Most of us have heard that the Holy Spirit is important. But do we actually know what he does?
Pentecost Sunday is one of the most significant days in the church calendar, and I think it is one of the most misunderstood. The Holy Spirit is not just a feeling you get on a Sunday morning. He is the most powerful presence in your life, and he is working for you right now.
Let me show you what I mean.
God is always intentional about the times, seasons, places, and people he works through, and Pentecost was no accident.
The day the Holy Spirit was poured out on the 120 believers in the upper room was already a significant Jewish feast day. They called it the Feast of Weeks, or Shavuot, which falls 50 days after Passover. Those believers were already gathered together because of that feast when the Holy Spirit came upon them.
The Lord does not work randomly. He has a specific place and purpose for every person at every moment. James puts it plainly:
Look here, you who say, "Today or tomorrow we are going to a certain town and will stay there a year. We will do business there and make a profit." How do you know what your life will be like tomorrow? Your life is like the morning fog—it's here a little while, then it's gone. What you ought to say is, "If the Lord wants us to, we will live and do this or that." Otherwise you are boasting about your own pretentious plans, and all such boasting is evil. Remember, it is sin to know what you ought to do and then not do it. — James 4:13-17
It matters where you are. It matters when you move. God was very intentional about the day the Holy Spirit came, and that intentionality tells us something about what that day meant.
The Feast of Weeks was the day Israel went from being a delivered people to a promoted people.
Fifty days after Israel was delivered from Egypt, God called Moses up to Mount Sinai and gave him a message for the people:
Now if you will obey me and keep my covenant, you will be my own special treasure from among all the peoples on earth; for all the earth belongs to me. And you will be my kingdom of priests, my holy nation. This is the message you must give to the people of Israel. — Exodus 19:5
Before that day, they had been slaves. After that day, they were God's treasure. They were his kingdom of priests. They were his holy nation.
That feast day was the day they got promoted.
The parallel between what happened at Mount Sinai and what happened in the upper room is one of the most beautiful pictures in all of Scripture.
Jesus went to the cross and we got delivered. When he shed his blood, our bondage was broken. And then 50 days later, on the day of Pentecost, we got promoted. The Holy Spirit came, and we received power to be his witnesses. We became his people, sealed by the Holy Spirit. (Acts 1:8)
The Old Testament Jews were celebrating the day they received the law so they could be his people. We celebrate the day we received the Holy Spirit for the exact same reason. What the law did for Israel in the old covenant, the Holy Spirit now does for us.
Jeremiah prophesied it centuries before it happened:
"The day is coming," says the Lord, "when I will make a new covenant with the people of Israel and Judah. This covenant will not be like the one I made with their ancestors when I took them by the hand and led them out of the land of Egypt. They broke that covenant, though I loved them as a husband loves his wife," says the Lord. "But this is the new covenant I will make with the people of Israel after those days," says the Lord. "I will put my instructions deep within them, and I will write them on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be my people. And they will not need to teach their neighbors, nor will they need to teach their relatives, saying, 'You should know the Lord.' For everyone, from the least to the greatest, will know me already," says the Lord. "And I will forgive their wickedness, and I will never again remember their sins." — Jeremiah 31:31-34
That is us. We are in that covenant right now.
Under the old covenant, obedience was an outward performance. Under the new covenant, it is your identity.
The law was written on tablets of stone, and the people had to perform their way into God's way of living. But under the new covenant, the Holy Spirit writes God's law directly on your heart.
You don't obey by performance anymore. You obey out of who you are. Righteousness used to be something you had to earn. Now it is a gift, and the Holy Spirit is the one who makes it real in your daily life.
He gives you both the desire and the power to do what pleases God. That desire is not you working yourself up. That is the Spirit already in you.
The contrast between what the law produced and what the Spirit produced on those same 50th days shows us exactly how much better our covenant is.
When Moses came down from the mountain and found the Israelites worshiping a golden calf, judgment fell. Three thousand people died that day. That is what happened the day the first covenant was established.
But when the Holy Spirit was poured out in Acts 2, the disciples went out and preached the gospel to everyone around them. Three thousand people were added to the church that day.
When the first covenant was given, 3,000 died. When the new covenant was given, 3,000 were saved. You should be deeply grateful to be alive in this covenant right now.
The Holy Spirit is far more than most of us have experienced, and Scripture gives us a specific picture of what he does every day.
John chapter 14 alone could change the way you live if you would read it and believe it. Here are six things the Holy Spirit does for you directly from the Word.
And I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Comforter (Counselor, Helper, Intercessor, Advocate, Strengthener, and Standby), that He may remain with you forever. — John 14:16 (Amplified Bible)
He is for you. He is not against you. All that accusing going on in your head is not him. The Holy Spirit is advocating for you to live the life God has planned. He is saying, "Come over here. Let's do this right."
He does not have his focus on everything you are doing wrong, because he knows that if he can draw you toward righteousness, you will leave those other things behind. God does not even remember your faults, so you have no business dwelling on them either.
The Spirit of truth...whom the world cannot receive, welcome, or take to its heart because it does not see Him or know or recognize Him. But you know Him and recognize Him for He lives with you constantly and will be in you. — John 14:17 (Amplified Bible)
The Holy Spirit aligns you with the truth of who God is and how God thinks. He is always working to bring you into alignment with that truth, because God does not lie and everything about him is real.
Think about how differently you see God now compared to a year ago. That is the Holy Spirit introducing you to the Father in greater depth, little by little, every single day.
But when the Father sends the Advocate as my representative—that is, the Holy Spirit—he will teach you everything and will remind you of everything I have told you. — John 14:26
How many of us have had God do something incredible in our lives and then, a season later, found ourselves complaining like it never happened? The Holy Spirit will remind you. He will stir up the visions, the dreams, the words God gave you. He will bring back to your memory the things the Lord has already done.
People have been forgetful since the beginning. The Israelites watched miracle after miracle and still made a golden calf forty days later. We are not so different. But we have a helper who keeps reminding us. Let him.
And when he comes, he will convict the world of its sin, and of God's righteousness, and of the coming judgment. — John 16:8
The Holy Spirit is not there to condemn you. He is your advocate. But he will absolutely convict you. And when you learn how good that conviction is for you, you will be thankful every time it comes.
He is also the one at work when someone realizes they are a sinner who needs a Savior. Nobody gets saved without the Holy Spirit drawing them. If it were not for his conviction, we would all still be lost.
When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all truth. He will not speak on his own but will tell you what he has heard. He will tell you about the future. — John 16:13
The Holy Spirit gives you revelation. He will show you where a path leads. He will show you what happens if you keep going in a certain direction, and he will show you what changes if you turn. He is always speaking, always guiding, always revealing.
Some of us have had the Holy Spirit telling us something for years. He does not give up. He just keeps going. Maybe it is time to listen.
But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you. And you will be my witnesses, telling people about me everywhere—in Jerusalem, throughout Judea, in Samaria, and to the ends of the earth. — Acts 1:8
The very first thing the Holy Spirit did when he came on those believers was give them the ability to speak to people in languages they had never studied, so that everyone present heard the gospel in their own native tongue. That is supernatural power to be a witness.
You do not have to write a script to reach someone. The Holy Spirit knows every language, every dialect, every person you are standing in front of. He gives you what you need in the moment you need it.
Isaiah 11:2 confirms everything Scripture says about the Holy Spirit in John 14 and Acts, and shows us that this was always God's plan.
And the Spirit of the Lord will rest on him—the Spirit of wisdom and understanding, the Spirit of counsel and might, the Spirit of knowledge and the fear of the Lord. — Isaiah 11:2
The Spirit of wisdom and understanding means you have access to heaven's wisdom, not man's wisdom. Your mind alone cannot contain the fullness of God's wisdom, but the Holy Spirit releases what you need in the moment you need it. That is why ordinary people can open their mouths and sound like they have been through seminary. They have not. The Holy Spirit gave them that.
The Spirit of counsel means you have the greatest counselor there is living inside you. He is trying to counsel you right now. The question is whether you are yielding to it. He never gives up. He just keeps going.
The Spirit of knowledge paired with the fear of the Lord is a beautiful combination. The Holy Spirit gives you intimacy with God, and at the same time gives you a reverence that keeps you from losing respect for your Father. You can be close to him without becoming too casual with him. That is a gift.
You ask. That is all. You ask, and you keep asking.
The Holy Spirit is not withholding. He is not hard to find. He is not waiting for you to reach a certain level before he shows up. Luke 11 makes it as simple as it gets:
And so I tell you, keep on asking, and you will receive what you ask for. Keep on seeking, and you will find. Keep on knocking, and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks, receives. Everyone who seeks, finds. And to everyone who knocks, the door will be opened. You fathers—if your children ask for a fish, do you give them a snake instead? Or if they ask for an egg, do you give them a scorpion? Of course not! So if you sinful people know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him. — Luke 11:9-13
Do not be a microwave about it. If you ask and it does not happen in the first minute, keep asking. Keep seeking. Keep knocking. If you ask and refuse to give up on what you asked for, you are going to receive it. No matter how much time goes by, you are going to receive it.
You ask believing you have already received, right? When you press that buy-now button online, you do not sit there wondering if they heard you. You know it is coming and you wait for it to show up. That is the posture. That is the faith.
Father, fill me with the Holy Spirit. Amen.
What is Pentecost Sunday and why does it matter to Christians? Pentecost Sunday is the day the Holy Spirit was poured out on 120 believers gathered in the upper room in Jerusalem, exactly as Jesus had instructed them to wait. It falls 50 days after Easter and mirrors the Jewish Feast of Weeks, which was already being celebrated that day. It is the day the church received the power and presence of the Holy Spirit, making it one of the most significant days in all of church history.
Why did God choose the Feast of Weeks (Shavuot) to send the Holy Spirit? The Feast of Weeks was the day Israel was promoted from a delivered people to God's own special treasure, 50 days after leaving Egypt. God chose that same day to pour out the Holy Spirit because what the law did for Israel in the old covenant, the Holy Spirit now does for believers in the new covenant. The parallel is intentional. God is always intentional about times and seasons.
What is the difference between the old covenant and the new covenant? In the old covenant, God's law was written on tablets of stone and the people had to perform their way into obedience. In the new covenant, as Jeremiah 31 prophesied, God writes his law directly on our hearts through the Holy Spirit. Obedience is no longer a performance. It becomes your identity. Righteousness was once a standard to reach. Now it is a gift already given.
Does the Holy Spirit convict you of sin or condemn you? The Holy Spirit convicts, but he does not condemn. He is your advocate, not your accuser. All the accusing that goes on in your head is not from him. He points out what needs to change so you can move forward, and he keeps his focus on drawing you toward righteousness. God does not even remember your sins, so the Holy Spirit is not sitting there rehearsing them either.
How do I know if the Holy Spirit is speaking to me? According to Jeremiah 31 and John 14:17, you already know him, because the Holy Spirit lives in you. The new covenant promise is that you will not need someone to teach you to know the Lord, because everyone from the least to the greatest will already know him. Stop confessing your doubt and start agreeing with what the Word says: you have the Spirit of God living in you and he is communicating with you constantly.
What does the Holy Spirit do for believers according to Scripture? Scripture names at least six specific things the Holy Spirit does: he is your advocate and helper (John 14:16), he leads you into all truth (John 14:17), he teaches you and reminds you of what God has said (John 14:26), he convicts you of sin and righteousness (John 16:8), he reveals truth and tells you things to come (John 16:13), and he gives you power to be a witness (Acts 1:8). Isaiah 11:2 further confirms he is the spirit of wisdom, understanding, counsel, might, knowledge, and the fear of the Lord.
How do I get filled with the Holy Spirit? You ask. Luke 11:13 says the heavenly Father gives the Holy Spirit to those who ask him. Keep asking, keep seeking, keep knocking, and do not give up. The Holy Spirit is not withholding. He is not hard to access. You do not need a special formula or a certain level of spiritual maturity. You just need to ask and keep asking.
What is the significance of 3,000 people dying at Sinai and 3,000 being saved at Pentecost? When the first covenant was given at Sinai, Moses came down from the mountain to find the Israelites worshiping a golden calf, and 3,000 people died in the resulting judgment. When the new covenant was established at Pentecost and the Holy Spirit was poured out, the disciples preached the gospel and 3,000 people were added to the church that same day. The contrast shows the difference between covenants. What the first covenant brought in death, the new covenant brings in life.
