Episode 9 – The Multitasker
Welcome back to the Proverbs 9:10 Ministries podcast, No Trash, Just Truth! We’re your hosts and co-founders of Proverbs 9:10 Ministries, Rose Spiller and Chris Paxson. In earlier episodes we talked about two of the Persons of the Trinity – God the Father, and Jesus the Son – so today we’re going to talk about the Third Person of our triune God, the Holy Spirit, and some of the things He does; things like guiding us as we go through our lives and sealing us for eternity so that believers can never lose their salvation! Rose, you want to start for us today?
Sure! The Holy Spirit is first mentioned in Genesis 1:2 which says, “Now the earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters.” However, it’s interesting that although the Old Testament has a lot to say about the Holy Spirit, it’s not until the New Testament that we get a clear picture that the Holy Spirit is distinct from the Father and from the Son, in passages that mention all Three Persons. The Holy Spirit is responsible for many different works in the life of a believer—some of which we’ve mentioned in earlier episodes. In this episode we’ll take a look at some of the others.
We titled this episode “The Multi-tasker” because the Holy Spirit does a lot of different things!
We’re not saying the Father and the Son don’t!
No, we’re not saying that at all! But the Holy Spirit is a distinct Divine Person Who speaks, teaches, searches, witnesses, determines, can be lied to, and can be grieved. And that’s not all, so, let’s start taking a look at some of the things He did, first in Old Testament times, and I think by the end it’ll become clear why we used the title “The Multi-Tasker! Rose, one of the differences between the Old Testament times and the New is that the Spirit didn’t reside permanently in someone, like He does in a believer now.
Right! We mentioned this in the last episode. In the Old Testament, the Holy Spirit came and went in people, as needed to accomplish God’s purposes. We’re really blessed that He resides in us full-time! The only person that happened to in the Old Testament was King David. The Scriptures tell us that after Samuel anointed David with oil the Spirit came on him “from that day on.” One example of the Spirit temporarily coming upon people is the prophets in order to give the Word of God to the people, and He even came upon unbelievers, like Baalam sometimes to accomplish His plans.
Right! And He came upon several of the judges to give them power to lead the people against their enemies. But one of the coolest things (in my opinion) was that He gave people special artistic abilities when they were building the tabernacle; like Bezalel from the Tribe of Judah. Exodus 35:31-32 says, “and he has filled him with the Spirit of God, with wisdom, understanding, knowledge and all kinds of skills to make artistic designs for work in wood and to engage in all kinds of artistic crafts.”
So, He made people “crafty.”
Yeah, He made people “crafty.”
Chris, some of the things pertaining to the Holy Spirit that we’ve covered in previous episodes, like regenerating the hearts of the elect and sanctifying them to make them more and more like Jesus. But I don’t think we’ve mentioned yet that the Holy Spirit is the One Who gives us the inward confirmation that the Bible really is the Word of God, and He helps us understand it!
I’m glad you mentioned that. 1 Corinthians 2 says, “What no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the heart of man imagined, what God has prepared for those who love him’—these things God has revealed to us through the Spirit.” And the flip side of it is that unbelievers can’t understand Scripture because they don’t have the Holy Spirit in them. They can read the text, but they can’t fully comprehend what’s being said. Later in in 1 Corinthians 2 it says, “The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned. “
That’s a good point to make, because it should give us compassion for unbelievers. They are truly blinded to the truth, so there’s no way we should expect them to know the Bible, or to follow it. In fact, if you look at the end of the verses you just read, it’s no wonder so many of them give Christians a hard time. When something seems like “folly” to me, I usually think whatever it is, that seems like folly, is pretty stupid!
Me too; and you’re right that it should make us more compassionate towards them. Something else that we haven’t mentioned yet is that the Holy Spirit is our helper. Jesus promised that in John 14:15-17 when He said, “If you love me, you will keep my commandments. And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Helper, to be with you forever, even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him.
I don’t want us to leave out that the Holy Spirit helps us when we pray. Romans 8:26 says, “the Spirit helps us in our weakness. For we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words”.
He really does support us by being our Helper, Adviser, Ally, Encourager, and Strengthener, along with all the other things we’ve mentioned! Talk about multi-tasking!
Hence, the name of the episode! Rose, we mentioned in an earlier episode that one thing we were gonna talk about sometime is the that we cannot lose our salvation. Since the Holy Spirit is the One who seals believers and is our “guaranteeof our inheritance until we acquire possession of it,” according to Ephesians 1:14, this is probably a good time to talk about that.
I agree. Most of us know Christians who believe salvation can be lost, and if you’re listening, you may be one of those people. So, I want to explain why this isn’t the case by starting at the beginning …that we can’t lose our salvation because it isn’t our choice to be saved in the first place – in fact, we were so dead in our sin that we never would have chosen God because we couldn’t. We’ve mentioned this in several episodes. But most people who believe salvation can be lost believe one of these three things about the human race: 1) that Adam’s sin did not affect all of humanity; therefore, human beings are born innocent, and it is the freedom of the human will to choose either good or evil. This is known as Pelagianism.
This idea has been condemned by several church councils, and Pelagius was condemned as a heretic and excommunicated in 418 AD. And rightly so. Romans 5:12 (as well as many other verses) tells us something different: “Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men, because all sinned.”
That’s right. Moving on, the second thing people who think salvation can be lost believe is that every person has a “little bit” of good left in them. In other words, that people were only “weakened” by the Fall and not spiritually deadened. It’s the belief that the Fall left mankind only sick and in need of an antibiotic, instead of dead and in need of the paddles to restart our cold, stony, dead hearts. This view is called Arminianism.
People with this view believe that everyone is born still “good enough” to be able to reach out to God, to respond to His “wooing,” or to muster-up faith in response to the Gospel message. The idea is that man makes the first move—he reaches out to God first; then God gives him grace. But dead men can’t reach out for God, as we’ve pointed out several times now, and the Bible says that “dead” is, in fact, the position we’re in.
Right. And very similar, but different view than that one is that human beings were deadened by the fall of Adam, but that God gave everyone a “little island of grace” (which is known as “Prevenient Grace”). This small amount of grace begins the process of drawing a person to God. It prepares the heart for hearing the Gospel, but it can be resisted. This view is called Wesleyanism.
Rose, in the many parts of Scripture we’ve read over the last several weeks, they clearly tell us that man is totally dead in his sin, hostile to God, and has no inclination to seek God. All of those verses indicate that man cannot initiate any part of salvation. That means God has initiate our salvation. The Pelagianism you described first is humanism or moralism, not Christianity, so we won’t go any further in discussing it, except to say that we should watch out for churches and preachers who tend to focus on our moral behavior, instead of Christ’s righteousness imputed to us. But in views two and three, the belief is that fallen man has enough righteousness in him (by either means), that he might actually seek God and have a desire to reach out to God for salvation is not only impossible because man is spiritually dead, but the logical conclusion (even if it was possible) is that it would make salvation a meritorious earning because you would have made the right choice to earn your own salvation.
Exactly. Making the right choice means that you have done something to earn it – you’re not basing your salvation totally on Christs’ work. That’s not grace. Grace is totally unmerited favor. As soon as we’ve made a “right choice,” we’ve merited it for ourselves. This is works-based theology – Christ has done His part, but now you have to do your part. Think of it this way. When you stand before God, what will you bring in your hands to offer for salvation? Are you bringing nothing, relying totally on the merit of what Jesus did for you? Or are you offering God what Jesus did on the cross, plus your “correct decision”? If we had to choose God (if we had the ability to), would we picture God, the Creator of the universe, hoping, wishing, maybe even wringing His hands, while He waits to see if we accept Him or not?
That’s not the Sovereign, Almighty God that the Scriptures clearly depict!.
No, It’s not! The Bible tells us that God elects all those that are His before the foundation of the world, and then brings them to a saving knowledge of Him. This is what Scripture teaches and demonstrates the whole way through the Bible—from God choosing Abel and his offering but rejecting Cain and his offering; to the call of Abraham, a pagan worshiper from a foreign land; to choosing Jacob, but not Esau; to God opening Lydia’s heart so that she could believe the Gospel message; and to Paul who Jesus commanded on the road to Damascus, “Get up and go into the city, and you will be told what you must do.” Paul didn’t choose to “accept Jesus” on the road – he was God’s “chosen instrument” according to the words the Lord spoke to Ananias three days later!
If this is the first time you’re hearing this, it may seem like a harsh truth; but it’s really not! It’s actually both freeing and encouraging! Leaning on our own righteousness, to any degree can crush our faith, and leave us with no surety of salvation, which is what we’re talking about today and why we needed to start by talking about who initiates salvation – us or God! If we are taught that our salvation is partially up to us, in any way, we will wonder if we’ve done enough, done it correctly, were sincere enough, if we know enough and lit will leave us wondering whether we’ve actually done what’s required in order to “close the deal[JP1] .”
But, if we understand that it’s God’s electing love that saved us, then it’s logical to believe that He absolutely will keep us till the end. If God has done all of the saving, from start to finish, why wouldn’t He bring it to completion? What would be the point if He didn’t? Philippians 1:6 says, “And I’m sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ.”
Like the verse in Ephesians that we read earlier said, we are sealed with the Holy Spirit, who is our guarantee until we acquire our inheritance.
Totally. But I’m thinking we should address some of the verses that seem to say we can lose our salvation, or that we can “fall away.” So, Chris, let’s start with Romans 11.
In Romans 11 Paul is asked if God has rejected His people, Israel. Paul’s Jewish heritage was evidence that God had not fully rejected Israel. This passage is about God’s elect remnant to be saved including both Jew and Gentile believers. The passage talks about Israel being “broken off” and Gentiles “grafted in” to make the Jews jealous to bring the elect Jews to salvation.
What about Galatians 5:4 that actually uses the words “fallen away from grace”? Galatians 5:4 says, “You are severed from Christ, you who would be justified by the law; you have fallen away from grace.”This is Paul rebuking believers for relying on circumcision instead of solely on Christ. He’s rebuking them for relying on works-based salvation!
What about Colossians 1 where it says the words “if you continue in the faith.” That sounds like some may not continue…
This is Paul admonishing people who claimed to be Christians for adding worship of things other than God to their worship of the One True God. This is called syncretism, and it’s what the Israelites were guilty of doing over and over again throughout their history. In this passage, as well as in Hebrew 6, 2 Peter 2 and elsewhere, are either encouragements to continue in the faith, and/or warnings for those who may be in church, but are not believers – people like the false teachers who are apostate - they claimed to be a Christian, but later renounce it. Apostates generally appear to be genuine believers, but they were never truly saved. These encouragements and warnings can be summed up in what 1 John 2:19 says about the subject, “They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would have continued with us. But they went out, that it might become plain that they all are not of us.” The clearest example of someone in that situation would be Judas Iscariot.
Augustine pointed out that the visible church consists of both the “wheat” (believers) and the “tares, (unbelievers)” so that at any given time, there are unbelievers in the Church, along with the elect. Matthew 25 tells us that when Jesus comes back again, He will separate out the unbelievers (goats) from the elect believers (sheep).
In John 6 Jesus says, “All that the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never cast out. For I have come down from heaven, not to do my own will but the will of him who sent me. And this is the will of him who sent me, that I should lose nothing of all that he has given me.”
If you have a genuine faith, you will never lose it; if you lose it, you never had it. Those who recant their faith never had it. Like we quoted earlier from 1 John, “They went out from us, but they did not really belong to us. For if they had belonged to us, they would have remained with us; but their going showed that none of them belonged to us.” This was not an instance where people in the church lost their salvation; these people were never saved in the first place.
It’s important to say here that sometimes truly regenerate believers backslide and fall into gross sin. Christians will still sin, sometimes even seriously. Even in ways that we can’t believe! When Christians see this, their first reaction often is to say the person has lost their salvation. But the truth is, none of us know what sins we are still capable of doing, even after years or decades of being a Christian.
The prime example of this is David, who committed adultery and murder. David sinned grievously but was still called “a man after God’s own heart.” He may have fallen away from grace, but he never fell out of grace. After being rebuked by Nathan, he repented.
Right, and another example is Peter. Peter publicly denied Jesus—the same thing Judas did. But the difference between Judas and Peter is that Peter was one of Jesus’ own. How do we know that? Jesus tells Peter he’d going to deny Him before he ever does it, but Jesus also tells him that He has prayed for him; and while Peter was repentant of what he did, Judas only felt guilt about what he did but he never repented.
Those who are truly Christians can have radical, serious falls, but they are not total and final falls from grace. And we should never have a puffed-up view of our own selves, because we might fall. We do not know what’s in a person’s heart. Only God knows that.
We’d be neglecting something the Holy Spirit does if we don’t mention one last thing – that His living inside of us from the moment of our salvation makes us able to persevere until the end.
We call that “the Perseverance of the Saints.”
The doctrine of the Perseverance of the Saints is a comfort to saints who are struggling with sin. It is a comfort to the dying, to those who need encouragement, to parents of prodigals; and it should be a comfort to every believer. But it’s actually more accurate in some ways to think of it as “God’s preserving us,” than “us persevering” because we’d fail miserably if we were on our own!
Absolutely! And that’s why the Reformers have often looked at this in light of both definitions. They understand the perseverance of the saints as God’s preservation of believers, while also recognizing that the believer has a responsibility to persevere in their faith, even through hardship. Believers persist under discouragement and pressure and are able to do so because the Holy Spirit ensures that we will endure to the end.
Paul tells the Philippian church “work out your own salvation with fear and trembling” in Philippians 2:12. We go through our Christian walk striving against sin, as the Holy Spirit is working to eradicate that sin from us. We hone the fruits of the Spirit, with His help. We persevere through trials as our life and faith are tested, with a continual reliance on Christ. Paul exhorted the Philippians to work out their salvation, but at the end added, “For it is God who works in you, both to will and to work, for his good pleasure.” (Philippians 2:13).
It’s the Holy Spirit Who raises us to eternal life. God starts with a promise to finish. We are sealed, and we are given the Spirit as a down-payment of our salvation. While people may put a down-payment on something and then walk away from it, God never does. Since it is God putting the down-payment on His elect, He is going to preserve those whose names are in the Book of Life, the whole way through this life.
If you are a believer in Christ, nothing can separate you from the love of God. You were chosen by the Father before the foundation of the world, bought with the precious blood of Christ, sealed with the Holy Spirit, and someday will be a citizen of Heaven.
Thanks for joining us today! If you have any questions or comments, we would love to hear from you.
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[JP1]Crush a believer’s faith, leave him with anxiety, or leave him with no surety of salvation.