The Ministry of the Holy Spirit

Open the Scriptures with Dr. David Jeremiah to discover our high calling —and responsibility—to obey God.
“be especially true as we draw closer to the period known as the tribulation. An increasing number of cultural Christians with little or no roots in the gospel will decide the cost is too great, and they will turn their backs on Christ.”
― Dr. David Jeremiah, Where Do We Go from Here?: How Tomorrow’s Prophecies Foreshadow Today’s Problems

What If one Chapter could change your life?
What if there was one passage of scripture that allowed you to leave the past behind you to look beyond your present challenges and provided the hope for a brighter tomorrow.
Turning the page to these powerful words can turn a page in your life, giving you the confidence you need.
For every step you take words that contain God’s desire to breathe renewed life into you through a divine promise just waiting to be claimed, a promise that you will never be abandoned, never be alone and always be cared for a promise that you are chosen and called by God.
How would your life change if you knew you could endure every trial that nothing could stand in your way knowing there’s nothing God wouldn’t do for you?
Is it too hard to believe that such an arrangement of simple words composed, beautifully authored divinely nearly 2000 years ago could be so great.
What is this chapter? Romans eight, the greatest chapter in the Bible.
Hello, I’m David Jeremiah.
Imagine if you received a letter or phone call saying you’ve been named an error by a distant relative and would be receiving a check in the mail.
Now, that kind of surprise would change your life. That’s unlikely to happen for many of us.
But today, I’m going to tell you about a letter you’ve already received Romans eight and how it can change your life with its teaching about your inheritance from God.
Romans eight may be the greatest chapter in the Bible and it reveals our birthright as followers of Christ.
There’s no hidden agenda or surprise letter. Your inheritance is clearly detailed for you in this powerful chapter.
So I hope you join me for today’s message, the Ministry of the Holy Spirit to discover all that your inheritance means for you as a child of God.
Coming up right here on turning point, the act of writing out scripture by hand is a powerful practice.
In fact, it is a command directly from God.
God understood how writing with your hand imprints the words on your mind.
And that’s why Doctor Jeremiah has created the written word journal, use the written word journal to write Paul’s wonderful rich letter to the Romans word for word.
As you do record your thoughts, reflections, notes and prayers on the adjacent page.
Charting your personal journey with God through the book of Romans.
The written word journal is yours when you give a gift of any amount in support of this program, and if you give $60 or more, Jeremiah will also send you his current teaching series, Romans eight on CD or DVD, along with a correlating study guide or if you give generously to the ministry, you will receive the written word journal and a genuine letter Jeremiah study Bible in the new King James version.
Contact turning point today. Thank you for watching, turning point.
Now, here is Doctor Jeremiah with his message, the Ministry of the Holy Spirit.
The 1st 11 verses of the eighth chapter have shown us what Christ has done for us, how he delivers us.
Remember the verse, there is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus.
But what you need to know about the writings of Paul concerning the eighth chapter of Romans is that Paul follows a pretty routine process.
When he writes, here’s what he does.
He gives you all of the doctrinal things, all the theological, all the biblical things you need to know in the beginning.

And then he makes a transition into now that you know all this, here’s how you should respond to it.
And what Paul is telling us in the book of Romans is this, if you really believe that God has rescued you through Jesus Christ from your old life, giving you this new strength over the flesh, which gives you the opportunity not to sin before you couldn’t help yourself.
Now, you can, if you believe all of that, what responsibility do you have? Because that’s true.
If this is true, if God has loved you so much that he’s done that there’s, there’s certain things that he wants you to know.
Now, this pattern of doctrine first and duty second is what makes Christianity different than all of the other religions you see in religion, the other religions, if you want to put categories around it, in religion, it goes like this, your acceptance with God is based on what you do to the degree that you work hard and live a good life.
You’ll become a child of God. That’s what they teach.
And it’s involved with catechisms and classes and standards and regulations and rules and all of that stuff.
But God turns that around. God says that’s not the way it works. Christianity is the exact opposite.
Listen carefully. Christianity says that your acceptance with God is based not on what you do for God, but what Christ has already done for you.
So in Christ, God makes you his child and then he asks you to obey totally different process.
And this is the model that Paul follows. Here in Romans eight.
He tells us that a person who’s been blessed by God, the father is to respond obediently to the Holy Spirit who lives within Him.
Yes, it’s wonderful to be a child in the family of God, but it comes with some responsibilities.
Can I get a witness? He is obligated to live in a new way even though He is by no means capable in his own life, how many of, you know, if you try to live the Christian life in your own strength, you’ll be a failure and we failed.
Haven’t? We’ve all tried that? The Christian life is not hard.
The Christian life is impossible apart from the Holy Spirit.
So, what God does is He puts you in his family.
He tells you some things that you need to do and then He gives you the Holy Spirit to help you do it.
But there’s a wonderful cooperative that goes on here that we can’t forget God gives you what you need to obey.
But he wants you to obey. This is a little bit sticky for a lot of people.
Some people think, well, I’m a Christian.
I’m just gonna hang out and let God do his work, let go and let God.
They say they don’t want to lift a finger to do anything of themselves.
So they just think God’s going to do how many of you know, that doesn’t work.
God wants us to obey and in the process of obeying God helps us by His Holy Spirit to do it.
But we are still responsible.
The Bible says we’re to work out our own salvation with fear and trembling for it is God who works in us to will and do for his good pleasure.
God is doing his work in us. He’s putting the Holy Spirit in us.
He wants us to take steps of obedience.
So the Holy Spirit can work in us to make us the people. God wants us to be.
So the first thing you need to know from Romans chapter eight is the believer is responsible to the Holy Spirit.
Verse 12 says brethren, we are debtors not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh.
Before we became Christians, we didn’t have any choice. You might have thought.
Well, before I became a Christian, I was a pretty good person and I didn’t do all the bad things.
I did some things that I shouldn’t have done. Listen, let me tell you what the Bible says.
We have all sinned and come short of the glory of God. There’s not one righteous, no, not one.
If you doubt that read Romans chapter three this week and you will be totally convinced.
Even our motives are bad before Christ comes to live within our heart.
But when Christ comes, he doesn’t take away the old nature.
He just gives us a new nature and enables us to live our lives according to his will.
Verse 10 says in Romans eight, that the Holy Spirit who lives in us is the spirit of life.
And that means that when he comes to live within our heart, he brings life with him.
The Bible calls it abundant life, new life, real life.
We may not all understand what happens when we become Christians in the process we go through.
But something changes the Bible says, all things pass away and behold all things become new.
Something happens in us when the spirit of God comes to live within us, our sins are gone, our guilt is gone.
We know that we’re gonna go to heaven someday.
When we die, everything about life is changed for one simple reason that God loved us, sent his son to die for us.
And in the process gave us His holy Spirit to live in our hearts.
And we then are responsible to live this new God given life and put to death.
Those things which get in the way.
Now, here’s where we’re going to find out how we cooperate with God in the living of this Christian life.
We are reinforced by the Holy Spirit in doing it.
Here’s what it says in verse 13, if you live according to the Flesh, you will die.
But if by the spirit, you put to death, the deeds of the body, you will live.
Now, let me just get clear about this. When you become a Christian, you have still the old nature.
You know that we’ve always joked about that.
If you don’t believe that, ask your partner, they will verify the fact that you still have the old nature.
Amen. So you don’t get a chance to eradicate the old nature.
Paul is not telling us here that there’s something you can do to make all of those things that are still a part of the old nature.
Go away. Here’s what he says. You can crucify the deeds of the old nature.
You can get rid of the old nature.
No, but you can take care of the things the old nature wants you to do and you can deal with those.
Paul says that when as Christians, we discover that things from our old life are slipping back into our life and starting to take hold in our lives.
How many of you know that happens when you become a Christian, you don’t just get rid of all of your old experiences and sometimes things that were true of you before you became a Christian.
That’s what we call the flesh.
Sometimes those things get back into your life and all of a sudden you look up one day and you said, man, I, what am I doing here?
I’m a Christian. Why is that happening?
Paul says when those things happen, you have to crucify those things and you have to take that responsibility and deal with them.
You don’t just sit around and wait. Well, I’m just gonna wait for God. Maybe he’ll take it away.
No, he won’t. God isn’t going to do for you.
What you’re unwilling to do for yourself by the Holy Spirit’s power.
He will help you obediently do what he asks you to do, but you have to take, so let’s just talk about what does it mean to crucify the flesh?
And there’s some characteristics about crucifixion that we all know from the passion, narrative, crucifixion is personal.
You gotta do this yourself. This is not a corporate deal.
This is not something we do together as a church.
We don’t come together on Sunday and together this Sunday, we’re gonna all crucify the things in our body that shouldn’t be there.
No, you have to do this yourself. Crucifixion is individual personal.
So what happens is when you know something’s in your life that shouldn’t be there.
You’re a Christian, you’re a child of God, you’re in the family of God, you, you’re a privileged person, you’re in God’s family.
He puts you in his family and when you’re in God’s family, he has certain expectations of you and some of the things you may be doing right now are not on his list of things he expects you to do.
So you have to deal with that. That’s what the scripture says.
You do it personally and you do it painfully how many of, you know, sometimes those things get in your life and they get really attached to you and it’s not easy to say no to them.
Here’s what Paul says. However painful, it may be crucify, it, deal with it.
And crucifixion is also pitiless.
I remember watching the passion couldn’t help but cry to see the way they brutalized his body.
And then when they put him on the cross, how pitiless it was, listen to me you have to deal with the things in your body, in your life that aren’t godly in the same way that the Roman soldiers dealt with Jesus Christ on the cross.
That’s what it means to crucify the flesh.
They put nails in his hands and in his feet And it was permanent.
Sometimes when I talk to Christians I hear them talk about. Oh, yeah.
Well, I know I’m doing some things and I, but I’m sure I’ll get one of these days I’ll get, when I turn 80, this will all go away.
Right. No.
How many of, you know, the things that are in our lives that shouldn’t be in our lives don’t naturally go away.
You got to confront them, you gotta deal with them and, and the whole idea of crucifixion is to help us understand how brutal we need to be with the things that are in our life that ought not to be there.
We’re Christians, we’re Children of God, the Holy Spirit lives within us.
And there are just certain things that we may allow ourselves to get into and when we do that, it just destroys the peace and joy and, and the a life that God wants us to, to know and when we deal with those things, what will happen is God will bring back that sense of peace and joy and life that we once knew before all of these things started to reappear.
I hope this is helpful to you because what I want you to know is this, you can know the joy of the Lord in your life as a Christian.
And when he identifies something in your life and it may not be anything, anything like a relationship, it might be some little simple thing.
I mean, I’ll tell you what television can be. One of those things.
The internet can be one of those things you all know, there’s a list of things that can get in your life and start messing up your relationship with God, whatever they are just be determined in your heart.
I am not going to tolerate that.
I’m gonna prosecute it to the fullest extent and get it out of my life.
The Holy Spirit reinforces us when we do that.
When we take that responsibility, we sense him coming along to help us.
Then the believers is ruled by the Holy Spirit.
Did you know that verse 14 says for as many of us are led by the Spirit of God?
These are the sons of God. What does it mean to be led by the spirit of God?
Well, if you’re a Christian, God gives you the Holy Spirit in your life and when you become a Christian, something really does change in your heart, the Holy Spirit is like the automatic sin detector in your life.
You know, the Holy Spirit can make you really uncomfortable if you’re doing something you shouldn’t do.
He comes to be your guide. He comes to be your tutor, your teacher, your leader.
And when the Holy Spirit is in your life, you have a whole new sense of direction.
The Holy Spirit loves to take the word of God and help you understand how that word of God relates to your life.
When you’re reading the scripture, you may have read it 100 times over.
But all of a sudden now you’re a Christian and you really wanna walk with God and you read it and all it jumps off the page.
That’s the Holy Spirit in your heart, taking the hard drive of God’s word.
The Holy Spirit is the software and he brings out of the hard drive, the truth that leads and guides and directs you.
The Holy Spirit leads, he leads in Godliness, but he also leads in general. How does he lead us?
Here’s one of the best paragraphs I’ve ever read about the Holy Spirit and how he leads.
I want you to listen to this very carefully because this will tell you what to expect from the Holy Spirit as He leads you in your life.
Here’s what he said. The Holy Spirit never coerces never compels, never puts on the pressure and never bullies.
He does not drive, he leads, he leads, we follow, he leads us into all truth.
He leads us in the path of righteousness. He leads us step by step. He leads gently understandingly. Unerringly.
He leads us in our daily quiet time. He leads us by the Godly Council of Spirit taught men.
He leads through the circumstances of life.
He leads by gently witnessing with our spirit in the innermost recesses of our being.
He leads by quickening our conscience.
He leads by encouraging us or by restraining us by assuring us or reproving us.
He leads, but he never drives, he never gives us that now or never feeling or that do this or else urging He leads and we follow one step at a time.
The Holy Spirit is the gentle leader of the Christian.
It’s the gentle inward awareness that God is with you, that He is in you.
And if you listen carefully to his sweet voice, he will take you where He wants you to go.
When you become a Christian, the Holy Spirit comes to live within you to encourage you from the inside out to be the person God wants you to be.
So now you’re in the family of God, you’ve got the Holy Spirit.
You’re dealing with the things in your life that shouldn’t be there.
And God says, for you did not receive the spirit of bondage again to fear, but you receive the spirit of adoption by whom you cry.
I’m a father. According to the 15th verse of Chapter eight, we have been brought into the family of God through the process of adoption.
The word for adoption in the Greek language is really interesting.
It means to place a son, that’s what God has done for us. He’s adopted us into his family.
How many of you know, we don’t have the right to be in God’s family.
We don’t, somebody had to do something for that.
So God took us out of our whatever we were in.
And when we accept Jesus Christ as our savior, we become the Children of God.
The Bible says when you’re adopted, you become God’s child.
Now, the other thing that happens here is also very interesting when you get adopted, you get to call God by a new name because the Bible says that when you’re adopted God’s name is Abba father, By whom we cry out.
Verse 15, Abba father, let me talk to you just a minute about that.
That’s one of the most tender terms in the Bible.
It actually means daddy or if it were a grandchild, it would be poppy.
That’s what my kids call me, my grandchildren or papa.
It was an ordinary family word in the days of Jesus alba was a common word.
It conveyed intimacy, tenderness, dependence, complete lack of fear, modern English equivalents or daddy or papa.
In other words, an everyday infant could call their father daddy.
Now, here’s the interesting thing about this term, men and women, no Jewish person, no old testament person would have ever dreamed of using this very intimate term to address God.
Jesus always used this word in prayer to his father, except when he was on the cross.
When you become a part of God’s forever family.
When you’re adopted into his family, you end up gaining a relationship with God that gets away from all of this.
God is so far away. Now, God becomes so dear to you. You call him father.
You refer to him in intimate term that’s reserved only for people who are in the family.
If you’re not a Christian, you don’t get to do that.
In fact, it’s the very term that Jesus used to teach us to pray.
How are we supposed to pray? Our father who art in heaven? Hallowed be your name. Same terminology.
I gotta tell you something when we are afraid.
When we’re filled with terror, that’s when we cry out of a father. He hears us.
When we’re at our lowest point.
I can’t think of anything more wonderful and glorious than to know that your Heavenly Father cares about you.
When you cry out to him, I have a father. He hears you.
And then here’s the fifth thing about the Holy Spirit.
In this chapter, the Holy Spirit reassures the believer. He comes to reassure you.
Here’s a verse of scripture that I have truly have to be honest with you.
I’ve misunderstood this passage of scripture my whole adult life and I finally got it right.
I mean, I, I, I’m not perfect. I, I try to be as accurate as I can.
But I never realized the impact of this verse. Here’s what the verse says.
The Spirit himself witnesses with our spirit that we are the Children of God.
Now, here’s how that was normally understood. Somebody comes and say, are you a Christian? Yes.
How do you know you’re a Christian? Well, let me tell you how I know I’m a Christian.
The spirit of God witnesses with my spirit that I’m a Christian. That’s how I know. I’m a Christian. Now.
That may be true, but that’s not what this verse means.
This verse does not mean that there’s an emotional sort of a mysterious way that if you’re a Christian, God witnesses by his spirit with your spirit that you’re a Christian, that’s not what it means.
I’ve always thought that this verse meant that God’s spirit gave testimony to my spirit that I was a Christian.
In other words, it was like an inward sort of confidence that I belong to the Lord.
And there’s a sense maybe where this is true.
But let me tell you what it really means if you dig into it, Paul is not saying that the Holy Spirit bears witness to my spirit that I am a child of God, but rather that the Holy Spirit witnesses with my spirit that I am a child of God.
In other words, at the same time that I am praying and calling God my father from within my spirit, the Holy Spirit is doing the same thing from within me so that there are two who call God father.
Every time I pray the Holy Spirit and my spirit, it’s a dual evidence of my son.
When I call Godfather, the Holy Spirit is witnessing right alongside me. He’s saying yes, yes.
David Jeremiah is your son, father. He’s, he’s yours. He belongs to you.
Here’s number six, the believers rewarded by the Holy Spirit.
Look what it says in verse 17, if Children, then heirs, heirs of God join heirs with Christ.
If indeed, we suffer with him, that we may be also glorified with him.
In this verse, the Bible tells us that in the future because we’re in God’s family, certain things are true.
First of all, we’re God’s Children. If you’re in the family, he’s the father who are we.
We are the Children of God. John 1 12 says many has received him to them.
He gave the right to become what the Children of God. First.
John 31 says, behold, what manner of love the father has bestowed on us that we should be called Children of God.
Not only are we Children.
The Bible says here in this verse that we’re heirs, we’re heirs of God.
An heir is one who has not yet received his inheritance but is anticipating it.
First Peter one forces it this way. Blessed be the God and father of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Who according to his abundant mercy has begotten us again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.
Now, watch this to an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled and that does not fade away. One of these days.
We’re gonna inherit eternity. We’re gonna be with the Lord forever. We’re gonna be in heaven.
We’re going to be heirs with God. But here’s the most important term in this verse.
We’re not just Children, we’re not just heirs. We are joint heirs. That’s what it says.
Joint heirs with Jesus Christ. What does that mean?
Well, let me explain to you what it means because it’s one of the best truths in the whole passage.
If a man dies, Leaving a large farm to four heirs, the estate is divided evenly and each heir receives 25% of the whole.
But if a man leaves a farm to four of his sons as joint heirs, then each son owns the whole farm.
Each one can say this house is mine. Those barns are mine, those fields are mine.
When the Lord tells us that we are heirs of God and joint heirs with Jesus Christ.
What he is saying is that God, the father has given to the Lord Jesus Christ, his inheritance and everything he gave to the Lord Jesus Christ, he gives to us.
We are joint heirs with Jesus Christ. Everything God gives to Jesus he gives to us.
We’re not just 1/4 of what he got. Not a half of what he got because we’re joint heirs.
We own the whole farm. Wow. I’m a joint heir of Jesus Christ.
When I read what God says about Jesus Christ, concerning the future. It’s true of me. Why is that?
Because I’m a joint heir, I’m a joint heir.
So let me ask you, are you gonna live like you are an heir or are you gonna to scrounge around the rest of your life just trying to get by as a Christian?
You know, when I hear from some Christians listen to me, I try to live as close to the edge as I can without going over the edge.
And what they mean by that is live as carnally as you can as a Christian just don’t step over the edge and do something that will ruin your life.
You should, you should be trying to live exactly the opposite way, live so close to Jesus.
You’re not even tempted for some of this stuff don’t live like you don’t have any inheritance because you have the inheritance that is the same as that, which was given to Jesus Christ.
You are joint heirs with Jesus Christ.
Let’s commit ourselves as we go forward this week that we’re going to live like that, we’re going to live according to our privilege.
We’re going to be Children of God and we’re going to be proud to be Children of God and we’re going to live like Children of God.
Amen. Amen. Dr Jeremiah will return in a moment to close today’s program right after this.
Thank you for watching. Turning point.
Dr Jeremiah would like to offer you the written word journal Romans sent to you in appreciation of your gift of any amount in support of this program.
And for a gift of $60 or more, Doctor Jeremiah will include his current teaching series, Romans eight, the greatest chapter in the Bible on your choice of CD DVD and a correlating study guide.
Or if you give a generous gift of $100 or more in support of the Ministry of Turning Point, you’ll receive the written word journal and a genuine leather Jeremiah study Bible in Doctor Jeremiah’s preferred New King James version.
Thank you for your support of Turning point. Contact us today.
And now with one last word for today’s program, here is Dr Jeremiah.
When it comes to claiming your inheritance from God, there’s really only one question. Are you his child?
Are you part of God’s family?
The Bible says God’s family consists of those who have trusted Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior.
So I want to encourage you today to put your faith in Christ and become God’s child now and forever as you begin your walk of faith, I would like to send you a free booklet called Your Greatest Turning Point and the further your spiritual growth.
I’d also like to send you our monthly devotional magazine called Turning Points full of inspiring articles and daily devotionals.
We will gladly send both of these gifts to you free of charge.
If you will contact us here at turning point today.
Next time on turning 0.1 day, you will be fully and finally redeemed.
And the Bible says because we know that’s true and because the Holy Spirit who is in us is the first fruits of that, which is to come, we grown awaiting the fulfillment of that in our lives.
Thank you for being with us today. Join Dr Jeremiah.
Next time for his message, groaning and glory here on turning point.