Thought for the Week - 4th June

Pastor Gareth Watkins
Ephesians 1: 13-14

In Him you also trusted, after you heard the word of truth,
the gospel of your salvation; in whom also, having believed,
you were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise,
who is the guarantee of our inheritance until the redemption
of the purchased possession, to the praise of His glory.

1 John 2: 1

My little children, these things I write to you, so that you may not sin.
And if anyone sins, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.

John 14: 16-18

And I will pray the Father, and He will give you another Helper,
that He may abide with you forever
the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive,
because it neither sees Him nor knows Him;
but you know Him, for He dwells with you and will be in you.
I will not leave you orphans; I will come to you.

When Christ was on earth He was a man, limited by time and space.  He was one person, in one place, at one time.  Yet, when He went up to heaven, He sent the Holy Spirit into the world for all believers.  Now they could hear Christ, God and words of eternity wherever they were.  That’s an incredible act of God!  Christians no longer necessarily needed to be at the foot of Christ to hear Him speak, because the Holy Spirit will speak on His behalf.  And He will lead us into all truth.

Pentecost is a remarkable day in the Christian calendar.  We don’t have to be in Israel, in the same town and place as Christ; but we can be in the UK and hear God speaking to us.

The Holy Spirit dwells in the believer, in the body of the believer – in the church.

God Himself wants to dwell in the life of a believer!  The Holy Spirit Himself wants to come down and dwell in the body of a believer.  Why?  He doesn’t want to be far off.  He wants to be close to His creation.  He doesn’t want to be separated by sin.  He wants to be close to the heart of mankind, and in order to do that He sent the Holy Spirit.  Our infinite God wants to dwell with finite man.

The Holy Spirit was promised to man by Christ.  He was promised as a comforter, a counsellor, a helper and many other things.  That He’d give the believer gifts and fruits, to enable that believer to stand in a sinful world that doesn’t want to know Christ.

At Pentecost, there were 120 believers waiting in one accord in the upper chamber.  But when the Holy Spirit became involved, that number increased to over 3,000.

Those Christians were now able to speak with authority; they were changed individuals able to go out with power and authority that wasn’t of themselves.  These ordinary people could be God’s representatives on earth!  That is how important the Holy Spirit is to the life of a believer!  Those things that happened then, still happen today.

The three scriptures above show the exciting things and different aspects that the Holy Spirit brings to the life of a believer:

  1. We will be sealed with a mark as a believer in Christ.
  2. He will become a guarantee to us.
  3. He will possess us fully when we pass over.
  4. He will be our advocate or person that stands in our place.
  5. He will be our helper in this life.
  6. He will live in us.

These six attributes belong to the Holy Spirit, which God Himself has brought down for us.

We are sealed with a mark when we become Christians.  The standards of this world are no longer ours because we believe in the standards of Christ, and God Himself puts the Holy Spirit in us – we are marked people.  We are different.  That’s the miracle of God working in us.  We haven’t sought the mark and we can’t make it up – but it makes us different!  God gives us the gift of baptism of the Holy Spirit.  Some churches don’t believe in baptism of the Holy Spirit and don’t accept it as second aspect of the Christian faith.  It’s a separate, dynamic coming of God into the heart of a believer!  He seals us with promises, and in that we have something of eternity right now!  The things of this life will be burnt up as chaff, but the wonderful things that are starting now with the seal of the Holy Spirit of promise, which is a guarantee of our inheritance.

We have been purchased as a possession, sealed under God.  Christ came that a transaction could occur between us and God.  And that transaction brought us into an eternal place where we could believe in Him, and through that belief we could have everlasting life, and through that everlasting life a new life could start now, and God would send the Holy Spirit to us now to take us all the way into eternity.  That is another wonderful promise of the Holy Spirit!  This is a guarantee of our inheritance.  We are the purchased possession, bought by Christ’s blood.

See the Holy Spirit as wonderful and all encompassing!

Sometimes we get into trouble because of our thoughts, rebellion, sins, or troubles etc.  In the world you’d get a lawyer to sort it out.  In the spiritual world, God has given us our own lawyer – an advocate!  Christ Himself becomes our advocate, our representative before God!  Come to Christ!  He will intercede to God on our behalf because He is righteous.  When we hit those troubles, come to the one who intercedes on our behalf to the Father.  The one who takes us to this place, where we can see this as a fact – the Holy Spirit comes to quicken our souls, to change us inwardly, to stop us being stubborn and hard hearted, and to stop us being mentally bound by chains of affliction.

If you get in a mess, trouble or turmoil and can’t get free from it… then come to the one who can intercede on your behalf with the Father.  The Holy Spirit brings us to the place where we recognise we need to sort things out; Christ will then advocate to God on our behalf.  We cannot represent ourselves before God on our own.  Christ gives us a chance.  He died for us!  He can go before the Father on behalf of you and me.

The Holy Spirit has been sent to all believers.  He is not limited by time or space.  He will take us into a place where Christ is, who will talk to the Father and bring things right.

We read that the Holy Spirit will “abide with you forever”!  He will abide with us forever!  We’ve now entered something that’s eternal and not affected by earthly issues etc.  He’s going to be with us through life and all things until we enter eternity.  The Spirit of Truth that the world cannot receive because it cannot see, dwells in you!  He will be in you as a believer, and then we will be led in these ways.

If our faith is in Christ, He will send this helper who will not leave us orphans, but will come to us.  He will come to us wherever we are.  If we find ourselves alone, if we’re in a meltdown, in painful circumstances, in uncertainty, Christ and the Holy Spirit will be there. We will not be left as orphans!  He will come to you!  Christ will come to us through the Holy Spirit to every believer.

Wherever we go, He can come to us.  Christ is not limited by time and space, because of the Holy Spirit.  He will come to you!

We have a choice – the Holy Spirit can help us or not.  If we want to live free, we need to choose Christ.  We need to choose the Holy Spirit to come help us.

When we choose Christ, the inheritance promises us starts to become ours.

He will be in us!

These are a wonderful set of promises for Pentecost!  This is a miracle that belongs to each believer in Christ right now.  Will you search for Christ?  Will you search for more of the Holy Spirit?  There’s more to be had!

Amen.

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