Q&A series - questions that you have asked, and I am now answering in sermons I always think of a sermon series as a conversation, but this one is especially conversational, and I really like that. Over the last two weeks we ve tackled some uncomfortable questions - tackling the human sexuality issues that are front and centre for the Presbyterian Church in Canada right now, and then looking at how to deal with the violence of some Old Testament passages, and the sense we sometimes have that God was angry and vengeful in the Old Testament, and different in the New Testament - kind and full of mercy and grace. We saw that we are called to love, first and foremost, and that God has always been the same, but sometimes humanity has interpreted God differently. This week s question was actually - at least in it s phrasing - one of the more simple ones: How can we know we have the Holy Spirit? I was really happy to get this question, because often as Presbyterians, we aren t so comfortable with the Holy Spirit. We re really comfortable with God - we can talk about our experience of God. And we re kinda comfortable with Jesus - a little less than with God I think that s because with Jesus it becomes personal. God is more conceptual, and even a non-religious person will have some concept of God. Even atheists can talk about God, even if only to say that they don t believe in God. But Jesus - well, Jesus is flesh and blood. One of my favourite Christmas songs makes a point of how human Jesus is: Fragile finger sent to heal us Tender brow prepared for thorn Tiny heart whose blood will save us Unto us is born, Unto us is born, So wrap our injured flesh around You 1
Breathe our air and walk our sod Rob our sin and make us holy Perfect Son of God, Perfect Son of God Welcome to our world Yes, Jesus is a person - flesh and blood. We can go and walk in the places where he walked, we can read the worlds he spoke, we can try - only try - to imagine what it was like for him to suffer, all that he suffered for us. With Jesus, it s always personal. We can t keep him simply as an idea, we have to recognize his personhood. He can t really be kept at arm s length. He demands things of us. And so we re a little less comfortable with Him. But the Spirit. Well, the Spirit downright freaks us out. I tried to come up with another phrase for that but I couldn t. The Spirit freaks us out. And that s not because there is anything wrong with us, or anything wrong with our faith. The Spirit is intangible. Ethereal. We are much better at grasping things that we can actually grasp. That which is abstract, incorporeal, spiritual, is much more difficult for us. The Spirit by definition is hard to understand, hard to define, hard to make heads or tails of. When I was a kid, we d often refer to the Spirit as the Holy Ghost. I was not ok with that. I did not want any ghosts - holy or otherwise - anywhere near me, thankyouverymuch. I was timid and easily frightened and just using the word ghost made me less likely to want to experience this aspect of God. Isn t that interesting? Language matters. Add to that the fact that some of the branches of Christianity that are very comfortable with the Spirit are more charismatic, 2
more demonstrative, more spontaneous in their worship style than Presbyterians, who appreciate good and decent order, and it s no wonder that we struggle with our understanding and experience of the Spirit. But I ve been on a bit of a mission about this for a few years now - because I don t believe that the Spirit NEEDS to be hard to grasp. I believe that there are some very simple things we need to remember about the Spirit, that will help us not be freaked-out by this person of the trinity. And I m so very glad this question was asked, because it gives me a chance to share them with you. First and foremost, I want you to know that the best - the very best thing - you can do to learn about the Spirit is to turn to the Scriptures. So that s what we re going to do now. I ve only chosen a couple of passages that speak of the Spirit this morning, I d encourage you to do your own search of the Scriptures in order to learn more about what the Bible says about the Holy Spirit. We heard these words from the book of the Acts of the Apostles: In my former book, Theophilus, I wrote about all that Jesus began to do and to teach until the day he was taken up to heaven, after giving instructions through the Holy Spirit to the apostles he had chosen. After his suffering, he showed himself to these men and gave many convincing proofs that he was alive. He appeared to them over a period of forty days and spoke about the kingdom of God. On one occasion, while he was eating with them, he gave them this command: Do not leave Jerusalem, but wait for the gift my Father promised, which you have heard me speak about. For John baptized with water, but in a few days you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit. So this is Jesus, talking about Pentecost before Pentecost happened. The first thing I want you to see is that Jesus promises the Spirit to his followers. That means - if we follow Jesus we have the Spirit. The Spirit is a gift given by God, promised by Jesus. If we put our faith in the Father and the Son, then the Holy Spirit is part of that faith. 3
We may not be terribly in touch with the Spirit, we may not always recognize the Spirit at work, but if we follow Jesus, we have the Spirit. The Scripture continues: So when they met together, they asked him, Lord, are you at this time going to restore the kingdom to Israel? He said to them: It is not for you to know the times or dates the Father has set by his own authority. But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth. Jesus tells them that they will have power when the Spirit comes on them - which we know happened at Pentecost - and that then they will be witnesses for Jesus, in their local area, in the wider community and to the ends of the earth. So the Spirit is the one who enables the Apostles to do what the Apostles do. Now, don t be intimidated by that. Because we think of the Apostles as travelling to foreign lands, and speaking so boldly about Jesus that people chose to become followers, and churches sprang up in the wake of their preaching. Most of us - me included - won t do a lot of that in the course of our lives of faith. That s just not our path. But I believe witnessing is much more than preaching. I believe witnessing is the whole work of the whole people of God. So when you hear of a friend going through a difficult time and you ask them if you can pray for them, and if you can add them to the prayer list at Graceview - you are witnessing. When you invite a friend to one of our services, or to an event like Deck the Halls or the Mission dinner we had in October, you are witnessing. When you give of your time to help another - whether it s simply providing a ride to someone who doesn t have a car, or volunteering at a food bank or nursing home - you are witnessing. 4
When you come to choir practice and are part of the music ministry on Sunday morning, that s evidence of the Spirit. It s not actually all that difficult to know if we have the Spirit. Sometimes it s hard for us to remember to see the Spirit in the things we do, because we might think of the things we do as quite ordinary, and therefore might miss the extraordinary presence of the Spirit in our activities, but it s not actually that hard to know that we have the Spirit. Our second lesson from the Scriptures says this, The man without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually discerned. The spiritual man makes judgments about all things, but he himself is not subject to any man s judgment, For who has known the mind of the Lord That he may instruct him? But we have the mind of Christ. The man without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God If that is true, then the reverse is also true: the man WITH the Spirit accepts the things that come from the Spirit of God. In other words, one of the ways we know that we have the Spirit is that we understand Scripture. One of the favourite passages of preachers everywhere is this verse from Second Timothy: All Scripture is inspired by God and is useful to teach us what is true and to make us realize what is wrong in our lives. It corrects us when we are wrong and teaches us to do what is right. (2 Timothy 3:16 NLT) Everything in Scripture comes from the Spirit of God, through human hands, but from the Spirit of God. And that means that it can only be understood by those who have the Spirit. So anytime you come across a Bible verse or passage and it moves you, or it helps you, or you know what it means, You have the Spirit. 5
Simple. The Spirit is the energy that moves the church. So that anything we do in Jesus name, or because it s what Jesus would want us to do - is evidence of the Holy Spirit. The fact that you showed up to worship today, is evidence of the Spirit in your life. The Spirit moves the church, so that whenever and wherever the church gathers, that is evidence of the Spirit. In a few minutes we re going to sing the hymn, Spirit, Spirit of Gentleness. And I want to invite you to pay attention - really pay attention - to the lyrics. Because this hymn tells the story of the Spirit s work throughout the history of God s people. The first verse deals with creation - the Scriptures say that the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters, and I love that - this sense of energy that is hovering, and then things begin to burst into being. The second verse - in four succinct lines - tells the story of the Old Testament, from God giving the law to Moses, to the entry into the Promised Land, to the people s wandering hearts, and God giving the prophets to call them back to Him. The third verse is the New Testament, the birth, life, death and resurrection of Jesus, and the Pentecost moment when the church was born. The fourth verse - that s us, friends. That s the story that God is writing in us and through us. That s the Spirit moving among us and calling us to the future that God has planned for us. May you hear the excitement of this story in the words of this hymn. May you know that the Spirit is present in us, in you, in me, as it always has been and always will be - because God promised it. Let us pray. 6