The Person and Work of the Holy Spirit Lesson 34 cont.

Thanks, JD. Good to see you recovered here, too. Yeah, I'm laboring a little bit with my chest. I heard a little bit in your voice, but you sounded really good, so hopefully you're feeling... Coming back around. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, well, you know that was actually I just read the Hungry Heart this morning that the opening little paragraph there It says affliction provides opportunity for us to learn more of our father in his mercy As well as providing a deeper understanding of what others may be called upon to go through So that's kind of in my mind as you were praying this morning and it sort of fits in with some of what I was going to talk about this morning and so Yeah, so we're finishing off lesson 34 this morning.

I kind of had one question left that we didn't cover, but I also wanted to kind of back up a little bit this morning and just string together some of the things we looked at last week, maybe in a little bit more of a coherent sort of order. I don't know. Sometimes when I'm preparing or thinking things through and then teaching things, I sort of afterwards think, did that fit together? Did all that string together?

So I wanted to kind of back up and review a little bit. This Lesson 34, or this section of the book, is about the preparation of the Holy Spirit. And that's why it ties into that comment from the hungry heart there. You know, we like we're talking about the preparation of the holy spirit for ministry and um I think it's I think we all know this but it's important to just remember that ministry is not Not a profession or not a a career choice, you know, um But you know how often is ministry thought of that way, you know, um certainly in the church at large that's a pretty common um conception of what ministry is that you know, it's either a professional thing or or it's your It's your church hat, kind of a thing. You know, I put on my ministry hat and I go do ministry. But I think we want to have our thinking more aligned to scripture in regards to ministry. And then ministry is fundamentally the work of the Holy Spirit through individual members of the body of Christ to other members of the body of Christ.

It's not my doing, my duty, my job. It's His work through us. And along those lines, since ministry is spiritual work, how does a person prepare for it, or do we? Does that kind of make sense? I guess, you know, I have a question here. Does it really make sense to, you know, to get a sort of technical or academic education in order to be prepared for ministry?

I'm so sorry. I did not realize I was off mute. I'm sorry. I was thinking about that question. I was like, man, that is a big question. And then I just started hacking it up. Um, so sorry. No. Yeah. So, um, well, and, and there's other things that go into that kind of conversation as well. Like, are you called to ministry? Um, and, and what's what, and you think about like preparations for it, goodness. Um, That's a I don't know if Brian or Ralph Janet any of you Cheryl anyone else have thoughts around What it what's the role of the Holy Spirit in preparation for ministry? along those lines I Think for us it was just I First of all, I think it has very much to do with your walk with the Lord, right?

Is formal education necessary? Absolutely not. We know that, biblically speaking, formal education is not necessary. The world would tell us quite different. And I think there's a lot of flattery and self-pride that goes into the educational aspect of ministry. When I started out with the desire to move into that phase of my life, I was like, you know, I'm going to go find an online institution that would help me learn. And I ended up at Tyndale Theological Seminary, which is where Byrne was at.

And then Jeremy and Jeremy Thomas and those that crew. And we've talked about that some in the past. But there's what's that, Cheryl? I didn't know Jeremy was at Tyndale. Yeah, Jeremy was at Tyndale as well. Let's see, Randy was there. I actually met Randy at a trip. It was a study in the book of Revelation and it was held by Tyndale. We had all gone up to hear this conference around that and lo and behold, there was Randy Peterman. It was the first time we ever met. We didn't know it until I showed up at years later, but we had ridden in the same car and knew the same folks. Kind of a funny story. Anyway, sorry about that, Miles. That's good.

As I think about it, there's definitely a wonderful thing about studying academically. The question is, is it personal to you in the sense that are you Is the Holy Spirit in the process of introducing you to a person that you are going to minister about and be an ambassador for? Or is it simply a list of conversations that you plan to have about someone that you may not be quite acquainted with? So there can be positive experiences through ministry and the training needed for that, but oftentimes it leads to a head knowledge and you end up more concerned with the books you're reading and the passages that you can kind of pull from in terms of other people's thought, and that loses sight of, I think, the entire point of ministry is to represent someone that you know, and that's a stark contrast to what most are learning these days.

Sorry. Yeah, I really appreciate that. You're tracking right along the lines of what I was thinking about in preparing for this. It's, you know, I mentioned last week how, you know, I've done this in my own life where I've studied academically. You know, not out of a wrong, necessarily really a wrong motive, but I'd say there's a genuine desire to know more, to understand more, you know, but But just the learning alone, I've seen it in my own life turn into more of a problem than an asset, if you want to think of it that way. And I've definitely seen that in the lives of other believers, very much engrossed in academic study of the Word. but no real ministry in terms of the Holy Spirit's work out through their lives. So, what you're saying there, J.D., fits right in with what I had kind of jotted down here. It's not that an academic education is a wrong thing, and Rideau talks about that.

He says, I don't know how to say it here, but that we should covet, as the word uses, we should covet to know more and more, and that the Lord can use these things, but this is not necessarily the Holy Spirit's preparation for ministry. So the way I put it down here is I said that Well, I ask the question, if it's not an academic institution that prepares us for ministry, and we say it's the Holy Spirit who prepares us, well, we need to ask the question, how does the Holy Spirit Himself prepare us for service? And I put down two points that kind of are in my mind.

The first is that He works through convicting us of the objective truth of His Word. And that is something that we can gain some of that through some of these academic pursuits, I guess. We can gain some of that objective knowledge of the Word. But the second point that I wrote down here is that He orchestrates the circumstances of our lives that produce in us a need and a hunger to depend on those objective truths in our day-to-day walk.

I was going to say that word hunger is a really interesting word. Yeah, I think that, because we're talking about how to determine whether or not ministry is by the Spirit of God. Am I right? That's where we're at with question number three? Yeah. Yeah. And so I think you're right.

I mean, I think of this not just in the life of those who are, you know, the Lord would have them minister or be an ambassador or be a representative. I think of it in terms of all of us, like we all minister. We're going to have opportunities ahead of us tomorrow to do that, each and every one of us in different ways, some at deeper levels and more challenging levels, and some of us are just going to be talking to our children.

So, ministry by definition is of the Spirit of God, and if it's not, then you're just not walking with the Lord. It falls short of having that ability to pierce joint and marrow, right, and impact a believer, those that we're spending time with in that way. I kind of think of it as just falls short. If I'm not walking with the Lord, if I don't see the opportunity as And sometimes it's hard because you think about ministering to others around us and you do look for hungry hearts. You regularly think about, is this person hungry or are they groping kind of in their sin nature?

And if so, then there's a different kind of ministry that's needed for that, right? For those that you know that are that you perceive that are walking with the Lord you and they're hungry for ministry in a certain case, a situation in their life, then at that point you know that you've got a whole larger breadth of scripture available to you to guide and help them think through. But when you do have that hungry heart and you can come alongside and walk with them through those situations, because ministry always has a focus, It's always back to the Lord, but it also has a need and there's a perspective of what are the needs here? And you know are they hungry and as you think about those are the kinds of things the spirit does right?

This isn't a technical prescription academic thing it is a an awareness of your family, right? Fellow believers So I don't know if that answers your question specifically, but I did want to kind of harp on the hunger side of things for a second there.

Yeah, that's good. I really appreciate that because the reason I kind of wanted to bring that out is because, you know, can an academic education give you that? Can it develop that in you? You know, I think that that's something only the Holy Spirit can do. That's a work that only He can do in your life.

And I guess what we're getting at here is the fact that all ministry, and I like the way Rideout says it, I was going to mention this, but he, on page 180 of the print book, he says, You know, I've been speaking of ministry or what is ordinarily understood by the term ministry, but he says ministry includes all true service. Ministry includes all true service. I think it's a really careful and accurate choice of words that he put together. together there.

So like you said, JD, that's all of us in the body of Christ, in all of the interactions with the body of Christ. And like he goes on to say at the end of the chapter here in evangelism. So even there's a ministry, that's kind of the branch of ministry, if you want to think of it that way, that reaches outside the church to draw people in. But it's, you know, for all the learning that we could do of Scripture, if the Holy Spirit is not developing in you the need and the hunger for that, it becomes really a very useless bunch of, and JD, you used the term head knowledge, and I actually wanted to touch on that, because what I put down here in my notes, I said, are we talking here about what's generally, well, you hear often the phrase, you know, head knowledge and heart knowledge, and is that what we're talking about?

I understand what people mean when they use that kind of distinction of terms. But I think the thing is that the way I've often heard it used is that heart knowledge means that now you're feeling it to be true. You knew it to be true, but now you feel it to be true.

And I have a problem with that because our feelings Well, we could ask the question are our feelings a more sure basis for knowing truth than God's written word You know and I'd say absolutely not. I mean, we've got the the Holly Hills has got the you know train on the tracks the phrase right, you know, I It's like a train that attracts the feelings follow. We should never be following our feelings. And so, you know, just because we have an experience of something in our lives and we have feelings about it, that doesn't make the truth of God's Word more certain or more sure.

But, so we're not talking about, you know, learning something academically, learning head knowledge, and then learning it in our heart, but I think, or learning it through our feelings, that's not what we're talking about, but what I want to kind of The way I want to look at it is that God simply shows us an objective truth in His Word, and then He shows us how that applies to our specific circumstances in our walk. But the authority is still on the basis of His written Word, that He's revealed it as true. Does anyone have a thought or comment on that? Is that too abstract? Does that make sense? It does make sense, yeah, totally. Okay, okay.

That's good, because I want to be clear in that when we talk about, when we're kind of talking down, or I'm sort of, you know, talking down just, you know, Bible study in a kind of cold and calculated sense, I'm not advocating for a mystical feelings-based sort of Bible study.

The Word of God is authoritative, and we should seek to understand it as clearly and accurately as possible, as Rideout says, even in the original languages. We're going to be, this Tuesday, starting with a group of young people here. I mentioned this in the past, but we're going to start teaching them some basic Greek and some basic Bible study skills, and we're going to be doing some of this academic stuff. So as I sit here and kind of talk about this, it's not that we oppose you know, excellent Bible study, but that we understand that that on its own is insufficient to prepare a person for ministry.

It is needed. It's needed to understand the Word of God. But like Rydow says, you know, he says, he talks about the blue-collar worker. Everyone kind of read that, recognize that? He says, he's just the, is that what he calls him? Something along those lines anyway. But he calls him the ignorant and unlearned man, I believe. Yeah, unlearned and ignorant man. How often has the humble blue-collar worker a deeper and broader knowledge of the divine truth? than the learned professor. And, you know, he says, do not be afraid of that ardent young evangelist who knows one thing. And I talked about that last week, you know, the one thing is Christ and Christ crucified.

You know, yeah, surely we should study to know more and more of God's Word. You know, it's revealed to us for a purpose. But at the same time, if we don't have the Holy Spirit working through us to prepare us and to use us, then it becomes very pointless. But as we're talking about the circumstances of life that the Holy Spirit uses to prepare us to develop this hunger, what kind of circumstances primarily are we talking about?

And I think it's mainly through trials. I think it's mainly through trials and sufferings. And I just wanted to ask the question, why is that? Why would that be that it would be primarily through trials and suffering? It's okay if it doesn't come readily to mind. I have been listening through Hal's study on trials and sufferings from a number of years ago here. So, it's part of the reason why this was quite present in my mind. But, this here, this statement is borrowing pretty heavily from Hal in this, but he says, so that we would, in answer to that question, why is the Holy Spirit using trials and sufferings?

So that we would reckon ourselves dead, and that the life of Christ would be lived out through us. If we were being... If we're being prepared for service, you know, is there any service that you or I could offer that would be of any value? Does that make sense? I should try to clarify that a little bit. If we're to be serving in the body of Christ, is there anything that I have to offer out of self, out of me, that is of any value to the body of Christ? There really isn't, right? Not in me. And that's why I have to die to myself, so that the life of Christ would be lived out, because it's Christ's life through me that is of value to the body of Christ. And only as His life is being lived out through me is the body of Christ built up and edified through that ministry.

So, if you have your Bible, turn to 2 Corinthians chapter 4. I just wanted to look at that. because this is the passage that's been really central to my thinking and studying along these lines in the last while, and Hal covered it in that series. 2 Corinthians chapter 4, Paul is talking about their ministry to the Corinthians. It's in the Sorry about him and the others who ministered with him.

He's starting in verse 5. He says, for we do not preach ourselves, but Christ Jesus as Lord. That's the one thing that Paul, you know, he determined to know one thing among them. That was it. Praise Jesus. And ourselves as your bondservants for Jesus' sake. That's the concept of ministry. I'm just your bondservant, you know, for Jesus' sake.

For God who said light shall shine out of darkness is the one who has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God by the presence of Christ. And then we go down to verse 7, and this is where he starts to talk about, but we have this treasure in earth and vessels, so that the surpassing greatness of the power will be of God and not from ourselves. And then he goes through the Familiar list here. We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed, perplexed, but not despairing, persecuted, but not forsaken, struck down, but not destroyed. Always caring about in the body the dying of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus also may be manifest in our body. So, and we could go on there and learn a little bit more, but that's the core part of that passage that I wanted to turn our attention to, that it was these circumstances of trial and suffering that were a dying for Paul and his companions in their ministry so that the life of Christ himself would be lived out.

So it would be his work and not their work so that he would get the glory and there would be true and effectual service to the body. And Miles, most of us need those trials that we can't do anything but depend on the Lord and that's where we're supposed to be.

Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Yeah, Hal said it. Actually, this is kind of a combination of some things that Hal said, and something that Newell said. Through trials, we come to see our utter helplessness. Through trials, we come to see our utter helplessness and His total sufficiency. And I think that we've all experienced that to be true. It's in those trials where we recognize our helplessness.

In preparing in Romans here for our Wednesday night Bible study, that's why I say I found this in Newell, he's talking about Abraham. And he says in there how Abraham looked at his own body and he's like, he considered it dead. And yet God brought life out of him and Sarah, so to speak. And that's exactly what, I think, sort of a figure of what we're to, is that to happen in us spiritually.

We're to look at ourselves as we go through these trials and we look at, wow, I really am dead. And we reckon ourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ, if that makes sense. Yeah, one of the things that came to mind, Miles, when I was thinking about this passage is in the trials and what Sue Ellen said about we need our needs, you know, it's kind of a term that we use quite often. But right after that kind of thinking, because we're going to face trials consistently and some are bigger than others, but what do we have? And I think that verse seven tells us about something that we have that should come right after that recognition of I'm in a trial here. But what do I have?

We have this treasure and we're earthen vessels. And the earthen vessels speaks to the common man, the ministry that the common man can have, like you were talking about earlier. And we have that treasure for a reason, and that purpose is so that the surpassing greatness of the power of God comes out of this common vessel, out of this common man. So the trials produce a bankruptcy of self through the cross and a treasure that we possess as an earthen vessel.

And so there is that recognition of I'm not capable of walking through this particular mystery of whatever the Lord's placed before me. And that's a great place to start because you do, by faith, have to recognize what you have in terms of the treasure, and that treasure is the person, the Lord Jesus himself.

And so, yeah, and like you said, there's so much to say about the rest of this verse, but, so that death works in us, but life in you. And I think that's really where you're trying to kind of anchor our thoughts there. Death works in us, but life in you. That's the end result there. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. I've come to kind of see it and think that that really is the heart of true ministry. Verse 12. So death works in us, but life in you. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I really think that is.

And yet, you know, when we think of ministry in terms of the ways often thought of within churchianity, you know, it's so often about the minister, you know, it's, it's, it's completely the opposite of this, of what Paul's talking about here. Yeah, it's, like you said, complete polar opposite there. Who is going to boast and death working in me? So that life So that you have life. I mean, I just that's Paul, you know Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Yeah, and hopefully yeah All of us yeah, yeah well, and and you know, and I think that's why I'm right out at the As he transitions in talking about evangelism, he says the line, all that is needed is to be a broken vessel that the Spirit of God may use us. And I just, actually when I read this chapter now a while ago, and that really struck me because it was something that I had been coming to see Like I said, in part, I was beginning to listen to Hal's series, you know, but it's just in reading and stuff, and some personal trials and so forth.

And, you know, it's interesting because Paul doesn't here refer to it as a broken vessel. You know, he calls it an earthen vessel, and like you said, Jamie, you know, a common vessel. That's the idea there. So, where does he get, you know, a broken vessel? It would need to be a broken vessel. And I suppose it comes from combining that thought with the verses 8 and 9 that we are afflicted and perplexed and persecuted and so forth. But I do really agree with the way Rideout put that together and said that, you know, as a vessel, you know, we need to be broken. so that the life of Christ would be manifest through us.

Well, we've got like five minutes, but I'm curious about your thoughts on being broken. Okay. Well, what does it mean to be broken? It's a good question. We talked about this a little bit when I first introduced this, or a similar passage on the earthen vessel and is it a broken vessel.

And the idea there that Rideout continues to share is that broken is not a self-reflection of, I've got to empty myself and I don't know maybe someone else can elaborate a little bit further on the thoughts there, but I Had to ask myself the question. What does it mean to be broken? right well what we're really talking about is a It's a mental exercise of faith that requires us to go back to the cross and the resurrection side of the cross, so that we can see the life that we now have, and that is by faith. So our process of being broken is a process of faith whereby we recognize that we died, we were co-crucified, and not just that, but that we were given new resurrection life.

So when we think about being broken, it's a process, it's a mental process of faith that takes, and I think the word mental might be a little confusing there because it is mental, but it's obviously led by the Spirit, right? The Spirit's the one that convicts us of this need of brokenness. The Spirit is the one who convinces us of our need. And He does that completely through the Word of God. And so that brokenness is a place of openness, maybe, of faith.

God, what is it that I'm missing about this particular situation? But it's not so much just that, it's a matter of going back to the realization that I'm not capable of these things. My abilities to speak or talk or share or play music in a certain way, I cannot do that without recognizing that you are my life now.

So the broken place is a wonderful place in the sense that it puts itself, yourself, in your place. And where do you belong? You belong at the cross. Christ has a life that he is conforming you and transforming you and all of those activities that he's involved with and that the Spirit is involved with to produce something that you could not produce on your own.

And I think that's really what we're after, right? We want to be broken in that way because we want to see the light of the earthen vessel, you know, that's what we want to see. Yeah, that's a lot of thoughts there, but I see again that broken concept is it's a wonderful place because it puts yourself in its place at the cross Mm-hmm Yeah, I mean, I don't know. I mean the word broken You know how how that may be used or understood in kind of popular?

I Well, it's understood as you've got, it's basically a self inflicted, like I'm, it's a, it's a mental process of I'm weak. I'm not capable. Whereas that's not the point. It's not the incapable part or the, I've been through so much that I'm at a broken place. It's right. Right. So, and it's more of death working in us and life in you. And that's a very powerful place, turns out.

Maybe there's humility, there's a sense of humility there, and not to miss out on the fact that that might be a feeling that accompanies that whole situation. But the question in my mind always goes back to, where am I going when I run potentially to the end of myself or whatever? align myself back with the life that I now possess in Christ and So that's the spirit job to draw us into that that conversation with himself, you know, yeah Yeah, absolutely.

Yeah, I really agree. I think I think that that is yeah to be broken the kind of the kind of way I tried to Say, you know is to to recognize, you know, our utter helplessness, you know and yet at the same time, his total sufficiency. It's not that we stopped there in our utter helplessness, like a useless, broken, quivering pile of jelly. That's such a key point. Recognizing the sufficiency is a big part of that process, for sure. Yeah, it's the two sides of the same coin. We don't stop at our utter helplessness, but it's part of the recognizing it's dead to sin, but alive to God in Christ. I was going to say one thing. When I think of brokenness, I think of exactly that verse you were quoting, Miles.

Romans 6.11, where we're reckoning ourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus. Yeah. Which really has nothing to do with me doing anything. He did it all. Yeah, exactly right.

You know, it's interesting if you look down in 2 Corinthians 4 where we're at, I know we've got to close here, but, you know, he says, he's actually talking about physical distresses. Starting in verse 16, he says, Therefore we do not lose heart, but though our outer man is decaying, yet our inner man is being renewed day by day.

For momentary light affliction is producing for us an eternal weight of glory. And that glory is Christ's glory, right? But he is talking about his physical body being destroyed, for lack of a better word. And so these afflictions, these trials, they show us our insufficiency, they show us our weakness, our helplessness. in order to bring us to greater dependence on Him so that He would be glorified. That's the heart of it. Hopefully we're able to understand a little bit more in connection with service, with ministry in the body of Christ.

That was really good. There's so many verses, Alan, that I think about when it comes to Romans 6-11. That's such a huge one. But golly, this whole chapter of 2 Corinthians 4 is just riddled with the kinds of truths that punch at the topics we've been talking about today.

It's manifested in our mortal flesh. I mean, Paul is just so rich there. And death precedes it all. And like you said, Alan, there's really nothing to do there. But behold, it is true. The reckoning is a conclusion based on what God's already done. Oh, that's good. After we know what he's done. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You can't really you can't reckon yourself dead without at the same time reckoning on what he has what he has done the life that he, you know, to properly understand that properly applied. But I really, really appreciate all the So we basically got through a review.

I didn't get off to question one at the end there about where he talks about the gospel. But I'm not even sure what the plan is for next week. So we'll, I know Mike had given me less than 35. I know they're going to be back. I kind of ended up finishing off, almost finishing with 34. But we'll see. We'll get that figured out. But I'll close in prayer here and then.

Heavenly Father, thank you so much for the opportunity that we've had this morning to discuss a little bit more, to gain a little more clarity on what it is that you are doing through your Holy Spirit in your church, in the lives of believers. in order to cause the building up of the body of Christ.

And Lord, we thank you that you do that. You do the preparatory work because it's you who knows what you're preparing us for. You take us through specific trials that are necessary for us to to go through in order to carry out the specific service that you have to do through us in the lives of others. We just thank you for that. Thank you that you are so perfectly and masterfully orchestrating and working all of that out in each one of our lives. We thank you that you continue to do that work in each one of our lives, and we just give you glory for that work that you're doing. We thank you for it. In Jesus' name, amen.