Sound doctrine is revealed through the Holy Spirit
If you always had this great desire to fly, and someone told you that it is now possible for man to fly, and you really believed him, what would you do next? Would you start flapping your hands, and expect to fly? Not at all, right? You would use an airplane.
In the same way, after realizing that we need to understand Scripture through the life of Jesus, we can’t get results now by merely studying the life of Jesus in text book fashion. We need the help of the Holy Spirit. He will show us how.
Let me show you Scripture to back that up. Consider these verses in the gospel of John.
Jn 13:7 Jesus answered and said to him, "What I do you do not realize now, but you will understand hereafter."
Jn 20:9 For as yet they did not understand the Scripture, that He must rise again from the dead.
Jesus did many things that the disciples could not initially understand. Jesus knew that they could not understand it because they didn’t have the Holy Spirit yet. Therefore He didn’t even try to explain it to them. He just told them that they would understand later.
My point? Jesus knew how important it was to have the Holy Spirit’s enlightenment in understanding Scripture through the life of Jesus.
Jn 16:7 "But I tell you the truth, it is to your advantage that I go away; for if I do not go away, the Helper will not come to you; but if I go, I will send Him to you.
Jn 12:16 These things His disciples did not understand at the first; but when Jesus was glorified, then they remembered that these things were written of Him, and that they had done these things to Him.
However, once Jesus was glorified, and the Holy Spirit was given, then the disciples could understand.
1 Cor 2:11-12 For who among men knows the thoughts of a man except the spirit of the man which is in him? Even so the thoughts of God no one knows except the Spirit of God. Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, so that we may know the things freely given to us by God,
Only the Spirit of God knows the thoughts of God. We can now know the thoughts of God only because of the Holy Spirit who dwells in us.
Jn 6:45 "It is written in the prophets, ‘AND THEY SHALL ALL BE TAUGHT OF GOD.’ Everyone who has heard and learnt from the Father, comes to Me.
It is God who teaches.
1 Jn 2:27 As for you, the anointing which you received from Him abides in you, and you have no need for anyone to teach you; but as His anointing teaches you about all things, and is true and is not a lie, and just as it has taught you, you abide in Him.
1 Cor 2:13 which things we also speak, not in words taught by human wisdom, but in those taught by the Spirit, combining spiritual thoughts with spiritual words.
Jn 14:26 "But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all that I said to you.
Jn 16:13 "But when He, the Spirit of truth, comes, He will guide you into all the truth; for He will not speak on His own initiative, but whatever He hears, He will speak; and He will disclose to you what is to come.
One reason why the Holy Spirit was given to us is so that He can teach us the things about God.
Jn 15:26 "When the Helper comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, that is the Spirit of truth who proceeds from the Father, He will testify about Me,
The Holy Spirit is also called the Spirit of truth and our Helper. This is because it is He who will help us to understand all the truth by showing us the glory of Jesus.
The Holy Spirit is the only source from where we are to get spiritual truth. Education is not the source of spiritual truth. Neither is meditation. Neither is imagination.
Jn 14:17 that is the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it does not see Him or know Him, but you know Him because He abides with you and will be in you.
The world cannot understand the Bible because the Spirit of truth reveals it and they do not have the Spirit of truth.
2 Cor 4:6 For God, who said, "Light shall shine out of darkness," is the One who has shone in our hearts to give the Light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ.
2 Cor 4:6 is a beautiful description of the point being made in this section: it is indwelling Holy Spirit who enlightens us about the Father by showing us things in the life of Jesus.
So we see that in order to understand Scripture we must depend on the Holy Spirit. When we are babes in Christ we might get a lot out of what we hear from godly men, and that is good. But there must come a point when we increasingly learn directly from Scripture through the Holy Spirit. That is God’s best for us.
Mt 11:28-29 28 "Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest. 29 Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and YOU WILL FIND REST FOR YOUR SOULS. 30 For My yoke is easy and My burden is light."
"Come to Me," and "Learn from Me," says Jesus. He doesn’t tell us to go to some preacher to learn.
When we trust in the Lord and acknowledge our need of Him whenever we study the Bible instead of trying to lean on our own understanding then He will enable us to understanding things properly.
Pr 3:5,6 5 Trust in the LORD with all your heart and do not lean on your own understanding. 6 In all your ways acknowledge Him, and He will make your paths straight.
So how will you know if you began to learn and are continuing to learn from the Holy Spirit?
Well, if the Holy Spirit is teaching you, the end result is that you will become holy because He will primarily be teaching you about becoming holy. You will also become humble because you will see what a great sinner you are. You will also become merciful to other sinners for the same reason.
If all that’s happening is that you are increasing in knowledge and becoming proud about what you know then you’ve gone astray. If instead of becoming holy you are becoming rich because you are selling what you have learnt then you’ve gone astray even if you once began learning from the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit does not teach you so that you can become proud or rich; He teaches you so that you can become holy, humble and merciful.
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