We're going to study the communion of the Holy Spirit. And this expression is taken from the last verse of Second Corinthians, the well-known benediction, the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Ghost be with you all. Amen. I think it's obvious from the verse that he is wishing for us the enjoyment of fellowship with the Holy Spirit. Now, first of all, He is our intercessor, one in addition to Christ. You remember in Romans chapter eight, the twenty-sixth verse says, The Spirit Himself makeeth intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered. while the thirty-fourth verse tells us that the Lord Jesus Christ also makes intercession for us. And in Hebrews seven, verse twenty-five, we're told that the Lord Jesus Christ liveth to make intercession for us. And this is why he is able to say it to the uttermost, all who come unto God by him. The same word is used, as we'll see a little later on in our studies. describe both the Lord Jesus and the Holy Spirit. Now secondly, he helps our infirmities. He does this in five ways. A, in our present suffering. Romans eight, seventeen and eighteen says, if so be that we suffer with him. We shall also reign with him. He says, I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared to the glory which shall be revealed in us. Christians are suffering more in some parts of the world than others, but all of us are called upon to go through some kind of suffering. The Spirit of God helps us in that time. And B, he helps us in our corrupt environment. According to the same eighth chapter, Romans, nineteen to twenty-two, the creation is waiting, is suffering bondage, and is growing under this present corrupt environment. I was a great deal of talk today about the ecology. I wish there was more concern about the moral contagion, because this is meant specially. However, creation suffers in many ways. They tell us that all of the sounds of the animal and bird life are in the minor keys, and we often refer to the sighing of the wind and the trees and all sorts of things like this to indicate that all creation is out of joint. because of what has happened in this world remember that in the Garden of Eden the Lord said that man would now have to earn his bread by the sweat of his face we usually say his brow this is what happens now see he helps our infirmities in our groaning bodies Romans eight twenty three even we who are saved grown, we're told, waiting for the adoption to let the redemption of the body. And if your body isn't groaning today, just be thankful. Little comes sooner or later. It may take old age to bring it on, but it always gets here. And the Lord knows what it means. Our Savior knows because he endured it. The Holy Spirit knows because he has taken up residence within our bodies. And then D, he helps our infirmities in our ignorant prayers. And that's exactly what they are. Romans eight, twenty-six. The Spirit helpeth our infirmities, for we know not what we should pray for as we ought. The next verse says, He maketh intercession according to the will of God. The Holy Spirit knows what's best. We don't know. So the best that you can do is to pray the best you know how. and then trust that the Spirit of God will translate this into the right kind of a prayer. And if you can't say any words at all, just go ahead and groan. He can translate groans. That's literally what he says. He makes intercession with groanings. In the twentieth of Jude, we're told to build ourselves up in our most holy faith, praying in the Holy Ghost. not for the Holy Ghost, because he is already here, but praying in the Holy Ghost means in his energy, in his power, conscious that he's helping us. And last of all, he helps our infirmities in our worship. I suppose every Christian has been conscious about how little real devotion we feel toward the Lord. Well, in the fourth of John, verses twenty-three to twenty-four, the Lord Jesus said that God is the spirit and that he seeks worshipers to worship him in spirit and in truth. And so we worship by means of the spirit. This is what Philippians three and three says. We worship God in the spirit, in his power and energy. A person who used the name of God only for blasphemy after the new birth finds himself adoring the Lord. And he hardly understands it himself. This is the work of the Spirit of God, leading us to do so. Now, the second section of this study, He is our teacher. We have already gone into this, but let's run back over it. One, promised by the Lord Jesus, John, fourteen, twenty-six, when the Spirit of truth is come, He shall guide you into all truth. And He promised, A, to teach us all things. He doesn't do it all at once, but you keep studying, you keep digging, and He will teach us all things, and be to bring Christ's words to remembrance. He says, He shall bring to your remembrance whatsoever I have said unto you. Incidentally, this is true in the local sense. And you find yourself talking to someone and you need a scripture to show him and suddenly one comes to your mind and you're not even conscious that you knew that verse. Now, he doesn't read the Bible for you. If you're too lazy to read the Bible, even the Holy Spirit can't help you. But if you read the Bible and store these things up in your memory, even though you think you don't remember them, he can reach into your memory and bring them out whenever you need them. And see to guide us into all truth. And this means to keep you from false doctrine, to keep you from misapprehension, to keep you from being misguided. And D, to show us things to come. John sixteen, thirteen to fifteen promises this. And finally, E, to glorify the Son. This is what the Lord Jesus said that the Holy Spirit would do. And here's a nice little thing. His text is the Bible and his subject is Christ. And you may be sure that if you're really led by the Spirit of God in the study of any section of the Word of God, Old or New Testament, that you will see Christ in it. If you don't see him, go back and read it again and again until you do see him, because he's there. And this is the work of the Spirit of God. Now, second, he is our unction or anointing. You remember he's called both in First John chapter two. In second Corinthians one, in verse twenty one, he says, He who establishes us and hath anointed us is God. So we are anointed by the Spirit of God. Now the purpose of this, A, to abide in us permanently. First John two, twenty and twenty-seven, the anointing you received abideth in you. This was never true in any other age. The Spirit of God did not stay with men in the Old Testament times. He came upon them and then left. And as I referred to in the other lesson, David was afraid and prayed that the Spirit of God would not be taken from him. This will never happen to a Christian in this age. He abides with us forever. And B, he is totally competent. I want to emphasize that because there are many who believe that the Spirit of God is simply a kind of agent or make-weight, an aid. But he is totally competent. see, he may use individuals. Ephesians four, eleven to sixteen says he gave some evangelists and some pastors and teachers. He doesn't have to have human beings through whom he can teach us, but he is pleased to use human teachers. And last, he empowers us to witness. In John fifteen, He says, The Spirit of Truth shall testify me, and then He says, Ye also shall be witnesses. And then you remember in the first chapter of Acts, in verse eight, when the Lord Jesus ascended up into heaven, the angels were standing by. And just before the Lord ascended up, He said to them, You wait here at Jerusalem. as he be endued with power from on high. And then he said, ye shall be witnesses of me in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and the uttermost parts of the earth. Now remember that the Dead Sea is dead because it has no outlast. And that the Spirit of God is constantly teaching you and ministering to you and pouring into you. And you don't do anything with it. You don't make use of it. You don't pass it on. You're liable to become a Dead Sea Christian. Now the Sea of Galilee has the same water as the Dead Sea in Palestine. It flows in from the north and flows out from the south, goes on down to the Dead Sea, flows into the Dead Sea, and there it stops. The Sea of Galilee is a lovely freshwater lake. with many species of fish in it, vegetation all around the bank, and the Dead Sea is just what the name implies. I'm afraid too many Christians are accumulating and doing nothing with it. I hope that those who are taking this study don't simply cram your heads, but get the knowledge that gets into your head, lowered about a foot, into your hearts, and then let it work out through your hands and your feet. Now third, we want to consider the communion of the Holy Spirit from the viewpoint that He is our guide. Now this is more than a teacher. A teacher may impart knowledge, but a guide is intended to show you the way. Now number one, leading us to the Savior. The first work of the Holy Spirit as our guide was to guide us to Christ. And if you're going to be any use to the Spirit of God in helping men to get to Christ, you've got to remember that this is what he's doing. He's not guiding them to the church. He's not guiding them into a better life. He's not guiding them into some answer that will take care of all the problems. He's guiding them to Christ. And if you're going to witness, you have to witness of Christ. Don't say you wish that they could hear your pastor, your preacher, but try to lead them to the Lord Jesus. Remember John one, twelve, thirteen, as many as received him, so them gave you the right to become the children of God. And again in the third chapter of John, the Lord Jesus said to Nicodemus in verse six, that which is born of the flesh is flesh. And then he went on to say that you've got to be born again. And that the Spirit of God is like the wind blows. You can't tell whence to come or where to go at, but you can certainly tell its effects. And the effect of the work of the Spirit of God is to lead man to Christ. Now, secondly, he is leading us in our walk. And the word walk is used very often in the New Testament. And I have not seen any modern speech translation that has improved on that word. They use all kinds of other words, but you really can't get a better word to describe your daily progress than the word walk. And your pathway through this life is a walk. You're not riding on a jet. You're just plodding along. They call our infantrymen in the army, foot sloggers. And that's what most of Christian life is. We're slogging it out. Day by day, step by step. Don't try any shortcuts. If you want to get acquainted with God, you're going to have to walk with Him. Now, our walk, A, is not according to the flesh. Romans eight, four and five, we walk not after the flesh, but after the spirit. And in Galatians five, eighteen, he says that we are led of the Spirit, and so we ought to live in the Spirit. And in the twenty-fifth verse he tells us that we walk in the Spirit. This means that we are in constant dependence upon the Holy Spirit in our walk. And dependence upon him means that we do not walk according to the flesh. We do not do the things that our own natural inclination would lead us into. The paths of the flesh and the paths of the Spirit are widely divergent, and you simply can't walk in both. And B, he leads us to act like full-grown sons. Romans eight, fourteen tells us that those who are led by the Spirit of God are the sons of God. Now, in all of Paul's writings, he differentiates between children who are infants and sons who are living up to their full-grown possessions. And in that same passage, in the fifteenth verse, he says, You have received the spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father. And we've already noticed in our studies that adoption means the placing as full-grown sons. And this is what God wants us to live up to. He says in Ephesians four, grow up. Now be no more children tossed to and fro with every wind of doctrine. And this is the way God wants us to live as adult sons and see after Christ's own example. Now in Luke four, one to fourteen, we read that the Lord Jesus was led by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted. And then after his temptation, it says, with great power, gave he witness the power of the Spirit of God operating in the Lord Jesus. Now this may seem strange to you because the Lord Jesus Christ is God. But as a man, he took the place of total dependence upon God. And he himself was moved and led by the Spirit of God in exactly the way that he expects us to be led. He did not take things into his own hands. He took the place of obedience and willingness to be led. In John three in verse thirty four, it says, He giveth not the Spirit by measure unto him. I was pleased to notice that unto him is in italic. And I take that to mean that he doesn't give the Spirit by measure in any of us. Sometimes we think that the Lord Jesus had the Holy Spirit in the way that we can have, and yet doesn't he plainly tell us that we can be and we should be filled with the Spirit. So he gives the Spirit not by measure to any of us. And you can be a Spirit-led believer if you desire to be. Now third, he leads us in our service. A, to speak his word. Acts four, thirty-one to thirty-three. They were all filled with the Spirit. They spake the word with boldness, and with great power they gave witness. This was a marvelous thing. God would do the same thing for Christians in this day. The potentials of this group met here today. If we were truly led by the Spirit of God in our service, is beyond calculation. God can take any human being and use him if that person is given into his hands. And this is what he expects us to do. The people who spread the gospel in the first century, for the most part, were ignorant, unlearned, poor, They did not have modern transportation. They did not have modern methods of communication. And they got the gospel all over the known world before their lifetime had expired. Now God could do the same thing with us. And B, to function in the body of Christ. His leading in service is not only in our witness in the world, but is in our functioning in the body of Christ, the church. First Corinthians chapter twelve deals with this at great length and tells us that each of us have our own particular place in the body, each of us fit into our niche if we're led by the Spirit of God, and he uses each of us according to the function that he designed for us. If we believe this and are willing to give ourselves into our hands, we will find ourselves useful in the local church. Now any Christian who wants to be a lone wolf, as Misty's calling, because we're not wolves at all, we're sheep. And sheep always go in herds, in packs, in groves. There's something wrong with a Christian who doesn't want the fellowship of other Christians. When I was a boy on the farm, I learned right away that any animal that's all by itself, you better ride out there and find out what's the matter with it, because it's sick. Any sheep that isn't with the rest of the sheep is sick. Any child of God who doesn't want the company of other believers in the local assembly of believers is sick. And I'd like to say a little about that. Number four, leading us in the local assembly. A, in public meetings. First Corinthians fourteen, twenty-four and twenty-five says, that the Spirit of God leads the various members to speak the Word of God in such a way that all who come in will be convinced and will be judged and will report that God is among you are the truth. Now this is wonderful when this happens. When you see God's people so subject to the Spirit of God that he is able to use this one to give out the right hymn and another one to read the right Scripture, And there's something wrong when people have to outline this whole thing ahead of time. I was in a meeting recently where a fellow got up and he had a big piece of paper in his Bible, which he had evidently typed off sometime in the past, and he was there to shoot off his little fireworks. And he just wasted twenty minutes of time. It had absolutely nothing to do with the rest of the meeting, you see. But he got this ready and studied it, and he thought he ought to give it. Now, that is not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about being sensitive to the leading of the Spirit of God so that he can use you to say the right thing or get out the right hymn or pray the right prayer at the right time. I believe this. I believe he leads us in worship. Be in worship because we're part of God's temple, Ephesians two, twenty-one and twenty-two. And remember the temples were places for deities. God himself had a temple which Solomon built, and that was a place where God was worshiped. And we who were built together as believers are to be a temple of God inhabited by the Holy Spirit. And so we ought to be exercised about worship. Now, worship doesn't happen. Worship is a result of occupation with the Lord Jesus until our hearts are filled with him. and we then speak to him in appreciation and see we must be in the spirits as Revelation one ten to eighteen pictures John John says I was in the spirit on the Lord's day and then he proceeds to tell how he saw the Lord Jesus in glory and how he fell down at his feet and worshiped him and the fourth section of our study He is our comforter. One, He is present in this age. And there again I emphasize this age. The Holy Spirit is always present with you as an individual in your body, which you never leave, and He is always present in the local church. Now this A is different from all other ages. John fourteen, sixteen and seventeen. He says the Father will give you a comforter. He is with you and shall be in you. Now he was already with them. But when the Lord went to the Father, then the Holy Spirit came in a special sense to be in us. So this was different from all other ages. This was not commonly taught among God's people. And there are very few books on the Holy Spirit that stress this important point, that the Holy Spirit is present at all times with us. B, our bodies are his temple. First Corinthians six, nineteen. And C, this is the fruit of Christ's death, resurrection, and ascension. It would be impossible. The Lord Jesus said this in John sixteen and seven. He said, If I depart, I will send the Spirit unto you. He said, It's expedient for me that I go away. If I go not away, the Spirit will not come. So the coming of the Spirit of God is predicated upon, is based upon the finished work of Christ and His ascension to the right hand of the Father. That's why we can count on the presence of the Holy Spirit. regardless of our unworthiness. He is here because of Christ, not because of what we are. And then, number two, his ever-present health. Now, first John two and one refers to the Holy Spirit, refers to the Lord Jesus as an advocate. we have an advocate with a father. The word advocate and the word comforter are translations of exactly the same word. And the word is para-cletos. Now para means alongside of, and kletos means a helper. It's just that simple. The Lord Jesus himself and the Holy Spirit each are to us a para-cletos. one standing beside to help. Now, you know, you'd have to be pretty weak if you couldn't make it, if you had one on each side of you holding you up. And that's exactly what we have. We have the Lord Jesus there at the right hand of God. What for? To be our advocate, our paracletos. And we have the Holy Spirit within us. What for? To be our comforter, our paracletos. So you and I have holding us up. Both the Lord Jesus and the Holy Spirit. How could you fail? We have little signs Jesus never fails. You could just throw up one hell and never fail either. Because it's absolutely true. We are in dependence upon God for this. But because of His ever-present help, we can be sure of this. And then His ever-present help, as we have already noticed, is to help our infirmities. It's not a matter of how strong are you for God. It's a matter of how weak are you and how willing are you to accept and use God's strength. Remember Paul said, he asked the Lord three times to take away that thorn in the flesh, and the Lord said to him, my strength is made perfect in weakness. Now, if you can furnish the weakness, he'll furnish the power. And see he quiets our fears and doubts. Romans eight, sixteen to eighteen tells us that the spirit bear witness with our spirit that we are the children of God. And if children then heirs, heirs of God and joint heirs with Jesus Christ. Now if that won't take away your fears and your doubts, I don't know what will. And his bearing witness with our spirit, of course, is through the Word of God. But it's more than just you're reading the Bible. You could read the Bible and get all the facts. But when the spirit bears witness with your spirit, he personally takes that word and applies it to your spirit in such a way as to remove your fears and your doubts. And this is what he promises to do. A non-Christian doesn't know about this. This is why he's afraid to launch out. He's afraid to step out. He's afraid to accept Christ, because he says, I could never hold on. I could never make it. Well, you couldn't either. But we don't need to. He is the ever-present help. And third, our enjoyment of his presence. Psalm fourteen, sixteen, twenty-seven, where he tells us that he's coming. is, A, more than a clear understanding of theology. I've already stressed that, let me say it again. It isn't having your head stuffed full. It's getting these things down to where you personally enjoy his presence. B, the world cannot receive, see, know, nor enjoy this peace. This is stated in the passage to which I've just referred, last part of the fourteenth of John. Now, he is also said to be a well of water springing up. John, verse fourteen. That means that God has not simply given you a drink of the water, and then you come back when you get thirsty again, but he has put the Holy Spirit within you to be a well inside. That's why the woman with the well went off and forgot her water pot. she came with an empty water pot she went away with a well inside of her and she didn't need her old pot anymore and might be a good thing for us to remember today and D according to John seven thirty eight and thirty nine rivers of living water shall flow from your inner being this he spake of the Holy Spirit so it not only springs up to refresh you and to praise God, but it flows out to bless everybody on the outside. Let me say once again that this truth, so far as I am aware, is not taught by most people, and it is not included in any church creed of which I am aware.