What It Means to be Filled with the Holy Spirit # 16

"And When the Day of Pentecost was Fully Come" (continued)

And, so again, Jesus was announcing that He was the Feast of the Lord. He was saying that old things had passed away, and the only way the people of God could please the Lord is to partake of Him, which meant they were to take Him as their ALL.

Now, there were varied reactions among this company who had sought Him out: most of them misunderstood Him completely and went away confused; "the Jews" heard His Words and rejected Him and continued to make plans to destroy Him; but the Word also tells us that "many therefore of His disciples, when they had heard this said, 'This is an hard saying; who can hear it?' " Why were both "the Jews" and the disciples so disturbed? First of all, we need to recall that they all knew that it was the Passover season; and they knew or suspected that Jesus was saying that no longer would the temple in Jerusalem, or the temple worship they loved so much, be the way of worship - all the ceremonies, all the ordinances, all the festal activities, all the methods, whether emotional or formal, were at an end - all that fed their soul, all that fed their human nature, whether it was the intellect or the emotions, must end, for God is seeking those who will worship Him in spirit and truth. The time has come, and now is, that they were to take Christ as their Life; and whether they were priests or Pharisees or prophets or scribes or ordinary everyday working people or mothers or children CHRIST WAS TO BE THEIR ALL.

Now, when we read this, we may wonder how they could give these things the preeminence over the Lord - the laws, the feasts, the priests, the ceremonies, etc. We may wonder why many of His disciples followed Him no more. But is not this the great problem of Christianity today,something other than Christ!? something instead of Christ!? something more than Christ!? something that satisfies the natural man other than Christ!? Brethren, many things can take the preeminence of Christ in our lives: a Church organization, a Bible school, a pastor, a doctrine, a teaching, a method, even what we call deeper life teaching, etc. But only Christ can truly satisfy our hearts!

~T. Austin-Sparks~

(continued with # 17)