The third person of the trinity is the One YAHSHUA sent to stay with us always. YAHSHUA identified Him as the Counselor, the Teacher, the Comforter, the Intercessor, the Helper, the Spirit of Truth. He is indeed, Emmanuel- God with us. He is in close relationship with all who love God. It is through Him that we are in touch with God. YAHSHUA said, When He comes, He will convict and convince the world and bring demonstration to it about sin and about righteousness and about judgment (John 16). He sealed all those who have believed in YAHSHUA with His own Spirit, guaranteeing them the inheritance in anticipation of its full redemption and our acquiring possession of it- to the praise of His glory (Eph. 1:13-14). He comes to our aid and bears us up in our in our weakness; for we do not know what prayer to offer nor how to offer it worthily as we ought, but the Spirit Himself goes to meet our supplication and pleads in our behalf with unspeakable yearnings and groanings too deep for utterance…He intercedes and pleads in behalf of the saints according to and in harmony with God’s will (Rom. 8:26-27). When YAHSHUA said that God is seeking those who will worship Him in spirit and in truth, it was not location that was significant, but the heart of men. It will not matter where one worships God, provided that we will worship Him in truth, with our spirit, the life within us, for It is with our spirit that we connect with God’s Spirit. The worship that God expects from us is from the essence of life. YAHSHUA said to the woman at the well, Woman, believe Me, a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither in this mountain nor in Jerusalem; God is Spirit and those who worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth (John 4:21,23).
Tag: Holy Spirit
Listen to the Spirit Call
Soft as a breeze going across the earth, a whisper in the ear is the voice of the Holy Spirit calling you and me, ever so gentle and peacefully His voice echoes in our inmost being- our spirit. Elijah, while running away for his life from Queen Jezabel heard that voice coming in a soft wind. The Lord told him to go out to stand on the mount before Him. And behold, the Lord passed by, and a great and strong wind rent the mountains and broke in pieces the rocks before the Lord, but the Lord was not in the wind; and after the wind an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake; and after the earthquake a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire; and after the fire [a sound of gentle stillness and] small voice. When Elijah heard the voice, he wrapped his face in his mantle and went out and stood in the entrance of the cave… (I Kings 19:11-13a). For Elijah to hear the Lord’s gentle voice, he had to be in the right place, that is, the place the Lord ordered him to be. In the quietness of a cave, Elijah defined the voice of God. The Lord God was not in the strong wind, not in the earthquake, neither in the fire; but He was in a “gentle, stillness and small voice.” The prophet Elijah, after winning a great victory over Jezabel’s false prophets, was running away, afraid of her, who intended to kill him. Hungry and tired from a great conflict over Jezabel’s false prophets, whom were all killed, he desired to die. But God had other plan for him, for Elijah was not to taste death. He was to be taken to heaven alive, as Enoch did.
When the Holy Spirit first came to earth, He came in a sound from heaven like the rushing of a violent tempest blast, and it filled the whole house in which they were sitting; and there appeared to them tongues resembling fire, which were separated and distributed and which settled on each one of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other languages as the Spirit kept giving them clear and loud expression (Acts 2:2-4). The Holy Spirit expressed His power in that day, when He came down to establish YAHSHUA’S church. That was the manifestation of His presence on earth; confirming to all the arrival of His long promised coming. All experienced His power in that place and the tongues of fire. Fire speaks of cleansing. He came to convict the world of sin. Also to abide in every born-again person, fulfilling the words of YAHSHUA to the disciples, when He said, I will not leave you orphans. I will come back to you (John 15:18). The Holy Spirit is called the Spirit of Truth; the world will not receive Him, as it hates truth, as it did not receive YAHSHUA, Who is the Way the Truth and the Life. There is a difference between those who know YAHSHUA, and those who don’t. The evidence is on hearing His voice. YAHSHUA said, My sheep hears My voice. His presence in every believer, shows the difference in our lifestyle. Paul calls us sons of light. As sons and daughters of light, we walk according to the dictates of the Holy Spirit, while those of the world, according the dictates of the flesh.
The Holy Spirit, Our Intercessor
The Holy Spirit, the third person of the trinity, is our comforter, helper, advocate, Intercessor, strengthener, the Spirit of Truth Who comes from the Father, He will testify regarding Me (YAHSHUA) (John 15:26). He is the Spirit of Truth, Whom the world cannot receive, because it does not see Him or know and recognize Him, for He lives and will be in you (14:17). YAHSHUA promised the disciples before He left the world, saying, I will not leave you as orphans; I will come [back] to you (14:18). How could the disciples understand this promise, unless they were tuned in to every word that YAHSHUA was saying? After our Lord made known His death and departure from the world, He knew how deeply it would affect His disciples. The words of comfort He offered them echoed through ages to come. In chapter 14:1-3, of John, very well- known verses, spark hope in every believer when reading them: “Do not let your hearts be troubled. You believe in God; believe also in Me; In My father’s house there are many dwelling places. If it were not so, I would have told you; for I am going away to prepare a place for you; and when I go and make ready a place for you, I will come back again ad will take you to Myself, that where I am you may be also”. In the midst of sorrow, knowing that their Lord was going to die and leave them, the disciples had these words to lean on for comfort.
The Holy Spirit faithfully leads us into all truth; faithfully teaches us the truth; faithfully convicts us of sin and guides us to repentance. He is preparing every believer in Him to meet YAHSHUA through the work of sanctification- through molding us to be more like Him. Sometimes we hear His voice audible, sometimes softly as He communicates to us through our conscience. In first Peter 1:2 we find the trinity involved in the work of redemption: God chose us, the Holy Spirit sanctifies us and YAHSHUA the Messiah sprinkled us with His precious blood in His redemptive act. Led by the Holy Spirit, we are His children; He has performed the work of adoption when He freed us from bondage to fear; He testifies with our spirit assuring us that we are children of God. That gives us the right to call Him Abba (Rom. 8) for He foreordained us to be adopted as His own children through YAHSHUA Messiah, in accordance with the purpose of His will (Ephe.1:5). Because we are sealed with the Holy Spirit, we are guaranteed our salvation. It is part of our spiritual blessings. Paul gives a list of all the spiritual blessings available to all who believes in YAHSHUA. One of them is we have been stamped with the seal of the long-promised Holy Spirit. He is a guarantee of our inheritance, in anticipation of its full redemption and our acquiring [complete] possession of it – to the praise of His glory (Ephe. 1:13-14). In Him we also were made [God’s] heritage and we obtained an inheritance. Therefore, we live for the praise of His glory! (Ephe. 1).
From Glory to Glory
(II Cor. 3:18; Ephesians 5:27; I Cor. 15: 43)
And all of us, as with unveiled face, continued to behold as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are constantly being transfigured into His very own image in ever increasing splendor and from one degree of glory to another; [for this comes] from the Lord [who is] the Spirit (II Cor. 3: 18).
“In justification, through faith into Christ the sinner is accepted in Christ (Ephesians. 5:17) who Himself is the pure and perfect Image of God, and that divine image is freely imputed to the believer. In sanctification, through the operation of the Holy Spirit who enables the believer constantly to behold the glory of the Lord, that image is increasingly imparted to the Christian. In glorification, justification and sanctification become complete in one, for that image is then finally impressed upon the redeemed in unobscured fullness, to the glory of God throughout eternity” (Second Corinthians, p. 120) Philip Hughes.
When God created Adam and Eve, He made them in His image and likeness (Gen. 1:26). But when they failed out of God’s image, they received the spirit of fear instead. In His customary time when He came to talk to them, God found them hidden and afraid when they heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day. Adam and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden. But the Lord God called to Adam and said to him, Where are you? He said, I heard the sound of You in the garden and I was afraid because I was naked; and I hid myself (Gen. 3:8-10). Because Adam and Eve had lost the image of God, they became slaves to the spirit of fear and to the demands of the flesh. Men lost the sparkle of the glory of God. A wall was now in between them and God; no longer did God walk in the garden to talk to them. But God’s love for men compelled Him to do something to restore them to Him again. And at the fullness of time He sent His Son YAHSHUA to restore and reconcile men to His Father, God. In that reconciliation man was justified through faith in Messiah; he was sanctified through the work of the Holy Spirit given him at the moment of his spiritual birth; God gave them His image through the indwelling of His Holy Spirit. The fullness of the glory of God will be complete in those who have accepted Him in their glorification, God’s final work in men. Man is justified, acquitted, and forgiven in the process of salvation; he is sanctified to reflect the glory of YAHSHUA, which is increasing from one glory to another, as he grows in Christ and matures in Him. Finally he will be glorified and completely holy and blameless and he will be as YAHSHUA is when men see Him.
The Upstairs Room
It was close to YAHSHUA’S last Passover, when He sent two of His disciples to a definite place to prepare it for His last Passover Super with them. He said, to them, go into the city, and a man carrying an [earthen] jar or pitcher of water will meet you; follow him. And whatever [house] he enters, say to the master of the house, The Teacher says: Where is My guest room, where I may eat the Passover with My disciples? And he will show you a large upper room, furnished and ready; there prepare for us (Mark 14:13-15). He had come to the end of His earthly ministry and needed a time alone with those called apostles to warn and to teach them and to prepare them for the ministry He was leaving behind for them to continue. That was the time and place when YAHSHUA, alone with His disciples, ministered to them by washing their feet; the time when He constituted the new covenant of His blood; the time when He gave a new commandment- to love one another as He loved them; that was the time and the place where He uttered His priestly prayer for them and for us. There were many disciples who followed Him, but He chose only twelve to be His messengers. These were the ones He explained the meaning of the parables to, who experienced a deep relationship with Him as His friends, who experienced the mount of transfiguration, and who witnessed His anguish at the Gethsemane Garden in the crucial moment of His decision. The last words from YAHSHUA to His disciples were printed in their hearts to change yesterdays and today’s world. Peter’s life was changed from a coward to a courageous outspoken man for the sake of the message he was given to tell; The doubtful Thomas died as a martyr in India for obedience to go and preach to all the world the message of salvation. John died on the Patmos Island, after they tried to kill him by putting him a caldron with boiling water. All died as martyrs for their Messiah. Nothing would stop these disciples from taking a stand for their Master, after the upper room experience.
At Mid-night, a Shout
(Matthew 25)
YAHSHUA tells a parable of comparison illustrating the kingdom of heaven to ten virgins: five wise and five foolish. This parable not only is a warning consisting of preparedness, but it also reveals who will be taken and who will be left behind when YAHSHUA comes to meet His bride on the air.
The kingdom of heaven shall be likened to ten virgins who took their lamps and went to meet the bridegroom (vs. 1). “The numberten is the number of testimony. It stands for responsibility and its judgement or reward. Man was responsible under the Law to keep the commandments and bear a testimony for God.” (Dr. Ed F. Vallowe). The ten virgins were identified as carrying their lamps with the purpose of meeting the bridegroom. Let’s imagine that these virgins were Christians who Sunday after Sunday worshiped together in some church. They lived their life of faith in a way that indicated they had a relationship with God. Perhaps they were involved in activities of their church, as in Sunday School teaching, pastoring, visitation, perhaps they were deacons and leaders in some capacity in church. These were not only women, but men also. The tittle bride of Christ applies to all professing Christians. They had some knowledge concerning the return of the bridegroom and prepared themselves as they saw fit. Five followed the Word of God and the other five simply followed what they thought to be right according to the interpretation of men, but empty of God’s truth. Nevertheless, they had one thing in common: to meet the waited for bridegroom.
For that trip they needed their lamps to be filled with oil, for the wait could be long. Five of them were prepared with extra oil in case the bridegroom was tardy coming. The other five, however, had insufficient quantity of oil for the journey. They were the ones who lived their spiritual lives quenching the Holy Spirit to satisfy their fleshy desires. The oil remaining in them was not enough to take them to meet the bridegroom. To quench means to overpower, to extinguish and to put out. That’s the difference that separated them. Oil speaks of the indwelling of the Holy Spirit in the true believer’s life. Paul, in his letter to the Ephesians, confirms this truth when he wrote: In Him you also who have heard of your salvation, and have believed, were stamped with the seal of the long-promised Holy spirit; He is the guarantee of our inheritance, an anticipation of its full redemption and our acquiring possession of it – to the praise of His glory (Ephesians 1:13-14).
DNA – The Evidence of God’s Signature in Every Cell
God said, Let Us [Father, Son, and Holy Spirit] make mankind in our image, after our likeness, and let them have complete authority over the fish of the sea, the birds of the air, the beasts, and over all of the earth, and over everything that creeps upon the earth. So, God created man in His own image, in the image and likeness of God He created him; male and female He created them; then the Lord God formed man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath or spirit of life, and man became a living being. And the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam; and while he slept, He took one of his ribs or a part of his side and closed up the flesh; and the rib or part of his side which the Lord God had taken from the man He built up and made into a woman, and He brought her to the man. Then Adam said, this is now bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called woman, because she was taken out of a man (Gen. 1:26-27; 2:7,21-23). When God created men, He perfected them with intelligence and wisdom. No one can comprehend the complicated manifold of His work. The human body, the heavens, all nature and every created living thing, have God’s signature on them. His, and His alone matches the manifold of wisdom manifested in all He created. “OH, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! For from Him and through Him and to Him are all things. To Him be glory forever! Amen (Rom.1:33a,36).
When created man and woman, God performed an act of perfect and wonderful creation. He focused on every detail of the body, visible and invisible. When He said, Let Us make mankind in our image, after our likeness… His words carried a very important meaning, not applied to the rest of His creation. Man was made to carry God’s image and likeness (Gen. 1:27). In that, man was set apart from the animal world. King David in his psalm 139 says, … You did form my inward parts; You did knit me together in my mother’s womb; I will confess and praise You for You are fearful and wonderful and for the awful wonder of my birth! Wonderful are Your works, and that my inner self knows right well; my frame was not hidden from You when I was being formed in secret intricately and curiously wrought [as if embroidered with various colors] in the depts of the earth; Your eyes saw my unformed substance, and in Your book all the days were written before ever they took shape, when as yet there was none of them; how precious and weighty also are Your thought to me, O God! How vast is the sum of them! “Intricately and curiously wrought,” he could be referring to the DNA, the hereditary part of humans. It is there that information is stored as a code. It transmits genetic information. It determines each cell’s structure and function; located in the center of the cell, it is responsible for the control of the cells’ activities. We are truly “God’s intelligent design!” Amazingly, scientists have found proof of God in the DNA code. As Paul said, man is without excuses concerning the existence of God (Rom. 1). DNA expresses information from intelligence, and one like no one else’s “It is an instructional script.” The DNA’s code is very complex, compost of 3 billion letters, which are four chemicals called, adenine, thymine, guanine, and cytosine. It is mind boggling; It is hard for men to grasp the complexity of God’s creation, for they are limited in their understanding concerning the deep wisdom and knowledge of God, since they are created and are not the Creator. DNA’S code is the evidence of God’s signature in every cell proving that He is the Creator of all living things. Paul asks the question: Who has known the mind of God and who has understood His thoughts, or who has been His counselor? (Rom. 11:34) All God’s creations – animal and plants alike have DNA, which is a long molecule containing their entire genetic code. Although the animals have will, emotion and intelligence, showing how smart they are in many things, they do not reflect the image of God. God does not require accountability from them, as Paul said, Creation was subjected to frailty, not because of some intentional fault on its part, but by the will off Him Who so subjected it- with the hope that nature itself will be set free from its bondage to decay and corruption into the glorious freedom of God’s children (Rom. 8: 20-21).
They Are Not of the World
(John 17: 16; Ephesians 2:6; Hebrews 11: 16, 13:14)
If you belonged to the world, the world would treat you with affection and would love you as its own, but because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, the world hates you (John 15:19).
Called and chosen out of the world, the believer has an eternal heavenly passport. The moment that a person becomes a child of God by the new birth, or being born again, he/she receives the right to become a child of God. It is not a birth from flesh, but of the Spirit. YAHSHUA told Nicodemus, unless a man is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God (Jn. 1,3). This passport is signed, and sealed by and with the Holy Spirit. As a foreigner carries his passport as the proof of his citizenship somewhere else, the believer also carries his heavenly passport as the proof of his heavenly identity in this world. This Seal guarantees the believer his entrance into his heavenly country, as Paul confirms: The Holy Spirit is the guarantee of our inheritance, an anticipation of its full redemption and our acquiring [complete] possession of it – to the praise of His glory (Ephesians 1:14). One sign of a true believer is the antagonist attitude the world displays against him/her. YAHSHUA said, Blessed are you when people revile you and persecute you and say all kinds of evil things against you falsely on My account. Be glad and supremely joyful, for your reward in heaven is great, for in this same way people persecuted the prophets who were before you (Matt. 5:11-12). In their persecution, the believers are sustained by the promise that the glory which will be revealed to them, will be greater than the sufferings he has endured in this world. In reference to the heroes and heroines of the faith, the writer of the letter to the Hebrews says, These people all died controlled and sustained by their faith, but not having received the tangible fulfillment of [God’s] promises, only having seen it and greeted it from a great distance by faith, and all the while acknowledging and confessing that they were strangers and temporary residents and exiles upon the earth…they were yearning for and aspiring to a better and more desirable country, that is, a heavenly [one]. For that reason, God is not ashamed to be called their God, for He has prepared a city for them (Heb. 11:13,16).
Blood and Water Flowed Out From His Side
(John 19:32-35)
What’s the meaning of blood and water flowing out from YAHSHUA’S side? Have you ever wondered why and the meaning behind it? The truth of the matter is that we never stop to wonder why and what’s the significance behind it; we go on with minimum knowledge, not perceiving how little we care to know the reason behind it, to understand the extent of YAHSHUA’S suffering on our behalf. I believe that knowledge, as a glass window, will make possible for our eyes of understanding to see clearly and to change the way we see Him in His sufferings, and in relation to blood and water flowing out from His side when He was pierced. There is much to consider in the case of blood and water being flown from His side that is very important in the physical and in the spiritual realm to all those who are called believers in YAHSHUA.
John reports that, since it was the day of Preparation, in order to prevent the bodies from hanging on the cross on the Sabbath- for that Sabbaths was a very solemn and important one- the Jews requested Pilate to have the legs broken and the bodies taken away. So the soldiers came and broke the legs of the first one, ad of the other who had been crucified with Him, but when they came to YAHSHUA and they saw that He was already dead, they did not break His legs, but one of the soldiers pierced His side with a spear, and immediately blood and water came out (John 19:31-34)
The Prophet Isaiah prophesized that YAHSHUA’S sufferings inflicted by Jews and Gentiles were marked on His appearance. His face and His whole appearance were marred more than any man’s, and His form beyond that of the sons of men-… (52:14a); He was despised and rejected and forsaken by men, and a man of sorrows and pains, and acquainted with grief and sickness; and like One from Whom men hide their faces, He was despised, and we did not appreciate His worth or have any esteem for Him (53:3). David, in his poetic writings, prophetically described the extent of YAHSUA’s physical as well as emotional sufferings in Psalms 22: Eli, Eli lama sabachthani? (My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?) I am poured out like water, and all my bones are out of joint. My heart is like wax; it is softened and melted down with me. My strength is dried up like a fragment of clay pottery my tongue cleaves to my jaws and You have brought me into the dust of death, for [like a pack of] dogs they have encompassed me; a company of evildoers has encircled me, they pierced my hands and my feet, I can count all my bones, …they part my clothing among them and cast lots for my raiment… (Psalm 22).
The Left Behind Bride
(Matt. 25:1-13; 24:40-41; I Thess. 5:1-3)
Not everyone who says to Me, Lord, Lord, will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father Who is in heaven. Many will say to Me on that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name and driven out demons in Your name and done many mighty works in Your name? and then I will say to them openly, I never knew you; depart from Me, you who act wickedly (Matt. 7:21-23).
We live in a time of convenience and short cuts to everything. Computers are the master mind of things we used to do yesterday. The age of high tech has indeed handicapped the mind of men. We only have to know how to click or press a button for things to happen. The sad thing about it is not only that our brains have become lazy and shrinking, but it has affected the spiritual side of things too. We can only tolerate teachings that tickle our ears. It has to be convenient for us to follow in line with our life styles. Conviction is a thing of the past. “I am okay, you are okay.” All our sins have been forgiven, no need to cry over them with repentance. The Word of God says that we must be born of the Spirit to be considered being born again. It is the only way that we can receive the image of God. His image is His Holy Spirit, Who is given at that time of our spiritual birth.
We may spend our life in church, teaching Sunday- School, preaching the Gospel, visiting the sick, we may never miss a day going to church, we may perform healing, prophesy, even casting demons out and still not being born again. We may impress the world with our look of humility and sacrificed life, but we can never impress God with all we do outside of Him. YAHSHUA said to a Pharisee, “You must be born again”. He assured Nicodemus that unless a person is born again, he cannot ever see the kingdom God; unless a man is born of water and [even] the Spirit he cannot enter the kingdom of God. What is born of the flesh is flesh; what is born of the Spirit is spirit (John 3: 3,4-6). Born of the Spirit, is when the Holy Spirit of God indwells the person. His indwelling is the sign that we are born again. The results are seen in the way we think, act and behave. His indwelling is the Seal, also a guarantee of our inheritance, in anticipation of its full redemption and our acquiring possession of it (Ephesians 1: 13-14).
Light from the Word 