The Holy Spirit

Come Holy Spirit, Heavenly Dove

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, prayer, promises, Sovereignty of God, The Holy Spirit Leave a comment

He shall receive of Mine, and shall shew it unto you. – John 16:14

Beloved, the practical lesson for us to learn is this, let us try to abide under the influence of the Holy Spirit. To that end, let us think very reverently of Him. Some never think of Him at all. How many sermons there are without even an allusion to Him! Shame on the preachers of such discourses! If any hearers come without praying for the Holy Spirit, shame on such hearers! We know and we confess that He is everything to our spiritual life; then why do we not remember Him with greater love, and worship Him with greater honour, and think of Him continually with greater reverence? Beware of committing the sin against the Holy Ghost. If any of you feel any gentle touches of His power when you are hearing a sermon, beware lest you harden your heart against it. Whenever the sacred fire comes as but a spark, quench not the Holy Spirit, but pray that the spark may become a flame. And you, Christian people, do cry to Him that you may not read your Bibles without His light. Do not pray without being helped by the Spirit; above all, may you never preach without the Holy Spirit! It seems a pity when a man asks to be guided of the Spirit in his preaching, and then pulls out a manuscript, and reads it. The Holy Spirit may bless what he reads; but He cannot very well guide him when he has tied himself down to what he has written. And it will be the same with the speaker if he only repeats what he has learnt, and leaves no room for the Spirit to give him a new thought, a fresh revelation of Christ; how can he hope for the divine blessing under such circumstances?

“Come Holy Spirit, heavenly Dove,”

I cannot help breaking out into that prayer, “Blessed Spirit, abide with us, take of the things of Christ, and show them to us, that so Christ may be glorified.” ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/2382.cfm

Our Teacher, the Holy Spirit

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, promises, Sovereignty of God, The Holy Spirit Leave a comment

Howbeit when He, the Spirit of truth, is come, He will guide you into all truth – John 16:13

It is wonderful how the Holy Spirit can take a fool, and make him know the wonders of Christ’s dying love; and he does make him know it very quickly when he begins to teach him. Some of us have been very slow learners, yet the Holy Spirit has been able to teach something even to us. He opens the Scriptures, and He also opens our minds; and when there are these two openings together, what a wonderful opening it is! It becomes like a new revelation; the first is the revelation of the letter, which we have in the Book; the second is the revelation of the Spirit, which we get in our own spirit. O my dear friend, if the Holy Ghost has ever enlightened your understanding, you know what it is for Him to show the things of Christ to you!

The Holy Ghost sometimes shows Christ to us by His power of vivifying the truth. I do not know whether I can quite tell you what I mean; but I have sometimes seen a truth differently from what I have ever seen it before. I knew it long ago, I owned it as part of the divine revelation; but now I realize it, grip it, grasp it, or what is better, it seems to get a grip of me, and hold me in its mighty hands. Have you not sometimes been overjoyed with a promise which never seemed anything to you before? Or a doctrine, which you believed, but never fully appreciated, has suddenly become to you a gem of the first water, a very Koh-I-Noor, or, “Mountain of Light.” The Holy Spirit has a way of focussing light, and when it falls in this special way upon a certain point, then the truth is revealed to us. He shall take of the things of Christ, and show them unto you. Have you never felt ready to jump for joy, ready to start from your seat, ready to sit up in your bed at night, and sing praises to God through the overpowering influence of some grand old truth which has seemed to be all at once quite new to you? ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/2382.cfm

A Plain Christ is Ever the Loveliest Christ

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, promises, Sovereignty of God, The Holy Spirit 4 Comments

For He shall receive of Mine, and shall shew it unto you. – John 16:14

When the Holy Spirit wants to glorify Christ, what does He do? He does not go abroad for anything, He comes to Christ Himself for that which will be for Christ’s own glory: “He shall glorify Me: for He shall receive of Mine, and shall shew it unto you.” There can be no glory added to Christ; it must be His own glory, which He has already, which is made more apparent to the hearts of God’s chosen by the Holy Spirit.

Christ needs no new inventions to glorify Him. “We have struck out a new line of things,” says one. Have you? “We have found out something very wonderful.” I dare say you have; but Christ, the same yesterday, to-day, and for ever, wants none of your inventions, or discoveries, or additions to His truth. A plain Christ is ever the loveliest Christ. Dress Him up, and you have deformed Him and defamed Him. Bring Him out just as He is, the Christ of God, nothing else but Christ, unless you bring in His cross, for we preach Christ crucified; indeed, you cannot have the Christ without the cross; but preach Christ crucified, and you have given Him all the glory that He wants. The Holy Ghost does not reveal in these last times any fresh ordinances, or any novel doctrines, or any new evolutions; but He simply brings to mind the things which Christ Himself spoke, He brings Christ’s own things to us, and in that way glorifies Him.

Think for a minute of Christ’s person as revealed to us by the Holy Spirit. What can more glorify Him than for us to see His person, very God of very God, and yet as truly man? What a wondrous being, as human as ourselves, but as divine as God! Was there ever another like to him? Never. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/2382.cfm

Have an Eye to this Truth in all Comforts

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, promises, salvation, Sovereignty of God, The Holy Spirit Leave a comment

“He shall glorify Me.” – John 16:14

I want you to keep this truth in your mind, and never to forget it; that which does not glorify Christ is not of the Holy Spirit, and that which is of the Holy Spirit invariably glorifies our Lord Jesus Christ.

Have an eye to this truth in all comforts. If a comfort which you think you need, and which appears to you to be very sweet, does not glorify Christ, look very suspiciously upon it. If, in conversing with an apparently religious man, he prates about truth which he says is comforting, but which does not honour Christ, do not have anything to do with it. It is a poisonous sweet; it may charm you for a moment, but it will ruin your soul for ever if you partake of it. But blessed are those comforts which smell of Christ, those consolations in which there is a fragrance of myrrh, and aloes, and cassia, out of the King’s palace, the comfort drawn from His person, from His work, from His blood, from His resurrection, from His glory, the comfort directly fetched from that sacred spot where He trod the wine-press alone. This is wine of which you may drink, and forget your misery, and be unhappy no more; but always look with great suspicion upon any comfort offered to you, either as a sinner or a saint, which does not come distinctly from Christ. Say, “I will not be comforted till Jesus comforts me. I will refuse to lay aside my despondency until He removes my sin. I will not go to Mr. Civility, or Mr. Legality, for the unloading of my burden; no hands shall ever lift the load of conscious sin from off my heart but those that were nailed to the cross, when Jesus Himself bore my sins in His own body on the tree.” Please carry this truth with you wherever you go, as a kind of spiritual litmus paper, by which you may test everything that is presented to you as a cordial or comfort. If it does not glorify Christ, let it not console or please you. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/2382.cfm

Glorifying Christ

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, promises, salvation, Sovereignty of God, The Holy Spirit 3 Comments

He shall take of Mine, and shall shew it unto you. – John 16:15

There are great movements in the world every now and then; we are inclined to look upon them hopefully, for any stir is better than stagnation; but, by-and-by, we begin to fear, with a holy jealousy, what their effects will be. How shall we judge them? To what test shall we put them? Always to this test: does this movement glorify Christ? Is Christ preached? Then therein I do rejoice, yea, and will rejoice. Are men pointed to Christ? Then this is the ministry of salvation. Is He preached as first and last? Are men bidden to be justified by faith in Him, and then to follow Him, and copy His divine example? It is well. I do not believe that any man ever lifted up the cross of Christ in a hurtful way. If it be but the cross that is seen, it is the sight of the cross, not of the hands that lift it, that will bring salvation. Some modern movements are heralded with great noise, and some come quietly; but if they glorify Christ, it is well. But dear friends, if it is some new theory that is propounded, if it is some old error revived, if it is something very glittering and fascinating, and for a while it bears the multitudes away, think nothing of it; unless it glorifies Christ it is not for you and me.

May the Holy Spirit come at this moment, and come at all times whenever His servants are trying to glorify Christ, and Himself do what must always be His own work! How can you and I glorify anybody, much less glorify Him who is infinetly glorious? But the Holy Ghost, being Himself the glorious God, can glorify the glorious Christ. It is a work worthy of God; and it shows us, when we think of it, the absolute need of our crying to the Holy Spirit that He would take us in His hand, and use us as a workman uses his hammer. What can a hammer do without the hand that grasps it, and what can we do without the Spirit of God? ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/2382.cfm

The Chief Office of the Holy Spirit

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, promises, salvation, Sovereignty of God, The Father, The Holy Spirit Leave a comment

“He shall glorify Me: for He shall receive of Mine, and shall shew it unto you. All things that the Father hath are Mine: therefore said I, that He shall take of Mine, and shall show it unto you” -John 16:14-15

Observe, that the Holy Ghost glorifies Christ by showing to us the things of Christ. It is a great marvel that there should be any glory given to Christ by showing Him to such poor creatures as we are. What! To make us see Christ, does that glorify Him? For our weak eyes to behold Him, for our trembling hearts to know Him, and to love Him, does this glorify Him? It is even so, for the Holy Ghost chooses this as His principal way of glorifying the Lord Jesus. He takes of the things of Christ, not to show them to angels, not to write them in letters of fire across the brow of night, but to show them unto us. Within the little temple of a sanctified heart, Christ is praised, not so much by what we do, or think, as by what we see. This puts great value upon meditation, upon the study of God’s Word, and upon silent thought under the teaching of the Holy Spirit, for Jesus says, “He shall glorify Me: for He shall receive of Mine, and shall shew it unto you.”

Poor sinner, conscious of your sin, it is possible for Christ to be glorified by Him being shown unto you. If you look to Him, if you see Him to be a suitable Saviour, an all-sufficient Saviour, if your mind’s eye takes Him in, if He is effectually shown to you by the Holy Spirit, He is thereby glorified. Sinner as you are, unworthy apparently to become the arena of Christ’s glory, yet shall you be a temple in which the King’s glory shall be revealed, and you poor heart, like a mirror, shall reflect His grace. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/2382.cfm

 

Partakers of the Divine Nature

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, promises, salvation, Sovereignty of God, The Holy Spirit Leave a comment

Whereby are given unto us exceeding great and precious promises: that by these ye might be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust. 2 Peter 1:4

We are, by grace, made like God. “God is love;” we become love-“He that loveth is born of God.” God is truth; we become true, and we love that which is true, and we hate the darkness and the lie. God is good, it is His very name; He makes us good by His grace, so that we become the pure in heart who shall see God. Nay, I will say this, that we become partakers of the divine nature in even a higher sense than this-in fact, in any sense, anything short of our being absolutely divine. Do we not become members of the body of the divine person of Christ? And what sort of union is this-“members of His body, of His flesh, and of His bones?” The same blood which flows in the head flows in the hand, and the same life which quickens Christ, quickens His people; for, “Ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God.” Nay, as if this were not enough, we are married into Christ. He hath betrothed us unto Himself in righteousness and in faithfulness; and as the spouse must, in the nature of things, be a partaker of the same nature as the husband, so Jesus Christ first became partaker of flesh and blood that they twain might be one flesh; and then He makes His Church partakers of the same spirit, that they twain may be one spirit; for he who is joined unto the Lord is one spirit. Oh, marvellous mystery! we look into it, but who shall understand it? One with Jesus, by eternal union one, married to Him; so one with Him that the branch is not more one with the vine than we are a part of the Lord, our Saviour, and our Redeemer. Rejoice in this, brethren, ye are made partakers of the divine nature, and all these promises are given to you in order that you may show this forth among the sons of men, that ye are like God, and not like ordinary men; that ye are different now from what flesh and blood would make you, having been made participators of the nature of God. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/0551.cfm