COME, HOLY SPIRIT, COME!

Part 2, by Helen Jesze, 29th May 2015

Last week, we talked about the coming of the Holy Spirit to earth, and I described how I was baptised in / filled with the Holy Spirit at 14 years of age. In the days following, I was filled with a great joy and I noticed that I could understand the Bible better, as though someone had switched on a brighter ‘light’ in my spirit; I could also witness better to my school ­friends and teachers than before.

God’s preparation

Then there was the dream which kept coming, the same one on several nights. I saw myself standing in a building, preaching in fluent German to a group of people. How strange it seemed! At the time, I was attending a Grammar School in England, and had been put into a special class to learn German. This was an experiment, for normally we would have started to learn Latin. When the Headmaster put me in that class, he didn’t know he was fulfilling part of God’s plan for my life, for later, I realised God was calling me to fulltime ministry, especially to German ­speaking countries and Europe.

I continued with German after leaving school, and in 1963 I went to work in the German Dept. of the T.L.Osborn Evangelistic Assn. in Birmingham, in their Continental Office. It was my job to read and answer the many German letters and prayer requests, which came in, sometimes 2000 letters in a day!!

In June 1965, a young pastor from Switzerland came to our church, interpreting for Bulgarian­-born Pastor Haralan Popoff. The next day they visited the office, and the rest is history! That was my husband, George. We married the following year and living in Switzerland and later for many years in Germany, German was very important to me. God had prepared it in advance!

People may have pushed you around, changed things in your circumstances, or you may have been led to do a certain thing and don’t understand why, but God may have a special reason for this. Not long ago I met a lady who had learned sign­language in order to help a deaf friend. Today she is married to a deaf man and they have a Christian ministry to deaf and hard­-of-­hearing people.​ God’s preparation!

Who is the Holy Spirit?

I began to learn more about Him. He is the 3​rd Person of the Trinity – God the Father, God the Son (Jesus) and God the Holy Spirit. The Spirit overshadowed the Virgin Mary and she conceived Jesus. So He was born of the Spirit, but still needed power for service – two separate experiences. At Jesus’ baptism in water, the Holy Spirit came in the form of a dove and alighted upon Him. God spoke from Heaven: „You are my son, whom I love; with you I am well pleased!“ Luke 3, 22 . Here we can clearly see the Trinity together – Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

We also, when we get saved / born again, we are born of the Spirit into God’s family, but need an empowering of the Spirit for service, and to live our Christian life as the Father would have it.

John 7, 37­-39:

We must be thirsty for the Spirit

John 14, 16 and 17:

Our Advocate, our Helper, our Comforter

John 14, 26:

He will teach us all things, bring all things to our remembrance (remind us of what Jesus had said )

John 16,13-15:

Spirit of Truth, will guide us into all truth, will not speak of Himself but speak what He hears from the Father, will show us things to come, will glorify Jesus, will take spiritual things and will show them unto us.

The Holy Spirit was there at Creation, hovering over the waters, waiting for God to speak the Word, then He went into action and the thing, for instance ‘light’, was created – the Word and the Spirit, God’s dynamic duo! It is the same principle in our life. As we speak the Word in faith and obedience, the Holy Spirit will cause answers to be created and come forth in our lives.

OLD TESTAMENT symbols of the Holy Spirit are: Water, fire, wind, oil, breath. He was called: The Spirit, the Spirit of God, the Spirit of the Lord, the hand of God

The Holy Spirit moved upon certain people enabling them to do certain tasks – Prophets, Samson, Deborah, Gideon, Miriam the prophetess… Prophets and Kings were anointed with oil, symbolizing that they needed the Holy Spirit to help them in this task. Our Kings and Queens in England are also anointed with oil at their coronation, for this reason.

NEW TESTAMENT symbols of the holy Spirit are: water, fire, wind, oil and dove. He is called the Holy Spirit, the Holy Ghost, the Spirit.

After Jesus paid the price for sin on Calvary, when we accept Him as our Saviour, He comes into our hearts (our human spirits) by His Spirit, the Holy Spirit – to stay with us always! This is now for every Christian, not just a few people. We can always count on His help!

Charismatic Movement

In last week’s Devotional I told how my father’s family and many others who received the baptism in the Holy Spirit were misunderstood, persecuted, and often shut out from the churches they had been in, and this resulted in the Pentecostal movements being brought into being. But this changed and a man called Pastor David du Plessis, came to the Bible College in 1961 where George was studying, to tell all about it. Pastor David was often called „Mr Pentecost“, for God had sent him into many of the historical denominations (Baptist, Methodist, Lutheran, Salvation Army, including the Roman Catholic Church and the Vatican), to bring the message that the baptism and the life in the Holy Spirit was for​ all ​Christians, not just for those in a Pentecostal denomination.

God’s Spirit was being poured out now on various churches, and the difference was now that those receiving were often allowed to stay in their churches. They were speaking in tongues, praying for the sick, seeing miracles. This was then called the „Charismatic Movement. “Pastor David later came to Germany and Switzerland and George interpreted for him at seminars and various functions. Once in a Baptist church he said: „Dear Baptist friends, you have been faithful to John the Baptist’s message about being baptised in water. But what about the fact that he said Jesus would baptise us with the Holy Spirt and with fire? We must not forget that bit!“

You and I may be in a particular church or denomination, and may not agree with some things or a doctrine in another church. George was telling the leader of a Pentecostal movement that people in other churches, including Roman Catholics were being filled with the Spirit. „I don’t believe it!“ the man replied. In other words, he was thinking that Jesus would have to ask his permission to do this, but ​Jesus is the Head of His Church, and who are we to disagree with Him?! ​This Church is His Body, the universal Church consisting of people out of every denomination, and it is up to Him what He does! We may disagree with somebody else’s doctrine, considering it unscriptural, but God’s Spirit will guide them into ALL truth and change them where necessary, and if they will allow Him.

George used to go and preach in Roman Catholic Charismatic groups. One time a professor sat through all the meeting, weeping. Afterwards he said, „Since being filled with the Spirit, my theology is being changed, from the inside out​!“ If a person had told him that, he would not have accepted it. But the Spirit was now giving him new revelation, and he was being changed.

A Pentecostal pastor said to me: „I saw this minister smoking a cigar and speaking in tongues!“ He was bitterly opposed to people in other churches being open to the Spirit. This pastor was right that smoking is a harmful habit, but the Holy Spirit working in the man would give him the strength to give it up, whereas he could not do it on his own! Yet the pastor could not see that his own heart was closed to his Brothers and Sisters in other churches; his doctrine might have been correct but his heart was hardened​, and he was not willing to learn what God is doing in His Church today.

So dear Devotionalsjust4u!! friends, I hope this short teaching has been helpful to you and I want to encourage you today to allow this wonderful Holy Spirit to have more room in your life, glorifying the Father and the Son, and using you in a greater way. Next time I want to share some illustrations from my own and other people’s lives, how the Holy Spirit works and helps us.

Prayer: Dear Lord Jesus, thank you for sending the Holy Spirit. I give Him permission to change my thinking and my heart, to guide me into all Truth, and to release your love and power in my life. Break down my prejudices and help me to see others as YOU see them! I need you today, Lord Jesus! Thank you for coming afresh to me, right now! Amen!

Stage backdrop on “El-Shaddai” TV programme