John Chapter 14:16-19

You may be sitting there going, filled with the Holy Spirit. You know, I've seen some guys on television that were got really, really weird and they were talking about the Holy Spirit. I've seen some people get really, really weird about what they term as Christianity. But I'm not gonna let that drive me away from the truth and the reality of God. So just because you've seen some weirdness, and I've seen stuff had nothing to do with the Holy Spirit, but somehow they blamed him. I've seen some weird stuff, but I'm not going to pull back from the experience with the Holy Spirit just because some people have gotten off and left field. And it's amazing to me that the Holy Spirit who talks about keeping the unity of the Spirit has become one of the most divisive issues in the evangelical Christianity today.

That's an amazing thing to me. It must grieve the Holy Spirit. Welcome to Cross the Bridge with David Magee. David is the senior pastor of the bridge in Kernersville, North Carolina. Today, we're blessed to have one of David Magee's associate pastors here with us. Pastor D.A., are we supposed to ask the Holy Spirit to fill us?

Bob, it's great to be here. As believers, we should be filled with the Holy Spirit. Today, Pastor David explains what this means as he continues in the Gospel of John chapter 14. Now, here's David Magee with part two of his teaching, in Jesus' name. John chapter 14, verse 16.

And I will pray the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may abide with you forever. Now, the word Comforter here, or Helper, Comforter in the King James, Helper in the New King James, is the Greek word parakletis. Now, Comforter is an interesting word too, because comfort, it comes from two words. Com, meaning alongside, fortis, or fort, means strength. It means with strength. See, when comfort, we think warm, fuzzy, pat on the back.

Yeah, it's that, but it's a whole lot more. It's coming along somebody else with strength in their moment of weakness. And that's what we're called to do. And this is what it's saying the Holy Spirit will do. Remember that, next time you're called upon to comfort somebody, and be careful that you're coming alongside them with strength, and that you're not necessarily, well, let me speak frankly.

Don't just enter into the pity party, but really love them and show them the strength of the Lord in that moment of need. In verse 17, the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees Him nor knows Him, but you know Him, for He dwells with you and will be in you. The ministry of the Holy Spirit is probably one of the least understood ministries of the Godhead. There's a lot of unbiblical teaching. There's a lot of stuff that has nothing to do with the ministry of the Holy Spirit that's laid out in Scripture. So what we want to do is for the moment, if you can, I know that you've probably had different experiences and different teachings about the Holy Spirit, but this morning, please kind of put that all behind you, and let's see what the word of God has to say about the Holy Spirit. One of the reasons error comes in is that the whole counsel of Scripture is not taught concerning the ministry of the Holy Spirit. In other words, you take one little verse and go, oh yeah, see this, let's apply this to everything, instead of saying, let's see what the Holy Spirit, the ministry of the Holy Spirit has to say.

The Bible has to say about these things. I'm going to introduce you to three Greek phrases. I don't stress a lot of original language stuff, but this is going to be important. These three words are para, and if you're a student of the Bible, you may want to jot these down. Para, which means alongside of, and en, E-N, which means in you, and epi, which means to be upon you or to be filled to overflowing, filled to overflowing. Those are the three Greek words that describe our relationship with the Holy Spirit.

Para, which means alongside of, en, which means in you, epi, which means to be upon you or filled to overflowing. Before conversion, the Holy Spirit is alongside of you. When you're an unbeliever, the Holy Spirit is not dwelling in you, and I'll tell you why. Because God cannot reside where there is sin. So if you're an unbeliever, somebody that's never asked for the forgiveness of your sins, then the Holy Spirit can't reside in you.

Now, I know that this flies. Some people go, well, everybody's got a little bit of spirit of God in them. I don't see that in the Bible. That's like the saying, well, everybody is God's children. Again, I don't see that in the Bible. Jesus told some people, he said, you're your father of the devil.

So apparently there's two fatherhoods going on anyway. So alongside, this is the relationship that you also see in the Hebrew scriptures, come alongside. See, this is why David prayed a prayer, and he said, creating me a new heart, oh God, take not from me your Holy Spirit. There's a worship song that sings that. We don't do it here. You know why?

Because it doesn't apply anymore. See, when it's in this relationship, then you can say, don't take your Holy Spirit from me. But once God gives you the Holy Spirit, he's not going to jerk it back.

He's not going to take it from you. That's old covenant. You can grieve the spirit in things you do, things you say.

So this is para, alongside. Then we have the en, E-N, and that's when the Holy Spirit is in you. This happens at conversion, when you ask the Lord to forgive you of your sins. Now we're going to dig into scriptures here in just a moment, and I'm going to show you the next event that happens, and that is the epi. And that is when you are filled to overflowing. That's what we want.

We want this epi experience. We want to be filled. Now to be filled, what do you got to do? You got to ask the Lord to fill you.

You got to take it in. I talked about the para. That again is the relationship somebody doesn't know Jesus, that's never asked for the forgiveness of their sins, has with the Holy Spirit. And here is one of the primary ministries of the Holy Spirit to convict of sin, to convict somebody that doesn't know the Lord of their sin. Now some of you going, I never heard that as a ministry of the Holy Spirit. It's in the Bible. It talks about it in John 16, chapter 16 talks about it in other places. That is when you're convicted of your sins, and perhaps you can remember when you sat in the service, perhaps it was here, perhaps it wasn't that long ago, when you sat in the service and you thought, you know what, I need what he's talking about.

I'm sitting here and I've got my sins and I don't know what to do and I don't know how to deal with this. That was the ministry of the Holy Spirit convicting you or convincing you of your sin. That's not some revelation you came to without the work of the Holy Spirit. That's something the Holy Spirit was convincing you of. And keep in mind, that is the ministry of the Holy Spirit. That's not your ministry. I'm gonna go from preaching to meddling now, huh? See, because here's what sometimes we think. We think we have to convict somebody of their sins.

You can't do that. You cannot convince somebody of their need for Jesus. That is a work of the Holy Spirit. You can be used, the words that you speak as the Holy Spirit speaks through you can be used to draw them to himself, but that is a work of the Holy Spirit. And you know what?

He does a beautiful job. You know, as a young believer, John 3 16, for God so loved the world and John 3 17, for God did not send his son into the world to condemn the world. I thought, well, there's my ministry.

I'll do it. I'll condemn them. I got me the ministry of condemnation. Praise God. Some people think that's their ministry. God's not condemning enough people.

I'll go around and do it. He doesn't know any better, I guess. And we set apart to go and condemn, but you know what? That's not God. That is not God. See, and this is the beautiful thing. You may sit and share Jesus with somebody and talk about verses and talk about their needing Jesus. And at some point that conversation ends and then they turn around and they walk off. Now you can't go to their house and knock on their door or knock on their window late at night going, repent, repent.

You can't, well, you can't do that legally. Okay? But the Holy Spirit not only can, but will. He'll keep them up at night. You need Jesus. He'll wake them up in the morning. Something's not right. You're missing something.

This is not all there is. He'll speak to them. He'll be faithful. He'll be faithful to convict them of their sins. That is one of the primary ministries of the Holy Spirit to those who don't yet know Him. Then when you ask for the forgiveness of your sins, the Holy Spirit, the relationship changes from that para to the en, to the en, and then you have the Holy Spirit in you. John chapter 20, verse 21. So Jesus said to them, peace to you as the Father has sent me, I also send you. Verse 22, and when He had said this, He breathed on them and said to them, receive the Holy Spirit. Now before this point, this is after the resurrection, before this point in time, the men could not receive the forgiveness of their sins, so the Holy Spirit could not be in them. But once they receive the forgiveness of their sins, then the Holy Spirit could be in them. And certainly when Jesus said, receive the Holy Spirit, what do you think happened? They received the Holy Spirit.

They got the Holy Spirit. Now many of us stop there and go, okay, well, okay, so I got it when I was forgiven. Now wait a minute.

Wait a minute. John chapter 20, right after the resurrection, is before the book of Acts. It's not only before the book of Acts in the sequence of events in the Bible, it's before time wise. So after Jesus told them to receive the Holy Spirit, Jesus says to them in Acts chapter one, verse eight, but you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you. There we have the epi word. And you shall be witnesses to me in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria and to the end of the earth.

The word there, it means filled to overflowing. And again, this verse comes after the verse in John. Now, you know, a lot of us, we hear that verse and we go power. Power's good. I want power.

Everybody wants power, right? But the emphasis not on the power, it's on the Holy Spirit. And what you'll hear me say, you notice I'm saying he, when I refer to the Holy Spirit, not it. Don't refer to the Holy Spirit as it. Use the proper, it's not it, it's he. There is a power that's needed for us to be witnesses.

There is a power for us to live our everyday life as Christians that we so desperately need. It's like, I don't know if you've ever heard this joke, this guy calls a guy and he goes, you know, I understand you got a chainsaw for sale? And he said, yeah. He says, well, it's a good chainsaw. He says, it's a great chainsaw. He said, how many trees in a day can you cut down with that chainsaw?

He said, about 20. 20 trees in one day? God said, yeah.

God, got to see it. So he goes over, guy shows him the chainsaw and goes, okay, I'll take it. You know, he takes it, goes back home, calls the guy like a week later and goes, this chainsaw is not working out. He said, you know, I can't cut more than one tree a day.

And he said, one tree a day? I'll come over. Let me come over and I'll help you out, you know? So he goes over to the guy's house. He opens the case. He takes the chainsaw out and he pulls the string and the chainsaw starts up and the guy goes, what's that noise? See, the guy had been sitting there with a chainsaw that wasn't running, sawing on the tree going, gee, this thing's not doing what it's supposed to do. Reminds me of a lot of Christians. What's that noise?

It's a power. We'll be right back with more from David McGee on Cross the Bridge. Right now, here's a word from associate pastor D.A.

Brown. We want to take just a minute to pray for seven cities in our listening audience. South Portsmouth, Westport, Kentucky, Baton Rouge, Denham Springs, Erwinville, Heflin, and Jennings, Louisiana. Lord, thank you for these cities. Thank you for those mayors, the police chiefs, the government officials, the town councils. Lord, we pray that you would give them wisdom and discernment. We pray that they would look to your word for advice on how to lead. Lord, help us to be praying for them consistently and be a place of encouragement, not division in their lives. Father, anyone in these cities who hasn't yet put their trust in you, we pray that you would convince them and encourage them to recognize how much you love them, so much that you died on the cross for them. And Lord, we pray for revival in each one of these cities. In Jesus' name, amen. Amen.

Thank you, brother. And now, let's get back to David McGee as he continues teaching verse by verse. Acts 19, verse 2 says, he said unto them, and this is Paul, he says, Have you received the Holy Ghost since you believed? And they said unto him, We have not so much as heard whether there be any Holy Ghost.

Now, many people find themselves in this position. What do you mean, received the Holy Spirit? Oh, I hadn't even heard that you need to receive the Holy Spirit. And many people teach that you don't need to ask the Lord to fill you with the Holy Spirit.

Now, wait a minute, wait a minute. That's not good Bible. And I've had discussions with people that took this stance, and from a scriptural standpoint, it is extremely, extremely weak. You can't get that from this book, that we're not supposed to ask for the Holy Spirit, that God no longer fills people with the Holy Spirit.

It's called dispensationalism. I disagree with it because it's not a biblical concept. Now, and in terms of that, in terms of the promise of the Holy Spirit, Acts 2 verse 39 says, For the promise is to you and your children and to all who are far off, as many as the Lord our God will call.

Now, let me ask you a question. Where in that verse do you see that at some point God's not going to fill people with the Holy Spirit anymore? The verse that people say that God doesn't fill people with the Spirit anymore is in 1 Corinthians 13. You can read it for yourself. And you know what? If you read it and on your own, you go, well, that's what this verse means.

Call me, email me, please. Chances are you will not see it in there, that somebody else has to say, well, you know, this is a verse that really says that. And it reminds me of that saying, if you torture the data, it will confess. Meaning you can get any scripture if you bend it hard enough to say what it is you want to, but you're going to be ripping it out of context. The life lesson here is we should be filled with the Spirit. We should be filled with the Holy Spirit. We should have this experience of asking for the Holy Spirit, and we should ask every day after that, Lord, fill me again, a daily renewal of the Holy Spirit.

See, because this is what happens. Either people say, yeah, that daily feeling is cool, but that one-time experience is not, or people say that one-time experience is great, but you don't need a daily feeling. Wait a minute, scripture teaches both. Ephesians chapter five, verse 18 says, be filled with the Spirit. So I want to encourage you, I want to encourage you to ask the Lord to fill you with the Holy Spirit.

And I understand some of you may have some fear, and even when I said that, you may have some anxieties. You may be sitting there going, filled with the Holy Spirit. You know, I've seen some guys on television that were, got really, really weird, and they were talking about the Holy Spirit. I've seen some people get really, really weird about what they term as Christianity, but I'm not going to let that drive me away from the truth and the reality of God. So just because you've seen some weirdness, and I've seen stuff, had nothing to do with the Holy Spirit, but somehow they blamed him. I've seen some weird stuff, but I'm not going to pull back from the experience with the Holy Spirit just because some people have gotten off and left field.

And you know what? Jesus understood that this would be an anxious thing, that this would be a fearful thing. And it's amazing to me that the Holy Spirit who talks about keeping the unity of the Spirit has become one of the most divisive issues in evangelical Christianity today.

That's an amazing thing to me. It must grieve the Holy Spirit. And perhaps you're sitting there and you're thinking, well, yeah, but I don't know. If we really needed to ask for the Holy Spirit, wouldn't Jesus tell us to ask for the Holy Spirit? Well, let me ask you a question. If we knew, if we could figure out that Jesus did point us towards that, point us towards asking for the Holy Spirit, can we be in agreement that we need to ask for the Holy Spirit?

Can we do that? Luke 11, verse 11 says, if a son asks for bread from any father among you, will he give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will he give him a serpent instead of a fish? Or if he asks for an egg, will he offer him a scorpion? If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask Him?

There it is, guys. Jesus told us that He'll give us the Holy Spirit if we ask for it. Now, I know what's going on in some of your heads and some of your hearts right now.

You're going, I've never heard this. I've never been told I need to ask for the Holy Spirit. You know, we go verse by verse, so as we're looking at this scripture, as we're looking at this passage, I'm going to teach on it. Now, we're not going to get into the gifts and those sorts of things today. We're going to be in Acts soon, and we'll be talking all about the gifts, but right now, let's talk about the giver.

The giver. God wants to give us the Holy Spirit. Why wouldn't we ask for it? What legitimate reason might you have this morning for not asking for the Holy Spirit? If you've got a legitimate one, there's no legitimate reason.

See, the ones that you'd come up with, well, I saw the guy on television. I'm sorry. That's not a legitimate reason. Again, I've seen people grossly misrepresent Christianity before. That didn't mean that God wasn't true or that Jesus wasn't true or that being saved wasn't a biblical fact.

It just meant they got off track. So this is something that we need to ask for. And if you get questions, we don't get offended by questions here.

We're not trying to hide anything. We are trying to be as open as we can, and we will point to the book. We won't whip out a manual from headquarters going, well, this little manual from headquarters tells us we're supposed to, no, we're going to point to the book and say, this is what the book says. The book says be filled with the Spirit. The book says we're supposed to ask for it.

We're supposed to ask for it. That should be enough. If you're wanting to follow Jesus and believe the word of God, that should be enough. Verse 18, I will not leave you orphans. I will come to you.

The Greek word is orphanos. If you're in the King James, you probably have comfortless. I will not leave you comfortless.

So the New King James is a little closer. I will not leave you orphans. I will come to you.

What a sweet thing. Jesus is with his disciples, and he's picking up. They're afraid. They're worried, and he's going, don't be worried.

Don't worry. I'm going away, but I'm going to be back. And he says, I'm not going to leave you like an orphan. Isn't that a beautiful thing? Do you understand that concept for us?

Let's read verse 19. We'll come back. A little while longer, and the world will see me no more, but you will see me because I live.

You will live also. Let me go back to the orphan thing because there's just something that, to me, is really beautiful in this. As I was studying one day, I spent some time and just kind of contemplated this. Romans chapter eight talks about us being adopted. Now, for some of you, that's a special significance. For others of us that maybe were born into a traditional family, it doesn't ring true.

So let me take a couple minutes, and let's get the picture. Let's say that you're a orphan because, in fact, we all were orphans spiritually, and you're in the orphanage, and people come by, and they pick the children they want to take home. Day after day, you get excited. You come into the room because you know that somebody is going to be chosen, and you keep hoping it's you. So you show up, and you run in there, and you're hoping it's you. Day after day, you're not the one that gets chosen.

Somebody else is. Day after day, this goes on to the point that when you hear that somebody's coming, you don't even get excited anymore. You don't even really want to show up, but you're supposed to.

You got to, so you go, and somebody else gets chosen every time. And then one day, you hear that the best father in the world is coming. The best father that's ever been seen by the orphanage has the cattle on a thousand hills, more love than anybody can imagine, and he shows up. And with your disillusioned and cynical heart, you go to that room, and to your amazement, his eyes meet yours, and he says, I want that one.

And in your mind, you're thinking, there's better kids here to choose. He says, no, I want you. While you were yet being formed in the womb, I knew you, and now I'm choosing you. He's not going to leave you as an orphan. He wants to adopt you into his family.

Oh, he knows. He knows all the bad things you've done and the stuff that's happened in your life, but he still wants to adopt you. And because Jesus lives, we can have life. He wants to give you life. It's interesting when we tried to find life and so many different things and success or drugs or alcohol, you know, we knew we were dead in our sins.

It's a very accurate description, isn't it? But you know what? It doesn't have to be that way, because if you're here this morning and you're hearing what I'm saying, the Lord's giving you another chance. Friend, do you know for sure that your sins have been forgiven?

You can know right now. I want to lead you in a short, simple prayer, simply telling God you're sorry and asking Him to help you to live for Him. Now, God wants you to pray this prayer so much that He died to give you the opportunity and the ability to ask Him to forgive you.

Please pray this prayer with me out loud, right now. Dear Jesus, I believe you died for me, that I could be forgiven. And I believe you were raised from the dead, that I could have a new life. And I've done wrong things. I have sinned. And I'm sorry. Please forgive me of all those things. I have sinned.

And I'm sorry. Please forgive me of all those things. Please give me the power to live for you all of my days. In Jesus' name.

Amen. Friend, if you prayed that prayer, according to the Bible, you've been forgiven. You've been born again. Jesus said He would not turn anybody away who comes to Him.

And He came for those people who knew they needed forgiveness, those who were sick, not the righteous. So congratulations, friend. You just made the greatest decision that you will ever make. God bless you. If you prayed that prayer with David for the first time, we'd love to hear from you. You can visit crossthebridge.com to receive our First Steps package with helpful resources to help you begin your walk with Christ.

Or you can write to Cross the Bridge at P.O. Box 12515, Winston-Salem, North Carolina, 27117, and share how God is working in your life. You know, the Bible tells us that the free gift of God is eternal life in Jesus Christ our Lord. But it does cost for us to come and bring that message to you and to others in your neighborhood through radio, through the internet, and through the mobile technologies that God has gifted us to be able to use. So if you'd like to support this ministry, please go to crossthebridge.com, click on the donate button, and ask God how much He would have you give, either on a one-time basis or a continuing basis each month to help ensure that the teaching of God's Word continues to go out through Cross the Bridge.

Thank you so much. Well, DA, before we go, what are some ways that we can bless our listeners? Each day you can wake up with encouragement from Pastor David through the Word of God with his email devotional, life lessons to consider, a daily reading plan, and a thought to meditate on throughout your day from the heart of David McGee. Thanks again for listening, and join us next time as David McGee continues teaching verse by verse in the Gospel of John.