THE BELIEVER’S RESOURCES IN THE HOLY SPIRIT
E. E. Hoyte
John 7: 37–39; Acts 2: 6–11; 2 Kings 4: 1–7
I have in mind to call attention to the great resources we have as possessing the Holy Spirit.
We referred today to God’s answer to Moses when, in view of his death, he asked God to set a man over His people who would go out and come in before them. The word was, “Take Joshua the son of Nun, a man in whom is the Spirit”, Numbers 27: 18. I think the emphasis on the Spirit indicates the pattern or kind of man God had in mind to take the place of His servant Moses, and we may be sure it is also indicative of the unique place the Spirit is intended to have in our dispensation, which we are told is “in faith”(1 Timothy 1: 4)—faith in God and in the Man who has been exalted to God’s right hand. It was as the result of that exaltation that the Spirit was sent down, as it says, “Having received of the Father the promise of the Holy Spirit, he has poured out this which ye behold and hear”, Acts 2: 33. The dispensation was set on by Christ; having accomplished the will and counsel of God here in manhood, He was received up into the Father’s presence, and as a consequence the Spirit was sent from the Father in Christ’s name to take up His abode here, completing, you may say, the inauguration of the dispensation. How vast has been the service of these two divine Persons in effecting this, and what a distinctive place They are worthy of in our affections!
In John 7 the Lord is anticipating the descent of the Spirit. In chapter 16 He says, “When he is come”; but here it says, “The Spirit was not yet, because Jesus had not yet been glorified”.
In verse 37 it says, “In the last, the great day of the feast. Jesus stood and cried saying, If any one thirst, let him come to me and drink. He that believes on me, as the scripture has said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water”. No doubt what is alluded to here is the feast of tabernacles which was proceeding, at which the Lord was present. According to Leviticus 23 this feast was the peak of all the yearly feasts commanded by God, being celebrated at the time of harvest ingathering.
At this time they were to dwell in booths amidst cut-down palm branches, willows, and other boughs of trees, rejoicing before God for seven days, love permeating their hearts for God and for one another. The sentiments that were to pervade the occasion are expressed by David in Psalm 133, “Behold, how good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity!”, ending with “For there hath Jehovah commanded the blessing, life for evermore”.
The last day, the great day, would be the highest point in their festivity. It was at that time Jesus stood and cried, “If any one thirst, let him come to me and drink”, which would imply that, though experiencing their highest degree of enjoyment, there was something lacking, something more to be desired. “Let him come to me”—think of the effect this appeal should have stirred in their hearts! The Lord was calling attention to the glory of His Person—as the One who superseded the best that Judaism afforded. It was christianity He had in mind. The woman in John 4 left her water-pot at the well, showing that she drank morally and went away filled. Christ was in her; “Is not he the Christ?”, she said to the men in the city. John 4 refers to what springs up in the believer; chapter 7 is what flows out from within—an additional thought—“out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water”. John explains the meaning, “But this he said concerning the Spirit, which they that believed on him were about to receive; for the Spirit was not yet, because Jesus had not yet been glorified”.
We were speaking earlier about the smiting of the rock in Exodus 17—Christ typically had to be smitten for us to get the Spirit. Smiting is a severe thing—“Smite the shepherd, and the sheep shall be scattered”, Zechariah.13: 7. Both these scriptures imply that Jesus had to die, but the point in John 7 is that not only was His death necessary, but also His resurrection and ascension and exaltation were a necessity. The great stoop in death had to be taken before His exaltation, as Philippians 2 shows. How it should affect and sober us that our Lord Jesus had to bear the judgment, the wrath of God was poured out upon Him, before we could receive the Holy Spirit. How this should touch our hearts! Christianity is a hallowed thing, based on sacrifice, the sacrifice of the One who offered Himself without spot to God.
Referring to Acts 2, it is good to take a look backward to see what characterised christianity at the beginning. What that word has become today as used in the world is a matter to be deplored. The enemy has got in and spoiled the name publicly, but thank God the Holy Spirit, from an exalted and glorified Christ, as here sustains, in spite of everything to the contrary, the substantiality of christianity in the souls of God’s people. This chapter records the fact that there were suitable vessels for His reception on His descent, and persons are still receiving Him at the present time. “Do ye remain”, the Lord said before going up, “in the city till ye be clothed with power from on high”, Luke 24: 49. According to Romans the Spirit is power. It is important for the young men to study Romans, which is foundational.
Paul enjoined Timothy as a young man, “Till I come, give thyself to reading” (1 Timothy 4: 13), also “Strive diligently to present thyself approved to God, a workman that has not to be ashamed, cutting in a straight line the word of truth”, 2 Timothy 2: 15. I just pass that on to my younger brethren. I know that the pressure of business affairs and the like consumes a good deal of our time, and rightly so; that is not to be condemned. But if we are to fill out our part intelligently in the assembly it is necessary to devote time to reading the Scriptures and to meditation, because the ‘flowing out’ time comes, as our Lord says in John 2: 8, “Draw out now”. It is a test that involves secret history and appropriation of the Holy Spirit.
To return to this wonderful episode in our chapter, “And when the day of Pentecost was now accomplishing, they were all together in one place. And there came suddenly a sound out of heaven as of a violent impetuous blowing, and filled all the house where they were sitting.
And there appeared to them parted tongues, as of fire, and it sat upon each one of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit, and began to speak with other tongues as the Spirit gave to them to speak forth”. What a day! It was a public demonstration of John 7, “Out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water”. Ponder over these expressions. First, “a violent impetuous blowing”, which is explained in the footnote—‘They heard blowing, as of hard breathing’. Breathing would suggest the presence of a person—in fact, a divine Person; then “impetuous” would denote the haste, you might say, with which He moved to take up His abode in the persons assembled. This violent action caused a stir among the crowd of Jews from many nations present—“The multitude came together and were confounded, because each one heard them speaking in his own dialect. And all were amazed and wondered, saying … We hear them speaking in our own tongues the great things of God”.
Now I want to link the great things of God with the passage in 2 Kings 4. The link is in Elisha’s ministry, representing the dispensation of the Spirit, following upon Elijah, typically Christ, being taken into heaven. The chapter prefigures the immensity of the spiritual wealth available to the believer who receives the Holy Spirit. Paul says, “The love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit which has been given to us”, Romans 5: 5. I think the reception of the Spirit is in a certain sense the starting point of the believer’s enjoyment of the great things of God. In the beginning of our spiritual history, like this widow, we have little apprehension of the wealth we received in the gift of the Spirit; “Things which eye has not seen, and ear not heard, and which have not come into man’s heart, which God has prepared for them that love him, but God has revealed to us by his Spirit; for the Spirit searches all things, even the depths of God”, 1 Corinthians 2: 9, 10. Like the widow we all have to learn the value of what we have in the Spirit, which the oil typifies. She related her pathetic case to the prophet, the loss of her husband, with the threat of the creditors taking her sons to be bondmen for the debt, not realising the potential wealth in her pot of oil, “Tell me, what hast thou in the house?”, said Elisha. “Thy handmaid has not anything at all in the house but a pot of oil”, as if to infer that the oil was nothing compared with her great need. “ And he said, Go, borrow for thyself vessels abroad from all thy neighbours, empty vessels; let it not be few; and go in, and shut the door upon thee and upon thy sons, and pour out into all those vessels, and set aside what is full”. She poured out until there was not another vessel more, “and the oil stayed”. What this would mean in our day is the inexhaustible supply the believer has in the gift of the Spirit.
She was a subject woman, not an aggressive type of person, so she returned to Elisha in her simplicity to be told what she should do next. “Go, sell the oil, and pay thy debt, and live thou and thy sons on the rest”. But her action only emphasises the fact that we are dependent upon the Holy Spirit to reveal these heavenly things to us, as it says—“We have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit which is of God, that we may know the things which have been freely given to us of God”, 1 Corinthians 2: 12. But to get the gain of the Spirit’s service it is necessary to follow the lead given—“Go in, and shut the door upon thee and upon thy sons, and pour out into all those vessels, and set aside what is full”. This is an inward, secret idea which involves the power to exclude every foreign influence that might affect our minds. The Lord’s action in the house of the ruler before raising the dead child (Luke 8: 54) gives a lead. The tumultuous crowd had to be first put out of the house; then He went in and raised the child. May the Lord bless the word to us.
Address at Plainfield, N.J.
14 August 1976