What does the Holy Spirit do?

Go ahead and take your Bible this morning. Turn with me to John chapter 14. John chapter 14. Now, we will begin our message this morning, much like we did last week's message. We will start in John 14. Then we'll move to various passages. But unlike last week's message, we will end back in John chapter 14, verse 16. Just like last week, I give you instructions on how to take notes. It could be difficult for you to keep up with many of the scripture references. I'd rather you listen and track with me as I carry you through many passages. If you need those passages, need those notes, we can give them to you later.

Now, last week we deviated from our verse-by-verse study in the Gospel of John. And we did that to get better acquainted with the person of the Holy Spirit. Now, from time to time, I do feel like it's important to deviate from our verse-by-verse studies. Right now, we are in the Gospel of John. We've been in John for quite some time. The title of that series is Christ, the Son of God, Believe, and Live. And we do this. I do this for a particular purpose. One of the times we've deviated came to my mind this week. I remember back between John chapter 2 and John chapter 3, we took a break in between those chapters to study the doctrine of man.

Remember, we had four Sunday morning messages. And then we had four Wednesday night Bible studies. And we called that little series, What the Bible Says About Man. Now, there was a purpose there, a very particular purpose. We needed to see really and truly what the Bible says about man before we got into John 3, when Jesus presents the new birth. We needed a proper understanding of the doctrine of man, because a lot of people would digest the teaching of the new birth without fully understanding who and what man is. So that was a particular purpose. Now, we have a particular purpose in this deviation. And that leads me to a question.

Why are we taking these two messages to focus on the Holy Spirit? The most expressive and extensive teaching on the Holy Spirit is found in these three chapters, John 14, 15, and 16. And before we dive off head first into these chapters, we need to be adequately prepared so we can learn all that the Lord wants to teach us concerning the Holy Spirit. It is sad to say that many people in the church today do not know theologically who the Holy Spirit is and practically what the Spirit does. And this ignorance not only causes a vague view of the Godhead, but it spawns all sorts of unbiblical practices in the life of the church.

Let me give you a little application here that will help you understand why I would say such a statement. If we do not realize fully that God, the Holy Spirit, lives within us, and we do not relate to God the Holy Spirit properly, then we will miss a lot of what God is doing in our life. Let me explain. When we come to church and we're sitting under the preached, the taught, the explained Word of God, that's what I do. I exposit the Word of God. I explain the Word of God. I teach it.

And when we come as born-again believers and we sin under the taught Word of God, if we do not understand fully that it is the Spirit that lives within us, and He is the one that is nudging us, He is the one that is affirming that truth when we hear it, that's not a good feeling in our hearts. That is the Spirit of God amenning what's being shared, nudging you, encouraging you, correcting you, teaching you, opening up your eyes to truth. That's just not a good feeling. That's God. And you see what happens if we have a vague understanding of who the Spirit is and what the Spirit does?

That affects us as believers in our personal, everyday life when we are faced with sin and the Holy Spirit of God starts tapping you on the shoulder, the Holy Spirit of God starts whispering in your ear, "No, that's not right." When the Spirit of God starts putting on the breaks in your heart, that's not a good feeling. That's not your conscience. That's the Spirit of God, God in you, correcting you, in guiding you, trying to hold you fast in the truth and the Word of God. See how if we have a vague understanding of who the Spirit is and what the Spirit does, see how it affects us?

If we do not understand how the Holy Spirit works to save lost sinners, then we are susceptible to all types of unbiblical evangelistic messages. I'll give you one that's an example. This dreaded profession of faith. So many people have been led to make this profession of faith. You can make a profession of faith all day long, but if it's not the Spirit of God that has led you and brought you to that place of salvation and granted you the ability to repent, you can profess all day long, but you will never be converted. We've seen in our Southern Baptist Convention whether you know it or not, more and more of a push for childhood decisions.

Now, I believe a child can be saved. A child is saved exactly like an adult is saved. But what's happened is, Southern Baptists have started studying the statistics, and they see more and more people leaving the church and leaving the gospel and leaving the teachings of the faith. And so what they're saying is, we've got to get them converted and get them to make a decision earlier and earlier and earlier so we don't lose them. That's not the way the Spirit works.

So I'll take that time to show you that if we're ignorant of who the Spirit is and what the Spirit does, and if we have a vague view of the Godhead, it spawns all types of unbiblical teaching and unbiblical practices, and the results are catastrophic. Now, last week we were introduced to the Holy Spirit right here in Chapter 14, Verse 16. Let's look back at this verse. Jesus says to the 11, that's that small audience, the disciples, "And I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Helper." The King James uses the word "comforter," and He will be with you forever.

Now, we know this Helper, this Comforter, is the Holy Spirit of God, because later in Verse 26, Jesus identifies the Helper as the Holy Spirit. Now, after this introduction last week, we went on a journey together into a lot of Scriptures, and we went on a journey together to learn who the Holy Spirit is. Now, this morning we have what I call kind of a natural part two, and we're going to learn what the Holy Spirit does. So I'll give you the title of the message this morning, and the title is, "What Does the Holy Spirit Do?" So we've had two questions, who is the Holy Spirit? And now our second question, what does the Holy Spirit do?

Like I said earlier, we started in Verse 16, we'll end with Verse 16, and in the middle we'll have quite a few Scriptures. You see the two major truths that we're going to cover? The work of the Holy Spirit will spend most of our time there, and then the giving of the Holy Spirit. That's where we'll end back up in Verse 16. Very simple truths for you to write down and remember. So let's dive right in, and let's look at our first major truth, the work of the Holy Spirit. When we think of the work of the Holy Spirit, we may think of many things, and a lot of the things that we can think of because of our exposure can be unbiblical.

Now I don't want to lump everybody into one category in an unfair manner, but lots of you have been exposed to unbiblical things when it comes to the Holy Spirit. We may think of a preacher trying to scare people in to make a decision for Christ. You've seen that in so-called revival meetings and evangelistic meetings. I've heard those stories. You've seen that happen. Where we just scare people. Some people scare people trying to get them to make a decision. We may think of a concert. Many of us have been to "Christian concerts" where the light is just right, the music is loud, and they're very vague and emotional lyrics.

And we seem to see people get caught up in this emotional frenzy. And some people can say that's the Holy Spirit. We might think of a TV preacher. We've seen many of those as we watch that type of stuff on television, as they hike people up and get them into some emotional frenzy. We might think of people even falling out into the floor and running the aisles. I have a minister friend of mine here just recently. It's a long story, but he ended up at a "Pentecostal church" and he witnessed that.

I remember sharing with him, I said, "Brother, you didn't know "that's what you were going to see?" He said, "I was afraid of that, "but I went there for an honest and genuine reason." And he was astonished at all the things that they did in the "name of the Holy Spirit." So we think of things like that. And I mentioned those types of situations to show us all that we have seen and heard things and we've witnessed things that are terribly unbiblical. These situations have nothing to do with the Holy Spirit.

I think that when the Holy Spirit is blamed for all types of activity like this, it angers the Spirit of God, it grieves the Spirit of God, and it makes God angry. Now, I want to show us the work of the Holy Spirit in the Old Testament and the New Testament and then beyond. So first I want us to see the Holy Spirit was working in the creation. The Holy Spirit was working in the creation. Now, we learned last week that the Holy Spirit was partially revealed in the Old Testament. We did not have that full revelation, but we saw that, especially through the lens of the New Testament.

In Genesis 1.26, we see the plurality of the Godhead described in that language. But we also see the work of the Holy Spirit in creation. Not just the Holy Spirit, but all three persons of the Godhead are seen working at creation. We see that God the Father spoke the universe into being. Yes, God spoke it into being. Genesis 1.3 says, "And God said." So we see God the Father speaking and working all throughout the creation. We see this in Genesis 1.3. We see it in Genesis 1.6, verse 9, verse 11, verse 14, verse 20, verse 24. Then it changes in verse 26 because it says, "Let us create man in our image." So what do we see there?

That's God the Father working in creation. Then we see that God the Son carried out the creation of the universe. We learned this back in our study, earlier study in John, John 1, verse 3. John says, "All things came into being by Him or through Him, and apart from Him nothing came into being that is coming to being." So what do we see there? All of the creation came into being through the Son. That is Jesus. So God the Father spoke the universe into being. God the Son carried out the creation of the universe. And then God the Holy Spirit was working in a different way in creation of the universe.

Genesis 1.2 says, "In the earth was formless and void, and darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was moving over the surface of the water." So we see the Holy Spirit was working in the creation just like God the Father and just like God the Son. So last week we saw that the Spirit of God was there at creation. Now this morning we see that the Spirit of God was working in creation. Second, I want us to see the Holy Spirit was working in inspiring the Word of God. The Holy Spirit was working in inspiring the Word of God. Now, in asking the question, who wrote the Bible?

We have to accept what Bible scholars call a paradox. Now that might be a word that you're not familiar with, but a paradox is a seeming contradiction. Now here's the paradox. Both God and man wrote the Bible. So if someone asks you a question, who wrote the Bible? God or man? You just look them right in the eye and say yes. God wrote the Bible and man wrote the Bible. It is a seeming contradiction, a paradox, that we accept by faith. But we need to see that it was the Holy Spirit of God that inspired men to write the Bible. Two verses I'll give you. First Peter chapter 1, verse 21.

Peter says, "For no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man, thus speaking of the Old Testament prophecies. But men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit." Here Peter teaches that when men of God spoke the word of God, they were carried along by the Holy Spirit of God. The King James says that they were moved. And this means that they were carried along by God, and they spoke for God. So it was the Spirit of God that enabled them to speak the word of God. Then our vacation Bible school passage.

Second Timothy 3, 16 says, "All scripture is breathed out by God and is profitable for teaching, for reproof, and for correction, and for training of in righteousness." Here Paul teaches that all scriptures are literally breathed out by God into man. Peter's verse that we read earlier tells us that this breathing is the Holy Spirit. And this is the work of the Holy Spirit in and through men to give us the word of God. So we see the Holy Spirit was working and inspiring men to write down the word of God. And then third, the Holy Spirit is working in the redemption of mankind. The Holy Spirit is working in the redemption of mankind.

Now just like last week, we needed to learn the deity of the Holy Spirit within the context of the Trinity, we need to do the same with redemption. We need to see the active roles of all three persons of the God head to fully understand the work of the Holy Spirit in redemption. We need to see that it was God the Father that planned to redeem mankind by sending God the Son into the world. God the Father sent God the Son. And God the Son came to redeem. He was that propitiation. And we see many passages that teach that, but I want to read a couple. John chapter 3, verse 16. This is a very famous verse. You should know it probably by heart.

For God, thus God the Father, so loved the world, that's us, that he gave his only son, thus God the Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish. But have eternal life. That is redemption. God the Father sent God the Son to be that redemption. Then in Galatians 4, verses 4 through 5, Paul says, but when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his son, born of a woman, born under the law. Verse 5, to redeem those who were under the law so that we might receive adoption as sons. So what do we see there? And Paul's writing, God the Father sent God the Son to redeem lost sinners, that we may be adopted sons.

So we see God the Father sending the Son, God the Son coming to be that substitutionary death on the cross. And after the work of redemption was completed by Jesus, Jesus ascended to heaven, and the Holy Spirit was sent by God the Father to carry out the Father's planned work of redemption. We see this spoken of by Jesus in John 3, when Jesus is talking there with Nicodemus. And we see how all this beautifully comes together in his teaching here. Verses 5 through 8 of John 3, "Truly, truly, or verily, verily, I'll say to you, unless one is born of water and of the Spirit--" that's the Holy Spirit-- "he cannot enter the kingdom of God.

That which is born of the flesh is flesh. That which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not marvel that I have said to you, you must be born again or born from above. The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear it sound. But you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who was born of the Spirit." So what do we see? God the Father sends God the Son. And when the work of redemption is complete, we see that God sends the Spirit, God the Holy Spirit, to carry out this work of redemption. And Jesus is just describing it right there to Nicodemus.

So we see the coming of the Holy Spirit to carry out the work of redeeming man spoken of. We see it in our verse in John chapter 14, verse 16. What does Jesus say? "And I will ask the Father, and He will give you another." That's the Holy Spirit. So now in seeing the Holy Spirit working in redemption, I want us to notice more specifically this work. I want to break it down a little more. And simplistically, I want us to see that the Holy Spirit has two jobs to perform. Notice, the Holy Spirit works to regenerate lost sinners. The Holy Spirit works to regenerate lost sinners. John chapter 3, verses 6 through 8.

I've already read these verses earlier, but listen. "That which is born of the flesh is flesh. That which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not marvel that I said to you, you must be born again or born from above. The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear its sound, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit." So Jesus is telling Nicodemus that you must be born from above, born of the Spirit, born again. You must be regenerated because you are dead. So the Holy Spirit works to regenerate lost sinners. I'll read you one more verse in Titus chapter 3, verses 4 through 5.

Paul says, "But when the goodness and loving kindness of God our Savior appeared, He saved us not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to His own mercy by the washing of regeneration and the renewal of the Holy Spirit." And this is how lost sinners come to Christ. The Holy Spirit brings about new life in dead men. Ephesians chapter 2, verse 1 says, "And you were dead in the trespasses and sins." In other words, the Holy Spirit brings about new life in dead people. If men are dead, and they are, then new life must be brought to them. This new life is the regenerating work of the Holy Spirit in that dead man.

Then notice the Holy Spirit works to sanctify believers. The Holy Spirit works to sanctify believers. We see this in 2 Thessalonians 2, 13. Paul says, "But we ought always to give thanks to God for you, brothers, beloved by the Lord, because God chose you as the first fruits to be saved, through sanctification by the Spirit and belief in the truth." What is Paul saying? "You were saved and now you are being sanctified." How? By the Spirit. We see this in 1 Peter chapter 1, starting in verse 1 and down to verse 2.

Peter says, "Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, to those who are elect exiles of the dispersion in Pontius and Galatia and Cappadocia, Asia and Bithynia," verse 2, "according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, in the sanctification of the Spirit, for obedience to Jesus Christ and for the sprinkling with His blood." So this is how we see the saints grow in Christ. It's not about our efforts. We see the work of the Spirit. The Holy Spirit works in them and in us to grow us in godliness and usefulness for His Kingdom. And this comes from the indwelling work of the Holy Spirit.

Jesus told the disciples in John 14, verse 17, He says, "I will be in you." And so we see this sanctification of the saints. So in summary, what do we see here? Now, truthfully, this is a lie. So let me help us wrap this up. Now, we know that the Holy Spirit is eternal because He is God. We learned that last week. That's vitally important. The Holy Spirit is not an influence. The Holy Spirit did not just burst on the scene in the New Testament. The Holy Spirit is God and He is eternal. But we see the Holy Spirit working at creation. He was there all along. We see that the Holy Spirit is working through the giving of God's Word to man.

And then we see the Holy Spirit working in the New Testament after as He works to redeem mankind. The Holy Spirit was sent by the Father to carry out the work of redeeming lost sinners and then to sanctify them into the saints of God that He wants them to be. The Holy Spirit was active and working in the Old Testament. The Holy Spirit was active and working in the New Testament. And the Holy Spirit is active and working now. Now, all this information, how does this apply to us? We must see that there is an active agent for the work of God and the will of God and that is the Holy Spirit of God. And you really need to see this.

And I want to help you see it by this one word. Trust. That's one word. Trust. Let me help you with that. We can trust God the Holy Spirit. We ignore all of those false things that we see out there. We ignore everything that these other denominations and cults do. And we see from the Word of God that the Holy Spirit of God is the eternal God. He is the third person of the Trinity and we can trust the Holy Spirit of God because He is God. But let me carry it a little further. We can trust God's Word. We can trust this word from Genesis to Revelation. Why?

Because the Holy Spirit of God breathed it through men and it was the Holy Spirit of God that gave us this word according to the will of the Father. And we can trust the Word of God because it was inspired by God. We can trust the Spirit of God to convert lost sinners. We don't have to invent gimmicks. We don't have to listen to what others might say we should do to get people to be converted and make decisions. No, we can trust the Spirit of God to convert lost sinners. It doesn't matter if they're religious. Remember Nicodemus? There wasn't any man more religious than Nicodemus.

It doesn't matter if they're religious or if they're the most unrighteous person on the face of the earth. We can trust the Spirit to convert lost sinners. We can trust the Spirit to sanctify us. Now look, I don't want to absolve you or me from our responsibility. Yes, we have a responsibility to pray and to study the Word and be faithful to church. I mean be faithful to the teaching of the Word of God and everything that we do in the life of the church. We have a responsibility to obey God's Word, but we can trust the Holy Spirit of God to work in us and to sanctify us. See why that word trust is important?

The Holy Spirit is the active agent for God and for the will of God to redeem lost sinners and to sanctify the saints. Now, I want to take another step further with this application. I want to turn to a passage. I really want you to write this down for your own study. This is one of my favorite. I've preached from this passage many times. I reserve the right to preach from this passage again in the future. But in Luke chapter 11, we see that the disciples do an astonishing thing. They ask Jesus to teach them to pray.

They didn't say, "Teach us to preach or heal the sick." And then starting in verse 5, after a shorter version of the Lord's Prayer, Jesus teaches them all prayer. He teaches them to have the proper perspective, verses 5 through 6. He teaches them persistence in prayer, verses 7 through 8. He teaches a progression in prayer in verses 9 through 10. But then right there is the promise. Verse 11, I'll read on down to verse 13. "Now, suppose one of you fathers is asked by his son for a fish. Will he not give him a snake instead of a fish? Will he?" No, that's absurd. "Or if he is asked for an egg, will he give him a scorpion?

Will he?" No, that's absurd. Verse 13, "If you then, being evil," in other words, sinful, "know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more shall your heavenly Father give what? The Holy Spirit to those who ask Him." What is he saying? The Father will give the Spirit to work in redemption and to work in sanctification if we will ask Him. What is God saying? You know how to take care of your children, and God the Father knows how to answer that prayer and take care of you. But there are two observations with this teaching. I've kind of come to this realization through the years. Hopefully, I can make you see this plainly.

Sometimes, those who strongly hold to the sovereignty of God do not really believe these verses and really do not pray. What they will do is they'll say, "Well, God's going to do what God's going to do. God's going to save who God's going to save. God's going to work in our lives according to His will and His purpose." That's true. That is accurate. But if you hold too strongly to that position, that will absolve us from our responsibility to pray. So sometimes, those who strongly hold to the sovereignty of God really do not believe Luke 11 and really do not believe that God will answer that prayer.

Sometimes those who strongly hold to man's responsibility do believe these verses, and they do really believe that a sovereign God will work according to their prayer. They have enough faith to do it and expect God to work and see God do what He says He's going to do. So my question for you and for me is this, where should we be? We understand the working of the Spirit. We know who the Holy Spirit is. We understand that the Spirit has come to redeem lost people and to sanctify the saints. And in Luke 11, we know that we are to pray for the working of the Holy Spirit among us.

And God said, "If you know how to take care of your children, I know how to take care of you. I know how to take care of the church, and I will give the Holy Spirit." So what have we seen here? A lot of time just on this first major truth, and that is the work of the Spirit. Let's move on. I want us to notice our second major truth, rather short, and that is the giving of the Holy Spirit. Like I said earlier, we'll end up in verse 16. This is the giving of the Holy Spirit. We should know this by heart, and I will ask the Father, and He will give you another help or comforter that He may be with you forever.

Now in the introduction, I said we would end here. This should be very familiar to us by now. We should know where this verse is in our Bible. We should know this verse, and I've repeated this verse purposefully. And here we see all three persons of the Godhead. We see God the Son is praying. God the Son is praying. And God the Son is praying that God the Father would give God the Holy Spirit to His own the eleven disciples. Now we know that chapters 13 through 17 are part of the farewell discourses. Jesus is preparing them for the cross, for His departure. Jesus is preparing them for so much that is before them.

I have said repeatedly that He is sanctifying them, and He is working in them. And this is part of His great love for them that He will provide for them. Now I want us to notice God the Son, God the Father, loved and provided for the disciples. Three observations. First, the Son prays for them. You might say, "Pastor, that's obvious. You've said that." This is part of Jesus' intercessory work as their great High Priest. Jesus loves His own, yes, even these disciples. He does not want to leave them alone. He does not want to leave them prepared. So Jesus prays for them. Then second, the Father provides for them.

Here Jesus says that the Father will give. He doesn't say He may give or He might give. He will give. They do not know what Jesus is praying for them, nor do they know what the Father is providing for them. So here we see the willingness of God the Father to provide them just what they needed. So the Son prays for them. The Father provides for them. And then third, the Holy Spirit's presence with them. Here Jesus says that the Holy Spirit will be with them forever. Look back at the verse. "And I will ask the Father, and He will give you another helper, that He may be with you forever." There's one verse there that speaks to eternal security.

And here Jesus is saying that the Holy Spirit will be with them no matter what. Jesus had been telling them that He was leaving them, and now He was telling them that the helper would be with them forever. He would not leave them as orphans. So in summary, what do we see here? All three persons of the Godhead working to provide for these disciples exactly what they needed. The Holy Spirit was all they needed in their personal lives and in their ministry. Now how does this apply for us? What does this mean to you and to me today? We must see that God the Son is praying for us right now.

God the Son is at the right hand of the Father, and He is making intercession for His own and for the Church. So we see that just like in that day, God the Son is praying for us. And we must see that God the Father is still providing for His own. He is still providing for His Church, and He is providing the work of the Holy Spirit to redeem lost sinners and to sanctify the saints. So God the Father is still providing. And then God the Holy Spirit can make His presence known. We must see that just like God the Spirit made His presence known in their lives, God the Spirit, the eternal God, can make His presence known to us today. How? Two ways.

By saving the lost around us and by sanctifying us into the saints He wants us to be. The Spirit has been given and He wants to continue to give more and more of the Spirit to do the work of the Church. Now as we move to the conclusion, I want to use two words that we used last week. We've learned a lot, theologically and practically. The key on these two words just for a moment and then we will close. First theologically. We have learned who the Holy Spirit is. He is the eternal Holy Spirit of God, the third person of the Trinity. He is God. Not an impersonal force for good. Not an impersonal force for God. He is not an it.

He is not a thing. He is God. So theologically we have a proper understanding of who the Holy Spirit is. But then practically, practically we have learned what the Holy Spirit did and what the Holy Spirit does. He was working in the creation. He was working all along in the Old Testament and I know that we had a partial revelation but as we look at that Old Testament through the lens of the New Testament we know exactly who that was. So we see that he was working in creation in the Old Testament and in the New Testament and he is working to redeem lost sinners and to sanctify the saints of God even today.

Now in these two messages I have sought to give you a panoramic view of the Holy Spirit and His work and this will prepare us for what the Lord wants to teach us in John 14, 15 and in 16. So what have we looked at? What are the titles of these messages that fit together? Who is the Holy Spirit and what does the Holy Spirit do? Let's pray together.