Ghost Stories (1) High School
Notes
Transcript
Hook:
Beginning tonight, we are looking at 2 weeks of Ghost stories from the Bible, alongside our church. Starting tonight off with a synopsis of a story I heard growing up. If you are familiar with this story, keep it to yourself and don’t ruin it for others.
Ghost Story #1
Amish Community cut off from outside world by the woods in which they believe dangerous creatures exist.
Uneasy truce with the creatures - don’t bother us and we won’t bother you.
Young villager becomes ill. Boy who loves her ignores the elders to make a bid to fetch medicine to the next town.
In the preparation of leaving village, some mysterious facts of their community are discovered. Such as...
Creatures are not real, but in fact, other villagers dressed as creatures to keep the community from journeying outside of the walls.
Villager makes the trek into woods and defeats one of the creatures by trapping dressed up villager.
Finds the medicine from other town and brings back to heal wounded lover.
The Problem: Fear and mystery controlled these people away from untapped resources.
Fear and mystery kept them from receiving further help, growth, and adventure.
The Holy Spirit points me to the Son of God through the Word of God to see Him as God.
The Holy Spirit points me to the Son of God through the Word of God to see Him as God.
The Holy Spirit is my helper, healer, and constant reminder of hope.
The Holy Spirit is my helper, healer, and constant reminder of hope.
Halloween is upon us, and tonight, I want to share a story about a ghost, and it’s not the kind of ghost that haunts an abandoned house, or a ghost of your dead cat that haunts you because you forgot to feed it or whatever. I want to talk about the Holy Ghost, or the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is talked about all throughout the Bible but when I was younger, I never really knew who the Holy Spirit was or the Holy Spirit’s role in my life.
Unfortunately, it’s easy to overlook the Holy Spirit because we talk a lot more about God the Father and Jesus the Son so much. But when you read throughout the Bible, we see a God who is triune (three) in His essence. You have God the Father, Jesus Christ the Son, and then we have the Holy Spirit who we don’t talk about as often. It is kind of like when you have a family reunion and you neglect talking about that weird uncle/cousin who is probably misunderstood. So tonight, I want to talk about the Holy Spirit, because sometimes, you might be thinking, Holy Spirit? What exactly is going on? They are talking about who? Holy what?
Book:
So tonight, we are going to be talking about the Holy Spirit, but more importantly, who the Holy Spirit is. And we are going to look at a couple verses that have helped me understand who the Holy Spirit is and hopefully will help you in the same way.
16 And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Helper, to be with you forever, 17 even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him. You know him, for he dwells with you and will be in you.
And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another advocate to help you and be with you forever— 17 the Spirit of truth. The world cannot accept him, because it neither sees him nor knows him. But you know him, for he lives with you and will be in you. [NLT]
It’s crazy to think about, but Jesus even said it: the world cannot accept the Holy Spirit, because it neither sees Him or knows Him. There was a time where I couldn’t understand Him or see Him, therefore, I didn’t know Him. It’ll be impossible to explain the Holy Spirit to someone who doesn’t know Jesus, who doesn’t know God.
I think about this like trying to explain what chocolate tastes like to someone who has never eaten chocolate. If I asked you how to describe the taste of chocolate, what words would you use? It tastes sweet? Good? Chocolatey? Milky? In the end, there is no way to describe the exact taste of chocolate since there is nothing similar you can compare it to. People just have to taste chocolate themselves to know exactly what it tastes like.
7 Nevertheless, I tell you the truth: it is to your advantage that I go away, for if I do not go away, the Helper will not come to you. But if I go, I will send him to you.
7 But very truly I tell you, it is for your good that I am going away. Unless I go away, the Advocate will not come to you; but if I go, I will send him to you. [NLT]
9 But there was a man named Simon, who had previously practiced magic in the city and amazed the people of Samaria, saying that he himself was somebody great. 10 They all paid attention to him, from the least to the greatest, saying, “This man is the power of God that is called Great.” 11 And they paid attention to him because for a long time he had amazed them with his magic. 12 But when they believed Philip as he preached good news about the kingdom of God and the name of Jesus Christ, they were baptized, both men and women. 13 Even Simon himself believed, and after being baptized he continued with Philip. And seeing signs and great miracles performed, he was amazed.
14 Now when the apostles at Jerusalem heard that Samaria had received the word of God, they sent to them Peter and John, 15 who came down and prayed for them that they might receive the Holy Spirit, 16 for he had not yet fallen on any of them, but they had only been baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. 17 Then they laid their hands on them and they received the Holy Spirit. 18 Now when Simon saw that the Spirit was given through the laying on of the apostles’ hands, he offered them money, 19 saying, “Give me this power also, so that anyone on whom I lay my hands may receive the Holy Spirit.” 20 But Peter said to him, “May your silver perish with you, because you thought you could obtain the gift of God with money! 21 You have neither part nor lot in this matter, for your heart is not right before God. 22 Repent, therefore, of this wickedness of yours, and pray to the Lord that, if possible, the intent of your heart may be forgiven you. 23 For I see that you are in the gall of bitterness and in the bond of iniquity.” 24 And Simon answered, “Pray for me to the Lord, that nothing of what you have said may come upon me.”
25 Now when they had testified and spoken the word of the Lord, they returned to Jerusalem, preaching the gospel to many villages of the Samaritans.
Acts
And when we have access to the power of the Holy Spirit, what do I mean by that? What does that look like in everyday life? When people talk about the Holy Spirit, you’ll hear things like, “Live a Spirit-filled or Spirit-empowered life.” Because if the Holy Spirit lives in us, we are Spirit-filled. But what does it look like when we are accessing that power, that same power Jesus had when He walked on earth?
22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness,
“The Holy Spirit produces this kind of fruit in our lives: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.” [NLT]
“The Holy Spirit produces this kind of fruit in our lives: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.” [NLT]
When you try to live life in your own power, showing love, having joy and peace, being patient, it can be pretty difficult. Let’s be honest, there are some people in our lives that when it comes to these things, it’s hard to show any of these things to them. But when you look at it from the perspective of living with the Holy Spirit in you, people will ask, “How do you do it? How are you not shaken by what just happened?” That’s the Holy Spirit, baby!
RC Sproul:
The Advocate
In the nineteenth century, two philosophers in Europe made an enormous impact on their culture and on subsequent history. Both of them were very concerned about the corruption of Western civilization. Both of them described nineteenth-century Europe as decadent. Decadent means a state of moral cultural decline, or to have become luxuriously self-indulgent. But the two of them saw very different reasons for that decadence and proposed very different solutions.
One of them was Søren Kierkegaard (1813–55), a Danish philosopher. He complained that the reason for the decadence of civilization in his age was a failure to apply p 28 Christianity in a vital way to daily life. He believed that Christianity had largely become a dead orthodoxy that was dispassionate and removed from day-to-day matters. As he put it, his age was “paltry.” Therefore, he cried out for the return of passion to the Christian life. When he became discouraged about this, he liked to turn to the pages of the Old Testament, for there he found people who seemed more real. They were saints and sinners, and there was nothing phony, fake, or artificial about them. God really worked in their lives, and they, in turn, had a passion for Him.
Another professor once asked me, “How do you assess the strength of the church today?” I replied that it was becoming increasingly clear to me that many people in the church have a vibrant faith, believe the cardinal doctrines of Scripture, and so forth, but few of them see the Christian faith as a mission, as a profound concern in their lives. That was what Kierkegaard longed to see.
The other philosopher who decried the death of civilization was Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900), a German. However, Nietzsche believed the biggest problem with Western civilization was the baleful influence of Christianity. He was convinced that the ethic of Christianity, with its virtues of meekness and kindness, had emasculated the p 29 human race. He felt that Christianity denied and undercut the most basic human passion of all—the will to power. Life, Nietzsche said, is a power struggle. All of us are engaged in a competitive enterprise, seeking dominance over others.
So, Nietzsche called for a new civilization that would be brought in by a new kind of human being, a new kind of existential hero, which he called the übermench, the “superman.” He described the superman as one who would build his home on the slopes of the volcano Mount Vesuvius. Thus, he would build his home in a place where it might be destroyed at any moment, should the volcano erupt. Likewise, he would sail his ship into uncharted seas. He might encounter sea monsters or tempests that would capsize his ship and kill him, but that would be no hindrance to the superman.
According to Nietzsche’s concept, the superman is chiefly a conqueror and his chief virtue is courage, for Nietzsche believed that courage was the main thing lacking in nineteenth-century culture. But when Nietzsche spoke about courage, he gave it a strange spin. He called for “dialectical courage.” In philosophy, the word dialectical has to do with a state of contradiction, wherein something stands p 30 as an antithesis to something else. These things can never be resolved. What, then, is dialectical courage? Nietzsche came to the conclusion that life ultimately is nihilistic or meaningless. He believed God is dead, and since there is no God, there is no such thing as absolute goodness or truth. There is no objective significance to human existence; life’s meaning is only what we make it. Therefore, we have to manifest courage in a world that is not so much hostile as indifferent, and this is what the superman will do. This is dialectical courage—courage in the face of the universe’s indifference. Nietzsche was saying, in essence: “Life is meaningless; therefore, have courage. Your courage is meaningless, but have it anyway.”
“ANOTHER HELPER”
What do Kierkegaard and Nietzsche have to do with the work of the Holy Spirit? In the upper room on the night before His crucifixion, Jesus gave His disciples some important promises regarding the Spirit. He told them that He was about to depart and that they could not go with Him, but He promised, “I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Helper, to be with you forever” (). p 31 Some translations use the word “Comforter” instead of “Helper.” The Greek word that is translated as “Helper” or “Comforter” is parakletos; it is the source of the English word paraclete. This word includes a prefix, para-, that means “alongside,” and a root that is a form of the verb kletos, which means “to call.” So, a parakletos was someone who was called to stand alongside another. It usually was applied to an attorney, but not just any attorney. Technically, the parakletos was the family attorney who was on a permanent retainer. Any time a problem arose in the family, the parakletos was on call, and he would come immediately to assist in the struggle. That is the way it is in our relationship with the Holy Spirit. We are part of the family of God, and the family attorney is the Holy Spirit Himself. He is always present to come alongside us and help in times of troubles.
I believe that most New Testament translations in English do a poor job of translating parakletos, particularly those that render it as “comforter.” That translation misses the point. When Jesus said He would ask the Father to send the disciples another Paraclete, He was not talking about Someone who would come and heal their wounds when they were bruised and broken. Of course, one of the vital works of the Holy Spirit is to bring consolation to broken p 32 hearts; He is a balm in Gilead when we are in the midst of grief and mourning. But we must remember the context in which Jesus promised to send the Spirit—He was telling His disciples that He was about to leave them. They were going to be without Him in the midst of a hostile world, where they would be hated as He had been hated. Every moment of their lives would be filled with pressure, hostility, and persecution from the world. No one wants to enter that kind of scenario without help.
The translators of the King James Version chose to render parakletos with the English word “Comforter” because at that time the English language was more closely connected to its historical roots in Latin. Today, we understand the word comfort to mean ease and solace in the midst of trouble. But its original meaning was different. It is derived from the Latin word comfortis, which consisted of a prefix (com-, meaning “with”) and a root (fortis, meaning “strong”). So, originally the word carried the meaning “with strength.” Therefore, the King James Version translators were telling us that the Holy Spirit comes to the people of Christ not to heal their wounds after a battle but to strengthen them before and during a struggle. The idea is that the church operates not so much as a hospital but as an army, and the p 33 Holy Spirit comes to empower and strengthen Christians, to ensure victory or conquest.
“MORE THAN CONQUERORS”
So, Nietzsche said, “Life is meaningless, but have courage anyway.” Jesus also called His people to be courageous in the face of difficulty, adversity, and hostility, but He did not call them to a groundless courage. As we know, Jesus told His disciples, “Take heart” (), or, as some translations put it, “Be of good cheer.” However, He did not simply tell them to take heart for the sake of taking heart. He gave them a reason why they ought to have a sense of confidence and assurance for the Christian life. He said, “Take heart; I have overcome the world.”
Nietzsche wanted a superman, a conqueror. He should have looked to Christ. He overcame the world, and He did it in the power of the same Spirit that He sends to His people. The Holy Spirit comes to give strength and power to the people of God. As a result, the Scriptures say, “We are more than conquerors through him who loved us” (). That is a step above Nietzsche.
So, the work of the Holy Spirit supplements the work p 34 of Christ. Christ was the first Paraclete, who came to strengthen us by His atoning death. Now, the empowerment to live the life that Christ has called us to live comes to us by the Holy Spirit.
R. C. Sproul, Who Is the Holy Spirit?, vol. 13, The Crucial Questions Series (Orlando, FL: Reformation Trust, 2012), 27–34.
In the nineteenth century, two philosophers in Europe made an enormous impact on their culture and on subsequent history. Both of them were very concerned about the corruption of Western civilization. Both of them described nineteenth-century Europe as decadent. But the two of them saw very different reasons for that decadence and proposed very different solutions.
One of them was Søren Kierkegaard (1813–55), a Danish philosopher. He complained that the reason for the decadence of civilization in his age was a failure to apply p 28 Christianity in a vital way to daily life. He believed that Christianity had largely become a dead orthodoxy that was dispassionate and removed from day-to-day matters. As he put it, his age was “paltry.” Therefore, he cried out for the return of passion to the Christian life. When he became discouraged about this, he liked to turn to the pages of the Old Testament, for there he found people who seemed more real. They were saints and sinners, and there was nothing phony, fake, or artificial about them. God really worked in their lives, and they, in turn, had a passion for Him.
Another professor once asked me, “How do you assess the strength of the church today?” I replied that it was becoming increasingly clear to me that many people in the church have a vibrant faith, believe the cardinal doctrines of Scripture, and so forth, but few of them see the Christian faith as a mission, as a profound concern in their lives. That was what Kierkegaard longed to see.
The other philosopher who decried the death of civilization was Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900), a German. However, Nietzsche believed the biggest problem with Western civilization was the baleful influence of Christianity. He was convinced that the ethic of Christianity, with its virtues of meekness and kindness, had emasculated the p 29 human race. He felt that Christianity denied and undercut the most basic human passion of all—the will to power. Life, Nietzsche said, is a power struggle. All of us are engaged in a competitive enterprise, seeking dominance over others.
So, Nietzsche called for a new civilization that would be brought in by a new kind of human being, a new kind of existential hero, which he called the übermench, the “superman.” He described the superman as one who would build his home on the slopes of the volcano Mount Vesuvius. Thus, he would build his home in a place where it might be destroyed at any moment, should the volcano erupt. Likewise, he would sail his ship into uncharted seas. He might encounter sea monsters or tempests that would capsize his ship and kill him, but that would be no hindrance to the superman.
According to Nietzsche’s concept, the superman is chiefly a conqueror and his chief virtue is courage, for Nietzsche believed that courage was the main thing lacking in nineteenth-century culture. But when Nietzsche spoke about courage, he gave it a strange spin. He called for “dialectical courage.” In philosophy, the word dialectical has to do with a state of contradiction, wherein something stands p 30 as an antithesis to something else. These things can never be resolved. What, then, is dialectical courage? Nietzsche came to the conclusion that life ultimately is nihilistic or meaningless. He believed God is dead, and since there is no God, there is no such thing as absolute goodness or truth. There is no objective significance to human existence; life’s meaning is only what we make it. Therefore, we have to manifest courage in a world that is not so much hostile as indifferent, and this is what the superman will do. This is dialectical courage—courage in the face of the universe’s indifference. Nietzsche was saying, in essence: “Life is meaningless; therefore, have courage. Your courage is meaningless, but have it anyway.”
“ANOTHER HELPER”
What do Kierkegaard and Nietzsche have to do with the work of the Holy Spirit? In the upper room on the night before His crucifixion, Jesus gave His disciples some important promises regarding the Spirit. He told them that He was about to depart and that they could not go with Him, but He promised, “I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Helper, to be with you forever” (). p 31 Some translations use the word “Comforter” instead of “Helper.” The Greek word that is translated as “Helper” or “Comforter” is parakletos; it is the source of the English word paraclete. This word includes a prefix, para-, that means “alongside,” and a root that is a form of the verb kletos, which means “to call.” So, a parakletos was someone who was called to stand alongside another. It usually was applied to an attorney, but not just any attorney. Technically, the parakletos was the family attorney who was on a permanent retainer. Any time a problem arose in the family, the parakletos was on call, and he would come immediately to assist in the struggle. That is the way it is in our relationship with the Holy Spirit. We are part of the family of God, and the family attorney is the Holy Spirit Himself. He is always present to come alongside us and help in times of troubles.
I believe that most New Testament translations in English do a poor job of translating parakletos, particularly those that render it as “comforter.” That translation misses the point. When Jesus said He would ask the Father to send the disciples another Paraclete, He was not talking about Someone who would come and heal their wounds when they were bruised and broken. Of course, one of the vital works of the Holy Spirit is to bring consolation to broken p 32 hearts; He is a balm in Gilead when we are in the midst of grief and mourning. But we must remember the context in which Jesus promised to send the Spirit—He was telling His disciples that He was about to leave them. They were going to be without Him in the midst of a hostile world, where they would be hated as He had been hated. Every moment of their lives would be filled with pressure, hostility, and persecution from the world. No one wants to enter that kind of scenario without help.
The translators of the King James Version chose to render parakletos with the English word “Comforter” because at that time the English language was more closely connected to its historical roots in Latin. Today, we understand the word comfort to mean ease and solace in the midst of trouble. But its original meaning was different. It is derived from the Latin word comfortis, which consisted of a prefix (com-, meaning “with”) and a root (fortis, meaning “strong”). So, originally the word carried the meaning “with strength.” Therefore, the King James Version translators were telling us that the Holy Spirit comes to the people of Christ not to heal their wounds after a battle but to strengthen them before and during a struggle. The idea is that the church operates not so much as a hospital but as an army, and the p 33 Holy Spirit comes to empower and strengthen Christians, to ensure victory or conquest.
“MORE THAN CONQUERORS”
So, Nietzsche said, “Life is meaningless, but have courage anyway.” Jesus also called His people to be courageous in the face of difficulty, adversity, and hostility, but He did not call them to a groundless courage. As we know, Jesus told His disciples, “Take heart” (), or, as some translations put it, “Be of good cheer.” However, He did not simply tell them to take heart for the sake of taking heart. He gave them a reason why they ought to have a sense of confidence and assurance for the Christian life. He said, “Take heart; I have overcome the world.”
Nietzsche wanted a superman, a conqueror. He should have looked to Christ. He overcame the world, and He did it in the power of the same Spirit that He sends to His people. The Holy Spirit comes to give strength and power to the people of God. As a result, the Scriptures say, “We are more than conquerors through him who loved us” (). That is a step above Nietzsche.
So, the work of the Holy Spirit supplements the work p 34 of Christ. Christ was the first Paraclete, who came to strengthen us by His atoning death. Now, the empowerment to live the life that Christ has called us to live comes to us by the Holy Spirit.
R. C. Sproul, Who Is the Holy Spirit?, vol. 13, The Crucial Questions Series (Orlando, FL: Reformation Trust, 2012), 27–34.
Look:
One of those names is Advocate, a more direct translation is that he is our Helper, one who is beside us.
Another name is Comforter. In
we read this,
26 But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you.
The Holy Spirit is also our Counselor. In
21 And your ears shall hear a word behind you, saying, “This is the way, walk in it,” when you turn to the right or when you turn to the left.
we find,
“Your own ears will hear him. Right behind you a voice will say, “this is the way you should go,” whether to the right or to the left.” [NLT]
The Holy Spirit also convicts, or exposes things in our lives, a part which can be difficult sometimes.
8 And when he comes, he will convict the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgment:
reads,
“When he comes, he will convict or expose the world of its sin, and of God’s righteousness, and of the coming judgment.” [NLT]
The Holy Spirit will reveal things in our lives, things we need to deal with, or to stop doing, and when that happens, we have to realize we need to draw closer to God.
Took:
So tonight, as I close, ask yourself,
have I been hearing the Holy Spirit?
Do I ask for the Holy Spirit’s help?
Has the Holy Spirit been revealing things in my life that I’m ignoring?
Do I need to start accessing the power of the Holy Spirit because I’m not seeing enough joy, peace, kindness, self-control in my life?
Begin praying to the Holy Spirit, asking Him to be the comforter in your life when you need comfort, guidance in your life when you need direction, and always know that the Holy Spirit is with you, in every situation, in every moment of your life. We just need to ask Him to help us recognize His presence in our lives. Let’s pray.