The Role of the Holy Spirit: Understanding His Work in Our Lives

Show Notes

Episode 382: 
Join us in this episode of The Bible Guys Podcast, where we dive deep into the significance of the Holy Spirit in our lives. In our usual ad-lib style, we discuss the strength of unprepared conversation and how it can lead to meaningful insights into the scriptures. Discover why Jesus said it's better for us that He went away and how the Holy Spirit works within us to complete God's will. Whether you're listening on your morning commute or as you wind down for the evening, this episode is sure to enrich your understanding and relationship with the Holy Spirit.

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You're listening to the Bible Guys, a podcast where a couple of friends talk about the Bible in fun, in practical ways. I think we need to find a new way to open. Well. I always we were like, hey, we're here. Hey yeah, but it's just because we maybe maybe our listeners don't know this. This is a good way to open is to tell our listeners that we think that not preparing there's a strength in that well, that the whole thing is ad libbed. Yeah, like there's a there's I mean, obviously there could be a disc The whole concept of the of this podcast is it's two guys opening the Bible and talking about it. Like if we were sitting in the coffee shop and you and I just got together. It's a devotional thing. This isn't like that both of us prepared to come in and debate the Bible. That would be a different kind of show. Instead, what we're trying to do is talk about how the fact that the Bible can be understood. If you're a student of the Bible, you should be able to open it, talk about what's on the page in front of you. You have a meaningful conversation. Then we horse around a lot because we take our faith very seriously. We just don't take ourselves too seriously, right, right, So so consequently we think that a lot of it is best at lib because there's some value in that. So so anyway, so I just so, other than the fact that Desiree gives us a show sheet that says, hey, be silly for five minutes and then go talk about this topic, right, other than that, we don't really have a plan. Yes, well that's a good way to open. There, we did it. There you go. We did a different opening. So we don't know why you're listening because we don't have a plan, right exactly what we kind of do. But okay, so our segment today is called guess the word. It's kind of like taboo. And if you're watching on the YouTube, you know where you visually can see this. We're going to try to put the words that I'm not allowed to say right across the bottom of the screen. Because that's really the challenge. The challenge is harder for me. Just say, if you're watching on the YouTube, did I yes, you did? You're hey? By the way, you so it used to be called Facebook. Did you know that? Yes? I know that. Okay, all right, so years ago, but it was never called YouTube. Alright, alright you all right, So so here we go. Okay, first word for there's no other way to be happy in Jesus but to trust and obey. There it is there you go, all right. I wasn't allowed to say listen, comply, submit, children or parents? Oh wow? Yeah, right, you have to sing trust and obey old Baptist hymn. That's right, that's right. That's page ninety eight. I'm just kidding. I don't know. I don't know, Okay, it depends on I actually do know that. I only know the first, second, and fourth verses, right, that's you never sing the third verse because nobody knows the third verse. That's right in anyone. Okay, This next one is okay, ready the sower in the seat? Is this? What is it? Farmer? Oh it's a parable. Yeah, it's a pair. Well that's ok. I wasn't allowed to say tail, Jesus story, miracle or Samaritan. Okay, right, so uh so how about that arible? Yeah parable? All right? How about this one? Oh goodness gracious? Uh wow. Uh When you stab a goat on an altar, it's called a sacrifice there it is. Wow. I wasn't allowed to say offering, blessing, worship, sheep or God. Okay, wow, that was hard to come up with that. When you stab, make it as gruesome as possible. Thank you. Sorry, Okay, all right, here we go. Next word, our next big day coming up for heritages. Sunday, No, the big one, A big one, yes, Easter. That's right. I wasn't allowed to say Sunday spring. I was not saying holiday or Jesus or resurrection, and I was going to My instinct was to say something about the Easter bunny, but I couldn't even say bunny. And I was like, you, you'll never get that because without the word easter, okay, because I was like, go non religious, then everybody's like soacritigious. Yeah, that's right. Then you would have been kicked off the Bible. You'd have been the secular guy. That's right. All right, How about this one? Okay, last word? When I say to you that you don't owe me anymore, that is called what forgiveness? That is exactly right. Wow, that's right. I was thanks man. I wasn't allowed to say ask, repent, apology, sorry, or pray. Wow. Yeah, and you got there. I did, so. There it is. It's fantastic. Now hopefully you played along and hopefully you tried to beat Jeff with the answers. We forgot to ask you to do that, but hopefully you did it. Awesome. Good, Well there you go. See I can read your mind. Yes, I know what you're thinking right now? What am I thinking? Got you? Shut up? No, I was thinking I forgot to look at the topic of the scripture. Oh okay, which is Jesus teaches about the Holy Spirit. Yes, exactly. So he's been peppering all of his teachings over the last several days. Right now, You've got to remember all of these teachings over the last several days have been on the walk from the Upper Room to the Mount of Olives, right But for us, which by the way we're taking it, it's not that far of a walk. No, no, no, it's it's how long would you say this? I don't know. We walked from the top of the Mount of Olives down into the Kidron Valley and then up to the Eastern Gate, and not the Eastern Gate but the Lion's Gate I think, which is near the Eastern gate a mole and a half. Yeah, it's probably in a leisurely stroll, not more than thirty five minutes forty minutes, wouldn't you think Yeah, I would think so too. Yeah, because it's a steep hill going in both directions. But yeah, Anyways, so Jesus has been peppering this conversation with the Holy Spirit. He keeps referring to the Holy Spirit as the advocate it right, or the helper, And so here we go. In John chapter sixteen, verse five, Jesus says, but now I'm going away to the one who sent me. Not any or not one of you is asking where I'm going. Instead, you grieve because of what I've told you. But in fact it's best for you that I go away, because if I don't, the Advocate won't come. If I do go away, then I will send him to you, and when he comes, he will convict the world of its sin and of God's righteousness and of the coming judgment. The world sin is that it refuses to believe in me. Righteousness is available because I go to the Father and you will see me. No more judgment will come, because the rule of this world has already been judged. There is so much more I want to tell you, but you can't bear it now. When the Spirit of Truth comes, he will guide you into all truth. He will not speak on his own, but will tell you what he has heard. He will tell you about the future. He will bring me glory by telling you whatever he receives from me. All that belongs to the Father is mine. This is why I said, the Spirit will tell you whatever he receives from me. Yeah, so this is his absolute declaration that I'm leaving you, but I'm not leaving you alone. And the thing that always blows me away, and it really does, I mean not literally, but you know I'm not spontaneously combusting or blowing away in the wind, but it does blow me away when I hear him say, it's better for you that the Holy Spirit comes. Right. So think about Jesus is there in person and has grown up among men. He's lived a sinless life. He's guiding them, They're following him closely. They have more of an they have more of an intimate relationship with the creator of the universe. While on Earth, then, it would be fair to say than anybody in history while on Earth, right, because there's obviously relationships in heaven, but on earth, is is there anybody else? Because you know the rest of us. You know, in the Old Testament they look forward to the cross, right, and then up to this point, he's there right now, we have you know, maybe maybe it's a little unfair to include us, but I would even include us. I would say they're there walking and talking with Jesus. Anyway. That's the point is you had his mom and his brothers and sisters. Yeah, they would have been with him for thirty years, yeah, or however long because he was the oldest of the brothers and sisters, so however old they were. And Jesus promises that these twelve are going to sit on twelve thrones and judge the twelve tribes of Israel, right right, And then he looks at them and says, however, it's better for you that I go away, never to return. It's better. And so if God promises that it's not only just good, but betters it would be hard to even imagine in that moment. But yet the Holy Spirit is, you know, in us, right, So the Holy Spirit comes in us, and so things change at this point because that's a concept that is a blow you away concept because at this point God only had an address, right, He had an address. He had a central location, the Holy of Holies, in the middle of the temple, you know, And in the Holy of Holies was just a small room on the innermost part of the temple. And soon when Jesus dies in the cross and says it is finished, the veil rips in two that separates God and man in the Holy Holies. The God, God's presence floods out. And now all of a sudden, God ceases to be at an address. And now the Bible says, we are the temple of God, right right, and God is in us. So just as God existed inside the Temple in the Holy of Holies, now God exists inside us, in the Temple of our bodies. And so that's what Jesus is packaging in that. And of course he knew all that, right, they didn't understand that, But think about how cool that is. So I heard a past one time say, uh, so he goes, he goes, you have God in you? I know it was it was Louis Giglio, And Luis Giglio said, so you have God in you? He goes don't underestimate how awesome that is. Because we look back at the Old Testament stories and we think, Man, when I get to Heaven, I'm gonna ask questions, like, you know, I go and I'm gonna go up to Moses. I'm gonna say, Moses, what was it like to go up on the mountain and see the burning bush? And wasn't that awesome? And Moses is gonna say, yeah, it was great. But let me ask you. I'm getting emotions talking about it, he says, let me ask you, He goes, what was it like to have the creator of the universe inside you and the power of God living in you that you were able to walk through you know, life and have that kind of power accessible inside of you. Because I never got to experience that, And most Christians are gonna go, I don't know. I never really thought of it that way. The power God in us right, and the devil has us believing it's nothing right, And so I mean, it's such an emotional concept, you know. And then to think like we're the privileged ones, you know, not Moses or sees the burning bush, right, and not Joshua who sits in the tent of the meeting and all these different things that they've witnessed. It's us today right now. We're the ones that have the privilege because Jesus said it and we're living in it. It's better right now. It's better on several levels. So certainly you're going to receive the Holy Spirit. It was also better because if Jesus didn't go die, didn't shed his blood, didn't resurrect, didn't ascend back to the Father, we couldn't be saved. That's right, right, So that's going to be better too, right, So it's both of those pieces together. So then he has referenced the Holy Spirit several times, often calling him the advocate, and then also talking about he calls him the helper. He's the spirit of truth, right, So there's these different references. As an advocate, he is the one who goes between us. We know that the Book of Romans tells us that the Holy Spirit prays for us with groanings we can't comprehend, meaning as we pray, the Holy Spirit intercepts those prayers, takes them to God and communicates on a level we can't can't imagine. One of the benefits of that then is you can't mess up and praying right. A lot of a lot of young Christians feel nervous about praying What if I mess up right? What if I write? What Spirit? It's like, I got you, I got it. Don't worry. I know what you mean. I know your thoughts, your intent, what you're trying to say, what you mean, what you're asking for. I know all that, right, And so it's that That's why I often I'll find myself saying, God, I'm not exactly sure what your will is, but that's what I want, is your will, And knowing that the Holy Spirit can translate, Hey, this is this is what he's asking for. What it's like, It's like that when you see those movies, you know, the brilliant code breakers on the ones who see patterns that's right, and you're like, wow, he's such a great code breaker. That's the Holy spirits part of the Holy Spirit's job sorting it out out. And then this idea of being the comforter. Certainly, Jesus talks a lot about persecution. He talks a lot about the difficult things. I've heard many people who've talked about being in prison and they were alone and the only thing they had was the Holy Spirit, you know, comforting them, reminding them. And almost always they would talk about how the Holy Spirit kept bringing back different scriptures that they had memorized, that they had studied, that they learned. The Holy Spirit would bring those back to memory when they felt like there was no other helper, right, the Holy Spirit do that. He also says that the Holy Spirit will teach you in all truth. He'll guide you in all truth. Right, So one of those things when we don't know what is true and what's not true, instead of just trying to sort it out logically all the time, although logic is part of what God's given us, it's a gift. But relying on the Holy Spirit to show us what is true and to point out what his fault, I think it's super important. He also, the Holy Spirit, he says, is here to convict the world. So, you know, I find myself a lot of times looking for an opportunity to share the gospel. I was just talking with a group of pastors here about the idea of, you know, encouraging their people to write down the names of thirty people that they know who aren't believers and just pray that the Holy Spirit would begin to convict those people of their sin and of their need for Jesus, so that when you show up to have a spiritual conversation with them, they're already prepared right right. And it reminds me of do you remember when Joshua was afraid to fight and God said, I'm going to send my hornets out ahead of you, or I'm gonna go before you. With Moses, it was both I'm behind you and in front of you. Right, I'm completely surrounding you. You know, a lot of times I'll pray God, go ahead of us before this service even begins today, go ahead of us and prepare the hearts of the people on their way in that need to hear from you. Or go ahead of me. I'm getting ready to go share the gospel with this guy. Go ahead of me, and hopefully over the weeks or the months that I've been praying for this guy ahead of time, the Holy Spirit's been kind of drilling into him and preparing. That's one of the things he does. He convicts the world of his sin, he calls to repentance, and then it says that he reveals God's standards because we're more coming up. But the uh every morning for like thirty years when I you know, I've been a pastor for just like you, like thirty one years, whatever it's been. And I'm telling you, I think I'm not sure. There's a Sunday that goes by when I say my prayers in the morning and a lot of times I'll pray, like even on the drive in, and I'll say because it's early, you know, it's always early when we get there, and I'll say, God, I want you to convict people to get out of bed. And for all the people who are thinking about not getting out of bed because it's so comfortable, I'm praying that you're going to convict them and say no, I have to get out of bed. And I don't know why, but that has been a prayer I think maybe every single Sunday I've ever ever been a part of church, because it's that same thing what you're saying, which is the conviction, and then also the sort of like going ahead of us, right, And I just I don't know why. I just always think of the people because it's so easy to stay in bed, absolutely, and I just I just pray that they're like no, no, no, no, no, I can't do it. I can't do it. They just get out of bed anyway, go ahead. It also says, so if you're miserable in the morning on Sunday mornings, then you you wake up and then you can't go back to sleep and all that stuff, and you're trying to and you're trying to stay comfortable. Just know Chris is praying that God makes you uncomfortable doing and I unapologetically do I really do. It's Chris's fault. You can next time you see him. Next time God does that wakes you up and won't let you get comfortable again. Any morning you wind up walking in the doors of the church, walk right up to Chris and tell him it's your fault. Yeah, thanks a lot. Is just roll over again. It's raining. Jesus also said that the Holy Spirit will reveal the standard of God's righteousness to anyone who believes right. And and that's that's important for us because Jesus isn't physically on earth anymore, so the disciples could look at Jesus and know what the standard was. And for us, you know, not having Jesus in front of us directly physically, then we need the Holy Spirit too. And that's why the Holy Spirit will use our conscience. A lot of times, the Holy Spirit will will lean in us and go, hey, you know that's not the right direction, or that is that wise for you or whatever. He's helping us understand what the standard of righteousness is. And then he we know that. Paul tells us he also seals us. He's the one that seals us, and Jesus kind of references it that we were in righteousness now right because of the Holy Spirit. He seals us until the day of redemption, until Jesus comes back. We are are sealed in Christ through the Holy Spirit and Jesus. Four. Yeah, so there's so many things that the Holy Spirit does. But can I point out one thing? Yeah, Jesus says, I guess I pointed out like six things. But Jesus says, the Holy Spirit doesn't draw attention to himself, and the Holy Spirit doesn't speak on his own. Sometimes some people play in the Holy Spirit, claiming that they're hearing from the Holy Spirit and they're doing all these amazing things in the Holy Spirit and all these things. It's the Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit. But the Holy Spirit doesn't talk about himself, and the Holy Spirit doesn't bring attention to himself. The Holy Spirit doesn't bring some kind of new revelation. He says, he's only bringing what I've told him. Jesus is the Word, the Word of God. Right, So the Holy Spirit isn't bringing attention to himself and isn't trying to get you to just play in the power of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit's whole job is to point us to Jesus and his finished work on the Cross. That's his job. Yeah. Yeah, So there's always a thing that whenever I hear a person pray and they don't pray to the Heavenly Father and they pray to Jesus. I never I never rebuke that. I just accept it move on because technically it's Father, Son, Holy Spirit, one God, three persons, right, But in my mind I always think, oh, theologically, if you really want to get technical, every single reference in the scripture talks about us being reconciled to the heavenly Father. So our relationship was broken to the heavenly Father, and our relationship is with the heavenly Father Jesus the mediator who brings us back so that we can pray to and Jesus always pray to the Father, right, So you can pray to Jesus if you want. I'm sure that that's fine since there are one God, three persons. But but well, every person who came to Jesus and needed him to help them, he was they were talking to God, right, right, right? Could you help me out? That's right, that's right. But in my mind, I'm like, it's better and more spiritually, it's more theologically, it's more theologically accurate. Yeah, okay, So in the same way, in the same way, people say this phrase all the time and they always say like, Holy Spirit come down, and I always think the Holy Spirit's here, right, It's like, I understand what you're meaning, but theologically that's not correct. And then they'll say, uh, okay, wow, the Holy Spirit was really present in that worship service today or that gathering whatever it was, and man, we were filled with the spirit like we've never been filled before, right to which I'm saying, like, I understand what you're saying. The Theologically, if you want to get technical, we believe based on what Jesus says is that when you become a Christian, when you put your faith, in trust in Christ, you receive the Holy Spirit, and you'll never ever be filled more with any more Holy Spirit than you have right now. You have all the Holy Spirit you need right now. There's never a time where the Holy Spirit leaves you ever, right, I'll never leave you nor forsake you. There's never a time where you have less the Holy Spirit than you have more the Holy Spirit. Because theologically speaking, when those times where you say, man, the Holy Spirit was really present and I had more of the Holy Spirit, that's not accurate, accurately or true. It means that the Holy Spirit had more of you, right, That's what it means. It means that there was a time where you experienced a really great thing and you didn't have more of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit had more of you. And so again I'm not going to rebut anybody who says that and I know what they mean, you know, and it's a great thing to sell it, right, but theologically it's not true. You have all the Holy Spirit you need right now if you're a follower of Christ. So let's let's let's maybe straight away and just sort of you know, re you know, begin to rethink how we say that because that also is a little bit of a danger there, right. So it's like it's like, man, our services are way more holy spirit filled than your services. Right now, nobody would ever probably say that they do. But that's they do. They do on a semi regular basis. Yeah, okay, but but but you see what I'm saying. It sort of paints the picture that God is more present here than it is here. But if you want to get theologically correct, it just means that that that that this group over here wasn't as submitted to the Holy Spirit, possibly in some cases right right, So there's a lack of God's price. You see a comment on boy, I really feel like I feel like the Spirit moved me. Yeah, but what they're saying is the Spirit was in this service, right well, the spirits with all the blieve all the time. So I think it was Tozer who used to say it was either Tosar or Tory, one of those old great preachers who said the question is not how much of the spirit do you have? But how much of this how much of you does the Spirit have? Right right? And I think that that's the bigger issue for us to understand. It's all about surrender. So if you want God's Spirit to move in you, it's about you surrendering to the Spirit, right, right, because He's already in you. Right, That's what Jesus says. Don't you know that? What Paul says, don't you know that you're the temple of God. God lives in you, and so it's a surrender issue. But yeah, and then you know it's because of the Holy Spirit that Jesus tells us, Hey, You're going to do greater things than me, right someday, which these are all in this same conversation here, so good. Yeah, And I heard one time that that's our time coming up. I heard one time that said, if you think about from a thirty thousand foot view of the Bible, the role of the Father and the Old Testament seems to be that God the Father is the one that has the will. He's the one that has the will for your life. It's Jesus is always pointing to. It's the will of the Father, the will of the Father, and and such is the case of the person of God in our lives. Right. So God, God has the will for you. God the Father, and then Jesus, I've heard it described as the one who initiates the work of the Father, the one who executes the will of the Father. And then and then it's the Holy Spirit's job in our lives. Who's the completer of the work, the completer of the work and all of these things. You know, if you think about every role that you described, the roles that the Holy Spirit has in our lives, it is to bring about our faith into completion. And he's the completer of the will of the Father in our lives. So it's really cool. Well, hey, that looks like it's our time, and we will see you next time, hopefully on the Bible. Guys,