March 5, 2006
Scripture:
I was struck by that line in our last hymn: “Meet it is Thy saints should bless Thee.” It reminded me of Luke 17:11–17: “And it came to pass, as he went to Jerusalem, that he passed through the midst of Samaria and Galilee. And as he entered into a certain village, there met him ten men that were lepers, which stood afar off: and they lifted up their voices, and said, Jesus, Master, have mercy on us. And when he saw them, he said unto them, Go shew yourselves unto the priests. And it came to pass, that, as they went, they were cleansed. And one of them, when he saw that he was healed, turned back, and with a loud voice glorified God, and fell down on his face at his feet, giving him thanks: and he was a Samaritan. And Jesus answering said, Were there not ten cleansed? but where are the nine?” We know that leprosy is a picture of sin. Here the Lord cleansed ten lepers of their sin; as it were. One of them, when he saw that he was clean, returned and praised Him. Surely the Lord must have been pleased to see one returning to thank Him. We can do the same this morning. As was mentioned in prayer, we do not have to do some great thing; we are only asked to remember Him, with these emblems before us.
EG Hymn 348– Little children, heavy laden, Prayer Luke 19:1–10 • There are eight things we can see in this passage:
Hebrews 10:14–22 • Last time we were speaking of sanctification, being set apart for God’s holy use. We have looked at the Will of God and the Work of Christ; v. 15 brings us to the Witness of the Holy Ghost. We talked about God’s will, made in an eternity past, and that “one offering,” Christ’s work; yet maybe we don’t always sense that the Holy Ghost is in all of this too. It is through the Holy Ghost that these things are revealed to us; what a loss it would be if we did not have this gift! In the gospels, we see how many times Jesus told the disciples that he was going to die, but they never understood. After He had risen from the dead, we can see what happened in John 20:19–21. This is a challenge; as God sent the Lord, so is He sending us. If this overwhelmed the disciples, the Lord did something that was rather remarkable, v. 22. This is not what happened at Pentecost, when the Holy Spirit was sent to endue them with power from above. The Lord is giving the disciples the Holy Spirit as the spirit of life, of resurrection. This is the first time in the Bible, that the Holy Spirit is received by someone. On previous occasions, in the Old Testament, it seems that the receiver was visited by the Spirit of God for a time. But can we realize that the Holy Spirit is very real and works in the power of God. It is seen in Genesis 1, where “the spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.” In Acts, we see that the Spirit of God indwelt all the believers (not as a person, but as a power). This Spirit that is given to us is part of the Godhead. In other places it has other names, “the Spirit of adoption,” (Romans 8:15), “the spirit of holiness,” (Romans 1:4), “the Spirit of truth,” (John 14:17), and many others. We have in scripture the unity of the Spirit, the unction of the Spirit, and so forth. It helps us understand the Bible; most unsaved people think the Bible is a mysterious book, full of riddles and contradictions. In verses like “be not drunk with wine … but be filled with the Spirit” (Ephesians 5:18), we can see that it is possible to be in a state that the Spirit cannot work in you. You receive the Spirit only once, but after that it is possible to quench it. That ‘once’ is at Salvation; some people may think that you need to be baptized by the Spirit after Salvation. This is not so; you receive the Holy Spirit at Salvation and it never leaves you; but we see that it is possible to stop it from working, in yourself or even in a meeting. This is why it is important, before coming to meeting on Lord’s Day, to follow I Corinthians 11:28: “let a man examine himself, and so let him eat.” We should not stay away from meeting for fear of quenching the Spirit, but should check ourselves “and so let him eat,” we are encouraged to come. We get the Holy Spirit as part of Salvation’s package deal. The Holy Spirit plays different roles in a Christian’s life: we can be “led of the Spirit,” (Galatians 5:18); the Spirit “shall teach you all things,” (John 14:26). This is why it can be so frustrating to deal with someone who is unsaved and try to show them passages from the Bible; it is so clear to us, but they do not have the Holy Spirit, and therefore they do not understand it. John’s Gospel has many passages about the Holy Spirit. In John 14, the Holy Spirit is also called “the Comforter.” Vv. 25 & 26, the disciples did not have to take notes on what Jesus said; The Holy Spirit would remind them of it all. But what He had said had not made any sense to them; once they received the Holy Spirit, they would be able to understand it. In John 15:26, the Holy Spirit was going to testify to them, and they to the world (we, too, should testify to the world). In chapter 16:7 & 13, the Holy Spirit would “shew you things to come.”