Would you turn with me to the Second Letter of the Apostle Paul to Timothy, chapter 1, from verse 12:
For which cause I suffer also these things: yet I am not ashamed;
for I know Him Whom I have believed,
and I am persuaded that He is able to guard that which I have committed unto Him against that day.Hold the pattern of sound words which thou hast heard from me, in faith and love which is in Christ Jesus.
That good thing which was committed unto thee guard through the Holy Spirit Which dwelleth in us.
And then in the Gospel of John, chapter 14, from verse 16:
And I will pray the Father, and He shall give you another Comforter, that He may be with you for ever,
even the Spirit of truth: Whom the world cannot receive; for it beholdeth Him not, neither knoweth Him:
ye know Him; for He abideth with you, and shall be in you.
I will not leave you desolate: I come unto you.
In the same Gospel, chapter 16, from verse 13:
Howbeit when He, the Spirit of truth, is come, He shall guide you into all the truth:
for He shall not speak from Himself; but what things soever He shall hear, these shall He speak:
and He shall declare unto you the things that are to come.
He shall glorify Me: for He shall take of Mine, and shall declare it unto you.
Let us just have a word of prayer.
Beloved Lord, we are so thankful that we have been gathered together in Your presence. We pray that You will make this conference of Your children a very special one. Open the eyes of our hearts. Build us into a new, deeper, living relationship with Yourself.
Now, as we come on this first evening of the ministry of Your Word, we know that we need that anointing. Many of us, if not all of us, have been travelling today. We need renewing, reviving, and quickening—renewing of spirit, soul, and body.
Lord, above all, we need the anointing of Your Spirit. We need that anointing, grace, and power for the speaking of Your Word, for the translating of Your Word, and for the hearing of Your Word.
Lord, we pray that that anointing may abide upon the whole of this time, upon every one of us. Lead us into the truth. Glorify the Lord Jesus. Take the things that are His and declare them to us.
Lord, we shall be careful to give You the praise and worship of our hearts for answering this prayer. We ask it in the name of our Lord Jesus. Amen.
I think you know that the theme of this conference is centred in these verses in the Second Letter of the Apostle Paul to Timothy, chapter 1, verses 12 to 14.
We are considering what God has entrusted to the church. Insofar as we are members of the body of our Lord Jesus, He has entrusted this treasure to us—to each one of us.
My responsibility is in verse 14: guarding that good thing by the Holy Spirit—that good thing which was entrusted to us by the Holy Spirit.
This which was entrusted to us is summed up in the little phrase used throughout the book of Revelation: the testimony of Jesus. John the apostle spoke of being in the Isle of Patmos for the Word of God and the testimony of Jesus.
It is very interesting that, when we come to the last book of the Bible, this phrase, “the testimony of Jesus,” is spoken of quite a number of times.
Now, my responsibility is guarding that treasure, guarding that good deposit, that good thing which has been entrusted to us by the Holy Spirit, Who dwells in us.
It is very sad that some Christians have very little understanding of the person and work of the Holy Spirit. All the emphasis is put on the Father and the Son, and very little emphasis, if any at all, is placed upon the person of the Holy Spirit.
Some believers are very afraid of the Holy Spirit, simply because they have seen excesses—all kinds of things that are not actually the work of the Holy Spirit, but the work of the flesh.
But this is ridiculous. Just because there are a lot of divorces, we do not stop getting married. Just because food poisoning is one of the biggest causes of death in the Americas, it does not stop us from eating.
I mean, we need to know personally the Holy Spirit.
So this evening, I want to speak in general about the Holy Spirit. Then, on Friday morning and Saturday evening, I will speak more practically about what it means to guard the treasure, or the good deposit, that has been entrusted to us.
The Holy Spirit is the third Person in the Godhead, absolutely equal to the Father and the Son.
In the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, we come face to face with the mystery of the Godhead.
God the Spirit is not an agency, not an instrument, not a power, but a Person.
He is not a kind of channel by which God works. It is the Person of the Holy Spirit.
The Word of God warns us not to grieve the Spirit. You cannot grieve a channel. You cannot grieve an instrument. You cannot grieve an agency. You can only grieve a person.
If I may put it in some sort of school language, the Holy Spirit is the manager of the work of God. He is the supervisor in the fulfilment of the purpose of God.
If I may put it somewhat crudely, He is the One Who gets the work done. This is true whether we speak corporately or individually, personally.
Let me try to explain. When the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit produced the plan of our salvation, it was in the heart of the Father. It was the Son Who was to be the Saviour. And it was the Holy Spirit Who supervised.
Mary conceived by the Holy Spirit. Jesus was born of the Spirit.
Thirty years later, when He entered into His Messianic ministry—the last three years—it was the Holy Spirit Who came upon Him like a dove and remained upon Him.
All through the Old Testament, the Holy Spirit had come upon servants of God to enable them to accomplish something. But the Holy Spirit had revealed to John the Baptist that when he saw the Holy Spirit coming like a dove and remaining upon Him, it was the Messiah.
It was by the Holy Spirit that, as the Word of God says, by the eternal Spirit, Jesus offered Himself up on the cross. Here is again: by the eternal Spirit, He offered Himself up for our salvation.
And on the third day, it was the Holy Spirit Who raised Jesus from the dead. This brings us face to face with the amazing work of the Holy Spirit.
If you take your Bible, just to bring it home a little more, you take your Bible in the very first chapter, Genesis 1:2, and you read this:
And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.
It is said they were void and formless, and the Spirit moved upon the waters. The Hebrew word is very interesting. In Hebrew, it is rachaph, and it means He brooded on the water.
In another place in Deuteronomy, the same Hebrew word is used of the Lord fluttering, hovering over His young.
When there was nothing—emptiness, darkness—the Holy Spirit hovered. The word used conveys the thought of a bird of prey looking for a perch to build its nest.
It was as if you have a picture, right at the beginning of the Bible, of the person and work of the Holy Spirit.
How would the purpose of God be fulfilled? How would the purpose of God, centred in the Lord Jesus, be fulfilled? How could the work of salvation be fulfilled? Only by the Holy Spirit.
It was the Lord Jesus Who would give Himself up, but it was the Holy Spirit Who enabled Him.
Come to the end of the Bible, Revelation 22:17, and listen to what it says:
And the Spirit and the bride say, Come.
Everything that was in the heart of God from the beginning is fulfilled. Here is the bride, and the Spirit and the bride say, “Come.” It is wonderful.
Nothing is accomplished, neither initiated, nor developed, nor completed, without the Holy Spirit.
Your spiritual transformation into the likeness of the Lord Jesus—the completion of God’s purpose in you personally—without the Holy Spirit, it is impossible.
It is the work of the Holy Spirit: the building of the church, its transformation, its overcoming of the problems it faces, the bride making herself ready, and the completion of the purpose of God in the church. Without the Holy Spirit, nothing.
On that Day of Pentecost, when the Holy Spirit came, poured out by the Lord Jesus, came the promise of the Father—the promised Holy Spirit.
He was always in the world. He had always been working. But on that Jewish festival, when the Lord Jesus, the glorified risen Messiah, took the promise from the Father and poured out the Holy Spirit, something amazing happened.
One hundred and twenty human beings, saved by the work of the Lord Jesus, were joined to a Head at the right hand of God.
The Lord Jesus Himself had said, “Upon this rock I will build My church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.” Everything had come against the Lord Jesus to stop the accomplishment of that promise.
But neither the Jewish establishment nor the Roman authorities, nor anything else, was able to stop what happened on the Day of Pentecost.
Some people say, “Well, Pentecost is to do with tongues and prophesying and gifts and power.” I have no problem with tongues. I have no problem with prophecy. I have no problem with power.
But what happened on the Day of Pentecost was far more than tongues and prophesying and power.
On that day, the Holy Spirit came home forever in human beings. As Jesus said, “He was with you; He will be in you.”
On that day, something tremendous happened: the Holy Spirit came home. One hundred and twenty saved human beings became the home of God.
Within hours, three thousand more were saved, and the same thing happened to them as to the one hundred and twenty. The whole of Jerusalem was turned upside down.
Then Samaria, Gentiles, Roman officers, the Roman army—people were saved by the grace of God. This has always been amazing to me.
The Lord Jesus said, “Upon this rock I will build My church.” Look at church history. He said, “The gates of hell shall not prevail against it.” But if we look at church history, it seems as if the gates of hell have prevailed again and again and again.
Even the church in the very beginning—gradually Satan managed to overcome that work of the Lord Jesus. But did he overcome? No.
The risen Head of the church initiated movements again and again and again, right through the history of the church. It is amazing.
Who carried out that work? It was the Holy Spirit.
Everywhere you look, it does not matter where, it is the same story: the Holy Spirit bringing human beings into living union with the Head, so that once again the original principles are established.
Well, I do not know whether this is too much for you on a Thursday evening. Let me move on.
I want to say something about the essential need to experience the person and work of the Holy Spirit.
On the personal level, whether it is a matter of salvation, whether it is a matter of new birth, whether it is a matter of growth, whether it is a matter of transformation, it is all to do with the Holy Spirit.
Let me go further. On the level of service, unanointed service—what is it? It is just the flesh. It is just the soul. That is why we need the anointing.
If the Lord Jesus needed the anointing of the Holy Spirit for three years of Messianic ministry leading to His crucifixion, so do you. So do I.
You want to live a crucified life. You want to take up your cross and follow Him. You need the power to give up all right to yourself. You need the power to fall into the ground and die and bear much fruit.
You need the Holy Spirit. You cannot die daily without the Holy Spirit.
Without Pentecost, you cannot know what it is, by the Spirit, to put to death the deeds of the body. There is no other way.
I sometimes feel sorry for some believers. I remember years ago being in a conference here in the States. We were queuing up for food. In those days, I was younger—a good deal younger.
This lady said to me, “Do you believe in the gifts of the Spirit?” Since it had not been mentioned in the conference, I was a little surprised. So I said, “Yes, I do.”
She said, “I do not need the gifts. I only need Jesus.”
But gifts are gifts of Jesus. You cannot divide the Holy Spirit from Jesus.
You cannot be born of God apart from the Holy Spirit. You cannot be a son of God unless you are led by the Holy Spirit. You cannot be an overcomer apart from hearing what the Spirit says.
It is quite simple. The Lord Jesus put it very clearly in the passages that we read in John 14.
He said, “I will pray the Father, and He shall give you another Comforter, that He may be with you forever.”
This wonderful word in Greek was used of a legal adviser—an advocate, someone who supported you.
We have such an Advocate at the right hand of the Majesty on high. It is the Lord Jesus. He is our supreme Advocate. He is the One Who advises us, supports us, encourages us, and corrects us.
But here the Lord Jesus says, “I will give you another Comforter, and He shall be with you forever.”
He said, “I will not leave you desolate.” Literally, in the Greek, it means, “I will not leave you as orphans.” I do not throw you out into the world to be on your own.
But the Holy Spirit has come to lead us, to advise us, and to encourage us.
When you come to John 16, the Lord Jesus goes further. He says, “When the Spirit of truth is come, He shall guide you into all the truth.”
That means He is the One Who opens the eyes of our hearts. He is the One Who brings revelation into our being. He is the One Who causes us to see light in light. He takes the Book and makes it live to us.
What kind of child of God is it who has never known the ministry of the Holy Spirit to see the Lord Jesus with the eye of faith?
It is only by the Holy Spirit to discern the truth, to understand the purpose of God. It is all the ministry and work of the Holy Spirit.
You cannot know the Father and the Son dwelling in you apart from the Holy Spirit.
Let me put it another way: you cannot know and experience what it is to be one with the Father in the Lord Jesus except by the Holy Spirit. Only by the Holy Spirit do we know this union with God the Father in Christ.
The Lord Jesus said, “He shall glorify Me.”
There is something wonderful about worship. When the eyes of our hearts see Jesus—the beauty of Jesus, the glory of Jesus, the power of Jesus, everything that is ours in Jesus—it is the blessed work of the Holy Spirit.
And you know, there is something else here. If you have followed me so far and are not asleep, then you will understand: how can we spiritually know anything of the Lord Jesus apart from the Holy Spirit?
How can we get anywhere spiritually without Him? Without Him, our Christian life, our Christian service, and church life are a façade. It is academic knowledge and routine.
It is very interesting to understand the words of the Lord Jesus when He said of the Holy Spirit, “He shall not speak from Himself.”
The old 1611 Authorised Version puts it this way: “He shall not speak of Himself.” But this is an inferior translation. The little Greek preposition is from.
He shall not speak out of Himself.
Because of this verse, many people think that we must treat the Holy Spirit as nothing. But that is not what the verse means.
So now we come to what was my responsibility: “Guard that good thing, that good deposit, that treasure entrusted to you, by the Holy Spirit Which dwelleth in you.” How can we do this?
Pentecost is a historic fact, just as Calvary is a historic fact.
But when you got saved, in some way you saw that Jesus was your Saviour. You were convicted of your own hopelessness and sin. You probably did not realise it at the time, but it was the Holy Spirit arranging your circumstances, producing everything that led you to the Lord.
In that moment when you saw Jesus as your Saviour, you entered into something that was a historic fact. Jesus had died for you nearly two thousand years ago. But in the moment you received Him as your Saviour and Lord, the historic fact became experience.
In exactly the same way, many of us who were saved had no idea what it was to be crucified with Christ. We tried to live the Christian life in sort of Christian phraseology, trying to look holy, and all the rest of it.
Until that blessed day when the Holy Spirit touched the eyes of our hearts, and we saw that Jesus died not only for us, but as us.
In that moment, we entered into the historic fact of Calvary. And so it is with Pentecost.
Pentecost is a historic thing. When you receive the Lord Jesus, it is the Holy Spirit Who comes to dwell within. Then you begin to experience the historic fact that the Holy Spirit has been poured out.
Now you are experiencing something. But there is, however you like to call it, the power of the Holy Spirit, the anointing of the Holy Spirit. This also is yours.
When the Lord Jesus poured out the Holy Spirit on that Day of Pentecost, two things happened: the indwelling of the Holy Spirit and the empowering of them.
Dear child of God, we need to enter, by revelation, through faith.
I must finish. You are tired. But let me say something. It is my conviction that we are entering into a time of unparalleled turmoil, trouble, and confusion.
The world calls it climate change. I wonder who is behind the climate change. If man is fully responsible for it, man can put it right. But if it is God, man will not be able to put it right.
It will grow in intensity. There will be earthquakes. It is part of the turmoil that the Lord Jesus spoke of.
This turmoil is not only physical. It is political. It is economic. It is social. Everything.
God has said clearly again and again:
I will shake not only the earth, but the heavens also.
Then everything that can be shaken will be shaken, that that which cannot be shaken may remain.
The writer of the Hebrew letter says:
Wherefore receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, let us have grace, whereby we may offer service to God, well-pleasing to Him.
Dear brothers and sisters, I believe that the United States is in for an unprecedented time of turmoil, of confusion.
That brings me back to what was the burden of the evening: no one will come through this time as an overcomer but by the Spirit of God.
If we grieve the Holy Spirit, we shall be defeated. If we quench the Holy Spirit, there is absolutely no way through.
That is why the apostle spoke about guarding the good thing, the good deposit, the treasure entrusted to us, by the Holy Spirit Who dwells in us.
How much time have we? Very little. If we compare it with these last two millennia, we have little time left.
How will we be enabled to see Jesus crowned with glory and honour? In martyrdom, to see Jesus as Stephen did, standing at the right hand of God?
How could this be possible? How will it be possible in times of turmoil, of trouble, of confusion, of judgment—divine judgment—for the bride to make herself ready?
Dear brother, dear sister, those of you who know your Bibles know that it says in Revelation 19:
Hallelujah: for the Lord our God, the Almighty, reigneth.
Let us rejoice and be exceeding glad, and let us give the glory unto Him:
for the marriage of the Lamb is come, and His wife hath made herself ready.
How is it possible? She did it in the midst of beasts, false prophets, apostate church, martyrdom, persecution, and judgments.
How does she reach the completion of the purpose of God in the midst of all that? Only by the Holy Spirit.
Years ago, our brother Theodore Austin-Sparks, when we were talking about the days ahead, said, “When I was a young man, I went on my first visit to the United States.”
He said, “I wanted to hear three of the great American Christians: A. J. Gordon, Arthur T. Pierson, and A. B. Simpson. I was so impressed with A. B. Simpson that I asked if I could see him, if he would give me a few moments.”
He said, “We talked about a number of things. Before I went, I said, ‘I have one last question. What do you think the people of God will be like at the very end of the age?’”
A. B. Simpson thought for a moment. He said, “They will make a new discovery of the person and work of the Holy Spirit.”
That is all. Nothing else, he said, will take them through to the coming of the Lord.
Beloved Lord, we are in need. It is not just knowledge we need. We need experience of Yourself. The only One Who can take the things of Yourself and disclose them to us is the Holy Spirit.
Father, let Your Holy Spirit work in every heart. Challenge us. Touch us, Lord. Meet us at the point of our need.
We do not know exactly what lies ahead, but we all have an inner feeling—something bad. We need You, Lord. We need to make a discovery of Yourself.
We need to be enabled to stand for absolute truth. We need to be able to glorify the Lord Jesus in our lives, in our assembly, in our workplace, in our assemblies. We need to glorify the Lord.
Father, it is the work of Your Holy Spirit to do this. Have mercy upon us. Touch us. Open us up in a new way to Yourself.
Preserve us from all that is false, all that is just the flesh or the soul. Keep us for Yourself.
We want to guard that good thing which You have entrusted to us by the Holy Spirit. He dwells in us. Open our eyes.
We ask it in the name of our Lord Jesus. Amen.