Living Waters

Lesson 4

“Maintaining Balance about the Holy Spirit”

I. Into Our History

Suggested Ice-breaker:

• What is the most bizarre church event that you have been in? Explain.

• What is the most boring church event that you have been in? Explain.

• Imagine a canoe in which two ores are faceted. If a person were to enter this canoe and only row with one ore (let’s say the one on the right hand side), where will the canoe go? Again, if a person were to row with only the left ore, where would the canoe go?

• Let’s label one ore, “The Spirit” and the other ore, “the Word.” When it comes to the person and work of the Holy Spirit, there seems to be an unhealthy polarization in the church on how we view the relationship of the Holy Spirit’s work and the Word of God. One the one hand, you have those that are so knowledge-based that their relationship with God seems to be no greater than a list of facts extracted from the Bible. These people tend to frown upon those who display any subjectivity in their faith. For them, faith is purely objective. On the other hand, you have those that are so experience-based that their relationship with God seems to be no greater than their emotional state at the time. These Christians often unconsciously handle their Bible casually, either by not reading it, or when they read it, they forgo a serious engagement of the text.

  “Those with all Word and no Spirit will dry up. Those with all Spirit and no Word will blow up.” - Unknown

II. Into the Bible

A. Word without Spirit – The Church of Ephesus:

Revelation 2:1-5: "To the angel of the church in Ephesus write: The One who holds the seven stars in His right hand, the One who walks among the seven golden lampstands, says this: 2 'I know your deeds and your toil and perseverance, and that you cannot tolerate evil men, and you put to the test those who call themselves apostles, and they are not, and you found them to be false; 3 and you have perseverance and have endured for My name's sake, and have not grown weary. 4 'But I have this against you, that you have left your first love. 5 'Therefore remember from where you have fallen, and repent and do the deeds you did at first; or else I am coming to you and will remove your lampstand out of its place-- unless you repent.”

1. What clues do we find in the text which indicates that the Ephesians were inclined toward the objective side of Christianity – focused on fact.

• They strived after an orthodox life.

  Revelation 2:2: 2 “ I know your deeds and your toil and perseverance, and that you cannot tolerate evil men…”

It appears that the Ephesians ran a clean and tight ship. They hated and sought to purge all compromise in behavior. They were the Puritans of the late first century, endeavoring with all of their might to have their conduct conform to Scripture.

• They strived after orthodox doctrine.

  The church at Ephesus seems to have been a teacher-lead church, as is seen in their ability to discern right and wrong doctrine. We read that they vigorously examined the declarations of Christian leaders by God’s word, with the result of sometimes identifying false apostles.

2. How were the Ephesians unbalanced?

• They departed from their first love. What does this mean?

  Although these believers’ behavior and doctrine were in conformity with truth, they were emotionally detached from the truth. The way they handled God’s word bred an emotional indifference to it.

  “At the turn of the century, James Burns wrote the book Revivals: The Laws and Leaders. In the opening chapter he discusses ‘laws’ of revival, as well as the ‘laws’ of the absence of revival. "The first tendency," he writes, "Is for the doctrine of the church to lose its power of convicting the conscience, convincing the mind, or moving the heart." He goes on to point out that spiritual decay brings with it a formality of worship in which the ‘ritual’ is so exalted that it crushes the spirit.” - Unknown

• Their life and doctrine were not infused and empowered by that love.

  Revelation 2:5: 5 “Therefore remember from where you have fallen, and repent and do the deeds you did at first.”

  Jesus had just praised them for their deeds, but adds here that they are lacking a quality that is essential for them to regain, namely, that their deeds would be infused by relationship and not by rote or ritual...

3. What punishment did Jesus threaten if they continued in this condition?

Revelation 2:5 5 “Therefore remember from where you have fallen, and repent and do the deeds you did at first; or else I am coming to you and will remove your lampstand out of its place-- unless you repent.”

• What does Jesus mean by the removal of their lampstand?

  Jesus probably means that they will lose their effectiveness in reaching the world. In short, the Ephesian church will stagnate.

B. Spirit without Word – The Church of Thyatira:

Revelation 2:18-24: 8 "And to the angel of the church in Thyatira write: The Son of God, who has eyes like a flame of fire, and His feet are like burnished bronze, says this: 19 'I know your deeds, and your love and faith and service and perseverance, and that your deeds of late are greater than at first. 20 'But I have this against you, that you tolerate the woman Jezebel, who calls herself a prophetess, and she teaches and leads My bond-servants astray so that they commit acts of immorality and eat things sacrificed to idols. 21 'I gave her time to repent, and she does not want to repent of her immorality. 22 'Behold, I will throw her on a bed of sickness, and those who commit adultery with her into great tribulation, unless they repent of her deeds. 23 'And I will kill her children with pestilence, and all the churches will know that I am He who searches the minds and hearts; and I will give to each one of you according to your deeds. 24 'But I say to you, the rest who are in Thyatira, who do not hold this teaching, who have not known the deep things of Satan, as they call them-- I place no other burden on you.”

1. What clues do we find in the text which indicates that the Thyatirans were inclined toward the subjective side of Christianity – focused on feelings?

• They were a church of “Love and Faith.”

  This description evokes images of vibrancy and zeal.

• They seem to have been a “Prophet-Driven” church.

  The Thyatirans were definitely into the gift of prophecy, as is seen in the deference they gave to Jezebel, and self-proclaimed prophetess. In light of the influence she had, clearly this prophetess was a principle leader in this church.

2. How were the Thyatirans unbalanced?

• They were casual with how they lived.
  • They minimized, ignored, or forgot about certain details related to the Christian moral code - “they committed acts of immorality.” Contrary to the puritanical Ephesians who were fixated on the letter of the law, the Thyatirans followed the “spirit of the law,” which meant their independence from clearly revealed truth about how believers ought to behave.
  • They minimized, ignored, or forgot about certain details related to proper worship of God. Jesus says that they were eating things sacrificed to idols. Now we know from 1 Corinthians 8 and Romans 14 that there isn’t anything intrinsically wrong in eating meat sacrificed to idols. However, Paul indicates that due to certain Christian’s backgrounds in paganism, they had a propensity to slip back into devotion to the deities they once worshipped. It appears that in the case of the Thyatirans, they might have been participating in the ritualistic worship of gods. Needless to say, the Thyatirans were casual with their worship.
• They were casual with what they believed.
  • They tolerated the false-prophetess Jezebel. Jezebel would have been ousted from the Ephesian church. However, we see her welcomed in the Thyatiran church. It appears that the church did not consider it their duty to maintain doctrinal purity, as long as someone seemed sincere, charismatic, and used the name Jesus, they were given a platform to teach and lead.
  • They had an inordinate fixation on supernatural things. There was a movement in this church centered on a preoccupation with the “deep things of Satan.” This alludes to an unhealthy interest and misguided approach to knowing truth (i.e., Gnosticism) and perhaps, spiritual warfare.

3. What punishment did Jesus threaten if they continued in this condition?

III. Into Our Lives

• Upon self-examination, what ore do you tend to row more with: The Word or the Spirit? Knowledge or experience? Do you do so to an extreme?

• If you lean more on knowledge than experience, how might you correct this?

• If you lean more on experience than knowledge, how might you correct this?

• Leader: revisit the canoe example and end in prayer.

Notes

Another analogy is a pair of scissors. Which blade is dispensable? Neither. Both are essential for cutting.

By “subjective,” I mean the experience of inner promptings by the Spirit to do such and such. This would obviously include experiences like dreams, visions, prophecy, etc. To put it differently, this includes anything that hints at contact with the supernatural.

To understand God’s word with any depth, it requires a believer to read actively and aggressively. Among many things, this involves searching out the context of any given passage; identifying what this passage would mean to the initial audience, also identifying figures of speech and their meaning in the time period, as well as whether this passage has any application to our lives today. Unfortunately, believers often will flip open their Bibles and read a passage out of context, and proceed to misapply this passage to their lives. As a basic principle, proper application requires proper interpretation.

“These false prophets boasted peculiarly of their knowledge of mysteries and the deep things of God; pretensions subsequently expressed by their arrogant title, Gnostics (“full of knowledge”). The Spirit here declares their so-called “depths,” (namely, knowledge of divine things) to be really “depths of Satan.” As in Rev 2:9, he says, instead of “the synagogue of God,” “the synagogue of Satan.” Hengstenberg thinks the teachers themselves professed to fathom the depths of Satan -- giving loose rein to fleshly lusts -- without being hurt thereby. They who thus think to fight Satan with his own weapons always find him more than a match for them. (Jamieson, R., Fausset, A. R., Fausset, A. R., Brown, D., & Brown, D. 1997. A commentary, critical and explanatory, on the Old and New Testaments. On spine: Critical and explanatory commentary. Logos Research Systems, Inc.: Oak Harbor, WA). ”

We must recognize that very few people will be perfectly balanced in this area, and I’m not sure that they should be. Truly, those endowed with gifts that appear supernatural (e.g., prophecy, miracles, discernment of spirits) will often have a bent in the direction of subjectivity. As those with the gift of teaching will probably have a bent towards knowledge and clarity of truth. What is of concern is an unhealthy balance in which one is eclipsed by another.