Episode Transcript
Speaker 1 00:00:05 Good morning. Good morning. Good morning. My name is Michael Fueling the lead pastor here at the Village Church. This is the last week of our series on the Holy Spirit, and in this series we have been exploring the role of the Holy Spirit in our lives. And so this morning we're gonna, we're gonna look specifically at how the Holy Spirit helps us to help others to trust in Jesus. Now, can we just agree on the front end that you do not want to get in the way of anybody personally trusting in Jesus, right? Yes. Amen. That was pretty weak. We're gonna go with an affirmative. I, i really believe that you don't want to get in in the way. And what I wanna do is I would love to, um, just bless you. I want to encourage you, I want to train you, and I want you to walk out of here knowing what your role is in gospel ministry, where your power ends in the Holy Spirit's, power begins.
Speaker 1 00:01:01 All right? So every person, whether you're a Christian or not, every person has the power to make a serious impact or dent on the soul of another person even if you don't have the Holy Spirit. So we speak and we teach and we admonish and we hold hands and we hug and, and, and, and we use our words sometimes to bless. I mean, don't you love it when somebody sincerely looks at you there, there's no fluff, and they call out something admirable or worthy of pring you to say, good job. I love this thing in you. I love what God's doing in your life. Doesn't it just kinda like fill your soul and satisfy you? And it doesn't, doesn't need to come from a, a Christian does it like when somebody you respect or admire looks at you and calls out something good, your heart says, yes, I needed it.
Speaker 1 00:01:48 Now, it seems that we have a far greater natural power to destroy a soul than we do to build up a soul. For example, the the encouragement that you receive from the kind words of another person will maybe last a few hours or a day, unless maybe it's from somebody you deeply admire than it might last a little bit longer. But if you, if you notice that cutting words, they pierce deeply and they can actually last for an entire lifetime, discouraging words, they can make the soul shrivel for months or years on end critical words, they create resentment in us. And if it's left unde with it lives with us until we make the decision to forgive that person for their words. Second grade, Justin P, we're not gonna say his last name. He comments on my body publicly in front of all of the class.
Speaker 1 00:03:04 I remember where I was. I remember his face. I remember the response from all the other students. I remember the emotions that I felt. I remember going home, looking in the mirror and trying to evaluate whether or not what he said about my body was true. I am 42 years old today. I think it feels right, <laugh> and those words verbatim are still with me. What's interesting is that the destruction, it doesn't like end there. It doesn't just stop with us. So the human instinct is to take these wounds and to unfairly transfer them to similar relationships. Let me, lemme show you how this works.
Speaker 1 00:03:50 Ex-boyfriend wounds get unfairly transferred to your husband, ex-girlfriend wounds get unfairly transferred to your wife. Former church wounds get unfor unfairly transferred to your new church. Old boss wounds get unfairly transferred to your new boss. Dad. Wounds get unfairly transferred to God and sometimes it can just, it can feel like we're all being punished for someone else's negligence. You ever feel that way? By the way, if you have overcome the instinct to transfer your pain from one like relationship to another, great job, you are in the rarity. And what that tells me is you have done real deep soul work to not punish everyone else in your life for the sins against you of one person. That's hard work, isn't it? But I stand by my statement. It seems that we actually have a far greater natural power for the destruction of a soul than we do for the building up of a soul.
Speaker 1 00:04:51 And so in life, in ministry, you have great power to do harm and you have a little bit of power to do a bit of good, then enter the Holy Spirit. And as believers in Jesus Christ, it's not just you in your words, you actually have the power of God himself resident in you. And this absolutely changes everything we are now capable of more than a bit of good. So the Holy Spirit and I wanna just talk about a unique, um, um, role, uh, that it has in our life in ministry Two specifically. Number one, the Holy Spirit takes our bit of good and amplifies its power exponentially. So the encouraging word that you got when that you received from somebody, when it is backed up by the power of the Spirit of God, can actually bring healing. When that encouraging word that you gave to somebody, when it's backed up by the power of the Holy Spirit, it can comfort a heart.
Speaker 1 00:05:48 And not just in like a, like a, a cheap way, but in a real measurable, practical way. In those moments of pain and grief, sometimes a word filled with the power of the spirit can change the entire trajectory of a life. Never ever underestimate the power of a word prayed over before it's delivered. But number two, the Holy Spirit alone works in places you and I have no jurisdiction. So there are some spiritual realities that humans have no power to create in another person no matter how hard we try. And believe me, I have tried, this is gonna be our focus this morning. We're gonna look at the, the place where the power of the human ends and the power of the Holy Spirit begins. And you and I need to know this because otherwise if we don't understand this, we're gonna start to try to do the work of the Holy Spirit.
Speaker 1 00:06:46 And as we've said the past couple weeks, we don't make a very good Holy Spirit, do we? I wanna be the Holy Spirit, anyone else, but I don't make a good spirit. So context, open up your Bibles, John 16 here, here's where we're at right now. We're just a few short hours before Jesus is going to be betrayed, arrested the very next day he is gonna be killed on the cross. And so he is giving his disciples some final instruc instructions and he's teaching them on the Holy Spirit. They have zero idea what they're about to receive. Zero idea. I mean, they have some like theological categories, but just none of it makes sense until they're actually going to get it. And and here's what's gonna happen. They're gonna get the Holy Spirit and these, these disciples, they're gonna become apostles and they're gonna have this really unique ability to do signs, wonders, and miracles.
Speaker 1 00:07:33 It's gonna be one of the ways that actually the church is actually able to validate who is a real apostle and who's a false apostle. And so they're gonna, they're gonna have this incredible ability and they are going to be tempted to take credit for what the Holy Spirit did. And, and I just wanna be clear, do you like when people take credit for what you've done? No, you don't. Drives you nuts, doesn't it? I don't think the Holy Spirit appreciates when you take credit for the things he does. And so what I wanna be able to do as a believer, Jesus, is I wanna give credit to where credit is due. I don't wanna take the glory that the Holy Spirit deserves and then apply that to, to myself. So you're gonna be tempted to, to take the credit. They're also gonna be tempted maybe to think is like the Holy Spirit, my slave.
Speaker 1 00:08:16 No, the Holy Spirit isn't your slave. He doesn't go at your command. He submits to God the Father and God the Son, period. And so they're gonna be tempted to take credit or to try to maybe not understand exactly what the role of the Holy Spirit is. And Jesus is gonna just provide unbelievable simple clarity. Here's your job, here's the spirit's job. You do your job and the Spirit will do his job. All right, John 16, eight. Here's what Jesus says. And when he comes, he is the Holy Spirit. He will convict the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgment. So right off the bat, Jesus is clarifying, there are some aspects of the human heart that you don't have control over. You can't create these realities in someone else. And Jesus uses a really great word to describe this. He uses the word convict.
Speaker 1 00:09:09 Now here, here's a, a helpful definition to convict means to make someone see. But it doesn't just stop there to make somebody see and agree with what is wrong. But, but it doesn't stop there either. Real Holy Spirit conviction does something a little bit deeper and move toward what is right. Specifically who do the disciples not have the power to change or convict? Well, Jesus tells us the world. Well, who's the world? The world are those who have yet to trust in Jesus Christ. So imagine receiving this. Jesus says, you have no power to convict them of right, wrong judgment or the gospel, that heart thing that happens, you have no power. Well then Jesus, what are we supposed to do? You're telling me to go make disciples of the entire world and then you tell me, I actually have no power to change the human heart.
Speaker 1 00:10:07 And this is where they gotta get their roles. Crystal clear it. Now let me, let me just say bluntly what I have been inferring so far, we have no power nor ability to bring a soul to salvation. None that is not within your jurisdiction, that is not within your power. You have no power nor ability to bring a human soul to the place of salvation. And if when you proclaim the gospel to somebody, if that person chooses to trust in Christ, hear me, that wasn't because you had an incredible apologetic, because you had the best argument on the planet because you are so incredibly godly. Look at your brain. You are like a master at debating and you broke down all of their intellectual barriers, right? Have you ever felt like tempted, maybe like if I just had the right answer to their impossible question, maybe I could have gotten through.
Speaker 1 00:11:06 If you ever have the privilege to watch someone come to faith in Christ, here's what you need to understand. That is 100% all of God do not take credit for that which God has done. Amen. Amen. And so we humble ourselves and say, I did my job and the weakness of my words and the weakness of my flesh, sometimes petrified out of my mind. I took this message that you have given me to give to the world and somehow to the proclamation of this message, you chose to work. My job was faithfulness to plant the seed. His job is to cause the growth. Now this all I think actually makes sense if you step back and think about it because you and I, as we said, we don't have the power to create salvation realities in another person. But here's the deal. The person who trusts in Jesus, they don't have the power to do it for themselves either.
Speaker 1 00:11:59 But just stop for a moment. Go back to the time when you realize that Jesus is God, that he died in the cross for your sins, he was raised from the dead. Go back to that moment where all of a sudden you were like, I believe, and you asked God to forgive you of your sins. Were you aware of what was happening in the spiritual realm in that moment? No, you weren't. All you knew is, I'm sorry, I've got a problem. You said you could fix it and you ran to him and you believed, but, but do you know that there are so many things happening behind the scenes in that moment that almost no, no brand new Christians are aware of? There's about a hundred, I just documented nine of them. So we can talk through them fairly quickly here. But here's a quick rundown of some of the things that you have no power to even create in yourself.
Speaker 1 00:12:51 Spiritual realities. Here's, here's one you didn't have the power to to grant forgiveness from God to yourself. Who? Who's the only person who can actually choose to forgive you? The one forgiving only God, only God can choose to forgive you. You can say or do whatever you want, but until God chooses that, that's up to him. Number two, only God has a jurisdiction to declare somebody not just legally forgiven, but innocent and righteous. You, you have no ability if you're a guilty of a crime to declare yourself I am innocent. No, only, only the judge can do that. And so even in that moment, you are guilty and you have no power or legal jurisdiction to declare yourself as innocent and righteous. You needed God to do that for you. Here's the third one. Only God can choose to adopt somebody as his own child.
Speaker 1 00:13:39 Give them his name and make them heir to all that is his. Like you, you don't get to sit there and be like, God, adopt me. Oh, now I'm adopted. Only God can make that legal declaration over you in the moment when you trusted in Christ, did you realize all of these things were happening behind the scenes? We'll keep going. Only God has the eternal resources to pay the price for our eternal sin. The only person who can actually choose to apply what Christ did to your account is God the chief accountant. Period. You had no control over that. You could ask him, but he's the one who actually has to do it. Number five, only God can resurrect a spiritually dead heart and bring it to life. If you go back to that moment where you personally trusted in Jesus, did you like take your dead spiritual heart and renew it to new life?
Speaker 1 00:14:24 Do you even know how to do that? You don't. Neither do I. What happened? God himself took your dead heart and resurrected it to new life. You needed him to do that. You couldn't do it. Number six, only God has the authority to transfer somebody from the domain of darkness to the kingdom of God's beloved son. Do you? Do you get to go to Satan and say, Hey, I'm no longer under your authority. I'm gonna transfer myself out of this, this domain, and now I'm gonna go to God's domain. You don't. The only person who has the authority and jurisdiction to make that transfer is God. Here's another one. Only God can send the Holy Spirit to andwell a person. You don't get to say, holy Spirit andwell me. That's just not how it works. The Holy Spirit only goes where the Father or the son sends him.
Speaker 1 00:15:09 And so in the moment that you trusted in Christ, God had to send his Holy Spirit to and dwell you, you couldn't do that yourself. Number eight, only God can give the gift of faith. Courage is contagious, but faith, a hundred percent of the time in scripture, it is called the gift of God. You didn't get to sit there as a non-Christian and say, I'm gonna conjure up faith inside of myself. I'm gonna make my faith grow because in scripture, faith comes from God. And number nine, we're gonna see even deeper this morning, only God, the Spirit can truly convict a person of their own sin. I dunno if you know this, but when you trusted in Christ and you were convicted of sin, you didn't convict yourself of sin, God convicted you of sin. And when you saw righteousness and truth, you didn't go, oh, look how smart I am.
Speaker 1 00:15:57 Righteousness and truth. God convicted you of righteousness and truth. And when you realize the internal significance and the judgment you deserve for your sin, you weren't more novel and smarter than everyone else and said, I get it. If only one day you could get it, be more like me. If you are able to understand and be convicted about any of those, that is the power of the Holy Spirit. All of that's happening. It's the subtext, the moment someone trusts in Christ and all they know is I'm a sinner, I believe, forgive me and save me. And in that moment, all of this and more is happening behind the scenes and only God is able to do them. In verse nine, Jesus elaborates specifically what the Holy Spirit will convict non-Christians of through the disciples of ministry. He says this, the Holy Spirit will convict the world concerning sin because they do not believe in me.
Speaker 1 00:16:57 So here, here's my, my challenge. When I, when I talk to people who are not Christians and we get to the conversation of the, of the gospel, sometimes I can get a non-Christian to acknowledge and see sin sometimes even more rarely can I get them to agree that they're wrong. And it's almost impossible that I'm able to debate them to a place where I can get them to see that they've sinned and they're wrong and they deserve to be judged by God for it. Whenever, whenever I see conviction of sin, here's the first thing I know, the Holy Spirit is up to something in their life. I have tried to manufacture conviction of sin. It has not gone well for me. It ends up just being shame at the end of the day for non-Christians. And so I can address sin, I can call something out of sin.
Speaker 1 00:18:00 But if they're going to be convicted, not just in their brain intellectually, but in their heart, that's gonna be a work of the Holy Spirit. So by the way, if you're here and you're not a Christian, which we have a handful of people who come with their husband or their wife or their parents, and they are explicitly not Christian every, every week, um, I just wanna take a moment to speak to you because I think this should be great news because if your Christian friend or family member is gonna be honest, they should look at you and say, I have no power to change you or save you. And if they keep trying to save you, I wanna empower you to have a conversation back with them. Try saying something like this. Um, your own Bible teaches that you can't save me, so stop trying.
Speaker 1 00:18:43 How about this? If you want to talk about the gospel, I'll talk about the gospel with you. But stop trying to guilt me and shame me into believing in Jesus. Because if I'm gonna believe in Jesus according to your theology, it's gonna be the work of the Holy Spirit and I won't be able to stop it anyways. So have that conversation. It should be a blast. Go for it. <laugh>. Verse 10, the Holy Spirit will also convict non-Christians, not just about what's wrong, says the Holy Spirit will convict the world concerning righteousness because I go to the Father and you'll see me no longer. In other words, Jesus is leaving Well, who's gonna convict the world of what's true? And his answer is, the Holy Spirit. Righteousness is simply that which is good and true. Now, in every, every culture that is not influenced by God's people, where there's not a Judeo-Christian kind of ethic, undergirding the entire culture right and wrong are often backwards.
Speaker 1 00:19:40 And you see this, typically they're, they're backwards on the things that are closest to the heart of God. For example, you're gonna notice these five things are all gonna be inverted. Family, marriage, sexuality, children, and religion. All of these are gonna be up, is down, down is up, left is right, and right is left un undoing. What culture has written on the human heart of a non-Christian is almost impossible. You, you cannot debate someone out of the belief that children should go to drag shows. It's just try it, it will be an uphill battle. You're, you're not gonna debate somebody out of the belief that a 3, 4, 5 year old should be able to choose their gender and their pronouns. You just won't be able to debate them out of that. You're so far off. That's not the debate unless they're willing to engage intellectually and honestly.
Speaker 1 00:20:35 But I have never had that experience. Uh, many years ago I was the youth pastor here and I went outside and I caught a kid smoking pot. Love this kid was not a Christian. And so I looked at him and I, I wrote down what I said because I just, it was one of those moments where you're like, I'm gonna wanna use that as an illustration one day. So I told him, um, Hey, we're gonna need to call your parents. And he so calmly said, go ahead. They don't care. Now, I wondered if he was that calm because he was high or I wondered if he was that calm because he was trying to like, like, yeah, I tried. They don't care. Don't hoping I wouldn't like call. So I called his mom and she said, I gave it to him. We smoke it together.
Speaker 1 00:21:28 At that point, my response was, okay, could you ask him not to do it at church? She said, no, is is the dark. It's darker Christians. We realize that like I I am now in a domain that I have no power over it. And the last thing that mom needed was a debate with a youth pastor. Cause that's all it would've been. And and I realize in that moment, I've had so many like this where I'm just like, this, this is not my, my territory. I have no power here. I have no authority that somehow the Holy Spirit is gonna have to be the one to convict of not just sin, but what is good and right. And this mom believed it was a good noble thing to give her son drugs. And that's so backwards. But the Holy Spirit eventually is gonna have to be the one to first convict her of sin and then to show her what righteousness truly is.
Speaker 1 00:22:25 Verse 11, the Holy Spirit's not just gonna convict non-Christians about right and wrong, but the Holy Spirit will convict concerning judgment because the ruler of this world is judged. I think this is often the hardest part. Uh, the Bible teaches that God is going to judge every single sin committed by every person throughout all of history. Christian or not. Every sin will be decisively, justly dealt with. There will be no exceptions, you, me, everybody. But sin is gonna be, is gonna be judged or dealt with in one of two ways. And there are no other options. The the first way, and I would like suggest it, is that you personally trust in Christ. And, and, and God makes a promise. Anybody who trusts in Jesus, all the righteous punishment for that sin, it will be dealt with, but it will be put on Jesus who is your substitute sacrifice, who took the punishment for your sins in your place.
Speaker 1 00:23:20 That's option number one. You can have all your sins they're gonna be paid for and it'll be put on Jesus. Option number two, strongly suggest you avoid this. You pay for your own sin in hell. That's hard. Now, when a person realizes I am guilty of sin, and then a person realizes what is good, right and true, and then they come to this conclusion, my sin is ugly to God and deserves to be judged. When, when the non-Christian gets to the point where they say, my sin is so grievous, I deserve hell because of it, that is a work of the Holy Spirit. That that is, you can't debate someone into that. You, you can maybe even give them an intellectual argument where they're like, well, I can kind of see it from your perspective and how the Bible could teach that. But for them to say, I, I deserve judgment and how, because of my sin, my sin that I chose separated me from God. I did this, I chose this. When they get to that point, you, you are now watching the Holy Spirit move. And you realize you, you have no ability to create these realities in another person's soul. When he comes, he will convict the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgment. I have 13, so whats, but I've boiled it down to three <laugh>. Thank you. The first one's a little long. But you're welcome.
Speaker 1 00:25:07 The Father has decided that as a general rule, the Holy Spirit will not move to save a soul until and unless they hear the gospel. Now, the reason I I wrote as a general rule is because in Islamic countries, you, you, you're gonna hear more and more and more. This is just such a regular story that Jesus appears to Muslims and dreams. Almost always Jesus in the dream, points them to a Christian in the area, tells them to go talk to them, and they hear the gospel. Sometimes you hear stories where Jesus himself just tells them, trust in me. So almost always, 99% of the time, the Holy Spirit will not regenerate or save a non-Christian until they hear the gospel. And that 0.01% exception globally and historically, uh, I just wouldn't rely on that, although Jesus is free to do it that way, because he's God, somebody will not trust in Christ until they hear the gospel and and to hear the gospel.
Speaker 1 00:26:15 I also think they need to be able to understand it. So I want you to read with me. Romans 10, I'll put it on the screen, but if you have a Bible open up there, Romans 10 14 says this, how them will they call on him? Who have they, who they've not believed, but how are they to believe in him who they've never heard? And it's, it's interesting because for the Apostle Paul, belief is not possible without hearing and, and how are they to hear without somebody preaching? Verse 15 says, how are they to preach unless they are sent? Can we disagree? Village's, church, if you believed in Christ, you have been equipped with the gospel and sent out to bring it to those in your life. Amen. Amen.
Speaker 1 00:26:56 As it's written, how beautiful are the feet of those who preach the good news? Like God just loves it when a Christian looks like an idiot because they're sharing the gospel with somebody. God's just like, ah, I love it when you look dumb. That's so great. They think you're, they think you're a fool. I just love when people think you're a fool because we, what they don't realize is you're wielding the most powerful tool on the planet, the power of the gospel. But, but look at what happens in verse 16. This is vital, but they've not all obeyed the gospel for, for Isaiah says Lord, who has believed what he has heard from us? And so to obey the gospel is simply to believe it. And here's what you know, every time you plant the seed of the gospel, does it always grow? Nope. I wish it did.
Speaker 1 00:27:40 And and so he's saying, listen, just because the gospel has power does not mean that the Holy Spirit's gonna activate its power every single time you send it out. But our job is to be sowers with the gospel. It's to sow the seeds. It's to put them out there and then we understand our role. My, my job is the sower and the spirit's job is the grower. And, and man, once I start trying to dabble into his territory, he's like, stop that. Don't do it. But listen, listen to verse 17, faith comes from hearing. Just think about this. Faith doesn't exist until they hear that, that the power of the gospel is that when they hear it, if the spirit activates, he gives them the gift of faith. This is beautiful. And hearing through the word of Christ, they need to hear the gospel. And when they hear the gospel, God has chosen that he will not save somebody until they hear it.
Speaker 1 00:28:39 Jesus, Jesus needs his disciples to get this, because you're you disciples, you're gonna be tempted to try to work in the domain of the non-Christians heart and it's not yours. That's the spirit's domain. Know your role. Know your domain, be faithful to that. And let me do my job. So what number two, in gospel ministry, which by the way, if you're a believer in Jesus, you are in gospel ministry. You must be gracious with others and with yourself. Uh, I want to talk primarily to, to mom's, dad's, grandma's, grandpa's, um, with this, so what the weight of guilt moms and dads take on themselves when they have unbelieving children, it's not yours.
Speaker 1 00:29:36 You have no ability to control the heart of your child. Amen. Moms and dads, amen. There have been incredible. I mean, the greatest parents on the planet who have unbelieving children, and I've seen some of the worst parents in the world have believing children <laugh>. I I I wish there was like a rhyme or a reason, but here, here's just what I know. When we bear on our soul, the guilt of our children's salvation, it was never yours to choose in the first place. It was never under your control in the first place. You, you have responsibilities. Your responsibility is to make sure your kids know the gospel backwards and forwards to make sure they know the word of God, to make sure they're exposed to the people of God and wise, older men and women in biblical sound teaching and, and exposing them to the family of God and making sure that they're protected and cared for all of that.
Speaker 1 00:30:30 And by the way, when you fall short of those, you apologize and own it. I think every mom and dad, we, we have issues with our parents, right? But we also have to understand we're raising kids. We're gonna take history with us. And so we humbly own the areas where we fell short. But what I can't do is own your faith. I I I don't have the power to make you a Christian or unmake you a Christian. That's not within my domain. And so there's this graciousness that I would love to see people have with themselves. I would never, I would never look at a one year old and be angry or disappointed at that child because they can't write a paper any more than I would look at a mom and dad and say, they don't believe because of you.
Speaker 1 00:31:15 And I just think some moms and dads need need a little bit of freedom. But what you might actually be feeling guilt over are the areas of your life where maybe the gospel wasn't present were the areas of your life that weren't consistent with the gospel. When I would look at every believing mom and dad, grandma and grandpa, I would tell you this, own them. Own them to your children. Apologize to them. But even you owning them, that is you stewarding before the Lord, your responsibility. You still can't control whether or not they forgive you or choose to trust in Christ. I wish, I wish. This is the moment where I wish I I could control the Holy Spirit and Jesus', I think he's hilarious. They're trying to get their head around the Holy Spirit. He's like, it's sort of like the wind. It goes whatever once and it does whatever it wants and you can't see from where it went and you can't see where it's going. Good luck trying to wrap your head around it, let alone control it.
Speaker 1 00:32:07 Number three, embrace the limitations of your role. The, the disciples. They just had to get to this point where they could admit, we, we are limited. I, I, I imagine, I don't know, I just imagine conversations that they had the week before Jesus was, was killed. Jesus. We, we literally can't do what you can do. We can't do miracles. We can't like compel large crowds. We can't go toe to toe with the Pharisees. We don't have kind of the resident knowledge like everything you do is awesome and we can't do any of that. And he is like, you're right. You can't and I'm gonna leave you. And they're all gonna hate you, but you are gonna have the power of the Holy Spirit and in a new way, in a way that you've never understood before. You're gonna, you're gonna be able to collaborate with the Holy Spirit.
Speaker 1 00:32:54 Now, scripture does teach, there are ways that we can participate with the Holy Spirit. I'll share with you three. Number one is walk, walk through the open doors the Holy Spirit has prepared for you. If, if you, maybe you're in a position and you're like, I don't really see any open doors, I would strongly suggest you start praying that the Lord open doors for gospel conversations in your life. I really believe there's a lot of people who don't know Jesus. Our mission as a church is to bring the gospel to the world. And if you are willing to do the foolish work of, of walking through an open door, the Lord will find a door for you, open it before you and push you through it. And all you gotta do is be faithful to the, to the gospel. I want you to listen to first Corinthians 16, eight.
Speaker 1 00:33:39 Paul's talking to the Corinthians, he's talking about his plans and he says, I will stay in Ephesus until Pentecost. Why? Why is he staying in Ephesus for a wide door for effective work has opened to me interesting. What do you expect? He would say next, here's what I thought he would say. And there's a whole bunch of people getting saved. That's not what he says. He says, A wide door for effective work is opened to me. And there are many adversaries. I just wanna tell you that as you walk through open gospel doors, you're entering into the trenches of spiritual battle. And here's what Paul learned. The closer he got to gospel conversations, the more demonic warfare accelerated. And so what he found is this, the moment you start to get really, really in the, in the mo, the moment you walk through the door, understand there will be adversaries, but you have the Holy Spirit.
Speaker 1 00:34:39 Christian, can you deal with an adversary? 100%. Is it always fun? Not at all. But do you have everything you need? Yes you do. Here's here's the second way we can work with the Holy Spirit. Don't just share the gospel. Like you have to do that. We've established this. Be gracious. When you share the gospel, uh, I wanna read to you what Paul writes to a young pastor Timothy. And by the way, this is not just a word for pastors. We are all in the ministry here together. So here's what he says. Second Timothy 2 24, the Lord's servant. That's us. Must not be quarrelsome, but kind to everybody. Stop fighting with everybody. Your arguments about the G like you're not gonna change their heart on the gospel. Now, I will debate with my non-Christian friends, a thousand different things. What I'm not gonna do is walk into a circumstance where I believe through debate and apologetics I am going to undo.
Speaker 1 00:35:35 Now if they want to talk, will I talk? You better believe it. That's an open door. But here's what he says. You must not be quen, but kind to everybody able to teach patiently enduring evil. Cuz this is what happens when you walk through gospel doors correcting his opponents. Can you correct people who have terrible ideas? For sure. Listen what he says with gentleness, listen to what happens next. Okay? If you're not, if you're not gonna be cruel, some when you're having gospel conversations, and you, and you can be gentle as you're dealing with spiritual ideas. He says, as God may perhaps grant them repentance, leading to a knowledge of the truth. And they may come to their senses and escape from the snare of the devil after being captured by him to do his will. If you wanna have like the greatest probability that the Holy Spirit would move through your gospel presentation, gentleness, kindness.
Speaker 1 00:36:33 And I love the phrase he says, God may perhaps Grant, who grants freedom from sin, conviction of sin, conviction of righteousness and conviction of judgment. It's the Holy Spirit. And the third way we can participate and work with the Holy Spirit is to pray specifically and regularly colosians for Here's what Paul says to the Colossians. He says, devote yourselves to prayer being watchful and thankful. Pray for us too, that God may open a door for our message so that we may proclaim the mystery of Christ for which I'm in chains. Pray that I may proclaim it clearly as I should. Two things he asked them to pray for. Number one, pray for open doors so that I can have gospel conversations about Jesus. And number two, pray that when I speak my words are clear, helpful, gentle, appropriate. Why? Why does he possible ask for prayer? He, he believes at the core of his being, that God the Father, responds to the prayers of his people. And here are two prayers. I think God loves the answer. Open doors, clarity of the gospel coming outta my mouth. And I, and I think these are, these are prayers that if we wanna participate with the Holy Spirit, two prayers that we can start asking him for.
Speaker 1 00:38:02 So embracing your limitations also applies to non-Christians as well. So I wanna take kinda the end of this message and I wanna just talk to those of you in the room who are not believers. You have no power at all to save yourself. You don't have the power to make God forgive you. You, you don't, you don't have the power to take a spiritually dead heart and resurrected to, to new life. You don't have it. You are completely and utterly dependent on God to save you. There's no other place to go where you could get forgiveness and salvation. Nothing. You can try different religions. You can try being a good person and being good enough. None of it will work. The only way that you are ever going to be forgiven and saved is if God himself does it. And I am so thankful that God in the scriptures did not teach well if you're just good enough, as long as you're better than Jimmy and Bobby Sue, it's not what he teaches ever.
Speaker 1 00:39:13 Cuz nobody will ever be good enough. And so what the scriptures are so clear is that God is willing and wanting to forgive anyone of their sin. And if you today believe in Jesus Christ, he will forgive you and save you freely and willingly. Uh, Romans 10, nine says this, if you confess with your mouth that Jesus' Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you shall be saved. That we see in scripture is that God is willing and desiring to offer you what only he can offer you. And he is actually willing to work in the place of your heart that you've tried fixing your heart and making it better. Have you ever realized you really can't do it because it's outside of your jurisdiction. Even your own heart at times is outside of your own power to change.
Speaker 1 00:40:11 And what he offers you is anybody who is willing to ask me for salvation and forgiveness and for a new heart and the power of the Holy Spirit, I will give it if they sincerely believe in Jesus and ask for it. I think that's incredible news by the way, that the only pathway to forgiveness in salvation is being offered to anybody who sincerely ask for it freely. Have you, have you ever personally asked God to save you? You, you actually might be here and you might have already been finding yourself being convicted of sin. Let me just tell you, that's evidence to me that the Holy Spirit is working in your life. You might even find yourself being convicted of what is good, right? And true Jesus Christ and the gospel. And, and, and maybe you're even here and today you're like, for the first time, I actually believe that my sin has separated me from God and it needs to be dealt with.
Speaker 1 00:41:08 And if you're in that place today, I just wanna encourage you. All of that is the work of the Holy Spirit drawing you to your knees and, and, and asking you to finally believe and trust in Christ. And so, if that's a decision that you're ready to make today, I think today's the absolute best day on the planet to do it. And so a lot of times people don't have the vocabulary for it. There's not like a magical prayer. But what I what I wanna do to end this message is, um, I'm gonna, I'm gonna pray and if, and if you are ready to trust in Christ, I want you to just re repeat in your head this prayer. I'll go slow. And, and if you mean these words, God's promise is that, that anybody who believes and asks for forgiveness, it is yours in Jesus Christ. So let's pray together.
Speaker 1 00:41:53 God, I realize today that I am a sinner and I have sinned against you today. I believe and confess that Jesus is God. I I believe Jesus died on the cross for my sins. I believe that Jesus was raised on the third day, God. I I want to turn for my sin and I want to follow Jesus. God, will you forgive me and save me in Jesus name? Amen. If, if that is the first time you've ever prayed that prayer, here's what I wanna encourage you to do. Tell somebody you came with, come talk to one of us up front. We would just love to celebrate with you. Can I just tell you in that moment that you pray, the amount of things happening behind the scenes scenes is astounding. That in the moment someone trusts in Christ, they are forgiven, they are adopted, they are justified, they are made right with God.
Speaker 1 00:43:08 They are given the Holy Spirit. It's astounding what happens here on the scenes. And if today you trusted in Christ for the first time, that is God's gift to you. If you were sincere, we're gonna, we're gonna celebrate communion together. And um, for those of you who have trusted in Christ, you are saved because the Holy Spirit convicted you of sin and righteousness and judgment. But has the Holy Spirit stopped doing that in your life? Nope. <laugh> the work of the Holy Spirit continues and we are still struggling with sin and we are being convicted of sin and righteousness and judgment. So we're gonna, we're gonna have a time together, time of silence and, and prayer where I encourage you, ask God, ask the Spirit, would you reveal to me sin that I need to confess? And at the same time, ask the Holy Spirit to help and encourage you because the Holy Spirit isn't trying to just shame you. The Holy Spirit wants to build you into the image of Christ. And so it's an opportunity just to reflect. It's an opportunity to listen. It's an opportunity to confess. And so I know a minute or so is not nearly enough time to confess probably everything that went wrong this morning, but it's a start. So Holy Spirit, would you, would you bring to light the things that we need to repent of? Would you convict us? But would you also Holy Spirit encourage us <laugh>.
