00:00The other day I did a talk on Genesis chapter 1 and I spoke about the fact that we are made in the image of God
00:07and said that one of the ways in which we are in the image of God is not so much that we look like God
00:13or that God looks like us, which he doesn't, but that we have this nature which is physical, the body,
00:20we have the soul which is the personality if you like, and the spirit part of us.
00:26And the spirit part of us is the part that was created to relate to God.
00:31And when God created Adam and Eve in the garden, he made them with body, soul and spirit,
00:36and through the spirit he wanted to communicate with them, and as God communicated through the spirit,
00:42so these parts, the other parts, the soul and the body would be in some kind of harmony and a good relationship with God.
00:49So it would affect the mind, the emotions, the will, and as they're under the control of the Holy Spirit,
00:56those will be functioning well and for the good of the person who is indwelt by the Holy Spirit,
01:04even affect our bodies.
01:06And so we have this diagram which speaks about the need to be filled with the Holy Spirit,
01:10have the Holy Spirit within our lives that he can guide us and make us into the people who God wants us to be.
01:14And our human spirit is to be filled with the Holy Spirit.
01:20And of course when sin came into the world, that was what broke.
01:25And instead of having the Holy Spirit within us, we had a part which was now influenced by the evil one.
01:33And the spirit part of us died, so the relationship with God died, and the rest of the body came under disorder.
01:41And we have the personality disorders which we have manifested in the world today.
01:47And we all come from the place of being in that state of disorder to coming into the order which comes through faith in Jesus.
01:54And the difference is whether we have the Holy Spirit in our spirit, Christ in you, the hope of glory,
02:01or whether he's absent, in which case that communication between God and humans is broken.
02:08And Jesus said, unless one is born of the water and the spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.
02:13That which is born of the flesh is flesh.
02:15That which is born of the spirit is spirit.
02:18Do not marvel that I said to you, you must be born again.
02:20So we must be born again, we must receive the Holy Spirit into our lives.
02:25No one is born a true believer in God through Jesus the Messiah.
02:32Everyone who comes into the world has this barrier between us and God,
02:35caused by the separation which comes right from the original sin down through all humans to our time
02:44because all have sinned and come short of the glory of God.
02:46Therefore we need to be born again to receive Jesus into our lives.
02:50And also to be filled with the Holy Spirit.
02:54In the book of Acts, the last word which Jesus said to the disciples was,
02:59you should be baptized or filled with the Holy Spirit not many days from now.
03:03You should receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you.
03:06Be witnesses to me in Jerusalem and all Judea and Samaria and to the ends of the earth.
03:11There's a promise of Jesus to those who are willing to receive the fullness and the power of the Holy Spirit.
03:16And he wants us to ask, to receive, to receive all that God has to give to us by the Holy Spirit.
03:23And to be filled with the Holy Spirit.
03:25Ephesians, it says, be filled with the Spirit.
03:27Chapter 5, verse 18.
03:30The word which is used for be filled is actually in what they call the continuous tense in Greek.
03:35So it means be continuously filled with the Holy Spirit.
03:38Not just a one-off experience.
03:40A continuous experience as we seek the Lord and ask him for our sanctification.
03:47And the Holy Spirit is the one who works for our sanctification.
03:51Said already in Thessalonians, it says, this is the will of God, your sanctification.
03:56That's what God wants of us.
03:572 Thessalonians, chapter 2, also says, we are bound to give thanks to God, always for you, brethren, beloved by the Lord,
04:04because from the beginning he chose you for salvation through sanctification by the Spirit and belief in the truth.
04:12So the purpose God chose you, he chose me, was in order that we might be changed from the person we were before we became a Christian
04:19to the person he wants us to be.
04:20And as we believe in Jesus, as we receive the Holy Spirit, so he wants to sanctify us and make us new people in the Lord.
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