Title: The Secret of Obedience
Bible Book: John 14 : 15-18
Author: Adrian Rogers
Subject: Obedience; Holy Spirit, Work of; Bible and Obedience
Objective:
Introduction
John 14:15-18
Turn with me to John chapter 14, and I want us to begin reading tonight in chapter 14, and we begin reading in verse 15. Jesus said, “If ye love me, keep my commandments. And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you forever; even the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye know him; for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you. I will not leave you comfortless” (John 14:15–18).
Tonight, I want to speak to you about “The Secret of Obedience.” Do you have the topic in your mind: “The Secret of Obedience”? So many people are looking for the secret of the Christian life. Where is it found? Well, I believe in the passage that I have before tonight we may be right close to actually one of the most incisive statements to help us to understand how to live victoriously of any passage in all of the Bible. And so I want to call tonight our message “The Secret of Obedience.” “Trust and obey, for there is no other way to be happy in Jesus but to trust and obey” (John H. Sammis).
Do you want me to tell you what is wrong with the average Christian? He’s disobedient. Do you want me to tell you what is wrong with the average church? It is filled with disobedient people. Do you want me to tell you why people are not happy in their faith - they’re saved, but they’re enduring it rather than enjoying it. They’re simply not being obedient. Now ladies and gentleman, there is no other way to be happy in Jesus us but to trust and obey.
Now obedience is something we don’t hear much about. We preach so much on salvation by grace through faith, and we tell people that salvation is a gift of God that sometimes if we talk about obedience people think we’re legalists. But I would have to agree with Martin Luther, who said, “We’re not saved by faith and works, but we are saved by a faith that works.” And James said that, “faith without works is dead” (James
2:26). And there are so many things that hinge on our obedience.
Now there are three things I want you to learn tonight in this passage of Scripture that we have before us.
I. Love Is the Motive for Our Obedience
First of all, I want you to notice the motive for obedience. Why do you obey the Lord?
Point number one: the love of Christ - a love for Christ is the motive for obedience. Look, if you will, in John 14, verse 15. Jesus said, “If you love me, keep my commandments” - “If you love me, keep my commandments.” Now ladies and gentleman, there is no other motive for keeping the Word of God than love for the Lord Jesus Christ. “If you love me, keep my commandments.” Don’t tell me that you love the Lord Jesus if you’re not obeying Him. It’s just foolish and empty talk.
As a matter of fact, our Lord makes it very clear and very plain that if we love Him we will keep his commandments. Look, if you will, please, in verse 21: “He that hath my commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me: and he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father, and I will love him, and will manifest myself to him” (John 14:21).
Now Jesus tells us very clearly and very plainly therefore that the motive for commandment keeping is love for the Lord Jesus Christ. I don’t keep the commandments in order to get to heaven - my way to heaven is paved by the grace of God. I keep the commandments simply because I love the Lord Jesus Christ.
Turn to Mark chapter 12, and let’s see how we’re to love the Lord Jesus - Mark chapter 12 for a moment, and I want us to look in verse 30. Here’s a key passage that deals with love, and we’re about loving our Lord - Mark chapter 12 and verse 30: “Thou shalt love the Lord…” - I want you to check up on yourselves now - “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength: this is the first commandment” (Mark 12:30).
A. The Reality of Love
Now ladies and gentleman, here is the way that we’re to love the Lord. He speaks of the reality of love. We’re to love God with all of our heart. It’s to be a heartfelt love. It’s not to be a superficial love. You know, Jesus said, “This people honoureth me with their lips, but their heart is far from me” (Mark 7:6). And I want to ask you tonight - would you nod your head if I ask you: Do you love Jesus? But I want to ask you with all of your heart, Do you truly love Jesus? Is there that reality of love? Is there that burning, passionate, emotional love for the Lord Jesus?
You know, people sing much about love, but they don’t really love the Lord. We sing sometimes on Sunday morning, “I will be true to you till death,” and we don’t even come back to church on Sunday night; we are sitting at home watching something on television, or at some ball game or something like that. No, dear friend, we are to love our Lord with reality. That is, with all of our hearts.
B. The Responsiveness of Love
And then He speaks of the responsiveness of love. Notice again, in verse 30, we’re to love the Lord our God with all of our soul - with all of our soul. What does that mean? Well, in the Bible, the soul is the self, and what our Lord is saying is that the entire self, the entire person, shall be given over to Him, no area private, no area where we say “Lord, keep out.” “Lord, everything is given to you. I love you with all of my soul; that is, with all there is of me. “ Every part, every area, is given over to the Lord.
They were looking for an evangelist for a revival crusade, and they were discussing who they might have. This was many years ago, and many ministers were saying, “We need Dwight L. Moody” - “We need Dwight L. Moody.” And one man protested and said, “Why do we need Dwight L. Moody? Does Dwight L. Moody have a monopoly on the Holy Spirit?” And they said, “No, but the Holy Spirit has a monopoly on Dwight L. Moody.” Now that’s loving the Lord. He loved the Lord with all of his soul.
C. The Reasonableness of Love
But notice this speaks not only of the reality of love, and the responsiveness of love, but it speaks of the reasonableness of love. Look at it again: “And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind.” You see, you can have a full heart, but a full heart is no excuse for an empty head. And a lump in your throat is no substitute for a vacuum in your cranium. You ought to love God with all of your mind. And the reason that some of us don’t love the Lord is we don’t study, and the reason we don’t study is that we don’t love the Lord. You can’t leave your mind out of it. The Bible says we’re to “study to show ourselves approved unto God, workmen that need not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth” (2 Timothy 2:15).
D. The Resourcefulness of Love
Do you love God with all your heart tonight? Do you really? Honest, folks. That’s the reality of love. You love Him tonight with all of your soul. That’s the responsiveness of love. Everything is given to Him. Do you love Him with all your mind? That’s the reasonableness of love. And then notice, you’re to love Him with all of your strength. That’s the resourcefulness of love. Everything that have, all of my energies are to be focused in love for the Lord Jesus Christ. Oh, I want to love Him that way! I need to love Him that way. I don’t love Him that way, as I ought. God, help me to love Him more, with all of my strength.
Now He’s not just talking about physical strength. Surely you ought to love Him with your physical strength, but there is more than one kind of strength. There’s emotional strength. There’s financial strength. There are all kinds of abilities and talents that you have. And we’re to love the Lord our God that way. And the Lord Jesus is telling us now that the motive for obedience is love.
Go back to John chapter 14 again and look at verse 15. Notice what our Lord is saying. “If you love me, keep my commandments.” Now don’t tell me you love the Lord Jesus if you don’t keep His commandments. God is not impressed by that kind of love. Don’t tell me how many verses you know. Don’t tell me how often you attend church. I want to know, Are you reading what this book says, and are you obeying it? Are you loving the Lord your God with all of your heart, with all of your soul, with all of your mind, with all of your strength? If you are, then you’ll be keeping the commandments of the Lord. You see, this is the motive for keeping the commandments.
Have you ever wondered why God didn’t just make us where we’d just have to love Him, or we’d have to serve Him? Let me back up to why God didn’t make us where we’d just have to serve Him. He could, you know. He could have created us where we couldn’t do anything else but serve Him. But God couldn’t get any blessing out of that. God couldn’t get any enjoyment out of that.
A few years ago, people were buying pet rocks, and everybody had a pet rock. I never had one. I couldn’t afford one. But a lot of people had pet rocks. And you know, there’s a neat thing about a pet rock: You put it down somewhere and say, “Don’t move,” and it just stays right there. You never have to feed it. It never breaks your heart. It will never disappoint you. It just sits there. But you know, you don’t kick out a pet rock. And really, I don’t think this idea of a pet rock is going to last very long, except for the most hard - hearted people. Pet rocks are - it’s just not much there. You see, God could have made us like a bunch of pet rocks, where we couldn’t do anything but obey Him, and do everything He says, but God can get no response from us that way anymore than you could get from a pet rock.
And so as we’re talking about obedience tonight, remember that it is love that God wants. It is your love that God wants, and love is the motive of obedience.
II. The Word of God Is the Measure of Our Obedience
Now the second thing I want you to see: If the love of God is the motive of obedience, the Word of God is the measure of your obedience. Look in John chapter 14, verse 15 again: “If you love me, keep my commandments.” Look in verse 21 again: “He that hath my commandments,” - that is, my Word - “and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me: and he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father, and I will love him, and will manifest myself to him.” Look in verse 23: “Jesus answered and said unto him, If a man love me, he will keep my words” (John 14:23).
Now here the Lord is speaking of His commandments, and here the Lord is speaking of His words. Now you see, if you love Him, that’s the motivation for obeying. But what is the measure for obedience? How are you going to know what to obey? How are you going to know what to do? Well, you’ve got to know the Word of God. You can’t keep His commandments until you have them. “He that has my commandments and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me.” And so you’ve got to get into the Word of God. That, ladies and gentleman, is the measure of your obedience: Are you bringing your life into conformity with the Word of God?
You know, Saul failed to obey the Lord, and he had a silly superficial excuse for failing to obey the Lord. And Samuel spoke to Saul. And “Saul, it is better to obey than to sacrifice. For rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft, and stubbornness is as iniquity and idolatry” (1 Samuel 15:22–23). Did you know that if you’re not obeying God tonight, that is, if you’re not bringing your life into conformity with this Word, God classes that rebellion, that disobedience, along with stubbornness, along with idolatry, along with iniquity, along with witchcraft? You see, to fail to obey God is sheer rebellion; to fail to bring your life into accordance with this book is sheer rebellion.
When I was a young father and one of my children, my first child, Stephen, was down on the floor playing as a little child of four, I asked him to pick up a piece of paper, and he failed to do it. And then I told him to pick up the piece of paper off the floor, and he refused to do it. And the next thing was that daddy was spanking this precious little boy, and mother was saying to daddy, “Daddy, you ought not to have spanked him for not picking up a piece of paper. That seems like such a small thing.” And I said, “Well, I didn’t spank him really for not picking up the piece of paper. I spanked him for disobeying his daddy.”
You see here, this is where it comes to rebellion. There may be some small little thing God is dealing with you about. You know, God may be telling you to go and apologize to someone. You say, “Well, that’s such a small thing.” It’s not a small thing to disobey God. God may be telling you to give a certain amount of money, and you say “Well, that’s a small thing.” It’s not a small thing to disobey God. God may be telling you to witness to a certain person. You say, “Well, that’s not a big sin. I haven’t committed adultery. God says that stubbornness is like idolatry, iniquity, and witchcraft. See, the measure of our obedience is the Word of God. I mean, if I am not bringing my life into conformity with His Word, then I’m not obeying Him.
The motive for my obedience is the love of God. The measure of my obedience is the Word of God, the degree to which I bring my life into conformity with this Word. Now you know, I’m speaking to a lot of people tonight who if they were honest would say to me, “Jesus Christ is not real in my life. Oh, I believe in Jesus, and in a way I love Jesus, and I’m trusting Jesus to get me to heaven, and I really expect to go to heaven, but really, if I were to be honest with you, Adrian Rogers, I would have to say that Jesus is someone more that I know about than I know, and He’s not really real to me like some people talk about Jesus Christ being real to them. He doesn’t really manifest Himself to me, and I don’t have that intimate personal relationship with the Lord Jesus.” If you’d be honest, many of you would say that. And I’m going to tell you why. Do you want to know why? It’s because you’re not obeying the Word of God.
I want to show you one of the most pungent verses in all of the Bible. It’s John 14, verse 21 - look at it: “He that hath my commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me:” - now notice - “and he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father…” - now you want the Father to love you? Then love the Son. You want you want to prove that you love the Son? Then keep the commandments of the Son of God. But now notice - “he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father, and I will love him,” - and watch this next phrase - “and will manifest myself to him.”
Do you want Jesus to be real to you? You want Jesus to show Himself to you? It’s so simple: Find His Word, start obeying His Word, and Jesus Christ will suddenly become very, very real to you, and you won’t have to be talking about, Why is God so far off? Why do the heavens seem like brass when I pray? Why is it that everybody else seems to be happy in Jesus but I’m not happy in Jesus? It’s because, dear friend, you’re not obeying the Word of God. “Trust and obey, for there is no other way to be happy in Jesus, but to trust and obey.” It is so plain, if you want Jesus Christ to be real to you.
Look, if you will, in the verses that follow - verse 22: “Judas saith unto him, not Iscariot, Lord, how is it that thou wilt manifest thyself unto us, and not unto the world?”
How is it you’re going to make yourself real to us? “Jesus answered and said unto him, If a man love me, he will keep my words: and my Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode with him” (John 14:22–23). That’s how I’m going to do it. I’m just going to dwell in your heart in such a real and a vital way that you just know that I’m in there. But you must be keeping my Word; you must be obeying me.
Have you ever wondered sometimes why you can’t understand the Bible, you read the Bible and you just don’t understand it? Well, I’ll tell you why. Anytime you read a commandment in the Word of God, and God makes it plain to you that’s what He wants you to do, and you haven’t been doing it and you need to start doing it, at the point where you say, “I’m not going to do that; now what else is new?” at that point you’re going to cease to understand the Scripture. At that point, from there on, the only understanding you’ll have of the Scripture will be the understanding of a carnal, natural man, and “the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God,” and “neither can he know them, [for] they are spiritually discerned” (1 Corinthians 2:14). The Bible will become a dull book to you. And if you would tell the truth, you’d rather be watching television, you’d rather be out at a restaurant, you’d rather be reading the newspaper, than reading the Bible, and yet you believe the Bible, and you love the Word of God, and there are many things in the Bible you’d like to understand, and you say, “Pastor, why is it I don’t understand the Bible?” I’ll tell you why. You’re not obeying the Bible. The way - put this down in your heart and get it down there good, and I hope you’ll never forget it - the way to understand the part of the Bible you don’t understand is to obey the part you do understand. Now please don’t forget that. The way to understand the part of the Bible you don’t understand is to obey the part that you do understand.
Suppose you come up to some commandment in the Bible and you refuse to obey it, and then you read a few verses further, and you say, “Lord, show me what this means,” and God says, “I’m not going to tell you.” You say, “Lord, you’re not going to tell me? Why, God? I really want know.” God says, “You are a hypocrite. You don’t really want to know. Because if you really wanted to know, then you would obey that which I’ve already shown you, and when you start to obey what I’ve already shown you, then I’m going to show you more.”
Ladies and gentlemen, there is no way - no way - to really know Jesus in a vital way, there is no way to really understand this book in a living way, except through obedience.
III. The Holy Spirit Is the Might of Our Obedience
Now look. The love of God is the motive of obedience, the Word of God is the measure of obedience, and just to put it the other way, the love of Christ is the secret of obedience, the Word of Christ is the standard of obedience - you’re going to obey Him by his Word. Now let’s go on and think not only of the motive, and the measure, but the might of obedience.
You say, “Well, Brother Rogers, I just can’t love the Lord that way, and I just don’t have enough strength to obey Him that way.” Well, you’re quite right. And I don’t either. You see, the Christian life isn’t a hard life; it’s an impossible life. And the only way that you’re going to obey the Lord is for God to give you supernatural strength to obey Him. So it’s not by happenstance that He speaks of keeping His commandments in verse 15, and then in verse 16 He says, “And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you forever; even the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye know him; for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you. I will not leave you comfortless: I will come to you” (John 14:16–18).
Now here if the task seems too great for you, just relax, because obeying the Lord is not in the strength of your flesh; it is the in the power and the might of the Holy Spirit of God. You cannot love Him without the Spirit; you cannot obey Him without the Spirit. And here when the Lord says, “I will send you another Comforter,” you can translate that correctly, “I will send you a strengthener, someone to strengthen you, someone to stand alongside of you, someone to guide you and energize you.” You’re not called upon to do it by yourself. And that strengthener is the Holy Spirit of God.
You know, people never really have understood how to live the Christian life. They miss it always because they leave the Holy Spirit out.
There are some people who think the answer is intellectual, if they can just go to their library and study. And we spend millions and millions of dollars on teaching programs, and people study and study and study, and they go to class after class after class, with their heads getting more full and their hearts getting more empty. I want to say to you seminary students that are here tonight that studying is not going to make you spiritual; it just will not do it. And you can backslide with a Bible under your arm. The answer is not intellectual.
There are other people who think the answer is emotional. And so they come into a certain kind of a service where everything is hyped up, and there’s a certain kind of rhythmic music and a certain kind of a beat, and there’s a certain kind of oratory from the pulpit, and there’s a certain kind of give - and - take from the people, till people get themselves kind of hyped up. And there is nothing really wrong with emotion. I’m not against emotion. I’m not against people getting excited in church. And if your cup overflows, let it overflow. Now don’t shove it over. But if it overflows, that’s all right. I’m not against that. But people come to the front, you know, and in some of the services they get down at the alter, and people will beat on their back and whisper in their ear, and the drums will play and all of this singing, and they get all hyped up, and then after a while they go out, and they’re trying to live in the glow of that emotional experience, and the next day the only thing that they have is a jaded memory of a great experience.
The answer is not intellectual. The answer is not emotional. And there are other people who think the answer must be in activity, and their motto is “A busy Christian is a happy Christian,” and “Work, work, work, go, go, go.” Now there are people who are just so busy that they’re always doing something and always acting, and their motto is “Do better and try harder,” but the whole time they’re trying, they’re failing, and that’s not the answer.
Other people believe the answer is the answer of the Pharisee: just giving up things. It’s amazing what people will give up. This season of the year, we’ve just come through a season of the year where people give up certain things. Now certainly there are things that we ought to give up, things that dishonor our Lord we ought to give up, and things that keep us from being spiritual we ought to give up, and things that are a hindrance to us we ought to give up, and things that are contrary to the Word of God we ought to give up. But did you know you can just give up things and put things away from you until you become just a cold bitter Pharisee, and you’ve pruned your limbs, and you strengthen your roots, and you’re worse off than you were before?
What is the strength of obedience? What is the might of obedience? The secret of obedience now is love for the Lord. The standard of obedience is the Word of the Lord. But the strength of obedience is the Spirit of the Lord - the Spirit of the Lord. “I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you for ever.”
Now I want you to notice what the Lord Jesus says here. He doesn’t say that it will abide with thee, but He shall abide with you. Learn this: The Holy Spirit is a person - not a thing, not an influence. Sometimes you hear a new Christian or those who have not been taught yet speak of the Holy Spirit as an it. The Jehovah’s Witnesses do not believe that the Holy Spirit is a person. They believe that the Holy Spirit is a force or an influence, the Spirit of God, but they do not believe that the Holy Spirit is a person as God the Father is a person, and as God the Son is a person, and they reject and repudiate the idea of the Holy Trinity. And one of the reasons they reject the idea of the Holy Trinity - God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit - is that it’s unreasonable to them.
Well, dear friend, never reject that which is unreasonable to you, because our great God is always beyond human reason. Someone has said of the Trinity, “Try to explain it, you lose your mind; deny it, you lose your soul.” The Holy Spirit is a person, a person just as real as I’m a person, just as real as Jesus is a person, just as real as God the Father is a person.
Now when I say to you that’s He’s a person, I don’t mean that He has a body, but I mean that He has personality. And when I say that He has personality, I don’t mean that He’s taken a Dale Carnegie course or well liked. Don’t get the idea of personality that way. I mean that He has the attributes of personhood, which is intelligence. For example, the Holy Spirit is intelligent. We read in Romans chapter 8 and verse 27, “He that searcheth the hearts knoweth what is the mind of the Spirit” (Romans 8:27). The Holy Spirit has a mind. That’s the reason that the early apostles and disciples, even though they were uneducated and unlettered men, spoke with great power and great wisdom. Why? The Holy Spirit in them, who has a mind, was giving them that wisdom.
The Holy Spirit has emotion, feeling. For example, the Bible says in Ephesians chapter 4 and verse 30, “And grieve not the Spirit of God, whereby ye are sealed unto the day of redemption” (Ephesians 4:30). Now you see, the Holy Spirit can be grieved and influenced. A thing can’t be grieved. Only a person can be grieved. The Bible says in Romans chapter 5, verse 5, “The love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost” (Romans 5:5). The Holy Ghost loves, and He’s a person, because only a person can love, and because of His love I can love God, and I can love you.
The Holy Spirit not only has a mind, not only does He have emotions, the Holy Spirit has a will. We read in Acts chapter 13 and verse 2, “And as they ministered to the Lord, and fasted, the Holy Ghost said, Separate me Barnabas and Saul for the work whereunto I have called them” (Acts 13:2). And so the Holy Spirit has a will for my life. The Holy Spirit has a will for your life. And there’s no need for us to be floundering around like a ship without a sail, a compass, and a rudder on a stormy sea. I ought to be hearing the Holy Spirit saying to me, “This is the way, walk ye in it” (Isaiah 30:21). The Bible says, “In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths”
(Proverbs 3:6). And how will He do it? By the Holy Spirit of God. For the Bible says, “As many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God” (Romans 8:14).
Now what I’m trying to say is this: that Jesus is saying that the strength for obedience, the might for obedience, is the Holy Spirit, and the Holy Spirit is a person. Now if you don’t understand that the Holy Spirit is a person, you’re going to be so mixed up and messed up you’ll never be a victorious Christian. Why is it important to understand that the Holy Spirit is a person rather than an influence?
Well, it’s so important to worship. You won’t worship a thing, you worship a person, and the Holy Spirit is to be worshiped. Don’t let the Holy Spirit be a forgotten person of worship. And as you meet to worship this Sunday night, next Sunday night, in your private devotion, worship God the Father, worship God the Son, and worship God the Holy Spirit. It’s so important to worship.
Friend, listen. It’s so important to service. Do you know why many people don’t obey the Lord? They don’t understand the principle of the Holy Spirit. They think that the Holy Spirit is some sort of a power, that if they can get that power within them, they can use that power. They think of the power of the Spirit as some sort of a supernatural force that comes in and takes over their lives. The Holy Spirit is not a force that I use; the Holy Spirit is a person who uses me. You see, it is not for me to get more of it; it is for Him to get more of me. People are talking about having more of the Holy Spirit. He doesn’t give the Spirit by measure (John 3:34). It’s not whether I get more of Him; it’s how much of Him that He has of me. Listen, friend. I’ll never serve the Lord until I understand that He is a person wanting to control me and take control of me.
It’s so important to blessing to understand that the Holy Spirit is a person. You see, He’s here to take Jesus’ place. Notice what He says in John chapter 14, beginning again in verse 15: “If you love me, keep my commandments.” And now notice verse 16: “And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter.”
Now there are two words in the Greek language that mean “another.” One means “another of a different kind,” like a flower, “but I’m going to show you another thing: here is a watch.” Now that word another means “another of a different kind,” but “here is a lily and here is another lily, another just like it.” Now the Greeks would have a different word for us, the word another, if it meant “another of the same kind” rather than “another of a different kind.” And that is the word that is used here when Jesus says, “And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter”; it is the Greek word that means “another of the same kind.”
Do you want me to give you a good definition of the Holy Spirit? Christ in the Christian. He is within me. He is Christ in my heart. Now if you don’t understand that He is a person, how mixed up you’re going to be.
You see, suppose a mother had to go away and leave her little babies, and she said to the babies, “Now don’t worry; I’m going to send you another to comfort you,” and she gives them a digital radio, or a clock, or a speedometer, or something like that, and says, “Now this will comfort you.” It can’t comfort them. It would have to be someone like her, another of the same kind.
And so when the Lord Jesus says, “I’m going away, but I’m sending you another,” He’s not sending us a thing, He’s not sending us an influence; He is sending us a person. How sweet must have been the fellowship of Jesus and the disciples, how let down they would have been if the Lord Jesus were just sending some sort of an influence rather than a person. Don’t you ever let somebody tell you that the Holy Spirit is not a person. He has the emotions of a person. He has the mind of a person. He has the will of a person. He is the third person in the Holy Trinity. And because of that He is so absolutely essential to obeying the Lord. It’s not what I do for God that counts; it’s what God does in me. And the program of the Holy Spirit is so simple. The Holy Spirit just asks what would Jesus do, and then He does it, because the Holy Spirit is here now on earth to represent Jesus.
Say, I want to ask you a question, and I want you to think it through: If you had your choice, which would you choose; if you could have the Lord Jesus Christ here in this auditorium tonight, I mean, standing up here, you could see Him just as plainly as you see me, and have the Lord Jesus Christ up here tonight to open the Word of God and preach a sermon, I mean, his bodily form standing right up here, if you could have Him to do that, or if, on the other hand, you could have the Holy Spirit within you tonight, just like you have Him, which would you choose? I hope you would say, “I would choose the Holy Spirit within me.”
Now most of us would say, ‘Oh, I wish I could have lived back then; I just wish I could have been back then when our Lord walked this earth.” Listen, friend. Turn to John chapter 16 and verse 7 and see what our Lord says - John chapter 16 and verse 7. Jesus said, “Nevertheless I tell you the truth; It is expedient for you that I go away:” - a loose translation: “It is better for you that I go away” - “for if I go not away, the Comforter will not come unto you; but if I depart, I will send him unto you” (John 16:7). Now what Jesus is saying is, “You are better off with the Holy Spirit inside you than you are with me beside you.” Now never forget that: “You are better off with the Holy Spirit inside you than you would ever be with me beside you.” “It is expedient for you” - it is better for you - “that I go away.”
Conclusion
Thank God for the work of the Holy Spirit in me. Remember this: that if I love the Lord Jesus Christ, that’s why I’m going to keep this commandment. Love for Jesus is the motive for obedience. The Word of God is the measure of my obedience - I cannot claim that I’m obeying if I’m not bringing my life in to conformity with this Word. But the Spirit of God is the might of my obedience. Oh, the strength of my obedience is the Holy Spirit within me. I’m so grateful that I don’t have to do it myself, and I know that as I yield my life to Him, He takes over, and He’s changing me, and He’s transforming me, and He will do the same for you.
I want us to bow our heads together in prayer - every head bowed, every eye closed; no one stirring, no one looking around. I want to ask you a question tonight: Do you love Jesus? Do you really love Him? Jesus said, “If you love me, you’ll keep my commandments.” Is the desire of your heart to keep His commandments? Secondly, are you bringing your life therefore into accordance with the Word of God? Are you keeping His Word? Is His Word the standard of your life? Is it really? Or is it the fashions and the ideas of your friends, and what you read in the newspaper, and what you see in the library, and what you decide what you want to do? Is the Word of God the standard for your life? Is it really? And then, is the Holy Spirit energizing you, filling you and energizing you to love Jesus and to obey Jesus?
If not, why don’t you let Him right now? Why don’t you say: “Spirit of God, forgive me for treating you like you’re some sort of a thing rather than a person. And Spirit of the living God, I yield my life to you right now. Take control my life. Make me the person you want me to be. Dear Spirit of God, I yield my life to you. Father, bless me and help me that I might yield more fully. For truly I have spoken to myself tonight, and I failed you, dear Lord, in so many ways, but dear Lord, tonight, before these my people, I want to yield my life to the Holy Spirit. Spirit of the living God, help me to love thee in such a way that I will hear His Word and keep it and obey it, and that He will manifest himself to me.
What I pray for myself grant that others will be praying for themselves tonight. In the name of Jesus. Amen”?
