The Indwelling | Holy Spirit E2

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Welcome to Tech Support, a podcast of Mount Julia Church of Christ ORG, where we encourage and equip people to interact with the biblical text. We are your host, Brian LaMasters, and Tim Martin PERSON.

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In today's episode, we're going to talk about a topic that has sometimes generated some controversy and there's a lot of speculation and some challenging things to Christian. That is what most people would dub the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. How does the Holy Spirit, or does the Holy Spirit occupy our physical bodies and existence, perhaps in the way that we might say our soul or our spirit, our own personal spirit and soul do? And what did that connection mean?What does a New Testament say about that? And does it mean what can work miracles? All the different things along those lines. How does it affect us? And it's a topic of a lot of discussion on that. If you know, it's more than we can cover in one episode.But we guys just want to point out some things in the Bible WORK_OF_ART about that and not to be dogmatic in that sense. Brian and I had talked about before this to kind of talk about what we think personally about those types of thoughts. Are you going to share that?

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Go ahead, Tim PERSON. Tell us kind of what you, how can you kind of summarize it really?

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Yeah. I've studied this numerous times just from a personal perspective because I don't necessarily always say that how I interpret the Bible WORK_OF_ART and understand the Bible ought to be how everybody else understands and interprets the Bible on a topic that is ambiguous and not easy to be concrete about because there's a lot of really, really highly intelligent Bible WORK_OF_ART believing, God-fearing people who disagree on this. What I have come to think of personally is that since I have become a Christian NORP, that I have a connectionto God's Holy Spirit that I can't explain physically any more than I can explain how my soul is connected to this physical body. I know it goes with this physical body if I move to Wisconsin GPE. My soul is going to move to Wisconsin GPE and how it's connected. I believe there's an intimate connection between myself and really the entire divine nature, God, the Father, God, the Son, God, the Holy Spirit that I really can't explain, but I think it exists because I believe God hears my silent prayers.I think God can encourage me, and I think His Spirit is that agent and that instrument that does that. However, I do not believe that it does that completely separated from my knowledge and study and awareness of the Word of God that the Holy Spirit inspired. And so I think that the knowledge of that, I think the Holy Spirit can help me understand more about God's Word. I think there's an element there that doesn't, that's not in place for people who aren't Christians NORP. And our understanding of God's Word, I don't mean it's going to help me miraculously understand God's word, but I think he can be a helper to me. I think there's ways that God provides comfortto us. And I think the spirit of God is that agent in way. And I think I believe that for the rest of my life, even though it's hard for me to do some kind of brick-and-mortar explanation of that.

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Yeah, and I think that's what makes it difficult, because if we pause and we think about other elements and faith, you can think of something like even prayer itself. Like, physically we're saying something or not saying something we're thinking it, but to just acceptbecause Scripture WORK_OF_ART tells us that God hears that prayer. But like, we don't have any tangible way of actually, like, seeing that happen or when you think of, we talked about baptism in the earlier episode there, that going into the water that, no, this is the time where God is washing away your sins.Like we see something physical. We don't actually see anything about the spiritual side of that action that we're doing. So to me, it's even a little bit harder with the Holy Spirit because you're still in that spiritual realm, but you don't have that tangible physical thing that you can semi-associate with it. So when I was growing up, the way that I was taught, the Holy Spirit, was much more focused on what the spirit does through Scripture WORK_OF_ART as opposed to the indwelling of the spirit. But as I've continued to study it and dwell on it,to me, I like just taking the Bible WORK_OF_ART at face value. And when we go through some of these texts that we're going to look at today, it reads as if the spirit is dwelling in me, almost like what we would see, the Holy of Holies in the Old Testament.Can't explain all that. But to me, I like to take it just at face value and have faith in that, even though I can't explain it or put my hands on exactly what all that means. I think there's some things that we can tell from scripture it doesn't mean and some things that it means, but yeah, we can jump into this. Let's flip over at Acts chapter two. I think it's a good place to start. If youmissed last week, we looked at the Holy Spirit during the Old Testament and during the ministry of Jesus PERSON. So now we're going to pick up just right after that. You have Acts WORK_OF_ART chapter 2, known asthe first gospel sermon there. Acts 238 and my background was one of those verses that you memorized. Hang on, my Bible is stuck together. Tim PERSON, can you read? Yeah. Okay, all right. I got static. Sorry, I was trying not to rip my page there. So in Acts chapter 2, verse 38, it's the conclusion of that sermon by Peter. And at the end of it, Peter says, and they said to him in verse 38, repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christfor the forgiveness of your sins and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. So Tim, the million dollar question there?

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What is it the gift of Holy Spirit? What does it mean by you will receive this gift to Holy Spirit? There's a lot of different views of this, but I guess I would try to probably lump them into two major groups that all have certain nuances and caveats to it.But is the gift of the Holy Spirit the salvation itself? Is the gift of the Holy Spirit that you want to receive that baptism? Is it simply salvation in itself? Or is it something special and supernatural that Christians NORP get a connection to God's Holy Spirit? And you can spend time analyzing the language and all that.Your translators have done a perfectly fine job here, a gift, a present of the Holy Spirit, however you want to say that in looking at that. However, the question comes in, does that mean that these people who eventually winds up being around 3,000 people we see that in verse 41, that they have some sort of abilitiesthat are beyond normal abilities? Or do they simply just have a connection to God through His Holy Spirit because they're baptized into Christ PERSON, because they're forgiven of their sins? I don't think it's simply salvation because really salvation comes from God.I think the New Testament WORK_OF_ART conveys that. It's the grace of God that we're saved through Jesus Christ PERSON. It is God who sent his son, Jesus Christ PERSON. It is God who's had the plan of salvation since before the foundation of the world. It is God who gives forgiveness of sins. It is God who will sit on the judgment seat.So as we think about the divine nature, and we see that divine nature with three different personalities here, salvation flows from God. And we know about salvation through the product of the Holy Spirit, right, through the written word, but these people didn't. They knew about the salvation of Jesus Christ through the spoken word of Peter PERSON, who I think, because we see earlier on in Acts WORK_OF_ART, they receive a miraculous baptism of the Holy Spirit that Jesus promised them that they would get. And I think Peter PERSON knows a whole lot more thingsin Acts 38 than he did in Acts Chapter 1, you know, as far as divine knowledge and divine revelation. I wish we had the rest of that sermon because he goes on in verse 40 with many other arguments and exhorted them to be saved. And so, hang on, you said Acts 38 LAW. Excuse me, Acts 238 LAW. Oh, okay.

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In Acts 238 LAW. Yeah, my Bible has some 10 additional chapters of Acts WORK_OF_ART to look at. And so for me, I don't really understand the rest of the New Testament WORK_OF_ART as saying salvation comes from the Holy Spirit of God. I think that would be a strange saying where I said salvation ultimately is God's decision to make on judgment day and at baptism to give forgiveness of our sins.I think the avenue for that is Jesus Christ PERSON. The avenue for salvation. You don't think that. I know that. Then we see this separate thing, this gift of the Holy Spirit. So is there a blessing?Is there a giving of the Holy Spirit to Christians NORP? That's the crux of the entire discussion. Yeah.

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What that means.

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Yeah, to me I see it as not being salvation there the way that it's described. Like, you have your forgiveness of sins that's occurring there. You're receiving the gift of the Holy Spirit. Later on in the text, it talks about you're also being added to the church or added to the number is the way that it mentions it a couple different times there as well, or being added to the family of God. So a bunch of things is occurring in that point of salvation and stuff. But yeah, I don't see it being that way. I also don't see this being a physical or fleshly thing.Like you think of Jesus PERSON coming down and taking on flesh. I don't think the Holy Spirit is taking on any fleshly indwelling or, you know, anything like that on there. We'll talk about this more next week, but I don't think this is directly tied to those that receive the gift of the Holy Spirit automatically had these miraculous powers and spiritual gifts that you're going to see for all Christians NORP throughout any time.I don't see those being directly connected there in all settings. And then what do you think about the omnipresence of God? I know you mentioned that earlier in our notes being tied to the Holy Spirit here.

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You know, I try to think about that concept like first century Christians NORP would have thought about it. Obviously, for the first five to ten years of Christianity, they were all Jews NORP or proselytes. I wonder how an Israelite NORP would answer that is, you know, God's present in the Holy of Holies, God's present in the tabernacle. He can see and know all things, perhaps, we would say. I don't even know how to define God is everywhere. perhaps we would say, but I don't even know how to define God is everywhere.Like his being is pervasive throughout creation. We say that a lot because we say, I see God in the trees or in the sky or in the clouds in his creation. I can see we can see the product and the wisdom and the majesty and the power of God and his creation. And I'm not a theologian, so I don't even know what that would mean, but if God is omnipresent, that means he's all present in all physical creation.That would mean he's present in every being, right? Christian NORP or not Christian. I mean, either all present is all present or it's not all present. Like all knowing is all knowing. I make the argument that Jesus PERSON was not always omniscient when he was here on earth because he asked questions. You know, he asked questions of people.Perhaps he's asking those questions rhetorically. But he didn't know when he was coming back. So that's one thing he didn't know. So therefore Omni is no longer applicable. To me, if God is omnipresent, that means he's everywhere, including his present must be in people who are not even Christians NORP. Yeah.

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So to me, I don't see those two things being tied together. Like when you hear people talk about the omnipresence of God, they're not talking about the indwelling of the Holy Spirit there as being as a gift, which I see more of the omnipresence of God being tied to knowledge and awareness of all those things, but not this indwelling among all people or any of that kind of stuff. So don't tie those two things together when you hear people talk about this. That's above my mental ability to figure out.

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I want to make sure. I think God can be wherever God wants to be. So I'm not putting him within boundaries, but I don't understand that concept. I can't, my mind can't process that concept. Yeah.

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Another big passage that I think a lot of people, if they've studied the Holy Spirit,

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will probably recognize Romans chapter 8 LAW.

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Let's slip over there and look at Romans 8. Tim PERSON, you want to read?

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Yeah, I read 9 through 11. We'll talk about the context beyond that, but even maybe before Paul PERSON is talking about in preceding this is flesh versus spirit. How are we going to walk? Are we going to walk according to spirit? We're going to walk according to flesh.And I think here we're in flesh we're talking about not just this bag of bones that we have and skin and things, but worldly ways. Are we going to walk in worldly ways or we're'll go walk in the ways of the Spirit of God? And Paul making that juxtaposition between the two of them. And 9 through 11, he says, but you speak into Roman NORP Christians are not in the flesh.You are in the Spirit, since the Spirit of God dwells in you. Anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to Him. That's a pretty strong statement. But if Christ PERSON is in you, then the body is dead because of sin, but the spirit is life because of righteousness.If the spirit of him who raised Jesus PERSON from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will give life to your mortal bodies, also through the spirit, his spirit, that dwells in you. Some translations basically inhabits you. You know, I don't know, Brian, if he was a Roman Christian NORP reading this, and then we have to decide, is this something that is special and occasionaljust to the Roman Christians NORP? Or would Paul be able to make this same statement to Ephesus and to Corinth GPE and to Thessalonica and to, if he wrote to Alexandria, to Alexandria or to Antioch GPE? And does it continue to be correct? Could I preach, could we preach this sermon today and it be applicable?

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Yeah, I fall into that camp that I think because we see it elsewhere throughout Scripture WORK_OF_ART as well, that this is a a I don't know of common theme but it's a theme throughout the New Testament WORK_OF_ART that the spirit dwells or the spirit has been given to Christians NORP I don't see anything in this context that would make me limit it to just this one gathering of Christians NORP here but do you think differently no I don't I don't

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I think you're correct and you know we go to see down in 13, the spirit put to death the deeds of the body. By the spirit, you put to death the deeds of the body in verse 13. We're led by the spirit of God so that we're the children of God. But we didn't receive a spirit of slavery. We received a spirit of adoption. Paul is speaking in a very spiritual sense here about what we are now that we are Christians NORP,how we're supposed to behave, what has been done away with in our life and what is present in our lives. And I don't know a lot about the psychology or maybe the cosmology or the people that lived in this day in town, if that's even the right word describe what I'm saying, but in the sense of there's a physical plane that we exist in and then there's a spiritual plane of existence that is there and then there's maybe even other planes of existence in where does God inhabit where does you know where are these things where is heaven you know for example where's hell um but it would be interesting to know that and there's probably people who've done a lotof theology it would know that I think it's probably people who've done a lot of theology, it would know that. I think it's very natural for them. Sometimes I think, I wonder, if we have put, if we have separated God and trifurcated God, if you will, into God the Father, God, the Son, God, the Holy Spirit, all three of these have jobs,and all three of them are separate. I don't know if Paul PERSON thought that same way. I just wonder if it was very natural to him to think about God as three manifestations or agents or personalities, but that they were still one. Does that make sense, too? Because he does seem to speak of them interchangeably at different times.Yeah. Is that more natural for his thinking than for us? Because we're all like, well, he said God PERSON does this. Well, he said Jesus PERSON does this. He's a spirit. Paul might be like, yeah, they're all three doing at the same time.You know what I mean?

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I don't know about it. I was going to ask you because this is one of those texts that he kind of uses it or changeable. I mean, where he'll go, Spirit of Christ belongs to him. But if Christ PERSON is in you and then he's going to go back to the Spirit of Life, you know, like.

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Yeah, it's just seems to be bouncing all over place.

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And I wondered if he's, if that's the train of thought he's going in or if he's going to go back to the spirit of life. You know, like... Yeah, it's just seems to be bouncing all over place. And I wondered if he's, if that's the train of thought he's going in or if he's trying to establish the importance of the spirit, you know, like putting on equal planes to crisis and using that interchangeable. I don't know for sure.It would be interesting, yeah.

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But yeah. Early Christian NORP thought on that would be interesting to see. You know, we get a lot of our Trinitarian NORP thought or, I don't know, you like the word Godhead, because I think it's a poor translation of the word means divine nature. But from a passage in 1st John 5 WORK_OF_ART that really is probably not even original 1st John 5 about, you know, these three or one, the father and son, holy spirit.I just wonder if we have too much of a doctrine of that, that maybe would have been understood differently. Obviously, I know that they obviously recognize Jesus Christ PERSON. I'm going to recognize God and sometimes separate them. Jesus PERSON sitting at the right hand of God. That's a clear like separation in their mind. I just wonder in a spiritual sense, do they think about that differently than we tend to,as we compartmentalize what all they do? Yeah, you're right.

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We tend to view them as separate individuals most of the time.

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Somebody's researched that. I haven't, but it would be interesting just to think about that. But it just seems to be very interchangeable here in that the Roman NORP audience has a relationship with the Spirit of God. And I don't mean congregation. Because if that's the case, it's only when they're met together in whatever house they met in or whatever houses they met in.Then when they walked out the door, all of a sudden they no longer had the Spirit of God. And the other side is, is this still applicable today? Could Romans be read aloud at the Mount Jewett Church of Christ ORG and these words still be true? Yeah, yeah.

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And I think we both were in agreement on that. To me, it's, you know, it's hard for us to speak in absolutes of exactly what the Spirit does in each of these roles and things like that. But in this passage, we see one that hits a requirement. If you do not have it, it also mentions later on in verse 15 about, or 16, sorry,that the spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God. Like, it's, the idea of the spirit being given to Christians and what I would say, dwelling with Christians NORP or in Christians,like gets raised up on a big pedestal when it's talked about. Like the necessity of it, we'll talk about this later in other episodes, but the role that the spirit plays in our transformation, in like sanctification or bearing fruit, you know, like exactly what all that looks like.It's hard to explain sometimes, but Paul PERSON tends to always take our morality to some degree back to the spirit as those two things being connected. Anyways, I just find a lot of that interesting.

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Here is part of our validation. We see in 16, the principle of two or more witnesses, the spirit is bearing witness with our spirit that we are the children of God. You know, it's giving validation to that testimony is validated by the fact that there are two witnesses there. I'm pretty sure somebody's probably talked about that.Yeah.

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And then if we jump down to 26, this will probably be recognized by a lot of people. If you've read through Romans NORP, I feel like this is one that everybody highlights. But likewise, the spirit helps us in our weakness. for we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the spirit himself intercedes with us with groanings too deep for words. Raises a lot of questions, you know, like what does that look like from an intercessory role? Like that what does that look like in functionality of when we're praying?And how is the spirit communicating some of those things that we're feeling to God? Tim PERSON, well, what do you make?

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Yeah, this is one of those passages where, like, including with 27, we're like, okay, where does there need to be a capital S, you know, and where is it a lowercase S? But here, like, for example, the new revised standard translators capitalize the word spirit in both 26 and 27, everywhere it appears. And we know God who searches hearts. We know that hearts doesn't mean this organ that bunch of blood in our bodies, but our spiritual beingknows what the mind of the spirit, and so God and the Holy Spirit obviously on the same page, because the spirit intercedes for the saints. I know some people might make a lowercase S there in the second part of the second phrase in 27. But I don't, I think it makes better sense to capitalize Holy Spirit type sense. But this intercession of the saints, when I think about prayers, when you and I talk about this in our preparatory work is many of our prayers, if not maybe most of our personal prayers, are not uttered out loud.And so there has to be some way that God knows those prayers. And here, Paul PERSON is explaining it as if in our weaknesses, and I don't know if that's our general weakness or in times of weakness, we don't know how to pray as we ought. Maybe we don't know the right words to say would be something we would say in modern day.

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But whatever we do say, the Spirit seems to be a translator or a conveyor in words that we don't know, that he takes them to God. Anyway, well, how does the Spirit know our prayers if there's no connection to us? I mean, there has to be a connection to us. And the Spirit here is seen as an intercessor, just like Jesus PERSON is, as a different personality. And so this is a powerful verse for me that the Holy Spirit of God knows my prayers and also helps me in that way in taking it to God and saying the things that I need to say.

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Sometimes people in very, very deep, passionate prayer, or in times of desperation, or in times where they just don't even know what to say, that the Holy Spirit helps here with that and knows our hearts. And so that to me is a powerful thing that indicates, unless I say that Paul was only speaking to people in the first century here, and it's no longer applicable,then I have to know that the spirit has a connection to my spirit in my mind.

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Yeah.

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Yeah, I agree with these really powerful passage because there's different ways you could take the idea of weakness there.

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But so it's either we don't know the will of God, like in our weakness of like immaturity when it comes to spirituality or weaknesses in like sufferings you know like either way it's i think it's applicable this concept that as people i think in new christians NORP for sure there's this concept of like my prayers have to be fancy and it's got to be

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all this like fancy language

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and all you know like especially when you think

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about times where we actually get insight

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into prayer it's always bashing that thought like no God just wants you to like speak it's not about you think of sermon on the mount it's not about saying all these fancy things but so many times there'speople that's like I don't know what to say, and that's okay. Like, your emotions, because, like, to me, this is, my emotions through the spirit can still communicate to God. The way that I feel, even though I don't know how to express some of those emotions or what to ask for, like, I can still have this dialogue, this communication, this fellowship with God, and the spirit's helping that in maybe communication to him, but also maybe molding my will to God as well.So how that all works, I don't know, but to me, it's very comforting that I don't have to have it all together when I go before the throne of God, that I can just be real. And, yeah.

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How do I pray? Yeah. We've got a gentleman that comes by here and sees us on almost a weekly basis from our community that he attends here often. He always worries, am I praying right? How do I'm supposed to pray?And I think he probably has better prayers than most of us. You said something about, you know, we talk about this according to the will of God at the end of Romans 827 LAW. And you said this about conforming to the will of God and the Holy Spirit helping us do that. And I would if we want to emphasize that I don't think that we have the ability to know the will of God wholly apart from Scripture WORK_OF_ART and from our knowledge of that.I know that's easy for us as Americans to say in the 21st century because we have the entirety of Scripture WORK_OF_ART translated into our language. And that's not something that people have always enjoyed in Christianity ORG from its time. Even English-speaking persons didn't have the Bible WORK_OF_ART in their language and really readily available until probably the 16th century. And so they had to rely on what was being talked to them. And even in the first and second century, so many Christians NORP hadto rely on what was being talked to them because you didn't have a canonical New Testament agreed upon and widely accepted and circulated in the first couple of centuries of the church and thinking about. So they had to they had a reliable but it still was what was read in the churches you know Justin PERSON talks about the memoirs of the apostles being read in the churches we know that that scripture was read in churches so they had to know that I don't think we can know the will of God and we know the Old Testament was was revered in early Christianity ORG and quotedand taught and things about God and knowing about God and how he interacted with his people and what his expectations were. I want to be sure that when I say what I understand is I don't think that the Holy Spirit gives me something that renders the word of God useless because the Word of God is a product of the Holy Spirit. So I think a knowledge of that helps us know more about God, what is what he wants for us in general, the pattern that Jesus Christ PERSON set down for behavior. And really, I don't know the plan of salvationwithout scriptures. I don't know, I don't know the things we're reading without the scriptures, but we're reading scriptures. And so I want to be sure that we don't, and I don't think we are putting across the feeling that I can be baptized, get the gift of Holy Spirit, and I no longer need to study the Word of God. I mean, I think that those two things mesh together in a gearbox that can't be separated. Oh, yeah, 100%.

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There is a word there just to make sure people know. You said canonical, you want to give your pre-Bron.

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I mean, what we would call, and I'm referring to the Protestant canon, 39 Old Testament books, 27 New Testament WORK_OF_ART books that we generally recognize as being scripture. Yeah. In that sense. All those came together.

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Yeah, that's right.

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Yeah, that's right. All right.

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Let's, if you're good, Tim, to jump over maybe to 1 Corinthians chapter 3. We'll look at a couple passages here in 1st Corinthians LAW, but I think this is going to be another key passage when we look at what does it look like to receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. It reads as follows. 1st Corinthians 316 LAW says,Do you not know that you are God's temple and that God's spirit dwells in you? If anyone destroys God's temple, God will destroy him for God's temple is holy and you are that temple. To me, when I think about what it looks likefor the Holy Spirit to dwell in us, this is the passage I go to in my mind. I mentioned that. I think at the beginning that I view it the idea of God's presence dwelling among the people in the Old Testament, especially when you think of like the Holy of Holies. And then now that imagery has been carried over to where we are now God's dwelling place as individual Christians NORP, but also as a collective body of believers as well. But there's this idea as individuals,I don't have to go to the temple through a priest, but now because of Christ PERSON and his salvation, I can go to God where I am. And with the gift of the Holy Spirit, God's presence dwells with me.

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We think about this idea of it, too. Now, there can a lot can be said about the fact that, yes, this is being read aloud to the church in Corinth GPE, and he is speaking to y'all, we would say, in the South LOC. These pronouns you instead are plural pronouns. And so he's speaking to the groupall, we would say, in the South LOC, at least pronouns, you instead of arterial pronouns. And so he's speaking to the group.So the discussion comes up whether or not he's speaking individualistically or he's speaking about the Corinthian NORP community as a whole as being the temple of God. But I think as we look over and we're going to go probably a minute to chapter six, we think about sexual immorality. You know, we're going to defile the temple of God by joining with a prostitute. Well, that's an individualistic sin.Sexual immorality is. And I know that sometimes sexual immorality is used metaphorically to talk about the people of Israel fornicating with foreign gods by worshipping them. But I don't think that's what's being talked about because there's so much aimed at individuals in the church in Corinth GPE or particular groups within it. There seems to be obviously a lot of divisive things in the church in Corinth GPE, but I don't know that it's talking about, that it's talking just to the people in this house church as a whole group, just as we talked about earlier.I think it's talking about individuals.

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Yeah, and you had mentioned 1st Corinthians 6 LAW.

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To me, that last phrase in that chapter, it talks about for you were bought with a

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price, so glorify God in your body, brings it back to the individual. Like, he's talking about the collective group, but yeah, I think he brings that back to the individual as well.

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What you said is revolutionary in thinking, though, for the, let's just say, especially in Corinth GPE, we're talking about probably a lot of people that were Gentiles before they were converted. And even for Jews NORP, this concept that you mentioned of God being available to each individual is very unusual, even for pagans NORP,because, well, if I want to worship Jupiter, I have to go to the temple of Jupiter. If I want to worship Athena or Artemis or whatever, I have to go to that location where Artemis dwells or where something that represents the manifestation of that deity is, like, where an idol would be. That's right.And the Jews will maybe say the same thing about the temple and even the Israelites NORP say that about the tabernacle. This concept of access to God through Christ PERSON on an individualistic basis, wherever you may be, it's pretty revolutionary if you think about it in both Jewish thought and pagan thought for these new Christians NORP. Especially

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when you include the thought of holiness as well. Because even for like the Greeks NORP and stuff and

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other religions they are like

Speaker 21845.38s - 1894.12s

they would have viewed certain areas as being holy or an idol being special and sacred yeah sacred space is like um oh can't say that so many times fast like yeah it's Peter PERSON piper sacred spaces but when you take that then and think about you are now a sacred space, like the change is the way that they would view, you know, especially when you think of like, some like, I think like First John PERSON and some of the teachers that later came of the separation from the spirit to the flesh, you know, like, but you are now a sacred space that's called to be holy and to live a life in a certain way as a priest or all these different things because you now are you're now holy you're not just a part of your life

Speaker 11894.12s - 1941.72s

or somewhere where you go to worship but yeah it's challenging too because I do tend to interpret the New Testament WORK_OF_ART very much from a community perspective I believe that sometimes we do tend to study the Bible because we're very individualistic in our culture, in our ideology, whereas our ancient brethren, I think we're a lot more community-oriented just by necessity.Christianity becomes a very urban religion as Paul PERSON begins to spread things around. And because we don't live in a world where what one person does affects another person as much because we live in individual homes with privacy fences and curtains and shades, these people live shoulder to shoulder in a lot of ways in the community. There's more of a sense of what's best for the community.How does the community operate? We see that in First Corinthians WORK_OF_ART, a little bit of yeast, leavens the entire community.

Speaker 01942.1s - 1957.32s

And so I always want to be careful when I start looking at things like we are right now, individualistically, because it kind of rubs against the grain a little bit of yeast, leavens the entire community. And so I always want to be careful when I start looking at things like we are right now, individualistically, because it kind of rubs against the grain a little bit of how I normally think. But I think what we've said is correct. And I don't want to be bound by always thinking in a community sense.

Speaker 21958.22s - 1975.98s

Yeah, no, and I agree with you. I think that the illustration you gave there was very good. In our notes, you had mentioned, I just wanted to talk a little bit about the word. I know you referenced it earlier, the role that it plays. You got more that you want to add to that?

Speaker 11977.12s - 1980.26s

You mean what, the role of the Bible WORK_OF_ART plays in our life?

Speaker 21980.26s - 2146.8s

Yeah, I think, you know, I described that we actually were in a class of the day on the Holy Spirit, and I kind of described the Word of God and the Holy Spirit of God, and really everything in our connection as Christians NORP as a joint partnership. I don't believe that simply becoming a Christian NORP means that I have this knowledge of God. I believe I have to read His Word. We've been given this product that is, again, as far as we think about things that were strange and unusual to the Gentile pagans who converted to Christianity ORG, having sacred writings that directed us morallyand told about our God and stuff like that are unusual to them. It's why I often say there's no such Greek NORP word that means scripture because they didn't have scripture in that sense. Now, for Jewish NORP converts, obviously they would understand that. The power of the word of God and knowing that and the fact that God inspired people to write these things downso we can know them, I don't think we can discount that. I think it goes hand in hand. I believe that God helps me understand his scripture is better spiritually because I have a connection to him spiritually. There's people that would disagree with that. I just feel differently. I've read the Bible WORK_OF_ART my entire life. I've never known a time where I didn't study the Bible WORK_OF_ART from when I was a small child.I maybe took a little bit of a break from that in college. But I've known about the Word of God. I went to a private Christian NORP school. I had to take a Bible WORK_OF_ART class every year. But God's Word means something different to me after I became a Christian. After I was joined to Christ, after I was just different in how I studied the Bible WORK_OF_ART. And I'll say this, studying the Bible WORK_OF_ART at a advanced level in graduate school, if you don't have faithand you don't have the spirit of God, you can very easily lose your faith in a deeper study of scripture if you don't have that partnership with God's Holy Spirit. And that's just something that's a personal belief in mind that I really don't anticipate ever being shook and shaken from that place. I just personally, I've had a different experience since I become a Christian NORP. Yeah, I wrote down in my notes one passage that maybe we would go to.I don't know that. I actually told you ahead of time, but 1st Corinthians LAW chapter 2, the ending of that chapter, I feel like, touches on what you're talking about here to where you have the natural man looks at what the spirit's trying to teach is, is folly and just doesn't care about that. Yeah.But then there's this concept that the mind, having the mind of Christ PERSON and the spirit, you know, like helping you with some of that. One of my questions was to you is, well, how much of that is just the spirit gave us scripture versus the spirit playing thisrole in helping us like understand scripture and like grow maturity and stuff like that.

Speaker 12147.04s - 2225.1s

I think both of them are involved in. I'll give an example. Someone can fall away. I believe people can fall away. I know there's a debate about that and then the security of believers with you. In Hebrews chapter six, one can fall away.We see that. But let's just say, for example, it's not what I want to happen, but just say one day I just decided that I didn't want to follow the paths of God anymore. Maybe I'd even cease to believe in him, but I just didn't want to obey them anymore. And I walked away from Christianity ORG, that maybe there were some things I couldn't resolve in my mind or whatever reason that would be. That doesn't mean I just all of a sudden they've forgotten everything I know about the Bible WORK_OF_ART. I would still have knowledge of His Word, but it wouldn't have the same effect in my life.It wouldn't be meaningful in my life anymore. It wouldn't be something that drove my life anymore. And so to me, simply having knowledge of Scripture WORK_OF_ART is not the only thing. I think you have to have a spiritual relationship with God that gives so much deeper meaning and so much more insight and importance to that. And I think it's more than just a focus of that.And so I think about that. It's not like you've just forgotten. I don't have relationship with God anymore if I fall away, or at least the same relationship with God, I guess I would say. But that doesn't mean I've erased all my knowledge of his word from his mind.I'm my own mind.

Speaker 22225.38s - 2225.56s

Yeah.

Speaker 12226.48s - 2234.52s

And I think for me, as a parent, that's one thing that, like, I want to make sure I do, like, for my kids is to instill scripture in them.

Speaker 22234.82s - 2241.38s

Because even if they walk away from faith at one point, like, those truths are still there.

Speaker 12241.52s - 2246.4s

You know, and you hope at one time that that will lead them back to a faithful relationship

Speaker 22246.4s - 2248.38s

with God where he's a part of their lives.

Speaker 12248.48s - 2253.04s

But, yeah, like, you can not be faithful to God, but still no script.

Speaker 22253.04s - 2257.88s

I know there's a lot of atheists that know the New Testament WORK_OF_ART better than most Christians

Speaker 12257.88s - 2303.14s

or many Christians NORP do. I think about Bart Ehrman PERSON, for example, he's an atheist because they couldn't reconcile God allowing evil to exist and the things that went on in this world. But he knows the New Testament WORK_OF_ART very, very well. It may interpret it very differently. But I think what you said about teaching your children, that's why we do vacation in Bible WORK_OF_ART school.That's why we have a Christian NORP preschool that this church sponsors for people. We are going to let people know the Word of God. It may not change their lives right away. It may be something that they may walk away from one day, but it's not going to be because they weren't taught and have a knowledge of the Word of God.That is a rote knowledge that I think needs more than just simple road knowledge, but we're trying to instill that. That's one of the main major two missions of this church to do that, and just hope that God guides the outcome in a positive way.

Speaker 22303.74s - 2308.44s

Yeah, and not to go too far down this rabbit hole that we're going down, I guess, a little bit,

Speaker 12308.5s - 2314.82s

but I think it ties back in as I want to challenge myself and our listeners is to not approach scripture,

Speaker 22314.82s - 2344.64s

whether it's personal devotion, like reading, sermons, a Bible WORK_OF_ART class, purely from the standpoint of education, but for transformation. Like to recognize, like, you can know about scripture without actually letting that guide you and change, like, who you are as an individual. I think we need to be very aware of that as a gift that God's given us. But just being in its presence doesn't always bring about the results that we need to withoutthat willing heart.

Speaker 12344.82s - 2416.48s

You can just tell you the Bible WORK_OF_ART. You can know the historical context, the theological context, and many scholars do that do not have a relationship with God and Jesus Christ PERSON, but they are very knowledgeable about the content and context and theology of Scripture of the New Testament WORK_OF_ART and the Old Testament and whatever way that may be, but they don't, yet it hasn't transformed their lives spiritually. And that's what I would say to those who would say, well, if the spirit does dwell in us,and let's just say, for example, the assumption is made that we no longer have these miraculous abilities. And we'll talk about that and we talk about our next, and our next episode a little bit about how that works in Scripture WORK_OF_ART. What purpose does it serve? I believe it serves that purpose.You know, I believe the purposes that we've read, taking our groanings before God and we understand, you know, I think the spirit is a comforter. I think it's a helper.I think it's something that helps us do. But I am speaking personally about that. And so the question is, well, what's the purpose of that? If not miracles, if the Holy Spirit is not inspiring me to write scripture, for example,or to raise people from the dead, does that necessitate the fact that the Holy Spirit is useless for me? I don't think that makes sense with what I read in New Testament WORK_OF_ART.

Speaker 22417.08s - 2456.14s

Yeah. My closing thought to people is this. Sometimes I've heard people say over the years that I don't feel like God is close to me or I don't feel like the presence of God in my life. But my encouragement to you is to accept scripture that God says, hey, I've given the gift of the spirit to you and I, you now have this witness. You nowhave this somebody that's interceding for you. And whether or not you have this this physical feeling like take comfort and assurance knowing that God dwells when you like you are holy because of Christ PERSON and you have a relationship with God whether or not you feel like that

Speaker 12456.14s - 2461.5s

like it's there so that's what you got a closing thought yeah there's times in people's lives

Speaker 22461.5s - 2465.68s

especially in times of great loss or great stress or great crisis,

Speaker 12466.28s - 2488.1s

where, as David PERSON said in the Psalms, at least this is attributed to David, don't let your spirit depart from me. You know, in a time of anguish, in a time of panic when the world's closing in around on you, sometimes we don't feel that way, but we need to know that that's, that God is with us, and that that connection, that spiritual connection exists.

Speaker 22488.74s - 2491.14s

Yeah, there's a good song based on that text there.

Speaker 12491.14s - 2496.28s

If you have any questions or suggestions for future topics, let us know by emailing us at

Speaker 22496.28s - 2503.2s

podcast at mountjulia.org. To our fellow students of scripture, thank you for joining us for tech support. We hope you will join us next week.

Speaker 02503.74s - 2520.26s

This is a podcast of the Mount Julia Church of Christ ORG. You can find more personal growth resources like this one at Mountjuliat.org slash resources. The Mount Juliet Church of Christ ORG exists to glorify God and make disciples by helping people grow in Christ PERSON love one another and serve others.