Living in the Spirit

Description of the Holy Spirit and His Work

Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill

I think a lot of people today are asking questions like how you heal and how you overcome
depression, and how do you pray and it seems like we have a multitude of how questions. It seems
that we always have a multitude of how questions when people are eating of the tree of the knowledge
of good and evil and not too much of the tree of life. If you remember, when Mary asked the angel,
“How can these things be?” And the angel said, “You shall conceive and the child shall be born in
your womb.” The angel answered, “By the Holy Spirit.”

And it seems that all the “how” questions are answered by life, by the life of the Holy Spirit. But
when there’s an abundance of knowledge and a shortage of life, then I think there are a lot of
questions and very few answers. I feel that in a way, even in spirit filled circles today, that’s
the problem. There are a great many of us who are saying, “This is the way to the Holy Spirit.
This is the way to receive the Holy Spirit. This is the way to be filled with the Holy Spirit.”
But there is surprisingly little of the sensitive life of the Holy Spirit alive among us.

And it does seem that you can often talk about the Holy Spirit and teach about the Holy Spirit
without actually living in the stream of the life of the Holy Spirit. And, I think it is important,
you know, just to see that really it’s the Holy Spirit alone that gives life. In 2 Corinthians 3:6,
this is really what Paul says, that the old letter kills in a written code but in the spirit for a
written code kills but the spirit gives life. And I think John 6:63 states the same thing, that
it’s in the spirit that real life is.

And I think that it is true that if we, in our bodies, here of Christ, give more respect to the Holy
Spirit than we did to ideas, I think we’d receive more life of the Holy Spirit into us. I think
too, we’d be led to the person of Jesus rather than the principles of Jesus. Old Stanley Jones was
good, he said, “Unity comes when people are preoccupied with the person of Christ rather than the
principle of Christ.” And really, if we honored the Holy Spirit and respected him in our own
individual lives, more of us would be preoccupied with the person of Christ and we’d be led into
real unity than preoccupied with the principles of Christ.

I think this is the real reason for Jesus’ command to the apostles. You remember, they had
experienced more of truth and reality than any of us probably will ever do in a sense and they had
walked, and ate, and slept with this man who was absolute truth and yet this man said to them,
“Listen, after I die I don’t want you to leave Jerusalem, I want you to stay there to wait for the
promise of the Father which is coming to you.” This seems to be the reason why Jesus emphasized
this command, because he knew that he could bring principles and he could teach truths, but only the
Holy Spirit could give actual life.

And I think this is why he emphasized the importance of the Holy Spirit in John 14. He talked of
the Holy Spirit as someone without whom we could not do at all. John 14:16-17, “And I will pray the
Father, and he will give you another Counselor, to be with you for ever, even the Spirit of truth,
whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him; you know him, for he
dwells with you, and will be in you.” And Jesus emphasized that unless the Holy Spirit came to
them, really all that he had said was of little value.

I think this is why such serious consequences were taught in the early church for blaspheming the

Holy Spirit. People blasphemed and lied to Jesus and yet they were not struck dead. But in Act
5:3-5, Ananias and Sapphira you remember, lied to the Holy Spirit when they kept back the proceeds
of the land and they were struck dead for that. It seems that in doing this kind of thing God was
guarding the Holy Spirit because the Holy Spirit was someone very precious that he wanted his people
to honor and obey. And you remember blasphemy against the Holy Spirit is reckoned in Mark 3:29, to
be the unpardonable sin. That is the sin that will not be forgiven, if you blaspheme against the
Holy Spirit.

I think this is the reason too for the battle that took place in the fourth century in the early
church about the divinity of the Holy Spirit. Many of us think of the battle over the divinity of
Jesus that took place around the time of the Creed of Nicene. But really it was in 381 at
Constantinople that at last the early church agreed that the Holy Spirit was a divine person of the
Trinity. And it seems that this was such a long drawn out battle because Satan realized that if
people did not treat the Holy Spirit as what he was, a real person in the Trinity then all would be
lost as far as Jesus’ death had gone.

I think the importance of the Holy Spirit is implied really in that benediction that we use most
Sundays in church. It’s the benediction mentioned in 2 Corinthians 13:14 and it’s that verse from
which we get the implied doctrine of the Trinity from the Bible. 2 Corinthians 13:14, “The grace of
the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all.”
It would seem very strange if Paul were to say, “The grace of Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God
and the fellowship of Peter be with you all.” We would feel, “Ah no, that is wrong. Peter isn’t on
the same level at all with Jesus and with God.” And yet Paul feels it is very natural to say, “The
grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit.” Implying
that the Holy Spirit is equally important with the Father and the Son and he’s just like them.

So, that’s really brothers why I think it’s important to see that the Holy Spirit is someone who is
pre-imminently important in these days, these days that we call the age of the Holy Spirit. What
I’d like to try to talk about a little is who the Holy Spirit is first of all. I think it’s
important to see that he is a person. Ephesians 4:30 talks about the Holy Spirit being someone who
can be grieved. We often insult him as treating him as a force or an influence and I think it’s
good to see that he is a person with a real will, and a real mind, and real desires and it is
possible for the Holy Spirit to interact with you and me, and it is possible for his mind to become
our mind and for his will to deal with our will.

This is I think, what we feel at times in our own Christian lives when we find something stirring
within us wanting us to go a certain way. It is the will of the Holy Spirit. When a person becomes
a Christian it is because the will of the Holy Spirit has taken over his will, or his will has
cooperated now with the will of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is a divine person; he’s not just
an influence. Jesus told us that he was to be his successor. He was to complete what Christ himself
began. Jesus said that we were dead in our sins but it’s the Holy Spirit that makes us really
realize that we’re dead.

Jesus can say, “You must be born of the Spirit,” but it’s the Holy Spirit that makes us actually
come alive. And, it’s the Holy Spirit that is the successor of Jesus in that he makes real to us
the things that Jesus talked about. He is a successor in a real way. He can do things for us that
Jesus cannot do. I think we often forget that. I think we feel, “Oh, Jesus can do everything.”
No, Jesus is at the right hand of the Father today and he can only influence us as the Holy Spirit
brings his life to us. The Holy Spirit was even so important to Jesus that Jesus said, “Unless the

Holy Spirit had anointed me, I could not preach the gospel to the poor, I could not heal the broken
hearted, I could not bind up wounds.” He said, “The Holy Spirit has anointed me to preach the
gospel to the poor.” So, it was the Holy Spirit that gave even Jesus the power to do these things.

Many of us say, “Oh well, I mean, you ask Jesus to do the thing and he’ll do it anyway.” But, it is
good to see that it’s wrong for us to look to one person of the Trinity to do what that person
expressly told us another person of the Trinity would do. And this is what Jesus said in John
16:7-8. He really pointed out that it was the Holy Spirit who would do things for us that he could
not do for us at this time, “Nevertheless I tell you the truth: it is to your advantage that I go
away, for if I do not go away, the Counselor will not come to you; but if I go, I will send him to
you. And when he comes, he will convince the world of sin and of righteousness and of judgment.”

Significant that it says in the Bible that Jesus did not come to condemn the world but to save it
and it’s the Holy Spirit who comes to convict the world of sin. Jesus himself does not convict it.
So, in many ways Jesus showed us that the Holy Spirit would do things that he could not do and we
should look to him to do them. Really we ourselves in our studies, and our preaching, and our
positions as husbands, and our positions as sons; I think we would be freer in our relationships if
we really did honor the Holy Spirit. Maybe too often we look to our wives, or we look to our
fathers or mothers to see how we can really be a blessing to them, or how we can be like Christ to
them. Maybe if we honored the Holy Spirit himself, and spent more time loving him, and respecting
him, and obeying him, we would automatically be better husbands and more sensitive people in our
families.

This is the kind of thing that Jesus said the Holy Spirit would do for us. That he would really
bring Jesus real in our own lives and make him real. I think we often have looked upon the Holy
Spirit as the force that comes upon a meeting, a great influence that comes upon a Billy Graham
evangelistic service, and this is just insulting the Holy Spirit. All of us have objected to people
treating us as machines. You, Mike, would hate to be treated in the library as a kind of book
machine that just shot out a book when you shot your card in. And I hated it most when men treated
me as a pastor, “He’s a pastor and that’s the kind of thing he’s supposed to do.” And we all feel
this, oh insult, to our personalities when people treat us as functions and yet I think often we
have grieved the Holy Spirit because we have treated him as a function, who will do certain things,
or influence us in certain ways instead of treating him as a real dear person whom we can love and
who can love us.

The Bible uses the same terms of the Holy Spirit as it does of the Father and the Son. It’s good to
see that, that in a sense you can think of the Father as God existing and the son as God revealing,
and the Holy Spirit as God communicating and yet they are all equal and equally important. And
omnipresence of the Father is attributed to the Holy Spirit. All these invisible qualities that God
has and the Son has, the Holy Spirit is said to have also. Indeed, you can see in connection with
the Constantinople conference that belief in the Holy Spirit was the last test of orthodoxy as far
as Christians were concerned. And even today we would think that orthodox Christians are
Trinitarians, people who really believe in the personality of the Holy Spirit.

Maybe it’s good to see lastly about this whole question of who is the Holy Spirit that the Holy
Spirit is the real gift. Maybe we’ve made a tremendous mistake in our bodies today in looking for
pardon, or cleansing, or peace as the gifts instead of looking to the Holy Spirit as the gift. You
remember, in Acts 2:38, it was the Holy Spirit who was promised as the gift to the new converts.

The men asked Peter, “Oh, what should we do?” And he said, “Be baptized in the name of Jesus for
the remission of your sins and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.” And it wasn’t, “That
you shall receive the gift of pardon, or the gift of cleansing, or the gift of peace, or the gift of
forgiveness but, “You shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.”

It seems that if we’re looking for the Holy Spirit it would help a lot if we’d look for the Holy
Spirit and not for his gifts. All the other things that he gives are gifts of his. He gives the
nine gifts of the Spirit outlined in 1 Corinthians 12:7-11 and he provides the nine fruit of the
Spirit as outlined in Galatians 5:22-23, but the Holy Spirit himself is the gift. Jesus emphasizes
that you know, in John 15:26 and I’d just refer maybe to John 8:13, where Jesus says, “It’s the Holy
Spirit that you need, it’s not pardon and cleansing that you need, it’s the Holy Spirit. He will
bring the rest of the things to you.” The Pharisees and John 16:7 he says when the Holy Spirit
comes, “I tell you the truth: it is to your advantage that I go away, for if I do not go away,” not
peace will not come to you, or forgiveness will not come to you, or sense of glory will not come to
you but, “The Counselor will not come to you; but if I go, I will send him to you” a person.

So, that’s something brothers of who the Holy Spirit is. What was the Holy Spirit’s relationship to
the church, to the early church? I think we find that the Holy Spirit was absolutely responsible
for the early church. Without the Holy Spirit the early church wouldn’t have existed really. The
Holy Spirit started the church. You remember there was no movement of a church. Jesus certainly
talked about his church but there was no creation of a church until Acts 2:4 took place, “And they
were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues, as the Spirit gave them
utterance.”

It was only when the Holy Spirit fell upon these men that they began to gather together in the
unique community that was called the church and that, you know, outlasted Domitian and Nero, and all
the other Emperors that tried to destroy it. The Holy Spirit began the church and Acts 2:17-18 you
get that emphasis again that this would take place, “And in the last days it shall be, God declares,
that I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh, and then your sons and your daughters shall prophesy,
and your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams.” And none of this would
take place until the Holy Spirit came.

It was the Holy Spirit who began the church. It was the Holy Spirit we saw that was promised as the
gift to the new converts. It wasn’t peace or forgiveness, it was the Holy Spirit. Wait for the
Holy Spirit. It was the Holy Spirit who disciplined the church. It’s good for us, I think, to see
that especially in our situation where we tend to feel that man is so important. I mean, we are
precious to each other and I know I’m precious to you as you’re precious to me, but it’s very
important to see that it’s not the elders, it’s not the pastor, it’s not we men that discipline the
church, it’s the Holy Spirit himself. Acts 5:3, “But Peter said, ‘Ananias, why has Satan filled
your heart to lie to the Bishop?” “Why has Satan filled your heart to lie to the Elders?” No, “Why
has Satan filled your heart to lie to the Holy Spirit and to keep back part of the proceeds of the
land?”

I really do feel that if we had that attitude to the Holy Spirit as the disciplinarian in the body,
it brings forth a great freedom. It brings for instance, me into tremendous freedom that I don’t
feel that when I’m reflecting something to Tim, or something to you Mike, that it’s my discipline or
I’m teaching you how to do something that I know better than you. But suddenly we all become aware,
“Yes, he’s just calling me back to the Holy Spirit.” I felt that, I have to say it Tim, even though
we’re recording, that when you were pushing me to record and to put this on tape it was good to feel

you’re not disciplining me. This isn’t Tim trying to discipline the pastor of the body, but it’s
Tim calling me back to what the Holy Spirit wants me to do.

And it seems that’s the atmosphere that God wants, you know, where the Holy Spirit is the
disciplinarian in the church and we all feel we are responsible to this invisible person that is
moving among us and that is expressing himself through different ones of us at different times. It
seems that that’s why the church can be a mutual experience. It seems that’s what takes the whole
responsibility from one man to lead the church and discipline the church, and advise the church.
Suddenly we begin to find that all of us men are being used by the Holy Spirit to speak forth his
word to each of us at different times.

It seems to me there’s a great balance, and a great set of balances and counteracting forces there
that saves us from wild individualism and fanaticism. But the Holy Spirit was the one who
disciplined the Church. The Holy Spirit was the one who directed the leaders in evangelistic
activity. I think it’s good to see that in Acts 16:6-7, because a lot of us, especially we here who
are concerned with getting 10,000 of us out here into the world for Jesus, we wonder well, “Where do
you go? Do you go to India Mike where you have had some experience?” Or, do we go Tim to London
and specialize there? Or, do we go to South America with Sue or to Bolivia with Wally and Marg who
have had some experience in Bolivia? Do we go where the Holy Spirit tells us? And it seems that
it’s plain you know, Acts 16:6-7 states that, “And they went through the region of Phrygia and
Galatia, having been forbidden by the Holy Spirit to speak the word in Asia.” And so they avoided
Asia not because they didn’t know Asia but because the Holy Spirit had forbidden them to speak the
world there. “And when they had come opposite Mysia, they attempted to go into Bithynia, but the
Spirit of Jesus did not allow them.”

This is the kind of discipline that the Holy Spirit exerted over the missionaries of the early
church and it seems to me it’s the kind of discipline that he wants to exercise over us in our
missionary strategy. The Holy Spirit apparently can see deeper than we can. It’s not a matter of
looking for the underprivileged countries, it’s not a matter of looking for the non-lost of lands,
or looking for the lands that will be freshest and most open to the gospel, but it’s really a
question of following the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit directed the evangelistic strategy of the
early church.

The Holy Spirit ministers to the world. It seems even in the New Testament it wasn’t the church
that ministered to the world but it was the Holy Spirit. You remember, Jesus said, “When the Holy
Spirit comes he will convince the world of sin and of righteousness and of judgment.” It wasn’t the
church that was to convince the world of sin but the Holy Spirit. I think the church has become so
often a mealy mouthed kind of harmless milk and water organization or it has seemed to other people
as a downright fanatical narrow minded fundamentalist oppressive operation because the church has
tried to convince the world of sin. Instead of just living before the world in the Spirit of Jesus,
the church has tried to convince the world of sin.

Now, the Holy Spirit is the one that ministers to the world through the church. So, it is really
good to see that the Holy Spirit is the one who will do the main work of the church and will do
these things for our church today. Perhaps it would be good just to look for a moment or two at
what the Holy Spirit does in connection with Jesus himself, in other words, the relationship of the
Holy Spirit to Jesus. Jesus said that the Holy Spirit would tell us who he was. John 15:26, “But
when the Counselor comes, whom I shall send to you from the Father, even the Spirit of truth, who
proceeds from the Father, he will bear witness to me.”

Many of us say, “Oh, we know who Jesus is, he’s the son of God, he lived in the first century, we
have manuscripts to back up his historicity. He’s the one that healed the lepers; he’s the one that
called Peter and John to follow him.” Those are the historical facts of Jesus and through those
facts we can know him as we know Winston Churchill, but the truth is that the Holy Spirit can bring
us into a personal knowledge of Jesus. Even though he lived 1900 years ago, he can enable us to
know Jesus as really and more really than even the disciples knew him. The disciples for instance,
knew Jesus after the flesh and yet when it came to the time of his trial they forsook him and fled.
That’s how well they knew him after the flesh.

It seems that the Holy Spirit can bring to us a knowledge of Jesus that is even finer, and more
sensitive, and more detailed than that in the New Testament. I’m not saying, you know, that we go
on to new revelations that are beyond the New Testament, but the Holy Spirit interprets the details
of the New Testament picture to us in ways that we’ve never seen before.

It was just a revelation to me in my prayer times, when I began to discover that I could get up from
prayer knowing Jesus in a deeper and a more sensitive way than I knew him when I first kneeled down
to pray. And yet, it wasn’t that I could tell you of some quality that I didn’t know he had before,
that I discovered, but it was him himself. I met him in a new way and the Holy Spirit will tell us
who Jesus is in that way. The Holy Spirit will make Jesus real in our own lives. He’ll reveal
Jesus to us. He’ll interpret scripture to us. Jesus said this in John 16:14, “He will glorify me,
for he will take what is mine and declare it to you.”

Some of us have used this kind of illustration that oh you could bring the most beautiful paintings
into this room at the moment, Leonardo Da Vinci’s Last Supper and the crucifixion and St. John of
the Cross, and have them around the walls of this room and then I could bring you into the room and
say, “Aren’t these beautiful paintings?” And never switch the light on you and you’d say, “Well, I
can’t see a thing, darkness, absolute darkness.” And then when I switch the light on you’d see
these beautiful master pieces lined up around the walls of the room.

Now, it seems to be the same with the Holy Spirit, you can talk about the beauties of Jesus, but
until the Holy Spirit has made them real to you, and revealed them to you, and lit them up for you,
there is no beauty in them. It’s the Holy Spirit who interprets scripture and enables us really to
understand scripture. The Holy Spirit makes the things of Jesus real and fresh. They happened 2000
years ago but he makes them real and fresh today. That’s really what Jesus is saying in John 15 and
that verse where Jesus says, “He will take of the things that are mine and communicate them to you,”
and the Greek word means you know, make them real with you, share them with you in a way that you
will understand.

And it seems that, oh you can talk of Jesus and he’s just a historical figure until the Holy Spirit
makes it real and alive. Jesus said, “The Holy Spirit will glorify him.” I was always baffled when
I read about that. I thought, “Oh yeah, that means we’ll all glorify Jesus. We’ll glorify Jesus.”
We’ll say, “Oh, Jesus you’re wonderful, you’re great. Oh, you’re a good Lord, you’re a good Lord.”
And I used to think, you know, that praising and glorifying Jesus seemed to me rather a flattering
kind of attitude towards Jesus and it never struck me as a manly thing to do, everybody would be
around glorifying one person.

But I think it’s good when you see that the Holy Spirit glorifies Jesus in this way. He takes of
the things of Jesus and reproduces them in our lives so that the world sees Jesus alive inside us

and that’s all the world needs to do to glorify him. Jesus will automatically be glorified when the
world sees him again and that’s really the way the Holy Spirit glorifies him. He imparts to us the
very beauties of Jesus’ own life and then the world sees Jesus alive again and simply falls before
him and worships him.

It seems that the same way the Holy Spirit will convict the world of sin. We often feel, he’ll come
straight down and strike them dead, or strike them in their conscious. No, I think the Holy Spirit
will reproduce the beauties of Jesus in you and me and then the world will see the beauty and the
balance of our lives and the peace of our emotions, and the love in our hearts, and the world will
be convicted of its own ugliness. And that’s the way the Holy Spirit convicts the world of sin.

Maybe I could just end by talking for a couple of minutes about the Holy Spirit and us ourselves.
The Holy Spirit, if we allow him will miraculously take the life of Jesus and make it real in us.
This is the unique factor in Christianity. Mohammad cannot make himself real in us, but Jesus can
make himself real in us. The Holy Spirit can take the love of Jesus and make it real in us.

It meant a lot to me when I at last saw that when 1 Corinthians 13 describes the love of Jesus, if
I’m really allowing the Holy Spirit to do what he wants in me, then it will describe me. And I know
you’ve maybe heard it before, but just to be able to say, you know, “I am not jealous or boastful.
I am not arrogant or rude. I do not insist on my own way. I am not irritable or resentful. I am
not glad when others go wrong. I am glad when others are right. I believe all things. I bear all
things. I endure all things. My love never ends.” It seems that that’s what happens when the Holy
Spirit takes the love of Jesus and makes it real in each one of us. And when he takes the
forgiveness of Jesus and makes it real in us and the humility of Jesus, not that old diffidence or
that humiliation, or that timidity, or that modesty that we call humility but real humility of Jesus
a willingness to be rated low, a willingness to waive our rights as Jesus did whether we’re praised
or blamed for his sake. Those qualities, those unique supernatural qualities the Holy Spirit will
make real in us.

So it seems to me this is some of his work and some of his ministry and oh, we would just
transformed people if we would really honor the Holy Spirit and ask him to make the supernatural
life of Jesus real in us and he will really. You know, in these next meetings I’d really like to
begin to talk of how the Holy Spirit will make real in us the purity and the power of Jesus.

New Testament Personal Experiences

Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill

What is really necessary things in regard to the work of the Holy Spirit is to be very clear in our
own minds what the New Testament experience of the Holy Spirit is, and to really interpret that
carefully and closely. And so that’s really what I’d like to spend a little time doing now. I
think it’s important brothers to see that Jesus himself came to do a two-fold work and you have that
pointed out clearly, you remember, in John 1:29 and 33 where John says first that Jesus is the one
you remember, “Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!” And John says, “First
of all Jesus came to take away the sin of the world,” that is to bring forgiveness of sins. And
then in Verse 33 the second purpose of his coming, “I myself did not know him; but he who sent me to
baptize with water said to me, ‘He on whom you see the Spirit descend and remain, this is he who
baptizes with the Holy Spirit.’’

So, I think it’s important to see that the reason Jesus came was to remove our sins from between us
and God so that God would then really be free to replace the tree of life in our lives and to fill
us and baptize us with the Holy Spirit. And I think it’s vital to see that Jesus’ work is not just
the work of a savior from the guilt of past sins but his work is also as a Savior through the power
of the Holy Spirit from present sinning and from our present powerless lives. And I think it’s
important to see that really this was what Jesus himself laid emphasis on in John 7:37-39.

You find Jesus emphasizing this truth that the Holy Spirit was someone that we would receive really
only from him and Verse 37, “On the last day of the feast, the great day, Jesus stood up and
proclaimed, ‘If anyone thirst, let him come to me and drink. He who believes in me, as the
scripture has said, “Out of his heart shall flow rivers of living water.”’” And then John explains
you see, “Now this he said about the Spirit, which those who believed in him were to receive; for as
yet the Spirit had not been given, because Jesus was not yet glorified.”

And you see that’s the special mark of the new covenant. You see that. The Holy Spirit had not yet
been given in a full way because Jesus was not yet glorified. So, not only is the baptism of the
Holy Spirit really the real reason Jesus came, but it’s the unique mark of the new covenant as
opposed to the old covenant because John says plainly, “Until Jesus is glorified.” That is until
Jesus presents his blood to the Father, God cannot replace the tree of life among us men and so
cannot baptize us with the Holy Spirit.

Now, you get that emphasis in Acts 2:17-18. The emphasis that this is the really unique mark of the
new covenant, the baptism with the Holy Spirit. Acts 2:17, “And in the last days it shall be.” You
remember, Peter quotes Joel, “And in the last days it shall be, God declares, that I will pour out
my Spirit upon all flesh, and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, and your young men shall
see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams; yeah, and on my menservants and my maidservants in
those days I will pour out my Spirit; and they shall prophesy.”

So, you can see that really the new covenant was to have as its unique mark, the indwelling of the
Holy Spirit. That’s why Jesus, you remember, said on one occasion to the disciples, “The Holy
Spirit is with you,” because in the old covenant in the Old Testament the Holy Spirit was with
people. I mean, the Holy Spirit was with Saul to be a king. The Holy Spirit was with the prophets
to prophesy. The Holy Spirit was often with Moses, but here in the New Testament the Holy Spirit
was to be in you and this was a new mark of the new covenant, that the Holy Spirit was going to be

able to become synonymous with us men and with us woman.

In the old days God spoke through Balaam’s ass external and independent of people but now with the
coming of the Holy Spirit into people then the word was again made flesh and so the mark of the new
covenant is the Holy Spirit coming in and filling and making us like Jesus himself. Now you get
that clear teaching about the Holy Spirit brothers if you look at the first instruction, you
remember, that was given after the first Christian sermon that was preached, Acts 2:37-38. You
remember, the response of the people to that first Christian sermon in Act 2:37, “Now when they
heard this they were cut to the heart, and said to Peter and the rest of the apostles, ‘Brethren,
what shall we do?’” And then the first instruction you see, includes right in the forefront of it
this command to receive the Holy Spirit, “And Peter said to them, ‘Repent, and be baptized every one
of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins; and you shall receive the gift
of the Holy Spirit.’”

And you see it there that the gift of the Holy Spirit was the thing they were told to receive. That
is what would make them Christians as opposed to Jews, they were going to receive the Holy Spirit
into themselves. Now, the Holy Spirit would do certain things in them and the Holy Spirit, we find
does certain things in us. First of all John 16:8, you remember, “When the Holy Spirit comes he
will convince the world of sin.” It is the Holy Spirit that convicts us of sin. None of us have
moved towards Jesus or towards God except that the Holy Spirit has worked in us and made us realize
that we were not right with God.

Then the Holy Spirit will regenerate us in John 3:5, you remember, “Unless you are born of water and
of the Spirit, you will in no wise enter the kingdom of God.” So, we’re born of the Spirit when we
become Christians. The Holy Spirit seals us you remember, Ephesians 1:13 that it is the Holy Spirit
that seals you as God’s own people. So our assurance that we’re children of God comes from the Holy
Spirit. And then you remember Acts 1:8, “You shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon
you.” It’s the Holy Spirit that brings power.

Now, I mention all those because I think we often have an idea that the Holy Spirit only comes upon
a person when that person is baptized with the Holy Spirit. It seems to me that the Holy Spirit has
dealt with many of us even before we’re children of God. He has convicted us of sin. It’s him that
brings real repentance to us. It’s him really that enables us to believe on God. It’s the Holy
Spirit that works the grace in us. We have to say yes or no to him, but it’s the Holy Spirit that
brings about the miracle of the new birth. It’s the Holy Spirit that brings about the miracle of
assurance that we’re children of God, and it’s the Holy Spirit that fills us with power.

So, maybe it’s good to see that the Holy Spirit is not just to be identified with what we have so
often called the baptism of the Holy Spirit but the Holy Spirit does many things in our lives down
through the years. Maybe it’s important to see at this stage that he’s the basis of our assurance.
A lot of people in these days really aren’t sure whether they’re Christians or not and they aren’t
sure because they don’t know the real basis of the assurance that they’re children of God. Some of
them get caught in that trap that Jesus outlined you remember, in John 1:12 and they say, “Oh, we’re
born of blood and we’re born of Christian parents so we must be Christians.” Or, “We’re born by the
will of man. The Baptist pastor or the Presbyterian pastor, or the Methodist pastor gives us the
hand of fellowship, welcomed us into the church, we’re members of the church so we know we’re
children of God.” Or, some have a belief in the will of the flesh, born of the will of the flesh.

They say at a Billy Graham meeting or an evangelist service, “I’m going to believe in Jesus,” and

they say, “Just the sheer determination to believe, that makes me a Christian.” And they try and
look back and say, “Do I really feel determined? Then I must be a Christian.” Now, assurance of
salvation is not based on any of those things. Assurance of salvation is a work of the Holy Spirit
within us and it can be clearly discerned. It’s outlined there in Romans 8:16 and you remember Paul
is talking about the Holy Spirit moving within us and he says in Verse 16, “It is the Spirit himself
bearing witness with our spirit that we are children of God.”

Now, the Holy Spirit gives us an assurance of salvation because he, you see the Spirit capital S in
Verse 16 of Romans 8, the Spirit himself and the capital S signifies a definite article in Greek and
it always refers to the Spirit of God, the Holy Spirit. It is the Holy Spirit himself bearing
witness with our spirit and that’s a small s that we are children of God. So the way you tell
you’re a child of God is because of the combination of the witness of the Holy Spirit and the
witness of your own spirit.

Now you know, if you say, “Well, what is the witness of God’s Spirit?” Well, it’s there outlined in
Verse 15 of Romans 8, “For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you
have received the spirit of sonship. When we cry, ‘Abba! Father!’” So, the witness of God’s
Spirit inside us is that we feel he is our Father, we sense he’s our Father. When we go to him in
prayer we sense we want to call Abba! Father! And Abba is the Greek word for dad, and we feel that
God is our Father. We sense inside, “He is our Father, he loves me.” There’s a spirit inside of
God that calls up to God and regards him as our Father, no longer as a great Creator or as a mighty
Lord God but it’s Jesus inside us calling up to his Father and saying, “Dad, I love you.”

Now, it seems to me the first witness is the witness of God’s Spirit inside us that makes us feel
about God the way Jesus does. We just sense we love him. We sense he is our Father. However much
we fail him, however much we’ve disobeyed, there’s a spirit inside us that makes us keep on coming
back to him saying, “Father forgive me.” It’s not a spirit of fear of the mighty judge but it’s a
spirit of a child coming back to his father and saying, “Father I’ve messed it all up again. Will
you forgive me?” But it’s a spirit inside, it’s a spirit you know, that assures you that because
Jesus has died for you, God no longer has anything against you. It’s an absolute recumbency upon
Jesus as your only hope of salvation. It’s an absolute confidence inside that you have nothing to
offer God, that only the blood of Jesus will enable you to be accepted by him and it’s therefore a
rest in Jesus as your redemption and sanctification. It’s a complete trust in Jesus because of his
blood.

But it seems to me that’s the witness of the Holy Spirit you see, and that’s something that goes
below feelings, and below intellectual convictions. It’s something that you sense deep down, it’s
an attitude of heart. And then what is the witness of our own spirit? Well, the witness of our own
spirit is outlined in several places but Romans 5:5 is one place. Romans 5:5, love is part of the
witness of our own spirit, when the Holy Spirit comes inside us he dwells with us and he also
influences our spirit and he fills it with love, “And hope does not disappoint us, because God’s
love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy spirit which has been given to us.”

So, there is a love inside us of God and a desire to love other people. Now brothers and sisters,
I’m not saying that it dwells unmixed in the heart until really you have been filled with the Holy
Spirit completely, but it is there. It’s a desire to love people and it’s a desire to love God, and
it is a sense inside, “I want to love you Lord. I want to go your way.” In other words, the real
mark of God’s Spirit within a person is that they have a desire deep down that they want to go his
way. When sin comes up, it’s an alien thing to them. You know, they don’t embrace sin. Sin may be

there but they don’t embrace it. They say, “No, I want to go God’s way.” Whatever the sin is like
they reject it as something alien and external to them.

Now, it’s important maybe brothers and sisters to just note those clearly and to see that really
Galatians 5:22-23, you know, the fruit of the Spirit is an indication that our own spirit has been
changed by God and the absolute confidence that we have that God will receive us for Jesus’ sake,
that’s the witness of God’s own Spirit and the Holy Spirit brings that about.

Now, what about the whole business of the baptism of the Holy Spirit? And it seems to me here it’s
important really to look carefully at the New Testament and to analyze it as carefully, and coolly,
and calmly as we can. Would you like to look at the whole problem of the time sequence? And this
is where a great deal of the problem lies. The time sequence in the baptism of the Holy Spirit and
regeneration by the Holy Spirit.

Let’s look at Acts 2:38. Here’s the norm you see, here is the norm. Acts 2:38, “And Peter said to
them, ‘Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of
your sins; and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.’” Probably what happened was this,
Peter preached, said, “You have murdered the son of God and this Jesus has been raised to the right
hand of the Father and he has poured out this power which you now see. You murdered him by ruthless
and cruel hands.” And the people said, “What do we do about it?” And Peter said, “Repent. Be
sorry, stop doing it. Turn to God and be baptized in the name of Jesus for the forgiveness of your
sins and then you receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.” And they probably that very day believed on
Jesus and said, “We’re sorry. We’re sorry. Now we’ve seen what we’ve done, we’re turning from it
and we’ll turn and we’ll live for this Jesus.”

And then Peter would say, “Alright, now next day you’re going to be baptized. I’m going to baptize
you in the name of Jesus for the forgiveness of your sins.” And he would gather them around the
next day and he would repeat probably something of what Paul wrote down for us, you remember, on
Romans 6:3-4. He would say, “Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ
Jesus were baptized into his death? We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, so
that as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of
life.” And they would say, “Well, yeah, yeah, but what does that mean?” And Peter would outline
what it meant. He would say, “Now listen, I could be arrested any day. I could be killed tomorrow.
I can’t live for tomorrow. I can’t hope for my family to grow up. I can’t hope to be wealthy. I
can’t hope to look to the future. As far as I’m concerned there is no future. Now, that’s what
being baptized into Jesus’ death is going to mean for you.”

And then he would go through the possessions you know, this is what it’s going to mean for you and
he would explain fully what full surrender meant. And then he would say, “Now, are you willing not
only to believe in Jesus for the forgiveness of your sins, but are you willing to be baptized ‘ice’
is the Greek word, into Jesus? Are you willing to be identified absolutely with Jesus in his death
so that you can be identified with him in his resurrection?” And then if they were willing they
would go down into the water and as they came up out of the water, the Holy Spirit would baptize
them with himself.

And so brothers, I honestly believe that in New Testament days the norm was really the whole
experience taking place either in one day or in two days. But, I honestly question you know, if the
norm in those days was you were born of the spirit and then a long while after, maybe two or three
years, or in my miserable experience, you know, 17 years later, you’re filled with the Spirit or

you’re baptized with the Spirit. I honestly believe that was the norm in those days and that they
were baptized with the spirit in two ways. They were filled with the Spirit for purity and from
that day on the nine fruit of the spirit listed in Galatians 5:22-23 began to appear in their lives
and they were anointed with the Holy Spirit for power so that the nine gifts of the spirit in 1
Corinthians 12:3-4 were made available to them.

But that really, that was the New Testament experience. And, really that is the work of the Holy
Spirit in the new covenant and in that way reproduced the image of Jesus, reproduced the purity of
Jesus in the converts and reproduced the power of Jesus in the converts which was really why the
people in the ancient world saw immediately Jesus in what were apparently very new converts. Now,
Satan has tried to upset our whole attitude to the Holy Spirit by preoccupying us with distractions
in regard to this experience. And I really think he has done his best to eliminate this precious
unique work of the Holy Spirit in the new covenant by getting us all to disagree in all kinds of
ways with the way your baptized with the Holy Spirit.

And so I’d like really to try and tackle some of those. First of all you know, that he has tried to
preoccupy us with this whole business of the time sequence of the works of the new birth and the
filling and the anointing by the Holy Spirit. And you know there are plenty of people in all kinds
of churches and all kinds of groups that spend their time disagreeing with each other about the time
sequence in regard to the work of the Holy Spirit. So, there are people who say, “Oh, you must be
born of the Spirit before you can be filled with the Spirit.” There are people who say, “You have
to be baptized with the Spirit before you can be filled with the Spirit.” There are others who say,
“No, it has to be the other way around.”

Now brothers, I think the first thing you have to face is that it’s very hard to tie down a time
sequence. After you’ve looked at the normal pattern in Acts 2:38 you have to accept that the Holy
Spirit in Jesus’ words is a free spirit and the wind bloweth where it listeth and the Holy Spirit
will often do things backwards and in different ways. And you get that you remember, in Acts
10:44-48 the experience of Cornelius. Acts 10:44-48, and you remember Peter had hardly finished
preaching and it says, “While Peter was still saying this,” still preaching, still preaching the
gospel, “The Holy Spirit fell on all who heard the word. And the believers from among the
circumcised who came with Peter were amazed, because the gift of the Holy Spirit had been poured out
even on the Gentiles.” Who had apparently not even believed on Jesus or just about and no more,
“For they heard them speaking in tongues and extolling God. Then Peter declared, ‘Can any one forbid
water for baptizing these people who have received the Holy Spirit just as we have?’”

So the first thing I think is to see that it’s hard to tie down and say, “No, Larry you can’t have
been baptized with the Holy Spirit because you haven’t experienced this or you haven’t experienced
that.” I think finally we have to be very humble about the time sequence of the works of the Holy
Spirit and be open to God doing them in a new way. So brothers, I don’t think you can afford to say
to a person, “You couldn’t be born of the Spirit and filled with the Spirit at the same time.” You
can say with old John Wesley that, “I have interviewed hundreds of people in the midst of revival in
the 18th century and I have not found one in whom both works have taken place instantaneously.”

So, you can take the empirical evidence and historical report but you have to finally say that there
is nothing in the scripture that says it should be so. And you certainly cannot afford to say to a
person purely on the basis of time sequence that you cannot be filled with the Holy Spirit because
you haven’t been born of the Spirit. You have to accept that a person could be born of the Spirit
and filled with the Spirit the same day as far as God is concerned. There is no difficulty as far

as faith is concerned.

Now then I think, people have tried to confuse us and Satan has tried to confuse people on the issue
of tongues. Tried to get people all wrapped up with the whole business of tongues. Not with the
gift of the Holy Spirit, not with being baptized with the Holy Spirit but with the whole business
that you have to speak in tongues otherwise you haven’t been baptized with the Holy Spirit. Now
brothers, it’s just not true you see. 1 Corinthians 12: 29-30 run like this, “Are all apostles?
Are all prophets? Are all teachers? Do all work miracles? Do all possess gifts of healing?” And
the form of the Greek question obviously expects the answer, “No.” And you could guess even from
the English that the answer is, “No, all aren’t prophets, all aren’t teachers, all don’t work
miracles.” And then, “Do all speak with tongues? Do all interpret?” And obviously, Paul is saying
everybody doesn’t speak with tongues. There are many people who are baptized with the Holy Spirit
who don’t speak with tongues.

Now, I think many people get caught up in the kind of scholastic argument, “Oh, but maybe that was
the gift of tongues, but everybody speaks with a tongue when they’re first baptized.” But then
brothers you’d have to deal with the fact that only three instances in Acts, only in three instances
in Acts is it recorded that they spoke with tongues. In all the other instances where they were
baptized with the Holy Spirit there’s no mention of tongues. And I’d just mention, you know, Acts
2:41, and Acts 8:17, and Acts 9:18 and Acts 2:41 is just a plain one where it just says clearly that
they were filled with the Holy Spirit and that was it.

Acts 2:41, “So those who received his word were baptized, and there were added that day about three
thousand souls.” It just says they were baptized into Jesus and there were added three thousand
souls. Or, if you like to look at Acts 8:17, you remember, the case of Philip’s converts, “Then
they laid their hands on them and they received the Holy Spirit.” But there’s no mention of
tongues. So it’s wrong, I think, for us to be preoccupied with the question of tongues. Tongues is
a manifestation of the Holy Spirit but the Holy Spirit is separate from his manifestations and the
baptism with the Holy Spirit is not signified simply by speaking on tongues.

But Satan, I think, has preoccupied us with this you know. I think he has tried to preoccupy us
with what many of us will claim is a very cool, and intellectual, and middle of the way, and maybe a
British attitude to take. And the alternative many people say to these is, “That’s right, you’re
right brother. That’s madness talking about the baptism of the Holy Spirit as a second work. It
isn’t a second work, it’s one complete work and when we’re born of the Spirit we’re baptized with
the Spirit and there’s no question about it. And it doesn’t matter what my life is like, it doesn’t
matter whether I have the fruit of the Spirit in my life or not, it doesn’t matter whether I
minister in the gifts of the Spirit or not, I’ve been baptized with the Spirit because what you say
is right. In the New Testament it was to be one experience and even though it seems to me, I
haven’t experienced the whole one experience yet I know I’ve been born of the Spirit so I must have
been baptized with the Spirit.”

Now brothers, do you see that’s an utterly blind attitude today where you say because the norm in
the New Testament was one great experience then you say you’re a Christian and yet you haven’t the
fruit of the Spirit in your life, you have no experience of the gifts of the Spirit but you keep on
saying, “Ah, no but I’m baptized with the Spirit.” Now dear ones, do you see that’s contradicted by
the New Testament examples of people who had entered into only part of the work of the Holy Spirit
and it’s contradicted also by those of us who know we’re Christians but know we’re not moving in the
fullness of the Spirit.

So really, what we need to see is that the norm in the New Testament is one complete experience but
there are several indications in the New Testament itself that many people entered into only half of
the experience. Some were born of the Spirit and not filled with the Spirit. Some were anointed
with the Spirit and not filled with the Spirit. Some experienced victory and not power. Some
experienced power and not victory. Some experienced forgiveness of sins and neither power nor
victory.

Now I know that there are some brothers who say, “Well, you should accept the teaching of the work
of the Holy Spirit on the basis of the didactic passages alone in the New Testament and you
shouldn’t bother with the descriptive passages. But do you see from the didactic passages you get
the norm and the normal doctrine of the Holy Spirit, but from the descriptive passages you find how
that worked out in human experience and how it often worked out only partially in some people’s
experience.

Now, that’s brothers what I’d like to look at a little now. Would you look with me at some of the
impartial experiences of the work of the Holy Spirit? First of all, you get Acts 19:1-6, and you
remember those were Apollos’ converts at Corinth. And you read in Verse 2, and Paul said to them,
“Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?’ And they said, ‘No, we have never even heard
that there is a Holy Spirit.’ And he said, ‘Into what then were you baptized?’ They said, ‘Into
John’s baptism.’ And Paul said, “John baptized with the baptism of repentance, telling the people
to believe in the one who was to come after him, that is, Jesus.’ On hearing this, they were
baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. And when Paul had laid his hands upon them the Holy Spirit
came on them; and they spoke with tongues and prophesied.”

Now, here was a group of people who believed on the one who was to come. Now, old Apollos obviously
hadn’t even told them about Jesus but they believed on the Messiah who was to come and through whose
holy servant of God they were to receive the forgiveness of their sins. In other words, they were
baptized as good Jews. Now, they obviously received the forgiveness of their sins for Jesus’ sake
but they did not believe for the Holy Spirit. And it is unto you according to your faith. Now it
seems that many people can be born of the Spirit and have their sins forgiven and yet not be
baptized with the Holy Spirit because it is unto them according to their faith.

There’s another situation in Acts 8, you remember, Philip converted some people in Samaria and in
Acts 8:5-8 you read this, that Philip asked them then to come forward and then explained to them
what was going to happen. Acts 8:5, “Philip went down to a city of Samaria, and proclaimed to them
the Christ. And the multitudes with one accord gave heed to what was said by Philip, when they
heard him and saw the signs which he did.” And then it says, you know, to be clear in Verse 12,
“But when they believed Philip as he preached good news about the kingdom of God and the name of
Jesus Christ, they were baptized, both men and women.”

Now here was an instance where people believed in Jesus for the forgiveness of their sins and so
they actually were born of the Spirit. They were not just good Jews, they were born of the Spirit
and they became children of God. And yet, “When the apostles at Jerusalem heard that Samaria had
received the word of God, they sent to them Peter and John, who came down and prayed for them that
they might receive the Holy Spirit; for it had not yet fallen on any of them, but they had only been
baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. Then they laid their hands on them and they received the
Holy Spirit.”

Now, it seems that some people can actually be baptized in the name of Jesus and become Christians,
not just be good Jews who know the forgiveness of their sins but really know Jesus himself and be
born of his Spirit and yet not be baptized with the Holy Spirit. And it seems to me that there are
some people that we come across that are in that position.

Then there’s another example, you remember, in 1 Corinthians 3:1-3, “But I, brethren, could not
address you as spiritual men, but as men of the flesh, as babes in Christ.” These are the people in
whom the spiritual gifts were manifest. The Corinthian church had the spiritual gifts in complete
fullness. You could see it from the details Paul gave in 1 Corinthians 12 about spiritual gifts and
yet he says, “I could only address you has babes in Christ. I fed you with milk, not solid food;
for you were not ready for it; and even yet you are not ready, for you are still of the flesh.” And
he says, “You are still carnal.” “For where there is jealousy and strife among you, are you not of
the flesh, and behaving like ordinary men?”

Now here was an instance of men who had been baptized with the Spirit and experienced the gifts of
the Spirit but had not experienced the inner purifying work of the Holy Spirit. And so it seems to
me you can come into that situation where people have entered into the power of the work of the Holy
Spirit but not into the purity.

Now really brothers, these are some of the instances in the New Testament that suggests that though
the work of the birth and the baptism of the Holy Spirit should probably and is planned by God to be
one great work, yet there are examples in the New Testament that it was only a partial work. What I
would like us to talk about probably in the next tape or the next time we meet is what should be our
practical attitude then to our own lives and our own experiences in the light of this fact that the
norm in the New Testament is one great experience but there are instances of people entering into
only partial experiences. And I would trust God, that he would at least begin to guide you in your
outworking of it in your own life during these days. Amen.

Fruits of the Spirit

Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill

I’d like brothers to really talk today about how to enter the fullness of the Holy Spirit. And you
remember, that last time we talked about the New Testament experience of the Holy Spirit and we
talked about receiving the Holy Spirit as being an essential part of entering into Christ where Acts
2:38 says, “Repent and be baptized into the name of Jesus for the remission of your sins and you
shall receive the Holy Spirit.” And the indication is in the New Testament that everybody was
expected to enter into the fullness of the Holy Spirit as a complete experience in salvation. And
yet you remember we saw that there were definite descriptive parts of the New Testament that
revealed to us that not everybody entered into the fullness of the Spirit.

You remember in Acts 19 Apollos’ converts entered into only the Jewish forgiveness of sins and I
think many people do that today, enter simply into forgiveness of sins. Probably as with Apollos’
converts through lack of light rather than through unwillingness to make a full surrender. Some
people enter into the same thing as Philips’ converts in Acts 8, they entered into a real
forgiveness of sins through Jesus and a real baptism into Jesus but they had not believed for the
fullness of the Holy Spirit and so the fullness of the Holy Spirit did not come to them so they were
simply in that position. They didn’t know all that the Holy Spirit could do in them.

And I think a lot of people in churches today are in that position, they just have not had full
surrender or the fullness of the Holy Spirit preached to them and so they enter into only a partial
experience. Thirdly you remember, there were the Corinthians that Paul wrote to who had entered
into the baptism with the Holy Spirit for the gifts and ministered in tongues and ministered in
healing but had not entered into the Holy Spirit as far as purity of life was concerned and so Paul
had to say you are carnal you are fleshly, you behave like ordinary men, you’re walking like
ordinary men who have never met Jesus. And I think there are many people in that position today who
believe their sins are being forgiven and even have some experience of the gifts of the spirit but
have not purity of life in their own hearts.

Now, what I’d like us to share just for about half an hour is how to enter into the fullness of the
Holy Spirit. What should be our practical application of the didactic teaching in the New Testament
that all men should enter into the fullness of the Holy Spirit and of the descriptive teaching that
some did not. I think the heart of it is our attitude should be a pragmatic attitude. We should
not play about with semantic games. We should not take the position of those people who say, “Well,
it is God’s will for you to enter into a full experience isn’t it? To enter into the new birth and
to enter into the baptism of the Holy Spirit all at once. That’s God’s will for you. Now, if
you’ve entered into part you must have entered into all.”

Now, it’s not wise to play that semantic game you see. Some people would say, “Oh well, doesn’t it
mean we’ve entered into the Holy Spirit, that we’ve all of the Holy Spirit that we need, but we’re
not letting him express himself in our lives?” Do you see it’s silly to argue about whether you’ve
entered into all of the Holy Spirit and you’re not letting him express himself in your lives or
you’ve entered into only part of the Holy Spirit and you need to receive more of him? It’s silly to
argue over that semantic question which is which. The vital thing is to take a pragmatic and a
practical attitude to the people involved.

I think we shouldn’t argue about superficial signs. I don’t think you should get into the position

where you say to a person, “Have you spoken in tongues?” Because obviously, the Bible makes it very
plain that not all people speak in tongues. I think it’s foolish if you get into the position,
“Have you had hands laid upon you and received the baptism of the Holy Spirit by that method?” It’s
silly to talk about superficial signs, you know, that are involved in the baptism of the Holy
Spirit. It’s wrong even brothers, to talk about the way you entered it. It’s wrong for me really
to say to you, “I entered in this way brothers so you must enter in the same way.”

Loved ones, I think we should be pragmatic about the thing. We should deal with the question, “have
you the marks of a person who is filled with the Holy Spirit?” Not did you go through a Pentecostal
experience, not did you go through a holiness experience, not do you think you’ve died to self, but
have you the marks of the fullness of the Holy Spirit in your life? And deal with that issue
brothers. Deal with reality. That is what will save us from all kinds of wild and vague
introspection and uncertainty. Deal with the basic pragmatic fact, “You’re filled with the Holy
Spirit? Okay. Have you the marks of a person who is filled with the Holy Spirit?” And then when
you’ve dealt with that see that it’s beautiful. If I haven’t those marks what I need is to be
filled with the Holy Spirit not to try harder, not to pretend that I have the fullness of the Holy
Spirit but to see I’ve entered into a partial experience like many people in the new Testament and
now even though I’m in Jesus’ and my sins are forgiven and I’m accepted by the Father because of his
blood, yet I need to enter into more of the Holy Spirit.

But brothers I think our attitudes should be pragmatic. Okay, what are the marks of the fullness of
the Holy Spirit? Well, maybe you’d like to look at very plain ones given in Galatians 5:22, the
fruit of the spirit. Galatians 5:22-23, “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience,
kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such there is no law.” Now,
when a person is filled with the Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit will bear the fruit of the Spirit
naturally and effortlessly in their lives. In other words, you will find yourself not having to try
to produce love and long suffering. You will find long suffering rising up from your spirit. Your
spirit, your inner human spirit will be a spirit that is filled with the Holy Spirit and will
automatically bear the fruit of that Holy Spirit.

You’ll find in situations that there’ll just rise up a gentleness in your heart; it will just come
from within. You’ll just know it’s there. If I were to ask you or if you were to ask yourself,
“Look, what is your spirit really like? What is your spirit inside you like at the moment?” You’d
be able to see, “It’s amazing, it’s a miracle, but it’s really a spirit of gentleness and of love.”
In other words brothers, you’ll be able to describe yourself as one who is love. That’s the fruit
of the Holy Spirit.

Some people have said, you know, “All the other fruits just really elaborate on the first fruit,
love. Joy, peace, long suffering, gentleness, goodness, are all expressions of love.” In other
words you’ll be able to say in 1 Corinthians 13, “Not love is patient and kind,” but, “My spirit, my
spirit is patient and kind. It is not jealous or boastful. It is not arrogant or rude. It does
not insist on its own way.” And you’ll be able to say your spirit that rises up from within you is
that kind of spirit.

And brothers, here’s the glory of it, if your spirit is not like that it’s great to see that there’s
a fullness of the Holy Spirit into which you can enter that will make your spirit like that. And
it’s good to see that you don’t have to try to keep repressing it or suppressing, or trying to will
it forth and say, “Oh, I’m filled with the Holy Spirit because I’m a Christian. I know that so I
have to really prove that I’m filled with the Holy Spirit.” No, it will be just a beautiful

admission. “Oh brother, my spirit is not like that. I have a spirit that comes up that is not
gentle and long suffering.”

Now, the thing is to begin to identify that spirit. You see, the Bible has told us that that spirit
would arise, you remember. In Galatians 5:17, it says, “This is the normal experience,” and I’m
afraid it’s the normal experience of most of us who have come to know Jesus. We believe in him for
the forgiveness of our sins. There comes in a beautiful sense of the presence of Jesus’ Spirit.
And in the early days and weeks we have no trouble reading the Bible, we have no trouble praying, we
have no trouble witnessing, it’s just a joy to do it. It’s a joy to serve our Lord. He’s given us
everything and we want to give everything to him.

And then many of us have found that this begins to be true inside us in Galatians 5:17, “For the
desires of the flesh are against the Spirit and the desires of the Spirit are against the flesh; for
these are opposed to each other, to prevent you from doing what you would.” And most of us who have
entered into the forgiveness of our sins, and have received the Holy Spirit inside us, find that
there’s another attitude in us that grieves the Holy Spirit and works against the Holy Spirit. And
we find that the Bible study isn’t so easy to do. We find there is another desire coming up inside
us to cut the Bible study a bit and get on with the rest of our lives.

There’s a bit of us that in prayer life, there’s a spirit within us of Jesus because we’ve really
received the Holy Spirit of Jesus when we’re born of God, but there’s a spirit inside us or an
attitude inside us that fights against that spirit that wants to go to God in prayer and says,
“You’ve other things to do. You have study to do you have more things you’re responsible for. You
have to get on with your own life as well as serve God.” And bit by bit many of us find that those
desires inside us grieve and quench the Spirit of Jesus more and more until we find a daily
resistance against God’s Spirit inside us and we find ourselves really just in a position that Paul
was in in Romans 7 where he says, “I find a law inside my members.” And he says in Romans 7:15, “I
do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing that I
hate.” And he says this, “For I know that nothing good dwells within me, that is, in my flesh. I
can will what is right, but I cannot do it. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not
want is what I do.”

Now many of us you see, in the Christian life have found that weeks, or months, or maybe years for
some of us, there begins to work inside us that desire that opposes the Spirit of Jesus at times.
Now, brothers it is true that if we would reject that spirit immediately, probably we would just
walk on into the fullness of the Holy Spirit. But the tragedy is that we tend to look around at
the rest of the Christians in the world who have had controlled surrender or half surrender preached
to them and we say, – well, I remember it happened in my own life. I remember the voice inside me
saying, “What would it be like to give everything to Jesus? To live only for him?” And I looked
around at all the other friends at college and I said, “Nobody else is doing that. That must be a
fanatical thought. I must get on with my own life, plan my career, make a good marriage, have a
good home, and serve God all I can.”

But I remember that voice and I do believe that the Spirit speaks to us early on in our Christian
lives and says, “Would you give all?” And brothers, the only reason a crisis experience is needed
in our hearts is because like the people in Corinth, we resist the Holy Spirit of Jesus. We resist
him and we build up a back log of resistances against the Holy Spirit so that we are actually
quenching him and grieving him. And that’s why it becomes necessary for us to come to a point where
we find, “What can I do? I’m not a Christian on the inside at all. I’m not in the position I

initially came to.” I realized, “I’m not a Christian inside at all. Inside I have all kinds of
Jekyll and Hyde struggles. Inside I have a desire to criticize my brother, I don’t have any desire
to love my sister, I have a desire to bite against them and the only reason I keep it down is
because I don’t want to spoil my witness.”

But what I didn’t realize was that that witness was being spoiled anyway because it was coming from
me, a stream of sweet water at times and a stream of sour water. And really it wasn’t a case of
teenagers. I mean it’s silly to tell about teenagers, you’re either one nature or the other nature.
A nature, when you talk about a person being a generous nature, you don’t mean he’s a generous
nature sometimes and a mean nature other times, or a pinch penny in nature at other times. You mean
he’s of a generous nature, that’s what he is, that’s what he’s like. Now you are either of one
nature or another.

When before we were born of the spirit they’re governed by an evil nature of the children of wrath.
When we’re born of the Spirit and as long as we submit to the Spirit we are born of God’s nature and
his nature is imparted to us. So brothers, really what many of us come to in our Christian lives is
what I came to 13 years after I’d been born of the Spirit. I came to a place where I had to face
it, was I a Christian or was I not? Was I governed by Jesus’ Spirit or was I governed by my own
desire for my own pride, and my own self, and my own ways? And bit-by-bit I began to see that
undoubtedly I was in Romans 7. I was not doing the good I wanted to do, it was the evil that I
wanted to avoid, that was the thing that drove my life.

And I didn’t know what to do, you know. I read a book called Possibilities of Grace and I began to
see there that some men had had to come into a new conviction of sin. And brothers, you know, I’m
not arguing that we all seek second experiences or second crisis but it was so in my life, that even
though I say here undoubtedly we can enter into a fullness of the Spirit as far as God is concerned
all in one activity and experience with the new birth, yet it seems true that most of us have to
come into a second conviction of sin, and a second believing, and a second repenting because our own
first one is not continued.

And I believe even the brothers, you know, across the Atlantic who would be a wee bit slow on the
whole business of baptism of the Holy Spirit, they would admit that this is the problem with many
Christians. This is the reason that many Christians are not living in the fullness of the Spirit,
because they have grieved the Spirit and they have quenched him in their lives and something else is
needed. And that’s why brothers, that’s why we emphasize so much another event in your life, or a
crisis of some kind because even though there may be a gradual, gradual awareness of your problem,
there comes a moment when you at last decide to deal with that problem.

Well brothers, I can only tell you the way I got down to it. First of all I started to see that
there was something in me that I couldn’t control. There was an attitude in me that I could not
control. I tried to control it, tried to pray it down, tried to will it down, tried to suppress it,
tried to repress it but there was something in me that wanted its own way, that wanted to be
independent of God. Now, it was a great help to me to see that that something was something that
was really beyond my control and I suspect that was the first step for me in any kind of
deliverance.

You see, the self inside us wants to believe that it can destroy itself whenever it wants and that’s
what kills most of us. Most of us feel, “Oh, I can control it whenever I really want to, it’s just
I don’t really want to. I can stop being impatient whenever I really want to.” It was a tremendous

relief for me when I looked – I think it was Romans 8:7 where I read this, “For the mind that is set
on the flesh,” and the flesh is just our independence of God you see, it’s not the physical flesh or
the sexual part of us, it’s the mind that is set on the flesh independent of God. For “The mind
that is set on the flesh is hostile to God; it does not submit to God’s law, indeed it cannot.”

And brothers that was a deliverance for me that I began to see that this thing inside me was really
something that I could not control. It was something that was a part of Satan in me and I could not
change it. It would not submit to God’s indeed it could not submit and for the first time I began
to distinguish between the part that Satan had in me and my own self. Up to then I’d mixed them
both up and that’s Satan’s game. He wants to mix up his rebellion in your heart with you. He wants
to try to get you to say, “Okay, that’s you. You can’t let you go.” And it’s a big step when you
begin to see, “But this isn’t the real me. The real me is deeper than that but this is something
that has almost taken me over.” And that was the first step in my life.

The second great step for me was seeing that God had done something with that because I didn’t know
how to get rid of it myself. And so Romans 6:6 was just deliverance for me. That can only be
deliverance I think when a man is at the end of his tether. That’s why I say approach this in a
pragmatic way. Deal with a person ask the gift of discernment to see where they are. If you
minister this to a person who isn’t ready for it, they’ll just give up completely. But for me, this
was life you know. What I didn’t know what to do with this place inside, this self that wanted its
own way and wouldn’t do what God wanted and then I saw in Romans 6:6, “We know that our old self was
crucified with him so that the sinful body might be destroyed, and we might no longer be enslaved to
sin.” And that was life that I saw that God had not only put my sins on Jesus and destroyed them,
but that he had put sin in the singular, the old independent self that produced sins, he had put
that on the cross and crucified that with Jesus.

That in some way loved ones that I couldn’t understand, God had put my independent rebellious carnal
will and rebellion against God into Jesus and destroyed that in him and that I was actually living a
lie. Persuaded by Satan I was believing that I was my own man that I was not bought with a price,
that I could do what I wanted. I could have my own way, I could do what I wanted, I could establish
my own rights, defend my own rights, assert myself and defend myself whenever I wanted and that all
that was a lie and that I was actually under the control of this old self because I was refusing to
believe that it had been crucified with Jesus. And so I began, you know, gradually to see maybe
there was a way through.

Then the thing that baffled me; why did I not believe that? Why did I not believe that my old self
had been crucified with Christ? And the Holy Spirit gradually showed me I didn’t believe it because
I didn’t want to believe it. I didn’t want my old self crucified. There were bits of my old self
that I liked. Alright, the anger was inconvenient at times but self-pity, I didn’t mind a good cry
over myself at times. It wasn’t bad at night just to think how everybody was treating me and it
wasn’t bad to kind of just mull over, mull over some of the resentment from the criticism I had of
people because it sort of made me feel, “Well I knew where other people stood and I knew what was
right and what was wrong.”

And I began to see that although there were bits of the old self that I didn’t like but there were
many bits that I hugged to myself and I enjoyed and that I really, in a way, couldn’t do without.
And so the Holy Spirit began to reveal to me in order to believe that your old self is crucified you
have to be willing for it to be crucified. And so I just began to ask the Holy Spirit, “Holy Spirit
will you show me what dying to self with Jesus on the cross would mean in my life at present?” And

for me it was a lot of different things. Anger for me was a method of pulling things back into my
control when they got out of control because I knew everybody respects you when you get angry so you
get angry to get them to respect you and get them to do what you want them to do.

And so the Holy Spirit made it plain to me, “If I take anger and self from you, you’ll actually be
in situations you can’t control. Do you know that? You’ll have to leave the control to me. Now,
would you be willing to let those things come under my control and not be able to control them or
stop them yourself? Would you be willing for me to call uncle when I choose not when you choose?
Would you be willing to face all the things that I would be willing for you to face however long I
ask you to continue it?” Brothers, I had to be willing to face the consequences in my life of the
Holy Spirit cleansing cleansing me from self, that’s what it was. I had to be willing to face the
consequences in my life of me being crucified with Christ.

Lust for me even though I was married, lust was a problem. So for me the question was, “Would you
be willing, if you die to self with Christ, and die like him to having a woman, would you be willing
if I asked you never to have intercourse again in your life?” And that was it. You know, he didn’t
ask me to do that afterwards but he asked me would I be willing and here’s the thing, the Holy
Spirit by searching out the places in my life where I was not willing for Christ’s death to be made
real, began to expose to me the part of myself that I treasured more than Jesus. And bit-by-bit he
began to get me down to the nitty gritty that it wasn’t the envy, it wasn’t the jealousy, it wasn’t
the lust, it wasn’t the pride, it wasn’t the ambition, it wasn’t the irritability, or bad temper, it
was self.

I felt I had the right to myself. I felt I had the right to run my own life and I had the right to
keep myself back from pain and hardship when I wanted to and I had the right to protect myself from
other people. I had the right to look after myself and take care of myself. And I began to see,
you know, it was self it was me Ernest O’Neill that was the problem and that that was the source of
all these works of the flesh envy, and jealousy, and bitterness that I read about in Galatians 5:21,
that it was the source of all those things. It wasn’t a matter of dying bit by bit, you know, to
self, and to envy, to envy and selfishness, and jealousy, and pride. It was a business of allowing
the Holy Spirit to bring me right to the ground of my heart where I saw it was myself I was
defending and would I be willing for that self to be crucified with Christ?

With me it was really finally, I mean, he gets you down to besetting sin, each of us has a besetting
sin that holds self down, you see. There’s a hard fallow ground that all of us have built up over –
because we have a back log of resistances to God’s will over many, many little failures and
surrenders. Now, on top of that fallow ground there’s a besetting sin like a cover of ice that
prevents the Holy Spirit getting down. All of us have a besetting sin. I think mine probably was,
“Would you be willing to be a failure for me if it’s for my glory?” I was a minister, I wanted to
succeed. I wanted to succeed.

I even defended it – self is so subtle, I even defended and said, “It’s for God’s sake you want to
succeed.” But I wanted to succeed I didn’t want to be left in the corner with nobody knowing what I
was doing for God. And finally, you know, the Holy Spirit brought me to that point, “Would you be
willing to be a failure for me? Would you be willing to be nothing for Jesus’ glory?”

Now brothers, I do emphasis that only the Holy Spirit can give you revelation on these things. Only
he could give me revelation. Even as I say this, you know, it was real to me when the Holy Spirit
made it real. It wouldn’t have been real if you had said it to me. I had to see the exceeding

sinfulness of myself. I had to think that this was a choosing – an intersection of two ways, a fork
in the path. I had to either go this way and all into the full surrender and fullness of the Holy
Spirit or I had to move out of Jesus. Actually, to be filled with the Spirit all you have to do is
to stay in Jesus. The only way to avoid the fullness of the Spirit is to step out of Jesus. And I
began to see that was the choice for me. Would I be willing to live for Jesus’ glory alone and
allow him to fill me with his Spirit so that was the only thing that governed my life?

And you know I’ve shared with you before, that there came a morning that the Holy Spirit witnessed
that I was at a place of full consecration. A place of full consecration. I’d often thought I was
at it before but I wasn’t sure. Then I began to realize if you’re not sure you’re not at it. There
was a moment when the Holy Spirit witnessed to me, “Yes, you are really willing to be nothing for
Jesus. You’re willing to be filled with me. Alright, I witness that in your heart.” And I just
knew it, I knew I was at a place of full consecration, or the human side of sanctification and then
I just received the fullness of the Holy Spirit that day.

Just a quiet assurance that he had come into my heart and with me there was just a sense of
cleanliness, and purity, and victory. There need not be that with you. For many people there’s a
weeping and a crying. For many people there’s a laughing. For many people there’s a speaking in
tongues. For many people there’s just a knowing. The heart of it is a knowing. You know that you
are willing to do what God wants from you in order to be filled with the Holy Spirit and therefore
that He must fill you and say you’ve just received the filling.

Now brothers, I honestly do believe that this is God’s normal way into a baptism of the Holy Spirit.
Really. I know there are other brothers and I’ll try and talk about it next day, I know there are
other brothers who will say, “Oh brother, you can enter into the baptism of the Holy Spirit with
tongues without any of this stuff that you’re talking about.” Brothers, I honestly do believe that
as it’s outlined in Romans 6, “Do you not know that you who were baptized into Christ Jesus will
baptize into his death so that you might be raised from the dead by the glory of the Father and
might walk in the newness of life.” I do believe that that’s God’s normal way of us entering into
the baptism of the Holy Spirit.

Now I agree with you, being ready to enter in is not the baptism. Being in a place of
sanctification, being in a place where you’re ready to be crucified with Christ is not the baptism.
It is the condition of the baptism it is a place of full consecration. But that is the normal way
to enter into it. Coming into a place of full consecration where you accept your identification
with Christ, and his death, and his life, and his resurrection and the Holy Spirit fills you with
himself and cleanses your heart. As Acts 15:9 says, God gives the Holy Spirit to them the Gentiles
that he did to us and cleansed our hearts by faith. And he fills you with the purity and the nine
fruit of the spirit and then he anoints you with that nine gifts of the spirit so that you can
minister that life to others. And that’s what I’d like to share next day the ministry of the gifts
of the spirit.

But brothers, if you don’t enter into an absolute consecration you’ll find that you’ll end up
ministering gifts in the flesh or by the power of demons, but you won’t minister the life of Jesus
unless your own life has been crucified with Christ and only his flows through you. So I really do
believe this is the normal scriptural way to enter into the fullness of the Holy Spirit that will
bring real joy and delight not only to your own life but the people who live with you. Amen.

Gifts of the Spirit

Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill

The unique factor in the Christian Gospel is not only Jesus but the gift of the Holy Spirit. And
that’s what we’ve been saying over the past few days, that the gift of the Holy Spirit is what sets
Christianity apart from Mohammedanism and Buddhism and other religions. It is that peculiar gift
that was offered, you remember, by Peter on the day of Pentecost when he said, “And you shall
receive the Holy Spirit when you’re baptized in the name of Jesus for the forgiveness of your sins.
Then, you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.”

And that is the unique gift that brings to us the very abilities and aptitudes of Jesus himself. No
other religion can do that. Buddha can never ensure that all his followers have the very gifts that
he had. Mohammad can never ensure that all his followers have the gifts that he had. But, Jesus
can ensure that we experience his own life through this gift of the Holy Spirit. And you remember
we shared in the past how the Holy Spirit normally comes into a person when he is born of the
Spirit, when he receives Jesus the first time for the forgiveness of his sins.

And how often the Holy Spirit then begins to try to expand his influence throughout that person’s
life and begins to try to fill that person with himself and how very soon after that most of us
began to experience a real double life inside us, a real sense of hypocrisy where the desires of the
flesh, the desires of our own selfish independent attitude to God strove against the desires of the
Spirit and we found that we were prevented from doing what we would. And most of us have found that
our lives have followed that kind of pattern.

We saw how in the New Testament it didn’t need to be like that. How in the New Testament probably
people were born of the Spirit and filled with the Spirit all at once and they died to self and were
raised with Christ the first day virtually that they heard the gospel. But we saw how even in the
New Testament many people experienced only half of the work of the Holy Spirit.

You remember the people who were converted in Acts 19 by Apollos had obviously believed in the one
that was to come and they’d obviously entered into some forgiveness of sins into actually a Jewish
experience of God wiping out their sins. Now, many of us have entered into that kind of partial
experience. Many of us have entered into what the people entered into who were converted by Philip
who entered into a real baptism into Jesus’ name for the forgiveness of sins and presumably came
alive in the Spirit and had the Spirit of Jesus inside them and were born of the Spirit but had not
really been filled with the Holy Spirit and so the apostles had to come down and pray they would
receive the Holy Spirit.

I think many of us too have come into the partial experience of the Corinthians who experienced the
fullness of the Holy Spirit for the gifts of the Spirit but still walked in strife, and envy, anger,
and jealously and therefore behaved like ordinary men and were called carnal or fleshly Christians.
And so we saw that in the New Testament times there were many people who entered into only half of
the work of the Holy Spirit so many of us have found the same thing, we’ve had to come to a new
experience of conviction of sin, of seeing where the Holy Spirit was not filling us completely and
seeing where we needed to die to self with Christ and be filled and cleansed by his Holy Spirit.

Now brothers that’s only half of the work of the Holy Spirit. The purifying work is only half of
the work that the Holy Spirit was sent to do. It is the cleansing work by which the Holy Spirit is

able to bring about inside our own lives the nine fruit of the Spirit but it is God’s will that we
should not only walk with the purity of Jesus but with the power of Jesus. And so the second part
of the work of the Holy Spirit is to anoint us with himself with power so that we can begin to
administer the gifts of the Spirit.

Now, if you imagine us entering into the purity of the Holy Spirit without the power of the Holy
Spirit, then it’s like imagining Jesus walking in absolute purity and coming to the leper and being
able to do nothing with him. Saying, “Well, look I love you with a pure heart but I can’t do
anything about your leprosy.” In other words, you would see a maimed Christ, a crippled Christ and
if we walk only in the purity of the Holy Spirit, we may walk in holiness, we may walk in purity and
in joy in our own lives, but we walk as a crippled Christ as far as the troubles and the problems of
this world is concerned.

Moreover, we’ll probably eventually walk back into our own self confidence because we’ll depend on
our own psychology or our philosophy to deal in problems of counseling with people who are being
oppressed by Satan. We’ll to try to deal with the ordinary form of medicine with people who are
oppressed in their body. So, it’s vital not to accept only half of the work of the Holy Spirit but
to go on and see that the Holy Spirit wants to make available to us the nine gifts of the Spirit.
And this is the second part of the work of the Holy Spirit.

Now, on the other hand, if you enter into the nine gifts of the Spirits without the purity of the
Holy Spirit running through you, if you enter into a ministry of gifts without really being purified
and cleansed from anger, and envy, and jealousy, then you’ll find yourself ministering the gifts in
the power of the flesh or in the power of satanic forces and you’ll find your ministering gifts but
instead of ministering life of Jesus through the gifts you’re ministering miracles and great events
that everybody is preoccupied with and people will be preoccupied with you instead of with Jesus.

So it’s vital, you can see, to enter into both the purity and the power of the Holy Spirit. What
I’d like to do just for a short time now is to talk a little about the nine gifts of the Spirit.
So, if you have a Bible maybe you’d turn to 1 Corinthians 12 and just see the teaching that is very
plain there and that will prevent us from going astray in regards to the nine gifts of the Spirit if
we’d only look at it. I think the first thing really to see is the statement made in 1 Corinthians
12:11, “All these are inspired by one and the same Spirit, who apportions to each one individually
as he wills.”

Now brothers, we need to write that on all our walls and in all our hearts, that it’s the Holy
Spirit who distributes the gifts. You can’t claim the gifts yourself by the sheer determination of
your faith. It is the Holy Spirit who distributes the gifts. He distributes to each one
individually as he wills for the up building of the body of Christ. Now, you cannot go to God and
say, “I want a gift to prove that I’m filled with the Holy Spirit.” Nor can you go to God and say,
“Look, I need this gift now give it to me.” The Holy Spirit distributes the gifts to each one of us
as he wills.

Now, I agree with you that the Bible says that we should covet the best gifts. We should want them,
you see. We should desire them. We should be in a position where we say, “Holy Spirit, we want you
to give us all the power that we need to be you to these people today.” And that should be our
general attitude of hunger and thirst for all that the Holy Spirit wants to give us. But then we
should wait upon him to show us which gift he wants us to have so that we can believe him for it.

So brothers, it’s important to see that it’s the Holy Spirit who distributes the gifts. You don’t
grab the gifts yourself. That is why it’s important to see the truth that is outlined there in
Verse 29 of 1 Corinthians 12, a verse we looked at before, 1 Corinthians 12:29, “Are all apostles?
Are all prophets? Are all teachers? Do all work miracles? Do all possess gifts of healing? Do
all speak with tongues? Do all interpret?” In other words, God is plainly saying, “All people are
not prophets, all do not work miracles.” Why? Because they haven’t enough faith, because they’re
not baptized with the Holy Spirit, because they’ve been under heretical teaching that has taught
that the Holy Spirit only cleanses? No, because the Holy Spirit distributes to each one
individually as he wills and he does not distribute tongues to everybody and he does not distribute
gifts of miracles to everyone. He distributes to each one as he wills.

One of the beauties of this is that no man becomes preeminent above everybody else by the fact that
he ministers in the whole nine gifts of the Spirit. No man becomes preeminent. It’s vital for John
to be in the body because the Holy Spirit is given him a gift that he has not given me. It is vital
for Scott to be in the body because the Holy Spirit is distributing to him a gift that he has not
distributed to me and so the body comes into a beautiful harmony and wholeness where it’s not just a
matter of Scott saying, “Oh yeah, yeah, I know I’m part of the body. I know you want me to feel I’m
necessary but really you could do it on your own.” It’s so good to be free from that. To see that
each of us is vital to the body. That the body is not a body if John is not in it. The body is not
a body if Scott is not in it. Why? Because the Holy Spirit will distribute to him a particular
gift at a particular time that will be needed in the body.

I think that’s important to see that, that no man can say, “I have the gift of healing.” No man can
say, “I have the gift of miracles.” Every one of us has to say, “The Holy Spirit will give us the
gift for the time that we need it at the time that we need it and then will take it back to
himself.” So, I think it’s good to see that the Holy Spirit is the one who distributes the gifts.

Maybe it would help us to see that there are differences of gifts, and differences of workings, and
differences of services because I think a lot of people say, “If you’re not ministering the gift of
tongues, or the gift of healing in the way I have seen it ministered then you’re not ministering
that gift.” Now maybe you’d look in Verse 4 of 1 Corinthians 12 to see God’s description of how the
gifts work, “And there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit.” So, there are nine different
gifts but there is the one Holy Spirit who distributes those gifts.

Then come to another person’s attrinity, the second person in Verse 5, “And there are varieties of
service, but the same Lord.” Now, there are varieties of service, Jesus will appoint some of us to
be pastors and teachers, some of us to be evangelists, some of us probably to be administrators.
He’ll appoint different ones of us to different services and the nine gifts will be ministered in
those different services, all obviously in different ways. A preacher ministers the gift of
prophecy in a very obvious way that is plain to everybody. He ministers it in a very different way
when he’s in a counseling situation. He ministers it in a slightly different way when he’s an
evangelist. Now, there are varieties of service and some of us will be administrators but we’ll
still need the nine gifts of the Spirit for our service.

Then in Verse 6, “And there are varieties of working,” maybe this is the most important one, “But it
is the same God who inspires them all in every one.” Now, there are different gifts distributed by
the Holy Spirit. There are different services appointed by Jesus but there are varieties of working
of the gifts or differences of operation and they are determined by God. And brothers I think it’s
vital for us to see that everybody does not minister the gift of healing the way Katherine Kuhlman

does. She ministers it by listening to Jesus’ Spirit and knowing when he reveals to her that
somebody in the balcony has been healed. Then she says, “Come up if you’ve been healed and she
invites them up.” They’re already healed she doesn’t heal them via her touching them.

So often as she recognizes and is given the gift of revelation, they have been healed. Oral Roberts
is different, he calls them up, lays his hands on them and heals them in the name of Jesus. There’s
a man called Christopher Woodard in London who doesn’t heal either of those ways. He is given
discernment by Spirit to see when a person is tense or upset in their own spiritual life and he
ministers directly to that and the healing of their whole spirit spreads to their body and heals
them.

Now brothers, it’s vital to see that there are different ways to minister the gift of healing and we
are being utterly naïve and utterly unfair to God’s word to say a man has not a gift of healing
because he simply doesn’t lay hands on people and they’re healed. Healing comes in many different
ways, so the gift of prophecy, so the gift of knowledge. So, dear brother David can stand in front
of a meeting and say, “I know what you were doing wrong today and I know what your relationship is
with this person,” and he can see right into your spirit and he can tell you that and that’s a real
gift of knowledge for knowing what is in a person’s life. Now, he can minister that gift of
knowledge that way another person can minister it in a study counseling another person not saying,
“Scott, I know what is in your heart.” Maybe he doesn’t know, but he shares something automatically
and Scott wonders, “How on earth did you know that about me?” And that’s the gift of knowledge
ministered in a much less obtrusive way but ministered nevertheless. So it’s important to see, you
see, that there are different ways of workings in the gifts.

Now, brothers maybe we could go on directly into the gifts themselves and just talk about them
one-by-one a little. You see that there are nine gifts. Let’s look at really the first one
mentioned there in Verse 8, “To one is given through the Spirit the utterance of wisdom.” Now,
there is an earthly wisdom you know, that comes from studying the psychology books, the philosophy
books and even that comes from studying the Bible. But there is a spiritual wisdom that is exactly
right for that person in their spiritual state. There’s a spiritual wisdom that is deeper than just
a scriptural wisdom. There’s a time when it may seem to you, “The right thing scripturally is this
person is obviously in disobedience to God and what they need to do is repent.” And you say, “Okay,
you must repent,” and you minister repentance to them.

A spiritual wisdom gives you the insight to see that what that person fails to believe is that God
is good and that God will forgive them and that’s really why they don’t repent. They don’t want to
even acknowledge their sins because they’re afraid God won’t forgive them. Now spiritual wisdom is
concerned with the internal workings of the Holy Spirit in a person and is a wisdom that is deeper
than just knowledge. Spiritual wisdom is really what a lot of the churches lacked. Spiritual
wisdom for instance in ministers or speakers enables you to apply the right word to a body at the
right time.

I remember reading once where someone said a lot of preachers are trying to cut wheat with a plow
and they’re trying to plant corn with a threshing machine and I think a lot of us are trying to do
that. I think a lot of us are trying to bring people into forgiveness with the word of law when we
should be using the word of grace and a lot of us are trying to bring people to an awareness of God
with teaching love/love all the time when what we should be bringing is the word of law home to
their hearts to convict them. Now spiritual wisdom is knowing which to do and the Holy Spirit gives
you that. The Holy Spirit gave wisdom, you remember, to Philip when he went up to Ethiopia eunuch

and asked him, “Do you know what you’re reading?” That was the right thing to ask that eunuch at
that time. Now that’s spiritual wisdom.

Do you see the next one is in Verse 8, “And to another the utterance of knowledge according to the
same Spirit.” I don’t think we need to dwell on that because I mentioned it as an illustration
earlier on that the gift of knowledge is the ability to know what is in a person’s spirit. So, I
remember one fellow who was dealing with someone who was seeking Jesus and suddenly this pastor saw
a great white cockatoo, just saw it as a vision. Now knowledge doesn’t come to everybody, it
doesn’t come to me like that, but it came as a great white cockatoo. So he said to the fellow, “Do
you know anything about a big white cockatoo?” The fellow said, “Yeah, yeah, yeah, I stole it four
years ago.” And he wouldn’t confess that to God and that was what held him up and when he confessed
it and dealt with it and was prepared to make restitution God dealt with the man. Now that’s the
gift of knowledge you see. It’s knowing what is in a person’s spirit.

Now brothers, could I say this, that most of these gifts are probably ministered with the person
very unconscious that he is ministering the gift. Probably that’s true. Probably we’re not very
conscious at the time that we’re ministering that. I’ve had a number of people come into the study
during this week so far and obviously they were ministered to as if I knew exactly what was in their
spirits but I didn’t know. So often the Holy Spirit will give the gift of knowledge and get you to
pass it on almost without you knowing. Now at other times, you’ll know very well. So you know, I
love you brothers and I just know at times what is in your hearts.

It’s very important also to see that the gift is the utterance of knowledge not just the knowledge
because I think a lot of us feel, “Ah yeah, I know what is in his heart so I minister it now,” and
we shouldn’t. I think we have to be loving to each other very often and hold back and some things I
see in you brothers and I’m sure you see in me and you just – no, God tells you, “Don’t utter just
keep quiet about it and pray and let the brother come on in to this.” So it’s more important that
you see that knowledge, the utterance of knowledge is something deeper than just knowledge itself.

Verse 9, “To another faith by the same Spirit.” This is working faith, you see, it’s not saving
faith that comes when a person is willing to submit to God and believe that Jesus has died for their
sins. But this is working faith. This is faith that works results in people’s lives. It’s the
kind of faith that Mueller had, you remember, with the orphanages. He just prayed and prayed and
God brought money and he built orphanages for thousands of homeless children just through the result
of his prayers.

Now if you remember reading Mueller’s life he emphasizes that he was not driven to build the
orphanages primarily for the children, though he really loved the children, but primarily to show
the world that God was still a prayer answering God and so God granted him the gift of faith for
that purpose. The gift of faith would really be seen in people like Brainerd who was among the red
Indians where he obviously could not be understood by the Indians through a drunken interpreter.
They couldn’t understand what he was trying to get over and yet Brainerd was given the gift of faith
in long periods of prayer each day to pray for these Indians so that they came to the highest level
of Christian living through the preaching that Brainerd did through the drunken interpreter. Now
obviously, it didn’t come through what the interpreter was able to say. It obviously didn’t come
through the spirit that came through the interpreter. It came direct from the Holy Spirit by
revelation as a result of old Brainerd’s faith and that’s what we mean, you see, when we talk about
the gift of faith.

Now, just if I could say a little about each it might be useful rather than spending a long time on
certain gifts. “To another,” Verse 9, “Gifts of healing by the one Spirit.” Again, I don’t think we
should spend a long time on it because I used that as an illustration at the beginning. But the
gift of healing can be manifested in many, many different ways and frankly, I think the Holy Spirit
wants to bring a lot of us in the bodies around the world into now is such an atmosphere of Jesus’
presence in an ordinary meeting. Such an atmosphere of love and peace. Such an atmosphere of
brokenness as far as soulish powers are concerned, that people will come into the meeting and
they’ll just sense a healing. They’ll just sense a healing in the atmosphere and they’ll receive
the healing without anyone doing anything.

It seems to me to keep us clear from this emphasis on people, “Oh, that man, you should see how he’s
used in healing.” It seems that in these days Jesus wants to lead us a way from this preoccupation
with individuals and lead us into a consciousness of the reality of the body of Christ. And that
when a number of people come into real love and harmony with Jesus, and with the trinity family, and
with each other, all the gifts of the Spirit begin to be manifested just naturally by the Holy
Spirit. So the gift of healing I think maybe we should just go quickly on since I did use some
examples about Katherine Kuhlman and Oral Roberts.

The next gift mentioned is in Verse 10, “To another the working of miracles.” Miracles is almost in
a sense apart from faith. It’s a definite miracle that is worked for a real reason and purpose and
as a sign not just for the sake of the healing but as a sign to people that God’s super natural
power is at work. It seems to me that’s how it would differ from the gift of healing which is
primarily concerned with bringing health to people. But the gift of miracles may be a gift of
healing but is primarily from the point of view of a sign to show that God’s super natural power is
still at work here in the world. Carvasso got into a coach you remember, in the 19th Century; there
were 12 people in the coach. They road down two miles down the road and he got out again and the 12
people were Christians.

Now, that wasn’t because he did a quick round with the Spiritual Laws booklet but because he had the
gift at that moment of the miracle whereby God revealed Jesus so really to each of these people that
they saw him and they did submit to him. The gift of miracles would be seeing, you remember, with
Finney when he went into that weaving factory and there were two little girls tittering you
remember, in one corner and he looked over at them and they tittered a little longer, and then they
got nervous, and then the tears began to come down their eyes, and then one broke the thread you
remember, and then they got worried, and then they started to weep quietly. Then another person at
the next loom began to weep, and another person further down the factory floor began to weep and
then gradually everybody began to get down on their knees and the manager who was still standing
with Finney looked around and then he closed the factory for the whole day and they sought God.

Now that’s a gift, that’s a miracle you see. Now it is important brothers for us to see that this
gift is still available to us and will be needed as we go out to be a Christian Peace Corps in God’s
world because that’s the only thing we have to pit against massive economic systems of supply and
support that Russia and America will give to different nations. We will have this power to work
miracles and God will work them, you know, in us in regard to damning up waters for reservoirs, in
regard to piping in electricity to people’s home, in regards to transport of all kinds, problems of
all kinds, God will work miracles for us. Now that’s the gift of working miracles.

“To another prophecy.” I think I shared that a little, that prophecy is the speaking forth of God’s
word and the speaking forth of the right word at the right moment. It’s not just the ability to

preach you see there are people who preach with no gift of prophecy. There are people who preach
just from their own knowledge of God’s word and their own insight into human nature. But the gift
of prophecy is being able to speak forth God’s word to the right person at the right moment. Now
that you can do in a constant situation. That you can do in an ordinary witnessing situation.
That’s where we’re so far astray when we go up to a person who isn’t a Christian and we blast them
with all the gospel versus and we say, “Well, we ought to take them through the whole gospel and we
ought to hit them with this, and this, and this.”

This is why it’s vital in any kind of booklet that outlines how to bring a person to Christ, it’s
vital that we receive from the Holy Spirit the gift of prophecy to speak the right verse at the
right time to that person. And the gift of prophecy is that more even, you know, than speaking
forth words about the future. Only on occasion did the prophets actually prophecy about the future.
More often than not, if you examine the Old Testament prophets, they spoke the right word to the
nation of people at the right time.

“To another the ability to distinguish between spirits.” In Verse 10, and that’s the discernment of
spirits and that’s what we need so badly today because there are a whole lot of people going around
doing miracles of all kinds, speaking in tongues in all kinds of situation and so few people seem to
have the discernment of the Holy Spirit to tell whether it’s of the Spirit. Whether it’s of an evil
spirit or whether it’s of the flesh. And brothers, that gift of discernment is essential. You can
read a book that seems very scriptural and seems very fundamentalist in its doctrine and yet there
can be a subtle spirit of deception running through that book. So it’s vital to have the
discernment of Spirits not only to see what books to read but to see what a person is like really in
their hearts.

It’s not enough in these days, you see, to say, “Oh I was baptized with the Spirit. I speak in
tongues. I have been used by God to bring miracles and healing.” So were the people that opposed
Moses that did the miracle of throwing their staffs down and turning them into snakes. So the Bible
says will the antichrist be. He will be a person who comes doing many miracles like a wolf in
sheep’s clothing having all the appearances of power. And unless we have the discernment of the
Spirit we can be led away after the antichrist thinking that it is Christ himself. So there’s a
great need for the discernment of spirits.

I’d just like to go quickly over that though a lot more needs to be said about it to the last gift
because there is so much misunderstanding about it. “To another various kinds of tongues, to
another the interpretation of tongues.” Could I just state briefly because of the shortage of the
time that if you examine 1 Corinthians 12 carefully you’ll find outlined there in 12, and in 13, and
particularly in 14, you’ll find especially in 14, there are three occasions when tongues are used as
a gift of the Holy Spirit.

One is in a believers meeting when only believers are present and there it’s to be used only if
there is an interpretation. If there is no interpretation then either the person themselves spoke
inspired by a demon, or spoke inspired by the flesh, or spoke out of God’s will. But it is not
God’s will for that tongue to come forth at that moment unless there is an interpretation. And the
problem is with the person who speaks in tongues. You may say, “What about the interpreter could
they not be disobedient of the Holy Spirit?” The Holy Spirit knows before he inspires a person to
speak in a tongue that there’s a person present to interpret. So first of all a tongues when it’s
used in a believers meeting must be accompanied by someone who has given the interpretation by the
Holy Spirit.

Secondly, you’ll see in 1 Corinthians 14 especially, that tongues can be used in private prayer
without interpretation and there the tongues simply express the glory, and the sense of praise that
you have for God in the midst of your private prayer. And it’s accompanied by a great sense of
elevation and a sense that you want to glorify God, “Father, you’re wonderful, you’re magnificent.
Lord Jesus, you’re beautiful,” and you run out of words and your tongue trips over itself as the
Holy Spirit gives you more words that you don’t know from an unknown language to express your desire
and your love for God. And there it’s used without any interpretation and it comes very naturally
from a sense of an inner desire to glorify and praise God.

When that inner desire isn’t there brothers, it’s questionable whether it’s tongue. If you ever
feel, “Oh, I must use the tongue today otherwise I’ll lose it,” then that’s questionable if that’s a
tongue in the Spirit. A tongue in the Spirit comes when you have a great sense of a glory and a
presence of your Father and you haven’t enough words to express your love to him. Now a tongue
comes then in private prayer. It up builds the person himself, and it elevates him and strengthens
him and releases his spirit.

The third occasion is in the presence of unbelievers. And then always it’s a known language such as
was used in the day of Pentecost. It’s a sign to unbelievers that God’s power is present. That’s
why they said, you remember, “Do we not all hear speaking in our own language the wonderful works of
God?” And often, you see, a person has been used I remember, Reverend Mirer was used by God in a
certain situation to speak to a person in their own language and he didn’t know the language at all
and this person said, “How did you come to speak in perfect,” whatever it was, “Arabian?” And he
was amazed. But it was the Holy Spirit giving him a known language to speak to an unbeliever to
convince the unbeliever that God’s power was still available.

Now it’s those three places you see, that the Holy Spirit in the Bible has told us tongues can be
used and I think we need to be careful in the use of them and to look especially at the New
Testament outline of a normal New Testament meeting and see that at the most two or three people
speak in tongues and always in order and always to the up building of the body and to the up
building of those present. In other words, where there are unbelievers present it’s very
questionable if you should ever use an unknown tongue.

How Can We Be Born of the Spirit?

Galatians 5:17-20

Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill

A dictatorship has been prepared for during previous years. And dear ones, in Cuba the people there
had had this decay working in their hearts for many years so that gradually their natures changed,
and changed, and changed and when the dictator came they welcomed him as the savior. And so it was
in Germany, it was no sudden event. The decay had been seeping through the nation. The decadence
had been working in the people’s hearts and to those of us on the outside it was a great surprise
when it took over, but to the people really, it was no surprise. The people received him as a
savior. It’s when the people’s needs, and the people’s willingness to pay the price for the
fulfillment of their needs come together that the dictator takes over without a battle. And so it
will be with the antichrist.

When the antichrist comes there will be no great opposition to him, but there will be a great
flocking to him from all the corners of the earth. From dear ones whose hearts have been deceived,
and whose hearts have been prepared, and whose hearts have been looking for the savior, and whose
hearts have not be filled with the Holy Spirit, and whose lives are not pervaded by the spirit of
God’s truth. And they will flock to the antichrist, and they will worship him as the savior.

So it will be with the personal opponent of Jesus Christ whom the New Testament says will come at
the end of the ages. He will be hailed as a new savior. And you say, “Well, why will this be?”
Well, you can look for yourself in the New Testament and find out why it will be dear ones, it’s in
1 John 4 and the second half of Verse three. 1 John 4:3, “And every spirit which does not confess
Jesus is not of God.” Then the second half reads, “This is the spirit of antichrist, of which you
heard that it was coming, and now it is in the world already.” That was 180, the spirit of
antichrist has been in the world preparing the hearts of many of the so called faithful to receive
the antichrist when he comes.

And so the Bible itself teaches that there is a spirit of antichrist abroad even in church people,
abroad even in those who think they are deep Christians. There is a spirit of antichrist seeping
underneath the very Holy Spirit that is trying to get ahold of our very hearts and lives and that
antichrist spirit is preparing us to receive the antichrist. And when he comes, many of us will be
deceived into thinking that this is Jesus. This is the second coming of our Savior.

Now, this is why the Bible warns us to discern spirits. And you can see that warning in 1 John 4:3B
there, “This is the Spirit of antichrist, which you heard that it was coming, and now it is in the
world already.” And 1 John 2:18, “Children, it is the last hour; and as you have heard that
antichrist is coming, so now many antichrists have come; therefore we know that it is the last
hour.” And in Chapter Four of 1 John 1, the warning to test the spirits, “Beloved, do not believe
every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are of God; for many false prophets have gone
out into the world.”

And you may say, “Well, why are you preaching about the antichrist?” Well, I’m not preaching
because you can stop the antichrist coming, you cannot. You cannot break scripture. The scripture
says, “The antichrist will come and you cannot stop him coming.” Even if I could tell you who he
was at this moment you could not stop him coming. Perhaps he is in the world already but you will

not be able to stop him coming because the scripture cannot be broken.

But dear ones, it is imperative that we begin to discern the spirit of antichrist when he moves in
our own hearts least we ourselves be deceived when he comes. That’s why I’m preaching. Not so you
will be able to look to the antichrist and not so that dear ones here will be able to become excited
over who the antichrist might be, dear ones those are doctrines of demons. Those are doctrines of
demons when these false prophets who do not even prophesy in the name of Jesus say, “The antichrist
is born in such and such a land.” That is not what the Bible tells us to look for. But, the Bible
does tell us to discern our own spirits and discern the spirits that are working in our own hearts
so that we ourselves will not be deceived.

You see, the Bible comes right down the line on who are Christians and who are not. The Bible comes
right down the line by the law and tells us, “If you obey the law then you please God.” The Bible
says that right from the first part of the Bible to the last part of the Bible. It tells us that
obedience to the law is the mark of the sons of God. Then Jesus Christ came and he says, “Whoever
has my spirit in their hearts, you are the sons of God, you are the children of God.” And Christ
comes right down the line and points out the things that we need to have if we claim to be alive in
God. And then the Holy Spirit came after Jesus ascended to the Father and he comes right down the
line and he says, “If I abide in you, you will have these marks. You will have love, and joy, and
peace.” And he comes right down the line. And the law and Jesus Christ’s life and the Holy Spirit
all testify to us who are the sons of God.

Now dear ones, there will come a day when God will allow someone to testify to us who will bring
even a clearer judgment. When the antichrist comes many of us who think we are sons of God will
find out where we really stand when we follow him as the antichrist. So it is important tonight, on
the last night of the conference, to make sure that you have the pure Holy Spirit of truth governing
your life.

Now, you may sit there and say, “Oh now, this is a lot of mumbo jumbo. You don’t need all this
stuff to distinguish the antichrist. I have a good mind and I may not be walking in all the light
that God has given me, but I have a good mind and I can discern the antichrist.” Now dear ones, the
Bible makes it plain that it will be difficult to discern the antichrist. One of the reasons it
will be difficult is given in 1 John 2:19. You remember, John has said so many antichrists have
come and then in 1 John 2:19, the Bible reads, “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 be plan
that they all are not of us.” But one reason is the antichrist and the spirit of the antichrist is
among us ourselves.

Another reason that’s given plainly in Ephesians 6:11. Ephesians 6:11, why you cannot discern the
antichrist just by your clever mind, “Put on the whole armor of God.” Why? “That you may be able
to stand against the wiles of the devil.” The devil when he comes, in the person of the antichrist,
will not plainly have a name on his chest saying, “Satan,” or, “Antichrist.” He will come with
tricks, and with wiles. It will be impossible to discern him however closely you have studied the
Bible. The Bible itself is not a sufficient guard against the antichrist.

Some of us know we’re not walking in all the will of God. You know it. You know you’re not walking
in all the will of God. You know you’re walking a little aside from God’s will and yet you keep
pretending to yourself, “Ah, I will not be deceived by the antichrist. I will know him because I
will see him. He will look like the antichrist.” He won’t dear ones. The spirit of antichrist was

in the false prophets and here’s what it said about the false prophets by Jesus, Matthew 7:15.
Matthew 7:15, “Beware of false prophets, who come to you in,” wolves clothing? No. But, “Who come
to you in sheep’s clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves.”

In other words, the antichrist will look like Christ. You see, from what you read in the scripture
the antichrist will come and will claim to unite all nations and all political powers in him. He
will claim to unite all churches in himself. He will come as the savior of the world. He will say,
“Come bring to me your sick and your dying. Come to me those who are enslaved and need deliverance
and I will deliver you.” The antichrist will look like Christ. He will be in sheep’s clothing.
You by the cleverness of your own mind or even by your intimate knowledge of the Bible will not be
able to discern him just by that alone.

You may say, “Oh, now that’s silly we’ll know him by his works. He will come and he will burn and
ravish all before him.” He won’t. He will come with healing medicines. He will come with an offer
of peace, mental peace such as we have never had before. He will come and offer to solve the
international problems in politics. He will come and promise to solve the economic difficulties we
have in our nations. He will come with good works. You doubt it? Well, look at what Jesus says
himself you can find it there in Matthew 7:22, that same Chapter Matthew 7:22, Jesus says, “On that
day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your
name, and do many might works in your name?’ And then will I declare to him, ‘I never knew you;
depart from me, you evildoers.’” And so the antichrist will come with mighty works that will
imitate the works of Jesus.

You remember what happened when Moses threw down his staff and it turned into a snake? Weren’t they
able to imitate the work even of God? How much more will the antichrist be able to imitate the very
works of Jesus? Some of us say, “Well, we’ll know him by his fruits, by their fruits you shall know
them.” But you know that today already, there are imitation fruits all around us. There are so
many of us that talk about concern now, we talk about care, you must be concerned, and you must show
concern for the downtrodden. But, it isn’t the loving, it isn’t the loving concern that comes from
the heart of Jesus it’s an artificial politic philanthropic concern that ends when its purpose is
achieved.

But already there is this artificial imitation of love abroad in many of our hearts. Already there
is an imitation of Christian joy abroad and many dear ones cannot discern the difference between
real Christian joy and the happiness that seems to exist in people’s minds. There is a false peace
abroad not only with the tranquilizers but there is a false peace with the new drugs. There is a
false peace with even the blindness that has come into many man’s eyes about the future. There are
artificial fruits. We will not be able to discern the antichrist simply by his works or by his
fruits.

The only way we can prepare for the coming of the antichrist and the only way you can be assured
that you will not be deceived by him when he comes is to allow the Holy Spirit tonight, to wield his
sword in your own spirit and to show you if any of the marks of the spirit of antichrist are present
in your life. Now, will you do that dear ones? Will you allow the Holy Spirit to wield his own
sword in your heart and to stop saying, “I was born again on that date.” Or, “I was sanctified on
that date.” Or, “I was baptized with the Spirit on that date.” And allow the Holy Spirit himself
to speak to your heart.

Let’s just look at some of those plain marks in scripture. The first one is found right at the

beginning of the Bible Genesis 3:4-6. Genesis 3:4-6, “But the serpent,” who is a symbol too of
Satan and of the antichrist, “But the serpent said to the woman, ‘You will not die. For God knows
that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.’”
The spirit of antichrist is the spirit of the whisperer. Yeah, the spirit of antichrist is the
spirit of the whisperer. The spirit of antichrist makes the bullets and allows someone else to
fire.

“I believe Mrs. Woodard feels that your children make a little too much noise.” Yeah, that’s the
spirit of antichrist. That establishes a hostile triangle, right? With the one that told it, with
the one whose children are being talked about, and with Mrs. Woodard. And you only need four of
those and you have 12 dear ones who have distrust being built up in their hearts for each other.
No, it is up to Mrs. Woodard to go and tell about the children herself. But, the spirit of the
whisperer wants to have the privilege of imparting to you some special knowledge that only she has.
The spirit of antichrist is the spirit of the whisperer.

This is why John Wesley said, “Never say anything about anyone who is absent or anyone who is dead.”
Never. You don’t need to talk about them. You don’t need to do you? Are you doing them any good?
It’s the spirit of antichrist that is working in your heart at that moment dear ones. It’s not
achieving any good, you know that, it only creates distrust. Or, you know, “I don’t think John is
really capable of that Job.” When it isn’t your responsibility to decide whether he’s capable or
not and you aren’t asked any opinion but you say to a third member, “I don’t think John is really
capable.”

That binds you two in an attitude of superiority to John and eventually John’s spirit feels that and
there’s distrust and the spirit of antichrist has already begun to prepare you to receive him when
he comes because he is the spirit of the whisperer. Dear ones, no whispering and if there is any
whispering in your heart and if you’ve done that then seek the spirit for purification tonight. Not
only for forgiveness but for purification from that whispering spirit.

Let’s look at a second mark of the antichrist and generally speaking it’s given by Jesus in Matthew
15:6. And generally speaking it’s the attitude of the serpent in the Garden of Eden. The attitude
that wants to question or disobey God’s word. You remember the serpent said, “God has not said,”
and it’s that spirit and it’s found in Matthew 15:6 and Jesus is speaking to some of those who had
the spirit of antichrist living in them. Matthew 15:6, “So, for the sake of your tradition, you
have made void the word of God.”

Now first of all dear ones, for the sake of your tradition. So many of us will say, “Well, I
believe that you’re righteous because Christ’s righteousness is imputed to you. I believe you’re
holy in Christ. I believe you can commit adultery and God looks down upon you and he says, ‘That’s
no adultery,’ because you’re within Christ.” And there are dear ones who say, “This is our
tradition. We believe in imputed righteousness. We believe you are holy in Christ. You may not be
holy in life but you’re holy in Christ.” And so they have a list of sins every day and they bring
them to Christa and they confess them to him as a matter of course but they thank him that they are
holy in Christ.

And Jesus again, and again says, “If a man love me he will keep my words. If a man loves me he will
not continue to cut me apart with the nails and the sword.” But they say they are holy in Christ.
And Jesus says, “So, for the sake of your tradition, you have made void the word of God.” There are
many in whom the spirit of antichrist has made void the word of God for the sake of their tradition.

So, let’s go to the other side of the spectrum and there are many of us who believe in holiness and
we say, “It’s glorious where you come to the place where you die to that old self and where the Holy
Spirit cleanses your heart from anger, and jealousy, and impatience, and irritability, and critical
spirit, and it’s glorious when you come to that place when you know the old self is dead at last and
nailed to the cross.” And then the next day we find we’re a little angry so for the sake of our
tradition, for the sake of our belief in eradication, we say, “The sin was taken out so that’s not
anger.” And we call black white. For the sake of our tradition we make void the word of God.

Now dear ones, those are some of the marks of the spirit of antichrist. And many of us – I see some
dear ones whom I love and they’ll know what I mean when I say this, many of us do the same with the
baptism of the Holy Spirit. We say, “I am baptized with the Holy Spirit. I may be irritable in my
home, I may cut my wife to bits, I may be angry when my friends oppose my doctrine but I am baptized
with the Holy Spirit.” Dear ones, the baptism with the Holy Spirit, according to Acts 15:9,
cleanses our hearts by faith but for the sake of our tradition we make void the word of God. One
group pretends that sin is not sin with them. The other group pretends that what they’re doing is
not sin and the middle group ignores sin altogether and for the sake of our tradition, for the sake
of our human doctrines we make void the word of God.
There’s another mark of the spirit of antichrist that is outlined in Colossians 2:16-22. Colossians
2:16-22, “Therefore let no one pass judgment on you in questions of food and drink or with regard to
a festival or a new moon or a Sabbath. These are only a shadow of what is to come; but the
substance belongs to Christ. Let no on disqualify you, insisting on self-abasement and worship of
angels, taking his stand on visions, puffed up without reason by his sensuous mind, and not holding
fast to the Head, from whom the whole body, nourished and knit together through its joints and
ligaments grows with a growth that is from God. If with Christ you died to the elemental spirits of
the universe, why do you live as if you still belonged to the world? Why do you submit to
regulations, ‘Do not handle, Do not taste, Do not touch” (referring to things which all perish as
they are used), according to human precepts and doctrines? These have indeed an appearance of
wisdom in promoting rigor of devotion and self-abasement and severity to the body, but they are of
no value in checking the indulgence of the flesh.” And many dear ones who have not really entered
into the purifying part of the Holy Spirit have sunk into a false legalism.

The Holy Spirit makes you want to obey God’s law and we have every responsibility to encourage each
other to obey the law of God if the Holy Spirit of God dwells in us. But, there is a false
legalism. There is a list of don’ts and dos that many of us arrange to suit ourselves. So, we
happen not to do this thing so we’ll label that a sin because we have no trouble avoiding it. And
we list our don’ts and we create a false legalism that is the very spirit of antichrist because it
takes our eyes off the beauty of Jesus and the spirit of Jesus and puts our eyes on men’s precepts
and doctrines.

There is also another mark of the spirit of antichrist mentioned in 1 Timothy 6:20. 1 Timothy 6:20,
“O Timothy, guard what has been entrusted to you.” This is the last verse of 1 Timothy 6 dear ones,
“Guard what has been entrusted to you. Avoid the godless chatter and contradictions of what is
falsely called knowledge, for by professing it some have missed the mark as regards the faith.”
“Avoid the godless chatter and contradictions of what is falsely called knowledge.” Even in Jesus’
day there was a devil living among the Greeks of gnostic beliefs. You remember the mastics felt
they had an esoteric kind of knowledge and you needed it.

Dear ones, let’s be humble about any knowledge that God has given us. You know there are movements
among us in these days that depend on an esoteric kind of knowledge. Esoteric means, you know, a

specialized kind of knowledge and you must joint my group to get it. Now dear ones, that’s
dangerous. The Spirit of Jesus is an open spirit full of love, full of joy with only one assurance
that the Spirit of Christ moves among you. That the Spirit of Christ motivates your every heart and
your every action. But it does not depend on an esoteric kind of knowledge that you feel you can
bestow on everyone else. That’s the very mark of antichrist.

So is the last mark of this kind that I’d ask you to look at. It’s in 2 Peter 2:17-19 and this is
the very opposite of the unscriptural legalism. 2 Peter 2:17-19, “These are waterless springs and
mists driven by a storm; for them the nether gloom of darkness has been reserved. For, uttering
loud boasts of folly, they entice with licentious passions of the flesh men who have barely escaped
from those who live in error. They promise them freedom, but they themselves are slaves of
corruption; for whatever overcomes a man, to that he is enslaved. For if, after they have escaped
the defilements of the world through the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are
again entangled in them and overpowered, the last state has become worse for them than the first.”
And you see what the Bible lays emphasis on, they promised him freedom but they themselves are
slaves of corruption and there is an unscriptural freedom, an unscriptural licentiousness.

There is a licentiousness that says, “It doesn’t matter what we do we have the Spirit of Christ
within us.” Dear ones, the mark of the Spirit of Christ is plain. It’s plain and you can’t go on
saying day, after day, after day, “Well, I’m angry but I have liberty in the Spirit.” The Bible
again, and again right down the line talks about anger. Proverbs says, “Cease from anger and
forsake wrath.” Another verse in Proverbs says, “He that is slow to anger is better than the
mighty.” Ecclesiastes says, “Be not hasty in thy spirit to be angry for anger rests in the bosom of
fools and the fool belief that there is no God.” And Matthew 5:19, you remember, Jesus says, “Think
not that I have come to abolish that law and those prophets. I have come not to abolish them but I
have come to fulfill them and I tell you it was said of old that whosoever kills is guilty of the
judgment but I say to you whosoever is angry with his brother is guilty of the judgment.” Let us
face the truth as it is in God’s word. Let us not say, “We have liberty. We have freedom,” while
anger rises and rules our hearts. We have nothing but the spirit off antichrist if that is so dear
ones.

Now, there is another mark of the spirit of antichrist and you can find it in 1 Timothy 1:6-7. 1
Timothy 1:6-7, “Certain persons by swerving from these,” you see what these are they are in Verse
Five, “The aim of our charge is love that issues from a pure heart and a good conscience and sincere
faith. Certain persons by swerving from these have wandered away into vain discussion, desiring to
be teachers of the law, without understanding either what they are saying or the things about which
they make assertions.” And so there are many today who claim today to be able to teach the way of
God but they teach it with so much ambiguity that you don’t know which side you’re on.

They say, “You should not sin.” But they say, “Well, this may not be sin and you can sin a little.”
They say, “Complete obedience to God is necessary. But well, you have to allow for a little
disobedience.” And they teach the way so ambiguously that no one knows where they are. They say,
“The Holy Spirit cleanses the heart from all sin,” and then they say, “Well, if there’s a little
rising that’s temptation.” Dear ones, temptation comes from the outside. The fiery darts of the
wicked one come into the converted heart and it’s like a can of gasoline inside and the look, the
look of the girl, or the temptation to be angry comes in as the fiery dart of the wicked one and
comes into the gasoline inside and there’s a reaction within that bursts out and responds. And the
flame goes up within and the anger is out or the lust is out.

And when the sanctified heart meets the fiery darts of the wicked one, the fiery dart of the wicked
one comes out from the outside and comes into the inside and into the can of water and it sizzles
out and the reaction and the response is not there. Ah dear ones, there’s no ambiguity about the
sanctified life. You can know whether you’re sanctified. It’s clear, there is no response within.
There is no rising from within. The temptation comes from without. But the spirit of antichrist is
trying to encourage many of us to say, “Well, maybe this maybe that.” The trumpet of God issues a
certain sound. You have no doubt about the trumpet of God, it issues a certain sound and you know
to prepare for battle. But so it is that many dear ones have come into ambiguity in their teaching.

Dear ones, there’s no ambiguity in the Bible, it’s full of it you know. Some people say, “Oh,
should a Christian obey God’s word? Can you really expect him to obey God’s word?” Well, it runs
through every part of it. Deuteronomy, “This day the Lord thy God has commanded thee to do these
statutes and judgments. They shall therefore keep them and do them with all thy heart and with all
thy soul.” Joshua says, “This book of the law shall not depart out of thy mouth even but they shall
meditate therein day and night that thy mayest observe to do according to all that is written
therein.” And we keep on asking, “Do you really mean that Christians are supposed to obey God’s
law?”

And Samuel said, “Hath the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices as in obeying the
voice of the Lord. Behold to obey is better to sacrifice and to harken than the fat of rams.” And
we keep asking, “Do you really think a Christian cannot have any sin in his life?” And in Matthew
it says, “Not everyone that sayeth unto me, “Lord,’ shall enter into the kingdom of heaven but he
that doeth the will of my Father which thou is heaven.” And we keep asking, “Do you really think
that we cannot afford to disobey God’s law even in just our [inaudible 30:21] or sons of God?”

Well, the Bible says in James 4:17, that if a man knows what is right to do and fails to do it for
him it is sin. And the Bible says, “Anyone who is born of God does not commit sin.” And then we
keep on ask you see, “Well, do you really think that we’re not allowed to sin at all?” And Jesus
says, “Therefore whosoever hear these things of mine and doeth them I will liken him onto a wise man
which built a house upon a rock.” And we ask, “Do you really think a Christian is meant to live
without sin? Do you really think he’s meant to obey God’s word?” And Jesus says, “For whosoever do
the will of my father which is in heaven the same is my brother and sister and mother.” And we say,
“Do you really think you can only belong to the family of God if you obey his word?”

Well dear ones, where does it stop? I have a list of symptoms of cancer here. Here they are and I
read them out to you. You don’t say to me, “I have only one of those.” One is enough. The marks
of the flesh are plain, you know they are. The marks of the flesh are there and you can look them
up yourself in Galatians 5:18-23. Galatians 5:18-23, “But if you are led by the Spirit you are not
under the law.” You see, you are not going to be condemned under the law. “Now the works of the
flesh are plain: fornication, impurity, licentiousness, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy,
anger, selfishness, dissension, party spirit, envy, drunkenness, carousing, and the like.”

Now the word of God is plain, if you come to that word and say, “Well, do you mean to say if I feel
just a little envy for that singer up there and just envy a little that voice that I am not walking
in the will of God?” Well, you can judge for yourself. You may say, “Do you mean to say if anger
rises in my heart at the children that I have some of the works of the flesh in me?” Well look,
look at the word. There is no ambiguity in God’s word and there is no ambiguity in the Spirit of
Christ but there is constant ambiguity in the spirit of antichrist.

Dear ones, I know many of you need to deal with the Holy Spirit for heart cleansing tonight and the
spirit of antichrist is trying to deceive you and persuade you that the amount of victory that you
have already is sufficient. Dear ones, complete victory is possible in the power of the Holy
Spirit.

Well so it goes on, another mark of the spirit of antichrist is 1 Timothy 4:1-2. 1 Timothy 4:1-2,
“Now the Spirit expressly says that in a later times some will depart from the faith by giving heed
to deceitful spirits and doctrines of demons, through the pretensions of liars whose consciences are
seared.” And one of the marks of the spirit of antichrist is the deceitful spirit, the dishonest
spirit.

When the Holy Spirit comes in and cleanses your heart and begins to lead you in away from your
soulish powers and into the purity of the resources of the tree of life, then you become very
conscious of the slightest dishonesty. The Holy Spirit makes you treasure absolute honesty,
absolute honesty. “That’s a beautiful dress.” Well, if it really is and you really think it is
then the Spirit of Jesus would have you say it and the dear one will know you mean it and the dear
one will know politeness and the dear one will know that cultured sophistication when she sees it
and there is just a great difference between the two.

When the Holy Spirit comes into your heart he makes you treasure honesty. He has nothing to do with
deceitful spirits because they are of the spirit of antichrist. He has nothing to do with doctrines
of demons. I think there are doctrines about demons as well as doctrines of demons. I think many
dear ones want to cast out demons when they should be repenting of carnality. And I think there are
a lot of us you know, that how that doctrine of demons and doctrines about demons. There are
doctrines of demons such as Robinson spreads about the virgin birth of Christ and there are
doctrines of demons such as [inaudible 34:40] spreads about the reality of God.

But there are also doctrines about demons and many of us are wanting people to cast out demons from
us when really the demon is just bad temper and we need to get down under God and surrender that old
self which produces the bad temper to him. But the doctrines of demons and the doctrines about
demons are part of the spirit of antichrist.

Then you see it mentions that their consciences have become seared and many wives weep over husbands
in these days. Husbands who think they are far on in the spirit and have not the Spirit of Jesus
ruling their own hearts and their homes. You cannot be advanced in the spirit unless the beauty of
Jesus rules your life and your home and in your work.

Just two more dear ones, and one especially that I think is important and you find it in Ezekiel
34:2-3. Ezekiel 34:2-3, and these men were produced by the spirit of antichrist even in Old
Testament times. Ezekiel 34:2-3, “Son of man, prophesy against the shepherds of Israel, prophesy,
and say to them, even to the shepherds, Thus says the Lord GOD: Ho, shepherds of Israel who have
been feeding yourselves!” A shepherd you see is one who feeds, but you’ve been feeding yourselves.
“Should not shepherds feed the sheep? You eat the fat, you clothe yourselves with the wool, you
slaughter the fatlings; but you do not feed the sheep. The weak you have not strengthened, the sick
you have not healed, the crippled you have not bound up, the strayed you have no brought back, the
lost you have not sought, and with force and harshness you have ruled them. So they were scattered,
because there was no shepherd; and they became food for all the wild beasts.”

There are many who feel they have advanced far in the Christian faith and they are ruled by
selfishness. And so I say to my dear brothers and sisters whom I love, it is glorious that there
will come a day that the sons of God will be revealed. It is glorious that Jesus is building for
himself a great body that will rise up and glorify his Father in heaven even as he glorified his
Father. It is glorious that there will be a great day when the sons of God will be revealed. And
that’s great but dear ones, let’s be careful. Let’s be careful that we do not become preoccupied
with the revelation of us as the sons of God, less we find ourselves feeding ourselves instead of
feeding the sheep.

After all there’s a time to sow and a time to reap. There is a time to be born and a time to die.
There’s a time to save the lost and to see the Holy Spirit filling others with the beauty of Jesus
and with the power of Jesus and there is a time for the revelation of the sons of God and no doubt
God will lead us forward bit-by-bit. We don’t have to keep looking ahead and trying to see what is
going to happen we can trust the Holy Spirit to prepare us for that day.

Let us be careful that none of the advancement that we have in the Christian faith becomes a selfish
delight in our position. Let us be careful that we are found doing what God has given us to do.
The commission, the great commission and my dear brother said, has never been with God. We are
still called to go and preach the gospel to all the world and we are to be found doing that when
Jesus comes.

Well the very last mark of the spirit of antichrist is there in the original chapters we were
studying 1 John 2:22. 1 John 2:22, “Who is the liar,” “Who is the liar but he who denies that Jesus
is the Christ? This is the antichrist, he who denies the Father and the Son.” You mean I say God
is not the Father, Jesus is not the son? No. Deny means make nothing of the Father and make
nothing of the son.

Perhaps the greatest and clearest mark of the spirit of the antichrist is that the antichrist will
rise in the place of Jesus. He will take the place that Jesus himself ought to have and the spirit
of antichrist is found that it is clearest in our own hearts, in our own selves when we want to rise
up and rule our own lives. And the dear one comes home and Jesus wants to be loving to that dear
one but the old self wants to rise up and cut the dear one apart. Jesus wants to rise up in us and
get the glory in the service, he wants to receive the glory to himself and our old self rises up and
we want all men to look at us. We want every eye to see what we have done. There’s a great pride
rises up within us. We not only want our way so that Jesus will not have his way but we want our
glory so he will not have his glory. There’s a great desire to be praised, a great desire to be
noticed that rises up in the hearts that is ruled by the spirit of antichrist because you see, the
antichrist is already preparing that heart for himself.

He’s already preparing that heart so that heart will recognize him when he comes. That heart will
bury down the pride, will bury down the envy and the jealousy but that is all seeping underneath and
will rise up to receive the antichrist when he arrives. There are only two guardians against the
spirit of antichrist. There is first of all in 2 Timothy 3:16-17 the scripture itself. You can
look at it there. Paul explained to Timothy that there would come days of stress and surely those
days are already upon us when men would be lovers of self rather than lovers of God. And then he
says, “There is only one guard on that day.”

2 Timothy 3:16-17, “All scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for
correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for

every good work.” And in Verse 14 he says, “But as for you, continue in what you have learned and
have firmly believed, knowing from whom you learned it.” And the second guardian against the spirit
of antichrist is found in John 16:13 and it is as you can guess yourselves the true Holy Spirit of
truth.

John 16:13, “When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth; for he will not
speak on his own authority, but whatever he hears he will speak, and he will declare to you the
things that are to come.” There will come a day either before you and I die or soon after it when a
glorious figure will appear in our world and he will have apparently the fruits of the spirit and he
will do many mighty works such as Jesus himself did and that great figure will call to himself all
who believe in him, all who respect what he is and great, great numbers of evenly elect will come
towards him and be deceived and their judgment will have already taken place. And you say, “How can
I prepare for that day?” Allow the Holy Spirit to wield his sword in your heart tonight and be
honest.

Now many of you have been arguing, haven’t you? I know it because God told me. Many of you have
been arguing with God and you have been saying, “Victorious life can’t be that victorious.” A
little anger, a little envy, a little jealous and the spirit of antichrist is already in work in
you. Dear ones, the only way to prepare is to be open with God. Open with God, direct with him and
honest now and admit that you are what you are. And you say, “What can be done?” Well, at this
present time the Holy Spirit is here among us. At this present time we are privileged to have the
Holy Spirit in our midst. There will come a day when he will withdraw but the Holy Spirit is here
tonight and his word is here and you know his word well enough during this past week to know where
you stand.

The Holy Spirit is able to show you where the spirit of antichrist still rules in your heart and
where you yourself are being prepared for his coming. You need to come to the alter tonight and
allow the Holy Spirit to do that. Ask him, “Holy Spirit of truth show me where the spirit of
antichrist still rules in my heart. Show me where I am not being obedient to you.” And the Holy
Spirit will show you. Then you need to see that all that spirit of antichrist within you, all that
old self was crucified with Jesus and the Holy Spirit is able to crucify it now in you. He is able
to cleanse out all that and fill you with himself so that when the antichrist comes the Holy Spirit
will cry in your heart, “That is the antichrist.” But he can only cry that in the heart of one who
is being utterly obedient to him today. Well are you such a one and will you have such a counselor
on that fateful day? I pray that you will. I pray that you will receive him tonight if you haven’t
received him already.

Let us pray. Loving Father, we trust you now to do your work. Blessed Holy Spirit, your word has
been proclaimed and we trust you to minister to each of us as we need that we may not be found
following the wrong man on that fateful day. We trust you Holy Spirit, now to minister to us and to
draw out the ones that need to take you fully into their hearts and surrender their spirits
completely to you. For the glory of Jesus, our Savior. Amen.

The Death of the Old Life

Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill

Last time we shared how God gives us the Holy Spirit and makes our spirits alive. He gives us the
Holy Spirit because something has happened that has made it no longer necessary for him to keep the
flaming sword that guards every way to the tree of life. The event that happened was simply that
his justice was able to work its full way out upon us in Jesus. That’s it. God took the whole
human race, put that human race into Jesus, and destroyed it there. Now that his justice has worked
its way out upon the sinner, the Holy Spirit and the way to the tree of life are accessible to us.

Now it seems to me it is very important to see that the only reason we can experience new birth or
the Holy Spirit coming into our spirits and regenerating us — is because all the old life was
destroyed. Sometimes I don’t think we really realize that that’s the case — that it’s because all
the old race of mankind with all its self and all its own rights were destroyed in Jesus. It’s
because of that, that God can actually begin a whole new race. That’s why the new life is possible
to us at all.

In God’s eyes new life is only possible because he has destroyed all the old life. That’s why we
can experience the new birth at all. It’s because we have all died in Jesus and all our old life of
independence of God has been destroyed, that God is able to give us a new life in the Holy Spirit.
So really, in a sense you could say the death comes before the new birth. Yet it is true that many
of us have found ourselves in the new birth experience and have not really come into the death of
the old life.

That’s what I’d really like to talk about during the three quarters of an hour that we have. I
think all of us see that being a Christian is not just being a moral person. It’s not just being a
church-goer. That is, it’s not doing works that will save you. It’s not just being a church
person, somebody who goes to the right service and attends the right meetings.

It’s not just being socially responsible. It’s not just being a person who believes and accepts the
world view of Christ that he has preached to the world. It’s not a person that experiences gifts or
miracles. A Christian is one who has received the Spirit of Jesus into himself. John 1:12: “To as
many as received him, to them gave him the right to become the children of God.”

Now we also looked at the kind of person that meant that you were. You remember, it was the kind of
person described in 1 John 3:9. A person who had really received the Spirit of Jesus into them
would be this kind of person. 1 John 3:9: “No one born of God commits sin; for God’s nature abides
in him, and he cannot sin because he is born of God.”

So you recognize a person who has really been born of the spirit — not just one who attends church,
not just one who accepts the Christian world view, not just one who tries to do what is best for him
and the world. You recognize a Christian who is born of the spirit by the fact that he does not
commit sin.

We talked a little about what that meant. It certainly doesn’t mean that you never deviate from
absolute right. Because of our imperfect minds, there will be times when we unintentionally deviate
from absolute truth and absolute goodness. So certainly, not committing sin doesn’t mean that we
never unintentionally deviate from absolute right. At times you will.

Nor does it mean that you never err in excess of emotion. I think our emotions at the point of the
new birth certainly are not utterly balanced and at times we will joke more than we should. I feel
like Ron and I and Scott — who were comedians before we met Jesus — will have emotions that tend
to fly off from the old joke or the old laugh too much, and we will overbalance in that direction.
So, it doesn’t mean that you’ll never indulge in excess emotion.

It doesn’t mean that you won’t fall back at times through physical weariness. In other words,
because of imperfect mind, and imperfect emotions, and a weakened body, we’ll find that very often
we’ll make mistakes and we’ll do things that we didn’t intend to do. So that isn’t sin. Sin is
what is stated in James 4:17. It’s stated very clearly so we really need be in no doubt of what it
is: “Whoever knows what is right to do and fails to do it, for him it is sin.”

Sin is something very far from being an unintentional deviation from absolute right. Sin is a
deliberate disobedience — a conscious knowing disobedience to God’s rule and God’s law.

It’s a knowing disobedience of the 10 Commandments, a knowing disobedience to the life that is
presented in the Sermon on the Mount, a knowing disobedience to some of the marks of a Christian
that are described in Paul’s Epistles, a knowing disobedience to the whole example we have in Jesus’
life. Sin is a conscious resistance to that will of God that is stated for us in scripture. So sin
is something very concrete. It’s a conscious disobedience to God’s will as outlined in the gospels,
and the Epistles, and the Old Testament.

Now, does this mean that a Christian never sins? “Whosoever is born of God does not commit sin.”
We’ve talked in the past a bit: does this mean you never sin, or does this mean that you just don’t
sin habitually?

It certainly doesn’t mean anything as weak as not sinning habitually. It doesn’t mean, “Oh yeah, I
sin once or twice every week but not habitually. I mean, I don’t sleep in every day of the week. I
don’t sleep in habitually. I sleep in maybe Saturday morning and maybe an odd Monday morning but
not habitually.” So, it doesn’t mean anything as weak as “does not commit sin habitually.”

But I think it’s fair to see that it doesn’t really mean “never sins.” It means hardly ever sins.
Whosoever is born of God does not commit sin. This is not the natural normal activity of a
Christian who is born of God — because the nature within him is Jesus’ nature, and that nature
always wants to obey God and will always obey God — except where the imperfect mind, or the
unbalanced emotions, or the weakened body that has not yet come under the daily discipline of the
daily cross — prevents the spirit of Jesus from getting out through that person. But inside, the
person will always have a pure attitude of wanting to obey God.

That brings us to the problem of the death of the old life, because I think that many of us have
difficulties there. We know that a Christian is one who does not commit sin and who does not
disobey God knowingly. Yet we have problems inside in our own inner lives.

We come to a situation where we are due to hand an assignment in to a professor and we know we have
to be honest. It says so in Ephesians 4:25. It might be good just to look at it because God’s word
can often speak individually to us as we look at it. Ephesians 4:25: “Therefore, putting away
falsehood, let every one speak the truth with his neighbor, for we are members one of another.” And
we see that.

We say, “Alright, I’m a Christian. I’m a child of God and I’ve to put away falsehood.” We haven’t
the assignment ready for the professor and we tell him so.

What troubles many of us is that even as we tell him, we have within us almost an unbearable strain
that makes us want to tell him a lie. We tell him the truth, but inside us there’s a tremendous
strain — because we don’t want to face the music and we don’t want to lose our reputation with this
man who respects us. Even though we do obey, we find a tremendous pressure within us, a tremendous
desire of the flesh that is against the desire of the spirit. That desire is deep down there and we
try to rationalize it away but it’s still there.

Or, we go home and the roommate is there. They’ve taken all of our books out and spread them all
over the floor. We know we’re to be patient with them, and we now that we’re not to be angry with
them, because if you’re angry you sin, and we hold the anger in. But within us there is a
tremendous strain and desire to be angry with that person, to put them in the right place.

So even though we obey God outwardly, inside we find this tremendous strain. I think many of us
wonder: is this the victory in the Christian life? We’re obeying – okay, we’re obeying outwardly.
We’re not sinning outwardly. But inside we have a tremendous battle to hold down that attitude, or
that reaction, or that response, or that motive that is not in accordance with God’s Spirit.

So underneath the water of the lake there is this restlessness. We feel it’s there. I think you’d
admit that at times you can obey God and you can be kind to the sister and say the right word to the
brother but inside it’s as if you didn’t do it — because the restlessness is so miserable, and the
strain is so terrible, that it’s almost as if you in your own heart have sinned.

Now that’s one of the problems they come against — that desire within to sin even though they don’t
actually sin. I think we have another problem, and it’s really the problem outlined in Hebrews
12:1. It’s a famous phrase that you’ll recognize. In Hebrews 12:1 the writer of Hebrews is saying
that we should follow the example of a great cloud of witnesses: “Therefore, since we are surrounded
by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so
closely, and let us run with perseverance the race that is set before us.” “Sin which clings so
closely” is translated in the King James Version as “the besetting sin.”

That’s the second problem that many of us Christians have: we’re born of the spirit but we have a
sin that we cannot get over. I don’t know what it is with you. With me it was the whole question
of lust and masturbation. It was that whole area. With others it’s just a strong selfish ambition.
With me for some time it was that. It was a strong selfish ambition that I could not get on top
of. With some of us it is a pride. But it is some besetting sin that keeps catching us out.

Now, we know we’re children of God as long as Jesus continues to deal with us as he told us to deal
with each other. That is, he said, “You must forgive until 70 times seven.” So we know we’re
saved. God will always forgive us as long as we’re able to repent. So the problem is not that God
will ever refuse to forgive us however often we commit this sin.

But don’t you see that isn’t the problem? The problem is deeper than that. The problem is that the
more that we commit this sin day after day, or week after week, or month after month, the more we
attempt to excuse it — the more we attempt to rationalize it — and the more we try to persuade
ourselves, “This is just my personality. This is just a normal human trait that I have.”

I think that’s the real danger here. The danger is not that God is not willing to forgive us. I
think a lot of us are concerned, “Well, am I really a child of God if I do sin? Say I do continue
in a sin maybe ever month. Am I a child of God?”

You’re a child of God as long as you can sue for forgiveness. As long as you can repent, God will
forgive you until 70 times seven and far beyond that time. But the real danger is that we continue
in this tendency to rationalize the sin, and to excuse it, and to talk our way around it, until we
begin to build up a resistance and a hardening of our conscious towards the conviction of the Holy
Spirit.

There’s a famous passage in Hebrews 6:4 that deals with this: “For it is impossible to restore again
to repentance those who have once been enlightened, who have tasted the heavenly gift, and have
become partakers of the Holy Spirit, and have tasted the goodness of the word of God and the powers
of the age to come, if they then commit apostasy, since they crucify the Son of God on their own
account and hold him up to contempt.”

Do you see? The key words are, “It is impossible to restore again to repentance.” It is not
impossible for God to forgive us. God can forgive us until 70 times seven. But it is impossible to
restore again to repentance a person who continues to so rationalize and excuse sin in his life that
he comes past the point of ever repenting.

I think those are the problems we share. Paul expresses it in Romans 7:22-24. It’s that old
passage that describes the defeated life that we’ve so often looked at: “For I delight in the law of
God, in my inmost self, but I see in my members another law at war with the law of my mind and
making me captive to the law of sin which dwells in my members. Wretched man that I am! Who will
deliver me from this body of death?”

The real problem there for us is two-fold. We often find ourselves obeying God outwardly, but
inwardly we have a tremendous strain to disobey him. As well as that we have often some sins that
eventually have broken out into outward expression in our lives that we keep on rationalizing and
excusing away. Do you see it’s the excusing that is the heart of sin? That’s what sin is.

Actually the argument mark isn’t over, “Do you tell a lie?” or, “Have I lived the whole of the past
year without ever losing my temper?” That isn’t the issue. The real issue is that sin is an
attitude of resistance to God’s will that wants to rationalize away any deviation from his will —
instead of face it and treat it as sin. That’s the real problem inside us.

The problem is how we treat sin as just a human shortcoming, and the corresponding tendency in our
nature to suppress it or repress it, and to strive to overcome it, and to fight it. That isn’t
God’s plan for us. It isn’t God’s plan that we should live in that kind of rationalizing and
suppressing and repressing kind of life.

Maybe we could look at the problem as we were mentioning it at the beginning of this talk. The real
problem is that though God destroyed all of us in Jesus — and that’s why he can forgive us — yet
we have not all entered into that. Now, we did become Christians, because the condition for
becoming a Christian is, “to as many as receive Jesus God gives the right to become the children of
God.” It’s important, I think, to see that the Greek word for “right” is “exousias.” The King
James Version wrongly interprets it as “power.”

God gives you the right to become the children of God. He gives you the right to eat fully of the
tree of life the moment you are ready to receive his Son Jesus. And you actually do receive the
Spirit of Jesus within you at that time.

But the fact is that that’s possible only because God destroyed us all in Jesus. You can only
experience the fullness of that life when you are actually willing to dot the i’s and cross the t’s
of what God did to us in Christ. Only when we’re willing to identify ourselves totally with Jesus’
death will we be able to identify ourselves totally with his fullness of life and his resurrection
life.

Part of the problem is not that everything has not been achieved for us by God and Jesus — but that
we’re only entering into half of it. Really what we need to experience is a complete death. Not
just a complete birth but a complete death with Jesus.

If you say to me, “Oh brother, why is that?” Because the basic principle upon which God deals with
us is, “Be it unto you according to your faith.” God can only do in each of us what we believe he
is able to do and what we’re willing to let him do. And so it is unto us according to our faith.
So I don’t know about you, but for me, when I heard of becoming a Christian, it was never told me
that I died with Jesus. I was told Jesus died for me so that I wouldn’t have to die. So I believed
that and God dealt with me according to my belief.

I think with many of us that’s the case. God dealt with us according to our belief. We believed
that Jesus would come into our hearts when we asked him in, and that’s what happened. We did not
believe for any death with Jesus. We didn’t even think it was necessary to die with Jesus. We
thought God had destroyed the whole human race in Jesus and that was it.

But it is possible to enter into an actual experience with that in our own life. You know the
secret is this — that sin is an attitude that has to be destroyed and displaced by the attitude of
the Holy Spirit — whereas sins are acts, and thoughts, and words that have to be forgiven. What
most of us enter into is a freedom from the outward symptoms first, and we deal with God over the
outward acts, and thoughts, and words.

Before I became a Christian I would have known what anger was by my angry words. But if you had
said to me, “Oh, you’re angry deep down even though you’re not showing it” — I don’t know if I had
enough sensitivity or light to even recognize that.

I recognized anger when I expressed it. I recognized irritability when I expressed it. But it was
only after the Spirit of Jesus came into me and gave me something to compare my own spirit with,
that I began to sense that you could have an attitude that didn’t come out and didn’t express
itself.

So it seems that it’s almost like a darkened room — until you bring a candle in you don’t see the
dark corners. It seems almost as if until the pure Spirit of Jesus comes into our hearts, we can’t
see the really dark corners — they just look gray to us. So for most of us, I think we’ve come
into a forgiveness of our sins but not into a real cleansing of the inward attitude.

What is that inward attitude? Some people say it’s just the old nature, and you’re committed to
fighting the old nature for the rest of your lives. There’s something silly even in the semantics

of it — because if you say to me, “Oh, he has a generous nature,” you mean he’s a generous kind of
person. That’s his nature. That’s the basic kind of person he are. You don’t really mean, “Yeah,
well he has a generous nature but he also has another nature.” When you talk about a person being
of a certain nature you mean that’s really what that person is.

Now do you see you can’t have good fruit from a bad tree and you can’t have bad fruit from a good
tree? You can’t have sweet water from a sour source and you can’t have sour water from a sweet
source? You’re either one or the other.

We all like to think that on the whole we are children of God and on the whole we are really
Christians. But there are just little bits of us that aren’t Christ-like. I think it’s probably
the other way around. I think on the whole we have an outward appearance of being Jesus, but
inwardly we’re our real selves, and that it’s not a question so much of one nature fighting against
another. It’s simply a fact that the desires of the flesh are against the spirit wherever they are.
The desires of the flesh are always against the spirit. But where the desires of the flesh are
strong in us, it’s probably because we have not really received the divine nature of God.

And that’s why many of us will say, “Oh, should the Christian life be a striving and a straining to
obey?” No, it’s probably true that the Christian life is never that. It’s probably true that it’s
just Christ imitators that live a straining, striving kind of life.

Yet do you see that you can’t accuse a brother or a sister who has entered into that of not being a
Christian in any sense? Because he has entered into all that God has told him, and all that he has
believed for he has entered into. But once more life begins to come to him and he begins to see
that more is possible. Then he is under obligation to go on into it.

Romans 3:25 shows part of the work that Jesus did on the cross. Romans 3:25: “Whom God put forward
as an expiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God’s righteousness,
because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins.” So the blood of Jesus is what we
believe was shed to enable God to forgive us for our sins. And so we enter into a sense of the
meaning of the blood of Jesus. Every time we sin we offer to God the blood of Jesus.

But the second part of the work that God did on the cross is in Romans 6 and it refers to the cross
of Christ. You see how Paul tackles it? He says in Romans 6:3: “Do you not know that all of us who
have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death?”

Now, you’ve been baptized into Christ Jesus. You’ve been baptized into him for the forgiveness of
your sins. Now do you realize that you were baptized into his death? Romans 6:4: “We were buried
therefore with him by baptism into death, so that as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of
the Father, we too might walk in newness of life.”

The death of Jesus, or the cross of Christ, is something that we enter into. Why? So that we might
walk in newness of life. Verse 5 says, “For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we
shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his.” The truth is that it’s really
impossible to walk in newness of life until we enter into the actuality of being buried with Christ.
It’s impossible to walk in anything but a partial experience of newness of life until you’ve
entered into the death of Christ.

The truth is that we all have been crucified. The truth is that you’re not really alive today as

far as God is concerned — you’ve been destroyed. But you and I keep believing Satan’s lie that
this is our life and this is our future, and we have a right to our own way and we have a right to
establish our reputation. The truth is we haven’t. We’re all dead. At this moment we’re each one
in heaven beside the Father — but we won’t believe that or aren’t willing to believe that.

First of all, some of us won’t believe it. We just won’t believe it. We won’t believe God’s word
that we know that our old self was crucified with him. We just won’t believe it. It’s a problem of
the mind. We set our eyes on our experience rather than on God’s word.

Some of us have a problem that we are not willing for it. We’re not willing to be dead. You have a
car that you like and you have clothes that you like. You have a lot of things you want to look
forward to – marriage and a whole future.

We don’t want to be dead people. We’re not willing to be dead. Really, if we were honest with God,
when he says, “You’re dead with my Son,” we would recognize that we’re saying, “We’re not dead with
your Son. We’re alive and we have a right to our own way. We have a right to ensure that we have a
certain future ahead of us.”

It’s disagreement with God. It’s a controversy with God when we don’t enter into the death with
Christ. I think it’s good to see the details of it. You see in Romans 6:6 there are three elements
involved in our defeated life that we live even after we’ve received the Spirit of Jesus into us.

You see in Verse 6 there’s first of all the old self. There’s that tendency, that desire, to have
our own way, to be God of our own lives, to do what we want, to insist on our own rights.

Then you see the body of sin, or the sinful body it is called in the RSV {Revised Standard Version
of the Bible}. That’s the second element. The sinful body, the body that is being used to commit
sin for years. The emotions have been used to getting angry with people who tried to oppose us.
The mind has been used to trying to manipulate other people. The body itself has been used to being
lazy and being indolent. So, the body can always be called a sinful body because it’s being used
for so long by sin. That’s the second element.

Then the third element is, “we might no longer be enslaved to sin.” That’s Satan himself. Satan
controls the attitude of sin in our world. Satan has spread throughout this world an attitude that
is determined to live happily in the world without God, without his creator. It’s an attitude of
rebellion against God, to go our own way rather than God’s way, to do what is right in our own eyes.
Now, those are the three elements that are used in bringing us into a defeated life.

Sin is the source of the rebellion against God. The body of sin is the instrument that that sin
uses to express itself in the world. Do you see the middle man? The middle man is our old self.
The middle man is the connection between sin and our body. The middle man is that little bit of
attitude that self has that it has a right to its own way. It’s the attitude of the will really.
It’s the evil will — the attitude of the will that wants to go its own way.

Now you see what God does. The perfectionist eliminates sin from the world. They say, “Yeah, when
you’ve entered into the death of Christ you never sin again. You can’t ever sin again even if you
try hard — you can’t ever sin. Sin is just eliminated from the world.” That’s what perfectionists
say.

There are some perfectionists who teach holiness in that line. They say, “If you have entered into
the death of Christ you’ll never sin again. Sin is once and for all blotted out from the world.”
They get themselves into the problem where they go home and beat their wives at night and they say,
“No, it wasn’t a sin. It wasn’t a sin. I’m a sanctified Christian. I can’t possibly sin. I know
it because I’ve entered into the death of Christ.” That’s what some holiness perfectionist will
say. They’ll try to eliminate sin from the world.

The ascetics — many of whom I think found themselves in the Catholic Church at one time anyway —
the ascetics will try to eliminate the body. They’ll teach the body as the problem. They’ll say,
“Let’s eliminate the body. Let’s beat it with irons and with chains.” They’ll say, “Let’s fast,
and let’s treat the body so badly that we take from it all power and energy to sin.”

That isn’t the answer. God’s answer is you take out the middle man. You take out the old self.
You crucify the old self. You crucify that evil will that wants to go its own way. That’s what
Romans 6:6 means: we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the sinful body might be
destroyed — or really rendered inoperative as the Greek word means. Rendered inoperative — and we
might no longer be enslaved to sin. It’s the old self that God rendered inoperative. It’s the evil
will.

That’s what makes us get angry. Your problem and my problem is: are we willing to have that evil
will destroyed? I think some of us have said, “Will God make me willing?” Well, God has already
destroyed that evil will, but you have to be willing to allow him to destroy it in you. You have to
be willing to allow him to destroy what you call freedom of your will.

In other words, we have to be prepared to face the consequences if we were never to be allowed to
sleep late when we wanted to. Would you be prepared to be in that position? Would you give up your
right of ever sleeping late in the morning just because you wanted to — if God wanted you not to?
Would you be prepared to give up your right ever to have ice cream again if God didn’t want you to
have it? Being willing for God to destroy the evil will means being willing for God to destroy your
will completely and make it absolutely like his whenever he wants to. You’d still have to exercise
the will, but you’re giving up the right ever to exercise it against God.

Now what the Holy Spirit does if a man is really anxious to enter into that, is he begins to show up
in your life the places where you wouldn’t be prepared for that — where you just don’t want that.
He begins to show you the places in your life where you want your own way and you’re determined to
get it, and you’re not prepared for that will to be destroyed. He’ll take the darling sins, or the
darling relationships, the things that are dearest to you, that mean most to you. He’ll take those
and say, “Would you be prepared for my will to be done alone there and for your will to be
destroyed?”

What we need to do is to come to the place where we are willing for the Holy Spirit to do that.
Where we say, “Lord, I’m willing for you to destroy this evil will and even my good will. I’m
willing for you to destroy that. I’m willing to do whatever you want me to do — if you will only
make this crucifixion with Christ real in my life.” It is true that after you get down all the
levels of the things you’re willing to do and the things you’re not willing to do, the Holy Spirit
graciously brings you to a place where he isolates the evil will, the heart of the evil will, the
heart of that self.

It’s just a miracle of the Holy Spirit that he isolates that for us, because we all probably think

as I used to think, “Oh, no. It’s just my mind that is used to working intellectually, and so I
have a natural pride in my mind. I just have to control that pride.” Or I thought, “No, I’m just
an emotional kind of person. Therefore I have trouble with my feelings. I just have to discipline
my emotions or my feelings a wee bit more.” But really the heart of it was that my will was letting
loose those things, and my will had to be destroyed with Christ on Calvary.

The Holy Spirit is so good to isolate that for you, and he’ll find out whatever is your darling sin,
or whatever is really the heart of your self will. He’ll bring you to that place and say, “Would
you be willing for me to destroy it?” And he’ll only destroy it when you say, “Yes.”

I think that’s what some people mean when they say, “Can I pray that the Lord make me willing to be
willing?” Well, yes, if you really get down to business and find out in what way you are not
willing and are prepared for God to destroy that sense in which you are not willing. But you
actually have to be willing for God to take away the right of you to do whatever you want to do.
And when you get to the heart of that, then the Holy Spirit will make that crucifixion real in you.

I’ve already shared before that it was just deliverance for me, and I almost thought that I had
really hardly experienced Christ’s life at all before that time. Even though I did know I was a
child of God before then, and I knew I was forgiven, and I knew God would accept me into his own
presence — yet I never had any real experience of the victorious or pure life within me — until
one day I did say, “I’m really willing.”

There are two parts to it, and it might be just good to look at the two verses. First of all to
look at 2 Corinthians 5:14 and see the complete experience of the new birth and the new death, or
the complete birth and the complete death together as they are in scripture. Because I think we
often try to separate them — and you cannot separate really the birth and the death. You cannot
separate the birth in the spirit from your death in Christ — though many of us have done this in
order to produce an easier kind of Christianity.

2 Corinthians 5:14: “For the love of Christ controls us, because we are convinced that one has died
for all.” That is what most of us enter into initially. We are convinced that Jesus has died for
us so that our sins can be forgiven. “Therefore all have died.” Because all have died, we have all
died with him. That’s what we need to enter into to experience freedom from the power of sin. Not
only from the penalty of sin but from its power.

The way to enter in is simple. It’s Romans 6:11. First of all the believing: “So you also must
consider yourselves dead to sin” — reckon yourselves dead to sin — “and alive to God in Christ
Jesus.” So we have a responsibility to believe what God has told us is true in scripture.

Then the second part is the obedience — Romans 8:13: “For if you live according to the flesh you
will die, but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body you will live.” Submission to
the Holy Spirit will enable the Holy Spirit to make this death real in us and this victorious life
real in us. So what’s needed is: believing what has happened to us in Jesus, and obeying the Holy
Spirit day-by-day.

The same truths are taught in Galatians 5:24-25. It might be good to look at them there again and
see the two parts that we need to be willing to enter into: “And those who belong to Christ Jesus
have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.” You belong to Christ when you receive his
spirit into you. If you have done that then you have already crucified the flesh with his passions

and desires, and you need to take your stand on that biblical ground, “I have been crucified with
Christ.” Not, “I have to crucify myself,” but, “I have been crucified.”

Then verse 25 says, “If we live by the Spirit, let us also walk by the Spirit.” It’s submission to
the Holy Spirit day-by-day. Some people have said, “How does it become real in us?” Well, you
believe it and you submit to the Holy Spirit and you trust him to make it real in you.

Next time I’d like to deal, if possible, with some of the difficulties that we run up against in the
actual experiential side of what has potentially taken place in Jesus. So maybe you’d perhaps think
of some questions for that presentation that we can then talk about.

How to Enter into Deliverance

Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill

Brothers just to remind you we’re in a series at the moment, dealing with the four great stages, if
you like to call them, in the Christian life, or the four great freedoms that you can experience in
the Christian life. And, you remember, we’ve talked about the freedom from the guilt, from the
guilty conscience. And we’ve talked about the freedom from the selfish will. And we’ve talked about
the freedom from the domination of a personality that is independent of God’s Spirit. And we’ve
talked about freedom from a passive spirit. And it seems to me that those are the great stages,
really, that all of us come to, sooner or later–maybe in different order and maybe some faster than
the other. But we eventually have to come through those stages.

We have to deal with our guilty conscious. We have to allow God to deal with our selfish wills. We
have to allow him to deal with our independent souls or independent personalities. And we have to
allow him to deal with our passive spirits that are so poor at warring against Satan in an
aggressive way. And what we have seen, during the past few talks together, is that all these
freedoms and deliverances are found already in what Jesus has done for us on Calvary. So there’s
nothing that we need in our own lives that Jesus has not already done for us. All we’re talking
about here is the making these things real in our own lives. So it’s never a case of, “Oh, the cross
is alright for forgiveness of sins, but when it comes to deliverance from the selfish will, you need
the baptism of the Holy Spirit.” It’s never that.

It’s always, what we have in Jesus on the cross, we can have made real in our own lives–if we will
really believe God’s word, and submit to his Holy Spirit. Now, last time we talked, you may
remember we discussed the deliverance from a selfish will. We discussed the problem that we all
have found, that is outlined in Romans 7, starting at verse15. I’ll just read it to you. You almost
know it off by heart–the problem which Paul explains this way. “I do not understand my own actions.
For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. Now if I do what I do not want, I
agree that the law is good.” And he says, “I can’t do what I want to do, for I do not do the good I
want, but the evil I do not want is what I do.”

And we talked last day of the need to be delivered from that selfish will. And you remember, we
outlined the facts that that deliverance was based on–the fact that our old self was crucified with
Christ, that that old selfish will was crucified with Jesus. And in order for that to be made real
in us we simply had to believe that and to be willing to submit to the Holy Spirit, to die to self,
ourselves. Now those are the only conditions that are necessary.

What I’d like to share today in a little more detail is how to enter into that deliverance. And I’d
really appreciate it in between the presentations, if you have questions, if you would share them.

Question from audience:

I was going to ask, you said there were two conditions for the person making it. Can we know which
one of those two a person is not fulfilling?

Reply from Pastor O’Neil:

Sam says that there are two needs: Revelation that you have been crucified with Christ and a

willingness to be crucified–belief and submission or trust and obey. And can you, in counseling,
tell which one a person is having trouble with?

Normally, the Holy Spirit can reveal to you which one the person is having trouble with, though you
can see that they are very closely linked, because “belief” in Greek is “pisteuo”. And it has a
willingness, a willing content to it. And if you’re not really willing, in fact, you’re only
believing with your head. And so, total belief is a real willingness. But I think that’s what I’ll
spend the time going into, in some detail.

Brothers the first point I think we should make clear is what the deliverance is. And it’s made
clear in Romans 7:17, “So then it is no longer I that do it, but sin which dwells within me.” “It
is sin which dwells within me.” Romans 6 goes back to that fact, you know, where Paul says in Verse
7 of Romans 6, “He who has died is freed from sin.” Now, the deliverance is from sin. Sin is an
inward desire to be independent of God.

I think it’s very important for us to see that the deliverance is from the selfish will. It is from
the desire to disobey God. It is deliverance from the desire to get angry. It’s deliverance from
the desire to be irritable. It’s the deliverance from that rising up from within when the fiery
darts of the wicked one come into you. It’s the deliverance from that quick reaction that is wrong
and that is apart from God’s will.

Now why I push that strongly is, I sensed at times, Larry, that you were sometimes asking me, “Well
your attitude, I mean, your attitude. You still really have to resist in your attitude.” Well, I
think it’s very important to see that it is an actual change that is wrought in your response to
Satan’s temptation that takes place when you are willing to die to self. It is not in other words
simply a case that the fiery dart of the wicked one comes in. And you find the rising up to get
irritable, but now you decide you have to resist it. And so you resist. It isn’t that kind of inner
fight that it once was. It is an actual deliverance from the desire to be irritable, or the desire
to be jealous, or the desire to be envious. That’s what we mean when we say, “You’re freed from
sin,” you see.

If you like to put it this way, you’re freed from the power of sin.” Or, if it’s clearer to put it
this way, “You’re free from having to sin.” You’re free to sin. But you’re freed from having to
sin. So it’s important to make that distinction. You’re free to sin, but you’re now free, so that
you need not sin, if you don’t want to. Before, you see, the problem was, “I don’t want to get
angry. I don’t want to think these unclean thoughts. I don’t want to be irritable. But, I find
something in me that wants to do them.” Now death to self with Christ, and being cleansed by the
Holy Spirit, means that your heart is actually cleansed by faith. That’s what Acts 15:9 says, “God
gave the Holy Spirit to them as he did to us and cleansed their hearts by faith.”

It is actually, brothers, a cleansing of the tendency to disobey God. It is a cleansing from the
tendency to fall over independent of God. I make that point, Bill, because deliverance was so real
in my own life, you know. And if you press me and say, “Brother, are you saying you never sin
again?” I’m saying, “If you ever do sin again it’s your fault.” And many of us are deceived into
sinning. And many of us sin after entering into our death with Christ. But if we do, it’s simply
our own fault. Before, it was really what Paul said, “If I do it, it is sin that dwells within me.”
But now this is a deliverance from that inward sin, and you’re really free to obey.

Now I believe I should stop there and give an opportunity for anybody to press me.

Question from audience:

You mean we’re not responsible for the sin before that?

Reply from Pastor O’Neil:

Alright, that’s good. Sam says, “You mean we’re not responsible for the sin before that?”

And obviously, old Paul would be very strong and say, you know, or James says, “Let no one say is
tempted by God.”

And undoubtedly God says, “A man is responsible for expressing the inward desire that Satan has put
inside him.” He’s responsible for that. And so, even though he says, “This is something that seems
to be controlling me,” yet he still is responsible for letting it express itself in his life.

Most of us Sam, it seems to me, have come to the place where we do not express this outwardly. But
we have it inside, and we’re holding it down. And most of us, therefore, are walking in some degree
of victory. But it’s through an intense self will and willpower. And it’s due to great repression
and suppression of that desire. But certainly, if we give vent to it, still God holds us
responsible for that giving vent. Indeed, we feel it ourselves. We sense guilt, immediately we
express that anger. We don’t say to ourselves, “Oh, well that anger is part of Satan so I’m not
responsible for it.” There’s something in our conscience that says, “If you express it you’re
responsible for it.”

Now I think the responsibility is the same in both cases. But before, it seems impossible to do
anything about it. And that possibly is due to the fact that we do not read God’s word in an open
minded way. Mark?

Question from audience:

You said there were two steps. Will there be a time period before they experience deliverance?

Reply from Pastor O’Neil:

Mark is going back–and it’s just for the sake for any who are listening to the cassette that I do
this. Mark is going back to the two facts, you remember, or the two conditions that are necessary if
we’re to enter in. And they’re outlined in many verses but Galatians 5:24-25 are two such verses,
“And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.”
That’s belief in that fact. And the second one, “If we live by the Spirit, let us also walk by the
Spirit,” is submission to the Holy Spirit or willingness. And he’s saying, “If you enter into a
real belief in the fact is there often a gap,” I think, “Before you enter into the willingness?”

Yes, I think there often is. I think many of us have to believe that fact for a long time only in
our heads until the Holy Spirit really brings us into a willingness for that fact to be made real in
our own spirits and lives. Mark I think now I’m going to deal with just some of those issues.

What I’d like now to deal with, brothers, is three of the misunderstandings or misconceptions about

how to enter into this deliverance from self or this being filled with the Holy Spirit. The first
one is this, that many of us do not set our eyes on the fact. We set our eyes on our own experience.
Many of us, in other words, when we find anger and impatience within us, say to ourselves,
“Obviously, I’m not crucified with Christ. Obviously, you can see it my life is full of
irritability, and anger, and jealousy. I’m not crucified.”

Now all we’re doing there, is walking by sight and not by faith. We’re walking by the symptoms that
Satan is producing in our own lives, rather than by the reality that is stated clearly in God’s
word. In other words, God’s word says in Romans 6:6, “Our old self was crucified with Christ.” Now
brothers, if the Holy Spirit is going to make real anything in our lives, he can only make it real
if we believe God’s word, against our own experiences.

Now many of us get into real problems you see, we say, “Oh no, my experience tells me that I am not
crucified with Christ. So now I have to crucify myself.” And if we don’t fall into exactly the
asceticism of the Catholic saints–of some of the Catholic saints–we do fall into that same kind of
attitude, “I must crucify myself. I must destroy this evil within me. I must destroy this
selfishness.” And we end up falling into legalism, in order to control this lion within us.

Now brothers it is not a matter of looking at our own personal experiences. I think each time you
find irritability, or impatience, or anger inside yourself you have to say, “Holy Spirit, I know
that is there. Satan, you don’t need to tell me I am evil. I know it. But I know that my old self
was crucified with Christ. And I set my mind on that fact. And Holy Spirit, I know you can only
make this real, if I set my mind upon it and accept it.”

Now brothers if you don’t set your mind on the fact that that was crucified on the cross, you will
begin to experience an increasing conviction of sin, which is the Holy Spirit’s way of leading you
on into this experience. But, as you increasingly experience how evil and how egotistical you are,
that great ego will loom so large, in your own mind, that you’ll become utterly discouraged–unless
you keep hold of the fact, “This has been crucified with Christ.” It will overwhelm you completely,
you see, unless you hold to the fact in your own mind, “But this has been destroyed. I thank God it
has been destroyed. Boy, I’m still under it but I thank God this old self has been destroyed.”

But if you don’t accept that brothers, there’ll be no deliverance for you, you see. And I think a
lot of us say, “Oh I see the old self. I see the envy. I see the jealousy. I see the irritability,
and boy, God, I don’t know how you’re ever going to overcome it.” Unless you hold to the fact that
God has said, “Listen my brother, my sister, your old self was crucified with my son. I destroyed
all that. What you’re seeing is simply a ghost.” Now if you say to me, “Oh, but brother, if the
old self was destroyed, why is it that I still feel the effects of it inside me?” Because, you’re
living a lie–you’re believing the lie that that old self is still alive, and that it has a right to
its own possessions–it has a right to its own way, when actually God has destroyed it. And the
reality is that all of us are dead.

I know that’s mad. But the reality is that all of us are dead. And we’ve been raised with Jesus. And
at the moment, are at God’s right hand. But, we keep believing Satan’s lie. We believe we have a
right to live our own life, to have our own way. And so, his lie produces those evil fruit. Sam?

Question from audience:

So it’s by ignoring the empirical reality of our evil nature?

Reply from Pastor O’Neil:

It is in a sense, though it is in another sense facing it, facing it head on and saying, “Holy
Spirit, I see that. I see evidence that I’m still believing the lie, but in actual fact, I know
that I’ve been crucified. I know that potentially it is there, and the only possibility of it being
actualized in me is if I believe it.” It’s the same with our sins. I mean, we all believed that
Jesus had died for us, but it was only made real in us when we were willing to let go of our sins.
Now, it’s the same with this. The only basis is to believe that you have been crucified with
Christ, and then to go on and find out in what way you’re not willing to be, because it’s the
unwillingness that prevents the Holy Spirit from making it real.

Do you want to press me anywhere brothers?

Question from audience: (inaudible)

Reply from Pastor O’Neil:

Scott, if you don’t mind I’ll repeat that just in case some listen. Scott was saying, as you heard,
that it seemed a lot more natural to him, and God seemed to begin to deal with him on the issue,
when he at last accepted that, “Okay, I have been crucified with Christ and now I’ll just let the
Holy Spirit show me, and make this real to me, but I won’t fight to die.” And it seems to me that’s
the heart of it, that we have to accept that when God destroyed Jesus, he destroyed the whole evil
world. And we are part of that world. And we have been destroyed in Jesus. And as far as God is
concerned we’re no longer any great threat. And we should simply accept, “Well Lord, I thank you
that you’ve destroyed this. And now, Holy Spirit, I know you want to express the victory of that
death right in my life. And now I just trust you to let it come.”

I agree with Scott, I think you can get yourself into a neurotic state if you say, “I’ve got to die.
I’ve got to die.” Yeah. It’s actually–the place of faith is, “I believe your word, Lord. Now
Holy Spirit, I trust you to make it real in me.” Sam?

Question from audience:

When I was dealing with some word last Sunday night, it came to me, “What does it mean to hunger?”

Reply from Pastor O’Neil:

Yes, that’s good. Sam has brought up the question of, when he stops striving, then God seemed to
deal with him. Then someone asked, “Well, what does it mean to hunger and thirst after
righteousness?” And it seems to me we need to keep doing our best to obey God’s word all the time.
We never need to stand back and say, “Okay, I can’t do it I’ll just be a sinner.” We need to, all
the time, set our mind on God’s word, and move towards it. But we need to see that what we’re trying
to do, is begin to see how helpless and hopeless we are. We’ll never succeed in obeying it on our
own. But it’s always a coming to an end of our own helplessness and hopelessness. So it’s a
hungering after Jesus rather than a striving to obey the word without him.

It seems to me that’s the heart of it. It seems to me as we try to obey the word without God, by
our own strength, that’s the striving that is wrong. That’s the striving that God is trying to

bring us to the end of. But the point to which he’s trying to bring us, is to see that, with all
our striving, we’ll never do anything. What we need is simply Jesus within us. But until that time
comes, I think Nee is right. All you can do is keep doing your best to obey. And yet all the time
allow the Holy Spirit to show you how hopeless your obedience or your attempts are.

The second misconception, brothers, that I’d like to deal with is, that many of us think it’s a
question of auto suggestion. Many of us say, “All I have to do is auto suggest myself into this
death with Christ.” And we keep saying it – in fact, I know a brother who used to walk around
saying, “I’m dead, I’m dead, I’m dead, I’m dead, I’m dead, I’m dead.” Now, do you see that’s only
the mind trying to persuade the mind that it’s dead? In other words, it’s revelation, not auto
suggestion that will bring us into this.

And it ties up a bit with what you said Scott, we need to set our mind on the fact that we’ve been
crucified with Christ. And then ask the Holy Spirit to reveal to us in what way we’re not crucified.
But it seems to be an attitude that says, “Alright Holy Spirit I’ve tried my method. Now I’m giving
up on my method. I’m willing to try your method. Holy Spirit, will you give me revelation about
what, in what way, I’m not crucified with Christ?”

Now brothers, if you don’t do that, you end up in introspection, because you start looking around
and saying, “Well, I’m not dead. It’s not real in my life. Now in what way am I not dead?” And
you start asking yourselves all kinds of questions that you make up, you know. “Would I be willing
not to be married? Yeah, yeah. Would I be willing not to have a dog? Would I be willing not to
have two dogs? Would I be willing not to have a lot of money?” And you start making up questions
that God isn’t asking you at all.

Now it seems to me that’s the difference between striving around and thrashing around in your own
experience and introspection and auto suggestion and what is really needed, going to the Holy Spirit
and saying, “Holy Spirit, my Lord said, ‘You would lead me into all truth.’ My Lord said, ‘You
would counsel me.’ Now, Holy Spirit, tell me how do I look in Jesus’ eyes at this moment? In what
way am I not willing to go through his death with him? In what way am I not willing to die to self?
Holy Spirit, I’m asking you. Will you show me?”

And brothers, it seems to me that’s the hungering and thirsting after righteousness. It’s not so
much, if you like, a hungering and thirsting after victory, Scott. It seems to me you can come
preoccupied with victory until it becomes almost a neurotic obsession. But, it’s a hungering and
thirsting after the Father’s will. “Lord, what is your mind for me? What do you think of me? Holy
Spirit, you know God’s mind. You know how he sees me. Give me judgment day honesty. Help me to see
myself through Jesus’ eyes.”

And it seems to me that’s what we mean by revelation, you see. And that’s so important, brothers,
because all of us have different things holding us back from death to self. All of us hold back
from the cross for lots of different reasons. And the person, who knows you best, still doesn’t know
you well enough to show you in what way you’re not willing to be crucified in Christ. Only the Holy
Spirit knows you that well.

And so that’s the second misconception. A lot of us think it’s auto suggestion instead of
revelation. A lot of us think it’s introspection instead of revelation. But it’s not. It’s always
revelation. And that’s, Scott, where that rest comes in. You come to a place where you see at
last, “Lord, I don’t know what’s holding me back. I’ve done my best to obey. I don’t know what’s

holding me back. Holy Spirit, will you show me?” And there was a great deliverance in my own life
when I gave up the introspection, and gave up trying to see the thing for myself. In fact, it
involved a death to my own mind, because my mind thought it could discover all my shortcomings
itself. And so that was part of the old self that had to die.

Now brothers, revelation not auto suggestion. Is that okay?

The third misconception brothers, is this. I think a lot of us are tempted by Satan to believe that
this experience of death to self, or deliverance from the selfish will, is simply a question of
believing that we’ve been crucified with Christ, and then repressing the feelings that we have
inside, on the basis of that. So a lot of us, I think, get into the position where we think it’s a
kind of double think, or a kind of bluff. “Okay knowing that you’re crucified with Christ, knowing
that fact, that fact has a certain intellectual power of constraint upon my mind. And if I keep
holding to that I’ll come into more strength than I used to have over envy and jealousy. And I’ll
somehow be able to repress them or suppress them, in a way that I wasn’t able to before.”

Now brothers, it is not suppression. It is submission. It is not suppression of the evil things
within us. It is submission to the Holy Spirit. It is a loving gentle attitude to the Holy Spirit.
“Holy Spirit, show me in what way I’m not ready to die to self. And whatever way you show me, I’m
willing to submit to you.” And you submit to the Holy Spirit. You come into an absolute death to
your own ability to live the Christ life, and an absolute obedience, instant obedience, to the Holy
Spirit and the Holy Spirit naturally and unconsciously takes away those desires from within you.

So it is a real miracle, the Holy Spirit removes those things from your heart as you spend your time
submitting to him. So actually it’s far from preoccupation, you know, with the evil things within
you. Actually, it’s a real preoccupation with the Holy Spirit and with submitting to him. And
suddenly as you begin to submit to him completely, and trust him to make the Christ life real in
you, suddenly you find yourself flying over all the other things. So it is a real miraculous
removal of those things by the Holy Spirit. It isn’t a suppressing of them with the help of the
intellectual fact that you’ve been crucified with Christ.

It is in other words, a real miracle, brothers. It’s a miracle that the Holy Spirit works in your
spirit in response to your absolute submission to him. And if you say to me you see, “Where is the
problem?” I think the problem is in the submission to the Holy Spirit. I think we think we’re
submitting to the Holy Spirit, but there are a hundred different ways in which we’re not really
obedient to the Holy Spirit at all. And, in a way, this experience is an experience of total
obedience, you know.

Question from audience:

How can one have the discernment to obey the Holy Spirit before they’ve died to self?

Reply from Pastor O’Neil:

How can one have the discernment to obey the Holy Spirit before they have died to themselves? First
of all I would go in on the word discernment. I would say that it is not discernment that is needed
to obey the Holy Spirit. But it is willingness to obey the Holy Spirit. Then, when you come into a
willingness to obey the Holy Spirit, discernment is given to you. In other words, God is very
gracious he doesn’t reveal to you much more than you’re willing to enter into. He just reveals a

little step ahead to convince you that there’s resistance in there that has to be dealt with. But
he will not – somebody has said, “The key to insight, spiritual insight is love, loving obedience.”

And so you only receive the discernment when you actually come into a willingness to obey. That
would tie up, Mark, with what I’ve said at times that when you come into full consecration or
readiness to die to self, the Holy Spirit witnesses that inside. He witnesses it, so that you know,
“Yeah, I am ready.” And then discernment pours in on top of you. If God gave us all the
discernment that he could give us, about how we’re not obeying the Holy Spirit, he would blind us,
and absolutely discourage us, and dishearten us. So, he only gives just enough, which is why we
talk about revelation, why we talk about the importance of revelation. God only reveals what is
necessary for us to see at that time in order to enter into deliverance.

Question from audience:

Doesn’t this description tend to present the death to self as a process rather than as a crisis?

Reply from Pastor O’Neil:

Why I think it appears as a process is, I’m trying to take this experience apart, and trying to
foresee all the ways in which we try to enter into it that are unscriptural, and ineffective. And I
think, in fact, you can spend a lot of time dying, but there’s a moment when the breath stops and
you’re dead. So you can say that there is a process leading up to the experience, but the
experience itself is instantaneous. And I remember in my own life there was a moment came, when I
knew I was willing to die with Christ. And it was just a moment when I knew I was filled with the
Holy Spirit.

Could I just finish with one thing brothers? What is the relationship of this to the baptism with
the Holy Spirit? It does seem that this is the precondition of a full, complete baptism of the Holy
Spirit. You can’t say that being ready to die to self is the baptism with the Holy Spirit. All you
can say is that, when you are willing to die to self, and to be buried with Christ, then, as he
rises up from the water, and the dove of the Holy Spirit comes upon him, so as we rise up from our
crucifixion with Christ, the Holy Spirit comes upon us, and baptizes us with himself–filling us for
inward purity and anointing us for outward power–filling us with the fruit of the sprit, the nine
fruit of the spirit, and anointing us with the availability of the nine gifts of the spirit.

But it is true I think, doctrinally, to say that it is – the baptism of the Holy Spirit is a result,
or follows upon, our readiness to be crucified with Christ. And yet it’s the baptism with the Holy
Spirit that actually completes it, because you can be ready to be crucified with Christ and to die
with self and never be angry again, but, unless the Holy Spirit baptizes you with himself, there’ll
be no deliverance from anger. So, really, it’s important to see that the baptism with the Holy
Spirit is, as it were, the seal. Ephesians puts it, you remember, it’s the seal of our childlike
position to God the Father.

So the baptism of the Holy Spirit is what follows upon our readiness to die with Christ. Now does
anyone want to press me on that?

I think we dealt, last day, with the fact that some people do seem to enter into a very partial
experience that they call baptism with the Holy Spirit, but that is only a temporary experience of
some of the gifts of the spirit–at times tongues, or maybe some of the miracle gifts. But they

don’t enter into a real death to self with Christ. And so they don’t minister life through the
gifts. They become preoccupied with the gifts and with each other.

Brothers, is there anything because I think we’re finished?

Question from audience:

It’s very natural. I didn’t realize it was happening.

Reply from Pastor O’Neil:

That’s good. It is good to point out what Larry has done, that many of us have entered into this
without any of the terms or the names being used, and that actually if we follow on after the Holy
Spirit, he will lead us into this. It seems, Larry, the tragedy is, that many of us have not
followed after the Holy Spirit, or have received some teaching which discouraged us from going on
into a complete consecration, and so we have entered into only a partial experience of the
forgiveness of sins, and deliverance from guilt, and we still walk in a defeated life, because of
the selfish will.

Okay, shall we pray? Lord Jesus, we thank you for the completeness of the victory that is in you
and in your death and resurrection. And we trust you by your Holy Spirit to make it real in each
one of our lives. To actualize in us what has potentially taken place in you. Lord Jesus, we know
that this is your will. And we thank you that all that we need is found in you, and in your death,
and in an absolute identification of ourselves with your death and resurrection. We thank you for
that, for your glory, amen.
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Independent Life of the Soul – edited by Mary

Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill

Do you remember the night that the servants of the high priests arrested Jesus in the Garden
Gethsemane? You remember the scene and then coming into the garden and surrounding him and his
disciples? Now, there was an incident that took place then and I’d ask you to look at it with me
loved ones, it’s John 18:10-11. The high priest followers have surrounded the disciples and Jesus
and then in John 18:10, “Then Simon Peter, having a sword, drew it and struck the high priest’s
slave and cut off his right ear. The slave’s name was Malchus. Jesus said to Peter, “Put your
sword into its sheath; shall I not drink the cup which the Father has given me?’” Now what was the
cup which the Father had given him?

Well, if you see that you’ll find it in Matthew 16 where he had explained it carefully to Peter long
before that incident took place. Matthew 16:21, “From that time Jesus began to show his disciples
that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things from the elders and chief priests and scribes,
and be killed, and on the third day be raised. And Peter took him and began to rebuke him, saying,
“God forbid, Lord! This shall never happen to you.” But he turned and said to Peter, “Get behind
me, Satan! You are a hindrance to me; for you are not on the side of God, but of men.’”

So Jesus knew that God had a plan for his life and he was determined to drink the cup of that plan
to the last drop. But Peter rebelled against the whole plan and felt, “No, Jesus don’t die stay
alive as long as possible and liberate the Jews from the Romans.” And so Peter rejected the plan
that God had completely and was determined to ensure that his plan would be executed by the strength
of his own strong right arm and that was the situation in the Garden of Gethsemane.

Now loved ones that is sin in the flesh. That is sin in the flesh, independent action by ourselves
on the basis of our own needs for self preservation, absolutely independent of what God wants and
using our own power to bring it about. That’s sin in the flesh, you see. You remember, we came
across it last Sunday because in Romans 8:3, it says, “That God sent Jesus and he destroyed sin in
the flesh in Jesus.” Now sin in the flesh is just Peter’s action in the garden. It’s action and
attitudes within ourselves that are motivated by priorities of the body’s need for self preservation
and self gratification independent of what God wants.

Now I think some of us who are activist are prone to say, “Ah, that’s it! Sin in the flesh is
action and today’s study walking in the spirit is doing nothing, leaving it all up to God.” Well
no, you know Jesus did plenty. I mean, he healed lepers, he rebuked the religious leaders, and he
carried his own cross, and he turned over the tables of the money lenders. So walking in the spirit
is certainly action but sin in the flesh is action that is motivated by our own selfish desire for
things, for pleasure, for power, and influence. That’s what sin in the flesh is. It’s action and
attitude that is independent of God, that is for our own benefit, and is motivated by the old body’s
need for things, and for pleasure, and for security. That’s what sin in the flesh is and really
that’s what God is opposing in Jesus.

And going back to last Sunday’s verse, some of you may say, “Well, why did he destroy sin in the
flesh?” Well maybe you should look at the verse because some of us weren’t here last Sunday and
maybe you should get the continuity for today’s study, Romans 8:3 dear ones, it mentions this sin in
the flesh. Romans 8:3, “For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do: sending
his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh.” Some of us

may say, “Well, going back to that verse I mean, why did God have to condemn sin to destruction in
the flesh?” Well the answer is that we men and woman had been operating that way for so long over
so many centuries that we have actually managed to twist our own personalities so that they only
work that way.

That’s it. Somebody comes at us with a sword; we take out our sword and cut the ear off. We’ve been
operating that way so long that our personalities have become twisted and forced into a rut whereby
they always work from the body’s fear mechanism, or the body’s need for security mechanism, or the
body’s need for comfort and pleasure mechanism work from the outside in all the time. It’s been
going for centuries like that. You remember what happened with Cain and Abel way at the beginning.
Cain and Abel were two brothers, they brought two sacrifices to God but God judged that Cain’s heart
was not truly penitent and Abel’s was and so he refused Cain’s sacrifice. Cain, kind of casual
like, “Would you like to come out into the field with me Abel?” And then, just takes out his sword
and kills his brother. Then when God says to him, “Where is his brother?” He says, “Am I my
brother’s keeper?”

So that was from that early stage but loved ones, the whole race has been operating that way for
generations. So much so that we have developed personalities that are twisted so that’s the way
they automatically operate. So we try to do what God wants us to do but our whole personalities have
been rutted into that kind of activity for so long that they are now hopeless reversed and perverted
and the only way God can give us any chance to do what he wants is to destroy that old reverse
personality completely.

You’ll find the same line again, you know, and you’ll see yourself in this one, with Jacob you
remember Jacob and Esau? You remember Jacob had conned his brother Esau out of his inheritance as
an older brother. Then, years later he heard that Esau was coming with many, many men to meet him
and so look at Jacob’s action. If you look at it in Genesis 32:11, and first you see he tries to do
it the way God wants him to, he prays, “Deliver me, I pray thee, from the hand of my brother, from
the hand of Esau, for I fear him, lest he come and slay us all, the mothers with the children.” So
he did make the effort to do the thing right, to go to God first and say, “Lord, I did the wrong
thing in regard to my brother. Will you protect me now?”

But it’s like ourselves you know, we say a prayer and then we think, “We better stack the deck the
right way anyway just in case the prayer doesn’t work,” and you get it in Genesis 32:13. “So he
lodged there that night, and took from what he had with him a present for his brother Esau, two
hundred she-goats and twenty he-goats, two hundred ewes and twenty rams, thirty milch camels and
their colts, forty cows and ten bulls, twenty she-asses and ten he-asses. These he delivered into
the hand of his servants, every drove by itself, and said to his servants,” as usual you know our
own system becomes highly complicated, “Pass on before me, and put a space between drove and drove.’
He instructed the foremost, ‘When Esau my brother meets you, and asks you, ‘To whom do you belong?’”
And you can get our old system in it, we’re always manipulating and every time we manipulate
everybody has to say just the right word you know, “Don’t tell him it this way tell him it this
way.” “To whom do you belong? Where are you going? And whose are these before you? Then you
shall say, ‘They belong to your servant Jacob; they are a present sent to my lord Esau; and moreover
he is behind us.’ He likewise instructed the second and the third and all who followed the droves,
‘You shall say the same thing to Esau when you meet him, and you shall say, ‘Moreover your servant
Jacob is behind us.’ For he thought, ‘I may appease him with the present that goes before me, and
afterwards I shall see his face; perhaps he will accept me.’” That’s sin in the flesh.

Not necessarily doing anything wrong you see, sin in the flesh is not necessarily murdering people,
or committing adultery, or committing fornication. Sin in the flesh is just acting independent of
whether there’s a Creator or whether there is not a Creator, independent of what he wants from my
life or what he doesn’t want, but acting on the basis of the old body desires for pleasures,
security, and power over other people. That’s loved ones, what sin in the flesh is and the truth is
we have a human race have been acting that way so long that our personalities are hopelessly twisted
into that direction.

And so for God to get us to operate the other way he has to first of all deal with this miserable
twisted perverted personality. And you know, some of you know, the diagram but it’s a fast way I
think, of reminding you of it but that was the way our personalities were supposed to work there.
And it was God’s plan that we would always operate that way. We would operate by praying to him as
Jacob tried to in the beginning in asking God what he wanted. Then he would give us the life of his
Holy Spirit in communion with him and would, through the intuition of our spirits, guide us as to
what we should do and then our conscious would constrain our will on the basis of that guidance and
direct our mind and emotions so that they would understand God’s will for us.

Our emotions would experience the joy of doing it and we would pass it on through our bodies to the
world and express it through our bodies to the world. And that was God’s plan for us, that we would
operate that way. Now of course, we kept rejecting that, we kept acting as Cain did on the basis of
security, or jealousy, or pride, on the basis of Jacob his fear of his brother, on the basis of
Peter let’s get our own way, our own judgment is right in this instance and we began to operate the
personalities the other way completely. And so we began to be dominated by our minds and emotions
and they in turn were dominated of course from here by the needs of the body and we began to
concentrate on doing things that would give us enjoyment, that would give us control of other
people, that would exploit our flesh and give us a sense of thrill in that area.

And so our whole personalities have been reversed and perverted and now that’s why God destroyed sin
in the flesh. He took our whole personalities, put them into Jesus and destroyed that old
personality there and that’s really what that means. That that was the way we operated and God took
that personality that operated from the outside in from the body and its desires, and its needs, and
its necessities, and put it on the cross and destroyed it and raised us up as a new personality.
And that’s what God has done.

What we shared last day was that God has done that with every one of us. He has destroyed sin in
the flesh. He has destroyed that old personality that worked the wrong way around. In other words
really, he took Peter’s old desire to retaliate immediately somebody attacked him and he put it into
Jesus. And even though Jesus could have had any time called millions of angels to his aid yet when
the Roman soldier put the spear into his side he accepted it and refused to retaliate on the basis
of the needs of his own body and the desire of his own mind and emotions to protect himself. And in
doing that he destroyed Peter’s powerful retaliatory force inside his personality. And so he made
it possible for Peter to receive a new personality and that’s what he has done with each one of us.
He has taken that old personality of yours that has been used to operating the other way for years;
he has put it into Jesus and destroyed it there.

Now loved ones, here’s a question if Peter just believed that would he fulfill God’s will for his
life? That is, if Peter said, “Well, I believe that my old desire to retaliate was crucified with
Jesus. I believe that. Okay now Lord, does that satisfy you?” God would have to say, “No. I
destroyed your old contorted perverted personality so that you would be able to obey me. It’s not

enough for you to just believe that I removed this old personality that prevented you obeying me out
of the way. I have done that so you will obey me, so that you’ll take advantage of the new
personality I’ve given you. So that you’ll take advantage of the death of your old self and old
flesh in Jesus and you’ll begin to obey me. In other words, the reason I took your old perverted
personality and put it into Jesus and destroyed it was to stop you cutting off people’s ears. That
was why I did it. It wasn’t so you’d carry on saying as you took the 25th ear off, the 25th of the
high priest guard, ‘Oh well, I believe my personality has been destroyed in Jesus.’ No, I did it so
that you would stop cutting off ears and so that you would take advantage of the new personality
that I have given you.”

Now loved ones, many of us I think have a misapprehension about this. I think many of us think, “Oh
no, you’ve got it wrong. Jesus died to his desire to retaliate against the Roman soldiers. Jesus
destroyed my old selfish personality in himself and the perverted drive of my psychic and of my
spirit so that I would not have to do it myself. So Jesus fulfilled the law so that I do not have
to fulfill it.” Now loved ones, there are people down through the centuries that have been called
antinomians. Antinomians, anti and “nomos” is Greek for law and anti is against the law and there
have been people down through the years who have been antinomians and have said, “No, no Jesus
destroyed the selfish drive in himself and obeyed God’s law so I wouldn’t have to do it any longer.”
And they will say, you see, you don’t need to do anything. You just need to believe that your old
personality has been crucified with Jesus and that’s enough and you can do what you like then. You
can live how you please because the important thing is Jesus has fulfilled the law for you.

Now of course, it just contradicts the ideas of our own logic but it contradicts also this verse
loved ones, that we’re studying today so maybe you’d look at it and we’ll just take it word-by-word.
Romans 8:3-4, “For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do: sending his own
Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh.” For what purpose?
So that we would not have to do anything else but believe? No, “In order that the just requirement
of the law might be fulfilled in us,” that’s why God did it. God destroyed the old carnal reversed
personality that we have that has made it impossible for us to obey him; he destroyed that in Jesus
in order that the just requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us.

Now an antinomian would read that verse you see and say, “Oh no, the verse is wrong, the Greek is
wrong. The word is not in; it is in order that the just requirement of the law might be fulfilled
for us.” No, it’s that the just requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us. You can’t go home
and lose your temper with your wife. You can’t go home and tell lies about the missed assignment
and say, “It’s okay, Jesus has fulfilled that law for me so I don’t need to fulfill it.” The fact
is loved ones; Jesus wants to fulfill the law in you not for you. What Jesus did for you was to die
for you so that God could take your miserable perverted personality, put it into Jesus and destroy
it there and make a new beautiful personality available to you that was adapted for God’s original
purpose of working according to his judgment and by his power.

That’s what Jesus did for you, but he did that for you so that the righteous requirement of the law
might be fulfilled in you. And I think some of us you see, who have been brought up maybe under a
kind of antinomian teaching, we will react and say, “Ah, that’s work righteousness. You’re saying
we have to do something, we have to do something.” Well no, not really loved ones, it’s the passive
voice you see. The verb is in the passive voice there in Romans 8:4, “In order that the just
requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us.” In other words, I’m right with you. You have no
more power to obey God’s law after your old self has been destroyed in Jesus than before it was
destroyed. You can’t obey God’s law yourself it has to be fulfilled in you by the Holy Spirit of

Jesus.

So it’s the Holy Spirit of Jesus that obeys the law but he does obey it in you. So you know you
can’t afford to say to your mum or your dad, “Yeah, yeah I know I lost my temper but it’s okay Jesus
in some ephemeral place in the seventh heaven is obeying the law for me and it doesn’t matter what I
am doing down here.” Because your mum and dad have every right to say, “No, no, the teaching is
that Jesus is obeying it in you. And if he’s obeying it in you it’s probably that I’ll be able to
perceive it.” And so Jesus’ Spirit fulfills the law in us.

But that’s the purpose of it loved ones, that we would express and let Jesus express his obedience
to the law through us. And that’s why God destroyed that old perverted self, so that the law might
be fulfilled in us. Really, what we’ve to do is let him. So it’s a wee bit like somebody buying
you a new electric carving knife for Christmas. And you put it up on the shelf and you have the old
knife and you take it and you just throw it out into the garbage bin and you realize no more sawing.
Then you sit there and you say, “Well, I believe that old knife has been thrown out and I believe I
have a perfectly new knife that will enable me to cut just efficiently and just with absolute
freedom and relaxation. I believe it.” And you just look at the old roast sitting there and you
expect any minute to see it falling into slices. And it doesn’t matter how much you believe, it
doesn’t matter how much you believe the old knife has been thrown away and you’ve got a new knife,
if you just keep believing and sitting there that meat will never be cut.

That’s one mistake I think some of us make. We say, “Oh, it’s enough just to believe that my old
personality is gone.” It’s not enough. You have to take advantage of the new personality that is
there. On the other hand, there’s no point either in getting the carving knife down, sticking the
knife in and going to it just sawing back and forward the way you used to in the old days with the
old knife because it’s just going to be as hard as ever. There’s no point in doing what you used to
do to get the meat cut, and yet you do have to do something.

You don’t have to do what you used to do with the old knife but you do have to do something. You
have to flick the switch. So it’s not right to say, “We don’t have to do anything.” It is right to
say, “We don’t have to do what we used to do. We don’t have to saw that old meat the way we used
to.” But we do have to flick the knife. Otherwise, the power that is available there will never do
its work as it was meant to. And loved ones, it’s the same with us. Your dead right if you’re
having trouble obeying God, you’re dead right when you say, “I can’t. I can’t.” You’re right.
Your old personality has been so used to acting from the outside and from the needs of the body
inside that unless you get rid of that old selfish reverse personality you won’t be able to obey
God’s law at all.

But the important thing to see is once you believe that it has been destroyed and that there is a
new personality available to you in Jesus, then you do have to flick the switch. You do have to let
the Spirit of Jesus begin to run your life. So it’s right, you don’t have the old legalistic
concentration on every jot and tittle of the law to make sure, “I don’t go wrong here, I don’t go
wrong there.” You don’t have to legalistically try to fulfill the law like that but you do have to
do something, you have to let the Holy Spirit of Jesus begin to operate in your life. And that of
course often means letting him express love through your body to somebody else instead of exploiting
somebody else’s body for the sake of your own.

It does mean that you have to often be content with experiencing just the joy of letting Jesus’ life
flow through you and stop looking for more and more enjoyment from circumstances, and situations,

and other people. It does mean you’ll have to be content for your mind to concentrate on
understanding God’s will and God’s plan for you instead of using your mind to control and manipulate
other people for your own purposes. So it does mean letting the Spirit of Jesus flow through you
and that means rejecting once and for all the old reverse personality that has been crucified with
him.

And loved ones, do you see how you do that in Romans 8:4, “In order that the just requirement of the
law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.”
That’s how you flick the switch, by walking not according to the flesh but according to the spirit.
By walking not according to this direction from the outside in but according to this direction from
the inside out beginning at last to give up concentrating on the law and obeying it and avoiding sin
and begin instead to pay attention to this dear new friend that is inside you called the Holy
Spirit.

And when he tells you to speak, to speak; when he tells you to turn, to turn; when he tells you to
be silent, to be silent; and to start listening to him and running your life by this Holy Spirit.
And then one day you’ll glance around and you’ll suddenly find to your surprise that the just
requirements of the law are being fulfilled in your life and you never thought about fulfilling them
you’ve just been so busy concentrating on this Holy Spirit. Now that’s God’s plan for us.

What I’d like to spend the next seven weeks doing is talking about how to walk after the Spirit and
not walk after the flesh. But that’s the secret, walking after the Spirit. That’s how to come into
victory and deliverance. So will you think loved ones, of some of those things and just see if
there has been some misunderstanding in your own mind or some deception that Satan has brought and
just get it straight in your own heart so that we can really get down to business these next couple
of months and talk about how to walk after the Spirit and not walking after the flesh. Let us pray.

Dear Father, we thank you that you have done all in Jesus’ death that needs to be done. We thank
you Lord that you did it so that you would be able to see your law fulfilled in our lives. So that
our friends would be able to meet people who are kind, and gentle, and loving, and understanding,
people who are free from that jealousy and anger, critical resentment. So Father, we trust you now
to make it clear to us that you have done everything that was needed to change our personalities and
we can afford to trade that old personality in now for the new one that you have given us in Jesus.

And Father, we know that old personality has been crucified and done away with forever and we know
that this new one will work only as we follow this dear Holy Spirit that you have given us. So Holy
Spirit, we would give ourselves to following you and walking after you in these coming days. And we
know that incidentally as a result of that we will end up fulfilling the law. Dear Father, we trust
you to make all these truths real in each one of us in these coming days for Jesus’ glory, Amen.

Gift of the Holy Spirit

Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill

There is someone called Bob here this morning who wrote me a letter and in it he said, “You’ve been
saying that the Holy Spirit is a ‘dynamic’ and what do you mean by a ‘dynamic?’” So I’d like to try
and talk about that loved ones. I’d point out to you that “dynamic” is not only an adjective but is
a noun and in the dictionary it means “an energizing or motivating force”.

You remember, during the first part of August, we talked about the general problem that all of us
have in our own personal lives. The problem is we have evil desires within us and we lack often
good desires that we would like to have. That’s exactly what Paul said in Romans 7:15, “I do not do
what I want. [There are times when I want to feel good desires and I can’t feel them] but I do the
very thing I hate. [There are evil desires within me that I am not able to control].” And you
remember, we shared at the beginning of August that most of us deal with these inner desires or
motivations within in the same way as we deal with a headache — we try to deal with the symptoms.
We take an aspirin to try and cut off the nervous system that connects up the pain with our
perception of the pain.

We do the same with these desires. We try to bring in external compulsions that will make us do
good. In secular business, we do it by offering incentives to the salesman to sell more. Really,
the ideal would be that he would want to get up and get out every morning and just sell for the joy
of selling, but he doesn’t find that, so we offer other incentives, promotion, or commissions to
make him do it. We, on the whole, deal with our own personal lives the same way. loved ones. We
hold carrots out to each other to make us do the good that we don’t feel comes naturally from within
us. So I’d ask you to look at your own lives and see do your own lives not operate that same way?
Why do you get up in the morning? It would be nice to say, “Oh, just because I love to get up in
the morning,” but often it’s because of fear of what the boss will say if we don’t get up, or it’s
because of fear of what our wives will say if we don’t get up.

It’s the same with the evil desires that we have. We tend on the whole not to be able to get rid of
them from within so we try to use external compulsions from without to hold them down. So, many of
us are not caught like Allan Howe [U.S. Congressman] because of fear of society. That’s why we
don’t get caught in the red light district of Salt Lake City, because of the fear of what other
people will think or what other people will say. Many of us hold down a great many of our evil
desires because of fear of what other people will say or because we have been brought up to respect
certain standards. It’s not that we feel naturally free of these evil desires, but we have all
kinds of inhibitions that we use to hold them down.

Now of course, that’s why so many of us are just wild neurotics, or we’re on the version of becoming
a wild neurotic, or we are a kind of semi-sophisticated civilized being that has tremendous internal
conflict within that we cannot get rid of. That’s why loved ones, most of us do not deal with that
failure inside us to have good motivations and that presence inside us of many bad motivations.
Most of us don’t deal with those inside at all. We simply control them or we limit them, or we
discipline them by all kinds of external compulsions. Of course, that’s the tremendous conflict
that keeps hitting — it just rings us dry. Many of us here, I’m sure, are run dry in one area or
another because we are a battlefield of EXTERNAL compulsion trying to control and INTERNAL
motivating force. It is hideous. That’s why we often feel we are a “Jekyll and Hyde”.

Now, God knows that and that’s why when he allowed his son to die on Calvary — though it was just a
death apparently of a political criminal on this space-time continuum yet in the cosmic world of
reality where time and space do not exist. The Father who made us put us into his son on Calvary
and destroyed there all the selfish perverted personality that has produced these strong evil
desires of ours. That’s what God did. He actually did that loved ones. That’s the only way to get
rid of those things. Not all the drugs in the world, not all the transcendental meditation in the
world and not all the power of positive thinking in the world can deal with those evil desires
because they themselves are only a product of a personality that is perverted, that has determined
to live on dependence on the world for its security, significance, and success. That’s where all
the problem comes from.

Now God put all that in Jesus and destroyed it there and recreated us anew by giving us HIS dynamic.
The dynamic that makes God God. The dynamic that makes God a loving father is the Holy Spirit.
That’s the energizing and motive force that makes God the kind of person he is. Now loved ones,
Jesus came to earth to destroy the evil desires in us once and for all and to give us this Holy
Spirit. That’s why he’s called the HOLY Spirit. He’s a spirit of holiness. He’s a spirit that
makes us like God. To be holy is to be like God. It’s not first an ethical concept you know,
strangely enough. Holiness is not first an ethical concept. It does become that in connection with
society but it’s first and foremost somebody like God. That’s what holiness is. The Holy Spirit is
a spirit of supernatural life that makes you like God from within. Of course it solves all that
chaos inside and that’s why Jesus came.

Now many of us here believe all that you see. Many of us here believe all that and that’s the first
great watershed that separates some of us from the others here this morning. Some of us really
believe that — but that’s all we do, we just believe it. We are like those demons that are
mentioned in James 2:19. We read it before but it might be good just to remind yourselves that this
degree of belief is mentioned in scripture and yet is inadequate.

James 2:19, “You believe that God is one; you do well. Even the demons believe and shudder.” Now a
lot of us do that. A lot of us say, “Oh, you mean God has destroyed all that is evil in me in
Jesus? Great, that means he has nothing against me?” “Right!” “That means he has forgiven me?”
“Right!” “Oh, good — I’m clear!” And that’s where we stay. Loved ones, hundreds of us live in
that – now, you know they do, dear ones. You know because I lived in that for years and felt I was
a Christian. I believed that that’s what had happened and therefore there was no reason why God
should have anything against me, which is all right, and that he had forgiven me my sins, which is
right. What I didn’t see was that BELIEVING is not enough — that even the demons believe all that
and they shudder because they won’t let it be made real in their own lives. It’s not BELIEVING that
enables you to become a child of God — it is RECEIVING. It’s receiving.

Would you like to look at that? It’s John 1:12, and this is one of the first distinctions, loved
ones, between two groups of us this morning that some of us “believe” and some of us “receive”.
John 1:12, “But to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children
of God.” “To all who received him.” And that’s what old Peter said in that Pentecost day. They
asked him, “What will we do?” And he said in Acts 2:38, “Be baptized in the name of Jesus for the
remission of your sins and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.”

In order to receive the gift of the Holy Spirit, you have to not only believe that you were
crucified with Christ but you have to actually reckon yourself dead indeed unto sin and alive to God
in Christ Jesus. You actually have to be willing for that to be made real in your life. Only then

are you able to receive the Holy Spirit. Now loved ones, could I just stress that just the last
time because I know many of you just know it off by heart — but loved ones, you will not be able to
receive the Holy Spirit unless you are willing for the crucifixion which took place on Calvary to be
made real in you.

Now dear ones, it may not be complete in you or you may still be smoking or you may still be losing
your temper, but if you enter into the position where you say, “Lord God, I know that Jesus did not
die instead of me. I know he died and I died with him and Lord, I’m willing for that to be made
real in me. I ask you by the power of your Holy Spirit to bring me into the same death to self and
death to my own will and my own way that Jesus experienced.” Loved ones, God will send the spirit
of his son into your heart and that’s what becoming a Christian is, receiving the Spirit of Jesus
into you.

Even when that dear Holy Spirit first comes in he will bring something of Jesus to you. That’s what
the Bible says, the Holy Spirit will take of the things of Jesus and impart them to you. [1
Corinthians 2:13] Now that’s why a person who becomes a Christian experiences a real change because
they receive a new energizing and motive force within them so that they find new attitudes coming up
from inside them. Now, that’s what that means in John 16:14 loved ones, if you’d like to look at
it. John 16:14, “He will glorify me, for he will take what is mine and declare it to you.” The
Greek word for “declare” actually means “impart or share”. So “he will take what is mine and share
it with you” — and that’s what the Holy Spirit does for a person who takes that step of
identification with Jesus in his death and willingness to obey the Holy Spirit.

Now then, another great watershed takes place because the Holy Spirit begins to want to spread his
life in you. That’s why I said to you we shouldn’t be surprised if we grow out of this auditorium.
I think we should be concerned if we don’t outgrow it. really — because the Holy Spirit always
expands, you see. He’s always moving out. You remember the way Jesus went into the highways and the
byways to bring people to come into the marriage feast? Now the Holy Spirit is always doing that.
He’s always acting. He’s always going out looking for dear sheep — and so that’s what the Holy
Spirit does in you.

So he begins, you remember, the house illustration we used. He begins to try to find his way into
every area of your life. Now some of us just say, “Stop there! Wait a minute! Holy Spirit, I’ve
given you my Christian religious life, and my inner life, but I can’t give you my business life, and
my social life and my sex life. I can’t give you everything. And I do have a life to get on with,
you know. I mean, there are limits!” Many of us say that loved ones. Many of us say, “Holy Spirit,
I’m willing for you to bring some truth to me but I’m not willing to give my whole life for Jesus’
glory. I have a lot of other things, you know, that I have to take care of and I better get on with
them myself.”

So many of us say, “No” to the Holy Spirit and we come into the position, loved ones, that Paul
talks about in Galatians 3:3, you remember, looking at it before probably. Many of us come into
that attitude, Galatians 3:3, “Are you so foolish,” he says to the Galatians, “having begun with
the Spirit, are you now ending with the flesh?” And many of us come into that spot, you see — the
Holy Spirit begins to say to us, “Are you willing for people to criticize you and to put you down
and yet to be satisfied with that?” And the flesh gets up — the flesh is the independent
personality that wants its own way — and it says, “No, I’m not. I’m not prepared for that at all.”
We grieve the Holy Spirit once there.

His voice is a little fainter the next time. He says, “Will you start reading the scripture again
each morning before you go out to work?” And we say, “Well, I’ll try.” But we don’t do it. And
his voice is fainter the next time and it’s not long before we become just BELIEVERS. You can call
us Christians if you like — it’s questionable if we are at all. We become part of that great group
of church-goers who believe it all, but aren’t like Jesus at all.

Now there are others of us who, when we come to this great watershed say, “Yeah, Lord I want
everything. I want your death to expand through every part of my life and Holy Spirit, whether I’m
a bank clerk, or whether I’m a shopkeeper, or whether I’m a businessman, or whether I’m a housewife,
Holy Spirit I want to go for Jesus. That’s the only one I care for, THAT’S the person I’m going to
live for for the rest of my life. Holy Spirit, change me whatever way you want. Make me like
Jesus.” And we take that attitude and we say, “You can do whatever you want to me.” The Holy
Spirit expands through all our personalities — and loved ones, he begins to change us completely
and to bring in a whole new set of motivating powers within us.

They’re all different kinds. In the Old Testament the Holy Spirit was talked of in terms of the oil
that was poured on the prophets, and the priests and the kings when they were anointed for their
office. They poured oil on them and the oil is regarded as the symbol of the Holy Spirit in the Old
Testament. The oil or the ointment that was put on them had certain effects and those are the
effects that the Holy Spirit has miraculously for those of us who surrender completely to live for
Jesus’ glory. It is miraculous, really, loved ones.

Here’s one of the effects in John 12:3 and some of you know these examples — we’ve looked at them
before. This is part of what it means when we talk about the Holy Spirit as a dynamic in your life.
He brings about attitudes within you that are foreign to you and that you cannot produce yourself.
John 12:3, an example of oil or ointment and the effect it has, “Mary took a pound of costly
ointment of pure nard and anointed the feet of Jesus and wiped his feet with her hair; and the house
was filled with the fragrance of the ointment.” When you allow the Holy Spirit to fill you
completely he fills your life with a fragrance of Jesus that is supernatural and that no one else
can imitate.

It is not the “sweetie sweetness” of the pseudo Christian. It is not the “I wouldn’t hurt a fly” of
the one who is pretending to be a Christian. It is the strong sweet fragrance of Jesus himself.
Your soul becomes a garden of spices. Your conscious becomes a delight to you and not a smell in
your nostrils. You yourself become a delight in the office where you work. You become a pleasure
in the church where you worship. You become a blessing in the home where you live. Loved ones, it
is a supernatural fragrance that the Holy Spirit brings upon you and brings into your life. It’s a
beauty that no man can create and no woman can create. It’s a supernatural fragrance.

I’ll tell you where it comes from. It comes directly from Jesus himself. The Holy Spirit takes the
fragrance of Jesus’ own life and creates that fragrance miraculously in you so that no longer do you
find you’re constantly arguing with people in the office to try and persuade them to be Christians.
No longer are you coming to church and saying, “Do I agree with that? Do I agree with that?” — but
there’s a beauty and a fragrance in your life that is the most precious thing to you and everything
else is a detail after that.

Oil was used in the old days to strengthen the body. Those who allow themselves to be filled with
the Holy Spirit find that they have supernatural strength. Many of us are good at this, “How are
ya?” “Oh, I’m doing fairly well, bearing up you know, bravely carrying the cross.” — and

everybody knows it. Everybody knows it. Our loved ones know it at home. Our friends know it.
Everybody knows what brave suffering soldiers we are. Loved ones, when the Holy Spirit fills your
life you’re able to bear unbearable sufferings and pain with absolute joy and with effortlessness —
and in a way that isn’t masochistic. You’re actually even able to enjoy and glory in the things
that you’re suffering for Jesus’ sake.

Now that’s what you get when you look at old Paul. If you’d just glance in 2 Corinthians 12:7-10.
It’s just a different kind of human being that this dear Holy Spirit creates. 2 Corinthians
12:7-10, “And to keep me from being too elated by the abundance of revelations, a thorn was given me
in the flesh, a messenger of Satan, to harass me, to keep me from being too elated. Three times I
besought the Lord about this, that it should leave me; but he said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient
for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.’ I will all the more gladly boast of my
weaknesses, that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For the sake of Christ, then, I am content
with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities; for when I am weak, then I am
strong.” Now loved ones, the Holy Spirit does that. He changes the power, and strength and ability
you have to endure pain and hardship.

Those of us who have been involved in athletics at all know at times they used to use oil in the old
days just to make the old joints supple and flexible. Now, when the Holy Spirit comes and fills a
person’s life that’s the kind of personality he gives them. Suddenly they’re flexible and supple.
Suddenly they can become all things to all men. Before you’re filled with the Holy Spirit you drag
yourself to pray, you drag yourself to church, you drag yourself to witness, you drag yourself to
talk about God –but after being filled with the Holy Spirit you can be whatever Jesus wants you to
be wherever you are.

I don’t know how often you find yourself in the position where your dear wife or your dear friend
needed something said to them — not a rebuke at all, but something loving, something that was just
right for them. You knew there was a dear broken bleeding heart in there and you knew you had to
say something to speak to it. You know how you felt: clumsiness, awkwardness, all the difficulties
and the frustrations of your own personality that you’ve inherited from your mums and dads, and you
just couldn’t bring it out.

Loved ones, how many times have we husbands and wives sat across from each other and failed to say
the thing that needed to be said? But loved ones, those of us who live together in houses and
rooms, those of us who live together in dorms, those of us who work with each other in the office,
how often have we found that our business attitude and our business behavior prevented us suddenly
opening out and being Jesus to a certain person? Loved ones, that’s because that is a miraculous
result of the Holy Spirit in you. The Holy Spirit fills you with that flexibility when you’re at
last willing to live for Jesus and for his glory alone.

There are other things that you can get just symbolically from the oil in the Old Testament. The
oil in the Old Testament was made up of different ingredients. There was one ingredient that was
called myrrh. It was probably the kind of thing that the men brought to Jesus when he was first
born. Myrrh is used to ease the pain and take the soreness out of a bruise. Before you’re filled
with the Holy Spirit somebody insults you or criticizes you, or puts you down, and you cry yourself
to sleep that night, or you bravely bear it but you know you have received a mortal wound.
Courageously, you overcome it or, as old Plato said, “You at least blot the face out of your memory
that created that pain in you.” But loved ones, when the Holy Spirit fills you with himself he
takes all the soreness out of those bruises and you can walk through the days in the office, and

people can say all kinds of things and can criticize you, and put you down, and can talk behind your
back, and there’s a peace and a freedom from resentment.

Loved ones, it’s true. Don’t sit there and say, “Ah brother, you mean you overcome resentment?”
No, there is no resentment – really, really. Now don’t tone it down. Don’t dilute it. There is no
resentment. The Holy Spirit takes away the soreness of the bruise. In fact, really in a way, you
feel like pitying them because you know you’ve been crucified in Christ and they aren’t doing it to
you they’re doing it to that old dead person that used to be and you feel like saying, “Look, don’t
kick that old dead horse you’ll hurt your foot!”

It just brings loved ones a miraculous detachment from yourself. You see, it’s ourselves we’re
bound up with. We’re always protecting our miserable selves. We’re always defending our miserable
selves because we think that’s it, that’s it. Loved ones, it isn’t. That old self was destroyed as
it needed to be thousands of years ago on Calvary but you cannot make that real by manipulation of
your thoughts. You can only allow the Holy Spirit to make it real miraculously in you. He takes
the soreness out of all the bruises.

Another of the ingredients was calamus. Calamus was used to counteract the acids and take the
sourness out of the stomach. I don’t know, but before the Holy Spirit fills you you’re always kind
of looking out, “Yeah well Billy Graham, yeah he’s okay there, but he’s wrong there. Yeah, and my
friend that neighbor, well she’s okay on that but she’s wrong on that. And this other person yeah,
they’re quite nice but they’re a wee bit critical, aren’t they?” You’re always seeing the little
things that are wrong in others. You see these apparent saints walking by seeing no harm in
anybody, and for a while, we argue they’re dumb. They just can’t see what’s really in front of
their eyes.

But loved ones, when the Holy Spirit fills you with himself he takes the sourness out of your
stomach, removes all the acid and you never have met a sourpuss. He never allows you to see the
sourpuss in others. He enables you always to see the Jesus in other people — now that’s true,
loved ones. Don’t say, “Ah Pastor, you mean you see the wrong thing but the Holy Spirit enables you
not to notice it?” No, no. The Holy Spirit gives you clean eyes, gives you a pure heart, gives you
a stomach that is clear of any acidity or sourness and enables you to meet other people for the
beautiful people that they are in Jesus. Loved ones, that’s a miracle.

I don’t know about you but I tried psychology and auto suggestion for a long time trying to control
the old mind because I believed these were the right things to do. Most of us do, don’t we? We all
agree that’s the right way to live. For a long time I tried to do it myself, but you can’t. It’s a
result of the Holy Spirit. That’s part of what it means when we say the Holy Spirit is a “dynamic”,
he’s a motivating and energizing power that changes you completely and enables you to be different
inside.

Another one is cinnamon. Cinnamon was a spice that was used to stimulate and to motivate and to
produce effortless activity. That’s what the Holy Spirit does. When you sit worn out and weary and
tired or utterly made passive by depression and you just can’t get this heavy body up to do
anything, loved ones, that’s the way life is until the fullness of the Holy Spirit brings that
stimulating effortlessness that makes nothing a problem or a trouble. You know how different it is
to have a person who is always willing to do anything that you ask the them to do. It’s entirely
different, isn’t it? In fact, you also know some people that if they have to do something outside
their ordinary job they haven’t time, “Everything’s on top of me”. They’re always complaining.

Everything is always down on them. They can never do anything but just manage through to the end of
the day and creep into bed and fall asleep.

Loved ones, that’s the way we are without this dear Holy Spirit who produces an effortless strength
in you and enables you to always have energy for whatever God allows you to be asked to do — of
course, that’s the secret. What we fail to realize is that if we’re asked to do something it is
because God has allowed it to be asked us. What we normally do is we try to judge for ourselves.
So it’s the whole difference between lumpish, awkward, heavy, people and people who are light and
effortless as a feather. The Holy Spirit brings that, loved ones, and you can trust him for that.

That’s why we talk about the Holy Spirit as a dynamic. You remember when Jesus said, “You shall
receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you.” The Greek word is “dunamis” and the “u”
changes to a “y” in English and becomes “dynamite”. That’s what “dunamis” is. That’s what the
power of the Holy Spirit is — it’s a dynamite that produces a new life in you that is utterly and
absolutely different. Now loved ones, that’s what God does — he gives you that Holy Spirit and
fills you with that Holy Spirit as long as you will continue to regard the Holy Spirit as your Lord
and master and obey him moment-by-moment and day-by-day. The truth in Acts 5:32 is true, God gives
the Holy Spirit “to those who obey” — and that’s it — not to those who are trying to obey, but
those who say, “Holy Spirit, I’m going to obey you whatever the cost, even if it means Calvary. I
thank you that it has meant Calvary for me.” That’s it loved ones — it’s a supernatural life.

Somebody said a couple of weeks ago, “Ah, another sermon on the Holy Spirit?” But actually, you
could go on for five or six weeks and I hope to go on for the next 40 years — no 80 years. I’m
going for 120 — because he is the precious gift, loved ones, that our Creator has prepared for us.
Oh I pray that you’ll see it that way and you’ll see that why God has given us supernatural
standards is because he has given us a supernatural power to reach those standards. That’s God’s
plan and so let us never lower the standards, but let us never take our eyes off this precious gift.

What do you need to do to receive him? Acts 5:32, “God gives the Holy Spirit to those who obey.”
All you need to do is bow your head in a moment and say, “Lord, I need that kind of life and I am
willing to do whatever you, Holy Spirit, tell me to do if you’ll bring me into God’s will for my
life.” That’s it. The Holy Spirit then will give you some direction, even this afternoon. Loved
ones, watch out because it will probably be so utterly contradictory to your normal way of life that
you’ll have a tendency to say, “No, no, I won’t do it!” But do it, do it. If you say to me, “What
if it’s not the Holy Spirit?” The Holy Spirit will check you before you get too far out on a limb.
If you read the Bible every day and you continue to fellowship with other loved ones in Jesus you
won’t get away out after some evil spirit. You can afford to trust that dear voice. So really,
that’s the secret loved ones. Anybody here could begin that kind of life this very moment —
really.

Shall we pray?
Holy Spirit, we do believe that you’re real because you have created the church, and with the church
the first hospitals, and the first schools, and all the civilization that has come to this dear old
broken world. Holy Spirit, most of all, you have created this Bible and made the life of Jesus
possible and we have seen you reproduce that life in others here. Holy Spirit, we would ask you to
come in and change our lives. Holy Spirit, all of us here may not know all the details but will you
tell us them — will you show us? We may not know everything that’s involved in being crucified
with Christ, but Holy Spirit, we ask, will you show us what that means in our lives? Holy Spirit,

if this is our Creator’s plan for us, that we will be filled with you and be governed by you as the
dynamic in our lives, then that’s what we want. So we commit ourselves to obeying you as our Lord
and Master in the same way that the disciples obeyed Jesus. Holy Spirit, we tell you we’re going to
put our faith in you and we’re going to expect to hear you either verbally through someone else, or
through the reading that we’ll do, or Holy Spirit, through an attitude inside us, or an impression,
or desire within us that makes us feel that we should do something this afternoon. Holy Spirit, we
commit ourselves to obeying that, whatever it is, and we trust you to grow in us as we obey you more
and more — and as we surrender more and more, Holy Spirit, will you fill us more and more until
we’re a replica of Jesus Christ and we’re a delight to our friends, and to our relatives, and to our
colleagues? We ask this for your glory, amen.

Ultimate Intention of the Holy Spirit

Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill

Lord Jesus, we trust you to explain these things to us yourself so that we can believe them with all
certainty and so that we can enter into all that you have provided through your counselor, the Holy
Spirit for us. We ask this in your name and for your glory, Amen.

It’s good dear ones, to see what God’s ultimate intention for us is. And I think you can find that
in Ephesians 1 there and reading just Verse 9 and Verse 11. Even Verse 9 and 10 reveals it clearly.
Ephesians 1:9-10, “For he has made known to us in all wisdom and insight the mystery of his will,
according to his purpose which he set forth in Christ as a plan for the fullness of time, to unite
all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth. In him, according to the purpose of him
who accomplishes all things according to the counsel of his will, we who first hoped in Christ have
been destined and appointed to live for the praise of his glory.”

It is dear ones, God’s will for us to become conformed completely to the image of his son Jesus so
that there will rise up on the earth here a great body of his sons. And all of us, you see, will be
different limbs of his body so that Jesus will look down upon the earth and will see another
reflection of himself rising up in the earth. And that this reflection of himself will be exactly
like him. And that eventually this great body of sons, this great body of brothers and sisters to
our Lord Jesus, will rise up and bring glory to the Father the same as the original son brought
glory to him. And that in its turn, that revelation of the sons of God that we talk about, in its
turn, is to bring us into the very family of the father heart of God.

I think we should be careful; some of us dear ones talk about the revelation of the sons of God as
if that was an end in itself. Well it’s not. That in its turn is only a step on the way to our
entering into the trinity love that the trinity family share with one another, until we enter into
the very Father heart of God and become a part of that dear blessed family. And so we will reflect
the glory of God among ourselves and up to him and he will reflect it back down to us. So it is
God’s will that we’ll become completely like Jesus.

You remember God made two provisions for that, they’re in Acts 2:38. It’s the first Christian
sermon that was ever preached, “And Peter said to them, ‘Repent, and be baptized every one of you in
the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins.’” That’s the first provision that he
made, that we could be restored into the favor of God. And then the second provision is, “And you
shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.” And that’s the second provision that we might be
restored into the very image of God and into the very image of his son.

Now last night we talked about the inward work that the gift of the Holy Spirit accomplishes in our
hearts. That’s the inward work, dear ones of, if you like, the baptism of the Holy Spirit. Now,
dear ones, if you rebel against that and shout out a Pentecostal shout and say, “Ah, no that isn’t a
baptism with the Holy Spirit.” You must remember that Peter looked back on the day of Pentecost you
remember in Acts 15:9, and he looked back on that day when we believe the apostles were baptized
with the Holy Spirit.

And he did not look back and say, “Well, on that day we received the gift of tongues.” But he
looked back and said, in Acts 15:8-9, “And God who knows the heart bore witness to them,” these
gentiles, “Giving them the Holy Spirit just as he did to us,” in parenthesis, on the day of

Pentecost, “And he made no distinction between us and them, but cleansed their hearts by faith.”
And so Peter says that one of the things that happened with the baptism of the Holy Spirit was an
inward cleansing of our hearts so that we could be renewed in the image of Jesus. And that inward
cleansing of the Holy Spirit begets in us the fruit of the Holy Spirit.

Now dear ones, it is important to see that the baptism of the Holy Spirit had an outward effect on
their lives in regard to their service. So you see there are two sides to the baptism of the Holy
Spirit. There is an inward cleansing through the Holy Spirit applying the work of the cross to our
own lives and the death to self. But there is an outward baptism with the Holy Spirit by which the
Holy Spirit gives us gifts and power for service. And I think it’s necessary to see both of those.

In other words, it’s necessary to see that Jesus would have put forth a very poor revelation of his
Father if he had not been able to perform miracles. The ability to perform miracles in Jesus’ life
was a vital part of the revelation of God. You can find that in Acts 2:22. It’s referred to there
by Peter. It was a necessary part of the proof that Jesus was the son of God and it was what Peter
used on that Pentecost sermon. “Men of Israel, hear these words: Jesus of Nazareth, a man attested
to you by God with mighty works and wonders and signs which God did through him in your midst, as
you yourselves know.” Jesus would not have been the revelation of God if he had not been able to do
many might works, and wonders, and signs.

And it was so with the group of people that were called his body. They were the body of Christ not
only because they shared the very inner pure cleansed heart of Christ but because they also were
able to do the same many might works, and wonders, and signs. So would you look at one of the
members of the body doing this in Acts 3:12? Peter was asked for alms and the Holy Spirit had
baptized him with power and so he stretched forth his hand and said, “Silver and gold have I none
but what I have…” (“I know I have because the Holy Spirit has baptized me with this power.”)
“…and what I have I give to thee.” And in Verse 12, Peter says, when Peter saw that the people
were moved and they clung to him, “He addressed the people, ‘Men of Israel, why do you wonder at
this, or why do you stare at us, as though by our own power or piety we had made him walk? The God
of Abraham and of Isaac and of Jacob, the God of our fathers, glorified his servant Jesus, whom you
delivered up and denied in the presence of Pilate, when he had decided to release him.” And he
says, “It was by Jesus’ power that this man was raised up.”

In other words, the early church had the same power and the same gifts as Jesus himself had
otherwise the early church could not have been called his body. And dear ones, the early church had
the power to stop believers in their track with a mighty sign so that they stopped and thought. Now
throughout our world today there are many churches who are trying to be the body of Jesus and the
non-believers know that they are not the body of Jesus because the only power they have is the power
of ministers who are trained in pastoral psychology. The only power they have is the power of the
doctors whom the churches send out to the mission fields. But it is human, fleshly power. And they
do not manifest the power that the Lord Jesus had. And so the believer respects these churches, and
goes to them, and uses them for his own convenience but does not believe that they are the body of
Christ.

And it is not God’s will that a church should work in such powerlessness. It is God’s will that the
body, the church, the body of Christ, should glorify him by a pure heart and power and service. And
so dear ones, the Holy Spirit gives us the power for serving God in his way by bestowing on us the
gifts of the Holy Spirit.

Now we do violence to the Holy Spirit if we enter into the death to self and then say to him, “Not
the gifts, Holy Spirit. We do not want the gifts.” It’s the same as the Pentecostals saying, “We
want the tongues, Holy Spirit, but we do not want the purity.” Each of those attitudes is a
reaction against the Holy Spirit and they grieve the Holy Spirit. And therefore, he begins to
withdraw from the life.

So dear ones, you know what has happened, many of us have entered into an experience of
sanctification or deliverance from inward sin and we have refused to go on into what the Holy Spirit
had to give us in gifts. And so we know we have sunk back into legalism. So it wasn’t long after
the Holy Spirit graciously cleansed my heart that he began to ask me to do things that I was not
able to do with the natural power that I had and so I was not able to obey him. And I knew that if
I could not obey him then he would withdraw from my heart. So I then began to seek him and say,
“Holy Spirit if you’ve told me to do these things you must be able to give me the power to do them.”
And so it wasn’t long after that the Holy Spirit revealed to me that he was able to give me the
gifts of the spirit.

And so dear ones, it’s almost – well, I think it’s essential after you’ve entered into the inward
cleansing of the heart through the Holy Spirit that you show your willingness to be led by the Holy
Spirit on into the gifts of the spirit. And you see the holiness groups on one side and the
Pentecostal groups on the other side have both grieved the Holy Spirit in many ways. The holiness
groups have said, “We won’t have the gifts. We don’t want anything to do with them because of their
fleshly administration we’ve seen in them.” And the Pentecostals say, “We don’t want holiness
because you say that the cleansing of the heart is what the baptism of the spirit is and that alone
and we believe that it gives power.” And it is God’s will for us to know that the baptism of the
Holy Spirit is an inward cleansing of the heart from sin so that we will obey God continually and
then it is an outward bestowal of power through the gifts of the spirit. But dear ones, we grieve
the spirit if we refuse to enter into one or the other.

Now, I think it is important to see that Paul says clearly – well, you could look at 1 Corinthians
13 dear ones, if you like. Paul does state clearly dear ones, what is essential and what will last
and I think we have to be wise about this. 1 Corinthians 13:8, “Love,” which is the bestowal of the
Holy Spirit and the cleansing of the heart through the death to self, “Love never ends.” So in
heaven, heaven will be full of love. There will be a great rising and pouring out of love to God,
the Father, and the Son and the Holy Spirit and a great pouring down of life and love into our
hearts from them. And love will never end. Love will involve all of us and will bathe us round as
we were bathed in our mother’s womb when we were babies. So love will bathe us all around.

“Love never ends; as for prophecies,” gifts of the spirit, “They will pass away,” because there will
be no need for them. “As for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away. For
our knowledge is imperfect and our prophecy is imperfect, but when the perfect comes, the imperfect
will pass away.” It’s important to see that the precious thing that the Holy Spirit does is to make
us holy.

Now there’s a reason why God did not call it the gift spirit, he called it the Holy Spirit. And it
is important to see that the precious permanent work that the Holy Spirit does in us is the
cleansing of the heart. But it is vital to see dear ones, that we live at the moment in the
dispensation of the Holy Spirit and the Holy Spirit has gifts to give us for service and if we
refuse these gifts we are unable to enter into the service that he calls us to. And so we grieve
him in disobedience and he withdraws even from the cleansing heart experience. But it is vital, I

think, to see that the precious thing that he brings is holiness to our lives.

Could I say just one more thing about that? You see, the terrible weakness and the terrible work
that the devil has done through many dear ones entering into a baptism of power with the Holy Spirit
and not entering into the cleansing inward experience of the Holy Spirit. So you have dear
Pentecostal ministers and others among us who know how to heal and have experienced the gift of
healing but in their home they are impure. And they lose their temper. And they’re irritable. And
they’re impatient. And pride surges up in their hearts. And they do many of these things at times
for a wrong motive. And so eventually the Devil begins to take over and they begin to minister
these things in the flesh.

It is vital in other words to take it in the order in which God has led us along this week. Dear
ones, first we are reborn by the spirit. Secondly, we are cleansed by the Holy Spirit. Then, we
are baptized with power by the Holy Spirit. And I know. I’m sure they could all take place at once.
And I am sure they could take place in strange order so that God will show us that he is sovereign.
But it is good, dear ones, it is good to see the good reason for them taking place in that order and
the good reason for seeking them in that way. So that when you’re baptized with the Holy Spirit
make sure, dear ones, that you’re ready to die to self. Make sure that you’ve allowed the Holy
Spirit to cleanse your heart as well as to give you these outwards gifts.

So now, could we go on to the outward gifts, because if you’re like me and maybe you aren’t, I came
through the holiness witness of this. And so I learned that Bethany taught three works of grace.
You see, so I thought you were all heretics. And so I had a reaction and I’m sure brother Dick
feels the same way. I was brought up a Methodist, not a John Wesley Methodist, though I was in my
heart. But I was brought up a formal Methodist and I felt that the tongues and all those things
were of the Devil and that they were fleshly imitations, as I think many of them were that I
observed.

So I had a great feeling against the gifts. And if you’re like me, maybe you have some of that. So
let’s deal with that dear ones. Let’s look at 1 Corinthians 12:31. And let’s look at the usual
interpretation we place upon that. See Paul says, he gives the gifts in 1 Corinthians 12 and then
in the last verse of the chapter he says, “But earnestly desire the higher gifts.” And many of us
feel, “Well that’s good, the tongues and the prophecies, yeah they’re lower gifts. Let’s desire the
higher gifts. I’m glad he’s getting onto some good holiness doctrine.” And then we read the next
half of the Verse and say, “And I will show you a still more excellent way.” And we tend to say,
“Ah, I’m glad Paul understands what God wants and that he sees that there is a still more excellent
way besides gifts. Gifts is a lower way and he’s going to show us a more excellent way.”

And then we say to ourselves, “Ah yes, you ought to covet the best gifts. And the best gift of all
is love.” And so, many of us get ourselves into a corner. We say, “Paul has outlined the gifts and
obviously he thinks there are gifts, but he obviously means us to covet the best gifts. And the best
gift of all is love. So we’ll go straight for love and we’ll ignore these things, lest we fall into
danger.”

Now dear ones, this isn’t the interpretation. Would you like to look at the verses 14-16 in that 1
Corinthians 12? And you see there that Paul says, “For the body does not consist of one member but
of many. If the foot should say, ‘Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body,’ that would
not make it any less a part of the body. And if the ear should say, ‘Because I am not an eye, I do
not belong to the body,’ that would not make it any less a part of the body.” And he goes on and

says towards the end of the Chapter in Verse 29, “Are all apostles? Are all prophets? Are all
teachers? Do all work miracles?” And he’s saying there is some need for cooperation between those
who have different gifts and he’s pointing out there is a difficulty here.

There is a tendency for some of us to say, “Ah, we have the most precious gift, what need have we
for the other gifts in the body?” And it’s in the light of that that he says, “Now I’m going to
show you a more excellent way to exercise these gifts.” He’s saying, “If I speak in the tongues of
men and of angels but have not love I am a noising gong or clanging symbol.” He’s not saying,
“Don’t speak in the tongues of men and angels,” but he’s saying, “If I do that and don’t have love
then I’ll constantly be in conflict with ones who have other gifts.” And in other words, in 1
Corinthians 13 he’s saying, “Not I give you a greater gift,” but, “I’m showing you how to exercise
the gifts you have received. You exercise them in love.”

In other words it’s important to see dear ones, that Paul is not saying, “You don’t need gifts.”
He’s saying, “These are the gifts but to exercise them properly in harmony you need the fruit of the
spirit which is love, joy, peace, long suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, and
temperance.” And so he’s not saying, “Don’t bother with the gifts.” He’s saying, “Exercise the
gifts in the spirit of the fruit of love that the Holy Spirit sheds in your heart.” So he’s not
saying, dear ones, “Don’t have gifts.”

If we argue against gifts we’re left with a powerless church that is pastor dominated. We’re left
with a powerless church which does not minister as a body but where the pastor alone ministers. And
he becomes – he takes the place of the Holy Spirit among us. But where the Holy Spirit is allowed
to shed abroad the gifts of the spirit among us there’s a ministry of the body. And when everyone
comes together they have a special gift by which they can minister.

So I think it’s good to see that the Devil has held us there and has held us back strongly from the
gifts. I think, as we’ll see later on he has held us back also on the tongues. But I think it’s
important dear ones, to see that we’re living in the dispensation of the Holy Spirit and that it is
his will that we should be able to minister through his power the gifts of his spirit.

You may say, “Well, were the gifts not always in the Church?” Well they were in the church for the
first 300 years. For the first 300 years the gifts were ministered freely in the church. Some of us
say you see – and look back on church history and some of us liberal theologians look back and we
see, “Ah well, from the year 300 I mean, there was nothing so obviously, it’s not meant to be
today.” But you know what happened around the year 300? Constantine legalized Christianity. And he
endowed the church with money. And he endowed it with great power and prestige. And as soon as he
did that the church began to depend on its power and prestige and its position of influence and so
it began to withdraw its dependence on the Holy Spirit. And so the Holy Spirit withdrew the gifts
from the church. And the church was left to get on without them.

Dear ones, wherever a church begins to depend on its own wealth, or its prestige, or its own methods
then the Holy Spirit withdraws the precious gifts from that church. And so I don’t know, but you
have a great temptation obviously in Bethany because you have a great going concern in the camping
trailers. And you have a going concern in the other things that you manufacture. And there will
always be a temptation for you to begin to depend on the power of the flesh that you have available
there and to depend on the wealth that God has given you, and the ability that God has given you.

You see, the Holy Spirit will only be active in a church that cannot do without him. And so it’s

vital for dear ones in their churches to constantly hang on the Holy Spirit and depend on him.
Otherwise, he withdraws the gifts and eventually the fruit of the spirit from their midst.

Now dear ones, will you look more closely with me then at 1 Corinthians 12 and just let’s receive
God’s teaching on the gifts of the Holy Spirit. Let’s look first at the verses which deal with the
problem the Devil brings up. The Devil says, “Ah well, he gives the gifts but only to some.” So
let’s look at the verses that deal with that. 1 Corinthians 12:7, “To each is given the
manifestation of the Spirit for the common good.” And the Devil wants us to read there, “To the
pastor is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good.” But God’s word cannot be
changed dear ones, and we need to read it as it is.

“To each,” that’s to each dear Christian who is ready to be cleansed and baptized with the Holy
Spirit, to each of them, “Is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good.” And then
in Verse 11 again, “All these,” and we want to read the pastor, or a few chosen ones. But in Verse
11, “All these are inspired by one and the same Spirit, who apportions to,” the pastor and a few
chosen ones. “Who apportions to each one individually as he wills.” And it’s good to look at 13
and 14, “For by one Spirit we were all baptized into one body – Jews or Greeks, slaves or free – and
all were made to drink of one Spirit. For the body does not consist of one member,” the pastor,
“But of many.” In other words, the emphasis in the teaching on gifts if that the Holy Spirit wants
to give each one of us gifts as we need them. He does not want to give them just to a few.

So dear ones, many of us sin against God in the sanctified life because we do not read these verses
sincerely and we are not prepared to enter into any gifts. We just assume that they’re for the
pastor, or they’re for a few chosen ones and so we’re not able to be used by the Holy Spirit. We
need to see that the Holy Spirit is willing to give to all of us the gifts that we need for
ministry.

I think some of us say, “Well, how do we know?” Well you see it in Chapter 14:1. You may say,
“Well, how do you know what gift you are going to be given?” Well, 1 Corinthians 14:1, “Make love
your aim, and earnestly desire the spiritual gifts, especially that you may prophesy.” I think we
need to do that, just to earnestly desire. To be hungering after the Holy Spirit day, after day.
To be drinking the Holy Spirit in day, after day and saying, “Holy Spirit, manifest more of the
power of the life of Jesus within me.” And be earnestly desiring the gifts. Not ask for one gift
but earnestly desire the gift that the Holy Spirit wants to give you. But we have a responsibility
to earnestly desire them, dear ones.

Now, could we look then at some more teaching on the gifts in 1 Corinthians 12:4-6. Look at Verse 4
first of all, “Now there are varieties of gifts,” and I think it just says diversities of gifts in
King James. “There are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit.” Well, you can see the varieties
of gifts if you look down at the nine of them that are listed. Notice there are nine fruits of the
spirit though it’s really only fruit of the spirit, isn’t it? But there are nine manifestations of
the fruit of the spirit and there are nine gifts of the spirit through which he manifests himself.

In Verse 8 and the following verses, “To one is given through the Spirit the utterance of wisdom.”
That’s a gift. “And to another the utterance of knowledge.” That’s a gift. “To another faith by
the same Spirit, to another gifts of healing by the one Spirit, to another the working of miracles,
to another prophecy, to another the ability to distinguish between spirits, to another various kinds
of tongues, to another the interpretation of tongues.” So that’s what Verse 4 means, you see, there
are varieties of gifts and the Holy Spirit gives different gifts to each one. Of course, it takes

away all pride, you see. Because anyone who is responsible, it seems, for the healing of a dear one
at the altar, all the others know, “Thank you Holy Spirit for manifesting the gift of healing
through that dear one.” And it’s precious that at times then, he withdraws the healing from that
dear one, the gift of healing, and gives them some other gift as they need it.

It’s precious that the Holy Spirit has the right to give the gift when he is pleased to give it.
And so the glory always goes to the Holy Spirit. And no one feels you see, “Oh, I wish I had his
gift.” Because if the Holy Spirit gives you one gift you thank him for it and you say, “Holy
Spirit, I’m glad you’re willing to use me as a little finger of the body. And I’m glad you’re
willing to use him as an eye of the body.” And there’s just a joy you see, in the exercise of the
gifts that is free from selfish pride if the old self is on the cross. Otherwise, the Devil works
mischief among us. But there are varieties of gifts.

Then will you look dear ones, at Verse 5 because I think these are important verses, “And there are
varieties of service, but the same Lord.” Now with the varieties of service the word is “diakonion”
and it means the same as deacon you know. It means, different kinds, different ministries. And it
means different ministries in the one body of the same Lord Jesus. And you see those different
ministries over there that God gives to the Lord Jesus in his body, over in the Verses 28 and the
following verses of 1 Corinthians 12. Here are the different ministries or the different forms of
service, “And God has appointed in the church first apostles, second prophets, third teachers, then
workers of miracles, then healers, helpers, administrators, speakers in various kinds of tongues.
Are all apostles? Are all prophets? Are all teachers? Do all work miracles? Do all possess gifts
of healing? Do all speak with tongues? Do all interpret?”

Well, there are different ministries and that’s why it’s a joy to be able to sit down there and say,
“Lord, you have given me the ministry of taking care of this auditorium and that brother has been
given the ministry of speaking today. And I’m glad Holy Spirit that the moment you withdraw your
power from me I have no ability to take care of this auditorium in the gracious way that you want
the life of Jesus to pour through me in doing it. And I’m glad, Holy Spirit, that the moment you
withdraw your power from that dear one at the desk, that moment he ceases to be able to be used to
pour forth the life of Jesus in his words.” It is a great sense everyone has that no one is more
important than the other because all of us owe our ministries to the Holy Spirit and to the Lord
Jesus himself who appoints some of us a finger, some of us a leg, some of us a foot. So there are
varieties of ministries. Now it’s important then dear ones – it’s important therefore not to covet
somebody else’s ministry you see, because that grieves the Holy Spirit.

And then in Verse 6, could I say that the preacher always has to be ready to take care of the
auditorium? See? If he ever gets to the place where he’s not willing for God to withdraw all his
power from him so that he can only clean the auditorium then he is not in the right place in the
body. So always keep your ministry – sit loosely by your ministry, won’t you? It’s given to you by
Jesus and just for as long as he pleases.

Now would you look dear ones, at Verse 6 because I think this is even more important in a sense,
“And there are varieties of working, but it is the same God who inspires them all in every one.”
And that’s “energaematon”, working. And there are varieties of working. And in King James isn’t it,
“operations?” There are varieties of operations. God operates in different ways through different
ministries at different times. So it’s important to see that a dear brother can be given the gift
of healing and God can have a different way of operating that gift through him. So that Oral
Roberts (Granville “Oral” Roberts was an American Methodist-Pentecostal televangelist and a

Christian charismatic.(cid:160)1918-2009) asks me to touch my radio set and if I’m in tune with the Holy
Spirit, the Holy Spirit does not say through me, “Ah, be careful of that man he asked you to touch
your radio set.” He does not say to me, “Now, look at Christopher Woodard, a Harley Street
specialist in London who practices the gift of healing in a different way.” He says, “You must come
to a harmony of your own spirit and then the harmony of your own spirit which God is able to bring
through my ministry to you, the harmony of your own spirit will spread to your body and make it
healthy and holy too.”

And the Holy Spirit does not say inside me, “Now that’s the way that healing gift should be
operating, the way Woodard does it in London, a much more cultured way, a much more sane way it
seems to this mind.” The Holy Spirit does not say that. The Holy Spirit if he’s in charge of you
says, “Thank God for Oral Roberts. Thank God for Christopher Woodard. Thank God that he works and
operates in different ways through different ministries through different gifts.” And dear ones,
then none of us is able to judge another.

And oh I wish we could see this – you know, if we really see the hordes of the enemy that are
marching against us, I don’t turn around as the Germans attack us and say, “Listen brother you’re
not firing your gun properly. You’d better fire it like me.” You don’t say that. If you’re
fighting against the hordes of the heathen you don’t turn around to a brother and say, “You’re not
using the gift the way I use it.” You say, “Thank God for you, brother. We need all of us. Let’s
go forward.” And you minister the life of Jesus to him. And the life of Jesus will fix him up if
he’s not fixed up. You see? But we don’t need to start repairing him. We just need to minister our
gift and keep our eyes off everybody else because there are varieties of working in these gifts.

Now dear ones, could we go on just briefly then to the gifts themselves. And we won’t be able
really to say too much about them. But would you like to look at the first on there that is given in
Verse 8, “To one is given through the Spirit the utterance of wisdom.” Now the world is full of
books dear ones, and the world is full of Stanley Jones’s and T.A. Hegre’s [founder of Bethany
Fellowship and author]. And the world is full of dear ones who have been given revelations by God.
And those are found in the precious books that these brothers have been inspired to write.

But there is a holy wisdom that the Holy Spirit is also able to give you at special times.
There is a wisdom that comes not from books but comes directly from the Holy Spirit himself. There
is an inner wisdom in doing things that only the Holy Spirit can give you, you see. And there are
moments when you need the real gift of wisdom. The preacher needs the real gift of wisdom so that
he will not reap when he should be sowing and so that he will not sow when he should be reaping; so
that he should not preach holiness when they’re not even half committed or converted and so that he
will not keep preaching salvation when they are walking in the light that they’ve been given. So
you need wisdom in dealing with souls as brother Elmer has said again and again this week. You need
at times the gift of wisdom to be able to interpret God’s supernatural wisdom to dear ones. You
need wisdom for understanding the things that are happening in your own life.

Now the Bible says plainly, “If any of you lack wisdom let him ask of God who gives liberally and
doesn’t question you as long as you ask in faith nothing doubting.” There is need for wisdom that
you cannot get from books. I remember a dear brother, and I think I’ve told you this before, who
was preaching with me at a camp meeting, a holiness camp meeting. And the dear brother was about 75
and had lovely white hair and I remember him saying once, “Now Brother O’Neil,” it’s the first time
I ever heard it, “Brother O’Neil is a man of books but I’m a man of one book, the Bible.” And
that’s right he had very little education, you know, and he had maybe got to–I don’t know–eighth

grade or something and then had left school. But God had given him the gift of wisdom.

I had been trying–I think I told you–for days to get over to dear ones that we needed to trust the
Holy Spirit even when we could not see where he was leading us. Even when we were going blind we
needed to trust him and obey what he told us. But this dear brother just in a moment did what I
tried to do with two or three sermons. He said, “You know, if the Holy Spirit tells you to jump
through that wall, you jump and he’ll make the hole.” That, I think, was a word of wisdom that the
Holy Spirit had given to him, and that came over clearly to all our hearts. So the Holy Spirit
wants at times to give you the word of wisdom.

Then would you look at the second word there in Verse 8, “To another the utterance of knowledge
according to the same Spirit.” And there come times you see, when you need insight into another’s
heart. And so there is a dear one at the altar and something is holding them back. And you need the
word of knowledge of their spiritual condition. So you’re kneeling there, and if you’re depending
on your own power or even your own ability to worship, then you’re lost. You need to be ready to
receive the gift of knowledge at any moment and say, “Holy Spirit, will you reveal to me what you
want to reveal?”

And so I remember one dear brother was dealing with another one at the altar and they couldn’t get
through and it was an hour and they’d been on their knees. And then there came to the brother who
was dealing with him the gift of knowledge. And he saw a great white hen, and he told the brother
what he saw. And of course the brother had stolen this great white hen two years before from a
neighbor. And what was holding him back from being cleansed by the Holy Spirit, his refusal not
only to look at that but to make restitution. So again and again we need the gift of knowledge of
the other’s condition.

Then would you like to look at faith. I think it’s the next gift, “To another faith by the same
Spirit.” And faith is working faith. So Carvaso [William Carvaso, of Cornwall, England, 1749-1834]
would get into a carriage and would drive two miles and there were 12 people in the carriage and
when he got out they were all converted.” Well that wasn’t because he explained the four spiritual
laws quickly, or because he had brother Hegre’s book and was able to read it fast to them. But that
was a miracle of working faith you see.

And there are miracles like that dear ones, whereby God can use you mightily to bring about the
conversion of many. So Finney [Charles Grandison Finney 1792-1875] you remember walked into the
factory. A little girl began to titter and he looked at her and then she felt condemnation in her
heart. And the thread broke in the loom and tears began to trickle down her eyes. And he went over
to her and spoke to her about Jesus. And then bit-by-bit the other members in the factory fell down
on their knees until everybody was on their knees. Then the owner of the factory closed the factory
and had a revival meeting. He was not a Christian but he closed the factory and many, many dear
ones were converted. That was a miracle of working faith, you see and that can happen. That can
happen, dear ones, if you’re given the gift of working faith. Not saving faith or sanctifying faith
but the gift of working faith.

So it goes on, dear ones, into others. Could we just look very briefly at the Devil’s instrument?
And there it is peeping out in 1 Corinthians 14:18. It’s ridiculous of Paul to say this kind of
thing when he knows the theology so thoroughly. He is daring enough to say, “I thank God that I
speak in tongues more than you all.” Then in Verse 39 he says, “So, my brethren, earnestly desires
to prophesy, and do not forbid speaking in tongues.” And I think Paul really was just deviating

from true pure holiness theology there. And I’m glad we can correct him.

Dear ones, do you see that that’s the Devil’s instrument? It is the ninth gift and because many
dear ones have made it the first gift, or have supplanted the need for the cleansed heart with an
outwards expression of tongues, and because so many dear ones have ministered tongues in the flesh,
the Devil has used tongues to turn us from all the gifts. Now you can see how illogical that is,
you see. We’ve looked at tongues and we’ve said, “Oh, no I’m not having anything to do with that
wild stuff.”

But you see there is a real message in the gift of tongues because the Holy Spirit wants complete
control of us and the last thing of course that we’re really ready to render is our tongue. It’s a
little thing you know, but a very strong member. It can guide a huge boat–the rudder–and the
tongue can set passions on fire. And so the Holy Spirit wants control of our tongues and it seems
to me that’s the message of this gift of tongues. That the Holy Spirit wants to control your tongue
not only when you’re speaking an unknown tongue but especially when you’re speaking a known tongue.

It is important then to see that this is one of the gifts of the spirit. And it is important to see
that the Devil has taken advantage of it and has said, “Look at tongues, that’s all you get when you
deal with gifts.” It’s important for us to see that’s silly. It’s the ninth gift of the spirit.
It’s one of the gifts. Let’s not throw the baby out with the bathwater. Let’s not throw everything
out. And you see that is what has happened, dear ones. The Holy Spirit has come into many dear
hearts in the cleansed experience and then the Holy Spirit has led them on to see the need for
gifts. And then someone has brought up, “Look at those wild people that minister tongues in the
flesh.” And so we look at them and we say, “Yes, that must be tongues. That can’t be God’s will.”

It’s not God’s will to minister any gift in the flesh, but it is his will to minister the gifts of
the Holy Spirit. And it is therefore necessary to look at those two verses where the apostle Paul
who was given the very presence of Jesus on the Damascus Road says in 1 Corinthians 14:18, “I thank
God that I speak in tongues more than you all.” And he says in Verse 39, “So, my brethren,
earnestly desires to prophesy, and do not forbid speaking in tongues.” So it’s important to see
that.

Now, what’s the meaning of tongues? Well would you like to look at the meaning as it’s outlined in
1 Corinthians 14:2, “For one who speaks in a tongue speaks not to men but to God; for no one
understands him, but he utters mysteries in the Spirit.” So obviously when you speak in a tongue
the Holy Spirit works directly bypassing your mind and speaks directly with your tongue to God. And
in Verse 4, “He who speaks in a tongue edifies himself.” Well now, it’s true that there is a great
sense of up building in times in private prayer when the Holy Spirit gives you freedom in utterance
in a tongue. Then in Verse 14, “For if I pray in a tongue, my spirit prays but my mind is
unfruitful.” Now in other words the tongue can be used to build you up spiritually.

It seems that the Bible puts the emphasis on private prayer. It doesn’t say, “You can’t use it in
public.” But it does seem to put the emphasis on private prayer. And what’s the meaning, dear
ones? When the Holy Spirit fills you with a great spirit of praise for Jesus and you see him in
all his glory at the right hand of God, then there surges up in your heart a great desire to praise
him. And you say, “Mighty God, Ruler of all things, Lord Jesus my Savior, my Dear One, I love you.”
And the words are not sufficient. And the Holy Spirit takes your tongue and utters an unknown
tongue, the praise. So that the very spirit of your self seems to rise out of your heart and you

seem to lift off from your body and rise into the very heavenlies.

That’s the purpose of a tongue and it’s a precious purpose. And the Holy Spirit has given us the
tongues for that. We should not be concerned if we haven’t tongues. We shouldn’t say to the Holy
Spirit, “Give me a tongue.” The Holy Spirit gives you what you need and will give you what you need
at the time you need it. So we should not say, “I want a tongue.” We should say, “Thank you Holy
Spirit for what you’ve given me and I’ll minister that in the fullness. And if I minister that in
the fullness you’ll give me other things that I need.” But, if he gives you a tongue it’s a
precious thing and a dear one should use it.

Though dear ones, the Bible emphasizes private prayer. You can see this in a few other verses just
before we finish. In 1 Corinthians 14:5, “Now I want you all to speak in tongues, but even more to
prophesy.” That’s to speak the word of God in the right way, at the right time, to the right
person. “He who prophesies is greater than he who speaks in tongues, unless some one interprets, so
that the church may be edified.” So on the whole God guides us through Paul to speak in tongues in
public only when there’s someone there to interpret.

Now dear ones, I think we need more obedience in that. I think we grieve the Holy Spirit often
because we speak in tongues when there’s no interpreter and the Devil can always get in in the flesh
unless we obey the sword of the Spirit which is the word of God. We cannot afford you see, to
grieve the Holy Spirit in any way in the life in the spirit. And then if you look again in Verse
9-13 Paul gives this emphasis again about the public use of tongues, “So with yourselves; if you in
a tongue utter speech that is not intelligible, how will any one know what is said? For you will be
speaking into the air. There are doubtless many different languages in the world, and none is
without meaning; but if I do not know the meaning of the language, I shall be a foreigner to the
speaker and the speaker a foreigner to me. So with yourselves; since you are eager for
manifestations of the Spirit, strive to excel in building up the church. Therefore, he who speaks
in a tongue should pray for the power to interpret.” And that seems like good logical, spiritual
common sense doesn’t it?

And I think it’s important to – the higher you get, the closer you must be to the obedience of the
Holy Spirit. You see, the higher you get the closer you must be and the finer must be your
obedience.

And last of all dear ones, in Verse 16 and 19 there, in Verse 16 Paul says, “Otherwise, if you bless
with the spirit how can any one in the position of an outsider say the “Amen” to your thanksgiving
when he does not know what you are saying?” And then in Verse 19 last of all, “Nevertheless, in
church I would rather speak five words with my mind, in order to instruct others, than ten thousand
words in a tongue.” In other words it’s important to minister the gifts according to the obedience
of the Holy Spirit and according to the words that God has given us.

Well dear ones, have you been baptized with the Holy Spirit? Now maybe you’re saying, “Well, I was
cleansed last night.” Well then the Holy Spirit is filling you, all you need to do is open your
heart to him and say, “Holy Spirit, I am willing to receive whatever gifts you want to give me and I
am willing to walk into whatever avenues of service you have equipped me for.” And the Holy Spirit
will give you the gifts as you need them so that you can walk fearlessly into the lion’s den,
fearlessly into the ward in the hospital, fearlessly in to the better educated person than you are
and you know that the Holy Spirit will give you the necessary gifts and will enable you to reflect
the very image of Jesus, not only purity but power. Let us pray.

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Crucifixion – Condition for Being Filled

Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill

If you say, “Oh I was baptized with the Holy Spirit when I was born of the Spirit.” Well I don’t
think anyone is going to say it’s not possible. I think they’re going to say if you have the marks
of the baptism with the Holy Spirit than that must have happened. But for many of us it has been as
second step in our Christian experience.

And so we have this bookcase with the baptism with the Holy Spirit: The top section has books on
filing of the Holy Spirit for purity, for inward victory. And the bottom section is anointing of
the Holy Spirit for power, for the gifts of the spirit. Emphasizing you see, that the baptism of
the Holy Spirit is an inward and an outward enduement: power for inward purity and power for
outward witnessing. And then the third bookcase is labeled “Walking In The Spirit,” and it deals
with union with Christ and with ministering life.

Now I tell you that to point out that really on these Sunday evenings we’ve been dealing again and
again with the third bookcase and with that third step. And I noticed that really the seminar this
morning that John leads on baptism with the Holy Spirit was overflowing. And really I think the
truth is that many of us are at that stage. I think that’s true, isn’t it? Many of us are at that
stage where we’re having some difficulty in some defeat in our Christian lives and what we need is
the baptism with the Holy Spirit.

Now some of us are baptized with the Holy Spirit and have come into a full surrender and we really
need to be walking in the Spirit and learning how to walk in the Spirit. But I think it’s necessary
maybe, from time-to-time on Sunday evenings to back up and deal again with that crises experience,
the baptism with the Holy Spirit. And that’s what I’d like to share a little about tonight and
you’ll forgive me therefore not dealing with the Christian’s desires but in fact, just going back in
the light of this morning’s message and dealing once more with the baptism of the Holy Spirit and
the need of it in our lives.

I had some cream in that glass jar and I left it too long. Yeah, I did. And it’s really quite a
smell. And there’s nothing as miserable as sour cream. Now do you see dear ones, if I leave that
like that and you bring me some fresh cream and I say, “Okay, I’ve got a jar here,” and I take your
fresh cream and I pour it in here, you know what will happen. And you’ll say to me, “Listen pastor
if you pour that fresh cream on top of the sour cream the sour cream will affect the fresh cream in
a matter of a day or so.” Now that’s foolish. What you need to do is clean that sour cream right
out and then put the fresh cream in.

Now loved ones, that’s the situation with many of us in our Christian lives. We have come to the
place where we realize there was a lot of sour cream in our lives that we needed to empty out. And
we did come into a real repentance and we received Jesus into our spirits. And it wasn’t long after
that until Jesus began to make us aware that there was something sour underneath that we had never
really got to the bottom of. And it was still laying there in our lives. There was a doubleness of
will that we had never really dealt with.

And do you see what happens? While we allow that to remain there you can receive more of the Holy
Spirit in every Sunday, and you can receive a special supply of the Holy Spirit at Easter time, and
a great supply of the Holy Spirit if you’re on a retreat, or at a series of evangelistic services.

But do you see that the same thing happens all the time? If that stuff at the bottom of your heart
has not been dealt with then the Holy Spirit will soon be soured again by that sour lack of full
surrender at the bottom of your heart.

Now that’s really what we’re talking about when we’re talking about the baptism with the Holy
Spirit. We’re saying that the only way to get that sour double will out of your life is to allow
the Holy Spirit to be poured in and displace it completely. And to do that you have to be willing
to be filled with the Holy Spirit. And the whole deal with the baptism of the Holy Spirit is coming
to a place of honesty where you really do want the Holy Spirit to fill every part of you.

Now brothers and sisters, you may say, “Oh Pastor if you had the trouble I have with my temper you’d
know I want it.” But loved ones, there’s a great part of us that wants so much of the Holy Spirit
but not completely and that’s what the struggle is all about, you see.

Now, this is built in to the whole message of salvation and maybe we should see that. Acts 2:38,
you remember, that famous verse where the people on the day of Pentecost came up to Peter and they
asked him, “What must we do to be saved?” And Peter’s answer you see really implies these two
important works that the Holy Spirit does within us, regenerating us and filling us. Peter replied,
you remember, “Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the
forgiveness of your sins; and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.”

Now the forgiveness of our sins is what Jesus’ blood was shed for. Jesus’ blood you remember, I
suggested this morning, was shed to enable God to forgive us and remain a just God even though we
were sinners and deserved death. And in a real sense therefore Jesus’ death was for God. In a real
sense, Jesus died for his Father’s sake, to enable his Father to forgive sinners who in all justice
deserved death. And this enabled his Father to forgive us even though we deserved death because his
Justice was wrought upon Jesus. Now that was for the remission of our sins.

But you see the second step is, you shall receive the Holy Spirit. And of course the Bible means
receive the Holy Spirit not only to regenerate you and renew your spirit and you give a desire for
God but to fill your spirit completely, to cleanse your heart by faith.

Now those two things are implied in Jesus’ death for us. And dear ones, they run right through the
whole of scripture. Jesus died so that God could forgive us our sins. Secondly, Jesus died so that
we might die in him and God might destroy and render in operative that rebellious will of ours. Now
you see, we don’t accept that at all most of the time. Most of the time we say, “Yes, Jesus died so
that God could forgive us our sins. Now our job is to suppress and repress that rebellious will.”
And that’s what most of us live in, isn’t it?

We believe that Jesus died so that God could forgive us our sins. We couldn’t find any other. There
was no other good enough to pay the price of sin. He only could unlock the gate of heaven and let
us in. But when it comes to victory within we begin to use our great willpower. We begin to
suppress and repress that attitude within us which begets individual sins on the outside.

Now if you’d just be patient and look at those two verses that we did check this morning. You
remember, I suggested that the first four and a half chapters of Romans deal all the time with sins
in the plural: acts, and thoughts, and words that are disobedient to God. And the second three and a
half chapters’ deal all the time with sin in the singular, the inward attitude that wants to disobey
God. Now that’s Romans 3:25. You remember, it mentions there that Jesus died for the remission of

our sins, “Whom God put forward as an expiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to
show God’s righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins; it was
to prove at the present time that he himself is righteous,” even though he forgives us, “And that he
justifies him who has faith in Jesus.” Now you see, the emphasis there is on sins and the
forgiveness of our sins.

Now would you look at Romans 6:6, where the emphasis is not on sins but on the inward attitude of
sin which produces those sins. “We know that our old self was crucified with him so that the sinful
body might be destroyed, and we might no longer be enslaved to sin,” in the singular. In other
words, there’s a real need for us not only to believe that Jesus has died for our sins and to be
willing to let go of our sins, but there’s a real need for us to realize that we were crucified with
Christ and to be willing to let go of self so that he is able to free us through the Holy Spirit.

Now there isn’t a place dear ones, where you cannot find these two things emphasized you see. You
look at 1 John 1:9 and it’s a verse we often quote about how really to become a Christian. “If we
confess our sins, he is faithful and just, and will forgive our sins,” and that’s the part that we
again, and again preach in our churches, “He will forgive us our sins.” But do you see the second,
“And cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”

Now it is God who will cleanse us from the unrighteousness within. It is not ourselves by willpower
or the power of positive thinking, or Paul Tournier [1898-1986, A Swiss physician, author and
pastoral counselor] or fellowship, or through Bible study and prayer. It is God himself who through
the Holy Spirit will do this.

Now why do we say through the Holy Spirit? Well Acts 15:9 states what Peter felt happened on the
day of Pentecost you remember. You remember there’s difficulty about receiving the gentiles in
without first becoming Jews. In Acts 15:8 Peter explains this, “And God who knows the heart bore
witness to them, giving them the Holy Spirit just as he did to us; and he made no distinction
between us and them, but cleansed their hearts by faith.”

In other words, when we share this need to die with Jesus we’re not making the Christian faith
harder, or the Christian life harder we’re making it possible, loved ones. It is impossible to
destroy that evil inward inclination you have to have your own way and insist on your own rights.
It is impossible to do that by human willpower. The only way is to see that God, through the Holy
Spirit, does it and he will only do it if you’re willing to die to self.

Now you know if you say, “Oh well brother now why don’t we share this more in our churches?” Loved
ones, you know why, because we want to retain some free will ourselves. We call it free will. It
isn’t free will. It’s slavery to self. But you know that in our churches we’re anxious for
admission into heaven. We want our sins covered by Jesus’ blood. We don’t want to be found in hell
at the end of this life. But when it comes to the way we live this present life, again, and again
we want to be able to live it our own way.

Now you’ll see as you go through scripture, it just isn’t on the books loved ones. It just is not
that way. Now look at 2 Corinthians 5:14 and you begin to see a magnificent symmetrical logic you
know, about God’s word when you see the two events that took place when Jesus died on the cross:
Not only the bearing of the penalty of our sins but the bearing of ourselves into death with him.
“For the love of Christ controls us, because we are convinced that one has died for all.” That’s for
the forgiveness of our sins. “Therefore all have died.” In other words the two emphases are there,

that Jesus died for us but that we also died with him. And really, until we enter into that there’ll
be no experience of resurrection.

You find it in the Old Testament. Ezekiel 36:25-26 and again, the two sides of the work that Jesus
did on the cross. “I will sprinkle clean water upon you, and you shall be clean from all your
uncleannesses, and from all your idols I will cleanse you.” And it says that God will sprinkle
clean water upon us: sprinkle the blood of Jesus upon us so that we are looked upon as righteous
because of Jesus’ righteousness. Then in Verse 26 the real change that he will work in us: “A new
heart I will give you, and a new spirit I will put within you; and I will take out of your flesh the
heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh.”

And again, and again throughout scripture there’s the emphasis. God will treat you as righteous
because Jesus has died for you but he will make you righteous by the filling of the Holy Spirit. Now
this is pictured for us you remember, in the Israelites. You remember, they passed over the Red Sea
and the escaped from the bondage and the slavery that they were in-in Egypt. And then, like many of
us, they wandered for 40 years in the wilderness coming back to their old campsites, making the same
old resolutions, “We’re going to win through this time. We’re going to obey you Lord whatever the
cost.” And it wasn’t until they eventually crossed the Jordan and into Canaan that they came into a
place of rest. And there was in a sense two different experiences for them: A coming free from
slavery and then an entering into the rest that God had for them.

Now that’s what many of us have found you know, in this baptism with the Holy Spirit, that it
suddenly seems to bring you into a rest. And that’s why many of us call it the second rest of the
people of God, where you cease from your labors. You cease from that striving to overcome those
miserable habits and you enter in through the filling of the Holy Spirit into an effortless life of
obedience.

But dear ones, those are just a few of the pictures in the New Testament and I have others here you
know, and could go through them.

Now where is the problem normally in the born again Christian or the child of God who has not
entered into baptism of the Holy Spirit? Where is the problem? Well I suggested where it is this
morning. It’s not normally in the outward life. Most of us can walk in a fair degree of outward
victory. We’ve been trained, we have strong wills. We’re sophisticated western educated people.
We have a fair degree of control over what we do outwardly and what we say outwardly. But the
problem with most of us is in the area of attitudes, or the area of reactions, or the area of
motives, or the area of tempers or desires. You see, we’re willing to do something for God and we
get up here and we do it and we’re not quite sure what was the real motive behind it. We believe
that it was for the glory of God and we say, “Praise God,” when somebody thanks us for it. But often
inside there’s a great welling up of pride in the old natural abilities. And there’s a great
pleasure derived from all eyes being upon us.

Now normally dear ones, it’s in the area of motives where we have our problems, or the area of
attitudes, you know. You can hold back from being angry with a brother. You can hold back from
outwardly criticizing someone. But you know if you’re heart was to be projected on one of those
outdoor screens in an outdoor theatre and everybody could see it, you know you would be the most
ashamed person in the whole world, because there are things in your attitudes to others: just
unquestioned attitudes of criticism. Unquestioned attitudes of hatred, and grudges, and resentment
that you would hate anyone to see.

Now loved ones, usually it’s in those inner areas. That’s why we often call it inward sin, you see,
as opposed to outward sins. And the reason why we have no revival among us is many of us are
walking about in apparent outward victory but inside our hearts our foul, and unclean, and filled
with things that are not godly and are not Christ-like. And those are the things that destroy our
witness.

Now if you said, “What particular things?” Well, you’d find them there in Galatians 5:19 if you
wanted to look at it. They’re called, you remember, in the New Testament the works of the flesh.
“Now the works of the flesh are plain: immorality, impurity,” you see, these are attitudes, all the
“-y’s”, all the “y” words are normally attitudes, “Immorality, impurity, licentiousness.” See it’s
not just enough loved ones, to hold back from unclean acts. It’s that God wants us to be free from a
spirit of licentiousness.

See there’s a real way in which I’m all for the sap coming up in the trees at spring time and all
that. And it’s beautiful. But there’s a way, too, in which there can be a licentiousness in our
lives. There can be an attitude of a libertine even though it doesn’t get outside. Now that’s what
is not consistent you see, with the spirit of the pure tender Jesus that is dwelling within us.
That’s why he is uncomfortable so often in our lives, because he has to dwell with such unclean
neighbors inside our hearts. And that’s why there’s always a struggle, because he will not stay
there if you’re going to keep that neighbor there, you see. One of them must go. And that’s where
the struggle comes from.

“Idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, anger, selfishness, dissension, party spirit, envy,
drunkenness, carousing, and the like.” Party spirit isn’t where this group on this side of the
church get up and fight against this group on this side of the church. That isn’t party spirit.
Party spirit is where that’s already beginning to move in your hearts– where we’re already
beginning to think of him as him or them as them and us as us. That’s party spirit beginning to
develop in our hearts.

One tract that I found was good for me at the time I needed to enter into the baptism of the Holy
Spirit, was this little one, and Roger is ordering more: “Traits of the Self Life.” And it’s good,
you know, to ask yourself, “Have you any of these?” Because, you see, the most plain evidence that
you’re not baptized with the spirit is your self life, your self life. And it has these things.
“Are you ever conscience of a secret spirit of pride, an exalted feeling in view of your success or
position, because of your good training or appearance, because of your natural gifts and abilities,
an important independent spirit? Are you ever conscience of a love of human praise, a secret
fondness to be noticed, a love of supremacy, a drawing attention to self in conversation, a swelling
out of self when you have had a free time in speaking or praying?”

“Are you ever conscience of the stirrings of anger or impatience which worse of all you call
nervousness or holy indignation, a touchy sensitive spirit, a disposition to resent and retaliate
when disapproved of or contradicted, a desire to throw sharp heated flings at another? Are you ever
conscience of self will, a stubborn unteachable spirit, an arguing talkative spirit, harsh sarcastic
expressions, an unyielding headstrong disposition, a driving commanding spirit, a disposition to
criticize and pick flaws when set aside and unnoticed, a peevish fretful spirit, a disposition that
loves to be coaxed and humored?”

“Are you ever conscience of carnal fear, a man fearing spirit, a shrinking from approach and duty, a

reasoning around your cross? Are you ever conscience of a compromising spirit, a jealous
disposition, a secret spirit of envy shut up in your heart, an unpleasant sensation in view of the
great prosperity and success of another, a disposition to speak of the faults and failings rather
than the gifts and virtues of those more talented and more appreciated than yourself?”

“Are you ever conscience of a dishonest deceitful disposition, the evading and covering of the
truth, the covering up of your real faults leaving a better impression of your self than is strictly
true, false humility, exaggeration, straining the truth? Are you ever conscience of unbelief, a
spirit of discouragement in times of pressure and opposition, lack of quietness and confidence in
God, lack of faith and trust in God, a disposition to worry and complain in the midst of pain, or at
the dispensations of divine providence, an over anxious feeling whether everything will come out
alright? Are you ever conscience of selfishness, a love of ease, a love of money?”

Now loved ones, do you see that God cannot use you if those things are down there? Loved ones, I
don’t care if you know Schaeffer [Francis August Schaeffer, 1912-1984, theologian, philosopher,
pastor, L’Abri founder] backwards. I don’t care if you know Watchman Nee back to front. I don’t care
if you’re a Baptist or if you’re a miserable poor Methodist like me. But do you see if you have
those things deep down within, then the Holy Spirit has not filled you with himself? Now loved
ones, that’s just true. You have not allowed him to deal with some areas in your life.

Now if you’ve come to a place you know, where you say, “Well Pastor I believe I entered into a
filling with the Holy Spirit.” Well then brothers and sisters thank the Holy Spirit for filling you
and tell him about these things. Tell him, “Holy Spirit, I know it’s your desire for me to be
completely cleansed from these things. Now will you reveal to me what area of my life is not nailed
to the cross with Christ?” Now that’s it, loved ones.

Now if you say you know, “How do you enter in?” Dear ones, it’s trust and obey. That’s the way you
enter into forgiveness of sins. You trust or you believe that Jesus died for your sins and then you
obey him absolutely. You let all those things go from your own life and you obey him.

It’s the same with entering into victory over sin within. You trust and you believe that you were
crucified with Christ. You believe that, that you died 1900 years ago. That that great person that
your parents have made all the plans for, that you have made all the plans for, that the government
has all the plans for is actually dead and that your mind and body are available for the Holy Spirit
to live the life of Jesus over again in. But believe that you are crucified, that you’re dead with
Christ, that you have no rights to your own way, or your own rights, or your own attitude. You’ve
no right to assert yourself or defend yourself and you were crucified with Christ.

And now look to the Holy Spirit and say, “Holy Spirit if there’s any way in which I’m not really
willing to be crucified then will you let me know?” Because do you see dear ones, believing is not
a matter of auto suggestion, you see. The word for believe in the New Testament means obey. You
can’t believe unless you’re willing to obey. I can’t say, “I believe that chair will hold me,”
unless I’m willing to step on that chair. Then in the New Testament sense I believe.

The word is “pisteuo” in Greek. It means I obey what I believe, I do what I believe. Even the
English word, believe, comes from “be” in Anglo Saxon and “liefan”, to be in accordance with. And
until you actually are in accordance with what you say you believe the Holy Spirit cannot fill you
with himself.

Now you’ll see that if you look at just two verses there in Romans and then two in Galatians.
Romans 6:11 explains how to enter into the baptism of the Holy Spirit or into a full surrender or
freedom from this desire to disobey God and have our own way. “So you also must consider yourselves
dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus.” That’s it. That’s what believing is. The word you
remember, is translated in the King James Version reckon and the Greek word for means you don’t only
reckon it, you don’t only imagine it, you are in that position. And for many of us that is the real
struggle in coming into the baptism with the Holy Spirit. It’s coming to that place where we’re
actually willing to be crucified with Christ.

Now that’s hard loved ones, because that means your future is not your own. That means dear sisters
you cannot choose who you’re going to marry. It means there is no marriage ahead for you, there is
only a marriage ahead for the Holy Spirit using your mind, and body, and emotions. Brothers, there
is no future ahead for us. There are no jobs to plan for; there is only a future ahead for the Holy
Spirit living inside our minds and bodies. It really means a funeral you see.

Somebody has said, “Oh, that death is more real than physical death.” And brothers and sisters I’d
testify to it in my own life. You know, that was a death to all the things I held dearest, all the
things I wanted myself. And God dealt with each one of them and asked me, “Would you be willing to
come to a place there where you’re willing to be a failure for Jesus? Where you’re willing to be
nothing for him?” Now do you see I can share these questions with you? But only the Holy Spirit can
choose the area of your life where you’re not willing to reckon yourself crucified with Christ. Now
in fact, you have been crucified. As far as God is concerned he sees you crucified. But that can
only be made real in you if you’re willing for it to be made real just as with the forgiveness of
your sins.

Now you see the second step is, after you’ve come to that place, Romans 8:13 is the way to live in
this victory. In other words, you don’t come to a place where you’re really willing to be crucified
with Christ and then start trying. No. “If you live according to the flesh you will die, but if by
the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body you will live.”

Now the answer to every how in the New Testament is the Holy Spirit. Mary said, “How shall these
things be?” The answer was, “The Holy Spirit will conceive within you.” Now it’s the same here.
How can you walk in this victory? By instant obedience and submission to the Holy Spirit.

So those are the two sides, dear ones, a reckoning that you have been crucified with Christ, that
you have no rights to live your own life in your own way and then an absolute submission to the Holy
Spirit.

Now I’d just point to two more verses and then we’ll have some questions if you want to ask.
Galatians 5:24-25 state those two conditions that are necessary to be fulfilled in order to be
entered in. The first, you see, is belief, is trust, “And those who belong to Christ Jesus have
crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.” The flesh in the New Testament is not the body
or even the sexual part of us. The flesh is if you rearrange the words and leave one letter out you
get what it is, it’s self. The flesh in the New Testament is self. The self love that is not the
kind of self respect that God wants but is a self centered love, a self deification, a self
glorification, a self aggrandizement. You see, it is those things.

Now all of us you see, that belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh. Loved ones, as far as
God is concerned you don’t have a future, you see. But you’re arguing with him. You’re saying,

“Yes Lord, I have a future and I am going to have a two car garage, a motor lounge, and I’m going to
have the best salary I can possibly get my hands on.” And the Father has just a controversy with
you. He says, “No my child, I crucified you with Jesus. I destroyed that evil inclination to have
your own way with Jesus. And you must accept that. Otherwise I cannot give you my Holy Spirit in his
fullness.”

Now that’s the first step you see, that realizing that you were crucified. And then Verse 25, the
obedience, “If we live by the Spirit, let us also walk by the Spirit.” The way you walk in that
victory is by instant obedience to the Holy Spirit. I’d just finish there that you see you cannot
have instant obedience to the Holy Spirit if there is a great area of your life that you have not
allowed the Holy Spirit to place on the cross. Then of course you’re trying to believe over a half
committed and half surrendered self. Well, that’s impossible you see and you’re always going to
have difficulty obeying.

Just one example, if your problem is anger, I think I used this before, or bad temper, the Holy
Spirit will probably deal with what would be the consequences if you did not use anger or bad temper
in your life. In other words he’ll probably point out to you, “Now listen you know you use anger to
keep people off. You know you use anger to control people. You use bad temper to let them see that
you want your way. Now, would you be willing not to have your way?” And then you will think in
your mind, “But Holy Spirit, if I don’t get my way at times these people would trample me under
foot. They would just walk over me. They would treat me as a doormat.” The Holy Spirit will pin
you on that and say, “Are you willing to be a doormat? Are you willing to be trampled underfoot as
much as I want you to be? Are you willing for me to be your only defense? Are you willing for me
to decide when to take the heat off?”

Now when you’re willing, you see, to face the consequences of not having anger and temper as a
weapon against other people then the Holy Spirit will move on to the next area in your life. And he
will keep moving dear ones, until he gets to the bottom of all your resistances to God’s will. Now
that doesn’t mean he’ll have no more light to show you but he’ll deal with all the areas where you
have already rebelled against God and he’ll bring you down to the ground of your heart Wesley said.
You’ll come to a place where you’ll see the ground of your heart. And the Holy Spirit will witness
you in a place of full consecration ready to be crucified with Jesus in your own life. And faith
will spring up in your heart to be filled with the Holy Spirit. Faith is not a problem when you
come to that place. Then it’s a matter of walking in the same way as you entered in, trusting and
obeying the Holy Spirit.

Now loved ones, will you share questions? Now brothers and sisters do you see that I’m glad to be
asked a question that I can’t answer. There was a day when I was concerned about that and anxious
always to have an answer. But I want you to ask questions, they may be even – well, if they’re
hostile questions don’t ask them in a hostile way, ask them in a loving way. But do you see, that I
want to find truth? Don’t you think if you’ve the truth there, don’t keep it wrapped up you see.
Share it and push me.

Chris is asking, “Does God break us individually of different areas?” What she has found at times
is she’s been broken in a certain area and later on it has cropped up.

Do you see, dear ones, that the common misunderstanding of growing in grace is that God gradually
breaks us of all the things that we’re doing wrong in our lives over a period of time? That’s the
normal misunderstanding of growing in grace. Dear ones don’t realize that growing in grace only

takes place after you’ve been crucified with Christ. It only takes place after you’ve entered into
resurrection life. Growth in grace implies growth in the grace and beauty of our Lord Jesus, not
growth out of our own ugliness. That is something that is achieved by Christ’s death on the cross.

And so the important thing I think to see is that no, the heart of all these areas is self. That is
the reason why we’re bad tempered. It’s the reason why we’re jealous, why we’re proud. All those
things can be traced back to self. And what the Holy Spirit does is he’ll deal with certain areas.
He’ll ask us to walk in obedience in those areas. We’ll have to, in other words, start walking in
obedience. We don’t want to wait for a great blockbuster some day when he’ll blast through
everything. If the Holy Spirit shows me some area, I need to walk in obedience in that area. But I
need to see that what the Holy Spirit wants to get at is the great self deep down.

And so I know for me, I had to ask the Holy Spirit, “Holy Spirit, show me. I see my anger, I see my
ambition, but reveal to me how that comes from self and how that great self underneath me is like an
iceberg, a tenth on the surface, a tenth on the surface that shows a little pride but underneath
nine tenths I cannot see. And will you show me that great self? And show me that it is hostile to
God. Show me that the exceeding sinfulness of that.”

Because if you had pointed out some of the things in my life I would have said, “Well, those are
just little things. I mean, those I can overcome gradually.” But it was only when the Holy Spirit
gave me revelation and light to see that self as a rebel against God, that I really saw that that
needed to be destroyed by God. “Rendered inoperative” is a better word because there’s nothing
destroyed forever, it’s only put on the cross and held there by the power of the Holy Spirit. As
soon as we cease to believe it comes back down again. So it’s held there by the power of faith and
willing submission to the Holy Spirit. But it is, as far as we’re concerned, it’s dead because it’s
rendered inoperative by the power of the Holy Spirit.

So that would be my answer, that you need to walk in obedience, ask the Holy Spirit to reveal it to
you, but the issue is to get to that heart of self. Otherwise, the things will just crop up again.
Otherwise, you’re just treating the symptoms of the disease and the disease is still there. “The
just shall live by faith.” We have to steer well clear of the emphasis that some dear ones, and
well intentioned they were, but it is not scripture, where they say, “The flesh you see, can be once
and for all done away with so that you never have to remember it again. You’ll never sin again.
Once you’ve entered into the crucifixion with Christ you’ll never sin again.”

Now I see no reason why you should ever sin again, but that’s because of continual exercise of faith
and submission to the Holy Spirit. In other words, you cannot get to the point where you say,
“Whether I exercise faith or submission to the Holy Spirit, I’ll never sin again because that’s once
and for all crucified.” Well, that’s a wrong understanding of inward sin. Inward sin and a carnal
nature is not an appendix that you take out and put on the cross.

It is an attitude within us. You say to a person, “That fellow is very generous. Yes, that’s his
nature. That’s the way he’s built. It’s just his whole attitude in life.” Now it’s in that sense
that we mean we have a carnal nature. But that’s an attitude that can be held on the cross by the
power of the Holy Spirit as long as we believe, as long as we trust and obey.

“Once the Holy Spirit has revealed to you that there’s something like pride in your life, how can
you know that you’re willing to give it up unless you give it up?”

Presumably, let’s go the other step by saying, “Surely you can only walk in obedience if the Holy
Spirit enables you to.”

Now do you see, dear ones, that the Holy Spirit knows if you’re willing to give it up? That’s why
I’ve mentioned the witness of the Holy Spirit to your full consecration. It’s not a question you
see, of wondering through this and wondering, “Am I fully consecrated? Well, I feel a bit more
consecrated than last time. I think I am.” No, the Holy Spirit comes and the New Testament says,
“We are sealed by the Holy Spirit.” The Holy Spirit stamps a seal upon us and says, “Yes, you’re
fully consecrated.”

I remember in my own heart, I came to a place where I knew that witness of the Holy Spirit. He
hadn’t filled me at that point, but he witnessed that I was fully consecrated. So, that’s it. The
Holy Spirit will witness, when you’ve come to the ground of your own heart, when you’ve come to the
end of yourself.

Diane says, “Then there’ll never be a time when we’ll have everything fully given over? The Holy
Spirit will always be showing us more things.”

Now, here’s the distinction I would make, that most of us after walking in Jesus for six months or a
year, the Holy Spirit begins to show us things where we ought to move out after him, maybe in
witnessing in school, which concerns our reputation. We want to be thought a swinger and the Holy
Spirit tells us to witness and be a square. And we stand back on that and our reputation becomes
precious to us. It’s those resistances to the Father’s will that we’ve already established. It’s
those things that the Holy Spirit wants to clear away. And you’re right, when he comes to the
bottom of those he will fill us. And then he will give us more light on other areas that we’ve never
seen before.

But do you see when it comes to those, the resistance of our will, will have been cleansed away by
the filling of the Holy Spirit and we’ll walk willingly and obediently into those other areas.

Well, as far as God is concerned you’re clear at that point. The Father regards you as perfect at
that moment, you see. Because the Father says, “Sin is, anyone who knows what is right to do it and
fails to do it, for him it is sin. Now my dear child if you are walking in obedience to me and have
no resistance to anything that I’ve shown you in the past, then as far as I’m concerned you are
perfect in my sight.” And the Father, you see, knows a whole lot of other things where we could
walk in greater perfection. But they are not obligatory on us until the Holy Spirit brings them to
our hearts. Of course, he can always tell whether we’re walking purposely blind to the Holy Spirit
or not. The Holy Spirit knows.

That’s why loved ones, I’ve shared with the importance of the Holy Spirit as the counselor. He
alone knows whether you’re being honest or not. I don’t know. Your wife doesn’t know. Your best
friend doesn’t know. The Holy Spirit knows if you’re being honest. And he determines his filling if
your life by your honesty with him.

There can be no separation. If we’re dealing with New Testament Christianity, there can be no
separation between belief and obedience. But you see, that today, you’re right, what we have shared
is cheap grace, you see.

Bless our hearts, our tendency is to present it as a hedonistic offer to people. And it’s
ridiculous you see, we say, “Now listen, if you continue as you are you’ll have a miserable life and
you’ll go to hell. Now if you accept Jesus you’ll have a great life and you’ll go to heaven.” Well
now anyone in their right senses will choose the latter. You know, they’ll say, “Well I’d rather
have a good life here and go to heaven.” And we’ve preached you see, all they have to do is accept
Jesus. And the emphasis has been on accept. And we thought it was the idea of accepting that he’s
the son of God, accept all the things that they say about him, and generally try to live like him.
But the New Testament experience is repent: A radical repentance, a turning from all our sins, an
absolute obedience to him and a receiving his spirit into our hearts.

It’s trust and obey. And that’s why, you see, we have so many – we call them conversions–they’re
not really you know. We call them even, intellectual Christians. They’re kind of intellectual
conversions, most of them. They’re giving intellectual assent to the truth of scripture and trying
hard. That’s really what many of them are…

The Holy Spirit Anoints Us for Witnessing

Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill

How many have you led to Christ during the past year? How many have you led to Christ during the
past year? Well, during the past two years? Well dear ones, how many have you witnessed due about
Jesus during this past week? Now not to Christians, and not witnessed about the church, but how
many have you witnessed to about Jesus during this past week? Well, during the past three weeks?

Now Acts 1:8 says, “You shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be
my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria and to the end of the earth.” You see,
that’s a promise. You’ll receive power and you’ll be his witnesses in Jerusalem, in your own home;
in Judea, in your place of work; in Samaria, among the people with whom you have personality
conflicts; and then until the utter most parts of the earth.

Now how is your witnessing life? Now dear ones, I think the Devil is engaged in deceiving us about
our spiritual state. I think he has persuaded us to treat created life as if it were begotten life.
He has persuaded us to eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil and then is now trying to
persuade us that we have eaten of the tree of life. And he is constantly trying to deceive us about
our true relationship to God. Now the Bible leaves no room for any deception.

Dear ones, knowing your state of grace is not a matter of, “I feel a feeling I felt I felt before.”
And it just is not, dear ones. And you can say what you like about these old hard preachers that
preach otherwise, but the Bible gives clear marks of our different states of grace. Now the mark of
one who is born of God is that one who is born of God does not commit sin. And that’s the glorious
grace into which God can lift us that we can be free from known act or word that disobeys him. So
if a dear one is talking to some others and someone says, “Well, you know she bakes very nice
cakes.” And you reply, “Yes, but I wish she’d help with the dishes,” that’s sin. Yeah, yeah,
that’s not what Jesus would say. Jesus would not say that about the dear one. And that is a
non-loving word.

Now loved ones, do you see I’m saying to you that God can lift you into this kind of victory. I’m
not beating it over your head and saying, “You must rise to that yourself,” but I’m saying that is
sin and anyone who is born of God need not do that. You need not speaking an unloving word like
that. The Holy Spirit can give you the insight to see that that is an unloving word. The one who
is born of God does not go to the higher $10 when he’s filing in his expenses in the income tax. He
doesn’t go to the next $10 up. He puts it exactly right. He does not steal. He is given the power
not to commit sin. And one who is born of God does not commit sin. And if he commits sin he isn’t
born of God.

See, it’s like a group of Irish doctors gathering around a corpse in some Irish town. And there
someone has left you know, part of what is to go on the coffin or the casket. And they have, “Born
15th of September 1903,” and the dear one is dead. And the doctors look and say, “Well, he was born
15th of September 1903. Now there’s no death and he doesn’t speak like someone who is alive. And he
doesn’t look like someone who is alive. And he doesn’t think like someone who is alive, but it says
he was born 15th of September 1903.” Now I think a lot of us are engaged in that kind of deception
with the Devil, “I was born again in this year; I must be alive; I must be regenerate. I do not
talk like a live person. I do not breath the Holy Spirit in like a live person. I do not breathe
the Holy Spirit out to my dear ones in love like a live person, but I must be a regenerate person.”

Dear ones, if you’re a regenerate person you do not commit sin. You have the marks of life. And the
Holy Spirit is able to give you that life. Some dear ones would say you know, “Well that’s hard
words. You’re not ministering grace you’re ministering the law.” Dear ones, it’s vital to know if
you have cancer so you can get better. You know the power is available in God, but it is vital to
know when you have not that power.

And so, one who is born of God doesn’t commit sin. One who has had their heart cleansed by the Holy
Spirit has no experience of these feelings within: “unbelief; a spirit of discouragement in times of
pressure and opposition; a lack of quietness and confidence in God; a lack of faith and trust in
God; a disposition to worry and complain in the midst of pain; an over anxious feeling whether
everything will come out all right; formality and deadness; lack of concern for lost souls; dryness
and indifference; lack of power with God.”

One who has allowed the Holy Spirit to come in and cleanse their heart has no lack of love for lost
souls. But dear ones, many of us are sanctified and petrified. And we are stamped and addressed and
are ready to go to heaven. And you know that because ever since we have come into Bethany, and ever
since we have come into this experience, we’ve just walked around concerned with our own family, and
our own little children, and with all that concerns ourselves. And we’re here and we’re ready to
help with the work, but we don’t overflow with the Love of Jesus. We have not a great burden of
souls in our spirits.

Now one who is cleansed from inward sin by the Holy Spirit is free from inward signs of self and
self centeredness and self love. And so it is that the Bible here gives us another clear mark of one
who has been anointed with the Holy Spirit, or baptized with the Holy Spirit. You may say, “Oh, you
speak in tongues.” No, no because the Bible says, “Do you all speak in tongues?” No, obviously you
don’t. Well you may say, “Oh, you have the gift of healing?” The Bible says, “Do all have the
gifts of healing?” No, because of course those are gifts. The Holy Spirit may be pleased to give
you himself without those gifts. He may just make those gifts available when you need them.

But this other sign is a plain sign and it’s found there in Acts 1:8 if you’d like to look at it.
And it refers to that realm in many of our lives where we are utter failures. It refers to our
witnessing lives. This is a clear sign that you have been anointed with the Holy Spirit. “But you
shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be my witnesses in
Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria and to the end of the earth.”

Now let me make another sentence up as near as I can to that, “When you get into this plane you will
end up in San Francisco, and then in Los Angeles, and then in Mexico City.” Now if you get into the
plane and you end up in New York, and Miami, and Cuba then you know you’re not on the right plane or
something has gone wrong. Now dear ones, if you are not witnesses in Jerusalem, your home, and in
Judea, your place of work, and in Samaria, to those with whom you have personality conflicts, then
you have not received the anointing of the Holy Spirit. That’s just what it means you see.

If you have not a victorious witnessing life tonight then you are not anointed with the Holy Spirit.
And if I have not a victorious witnessing life tonight it doesn’t matter what state I have been in
in the past, the anointing of the Holy Spirit is not upon me. And I am not pouring fourth the life
of Jesus because a witness is a “marturae” and “Martureo” in Greek is obviously near to our “martyr”
and it means just that: One who dies. And a real witness is one who dies to himself so that Jesus

stands up and lives within him and everyone sees Jesus instead of the person. Now if you are not a
witness in that sense to Jesus then you have not been anointed with the Holy Spirit. And I’m saying
tonight that the Holy Spirit is available for you.

Now some of us of course say, “Oh well, I haven’t time to wait around for the anointing of the Holy
Spirit, and I don’t know whether I have the anointing of the Holy Spirit or not, but I’ll go out and
witness anyway.” And many of us get out there and you know what we do, we end up in a conversation
with some dear one and we say, “You know, we believe you can be free from sin.” And the other dear
one says, “Well, I have just finished reading Calvin and I don’t believe you can be free from sin in
this life. I believe, in a sense, one has to sin in act and word and thought every day.” And then
we say, “Well, 1 John 3:9 says, ‘Whosoever is born of God does not commit sin.’” And they say,
“Well, even so-and-so sinned.” And you have a long argument over whether you can commit sin or not.
And you leave and they leave. And they think, “Well that’s a strange theology.” And the only
impression you make on them is that of a clever theologian or a theologian of a different color to
themselves. You know that.

Or, we meet some dear one and we decide to witness without the anointing of the Holy Spirit and we
go up to them and say, “You know, I think you drink too much.” And they say, “Well, it’s my own
life. I can do what I like.” And we say, “Well, look it says in the Bible that drunkenness is a
sin.” And they say, “But it says take a little wine for your stomach’s sake.” And then you balance
up a few more verses and they balance up the two or three other verses that they have and you leave
each other. And they get the impression, “Well, he’s a very moral person. He doesn’t drink and I
must say I’d like to be him.”

But these dear ones do not see Jesus. They see you as a theologian or they see you as a moralist.
Or we go to them you know, and we tell them about Bethany Church, or we tell them about our
Presbyterian church or our Nazarene Church or Methodist Church and they say, “That’s very
interesting. I go the Lutheran Church.” And they share some things about the Lutheran Church. And
you share some things about your minister. And then you talk about the terrible state of the world,
and you talk about ecumenicity, and how many some things are getting better or worse. And you
depart from each other and all they think is, “That’s a certain kind of churchman and I’m this kind
of churchman.” And you make an impression on them as a certain kind of churchman but you don’t
witness about Jesus.

Now dear ones, that’s the disappointing, defeatist witnessing life without the anointing of the Holy
Spirit. Now the Bible says, “Listen, there’s a promise. You can receive power when the Holy Spirit
has come upon you and then you will be witnesses, when the power of the Holy Spirit is upon you.”
In other words the Bible says, “God has done a miraculous work in your heart. You need a miraculous
power and ability to tell of it to others.” If you haven’t that miraculous power all you’ll get
over to them is the non-supernatural part of the experience. But if you have the supernatural part
of the Holy Spirit then Jesus will shine through you to them.

Now dear ones, Jesus himself required this anointing. Maybe you’d like to check that for
yourselves. It’s in Luke 4:18-19, and Jesus, you remember, is speaking and reading in the temple
and he applies these words to himself from the Old Testament. “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,
because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to
the captives and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed, to
proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord.”

In other words, Jesus could not have preached good news to the poor; he could not have proclaimed
release to the captives; he could not have proclaimed recovering of sight to the blind if he had not
been anointed with the Holy Spirit at his baptism. Even our Lord Jesus who was the son of God
himself had to be anointed with the Holy Spirit for the work he was sent to do.

And so it is with us, dear ones. We cannot go and witness unless we have the baptism and the
anointing of the Holy Spirit upon us. So Fletcher of Madeley, the old saintly Methodist used to
gather his preachers around them and he used to talk to them for 30 minutes and then he used to get
them to pray for 30 minutes for the anointing of the Holy Spirit. And the older Methodist bishops
used to gather their preachers around them before they ordained them and they’d say, “Have you the
anointing of the Spirit?” Dear ones, there can be no witnessing without the anointing of the Holy
Spirit.

Now of course the truth is that you and I are members of the body of Jesus. And so if you are a
hand, then as the Holy Spirit anoints Jesus, the Holy Spirit pours down over the whole body and down
over this right hand. And so he anoints you also if you stay in Jesus. But many of us get into the
position where we find witnessing so difficult that we disobey Jesus’ command to witness. We
disobey his injunction that we are to be witnesses. And so we step aside from Jesus and the Holy
Spirit is not able to anoint us.

Now we can only receive the anointing if we remain in Christ in obedience and in love. You may say,
“Well, what is the significance of this anointing?” Well you remember it occurred in the Old
Testament. You could be born into the tribe of Levi but you did not become a priest, you did not
enter into your Levite priesthood until you were anointed with oil. That was the seal that the
Israelites put upon you that you were ready to enter your office.

Now you can be a born again Christian, but you cannot enter your office as a priest before God until
you have the anointing of the Holy Spirit. That’s why so many of us are unable to be a “pontifex”,
a “bridge maker” between ourselves or between our friends and God. We’re unable to intercede before
the Father for dear ones. And we have little experience of successful and victorious intercessory
prayer because we have no anointing to enter into that priesthood.

See dear ones, there’s a sense in which a priest must bear the sorrows and the pains of others as
his very own and that requires the anointing of the Holy Spirit. We need priests in our churches
today. We don’t need so much, better preachers, but we greatly need priests who will intercede
mightily before God. And so you remember, that story that I’m sure you’ve heard again and again of
Moody (Dwight L. Moody 1837-1899, American evangelist) traveling to that church, preaching in the
morning: cold service, no atmosphere, no movement. And he was reluctant to go back that night. But
a dear one went home to her invalid sister and told her that a Mr. Moody was at the church. And the
sister said, “Take my lunch away. I’ve been praying for him to come to this church for years.” And
she prayed all day and Moody preached that night and 500 came forward. And he sent them back and
said, “No, this is emotion. If you want really to give your lives to Jesus, to deny yourself, to
become nothing for him, then come to the vestry tomorrow night.” So those 500 and 200 others came
forward.

Now dear ones, that’s the power of an intercessor in prayer. We need the anointing of the Holy
Spirit to become priests before God. Now you could be born a king in Israel. But until you had the
anointing of the oil you could not enter into your office as a king. Now we have available
authority in Jesus over evil spirits and over demons. You remember, it says in Ephesians that Jesus

was placed above every authority and above every power in heaven and on earth. And of course, we
who are in Jesus are there also. And so if every enemy is under his feet and if we are in him we are
at least above the soles of his feet. So we’re above every enemy.

So the Holy Spirit is able to anoint us to be kings, rulers over demons and evil spirits. But many
of us go to homes where the Devil rules, where the Satan spirit has a hold on a member of that home
so that that member is not free to decide for Jesus. And we go and we give them the gospel again,
and again, and again. And we wonder why they aren’t reacting. And we have not the anointing of the
Holy Spirit to stand against that evil force within them. We need the anointing then to be kings.

You remember, there were prophets. You could be born a prophet because one of them said, you
remember, “I wasn’t born in a prophet’s family. I was a shepherd.” You could be born as a prophet.
But you couldn’t enter into the office until the Holy Spirit anointed you. Now we need prophets
today. We need people who will stop going to the person next door who has a funeral and say, “Well
now, I want to give you some verses that will help you.” And then they read over “Let not your
heart be troubled, you believe in God, believe also in me.” And they read over some other verses.
Then they close the Bible and they think of some good things that ministers have said in the past at
funerals and they give them then. And then they give them a little bit of commonsense that they’ve
got out of the Reader’s Digest. And they feel that they have acted the part of a prophet and
comforted the dear ones.

Do you see that God has a right word for that person at that time? And you need the anointing of the
Holy Spirit so that you can speak that prophetic word to them, so that you can speak the right word
out of the right place of the Bible to the right person at the right time. And that requires the
anointing of the Holy Spirit. And God has promised us this. Now you can have this anointing
tonight.

What affect does this anointing have on your own life? Well, some of the effect of the anointing
can be found if you look at John 12:3. You can see if you take the “an” off as an indefinite
article from “anointing” you’re left with “o-i-n-t” And therefore you can see the connection easily
in the English language between it and “ointment”. And they’re very close together. The effect of
the anointing on a life is the effect of this ointment. “Mary took a pound of costly ointment of
pure nard and anointed the feet of Jesus and wiped his feet with her hair; and the house was filled
with the fragrance of the ointment.”

And when the Holy Spirit anoints you with himself he fills your life with the fragrance of Jesus.
And Jesus breaks through what was that old self. And your thoughts and your feelings become sweet as
his are. Not with the sweetie sweetness that people try to imitate, but with the real sweetness of
Jesus himself. When the Holy Spirit anoints you with himself, your own soul becomes a garden of
spices and you become a delight in the church, and a delight at work. There’s something fragrant
about your presence. You don’t need to speak but something shines through from you and people sense
the very presence of Jesus. And you don’t need to preach the gospel to them. But the Holy Spirit
has anointed you with the very fragrance of Christ himself.

Now that can be yours dear ones. The Holy Spirit is anxious to give you that kind of fragrance
instead of the sourness that so many people connect with so many of us Christians. When the Holy
Spirit anoints you with himself he anoints you with the very fragrance of the Christ life
miraculously. Too many of us have tried to imitate Jesus. We aren’t called to imitate Jesus.
Jesus is at the right hand of God the Father and he is able through the Holy Spirit to give us the

things that are his own. So he is able supernaturally to impart to you his own fragrance of his own
life. But you need to get down on your knees and begin to admit that you need it and that you have
not sufficient in your own self.

When the Holy Spirit comes he gives you strength. When the Holy Spirit came to Paul he was able to
endure shipwrecks and persecutions. He was able to endure stonings. He was able to endure arrest,
and criticism, and conflict with joy–with complete joy. Now some of us come into a hard place and
somebody says, “You’re having a hard time these days.” And we say, “Yes, but God is sufficient,”
with teeth clenched. Now we don’t need to have the teeth clenched. You can meet those trials, and
those defeats, and those difficulties with joy. The Holy Spirit is able to strengthen you so that
you can face all those things and not be weary.

So this is the whole promise of the Bible: that you’ll rise up with wings as of eagles. You shall
run and not faint. And the Holy Spirit is able to strengthen you in this way so that you can go
through unbearable trials, things that you would have thought you could not meet. And you can meet
them, not just meet them but meet them with joy and with peace because nothing is draining from you
yourself. The Holy Spirit has anointed you with his own strength.

Another effect I think of the Holy Spirit is the same effect as oil. You know that oil in the Old
Testament is the symbol of the Holy Spirit. And the young men especially, will know that athletes
use oil on their limbs to make them supple and flexible, to make the joints nimble so that they’ll
move easily and quickly without any friction, without any strain. Now many Christians enter into
some experience of conversion and often enter into the place of full consecration for sanctification
but never stay long enough to be anointed with the Holy Spirit. And so they have to be dragged to
the prayer meeting. They have to be dragged to testify. They have to be persuaded and begged to do
this or that piece of Christian work. They move slowly and lumpishly and awkward about God’s
business. They are enthusiastic and alive and active in their own business but they’re slow and
awkward in God’s business.

Now when you have the anointing of the Holy Spirit he makes you flexible. He makes you nimble about
God’s business. You have gospel shoes on and you’re ready to go about God’s business. And you’re
not always preoccupied with how little time I have left for myself, but you’re anxious how much time
can I give to the Lord Jesus because the Holy Spirit has anointed you with that. No longer do you
come up to people and say, “I can’t witness to them because they are better educated and better read
than I am.” But the Holy Spirit anoints you with himself so that your personality becomes as fluid
as the psychologists think it can become. It becomes fluid and flexible so that you can meet all
different kinds of people and you can deal with them in the way God wants you to deal with them.
And you can tell that you have this flexibility about you.

You know it. You know yourself. You know whether you’re lumpish and awkward at the moment in God’s
business. You know it dear ones, don’t you? You know how you feel tonight. You know whether
you’re free for Jesus just to break out of you if he wants. You know it. Or, whether you’re wrapped
up in half a dozen contortions of thinking that you have. The Holy Spirit anoints us with that kind
of flexibility in our lives.

Just, dear ones, to finish could we look at the anointing oil of the Old Testament? And I think it
teaches us some things about the way the Holy Spirit can affect your own witnessing life. The oil
in the Old Testament that they use to anoint prophets, and priests, and kings with contains several
ingredients. The first ingredient was myrrh. And myrrh was used to take the soreness out of a

bruise. Now when the Holy Spirit anoints you with himself people can kick you, and tear you apart,
and criticize you, and complain about you, and oppose you, and offend you, and there is no soreness
in the bruise. Now there is no soreness.

You may sit there and say, “I don’t believe it. You feel hurt surely and the Holy Spirit comes in
and he gives you a band for the hurt. And it heals up after a while.” No, when you’re anointed with
the Holy Spirit you feel no bruise. You feel no soreness. You feel no pain. You never feel, “How
badly I’ve been treated. How unfair they’ve been to me. What a thing to say to me. I’ll never see
that person again if they’re going to treat me like that.” You don’t feel it. The Holy Spirit takes
the soreness out of the bruises. And that’s why one who is anointed with the Holy Spirit can keep
going forward. So he’s a Steven; he’s a Paul; he’s a Peter. He feels nothing. The Holy Spirit bears
it all. It is possible, dear ones, and it is for you.

Another ingredient of the anointing oil was cinnamon. And it was a fiery spice as we know and
stimulates. This is why Paul said, “Don’t be drunk with wine but be filled with the Spirit.”
Because wine does stimulate you at one point but the Holy Spirit does a far better job and has none
of the other effects. That’s why the Holy Spirit acts as cinnamon in us. It stimulates us and
makes us active, makes us able to do 10 times the amount of work that we did before. That’s why one
old preacher said, “I enjoy the rest of faith which keeps me in perpetual motion.”

When you’re in that place anointed with the Holy Spirit you have no weariness, you have no tiredness
because the Holy Spirit has given you a new stimulation. And I think it’s important to say that
there is a stimulation in our faces and our hearts. You know, some of us take each other for
granted, don’t we–in Bethany, and in our churches, and in our families? We say, “Well, we’ve to
witness to everyone else but these people know. And they won’t mind me walking around just my good
old self.” And we expect them to take our good old selves which are usually glum, complacent, and
wrapped up in ourselves saying nothing but what refers to our desires and our wishes.

Now when the Holy Spirit comes he stimulates you so that you are interesting each way in a new way
and a new way to your wife. Each morning is new. She meets you as a new person with more of Jesus
in you. And you meet her with more of the loved one in you, more of the Savior in you. And the Holy
Spirit is able to do that. It’s new every morning, the grace that he gives. But it’s a continual
moving forward because of the stimulating power of the Holy Spirit.

So one who is anointed with the Holy Spirit is an interesting person to be with. He or she is just
an exciting person to be with because they’re dynamic and they’re moving forward. And they’re saved
out of self and delivered out of self, and out of those sinking sands–out of those quick sands
where we’re lifting one foot after another with grave difficulty, grave difficulty.

The Holy Spirit gives you stimulation in your life. The Holy Spirit acts as calamus. Calamus was
another ingredient and it was used to counteract the acid in people’s stomachs. I suppose it was
alka-seltzer. And it took the sourness out of people’s stomachs. And when one is anointed with the
Holy Spirit they’re like the people in that bank that used to advertise on the TV, they’ve never met
a sourpuss. They not only are not sourpusses but they themselves have never met a sourpuss. They
really haven’t.

And someone comes along to them and says, “Isn’t he very irritable? Isn’t he? Isn’t he an
irritable person? Don’t you find that?” And the one who is anointed with the Holy Spirit says,
“No, no. But I tell you I see this of Jesus in him. I see this beauty of Jesus in him.” And the

Holy Spirit anoints you so that it takes the sourness out of the stomach. You do not feel sourness
coming to you.

Now don’t you say, “Oh, you have to be honest you know.” I think we should leave that to the Holy
Spirit of truth. He’ll do a better job of convicting than we will. If we can trust him he’ll
enable us only to see the sweetness in other’s lives. And that’s the way we should be, to be looking
for the Jesus in each of us so that one anointed with the Holy Spirit is always being ministered to
by the life of Jesus.

Well just looking at one other thing, one other ingredient of the anointing oil was olive oil. And
olive oil was used to take the kinks and the creases out of the skin and to put a shin on the skin
and make it smooth. And when the Holy Spirit anoints a person with himself he takes all those
stupid idiosyncrasies out of that person’s life. You know how many of us want to witness but we
want to witness so they know that it is us that are witnessing. I mean, we want our witness to have
a special kind of flavor to it. We want them to know it’s our particular self that’s being used by
Jesus to witness. We don’t want to be rolled over in the crowd. We don’t want to be conformed to
the mass of Christians, we want them to see Jesus but we want them to see Jesus through the beauty
that is in us.

And we have these idiosyncrasies and these elbows, and they’re always getting in the way. We try to
deal with it dear one and the elbows are getting in the way because we want them to see just how
vitally different we are to all other Christians they’ve met. When the Holy Spirit anoints us with
himself he takes all those kinks out of our characters–all those creases that shouldn’t be there,
all those strange characteristics that God doesn’t really want there, because he wants to replace
some of his own. When the Holy Spirit anoints you with himself he anoints you with the very beauty
of Jesus.

So that you know, you can read 1 Corinthians 13 and you don’t need to say “love”, but you can say,
“I am patient and kind. I am not arrogant or rude. I do not insist on my own way. I am not glad
when others go wrong. I rejoice at the truth. I bear all things. I believe all things. I endure
all things.” And it is God’s will for you tonight to be able to say that. And the Holy Spirit is
available to you tonight to anoint you with that beauty of Jesus.

Now have you that beauty? Have you the beauty of Jesus in your life? You may say, “Well, will he
anoint anyone?” No, he will only anoint a lamb. You remember, the Holy Spirit came down on Jesus
at the baptism in the shape of a dove. A dove is a very gentle bird and very easily repelled, and
very easily frightened. And a dove will only come to rest on a lamb–on one who is like the lamb of
God, one who is gentile and who “as a lamb to the slaughter, opened not his mouth.” One who is
ready to die to all self seeking. One who is ready to die to that desire to appear a more
enthusiastic Christian than everyone else. One who is ready to die to that desire of self to seek to
pray better than everyone else, to seek to preach better than everyone else. One who is dead to
self seeking, who does not steal any glory from God. One who is dead to self confidence, a lamb
without self confidence. One who, like Peter, has fallen and lost their self confidence–lost
confidence in their own ability to witness in this way. One who, like Paul, became blind before he
could see at all. One who has lost trust in their own ability to see what is needed in any
witnessing situation. One who has died, not only to self seeking, but one who has died to this
desire to have your own way, this desire to have your own self confidence.

One who has died to that desire to help yourself. One who is no longer anxious to say, “Lord, these

are difficult circumstances if I could only get out of these I could witness better.” One who is
not eager to rescue himself from the circumstances in which God has put him. One who is not eager
to say, “If that person were only removed I could witness.” One who is not eager to withdraw from a
certain situation so that they’ll be able to witness. One who has stopped trying to plane away
their own cross to make it easier to carry.

If you are ready to be a lamb, if you are ready to die to self defense, and self assertion, and
ready to be looked upon as nothing by others for Jesus’ sake, then the Holy Spirit, the blessed dove
that God sends will come and anoint you with the beauty of Jesus.

Now if you have entered into sanctification, if you have died to self and been filled with the Holy
Spirit this week and yet God has spoken to your heart and you need the anointing, I would ask you
dear ones, unless God presses you, to remain in your seat and receive the anointing of the Holy
Spirit, you see. Or, to kneel down in your place afterwards and receive that anointing, because if
you are a place of real readiness to die to self then the Holy Spirit will anoint you without
refusing. So I’d ask you just to stay in your seat.

But if God has spoken to some of you dear ones, tonight and you do not know the victory of death to
self–and I know there’s one dear brother here certainly that does not and wants to seek tonight–so
in other words if you have not entered into sanctification, if you have not freedom from anger, and
envy, and jealousy, if you’ve not freedom from bitterness, a desire to save yourself, a desire to
assert yourself and get yourself out of difficult situations, if you’ve a desire still to protect
yourself and are not a lamb, then will you seek God tonight and simply allow the Holy Spirit show
you where you’re not ready to be a lamb yet. And then come to the place where you’re ready to be
one, and simply receive the anointing of the Holy Spirit tonight for a witnessing life that God has
planned for you–that God has available for you tonight. No more defeat and no more disappointment,
but the victory of the beauty of Jesus shining through. That can be yours. I pray it will.

Let us just turn to the last hymn dear ones. And will you just come to the altar and seek God as he
speaks to you. “Hover o’er me, Holy Spirit, bathe my trembling heart and brow, fill me with thy
hallowed presence. Come oh come and fill me now.” And the Holy Spirit will fill those who are
willing. So let us stand as we sing.
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The Holy Spirit Cleanses Our Heart

Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill

Let us pray, dear ones. Father, we trust you in the name of Jesus and for his sake and for his
glory, and for the exhibiting of him in all our lives. We trust you our Father, tonight to expose
the lies of the Devil. We trust you our Father, to expose his lies that we cannot live a conquering
victorious life. Father, we trust you to dissipate all the grey area. We trust you to make things
black and white for us so that we can glimpse the victory that you are able to bring about in our
hearts. Father, we trust you to lead us to throw away all belief in past experiences, all belief in
an experience and to look at you and know that you are able to accomplish what you have promised.
And that in Christ we are able to be more than conquerors through him that loved us. We trust you
for this, our Father, that we may be your sons in spirit and in life. Amen.

I don’t know if you can see from there but you can tell by the smell. It was good cream at one time
and I left it too long and it got a bit sour. And it smells sour. And dear ones, it doesn’t matter
how often I put good milk into it. It keeps going sour faster than the original stuff did. And I
can fill it up again, and again, and again. And maybe a day later the whole jar of milk is sour.
And while that sour stuff remains at the bottom you can do nothing. And you’ll continue to sour even
the sweet milk that goes in.

And many Christians are experiencing that. They go to a conference like this, and some of the sweet
milk of the Holy Spirit pours in. And there’s something sour deep down that makes it all sour two
days after the conference has ended. And they’re up on that peak at the conference but two days
later the old sour stuff that has never been cleansed away has soured all that has come in. And
dear ones, many Christians are living like that. Many Christians are living that up and down
existence because they still have something sour at the bottom that they have never had cleansed
out. And you know, the only answer to this is for me to put it under the hot tap and to wash it
thoroughly and clean out all the sour stuff. And then I can put sweet milk in it and it stays sweet.

And that’s exactly what Peter meant. He said, “You know there came a day when the Father gave us
the Holy Spirit. And he cleansed our hearts by faith.” But many Christians are living defeated
lives because they have never gone that deep. You know, they came as all of us have done, where
they felt that God was condemning them. They saw that angry words were wrong. They saw that
dishonest words were wrong. They saw that their actions were all built on building their bank
account and on making themselves successful. And they saw that they were under condemnation of
death, that the Bible said that the wages of sin was death. And they didn’t know what to do. They
felt they had to die. And then the Holy Spirit revealed the blood of Jesus to them. And they
suddenly realized that they could present the blood of Jesus on behalf of their sins. They realized
that the Father looked down on them. And where he had said before, “I demand your life,” now he was
ready to say, “I accept my son’s life on your behalf.” And so when Satan the accuser of the
brethren would say, “You haven’t had such a good day today. You haven’t been up so much as you were
yesterday,” they got used to saying, “Well no, but that’s not the basis of my acceptance with God.
It’s the blood of Jesus. The outpoured life of Jesus pleases my Father.”

But then they began to find that more and more they were needing the blood of Jesus where they
hadn’t before. And though all of us, even if we were as saintly as God is able to make us, all of
us need the blood of Jesus to be acceptable to God, they found that their life was becoming a series

of hills and valleys. And they began to discover that they were on the top at a conference, or they
were at the top at Easter time, or they were at the top when church began in the fall. But there
were long, long dry valleys when they began to feel that they were not in grace at all.

In other words, they began to feel great depression in their spirits. And the depression of course
was brought by guilt because they could see that certain things were wrong. They could see that
they should not break out in bad temper with the children. They could see that that was wrong. And
they would pray to Jesus at the beginning of the day that he would control them in this very regard.
And then the children would do something and before they knew it the temper was out. And they
would go to the Lord Jesus at night and they would plead again his precious blood. And they would
confess the sin. And then they would come to repentance. And they would remember the words of some
preacher who said, “Repentance is a godly sorrow to Jesus for your sins and an absolute turning from
the sin.” And they would remember the words of John when he said, “If we walk in the light as he is
in the light then the blood of Jesus cleanses us from all sin.”

But they realized they were not walking in the light because they had confessed this sin yesterday.
And so they would walk the next day, and they would walk that day victoriously. And the next day
they would lose their temper again with the children. And the guilt would settle on their
conscience. And when they tried to plead the blood of Jesus again for that, the words would come
in, “If we walk in the light as he is in the light.” And they realized that they had confessed this
sin so often to the Father that they were now becoming immune to what even the blood of Jesus could
do for them.

And dear ones, there are many I think, dear Christians and many who are even baptized with the
Spirit and experience some of the gifts of the spirit who live this kind of up and down life. You
remember that Jesus gave the gift of casting out demons and healing to the apostles when he sent
them out, the mission of the 70 you remember. And yet even after that James and John will still
arguing about the place they were going to get in heaven. Even after that Peter denied his Lord for
fear of the little maid and his reputation. And many Christians who seem to have gone on in the
Lord in many might ways are experiencing this up and down life.

Now dear ones, you know what that brings. It brings eventually a sense of condemnation that you are
a hypocrite. Bit-by-bit you begin to feel that what the people say at home is right. You know, “I
wish the church people could see you.” And bit-by-bit you begin to realize that you seem to be
leading a double life. You’re one person on the outside, you can control your acts and words at
times. And to some people you make a good impression but inside there is a mass of what Jesus said
was in the heart. For he said, “It was out of the heart that adultery comes and the jealous comes
and envy.” It’s out of the heart that that comes. And bit-by-bit you began to realize that there
was something down there that you had never allowed God to touch.

Now dear ones, the Bible has made provision for all that and God has. The Bible has made a clear
distinction between sins, your acts and words over which you get victory at the beginning in your
converted life and sin in the singular which is the attitude within you that still wants to be a
little independent of God in some things. If you read, you see, the book of Romans carefully, you
find that the first four and a half chapters are concerned with sins. You very rarely find the
singular word sin in the first four and a half chapters of Romans. It talks about sins. And it
talks about the blood of Jesus.

You might like to look at one of these places now. In Romans 3:25 you find an example of this. And

if you go through the first four and a half chapters of Romans I think you’ll find that on the whole
those chapters talk about sins and the blood of Jesus. You see it says there, taking part of 24,
“Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as an expiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was
to show God’s righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins.”

In other words, the first four and a half chapters give us the message that you can be forgiven your
sins by God because he looks upon the blood of Jesus, the outpoured life of Jesus, the death of
Jesus that has been offered in your place. And therefore you see, there is nothing between you and
God. Before, there was death between you and God. Now there is nothing because Jesus has died for
you. And he is able to reach right over Jesus and to grip you and draw you to himself. And he
forgives you. He restores the relationship that he wants with you.

In other words, the blood of Jesus deals with the forgiveness of our sins. And it refers to the
standing we have before God. And so we can go before God in confidence because of the blood of
Jesus. But it refers to our standing before God. It refers to our justification. To justify you
means God treats you as just for the sake of the blood of Jesus offered on your behalf.

But the second three and a half chapters of Romans deal with another subject completely. There you
find the word sins, rarely occurs. But the word sin in the singular occurs often. And there you
find the emphasis not so much on the blood of Jesus but on the death of Jesus and on the cross of
Christ. And there you find the emphasis is not so much on our standing with God or the state of our
own conscience. But you find the emphasis is on our walk with God and our life.

Now dear ones, you can see that yourselves if you look at Romans 6. And these are the second three
and a half chapters in Romans. And I’m just taking this one example but you can read through them
all and you’ll find this emphasis. Romans 6:4, “We were buried therefore with him by baptism into
death,” no mention of blood but, “Into death, so that as Christ was raised from the dead by the
glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life.”

In other words, the emphasis there is on our walk with God. And I suggest to you dear ones, that
it’s at that point that many dear Christians who are converted but have had no experience of the
death to self, or the deliverance from sin, it’s there that many of us are failing. We are failing
to walk in the light because we have taken one truth of Christ’s death for us, and we have utterly
forgotten the other side of that truth. And so dear ones, the blood of Jesus is for the forgiveness
of our sins but the cross of Jesus and the death of Jesus are for the deliverance of us from sin, in
the singular.

In other words, there are two sides to sin. There’s the inward sin in the singular, the inward
attitude of independence to God. And there are the outward sins that that begets in our life. There
is the inward “dis-ease” where we are at “dis ease” with God’s will. And there are the outward
symptoms of that “dis ease”. And, as with the doctor when you come to him, he sees your symptoms
first. And so when we first come to Jesus he points to the symptoms on the outside and he says,
“Those must first be forgiven.”

But then if we will stay with him and if we will open our hearts to all the Bible demands of us in a
victorious life, we will see that Jesus is pointing to the “dis ease” and he is saying, “Listen,
that is no use being forgiven. I am not going to forgive you that rebellion which lurks in your
heart. That rebellion has to be removed. The disease has to be cleansed. The disease has to be
cleansed from the bottom of your heart. Otherwise, every time I pour your spirit in your “dis ease”

with me, will contort what I give you. And you’ll pervert it.”

Now dear ones, do you see that this was the emphasis all through the Bible? That again and again,
even the Old Testament while it talks of the need to have our sins forgiven, again and again it
says, “I will put a new heart within you. I will take away your old heart of stone and I will put a
heart of flesh within you, a heart that can feel me and wants me.” Again and again the Old
Testament emphasis, “I will put a new spirit within you.” And dear ones, many of us are trying to
walk without entering into the second blessing of Christ’s death. And it is there for us. We can
enter into it.

The Bible calls sin by several names. First of all it talks about sin in the singular. And it
doesn’t matter what creed of which church you read, the creed will state “We believe that there are
the remains of sin even in the born again believer.” Even if you looked at the Baptist church
statement of belief, you’ll find that it says that. If you look at the Methodist church statement
of belief you’ll find it says that. The Lutheran… They proclaim plainly that even after you’re
converted, there remains within you some of this sin.

Now the easy way to see what the sin is, is to take the center letter of it. And many of us come to
Jesus and tell him that we want to get into heaven. We tell him that we want our sins forgiven and
we want to be accepted by his Father. And we receive forgiveness. But the “I” is still central. And
we still begin to rub our hands and tend to say, “I’m glad I’m going to heaven. I’m glad of what
Jesus has done for me. And now I want to get on with my life and I want to live it the way I best
possibly can, and then be accepted by him, at the end, in heaven.”

But the “I” is central. “It is not for his purposes that I’m living. It’s primarily for my own
purposes that I’m living. I want to help with the missions. I want to be a good church member. I
want to do as much as I can for Jesus. “I can” for Jesus.” But the “I” is central. And everything
in my Christian experience is still being referred to myself. And if someone asked me to do
something in the church, I find out whether it’s convenient for me first. And then I may do it. And
even when I do-do it if they ask me to sing, I sing. And I sing for the glory of Jesus. But there’s
something inside that creeps up and says, “Look at what these people are thinking of you. And look
at some of the glory that you’re getting for yourself.” And so this “I” begins to have a greater
and greater place in many Christian’s lives until it comes to the place where it begins to break out
in outward sin again.

See you know dear ones, it stays for a while where no one can see it. It does stay for a while in
the inward part of man’s life. It stays in the realm of the attitudes. It stays in the realm of
the motives. You know, you preach. But there’s a voice says, “Look at what they’re thinking of you.
Look at what they’re thinking of you.” And the self rises up within. And you don’t want it to rise
up, but it rises up. And sometimes you can’t control it. And before you know it you’ve said
something that obviously express pride. And you’ve committed an outward sin and then you have to go
back and plead the blood of Jesus. And there’s that continual list of confessions and
forgiveness’s.

It’s found in the realm of the reactions and the responses. You’re alright while it’s the pastor
that’s coming to the house because you know he thinks you’re a Christian and feels you’re a
Christian and you ought to be on your best behavior. So you get prayed up so that you will be in
good form. And he comes in and everything is right and the kids are in the right place in the other
room and the wife is organized. And you’re ready to receive him. And you witness well for Jesus.

And then he goes out and the kids come in and the wife comes in and says, “I forgot that thing you
wanted me to get today.” And you say, “You forgot?” And before you know it you’ve responded in a
way that shows that what is in will always come out. And dear ones, sin will always come out.

The tragedy is it comes out with the ones whom you ought to love best. Not the ones you love best,
the ones you ought to love best. It comes out with them. There you’re relaxed, there you go off
your guard. And before you know it the sin is out. And it’s out in the responses and the reactions.
Brother Elmer said the same thing, “You know, it’s not the actions that are the trouble to a
converted Christian it’s the reactions.” And that’s what shows what’s inside you.

So it’s in the realm of the attitudes and the motives, the reactions and responses, the intentions
and the desires. It’s there where we have trouble. And you know what it’s like at times, it’s like
a great Alsatian dog–and I think maybe I said this to you before– and it’s running around the
room, it’s bounding everywhere in chaos. And you can’t get talking to the pastor. So you take that
big Alsatian dog that’s so obvious to everyone, those sins, and you put it in a box. And then you
sit on it and you start talking to the pastor. And then after six months or so the dog begins to
jump and the box begins to lift and you begin to go up and down and say, “Yes, yes, yes.” And the
lid is lifting and you’re having trouble keeping it down.

And you know dear ones, I needn’t tell you because we know what it’s like. You pray for patience.
And God doesn’t give you patience. Maybe he gives you a temporary patience but he allows it to
break out again. Do you know why? Because you don’t put cosmetics on somebody that has cancer, you
see. And he wants you to see your real state. And so he refuses to take away one of the symptoms
that show the deadly disease that is within. And he wants you to know that it is possible to remove
that, to remove that completely.

How do you know it’s there, dear ones? Well you can do it in many ways. I’d ask you to listen
faithfully and honestly as I read these words. “Are you ever conscious of a secret spirit of pride,
an exalted feeling in view of your success or position, because of your good training or appearance,
because of your natural gifts and abilities? Are you ever conscious of an important independent
spirit? Are you ever conscious of a love of human praise, a secret fondness to be noticed, a love
of supremacy, a drawing attention to self in conversation, a swelling out of self when you have had
a free time in speaking or praying? Are you ever conscious of the stirrings of anger or impatience
which worst of all you call nervousness or holy indignation?”

“Are you ever conscious of a touchy sensitive spirit, a disposition to resent and retaliate when
disapproved of or contradicted, a desires to throw sharp heated flings at another? Are you ever
conscious of a disposition to criticize and pick flaws when set aside and unnoticed, a peevish
fretful spirit, a disposition that loves to be coaxed and humored. Are you ever conscious of a
jealous disposition, a secret spirit of envy shut up in your heart, an unpleasant sensation in view
of the great prosperity and success of another, a disposition to speak of the faults and failings
rather than the gifts and virtues of those more talented and appreciated than yourself? Are you
ever conscious of a dishonest, deceitful disposition? Are you ever anxious about whether everything
will come out alright?”

Dear ones, all those are symptoms of the self inside you that you have never allowed God to deal
with. The teaching of the Bible is that we can live the exchanged life. As Jesus exchanged your
position on the cross, as Jesus died on that cross for you now he calls you to die on that cross
with him. Now many of us fail to see that. Many of us say, “He’s died the death for me now I’m

free to live my own life.” You’re free to live your own life under the tyranny of self. But he has
called you to die on that cross with him. He has said to you, “I can bear your sins but I want to
bear you to the cross with me.”

Now you can see this, dear ones, in Romans 6 very plainly. “We were buried therefore with him by
baptism into death.” Now I ask you, do you know that experience? Do you know that experience of
being baptized into Jesus’ death? Because that’s the truth that the Bible proclaims. You cannot
tame that old self, you cannot train it. That old self has to be destroyed on the cross by Jesus.
And he has done it. It says in Romans 6:6, “We know that our old self, our old man was crucified
with him.” Why? “So that the sinful body might be destroyed and we might no longer be enslaved to
sin,” we might no longer have to cry out, “The good that I would I cannot do and the evil I do not
want that’s the very thing I do.” The next verse says, “Who is free from sin?” “Those of us who
have died are free from sin.”

In other words Jesus calls you as a converted Christian to come to him on the cross and allow
yourself to be crucified with him. And no more of this business, “Thank God that he has forgiven my
sins, and now I can get on with my life. And I can have my own way, and insist on my own rights, and
stand up for myself, and assert myself, and defend myself.” But, “Now, I can join him on the cross
and I can die to this old self within.” But dear ones, do you see that it’s Jesus that has
crucified that old self and all you can do is enter into this victory?

So the Bible makes a clear distinction between being born again and dying. It says at the beginning
in John 3:3, “You must be born again.” You have to be born again. You have to come into the life
of Jesus. But when that life comes into you it will soon begin to tackle another life that’s within
you already. And in Galatians 5:17 Paul stated it plainly. He said, “This life of the spirit
fights against the life of the flesh within.” And is another word the Bible gives to sin, the life
of the flesh, the independent spirit of a man.

Now do you see that it shows itself only slightly in all of us? You know, the Devil is clever and
the Devil loves religion. And Christians in whom the old self has not been crucified usually love
religion. And they especially love to do a whole lot of work in the church. And they love to get
leading positions in the church. And so the Devil loves religion and the old self loves religion.
And it really enjoys being looked upon as a Christian worker. But inside all the time it’s
perverting everything to its own glory. And the old self takes all the victory out of the Christian
life. It destroys your victory.

You come to a time when you know you should have love for the wife and she comes in and she has
bought a new dress and she says, “Do you like it?” And the bank account isn’t in too good shape and
you say, “Yeah, yeah, yeah it’s alright.” That’s the old self. Do you see? See? Don’t say dear
ones, “That isn’t a sin.” That’s a sin of a lack of love. That’s not perfect Christian behavior.
That’s not the victory that Jesus has wrought in us. And you know why it’s not, because you’re
thinking of the bank account. You have not committed it to God. You’ve said you had, but you
haven’t really. And she’s affected the bank account. And you know you are the guardian of the bank
account. And it’s your responsibility to take charge of it. And the only way you can take charge of
it is by showing her what you think of the new dress. And it all comes from self. Self is in
charge of the bank account. And self must up and show its ugly head to the dear one. And it takes
all the joy out of the new dress.

Do you think Jesus could organize that bank account even though she bought the new dress? Dear

ones, I know he can. I know he can. Really! But we don’t believe it and we take control. Or, the
kids are running around the house and they’re tearing the place apart and somebody is coming. And we
don’t know what to do because we are mother. And this is our home. And it’s our responsibility to
keep it right. And we want to be like Eve. We want to be as gods. And we want to have this place
right. And we are the mother of these children. And it’s our responsibility. And we have never died
to our motherhood. We have never died. We have never allowed the mother of that home to be placed
on the cross. And so we don’t know what to do and we tell them gently. And we try to be Christian.
And then we lose our temper and we’re angry. And then the words fly. And the peace of Jesus rules
no one’s heart.

And all the time the Lord Jesus is waiting in the power of the Holy Spirit to cleanse out all that
from you. And dear ones, it can be. The Holy Spirit can cleanse all those reactions out of your
heart.

Now do you understand that? I don’t mean fight them. You’ve fought them, I know you have because I
fought them. You can fight them. And you can call it the fight of faith even though you’re not
being biblical. But you can call it the fight of faith. And you can try to pray them down. But
there is no victory. There is no victory until Jesus comes in and cleanses those. And in this
experience of Jesus’ death on the cross, the Holy Spirit is able to cleanse those things from you.

I don’t know how I could make any more plain the victory, dear ones. Do you see that even if it’s
within you, and you don’t express it, that is sin rising up? Do you see that? You come into the
church and you see someone whom you know isn’t living a right life and you don’t say a thing. Your
face doesn’t even change, but a critical attitude rises inside you. And you just look at them
without the pure love of Jesus. That is sin. That is a lack of victory.

I think I told you what I did as a pastor. They would come in to me in the office, and makes some
slick comment about the sermon which wasn’t very complementary. And I would grip the chair and smile
because a pastor always smiles. And I would smile. And inwardly the old self rose up and said,
“What right have you to criticize my sermon? They don’t know any Homiletics.” And dear ones, again
and again it’s this reaction within.

It doesn’t show itself outside except that the eyes begin to get a grey look at the back of them.
There becomes a defeat into the eyes of Christians who live with the old self alive inside. There
comes that defeated look, there comes that strain to the whole face. You know, when you hold a
disease down that brings a strain to the face. And these Christians live strained lives. They carry
the burden of Christianity on their back. They do not look into the heavenlies in Jesus. But they
struggle along.

And you know, they draw up their car to Jesus and they ask him to step in and he steps into the
passenger seat and they drive along in their life for six months. And he says, “Turn left.” They
turn left. “Turn right.” They turn right. “Go down the hill.” And they go down the hill.

Then he says one day, “Go down through those slums.” And they say, “Father, Lord Jesus, I don’t
want to spoil my reputation by going down there and doing that kind of thing. No.” And then they
do that a few times. And they turnaround one day and Jesus is not there any longer. And the whole
assurance of his presence has gone from their hearts.

Dear ones, there comes a day when you have to stop the car, and get out, and walk around and let

Jesus into the driver seat and then keep your hands off the wheel. Keep your hands off the wheel
and say, “Lord Jesus, whatever this means for me, whatever it means, a loss of reputation, it
doesn’t matter. I’m dying now with you. I’m willing to die to self. I’m willing to be anything
for you.”

How do you enter in dear ones? First of all acknowledge the Holy Spirit as a person. First, do
that. Don’t treat him as a force or an influence. Start praying to the Holy Spirit. Now would you
do that? A lot of people say, “I know what you mean, I know what you mean. Now Lord Jesus, will
you help me here?” Jesus has said, “It is to your advantage that I go away because if I did not go
away the Holy Spirit would not come unto you. And he’s the counselor. And when he comes he will lead
you into all the truth. And he will convict you of sin.”

So begin to pray to the Holy Spirit. And if you do this tonight, do it this way, dear ones. Address
the Holy Spirit in your prayers and say, “Holy Spirit, will you search my old self and see where
it’s still alive in me?” And he’ll take you deep down. And he’ll begin to show you the pride that
is deep within you. He’ll begin to show you the irritability that is deep within you. He’ll begin
to show the root and the source of these things that you really want to be God. You want your own
way all the time. You want to rule your own life and everybody else’s. And the Holy Spirit will
reveal this to you.

But only he can do it. You can’t do it through introspection. Nee says that introspection is no
good to Christians. Introspection does harm because you only look at what you’re prepared to look
at. The Holy Spirit will take you into the very heart of yourself where you’ve never seen the evil
that is within. Now dear ones, you need to deal with the Holy Spirit in this regard. You know?
That’s why at the altar it’s so good to leave your seeking with the Holy Spirit. He is the
counselor. He can counsel you. He can reveal to you where this still exists in you.

Secondly, it’s necessary to see the sinfulness of that old self and to see that it isn’t just a
shortcoming. And it isn’t just a higher realm in the Christian life you’re concerned with but it’s
what Romans 8:7 says it is, “The mind of the flesh, the mind of the old self, the mind of sin, the
mind of the eye is enmity against God. It is not subject to God’s law neither indeed can it be.”
And dear ones, do you see why it’s so silly to struggle? Do you see why it’s pleasing the Devil
tonight if you say, “I have some of those things but I’m not going to come up there and deal with
them?”

It pleases the Devil. Because while you’re a Christian with the old self alive you’re at enmity
against God. And that is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can it be. That’s why when
you try to get patience or you try to pray anger down you can’t. Because those things are not
subject to God’s law. They’re subject only to the power of the evil one within you. And that’s why
they need to be crucified. And it’s necessary to see the sinfulness of that.

And then to see thirdly, that Jesus has done something for it. You cannot crucify it. You can’t
strangle it. But Romans 6:6 says, “That our old self was crucified with Christ.” Do you realize
that’s every one of you? Dear ones, all your pride, all your desire to have your own way, all that
strong, stiff necked attitude that you have towards God: That has all been destroyed on the cross of
Calvary. It has been destroyed on the cross of Calvary. It is dead already. That old self is
dead. And that can be made real in your heart because the Holy Spirit can take of the things of
Jesus and impart them to you. By a miracle you can receive the application of that victory to your
heart. Romans 6:6, “Our old self was crucified with Christ.”

And lastly, you need faith. You need faith to allow the Holy Spirit to come in and cleanse out all
this and displace it with himself. And what is faith? Some people say, “Oh, if I had only faith. I
want to pump up faith.” And they pump up faith. And they say, “Our old self was crucified with
Christ. Our old self was crucified with Christ.” And they try auto suggestion instead of faith.

Faith is the gift of God. In other words, faith has two sides. It’s first of all a vote of no
confidence in self. It’s a readiness to say, “Father, there is no good in me. The anger comes out
because that is me. That is what I am. I am anger. It’s not something I do. I am pride. It’s not
something I feel. I am envy. It’s not something I show or express. I am envy. I am anger. I am
pride. I am a man of unclean lips. Not, I speak unclean words. It’s me that’s wrong. It’s me that
has to go to the cross with you. Father, I accept. Holy Spirit, I believe. There is no good thing
in me. Even the good things I’ve done in church have been tinged with self and have stolen the
glory from God.”

In other words, the first part of faith is not a circling to believe dear ones, but a readiness to
accept that there is no good thing in me and a readiness, therefore, to consecrate my whole self to
God and a readiness to say, “I’m ready to be anything for you Father.” And the Holy Spirit will
come into you tonight and he’ll begin to say, “Are you ready to be anything? Are you ready to fail
financially for me? Are you ready to fail financially? Are you ready to sell that house and buy
one that I want you to buy or to live in rented accommodation? Are you ready to do without that
davenport forever? Are you ready to be a failure in your business? Are you ready to do without
your own way at home tonight? Are you ready to do without your summer vacation that you’ve planned?
Are you ready to die to your own plans, to die to your future?”

Ah young brothers and sisters. That’s us, you know. We carry the future on our back. We want to be
gods in our future. Jesus says, “He who is crucified has died to the future. He has no future.”
Are you ready to be dead to your future? And the Holy Spirit will come down and down the line. And
then he will say, “Are you ready to be nothing for Jesus if he wants you to be? Are you ready to
be nothing? Someone with no reactions, no responses, no opinions? Are you ready to be nothing for
Jesus?” And then there comes a blessed moment when the Holy Spirit witnesses that you are ready to
be nothing. And he witnesses that you’re at the place of full consecration.

Now the Holy Spirit will tell you that dear ones, you don’t need to struggle to believe that. The
Holy Spirit will witness you have reached the ground of your heart. You have seen all that God wants
to show you.

And then there will spring up in your heart faith. It will spring up in your heart. You don’t
grasp it. You don’t work it up. It springs up in your heart when you’re at the place of full
consecration.

But what many of us do is we try to have faith for the death of self over a partially consecrated
life and it’s impossible. We work up a human faith and the thing, as we say, doesn’t take or
doesn’t work. It doesn’t work because it’s human faith. When you come to the ground of your heart
and you’re ready to be anything that the Holy Spirit wants you to be, then faith springs up in your
heart and receives the blessed Holy Spirit in. And he comes in. And I don’t know what he’ll do with
you. I don’t know how he’ll manifest himself in you. But he will cleanse all that mess out. And he
will displace all that unholy spirit that rules your life, and all those unholy desires that you
have and those unholy motives. And he will fill you with the very beauty of Jesus.

And dear ones, I can’t tell you the victory that comes into your heart when you find the envy does
not rise, when you find the anger is not there, when you find the pride does not rise in that
situation, and when you find the motive is clean. And the Father is pleased completely with what he
sees in your heart. Ah that’s a joy and a victory that is for each one of us, for every one of us.

What is it to die to self? You die tonight. My mother is lying, her corpse, in our home in Ireland
now. You’re dying and you lie here tonight. And you lie there. And what have you died to? You’ve
died to your possessions. It doesn’t matter about those possessions they belong to somebody else
now. They’re not yours. You’re not concerned with whether that house ever gets painted. You’re not
concerned with all that. Your mind is not burdened with all the things that you’re going to do
tomorrow. You’ve died to your possessions.

You’ve died to your affections, too. You know, your loved ones may still love you in some sense,
but you cannot love them. And it’s a good thing to die to your natural affection, because at times
it binds us from doing what we need to do with our dear ones. You die to your natural affections.
And you die to your future. You have no future. And you’re called to die tonight to all that. To
be as if you were now with Christ in the heavenlies and as if your body belonged to him.

And then tonight, let’s say, we all go out of this auditorium, and during the night Jesus comes in
and he sees your body lying there. And he gets inside it and he stands up straight. And then he
walks out in your body and walks to your work tomorrow and your friends say, “Good to see you.
You’re looking well today.” And you say, “Well no, actually I died last night. And this life, this
life that I live is not I that am alive but it is Christ that lives within me. And this life I’m
living now I live by the faith of the son of God.” And dear ones, that can be your experience
tonight. So that only Jesus, only Jesus thinks and feels in your heart.

The Holy Spirit is able to do that for you. He is able to do that this very night for you. And I
testify that he did it for me and that the Holy Spirit is able to keep you clean. He’s able to keep
you clean every day as you trust him and obey him. And it need not be a battle. It is victory,
victory all the way, inside and out with no “ifs” and no “buts,” and no qualifications. And it’s
available for you.

Dear ones, you know you’ve heard God’s word and I trust you now just to respond to the Spirit as he
tells you. I wouldn’t stay in my seat if I was defeated. I tell you that. Because the Holy Spirit
is present tonight and is able to cleanse you completely and give you victory. So I trust you just
to do what God tells you. And if you all have victory then you need to stay in your seats or you
need to stay standing. But if you haven’t victory, don’t struggle further. And don’t keep
compromising. Don’t keep compromising. Come and receive the Holy Spirit to cleanse your heart from
inward sin and give you victory.

Preparation for the Spirit of Anti Christ

Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill

A dictatorship has been prepared for during previous years. And dear ones, in Cuba the people there
had had this decay working in their hearts for many years. So gradually their natures changed, and
changed, and changed. And when the dictator came they welcomed him as the savior. And so it was in
Germany. It was no sudden event; the decay had been seeping through the nation. The decadence had
been working in the people’s hearts. And to those of us on the outside it was a great surprise when
the dictator took over but to the people really it was no surprise. The people received him as a
savior.

It’s when the people’s needs and the people’s willingness to pay the price for the fulfillment of
their needs come together that the dictator takes over without a battle. And so it will be with the
antichrist. When the antichrist comes there will be no great opposition to him but there will be a
great flocking to him from all the corners of the earth. It will be dear ones whose hearts have
been deceived, and whose hearts have been prepared, and whose hearts have been looking for the
savior but whose hearts have not been filled with the Holy Spirit. It will be those, whose lives are
not pervaded by the spirit of God’s truth, and they will flock to the antichrist and they will
welcome him as the savior.

So it will be with the personal opponent of Jesus Christ who the New Testament says will come at the
end of the ages. He will be hailed as a new savior. And you say, “Well, why will this be?” Well
you can look for yourself in the New Testament and find out why it will be dear ones. It’s in 1
John 4 and the second half of Verse 3. “And every spirit which does not confess Jesus is not of
God.” And then the second half reads, “This is the spirit of antichrist, of which you heard that it
was coming, and now it is in the world already.” That was 100 A.D.

The spirit of the antichrist has been in the world preparing the hearts of many of the so called
faithful to receive the antichrist when he comes. And so the Bible itself teaches that there is a
spirit of antichrist abroad even in church people, abroad even in those who think they are deep
Christians. There is a spirit of antichrist seeping underneath the very Holy Spirit that is trying
to get a hold of all our hearts and lives. And that antichrist spirit is preparing us to receive the
antichrist. And when he comes, many of us will be deceived into thinking that this is Jesus. This
is the second coming of our Savior.

Now this is why the Bible warns us to discern spirits. And you can see that warning in 1 John 4:3b
there, “This is the spirit of antichrist, of which you heard that is coming, and now it is in the
world already.” And 1 John 2:18, “Children, it is the last hour; and as you have heard that
antichrist is coming, so now many antichrists have come; therefore we know that it is the last
hour.” And in 1 John 4:1, the warning to test the spirits, “Beloved, do not believe every spirit,
but test the spirits to see whether they are of God; for many false prophets have gone out into the
world.”

And you may say, “Well, why are you preaching about the antichrist?” Well, I’m not preaching
because you can stop the antichrist coming. You cannot. You cannot break scripture. The scripture
says the antichrist will come and you cannot stop him coming. Even if I could tell you who he was
at this moment you could not stop him coming. Perhaps he is in the world already but you will not
be able to stop him coming because the scripture cannot be broken. But dear ones, it is imperative

that we begin to discern the spirit of antichrist when he moves in our own hearts lest we ourselves
be deceived when he comes. That’s why I’m preaching. Not so you will be able to look to the
antichrist, and not so that dear ones here will be able to become excited over whom the antichrist
might be. Dear ones, those are doctrines of demons. Those are doctrines of demons when these false
prophets who do not even prophesy in the name of Jesus say, “The antichrist is born in such and such
a land.” That is not what the Bible tells us to look for. But the Bible does tell us to discern our
own spirits and discern the spirits that are working in our own hearts so that we ourselves will not
be deceived.

You see, the Bible comes right down the line on who are Christians and who are not. The Bible comes
right down the line by the law and tells us, “If you obey the law then you please God.” The Bible
says that right from the first part of the Bible to the last part of the Bible. It tells us that,
“Obedience to the law is the mark of the sons of God.” Then Jesus Christ came and he says, “Whoever
has my spirit in their hearts, you are the sons of God, you are the children of God.” And Christ
comes right down the line and points out the things that we need to have if we claim to be alive in
God. And then the Holy Spirit came after Jesus ascended to the Father and he comes right down the
line and he says, “If I abide in you, you will have these marks. You will have love, and joy, and
peace.” And he comes right down the line. And the law, and Jesus Christ’s life, and the Holy
Spirit all testify to us who are the sons of God.

Now dear ones, there will come a day when God will allow someone to testify to us who will bring
even a clearer judgment. When the antichrist comes many of us who think we are sons of God will
find out where we really stand when we follow him as the antichrist. So it is important tonight, on
the last night of the conference, to make sure that you have the pure Holy Spirit of truth governing
your life.

Now you may sit there and say, “Ah, now this is a lot of mumbo jumbo. You don’t need all this stuff
to distinguish the antichrist. I have a good mind and I may not be walking in all the light that
God has given me but I have a good mind and I can discern the antichrist.” Now dear ones, the Bible
makes it plain that it will be difficult to discern the antichrist.

One of the reasons it will be difficult is given in 1 John 2:19. You remember, John had said so
many antichrists have come. And then the Bible reads, “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
be plain that they all are not of us.” But one reason is the antichrist and the spirit of
antichrist is among us ourselves.

Another reason is given plainly in Ephesians 6:11, why you cannot discern the antichrist just by
your clever mind, “Put on the whole armor of God.” Why? “That you may be able to stand against the
wiles of the devil.” The Devil when he comes in the person of the antichrist will not plainly have
a name on his chest saying, “Satan,” or, “Antichrist.” He will come with tricks and with wiles. It
will be impossible to discern him however closely you have studied the Bible. The Bible itself is
not a sufficient guard against the antichrist.

Some of us know we’re not walking in all the will of God. You know it. You know you’re not walking
in all the will of God. You know you’re walking a little aside from God’s will and yet you keep
pretending to yourself, “Ah, I will not be deceived by the antichrist. I will know him because I
will see him. He will look like the antichrist.” He won’t dear ones. The spirit of antichrist was
in the false prophets. And here is what is said about the false prophets by Jesus, Matthew 7:15,

“Beware of false prophets, who come to you…” “In wolves clothing?” No but, “Who come to you in
sheep’s clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves.”

In other words, the antichrist will look like Christ. You see from what you read in the scripture
the antichrist will come and will claim to unite all nations and all political powers in himself.
He will claim to unite all churches in himself. He will come as the savior of the world. He will
say, “Come, bring to me your sick and your dying. Come to me those who are enslaved and need
deliverance and I will deliver you.” The antichrist will look like Christ. He will be in sheep’s
clothing. You by the cleverness of your own mind, or even by your intimate knowledge of the Bible
will not be able to discern him just by that alone.

You may say, “Oh, now that’s silly we’ll know him by his works. He will come and he will burn and
ravage all before him.” He won’t. He will come with healing medicines. He will come with an offer
of peace, mental peace such as we have never had before. He will come and offer to solve the
international problems in politics. He will come and promise to solve the economic difficulties we
have in our nations. He will come with good works.

You doubt it? Well, look at what Jesus says himself. You can find it there in Matthew 7:22, that
same chapter. Jesus says, “On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your
name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty words in your name?’ And then will I
declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from me, you evildoers.’” And so the antichrist will
come with mighty works that imitate the works of Jesus.

You remember, what happened when Moses threw down his staff and it turned into a snake. Weren’t
they able to imitate the work even of God? How much more will the antichrist be able to imitate the
very works of Jesus? Some of us say, “Well, we’ll know him by his fruits. By their fruits you
shall know them.” But you know that today already there are imitation fruits all around us. There
are so many of us that talk about concern now. We talk about care. You must be concerned. You must
show concern for the downtrodden. But it isn’t the loving. It isn’t the loving concern that comes
from the heart of Jesus. It’s an artificial, politic, philanthropic concern that ends when its
purpose is achieved.

But already there is this artificial imitation of love abroad in many of our hearts. Already there
is an imitation of Christian joy abroad. And many dear ones cannot discern the difference between
real Christian joy and the happiness that seems to exist in people’s minds. There is a false peace
abroad not only with the tranquilizers but there is a false peace with the new drugs, there is a
false peace with even the blindness that has come in many men’s eyes about the future. There are
artificial fruits. We will not be able to discern the antichrist simply by his works or by his
fruits.

The only way we can prepare for the coming of the antichrist and the only way you can be assured
that you will not be deceived by him when he comes is to allow the Holy Spirit tonight to wield his
sword in your own spirit and to show you if any of the marks of the spirit of antichrist are present
in your life. Now will you do that dear ones? Will you allow the Holy Spirit to wield his own
sword in your heart? And will you stop saying, “I was born again on that date.” Or, “I was
sanctified on that date.” Or, “I was baptized with the Spirit on that date.” And allow the Holy
Spirit himself to speak to your heart.

Let’s just look at some of those plain marks in scripture. The first one is found right at the

beginning of the Bible. Genesis 3:4-6, “But the serpent,” who is a symbol too of Satan and of the
antichrist, “But the serpent said to the woman, ‘You will not die. For God knows that when you
eat,’” (of that tree of knowledge of good and evil) “Your eyes will be opened, and you will be like
God, knowing good and evil.” The spirit of antichrist is the spirit of the whisperer. The spirit
of the antichrist is the spirit of the whisperer. The spirit of antichrist makes the bullets and
allows someone else to fire.

“I believe that Mrs. Woodard feels that your children make a little too much noise.” Yeah, that’s
the spirit of antichrist. That establishes a hostile triangle. Right? With the one that told it,
with the one whose children are being talked about, and with Mrs. Woodard. And you only need four
of those and you have 12 dear ones who have distrusting built up in their hearts for each other.
No, it is up to Mrs. Woodard to go and tell about the children herself. But the spirit of the
whisperer wants to have the privilege of imparting to you some special knowledge that only she has.

The spirit of antichrist is the spirit of the whisperer. This is why John Wesley said, “Never say
anything about anyone who is absent or anyone who is dead.” Never! You don’t need to talk about
them. You don’t need to do you? Are you doing them any good? It’s the spirit of antichrist that
is working in your heart at that moment, dear ones. It’s not achieving any good. You know that. It
only creates distrust.

Or, “You know I don’t think John is really capable of that job.” When it isn’t your responsibility
to decide whether he is capable or not and you aren’t asked any opinion but you say to a third
member, “I don’t think John is really capable.” That binds you two in an attitude of superiority to
John. And eventually John’s spirit feels that and there’s distrust. And the spirit of antichrist has
already begun to prepare you to receive him when he comes because he is the spirit of the whisperer.

Dear ones, no whisper. And if there’s any whisper in your heart, and if you’ve done that, then seek
the Spirit for purification tonight–not only for forgiveness but for purification from that
whispering spirit.

Let’s look at a second mark of the antichrist. Generally speaking, it’s given by Jesus in Matthew
15:6. And generally speaking, it’s the attitude of the serpent in the Garden of Eden–the attitude
that wants to question or disobey God’s word. You remember, the serpent said, “God hath not said.”
And it’s that spirit. It’s found in Matthew 15:6. Jesus is speaking to some of those who have the
spirit of antichrist living in them. “So, for the sake of your tradition, you have made void the
word of God.”

Now first of all dear ones, “For the sake of your tradition.” So, many of us will say, “Well, I
believe that you’re righteous because Christ’s righteousness is imputed to you. I believe you’re
holy in Christ. I believe you can commit adultery and God looks down upon you and he says, ‘That’s
not adultery because you’re in Christ.’” And there are dear ones you say, “This is our tradition.
We believe in imputed righteousness. We believe you are holy in Christ. You may not be holy in
life but you’re holy in Christ.” And so they have a list of sins every day. And they bring them to
Christ and they confess them to him as a matter of course. But they thank them that they are holy in
Christ. And Jesus again and again says, “If a man loves me he will keep my words. If a man loves
me he will not continue to cut me apart with the nails and the sword.” But they say they are holy
in Christ. And Jesus says, “So, for the sake of your tradition, you have made void the word of God.”
There are many in whom the spirit of antichrist has made void the word of God for the sake of their

tradition.

So let’s go to the other side of the spectrum and there are many of us who believe in holiness and
we say, “It’s glorious when you come to the place where you die to that old self and where the Holy
Spirit cleanses your heart from anger, and jealousy, and impatience, and irritability, and critical
spirit. And it’s glorious when you come to that place when you know the old self is dead at last
and nailed to the cross.” And then the next day we find we’re a little angry. So for the sake of
our tradition, for the sake in our belief in eradication we say, “The sin was taken out so that’s
not anger.” And we call black white. For the sake of our tradition we make void the word of God.

Now dear ones, those are some of the marks of the spirit of antichrist. And I see some dear ones
whom I love and they’ll know what I mean when I say this, many of us do the same with the baptism of
the Holy Spirit. We say, “I am baptized with the Holy Spirit. I may be irritable in my home, I may
cut my wife to bits, I may be angry when friends oppose my doctrine, but I am baptized with the Holy
Spirit.” Dear ones, the baptism with the Holy Spirit, according to Acts 15:9, cleanses our hearts
by faith. “But for the sake of our tradition we make void the word of God.” One group pretends
that sin is not sin with them. The other group pretends that what they’re doing is not sin. And
the middle group ignores sin all together. .”And for the sake of our condition, for the sake of our
human doctrines, we make void the word of God.”

There’s another mark of the spirit of antichrist that is outlined in Colossians 2:16-22. “Therefore
let no one pass judgment on you in questions of food and drink or with regard to a festival or a new
moon or a Sabbath. These are only a shadow of what is to come; but the substance belongs to Christ.
Let no one disqualify you, insisting on self-abasement and worship of angels, taking his stand on
visions, puffed up without reason by his sensuous mind, and not holding fast to the Head, from whom
the whole body, nourished and knit together through its joints and ligaments, grows with a growth
that is from God. If with Christ you died to the elemental spirits of the universe, why do you live
as if you still belonged to the world? Why do you submit to regulations, ‘Do not handle, Do not
taste, Do not touch’ (referring to things which all perish as they are used), according to human
percepts and doctrines? These have indeed an appearance of wisdom in promoting rigor of devotion
and self-abasement and severity to the body, but they are of no value in checking the indulgence of
the flesh.” And many dear ones who have not really entered into the purifying power of the Holy
Spirit have sunk into a false legalism.

The Holy Spirit makes you want to obey God’s law. And we have every responsibility to encourage
each other to obey the law of God if the Holy Spirit of God dwells in us. But there is a false
legalism. There is a list of don’ts and do’s that many of us arrange to suit ourselves. So we
happen not to do this thing so we label that as sin because we have no trouble avoiding it. And we
list our don’ts and we create a false legalism that is the very spirit of antichrist because it
takes our eyes off the beauty of Jesus and the Spirit of Jesus and puts our eyes on men’s precepts
and doctrines.

There is also another mark of the spirit of antichrist mentioned in 1 Timothy 6:20, “O Timothy,
guard what has been entrusted to you. Avoid the godless chatter and contradictions of what is
falsely called knowledge, for by professing it some have missed the mark as regards the faith.”
“Avoid the godless chatter and contradictions of what is falsely called knowledge.” Even in Jesus’
day there was a development among the Greeks of Gnostic beliefs. You remember, the Gnostics felt
they had an esoteric kind of knowledge. And you needed it.

Dear ones, let’s be humble about any knowledge that God has given us. You know there are movements
among us in these days which depend on an esoteric kind of knowledge. Esoteric means, you know, a
specialized kind of knowledge. “And you must join my group to get it.” Ah, dear ones, that’s
dangerous. The Spirit of Jesus is an open spirit full of love, full of joy, with only one
assurance: that the Spirit of Christ moves among you, that the Spirit of Christ motivates your every
heart and your every action. But it does not depend on an esoteric kind of knowledge that you feel
you can bestow on everyone else. That’s the very mark of antichrist.

So is the last mark of this kind that I’d ask you to look at. It’s in 2 Peter 2:17-19 and this is
the very opposite of the unscriptural legalism. “These are waterless springs and mists driven by a
storm; for them the nether gloom of darkness has been reserved. For, uttering loud boasts of folly,
they entice with licentious passions of the flesh men who have barely escaped from those who live in
error. They promise them freedom, but they themselves are slaves of corruption; for whatever
overcomes a man, to that he is enslaved. For if, after they have escaped the defilements of the
world through the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are again entangled in them
and overpowered, the last state has become worse for them than the first.” And you see what the
Bible lays emphasis on, “They promise them freedom but they themselves are slaves of corruption.”
And there is an unscriptural freedom, an unscriptural licentiousness. There is a licentiousness
that says, “It doesn’t matter what we do. We have the Spirit of Christ within us.”

Dear ones, the mark of the Spirit of Christ is plain. It’s plain. And you can’t go on saying day,
after day, after day, “Well, I’m angry but I have liberty in the Spirit.” The Bible again, and
again right down the line talks about anger. Proverbs says, “Cease from anger and forsake wrath.”
Another verse in Proverbs says, “He that is slow to anger is better than the mighty.” Ecclesiastes
says, “Be not hasty in thy spirit to be angry for anger resteth in the bosom of fools and the fool
believeth that there is no God.” And Matthew 5:19 you remember, Jesus says, “Think not that I have
come to abolish that law and those prophets. I have come not to abolish them but I have come to
fulfill them. And I tell you it was said of old that whosoever kills is guilty of the judgment but
I say to you whosoever is angry with his brother is guilty of the judgment.”

Let us face the truth as it is in God’s word. Let us not say, “We have liberty, we have freedom,”
while anger rises and rules our hearts. We have nothing but the spirit of antichrist if that is so,
dear ones.

Now there is another mark of the spirit of antichrist and you can find it in 1 Timothy 1:6-7.
“Certain persons by swerving from these.” You see what “these” are. They’re in Verse 5, “The aim of
our charge is love that issues from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith.”
“Certain persons by swerving from these have wandered away into vain discussion, desiring to be
teachers of the law, without understanding either what they are saying or the things about which
they make assertions.”

And so there are many today who claim to be able to teach the way of God but they teach it with so
much ambiguity that you don’t know which side you’re on. They say, “You should not sin.” But they
say, “Well, this may not be sin and you can sin a little.” They say, “Complete obedience to God is
necessary but, well, you have to allow for a little disobedience.” And they teach the way so
ambiguously that no one knows where they are. They say, “The Holy Spirit cleanses the heart from
all sin,” and then they say, “Well, if there is a little rising maybe that’s temptation.”

Dear ones, temptation comes from the outside. The fiery darts of the wicked one come into the

converted heart and it’s like a can of gasoline inside. And the look, the look of the girl or the
temptation to be angry comes in as a fiery dart of the wicked one and comes into the gasoline
inside. And there’s a reaction within that bursts out and responds. And the flame goes up within.
And the anger is out or the lust is out.

And when the sanctified heart meets the fiery darts of the wicked one, the fiery dart of the wicked
one comes from the outside and comes into the inside, and into the can of water and it sizzles out.
And the reaction and the response is not there.

Ah, dear ones, there’s no ambiguity about the sanctified life. You can know whether you’re
sanctified. It is clear. There is no response within. There is no rising from within. The
temptation comes from without. But the spirit of antichrist is trying to encourage many of us to
say, “Well, maybe this, maybe that.” The trumpet of God issues a certain sound. You have no doubt
about the trumpet of God. It issues a certain sound. And you know to prepare for battle. But so it
is that many dear ones have come into ambiguity in their teaching.

Dear ones, there’s no ambiguity in the Bible. It’s full of it, you know. Some people say, “Oh well,
should a Christian obey God’s word? Can you really expect them to obey God’s word?” Well it runs
through every part of it. Deuteronomy, “This day the Lord thy God has commanded thee to do these
statutes and judgments. Thou shall therefore keep them and do them with all thy heart and with all
thy soul.” Joshua says, “This book of the law shall not depart out of thy mouth even but thou shall
meditate therein day and night that thou may observe to do according to all that is written
therein.” And we keep on asking, “Do you really mean that Christians are supposed to obey God’s
law?” And Samuel said, “Hath the Lord its great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices, as in
obeying the voice of the Lord? Behold to obey is better than sacrifices and to harken than the fat
of rams.”

And we keep asking, “Do you really think a Christian cannot have any sin in his life?” And in
Matthew it says, “Not everyone that sayeth unto me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ shall enter into the kingdom of
heaven but he who doeth the will of my Father which thou in heaven.”

And we keep asking, “Do you really think that we cannot afford to disobey God’s law even in one jot
or tattle if we’re Christians or sons of God?”

Well the Bible says in James 4:17, “If a man knows what is right and fails to do it for him it is
sin.” And the Bible says, “Anyone who is born of God does not commit sin.” And then we keep on
asking you see, “Well, do you really think that we’re not allowed to sin at all?” And Jesus says,
“Therefore whosoever heareth these things of mine and doeth them I will liken him unto a wise man
who built his house upon a rock.” And we ask, “Do you really think a Christian is meant to live
without sin? Do you really think he’s meant to obey God’s word?” And Jesus says, “For whosoever
shall do the will of my Father which is in heaven the same is my brother and sister and mother.”
And we say, “Do you really think you can only belong to the family of God if you obey his word?”

Well dear ones, where does it stop? I have a list of symptoms of cancer here. Here they are and I
read them out to you, you don’t say to me, “I have only one of those.” One is enough. The marks of
the flesh are plain. You know they are. The marks of the flesh are there. And you can look them up
yourself in Galatians 5:18-23. “But if you are led by the Spirit you are not under the law.” You
see, you’re not going to be condemned under the law. “Now the words of the flesh are plain:
fornication, impurity, licentiousness, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, anger,

selfishness, dissension, party spirit, envy, drunkenness, carousing, and the like.”

Now the word of God is plain, if you come to that word and say, “Well, do you mean to say if I feel
just a little envy for that singer up there and just envy a little that voice, that I am not walking
in the will of God?” Well, you can judge for yourself. You may say, “Do you mean to say if anger
rises in my heart at the children that I have some of the works of the flesh in me?” Well look,
look at the word. There is no ambiguity in God’s word and there is no ambiguity in the Spirit of
Christ. But there is constant ambiguity in the spirit of antichrist.

Dear ones, I know many of you need to deal with the Holy Spirit for heart cleansing tonight, and the
spirit of antichrist is trying to deceive you and persuade you that the amount of victory that you
have already is sufficient. Dear ones, complete victory is possible in the power of the Holy
Spirit.

Well so it goes on. Another mark of the spirit of antichrist is 1 Timothy 4:1-2, “Now the Spirit
expressly says that in later times some will depart from the faith by giving heed to deceitful
spirits and doctrines of demons, through the pretensions of liars whose consciences are seared.”
And one of the marks of the spirit of antichrist is the deceitful spirit, the dishonest spirit.

When the Holy Spirit comes in and cleanses your heart and begins to lead you in away from your
soulish powers and into the purity of the resources of the tree of life, then you become very
conscious of the slightest dishonesty. The Holy Spirit makes you treasure absolute honesty,
absolute honesty. “That’s a beautiful dress.” Well, if it really is and you really think it is then
the Spirit of Jesus would have you say it, and the dear one will know you mean it. And the dear one
will know politeness and the dear one will know that cultured sophistication when she sees it. And
there’s just a great difference between the two. When the Holy Spirit comes into your heart he makes
you treasure honesty. He has nothing to do with deceitful spirits because they are of the spirit of
antichrist. He has nothing to do with doctrines of demons.

I think there are doctrines about demons as well as doctrines of demons. I think many dear ones
want to cast out demons when they should be repenting of carnality. And I think there are a lot of
us, you know, that have that doctrine of demons and doctrine about demons. There are doctrines of
demons such as Robinson (John A. T. Robinson, Anglican bishop) spreads about the virgin birth of
Christ and there are doctrines of demons such as Altizer (Thomas J. J. Altizer, b. 1927) spreads
about the reality of God.

But there are also doctrines about demons. And many of us are wanting people to cast out demons from
us when really the demon is just bad temper. And we need to get down under God and surrender that
old self which produces the bad temper to him. But the doctrine of demons and the doctrines about
demons are part of the spirit of antichrist.

And then you see that it mentions that “their consciences have become seared”. And many wives weep
over husbands in these days…husbands who think they are far on in the spirit and have not the
Spirit of Jesus ruling in their own hearts and in their homes. You cannot be advanced in the spirit
unless the beauty of Jesus rules your life, in your home, and in your work.

Just two more, dear ones, and one especially I think that is important. You find it in Ezekiel
34:2-3. These men were produced by the spirit of antichrist even in Old Testament times. “Son of
man, prophesy against the shepherds of Israel, prophesy, and say to them, even to the shepherds,

Thus says the Lord GOD: Ho, shepherds of Israel who have been feeding yourselves!” A shepherd, you
see, is one who feeds. But you’ve been feeding yourselves. “Should not shepherds feed the sheep?
You eat the fat, you clothe yourselves with the wool, you slaughter the fatlings; but you do not
feed the sheep. The weak you have not strengthened, the sick you have not healed, the crippled you
have not bound up, the strayed you have not brought back, the lost you have not sought, and with
force and harshness you have ruled them. So they were scattered, because there was no shepherd; and
they became food for all the wild beasts.”

There are many who feel they have advanced far in the Christian faith and they are ruled by
selfishness. And so I say to my dear brothers and sisters whom I love, it is glorious that there
will come a day when the sons of God will be revealed. It is glorious that Jesus is building for
himself a great body that will rise up and glorify his Father in heaven even has he glorified his
Father. It is glorious that there will be a great day when the sons of God will be revealed. And
that’s great, but dear ones, let’s be careful. Let’s be careful that we do not become preoccupied
with the revelation of us as the sons of God lest we find ourselves feeding ourselves instead of
feeding the sheep.

After all, there’s a time to sow and a time to reap. There is a time to be born and a time to die.
There’s a time to save the lost and to see the Holy Spirit filling others with the beauty of Jesus
and with the power of Jesus. And there is a time for the revelation of the sons of God. And no doubt
God will lead us forward bit-by-bit. We don’t have to keep looking ahead and trying to see what is
going to happen. We can trust the Holy Spirit to prepare us for that day. Let us be careful that
none of the advancement that we have in the Christian faith becomes a selfish delight in our
position. Let us be careful that we are found doing what God has given us to do. The commission,
the great commission, my dear brother said, has never been withdrawn. We are still called to go and
preach the gospel to all the world. And we are to be found doing that when Jesus comes.

Well, the very last mark of the spirit of antichrist is there in the original chapters we were
studying. 1 John 2:22, “Who is the liar?” “Who is the liar but he who denies that Jesus is the
Christ? This is the antichrist, he who denies the Father and the Son.” You mean, “I say, God is
not the Father? Jesus is not the Son?” No. Deny means, make nothing of the Father and make nothing
of the Son.

Perhaps the greatest and clearest mark of the spirit of antichrist is that the antichrist will rise
in the place of Jesus. He will take the place that Jesus himself ought to have and the spirit of
antichrist is found in its clearest in our own hearts, in our own selves when we want to rise up and
rule our own lives. And the dear one comes home, and Jesus wants to be loving to that dear one, but
the old self wants to rise up and cut the dear one apart. Jesus wants to rise up in us and get the
glory and the service. He wants to receive the glory to himself and our old self rises up and we
want all men to look at us. We want every eye to see what we have done.

There’s a great pride rises up within us. We not only want our way so that Jesus will not have his
way, but we want our glory so he will not have his glory. There’s a great desire to be praised, a
great desire to be noticed that rises up in the heart that is ruled by the Spirit of antichrist.
Because you see, the antichrist is already preparing that heart for himself. He’s already preparing
that heart so that that heart will recognize him when he comes. That heart will bury down the
pride, will bury down the envy and the jealousy but that is all seeping underneath and will rise up
to receive the antichrist when he arrives.

There are only two guardians against the spirit of antichrist. There is first of all in 2 Timothy
3:16-17, the scripture itself. You can look at it there. Paul explained to Timothy that there would
come days of stress and surely those days are already upon us when men would be lovers of self
rather than lovers of God. And then he says there is only one guard on that day. “All scripture is
inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in
righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.” And in Verse 14
he says in these days, “But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have firmly believed,
knowing from whom you learned it.”

And the second guardian against the spirit of antichrist is found in John 16:13. And it is as you
can guess yourselves, the true Holy Spirit of truth. “When the Spirit of truth comes,” into your
heart, “He will guide you into all the truth; for he will not speak on his own authority, but
whatever he hears he will speak, and he will declare to you the things that are to come.”

There will come a day either before you and I die, or soon after it, when a glorious figure will
appear in our world and he will have apparently the fruits of the spirit and he will do many might
works such as Jesus himself did. And that great figure will call to himself all who believe in him,
all who respect what he is. And great, great numbers of even the elect will come towards him and be
deceived. And their judgment will have already taken place. And you say, “How can I prepare for
that day?” Allow the Holy Spirit to wield his sword in your heart tonight and be honest.

Now many of you have been arguing haven’t you? I know it because God told me. Many of you have
been arguing with God, and you’ve been saying, “Victorious life can’t be that victorious.” A little
anger? A little envy? A little jealousy? And the spirit of antichrist is already at work in you.
Dear ones, the only way to prepare is to be open with God–open with God, direct with him and honest
now and admit that you are what you are. And you say, “What can be done?” Well at this present
time the Holy Spirit is here among us. At this present time we are privileged to have the Holy
Spirit in our midst.

There will come a day when he will be withdrawn, but the Holy Spirit is here tonight. And his word
is here and you know his word well enough during this past week to know where you stand. The Holy
Spirit is able to show you where the spirit of antichrist still rules in your heart and where you
yourself are being prepared for his coming. You need to come to the altar tonight and allow the
Holy Spirit to do that. Ask him, “Holy Spirit of truth, show me where the spirit of antichrist
still rules in my heart. Show me where I am not being obedient to you.” And the Holy Spirit will
show you and then you need to see that all that spirit of antichrist within you, all that old self
was crucified with Jesus. And the Holy Spirit is able to crucify it now in you.

He is able to cleanse out all that and fill you with himself so that when the antichrist comes the
Holy Spirit will cry in your heart, “That is the antichrist.” But he can only cry that in the heart
of one who is being utterly obedient to him, today. Well, are you such a one? And will you have
such a counselor on that fateful day? I pray that you will. I pray that you’ll receive him tonight
if you haven’t received him already. Let us pray.

Loving Father, we trust you now to do your work. Blessed Holy Spirit, your word has been proclaimed
and we trust you to minister to each of us as we need that we may not be found following the wrong
man on that fateful day. We trust you Holy Spirit, now to minister to us and to draw out the ones
that need to take you fully into their hearts and surrender their spirits completely to you. For
the glory of Jesus, our Savior, amen.

Healing in the Christian Life 1

Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill

It’s important for each one of us not only that we be strong in our spiritual life, but also to be
strong and healthy physically. You can easily see that if your body continues to be weak, it doesn’t
matter how strong a spirit you have, or how strong or healthy a mind and emotions you may have. If
your body is weak then the life cannot flow out to the outside world. Actually what happens is, the
spirit life that God gives you damns up inside you.

You remember — the natural life of our spirit is expressed in the last few Psalms in the Book of
Psalms. Any of those Psalms at the very end of the book really express the normal state of our
spirits — anywhere from Psalms 144 to 150. If you look at Psalm 144 this is the normal activity of
our spirits when they’re filled with the Holy Spirit.

In other words, the Holy Spirit is like a fountain in the earth, and it’s continually rising up to
God with this kind of attitude: Psalm 144:1-2: “Blessed by the Lord, my rock, who trains my hands
for war, and my fingers for battle; my rock and my fortress, my stronghold and my deliverer, my
shield and he in whom I take refuge.”

Psalm 145 verses 1 and 2: “I will extol thee, my God and King, and bless thy name for ever and ever.
Every day I will bless thee, and praise thy name for ever and ever. Great is the Lord, and greatly
to be praised, and his greatness is unsearchable.” Psalm 146 verses 1 and 2: “Praise the Lord!
Praise the Lord, O my soul! I will praise the Lord as long as I live; I will sing praises to my God
while I have being.”

That’s the normal attitude of our spirits. Now if your body is racked with sickness, do you see
that it will block the outflow of your spirit up to God? You’ve noticed that even with a cold. A
cold is often enough to block your spirit inside you so that it cannot rise up to God and it
certainly can’t go out to other people. You’ve noticed with a cold it kind of closes you in from
other people. Any sickness kind of closes you in and blocks your spirit off.

Now that’s why it’s so vital for our body to experience the wholeness that our spirits experience
and that our souls experience. That’s why over the next few Sundays I’d like to talk just about
sickness — because sickness is something that we’re very conscious of in our everyday lives, and
it’s very important for us to know what our attitude to sickness should be and how we should view
sickness, and then how God can heal sickness.

Then you can see that if we don’t move into this realm, brothers and sisters — then we’ll always be
crippled children of God — perhaps with spirits that are filled with his Holy Spirit and perhaps
with minds that are renewed, and emotions that are balanced — but with weak, tired, sick bodies
that continually bear in on our spirits, press our spirits down, and repress our spirits, and make
us in every way appear to the world really as unregenerate people.

Now, that’s what Jesus meant when he referred to the disciplines in Matthew 26:41. It really didn’t
matter what the desire of their spirit was, because the old body held them back from doing what he
had asked them to do. And so it is with us. If our bodies are not made whole as he wants them to
be, then repeatedly we’ll find ourselves in the position of the disciples there.

Matthew 26:41 tells what takes place in the Garden of Gethsemane: “’Watch and pray that you may not
enter into temptation; the spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak.’” It wasn’t the old
self that Jesus meant was weak there. It was the body. The old body couldn’t keep awake any longer
— and if our bodies don’t share the strength of Jesus then we’ll find ourselves often in that
position.

I put it to you: have you not done that? Have you not often found that there was a real desire in
you to do something for God, or to spend time in prayer – and yet the old body wouldn’t respond?
And it seemed as if you had a supernatural spirit but you had only an old natural body that wouldn’t
rise to it.

Now that’s why it’s vital, you can see, to have a body that fits your spirit and matches really what
he wants you to do. Now as we’re talking about this business of sickness the next two or three
Sundays, will you really look to Jesus to break the bread for you? Will you do that? Don’t look to
me. Don’t do that, loved ones. Don’t look to preachers, or teachers to break the bread for you.
I’ll say what Jesus guides me to say but you see you must ask the Holy Spirit, “Holy Spirit, will
you explain this to me in a way that I will understand?”

Otherwise brothers and sisters you’ll go off on all kinds of wild ideas. It’ll take us two or three
Sundays to deal with the whole business of sickness. We’ll only talk about part of it tonight. So
it’s vital for you to look to the Holy Spirit and say, “Holy Spirit, what do you want me to
receive?” Now the reason I say this is found in 2 Timothy 3:6-7. It is really relevant to this
kind of teaching about the deeper life. Paul isn’t really against women’s liberation here. He’s
talking about those men among us who do the same thing — but in this situation, it was just women
that were involved. 2 Timothy 3:6: “For among them are those who make their way into households and
capture weak women, burdened with sins and swayed by various impulses.” And then verse 7: “who will
listen to anybody and can never arrive at a knowledge of the truth.”

Now that’s why I say — look to the Holy Spirit. Don’t run away home tonight and take a whole lot
of things that I share and then just without any question accept them all. And then take something
else that somebody else says and pile those things on top. One moment you’ll be way over in this
direction with healing, and another moment you’ll be way over in this direction, and then you’ll be
down the middle for a while until you hear somebody else’s take on healing.

Now loved ones, don’t do that. Look to the Holy Spirit tonight and say, “Holy Spirit, I don’t want
to be a person like that, swayed to and fro by anybody who comes with any gospel. I want your word
for me.” You can see each of us are at different stages, brothers and sisters. Each of us are at
different stages in regards to our bodies tonight, and only the Holy Spirit can minister to you what
will be life for you. So that’s important — otherwise we get into all kinds of extremes.

Now maybe it would be good to look at what Jesus’ attitude to sickness was. Let’s look at it first
in Romans 8:2 and you can see there the general teaching of the Bible about sickness. Romans 8:2:
“For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set me free from the law of sin and death.”
The Bible links sin and death as two results of the fall of mankind. Death is the ultimate
consequence of sickness. So really the Bible links sin and death, or sin and sickness together. In
fact, God implies that there was no death until men rebelled against God.

You can see that in Genesis 3:19. There you remember God is speaking to Adam and telling him the
consequences of this fall. Genesis 3:19: “’In the sweat of your face you shall eat bread till you

return to the ground, for out of it you were taken; you are dust, and to dust you shall return.’”
Death was a result that followed upon man rebelling against God. In other words, sin and sickness
are twin results of the fall and God and Jesus look upon them as that. They don’t look upon
sickness as a natural thing. They look upon sickness and death as something that is not God’s
perfect will for us, and they tie them both up together –sin and death, sin and sickness.

Now Jesus came with a message about both of those. He came to completely recapitulate our lives and
completely reverse the effects of the fall. So he came not only preaching forgiveness of sin but he
came preaching healing of sickness. You can see it there in the first day of his ministry in
Matthew 4. The very first day of his ministry includes the emphasis on these two things. He came
not only to forgive sins but he came to heal sickness.

Matthew 4:17: “From that time Jesus began to preach, saying, ‘Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is
at hand.’” That was his dealing with sin and forgiveness of sins.

Then in Verse 23: “And he went about all Galilee, teaching in their synagogues and preaching the
gospel of the kingdom and healing every disease and every infirmity among the people.” Jesus
preached the gospel of the kingdom and healed every infirmity and every disease. So Jesus came both
forgiving sins and healing sicknesses, and he regarded both as equally important parts of his
ministry. When he was sending out the seventy he gave them the same commission. You have it there in
Luke 9:1-2: “And he called the twelve together and gave them power and authority over all demons and
to cure diseases, and he sent them out to preach the kingdom of God and to heal.”

You can’t get away from it, dear ones — as you go right through the Bible you find that God looks
upon sin and sickness as both enemies of his in people’s lives and both of them as results of the
fall of mankind. These are both mentioned in that famous chapter — Isaiah 53 — that talks about
Jesus’ death and the effects of his death.

Isaiah 53:4-5: “Surely he has born our griefs.” You see the footnote “x” in the RSV and you look
down to the bottom, “Or sicknesses.” The Hebrew word is actually sicknesses. “Surely he has borne
our sicknesses and carried our sorrows,” and the footnote “y” goes down to the word “pains” and the
Hebrew is “pains.” “Surely he has borne our sicknesses and carried our pains.” Then in Verse 5:
“But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities; upon him was the
chastisement that made us whole, and with his stripes we are healed.”

That’s continually the emphasis in the Bible — that Jesus’ death did something not only for our
sins but for our sicknesses. Jesus came not only to forgive us our sins but to heal our bodies and
to heal sickness. You find it in Psalms 103:1 and 3: “Bless the Lord oh my soul,… who forgives all
your iniquity, who heals all your diseases.”

So brothers and sisters it’s very hard for us to split sickness from sin. It’s very hard for us to
say, “Jesus emphasized only forgiveness of sins.” It’s just very difficult to read anything about
the gospel, or anything about the description of our fall from God’s fellowship, and not to find sin
and sickness linked together — and that Jesus really dealt with both.

Sometimes he healed first. That’s right. Sometimes he healed first and sometimes he forgave people
their sins first. I think this was really because the Jews at that time found it easier to believe
for healing. That’s strange. They found it easier to believe that Jesus was healing diseases than
he was forgiving sins and so Jesus therefore dealt with sickness.

He dealt with people where they were. If they respected his power in healing then he healed first
in various situations. Matthew 9:5 was one of them where obviously Jesus himself would have been
inclined to forgive the man his sins — but then he saw the attitude of the Jews. He in that case
did the thing that they would find it easier to recognize.

Matthew 9:5: “’For which is easier, to say, “Your sins are forgiven,” or to say, “Rise and walk”?’”
Then Verse 6 says, “’But that you may know that the Son of man has authority on earth to forgive
sins’ – he then said to the paralytic – ‘Rise, take up your bed and go home.’ And he rose and went
home. When the crowds saw it, they were afraid, and they glorified God, who had given such
authority to men.”

Jesus healed a man in that case because they were readier to believe in healing and the power to
heal. Then once they believed that, he felt they would begin to move on and see, “Well, if he can
heal sickness, then maybe what he says about the forgiveness of sins is true.”

Now in our day it’s the other way around. We find it easier in our churches to emphasize, “Oh yeah,
Jesus can forgive your sins, forgive your sins.” But we find it difficult to believe that he can
heal our sicknesses. So Jesus has to deal with us in a different way. And yet it is important to
see that really it’s both that Jesus wants done.

Luke 5:24 shows this: “’But that you may know that the Son of man has authority on earth to forgive
sins’ – he said to the man who was paralyzed – ‘I say to you, rise, take up your bed and go home.’”
But then in Verse 20, it says: “And when he saw their faith he said, ‘Man, your sins are forgiven
you.’” So it’s Jesus’ will that both things should take place.

Now that isn’t our attitude. So often our attitude is that sin — which we can see — belongs to the
spiritual realm and is evil — but we feel sickness is in the natural realm and it may be evil or it
may be good.

Now do you see that Jesus didn’t take that attitude? Jesus didn’t say, “Sickness is an option for
Christians.” He implied that sickness was part of the work of the devil and that as it says in 1
John 3:8: “Jesus came to destroy the works of the devil.”

In Acts 10:38, Peter says: “’How God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power;
how he went about doing good and healing all that were oppressed by the devil, for God was with
him.’” Jesus regarded sickness as an oppression or a work of the devil. So, brothers and sisters,
if we ever regard sickness as just a natural thing in our lives — do you see we’re treating a work
of the devil as something natural? That’s what he wants.

He wants us to treat his works as something natural — something that we ought to expect in the
every-day world. And once he can deceive us into that, then half the battle is won as far as he is
concerned. But you can see Jesus doesn’t think of it that way at all. He thinks of sin as an enemy
of his Father and sickness as an enemy of his Father and he opposes both.

Now maybe it would be good to see about the use and the meaning of sickness. Could God ever use
sickness to chastise us? We say staunchly, “Never. Never.” Don’t we? You know we do it. We
react against that old puritanical old-fashioned belief that anyone who was sick was a sinner and so
we had reacted away to the other extreme and we say, “No, God never uses sickness to chastise us.”

But what then is the place of sickness in the believer?

Now it might be good to see why we reacted in that way. It’s because of what it says in John 9:3.
You remember the man who was born blind. This is the basis of our attitude to sickness whereby we
say, “No, God would never use sickness to chastise his children.”

John 9:2-3: “And his disciples asked him, ‘Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was
born blind?’ Jesus answered, ‘It was not that this man sinned, or his parents, but that the works
of God might be made manifest in him.’” We then tend to say, “There it is in black and white — sin
never causes sickness. That is what Jesus is saying: ‘This man didn’t sin nor did his parents sin.
Sickness has nothing to do with sin.’ And God therefore could never use sickness to chastise his
children.”

Now do you see first of all that this sickness is utterly different from what we’re talking about in
believers? This sickness was something the man was born with so it was of a different nature
entirely to the sicknesses that come upon God’s children. It was a different sickness — it was one
that the man was born with. It was a different situation.

Secondly, Jesus isn’t saying, “No, sickness is never due to sin.” He’s just saying, “In this case
it wasn’t this man that sinned nor was it his parents that sinned.” And Jesus is really saying,
“Every time you see a sick person don’t immediately say that they have sinned.” But do you see
that’s a far cry from saying sickness is never due to sin?

Now brothers and sisters, do you see the two extremes? Jesus is saying, “Look, every time you see a
sick person — don’t immediately say like Jesus’ disciples, ‘This man has sinned or his parents have
sinned.’” Jesus is saying, “That’s not always the case. There are many people who are sick who
haven’t sinned and brought their sickness upon themselves.” But that’s a far cry from Jesus saying,
“No, my Father never uses sickness to draw attention to any sin in your life.”

Now do you see it’s important for us to balance that out, loved ones? It’s important for us to
accept what Jesus says. Every time you see a sick person you can’t say, “Ah, you’ve sinned greatly
because you have a great sickness.” But on the other hand you shouldn’t run to the other extreme
and say, “No, God never uses sickness to chastise his children.”

In fact, there are some indications in the Bible that God can use what is really a work of Satan.
God never sends sickness. God doesn’t send sickness and then send his Son to die for sickness. You
can see how that doesn’t make sense. You can’t have A and not-A. You can’t have God opposing
sickness and then sending sickness. You can’t have him sending sickness upon the earth and then
sending his Son to take away sickness. But God can use a work of Satan and he can use it for his
own purposes.

Now let’s just look at some of the verses that would help us with that. 1 Corinthians 11:30-32,
“That is why many of you are weak and ill, and some have died. But if we judged ourselves truly, we
should not be judged. But when we are judged by the Lord, we are chastened so that we may not be
condemned along with the world.”

Now brothers and sisters you can see in Verse 30 that that can mean only spiritual death when you
drink the body and blood of Jesus without discerning or without judging yourself, and without
examining yourself about your sins. But it can mean really what it says, “That is why many of you

are weak and ill, and some have died. But if we judged ourselves truly, we should not be judged.”

In other words, if you examined yourself, Paul says, “You should not have to be judged by God or
brought to account by him. But when we are judged by the Lord, we are chastened.” Of course the
obvious implication with that verse with the previous one is that when we are chastened by sickness,
then, “We are chastened so that we may not be condemned along with the world.” It is for a good
purpose. Now that’s one of the verses that suggests how God uses a sickness caused by Satan for
God’s purpose.

Now let’s look at another verse– James 5:16. It makes sense of this verse which perhaps many of us
have often wondered why the two facts are mentioned in this verse. James 5:16, “Therefore confess
your sins to one another, and pray for one another, that you may be healed.”

Do you see that God connects confession of sins with praying that you may be healed? You see the
previous verse has the same emphasis (Verse 15): “And the prayer of faith will save the sick man,
and the Lord will raise him up; and if he has committed sins, he will be forgiven.” The two are
closely connected — the confession of sins and the healing of sickness.

Do you see that the normal state of God’s children is the normal state of the Israelites? Now
that’s the state described in Exodus 15:26. Here God is speaking: “’If you will diligently hearken
to the voice of the Lord your God, and do that which is right in his eyes, and give heed to his
commandments and keep all his statutes, I will put none of the diseases upon you which I put upon
the Egyptians; for I am the Lord, your healer.’” Now that’s the normal state of the children of
God, that God puts or allows Satan to put none of the diseases upon us that ordinary non-Christians
experience — if we will abide by his statutes.

But do you see that when the Father sees us needing chastening, then he is able to use a work of
Satan to bring us to a place of self-examination? Now what is very important for us to see is that
it is not just connected with ordinary sin. That’s important. Otherwise if we teach that it’s
always connected with sin, anybody with a cold tonight is in bad shape and you better just keep your
coughs quiet! Otherwise everybody will look at you and say, “Ha-ha! You’re sinning like mad
again.” So it’s very important to see that chastening is not simply connected with sin. It is also
connected with the growth in Christ-likeness.

God chastens his children whom he loves. Maybe it would be good to settle that one from Jesus’ own
words. When we talk about God using sickness to chasten his children we’re not talking only about
sin. We may be talking about sin — but we are not necessarily talking about sin. You can be
talking about a new position of Christ-likeness into which God is trying to bring his children.
Luke 13:2 deals with this: “And he answered them, ‘Do you think that these Galileans were worse
sinners than all the other Galileans, because they suffered thus?’” So again it’s Jesus’ balanced
way of seeing things. It’s Jesus saying, “No, every time you see somebody who is sick, don’t say,
‘Ah, they must have sinned.’” Because God is concerned with not only bringing us into an awareness
of sin in our lives, but with bringing us into new positions of Christ-likeness.

Job is an example of that. If you look at Job 1:7-12 you’ll find that Job was not regarded really
in any way as a great sinner by God. Job 1:7-12: “The Lord said to Satan, ‘Whence have you come?’
Satan answered the Lord, ‘From going to and fro on the earth, and from walking up and down on it.’
And the Lord said to Satan, ‘Have you considered my servant Job, that there is none like him on the
earth, a blameless and upright man, who fears God and turns away from evil?’” Now that’s God

obviously saying that Job was a blameless and upright man as far as God was concerned.

Continuing on in this passage: “Then Satan answered the Lord, ‘Does Job fear God for naught? Has
thou not put a hedge about him and his house and all that he has, on every side? Thou hast blessed
the work of his hands, and his possessions have increased in the land. But put forth thy hand now,
and touch all that he has, and he will curse thee to thy face.’ And the Lord said to Satan,
‘Behold, all that he has is in your power; only upon himself do not put forth your hand.’” That is,
don’t destroy his physical self. “So Satan went forth from the presence of the Lord.”

And you remember, God allowed Satan to bring all kinds of sicknesses, and boils, and pains, and
sufferings to Job. So God will use sickness sent by Satan — first of all, to bring us into an
awareness of some sin that there may be in our lives, and secondly, to bring us into a new place of
Christ-likeness.

Now do you see that this affects our whole attitude to sickness when it comes — our response to
sickness? Do you see that we shouldn’t scurry around looking for a cure? That’s our attitude,
isn’t it? We say, “Sickness is of Satan, so once it comes about we must get a cure. We must get a
cure either by doctor, by medicine, by drugs, by a healer, anything — but we must get a cure. We
must get rid of the sickness.”

Now brothers and sisters, do you see that that isn’t the attitude of children of God who trust their
Father? The attitude of children of God is, “Father, you said you would put none of these
sicknesses upon me. Now, is there any way in which I have become self-reliant in your work, or in
which I have become greedy in your work? Or, is there any sin that is lodging in my life that you
are trying to bring before my mind? Because, Father, once I confess that and turn from it, I know I
won’t have to try to whip myself into a frenzy to believe that you’re healing. I know that the
healing life will flow from Jesus and will fill me, and heal me, and make me whole.” Loved ones,
that is to be our attitude to sickness.

There shouldn’t be this panic and this terrible fear: “We must get rid of it at all costs.” But
there should be the attitude of children who have a loving dear Father and we should go to him and
say, “Now Father, it’s your own word in Exodus that you’ll put none of these diseases upon me. Now
I can only believe that you’re using this sickness that Satan has brought to bring something before
my mind. Now Father, is there any sin in me that is there?”

Loved ones, do you see you don’t burrow into yourself in introspection? You ask the Father, you
listen to the Holy Spirit, and if he brings the sin before you, you repent. You confess it. You
make the thing right with somebody else if the sin has been against somebody else, or if it is
against God you make it right with him. And then you look to the Father and you say, “Father, I
will receive healing just as you want me to receive it now. I know it is here. I know it is my
position according to your word to receive healing.”

Now if there is no sin you see you need to repent of — you go before the Holy Spirit and you ask,
“Holy Spirit, is there any new place you want me to come in here? Is there any new place, new
position in Jesus that you want me to enter into?” Loved ones, I honestly think that we don’t
realize how much Jesus wants us to draw into an experience of his own sufferings. I think we really
feel it’s a superficial and easy thing to become like Jesus. It isn’t, loved ones. If Jesus had to
learn obedience through suffering, do you see that we are called into the same thing?

We like to think that once we’ve reckoned ourselves dead with Christ then that’s the end of it. But
do you see that God requires of us permission at that point to begin to bring us into something of
Jesus’ sufferings? Do you see that there’s a self-love, there are self-desires, there is a self
will in us that has to be burned out? It cannot be thought out or prayed out — it has to be burned
out and at times suffered out. And after we’ve entered into a willingness to be crucified with
Jesus, then we have the glory of walking the Calvary road with Jesus.

I think I shared with you before that I used to think all Jesus was asking me was: would I be
willing to be nothing? Would I be willing to be a failure? Would I be willing not to have my own
desires? Then as the years passed I found that he “did the dirty on me.” He began to ask me to
actually walk into these things. He tested the old will inside and really was saying, “Would you
really be willing? Would you really be willing? Is this bit of you dead? Is this bit of you dead?
Is this bit of you dead?” He’d stick needles in to see if that bit was dead. That’s the Father
showing that really you can only come into a real Christ-likeness if you’re willing to take part in
Jesus’ own suffering.

I know it’s a hard teaching. You find that there in Philippians 3:10: “That I may know him and the
power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death.” It’s
pretty explicit that Paul is saying, “There is a sense in which we are to share Jesus’ suffering and
become like him in his death.” It’s only in his death that we can become like him. So God will
often use sickness to bring us into a place with Jesus that is close to his heart.

So God uses sickness at times to point out actual positive sin in our lives. At other times he uses
sickness to try to bring us into a new place with himself, a new position in Jesus. Of course the
reason is so that we will produce work that is lasting. If you are in the same place as Jesus, the
work that God does through you will be lasting.

Now do you remember that Paul makes a distinction between two kinds of work? He talks about the
foundation of Jesus and then about the building that men put upon it. The building would be things
like the body here that we’re building, or Fish Enterprises {a business affiliated with Campus
Church and Rev. O’Neill}, or a work that God does through you in the world or through all of us.

Paul talks about this in I Corinthians 3:12: “Now if any one builds on the foundation with gold,
silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw” — you see, either precious stones, or stubble (wood,
hay, or straw); “– each man’s work will become manifest; for the Day” — that is, the Day of
judgment — “will disclose it, because it will be revealed with fire, and the fire will test what
sort of work each one has done.”

Superficial shallow work that has been done by shallow little Christians who have entered into none
of the fellowship of Jesus’ sufferings — that work will be wood, hay, and stubble and will not
last. So it’s vital for us to be willing to regard our sicknesses as a possible way that God has in
bringing us close to himself — never to regard that that sickness is his final will for us.

God’s ideal will for us is perfect health. But it is his permissive will — as it was his
permissive will to use suffering with Jesus — to bring us into an awareness of a new place with
himself. Now I’d just share with you a book that I’ve just started to read. I suppose I should
have read it a long time ago. It’s a book with a message similar to that of The Calvary Road by Roy
Hession. The Calvary Road book deals with the life of fellowship with Jesus’ sufferings after the
crisis experience of being filled with the Spirit.

You can see there are a lot of naïve people running around filled with the Spirit saying,
“Hallelujah, and Amen, we’re filled with the Spirit.” But bless their hearts — they have turned
from any of the fellowship of Jesus’ suffering. Anything that is suffering in any way or travail
they have turned from and said, “No, no, that must be wrong. That must be wrong. Things must be
just Hallelujah and Amen all the time.”

Well it is. But it’s often a deep Hallelujah and a deep Amen from the heart of a spirit that has
come unto the cross with Jesus in a new way. This is partly what is talked about in this book that
I’m referring to, “Hind’s Feet on High Places.” God talks in his Word about how we will skip on
the mountains on the high places like hinds — light, and easily, and agilely. Of course this woman
who is the author of this book is talking about how a person comes to those high places and she has
an allegorical conversation between a person in the book and her Lord.

I’ll just read a little of the preface: “But the high places of victory and union with Christ cannot
be reached by any mental reckoning of self to be dead to sin, or by seeking to devise some way or
discipline by which the will can be crucified. The only way is by learning to accept day-by-day the
actual conditions and tests permitted by God, by a continually repeated laying down of our own will
and acceptance of his as it is presented to us in the form of the people with whom we have to live
and work and in the things which happen to us. Every acceptance of his will becomes an altar of
sacrifice.”

There’s a conversation found on page 41 of the book. Jesus introduces the main character in the book
to the two helpers who will bring her unto the high places — into the victorious life. She looks
at them in horror. He’s just told her their names. She says: “‘I can’t go with them. I can’t! I
can’t! Oh my Lord Shepherd, why do you do this to me? How can I travel in their company? It is
more than I can bear. You tell me the mountain way is so steep and difficult that I cannot climb it
alone. Then why, oh why, must You make Sorrow and Suffering my companions?’” Those were the two
companions that Jesus introduced her to — Sorrow and Suffering.

‘“Couldn’t You have given Joy and Peace to go with me, to strengthen me and encourage me and help me
on the difficult way? I never thought you would do this to me!’ And she burst into tears.”

“A strange look passed over the Shepherd’s face as he listened to this outburst, then looking at the
veiled figures as he spoke he answered very gently, ‘Joy and Peace. Are those the companions you
would choose for yourself? You remember your promise, to accept the helpers that I would give,
because you believed that I would choose the very best possible guides for you. Will you still
trust me, Much-Afraid?’” That was the name she was given – Much-Afraid. “’Will you go with them,
or do you wish to turn back to the Valley, and to all your Fearing relatives, to Craven Fear
himself?’”

Now loved ones, do you see that it brings a new meaning into sickness if we can see that it’s not a
matter of scurrying away to the nearest faith healer, or scurrying away to the first doctor — but
rather a going to our Father first and saying, “Lord, why has this come upon me? I know you can
keep this from me. Why have you allowed it to come upon me? What do you want me to repent of, or
what new position into Jesus do you want me to enter?” It’s this way that God begins to expose any
self that is still there.

Loved ones, we will say in the glory of health, “Father, I will take from your hand whatever you

choose to give me.” But in the midst of sickness God can tell whether we meant that or not. We
will say in the glory of health, “Lord, I don’t care what happens to me. I will look to you alone.”
But when sickness comes and we get wrapped up in the symptoms and we begin to wonder, “Are we hot
enough? Or, “Are we too cold?” Or, “Are those people giving me the right sympathy?” Or, “Are they
treating me right? Am I looking after myself right?” As we get involved more and more in the
symptoms of our sickness, we see that God is using that sickness to expose the self that we thought
was absolutely on the cross. Do you see that what God wants is the midst of sickness is a
forgetfulness of the sickness? That’s it.

That proves to him that we’re where he wants us to be. Where we forget the sickness and we say,
“Father, I thank you for allowing this to come upon me. I know it’s here for some reason. Now will
you reveal to me whether it’s positive sin in me, or whether it’s a new place of completeness in
Jesus that you want me to enter into?”

Then he wants us to be content to have the sickness as long as he wants us to have it. Because the
truth is, loved ones, once the cause or the reason for the sickness is removed, the sickness will be
healed. The sickness will be healed once the reason is dealt with. But if we get down under it and
we start yielding to Satan and saying, “Ah, I’m a sinner. I’m a sinner. Something must be wrong,”
and we don’t look to the loving healer himself — then of course the sickness will work death in us.

Now loved ones, I think that’s maybe as far as we should go tonight — just about God’s attitude to
sickness, and our attitude, and then how God can use sickness.

Healing in the Christian Life 2

Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill

Tonight I’d like to continue on talking about what the Bible says about sickness and death as they
apply to Christians, and begin with the overall general will of God for us as it’s explained there.
1 Thessalonians 5:23 says: “May the God of peace himself sanctify you wholly; and may your spirit
and soul and body be kept sound and blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.”

That is God’s will for us. And there it is again in 1 Thessalonians 4:3: “For this is the will of
God, your sanctification,” — that is, your being made completely like him. Of course being made
completely like him means your spirit, and soul, and body will be kept sound and blameless at the
coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.

So that’s God’s will for our bodies. We ought to see that plainly. That was not the state of our
bodies after we rebelled against God, you remember. We became independent of God and our bodies
suffered the same kind of death really that our souls and our spirits suffered. You find it there
in Genesis 3:19. As we rebelled against God, so we suffered death in our spirits, and death in our
souls, and death in our bodies. Genesis 3:19: “In the sweat of your face you shall eat bread till
you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken; you are dust, and to dust you shall return.”

Death came into the world, and all that leads up to death in the way of sickness resulted from us
rebelling against God. It worked just this way. If we had followed God’s will we would have
received his approval continually on our lives. Our consciences would have been clean, we would
have sensed that the Father in the heaven above enjoys us and approves of us. There would have been
a freedom from any strain.

When we lacked that approval by rebelling against him, we began to try and justify ourselves. We
entered into all the strain of trying to justify ourselves and prove ourselves to everybody. That
brought all the strain and stress diseases that bring too much adrenaline and acid into the stomach
and bring the ulcers and create all the sicknesses that come from strain and stress.

If we had really obeyed God we would have enjoyed just doing what he wanted us to do. That would
have been all the enjoyment that we needed. But when we didn’t receive that enjoyment of operating
and exercising our personalities fully in the way he wanted us to, then we wanted to get enjoyment
for ourselves. So you remember we turned hunger into gluttony and we turned the desire to reproduce
ourselves into lust. And lust and gluttony brought a whole series of diseases and sicknesses within
— and our bodies became weak and out of shape.

If we had listened to God we would have had pure direction about how we should use the world.
Instead of that we misused the world and we perverted the world itself. We used it actually to harm
us and to bring other diseases to us. So you see, disease set in on top of sin and is a direct
result of sin.

No doubt even viruses and germs would not be in the world if we loved each other enough to keep
clean, and to keep pure, and to maintain the world under God’s will and in submission to his plan.
But because we didn’t listen to God and follow his plan, all these sicknesses followed and all these
diseases were the result. It was because of that that we read in Romans 8:20-22 what God did. The

whole world suffered this kind of fall.

Romans 8:20-22: “For the creation was subjected to futility, not of its own will but by the will of
him who subjected it in hope; because the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay
and obtain the glorious liberty of the children of God. We know that the whole creation has been
groaning in travail together until now.”

So the whole natural creation fell into that same kind of strain. That coupled with us men and us
woman resulted in us having minds that were impaired, emotions that were unbalanced, and bodies that
became very, very weak. So weak that we’re only a shadow of the great giants of people that we were
at the very beginning of creation.

Now, God himself always connects up sickness with this rebellion against him. He really does,
brothers and sisters. God always connects the two up together. You can see it there in Romans 8:2:
“For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set me free from the law of sin and death.”

That’s the law of sin and death — that as we rebelled against God we lacked his approval, and we
fell into justifying ourselves. We created strain and stress in our bodies, resulting in all the
adrenaline pumping into the stomach and the acid and bringing the diseases that come with stress.

It resulted in a lack of direction, so that we perverted the world and misused it against ourselves.
It resulted in us seeking enjoyment through lust and gluttony which in its turn weakened and
destroyed our bodies. That’s the law of sin and death, and God always connects the two up together.
Death is the ultimate result of sickness and sin, and sickness God always sees as a result of us
rebelling against him.

Jesus always connected them both together in his ministry. He always said, “I oppose both — not
just sin but sickness also. They’re both a result of your rebellion against God.” You have it
there in Mark 1:15. You can really turn to any gospel that describes Jesus’ first day in his
ministry and you find that they all emphasize both these sides of his ministry.

The emphasis is on sin as an enemy of God and the emphasis is on sickness. He opposed both sin and
sickness. Mark 1:15: “’The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent, and
believe in the gospel.’”

Jesus first called men to turn from sin. And then verses 22-23 go on: “And they were astonished at
his teaching, for he taught them as one who had authority, and not as the scribes. And immediately
there was in their synagogue a man with an unclean spirit.” As soon as Jesus appears, sickness
exposed itself. Then you remember that Jesus deals with the sickness. Jesus always connected the
two together.

If you look at Matthew 9:5 he connected the two up together. Matthew 9:5: “For which is easier, to
say, ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ or to say, ‘Rise and walk?’”

Jesus obviously saw a connection between the sickness and the sin because he mentioned that both or
either of those would deal with the case at hand. Last Sunday we suggested that why he so often
dealt with sickness was that the Jews and the Gentiles at that time found it easier to believe in
healing than they did in forgiveness of sins. Now in our day it’s almost the other way around.
Then he entrusted to us really the job of removing both when he sent out the apostles and said, “You

are to preach the gospel of the kingdom and you are to heal all diseases.”

Now that is why we say that sin and sickness are connected up together. Now, why did God allow
sickness to continue if it wasn’t his will? Why did he not come down after the fall of mankind and
simply clean up the whole earth and wipe out cancer, and wipe out gonorrhea, and wipe out leprosy?
Why did God not just come down and clean up all sicknesses?

Well, the first reason, dear ones, is in Genesis 2:16-17: “And the Lord God commanded the man,
saying, ‘You may freely eat of every tree of the garden; but the tree of the knowledge of good and
evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall die.’” The very fact that God
gave a commandment to man proves that he gave him free will. God had to allow man to choose what he
wanted.

You can see that if man chooses rebellion against God and therefore sickness, really God is
cancelling out man’s free will if he comes down and wipes out sickness. Or if God came down and
wiped out sin in every generation he would really be saying, “No, you can only choose it as long as
you want, but I come down and cancel it out as soon as you die.” In other words, the first reason
God had to allow sickness to continue was because man had chosen it and God was determined most of
all to make man be like himself. He himself had a free will, so he was committed to preserving
man’s free will even if he had to let sickness run rampant.

The second reason you’ll see is in Genesis 3:4: “But the serpent,” Satan, “said to the woman, ‘You
will not die.’” The devil persuaded man that they wouldn’t die. They could rebel against God —
live independently of him — and they wouldn’t die. God had to leave sickness in the world to show
man that he would die.

Sickness is one of God’s ways of showing man that all is not right in creation. You know that the
whole world is bent on making it normal and natural to live as if there’s no creator. In great
parts of the world that has become almost possible. There are many people who don’t think there is
a creator at all.

Do you see that Satan’s job was to persuade us that we’d never die? And God’s job was to leave some
signs in the earth that we would die — indeed, that we were in the process of death. That
explains that verse that we read, that God subjected the creation to futility. He subjected it in
hope. He allowed disease and sickness to come as the natural consequences of our sin so that we
ourselves would see that all is not right. That’s the second reason why God allowed sickness to
continue.

And the third reason really is an extension of that last one. It’s in 1 Corinthians 11:30-32: “That
is why many of you are weak and ill, and some have died. But if we judged ourselves truly, we
should not be judged. But when we are judged by the Lord, we are chastened so that we may not be
condemned along with the world.”

God left sickness in the world as a sign to us to at least judge ourselves and see if there is any
sin present. So sickness really can be a friend — something like the law. I think many of us say,
“Oh well now, what about what it says in John 9:3?” And we say, “They ask Jesus, ‘What about this
man? Has this man sinned or his parents?’ And Jesus said, ‘No, this man has not sinned nor have
his parents sinned.’” It is very important for us to see that all God was saying was — because you
are sick it does not necessarily mean you individually have sinned.

Moreover, some of you have been born with a congenital sickness that is there because of your
parents’ sin, or your grandparents’ sin, or because way back Adam himself sinned. So every time you
see someone who is sick, you don’t automatically say, “They’ve sinned and that’s what Jesus was
saying.” The man in John Chapter 9 was one who had been born blind. All that Jesus means there is
that not everyone who is sick has sinned and brought it upon themselves. Some people are born with
congenital sickness because the sins of their fathers have been visited on the third and fourth
generation. But that is very different, brothers and sisters, as we said last day, from saying that
sickness has no connection with sin.

Sickness is there, allowed by God as a consequence of sin, to ask us to examine ourselves and see if
things are right. Now why do we say that? Because the normal state of God’s children is expressed
in Exodus 15:26: “’If you will diligently hearken to the voice of the Lord your God, and do that
which is right in his eyes, and give heed to his commandments and keep all his statutes, I will put
none of the diseases upon you which I put upon the Egyptians; for I am the Lord, your healer.’”

In other words, here is a world torn with sin and sickness, and God says, “You are my people, and if
you avoid sin then I will put none of the sicknesses upon you that have been put upon the
Egyptians.” Now, if you know your grammar well enough, you’ll know what I mean: if the apodosis is
not true then one ought to examine if the hypothesis is not true. And if the apodosis is true, then
one ought to examine if the hypothesis is true.

That’s why God allowed sickness to continue. You see, the hypothesis is, “if you will gently
hearken to the voice of the Lord your God.” That’s the hypothesis in a conditional statement and
the apodosis is, “I will put none of the diseases upon you which I put upon the Egyptians.”

Now that’s why God has allowed sickness to continue in the world, so that when we see sickness we
may at least suspect that perhaps there is sin somewhere around — or perhaps God is trying to say
something to us about our relationship with him. In other words, sickness is a bit like the law.
You remember the law, as it’s outlined in Exodus 20: “If you receive the Spirit of my uncreated life
in you, you’ll have no other gods before me. You will not commit adultery. You will not steal.
You will not bear false witness.” Those are promises that are true if you’re receiving the Spirit
of God’s uncreated life.

Now sickness is a little like the law. God is saying, “If you’re receiving all of the life that
flows from my right hand from my Son Jesus from the tree of life, then really you’ll be well. I
will put no sicknesses upon you.” Now if you find yourself with some sicknesses, at least be fair
and loving enough to ask yourself, “Am I receiving all of the life that God can give me?” And
that’s part of the purpose of sickness, and it can be used by God in that way. It’s not that God
sends sickness. It’s that he allows Satan to work this work upon us.

Now I think some of us have a danger here. We say, “You mean, every time I have a sickness I have
sinned?” No. It could be that God wants you to come into more Christ-likeness. It could be that
you haven’t sinned at all but that God is anxious for you to come into a new Christ-likeness. Now
you can see this if you look at the teaching that you receive in Hebrews 12:10 about Jesus’ own
position. Here God is talking about ordinary fathers and how they discipline. Hebrews 12:10: “For
they disciplined us for a short time at their pleasure, but he disciplines us for our good, that we
may share his holiness.”

God at times allows hard things to come upon us so that we might share his holiness. Now, do you
see sharing his holiness is both a negative thing and a positive thing? It’s first of all being
cleared of sins, and secondly it’s growing in Christ-likeness. That’s why at times God can allow
sickness to come upon us. It’s either because there is sin in our life of some kind and he wants to
draw attention to it in as loving a way as possible — or because there’s a new position in Jesus
into which he wants us to come. Now I think it’s important, brothers and sisters, to see the two
sides — otherwise you won’t understand what Jesus meant when he said, “Just because these Gentiles
are suffering it doesn’t mean they’ve sinned.”

So some of us may come into a real deep sickness. It’s very important for the rest of us to see
that doesn’t mean necessarily that that person has sinned. It can mean that that person is far away
beyond the stage at which we are with Jesus, and God is allowing that person to come into a new
place with Jesus.

That ties up with Jesus’ own experience which is described in Hebrews 5:8: “Although he was a Son,
he learned obedience through what he suffered; and being made perfect he became the source of
eternal salvation to all who obey him.” You see that even Jesus suffered — and obviously he didn’t
sin. Obviously it wasn’t because of sin that he suffered. Yet he did suffer so that he would learn
perfect obedience.

Now at times God allows sickness to come upon us because there is sin there. At other times he
allows sickness to come upon us because he wants us to come into a new place in his Son Jesus, a new
place of growth in Christ-likeness. I think we have to see both those sides.

Maybe you can share a little bit in questions at the end about that. Do you see then that sickness
is really a symptom of a disease that we have with God? Sickness is not God’s perfect will for us.
So whenever sickness comes upon us we should regard it as a symptom. “Now Lord, why has this
sickness come upon me?” God is faithful, and he will reveal to us what the real disease is. God
has promised that.

He’s promised for instance in Exodus 15:26 that he’ll prevent sickness as far as his children are
concerned. He will prevent sickness. He says, “I will put none of the diseases upon you which I
put upon the Egyptians.” And secondly he says, “If ever sickness comes upon you I’ll cure
sickness.” You remember he said that in James 5:16. It’s the promise given to us if we are ever
sick. “Therefore confess your sins to one another, and pray for one another, that you may be healed.
The prayer of a righteous man has great power in its effects.”

God says, “If you confess your sins — if you get rid of whatever it is that I’m trying to draw
attention to — then as soon as that’s removed your sickness will be healed. Also — if I’m trying
to show you how to come into a greater place of faith in my Son Jesus — as soon as you come into
it, as soon as you confess your lack of Christ-likeness and you see it plainly — then the sickness
will be removed.”

So that is God’s promise to us — that he will prevent sickness, and that if ever we come into a
place where he needs to allow sickness to come upon us, once we have seen whatever he’s been trying
to point out, he will remove the sickness from us.

That’s God’s will for us in regard to sickness. Now where does this put the whole business of
medicine? What is the place of medicine in the sickness of Christians? Probably the place of

medicine in the world is the same position as the law. Do you remember why God gave us the law? It
wasn’t to make us like Jesus. Let’s look at the reason why in Galatians 3:23: “Now before faith
came, we were confined under the law, kept under restraint until faith should be revealed.” The
purpose of the law was to keep us under restraint until faith should be revealed.

God gave the law to keep us men and woman from blowing apart the world before his redeeming Spirit
could get to work among us. Now that was the purpose of the law. You know that you could try to
obey the law perfectly in every way and yet it would never make you like Jesus. The law is there
only to keep back sin and to keep back sin from destroying the world.

You remember that Luther put it this way: “There’s the power of the sword and there’s the power of
the spirit.” The power of the sword is the power of law, of police officers, of courts, and of
everything connected with our judicial system. The purpose of the power of the sword is to control
the world and keep men from blowing it apart — while the power of the Holy Spirit gets to work
through Jesus to redeem men.

Now that’s probably the same purpose of medicine. It’s to keep sickness from running rampant
throughout the world and destroying the whole world before the Spirit of Jesus can really come into
people and make them whole as he is.

What then should Christians do about medicine? First of all, if you get sick you shouldn’t
immediately start running for a cure. Your first question should not be, “Where can I find the
cure?” Just the same way if you had trouble with some brother or sister in the body, who was really
sinning against you in some way, you wouldn’t hand them over to the police. You wouldn’t say, “I
must get rid of this nuisance as soon as I can whatever way I can do it.”

So your first question in sickness should not be, “Where can I find a cure?” but, “Father, why have
you allowed this to come upon me? Is there something you’re trying to show me in this sickness? Is
there some sin that I have in my own life, or is there some new position in Christ that you want me
to enter into?”

This should be our first response to sickness. The issue isn’t: can Christians use medicine to get
healed? There’s no problem with that as long as you don’t object to what Paul called medicine.

Now maybe you’d look at it in 1 Timothy 5:23. A lot of you know it already. The issue isn’t
whether Christians can use medicine or not. The answer is obvious there in 1 Timothy 5:23: “No
longer drink only water, but use a little wine for the sake of your stomach and your frequent
ailments.” So obviously Paul advised Timothy, “Listen, there are good nourishing things that will
help your body. At times it’s good to use those.” That isn’t the issue – whether Christians should
use medicine or not.

You get into a legal bind and come under bondage if you begin to take the position, “No, Christians
should not use medicine if they want.” But do you see that with Jesus it is a higher thing? The
principle that we follow in regard to sickness is in 1 Corinthians 6:12: “’All things are lawful for
me’, but not all things are helpful. ‘All things are lawful for me’, but I will not be enslaved by
anything.”

All things are lawful for us Christians, but there are some things that are lawful and there are
some things that are expedient. Really the question is, “Am I concerned to find out what God is

trying to show me through this sickness? Or do I love myself so much that I have to get rid of this
pain and suffering at any cost? Do I have to use the normal methods that non-Christians use to be
healed of my sickness?”

And do you see brothers and sisters, there’s no question of whether Christians should be doctors or
not? Don’t you see that? It’s the same question about whether Christians should be lawyers or
policemen. Of course they should. As God guides them they should take part in part of the
preserving grace that he has shed throughout the world in the legal systems. Of course they should
take part in the whole medical work which is an attempt of God’s preserving grace to hold back
sickness in the world so that God’s Spirit can get to deal with men.

But the issue for Christians is not, “Is it legal to be a Christian? Is it right to be a
Christian?” It is not, “As a Christian is it right to use medicine?” But the issue is, “Is this
what God’s will is for me in this present situation?”

At times it may be God’s will for you. But there are several precautions now that we ought to share
with one another as Christians in regards to medicine. I’ll try to take them in what detail I can.

First of all, often our rush to man’s drugs is simply a compounding of the rebellion of our
self-love against God. God sees that we love ourselves in some way that is not according to his
will, and he allows sickness to come upon us. We rush to drugs to get rid of the sickness in order
to carry on without looking at what God was trying to show us.

Moreover, some of us are so hurt by the pain of the sickness, and we love ourselves so much, and we
want to avoid suffering at any cost, that we are determined to take drugs or anything that will get
rid of the pain. Do you see that often when we rush to medicine – now remember what I said, that
accepting medicine is lawful to us — but it just is a fact that often we rush to medicine because
of our self-love — because we’re not really willing to wait to find out what God is trying to show
us.

Often we ignore the deeper benefits of the salvation that Jesus has wrought in his death for us by
rushing to medicine. Often we take the drugs to clear up the symptoms — and actually the disease
remains deep down there, and we ignore the depth of the salvation which is wrought in Jesus and
which is available to us — for a rather shallower, more superficial kind of removal of the
symptoms. Now often I think that is true, isn’t it?

We know the whole business about Contact {a decongestant drug} and the old tiny time capsules, you
know, and really they just work on the principle that they stop the secretions that God has put in
our bodies to clear away virus and germs, and they just stop them. They stop the nose running. They
stop all the secretions that really are used by God to take away the sickness. That’s just one very
clear example of the way we take drugs to suppress and repress symptoms rather than to deal with the
real sickness underneath.

Now very often, by running to man’s medicines we ignore and neglect the deeper health and healing
that Jesus can bring to us from the cross. Often, in other words, men’s medicines heal the physical
symptoms but really don’t deal at all with the spiritual sickness that was what God wanted to point
out to us. So, often we miss the whole purpose of the sickness. Often we say that doctors are
God’s intermediaries. We thank God for them, and that’s right because they are God’s

intermediaries. But we ourselves really end up trusting more in the doctors and the drugs than we
do in God.

Now that need not be you. It need not be. But isn’t it true that often that’s what happens? It’s
very important, brothers and sisters, that we see that I’m not saying to you, “Don’t use medicine,”
— because my wife would be out of a job if you did that. {Rev. O’Neill’s wife is a dentist.} So
I’m not saying don’t use medicine. But I’m saying to you that there are cautions that we need to
remember as we approach this whole question of sickness.

The first question we should ask is, “Lord, is there anything that you’re trying to draw my
attention to? I know you’re fully able to make me whole and well on your own as soon as the reason
for this sickness is removed. Now, is there anything you’re trying to draw my attention to?” That
should be our first question – instead of our first question being, “Where can I get a cure?” Often
that latter one is the first question we ask.

I think it’s true that though all medical knowledge is made possible by God’s Spirit — yet often
medical knowledge glorifies the cleverness of man rather than glorifying the death of Jesus on the
cross. That need not be, but often it is the case. Often you’ll find brothers and sisters who say,
“The doctor is God’s method of healing. So I take the healing as if it’s from God.” But deep down
they really know better. They know the healing comes from the doctor — really. They don’t believe
it comes primarily from the Father because they have tackled it in the wrong way.

In other words, it depends on the way you go for medical help. It depends on whether God has
directed you to go to that — whether you have waited long enough for him to see how he wants you to
proceed. Very many of us who run to medicine are so quick to get a cure that we cannot wait long
enough to ascertain what God’s will is for us. We can’t find out why he allowed the sickness to
come, and we certainly can’t find out whether he wants us to go to a doctor or not to go to a
doctor.

But what God wants when we come into a problem with sickness is to wait upon him — to draw closer
to him. That’s why he’s allowed the thing to come to us, so that we would draw closer and nearer to
him and understand him better. Instead many of us draw away from him and we actually get more
independent of him almost because of the sickness, rather than really drawing close to him.

God’s will for us in sickness is found there in Matthew 6:25: “’Therefore I tell you, do not be
anxious about your life.’” That’s God’s will. When we come into sickness he wants us not to get
away down under the symptoms and start being anxious and worried about our life.

He wants us to look up to him and say, “Father, I thank you for allowing this to come. I know
you’re trying to point something out to me because you have said that you will put none of these
diseases upon anyone who abides in your statutes. So Father, I’ll wait upon you and I’ll wait for
you to show me this.” And wait, brothers and sisters, long enough for God to show you this.

It says in James Chapter 1 verse 4, “Let steadfastness have its full effect.” Don’t opt out before
God has shown you what he wants to show you. He wants you to take that attitude. As the symptoms
bear down on you more and more heavily, he’s saying to you, “Do not love yourself. Do not love
yourself. Do not get all wrought up and desire sympathy from other people for your symptoms. Look
away from your symptoms and look up to me and wait upon me. Wait as long as I ask you to wait.”
And do you see dear ones, that God may ask you to wait a little while?

Now that was true of Paul, where Paul describes what we think may have been a sickness in his eyes
as “a thorn in the flesh.” It’s 2 Corinthians 12:7, where he expresses plainly the belief that God
had allowed this to come upon him for a spiritual reason: “And to keep me from being too elated by
the abundance of revelations, a thorn was given me in the flesh, a messenger of Satan, to harass me,
to keep me from being too elated. Three times I besought the Lord about this, that it should leave
me; but,” — here’s the important thing: he didn’t just go on hoping and hoping, he received an
answer from God– “but he said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect
in weakness.’” Then he said in verse 9: “’I will all the more gladly boast of my weaknesses, that
the power of Christ may rest upon me.’”

Now that is God’s will, that we should know what he intends in the sickness. In other words, it is
not his will that any of us should be under sickness for years and years and not know why it’s
there, and not be clear whether God wants to heal it or not. God’s normal attitude to sickness is,
“I want to heal all your sicknesses. I want to put none of them upon you that I’ve put upon the
Egyptians.” But you can see that at times, as in Paul’s situation, he allowed a thorn in the flesh
to remain and allowed Paul to glory actually in that weakness.

Now it’s important I think, to say last of all that some people go to the other extreme and some
people say, “I have drawn close to God in my sickness so really I’d rather be sick than well.” So
they accept sickness and welcome it, and never look for healing at all. Now do you see that that
kind of holiness will not last? If you’re only holy while you’re sick — that is certainly not the
Father’s will for you.

So it’s not right ever to accept sickness as something that is God’s will for you. Sickness is
never God’s will for you. God may, through his permissive will, allow sickness to come upon you —
but for a purpose and for a time — and then when the reason for that is removed, the sickness will
be removed. So it is a lie of Satan for us ever to accept sickness as God’s permanent will for us.
Yet some of us glory in sickness in that way.

Now it’s plain that sickness is not God’s will. You can look up many verses in the Bible, but John
9:3 is a plain reason why we should never accept sickness. In this verse, they asked, “Did this man
sin, or did his parents sin?” Jesus answered, “It was not that this man sinned or his parents but
that the works of God might be made manifest in him.” Now the reason the sickness came was that the
works of God might be made manifest in him.

That’s why God allows sickness to come upon you. Now if the sickness is not healed then God’s works
are not made manifest in you. So there’s no point if you accept sickness as a permanent part of
your life. Then God is not glorified by sickness. In fact, only one person is glorified by
sickness, and that is the one whom Jesus said really is the one that produces it. It’s Acts 10:38.
Peter is talking about Jesus and he talks about the works that Jesus did: “’How God anointed Jesus
of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power; how he went about doing good and healing all that
were oppressed by the devil, for God was with him.’”

The reason we should never accept sickness is that sickness is oppression by the devil. We should
never accept anything from Satan as a permanent work in our lives. So it’s not right to say, “Oh, I
have grown closer to God during this sickness. So really, sickness is good and sickness will keep
me close to God.” No. God wants you to be rid of sickness because sickness is a work of Satan and
God cannot be glorified in the midst of it.

So brothers and sisters there are a lot of other things to say, and we’ll share a little more of
them next Sunday. But do you see that the basic attitude of Christians towards medicine should be
not that we cannot use it? But that God has a perfect way, and the perfect way is to receive all
healing and life from Jesus. Yet we have to deal individually with God about that. But if we ever
do use medicine, we have to see that there are many cautions to be observed in the use of it. We
have to at least ascertain: is it God’s will that we should use medicine?

Yet we ought to see that it is easily and obviously God’s will for many Christians to be in medicine
— because it’s a beautiful opportunity to deal with a work of Satan, and at the same time to have
the opportunity to explain to someone that there is a better way and a fuller way for dealing with
the sickness and for dealing with this enemy.

Now dear ones, would you like to ask questions? Because I think that the questions are the most
important part. We’ll share a little more next Sunday.

Question from someone in the audience: Christian Science healings — are they sometimes of the devil
or can they be of God?

Rev. O’Neill: I’m sure, sister, that there are many Christians in all denominations or sects, even
though we would think that no one could be a Christian Scientist and still be a Christian. I’m sure
there must be many dear souls who maybe don’t see all the finer points of doctrine and maybe are
real Christians in their own homes. So they may well experience real healing from Jesus .

Sickness and Health 3

Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill

Brothers and sisters, we’re coming to the end of a series on sickness. The question tonight is:
sickness or health? It concerns sickness or health for you and me. So tonight I will be summarizing
some of the things that we said during the past two Sundays and perhaps trying to tie it together
from the point of view of practical application. Now it might be good to begin with Romans 5:12
where we see plainly where God puts sickness: “Therefore as sin came into the world through one man
and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all men sinned.”

Now death came through sin and death is the ultimate in sickness. So what God is plainly saying is
that if there had been no sin, if there had been no independence of him in the race of mankind —
there would have been no sickness. So that’s the basic position we start with.

Nevertheless, you know that though that is true in regard to the whole race of mankind, it is not
necessarily true in every individual situation. Now Jesus pointed out that though sin generally is
responsible for sickness, and so sickness is something that God opposes and does not want — yet
individually you cannot say that everyone who is sick has himself sinned.

You remember we found that in John 9:1 where Jesus deals with a man who had a congenital sickness.
He was born blind: “As he passed by, he saw a man blind from his birth. And his disciples asked
him, ‘Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?’”

So though sickness here was due to the original rebellion of man against God and though if man had
never rebelled there never would have been any blindness, yet you see how Jesus answered as far as
the individual is concerned. John 9:3: “Jesus answered, ‘It was not that this man sinned, or his
parents, but that the works of God might be made manifest in him.’”

So there are many individual sicknesses that are not due to the individual sin. Jesus emphasized
this again in Luke 13:2. Luke 13:2 follows the same line that though sin in mankind was the cause
of sickness, yet you cannot apply that in every individual case. Luke 13:2: “And he answered them,
‘Do you think that these Galileans were worse sinners than all the other Galileans, because they
suffered thus?’”

So it’s not fair to see someone who is under the weather with a cold and say, “This man has sinned
worse than the rest of us.” Jesus said plainly, “You cannot say right across the board that every
individual who is sick has sinned.” Yet it is true that that is sometimes the case.

That’s what Jesus was really saying: it’s not always the case that the individual has sinned, but
sometimes that has caused his sickness. Sometimes it is God trying to point out some sin in an
individual that is really the cause of the sickness. Now, you find that in 1 Corinthians 11:30.
Some of these verses we mentioned in the last two talks.

1 Corinthians 11:30: “That is why many of you are weak and ill, and some have died. But if we
judged ourselves truly,” that is if we really thoroughly examined our own lives, “we should not be
judged.” This implies that when you become sick and ill you are sometimes being judged and not
being punished. Jesus bore all the punishment for our sins. God doesn’t punish us with sickness
but he judges us sometimes with sickness.

Sometimes he says, “Okay, look at this part of your life. It’s not right.” “But when we are judged
by the Lord, we are chastened so that we may not be condemned along with the world.” (Verse 32) So
sometimes God uses sickness in order to point out some sin in us — “that we may not be condemned
along with the world.” It’s not to punish us. It’s not to condemn. So it’s to save us from a
blindness to a certain sin that is developing in our lives.

Yet it’s good to see you see that sickness is not brought by God. Sickness is caused by sin and by
Satan. Whenever you’re oppressed by sickness, you’re not being oppressed by God but you’re being
oppressed by Satan himself. It’s simply that God uses Satan’s work at times to point out certain
things.

Now, that isn’t always the case. Sometimes God wants us to move into a new position of
Christ-likeness. So he allows a weakness or sickness to come upon us. You find that in Hebrews 5:8
in regard to Jesus himself. Jesus, you remember, was without sin at all. God himself said that.
Yet Hebrews 5:8 says: “Although he was a Son,” and a perfect Son, you can see that from the capital
S, God’s only Son, “Although he was a Son, he learned obedience through what he suffered.” So
there’s a place for God allowing weakness and sickness to come upon us in order to bring us into a
new place of Christ-likeness.

So sometimes he allows it to point out a positive thing. Sometimes he allows it to bring us into a
new place of Christ-likeness. It’s mentioned again in 2 Corinthians 12:7. There’s a clear example
of that happening in one of God’s greatest saints. This man you remember said, “In Christ we are
more than conquerors through him that loved us.” (Romans 8:37) This is the man who said, “I can do
all things in Christ.” (Philippians 4:13) This is the man who said, “Who shall deliver me from this
body of death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord.” (Romans 7:24-25) Yet this man said
in 2 Corinthians 12:7: “And to keep me from being too elated by the abundance of revelations, a
thorn was given me in the flesh, a messenger of Satan, to harass me, to keep me from being too
elated.” So at times God allows sickness to come upon us in order to bring us into a new position
of Christ-likeness.

It is true that in Exodus 15:26, God promised his people if they obeyed his laws and commandments,
to keep them from many sicknesses that the Egyptians have suffered. So it is true, brothers and
sisters, that there is sufficient emphasis in the Bible on health as a result of obeying God. There
is also sufficient emphasis on the need to confess our sins in order that we should be healed. We
are to seriously examine ourselves when we come into sickness and say, “Lord, I know this may not
mean that I’ve sinned. But does it? Are you trying to point out some sin in my life?” Certainly
if God does not point out any sin then we should say, “Father, what new position of Christ-likeness
do you want me to come into?”

Maybe we should look, brothers and sisters, just for a few minutes at God using sickness to bring us
into a new position of Christ-likeness. In other words, sickness in regard to God’s work and in
regard to his workers and preparing his workers. Maybe we could look back at the basis of God’s
power over sickness.

Isaiah 53:4-5 talks about this: “Surely he has borne our griefs,” — that is, as you see when you
look at footnote “x”, “sicknesses.” “Surely he has borne our sicknesses and carried our sorrows.”
You see the footnote “y”, “or pains.” The Hebrew is “pains.” “Surely he has borne our sicknesses
and carried our pains; yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. But he was

wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement
that made us whole, and with his stripes we are healed.”

Now there it says plainly that Jesus bore our sins and he also bore our sicknesses. Yet the Holy
Spirit does apply the benefits of Christ’s atonement in regard to those two facts differently,
doesn’t he? Jesus bore our sins so that for any of us that confess our sins to God, God forgives
those sins and removes them from us. But it seems different with sicknesses, doesn’t it? Even
though Jesus has born our sicknesses and God is free to lift all our sicknesses from us, it does
seem that at times the Holy Spirit applies that particular benefit of Christ’s atonement
differently.

You can see some of the reasons why leaving sin in our lives would never glorify God. Any time a
person confesses a sin, God deals with it and removes it right away. He doesn’t always remove
sneezes, or remove sickness. Sometimes he leaves the sickness and it seems that he can glorify
himself through a sickness. But he can’t glorify himself through a sin.

I think it’s important, brothers and sisters, to see that there is nothing that God cannot do.
Jesus has already borne our sins and borne our sicknesses. But it is the Holy Spirit’s right and
prerogative to apply the benefits of that bearing by Jesus according as it will glorify God. And
sometimes when he leaves a sickness upon a person for a little longer – the Holy Spirit is able to
glorify the Father.

Now you can see that in 2 Corinthians 12:10 again in regard to Paul: “For the sake of Christ,
then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities; for when I am
weak, then I am strong.” Somehow it is possible in sickness to say, “When I am weak, then I am more
strong. When I am at my weakest the power of Jesus is most powerful in me.” Whereas you can’t say,
“When I am most sinful then I am most holy.”

So there is a real difference. Even though Jesus has borne both sin and sickness on the cross for
us, yet the Holy Spirit always removes one of them when we confess it. But the other at times he
will leave upon us because this can often glorify the Father and can often enable us to say, “When I
am really most weak then I am really strongest.”

Yet it is important never to accept sickness as one of God’s workers, never to accept it
unquestionably — because it is a work of Satan. You should never accept any work of Satan unless
God very clearly explains to you that, “I want you to bear this for a little.” Now that’s
important, brother and sisters. I think too many of us pray away there and ask God to heal us. He
doesn’t heal us so we say, “Oh well, I’ve just to bear this. This is God’s will for me.”

Now, God does not work in us by default. We do not assume God’s will through silence. We do not
assume it is God’s will because we hear nothing from him. The only reason you should ever accept
the sickness is if God clearly tells you that this is his will.

Now you can see that in Paul’s experience there in that same chapter, 2 Corinthians 12:8. Paul is
saying, “Three times I besought the Lord about this,” — probably some sickness of the eyes — “that
it should leave me; but he said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect
in weakness.’” And then Paul says, “’I will all the more gladly boast of my weaknesses, that the
power of Christ my rest upon me.’”

But do you see that God specifically said to Paul, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is
made perfect in weakness.” In other words, God explained it to him, “This is going to glorify me —
what you’re experiencing.”

I think it’s very important for us to see that, so that we don’t condemn a person who is walking
under sickness and yet so that we do not easily accept sickness. Loved ones, it is significant that
it’s God’s giants in the Bible that bore sickness over a long period of time. So let us be careful
before we say, “God is allowing me to bear this sickness that I may serve him better or may glorify
him better.” It is God’s giants that bear sickness as a normal run of their lives over a long
period of years.

Nevertheless, it is important to see that they do it. There are some other examples beside Paul.
If you look at 2 Timothy 4:20, you’ll see a reference there. It is important, brothers and sisters,
to see this — otherwise you’re driven into absolutism in healing. That is, you say, “If you had
enough faith you’d be healed.” That’s enough to drive a person insane if you beat them with that
law. So it’s important to see there are definite instances in the New Testament where God did ask
someone to walk in sickness. Yet it’s important to see that it did not interfere with their work,
and that they were real spiritual giants at that time.

2 Timothy 4:20: “Erastus remained at Corinth; Trophimus I left ill at Miletus.” Now it should also
deliver us from this business of, “Why don’t you heal if you’re an apostle of God?” If Paul, with
all his power, left Trophimus ill at Miletus, then we can’t get each other over the barrel in this
kind of way. If you drive yourself into absolutism as far as healing is concerned, you really will
back yourself into a corner that will spoil all blessings from God. So it is important to see that
there are instances in the Bible of this.

1 Timothy 5:23, is another one: “No longer drink only water, but use a little wine for the sake of
your stomach and your frequent ailments.” I mean, why didn’t Paul just heal Timothy? So it is
vital for us to see that God has allowed sickness in some situations. But I think before we get
ourselves lined up with old Timothy, Trophimus, and Paul we ought to really check: are we maybe that
stature and is God really allowing that sickness to come upon us? Or is it our own stubbornness
that will not deal with God over what is wrong in our lives?

So our general attitude should be not one of getting ourselves onto a rack: “If this sickness is
left upon me then I’m not getting through to God.” But rather, “This could be the Father’s will but
it’s more than likely not.” God’s normal will for his children is for them to be well. So we
should pray like this: “Father, is there anything wrong in my life that has opened me up to this
sickness?” Really, that should be our attitude rather than just accepting the thing.

It seems the normal attitude is stated in 3 John 1, and you find that that’s really God’s will for
us. 3 John 1:2: “Beloved, I pray that all may go well with you and that you may be in health; I
know that it is well with your soul.” That’s praying according to God’s will: “I pray that all may
go well with you and that you may be in health.”

Along these same lines is 1 Thessalonians 5:23: “May the God of peace himself sanctify you wholly;
and may your spirit and soul and body be kept sound and blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus
Christ.” God’s normal will for his children is health, and we need to be very clear that it is not
otherwise.

Nevertheless, do you see that we should not look upon sickness as something terrible? I’ve said
often to you: would you treat the law as a dear friend? We should love the law. We children of God
should love the law. We should not grind under the law. We should not be glad we don’t have to
obey the law. We should love the law because the law is God’s list of symptoms that show us when
we’re lacking his light of the Spirit flowing through us.

So it is with sickness. When sickness comes we should not treat it as something terrible. We
should see it’s something that is lovingly filtered down to us by a dear Father, and that dear
Father will not give us more than we’re able to bear. We should see that.

It’s in James 5:11 that God says that: “Behold, we call those happy who were steadfast. You have
heard of the steadfastness of Job, and you have seen the purpose of the Lord, how the Lord is
compassionate and merciful.”

God only allows sickness to come upon us for a certain purpose. So we need to accept it in that
light and receive it from him in that light. Not accept it as a permanent will for us but receive
it as something that is filtered down to us by a Lord that is compassionate and merciful. Yet we
need to go before him and say, “Lord, why has this come upon us?”

I suggested last Sunday that we should never be preoccupied with our sickness. Watchman Nee
describes a friend of his who, when he got sickness, he really enjoyed it. ”I know a brother who
always expected love and kindness from others. Whenever people inquired after his wellbeing he
habitually responded with complaints about his physical weakness. He would give a detailed report
of how many minutes he suffered from fever, how long it was he had the headache, how many times a
minute he breathed, and how irregular was his heartbeat. He was continually in discomfort. He
loved to tell people of his stress so that they might sympathize with him. He had nothing to relate
except his tail of endless sickness and at times he wondered why he was never healed.”

Well, even if God is showing us something through sickness, or even if God has said to us, “This
sickness is my will for you for a little while,” we should never emphasize the sickness. We should
never talk about the sickness. We should be looking up to the Father.

You might say, “Does that mean we should tell a lie?” There’s an interesting example in 2 Kings
4:18-21: “When the child had grown, he went out one day to his father among the reapers. And he
said to his father, ‘Oh, my head, my head!’ The father said to his servant, ‘Carry him to his
mother.’ And when he had lifted him, and brought him to his mother, the child sat on her lap till
noon, and then he died. And she went up and laid him on the bed of the man of God, and shut the
door upon him, and went out.” Then Verse 25, “So she set out, and came to the man of God at Mount
Carmel. When the man of God saw her coming, he said to Gehazi his servant, ‘Look, yonder is the
Shunammite; run at once to meet her, and say to her, Is it well with you? Is it well with your
husband? Is it well with the child?’ And she answered, ‘It is well.’” And it was well that she
had absolute faith that God was in charge of the child’s life and that this man of God would be used
by the Father in a way that would bring about his will.

But it is interesting to see that God’s word obviously agrees with that. You don’t talk about your
sickness. You deal with God about it and you commit the whole thing to him and you don’t fret, and
you don’t talk to everybody about your sickness. It does seem, brothers and sisters, that you can
tell a prayer of faith in a person by whether they delineate in great detail what their sickness is,
or whether they glory in the fact that Jesus has borne their sicknesses. You really can.

You can tell whether a man or a woman is going in God’s direction by how they pray. If they pray
under the sickness all the time, then you can be sure that there is something of Satan’s deception
in them, and they are really in some way preoccupied with the sickness, and they are really in some
way glorying in the sickness — because it brings them a lot of attention.

But when God’s people are rightly related to Jesus about a sickness, they don’t mention the sickness
much. They glory in the health that is streaming down from Jesus. That’s really God’s will,
whether the sickness is for pointing out a sin inside you, or whether it is pointing out a new
position of Christ-likeness in you, or whether it is to keep you from being too proud, or to keep
you close to God yourself. Yet in all of those three instances, God’s will is for us to glory in
his healing, and to glory in the fact that he has the thing under control, and what is happening is
known by him and is being controlled by him.

Now what should we do in seeking healing when sickness comes upon us? What should be our attitude?
First of all, don’t get all over-anxious and run here, there, and everywhere for remedies. That’s
the first thing. Don’t do what most of us do. Don’t do that. Satan has gotten us used to that.
That’s one of the reasons we experience so little healing, relatively speaking, in the bodies of
Christ — because we’re all used to running to the doctor immediately for a remedy. So don’t be
over-anxious, and don’t run for quick remedies from anybody.

Second step: examine yourself. That’s it. Under the Holy Spirit’s light examine yourself: “Father,
I thank you for this sickness. I thank you that it has been allowed to come upon me for a purpose.
It may have been caused by a virus of some kind. But you obviously allowed this to come upon me.
Now thank you for that.”

“Now, I want to examine myself before you, and Father, I want you to show me in your word through
the inspiration of the Holy Spirit if there’s any sin in my life.” Then if there’s no sin stay
before the Father maybe several days, praying, “Father, is there a new position of Christ-likeness
that you want me to come into? Is there new light and new revelation that I have to receive?” Stay
before the Father until he shows you.

When he shows you, deal with him over it. Don’t leave it there. If he’s getting at you over a lack
of care about your sleeping habits, put them right. If he’s getting to you over the way you eat,
put that right. If he’s getting to you over tension or strain that you’re enduring because some
part of your life is not fully surrendered to him, get that right. Whatever it is, get it right.

If he’s getting at your prayer life, then put your prayer life right. Whatever it is God is
highlighting, put it right and then thank him for healing. Because once the cause is removed the
healing will follow.

God always will remove the sickness if the cause of the sickness is removed. If you want any help
in it, it’s good just to look up to God, to look to his power, and see that there’s no question of
his power, no question that he is able to heal. There’s an example in Mark 9:21-23. Some people
came to Jesus and this question came up of his power to do a thing. So you need to establish
yourself firmly on that fact first — because sometimes the sickness seems to be so heavy upon us
that we wonder at times, “Well, can God do anything with this?”

Mark 9:21: “And Jesus asked his father, ‘How long has he had this?’ And he said, ‘From childhood.

And it has often cast him into the fire and into the water, to destroy him; but if you can do
anything, have pity on us and help us.’” And it’s unusual for Jesus to use this kind of strength
and really almost rebuke the man: “And Jesus said to him, ‘If you can! All things are possible to
him who believes.’”

So it’s good to look directly to the power of God and say, “Father, this is in your power.” It’s
good to look to the will of God. It’s good to look to his general will for you. It’s referred to
in Mark 1:40-41. You ought to establish it with a word of scripture because so often Satan on
sickness can make us doubt. Mark 1:40-41: “And a leper came to him beseeching him, and kneeling
said to him, ‘If you will, you can make me clean.’ Moved with pity, he stretched out his hand and
touched him, and said to him, ‘I will; be clean.’” That’s Jesus’ will.

Unless Jesus very clearly explains to you, “It’s not my will to heal you,” — it’s his will to heal
you. Notice you don’t take it for granted that it’s not God’s will to heal because you’re not
getting anywhere. That’s walking by sight. Walking by faith is, “Lord, I know it’s your will to
heal me. I accept that.” And only if God very clearly explains to you as he explained to Paul
after beseeching him three times — only then do you say, “Well, perhaps God, you want me to be
under this for a while.”

Then the third step that is important is in Mark 11:23-24: “’Truly, I say to you, whoever says to
this mountain, “Be taken up and cast into the sea,” and does not doubt in his heart but believes
that what he says will come to pass, it will be done for him. Therefore I tell you, whatever you
ask in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours.’”

We said that hope is belief that God will undoubtedly do something. Faith is belief that he has
already done it. So the third step is — after looking to God’s power and looking to his will —
accepting healing. You still have a pain in your back — that’s sight back there. You don’t walk
by sight. You don’t walk by removal of symptoms. You walk by a faith that the thing has happened,
and you walk that way with your eyes on Jesus and not on the sickness — until it pleases God to
remove the symptoms.

Now brothers and sisters, that is the approach we should take now inside the body in regard to
sickness. If it’s God’s will that we should take a little wine for our stomach’s sake, if it’s
God’s will and he guides us to a doctor or to drugs of some kind — alright that’s for him to guide
us that way. But his normal will for us is that we would receive healing directly through the life
of Jesus. Yet you can see that that’s something we need to deal with individually and honestly in
regard to him.

Now dear ones, I think we should stop and you should ask questions, if you have any.

[Question — inaudible]

You remember, John 9:3, Jesus said, “It is not that this man sinned or his parents but that the
works of God might be made manifest in him.” We touched on it last Sunday. It seems to me that it
was the power of Jesus to heal even a congenital illness — that Jesus had complete power to heal —
and that that is where God is normally glorified in the sickness. That’s why it’s normally not his
will for us to lay under sickness permanently. It is only on a rare occasion with a giant of his
that he is glorified in the continual sickness. God is normally glorified by the removal of the
work of Satan — not by the continuation of the work of Satan.

[Question inaudible]

I see. This is the man who was born blind. You’re asking: If any man is filled with the Holy
Spirit and believes completely that God will heal his sickness, why does he remain sick?

All I can say is — I’m going along the lines that I explained — that the Holy Spirit can only
apply the benefits of Christ’s bearing of the sickness, in the light of our honesty about our sin,
or about the new Christ-likeness into which God wants us to enter, or in the light of the fact that
sometimes God asks a man to walk with sickness as he did Paul, and Trophimus, and Timothy. In other
words, according to that man’s dealing with God.

If that man is walking in the fullness of the Spirit and walking into all the light, then his
sickness will be lifted from him unless God wants him to walk as he wanted Paul to walk. But that
is an abnormal situation, dear ones.

Question: What position is a child of God in if he turns to medicine to remove the sickness?

It seems to me, brother, that first of all we have to withdraw from any position that would suggest
that we condemn such a person because otherwise you’d have to condemn Paul and his advice to Timothy
about a little wine for a stomach sickness. So we cannot condemn each other for going to medicine.
Nevertheless, I think we should see that medicine is like the law. The law is there to restrain sin
in the world so that the redeeming grace of God can go to work to hold the world back from chaos and
disorder. So medicine is primarily in the same position in regard to sickness. It’s to keep the
world from being destroyed by plagues and tremendous diseases. It’s not God’s primary will but it
is certainly his permissive will. So medicine is primarily for the unbeliever, or for holding back
sickness in a situation. Really, the believer is to go to Jesus.

But we should be very wise and see that God will always deal with us according to our situation and
our state. Sometimes some of us are so proud in our faith and have been so strong in condemnation
of others who did not trust God, that God makes us go to medicine. Or at times God may have some
work for us to do. I have known hospitals that were blessed, brother, by some brother or sister in
Christ being in that hospital. So there are situations like that. So again, it’s as with
absolutism in sickness: we should teach strongly what is God’s normal way, but we should not dare to
condemn a person who does not come into that normal pattern because God can move as he wishes.

[Question inaudible]

That’s right. The Father deals with us according to our situations, right? Obviously it would be
most obvious that the Father would expect you – if Paul gave Timothy instructions to use something
that would stimulate the juices in his stomach — then undoubtedly God would certainly agree with us
massaging the heart and doing what natural things we know in order to keep the person alive. So
obviously, God deals with us according to our particular situation. Nevertheless, I do believe if
more of us really trusted to Jesus to pour down his life in emergency situations, the life would
come down like that.

Question: What should our attitude be to vaccinations?

Could you go to some other church? {Laughter} That’s good brother, that’s good. I’ve been on this

campus for five years and I’ve never been in this position. At least I can say you’re a professor
and not a student. I don’t know. At least I’ve the confidence to say that. Ushers could you keep
this man out of the church? {Laughter} It would seem to me that one undoubtedly is up against lots
of influences of environment in regard to that question.

For instance, in Ireland because we lived there the whole TB {tuberculosis} situation was utterly
different from here in Minnesota. It was really a fearful disease certainly when I was in high
school. I can see that was partly because you’re taking part in the sinfulness or the sinful and
sick atmosphere around you and you cannot avoid it. You’re born to parents with this kind of thing.
I can see how you’re laboring under an environmental predisposition to a disease that some people
maybe in another country or another part of the world are not laboring under. So I can see that in
some things you’re fighting against a general sickness. You’re sharing in the sickness of the
world.

Now in that regard, obviously one could liken it in some way to the congenital blindness of the
person in John. So I’m sure that that would influence what God would have people do with their
children. I’m sure that one would have to accept that God has provided some medical means of
counteracting this kind of environmental influence. Now at the same time I would have to hold that
if the Father put one of us in Iran with children in a situation that was very open to this kind of
sickness where vaccination was not possible, I’m quite sure the Holy Spirit would give the strength
and the immunity that would normally proceed through vaccination. So I think that I would walk
somewhere between those two positions. Has anyone any light on it?

(End of tape)

Sickness and Health 4

Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill

Now dear ones, maybe we could just tonight talk a little more about God’s life and the body. Maybe
before I begin it would be good just to deal with that question, which is: can we really expect
healing of residual pains of bodily injuries sustained years ago? Presumably that’s the kind of
injury you would get in a car accident. You can see that we cannot divide diseases up into
structural diseases which would be that kind of thing, and infectious diseases, invasive diseases,
and spiritual and emotional diseases — and then say that God can only heal one category.

God can heal any kind of weakness or sickness. We’ll see that in some of the promises that he gives
us in his Word. But God will heal any kind of weakness or sickness, anything that really is
hindering us from being what he wants us to be in his kingdom’s work? God will heal those things as
well. God will not only heal infectious or invasive diseases, but will heal sickness or weaknesses
that come from that kind of thing.

One of the things that we have to be very sure of is to find out from him whether we were in some
way at fault in that situation. I remember a girl who had a car accident, and in some sense it was
an attitude of sin or carelessness that had caused the accident. Now it would be important there as
with every other sickness to say, “Father, what are you trying to show me in this?” Do you see?
Then to confess it and to get it right. But then to trust God for the healing and the wholeness of
the sickness. I have known brothers and sisters who have been healed from this kind of thing.

Dear ones, what we’ve been sharing the past few Sundays on sickness is contained in 1 Corinthians
6:19: “Do you not know that your body,” — your body — “is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you,
which you have from God?”

Now why didn’t God say, “Do you not know that your spirit is a temple of the Holy Spirit?” Why did
he say, “Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit?” The answer is because he
reckons that his Holy Spirit who dwells within our spirits will move out and discipline our souls,
and bring peace to our minds and balance to our emotions, and liberty to our wills. Then he will
move out into our bodies and bring complete redemption and wholeness to our bodies.

That’s what we’ve been saying — that God’s Spirit who dwells within us brings complete wholeness to
every part of us and brings wholeness to our bodies. We used the example of Jesus who at the
transfiguration found that this resurrection life was bursting through his physical body and not
only filled him to completeness so that he was utterly healthy, but actually broke through so that
he seemed to be shinning and transfigured on that mountain top. Then of course on the resurrection
day, his spiritual body broke through completely and just transformed his physical body.

So that’s what we’ve been saying — that God’s Holy Spirit will bring light to our own bodies. Not
only to our minds, or to our spirits, or to our emotions, but actually to our bodies. You get that
in Romans 8:11. It’s really the parts of the Bible — that are important in what we share. Romans
8:11: “If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus
from the dead will give life to your mortal bodies also through his Spirit which dwells in you.”

The important word is “mortal.” It doesn’t say corruptible body as when Paul is talking about the
resurrection — when this corruptible body will be put on incorruptibility — but it says our mortal

body. That is our present body, our physical body.

If God’s Spirit dwells in you, that spirit will give life to your physical body. It will actually
fill your physical body with health and wholeness. That’s God’s promise. Never does God look upon
the body as an old physical prison cell that we have to escape from, or that we have to put up with.
But he looks upon our body always as something that is sharing the wholeness of the Holy Spirit.
You find that in 1 Timothy 6:12: “Fight the good fight of the faith; take hold of the eternal life
to which you were called when you made the good confession in the presence of many witnesses.”

Now do you see the words, “Take hold of the eternal life”? There are many of us who dwell in
weakness and sickness because we don’t take hold of the eternal life which is within us, and realize
that that is to be taken by us for physical wholeness and health.

God says, “Take hold of it. Don’t just let it dwell within and say, ‘Ah yeah, the Holy Spirit takes
care of the spiritual side of my life. He takes care of the Christian side, the witnessing side,
the prayer side. But this body I have to struggle along with through drugs, and through medicine as
well as I can.’’” God’s word is always, “No, take hold of the life that is inside you.”

Loved ones, we need to do that. There is a Holy Spirit within you that is complete wholeness. The
Hebrew word for holiness means health. It means health, and the Holy Spirit within you will bring
health to your own body.

Now you can see that there are really two laws at work in your body. There’s sort of the law of
consumption. There’s the consuming of energy that goes on inside you continually. Just an eating
up and a burning up of energy — in walking along, in running, in speaking, in exercising, and in
thinking. There’s just a consumption of energy. Then there is a replenishment — a law of
replenishment whereby life comes into you through rest, and through food, and through sleep. Those
two really should be balanced all the time inside your body for perfect health.

Now, in a Christian’s life there is an extra consumption taking place over that of a non-Christian.
You can see that if you look at it in Galatians 4:19, where Paul mentions that in his own life: “My
little children, with whom I am again in travail until Christ be formed in you!” Paul said, “with
whom I am again in travail.” Now that’s just one of the consumption exercises or drains on energy
that a Christian has that a non-Christian has not. There is a travailing, and a laboring in prayer
that non-Christians know nothing about. There is a fighting against Satan that non-Christians know
nothing about. There is a resisting Satan that non-Christians don’t have to worry about too much.

In other words, there are a lot of consuming factors in a Christian’s life that use up energy that a
non-Christian does not have to face. That’s why many Christians have no trouble with their health
until they begin to really live for Jesus. Many of us have no trouble with weakness or weariness of
body until we began really to be a priest unto Jesus. Many of us, until we were filled with the
Holy Spirit, never engaged in this kind of warfare and so we never had this kind of strain upon our
bodies.

You can see this is why it’s vital for those who are Christians to not only depend on food, and rest
and sleep to replenish their own energies, but to depend on Jesus himself. Brothers and sisters,
you cannot live the strenuous life of a Christian in your body without receiving the life of Jesus
for your body. That is why there is a part in the Bible that says, “The Lord is for the body.” The
Lord Jesus is for your body, and you really need to receive his life for your body. You need to

receive him into your body to fill you with himself. That’s why Jesus says so often that he is the
vine and you are the branches. It’s vital for us to receive the life that runs through the main
plant of the vine into the branches. If you’re not living that way — you’ll go down.

There’s a part of the Bible that explains it well, saying that Christians need not only food and
rest but something deeper than that. It’s one of Jesus’ replies to Satan in the wilderness. It’s
Matthew 4:4: “But he answered, ‘It is written, “Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every
word that proceeds from the mouth of God.”’”

God’s own word through the Holy Spirit is life to a Christian, and it’s life to your body. Yet the
other side that it says is, “Man shall not live by bread alone.” So we need to take care of our
bodies. We need to eat right, and we need to sleep right, and we need to exercise right. But do
you see? After you’ve done all — you’ll crash in a physical or nervous breakdown unless you’ve
learned to eat of Jesus’ body itself. Unless you’ve learned to take him into yourself as health,
and wholeness, and energy — you’ll wear out.

A.B. Simpson puts it like this: “Then the body broke away in every sort of way. I had always worked
hard and from the age of 14 I studied and labored and spared no strength. I took charge of a large
congregation at the age of 21. I broke down utterly half a dozen times and at last my constitution
was worn out. Many times I feared I should drop dead in my pulpit. I could not ascend any height
without a sense of suffocation because of a broken-down heart and exhausted nervous system.”

“I heard of the Lord’s healing but I struggled against it. I was afraid of it. I had been taught
in theological seminaries that the age of the supernatural was past and I could not go back from my
early training. My head was in my way. But at last when I was brought to attend the ‘funeral of my
dogmatics’ the Lord whispered to me the little secret, ‘Christ in you.’ And from that hour I
received him for my body as I had done for my soul. I was made so strong and well that work has
been a perfect delight. For years I have spent my summer holiday in the hot city of New York
preaching and working among the masses as I never did before; besides the work of our Home and
College and an immense mass of library work and much besides. But the Lord did not merely remove my
sufferings. It was more than simple healing. He so gave me Himself that I lost the painful
consciousness of physical organs.”

“That is the best of the health he gives. I thank the Lord that he keeps me from all morbid
physical consciousness and a body that is the object of anxious care, and gives a simple life that
is a delight and a service for the Master, that is a rest and joy.”

Really it’s true. It really is true. I had some weaknesses in my own body that I cosseted, and
looked after, and took care of, and tried to treat with exercise, and with the right rest, and Jesus
came in and worked a miracle. As long as I trusted and as long as I eat his flesh and drink his
blood into myself, so long the health stays.

Loved ones, it is a miracle and it is God’s will, not only that he will heal our sicknesses but that
he will keep us well and keep us healthy. That happens as long as we take the Lord God himself for
our bodies. The Lord is for the body. The Lord is not just for the spirit. He is not just for the
soul. The Lord Jesus is for your body. You can actually receive Jesus for your bodily health and
wholeness.

This goes right through the Old Testament. Just as you look through it you find all the time that

God preserved his own servants and his saints in health and wholeness. You find that even in the
case of Paul, as you’ll see a little later, even where the sickness still remained as far as the
outward phenomena was concerned. Yet there was health and wholeness that enabled these men to do
God’s work without any holding back.

You find that promise — God’s own will — in Deuteronomy 33:25. You do need a promise, a clear
promise in his word in order to go before him in this regard. Deuteronomy 33:25: “’Your bars shall
be iron and bronze; and as your days, so shall your strength be.’”

“And as your days, so shall your strength be.” That means as long as you’re alive your strength
will be there available to you. So really it’s up to us to get up each morning, whatever the night
before has been like, however restless we have been in sleep. It is good to get up each morning and
say, “Father, you’ve said, ‘As my days are, so shall my strength be.’ Now this is another day
you’ve given me. Now I trust you to make that promise real, and I take your life now. I take your
life now into me for this day.”

And brothers and sisters, it means a disregarding of the feelings in the body, or the feelings in
the emotions. It means a walk by faith — not by sight. But as you receive that, so God gives you
strength. As your days are, so will your strength be.

In other words, it is God’s will for his children to be robust and healthy as long as they’re alive
and really, in a way, to die well. To die well! Even if we die like Paul with a thorn in the
flesh, to die well. To die indifferent to whatever physical ailment there seems to be, and in no
way held back by that physical ailment.

That’s what you find right through scripture. Look at Abraham in Romans 4:19. These verses refer to
him: “He did not weaken in faith when he considered his own body, which was as good as dead because
he was about a hundred years old, or when he considered the barrenness of Sarah’s womb. No distrust
made him waver concerning the promise of God, but he grew strong in his faith as he gave glory to
God, fully convinced that God was able to do what he had promised.”

Abraham was nearly 100 years of age, and, “He did not weaken in faith when he considered his own
body, which was as good as dead.” The body still remained as good as dead. Do you see that? The
body didn’t suddenly blossom with a young man’s body. The body was still as good as dead. But God
gave Abraham the kind of strength and life that enabled him to have a son, and gave Sarah’s body the
same kind of life that enabled her to bear a son.

See — the body remained as good as dead. The body remained old. It’s just that the life of Jesus
is different from physical life. Do you see that? You could have all of the signs of cancer with
Jesus’ life and still continue a full ministry. I knew a man, Brian Hessian, a minister in England
who was dying of cancer. He never was healed of cancer — at least the world would have said he
never was healed. He had countless operations after operations and everybody would say, “Ah, he
wasn’t believing.” The man had hardly anything inside him left. They had cut away organs upon
organs and he continued a full ministry right to the moment he went into the Father’s arms.

He actually traveled around the country. I met him in Ireland. He traveled around the country and
he traveled into Europe. They were cutting away all the time, more operations upon operations. But
the life of Jesus is separate from the phenomena in the physical body.

It’s separate from those symptoms — so that a man can work and can walk with a body that the world
would say cannot hold up any kind of ministry. That kind of man can walk in strength. So it is not
the symptoms. Now again, I remind you that it is not just that God does that. He does that to some
people. With most people he makes them whole and well. But even when he lets the symptoms continue
he gives a life that is different from physical life, and that manages to enable you to continue a
full ministry and a full work.

You see it again with Moses in Deuteronomy 34:7: “Moses was a hundred and twenty years old when he
died; his eye was not dim, nor his natural force abated.” Now that’s at 120 years old. That’s
God’s will. God can keep us as long as it’s his will for us to continue in this world. He can keep
us well. He can keep us like that. “His eye was not dim, nor his natural force abated.”

It’s the same with Caleb. You can read it in Joshua 14:9-11. Caleb, one of the scouts that was
sent into the Promised Land, is speaking in Joshua 14:9-11: “’And Moses swore on that day, saying,
“Surely the land on which your foot has trodden shall be an inheritance for you and your children
for ever, because you have wholly followed the Lord my God.” And now, behold, the Lord has kept me
alive, as he said, these forty-five years since the time that the Lord spoke this word to Moses,
while Israel walked in the wilderness; and now, lo, I am this day eighty-five years old. I am still
as strong to this day as I was in the day that Moses sent me; my strength now is as my strength was
then, for war, and for going and coming.’” That is God’s word to us.

If God wants you to live to 85, he will give you the health and the strength to live until that
time. As your days are, so will your strength be. So it goes on. I could give you lots of
references about David and about Joshua himself, about Job, about Ehud, and about other saints of
God — that God did give them strength and that the Lord was for the body. And you know that that
was in those days — then how much more now in the days of the Holy Spirit, when grace is flowing
like a river and it is plentiful for all of us.

Now do you see — the one condition is that it is for God’s work. You find that it is for God’s
work. You remember that promise about the diseases that God had put upon the Egyptians. He said,
“None of those diseases will I put upon you if you abide in my statutes.” {Paraphrase of Exodus
15:26}

Now, brothers and sisters, it does mean that you have to live a life that is only for Jesus. I tell
you this, as soon as your eyes turn in on yourselves and you begin to live for yourself and for your
own pleasure, the strength of God is no longer available. You’ll find that, and I’ve found it in my
own life — when you’re going out after God’s work and God’s will — it doesn’t matter what the
difficulties are. He gives more healing and strength.

When you’re engaged in his work there is no shortage of supply. My wife and I joke about it a
little because if I’m going off to Pittsburgh, or down to Puerto Rico, or somewhere for a week’s
meetings, and I’m just feeling tired and weary, we both know that I’ll come back blasting away like
mad when I come back from the place — because it seems that when you’re engaged in his work, or
giving out the life that Jesus has given you, it seems that that life flowing through you is like
good clear blood through your arteries. It makes them whole and well. Do you see it is tied to the
work of his kingdom, dear ones? It cannot be otherwise.