The Person and Work of the Holy Spirit, lesson 10 cont.

So, lesson ten, we're still working on chapter two of the book by Samuel Rideout, and we're still working on the issue of sealing. And what I've tried to do, and you may wonder about the page numbers that I put in there, it all has to do with the PDF file of the person and work of the Holy Spirit. So if you have the PDF file, you go to page 27, and that's where we are in the book, okay?

So we've been talking about earnest payments, something I'm really familiar with because of my, My stint as a realtor, anybody who's involved in contracts knows what earnest is. So question number one is, if earnest is part payment in kind, what is the rest of the payment?

And I referenced, write out reference Romans 8.23. What does it mean to be part payment in kind? Well, that's the redemption of our bodies and the delights of heaven. OK. I want to get this word in kind opened up a little bit. Rite Out says the full payment would be of the same character as the earnest is. So it's the same thing.

So we are said to have received, in Romans 8.23, we are the first fruit of the Spirit.

So the feast of first fruits is important to give us information there, because the first fruits are like the whole crop's going to be. If the first fruits are gonna be really good, then the supposition is that the crop will be really great. Mike, I had a thought on that. If the first fruits are barley, then the main harvest is barley. If the first fruits are grapes, the harvest is grapes.

If you're on a real estate contract, if the down payment or the deposit is in Canadian currency, you know, the payments, the selling prices in dollars as well. Right. And so that's kind of a concept I think that's, but it's an interesting thing because if our deposit is the Holy Spirit, he's the fullness of, he's fully God, right? Right.

So it's an interesting thing because we just sold a property a few years ago and you know, they put a, I'm not a realtor, but the real estate, they put a deposit and our lawyer said, well, you know, you should maybe ask for a larger deposit. And that's an interesting thing because it kind of insinuates that they might back out. And if they do, you want a bit more on the table for them to walk away from. But, you know, when you're dealing with the Holy Spirit as a deposit guaranteeing, I mean, That's a sure guarantee, and you don't have to ask for a bigger deposit to guarantee. Anyway, a few thoughts on that.

No, that's a great thought, because the Holy Spirit is the earnest, or the deposit, so to speak, or the first fruit. Then there's a guarantee there's going to be a closing. It's like all of the money got deposited up front. and it's held in escrow someplace, guaranteeing that the rest of it will be brought in.

One of the things that Rideout mentioned that I had never understood before, he says that the first fruits of the spirit remind us of those fruits of the land brought in by the spies to their brethren, yet in the wilderness. He elaborated on that. He said, to faith, those fruits were the pledge that the inheritance was theirs. But they were also a sample of the fruits yielded by that good land. Sinai had never thought of it that way, that the spies did in fact bring produce and things from the land back to the nation of Israel. They said, this is a land flowing with milk and honey, and here's some of it right here.

And God has given us that land. So this is what we can expect when we go in and take possession of it. So that brings up an interesting point. How ready were they to go in and possess the land? They weren't ready at all. And how was the land to be possessed?

By faith. by faith that we're supposed to go in. So is there a parallel between that and us as believers when we begin to find out what we call positional truth? By faith we don't enter into the positional truth. We rely on experience rather than what the word of God says. Do we have to take that little 40 year trip into the desert? The parallel is really interesting because The 40-year trip in the desert for all the non-believers who wouldn't go in was designed for one thing to happen.

What was it? That they all die. All the non-believers died. So that when they came back to go in, there weren't any of those guys anymore. That everybody that went in was a person of faith. Well, why would God take me out in the desert? so that I'd stop trusting the old man. I would really die to him so that when I'm confronted with a positional truth or a new truth from the Lord, I accept it and take it as mine.

See the parallel? I think it's really applicable to us. So we don't walk across the Jordan and abide in the promised land because of our little faith we have. It's ours. Hey Mike, one more thing on the earnest I was thinking of is that normally when there's earnest there's a buyer and a seller. In this case it seems like there's a buyer and an inheritor. Normally there's something of value that's being sold, but for us we're not giving anything of value to our God, which shows His grace. And what he's giving us is an unlimited final payment after the earnest. It's unlimitedly big, unlimited, incredibly great. But we can't even get to the end of it, how great it is.

Yeah. But we're supposed to, how do I say this? Because we're the first fruits, we're supposed to have a taste of that. We're supposed to know to some degree. You know, because if the spies went in the land and brought the stuff back and said, well, here's what's in the land, as we grow in the knowledge and grace of the Lord Jesus, what do we find? We kind of know. Oh, this is what it's like, you know? And I think you find that older believers who have been around a while and have walked with the Lord, they begin to look forward. I'm sure Ken Dahl looked forward to being home, because he knew. He's a pretty savvy guy.

The write-out says, every view of the love of God, every unfolding of His grace, every manifestation of the beauties of Christ, All the sweets of, quote, the fellowship of kindred minds, these and all else of the precious witness of that holy one are foretastes of the coming feast. What a great sentence, the paragraph. So what we're talking about here is the love of God, his grace, the manifestation, and the beauties of Christ, and the fellowship on the same level as Christ. These are the foretastes of coming feasts.

That explains it. That the first fruits that we live in are those things right there. These grapes are but a cluster of fruit from the tree of life in the midst of the paradise of God. The tree that grows by the river of water of life in the heavenly city, which is our home. One of the things that growing believers begin to understand that we really aren't from around here. That we do belong to another creation. That our home is in heaven. That's where it is. That's where we're from. So for us to experience or think that living in the world is where we belong, we don't belong there anymore.

So question two, what does a seal on a document impart? I'm going to use a servo. Well, let me ask you, what does a seal on a document impart? What does it say? Authentic? What's that? It's verification, a guarantee. It's verification, it's a guarantee. I've put down it gives the full authorization of the woman authority and all the power at his disposal to carry out what is in that document. Oh, that's really good. I like that. That's really good. He uses the example of Esther how to obtain grace at the hands of king, how do you say that word?

Ahasuerus. Yeah. And was to undo as far as possible the evil which Haman had already been authorized to inflict on his people, which are the Jews. He was authorized to write a letter to the king in the king's name and seal it with the king's ring permitting Jews to resist the utmost all assaults upon them. The seal gave the full authorization of the king to the letter." Isn't that interesting? There's an imprimatur on that letter that says this is as though the king is speaking directly. Yeah.

I was just thinking, sometimes when you have a, I mean, not like that, when you've got a document that's got a seal on it and you see the document. But sometimes, if it's like a letter or something that's sealed, you don't know exactly what's in there until you open it and look at it. That's right. So it's kind of a, you know, it makes you wonder exactly what's in there, but you don't know until you break the seal. That's exactly right. And you don't know. And sometimes when you break that seal and take a look, it kind of scares you what's in there. And yet, we're on the inside of the seal. We have first fruits of what that seal's for. So we kind of do know in the sense of that. Yeah. And a little part of it, I think, we can't imagine. tells us in his word, you know, some of the things that we're going to find, but I think also we can't fathom it. We can't, with our minds, we can't.

Well, you know, it's interesting about that, Carolyn, is that God has given us his word, the Bible, and that's the document. That's where all the information is. And that's the document that he has sent to us and said, well, here's my letter. And in that letter is everything I intend to do and have done in grace towards you. And the authority is the fact, what gives it the authority? That the Holy Spirit is, in fact, the seal.

So not only does it come from the Father, but another member of the Trinity is, in fact, that the authority or the value that all three persons of the Godhead have committed to what the Word of God says. So, you know, it right out uses the idea of a check.

If I write it, well, put it, this won't happen, but if Courtney wrote me a check. That's not gonna happen. When he gave it to me, but he didn't sign it, does it have any value? Even if I signed it, it doesn't have any value. But the point is, is that your signature on a check is your author's signature.

I want to go back on one. Jimmy, I really like what you said, and I hadn't thought about it that way. When we think of a document and sealed and what's inside, and you say you don't know what's inside. Jimmy, I like what you said. We're inside. We have been sealed. We're on the inside. We don't need to look inside the letter. We are inside the letter. I think that's really cool, Jimmy. I think that's a different perspective. When we're talking about all these seals, it's like, yes, ooh, it's by the king and all that. But we're on the inside. We have been sealed by the Holy Spirit. That's a great position. We are the letter. You guys have read The Hungry Heart this morning. Jim and I were talking about it before class started. It's a very interesting sentence.

It says, grace is sufficient for favorable circumstances, but they are by far the most trying spiritually to the believer. So here we are, we open up the book, it has the seal of the Holy Spirit on it, and it's all grace. Why is it so hard? That's what this is saying, that God's grace, if my circumstances are favorable, they're much more difficult for me as a believer than the trying ones. Why is that? Need. What's that? would say need. When things are tough, we need our Lord so badly. And when they're not, we tend to forget how much we need Him. Boy, it's like right away we tend to forget. It isn't, I sort of slide into it. I instantly forget. Because we're not done with self. Yeah.

So we have all this tremendous news in this document that's been sealed, given to us, And unless God puts need in our life, it isn't very valuable to us. I was telling Jim that my father-in-law, Jack McBride, two decades ago, we'd gone through a really tough spell in the real estate market. Nobody was making any money. There weren't any closings, right? Then it turned around, and it turned around overnight, especially for me. And so I pick him up, or he picks me up to come out to the Tuesday Bible study.

He says to me, well, you did pretty good when it was tough. We'll see how you do when it's good. I almost ducked. But boy, that was really profound. He understood how the good times are way more difficult for a believer than the tough times are, way more. Mike, I think we've talked about this before in the business world, too.

Same sort of thing. After I've gotten a great contract or something and thinking how great it is, I tend to forget it's the Lord doing it. He's the one providing all this stuff. And I always go back to the Nebuchadnezzar, standing out on the thing looking, this is all mine, mine. Look what I've done. You know, then he's eating with the cattle, you know, grazing in the grass after trying, you know, this is all mine and taking no perspective that God is in there.

And then what happens? He's humbled until he looks up and realizes, you know, where he's at. And I always think that when I get a great contract and I go off thinking how great I am, it's like, well, that's stupid. It's like Mike was saying, the hardest thing is that That's sin nature that always wants to take credit for everything, even though it doesn't have anything to do with it. It's not only that. When things are good, you just don't focus on Christ. You don't look to God. You forget about Him. You start living in the world like you and I were talking about. I think it's also reflected in when we start the class and ask for prayers.

We always think about the needs. What about the praises? We're so remiss on giving praises to all the blessings that we have every day and what he's done. We look at the need and answer this, do this. We forget about the blessings constantly. Each heartbeat, every breath is a gift. And we forget about that. That's just emblematic of what we're talking about. And the good things we forget about.

I've had some thoughts on that lately. I've come to the conclusion that if you have got to the understanding that the only reason I'm here and the only reason you're here is to serve the Lord, there's really no other reason, then it isn't about you. And if it isn't about you, it's about service, then your focus, more than not, is about somebody else or some other thing that you're involved in. And we should be so thankful for the fact that he has each one of us in a position where we're serving somebody in some capacity. And there has to be a focus on that. And the great thing about that is That's a time I'm not focused on me. I get 15 seconds of no pressure or no service. Guess who just runs right in the camera? Good old me. And the next question that hits my mind is, well, I'm the one that gets to judge whether this is good or not. No, I don't.

I was having a conversation with Mike last week, and some of you know I've been going through some major extreme trials. And all of a sudden, God has taken the pressure off. And I was saying, Mike, I'm really worried. He's like, why are you worried? I'm like, because I experienced such incredible things with Christ while I was under such extreme pressure. And now I'm frightened that now that the pressure's off, I'm going to be turning my view away from him no matter how hard I try not to.

Is there a solution for that? Because, I mean, that's a real identifiable problem that I think every one of us face. Is there an answer for that? In other words, maybe make it a more distinct question, is there something God would do that would keep us focused on him even though there may not be a severe trial at the time? What is it? Anybody know?

The death and resurrection of Christ. I think it's intimacy with Christ. There it is. It's if you know him and you study him and you're looking at him and you have that union that's in John 17, that's where you can go through the good times and still be fine. Yeah, because his door isn't open. intimacy with Christ is really what is moving everybody in that direction. Most of the time it's through trials, but without trials, I mean, it's a trial to end the trial and think, oh, where do I go from here? That's a trial in itself.

What do I do now? Jimmy, I used to kind of the same thing. When things go through a trial and then you get the blessings, I kept thinking, when is the stick going to come? When am I going to get whacked with the next trial or whatever? And I thought, how stupid is that?

That's why I think I've focused a lot more on the Romans 8, latter part of 8 and the 30s, He has an eternal love for us. No matter what happens in blessings and in trial, He loves us. And I'm not worried about the next trial. I'm not worried about what the next thing to come down the pike, because I know he has an eternal love.

I can't be separated from it. It was one of my early days in the consulting business, and the boss I had was a very tough boss. He used to just rule by getting everybody angry so he'd produce. And I think I've told the story where he, I was in his office and he was just praising me and one of the vice presidents from It was in the doorway. And when I walked out, I just remember it so well.

He said, well, you're on top of the mountain right now. There's only one place to go. I thought that was very humbling after getting this great praise that when you're on the hill, there's only one place to go. But in God's economy, the hills and the valleys, he still loves you.

And that's the beautiful part. That's really good. I rely on the fact that Paul said he could abound and he could abase. Sure. And that the Lord can teach me to abound. Yeah, that's cool. Okay, a little more along the same lines of question three, which is more authority or authentication? The document itself or the seal?

And he uses a verse out of Esther 8.8. Esther says, Esther writes, now you write to the Jews as you see fit in the king's name and seal it with the king's signet ring. For a decree which is written in the name of the king and sealed with the king's signet ring may not be revoked. So, which is more important, the document or the seal? Because without the seal, there's no guarantee your authority to access the document.

Yeah. I say the document, because the document's my guarantee. I believe him for what he's saying. He sealed me. I treasure that. But the document is everything. It's unlimited beauty. It's the truth. So I would say this, Jimmy. Let's look at Romans 8, 9. about the Holy Spirit. Amen. Have not the spirit of Christ. He's none of this.

The document may be the greatest document ever. I mean, you may be able to let's say there's a document. It's a will and testament. the three wealthiest men in the world and you get all of their wealth. Well, if they didn't sign it, it's just One, if you don't understand what he's saying. Two, if you don't recognize where that came from, where that information came from. Because salvation in the Lord Jesus Christ is based on the veracity of the father who tells us about his son. Well, it's great news, but what makes it true? What gives it authority? The seal. The seal does.

The question for you, Mike, can you have and kind of along the lines of what Jimmy was saying, can you have one without the other. Oh, that's a great question. Let me think about what do you think I'm thinking about that. Well, I hope somebody else will talk. I was just thinking that God speaks to us through his document, through his word, and to me, that's good enough. Later, I find out that I've been sealed. Well, that's awesome. But to me, I believe what God said. It's perfect. I don't need more than that, really.

Well, and the seal is on the document, too. Any other thoughts? authentication document or the seal. The seal has the authority behind the document. Not to go down a rabbit hole, but isn't the word Christ? Sure. It is true. Without the document, the seal would just be a blank check.

Okay, so let's put it in human terms. Everybody in the room is an epistle of Christ, right? I said so in the work. Well, what gives you the authority? I mean, think about it. If you're an epistle of Christ, which is a nonverbal communicator, if you're looking at me as an epistle, it's pretty scribbly, the paper's kind of crumpled, and it doesn't have a lot of authority, and you're looking through the pages looking for the authority. Every one of us is like that. What gives it the authority? It's the seal of the Holy Spirit on each one of us. We're the ones that are the paper that it's written on. The information and the authority is the Holy Spirit.

And Mike, I also kind of think of there are millions of people who look at this word and it means nothing. Right. It's what gives it the authority as the seal. I mean, there's millions of people who read his word and reject it. It's a historical document. It's not a historical document. What gives the seal is the Holy Spirit that convicts and convinces you and then seals you. And does that through you to somebody else. To somebody else. You know, Jimmy, it goes back to what you were saying, I think, at the very beginning. We're sealed and we're inside.

So the seal is the important part on the outside of the letter that we are. Yeah, I think it's interesting that, again, back to the idea of service, we're not just saved so that we can walk around with a badge on our forehead that says I'm a Christian. And there's this whole idea of our walk should match the talk. So yeah, I was just going to say, I think the word authority really helps clarify this question over the word importance because they're both important and they each are required. Um, however, the authority, um, authenticity maybe is in the seal. I think that's what we're trying to get to, right? Yeah. Yeah. That's good, Jim. You know, since Alan's cleaned the chapel area, he's put the faith in the facts right in front of me now, so I can read this exactly. Faith in the facts is like train on the tracks. Facts lead and the feelings follow.

You know, it's kind of the chicken and the egg. You need the word, you know, initially. You know, we can do the Romans one where you see God and the power of God, but you actually need his word to understand who Christ is, what he did, and salvation through Christ. So, it's a little bit of the chicken or the egg, you know, that you need the facts, you need that. the word, but once we're sealed, I think it's the sealing that's the important part.

Yeah, I think everybody that, quote unquote, is sealed knows that they've been sealed by the Holy Spirit. Yeah, I don't think they do. I don't think we realize the importance of the work of the Holy Spirit, what he's doing. He's the persuader. You know, he's the one that says, well, here's the document, and here's my stamp on it. which makes it verifiable.

Before I was saved, I realized the Bible was a very valuable document and I loved it. When I read it, it just meant nothing to me. But after I was saved, there was a whole new world opening up. I didn't realize that I was sealed with the Holy Spirit, but I just loved God's Word.

That's part of the seal that comes with it. I think there are a lot of, maybe put it this way, believers who desire to be Christian leaders that go and get educated in the Bible, and they get enamored with the Bible and what it says and how it's structured and the truth, but they forget or they don't know about the sealing of the Holy Spirit, which adds a dimension to it that isn't there just intellectually. The dimension, as Courtney talked about, is the intimacy with Christ. This document, the seal of the Holy Spirit, is specifically designed for the believer to have a growing intimacy with the Son of God. So he's not only verifying the information with the seal, but with his energy and his life, he's revealing the person of Christ to the believer.

You know, I've had people accuse me of being a charismatic because I said something like that. Because it's personal and it's, you know, it's not just academic. Well, you know, academics will get you out the door and in heresy faster than anything I know. The only thing that holds you true, like we were talking about with Jim, with the pressure off is this intimacy with Christ, you know.

I think it's necessary, like 2 Corinthians 3.18, to focus on Christ. We all, with unveiled faces, looking in as an emir, at the glory of the Lord. And I think that's the key when things are going well. You still need to look to Christ, at His glory, to let the transformation process continue. One other perspective on this.

What's more important, the Word, the document, or the seal? In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. What's more important, Christ Jesus, our Savior, or the seal placed by the Holy Spirit? If you look at it from that perspective, I agree with what everybody's saying here, but it's just another perspective.

Well, the Word there is the person of Christ. That's who it is. He is the Word. We use his words to reveal the word, the word. And that was kind of my point is you can't have one without the other. One is authoritative. They're both authoritative, actually. But once there's belief, there's the seal. So you can't have one without the other.

The human perspective of a document and a seal, I don't know that it can measure up to the truth of what has happened in terms of the word being got. And yeah, we can think of ourselves as the document inside and so forth. which is not a bad analogy, but it's an analogy, right? So we have to take the word himself and believe it and trust that the Holy Spirit is the seal that keeps us.

And I think that's the important part of what I take away from this is he keeps us. He won't ever unauthorize what he's done. Yeah. And the confirmation of that, I think, is, again, back to the idea that God loves me. Not only do I know the words that say that he loves me, I know that he does because the Spirit of God has shown me that he does.

It's kind of like now that we have all the gold in the vault, the seal keeps anyone from stealing it. Yeah. Well, on the positive side, if you're a member of the royal family and you have all of this pomp and circumstance and you don't have any love in the family, I'd be bailing out of that family. I wouldn't want to be there. One of the great things about families is that you love one another. You're secure and safe there.

So it's 946. I can do one more question. Take five minutes. You want to go ahead? I'm looking at the thing. Yeah, let's go ahead. This is a really great illustration. Leviticus 8.23.14.14. Describe what the blood and the oil represent. Right out says it's a beautiful illustration.

This occurs in the Levitical ordinance in the Old Testament. And what it has to do with the consecration of a priest and in the restoration of a leper. The blood of sacrifice was put on the ear, the hand, and the foot, making the whole man redeemed, Leviticus 8. After this application of the blood, they were sprinkled with oil, which is a type of the Holy Spirit. Particularly in the case of a leper, we're told that the oil was put on the ear, hand, and foot, and upon the blood. So the Spirit of God seals us because of the blood, the work of Christ. It's a really good point. It is not a matter of personal worthiness or of personal faithfulness, but of the value of the work of Christ.

E, have we rested in that, write out S. Then we are sealed divinely, authenticated as belonging to God by his spirit. and I close it up, he says, think of that, you trembling saints. You are sealed with the king's seal, confessed and owned as his. Okay, I'm gonna stop there. Okay, let's close.

Dear Father, how we thank you. We thank you so much that we can Spend time in your word and especially looking at this issue of sealing and the work of your spirit in our lives, how important he is in our growth and the knowledge and grace of your dear son, the Lord Jesus. And we pray in his name. Amen.