I really appreciate the music tonight. It's ministered in my heart.
Our last time together we talked about the ministry of the Holy Spirit.
And we basically said three things regarding the Holy Spirit.
First of all we said that the Holy Spirit is a person.
The Scriptures teach this regarding Him.
The Holy Spirit is not an it, not an influence,
but the Holy Spirit is a person.
And then we said the Holy Spirit is God.
He is deity. The Scriptures over and over and over declare that to be so.
And then we talked about the fact that the Holy Spirit is active in this age.
We talked briefly regarding His ministry in the world,
the ministry of convicting of sin, righteousness, and judgment,
and the ministry of restraining evil in this age.
A ministry that one of these days He's going to cease
so that Satan can bring to pass His great scheme in the Antichrist.
But at the present time in this age He is restraining the evil,
2 Thessalonians 2 verses 3 through 10.
Tonight I want to talk about the ministry of the Holy Spirit in your life.
That is assuming that you are a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ.
And let me affirm first of all that apart from the Holy Spirit
you would not be a child of God.
For the ministry of the Holy Spirit is absolutely essential
for you to be born into God's family.
Turn with me please to 1 Peter where we see one of the expressions
in scripture regarding the ministry of the Holy Spirit
in bringing the child of God to faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.
Peter addresses in his first epistle those who are scattered
throughout Asia Minor whom he calls the chosen.
Chosen it says in verse 2, according to the foreknowledge of God the Father
by the sanctifying work of the Spirit that you may obey Jesus Christ
and be sprinkled with His blood.
We see in the first phrase in verse 2 the elective purpose of God
His activity in choosing us in Christ before the foundation of the world.
A work that we have talked about at some length in Ephesians chapter 1.
And then we see how God accomplishes that.
It is by the sanctifying work of the Spirit.
In other words the Holy Spirit sets apart and calls effectually,
those who are the chosen to Jesus Christ.
That sanctifying work of the Spirit of God in setting us apart
for God's elective purpose is essential
if we would believe on the Son of God and be saved.
It is because of that sanctifying work that we then obey Jesus Christ
and are sprinkled with His blood.
The obedience here is the obedience of faith.
Believing on Him for salvation and personally appropriating the shed blood
of the Lord Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of our sins.
That is the sprinkling of His blood.
That is the personal application of it for each of us when we believe.
This is a counterpart to what John says when he said that we must be born again
by the Spirit.
John chapter 3.
It is the Spirit of God who regenerates.
That is who quickens us, who gives us life.
That happens by the way at the moment of salvation.
It is not something that we experience in the sense that,
oh, I know what just happened to me.
It's not experienced in that sense.
But it's something that's very real.
It is the infusion or the impartation of life in the sinner
that he might believe on the Lord Jesus Christ.
And then at that same time, the Holy Spirit does something more.
He baptizes us or He identifies us with the Lord Jesus Christ.
1 Corinthians 12 verse 13.
At that same moment of our salvation, we are placed into the body of the Lord Jesus Christ.
We are united with Christ.
We are brought into vital living union with Him
and identified with Christ in His death, burial, and resurrection to walk in newness of life.
Furthermore, at that same instant, the Holy Spirit indwells us.
We are now the temple of God.
The Holy Spirit resides within. 1 Corinthians 6 verses 19 and 20.
At that moment of our salvation, the Spirit of God took up residence in you and in me.
A residence that He maintains.
He never leaves. He never forsakes.
He is always, always there.
Through the happy times and the sad times, through the blessings and through the trials,
the Spirit of God indwells us.
So that God, through the third person of the Godhead, the blessed Trinity, is always in you.
Always.
That is a ministry that He did not perform in the Old Testament.
Under the Old Covenant, in those days of ancient Israel,
the Spirit of God came upon selected believers for specific and temporary purposes.
He did not indwell all believers.
That is why David prayed in Psalm 51 that God would not take away the Holy Spirit from him.
When David said that, he wasn't concerned about losing his salvation.
But the Spirit of God was upon David for his ministry as being king, for leading the nation.
And he prayed that as a result of his tragic sin with Bathsheba,
that God would not take away the Holy Spirit from that ministry of enabling him to lead such a great people as the nation of Israel.
For today, the Holy Spirit indwells all believers.
Never to be taken away from us, even when we sin.
It says in Ephesians 4.30,
Grieve not the Holy Spirit of God, whereby you are sealed under the day of redemption.
The Holy Spirit is a person, as we've said before, and He may be grieved.
But He has never grieved away.
His grief, His sorrow at our disobedience, our sin, our carnality, never causes Him to leave us.
He is there permanently.
And that brings me to the next ministry of the Holy Spirit in our life right now, and that is the ministry of sealing us.
He secures us into the Lord Jesus Christ.
That happens at the moment of salvation.
Now this is an important truth for all of us to grasp, but I hope that all of you will listen.
So that the Spirit of God can speak to you, and you may understand what His ministry is.
In sealing us into the Lord Jesus Christ.
That sealing is a securing of us into Christ.
That word seal is used back in the Gospels of what the Roman governor, Pilate, did in sealing the grave of Christ.
To secure it, he thought, with the authority of the Roman government.
Of course, that seal was broken.
But that gives us an understanding of what the seal of the Spirit of God is.
The Spirit of God is the seal upon us.
That we are genuinely the children of God, and He secures us in our faith in Jesus Christ.
All of those ministries began at the moment of our salvation.
Now there is another ministry that began then, that started at that moment, but which is constant.
Those other ministries occurred then once and for all, but there is a constant continuous aspect of the ministry of the Spirit of God in our lives.
I'm thinking first of His teaching ministry.
The Spirit of God is our instructor, John 16, verses 12 to 15.
John in his first epistle calls the Holy Spirit the anointing that we have received from God and who teaches us.
We are not left to ourselves to try to understand the Bible.
But the very author of this book, because he is resident within us, is our professor.
He is our instructor and our teacher in the things of God.
He enlightens our minds so that we may be able to understand and apply to our lives these precious truths.
Oh thank God for His teaching ministry.
That by the way is a ministry that is conditioned upon our obedience and our listening.
If we are not obeying the Spirit of God, if we are not yielded to the Spirit of God, He is not going to teach us through the Word.
Those earlier ministries that I mentioned are positional.
They happen to us no matter what, but the teaching ministry of the Spirit of God implies that there is a listening ear on our part to hear what the Spirit of God would say to us.
And then let's think about the sanctifying ministry of the Holy Spirit.
Now we mentioned that earlier in relation to our salvation.
There is that initial work of the Spirit of God setting us apart from the world to be the family of God.
But there is a continuous aspect to the sanctifying ministry of the Holy Spirit.
It was mentioned in 1 Thessalonians 5 verses 24 and 25 and in many other places.
It is that work of the Spirit of God in our lives right now continually removing us from the sphere of the world where we tend to wander.
Setting us apart, changing us within, transforming us into the image of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Oh how the Spirit of God yearns to see Jesus Christ formed in us.
That work of forming Christ in our character is his sanctifying work.
And we learn that he is one day going to complete that because what he begins he completes.
Even though there are times when we even resist that sanctifying work of the Spirit of God in our stubbornness, in our rebellion, how saddened when we do that.
Even though there are times that we do that and his work is impeded, there is no question that one day he will completely fulfill that sanctifying work.
So that body, soul, and spirit as it says there in Thessalonians 5, we will be completely like the Lord Jesus Christ all by the work of God's Holy Spirit.
There is one more aspect of his ministry that I really want to dwell on tonight and that is the one that is so very important for us to get a hold of and that is the empowering ministry of the Spirit of God to us who are believers in the Lord Jesus.
The empowering ministry of the Spirit of God by which he enables us in living for Christ.
We are not left to our own strength.
Maybe I should say weakness to live for Christ.
If we were called upon to be his ambassadors in this world, to carry forth the message of Christ, if we were called upon to live for Christ in this world in our own strength, none of us would last very long because we don't have strength for that.
And we are not left as orphans. The Spirit of God is with us that he might empower us and strengthen us.
There is a key verse in Ephesians 5, 18 that we'll just refer to, but I want to look at another text.
There we are commanded to be filled with the Spirit of God.
We continually filled, it says, with the Holy Spirit. What does that mean?
Well, we think of the word filled as a glass being filled up with some content.
We do not need to receive more of the Spirit of God as though we lack some of the Holy Spirit and we need him to fill us up in that sense.
What we need of the Spirit of God is in us. He is in us in his fullness. We lack nothing.
But the word filling there means to empower, to move out.
The picture of it that I think is most accurate is of a sail on a ship.
The sails are put up and the wind then hits the sail and fills the sail.
The result being that the ship is moved along the surface of the water.
Because of the empowering of the wind, the sail is being put up to catch it.
Now what it said in Ephesians 5, 18 is that you and I are to put up the sails as it were,
so that the Spirit of God, the wind of God, may move us along, empower us in living for Jesus Christ in this world.
The context I want to look at more in depth is Galatians chapter 5.
For here in Galatians chapter 5, it deals with a battle that every one of us faces.
It is the battle that we have with the flesh.
What is the flesh?
Well, there are some Bible students who understand the flesh to be the old nature that is with us even after we are born again.
And I respect that position, having had that position at one time in my life.
For my personal conviction now based upon additional study of the word of God is that we do not have two natures,
but we have one as the children of God.
And that one nature is a new nature.
But having one nature, we still do have what the Bible calls the flesh.
By the way, nature has to do with one's essential being.
How can we essentially be two beings?
We are one being, we are a new person in Jesus Christ, a new creation.
Old things are passed away, all things become new.
But as believers in Jesus Christ who have one nature, we still do have within us the potential to sin.
And that potential to sin is derived from what the Bible calls our flesh.
I think a helpful definition of the flesh is this.
There is that old pattern of thinking and action left over from what we were before in Adam.
It's the old pattern that is ingrained in us, in the way that we think, in our actions, our actions.
That it seems to me is the flesh.
And that old pattern desires to express itself.
It still wants to give evidence of its presence in our lives by what is called here the works of the flesh.
Ugly indeed they are.
They include these things beginning in verse 19.
Immorality, impurity, sensuality, all of those sexual oriented sins.
That's a part of the flesh of the Christian.
Idolatry, sorcery, embities, strife, jealousy,
outbursts of anger, disputes, dissensions, factions, envy, drunkenness, carousing, what a lot of people like to do on the weekend and call fun.
And then he says things like these.
So this is not a complete list by any means of what that old pattern within us can produce.
But it's suggestive. And it's suggestive enough to bring all of us to awareness of what is meant, right?
We all understand what these works of the flesh are.
Because these and other works of the flesh are evidenced from time to time in our lives.
Now he goes on to say, I have forewarned you, I warn you again,
that those who practice such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God.
That is those who are characterized by these things.
Those whose pattern of life, those whose habit of living is described with these words,
are by that testifying that they are not the children of God at all.
That they are not a part of the kingdom of God. They shall not inherit that kingdom.
Because they are completely in the flesh.
If they are characterized habitually as a pattern of life by these things.
Now every one of us may do these things.
Do not let the warning of verse 21 cause you to doubt your salvation if you're a child of God.
You can do anything in this list, but the fact is that you're not going to make that a pattern of your life.
You cannot. And the reason you cannot is because the Spirit of God is in you.
And the Spirit of God will not allow that.
The Spirit of God is jealous for you.
He is jealous that you be transformed in your inner man to be like the Lord Jesus Christ.
And he will accomplish that goal.
But there's a battle that takes place.
And it's a battle that's described earlier in these verses.
Look at verse 16. I say, walk by the Spirit.
And you will not carry out the desire of the flesh.
What is the desire of the flesh?
The desire of that old pattern is to express itself or to dominate us.
That's what it wants.
It wants to expose its ugliness, the works that are described here.
It says the flesh sets its desire against the Spirit.
And the Spirit against the flesh.
And these are in opposition to one another so that you may not do the things that you please.
That last phrase there is elaborated out in Romans chapter 7 by the Apostle Paul.
He is saying that you and I may not always do the things that we please
because there is a battle going on in our lives.
I know that there are some of you here tonight who have in the past rustled.
Either in college or hopefully none of you professionally.
I don't even know why I started to say that.
But in college or perhaps in some amateur way you have rustled.
That is an exciting sport to watch when it's the real thing.
No commentary on that tonight.
You see two people who are locked in combat, their arms outstretched and around each other.
Working their bodies, their legs, their arms to try to gain advantage.
Each of them seeking to put down the other and to pin him.
Now that is the picture that is used by Paul here.
It's a very expressive picture.
It is a picture of the Spirit of God doing wrestle, doing battle in our life with the flesh.
They are locked in combat it says and that is a combat that never ceases.
There is never an end of the round in this life for the Holy Spirit and the flesh.
As long as we are in this world and until that time that we are taken into the presence of the Lord,
there is going to be this battle raging within us.
The Spirit and the flesh.
Now he goes on to say in verse 18,
If you are led by the Spirit you are not under the law, for the book of Galatians is written to a group of people
who are being tempted by some false teachers to place themselves back under the law.
Paul is concerned about that.
He wants to remind them here that they are being led by the Spirit.
He says to the Romans that if we are being led by the Spirit of God, we are the sons of God.
He says that the sons of God are led by the Spirit, they are not under the law anymore.
By the way, is the law capable of controlling the flesh?
You learn the Ten Commandments by memory.
Does that give you ability to control your flesh?
Not in the least.
The law does not have that power.
Why is it that we are not under the law? Because the law has already done its work for us.
The purpose of the law is to bring us to Christ.
It is to expose our sinfulness.
Indeed, the law actually exacerbates sin within the sinner.
It only stimulates and provokes it to do worse.
So that the ugliness of the sin might be exposed and bring us to Christ.
We are not under the law.
My friend, if you are a born-again Christian seeking to live by legal rules or by legalism,
by obeying the law, let me assure you, you will never come to maturity in Christ that way.
All that the principle of law keeping can do, all that legalism will do, is to provoke the flesh.
It cannot ever control it.
Only the Spirit of God is able to subdue the flesh, and He will, He can.
He has explained to us how that takes place.
He says, if you walk by the Spirit, you will not carry out the desire of the flesh.
He doesn't say the desire won't be there.
It will be.
The flesh will always in this life be beckoning you and enticing you saying,
come on, don't you remember what this was like?
You will always be there, but if you are walking by the Spirit, you will not listen to the flesh, is what He says.
You don't have to do what the flesh invites you to do.
Paul said again to the Romans, do not make provision for the flesh to fulfill its desires,
but put on the Lord Jesus Christ.
A phrase that is synonymous with what it means here to walk by the Spirit.
What does it mean to walk by the Spirit?
Walking by the Spirit is a very simple concept.
It is so simple that any boy or girl here tonight can understand it.
Any junior high or any high schooler is able to take this principle and apply it to his life.
It's that simple.
In fact, it is so simple it's almost like salvation.
People stumble over it.
It's almost too simple, so to speak.
Because to walk by the Spirit simply means to live in dependence upon the Holy Spirit.
Now to get that principle down in your life and applied in your life, it takes time.
It takes practice.
Walking took you a while to learn.
So don't get discouraged.
But please understand that this is not a difficult thing to understand, to grasp,
and to begin to apply to your life, simply to conduct your life in dependence upon the Holy Spirit,
and instead upon yourself.
Daily giving yourself to the Lord and saying,
Lord, now you, you strengthen me, you live through me.
You produce your fruit described in verses 22 and 23.
And by the way, that fruit has got a beautiful description of the life of Jesus.
And he says against these things there is no law.
There doesn't have to be a law against those things.
The law is to restrain evil.
These things are good.
How do we walk by the Spirit?
By depending on him.
When you and I walk, what we do is to throw ourselves off balance.
And we make progress by catching ourselves with our legs.
And then we walk in that way.
When you and I walk by the Spirit, we're simply casting ourselves upon him.
As it were, letting him be our legs to give us the progress.
He says in verse 24, those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.
He seems to be going back here to that moment when we trusted Christ,
and we were identified with Christ in his death.
Paul said earlier in Galatians 2.20, I have been crucified with Christ, nailed to the cross.
But he says I live, a new I, a new me, a new being, a new person.
I live.
And yet it's not me, but it's Jesus Christ.
He says if we belong to Jesus Christ, that flesh has been dealt a death blow.
But my friend, it also, that death blow has to be continually applied through life.
The cross principle must be continually applied to the flesh as we walk by the Spirit.
He goes on to say in verse 25, if we live by the Spirit, and that's where we began, the Spirit gave us life.
He said if we live by the Spirit, let us also walk by the Spirit.
It's not enough just to be alive by the Spirit.
He says now make progress by depending upon the Spirit, learning to appropriate the Spirit's strength,
letting him move you along.
And as you walk and depend upon the Holy Spirit, though the flesh will beckon you,
though you will be tempted, you will not fulfill its desire, you will not make provision for it,
because the Spirit of God will lift you above that.
The principle of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus will cause us to soar above the enticements, the temptations of the flesh.
God has not left us in this world to live the Christian life in our own strength.
My friend, the Holy Spirit is ministering tonight to you, and he desires to minister to you in this way.
That he might strengthen you, that he might teach you how to apply what it means to walk by the Spirit,
so that you can be victorious, you can be a conqueror in life.
We do not have to live under the dictates of our flesh.
Oh, how the enemy desires to make us think that we have no choice, but to listen to what the flesh says.
But we do have a choice. We do have a choice.
And by walking by the Spirit, depending on him, throwing ourselves on him, we will not carry out the desire of the flesh.
Oh, may that be the experience of each one of us.
And may we understand that the Spirit of God loves us, and he desires our very best.
He desires for the perfect, the good, acceptable, and perfect will of God to be fully brought to fruition in your life and mine.
Oh, tonight, all he wants from us is a yieldedness, a surrenderedness.
And as it says in Romans chapter 6 again, that we might present our members, that is, our capacities, our abilities to the Lord as a sacrifice.
That we might present our members to him, that we might then serve him in the strength that he in turn provides.
Let that be your experience in your walk with God. Let's pray together.
Father, we thank you for the presence of the Holy Spirit and for his ministry in our lives as believers.
Oh, we have so much to learn and to apply, especially in this area of walking by the Spirit.
Lord, I know I speak for almost everyone here tonight, and we want to learn that.
I thank you that we no longer have to listen to the voice of sin within us, to the allurements of the flesh.
But that by walking by the Spirit, we can know victory, and we do not have to carry out what the flesh tries to enforce upon us.
Father, tonight as we close this service, right now many of us in our hearts will yield up ourselves afresh to you.
And as the Spirit of God, even at this moment, is locked in combat with the flesh,
we give ourselves to you that the flesh may be pinned and dropped down and defeated,
so that the Spirit of God can produce in us His fruit, even the very life of Jesus, in all of us loveliness.
Thank you, Father, for this truth.
Thank you that we may experience it and claim it as our own.
In Jesus' name, Amen.