Think on These Things
September 1998
1. Indwelling of the Holy Spirit
3. How Does the Holy Spirit Indwell?
4. Ye often hear it said...
"No man hath seen God at any time. If we love one another, God dwelleth in us, and his love is perfected in us." (I Jn 4:12). "What? know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not your own?" (1 Cor 6:19). The indwelling of Jesus and the indwelling of the spirit are used interchangeably in Romans 8:9-11: "But ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwells in you. Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his. And if Christ be in you, the body is dead because of sin; but the Spirit is life because of righteousness. But if the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you."
So the question is not: "Does the Spirit of God indwell the Christian?" but "How does the Spirit indwell?" Is there some mystical method to bring it about? Does it produce miraculous powers? What is its effect? The first step in answering these questions is to recognize that the indwelling is not physical — it is spiritual. From Romans 8:9-11, the indwelling of Christ and the Spirit are identical — you cannot have one without the other. Clearly, the physical body of Christ does not indwell the Christian, and neither should we view the Holy Spirit as a physical being. The indwelling of God in our lives is much more powerful than a mere physical presence (see Jn. 16:7), since it results from the most powerful of spiritual influences (Rom. 1:16).
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David? Ever since the worst was suspected of our President, comparisons have been made to the Old Testament character David. Almost all of the great leaders of the Old Testament were corrupted, especially those who ruled in good times. There is no question that power corrupts. Many who have never been in positions of power over others are quite hypocritical in their judgments if, given the opportunity, they would do the same thing (e.g., Mt. 5:28). But the fact that others are wrong never excuses our own sin (Ezek. 18:20).
Please take a few minutes and read 2 Samuel 12. Notice vss. 10-12. David’s sin had immediate and dire consequences: "the sword shall never depart from thine house, ... evil against thee in thine own house, ... thy neighbor...shall lie with they wives in the sight of this sun ..." Reading the next few chapters reveals that David could no longer control the country (or even his own family) because he lost his moral authority to govern. The punishment started with the death of the child born of the adulterous relationship, but it culminated in the death of Absalom, as described by some of the saddest words recorded in the bible (2 Sam 18:33): "And the king was much moved, and went up to the chamber over the gate, and wept: and as he went, thus he said, O my son Absalom, my son, my son Absalom! would God I had died for thee, O Absalom, my son, my son!" The effects on the kingdom of Israel were equally as devastating — all of Israel suffered.
But even these personal and national consequences are a best-case scenario. David’s honest reaction to Nathan is given in 2 Sam. 12:13: "And David said unto Nathan, I have sinned against the LORD." No qualifiers, no equivocation. Can you imagine the consequences had David blamed Nathan, or perhaps Saul’s household? Oh, that not only our President, but all of our politicians were willing to follow David’s example (Mt. 3:8). The fate of our nation depends on it.
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How Does the Holy Spirit Indwell?
This question is answered in Ephesians 3:14-19: "For this cause I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, Of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named, That he would grant you, according to the riches of his glory, to be strengthened with might by his Spirit in the inner man; That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith; that ye, being rooted and grounded in love, May be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height; And to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that ye might be filled with all the fullness of God."Read this passage several times and meditate on it. Notice that the indwelling of the Spirit, Christ and God are all mentioned as being the same thing. Notice that the indwelling comes by faith: "That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith ..." Faith can be true or false, living or dead. James 2 declares that faith without works is dead, as is faith only. This proves that faith only is an oxymoron, for if the indwelling of God proceeds out of true faith, this must certainly result in something.
So to determine the source of the indwelling of God we must find the source of true faith. The only passage in the New Testament that declares the source of faith is Romans 10:17: "So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God." Should we be so surprised that placing God’s word in our hearts will result in faith, and that faith will result in the indwelling of God. Jesus himself is called the Word in John 1:1: "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God."
This means that God’s indwelling is something that is up to you — it is up to you to fill yourself with God’s word and thus build the condition "that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith." This is a principle of God’s established truth; it does not require anything miraculous.
The miraculous gifts of the Holy Spirit in the first century were to reveal and confirm the word (Mk. 16:20). The power is in the gospel (Rom. 1:16), and the essence of the gift of the Holy Spirit is not the temporal proofs that established and proved it, but the revealed truth itself.
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but in John 10:41 it states with regard to John the Baptist:
"And many resorted unto him, and said, John did no miracle:
but all things that John spake of this man were true."
This, despite the fact that the bible declares explicitly that John the Baptist "shall be filled with the Holy Spirit, even from his mother's womb" (Luke 1:15). Clearly there is no implication that being filled with the Holy Spirit necessitated the miraculous. However, in all cases in the book of Acts where Christians are stated to be "filled with the Holy Spirit" it goes on to say that they spoke the word of God. (Acts 2:4, 4:8, 4:31, 13:9f). Being "filled with the Holy Spirit" results in the God who is living within us becoming evident to others.
Even having the gift of the Holy Spirit did not imply the miraculous. The scriptures state that all who obey have the gift of the Holy Spirit (Acts 5:32). Yet, they did not all have miraculous spiritual gifts (1 Cor. 12:28f). In Acts 8 many were baptized but could do nothing miraculous until receiving the laying on of the apostles’ hands (17-18). We cannot begin to enjoy the essence of the Holy Spirit as long as we limit His power to the temporal benefits of the miraculous. The essence of the Holy Spirit is the Divine truth He revealed (Jn. 8:32).
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