Month: June 2012

However, when He, the Spirit of truth, has come, He will guide you into all truth; for He will not speak on His own authority, but whatever He hears He will speak; and He will tell you things to come.  He will glorify Me, for He will take of what is Mine and declare it to you.
John 16:13-14

At the end of Jn 13, Judas departs to betray the Lord, and being left with the faithful eleven, the Lord begins an intimate teaching session that lasts through the end of Jn 16.  In this dialogue, He gives His most in-depth explanation of the work of the Spirit of God that would soon dwell within His children.  Our text above contains a phrase that sums up the Spirit’s work: “He will glorify me…”  That little statement exposes much of what is falsely called the Spirit of God in houses of religion today!  If you have a “spiritual experience” and Christ is not glorified and exalted through that experience, then you were influenced by a spirit other than the Lord’s.  The Holy Ghost will ALWAYS glorify Christ!

In Jn 14:26, Jesus explains, “the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all things that I said to you.”  The Spirit of God is our Teacher.  The reason we have any true knowledge regarding spiritual things is because the Spirit has revealed those things to us.  In preaching the gospel, I certainly have a responsibility to preach accurately and as clearly as possible, but it is the Holy Ghost’s job to make that word alive to men’s souls!  As we read in our main text above, “He will guide you into all truth”. (Jn 16:14) Thank God for such an able Teacher!  But notice, per Jn 14:26 what He teaches.  He will “bring to your remembrance all things that I said to you.”  He reminds us of the words of Christ!  Again, Christ is glorified in all the Spirit does!

In Jn 15:26, Jesus says: “But when the Helper comes, whom I shall send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth who proceeds from the Father, He will testify of Me.”  Again, the singular purpose in all that the Spirit does is to declare the Lord Jesus.  The Spirit does not bring glory to Himself, but He honors Christ.  The Holy Ghost was sent into the world to be a witness of Christ, a purpose He will also accomplish in the lives of all those He indwells: “And we are His witnesses to these things, and so also is the Holy Spirit whom God has given to those who obey Him.” (Act 5:32) The Spirit is a witness of the Son of God.  As Jesus says in our main text above in Jn 16:14, “He will take of what is Mine and declare it to you”.

Why is this point so very important when it comes to the Spirit of God?  Why must we understand that He will ALWAYS glorify Christ?  It’s important because of the instruction in 1 Jn 4:1: “Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits, whether they are of God; because many false prophets have gone out into the world.”  We have to discern in our religious experiences whether we’re dealing with the Spirit of God or some other spirit.  Early in my Christian walk, I was around a young man that often wanted to talk about the magnificent works of the Spirit at his church.  He was obsessed with these “Spirit-filled” experiences.  I never felt comfortable with the things He spoke of, but it was some years later before I could clearly undrstand why.  This young man always talked about the Spirit, but he never spoke about Christ!  Beloved, there are “many false prophets” in the world today.  Make sure the spirit speaking to you is the one true Spirit of God!  How will we tell the difference?  “By this you know the Spirit of God: Every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is of God”. (1 Jn 4:2) The true Spirit will ALWAYS confess Christ!

Jamie

So Jesus answered and said to them, “ Assuredly, I say to you, if you have faith and do not doubt, you will not only do what was done to the fig tree, but also if you say to this mountain, ‘Be removed and be cast into the sea,’ it will be done. And whatever things you ask in prayer, believing, you will receive.”
Mat 21:21-22

Over the last few weeks we have seen the fruitless fig tree as a representation of a religionist that looks great on the outside, but, because he hasn’t been born of the Spirit, he has no fruit of the Spirit. Such individuals are a burden on the church, always taking and never giving back. They can be a great source of grief for true believers, but Jesus says,”Don’t let them get you down!” You can handle the fig tree as well as the mountain, i.e. anything that is much greater, through the power of prayer! As we face the mountains of life, there are three basic reasons we don’t get the things we desire when we pray.

The first problem is highlighted by our text above: “And whatever things you ask in prayer, believing, you will receive.” When we ask in unbelief, we shouldn’t expect to get what we ask for! When James explains that a request for wisdom is a prayer God will answer, he clarifies that truth by stating, “But let him ask in faith, with no doubting, for he who doubts is like a wave of the sea driven and tossed by the wind. For let not that man suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord…” (Jam 1:6-7) Unbelief makes prayer ineffective!

The second reason we don’t receive the things we desire is because we never ask! Our need may be great and God may be poised to deliver us, but until were humbled enough to look beyond ourselves and seek Him, He will not give us our desire. “…you do not have because you do not ask.” (Jam 4:2) You may be suffering needlessly. Ask for what you desire! The Lord instructs us to “ask, and it will be given to you…” (Mat 7:7)

Lastly, even when we ask, we don’t always get what we desire. Why? “You ask and do not receive, because you ask amiss, that you may spend it on your pleasures.” (Jam 4:3) If we’re asking with the wrong motives–in other words, for our glory and not the Lord’s–we should not expect to have our prayers answered. We must pray desiring God’s will and not our own. “Now this is the confidence that we have in Him, that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us. And if we know that He hears us, whatever we ask, we know that we have the petitions that we have asked of Him.” (1 Jn 5:14-15)

Christ is our pattern. When facing the horror of the cross, He didn’t look forward to the suffering, and yet He didn’t want deliverance if it was contrary to His Father’s will. Set your heart upon God’s desires, and you’ll find yourself praying that His will be done. Want what He wants, and you’ll find your prayers unhindered! “Delight yourself also in the Lord, and He shall give you the desires of your heart. Commit your way to the Lord, trust also in Him, and He shall bring it to pass.” (Ps 37:4-5)

Jamie

He is the Rock, His work is perfect; For all His ways are justice, A God of truth and without injustice; Righteous and upright is He.
Deuteronomy 32:4

It’s interesting to me where our conversation goes at times as we meet from week to week.  The question of infant salvation was not a topic I planned to discuss in our Bible study a couple of weeks ago.  I’m not even sure how we arrived at the question!  And yet, the question came up: does God save babies?  We want to deal with every question faithfully and base our answer not on opinion or feeling but upon the word of God.  Please pray with me as we meet weekly that God would grant wisdom and reveal His truth to us!

Before we can deal with this question of infant salvation, we must first consider whether or not babies even need to be saved.  Humanly speaking, do we have a better picture of innocence?  When the Lord teaches what we must be to enter His kingdom, doesn’t He say we must become as little children? (Mt 18:3) But as much as we would like to have an “age of accountability” defined by the word of God, the truth is that the Scripture is silent concerning such a thing.  In fact, the word of God is clear that, from the beginning, even babies are sinners!

In Rom 3:23 we read, “for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God…”  The word “all” in that verse is a pretty broad term!  It means just what it appears to mean.  Every single descendent of Adam is a transgressor regardless of his age.  Rom 5:12 explains that when Adam fell in sin, more was affected than simply his residency in the garden of Eden: “Therefore, just as through one man sin entered the world, and death through sin, and thus death spread to all men, because all sinned…”  The entire human race was cast into sin from that point, and with that sin came death for “the wages of sin is death”. (Rom 6:23)  The reason man dies is because he’s a sinner.  The reason the Lord Jesus rose again and death could not hold Him was because He was the only sinless man!  He was an unlawful captive of death!  If babies weren’t guilty sinners, then every child that died at birth would have to be resurrected even as Christ was!

David, an individual described as a man after God’s own heart (Ac 13:22), makes an amazing statement in Ps 51:5: “Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity, and in sin my mother conceived me.”  Is David saying the circumstances of his conception were sinful?  Absolutely not!  He describes his mother as God’s maidservant in Ps 86:16.  No, David was talking about the state of his own heart, not simply at birth, but at the very point of conception!  In Ps 58:3, listen to how he describes man at birth: “The wicked are estranged from the womb; They go astray as soon as they are born, speaking lies.”  Men don’t grow up to be wicked.  They are born that way!

So, if a child is spiritually dead as soon as he has physical life, what hope does that child have of salvation prior to being able to confess with his mouth and believe in his heart on the Lord? (Rom 10:9) That child has the same hope the rest of us have–a God who is “mighty to save”! (Is 63:1) If salvation is solely a work of man, we have great reason to be in distress concerning the souls of children that die in the womb or early in life.  But if salvation is a work of a sovereign God, that unborn child has great hope!!  Thank God that those that are saved are described as having been “born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.” (Jn 1:13) “Salvation is of the LORD”! (Jon 2:9) God can give a child spiritual life before he is ever born for it was said of John the Baptist that he was filled with the Holy Ghost while in the womb and leapt within his mother when the name of Christ was spoken! (Jn 1:15, 41)

I have a great hope for babies that are ushered into eternity because I have a great God!  When David sinned with Bathsheba, one of the consequences of that sin was that their newborn child died.  David grieved and fasted, crying out to the Lord as the child lay sick, but when the child died, he got up, washed his face, and ate.  Why?  Because David had the hope of being united with that child in heaven!  “I shall go to him, but he shall not return to me.” (2 Sam 12:23) The bottom line is that God will do right with all men.  As our original text states, “He is the Rock, His work is perfect; For all His ways are justice, A God of truth and without injustice; Righteous and upright is He.” (Deut 32:4) I don’t have to worry about the eternal fate of babies because I know that God will do right!  David knew the goodness and the greatness of God.  He knew God could save anyone, anywhere, at any time.  Let’s tell the world about our mighty Savior!  “…there is no other God besides Me, A just God and a Savior; There is none besides Me.  Look to Me, and be saved, All you ends of the earth! For I am God, and there is no other.” (Is 45:21-22)

Jamie