T. Austin-Sparks · 1 of 2

The Holy Spirit's Purpose

"That which may be known of God is manifest in them; for God manifested it unto them. For the invisible things of Him since the creation of the world are clearly seen, being perceived through the things that are made, even his everlasting power and divinity; that they may be without excuse" (Rom. 1:19-20).

"And they, when they heard it, lifted up their voice to God with one accord, and said, O Lord, thou that didst make the heaven and the earth and the sea, and all that in them is" (Acts 4:24).

"Worthy art thou, our Lord and our God, to receive the glory and the honour and the power: for thou didst create all things, and because of thy will they were, and were created" (Rev. 4:11).

I want to stand right back from the Bible for a minute, and give you a word of advice with regard to studying it. You can take any particular subject that is in the Bible and gather up all that is said about it, and then ask yourself one question: "Why is that?" For example, begin with the coming into the world of the Lord Jesus. Gather up all that is said in the Bible about it and then ask "Why the incarnation?" Or take the cross and gather up from the Old and the New Testaments all that is said about it, and then ask yourself "Why the cross?" Similarly gather up all that you can find about the church and ask "Why the church?" And we should try to give the answer in one single statement. The Lord Jesus came into the world just for this one single purpose. What was it? He went to the cross just for one reason. What was it? The church was brought into being just for one thing. What was that? There may be many aspects of each of these, but they are only aspects of the one thing. It is most valuable to be able to put your finger on the one reason and to be able to say, "That is it". That is a suggestion for Bible study. What we are going to speak about now will be an example of this.

When we have said all the things that can be said about Him, they are only different aspects of one thing. So we come to the question: "Why the Spirit?"

You may not have recognised it, but that one thing was in the passages which we have quoted.

You will remember that the Holy Spirit initiated all the new movements of God. At the beginning of the Bible He was the divine agent in the creation; in Exodus it was the Spirit, as typified in the pillar of cloud and fire, who led the children out of Egypt to become a new nation; then in the wilderness the pattern of the tabernacle was given to Moses and by the Spirit Bezaleel and Aholiab were equipped to make all manner of things for it. Later David said that by the Spirit, God had made known to him the pattern of the temple and lastly, the revelation of the House given to Ezekiel was all by the Spirit.

Turning to the New Testament we find that the Lord Jesus was born of the Holy Spirit and was anointed for His ministry by the Spirit, He was raised from the dead through the power of the Spirit and the church was born on the day of Pentecost by the Holy Spirit. These look like many things which the Holy Spirit did, but really He only did one thing in all of them. What is the one all-inclusive work of the Holy Spirit? And it is a matter of the greatest importance for us here to be able to answer that question.