David Pawson - The Holy Spirit Series Pt6 - End of John

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Thoughtful Thoughts 6.5.2022 by John Dunning. The Holy Spirit Pt 6;
Disciples filled with the Spirit.
As there are links to two testimonies in this week’s blog, you may need to visit our website more than once this week. You could read the blog first without clicking the links, to get an overview and then revisit the homepage twice more to hear the testimonies. Both testimonies are introduced in our blog this week...
Introduction…
Because there is an order laid down before we can have the Holy Spirit, I’ll repeat the order of events briefly for any new visitors…
The Old Testament teaches that what is unclean can never come into contact with the holy, or it will die. God created a plan enabling whoever is unclean, to become clean. Then, whoever is clean, can become holy. God’s plan is that the cross can make repentant sinners clean, and then can God can fill us with His Holy Spirit. Hence the order that was given to us in Acts 2:38.
Part 1. Forgiveness is dependent on repentance…
There has come into Christian vocabulary, the phrase “unconditional” forgiveness…
However, John the Baptist refused to baptise Pharisees because they had not met the condition of repentance. So, John the Baptist was already practicing what Jesus taught by refusing to baptise the Pharisees - because forgiveness is conditional on repentance. That is not just a New Testament rule but was an Old Testament rule too. In the Old Testament, it was expensive to ask for forgiveness. In the New Testament, it still is - except Jesus paid the price.
If there is anything that is unconditional, it is repentance. Repentant sinners will always have their cry for mercy, answered, which is why Jesus died on the cross. There are other examples showing that forgiveness is conditional on repentance, but we covered this before and is not the subject of this week’s blog.
After repenting of his lifestyle, New Zealander, Ian McCormack, had a Lazarus experience and spent all of his new life sharing his testimony, “Death by Jellyfish”. He became an evangelist and eventually, a pastor… www.inspiratio...
Part 2. The Holy Spirit…
- Jackie Pullinger…
But, discipleship does not stop at forgiveness. Jesus commanded His disciples to do nothing until He gave them His Holy Spirit. How? Well, first, Peter tells us that immersion in water must follow repentance. (Acts 2:38). Then we may receive the Holy Spirit…
Jackie Pullinger was awarded an MBE by the Queen for the work she did in Hong Kong among drug addicts and wrote a book about that called “Chasing The Dragon”. She was able to do something miraculous by allowing God to work through her.
After Jesus became her Saviour and Lord, she walked out of an evangelical Anglican church in Surrey, England, asking for nothing from them as she embarked on a remarkable venture of faith. She caught a boat to Hong Kong, simply because that was as far as her savings could buy a ticket for. She trusted God completely for whatever would happen to her next. What she achieved was so remarkable that the Queen awarded her the MBE.
I went to hear a report on her work at the church she left behind. After many decades, and her recognition by the Queen with an MBE, the evangelical Anglican vicar of her former church figured he should have visited her mission in Hong Kong long ago. The vicar had once been an army officer in the second world war and now was of an age that he was not far off retirement as a vicar.
He conducted his report at a mid-week meeting and started by explaining that the report would not be what they expected to hear, as he had a confession to make. He had made a vow to God during Jackie Pullinger’s service, at which he was supposed to have preached. He had prepared his message two weeks beforehand in his study, which was written up word for word and was in his briefcase waiting to be read...
However, before he came to preach, a non-English speaking Chinese member stood up and not only preached the very sermon that was still in his briefcase but delivered it in English. He was flabbergasted! This former army officer who was by now an elderly country vicar had become the student again - and was back in God’s classroom, learning from Jackie Pullinger’s students. His mind was spinning, thinking, “How could he have recited the sermon in my briefcase?” And “How could his teaching have been so wrong about the Holy Spirit.”
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