[AI translation] The tone of this Word is strange and striking: it is not a statement of mere fact, not a promise or a wish, but a very definite exhortation, "Be filled with the Holy Spirit!" It is as if we were standing at a gushing spring with a pitcher in our hands, and someone were giving us a definite command: "Fill this pitcher with water! Well, that can only be done on command, because there's the water, there's the pitcher, a short movement and it's ready!But can one be filled with the Holy Spirit on command? Surely, if God calls us to do it in such a definite way, there must be some way of doing it! God never requires of us anything that He has not made it possible for us to fulfil. So, if God says, "Be filled with the Holy Spirit", then this can happen just as much as filling the pitcher with spring water in the example above. If God says it here and now, then those who are to be filled must be here now, and the Holy Spirit must be here, with Whom they must be filled, and there must be some way in which this filling can take place. So let us seek the answers to these three questions: to whom God says to be filled with the Holy Spirit, for what purpose God wants to be filled with His Spirit, and in what way God wants or is wont to perform this operation.
The answer to our first question, to whom is this exhortation addressed, is quickly given if we remember that Pentecost is the last of the great Christian feasts, and as such is a kind of inauguration of Christ's saving work. Jesus was born into this world, lived, suffered and died, rose from the dead, and ascended into heaven to make Pentecost possible, so that the Holy Spirit can flow freely on this earth. Before Christ's redemptive work, there was not a single place, nation, or church, or circle of people in the whole world, where the Holy Spirit could dwell permanently. Everywhere there was unconfessed and unatoned sin, and this filth of sin prevented the Holy Spirit from descending. For what can light have in common with darkness? Nowhere was there an area cleansed from sin!
But Jesus cleansed such an area with His sin-blotting blood. He came into the world to atone for sin by His suffering and death, and to cover it with His holy blood. And by His resurrection from death and ascension into heaven, the Father Himself solemnly declared that He had accepted the Son's sacrifice for sin, and had put away the sins of His children as far as the sunrise is from the sunset, as Psalm 103 says. Since Christ's death, resurrection and ascension, then, there is only in this world a region now free from the curse of sin, where the Holy Spirit has at last found a place to dwell. Jesus has built the spiritual temple which the Holy Spirit can now fill with His abiding presence.
This is the place, this temple, which is therefore fit for the indwelling of the Holy Spirit: every single human soul who has accepted forgiveness of sins through the death of Christ, whose sins have been covered by the holy blood of Jesus, that is, the soul cleansed by the blood of Christ, and the community of such souls, that is, the congregation of believing souls who have found their Saviour in Christ. Filling with the Holy Spirit is therefore the highest degree of the believer's life. For there are different degrees in the life of faith. From utter unbelief, a soul reaches the first and lowest degree of faith, when the realisation dawns on him that there is a God, and a God of awesome power, who is Lord even of his own destiny! This is not really faith; even common sense can come to this, and it is with such faith in God that one is most surely damned. The Scripture says that even devils believe that there is a God and are terrified of Him.
A decisive difference from this general belief in God is the next degree: belief in Jesus Christ as Saviour. The faith that can already accept the forgiveness of sins, the saving grace and the blessed hope of eternal life. This is saving faith, because it means saving faith in Jesus Christ. Then comes the third and highest stage: being filled with the Holy Spirit.
So, in short, in the first degree we know that there is God, in the second degree we happily know that God is with us through living faith in Jesus Christ (the name given to Jesus by the angel - Immanuel - also means "God with us"), and finally, in the third degree, the filling with the Holy Spirit means that God is in us! The crowning glory of Christ's redemptive work is therefore Pentecost. So now the relationship between God and man is fully restored. No deeper, more intimate communion with the Lord God can now be imagined than that of dwelling in a man through His Holy Spirit, as in a cleansed temple. As the Scripture says, a believer is the temple of the indwelling Holy Spirit (cf. 1 Corinthians 6:19).
Of course, the Holy Spirit works in a man before, the unbeliever also becomes a believer by the Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit works in us to repentance, to the acceptance of forgiveness of sins, to the recognition of the Saviour, but it is different when Christ works in us by His Holy Spirit, or in us and through us. It is one thing to be touched by the Holy Spirit, and another to be filled with the Spirit of God. To continue with the previous example, it is one thing to hold the pitcher under the spring water, pour it out and rinse it so that the inside is clean, and another to pour the same water after rinsing it out, so that now the pitcher can also be filled with clean spring water. Some people have already reached the point of rinsing, of being cleansed from sin, but now the pitcher of their soul, thus purified, remains empty, not filled with the Spirit of Christ.
Hence this strong exhortation, "Be filled with the Holy Spirit." You who have already been converted, who have already been cleansed by the blood of Christ, you who have already experienced the working of the Holy Spirit in yourselves, who have already been prepared by Christ, to you is the call, "Be filled with the Holy Spirit." For it is for this reason that your sins have been forgiven, that God has redeemed you through the blood of Jesus Christ, so that you may now be filled with the Holy Spirit!
This is halfway to answering our second question: for what purpose does God want you to be filled with the Holy Spirit? In short, so that Jesus Christ may not only be a welcome, yet occasional, guest in my life, but a permanent owner and steward, who now takes over the government and action, the whole household of my life. In England, at a preparatory meeting for an evangelistic crusade, there was a discussion about who to invite to give the lectures. Several names were mentioned by those present, and one person was very insistent that Moody, the famous American evangelizer, should be invited. One of those present sneered: 'Do you think Moody has a monopoly on the Holy Spirit? "No," he said, "I think the Holy Spirit has a monopoly over Moody.
Well, yes, that's what it means to be filled with the Holy Spirit, that God appropriates someone to himself. A complete change of dominion takes place in the soul: the Self abdicates! The Self that is the cause of so much trouble, because it measures everything to itself, judges everything selfishly, demands for itself, puts itself first everywhere - and gives way to Christ! So now Christ lives and reigns where the Self has lived and reigned. God wants to give me the fullness of the Holy Spirit so that the person of Jesus may be fulfilled in my life. That I may literally become Jesus in every thought, word and deed. That Christ may be manifested in me, that His holy, blessed and blessing life may be made visible in my presence at home and wherever I go.
But God does not want to fill a man with His Holy Spirit in this way, so that he may thus show off the holiness and beauty of the Christian life and boast to himself, "How great I am!" but as a witness of how great Christ is! For this reason God wants to sanctify me with the fullness of His Spirit, so that I may bear witness to Him by His power and might. Jesus said to His disciples, "Be ye empowered when the Holy Ghost shall come upon you, and ye shall be witnesses unto me" (Acts 1:8). Here we see most clearly the purpose for which God gave them the power of His Holy Spirit: to bear a powerful witness to Christ.
And behold, we see from the story that as soon as they were all filled with the Holy Spirit, they immediately began to speak in other tongues, as the Spirit gave them to speak. So immediately they became powerful witnesses, and at once the gospel of Christ was so powerfully preached that the little community, which had hitherto consisted of a few souls, increased that very day by three thousand converts. That is why God wants to fill believers with the Holy Spirit, so that their lives and the witness of their words may be a power that compels others to submit to Christ. It is not for your own beauty that you have become the redeemed of Christ, but so that God the Holy Spirit may now present Jesus Christ to the world through you, so that in you and through you Jesus Christ himself may now continue his conquering journey among the human souls in your immediate environment. That is why the exhortation, "Be filled with the Holy Spirit!"
But how is this to be done? Our Word describes the phenomenon of the filling of the Holy Spirit as follows: "And suddenly there came a rushing sound out of heaven like a rushing wind, and it filled the whole house." (Acts 2:2) Jesus says something similar to Nicodemus about the Holy Spirit, saying: "The wind blows where it will, and you hear its roar, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes." (John 3:8) The Spirit's moving is therefore something like the wind: it comes suddenly, freshens the air, and then dies away again. The trees continue to sleep motionless, the leaves do not rustle, the air becomes stuffy, there is no movement. In spiritual life, too, there are such windless, sultry periods. The singing dies away, the prayer becomes stagnant, the trumpet of the Word becomes a wavering sound, going to church becomes an empty habit, there is no movement. Then again, from where and how, it is not known, the wind rises, the air freshens, one can almost hear the sound of the Holy Spirit.
Now, by God's grace, we are living in just such a time. A fresh wind of a great revival is blowing, and the wind of the Spirit is undoubtedly blowing in our Hungarian evangelical churches too. If you too want to be filled with it, do you know what the first thing to do is? Stand where you can hear the Spirit's sound in the joyful witness of human souls, in their confession of sins, in their prayers and in their meetings to glorify God. Stand in the breezeway, where the wind blows, and do with others what the apostles did: pray! It was recorded that while Spurgeon, the great English lay preacher, was preaching the Word in the church, in the basement of the church, at the same time, some believing souls were constantly persevering in prayer, pleading for the power of the Holy Spirit to take hold of human souls, to pour out. And meanwhile, up in the church, people were coming to Christ in droves.
"Be filled with the Holy Spirit!" This means, in practice: fall on your knees and beg, pray! Not that prayer can be used to force the wind of the Spirit to move, but because prayer can be used to catch the roar of the rushing wind. Not for our prayers, but for our prayers, the reviving, new life-giving wind of the Spirit will blow again among us!
Whoever already believes in Jesus Christ as his Saviour, whoever longs for the fullness of the Spirit so that he may shine forth the glory of Christ in his life as a witness, let him only pray persistently, preferably with others like him, in common, in full faith, in the hope of a sure hearing. He certainly does not pray in vain, for God also wants him to be filled with the Holy Spirit! So pray persistently, as our beautiful hymn teaches you:
O living Spirit of God, come and bless me, let your heavenly flame pass through my heart and mouth! Dissolve me, send me away, fill me with fire!
God's living Spirit, come and bless me with your blessing!
Canto 463, verse 1
Amen
Date: 16 May 1948, Pentecost.
Lesson
ApCsel 2,1-17