Part 20

Walking In The Spirit

Ephesians 1:11–14 (ESV) — In him we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to the purpose of him who works all things according to the counsel of his will, so that we who were the first to hope in Christ might be to the praise of his glory. In him you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed in him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, who is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it, to the praise of his glory.

Recap

Once we have the gift of the Holy Spirit, how do we keep Him? This is the next question for us to address in this newsletter series because it arises naturally from what our last 5 newsletter articles have been about.

First though, we are up to the 20th installment of our newsletter series exploring what the Bible tells us about the Holy Spirit. Before we move forward and begin to explore the Bible’s answer to this month’s question, let’s recap some of what the Holy Spirit has disclosed to us about Himself through His Word.

The Holy Spirit is the maker and giver of life (John 6:63). Back in the 2nd month of this series we said that His mission is to “make and create life”, as we confess in the Nicene Creed. When the Holy Spirit is doing things, what is it He’s trying to do? What is His goal and purpose? He is creating, giving, protecting, sanctifying, renewing and purifying life.

What then is “life”? The best and most all-encompassing definition of “life” is one that Jesus gives us in John 17:3 (ESV) — “And this is eternal life, that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent.” We were created for the purpose of enjoying this life, which is way more than just a biological process. We were created to be in an eternal relationship with God (Genesis 2:5-17), and with our fellow humans (Genesis 2:18). This “life” of relationship was created to be intimate, blissful, and without shame (Genesis 2:25).

Then sin severed all that and mankind received death in place of eternal life (Genesis 2:17, Genesis 3:1-19). Mankind became alienated from God, rather than intimate with Him (Genesis 3:24). Eternal life was lost.

The Holy Spirit gives life to the otherwise eternally dead (Ephesians 2:1-8). Salvation is more than just us being declared righteous in God’s courtroom. It is that, but it’s also more than that. Salvation is also a restoration of a right relationship with God, which means salvation is a return to eternal life. By the power of the Holy Spirit, those who are reborn and saved “know” the One True God and His Son.

This salvation is given in baptism (1 Peter 3:21), not because Christian Baptism is the good work that pleases God enough to make Him save us, but because Baptism is God’s promise to us that we are saved. Those who are reborn of water are also reborn to new and eternal life through the Spirit (John 3:5) and their banishment from God’s presence has been undone. This is because Christian Baptism unites us with Jesus (Romans 6:2-11, Colossians 2:11-14). By the power of the Holy Spirit, after our baptism we say with Paul- Galatians 2:20 (ESV) — “I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.”

Salvation and the Holy Spirit are also given through the sharing and preaching of God’s Word (Romans 1:16-17, 10:17, Galatians 3:2-6). In many articles we dove deep into this wonderful truth that the Holy Spirit calls spiritually dead and totally depraved sinners out of death and unrighteousness into life and forgiveness. It’s a miraculous and gracious work, but it’s one that He does through the so-called “Means of Grace.”

Yet, this salvation, which is so incredibly and graciously given to us, can be forsaken. That truth is one we’ve spent the last 5 articles poring over. It’s an unpleasant truth, but it’s an important one for us to appreciate.

How We Get To This Question

So we start out as depraved sinners, devoid of good (Mark 10:18), incapable of even contributing to our salvation (Isaiah 64:6, Psalm 14:3). In fact, we cannot even comprehend the things of God that are necessary for us to believe in order to be saved (1 Corinthians 2:14), but the Holy Spirit enlightens us and reveals to us the truth (1 Corinthians 2:10).

Our entrance into salvation, which is a second birth unto eternal life, happens totally by God’s power working through the Holy Spirit. It is not our own doing (Ephesians 2:8-9). Yet, we know that through our own “current, continuous, ongoing, deliberate and unrepentant sin”, we can forsake our salvation and relinquish the Holy Spirit (see the previous 5 articles explaining that).

The problem is: our entrance to salvation does not immediately terminate our old sinful nature. The Holy Spirit explained this to us through Paul’s experience dealing with it personally (Romans 7:14-25). Salvation does not completely eliminate our old sinful flesh. For that, we have to wait until we receive our new resurrection bodies (Philippians 3:20-21).

So here is our conundrum: Grace and only grace saves us. It saves us even from our sin and from our sinful nature. Faith is the assurance that we’ve received that salvation. This assurance is given to us through and by our reliance on the Means of Grace (The Word, Baptism and the Lord’s Supper). Yet, even though our faith saves us from our sin, we still sin. And even though we’re saved entirely by grace (and not by works), our sinful works can lead us away from that grace and back into death. So, when God’s grace and our sinfulness are both present in our lives, how do we know which has control?

How do we know if we’re a saved sinner or an unsaved sinner? How do we make sure we stay a saved sinner and not revert to being an unsaved sinner? The reality that we can outrage the Holy Spirit and drive Him away from us has been convincingly laid upon our hearts by the last 5 months’ exploration of Scripture. How do we deal with that?

We Continue As We Began

The last few months we’ve looked at what the Holy Spirit says not to do: do not continue to sin unrepentantly in an ongoing and deliberate fashion. Yet, this same command is given to unbelievers and they just keep doing that anyway. In fact, even though this command is given to believers, the Bible has many stories of the people of the covenant doing this anyway. The reality of this is enough to leave us anxious.

Yet that is not the Holy Spirit’s desire or intention. His goal is not to start us off by grace then flip the switch and send us off by the power of our old sinful flesh. This is a central point in the book of Galatians-

Galatians 3:2–3 (ESV) — Let me ask you only this: Did you receive the Spirit by works of the law or by hearing with faith? Are you so foolish? Having begun by the Spirit, are you now being perfected by the flesh?

We did not rely on our flesh to start our salvation and we cannot rely on our flesh to keep us saved. We must continue in our salvation the same way we entered it: through the Means of Grace.

Numerous other Scriptural witnesses say the same.

Colossians 2:6–7 (ESV) — Therefore, as you received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in him, rooted and built up in him and established in the faith, just as you were taught, abounding in thanksgiving.

The Colossians verse complements the Galatians one and gives us very simple marching orders, as well as a very simple promise. The marching orders are: The Means of Grace saved you. Trust in them to keep you saved. The promise is that they will both root you (i.e. keep you solidly in your salvation) and also build you up (i.e. help you grow in faith rather than atrophy and fall away). Both the Galatians verse and the Colossians verse encourage us to trust in the Means of Grace. Through the Means of Grace, Jesus saves us and He keeps us saved.

So the Word of God is absolutely central to the life of a Christian. I never tire of telling people that the Word is the power of God unto salvation (Romans 1:16-17), because it’s my earnest desire that everyone experience that same power at work in their hearts and lives. The Word is the power of God unto salvation (Romans 1 again), and the Word is the power that keeps us in salvation (Galatians 3:2-3 and Colossians 2:4-6). This is one of the reasons that honoring the Sabbath and making time for personal devotions and Bible study are so important to the life of the believer. The Word rooted us in Christ. Until the day we physically die, we need to let the Word build us up.

But hold on now (some will say): “You keep saying the Word is central to getting us and keeping us saved, but we know that the Holy Spirit is absolutely necessary. Are we minimizing the Holy Spirit by elevating the Word so much?”

We have to remember that the Word is the Holy Spirit’s power for accomplishing all this. Consider these verses-

2 Timothy 3:12–17 (ESV) — Indeed, all who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted, while evil people and impostors will go on from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived. But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have firmly believed, knowing from whom you learned it and how from childhood you have been acquainted with the sacred writings, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.

John 6:63 (ESV) — It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh is no help at all. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life.

The Words of Jesus are “Spirit” and “life”. It’s not like the Bible and the Holy Spirit are competing to see who can convert the most people. The Word and the Spirit are always working together, miraculously and mysteriously. This is our source of confidence. Even though we’re all works-in-progress and even though the unbelieving world is going from bad to worse while also trying to deceive us, the Word is “profitable” (i.e. useful and capable) for teaching, correcting and training us.

The word in Greek for “spirit” is also the same word for “breath” or “wind.” So in 2 Timothy 3:16 when it says “All Scripture is breathed out by God”, a more literal rendering of it is that it’s all “God-breathed” or “God-Spirited”. The Bible is, cover to cover, inspired by the Holy Spirit and given to us by Him.

The Holy Spirit is actually the Author of all Scripture. The Word is His power, and He is the Word’s power. Peter explains part of this mystery to us in his first letter to the Church-

2 Peter 1:19–21 (ESV) — And we have the prophetic word more fully confirmed, to which you will do well to pay attention as to a lamp shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts, knowing this first of all, that no prophecy of Scripture comes from someone’s own interpretation. For no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.

This is why God can give us the promise He gives us in Ephesians 1:13, that we were not only just given the Holy Spirit, but that we were sealed by Him as a guarantee of our eternal inheritance. The Word and the Spirit don’t just get us started in our salvation. Jesus uses them to keep us secure in His salvation as well.

John 10:28 (ESV) — I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand.

Philippians 1:6 (ESV) — And I am sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ.

How We Stay Saved

We stay saved by continuing to trust in the thing that saved us in the first place: the shed blood of Jesus Christ which was made ours through the Means of Grace. This is why the life of a Christian should be permeated with the Word of God. This is why we need to dive into congregational life and why congregational life needs to be first and foremost centered on the Gospel. We need to trust that the Holy Spirit will work on us through the Word in the same way that we trust in the Word and Baptism to save us. Our lives need to reflect that trust.

Think of yourself as a car with a check-engine light. The absolution and the Lord’s Supper are God declaring to you that the check-engine light has been cleared, and the preaching and teaching of the Word are how the Holy Spirit actually does the tuning and repairing that we need. This is a gross illustration, of course, but it’s a fair one all the same.

We know that we continue to sin even after we come to Christ. We’re “works-in-progress” and we might be tempted to worry that our sin will eventually render us spiritual scrap iron. The Holy Spirit promises us that He will continue and complete His Work on us. So we trust Him to keep us in the faith, and we show that trust by actually relying on the Word to work on us.

If we understand that we are a work in progress, and we allow the Holy Spirit room in our schedule and in our hearts to be constantly working on us, He will bring our faith to its completion in the day of Christ’s return.

We stay saved the same way we got saved: through our reliance on the Word and Spirit of God.