Let's pick up right where we left all shall we?
This passage is denoting that there is a time of God's favor. It’s important to know that there is, and this is the time of God’s favor. This lets us know that all the things that Jesus said he came to do are for today. If you remember, Jesus stood up in the synagogue in his hometown and read a couple of verses from Isaiah 61 which said something similar:
"The Spirit of the Lord GOD is on Me,
because the LORD has anointed Me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent Me to bind up the brokenhearted,
to proclaim liberty to the captives
and release from darkness to the prisoners,
to proclaim the year of the LORD’s favor..."
Jesus stopped short, not to twist scripture but to let you know that this time, right now is the acceptable year of the Lord. This very moment he said that this scripture was fulfilled through him. The rest of the verse is speaking about the end times and judgment, but we know from John 3 That Jesus didn't come to condemn the world. Now upon further inspection, we know that Jesus came to preach the acceptable year of the lord... Oh, hold onto your britches it's going to get a lot better!
This passage is denoting that there is a time of God's favor. The Hebrew word for favor actually means Acceptance. If you are willing to look into this passage in the Hebrew it says, "Yahweh says, In the time of my acceptance I have heard you. In the time of Jesus (Joshua, salvation) I have helped you and I will persevere you and Give you as a covenant to the people and cause them to inherit the heritage of the people who have become desolate."
This first verse identifies beyond a shadow of a doubt that the acceptable year of the lord is the time in which Jesus came and became a covenant for us, a covenant in which we still live in today. It’s no wonder Jesus’ kinfolk got mad! They were probably thinking, “Just because it says your name in the scripture doesn’t mean that it’s about you! Who does this guy think that he is? Isn’t he the carpenter’s son? Aren’t his brothers and sisters right here?”
Today Jesus statement wouldn’t be illogical or irrational because what was said in the scripture about Jesus, barring a few examples such as Jesus is the only way to Heaven, is the same thing that God has said about us now! We are the light of the world, we are the salt of the earth, we are advancing God’s kingdom, we are fulfilling God’s promises and so forth.
Take a look at Isaiah 49:9.
“to say to the captives, ‘Come out,’ and to those in darkness, ‘Be free (Show Yourself)!’ “They will feed beside the roads and find pasture on every barren hill."
For the most part that is the accurate translation of the passage. Notice How he compares the people that are set free from captivity, and people that are freed from the darkness as sheep that are grazing on the hills that were once desolate. He gave us our inheritance, and he fertilized the high places in the lord that was once thriving and had been abandoned as people were led off into captivity are now ours to take back! I also notice in the passage that the words used are very authoritative. “Come out! BE FREE (show yourself)!” He isn’t giving them a choice, he isn’t asking them to be free, he is declaring to them to be free, and to come out of the darkness. This is similar to how Jesus dealt with healing and how his disciples healed. They never prayed and begged God to heal someone, they simply told the person to be free, that they were healed, that they were forgiven, to stand up and walk, etc. They exercised the authority that Jesus had given them.
Next verse: "They will neither hunger nor thirst nor will the desert heat or the sun beat down on them. He who has compassion on them will guide them and lead them beside springs of water."
This says in Hebrew, " NO, they will not hunger, they will not thirst and they will not be smitten by the fire (scorching earth, heat, fire, the fire of hell is what I deduce. Naturally, this must mean something that is spiritual because here in the earth we still get thirsty, and we still get a sunburn. Most people have deduced this meant when they get to heaven and these things don't happen but that only occurs when you get to heaven. I, however, believe that this implies here and now).
This verse correlates to Proverbs 10:3 where it says in Hebrew, "God will not allow the soul of the righteous to hunger (Hebrew word means to get hungry, to suffer hunger, or to be famished), but the desire of the wicked (the criminal) he thrusts away. (quite different than being gently led to something. It is like saying he throws them out like garbage). As Christians we are taught in 2 Corinthians 5:21 that because of what Jesus has done, we have become the righteousness of God, therefore it is not for us to hunger in our soul because God will not allow us, the righteous, to hunger.
Next verse: He who has compassion on them, he will drive them to the wellsprings of water above and he will gently lead them to a place of rest, A refreshing, well of water.
The New Testament uses the word compassion 12 times (12 is the number of reigning ruling, and government, and full completion) and each time that it is used it is speaking about Jesus having compassion on the lost people because (like I pointed out in verse 9 of Isaiah 49 how he likened us to sheep going to Pasteur) because the people were like lost sheep that had no shepherd. . .
That being said, why are we still saying that we need to be filled back up and we are saying that we are always hungry? Jesus satisfies our hunger and our thirst so long as we are abiding in his word, loving each other, and doing the will of God who sent him, and these are commandments of Jesus, Love one another. John 15 Jesus says,
"9 “As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love. 10 If you keep my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commands and remain in his love. 11 I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete. 12 My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. 13 Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. 14 You are my friends if you do what I command. 15 I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you. 16 You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you so that you might go and bear fruit-fruit that will last—and so that whatever you ask in my name the Father will give you. 17 This is my command: Love each other.”
If you’re anything like myself, or some of my friends, you are thinking to yourself, or have already thought “Wait, why did Jesus say blessed are those that hunger and thirst?” As we learned from the previous verses those that are hungering and thirsting are the people that are without Jesus. The ones that are hungering and thirsting are the people that have a desire for something supernatural and have not been satisfied.
In Jeremiah 2:13 it says, “My people have committed two sins: They have forsaken me, the spring of living water, and have dug their own cisterns, broken cisterns that cannot hold water.”
By way of reason one can deduce that if you are constantly “thirsty” for more God, it is because you are not drinking from the right source of water. Instead, you are drinking a well that is a man-made well that loses its water and therefore cannot quench the spiritual thirst of anyone. It leaves you constantly wanting more.
If you are saying, “When I say that I am thirsty for God I am not saying that I am not satisfied with God. I’m saying that I desire more of God.” Oh really? Are you saying that you are desiring more of God, or are you now trying to make an excuse for a wrong teaching that was passed down from generation to generation and you don’t want to take accountability for not having researched a doctrine to make sure that what you were professing over yourself was actually biblical and not a deception passed down the line by the enemy. After all, God says, “My people perish for lack of knowledge.”
It is our responsibility to test every word that is presented to us because it may not line up with the word of God at all! 1 John 4:1 tells us, “Dear friends, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world.” Take note of this. John said that false prophets were sent out with false messages because they didn’t test the word of God.
We all have sacred cows that we haven’t looked in to. This was a sacred cow for almost every single Christian in the modern Church today. In fact, it is still widely held onto as valid teaching. I have been rebuked for preaching this even though I have shown the scriptures and the evidence countless times, through countless verses. This teaching is a very religiously protected stronghold. Rather than come free from it, people are holding onto it without researching it for themselves to see that this teaching is true.
One such contention was that in Acts 2:3 it states that they were filled with the Holy Spirit, and in 4:31 it says and they were filled with the Holy Spirit. I looked at the Greek word for filled and I saw a striking pattern. Filled is used 88 times in the new testament, but not once it used to describe a person being filled with the Holy spirit on numerous occasions. What is being said the majority of the time is that they were fulfilled by the spirit. There is quite the difference between being filled, and being fulfilled.
A good illustration to demonstrate this is comparing to a minister that is on the platform and he is calling down the Holy Ghost Baptism on those that haven’t been baptized yet. It would be safe to deduce that the minister was already filled with the Holy Spirit or else he would not really have any business baptizing others in something he didn’t already operate in. As he prayed, every single person was filled with the Holy Spirit! The minister was not asking to be refilled with the Spirit because he was already filled and operating in. When you retell or recount the story to others you will say that they (everyone in that prayed for) were all filled with Holy Spirit.
Many people will say “well, then why were they filled with Holy Spirit in John 20:22 when Jesus breathed on them and then filled with the Holy Spirit in Acts 2?” Being filled and thirsting are separate topics. Thirsting Implies that the Spirit of God comes and Goes despite the fact that the Bible teaches us that we are indwelled permanently by God because of What Jesus has done. Being filled shows that the Holy Spirit has filled you to your maximum capacity. In John the received the indwelling which is the implantation of God in a person. Later, in Acts 2, they are filled to their maximum capacity with God.
In the old testament, before Jesus had died for the forgiveness of our sins, there was not an indwelling of the spirit of God. The Holy Spirit would simply set upon and lift off of a person on a whim’s notice at God’s discretion. God did not reside in any person. When he did settle and dwell in an area it was not in a person but in a place such as a tabernacle, the temple, a bush, a mountaintop. In the same manner that is still God’s pattern today. Because of what Jesus has done we are now God’s tabernacle and he can now remain indwelled in us.
In John 20:22 this is the first example if the indwelling of the spirit of God after Jesus’s death and resurrection. He breathed on them and said receive the Holy Spirit. These eleven disciples then received the Holy Spirit. The rest of the Disciples in acts 2, the other 109, were filled with the Holy Spirit when they had all come into accord or agreement with each other.
God’s spirit is the Holy Spirit as well as the Holy Spirit being its own separate aspect of the Trinity. Jesus, God, and the Holy Spirit are one and the same. For example, when we get saved, we accept Jesus as our Lord and Savior, and at that moment God comes and lives in our hearts. It’s not until we are cleaned by the blood of Jesus that God can live in us as the tabernacles we have become. In the same manner, the tabernacle was built with clean, sinless material and then, after sacrifices were made, the Holy Spirit came down and settled in the tabernacle and the Glory of God was seen. Interestingly enough we learn that the Radiance, meaning the light that shines when God’s Glory appears, is Jesus.
Strong’s 2983 states it like this; lambánō from the primitive root, lab- meaning actively lay hold of to take or receive. properly, to lay hold by aggressively(actively) accepting what is available.
A similar concept is shared by Jesus in Matthew 11:12, “From the days of John the Baptist until now, the kingdom of heaven has been subjected to violence, and violent people have been raiding it.” This is showing that the kingdom of Heaven and its rewards are subject to being taken for oneself as if it were a treasure that a soldier has taken as a spoil of war when they have had victory over an enemy.
Hebrews 1: 3 teaches us “The Son is the radiance of God's glory and the exact representation of his being, sustaining all things by his powerful word. After he had provided purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty in heaven.” Now, knowing that when seeing the Glory of God manifest you are seeing Jesus and the spirit of God, it brings to light a whole new understanding of what Paul was talking about when he was speaking of the manifestations of the spirit or the gifts of the spirit in first Corinthians.
Luke 24 is the only book that tells us that Jesus directed the eleven disciples to wait in Jerusalem until the Holy Spirit came upon them. Here is what it says, “I am going to send you what my Father has promised, but stay in the city until you have been clothed with power from on high.” There is a notable difference between receiving the baptism of the Holy Spirit and receiving the indwelling spirit of the father. As far as the other 109 believers that were the upper room, I believe that they received the indwelling of God the same way we do today. We do not have Jesus breathing on us because he already went up to Heaven and is seated at the right hand of God. They received the indwelling by believing that Jesus had died, was resurrected, and had ascended to Heaven.
There is no new testament scripture that informs us that the Holy Spirit can lift off of a person if you did something wrong, or if you didn’t pay enough attention to him, or if you somehow managed to sin so abhorrently that it made you feel like God forsook you and abandoned you. Those things don’t make him lift. They will, however, cause thwart the Holy Spirit from operating, and or cause him emotional distress, or as it is known in the bible, grieve the Holy Spirit.
In the Old Testament, the word that is used for departed is Sarah. This word means to turn aside from. What happens when someone does something to grieve the spirit of God is that He turns from you. This is equivalent to when you turn from someone and ignore them because they have hurt you in some way. You see evidence of this in John 9:31, “We know that God does not listen to sinners. He listens to the godly person who does his will.” We see it as well in Proverbs 28:9, “If anyone turns a deaf ear to my instruction, even their prayers are detestable.” That same word to turn away that is translated as departed is used in this verse.
In 1 Thessalonians 5:19 it speaks of quenching the spirit. The Greek word sbennumi, quench, literally means to thwart, or extinguish something. It is likened to taking a bucket of water and drowning out a fire to completely extinguish it.
When you sin, it drowns out what the Holy Spirit wanted to do through you. The plan of The Holy Spirit for your life has been thwarted for a moment. The best way to rekindle that fire is to repent and turn from that sin. Even though your sin thwarts the plans that the Holy Spirit had for you, it doesn’t cause him to lift off of you or leave you. It simply delays what he was desiring to do with you before you quenched him.
In summary, if you want to stop hungering after God then start doing the will of him who sent you. If you want to stop thirsting for the Holy Spirit, then you need to take the capstone off of his well and stop trying to drink for a broken down, worn out, leaky old, man-made well that God said is how his people have rejected him. This is the day and age of our Lord (Anno Domini) and all of his promises and words are for today, tomorrow, and forever amen!
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