The
Salty Saints
Weekly
Inspiration
Matthew
5:13
Ye are
the salt of the earth: but if the salt have lost his savour, wherewith shall it
be salted? it is thenceforth good for nothing, but to be cast out, and to be
trodden under foot of men.
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The ministry of the Holy Spirit is a grand theme in the
Holy Scripture. His activity is
evident in the first chapter of Genesis as He broods upon the chaotic
emptiness. "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." (Genesis 1:2). At that moment, as the Word was spoken,
the world, as we know it, was created.
What He did in the First Testament is greatly evident to us now, yet His
person was hidden from the Jewish eye.
Jesus clearly changed that in His ministry and promised a highly visible
role for the Holy Spirit in the Second (New)
Testament.
Our risen Lord had only ascended back to the Father ten days when that
promised role of Spirit possession exploded in Jerusalem at the Feast of
Pentecost. The Holy Spirit was
clearly the power of God birthing the visible church. He was that "rushing mighty wind"
blowing upon one hundred and twenty awaiting vessels in the upper room. In such a humble place occupied by
humble men and women, the kingdom of God had appeared. The Holy Spirit had moved His epicenter
from the throne in heaven to the church body on earth. The world would never be the
same.
The Holy Ghost did not come to represent Himself or to exalt His person
in any form or fashion. Jesus
Christ had clearly promised that the Holy Spirit would not speak of Himself, or
for Himself, but totally for the one He came to represent. He was sent to be the "Vicar" of
the crucified Lord in all His triumphant redemption and resurrection. The “Vicar” of Jesus Christ had
come to possess the church with the same anointing that He had possessed Jesus
Christ at John's baptism. The
Scripture teaches us that the Holy Spirit descended on Christ in the form of a
dove and then led Him into the wilderness to be tempted of the devil. The Lord Jesus then returned from the
wilderness in the power of the Spirit and began His mighty works. Jesus was filled with the Holy Ghost
without measure. He is the ultimate
model of a Spirit-possessed life.
Let's establish from Scripture that the Holy Spirit never speaks of
Himself. As the Lord begins to
teach about the Holy Spirit's ministry, He starts with a promise, "And I
will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide
with you for ever; Even the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive,
because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye know him; for he dwelleth
with you, and shall be in you. I
will not leave you comfortless: I will come to you. Yet a little while, and the world seeth
me no more; but ye see me: because I live, ye shall live also. At that day ye shall know that I am in
my Father, and ye in me, and I in you.
He that hath my commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me:
and he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father, and I will love him, and will
manifest myself to him."
(John 14:16-21).
Notice these terms, "He shall give you another Comforter"
followed by, "I will not leave you comfortless, I will come to
you." He is actually saying
that the Holy Spirit's baptism is Himself coming to you by the person of the
Spirit. Then He says, "At
that day ye shall know that I am in My Father, and ye in Me and I in
you." In other words He
would be at the Father's right hand in triumphant power and in us by Holy Ghost
power all at the same time. He ends
this breathtaking passage by saying, "he that loveth me shall be loved of
My Father, and I will love him and manifest myself to Him." By the Holy Spirit He reveals or
manifests Himself to us individually and to His body the church.
Again the Lord said in the great discourse on the Holy
Spirit, “But when the Comforter is come, whom I will send unto you from
the Father, even the Spirit of truth, which proceedeth from the Father, he shall
testify of me.” (John
15:26)
In chapter 16 He enlarges that statement, “I have
yet many things to say unto you, but ye cannot bear them now. Howbeit when he, the Spirit of truth, is
come, he will guide you into all truth:
for he shall not speak of himself; but whatsoever he shall hear, that
shall he speak: and he will shew
you things to come. He shall
glorify me: for he shall receive of
mine, and shall shew it unto you."
(John 16:12-14).
Jesus is at the Father's right hand. He said, "Ye shall not see me
henceforth, till ye shall say, Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the
Lord." (Matthew 23:39). "Then if any man shall say unto you, Lo,
here is Christ, or there; believe it not.
For there shall arise false Christs, and false prophets, and shall shew
great signs and wonders; insomuch that, if it were possible, they shall deceive
the very elect." (Matthew
24:23-24).
Our Lord was very careful to warn us of those that would claim that He
had appeared or would appear as a confirmation of their genuineness. There is a growing interest in religious
phenomena and many individuals are superstitiously attached to such events. The warning by our Lord that men would
say, "Lo, here is Christ or there," has never been needed as
urgently as today. Any kind of
esoteric appearance assumed to be Jesus is to be rejected without question. People are claiming healing and other
spiritual results from a variety of special revelations, visions, and angelic
manifestations, etc. The Bible
warns us to beware of all such claims.
Everything of a spiritual nature is to be judged by the plain sense of
Holy Scripture.
The Holy Ghost, and He alone, is the Vicar of Jesus Christ. Not angels, not Marian appearances, nor
special revelations or emotional physical manifestations; but the Holy Spirit is
our teacher and our Doorkeeper into His marvelous fullness. Why should we ever assume to need
anything beyond the abiding presence of the Holy Spirit? He is very God and the right arm of the
Heavenly Father. He is present in
the believer's temple and in Christ's Body, the church, to manifest every
fullness of Jesus Christ and His redemptive graces.
The believer will have an exploding fellowship with the Lord Jesus Christ
when the Holy Spirit has the above kind of Sovereign right to rule. The flesh life has been put under the
mastery of the Spirit life and He is manifesting the life of the resurrected
Lord visibly to all. The Holy
Spirit does not come to induce barking, roaring, twisting, and a multitude of
other strange emotions. He comes to
magnify Jesus Christ and He can only do that when we provide the skin-tent to
His glory.
The Holy Ghost is the Vicar of Jesus Christ. He represents and reveals everything
Jesus is in Himself into the life of the yielded believer. To allow Him to do less is to quench the
Spirit. Apostle Paul warns us in I
Thessalonians to, "Quench not the Spirit." (I Thessalonians 5:19). To the Ephesians, he stated, "And
grieve not the Holy Spirit of God, whereby ye are sealed unto the day of
redemption." (Ephesians
4:30). It is evident that the Holy
Spirit is a person who can be "quenched," "grieved," "resisted," or
otherwise hindered from doing what He by His very nature has come to do. Again, we have a confused idea of what
grieving or quenching Him is all about.
Our skin tent has become His tabernacle, His place to manifest the glory
of Jesus Christ and if we refuse that revelation, we are guilty of resisting His
very reason for dwelling in us.