The Person And Work Of The Holy Spirit

This last month we have been looking at Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians. We have talked about how these words answer the great questions of life: who am I—what is my life’s purpose—and where am I going when this life is over. We talked about how the answer to those questions—Jesus Christ—has united us to one another and to God. And then last week we talked about how this “word of the cross” that unites us as Christians, also has the power to divide us from those who are not Christians.

The assumption that lies behind what we have learned is that we believe what Paul has to say: that the great questions of life are answered by Jesus—that his atoning sacrifice has united us to God and to one another in the church—that there is a division between those who believe these things and those who don’t. These things we believe.

But what we haven’t asked yet is this: Where did this faith--come from? How I am able to believe God’s Word and trust in Jesus Christ when so many in the world around me—do not? The answer to that question is the person and work of the Holy Spirit in our lives--and that is what Paul talks about today. He says:

When I came to you, brothers, I did not come proclaiming to you the testimony of God with lofty speech or wisdom. For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. And I was with you in weakness and in fear and much trembling, and my speech and my message were not in plausible words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, that your faith might not rest in the wisdom of men but in the power of God.

The Corinthians would have expected that anyone coming to them with some new, important message would have been a persuasive speaker and a great debater like they were used to hearing from the philosophers of the day. They would have expected what Paul calls: “lofty speech and plausible words of wisdom”.

But Paul made a conscious decision NOT to do that. In fact, he says that when he spoke to them he was “weak and fearful and trembling”. But his message was life-changing! I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. And in their lives-that message- was a demonstration of the Spirit’s power.

The Corinthians began their journey of faith where everyone begins their journey of faith--regarding the word of the cross as foolishness and weakness—spiritually dead. But as Jesus Christ was preached to them, the Holy Spirit worked through that message and their hearts were changed- and their eyes were opened- and they were born again.

This remarkable change wasn’t accomplished because Paul was a great speaker—it wasn’t accomplished because he won some argument—it was accomplished by the power of the Holy Spirit working through the word of the cross. So it is in our life of faith. The pastors who baptized us and taught us the faith and preached to us all these years didn’t save us. Rather, our salvation comes through the work of the Spirit as the message of the cross is preached and given in the sacraments.

And the value of God’s way of bringing us to faith, is that there can be no doubt that it is his work that we are saved—not because we were caught up in some emotional event—not because we were taken in by some smooth-talking preacher—but because the Holy Spirit has worked faith in Jesus in our hearts. That rock-solid foundation for our faith is something that transcends the passing wisdom of this age. Paul writes:

Among the mature we do impart wisdom, although it is not a wisdom of this age or of the rulers of this age, who are doomed to pass away. But we impart a secret and hidden wisdom of God, which God decreed before the ages for our glory. None of the rulers of this age understood this, for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory. But, as it is written, “What no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the heart of man imagined, what God has prepared for those who love him”— these things God has revealed to us through the Spirit.

The wisdom of God is not like the wisdom of this day that can be known through reason and measured scientifically—but it is real wisdom. In fact, it is a wisdom that never fades away, like various scientific theories that have come and gone along with the scientists who came up with them. Instead, the wisdom of God is a wisdom that endures from everlasting to everlasting for its source is from before the foundation of the world.

God’s eternal purpose in creating the world and creating us is that we would live with him forever in perfect fellowship—his glory reflected upon us- and in us -and through us- to others. This is what Paul calls “the secret and hidden wisdom of God”—secret and hidden only because our eyes cannot see it or our ears hear it or our hearts imagine it—secret and hidden because it musts be revealed to us.

This wisdom of God—his desire that humans would have fellowship with him—is possible only through his Son. Jesus is the bridge that connects us to God. The greatest minds of the ages could never have conceived such a thing—because if they could, they never would have crucified the one and only God-given way back to God.

But what sinful man did in spiritual blindness--God designed and decreed for the eternal glory of those who love him so that Jesus’ death would bring everlasting life with God-- back to us. Jesus is the Lord of Glory not only because he possesses the glory of God himself—but because he is the only way that we can dwell forever in that glory.

Life in God’s presence is why we were created and God’s eternal saving purpose cannot be reasoned out by us, it has to be revealed to us through the Spirit. Paul writes:

The Spirit searches everything, even the depths of God. For who knows a person's thoughts except the spirit of that person, which is in him? So also no one comprehends the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God. Now we have received not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might understand the things freely given us by God.

What God has planned from eternity for our salvation—what Jesus has accomplished in his dying and rising for our salvation—has to be revealed to us- and made known to us- and we have to understand it and believe in it- if we are to be saved.

Without the Spirit’s work in us, the loving purpose of the Father and the saving works of the Son will do us no good whatsoever. Those who do not believe in Jesus are lost. Yes God loves them—yes Jesus died for them—but each person must receive that for themselves in faith to be saved. We need the help of the Holy Spirit for this.

While we cannot know or understand the wisdom of God on our own—the Spirit knows it intimately because the Holy Spirit IS God and just as our own spirit knows what is in our hearts and minds, so the Holy Spirit knows the saving will of God towards us and conveys it to us through the preaching of the cross of Christ. Paul writes:

We impart this in words not taught by human wisdom but taught by the Spirit, interpreting spiritual truths to those who are spiritual.

In Romans chapter 10 Paul carefully explains this necessary connection between “our believing” and the “Spirit’s work” and the “preaching of the Gospel by men”.
He says that if we confess with our mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in our heart that God raised him from the dead—we will be saved. But then he asks the question that we began with: How can we call on the Lord if we don’t believe in him? How can we believe in him if we’ve never heard of him? How can we hear of him if no one preaches? For faith comes from hearing—and hearing through the word of Christ.

The Holy Spirit is the One who brings us to faith in Jesus --he is the One who reveals the saving will of the Father—he is the One who stretches out our hand to receive the gifts of God. But the Holy Spirit does that enlightening, sanctifying work through the Gospel that is preached- and the sacraments that are administered--by pastors.

Paul says: WE IMPART THIS (THAT IS SALVATION) IN WORDS TAUGHT BY THE SPIRIT. When the pastor preaches the Good News of Jesus-when he baptizes us into Christ’s death and resurrection-when he administers the saving fruits of the cross in Holy Communion-when tells us that our sins are forgiven-we can be confident that the Holy Spirit is at work in the Gospel to impart God’s gift of salvation to us. Paul says:

The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned. The spiritual person judges all things, but is himself to be judged by no one. “For who has understood the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him?” But we have the mind of Christ.

Jesus once told Nicodemus: You must be born again—flesh give birth to flesh—but the Spirit gives birth to spirit. Paul says the same thing: the person that we are by nature-- cannot accept the things of God—we must be born again spiritually. This new birth is not something that we can bring about in ourselves anymore than we were responsible for giving birth to ourselves naturally—we must be born again by God.

That is exactly what the Holy Spirit has done in us by the Father’s will through faith in Jesus. We no longer possess only a sinful nature—but now we are a new person spiritually. We have been given the ability to know and understand and believe the wisdom of God that is hidden from our senses and our intellect. We have a spiritual knowledge and insight and confidence that the world does not—and cannot—have.

The judgment of the unbelieving world on those things that matter eternally—those things that we have been talking about over this last month—are simply wrong. They don’t know the answer to life’s great questions. They don’t believe that Jesus has reconciled them to God. They think everyone will be saved. Who God is- and what he is about in the world- and what his attitude is towards us—is hidden to them—BUT—it has been revealed to us in Jesus by the Holy Spirit.

Today we give thanks for the work of the Holy Spirit in our lives. He has brought us to faith and he will work in our lives to keep us in faith until that day that we are safely delivered into the presence of the Lord. Amen.