Holy Spirit

Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ.

—Ephesians 1:3 NIV

Key Thought
Go back and read that verse again and instead of "every spiritual blessing," read "every blessing the Spirit gives"! Does the meaning change? Is your focus refined? Spiritual means "of the Spirit" — from the Spirit or involving the Spirit. The root of the word "spiritual" in the original is just like the root in...

 

Let the message of Christ dwell among you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom through psalms, hymns and songs from the Spirit, singing to God with gratitude in your hearts.

—Colossians 3:16 NIV

Key Thought
Many translations use the term "spiritual songs" and so we miss an important connection. From the viewpoint of the early believers and New Testament writers, for anything to be truly "spiritual," it had to involve the Holy Spirit. Worship, including...

 

For this reason, since the day we heard about you, we have not stopped praying for you. We continually ask God to fill you with the knowledge of his will through all the wisdom and understanding that the Spirit gives....

—Colossians 1:9 NIV

Key Thought
There are simply some things that no one, not even the smartest among us, can understand without the Holy Spirit (1 Corinthians 2:12-14). One of the greatest blessings we can ask God to send to our brothers and sisters in Christ is...

 

As for us, we can't help but thank God for you, dear brothers and sisters loved by the Lord. We are always thankful that God chose you to be among the first to experience salvation — a salvation that came through the Spirit who makes you holy and through your belief in the truth.

—2 Thessalonians 2:13 NLT

Key Thought
Salvation is connected to two central realities — first, we believe the truth about Jesus placing our trust in him, and second, the Spirit of God comes into our lives...

 

Some of you were once like that [living sinful lives]. But you were cleansed; you were made holy; you were made right with God by calling on the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.

—1 Corinthians 6:11 NLT

Key Thought
The verses leading up to this passage give a laundry list of sins. Then Paul makes two points using the verb "were." Some of us "were" people habitually living those sins! Now, however, we live with a new reality: we "were" cleansed and made...

 

So, my dear friends, don't take my rather bold and blunt language as criticism. It's not criticism. I'm simply underlining how very much I need your help in carrying out this highly focused assignment God gave me, this priestly and gospel work of serving the spiritual needs of the non-Jewish outsiders so they can be presented as an acceptable offering to God, made whole and holy by God's Holy Spirit.

—Romans 15:15-16 MESSAGE

Key Thought
Yesterday we talked about the sanctifying work...

 

Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, to God's elect, exiles scattered throughout the provinces of Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia and Bithynia, who have been chosen according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, through the sanctifying work of the Spirit, to be obedient to Jesus Christ and sprinkled with his blood: Grace and peace be yours in abundance.

—1 Peter 1:1-2 NIV

Key Thought
"Sanctifying work of the Spirit" sounds so formal and religious. Some translations put, "his...

 

The Holy Spirit confirms this: This new plan I'm making with Israel isn't going to be written on paper, isn't going to be chiseled in stone [says the Lord] ; This time I'm writing out the plan in them, carving it on the lining of their hearts.

—Hebrews 10:15-16 MESSAGE

Key Thought
The Holy Spirit used the prophet Jeremiah to speak of a coming new covenant with his people where the Spirit of God places the will of God on their hearts (Jeremiah 31:31-34), and the writer of...

 

How much more severely do you think someone deserves to be punished who has trampled the Son of God underfoot, who has treated as an unholy thing the blood of the covenant that sanctified them, and who has insulted the Spirit of grace?

—Hebrews 10:29 NIV

Key Thought
If we reject Jesus, we reject everything that God is and everything he has given. We insult Father, Son, and Spirit. We reject grace at every level. The message of Jesus is precious and must never be spurned, rejected...

 

Through the Spirit, Christ offered himself as an unblemished sacrifice, freeing us from all those dead-end efforts to make ourselves respectable, so that we can live all out for God.

—Hebrews 9:15 MESSAGE

Key Thought
Jesus' sacrifice, his offering of himself as an "unblemished sacrifice," was not an accident. Yes, evil men put Jesus to death, but it was also part of God's plan (Acts 2:23). The Holy Spirit guided, prophesied, directed, and led God's redemptive story through history...