Person & Work of the Holy Spirit
Randy Peterman · Nov 24, 2013
Holy Spirit (2013), No. 46
Holly Hills Bible Church
https://hollyhillsbiblechurch.org/teaching/messages/492647415550

Transcribed from the recording by SermonAudio, so expect the occasional misheard word.

So we are going to transition from inspiration to illumination this morning. If there is one thing that I think is interesting about sanctification and spiritual growth that we have as believers is how the Lord begins to illumine his work. We will get into that as we go through this and I think it is an interesting study. The first question that we've got in our handout, everybody's got lesson 23? No? Okay, sure. Lesson 23, the first question that we have, I'll bring it to you as I'm doing this.

How does God make use of the human element in inspiration? when we get a human. Humans are the instrument. Humans are the instrument. Anybody disagree with that? We didn't hear it. Humans are the instrument. But the Holy Spirit guides the thoughts. So the Holy Spirit guides the thoughts. The human is the instrument. Let me ask it with this nuance. How come all of the Bible doesn't sound like it's written by one author in tone and personality? Because it isn't. So the spirit carries the author and conveys the idea, but the personality of the author comes out. And I think that's really a cool but important detail.

That's why Paul, when he writes his letter to the Galatians, he's got this strong tone. He chastises them. and yet he writes to the Ephesians and here's these people that have got this problem with thievery and various other sin issues and it's this just gushing, excited letter that starts out with who we are in Christ and you read it and you just think, man he's very excited about the material he's got there or how about Moses? Moses compiled the first five books of scripture and He compiled it, which means we have elements that came from different authors that he, by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, drew those things in there. But then there's things that he did write. And so we get complexity that makes the scripture have poetry. It has love and romance. It has legal documents in it. And all of those things are all part of the inspiration of the Holy Spirit.

Could you say that that transfers even in translations like the King James with all the vows and deeds and all that and yet the Holy Spirit uses that to be accurate? The Holy Spirit sustains the veracity of his word. If it's a stable, solid translation, I think the King James is a pretty safe translation. The American Standard is a safe translation. The Lord will preserve the intent of his word.

I always get a little concerned when you start to put a lot of emphasis into the modern vernacular over the intent of the original author. Because that's when you start getting into the things like we did when I was in ninth grade. We rewrote Shakespeare in modern slang. The idea was that you make people feel comfortable with the material that was there.

But then you start getting into some weird personal references, and it steps outside the scope of those kinds of things. Which is partially why I kind of hesitate around the message, if you're familiar with the message bible. It's not terrible for just reading at a glance, but I wouldn't study it. There's very personal, direct, modern observations embedded into the text of the message.

In essence, the personality of the author comes out and is used by the spirit to convey the message. It helps us as readers understand the relational aspect of scripture, I think. There's a quality of relationship that comes out of that. There's a term that Rideout uses in one of the paragraphs. He says he uses free agents. And I like that term, free agents, because it lets us understand the idea of beings who are created in God's image being used by God to communicate. So that's an inspirational transition from last week. We had inspiration.

And then question two says, how are we to make use of and understand the Word of God? And this is really important. We all need to answer this and understand it. Through scripture, study, prayer and hearing. Okay. Scripture, study, prayer and hearing. That's good. I don't know if that's right. It is. Those are all good elements of what's there. Let's take a a look at the text from right out, it says, bearing in mind that the natural man receives not the things of the spirit of God, we see that something more than mere natural intelligence is needed. And I think that's important.

When you talk to a Mormon, they come knocking on your door, and they want to talk with you. Do they have the Holy Spirit enrolling them to accurately understand and divide the word of God. No. No. But they are trying with the mind of natural man to argue with you through the scriptures.

But there needs to be something more. You may know, and Bright Out continues, you may know the languages accurately but be able to make nice distinctions in Greek particles and tenses and yet be utterly in the dark as to the meaning of this holy word. And as a seminary student I have to say that I saw that in a lot of places people could parse out all kinds of Greek and they could talk about things from a systematic theology perspective and yet it was very dead and cold. The word of God was a tool for arguing not for relationship.

And that's a really key element there. Rideout says, and I'll continue on here, and this I thought was just really, really fantastic, but alas, no sunlight. You will understand that I value the sidelight, but only after I have the sunlight. We can thank God for everything in the way of geography and history that illustrates scripture, but this is not illumination. What page are you on?

97. I am a copy and paste type. Bottom of 97. Ninety one. Ninety seven. So. So the teachers are in the habit of copying and pasting things to answer. Sometimes I don't. I try to make note of the day. So.

What does illumination mean? Let's talk about the word illumination. We better make sure we have a definition of that word. Clear understanding. Clear understanding is definitely the result of illumination. Enlightenment. We're using good synonyms. Let's come up with a sentence definition of illumination.

And Rideout, I don't think, has one that I remember reading. But let's talk about a working definition. Go ahead, Holly. How about the Holy Spirit shows you something that you haven't seen before. Something that was in the dark is kind of lighted up. OK. That's a good one, Mike. I think what Rideout did, which I thought was kind of cool, is that he quoted that scripture about the guys on the road to Emmaus, all he said was that he opened up their understanding that they might understand the scriptures. And that's the key part, that the Spirit of God must open up your understanding about what he meant when he wrote them.

And illumination, he says, is the common privilege of every believer. I find that so many believers think that unless they're a theologian, or they've been to seminary or something like that that the spirit of God won't illuminate them and that's ridiculous. I was just thinking, the idea of illumination somehow seems to be personal too. It has to be rather than just the facts, there has to be a personal attachment or a personal correlation with those facts. It goes from being a technical knowledge to a personal knowledge. So the way I would define illumination, and I don't have this written down, so if you ask me to repeat it I may state it differently, is that the spirit opens up God's meaning of the text to your life.

And here's an important thing though, and this is not something that's really in this, but it's something that I It's not in the White House text, but I think it needs to be covered. You are not going to get truth illuminated to you that contradicts what the Spirit has illuminated to somebody else. You are not going to understand Scripture and have... You can't say, I have God illuminate this text to me and have it contradict someone else that the Holy Spirit Because the Spirit doesn't say, this text means this to one person, and then this to another person. So if you find yourself having a disagreement of theology, there may be an opportunity to study God's word deeply with another believer.

But the principle is not that the Spirit is going to contradict himself. Joseph Smith is a classic, modern, within recent history figure who says, the spirit has illumined scripture to me. And the Mormons have a copy of the King James Bible with notes where Joseph Smith blatantly contradicts the text of the King James, which is the Bible that he had at the time, and said, the spirit has illumined to me that this is really what he meant. And you cannot disagree with him, because while one, he's dead, and two, He spoke as a prophet of God in their eyes. But that's not how the Holy Spirit works. The Spirit is going to illumine the text and it's going to mean and say the same thing.

And that's an important detail. Well, I need to ask this question. Sure. Okay. Was it Philip's that there was this man riding along... The unit and the chariot? Yeah. And then he went to him and he said, Do you understand what you're reading? And he said, how can I unless someone teaches me? Yes.

So look at the few people that have come here that were sort of in the dark, that then we understand things now that we didn't understand before. But it was because someone enlightened us? Well if you've learned anything at Holly Hills and it is true in scripture then it's the spirit that is doing that teaching to you. If Mike or Courtney or myself or my dad or any other teacher here happens to have been a voice that communicated something. The truth of God's word is illumined by the spirit not by Randy Allmight or Corby. But it's through you. We might be agents but the illumination is of the spirit through the word in your heart and mind.

But Philip illuminated... He explained it, but the spirit illuminated the word holy in it. Oh, okay. I see. I would say too that part of the illumination process is through agents. We all learn from each other. As iron sharpens iron. It really does. It's really scripture interpreting scripture. We could use that if we aren't having somebody else interpreting it. I've gone to my dad and Mike and Roger so many times and asked, OK, I don't understand this or help me.

There was one night I said to Mike, I said in Bible study, I said, OK, I don't understand this beholding the Lord stuff in 2 Corinthians 3.18. And so we spent an evening talking about it. And I was so excited that I canceled my lesson on the next Tuesday night that I was supposed to teach. Bible study somewhere else, and I said, listen, I have to share this with you because it changed the way that I understand my walk with the Lord. And it wasn't just that Mike was the one that taught me. Mike was the alumnus. The Spirit used Mike to show me God's Word in a deeper way. It went from being something that might be head knowledge to something that was Part of my my interview.

And I think that goes with the second Timothy about faithful men. Yeah. Faithful men to teach the word, teach the word. And I think that that's how it gets passed down. Yeah. and how those men are always around and they're learning and growing. They're the free agents that Rideout talks about. Pauline? I was just thinking too that now we have Bibles available to us.

Back then it would be really important to have someone telling you, right? Because you may not have those. The eunuch had a scroll and he was baffled by it. That was pretty rare that you would be able to have access to that. That really showed you what position of power he had and what stature he had.

Well now wait a minute. Sure. What? Mike taught you or explained to you was a life-changing event or whatever. And what was that? I mean we're all here hoping. To be. Oh, what was it that I learned that was like, what are you missing out on? I want to talk to you. You talk for an hour at least or so. So I don't know if I can put that in a two minute blurb. That feels rather rather rabbit trail. We talk about it after Sunday school. I'm sure I can summarize it in a terse fashion. All right, I will be as efficient as I can and Mike will laugh at how I've restated what he said. I googled it, I don't know.

So 2 Corinthians 3.18 says, but we all with unveiled face, beholding is in a mirror, the glory of the Lord are being transformed. Well, this is actually very relevant to the class, so we're good. beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, justice from the Lord, the Spirit.

So one of the things that I had believed errantly or inaccurately before I talked about this was that there was always my sin separating me as a barrier from God. Even though I was saved and I knew I was justified in some technical sense, I always felt like my sin always created this separation between me and the Lord. And I could never really have intimacy with him functionally on a day-to-day, moment-by-moment basis. It was always going to be something that I'm going to keep sinning, and I'm going to keep falling short of God's glory, and I'm going to keep having a barrier that separates me.

But that's not the way that Paul writes here. Moses had to wear a veil to hide the glory of the Lord when he went down the mountain. But Paul says we don't have that veil anymore. We don't have a fading glory, we have an eternal glory that comes from our relationship with the Lord. So, beholding isn't a mirror of the glory of the Lord.

The Corinthians had a mirror that they made, and I got to see one at the Denver Museum at one of the exhibits, and they're terrible. By today's standards, we'd never call it a mirror, because it's really foggy, and you polish the snot out of it, and then it gets a little reflective, a little better, and you can look at yourself, and you can be vain if you want. But then it fades, it oxidizes, the surface oxidizes. So we behold to a mirrored emily was something that the Corinthians traded in those mirrors and they understood them.

But we are not face to face with the Lord in eternity now, are we? But we are called to be beholden. We are called to have our thoughts and our focus be heavenly. Colossians 3 tells us the same thing. Well we are with Christ. We are seated in the heavenlies with Christ, positionally.

But we can conditionally have the focus of our minds be there beholding the Lord right now. And so now I'm going much longer than I was hoping to. But we're being transformed, as a result of beholding the Lord, we're being transformed into his image. And he says just as from the Lord the Spirit. The Spirit is doing the transformation in our lives. right now. He's illumining through the word the personhood of Jesus Christ. And that transforms us. That would be the direct tie-in from our lesson, this passage. What did I miss? Besides everything in our lesson.

The word of God is a reflector. And the spirit of God is the one that shows or illuminates you regarding the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ through the Word. You see him, fellowship with him in the Word and the Spirit of God uses that by your beholding and seeing to transform you, to conform you to the image of the Lord Jesus Christ. It's an amazing thing that spiritual growth is really a conformity to the one who is our very life. And he uses the word as the reflector. So the word is the mirror? Yeah.

As an example, there are times, like in Colossians, you can read about that in Christ dwells the fullness of the Godhead. And the Spirit of God will show you some of that fullness and then it will say that you are complete in Him. And you see something there of what? Of who Christ is. His very personhood. And from a positional standpoint you are just like Him being conformed conditionally to what you already are positionally.

And there is no barrier. I mean the fact that God would even do that amazes me, that he would go to that extent in a body that can't even use glasses, that through the work of the spirit and his word you can actually behold the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ now. That's amazing to me. The other thing that I love about that too is that there's no qualifier on the believer, right? You don't have to be smart. You don't have to be a certain age. You don't have to have studied. There's no qualification. I just love that. Yeah. There's no barrier.

A couple of things. One, I think on the rabbit trail side. Yeah, I think one of the Hungry Hearts had just recently about the addicts that we have. Your parents always said, you know, whoever you hang out with, you're going to be identified with. It's applicable. If we hang out with the Lord, that's who we're identified with. And as we spend more time, it's that mirror, it's that reflection, it's who we become. And who we're identified with is who we hang out with. And if it's Christ, then we get that association. The other thing was on the enlightenment and you guys coming.

I had 20 years in the Brethren or plus years in the Brethren and all this. I think we've got to go back on the growth too and people like why you didn't see this or why you didn't see that. I think God is sovereign and you can't teach And I think he brings us to a point where sovereignly through all these different things to where he then has a person, an event, all these things that will help it get right at the right time at the right place to understand scripture. I don't know how many times you've read scripture and then You read it again and it's suddenly... Wow! It's the 200th time that suddenly the light goes on. Oh! Well, guess what?

You couldn't understand that when you're a two-year-old, but when you're a teenager in Christ or, you know, as you're on this growth, you can understand it now. And so I think that's where, you know, He uses different people and different things at different times. He's sovereignly in control of all this and the events and the, you know, the trials and tribulations, the people, all that. is used in our growth. And so, you know, Peter was there with the eunuch, and it was right at the right time at the right place, and that's where God wanted him. And, you know, there's so many times where that happens, where just an event, or somebody says something, behold that. And it was like, I've seen that 59 times, but today, I'm right at that point where the Holy Spirit is going to make me grow, or knows that I can accept that and grow.

I'm sorry. That's okay. We'll tie this all back in. I had a former Sunday school student that is in Texas. And when I moved to Colorado, I suddenly got an email from her in my inbox. And it was, hey, here's this young lady. And she was really argumentative. She was upset about stuff. And she didn't like all my gracious talking. Very offensive. And I had just patient back and forth emails.

Again, with God's Word. Here's God's Word. This is what God's Word says. You say this, this is what God's Word says. Finally, she said, I don't think we're ever going to agree. I would just like to stop emailing. And then it was about nine months later I got an email from her again. She said, I was reading through Ephesians and finally the Holy Spirit showed me.

This is what grace is. And it's that illumination. It's this okay, I disagree, I disagree, I disagree. And then the Lord opens his word. And you're right. It was at his time. I couldn't convince her In my time, it was his time. Now is the time. You're going to understand this.

Listen, I have met so many believers that are at different stages and I meet young teenagers who get position and condition and in the flesh I would be jealous of them. It took me a long time. Oh, well, it took you a different amount of time. And it took Mike a different amount of time.

And I think Kortney was born knowing. He was born talking. So let's wrap back around into our lesson. The illumination comes that there will be doctrines that we do understand that the spirit will suddenly make alive to us through his word. And it will be life changing. It may be that right now beholding isn't the thing that you need to know or I did a poor job explaining it or something and that the Lord will give you time in 2 Corinthians 3 and you will come to church and you will be telling everybody about it because the Lord has illumined it in your life and you will spread the infectious bug of life in Christ and that's just a great thing Let's keep going here. Question number three, what kind of teacher do we need to illuminate scripture and why? Did we already answer that one? Well, in our rabid trail, we did. Well, we did, very much so. So the short answer, given that we've kind of discussed it, but just to put it into words, we do need a divine teacher to illuminate this work for us.

We are not competent to learn it by ourselves. But it's a God-given teacher. It's the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit opens up the text of Scripture. So let's, Mike mentioned this earlier, the stranger on the road. Luke 24, 25-32 relates Jesus opening up the Scriptures to the two disciples.

Do we today have an advantage over them in understanding Scripture? Yes, we sure do. What are some of the advantages? What are the qualities of the advantage? Because yes is an easy answer. Well, we have the Holy Spirit dwelling in us. Okay, the Spirit dwells inside of us. We have the complete text. The complete text.

Well, and at that time, they didn't know that Jesus had... Did they know? They didn't know as far as they could walk. I know they didn't know that, but did they know that he had risen? Let's go ahead and let's flip over there and we'll read it, Luke 24, 25 through 32. As I was rereading this passage to the study for this morning, the second time I've mentioned jealousy, but I was jealous of these men to certain degree to be able to walk with the Lord. He's just explaining from Moses to the end. That's pretty phenomenal.

So Luke 24, 25-32 He says, And he said to them, O foolish men and slow of heart to believe in all that the prophets have spoken. Was it not necessary for the Christ to suffer these things and enter into his glory? Then beginning with Moses and with all the prophets, so yes they did, he was talking about Christ having died and been resurrected. With all the prophets he explained to them the things concerning himself in all the scriptures.

And they approached the village where they were going and he acted as though he were going further. But they urged him saying stay with us for it is getting toward evening and the day is now nearly over. So he went in to stay with them. When he had reclined at the table with them, he took the bread and blessed it, and breaking it, he began giving it to them. Then their eyes were opened, and they recognized him, and he vanished from their sight. They said to one another, were not our hearts burning within us while he was speaking to us on the road, while he was explaining the scriptures to us?

That's just so cool. I just read that and I go, okay. I think I would be Pretty excited about the opportunity that the Lord has given me and I would want to tell everyone about that. Is it unreasonable to think that that same reaction would happen to us today? Yeah, I think that we would definitely have that same response. Yeah, I think so. Well, it is that same response, right? When you get some illumination. Yeah, it makes you excited as he reveals those things.

In 1 Corinthians 2.16, Paul writes, For who has known the mind of the Lord, that he will instruct him? And then in, I'll call it part B, he says, But we have the mind of Christ. That's a really important detail. We have the mind of Christ. Not the brain. The spirit reveals the mind of Christ to us. We can think God's thoughts after him.

That is an opportunity that you don't see that in the Old Testament. The spirit would come upon the Old Testament saint and reveal truths. But then the spirit would go away. Does the spirit ever leave us as believers? No. And that's a really powerful thing. So we have a mind of Christ and we have the spirit teaching us.

He's the author of the book and the teacher of the book. Question forward, do we have an advantage over them in understanding scripture? I don't know how much he explained when whispered, it's all of Paul's epistles that he's going to tell about us and the church. And we have great advantage over that with what Paul explained to us about identification, the body, the bride of Christ, all of those things we have now.

I don't know, from this text, I don't know if they got it explained. It says all the concern about him, himself, in all the scripture. So I don't know what that means, if he explained the body of Christ. I don't think so. I guess my assumption is they didn't have that. So the advantage we have is that all that Paul explains to us, they didn't have.

That's who we are in Christ. That explains all of who we are. That Luke passage is between his resurrection and Acts chapter 2, so there's this time period where the church hasn't been instantiated. And that's a powerful historical point. But even at that, there's still this unbelief that's prevalent. They had the same unbelief as we have today. More facts.

The problem they had is that, is Jesus of Nazareth the Messiah. That was the issue. Who is this man? Is he the Messiah? Or is there somebody else? And that's what he was doing. He was illuminating them, or what he did, he illuminated them about himself. And he said, here's all the proof, and here I am. Imagine him talking about Isaiah 53, and suddenly the dots are connecting. Oh my gosh, this is the God of the universe and his son.

So yeah, the Spirit is within us and acts directly upon our mind. We see that in 1 Corinthians 2 where it talks about the Spirit. Actually the verse is right before 16 there. Verse 12, Now we have received, not the Spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, so that we may know the things freely given to us by God. Which things we also speak, not in words taught by human wisdom, but in those taught by the Spirit, combining spiritual thoughts with spiritual words. So, we have the Spirit teaching us when we do those things. Any thoughts on that before we get a question? Fine. Other than a little bit of jealousy for the two guys. It's better. It's better. Absolutely better than walking with Christ would be cool. And the Holy Spirit. Yeah. Double win.

So question five says, when we already did this a little bit, define inspiration and illumination, which is common to all believers. So what are our definitions for inspiration and illumination? We can be, I think, We are inspired by God making use of humans to convey his thoughts and illumination is the understanding and enlightenment. Does everybody have an inspiration?

No. So those who were inspired to write the scripture were a subset of all saints. A very small subset, given that there have been millions if not billions of believers or saints throughout history, versus 40 some authors of all the scripture. But illumination, do all believers have illumination?

Like Donna said, there's no gateway, there's no boundary that prevents us from, you don't have to be a theologian. and you know what's been awesome for me having come out of seminary is to discover how many believers who just passionately love the Lord and study his word get taught from God's word and they don't have any letters after their name and they know God's word better and they know Christ better than so many of the other people that it seems that they have degrees so it's been really neat for me as a believer just to As I grow older now, so many people just love God's Word and they love the Lord. And the Spirit has illumined so many things. And I have so much to learn from them. And that's really cool. If the Lord gives me twice as many years as I have now, I can't wait to see what I learn from all the other believers in the Lord. Do you think we have more illumination today than we did, say, 50 years ago?

I'm thinking of when I grew up as a child. None of this was ever brought up. I don't think that that's something that I would feel comfortable saying yes to. Because the Spirit has been working in the church and those who believe throughout all of history. There have been different ages where different things mattered. Like coming out of the dark ages when we had the Reformation.

It was an argument over just the simplicity of what is the gospel. And everything else didn't matter because the church state issues that existed historically at that time had blurred all those lines. The Catholic Church had redefined salvation to involve all kinds of works and indulgences and things like that. And the Spirit illumined 2 Corinthians 3, 2 Corinthians 15, 1 through 3. Just the gospel. I know my parents attended a very formal German church. The Lord opened up about Christ and grace. And they tried changing the church and were booted out. They were not even allowed to sing the hymns or shake hands with people.

So it just came to them through the studying of the scripture. But the thing is that the Lord illumines things over time to different people and saying more I think is probably not reflect, the nature is personal of illumination and not necessarily corporately although there is a quality to what that can be. I know growing up as a Catholic and going to Catholic schools we were taught in religion class from a Catholic standpoint about the heretics. The heretics were people like the Anabaptists, the Huguenots, and well it turns out that they were the ones that had the real message and the Catholics persecuted them. because they believed in salvation by grace and faith period and so the Catholic Church tried to snuff them out and Martin Luther is the guy who made the big splash about it but there were groups through the dark ages that were true believers that were sort of hidden off, the Lord had them in different places. The thing they did not have was the word, the published word. And that, with Luther and the Bible and printing coming together in the 1500s, really made a difference. It was an important quality to the sequence of events as it played out.

Randy, the other thing that I look at is the truth has never changed. throughout all of time. You know, there isn't a truth back, you know, that was different in the 1500s, 1300s, 1800s. The truth has always been the same. And, you know, there have been great teachers and different things, you know, Stoney and Darby and all these guys who were back in the 1800s, you know. A lot of these truths that we look at now, identification, were 1800s, early 1900s. So these truths have been explained 100, 200 years ago. But the thing is the truth has always been the same. It never changes. And it's just the illumination.

And God uses different times, different people, different things, just as we're discussing, to bring it to that group of people at that time. It's like going back to the beginning of this. He used different men at different times speaking to that generation or that time. He's done that throughout all of time now. You know, speaking to us in a different way today and illuminating us differently today maybe than he did in the 1800s. The cultural relevance of those truths has changed over time.

Imagine if God had revealed about driving. The way that you drive an automobile in scripture. It would have been irrelevant for 1900 years. No, it's prophetic. But instead he gives us the spirit and the spirit eliminates truths that are timeless throughout scripture that we can then apply to driving, that we can then apply to how do we use technology, how do we use the internet, all those things.

Russ? I was going to say, I think this whole concept kind of worked itself out with my friend Sandy because Like honestly we've been sending emails back and forth for over a year and one of her last emails was, I think I have to believe in Jesus my way because I just have trouble believing in the virgin birth. And Mike told me last week that isn't the gospel. Tell her the gospel. And I when I told her, you just need to understand this basic gospel about Jesus death, burial, resurrection, etc. And then God will teach you the rest and make all that make sense.

You don't need to understand it now. And that's when she wrote me back and said, I thought I had to understand everything. Oh, man. Wow. I have to understand and believe everything the Bible says before I can really be a true Christian. I have so much more to learn. I've been studying for years. And I think the Holy Spirit was involved in all of that. Yeah, wow. That's good.

Alright, since this relates, let's take a look at 6 real quick, and then I think we'll be out of time. What is the secret clue to finding the exhaustless treasures in the Bible? And there's two sentences that write out as there. OK, I can't tell you now.

We depend on the spirit and study your memory. Is that why you should bring all human knowledge to the feet of Jesus, the divine interpreter. So the quote I'm looking for is, to what is this secret clue? To the holy light that shines upon its truths and into our hearts by the Holy Spirit. So the Holy Spirit is the secret clue.

Mike? You know, I think within a body of believers, part of this growth process is to actually come to the point where you expect the Holy Spirit to do what he's been sent to do. Up until that time I think you either challenge him or you don't believe him or you don't think you're worthy for a thousand reasons. But the real secret is You get to a point where you believe and trust him to do what he says he's here to do. And that's the secret. And so there's the faith. You just have to, okay, you're here to reveal Christ to me, go for it. It isn't the memorization of all processes that you have to do.

And when he does that, What begins to open up to you, like Rydot said, instead of taking up the Bible as a duty and reading the appointed chapter with a little prophet, you find it difficult to lay the book down. No romance could be so attractive, could so attract, no human production could so absorb you. When the Spirit of God begins to show you, you can't put it down. You can't get away from it, because there's just nothing like it.

It goes back to what Francis was saying, there are some devout students who realize this, who bring all the human knowledge to the feet of Jesus. Once you get all the human knowledge out of the way, all our greatness, all our great thoughts, all of our great things, that's when you begin to get the illumination.

Yeah, because it's his word. It's your word. The objective of your life. That was the second Bible closing prayer. You made it halfway through. I feel somewhat good about that. Heavenly Father, we come before you and ask that you would just continue to illumine your work to us this week. And I would pray that as we continue to study this, that the truth of who your spirit is in our lives would be just inundating the way we think so that we can think no other way but as abiding, beholding, and trusting believers. We just thank you and praise you in Jesus' name. Amen.