Word and Spirit [Part 3]

Pastor, author, and Bible teacher, Alan Wright.

The Bible may be criticized, it may be misapplied, it may be debated, hated, or even rejected, but one thing is for sure, you cannot ignore this book, for it is the best-selling book of all time. I love this book. That's Pastor Alan Wright. Welcome to another message of good news that will help you see your life in a whole new light. I'm Daniel Britt, excited for you to hear the teaching today in the series Word and Spirit, The Beauty of Balance, as presented at Reynolda Church in North Carolina. Now, if you're not able to stay with us throughout the entire program, I want to make sure you know how to get our special resource right now. It can be yours for your donation this month to Alan Wright Ministries. So as you listen to today's message, go deeper as we send you this resource, today's special offer. Contact us at pastoralan.org. That's pastoralan.org, or call 877-544-4860.

That's 877-544-4860. More on this later in the program. But now, let's get started with today's teaching.

Here is Alan Wright. I said, I just wanted you to know that before the criticism comes. And I was so naive. I said, criticism? Who could criticize? All I did was lay hands on people and bless them. What?

I mean, they're not going to be, I said, I literally said, they don't be any criticism. He said, well, okay, I just wanted you to know. And then it started. And it didn't start from the people who had experienced it. It started from the people who hadn't experienced it and had heard that something had happened. I still to this day absolutely mystified as how somebody who goes to church and even as a leader in church could be mad if God himself moves in that church.

But it does happen a lot. And I say this with all real respect to even some of those dear ones that later we worked it through with. But it was a kind of form of persecution that really hurt me a lot because there were some who began to make fun of it. And that's a painful thing.

If you're used by God and then someone mocks your gift. And so it was painful. At the same time, I had been doing a training course on the ministry of healing and I had been teaching people about 50 people for a semester and was going to start a healing ministry in the church just to pray for people after the service. That's all I wanted to do. And there were several who came up in real opposition.

They were very afraid that it would be too charismatic looking or something or whatever. And so it was kind of being attacked. And all of this is going on and my soul is hurting with this. And I'll just be honest with you as a young man, it doesn't feel good to be experiencing that. And I'm trying to figure out, Lord, what do I do with this? Do I just sort of tone all this down?

How do I handle this? And there's that little part of you that just wants to quit acknowledging the Holy Spirit. And this is exactly what happened. I tell you this story for this reason. This is exactly what happened. I was going into my house one day into the front door and across the street my neighbors were saying goodbye to some friends who had obviously been visiting. And as they were seeing them get into the car, they were, you know how sometimes you'll say, see you later, and the person who's saying goodbye will kind of help close the door to the car. So they were seeing them into their car. And I'm just telling you, this is exactly what happened.

I could hear them talking, but it's fairly, it's caddy cornered across the street, but I couldn't hear it real out. But when the final words were spoken by my neighbors to their visitors, this is exactly what it was like. They yelled the words and I heard this as they were closing the door behind them, Luke 12 verse 8.

It went through my mind. I was like, I didn't even know they were Christian. You know, I didn't even, I mean, Luke 12 verse 8, but then almost in the same instant I really knew God had just hollered out a scripture to me. It's the only time this has ever happened in my whole life that God just had put a scripture out there. And so I raced into the house to look up Luke 12 verse 8. And when I read the words, I began to weep for the words of Luke 12 verse 8 say, I tell you everyone who acknowledges me before men, the son of man also will acknowledge before the angels of God. And I just wept for a long time because though I know that scripture was there and I have read that scripture before, the Holy Spirit made that scripture go into my heart in a way that it was like God himself was in the room and speaking to me. That's what I want the word of God to be to me every day.

And that's what I want for you. So the scripture, the truth of God, illumined by the spirit of truth. And if we have the word and we don't have the spirit, then we dry up.

We have no life in that word to us. Now let me just start by saying this. I, as you hopefully have detected, love the Bible. I don't worship the Bible, I worship Jesus, but I love, I love the scripture. The Bible is God-breathed. The Bible is so marvelous.

I just cannot say enough about how much I love the word of God. It's the only infallible rule of faith and practice. It's the primary source for the greatest art in the history of the world.

It is the inspiration of the finest music ever composed. Its verses are literally etched into the columns and corridors of our nation's capital. This book has been deemed so powerful that it is used in secular courtrooms as the proof of honesty when a witness gives his oath. It has been reckoned so influential that both Hitler and the devil misused it. It has been viewed so threatening that religious aristocracies have kept it from ordinary readers and governmental agencies have kept it from entering country borders.

It has been banned and burned and its translators have been killed. And through it all, the word of God stands. It's life-giving. It is imperishable and incorruptible.

It is utterly timeless and yet always timely. It is incomprehensible to the proud but readable to the simplest child. The Bible may be criticized. It may be misapplied. It may be debated, hated, or even rejected. But one thing is for sure, you cannot ignore this book for it is the best-selling book of all time.

I love this book. So understand that for me to say that if you only have the word you dry up, I don't mean this in the sense that you don't understand the vitality and how alive this word really is. I grew up in a highly liturgical church. And this now, as I have grown and matured, is in no way a criticism of the highly liturgical church.

And here's the case in point. The church I grew up in as a youth, I'm just giving you my perspective, no offense to all of my brethren and sistren who have been in these churches, but it was a whole lot of stand up, sit down, kneel, stand up, sit down, kneel, and the minister would sort of chant most of the service. So my experience of church was this was my main experience of scripture. As it was in the beginning is now and ever shall be. I mean, it's like even you get to those scriptures that would be like, you know, a song that's like, praise the Lord, O ye people, praise Him with the loud symbols, the clashing symbols.

I mean, it just, you know, it didn't, it just didn't match up. So it was a lot, there's a lot. Well, I just like, that's what the word, it just seemed so lifeless to me. Years later, however, my wife and I live in Atlanta, and we decided while I was in seminary, for a period of time, we went and attended a highly liturgical church. But man, it was such an alive church. They had all this vibrant music, people just worshiping, and when they would kneel and confess, people would weep, and when they would sing out this, you know, and they'd be like reciting the scriptures, and they'd be shouting them, and it was just like, same thing, but it was just a lie.

So it's not the style at all that I'm talking about. I'm talking about, I'm talking about if you become one of those who is like, I'm just sowing the word, I'm just going to be sowing the word, but you're never open to the Holy Spirit, it becomes pharisaical. This is what Jesus said. He said to the crowds and his disciples in Matthew 23, the scribes and the Pharisees sit on Moses's seat, so do and observe whatever they tell you, but not the works they do, for they preach but they do not practice.

See, that's the thing, the Holy Spirit wants to take the word and put it into practice in your life, but what a Pharisee wants to do is just say, I know the word better than you know the word, and you ought to do therefore what I say, but you got to understand that not only did the Pharisees quote the scripture and Jesus rebuked them, but the devil himself quoted the scriptures to Jesus. And so you can take it, you can misuse it, you can misapply it. If you have all word and no spirit, you dry up, but if you have all spirit and no word, then you're going to blow up.

That's Alan Wright, and we'll have more teaching in a moment from today's important series. All word, no spirit, you dry up. All spirit, no word, you blow up. Both word and spirit, you grow up. When you make a gift of support this month, we'll send you Alan Wright's newest audio album on CD or digital download titled Word and Spirit. It's about word and spirit.

It's about the beauty of balance. Embrace the fullness of God's word and his spirit and grow like never before. With word and spirit, you'll grow up and you'll be helping someone else grow as well. And remember, when you partner with Alan Wright Ministries, you'll be broadcasting the love of God to thousands every day. Call us at 877-544-4860.

That's 877-544-4860. Or come to our website, PastorAlan.org. Today's teaching now continues. Here once again is Alan Wright. If you have all word and no spirit, you dry up. But if you have all spirit and no word, then you're going to blow up.

Let me give you a couple examples of this. King Saul. I'm not going to take time to go back and read the text, but go check it out sometime for yourself and look back. The first king of Israel, the people of God, begged God for a king. We want a king like the other nations. And they just begged God. So finally he said, okay, if you want a king like the other nations have, and he gave him Saul. And Saul looked kingly. He was handsome. He was strong. He was a head taller than everyone else.

And here was the thing that was amazing about Saul. He was anointed by the Holy Spirit. He prophesied. He won battles under the unction of the Holy Spirit, but he had no character. He had no commitment to the word of God in his life. He had no substance.

He had no fruit in his life. So he was a man of the Spirit who had no word. And he became jealous of David. He became demonized. He became obsessed. He lost the throne because he disobeyed God. Had the Spirit.

Had no word. Another instance you might see in the Scripture is Paul in his conversation with the Corinthians. The Corinthian Christians were so full of the Holy Spirit. They had, they were so much emphasis on the gifts of the Spirit. They, it was just, it was just, I mean, their move in the Spirit, oh, it's just wonderful. But they had actual, Paul said, I actually hear of sexual immorality in your midst.

It's like, are you kidding me? How could this possibly be? He had to correct them. He had to correct the way they were doing their love feasts. They were going to love feasts and they were getting drunk. They were, some of them were even endorsing a kind of prostitution as part of their spirituality.

He was able to correct that. It's just like, I can't even believe I'm having to tell you these things. Because the fact of the matter is it just makes no sense if you have the Holy Spirit, how you wouldn't have a love for the word of God and how you wouldn't want to become more and more obedient to God. The worst instance is of course, Spirit, no word, where it becomes something like a cult. Do you know the famous Jim Jones cult and the mass suicide, all that began, Jim Jones at first, by many evangelical leaders, they thought he was part of kind of a fourth wave of the move of God in our country. And many influential leaders met with him and they began to have all of this sense of revelation that was just in addition to the Bible.

And next thing you know, you had a cult. You got all word, no spirit. You drive, you got all spirit, no word, you blow up. But if you have spirit and word, then you grow up. And I just want to give testimony to this that what I've experienced is that the more that I'm full of the Holy Spirit, the more I love the word of God. I cannot for the life of me imagine being full of the Holy Spirit and not loving the very word that the spirit of truth has inspired. I just love, love the word. And the more that I'm in the word, the more that I just yearn for the power and presence of the Holy Spirit in my life. I love the presence of the Holy Spirit in my life. He is the giver of gifts and the giver of fruit.

He is the one who empowers us for ministry and builds character that is consistent with the word of God. Someone has said that to be a Christian is to be armed like a police officer is. You have a badge, which is authority, and you have a gun, which is dunamis power. And so it's like you've got the word and you've got the spirit.

But my problem was if I was a police officer for so much of my Christian life, I felt like Barney Fife. You know, I mean, it's like, yeah, I got the spirit, but it's like, yeah, but ain't no bullets in that thing. I mean, I just got nothing.

I got nothing. Some of you can identify with that. It's like a little bit like John, when do we get to do when do we get to do this stuff? When does all this stuff that's in the Bible, when does that apply to us?

And some people say, well, it just doesn't apply. And I'd say, well, that's an easy way out because it's never called upon you then to experience something deeper and richer of God. But the fact of the matter is that I had for me three big personal problems as I was thinking about all this as a person who was more of the word than of the spirit. And the first was that without any inward or outward confirmations from the spirit, I was left as a young man wondering, is it all true? In other words, you read all of this in the scripture of miraculous things and you read of love and joy and peace. Even in the face of adversity, I wasn't experiencing and I wasn't experiencing some of the victory over sin. And I certainly wasn't experiencing seeing the sick healed or seeing how God could speak prophetically through somebody.

I wasn't experiencing any of those things. And so if you never experience in the spirit what you see in the word, what I'm just saying is the tempter can use this to make you start asking the question, the question is the word even true? Here's the second problem I had was that if you don't have the spirit confirming the word, then it makes the word seem harsh and unreasonable. Imagine telling somebody love your neighbor as yourself.

I want you to love other people with just love them and care for them the way you'd care for yourself. Imagine just telling somebody to rejoice in the Lord, just rejoice always even when you're going through difficult times. Imagine telling somebody that they need to forgive those that have hurt them seven times, seventy times.

Imagine telling people all this stuff and yet there's no power for them to do it. If so, it just leaves you hurting and frustrated and confused like I've got all these instructions of impossible things that I cannot possibly do by my own strength. The third dilemma that I had in this was I began to realize that though the word is infallible and had all that I needed for salvation and life, that I needed this word to guide me in a supernatural way and to move me in ways that I couldn't just get simply from words on the page.

I mean, they're just things that, like my brother David one time, when his boy, Coba, was young, they were pulling into a fast food restaurant just to pull up and go through the drive-through one Saturday. And as David just pulled into the parking lot, he said something inside him, it was the Holy Spirit, just said, get out of there. Never had something like that happen for you. It was just a prompting. It was just a prompting. It was just leave.

And he pulled out of the parking lot and as he did, he heard gunshots and later found out the place was robbed and people were shot inside on that very day. Where does that come from? That's the Holy Spirit. And what I'm just saying is that for the Holy Spirit to say something like that to David was not extra biblical revelation, it was the fulfillment of biblical revelation of the God who says I'm with you and I'll never leave you and never forsake you. It was fulfillment of Psalm 91. It's a fulfillment of the protective promises of God. It's a fulfillment of what Jesus said to the disciples, the Spirit of truth will lead you into all truth. And the truth was you're not supposed to be in this parking lot right now, get out of here.

You see? And so it doesn't say in the Bible, don't go to a McDonald's parking lot on a Saturday. But on that day, the Spirit said, get out. I just realized I was yearning for this. I wanted to have this kind of dynamism in my relationship with God. And I was a young man in college.

And you know, it's interesting how people come to new growth in their spiritual life, but so often it comes because something has made you more hungry for God than you were before. And what happened in my life is I'd been dating the same girl for about six years. Everybody thought we'd get married. We thought we'd get married. And as I matured, it became apparent to me, we weren't supposed to get married.

And when I called off the relationship, it not only hurt her, it hurt me. And a whole way of life changed for me. And I was hurting and I was searching and I was feeling guilty and I needed God. And I needed to know that everything that I had read in the scriptures and everything that I'd counted on, I needed to know it was real.

And I just got by myself one Christmas break. And as a college student, got home alone in my little room and I started calling out to God like I'd never called out to God before. I guess you'd just say I was more surrendered. I wouldn't say that I got more of the Holy Spirit that day, but I'd say the Holy Spirit sure did get more of me. I'd say that something happened to me that day and I began to experience the gifts of the Spirit. I began to experience what it was to have a prayer life with God in which it was suddenly passionate. I had a new passion for the Word of God. And I'll tell you, one of the greatest signs I ever had of the infilling of the Holy Spirit in my life was my mother had been telling me for weeks to please what I clean out the gutters of the house.

And I had been putting it off and I got up and I said, what am I going to do with myself? And I went and cleaned the gutters with joy in my heart. If you clean the gutters with joy in your heart, you got the Holy Spirit. And so, everybody's got different evidence for the Holy Spirit, that's mine. And what I'm just saying to you is that everything in my life has been completely transformed because of coming into a new awareness of the power and the presence of the Holy Spirit, who is never separate from His Word, but always filling His Word, always illuminating His Word, so that I don't have concern because of balance. I don't have concern that if I surrender to the Spirit that I'm going to become a nut. I don't have concern that if I dig deeply into the Word of God and study through and through that I'm going to become dry. Because the Spirit of God fills this Word, and this Word in every way makes you hunger for the Spirit of God. If you've got the Word and no Spirit, you might just dry up. If you've got the Spirit and no Word, you might just blow up. But if you get Spirit and Word, you will grow up. And that's the Gospel.

Allen Wright. And that's an encouraging word today. And our conclusion of this teaching, Word and Spirit, in the middle of the series, The Beauty of Balance. Allen is back in a moment with additional insight on this for your life and a final word. Though some traditions emphasize studying Scripture and some traditions emphasize the Spirit, the path to real Christian growth is the fullness of both Word and Spirit. When you make a gift of support this month, we'll send you Allen Wright's newest audio album on CD or digital download titled Word and Spirit.

It's about the beauty of balance. Embrace the fullness of God's Word and His Spirit and grow like never before. With Word and Spirit, you'll grow up and you'll be helping someone else grow as well. And remember, when you partner with Allen Wright Ministries, you'll be broadcasting the love of God to thousands every day.

Or come to our website, pastorallen.org. So Allen, I'm motivated. I want to grow up. And so often we can maybe misuse that and then say, okay, well, now we've got to work at it.

How do we strike this balance without it turning again back into what we so often as people will do is turn it into a formula? I know. It's like, well, let's see. I've got today. I moved in the Spirit. Tomorrow I'll speak time and the Word. I think the secret here, what we're trying to say, Daniel, is that really, when you're in the Word, you're in the Spirit. And if you're in the Spirit, you're in the Word. And I think that what this means is that we are open to God and aware that He has spoken in His Word and that He is at work through His Word by the power of His Holy Spirit. And that when the Spirit moves in your life, that it's utterly consistent with God's Word. And I think that's the key here is we don't make a formula out of it or a work out of it, but we flow with it, Word and Spirit. Today's good news message is a listener supported production of Allen Wright Ministries.