Christ also blessed them with the Spirit of peace. The Holy Spirit worked and produced the fruit of peace in the disciples before the day of Pentecost. “Peace be unto you.” John 20:26.
Christ, through the Holy Spirit, always blesses the believer with the gift of the Holy Spirit and with the fruit of the Holy Spirit, which is peace. The Peace of God rules in the hearts and minds of those who have been persecuted, afflicted, and hurt, and of those who are in trouble due to many different circumstances.
He blesses believers with peace to be strong, to be strengthened, to not be afraid, to be strong and immovable, to have unshakable faith, to be courageous, and to stand firm in the Lord. He blesses the apostles with peace so that they may wait for His promise. The third blessing of our Lord occurred when He breathed on them and He said, “receive the Holy Spirit’s joy.”
“And ye now therefore have sorrow: but I will see you again, and your heart shall rejoice, and your joy no man taketh from you.” John 16:22.
Our Lord wants the apostles to rejoice in what has happened and what is still going to happen the result is that they rejoice in the joy He is giving them, which is a joy that cannot be taken away from them. All believers share the same joy today, which is the joy of resurrection and eternal life.
The apostles were overjoyed to see the Lord after he was crucified, dead, and buried; they never knew that they could see Him again. He was alive, eating, and speaking with them. Jesus compared the pain of the apostles to a woman who was in pain of childbirth and rejoiced, full of joy, after the child was born.
“A woman when she is in travail hath sorrow, because her hour is come: but as soon as she is delivered of the child, she remembereth no more the anguish, for joy that a man is born into the world.” John 16:21.
Breathing on the apostles brought great joy to them and showed that the Spirit would produce the fruit of joy and peace on the apostles. The fourth blessing of Jesus’ breath on the apostles was the blessing of the power of the Holy Spirit to bear witness.
The Spirit produced in them, before the day of Pentecost, power to proclaim the gospel to unbelievers for forgiveness of their sins. “Then said Jesus to them again, Peace be unto you: as my Father hath sent me, even so send I you.” John 20:21.
The Father sends Jesus, His only begotten Son, to save the world. Jesus Christ sent the apostles and all of the body of Christ on earth to continue this great commission. The peace that the Spirit of God produces takes away fear, confusion, and sadness, and calms down believers’ fear and confusion. The Spirit gave and produced courage and brought peace of God to the believers’ spirit, soul, and body.
The Holy Spirit shed His light and produced strength, ability, and power for the apostles, before the day of Pentecost, to witness and boldly proclaim the gospel of God to all people on the day of Pentecost.
On that day, the apostles were filled with great power, to such an extent that three thousand sinners were converted. Everyone that has the Spirit of God in him or her has a burden for missionary work, for saving sinners and calling the lost unto Christ. This is the automatic work of the Holy Spirit, to make believers strive for the work of the Gospel and to take the Gospel of God to the ends of the earth.
Believers become God’s workmanship through the Holy Spirit; they are new creations in Christ Jesus. They are very unique and placed into the body of Christ, regardless of whether they are Jews or Gentiles, black or white.
Regardless of their ethnicity or nationality, believers share one Spirit of Jesus Christ and they are one body of Christ. Believers are created in Christ Jesus to do the good work that Spirit of God has assigned to them before the beginning of creation.
Believers belong to a glorious new creation, which God, through the power of the Holy Spirit, has brought into his existing plan of redemption and salvation through Jesus Christ His Son.
3
Holy Spirit Power in the New Testament
One important aspect of the Holy Spirit in the New Testament is that God is available to every believer through baptism with the Holy Spirit. Every believer must be filled with the power of the Holy Spirit.
The Spirit has given us the power to witness the Gospel to people who have never heard the Gospel before. We do our witnessing as commanded and the Holy Spirit carries out the transformation.
The Spirit of God will transform the non-believing sinner into a child of God. The Holy Spirit empowers believers against the enemy: “Ye are of God, little children, and have overcome them: because greater is he that is in you, than he that is in the world.” 1 John 4:4. This verse is telling us that: the Spirit of God dwells in us and that Spirit is more mighty than men or devils. The Spirit of God has framed our mind for God and heaven.
The world will love its own, and its own will love it. The Holy Spirit indwelling is more powerful than Satan and the Devil. The Holy Spirit will convict us of sin, “Nevertheless I tell you the truth; it is expedient for you that I go away: for if I go not away, the Comforter will not come unto you; but if I depart, I will send him unto you. And when he is come, he will reprove the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment.” John 16:7-8.
The outpouring of the Holy Spirit occurred after Christ went to heaven. The Holy Spirit’s principal work with respect to proclaiming the Gospel will be that of convicting sin. The Holy Spirit will expose sin and unbelief in order to awaken a consciousness of guilt and need for forgiveness.
The Spirit will let us know when we are doing bad things or about to do bad things either to ourselves or to other people around us. The Holy Spirit is our director and controller. He convicts us of sin or warns us of sin before we commit it.
In this, the Spirit helps us to maintain a close relationship with our Lord. After the conviction of sin, true repentance always happens and turning to Christ as Lord and Savior prevails. In order to access the Spirit power, we must be baptized with the Holy Spirit. Each believer needs to be filled with the Holy Spirit every day by following the words of God. The role of the ministry of the Holy Spirit in our lives is to keep us away from the work of the flesh.
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