Are Rivers of Living Water Flowing From You?

Tom:

We are continuing with the gospel.We are particularly interested in salvation, but we are interested in everything else Dave, which is why it is taking us so long.We are going through the Gospel of John verse by verse and currently we are in chapter 7 and we’ll pick up with verse 37, although I think we got to 40 last week Dave, but I think I want to back up.So we take a few steps forward, we come back a bit, but it’s all good.

Dave:

We’re getting there.

Tom:

Yes.“In the last day, that great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried, saying, If any man thirst, let him come unto me, and drink.In the last day, that great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried, saying, If any man thirst, let him come unto me, and drink.(But this spake he of the Spirit, which they that believe on him should receive: for the Holy Ghost was not yet given; because that Jesus was not yet glorified.)”Dave, Jesus once again—and we’ve had this verse after verse.He continues to offer—I don’t even know how to describe it—not just himself, but all that we need, not just for salvation, but for living a life that’s pleasing to him.And well, never thirst.

Dave:

Well Tom, again it relates to what we have just been talking about.Two things, it’s not physical.There is no physical way, no metals we can wear, no rituals, no sacraments we can go through, no money we can offer that buys our salvation.It’s something spiritual.So when Jesus says if any man thirst, let him come unto me and drink, he is not talking about some holy water, he’s not talking about H2O.I mean we have to hammer away on this over and over.This is something spiritual, this is spiritual life and there is a spiritual food for spiritual life and that is the Word of God.Man doesn’t live by bread alone, but by every word.So that goes back to chapter six once again.The Catholic Church turns this wafer into the body of Jesus and says no, this is not symbolic of the spiritual life that we receive from Christ, but this must be the literal physical body and blood of Christ that you must ingest into your stomach.They’ve taken a step backward.But John Calvin said something very close to that.He said this physical thing is spiritual food that sustains you and strengthens you.No!It’s in remembrance of Christ.It is symbolic of his body and blood that were broken and poured out for us upon the cross.And the second thing is let him—let him, it’s his initiative.I want you to come to me and the Father will draw you, but you can draw back also.Remember the writer of Hebrews:“We are not of those who draw back unto perdition.”So there is some initiative on man’s part.Man must be willing to do this.Let him come unto me and drink.He that believeth on me—this is a challenge for all of us—out of his belly shall flow rivers-out of his innermost being shall flow rivers of living water.In other words, you talked about that earlier Tom.The passion that we have for God and work out your own salvation with fear and trembling.God is working in you.I’d give everything I’ve got for what God is working out through me.Is this where my heart really is?We should be a people who are dispensing life giving water to those about us who are dying of thirst in the desert of man’s materialism and rejection of God.But verse 39—

Tom:

Dave, let me jump in on 39.It makes me think about Solomon.We talked about it earlier. Would I be out of line to say we’re better off than Solomon was?Even though he had wisdom and understanding, but he didn’t have the Holy Spirit as we today have the Holy Spirit.

Dave:

Not as we have the Holy Spirit and that’s a good point Tom.There are a couple of considerations here.This is a very important verse and I don’t think we really covered it the last time.

Tom:

No, that’s why we backed up.

Dave:

Jesus says of—this would be in Luke 7, of John the Baptist, “Of men born of women, there hath not arisen a greater prophet than he, but Jesus goes on and says, “But he that is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he.Now the Holy Spirit in the Old Testament came upon them.It very clearly says, “Holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Spirit.The Word of the Lord came unto me,” Ezekiel 7 and so forth.

Tom:

Yes, Daniel said, “Take not thy Holy Spirit from me.”So it must have been possible.

Dave:

So please folks, don’t sing that in your churches.As a Christian, that is not a biblical song for you to sing.

Tom:

But it gives us understanding about David and his situation.

Dave:

Right, the Holy Spirit will never leave us.He will never leave us or forsake us.

Tom:

Sealed, we are sealed unto the day of redemption.

Dave:

Exactly, but the Holy Spirit could come and go upon those in the Old Testament. This is what he means.The Holy Ghost was no yet given, because Jesus was not yet glorified.Well what do you mean not yet given? “Not given permanently.”But the Holy Spirit conspired to come upon and work through and so forth.

Tom:

And fill?

Dave:

Well he was filled with the Holy Ghost from his mother’s womb—

Tom:

John the Baptist.

Dave:

Right, right, John the Baptist.That’s an amazing statement.Okay, so then I think this also relates to 2 Thessalonians 2.I hope no one thinks I am going too far a field now. Where the scriptures says “You know—it talks about that man of sin, the wicked one, as god sit in the temple of God and claims that he is God—

Tom:

The man of lawlessness—

Dave:

Right, this is the Antichrist, and you know what prevents him from being revealed in his time.He who now hinders, will hinder until he is taken out of the way.So it tells a person has been hindering since Paul’s day until now, the Antichrist to come into power.Satan can’t put his man out there to rule the world because some one is hindering.Now only God can do that, so it must be God, but you can’t take God out of the way.He will hinder until he is taken out of the way because God is omnipresent.So what are we talking about?I think this verse gives us the key to this.There is a presence of the Holy Spirit on the earth now since the day of Pentecost.When Jesus was glorified, Peter says, “Having been exalted to the right hand of the Father he has sent this which you now see before you.”So when Jesus was glorified on the day of Pentecost, he sent the Holy Spirit to indwell permanently the believers.Jesus said it in John 14, he said, “I am going to send a Comforter, even the Spirit of Truth, whom the world cannot receive because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him, but you know him for he is with you and shall be in you.”And then he says in John:16:13Howbeit when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth: for he shall not speak of himself; but whatsoever he shall hear, that shall he speak: and he will shew you things to come.
See All..., “When he the spirit of truth is come….”So there was an entrance of the Holy Spirit into this earth, into mankind, when Jesus was glorified it happened on the Day of Pentecost that had never been known before.Now that’s the church, indwelt, as you said, sealed by the Holy Spirit and the promise when the church is removed from this earth, that presence of the Holy Spirit will be taken away.It doesn’t mean that God won’t be here; it doesn’t mean the Holy Spirit won’t be here as he was before; omnipresent to convict men so that people could get saved.Those who haven’t refused the love of the truth.There will be those who will be saved during the Great Tribulation and they will pay for it with their lives; they will be martyred, but I think it is clear from these scriptures that the church must be removed before the Antichrist can appear. Revelation 13 says of the Antichrist that he is given authority over the saints to make war with them.Now if this is the church, then he can do what Christ said could not be done. The gates of hell cannot prevail against the church.But if these are the believers who have come to faith in Christ in the absence of the church, the church is gone at the Rapture, but the gospel is still going forth, and they have believed the gospel and they pay for it with their lives.A post-trib Rapture would be a classic non-event, because there is no one to rapture.It says whoever doesn’t take the mark can’t buy or sell.If you take the mark, you are lost and if you don’t bow down and worship the image of the Antichrist, you are killed.So true believers will not survive the Great Tribulation.There may be a handful of them—well anyway, Tom, I think this is a tremendous scripture here of the promise as you said, of the indwelling presence of Christ himself and of the Holy Spirit to empower us, to live through us, this salvation that he has given to us.

Tom:

Yes, so in many ways we are better off than Solomon.We have the Spirit of truth.But Dave we still go, just as Solomon did—we grieve the Holy Spirit, as we’ve been talking about in throughout in our earlier segment, we don’t have this heart for truth.Not in everything, but in some things we want to draw back and preserve our own agenda and so on.But we have the spirit of conviction.We can turn, repent, and get back in line with what God wants.

Dave:

When you consider how he loves us, and what he has done for us, how can I do less than give him my best?You know the little verse:and live for him each day when I think of what Christ has done for me, I want to please him, I want to be what he wants me to be.In fact Tom, I can truthfully say that’s the only thing that I want because nothing else compares, nothing else makes any sense at all in the long run.