Search
I. Receiving the Spirit through the Word
II. Two extremes
А. Fundamentalists
B. Pentecostalists
III. The Spirit embodied in the Word
А. The spoken words being the embodiment of the life-giving Spirit
B. The Scripture being God's breath
C. The Spirit and the Word being one
IV. Experiencing the fire in the Word by pray-reading
V. Ministering the Word by the Spirit
А. The word growing and multiplying
B. The need to be full of the Word
C. The Spirit within and the Word outside
VI. The daily need to touch the Spirit in the Word
[We have seen that the Holy Spirit is the Triune God reaching us in a consummate way. When the Holy Spirit reaches us, the Triune God is with us. The Spirit, however, is abstract and mysterious. Hence, it is important to see that the Spirit is embodied in the Word. Now if we would live Christ, we need to experience the Spirit within and enjoy the Word without.]
[In our Christian experience, the Word and the Spirit must always be one. It is an utter falsehood to say that we take the Spirit without taking the Word. Without taking the Word, we cannot have the Spirit. In my experience, I receive the Spirit mostly through the Word. As I contact the Word in a living way, it becomes the Spirit to me. However, some take the Bible without the Spirit. This also is wrong. Those who wish to grow flowers need both the seeds and the life contained in the seeds. It is impossible to separate the life within the seeds from the seeds themselves. In order to have the life, we must take the seeds. The relationship between the Word and the Spirit is like that between the seeds and the life. We must have both. The Lord Jesus is both the Spirit and the Word. He is not the Spirit without being the Word, nor the Word without being the Spirit.]
[Concerning the Spirit, there are two extremes, one found among fundamentalists and the other among Pentecostalists.]
[Because they are afraid of the experience of the Spirit, certain fundamental Christians care primarily for Bible doctrine. But to have only the doctrine of the Bible without the Spirit is to have a lifeless body. The Spirit is embodied in the Word. Hence, the Word may be called the body of the Spirit. To separate the Spirit from the Word is to have a lifeless body. The Spirit is the life content of the Bible. Apart from the Spirit, the Bible is dead letters. Nevertheless, fundamental Christians are often afraid to hear about the experience of Christ, the Spirit, and the inner life. They represent one extreme.]
[The Pentecostalists represent another extreme. They may neglect the Word and emphasize the Spirit in an abnormal, unbalanced way.] [Their attention is fully occupied by their thought of the Spirit. They do not see that without the Word, the Spirit is in vain. We all have to realize the Spirit comes after the Word.]
[We should not be at either extreme, but should be balanced, caring both for the Spirit and the Word. Within, we have the Spirit, and in our hands we have the Word, the Bible.]
We can say that the Spirit and the Word are one because this is clearly revealed in the Bible. The Lord Jesus said, "The words which I have spoken unto you are spirit and are life" (John 6:63). [The Spirit is living and real, but rather mysterious, intangible, and difficult for people to apprehend, but the words are substantial. Firstly, the Lord indicated that for giving life He would become the Spirit. ["It is the Spirit who gives life." John 6:63a] Then He said that the words He speaks are spirit and life. This shows that His spoken words are the embodiment of the life-giving Spirit. He is now the life-giving Spirit in resurrection, and the Spirit is embodied in His words. When we receive His words by exercising our spirit, we receive the Spirit who is life.]
[Second Timothy 3:16 says that all Scripture is God-breathed. Every word of the Bible is the breath of God. We have pointed out that this breath is the pneuma, the Spirit. Thus, because both the Word and the Spirit are the breath of God, they are truly one. The Spirit is the breath of God, and the Word also is God's breath. Furthermore, God's breath is His pneuma, the Spirit. On the one hand, the Word of God is the Spirit; on the other hand, the Spirit of God is the Word.]
Furthermore, Ephesians 6:17 even identifies the Word as the Spirit. "And receive the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit which is the word of God." In this verse the Spirit and the Word are one thing.
[Ephesians 5:18-19 says that when we are filled with the Spirit, we will sing hymns and songs. But Colossians 3:16 says that when we are filled with the Word, we will sing hymns and songs. Ephesians and Colossians are "sister books." They always go together. Ephesians says that when we are filled with the Spirit, we will sing. Colossians says that when we are filled with the Word, we will sing. When we compare these two parts of the Bible, we realize that the Spirit is the Word and the Word is the Spirit!]
[Let us use for an illustration a match. The match stick, it is true, is made of wood, but in essence the match is really phosphorus....Now suppose I want to use the match: what shall I do? Of course, I must strike it. But how shall I strike it? If I strike it, using the end without the phosphorus, though I strike till eternity I will get no light. I am using the wrong end. The Bible is the match, and the Lord Jesus, the Spirit, is the phosphorus. The wooden stick may be likened to the black and white letters, the words in the Bible, which hold Christ as the phosphorus, the heavenly day-star. How can we make the phosphorus take fire and shine? We must use the right end of the match, and we must strike it on the right spot. The right end is the Holy Spirit, and the right spot is our human spirit.]
Ephesians 6:17-18 tells us that we should receive "the sword of the Spirit which is the word of God, by means of all prayer and petition, praying at every time in spirit." [When we read the Word, we should mingle our reading with prayer. As we exercise our eyes and our mind, we should also exercise our spirit to touch the Spirit. Then all that is in the Word will become in our experience the bountiful supply of the Spirit.]
[If we fail to exercise our spirit in reading the Word, we fail to "strike" the "match" in our spirit. As a result, the "phosphorus," the Spirit embodied in the Word, does not ignite. If we want to experience the phosphorus embodied in the match, the Spirit embodied in the Word, we need to exercise our spirit to pray-read the Word. Then we shall strike the match in the right place and experience the fire in the Word. We can testify that by taking the Word in the proper way, exercising our spirit, we experience the burning in our spirit.]
[In Acts we are told three times that the word grew and that the word multiplied (Acts 6:7; 12:24; 19:20). A lifeless thing can never grow but the word grows. Actually, the multiplication of the disciples depends upon the growth of the word. However, many who read Acts would mostly pay their attention to the Spirit. No doubt, the Spirit is stressed in Acts. But those who received the Spirit did not go out and preach the Spirit. Rather, they preached the word. Many verses in Acts tell us that what was preached and taught by the first group of believers was the word. The scattered ones in Acts 8 went out to bring the good news of the word (v. 1). People believed in the word, received the word, and the word became so prevailing in that it grew and multiplied.]
[I want to impress you that the divine Word is what we really need and we should be one with the Word, full of the Word, saturated with the Word, and constituted with the Word. Then when we minister, we minister the Word by the Spirit. We do not minister the Spirit by the Word, but we minister the Word by the Spirit. In chapter four of Acts, while the disciples and the apostles were praying, they were filled with the Spirit and began to speak the word with boldness (Acts 4:31). They did not teach or preach the Spirit; the Spirit was only the power for them to preach the word.]
In the last lesson we pointed out that in order to preach the gospel effectively we must gain a rich deposit from the Word. Now we see more clearly why this is so crucial. We surely need the Spirit's empowering, but it is the Word that we must preach.
[We have the Holy Spirit in our spirit, and we have the Holy Word, the Bible, in our hands. These should not be two things, but two ends of one thing. The end within us is the Spirit; the end outside of us is the Word. When the Word enters our spirit it becomes the Spirit, and when the Spirit is expressed from our mouth it becomes the Word.]
Our need, then, is to spend time every day to touch the Spirit in the Word. Even if we take as little as ten minutes to pray-read a portion of the Word, we shall receive nourishment. At the very least, we should do this every morning. The morning is the best time. Before you go to school, before you do anything, pray to touch the Lord, apply His precious blood, and open the Bible to receive the Spirit through the Word.
[As saved and regenerated ones, we have the Spirit of God in our spirit. Thus, when we exercise our spirit in pray-reading the Word, we apply the Word to us and mingle the Word and the Spirit. Immediately, we receive the bountiful supply of the Spirit.]
Praise the Lord! The all-inclusive, compound, life-giving, indwelling, sevenfold intensified Spirit is embodied in the Word! Eventually you will find that ten minutes is too short a time.
The Spirit is rather abstract and mysterious, but the Word of God is concrete and in our hands. The Lord Jesus is both the Spirit and the Word. Without taking the Word, we cannot have the Spirit, because the Spirit is embodied in the Word. If we would receive the Spirit through the Word, we must take the Word by exercising our spirit. Although the Spirit is our power for preaching, the Word is what we must preach. Every day we need to open the Bible to receive the Spirit through the Word.
