled, but hitherto hidden in the atmosphere of mark and chaos, suddenly discovered they were predestined to be the organs and transmitters of light.
When the light broke in, they all suddenly awoke to their capabilities. The stars, the moon, the sun, their use was there in the final ends of their creation. The fullness of time had arrived, and they were needed to disseminate light.
Let's now look at the creation of man, and I'd like to notice five facts that are narrated of God's conception of what he was meant to be, what man was meant to be. First of all, his nature was tripartite, that means three parts consisting of spirit, soul, and body.
Secondly, he was to have dominion, he was to rule. Thirdly, he was to be zoned in a garment of light. Fourthly, he was God's fellow worker in the garden. And fifthly, he was invited to intimate communion and converse with God.
Now the fall in the Garden of Eden, sin, this fall, the brought about the fall, consisted in the substitution of the readings of the soul for the intuitions of the spirit. Now man is governed by what he thinks and what he feels by his emotions, rather than what the spirit communicates to him.
The woman saw that the forbidden fruit was pleasant to the senses and good for food, and to be desired to make wise, and she inanimated. But at that moment, the Shekinah ceased to shine in the spirit, and God could no longer converse with man's spirit.
Thus the holy shrine of our nature fell into disuse. Later on, the scriptures declared that the merely natural or soulish man could not receive the things of the divine spirit, because they are spiritually discerned.
Everyone is endowed with a spiritual nature, which is the soul's outlook on and capacity for God, just as, on the other hand, the body is the soul's attachment to this material world. But for the most part, this higher nature is submerged, lost sight of, like a disused muscle.
One main object of Christianity is to rediscover the spirit, to use it to teach man that it should be in constant use. Christ by the Holy Spirit seeks to awaken our slumbering spiritual sense that is practically dead.
It is, as far as God is concerned, spiritually dead. He calls to our nature as to Lazarus and his sepulcher, or to the little girl of twelve summers who had faded too soon like a rare beautiful flower.
But his appeal and its depth of significance is largely ignored. But let us affirm our belief in the tripartite nature of man, as taught by the apostles Paul and John, the body which is the organ of the world of matter, the soul is the organ of our personality, and the spirit is the organ of the divine and eternal.
The soul, in the earlier stages of experience, strongly contacts with the spirit for supreme control. The eye of the one is in antagonism with the not-eye of the other. The conflict is often long and dire, but it determines destiny.
You see, man is dead in trespasses and sin. His old nature will lead him wrong. He needs to be born again in the spirit. The culmination of creation was the appearance of the first man in the image of God.
And the culmination of all that can be said by any of us who would lead inquiries forward is that all philosophies, systems, arguments and distinctions, all teachings and exhortations will fail unless, at the close, we are left face to face with Jesus Christ.
For when he who commanded the light to shine out of darkness shines in our hearts, the light of the knowledge of God's glory will be found focused on the face of Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ and him alone, Jesus Christ only, must fill the spirit's vision.
Not rules nor conditions, but Jesus Christ himself. The great missionary man of God, Hudson Taylor, said, and I quote, The consciousness of sin oppressed me. I prayed, agonized, fasted, read the word, all without effect.
I tried in vain to attain holiness for its own sake. But I came to see that it was not by striving after faith, but by trusting the faithful one that I obtained peace. It does not matter what situation we are placed in.
He is ever in us, and he is adequate. The Lord Jesus received is holiness begun. The Lord Jesus cherished is holiness advancing. The Lord Jesus counted on as never being absent is holiness complete. We understand that when we are regenerated by the Holy Spirit, we are restored to the status from which Adam fell, and each of the five particulars is restored to us in union with our Savior.
The spirit is relighted by the Shekinah of his spirit. We are born again. We have spiritual power. We walk with God in purity. We commune with him face to face and cooperate in his work. As each Christian enters into that consciousness, he realizes that it is superabundant, overflowing, and ever freshly springing up.
God works with patient persistence to the perfect forming of Christ in our heart, just like the young chicken is formed in the shell of the egg. Let us follow to know the Lord, for his coming forth is prepared as the morning, and we shall see his face.
When we do, there shall be no more night, for the Lord shall be our everlasting light, and the days of our mourning shall be ended. There from the music round about me stealing, I fain would learn the new and holy song, and find at last beneath thy trees of healing the life for which I long.
How is it, we ask, is this going to come about? It is simply going to come about by our communion with the Holy Spirit of God. We must have communion with him. The word communion means partnership. The word passes through various phases as you study the New Testament, and it is variously translated, but the idea of sharing runs through them all.
In Luke 5, verse 10, it is said that James and John, the sons of Zebedee, were partners with Simon. In 2 Corinthians 8, verse 23, Paul says of Titus that he was his partner and fellow laborer, that is, they were colleagues in the ministry of the church.
Of Philemon and Onesimus, it is used in a more intimate sense of comradeship. The communion of the Holy Spirit, therefore, would mean that we are partners, colleagues, comrades with the Spirit of God.
We are partners in vocation and resources. We are sharers in work and power. Now such communion as this involves communication. The partners put into the common stock for common ends. The New Testament insists upon this grace of fellowship in the church.
You recall that the Christians at Philippi are commended because they communicated with the Apostle in the matter of giving and receiving, Philippians chapter 4, verses 15 and 16. The Romans, likewise, are exhorted to communicate to the necessities of the saints, Romans 12, 13.
The rich are charged that they do good, that they be rich in good works, that they be ready to distribute, willing to communicate, 1 Timothy 6, 18. What I'm saying is this idea of partnership is carried into the highest aspects of our calling.
We are called of God into the fellowship of His Son, Jesus Christ our Lord, 1 Corinthians 1, verse 9. We are partakers of His sufferings and His comfort, 2 Corinthians 1, verses 4 -7 with Philippians 3, verse 10.
It is through Him we become partakers of the divine nature, 2 Peter chapter 1, verse 4. In all of these senses, the Holy Spirit of God enters into partnership with us and becomes to us colleague and comrade, sharing what we have and admitting us into His mission and placing at our disposal all the resources of His person in power.
Now I want you to think with me for a moment about our fellowship and His. Emphasis is laid upon the fact that He enters into partnership with us rather than He takes us into partnership with Him. He comes into partnership with us rather than us taking partnership with Him.
Both these aspects are true, for all fellowship must be mutual, but it is never said that our fellowship is with the Spirit. It is always the communion of the Holy Spirit be with you. Philippians chapter 2, verse 1 says it is the fellowship of the Spirit and not with Him.
John says in chapter 1, verse 3 of 1 John, he says our fellowship is with the Father and with His Son, Jesus Christ. There is no mention of fellowship with the Spirit and yet communion is the special function and distinction of the Holy Spirit.
The omission implies that there is a difference between our fellowship with the Father and the Son and the communion of the Holy Spirit with us. In the one case we are partakers with Christ, in the other the Holy Spirit is partaker with us.
This may possibly be connected with a special intimacy of His communion by which He as a Spirit enters into the deepest and closest relation with our spirits. That is the first form in which we know it, but thereafter there is a reflex fellowship which we come to have with Him.
He enters at first into our position because He fills our heart and He sympathizes with all of our needs. He then leads us to enter into His position, but that is a higher thing. Now this distinction will make plain many things.
The Christian benediction ascribes love to the Father, grace to the Son, and communion to the Holy Spirit. Let's say, you know, the love of God the Father, the grace of the Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with you now and forever.
You know the communion to be a Christian benediction. These qualities are common to all persons of the Trinity. They all have them, but they are distinctive of each. Love is attributed to the Son and the Spirit as well as to the Father.
Grace is of God the Father as well as of the Son. And our fellowship is expressly said to be with the Father and the Son. There is a distinction, however, that must not be confused. The love of the Father is the origin of all grace.
The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ is the medium of redeeming love, and it is through the Spirit that is communicated both the grace of the Son and the love of the Father. So the Spirit is the executive agent of the Father and the Son.
He brings us into the fellowship of the Father and the Son by entering into communion with us. His partnership with us is progressive, and often His progress is hindered, we might add, because we admit Him into a partnership with qualifications.
His communion is with us. He seeks to come into cooperation with us. The negotiations are from Him, but the consent to do them is with us. All of His negotiations wait for our consent. Now let's bring this down into the church situation that we are talking about this evening, the fellowship of the Holy Spirit in the church.
This distinction is observed in all the teachings of our Lord concerning the Spirit. You remember He said He is the paraclete, sent by the Father and the Son to abide in the church until the purpose of redeeming love is accomplished in the world.
For all the work of the church, they were to look to Him for light, guidance, and power. They were sent forth to witness, interpret, and save. But they were first to receive a witness and teacher and the Spirit of power.
He would be in them and with them. By Him they would have the right word at the critical moment. In Him the church would find all its supply of life and grace, wisdom, and power. Now, the basis of His work, the work of the Holy Spirit, is always that of communion.
That is why the work of the Spirit is always linked with the life of the church, and the power of the church is associated with the presence of the Spirit. The Spirit works and speaks through a praying and consecrated people.
The church that has authority is a church agreed in power, in prayer, and gathered in the name. And the church that has power to cast out demons is a church that believes and prays. The Holy Spirit and the church cannot be independent of each other.
The Spirit needs the church, and the church needs the Spirit. They are partners. May I add that power is not in organization. Neither is power in wealth or learning. It is still true that this work is not by might, nor by power, but by the Spirit of the Lord.
I have a question. Why then is the church bewildered in the day of confusion, and powerless in the presence of both her adversaries and her marvelous opportunities? I believe the answer is found in the terms of communion.
Conditions now exist that make the partnership between the church, that is, the body of Christ, and the Holy Spirit ineffective. There is a law of the Spirit by which His communion is made operative. The laws are few and simple, but they are imperative.
He cannot work if they are ignored. Communion must rest on common ground. I think we agree here. Its basis is a common bond of union. Communion is the outcome of union, that is, unity. In this fellowship, the bond is Christ.
Where Christ is glorified, the Spirit comes to abide, reveal, direct, and work. Through Him we enter into living union with our Lord, and by Him we find this unity which brings identity of interest and community of possession.
That is why faith and prayer count for so much in the work of the Spirit. Nothing else really matters. These are the things that make possible the fellowship of the Spirit. He asks of nothing more than unreserved consecration to Christ, unclouded simplicity of the open heart, and exultant faith in His grace and power.
It is by these the churches live and prevail through the fellowship of the Spirit. Well, we speak of the church. What about the believer? Because a body is made up of members, and the members are the believers.
The fellowship of the Spirit with the believers. All the blessings of communion are for each and every believer. There is nothing promised to the church that does not belong to each member of the body.
The Spirit of God is not the monopoly of any particular class of Christians. Everyone can say, He is my helper, my witness, my teacher, my guide, my strength. For all the will of God, we each have the Spirit with all His resources of wisdom and power.
Let me say that again. For all the will of God, we each have the Spirit with all His resources of wisdom and power. Well, if these things be true, wherein lies the explanation of our weakness and reproach?
Where is the note of certainty in our testimony? Where is the prevailing power of prayer? Where is the power that overturns strongholds and casts out demons? The communion of the Spirit is with us. His resources are inexhaustible, and His power invincible.
But wait! Wait! Wait! Ah! There are conditions, concerns, interests. There are barriers that hinder, grieve, and quench the Spirit. He is held back by the barriers of unbelief, prayerless living, worldly ambition, stupid vanity, and inflated pride.
He wants a central place in our hearts and to be admitted to the life of the soul. He comes to cooperate, and cooperation waits for confidence and consent. Where there is agreement, there is power. And service becomes mighty in this kind of a fellowship.
Our personality is quickened and sanctified. Sympathy is deepened and enlightened, and in sympathy are the discernment that understands and the appeal that woos and wins. Weakness becomes strength when the Spirit of might comes upon us.
Ordinary men become wonderful when clothed with the Spirit of His power. Weakness is a reproach when such might is at our disposal. Defeat is dishonor when the partnership of God is rejected. With the communion of the Holy Spirit at our command, what manner of people we ought to be.
With such a partnership, what mighty works we ought to do. There are no limits to His power. There are no reserves in His communion. There is no respect of persons with Him. Why do we set boundaries to His work, limit His activities, and refuse His appeal?
He brings all, and let us give all. He seeks to enter into communion with us in all our life, with you and me, and in return He will lead us into the communion of all that He has and is. Sign that deed today, and there will come the joy and power of the Holy Spirit of God, who is the Spirit of Christ.
Have you come to the place of the sea in your life? Have you come to the Red Sea place in your life, where in spite of all you can do, there is no way out, there is no way back, there is no other way but through?
Then wait on the Lord with a trust serene, till the night of your fear is gone. He will send the wind, He will heap the floods, when He says to your soul, go on, and His hand will lead you through, clear through, ere the watery walls roll down.
No foe can reach you, no wave can touch, no mightiest sea can drown, the tossing billows may rear their crest, their foam at your feet may break, but over their bed you shall walk dry shod in the path that your Lord will make.
In the morning watch neath the lifted cloud, you shall see but the Lord alone, when He leads you on from the place of the sea to land that you have not known, and your fear shall pass as your foes have passed, you shall be no more afraid, you shall sing His praise in a better place, a place that His hand has made.
Afraid of what? To feel the Spirit's glad release, to pass from pain to perfect peace, the strife and strain of life to cease, afraid of what? Afraid of what? Afraid to see the Saviour's face, to hear His welcome and to trace the glory gleaned from wounds of grace, afraid of what?
Afraid of that? A flash, a crash, a pierced heart, darkness, light, O Heaven's art, a wound of His account a part, afraid of that? To enter into Heaven's rest and yet to serve the Master blessed, from service good to service best, are we afraid of that?
To do by death what life could not, baptize with death a stony plot, till soul shall blossom from that spot, afraid of that? Afraid of what? Exodus 15, 16 says, By the greatness of thine arm they shall be still till thy people pass over, O Lord.
I don't look back. God knows the fruitless efforts, the wasted hours, the sinning and the regrets. I leave them all with Him who blots the record and mercifully forgives and then forgets. I don't look forward.
God sees all the future, the road that short or long will lead me home. He will face with me its every trial and bear for me the burdens that may come. I don't look round me, then would fears assail me, so wild the tumult of earth's restless seas, so dark the world, so filled with woe and evil, so vain the hope of comfort or of ease.
I don't look in, for then am I most wretched, myself hath naught on which to stay my trust. Nothing I see save failures and shortcomings and weak endeavors crumbling into the dust. But I look up into the face of Jesus, for there my heart can rest.
My fears are still, and there is joy and love and light for darkness and perfect peace and every hope fulfilled. Joys are our wings, sorrows our spurs. May the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with you all.
The Lord bless thee and keep thee. The Lord make His face shine upon thee and be gracious unto thee. The Lord lift up His countenance upon thee and give thee peace.