Feb 1, 2021
“I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Helper, to be with you forever, even the Spirit of truth …” —John 14:16-17
This morning’s service will place particular emphasis on the work
of the Holy Spirit as our helper and teacher. Take a look through
the bulletin, and notice how many times in our hymns we ask for
help. We’ll ask for help to sing (“tune my heart to sing Thy
grace”—Come, Thou Fount Of Every Blessing). We will ask
the Lord to defend us from our enemies (Blest Be The Lord, My
Rock, My Might—Psalm 144). We ask for patience and virtue,
that we might “only pursue holy peace” in the body (Come, O
Creator Spirit Blest), and an “obedient mind” (Teach Me, O
Lord, Thy Holy Way), recalling the Spirit’s role in guiding
our understanding. We ask God to send the Spirit to “change our
hearts” (There Is No Greater Portrait) and to help us
endure (Breathe On Me Breath Of God). We ask these things,
and the Lord is faithful to answer. Since the Scriptures promise
that Christians will be “led by the Spirit of God” (Romans 8:14)
and “taught by the Spirit” (1 Corinthians 2:13), how else can we
respond but with gratitude? “Thank You, O my Father for giving us
Your Son, and leaving Your Spirit till the work on earth is done.”
—Henry C. Haffner
Key Words: Spirit,
Power, Depths, Comprehends, Understand, Impart, Natural,
Spiritual
Keystone Verse: Now we have received not the
spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might
understand the things freely given us by God. (1 Corinthians
2:12)
1 Corinthians 2:1-16
And I, when I came to you, brothers, did not come proclaiming to
you the testimony of God with lofty speech or wisdom. 2
For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and Him
crucified. 3 And I was with you in weakness and in fear
and much trembling, 4 and my speech and my message were
not in plausible words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the
Spirit and of power, 5 so that your faith might not rest in the
wisdom of men but in the power of God. 6 Yet among the
mature we do impart wisdom, although it is not a wisdom of this age
or of the rulers of this age, who are doomed to pass away.
7 But we impart a secret and hidden wisdom of God, which
God decreed before the ages for our glory. 8 None of the
rulers of this age understood this, for if they had, they would not
have crucified the Lord of glory. 9 But, as it is
written, “What no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the heart of man
imagined, what God has prepared for those who love Him”—
10 these things God has revealed to us through the
Spirit. For the Spirit searches everything, even the depths of God.
11 For who knows a person's thoughts except the spirit
of that person, which is in him? So also no one comprehends the
thoughts of God except the Spirit of God.12 Now we have
received not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from
God, that we might understand the things freely given us by God.
13 And we impart this in words not taught by human
wisdom but taught by the Spirit, interpreting spiritual truths to
those who are spiritual. 14 The natural person does not
accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him,
and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually
discerned. 15 The spiritual person judges all things, but is
himself to be judged by no one. 16 “For who has understood the mind
of the Lord so as to instruct him?” But we have the mind of
Christ.