FUNDAMENTALS OF DISCIPLESHIP
THE GIFTS
OF THE SPIRIT – IV
Acts 2:38 Then Peter said unto them, Repent, and be
baptized every one of you in the name of Yahushua Messiah for the remission of
sins, and ye shall receive the gift of
the Holy Spirit.
Last week, we concluded with this thought:
The gifts are
not about us. They are about IAUE.
It is critical to our discipleship to Yahushua
and to our obedience to the will of IAUE that we truly understand the agency of
the Holy Spirit in the life of a disciple. What is His function in our lives,
and what is the timing of the exercise of His function in our life? Without
this understanding, a detailed study of the gifts of the Holy Spirit will not
produce the proper response. Too many denominations and sects of believers have
been taught and have believed that when they “prayed to receive” the Master
Yahushua, they received the Holy Spirit in response to that prayer. Subsequently, they essentially ignore the
Holy Spirit for the rest of their lives, assuming He is already at work within
them. In our opening lesson in this
study, the Scriptures spoke for themselves revealing that receiving the Holy
Spirit was not a function of the new birth.
Acts 2:38 Then Peter said unto them, Repent, and be
baptized every one of you in the name of Yahushua Messiah for the remission of
sins, and ye shall receive the gift of
the Holy Spirit.
On the day of Pentecost, Peter preached the
first message of the “church age.” Acts
2 contains the very first sermon, the very first evangelistic message ever
preached in the age of the Body of Messiah.
In this evangelistic sermon, Peter identified Yahushua as “a man approved of Elohim among you by miracles and wonders and signs, which Elohim did by him
(by the man) (Acts 2:22).”
He explains to his audience that this man was raised from the dead by Elohim. (Acts 2.24). Then
Peter explains their responsibility to repent of their disobedience to IAUE and
to His right to rule over their lives, demonstrate their allegiance to IAUE
through baptism unto Yahushua Messiah as their Master; and having done that,
they would receive “the gift of the Holy Spirit.” This was a reference to the
supernatural manifestation that everyone within Peter’s voice had been
witnessing…the thousands of people present in Jerusalem for the feast of
Pentecost were hearing the praises of IAUE being declared in their own
languages, over a dozen different languages coming out of the mouths of
unlearned Jews. It was a miraculous
event, a supernatural event. The
evidence of the Holy Spirit acting from within the 120 disciples that morning
was undeniable and it was occurring differently than all their recorded history
of the acts of the Holy Spirit.
We should note that repentance is something
man does. It costs him everything. Of course, IAUE is working to draw man unto
Himself by revealing His son to man; but man is the one who must respond. The
new birth, the imputation of righteousness, the salvation that these are
designed to bring, these cost Messiah everything. Discipleship to Yahushua is
something man does. It is a choice that costs
him his human freedom, his right of self-determination. He becomes the bond servant of Yahushua. Receiving the Holy Spirit, however, does not
come with a price. He is a gift. There
is no price tag on the Holy Spirit. He
is the Gift of IAUE; and IAUE has waited patiently to be able to give of
Himself to man in this way; a way He has not been able to do since the fall of
Adam.
When the Holy Spirit is referred to in the Old
Testament as “the Spirit of Elohim,” the first seven references regarding His involvement with man say:
When the Holy Spirit is referred to in the Old Testament as the Spirit of IAUE, the first nine references say:
Judges 14:6
And the Spirit of IAUE came mightily upon him…
Prior to the resurrection of Messiah Yahushua,
man was not qualified to receive the Holy Spirit. Instead, the Holy Spirit would come upon a
man, inspire or empower the man then He would depart from the man until needed
again, if ever. In Peter’s sermon on the
day of Pentecost, he was announcing something quite radical regarding the Holy
Spirit. No more would the Spirit “come
upon” a man to do a work through that man then leave until needed later, if
ever. No, He was called a “gift” by
Peter; a present that IAUE wanted to give to man. Look at the change in how the manner the activity
of the Holy Spirit is described in the book of Acts.
Acts 2:2, 4 And
suddenly there came a sound from heaven as of a rushing mighty wind, and it filled all
the house where they were sitting…And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit, and
began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance.
In
this first reference of the agency of the Holy Spirit in the church age, note
that He first “filled all the house,” effectively
immersing the 120..baptizing them all in the Holy Spirit, creating within them
the new birth, making the 120 disciples in the upper room new creatures in
Yahushua Messiah. Then He FILLED them.
He entered into their bodies as a gift given by IAUE. This is exactly the activity to which Paul
referred in 1 Corinthians 12:13 (“For
by one Spirit are we all baptized into one body, whether we be Jews or
Gentiles, whether we be bond or free; and have been all made to drink into one
Spirit.”) Now, let’s look to
see the continuity of this experience in the book of Acts.
Acts 4:8 Then
Peter, filled with
the Holy Spirit, said unto them, Ye rulers of the people, and elders of
Israel,
Acts 4:31 And
when they had prayed, the place was shaken where they were assembled together;
and they were all filled with
the Holy Spirit, and they spake the word of Elohim with boldness.
Acts 9:17 And
Ananias went his way, and entered into the house; and putting his hands on him
said, Brother Saul, the Master, even Yahushua, that appeared unto thee in the
way as thou camest, hath sent me, that thou mightest receive thy sight, and be filled with the Holy Spirit.
No more was the Holy Spirit “coming upon” man
to accomplish the work of IAUE. He
worked from within man.
Now, this “working” of the Holy Spirit becomes
an important focus for us. The very
first mention of the Holy Spirit in the Scriptures is in the very second verse.
Genesis 1: 1 In
the beginning Elohim created the heaven and the earth.
2 And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness
was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit
of Elohim moved upon the face of the waters.
Everywhere you see the Holy Spirit mentioned
He is moving. He is coming upon,
departing from, filling… The Holy Spirit
is not static. He is not the inert
presence of IAUE. He is constantly
moving to accomplish the divine objective.
Paul tells us in Ephesians 1:11 that IAUE “works
all things according to the counsel of His own will.” He does so by His Spirit, who is forever active,
forever in motion. If we are sitting
still, it is little wonder that we do not see the Spirit working supernaturally
through our lives. If WE are inert, we
render the Holy Spirit within us inert, making Him, essentially, of no effect.
The Scripture is clear on this point.
1 Corinthians
12:7 But the
manifestation of the Spirit is given to every man to profit withal.
Through all of us, the Holy Spirit would
manifest Himself to those around us, doing the work of IAUE, working all things
according to the counsel of IAUE’s will.
Notice how Isaiah describe the Holy Spirit.
Isaiah 11:2 And the spirit
of IAUE shall rest upon him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit
of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and of the fear of IAUE;
The Spirit of IAUE is: The Gifts of the Holy Spirit are:
The
Spirit of wisdom Word
of wisdom
The
Sprit of understanding Discerning
of spirits/Tongues/Interpretation of tongues
The
spirit of counsel Prophecy
The
spirit of might Working of miracles/Gifts of
healing/Faith
The
Spirit of knowledge Word
of knowledge
The
Spirit of the fear of IAUE
So, you can see that the gifts of the Holy
Spirit are literally manifestations of the attributes of the Spirit of IAUE. Notice the last attribute in Isaiah’s
list: The fear of IAUE. If we do not possess the fear of IAUE, the
manifestation of the Holy Spirit in our lives will become subjected to human
pride and ego, rendering the gifts of no profit to the church or to the world
around us (see our last lesson).
How can we not fear when we contemplate the
gift of IAUE? The Holy Spirit is the
Spirit of IAUE. IAUE has indwelled us
with Himself, through the agency of His own Spirit. His Spirit is “holy” (hagios),
which means “so pure and chaste as to invoke reverence or veneration out of
fear produced by our awareness of the contrast of His nature versus our nature.”
It is by His Spirit that IAUE created the
heavens and the earth. It is by His
Spirit that He raised up Yahushua Messiah from the dead; and this is the gift
IAUE has desired to give to man…the indwelling presence of Himself. Is that really something that we can sit back
and regard with mere doctrinal smugness?
He is given to us so that as we “move” in obedience to the will of IAUE,
the Holy Spirit might continue to do the works of IAUE through us. In the weeks to come, we will be discussing
the ways the Holy Spirit executes the will of IAUE through us by the
manifestation of Himself through the gifts of the Holy Spirit; and we will
learn to expect the supernatural to happen around us as a matter of routine.
Kingdom
heart: a heart that offers no resistance to the
performance of the will of IAUE.
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