The twelve apostles had been filled with the Holy Spirit on the Day of Pentecost, along with the other 108 believers who were in the Upper Room. They had listened by the hour as Jesus had finished his teachings on the Holy Spirit, promising that He and the Father would send the Holy Spirit to them. They had heard enough from Him to realize the importance of the role of the Holy Spirit in their lives and ministries. Jesus had made it clear that if they missed the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, they could never qualify as His Kingdom agents on earth. Even before they had received the Spirit in His fullness they understood that they must learn to maintain a relationship with Him even as they had with their Lord. He was Someone to host. He was to be treated as the Divine Guest. No doubt they felt privileged to become His temple, to sense His Presence, to hear His voice, to follow His direction. The apostles soon realized that just as He was the Spirit of the Father, even so He truly was the very Spirit of Jesus Christ. He was no different in nature and in relationship with them than Jesus had been. He was not only with them, but He was in them.
Jesus' final business with the crowd that had gathered on the Mount of Olives on the morning of His ascension to the Father was to issue a command and give a promise. The command was, "Go back into the city of Jerusalem and start a prayer meeting." The promise was, "I and the Father will send the Holy Spirit." It is believed that about 500 believers heard the command and the promise. And yet only 120 obeyed the command. And only 120 experienced the fulfillment of Jesus' promise: "They were all filled with the Holy Spirit," said Luke (Acts 2:4).
We might wonder what happened to the 380 who did not join the prayer meeting. Did they not consider the Master's command and promise to be urgent? What did they consider more important than obeying the Lord? Was it family, personal plans or just unbelief that hindered their moving out with the 120 toward the city? Even today, in most of our churches and fellowships, we see about the same ratio of the disobedient to the obedient -- four to one. I believe 120 out of 500 represent 24%. Most pastors I know would be quite encouraged to have one out of four of their members passionately seeking the sanctifying fullness of the Holy Spirit, on fire for Christ and joining in prayer for a sweeping revival through the church and out into their city. But let me encourage us: We need to be reminded that if there is an obedient, Spirit-hungry minority, the disobedient, indifferent majority cannot prevent revival! God worked mightily through the 120 who were filled with the Spirit.
By the time Christ's apostles were imprisoned, threatened and persecuted by the Jewish authorities for boldly proclaiming Jesus Christ as God's appointed Savior of the world, they had learned enough about the Holy Spirit to know that He must be obeyed. They realized that if they were to continue to be filled with the Spirit and minister in power, they would need to be as sensitive to His voice as they had been to their Lord's. Therefore when ordered by the Sanhedrin to cease their teaching in Jesus' Name and filling Jerusalem with their Christian doctrines, their reply was, "We ought to obey God rather than men" (Acts 5:29).
Sensitivity to the Holy Spirit
It seems to be the apostle Paul's passion in the book of Ephesians to prepare the church for walking in fellowship with an ungrieved Holy Spirit. He begins chapter four with an appeal for unity and maturity in relation to one another. Then he shifts to an appeal for a sensitivity to the Spirit. And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption (Eph. 4:30). With an awareness of His Presence and nature, the apostle went on in the next chapter to command, Keep on being filled with the Spirit (Eph. 5:18). It is my fear that many evangelicals are losing their sensitivity to the Spirit, and that we are producing a generation that does not even know how to relate to the Holy Spirit. As we become more affluent, more educated, more technological, more steeped in our culture, we just don't seem to regard intimacy with the Spirit as an urgent matter. So we go on content to just co-exist with the Spirit, not too passionate for His fullness, not willing to make time to discern His direction for us.
Let us remember that it is by the Spirit that we have access to God the Father and God the Son. It is the Spirit who illumines the Word of God for us. He helps us worship and pray. He purifies our hearts and keeps us empowered. By His grace we are enabled to live a holy life. He emboldens us to witness to the lost, to care for our brothers and sisters in Christ and to help build up His body. Apart from the Holy Spirit, we cannot even live the Christian life.
Seeking the Holy Spirit
I'm hearing the confessions of many church members today as they tell me, "In total honesty, I need to say that I've lost the fire. My heart is cold. My soul is dead. I feel cut off from the flow of spiritual power. How do I recover from this coldness of heart?" Most of my altar calls in these times are to this kind of empty-hearted professing Christians who know they can't go on in their defeat. They must become seekers who cry out for the baptizing fullness of the Holy Spirit.
These dear seekers have learned that it is easy to tune out the Spirit and lose His fire and fullness. They know a Christian doesn't have to get drunk, rob a bank or commit adultery to grieve the Holy Spirit. It can be done so easily. They have also learned that it is easier to lose the fullness than it is to be refilled with the Spirit. This is not due to God's lack of readiness to refill them; it is due to the lack of humility, honesty and hunger on the part of the one who has grieved the Holy Spirit.
But we are called to experience the times of the renewing of the Spirit. Let the believer who has been grieving the Spirit, quenching the Spirit or ignoring the Spirit understand that he or she is no longer full of the Holy Spirit. Even though they may not have lost their salvation, let them understand that they have lost something. They have lost love and joy and peace. They have lost the witness of the Spirit to fullness of faith and power. They have lost the passion to worship and witness. They have lost the strength to stand up to temptation and live a life of holiness. They have lost the anointing of the Holy Spirit.
But, thank God, the Spirit calls us back to fullness and power. He longs to return with fresh faith, fresh oil, fresh fire. Oh, my dear friends, let us not go on in cold-hearted, lukewarm mediocrity. The Spirit is calling us back to the Upper Room for another infusion of the Holy Spirit into our hearts and lives. He would have us walk the Emmaus Road with burning hearts. It is time to regain the glory and power and anointing of the Holy Spirit. I beg us to denounce our doubts, shake off our unbelief, repent of our procrastination and cry out to God for a new filling of the Spirit. Until we believers are personally filled with the Holy Spirt, I marvel at the shallow view, the flimsy grip, the casual attitude we hold toward the Kingdom of God. The Holy Spirit is the Kingdom Spirit. He will impart Kingdom power to think Kingdom thoughts, to produce Kingdom faith, to pray Kingdom prayers, to work Kingdom works. So let us be as generous in our receiving as God is in His giving of His Spirit. Our asking must become intense. We ASK, then we SEEK, and finally we KNOCK -- we get desperate, hungry, determined because we are utterly set on a fresh filling of the Spirit and we will not accept NO as the answer.
Receiving a fresh filling of the Holy Spirit is worth the wait. It is worth the humility. It is worth the repentance. Such renewal means that we are rising to a new level in the Kingdom of God. We are now experiencing Kingdom power. We can discern Kingdom direction.
A new filling of the Spirit will cause us to love God with our whole being, to love our brothers and sisters in Christ and our neighbors even as we love ourselves, to be able to sense the Presence of God in private or public worship, to hear Christ speak to us in the quiet moments, to pray the will of God to pass in our lives, our homes, our churches, our businesses, our communities, our nation and our world, to become jealous and zealous for the glory of God to be manifested among saints and sinners, to long for God's grace and miracles to be released upon our lost world.
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