#5 The Holy Spirit & Jesus

I. Introduction
A. The elders asked me to preach this series because we recognize that the thing we need most is for the Spirit to work in our hearts and in our midst. This isn’t a ‘we have the Spirit and you don’t’ kind of thing. This is a ‘we feel our own weakness and our need for the Spirit’s work in our hearts’ and a ‘we’re all in this together and you all need Him too’ kind of series.
B. The fact is that we need help and Jesus has given us a wonderful Helper. So let’s try to learn about Him and get in touch with Him and seek His work in our hearts.
1. There is so much “Christianity,” so much “church” which is very much human.
2. You don’t need the Holy Spirit in order to sing songs & preach sermons & have gatherings & even pray.
3. But Holy Spirit-less Christianity is not what we’re after, is it? We want the kind of Christianity which glows with love for Jesus. We want the kind of Christianity which results from the Holy Spirit changing hearts and transforming lives. We don’t care how outwardly attractive or even how doctrinally accurate it is: If it is not fueled by the power of the Holy Spirit, we don’t want to be a part of it. Right?
4. And even if you feel like you have all the divine help you need, please pray for me, and please pray for my fellow elders, please pray for our church. We are desperately in need of the Lord’s love, the Lord’s joy, the Lord’s transforming power.
C. Story of the Holy Spirit
1. Last week we began to talk about the story of the Holy Spirit, or the history of what the Holy Spirit has done.
2. We are all familiar with the story of Jesus, how He was with God in heaven, but came down to earth incarnated as a man. He lived and taught for and was crucified. On the third day he was raised from the dead, met with His people for 40 days and then ascended into heaven.
3. Well, the Bible also tells us the story of the Holy Spirit. Last week we talked about the first part of that story, the activity of the Holy Spirit in the OT.
a. Just as in the OT God spoke in partial ways through the prophets but now in Jesus has spoke in fuller and more final ways (Heb.1:1), so it is with the Spirit.
b. In OT days the Spirit worked in partial ways and now in Jesus the Spirit comes and works in much fuller and more powerful ways.
D. This morning we’re going to talk about where the story of Jesus and the story of the Holy Spirit converge and dovetail.
E. This story begins back in the OT. Yes, there is one important category of references to the Holy Spirit which I left out last week because I wanted to cover it this week. What I am referring to is OT passages which prophesy about the coming Messiah as someone upon whom the Spirit will rest.
1. Isaiah 11:2 “The Spirit of the LORD will rest on Him, The spirit of wisdom and understanding, The spirit of counsel and strength, The spirit of knowledge and the fear of the LORD.”
2. Isaiah 42:1 “Behold, My Servant, whom I uphold; My chosen one in whom My soul delights. I have put My Spirit upon Him.”
3. Isaiah 61:1 “The Spirit of the Lord GOD is upon me, Because the LORD has anointed me To bring good news to the afflicted; He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, To proclaim liberty to captives and freedom to prisoners.” (Cf. Isaiah 59:20–21)
II. In the New Testament, there are four great episodes in the relationship between the Holy Spirit and the ministry of Jesus. First, Jesus is conceived by the Spirit in Mary's womb (Luke 1:35). Then, He is anointed by the Spirit at the Jordan River. Thirdly, He is crucified and then raised from the dead by the power of the Spirit. And finally, He receives the Spirit at His exaltation in order to pour out the Spirit upon His church. Let’s look at each one of these (though we will give a lot more attention to the second one):
A. Incarnation
1. In Luke 1:35 Gabriel says to Mary, “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; and for that reason the holy offspring shall be called the Son of God.”
2. In Matthew 1:18, 20 we learn that “Mary ... was found to be with child by the Holy Spirit.” and that “... that which has been conceived in her is of the Holy Spirit.”
3. How does the Son of God become the Son of Man? By the Holy Spirit.
4. In prior studies we have seen that the Holy Spirit is the person of the Trinity whose role it is to deal directly with men. And so it shouldn’t surprise us that the Spirit is the One who comes and does this miracle of incarnation.
B. Baptism, Temptation, Ministry
1. But another important incident between Jesus and the Holy Spirit occurred when Jesus was thirty years old. Up until that point Jesus had done no preaching and performed no miracles. Except for the fact that He was morally perfect, He had lived a rather normal life. But now it is time for Him to transition into His public ministry, and we come to the next great Holy Spirit event in the life of Jesus.
2. Luke 3:21-22 tells the story: “Now it came about when all the people were baptized, that Jesus also was baptized, and while He was praying, heaven was opened, and the Holy Spirit descended upon Him in bodily form like a dove, and a voice came out of heaven, "Thou art My beloved Son, in Thee I am well-pleased."”
3. After this something has changed. From this point on Jesus is spoken of as being led and empowered by the Holy Spirit.
a. Luke 4:1 picks up the story, “And Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led about by the Spirit in the wilderness.”
b. Luke 4:14 says, “And Jesus returned to Galilee in the power of the Spirit; and news about Him spread through all the surrounding district.”
c. And in Luke 4:18 Jesus Himself says, “The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me, because He anointed Me to preach the gospel to the poor. He has sent Me to proclaim release to the captives, and recovery of sight to the blind, to set free those who are downtrodden.” quoting Is.62, above.
d. From this point on we see that the whole life of Jesus is lived in the power of the Holy Spirit.
e. As soon as He received the Spirit, He began to do miracles: healing, casting out demons, etc. (Luke 4:33-41). It was by the Spirit's power that Jesus performed signs and wonders (Matt. 12:28; Luke 4:18; Acts 10:38), it was by the Spirit’s power that He cast out demons (Matthew 12:28), and it was by the power of the Spirit that He proclaimed the gospel (Luke 4:18; Matt. 12:18; Acts 1:2).
f. Just as He was directed not by His own agenda, but by His Father's (John 5:19-20,30; 8:26-29,42; 14:10,24), so He was driven not by His own power, but by the Spirit's.
g. Jesus was sent to earth by the Father with a mission to fulfill. When the time for the mission arrived, God gave Him the Spirit to empower Him to fulfill the mission.
4. Let’s talk a little more about this “anointing” of Jesus, from Luke 4:18, “The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me, because He anointed Me to preach the gospel to the poor...”
a. Jesus says here that He’s been anointed by God.
b. In fact, this is essence of what it means to be the Messiah, one of the common designations of the promised savior in the OT.
c. It’s the same meaning in three different languages: Anointed One (English) = Christ (Greek) = Messiah (Hebrew)
d. In the Bible, prophets, priests and kings were anointed for their special callings, and the anointing was generally by oil.
e. With what was Jesus anointed? Even though He was a prophet, He was never anointed with oil to become a prophet. And though He was a high priest, He was never anointed with oil to be a priest. And though He was a king, He was never anointed with oil to be king.
f. Acts 10:38 tells us what Jesus was anointed with. Peter says, "You know of Jesus of Nazareth, how God anointed Him with the Holy Spirit and with power.”
g. So Jesus the messiah, Jesus the Christ, Jesus the anointed One, was anointed with the Holy Spirit.
5. When the OT refers to the coming Christ as King, Prophet, branch, suffering servant, son of David, each of these titles says something important to us about who Jesus would be. And the title Messiah tells us that He’s going to be the anointed-with-the-Holy-Spirit One.
6. This is enormous. Let me tell you why.
a. The story of man was the story of failure. Adam was created in glory and in paradise. But Adam fell into sin. And so it was with all those who came after Adam. No matter how promising, no matter how blessed, mankind kept veering off the road and into the ditch of sin.
b. Was there any hope? Yes, because God sent a Man who was different. This Man who was not going forth according to His humanity, but empowered by the Spirit of God. This man was anointed by the Holy Spirit to live in purity, in power, in perfection.
c. And because He was anointed with the Spirit, He succeeded where all others had failed. And now He carries all the rest of us on His back – back into paradise.
7. When was Jesus anointed with the Holy Spirit? Well, it seems to have been at His baptism that this happened — when the Holy Spirit came upon Him in the form of a dove. You can see this by the fact that His Spirit-empowered ministry is said to follow His anointing in Acts 10:38 “You know of Jesus of Nazareth, how God anointed Him with the Holy Spirit and with power, and how He went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with Him.” (See also Acts 4:27.)
C. Crucifixion, resurrection, etc.
1. In the gospel narratives, there is no mention of the Holy Spirit in the story of Christ’s death and resurrection.
2. However, in the epistles it is clear that the empowering of Jesus by the Holy Spirit continued even through His death on the cross: In Hebrews 9:14 we read, “...Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without blemish to God”
3. Jesus was also raised from the dead by the power of the Spirit according to 1Peter 3:18, Romans 1:4 and 8:11 “the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead.”
4. And after the resurrection, He continued to minister by the power of the Holy Spirit. For example, Acts 1:2 refers to “the day when He was taken up, after He had by the Holy Spirit given orders to the apostles whom He had chosen.”
D. Pentecost
1. We’ll talk more about the event and significance of Pentecost next week, but here’s what I want us to think about this morning.
2. Centuries of human history had proven that man on his own strength could not be what he needed to be. But now a Man was sent who was not going to live by human power but by the power of God’s Spirit. And in this way He would succeed where all the others had failed.
3. God anointed Jesus with the Spirit and so finally in Him righteousness could be established and then passed on to His people.
4. But that’s not how the story ends. There’s another important chapter.
5. God doesn’t just pour out His Spirit upon Jesus.
6. After His earthly mission was complete, Christ was given the Holy Spirit to pour out on His followers to empower them to continue to fulfill the task that He had begun: "Having been exalted to the right hand of God, and having received from the Father the promise of the Holy Spirit, He has poured forth this which you both see and hear.” (Acts 2:33)
7. This same empowering Spirit which came down upon Jesus and empowered Him in His ministry, death and resurrection is poured out upon each one of His people: young and old, male and female, rich and poor!
8. Jesus has sent us a Helper! We have the same Spirit which empowered Jesus amazing ministry!
9. God didn’t have to do this. Jesus could have died for sin and been resurrected to overcome death, and then God could have allowed His people to go on as they did in the OT.
10. He didn’t have to send us the Helper. He didn’t have to send us power from on high. But He did!
III. Sometimes we act like the resurrection is the end of the story, don’t we?
A. Sometimes we act like we don’t have a Helper.
B. Sometimes we act as though there is no power accessible to us. I know I do!
C. Sometimes we’re feeling discouraged and we act like God has not sent a Helper for the discouraged. We act like there is no fountain of joy for us to go to. (1Thes.1:6)
D. Sometimes we feel hopeless, and we act like we could never “abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit” (Rom.15:13).
E. Maybe sometimes we struggle with bitterness and we forget that the fruit of the Spirit is love, so we don’t go to Him, we don’t seek Him.
F. Sometimes we’re overcome with worry or fear, and we forget that “God has not given us a spirit of fear, but a Spirit of power and love and discipline.” (2Tim.1:7)
G. Sometimes we’re feeling tempted and we act like there’s no one we can turn to, when in fact self-control is a fruit of the Spirit’s work in our lives!
H. Sometimes we believe the devil’s lies, designed to make us feel we are alone.
1. Do you ever feel alone and unloved? The Holy Spirit is the Spirit of adoption! (Rom.8:15), the Holy Spirit bears witness with our spirit that we are the children of God (Rom.8:16)!
2. He is the One who moves in our hearts to cry out to God, “Abba father!” (Gal.4:6)
I. Someone might respond: “I’ve tried but it doesn’t work!”
1. Luke 11:10–13 “Everyone who asks, receives; and he who seeks, finds; and to him who knocks, it will be opened. Now suppose one of you fathers is asked by his son for a fish; he will not give him a snake instead of a fish, will he? Or if he is asked for an egg, he will not give him a scorpion, will he? 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?”
2. Luke 11:9 Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you.