Word of Salvation – Vol. 31 No. 44 – November 1987

 

The Presence Of The Spirit

 

Sermon by Rev. H. W. Pennings on Romans 8:5, 8, 15, 26

Reading: Romans 8:1-27

 

Congregation of the Lord Jesus Christ,

How can you be sure that you have the Spirit of God?  While I have asked that same question in earlier sermons it’s important that we ask it again.  For various people, answer that question in various ways.  For instance, one of the proof-tests which some propose is that, to be sure that we have the Spirit of God in our lives, we need to speak in ecstatic tongues and to receive spiritual (as opposed to medical or surgical) healing.  Some have also said that you ought to let yourself be bitten by poisonous snakes to put the matter to the test!  The test of some others is the necessity of having some sort of miraculous power.  It has amazed me, too, that so many people who have claimed the infilling of the Spirit were born with one leg longer (or shorter) than the other – and then, all of a sudden they are the same size again.  If that, too, is a test, many of us have failed.  Yet the question ought not to be looked at in such a light-hearted manner.  It’s an important question.  How can we be sure that we have the Spirit of God?

While it’s undeniable that sometimes, for the great glory of the Lord and the welfare of the whole body of Christ, the Holy Spirit did give special powers and gifts to some believers but the Bible never makes any of these things a test of His presence in the believer.  The test according to verse 5 is this: To be sure that you have the Spirit – which also means, to be sure that you are truly one of Jesus’ disciples because He died for your sin and rose from the grave to give you eternal life – to be sure that you have the Spirit, you must be a spiritually-minded person!  No, the test is not that you are always without sin, or even usually or sometimes without sin.  The test is, is it your greatest desire to walk humbly with your God as His Spirit leads you?  If the desire of your heart is to do exactly as you please from day to day, whether or not God approves, you are not spiritually minded, but still live according to your sinful nature which listens more to the demons of Satan than to the Spirit of God.  If your worship of the Lord is limited to or two hours per week because for the rest of the week, you worship the ‘god’ of the house, the car, your sport, your garden and your hobbies, or your work, or your education, you are not filled or guided by the Spirit of God.  This is what the apostle Paul calls “living according to the sinful nature”.  And the wages of that sin is eternal death.  You may still give God a bit of your time or money or interest, but the apostle Paul calls it a life that is hostile to the Lord.  Having the Spirit doesn’t make anyone live like that.  Listening to the Spirit will make everyone put God first in all things.  Having the Spirit, being a disciple of Jesus Christ to whom you have given your whole life, means…

 – when you fail to please God, you know it is sin, and you hate that sin.

 – using all your time and talents and money to express your love for God and your fellow-man, and bowing in penitence before the Lord when you realize that you are pleasing Satan more than God.

 – not living by bread and water alone, but by every word that God gives you, and desiring to know that word better and obey that word more.

 – listening more to God than to Satan, and desiring to give Satan less room in your lifestyle.

If that is really your greatest desire, even though your failure to do it every day is great, you can be sure that you belong to Jesus Christ and that His Spirit lives in you.  Only the Spirit can give you a new heart for such desires.  Is the Spirit of God making you think about these things now?  If He lives in you, He’ll be doing that.

Next we look at verse eight…

The greatest comfort which the Bible gives to those who have the Spirit of God within them is that, by faith, we are united (at one, at peace) with our dear Saviour Jesus.  For, as Scripture teaches, the same Holy Spirit who was able to bring Jesus through His life of suffering and temptation to victory over Satan and death is the Spirit who dwells in us and who gives us the same victory.  Then, what Jesus has won for us in the Spirit, is ours as a gift from the Spirit.  If the Spirit lives in us, He will also make us walk along the same kind of road on which Jesus walked.  And to follow in the footsteps of Jesus, is the most glorious of all things.  Those footsteps lead us right into heaven at the end of our walk.  Do you want to know what is in store for you if you keep on following Jesus, living not only by bread and water?  Look to Jesus!  See what the Bible says has become of Him.  What Jesus told His disciples He also tells us – that He has gone before us that He has given us His Spirit so that we will be able to follow Him.

There might still be some tension in your life about that, but the Spirit who lives in you will make you long for that glorious time.  Realizing that Jesus’ resurrection is a sure proof of your own resurrection from the dead, you’ll look forward to that final gift of the Spirit.  That life of perfect love and peace.  The Spirit of life will restore the bodies of all those who die in the Lord.  Also our souls will be pure then, all the stains of sin being removed.  Every song we sing will be a hymn, every word we utter will be a poem to the glory of God.  Can you imagine that with longing in your heart, even though there is still some tension about dying?  If you can, that longing is another gift of the Spirit of Christ.  What glory lies ahead for God’s spiritual children!

But, just in case you start to think that all the joys of the Spirit are still all future, let’s look at a third verse from this chapter.

… verse fifteen.

Loneliness.  It’s possible to be lonely even among a crowd of people.  We can even feel lonely when we have many friends.  Societies such as ‘Jigsaw’ tell us that among the very loneliest of all people are those who have no knowledge of their parents and brothers and sisters.  How lonely, then, is an orphan – a child without parents – even though there may be others who can give a certain amount of care and direction and love.  What a joy it is when everything works out well, and such a child can be adopted into a loving family – when such a child can say, “I’ve got parents after all, parents who especially chose me.”

In a sense we are all orphans.  Every sinner is.  Every person who has no saving faith in Jesus Christ is like a helpless waif – homeless, fatherless, motherless (unless you can call Satan some kind of ‘father’) without hope, having to face the fearful trials of life, and the cold fact of death, without anyone to say, “I’ll help you, I’ll stand beside you.  You are, after all, my own flesh and blood.”  Sure, most of us have or have had parents, but are they not in the same situation we are in?  They too need someone to help them through…!

But for the believer all this has changed – and changed right now!  For the Spirit of God, who changes our heart and dwells within our soul, is also known as the Spirit of adoption.  He who gives us faith in Jesus Christ also gives us fellowship with the Father.  Fellowship like that of a son with his father, only this is perfect fellowship because He is a perfect Father!  If you seriously contemplate the issues of life and death you must have many anxieties for both the present and the future.  But if the Spirit of adoption gives you true faith in Jesus Christ He also gives us a true and heavenly Father.  And that Father commands His Spirit to stand beside us.  This gives us the comfort of knowing that we are not on our own – that we are not homeless and helpless, loveless and friendless and powerless.  When the Spirit of the Father and the Son makes His home in our heart and soul, He makes us seek those things which are above where Christ is, seated at the right hand of the Father, and He also assures us that all the Father’s love and care are ours and that the Father’s mansion is also our home.  We belong to him and we belong there.

What rich comfort it is to know that the Holy Spirit is ours now.  What comfort that we may address the Almighty and eternal God as Father and even as Abba, dearest Father.  If such a Father is for us, who can be against us?

Finally we turn to verse twenty six of this chapter.

This verse helps to explain even further how the Spirit of adoption helps us to be united with our heavenly Father.

Perhaps in nothing does a believer experience spiritual helplessness as much as in the area of prayer.  We find it difficult to pray and we realize that even the best of our prayers is so poor.  We all readily agree with those words of the apostle Paul, “We do not know what (or, how) we ought to pray…!”  How utterly inadequate we are to say exactly what we mean and would like to say.  Of course, with the Lord we can be completely open in what we say.  We can tell Him exactly what we think.  He won’t misunderstand us in the same way that we often misunderstand each other.  Even so, prayer is often very difficult isn’t it?

Does our God understand that?  In Psalm 103 we read, “As a father has compassion on his children, so the Lord has compassion on those who fear Him; for He knows how we are formed, and remembers that we are dust.”  Of course the Lord understands our predicament!  He has fully anticipated our human frailty in His plans.  That’s why the message of this verse is so comforting to us.  When we are completely speechless to tell the Lord what we ought – when words fail us and the spirit is weak – then the Holy Spirit who lives in our soul reaches our heavenly Father on our behalf with language unknown to any person.  And with these words or signs of the Spirit we are able to tell the Lord everything.  Surely we ought to be most thankful to the Lord that we are able to pray to speak with Him as a child to a Father – but, if anything, even more thankful for the prayer we can pray through the Spirit who lives in our soul.

We are nearly always under the pressure of trial and temptation.  And our sinful nature is still our biggest problem.  Often we are disturbed by doubts and fears.  Sometimes we have very deep sorrows.  So lonely!  Yet what great relief is that gift of prayer.  Whenever we come to our heavenly Father on bended knees that is, in a spirit of humility and faith we can always obtain that great spiritual relief and comfort which prayer brings.  To quote Hebrews 4:16, “Let us then approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.”  The Holy Spirit teaches us to pray rightly in the Name of Jesus.  And even when we are lost for words of either joy or sadness, need or thanksgiving, He will express it all for us perfectly.  So, too, are we one with the Spirit of Christ.  So are we one with the Father whose children we are.  So are we one with the Saviour.  Alone?  Never!  Without words?  Never!

AMEN.