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The Holy Spirit
This is a subject of much controversy both in the church and out of the church. I hope we can add
something to the educational process, that we might better understand the work of the Holy Spirit. We
are instructed to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace (Eph. 4:3). God does something we
cannot do. The next verse tells us that there is one Spirit (Eph. 4:4). The Bible reveals that the Spirit is a
person, not an influence. It is true that he may influence people but he is a person: "Howbeit when he the
Spirit of truth is come...." (John 16:13); "But the Comforter, even the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will
send in my name, he shall teach you all things" (John 14:26). So this person is to teach the apostles all
things and then through their words we will have unity. He is the Spirit of truth (John 16:13). We are
sanctified in the truth and God's word is truth (John 17:17). Truth is always in harmony with truth.
Therefore the Holy Spirit will not guide, or instruct us, into something contrary to the word. That the
teachings of the apostles were the words of the Holy Spirit is made evident in this passage: "Neither for
these only do I pray, but for them also that believe in me through their word: that all may be one, even as
thou Father art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us; that the world may believe that thou
didst send me" (John 17:20-21).
The apostles did not interpret the Spirit to us. They did not tell us what the Spirit meant. They
told us what the Holy Spirit said, "But we received, not the spirit of the world, but the spirit which is
from God; that we might know the things which were freely given to us of God. Which things also we
speak, not in words which man's wisdom teacheth, but which the Spirit teacheth, combining spiritual
things with spiritual words (I Cor. 2:12-13). We read again: "For no prophecy ever came by will of man;
but men spake from God, being moved by the Holy Spirit (2 Peter 1:21). We are told that we need the
Holy Spirit to interpret the Bible to us. If the Holy Spirit did not tell us what He meant the first time then
how would we know that he was telling us the truth the second time? In the Bible there is oneness but
when men begin to interpret the Bible we have confusion.
It would be impossible for the Spirit to teach us something different from the word of God, or it is
not the word of God that we have. For Truth cannot contradict Truth. Two and two are four. We never
learn anything that contradicts that no matter how far we may go in mathematics. So He is the Spirit of
Truth. The Bible is the Word of Truth. So they must be in harmony. To make this abundantly clear Jesus
said, "It is the spirit that giveth life, the flesh profiteth nothing: the words that I have spoken unto you are
spirit, and are life" (John 6:63).
We are to keep the unity of the Spirit. The Bible says, there is one God. That we accept. There is
one Lord Jesus Christ, that we accept. There is one Spirit. In theory we accept that, but in practice many
reject it. The very same verse that says there is One Spirit says that there is One Body (Eph. 4:4). That
body is the church but people who claim to be directly guided by the Holy Spirit say that the church
consists of many bodies, that the church consists of the various religious bodies or at least certain people
within the various religious bodies, that the church is not one body as the Bible teaches and hence the
Holy Spirit teaches. The unity of the Holy Spirit has been destroyed and not enhanced as these people
would like us to believe. This is one of the remarkable things about those who claim to be directly guided
by the Spirit today: immediately they reject what the Holy Spirit said about one body, the church.
The Holy Spirit reveals the church as a glorious thing but those who claim today to be led by the
Spirit reject the Bible concept of the church for a fragmented denominationalism. The Bible teaches that
as a husband and wife are to live together in true fidelity, so Christ and the church are to live (Eph. 5:25-
26). Not only is there only one Spirit and one body (church) but there is only One Lord. The word Lord
means ruler. When you have more than one church you have more than one ruler. Each church has its
own system of government and its laws. Then every church with its own government also has its own
faith. So the faith is fragmented. The Holy Spirit tells us that the faith was once for all delivered to the
saints (Jude 3). So anything newer than the New Testament is not the faith.
Then there is one baptism. As we have more Lords we have more bodies, we have more faiths
and we have more baptisms. On the day of Pentecost the Holy Spirit, by Peter, told them to repent and be
baptized for the remission of sins. The command is plain. We have no trouble understanding what it says
but men have used barrels of ink and tons of paper trying to show that this did not mean exactly what it
says. Why? The Lordship has been altered, the faith that has been added teaches something else besides
the One Baptism that the Holy Spirit reveals (Acts 2:38). Note this significant statement. "They then that
received his word were baptized and there were added unto them in that day about three thousand souls"
(Acts 2:41). So this is the one baptism. We hear the word of the Spirit as given on Pentecost and we obey
it. God is over this plan and in this plan (Eph. 4:6).
But someone asks the question, "What about Holy Spirit baptism?" Let us see what the Bible tells
us about this. In other words, we shall see what the Holy Spirit said about baptism of the Holy Spirit.
Jesus gave us the fulfillment of this promise. Here is the prophecy as made by John the Baptist: "I indeed
baptize you in water unto repentance: but he that cometh after me is mightier than I, whose shoes I am
not worthy to bear, he shall baptize you in the Holy Spirit and in fire." Then John goes right on to tell us
what the baptism of fire will be. It is unquenchable fire that shall burn up the chaff (Matthew 3:11-12).
After his resurrection Jesus tells us about the baptism of the Holy Spirit and I want you to study
with me very carefully: "The former treatise I made O Theophilus, concerning all that Jesus began both to
do and to teach until the day in which he was received up after he had given commandment through the
Holy Spirit unto the apostles whom he had chosen: to whom he also showed himself alive after his
passion by many proofs, appearing unto them by the space of forty days, and speaking the things
concerning the kingdom of God, and being assembled together with them [notice that the antecedent to
'them' must be the apostles and only the apostles] he charged them not to depart from Jerusalem, but to
wait for the promise of the Father, which, said he, ye heard from me: For John indeed baptized with
water but ye shall be baptized in the Holy Spirit not many days hence" (Acts 1:1-5). So Jesus said that the
baptism of the Holy Spirit was for the apostles and there was no promise that it would ever be given to
any other person.
Now let us note carefully what happened: We quote from Acts 2: "And when the day of Pentecost
was now come they [the apostles] were all together in one place. And suddenly there came from heaven a
sound as the rushing of a might wind, and it filled all the house where they were sitting. And there
appeared unto them tongues, parting asunder like as of fire, and it sat upon each one of them. And they
were all filled with the Holy Spirit, and began to speak with other tongues as the Spirit gave them
utterance (Acts 2:1-4). When the Holy Spirit came the result was that these people spoke by the power of
the Holy Spirit.
After explaining the purpose of the Spirit coming they then preached the gospel to these people.
They told them of the miracles of Christ. Jesus did these things that we might be believers and be saved,
not by any direct operation of the Holy Spirit, but by believing the miracles that Jesus worked. Let us
read carefully: "Many other signs therefore did Jesus in the presence of his disciples which are not written
in this book: but these are written, that ye may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and
believing might have life in his name" (John 20:30-31). So Peter by the Holy Spirit preached about the
miracles of Jesus.
We are to be saved by our faith in the gospel: "And he said unto them, Go ye unto all the world
and preach the gospel to the whole creation. He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved but he that
disbelieveth shall be condemned" (Mark 16:15-16). Paul told us that the gospel was the facts of the
death, burial and resurrection of Christ (1 Cor. 15:1-5). Peter ended the first part of his sermon with these
words: "Let all the house of Israel know assuredly, that God hath made him both Lord and Christ, this
Jesus whom ye have crucified (Acts 2:36). This did not cause people to fall down on the floor. This
caused people to ask a question. They believed the message that the Holy Spirit gave and this caused
them to ask a question: "now when they heard this, they were pricked in the heart, and said unto Peter
and the rest of the apostles, Brethren, what shall we do?" Peter was baptized in the Holy Spirit along with
the rest of the apostles and here was the answer. He did not tell them to pray through. He did not tell
them that since they had become believers, there was nothing for them to do. Listen to the answer of the
Holy Spirit: "Repent ye and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ unto the remission
of your sins; and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit (Acts 2:38).
He said that the gift of the Holy Spirit would be given to the people who were baptized for the
remission of sins. Then we have it made more plain in Acts 5:32. Peter is talking: "and we are witnesses
of these things: and so is the Holy Spirit whom God hath given to those who obey him." Here is a
promise from the Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit is given to those who obey. We may not fully understand
this but we can believe it and we can learn from the Scriptures something of this at least, if not
everything.
As I write I have an electric light beside me. I do not know much about electricity but I can make
much use of it. So the Christian has the indwelling of the Spirit and we can make use of it even if our
knowledge is not perfect. The New Testament provides us with all that we need to know. Paul wrote to
Timothy or rather the Holy Spirit wrote to Timothy and used Paul as his secretary. Here is what he had to
say, "and that from a babe thou hast known the sacred writings which are able to make you wise unto
salvation through the faith which is in Christ Jesus. Every scripture inspired of God is profitable for
teaching, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness that the man of God may be
complete, furnished completely unto every good work" (2 Tim. 3:15-17). So I can learn the word of
God, I can believe the word of God and the Holy Spirit says I am completely furnished unto every good
work.
However, we must realize that the mere learning of the Scripture is not enough. Christ by the
Spirit, by faith, must dwell in the inner man. We read, "That he would grant you, according to the
richness of his glory, that ye may be strengthened with power through his Spirit in the inward man, that
Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith to the end that ye, being rooted and grounded in love..."
(Eph. 3:16-17). So we are grounded by faith in Christ, the Spirit, dwells in the inner man.
This indwelling Spirit is something peculiar to the gospel. We have inspiration in the Old
Testament. We have healing in the Old Testament. We had the miracles of creation and we have the
miracles that Moses worked. We have miracles that were worked by the apostles during the personal
ministry of Christ. But there was something beyond all this, for we learn in John 7:37-39: "Now on the
last day, the great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried saying, if any man thirst, let him come unto me
and drink. He that believeth on me, as the Scripture hath said, from within him shall flow rivers of living
water. But this spake he of the Spirit, which they that believed on him were to receive: for the Spirit was
not yet given, because Jesus was not glorified." So the gift of the Spirit was for Christians in a way that
others did not receive it. We shall return to this in a moment but we must notice that the Spirit was not
given to the world but to the believer: "even the Spirit of truth: whom the world cannot receive; for it
beholdeth him not, neither knoweth him: ye know him, for he abideth with you, and shall be in you" (John
14:17). The gospel is the power of God to save the believer (Rom. 1:16). Yet, the people of the world
pray that the Holy Spirit will come in converting power to the sinner. Jesus said that the sinner cannot
receive the Holy Spirit.
If we do not have the Spirit we cannot lose the Spirit. The Thessalonians were told not to quench
the Spirit (1 Thess. 5:19). Jude told us that some so sinned that they did not have the Spirit (Jude 19).
How do I know that I have the Spirit? Because I have the fruit of the Spirit? Paul tells us of the
fight that goes on. The flesh lusteth against the Spirit and the Spirit against the flesh and these are
contrary to one another (Gal. 5:16-21). Then he says the fruit of the spirit is love, joy, peace,
longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, meekness, self control: against such there is no law (Gal
5:22-23). In order for the Spirit to abide, we must crucify the flesh with its passions (verse 24).
God operates according to law. Miracles were always an exception. He made Adam from dust.
He made Eve from a rib and then natural law went into operation and all people come into the world
through natural law. Moses turned water into blood. That was a miracle but by natural law in our bodies
every day, water is turned into blood. If this were not so, man would soon perish from the earth. Jesus
fed five thousand by a miracle. God feeds billions every day by natural law. God must put the life into
every grain of wheat, or rice, or any other food. No man can do that. The light and heat of the sun is
brought 93 million miles and is not expended. Man cannot do that. God sends the rain. No man can do
that. So God's natural laws are far greater than any miracle but these miracles were done to show his
power (Mk. 16:29-30; Heb. 2:3-4).
When the New Testament was complete the purpose of these signs was fulfilled. Paul was a great
worker of miracles but they had fulfilled their purpose: He said tongues would cease and that prophecy
would fail (I Cor. 13:8-9). John tells us that with Revelation, prophecy was complete (Rev. 22:18-19).
Paul told Timothy to take some medicine for his sickness (1 Tim. 5:23). The old soldier, the man who
had kept the faith, says that he left Trophimus at Miletus sick (2 Tim. 4:20). Even in the midst of His
miracles Jesus said the sick need a doctor (Mk. 2:17). The miraculous does not change man. Balaam, the
son of Beor, was a prophet but he loved the hire of wrong doing. Caiaphas was a prophet and told of the
death of Christ but he was a wicked man. The Corinthian church had many miraculous gifts but the
church had many sins. The indwelling Spirit which is the right of every baptized believer will lift up to the
better plain. "But if the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwelleth in you, he that raised up
Jesus from the dead shall give life also to your mortal bodies through his Spirit that dwelleth in you"
(Rom. 8:11). When the Spirit would come, Jesus said that from the believer would flow living water. The
last invitation is to take freely of the water of life (Rev. 22:17).
J.C. Bailey (January 1986, Bengough, Saskatchewan)
(http://www.oldpaths.com)