Begin in John 3, verses 1-8. There was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. This man came to Jesus by night and said to him, Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher come from God, for no one can do these signs that you do unless God is with him. Jesus answered and said to him, Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. Nicodemus said to him, How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother's womb and be born? 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. And then Ephesians chapter 1 verses 15 through 21. We see Paul's prayer for the church in Ephesus. Therefore, I also, after I heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love for all the saints, do not cease to give thanks for you, making mention of you in my prayers, that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give to you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of him, the eyes of your understanding being enlightened. You may know what is the hope of His calling, what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints, and what is the exceeding greatness of His power toward us who believe, according to the working of His mighty power, which He worked in Christ when He raised Him from the dead and seated Him at the right hand in the heavenly places. far above all principality, and power, and might, and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this age, but also in that which is to come. Dear congregation, this is the word of the Lord. Thanks be to God. You may be seated. Our lesson is based off of the Heidelberg Catechism, Lord's Day 20. the doctrine of the Holy Spirit. Dear congregation, as a church, we confess with a historic Christian church, I believe in the Holy Spirit. Now there is much confusion regarding the person and the ministry of the Holy Spirit in our day. Many of you may know that. And there's typically two extremes that we see today, and it's like a dimmer switch. There's all sorts of versions of these two extremes. There's charismatic confusion on one side that you see in Pentecostal churches, where people are barking like dogs and getting all sorts of strange prophecies and rolling on the ground and falling out in the spirit, quote-unquote, and they blame it all on the Holy Spirit. And even within that kind of group of people, you also have Christians that eat a bad piece of pizza and think that the Holy Spirit is talking to them in a dream. And on the other extreme, you have hyper cessationism, of which many conservative Calvinists are guilty of as well. They don't believe in the Holy Spirit as much as they believe in Father, Son, and Holy Bible. They kind of don't know what to do with the Holy Spirit in that regard. They're afraid of too much emotionalism, too much subjectivism, and rightly so. We don't want to fall into mere subjectivism. But we can go too far as Reformed Christians if we are not careful. But we as Reformed believers should not fear the working of the Holy Spirit. Of all believers, of all communions, of all traditions, the Reformed tradition really is the tradition of the Holy Spirit. Holy Spirit-wrought theology. We see the Holy Spirit more clearly than any other tradition, in my opinion. In fact, Calvin, John Calvin, he was called the theologian of the Holy Spirit by his contemporaries. And in his Institutes of the Christian Religion, you would think that his largest chapter would be on something like predestination, or reprobation, or maybe hell. But in fact, his largest chapter, by a long shot, is on and communion with God, the Holy Spirit. Now, Lord's Day 20, question 53, is the only question in the Heidelberg Catechism that directly deals with the doctrine of the Holy Spirit. And some have criticized the Heidelberg Catechism for this, saying that they don't touch on the Holy Spirit enough, and while it's true that this is the only question that directly addresses the doctrine of the Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit, His work, His person, is seen all throughout the Catechism, even in the first question and answer. But it's scattered all throughout, and you'll see this in Reformed writing in general. Reformed theology truly is the theology of the Holy Spirit. The doctrine of the Holy Spirit permeates all of Reformed theology. And tonight, let us examine three aspects of the Holy Spirit's ministry. First, the Holy Spirit's ministry and work in regeneration. In regeneration, bringing us from a state of death into a state of life. Secondly, in sanctification. The Holy Spirit's work and ministry in the work of sanctification. And third, in perseverance. The Holy Spirit's work and ministry in perseverance. First, the Holy Spirit's work in regeneration. Regeneration, being born again, as Jesus calls it in our passage in John chapter 3. How does it happen? Well, in fact, we should know that it is impossible. It's something that is impossible to happen. That is, apart from the working, the supernatural working of the Holy Spirit, regeneration is indeed an impossibility. Why is this? Because man is spiritually dead in trespasses and sins. As Paul tells us in Ephesians chapter 2 verse 1, and you, speaking of Christians, he made alive who were dead in trespasses and sins. Man is spiritually dead. What does this mean? It means he's cut off from the life of God. He doesn't respond to any spiritual stimuli. In Ephesians 4, 18, Paul writes, having their understanding, speaking of those reprobate, having their understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness of their heart. They're alienated. They are strangers. They are cut off from the life of God. They're ignorant. Their eyes are darkened. Their understanding is blind. Their hearts are blind. They cannot respond to any stimuli from God, if you would put it that way. They're unable to hear. They're unable to even hear what God has to say to them, and thus, they're unable to respond. In 1 Corinthians, 2.14, the Apostle Paul writes that the natural man, that is the unconverted man, the unregenerate man, does not receive the things of the Spirit of God. Why? For they are foolishness to him. Nor can he know them because they are spiritually discerned. They are utterly unable. The natural man is utterly unable to even comprehend the things of God. They're spiritually discerned, and because they have not the Spirit of God, it is mere foolishness to them. Moreover, man is wicked and hostile to God. A lot of people will look at the things we just talked about. The man is dead in sins and transgressions and almost feel bad for man. He's a victim of sorts. But no, also on top of this, He is wicked and hostile to God. He's not only unable to respond to God, not only unable, but he's also unwilling. Even if he were able, he's unwilling. Romans 8, 7, the Apostle Paul writes, the carnal mind, that is the natural mind, the fleshly mind, is enmity against God. It's at war with God. It's an enemy of God. For it is not subject to the law of God, nor indeed can be. So man is not a victim. We do not feel bad for the natural man, the man who has not been converted. He's not a victim of his sin. He is a bold sinner against God, enmity against God. Now, I think we all have seen this reality of the things that we just talked about when we're having conversations with unbelievers. If you've had conversations with unbelieving friends, family, coworkers, fellow students, whatever it might be, you have seen this firsthand up close. In fact, I had a conversation like that just this week, two of them. It's like talking to a stone wall sometimes. More like a gravestone, in fact. It's like trying to have a conversation and persuade a gravestone. These are the threatenings of the law. You are in danger, my friend. God's wrath stands against you. God's law is opposed to you. You have broken his law, the threatenings of the law. do nothing for them. It seems to make no effect, whatever, nor do the promises of the gospel seem to persuade them. They don't have any effect. Christ has died for you, my friend. Christ receives all sinners who come to Him and ask to be forgiven, who cast themselves upon His mercy. You can cry a flood of tears and try to persuade them, but it will have no effect. Why? They must be re-created, 2 Corinthians 5.17. And this is the Holy Spirit's work. God, the Holy Spirit, is the one who re-creates, who regenerates the sinful, dead heart. He's the one who causes believers to share in Christ and all His benefits, as the catechism put it. So, alas, what can man do? What can man do? How can he bring about this regeneration? How can he bring about this change within himself so he can escape the punishment of sin, the wrath of God, which he deserves? Well, as our Lord Jesus himself said, God is not the God of the dead, is he? He's the God of the living. He's the God of the living. So therefore, dead men can do nothing. They can be dead, they can rot, and that's about it. They must first be made alive. That is, they must be born again, as Christ says in our passage. The idea of, well, what can man do? Or how can we persuade man to accept the truth? This was the error of Nicodemus in our text this evening. He asked what man can do to affect the new birth. How can he bring about regeneration? Jesus says, ye must be born again. Okay, fair enough. I trust Jesus is some sort of prophet. He's a good teacher. I'm going to go deeper into this. What does he mean by this? How can this be done? And he asks in John 3, 4, how can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother's womb and be born? Okay, fair enough. How does this happen? Do I need to go back into my mother's womb? I'm not sure if he's being sarcastic here. You could take it either way. But still, he's trying to find a man-made solution for something that only God can do. Dead sinners must be brought into the life of God by Christ. In Christ himself is life, as we read in the prologue of John's Gospel in John 1-4. And it is the Holy Spirit alone who causes us to share in his life, who unites us to Christ. Sinners are made new creations in Christ Jesus by the power of the Holy Spirit, not by their own doing, not by social programs, not by self-help books, They're born of the Spirit, Jesus says. They're made into the children of God, that is. They're born again, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God. John 1, 13. The Holy Spirit regenerates fallen man. He regenerates fallen man, causing him to be born again. How does he do this? Well, in Ephesians 1, 17 and 18, we read, that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give to you the spirit of wisdom and revelation and the knowledge of him, the eyes of your understanding being enlightened. He enlightens the dark mind. What was once darkness is now light. What was once darkness is now light. The gospel of Christ, which was previously only foolishness and couldn't even be understood by the sinful, fallen, dead heart of natural man, now becomes wisdom. It becomes light. As Paul put it in our Ephesians passage, the eyes of the sinner, of his heart, his understanding, are enlightened. He also does this by engrafting into the sinner a true vitality of life unto God. He's dead. He's dead. So the Holy Spirit makes him alive. He puts true vitality of life, as one Puritan put it, unto God within him. In Romans 6-11, the Apostle Paul says, Likewise, you also. Reckon yourselves to be dead, indeed to sin. but alive to God in Christ Jesus our Lord. This is done by the work of the Holy Spirit. We are made alive to God. We live in, through, and by Christ. The Spirit's ministry thus unites us to our Lord Jesus Christ. That's why, and the only reason why Paul could say, I have been crucified with Christ. Well, what do you mean by that? He meant his old man, his kernel man, his natural man, his old nature was dead, which was dead to God previously, has been crucified with Christ. And he says, it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me. And the life which I now live in the flesh, I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me. That's what regeneration looks like. That's the power of the Holy Spirit working upon a dead sinner. We will look more at what the Spirit does in regeneration in our second point, but for now I want to ask, how? How does the Holy Spirit do this work in and upon dead sinners? How does he bring them from a state of death to a state of life? ordinarily. The ordinary means by which he does this is the Holy Spirit does not work outside of means. He can work outside of means. God can work outside of means, but he ordinarily does not do so. Okay, so by what means then does the Holy Spirit do this. While all of the Spirit's work, including regeneration, is, as our Westminster Confession of Faith states in its chapter on saving faith, is, quote, ordinarily wrought by, what, the ministry of the Word. That's in chapter 14, section or paragraph 1. ordinarily wrought by the ministry of the Word. Now, since tonight we are dealing with the Spirit's ordinary work of regeneration, we're not going to touch upon those extraordinary regenerative works of the Spirit upon those who are regenerated apart from the Word, such as elect infants dying in infancy, or those who are regenerated from the womb, or those regenerated persons who are incapable of being called by the ministry of the Word. We're not going to touch on those tonight. Ordinarily is what we want to look at. How does he ordinarily work? Well, ordinarily, the Holy Spirit regenerates sinners by means of the ministry of the Word. Paul plainly states this in Romans 10, 17. He says, faith cometh by hearing. and hearing by the Word of God. Our Reformed forefathers rightly held to a three-fold Word of God. A three-fold Word of God that Christians benefit from, the world hears. The Word of God, Jesus Christ, the Word of God as in the Bible, and the Word of God as in the preached proclamation of the Gospel, the ministry of the Word. John Calvin continually asserted, and so did all of our Reformed forefathers, that God Himself speaks through the preacher as He preaches. This ought to change how we hear sermons, shouldn't it? If we believe that God is speaking, something supernatural is happening as the minister brings the word to us, that God is speaking. Not every word of the minister is perfect, of course, but the gist of it is that God is speaking in and through the proclamation, the ministry of the word insofar as it is accurate to the revealed word of God in the scriptures. Let this cause us to marvel. I think it should cause us to marvel at the powerful work of God the Holy Spirit in regeneration. That he would do so powerful a work, namely regenerating sinners, bringing dead sinners from death to life through so lowly a means as preaching, as preaching. We know that God did a great miracle in creation, right? He spoke, and the world was created. He created the world ex nihilo, out of nothing. However, let us not be deceived. He does a far greater work in recreating sinners into saints. In the first, in the creation of the world, He works from nothing. He barely, He speaks the bare word, and it is so. But in regeneration, he works with a corrupt mass of rebellious, dead, sinful flesh. And he turns that into his children. He turns that into saints. Our current day thinks very little of preaching. You can see this by how many mainstream churches are going with their services. It's a some kind of chair or table or couch and a couple of guys up there talking for 15 minutes, but most of the service is about entertainment, not about preaching. Even the preaching itself, the teaching is little more than a TED Talk, a guy talking behind a plexiglass pulpit. And that's really it about self-help techniques. Our current day thinks very little of preaching, but not so the Bible. The Bible does not think little of preaching. In Ezekiel's vision, in Ezekiel 37, we have a picture of the miracle of regeneration in one way. Ezekiel is shown a valley. It's strewn with the bones of a dead army. And indeed, they are very dry, the text says. They are very dry. God asks the prophet, can these bones live? No, they can't. Well, no, actually, Ezekiel says in faith, oh Lord God, you know, you know. What happens next is particularly instructive. God could have made these bones rise without means, couldn't he? He could have simply made them rise without means. But he commands the prophet Ezekiel and he says, prophesy to these bones and say to them, O dry bones, hear the word of the Lord. God chooses to use means. He speaks through the preaching of Ezekiel. And just like the entombed Lazarus rose to life at the word of Christ, so too in the vision these bones come together and sinews and flesh come upon them and they're given armor. and they rise and live. That is a picture of regeneration in one regard. They're brought from death to life. Prior to the Spirit's work of regeneration, the sinner is unable and unwilling to come to God, to hear God. He only wishes to rebel against God. But in the effectual calling, of the sinner through the Word. The Spirit makes the sinner alive to God, able to respond, and He so changes the sinner's will as to make him willing. He doesn't go against the will of the sinner. He changes the will of the sinner, and I am glad of it. I am glad of it. The dead sinner is unable and unwilling to come to God. The Holy Spirit, by the powerful work of regeneration in and through the preached, proclaimed Word, makes him both able and willing, as Psalm 110, 3 says, thy people shall be willing in the day of thy power. I want to make a couple of applications on this point in particular. First, as Christians, as Christians, let us never boast in our salvation as though we did anything, as though we made it happen somehow. We played no part in the work of our redemption on the cross, did we? In the death, burial, resurrection, and ascension of Christ. We played no part in that. nor in its application of that work of Jesus Christ to us by the Holy Spirit. We play no work at all. We are, as our confession states, quote, altogether passive, end quote, in our salvation. It's pretty clear where our confession stands. Altogether passive. It's like the absurdity, many of you are in the medical field or know somebody in the medical field who have worked in surgeries or possibly in emergency room settings. It's the same kind of absurdity for us to boast in our salvation as though we did something, as it would be if you're working on a guy who's flatlined, you've lost his pulse, he's been medically dead for some time and you get him back and he sits up and goes, hurrah, I've done it. He did nothing, nor did we. Let us be, secondly, always mindful in our gospel conversations with unbelievers that we cannot open their blind eyes. We cannot make them live. They are dead. They are stoned. We cannot take the stoning heart from them and give them a heart of flesh. We must remember that. This should not discourage us, though. It should actually encourage us, because we know the one who can change them. We can no more convince a dead man that sugar tastes sweet than we can convince a sinner to taste and see that God is good. No apologetic system, in other words. No evangelistic method, no amount of tears, persuasion, logic, evidences, or scripture quotations can open the eyes of the spiritually blind. I had this experience earlier this week, like I said, I'm sure many of you have as well, where I felt like I was getting somewhere with a gospel conversation. with someone. It seemed like they were tracking, they were listening, they asked a couple of good questions, and then as I finished, that exclamation point at the end, they nodded and then started talking about something else completely unrelated. They didn't hear me. They couldn't. They couldn't until God opens their eyes. Only the spirit of the living God can do this. Therefore, let us always be dependent upon God in prayer before we have gospel conversations, during and after we have those gospel opportunities in our life. The Bible is correct in saying, he who winneth souls is wise. but let this wise deed be done in a wise way. That is, let it be done in dependence on the only one who can save sinful souls, the only one who can win souls to his own kingdom, and that is the Lord himself. As the Puritan John Flavel said, quote, we may preach, pray, and hear, but there will be no motion Christward until the Spirit of God blows upon them, end quote. Further, let us be sure that we are never simply pushing people towards moral conformity. Moral conformity. A lot of people make this mistake as well. They tell people they need to clean up their act and then come to Jesus. Repent of all these sins and then come to Jesus. No, that's just making a dead person smell better. It's putting perfume on them. That doesn't do anything. We're not in the business of making people moral when we share the gospel. We're in the business of being God's herald so that he can recreate the dead and raise the dead to life and fill his kingdom with his children and his saints. Thomas Adams, another Puritan, said, quote, Repentance is the mere changing of the mind. Repentance is the mere changing of the mind. Regeneration is the changing of the man. End quote. Thirdly, Let us be careful in our use of the means of grace, especially the ministry of the Word. While it is true that only the Holy Spirit can cause us to profit from the Word, still we must be active under the Word, pleading Him to add His blessing to our hearing. The larger catechism goes into some detail about this, actually. How we are to prepare to partake in the means of grace. The preaching of the word and the sacraments. It goes into some detail on how to do this. That we should pray before we go to church to hear the word. Pray when we get to church. Pray when we're at church. Oh God, open my ears that I might hear thy word. That I might see glorious things in thy word. And pray afterwards as well. One cannot benefit from the Holy Spirit's sovereign ministry if one does not attend to it, and that thoughtfully or diligently. Because there's people even who think this way, who will think, well, if all this is true, God is sovereign, the Holy Spirit is sovereign, I cannot grow in holiness unless it's God who does it in me by the Holy Spirit. Well, I'll just stay at home then and do as I please, because what shall be, shall be. I can't do anything on my own anyway. The Holy Spirit has to do it, and if he doesn't, then it is what it is. And if he does, great, so I'll just sit and wait. But this is entirely the wrong way of thinking. Rather, precisely because we know that it is only the Holy Spirit who can give us the increase, We must work all the more in those means where He has promised to work. If we know that He will and has promised to work in the preaching of the Word, in the sacraments, in the gathering of His church on the Lord's Day, that's where we should go if we wish to be blessed. Secondly, or second point, the Holy Spirit's work in our sanctification. There's a common misconception of an antinomian flavor that's prominent in American Christianity, which assumes that the only thing that's required to be truly Christian is to believe, to believe Jesus. I know lots of people who believe Jesus who are going to hell, and so do you. To believe, by that they mean, give intellectual assent. Yeah, I believe that's a plausible story. I believe that probably happened. Or they think that all that's required is to believe, to pray some prayer, pray a sinner's prayer, then assert oneself as being born again. and then wait until either the Lord Jesus returns or death takes them home to him. I was part of a ministry that actually used to go around after the gospel was preached and all the people raised their hands and every eye was closed, I assure you of that, except for the people who were looking to count how many hands were up. And when the hands went up, they counted them and then afterwards went around and handed out cards. to all the people who raised their hand and prayed the prayer, and those cards told them the date that they were saved. And they said, don't lose that. Because every time you doubt, look at that little card that we're giving you from this harvest thing. I forget the name of the festival that we would always go to. I think it was Harvest Festival. But our ministry would do it with the Harvest Festival. And here's this card. Hold on to it. Don't lose it. I guess you'd lose your salvation if you lost the card. But I digress. That's all they think that salvation is. It's giving intellectual assent. It's believing. And then, we can just live in however we want. After Jesus saves us, after we pray the prayer, then we are good to go. We can just do what we want. And this comes with the related misconception that the only role of the Holy Spirit's ministry is to apply the work of salvation to us, and it's caused us to be born again, and then leave it to ourselves to do all the hard work of living unto Him. But just like in regeneration, the dead sinner is made willing and made able by the Holy Spirit to actively believe upon the Lord Jesus Christ, so too, in sanctification, the living of the new life in Christ, it is the Spirit of God who works in us believers, causing us to actively live unto Christ. It's both. It's both. Philippians 2, 12 and 13. Therefore, Paul writes, my beloved, as you have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling. For it is God who works in you, both to will and to do for his good pleasure. So which is it, Paul? Both. It's both. Work out your own salvation because it's God working in you to bring it to completion. Paul joins both our utter inability to grow in sanctification apart from the sovereign, supernatural, omnipotent working of the Holy Spirit with our duty to actively grow in grace. In another place, Ephesians 2.10, he writes, we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them. It is not that the Holy Spirit saves us. He saves us. He regenerates us. He causes us to be born again. And after that, it's up to us to be good Christians. We have to work really, really hard to try not to curse or do bad things. This is a grave error. In so doing, we rely on the arm of the flesh, not upon God. But it's equally an error to assume that since our sanctification is indeed truly the sole work of the Spirit, that there is therefore no obligation on our part. There is obligation. But if we assume that because it's all the Spirit's work, therefore we don't have any duty to pursue holiness, to pursue repentance and sanctification, we err greatly. Sanctification is the work of the Holy Spirit from beginning to end. It's all His work. We are entirely passive. Yet, it is our work too in which we are active. Both. are true. We work because it is He who works in us. In chapters 10 through 18, I recommend you read them in our Confession of Faith, chapters 10 through 18, and go through and highlight how many references to the Holy Spirit are in there. That section is about salvation and its application to us. Our adoption, our sanctification, our justification, our effectual calling, etc., etc. The Holy Spirit is highlighted time and time again, and His work is emphasized in those chapters. It is He who calls us. It is He who regenerates us. It is He who unites us to Christ, who sanctifies us, who empowers us for good works and repentance. It's He who preserves us. It's He who comforts us and assures us of God's love to us. The Spirit implants a true principle of holiness within us at regeneration. And that continues on living within us. He creates true spiritual life within us. He enlightens our minds. He renews our wills and turns our affections from the things of earth to the things of Christ. I hope my children, and hopefully there's many of you here, I think I've met many of you here who have a very boring testimony, quote-unquote, and I praise God for it. I praise God for it. I hope my children never know a day they don't know the Lord Jesus Christ. Never They can't even recall a day that they didn't know the Lord Jesus Christ. But for those of us who have testimonies like mine, who have been radically saved out of some crazy thing, out of atheism or whatever, we do remember times when Christianity was utterly foolish to us. We were dead in sins and transgressions, and the contrast we can see most brilliantly. The things that I once thought were foolishness, I now see as wisdom. My mind was dark and evil and against God, and now it is light. It's been enlightened by his work. I did not do it myself. And I certainly wasn't persuaded by my Christian friends who were not very good at arguing, now looking back. Because of the work of the Spirit in us, the things of earth grow strangely dim more and more. Our desire for earthly things, for carnal things, for the things of the natural man, decreases. And because of that, we begin to choose them less and Christ more. So you see, that's the Holy Spirit's working, and it's also our choice. He causes us to choose. He causes us to work, and it is us working. It is the Spirit who does it all. yet it does not mitigate our duty. I think it rather, in fact, amplifies our duty, the necessity of us to work. The great Scottish Presbyterian John Duncan said this, quote, though we are passive in our regeneration, we are not to be passive about it or after it. We are not to be passive about it or after it, end quote. That is, we are made willing. We are made willing. As the Heidelberg Catechism said, it is the Holy Spirit that makes us to share in Christ with all of His benefits, and is the Holy Spirit who comforts us forever. Ultimately, this is not our doing. Nonetheless, we are called to actively partake in it. It's He, the Spirit, who bids us to prayer, but it is we who bow our knee in prayer. It is He who causes us to hate sin, but it is we who begin to truly, actively loathe it. It's He who empowers us to repent. We do not repent of sin by our own power, yet it is we who turn from sin because He has empowered us. It's He who opens our deaf ears to hear His Word, yet it is we who listen and are commanded to actively give our attention to the Word. The many moral commands throughout the New Testament highlights this very thing for us. It is the Spirit's work which we must join in with. In Romans 8.13 we read, If you live according to the flesh, you will die. But if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live by the Spirit. 516. "...walk in the Spirit, and you shall not fulfill the lusts of the flesh. For the flesh lusts against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh. And these are contrary to one another, so that you do not do the things that you wish." You see that new principle within us. To even wish to do the things that please God. And to have to fight against the flesh. But yet it is the Spirit who empowers us to do so. by the Holy Spirit, we are raised with Christ to newness of life. And we are called and empowered to, by the same Spirit, walk in that new life. In our passage from Ephesians, Paul tells us that there is a power at work within us, a exceedingly great power, the same mighty power, he says, in fact, that worked in Christ when He raised Him from the dead and seated Him at the right hand in the heavenly places. that is the same power, dear Christians. That is the spirit that raised Christ from the dead and seated Him in heaven has raised us who believe, who are Christians from the dead and has seated us with Christ now. That's amazing. That's what the Holy Spirit has done. He's united us to Him. Therefore, when we live in sin, when we walk in the old ways, according to the passions and lusts of the flesh, we are living contrary to our nature. contrary to our nature, because now we've been raised with Christ. That's why the commandments are given in the New Testament, that show us how foolish this is, how against nature, our new nature in Christ, it is. Thus the New Testament injunction upon us is that as we have received Christ, so we are to walk in Him, Colossians 2.6. The power to do so is freely available to us in the gift of the Father, and the Son that they gave us, the Holy Spirit, whose temple we are, as we covered a few weeks ago on Sunday morning. The Spirit empowers us, but we must avail ourselves of that power. The Spirit comforts us sovereignly, independently of us, but we also must labor to receive that comfort. Let us see how dependent we are upon the Holy Spirit. Without Him, the one who connects us to Christ, who unites us to Christ, we can do nothing. As Abraham Kuyper said, just as air for the body, so is the Holy Spirit for our spiritual life. We need the Holy Spirit. We're not supposed to be afraid of Him, afraid of Him that He might make us feel emotions or subjectivity. No, we must run to Him, trust Him. use the power that he has given us. We must run the race set before us, not by our own power, but by his. We run by the power of Christ who is at work within us by his spirit. As James Durham wrote, the graces and influences of the Holy Spirit give legs, strength, and vigor to the inner man to run as wind does the ship, end quote. If we wish to be empowered, therefore, to live the Christian life, we must look continually to the Spirit. If we desire our comfort and our assurances as Christians to increase, we must look to the Spirit and avoid all things which grieve the Spirit, as Paul tells us, and thus dampens our comfort, dampens our assurance. Faith is the key here. It unites the whole of all of what we are discussing this evening. We are united to Christ by faith and we walk by faith now. The Spirit uses and He gives us faith and He works through our faith and in our faith that we might live unto God. William Gernal wrote this, Christ is the door that opens into God's presence and lets the soul into His very bosom. Faith is the key that unlocks the door, but the Holy Spirit is He who made the key, end quote. Dear Christians, the same Spirit that worked in Christ during His ministry, during His life, the same Spirit who raised Christ from the dead has also raised you from the dead. He is now at work in you, empowering you to live for Christ's service, to turn from sin, to love the things of Christ, to set your affections on the things above where Christ is seated, who is your life. He's the one who comforts you on your earthly pilgrimage to the celestial city. What a wonderful truth. If this truth causes us to be complacent, We've greatly and grossly misunderstood the truth. We don't understand it. The Spirit's work of sanctification should never lead us to say, well, I have nothing to do. Whatever's going to happen is going to happen. God is sovereign. Rather, it should lead us to say, it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me. In the life which I now live in the flesh, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. In closing, let's look at our third point. The Holy Spirit's work and our perseverance. Those who are born of the Spirit shall live by the Spirit all their days. And they shall also be brought safely home to glory by that same Holy Spirit. Paul said that he thanked God for the church in Philippi, for the Christians in Philippi, in Philippians 1, 6, being confident of this very thing, he writes, that he who has begun a good work in you will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ. This affords us great comfort and assurance that when we are faithless, which we so often are, He remains faithful. God shall complete what He has begun in us, and He shall do this and does do this by His Holy Spirit every day of our lives. The doctrine of the saints' perseverance is of great comfort to us as believers, and indeed it should be. And it, too, is the work of the Holy Spirit. Again, in Westminster Confession 17-2, it highlights this very point. Quote, they who are effectually called and regenerated, having a new heart and a new spirit created in them, are further sanctified, really and personally, through the virtue of Christ's death and resurrection, by his word and spirit dwelling in them. The dominion of the whole body of sin is destroyed. The several lusts thereof are more and more weakened and mortified, and they more and more quickened and strengthened in all saving graces, to the practice of true holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord." The Holy Spirit does all this. The Holy Spirit who dwells in us, and he does this through the means of the Word. As the Heidelberg Catechism tells us, the Holy Spirit is given to us to be with us forever. Jesus said this very same thing in John 14, 16. He says, I will pray the Father, and he will give you another helper that he may abide with you forever. It's the Holy Spirit who originates faith within us, and he also increases it every day more and more as believers. And finally, through that faith that he increases, he conducts us and leads us into heaven, the heavenly kingdom, by that same faith that he started within us. Christ is the Good Shepherd. But where did he go? As we talked about the ascension a few weeks ago in Lord's Day 18. That was a very thing that the disciples struggled with and sometimes we struggle with also. If Christ is the good shepherd, where is my shepherd? If he's at the right hand of God, how is he with me? How is it that he cares for me? He says he cares for his flock. That's his promise. And dear believer, Jesus has promised that I will not leave you as orphans. I will come to you. And he did this, he kept his promise. He did this as he said he would, by sending us the spirit of truth, John 14, 17. The Lord is our shepherd. Jesus Christ, our Lord, is the good shepherd. He has not left us. He is with us still, in and through his Holy Spirit. His rod and his staff comfort us still. He still leads us into green pastures. Even now, we have no lack, do we? Even while we walk through life's dark valleys, He is still with us. Actually, more so now than ever, as we talked about on Lord's Day 18. The same Holy Spirit of Christ who was given to us, who has dwelt inside of us since our regeneration, shall be with us always and shall bring us home. Comfort leads to contentment. Comfort leads to contentment. Jeremiah Burroughs, the great Puritan, touched on this very theme many times in his book, The Rare Jewel of Christian Contentment. We trust the providence of God, no doubt. But I think it's more important to phrase it that we should trust the God of providence. Not just what God does, but God himself. This God, the God of Providence, is within us. He's closer to us than our own skin. With His staff, He shall lead us where we are to go, and He shall cause us to rest in Himself. Therefore, dear congregation, let our constant refrain throughout the whole of our Christian life be, I believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord and Giver of life, who with the Father and the Son together is worshiped and glorified. Amen.