Belgian Confession, Article 11, Who is the Holy Spirit and what does He do? Brothers and sisters in the Lord Jesus Christ, there's much confusion in Christian churches today about who the Holy Spirit is and what He does. Some, like the Jehovah's Witnesses, say the Holy Spirit is just a force of God that sort of changes things from time to time, but He's not an individual person. Others like the Charismatics treat the Holy Spirit as the most important person of the Trinity, and they minimize the work of the Father. And they call this the age of the Holy Spirit, as if he was not from the very beginning. Others think that the Holy Spirit's main work is to enable people to speak in a language that no one understands, which is kind of really humiliating. It's saying, you're speaking language that nobody understands. That's the real gift of the Spirit. That's not much of a gift, is it? if no one understands what you're saying. So let's open God's Word today and let it speak clearly about who the Spirit of God is and what He does. Headings are two, the nature of the Holy Spirit, and second, the work of the Holy Spirit. Our goals are three. First, that you will properly understand the nature and work of the Holy Spirit. Two, that you will worship Him for who He is and what He has done for you. And three, that you will ask Him to fill you more and more with His presence so you will live a godlier life and be more effective for His kingdom. So, Belgian Confession Article 11, we say together, we believe and confess also that the Holy Spirit from eternity proceeds from the Father and the Son, and therefore neither is made, created, nor begotten, but only proceeds from both. who in order is the third person of the Holy Trinity, of one and the same essence, majesty, and glory with the Father and the Son, and therefore is the true and eternal God, as the Holy Scriptures teach us. The nature of the Holy Spirit. First, we'll run through this. It's a good reminder of who He is so you hold Him in right perspective. The Holy Spirit is called God. Apostle Peter said the Holy Spirit is God in the account with Ananias and Sapphira. Apostle Peter interchanged the words Holy Spirit with God while referring to the same person. And this is one passage to have at the back of your mind if people ask you if the Jehovah's Witnesses happen to come at your door. Acts 5 verses 3 and 4 say together, Peter said, Ananias, why has Satan filled your heart to lie to the Holy Spirit and keep back part of the price of the land for yourself? While it remained, was it not your own? And after it was sold, was it not in your control? Why have you conceived this thing in your heart? You have not lied to men, but to God. So he said, you lied to the Holy Spirit, you lied to God. Therefore, the Holy Spirit is God. There's a parallel language there. Look also at 1 Corinthians chapter 3 verse 16. Together, do you not know that you are the temple of God and that the Holy Spirit of God dwells in you? The Spirit of God is in the temple and God is in the temple. Then the Spirit of God is God. But this is not just a New Testament doctrine. This was in the Old Testament as well. Look at what Isaiah wrote in Isaiah 63, verse 10. Together, but there rebelled and grieved his Holy Spirit. So he turned himself against them as an enemy and he fought against them. Now you read on more, you will see God fought against them, showing that the Holy Spirit is also God. 2. The Holy Spirit was sent from the Father and the Son. Not only is He God, but the Father and the Son sent Him, showing unity between the three persons. John 15, verse 26. Together? But when the Helper comes, whom I shall send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father, he will testify of me. You see the interconnection? Jesus will send the Holy Spirit from the Father, the Father will send the Holy Spirit, and then the Holy Spirit will talk about Jesus. You cannot separate the three persons of the Trinity. Galatians chapter 4 verse 6 says together, And because you are sons, God has sent forth the Spirit of His Son into your hearts, crying out, Abba, Father. So the Son sends the Spirit who calls out to the Father. And who sent the Son? The Father. So the link is there from the Father to the Son to the Spirit. because the Father sends the Spirit, but that's the value of the Son, whom He sent. You see the connection? And that's why we often use a triangle to represent the Trinity, because the three are equal. They're intertwined. No one is ever seen as greater than the other. But we also see the details, because you can say the Holy Spirit is God and you say, well, show me, show me his actions that match. Well, the Holy Spirit has divine attributes. For example, the Psalmist David pointed out that the Holy Spirit was omnipresent. Look at Psalm 139, verse 7 through 10 together. Where can I go from your spirit or where can I flee from your presence? If I ascend into heaven, you are there. If I make my bed in hell, behold, you are there. If I take the wings of the morning and dwell in the outermost parts of the sea, even there your hand shall lead me. So you see, God is leading. The spirit is leading. God is everywhere. The spirit is everywhere. And you say, how is that about work? That's just describing who he is. Well, not really. The nature of the Holy Spirit himself, the fact that he's omnipresent, is really important for you. Because you are never, ever alone. It doesn't matter what you're going through in life, the darkest times in your life, when no one wants to talk to you, he is there. You could have committed the worst possible sin. He doesn't say, yuck. People might say that. Even Christian brothers might say that. Never the Holy Spirit. He is there with you. That's His omnipresence. He dwells within you. Further, the Holy Spirit is perfect. And we know only God is perfect. John chapter 16, verse 13 says together, when he, the spirit of truth has come, he will guide you into all truth. And he said, yeah, so what does that mean? He will teach you. He will give you right words to speak. You can count on what he says because the scriptures that were given by the Holy Spirit never ever changes. His truth will last. Remember all the things the government told us during the time of COVID? Two more weeks to bend the curve, you get your vaccine, COVID is done. And all the things that turned out, they had no idea what they were talking about. They're just making stuff up. And they admitted that later. You ever seen any... Never. The Word of God stands forever. And that's the Word of the Spirit of God. Now because of that, the Holy Spirit is rightly honored by man. Jesus puts honor on the Holy Spirit when he commanded that every baptism would be done in the Holy Spirit's name. Baptism is never done in the name of any man, always in God's name. And that's why Jesus said, and let's read Matthew 28, 19 together. Go, therefore, and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit." You notice that? Baptism is done in the name of the Spirit. Again, you see the unity of the three persons of the Trinity, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Many erroneously believe, since Christians Jews and Muslims are monotheists, that we all worship the same God. That is a lie. Don't ever concede that. God exists in three persons. For the Jews and the Muslims, for their good, don't make them think that we're worshiping the same God. Tell them we are very far from each other, because their God doesn't have The persons to bring salvation. We need to be chosen by God. We need to be redeemed by Christ. We need to be sealed by the Spirit of God. They don't have that. In fact, they have no solution for their sins except their efforts, which cannot satisfy a holy God. Their God says, you do good things and you give money, your sins will be forgiven. Imagine that. That's a kind of nice God to have because then you don't have to be very careful how you live. You can live however you want, believe whatever you want and give money and say a few prayers and you're okay. You might have to go to hell for a while to be burned out a little bit, but then you will go to paradise. That's their belief. That's why it's so appealing to people. Work's salvation. When you share the gospel, it tells people you can't do anything. It gets to the heart of man, the arrogance, the pride. He wants to save himself. Don't make that concession. You see here, the Holy Spirit is essential. He is God. Jesus confirmed He is God. His actions confirm that He is God. The Old Testament confirmed He is God. The New Testament confirmed that He is God. Let's then move to our second point. We've seen more of the details, we've already touched on some of the work of the Holy Spirit of God, but let's look at some more in detail now. The Holy Spirit is Creator. Genesis chapter 1, verses 1 and 2 say, together, In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was without form and void, and darkness was on the face of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters. Now, how does this verse teach? about the work of the Holy Spirit. You read and it says, he was there hovering over the waters. Hovering sounds like he's not doing anything. But these words were not written to teach that the Holy Spirit was simply present. It's written to teach that he was active in some way. He was active in creation. Was he really? Does the scripture confirm that? Well, Psalm 33 verse 6 says, together By the word of the Lord, the heavens were made, all the host of them by the breath of his mouth. And you say, where's the Holy Spirit? That's the word breath, wind. That's the word of the Spirit of God. Breath or wind is the same word for spirit. And in fact, Job wrote the Spirit of God in chapter 33, verse four, the Spirit of God has made me and the breath of the Almighty gives me life. So the Holy Spirit, his work started with creation. from the very beginning. So when people say, do you have the Holy Spirit? You have to be able to say, well, he was with us from the very beginning of the world. He didn't suddenly appear at Pentecost. There was a richness and a fullness and with special gifts for the quick expansion of the kingdom. But everyone who has ever been saved from Adam onward was saved by the Spirit of God. So he was their creation. And that's the second point here. The Holy Spirit, or we'll come to that in a minute, is a sustainer of the earth. He made the earth and he sustains the earth. Look at Psalm 104, verse 30, together. You send forth your spirit, they are created, and you renew the face of the earth. So he made the world and he sustains the world. The world that has fallen into decay, the Holy Spirit still continues to work. The Holy Spirit causes plants to bud each year to grow and to produce food for us. The Holy Spirit did divine work even as they traveled from Egypt to Canaan, challenging them, guiding them, correcting them, rebuking them. I look at the example of this in Psalm 95 verse 9. Together, when your fathers tested me, they tried me, though they saw my work. Now when you read it and say, where's the Spirit? What proof do you have that this was referring to Holy Spirit work? And if that's the question that came to your mind, I'm glad you asked. Now let's read Hebrews chapter 3 verses 7 to 9 together. Therefore, as the Holy Spirit says, today, if you will hear his voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion, in the day of trial in the wilderness, where your father tested me, tried me, and saw my works 40 years. So who was speaking there that David was speaking, or the psalmist in Psalm 95, when your father tested me? Who was the me? The Holy Spirit. So He not only gave them life, He sustained them in their day-to-day life. He kept them all the time in the desert. And so He continues to work today. Third, the Holy Spirit saves men from their sins. He created them, He recreated them and kept the earth going, but He also is the Savior. Only God can save man from his sins as man is unable to save himself. Man is deceitful and desperately wicked. Man is dead in trespasses and sins and need to be made alive. That's the work of the Holy Spirit. John chapter 3 verses 5 through 8 now, together. Jesus answered, Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not marvel that I said to you, you must be born again. The wind blows where it wishes and you hear the sound of it, but cannot tell where it comes from and where it goes. So is everyone who is born of the spirit. No one can enter the kingdom of God unless the spirit brings him in. In fact, Romans chapter eight, verse nine says it even clearer together. Now, if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he is not his. That's as blunt as you get. So when somebody comes up to you and your charismatic friends and say, do you have the Holy Spirit? Say, he has had me from before I was born. He elected me. He regenerated me. He lives in me. Without the Holy Spirit, you will remain dead in your sins. Only He can create faith. Only He can regenerate you. So the Holy Spirit, we say, is inextricably linked to salvation that comes from Jesus Christ. He guides you into truth. No one can come to the Father unless the Spirit draws him. And Jesus said, pointed to the Spirit of God and His work in man. But it's not just that the Holy Spirit saves you. The Holy Spirit sanctifies you. What does that mean? The Holy Spirit separates you from sin more and more and impresses upon you that you are the child of God. He sustains you spiritually. How does he do that? Well, the Holy Spirit produces fruit in the heart of the Christian to enrich him and make him know whose he is. Now, I got a blackberry bush in the backyard. The reason you know for sure it's a blackberry bush, because other bushes can look similar, is that there are hundreds and hundreds of blackberries on it. By the fruit, you know that that is a good tree. How do you know you have the Holy Spirit? Well, his fruits are in your life. Galatians chapter 5 verse 22 and 23 say together, but the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such there is no law. This good fruit separates man from wickedness. He's bearing all these good fruits and his life then has no room for bearing adultery and fornication and uncleanness and lewdness and idolatry and sorcery and hatred and outbursts of wrath and selfish ambitions and heresies and envy and murders and drunkenness. Because your life is filled with the working of the Holy Spirit. You know the Apostle Paul said, When you get rid of drunkenness, what do you do? You live soberly. The more sober you are, you're not gonna get drunk with wine. The awareness of whose you are, when you think of all the riches you have, the joy and peace, why would you run back to something that will take away peace? You give up a drunken lifestyle? Have you seen, maybe somebody has videos or photographs of what you look like when you were drunk? Do you want to go back to that? You say, no, I want to be sober. I want to meet with God's people. I want to sing with them. I want to be encouraged by them. Ephesians chapter 1, 13b and 14 say together, in whom also, having believed, you were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise, who was the guarantee of our inheritance until the redemption." See the work of the Holy Spirit? He not only saves you, but He keeps you. So He made the world, He keeps the world. He made you and saved you, remade you, and now He keeps you as well. Now, Think of the greatness of his work. Now think how silly it is that there are those who advocate that the main work of the Holy Spirit is to make you speak a gobbledygook language, gibberish, that no one understands. How does that sanctify? How does that equip you for the work of ministry? How does that make you a better dad? How does that make you a better wife? It doesn't. That's an imagination of man's heart. To think that if you speak a language that somehow nobody understands and you don't even understand. What did the Apostle Paul said if they see people doing that? They're saying something and nobody understands. They will say, are they not mad? See, when people spoke in tongues, That was a different language. That's why on the day of Pentecost, everyone heard others speak in his language. And that was intended for the fast spread of the gospel, so the kingdom would be established. And that was a miraculous working of the Spirit of God to make people speak in different languages. There were times when a man could look at you and tell you what you were thinking. Can you do that? Now wives would probably be able to tell sometimes some of the things we're thinking when they look at us. They see a smile on our face and it's like you want to say something. But they don't know all the thoughts of our hearts. Let's put in perspective the work of the Lord, how great the Spirit of God is. And how he did remarkable work but not misunderstand and think that that is the evidence of the Holy Spirit. His work is much bigger. He saves you. He regenerates you. He calls you. He makes you bold. He guides you in truth. He prays for you. To put it simply, men are blessed through the Holy Spirit. 2 Corinthians 13, verse 14 says this. Together, the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with you all. Amen. See what the Holy Spirit is doing here? He has communion with you. Closeness. When you make some terrible prayer, He cleans it up. When you struggle with envy, he says, look, you are rich. By the way, no blessing is ever done in the authority of any man, but in God alone. There's much more. The Holy Spirit gives man what he needs for the right occasions. He gave men courage. Jesus said, you will appear before kings for my sake. And many of them would be killed. And that reality set in for us when we're in Rome at the Colosseum and you watch the place where Christians, 60,000 people gather on Sunday morning to watch Christians be eaten by lions because they would not deny their faith. Why is it that we're able to do that? You know, you might think you would not be able to do that too, but that's underestimating the Spirit of God. You would, of course, you would not be able to do that. I wouldn't be able to do that. But when the Spirit of God is in you, he will allow you to put your head down and have it chopped off by an executioner's axe. And you will be able to face it without hatred because the Spirit of God is at work in you. He will put the right words in your mouth when you're not sure what to say. He will give you words to comfort those who are struggling. He will give you bravery to contradict someone who's spreading lies. He will give you the courage to rebuke sin in someone's life so they can come back in the way of truth. That's the work of the Spirit of God. and then the Holy Spirit restricts sin. He gives common grace even to those who are not believers. He works among them too. This common grace does not lead to salvation, as sometimes Armenians argue, but this common grace helps to maintain a degree of peace. Because man left to himself would show total depravity, but the Holy Spirit works and restricts sin in society. Genesis 6.3 says, together, And the Lord said, My spirit shall not strive with man forever, for he is indeed flesh, yet his days shall be 120 years. It's when they were destroyed. Genesis 20.6, together, And God said to him in a dream, Yes, I know that you did this in the integrity of your heart, for I also withheld you from sinning against me. Therefore, I did not let you touch her." Remember that? We looked at that with Abraham, how God restricted the king by his Holy Spirit. Job 1.12 says, together, And the Lord said to Satan, behold, all that he has is in your power. Only do not lay a hand on his person. So Satan went out from the presence of the Lord. Remember, Job talked about the Holy Spirit who was within him, who made him. And then the Lord is saying, you're not going to touch him. What's that? That's the limitation that the Holy Spirit puts upon the world. So we're talking to someone in between the service, and he says, oh, you feel so overwhelmed with so much sin and wickedness. Many of the leaders in Canada are pursuing goals that are harmful to the church, anti-Christian in the very foundation. Well, we know who's on our side, the Spirit of God. Spirit of God. And He loves us. We can count on Him limiting the wicked. How challenged then when people focus on the Holy Spirit as the one who makes them speak a language that no one understands, as if that's His work. That's minimizing the Holy Spirit. His work is much bigger, deeper, richer. essential for everyone. So a warning before we conclude. Do not therefore stop the Holy Spirit from His work of saving and sanctifying. Remember 1 Corinthians chapter 9 verse 19 and 20 says, Do not quench the Spirit. Do not despise prophecies. Don't try to stop Him from doing His work. Remember Acts 7.51? You stiff-necked and uncircumcised in the heart, you always resist the Holy Spirit as your fathers did, so do you. Stephen was very strong in rebuking the Jews for resisting the Holy Spirit. You just rob yourself when you do. Submit to Him. Let's conclude. The Holy Spirit is the third person of the Godhead. He's a real person with all the attributes of God. The Father is not more important than the Spirit, nor the Spirit superior to the Father. So the Holy Spirit is God by nature. The Holy Spirit is God by His activity, who He is and what He has done. He did what only God could do. He created the world. He sustains the world. He redeems man. He lives in man. He purifies man. He strengthens man. He prays for man. He seals man for eternity. No wonder men rightly worship the Holy Spirit. So, brothers and sisters in Jesus Christ, when you have a proper view of the Holy Spirit, that He is the eternal God, you'll be careful how you live. Remember, He lives within you. Where can I flee from His presence? I'm 139. He is there. Now, that's a warning, but it's also an encouragement. He's there to help you. You don't need to be afraid of that dark time in your life. He also knows what to think when you allow sin to overwhelm you, when you allow problems to cloud you from worshiping God. He also knows how you live. He knows when you don't eat properly. He knows when you work too much or you don't work enough. He knows when you're lazy. He knows when you say a mean word or think a hurtful thing. He knows when you watch things on the television or the internet you should not be watching. But He also knows when you do the good things. When you send that email to someone or text message to someone and encourage them. When you pray for someone, they don't know that you're praying for them. He knows. See, He uses you, too, for good in that way. So honor Him in all He is doing for you In who he is, honor him. Worship him. Don't fight him. Don't grieve the Holy Spirit of God. He sealed it for the day of redemption. Then announce the Holy Spirit to the world. Let them know that God is one God in three persons. Let them know that He wants to live in them. He wants to transform their lives and take them from being in the gutter to establishing them in heavenly places in Christ Jesus. They need to call on Him to be saved. Don't be ashamed to talk about the Holy Spirit, because that's the only way they can be saved from their sins. No one can truly call God his Father unless the Holy Spirit is working in his heart. And if you're not a Christian today, may you call upon the Holy Spirit to enter your heart and make you God's child. Let us pray. Thank you, Lord, for your words that we have been able to hear again today. It's a lot to ponder. But we learn again about who the Holy Spirit is and what He has done. We see Him in all His glory and wonder and power, but we also see Him in all His love, His compassion, His patience, His discipline. Where would we be without Him? May we adore Him. May we tell the world about Him. so the world can come to Jesus Christ as he applies salvation to their hearts. In Jesus' name we pray, amen.