HOLY SPIRIT OF TRUTH
HOLY SPIRIT OF TRUTH
Sunday, April 28, 2024
Pastor Carolyn Sissom
Another war has erupted in the United States of America. It is a war from within. The pro-Palestinians led by the terrorist’s regime of Hamas under the guise of protesting are rioting with lawless threats in our cities and on our college campuses.
Before I start the message, I want to advise the church that YouTube removed one of my messages and notified me they may remove others. The message was dated 1/23/2021, “The Advent of Jesus Christ.” “It violated their medical misinformation policy… Content poses a serious risk of egregious harm by spreading medical misinformation about currently administered vaccines.”
We the Church continue in spiritual battles against evil and wicked regimes worldwide fueled by the spirit of antichrist, the god of this age. In Isaiah 59, Isaiah declares the reason for national suffering. The people had been quarreling with God about unanswered prayer.
Isa. 59:14-15a: Judgment is turned away backward. Justice stands afar off. Truth is fallen in the street. Equity cannot enter. Truth fails. He that departs from evil makes himself prey…”
59: 15b-16: …the Lord saw it, and it displeased Him that there was no judgment. He saw there was no man, and wondered that there was no intercessor; therefore, His arm brought salvation to Him; and His righteousness, it sustained Him.
The word for “man” is “iysh” = a notable man of high degree.
The word for intercessor is a study unto itself. It is one who entreats and meets with God.
An intercessor cries out to God for the people. A prophet sits in the council of God and says, “Thus says the Lord." When prophets and intercessors pray together, there should be a flow of intercession and a response in divine utterance.
Thus the prophet Isiah describes how this restoration will come. It is to be wholly a victory by Jehovah Himself! It is based on the knowledge of the people’s sin, and on the fact that they are unable to provide an intercessor. It is the result of His action alone. His arm brings salvation. God’s plan of salvation will not only redeem mankind but will join together heaven and earth under the headship of His only begotten Son, Jesus Christ., who gave us His precious Holy Spirit.
John 15:26: When the Comforter is come, who I will send not you from the Father, even the Spirit of truth, which proceeds from the Father, he will testify of me.
John 16:13: When 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 show you things to come.
We the church are not of those where “truth is fallen in the street” and “truth fails.” We have the indwelling of the Holy Spirit of Truth. He will guide His own into all truth. He will show us things to come.
John 14:17: Even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it sees him not, neither knows him; but you know him; for he dwells with you, and shall be in you.
Now, O’ Lord from your Holy Place, fill us with a fresh supply of Manna and Oil from your Well and from your River. Send your Holy Wind, Fire, New Wine, Water, Clothing, Dove, Seal, and Salt.
In Acts 1:8: You shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you.
Those who receive the Holy Spirit are able to release captives from Satan’s kingdom and transplant (or convey) them into Christ’s Kingdom (Col. 1:13). No military force can do that. It can’t capture the minds of men, let alone their hearts. Ah, but Holy Spirit power is unseen and works by Faith.
Ex. 27:20: You shall command the children of Israel, that they bring you pure oil olive beaten for the light, to cause the lamp to burn always.
Matt. 25:13: Then shall the Kingdom of Heaven be likened unto ten virgins, which took their lamps, and went forth to meet the bridegroom. Five of them were wise, and five were foolish. They that were foolish took their lamps, and took no oil with them. But the wise took oil in their vessels with their lamps.
I am not going to get into the mechanics of the parable. Are these virgins’ part of the bridesmaids, or part of the bride? God forbid that our walking with God should degenerate into a system of theology where we pigeon-hole truth and then fight over doctrine.
The Holy Spirit is truth.
Theology takes the teeth out of truth. Man debating theology degrades truth to the doctrines of men and devils. Truth is devastating to the natural man. “Truth has fallen in the street.” “Truth fails.” Until we come to the places of total devastation as far as the natural man is concerned, we are not going to experience the beauty of Holy Spirit filled life.
We the church must prepare the “Bride” with oil for the days of darkness that are upon the earth. The days of testing and trial for God’s people are not coming. Those days are now! The training time has become reigning time.
The Lord has warned us that there was an hour of trial to come upon the world, “to try them that dwell upon the earth” (Rev. 3:10). God has shown us the way to overcome in the day of persecution, flood, famine, darkness, gloominess and in the day when he sends fire on the earth (911), and the continuity of war since 911. It is a day of the unveiling of the spiritual worth or bankruptcy of the Church.
We as a church body went before God and declared ourselves “guilty,” “helpless,” and “bankrupt,” except for His Grace. We asked him to “buy gold tried in the fire,” “white raiment” to clothe ourselves, and “eye salve to anoint our eyes” that we may see in the Spirit what God is doing on the earth.
The wise and foolish were all virgins. They all had lamps---they took their lamps and went forth to meet the bridegroom. If they were the “bridesmaids,” you can be sure the bride would require even greater diligence for her preparation than would the bridesmaids themselves. All their lamps were burning with oil; for at the midnight hour, they did not arise and light their lamps---they rose up and “trimmed” them. They came to this place of waiting and of sleeping, with lamps that were burning; but as they slept their lamps grew dim. The light from the lamps of the foolish appeared to be equally illuminating as the light from the lamps of the wise. But there was one difference, and this was only revealed in the midnight hour. The wise had brought along with them a supply of oil “in their vessels” --while the foolish were trusting that the lamp they had would keep burning, without any extra supply.
The oil in our lamp will burn out except we have a total abiding union with the LORD. There is no blessing, no experience, no gift, no ministry, no Church structure, that will keep your lamp burning in the hour of trial. Having the right arrangement, the proper New Testament pattern, the right kind of structure or covering, the right order—these will not suffice. Having His gifts, His blessings, His ministries—these in themselves will not do. They have their purpose, a very needful purpose, and that is to bring us into relationship with Christ unto the fullness of God.
But if this is not the vision and the hope, and if this is not the objective of our gatherings together in HIS NAME—sooner or later the lamp will run dry, and the light will grow dim and go out.
There is only one way that we can maintain the oil that will maintain the light that will maintain the vision of His appearing, and prepare us for that appearing—and that is by coming into union with Him who is the Source. It is not some new doctrine or revelation that you can take or leave. It is God’s provision for His people in the hour of famine and of darkness. You must walk in identification and union with Christ, in His Cross as well as in His life. Only in Christ is there an unfailing supply.
The oil is not something we automatically have when we receive of His Spirit and partake of His gifts and blessings. These gifts and blessings are intended to help us along the Way as we seek to follow on to appropriate the death of the Cross and the resurrection life that these enabling gifts and ministries would lead us into. The precious gifts of His Spirit are a means and not the end. Only in Christ is there an unfailing supply of the “oil.”
In Zech 4:2-3, God showed Zechariah the vision of the candlestick, with a bowl upon the top and seven lamps, with seven pipes to the seven lamps. And two olive trees by it, one upon the right side of the bowl, and other upon the left side.
The candlestick was in union with an exhaust-less supply of oil---oil from the olive-trees---oil from the fountain-head and source.
God showed Zechariah that the “olive trees” were the sons of oil, the anointed ones. It was Christ, but it was Christ in union with His many brethren. They were the sons of oil, sons of the anointing---and through them there was an exhaust-less supply of oil for the lamp of God.
There is an exhaust-less supply of oil—but we must buy it for our-self. We cannot borrow it. When we find it (or rather Him), we cannot sell it to anyone else. We cannot delegate it to others. We cannot give it away, much as we would like to share it with others. One must walk with Him and learn His ways---hearing His voice an doing His will.
Association with God’s anointed ones is not sufficient. As they minister out from the heart of God, they will seek to bring God’s people into union with Christ; for they know that these will not be prepared to go forth in this midnight hour to meet the Bridegroom except as we come into vital union with Him who is the Source.
We have to buy this oil for ourselves. If we are going to have it, we have to buy it now. At the midnight hour, we will not have the opportunity to buy it.
What is the Price? If we truly want to pay the price, the Lord will show us. The price-tag is not according to the value of the oil. This unfailing supply is really without money and without price. But there is a cost, and each one of us will have to discover that for ourselves. It can be some paltry earthly thing that has blinded our eyes to the true riches. It could also be some degree of spiritual attainment that we are loathe to relinquish in order to have His fullness.
The price-tag merely reveals the smallness of our own hearts, and the struggle one has to go through in order that we might receive the riches of His grace.
The cost could be anything---but it has to be everything. For it is only in forsaking all we have that we might receive all of Him. Our blessings, gifts and enablements are manifestations of Him. They are good, but they lead us unto Him, unto His fullness, unto the Fountain-head and Source.
O’ Lord continue to send forth your Word and Holy Spirit that your people may hastily sell all and buy this precious, exhaust-less supply of oil. For truly the midnight hour is near at hand for the Bride to be revealed and for the harvest of the earth. We must go forth to meet the Bridegroom under the illumination, anointing and guidance of Your precious Holy Spirit.
When Jesus came the first time, it was those who had an abundance of scriptural knowledge of His coming who missed Him---whereas the humble and the lowly whose hearts were prepared saw Him.
1. Midnight Cry
I hear the sound
Of a mighty rushing wind
And it's closer now
Than it's ever been
I can almost hear the trumpet
As Gabriel sounds the call
I look around me
I see prophecies fulfilled everywhere
The signs of the times
They're appearing everywhere
Oh, I can almost see the father
As He says, son, go get my children
At the midnight cry
The bride of Christ will rise.
This is a beautiful song. The midnight call can be a time of visitation that we are in now and it can be the second coming. Whether it is visitation or the return of Jesus Christ, “we the church” are to be ready and prepare others.
It is clear there will be some very dramatic, sudden, outward manifestations at His second coming. But it is also evident there will be aspects of His appearing that only those who have eyes to see and ears to hear, will recognize.
Paul saw the Lord in such a brightness of His glory that it blinded his eyes. But his companions who traveled with him saw nothing, and only heard meaningless sounds. Yet it all happened at the same moment and in the same place. This was not at Christ’s first coming or His second coming. But Paul saw Him! It was an appearing of the LORD that was just as real as His appearing to Peter, James, John and the other disciples.
I believe all who are called to be apostles will have a visitation of the LORD, Himself. The five virgins saw Him and walked into His presence---while the foolish virgins saw him not. He comes as “a thief in the night” to those who are not walking in the light---but in the brightness of His glory to those who are (1 Thess. 5:2,4).
In all of the parables, in all of the exhortations in the epistles, there is both encouragement and warning to God’s people that Jesus may appear any moment, and those who see Him when He appears are those who are looking for Him, waiting for Him, and expecting Him.
But it does not mean that everything pertaining to the second coming must take place in that single moment of time. It took 33 years for the prophecies related to His first coming to be fulfilled; and we have no way of knowing how many years it may take for all aspects of his second coming to be fully revealed.
Those who earnestly looked for Him, and whose hearts were prepared, saw Him early in the day of His appearing, simply because they were walking with God, and had eyes to see what they could not see.
We cannot miss Him if we are constantly looking for Him. And God forbid that any of us should be found in the company of those who are going about lecturing from beautiful charts of the second coming, while the Bride of Christ is feasting with her LORD at “the marriage supper of the Lamb.”
Of Christ it is said, “Therefore God, your God, has anointed you with the oil of gladness above your fellows. All your garments smell of myrrh, aloes, and cassia, out of the ivory palaces” (Ps. 45: 7-8).
The anointing oil confines us to His will. We are not free to use substitute anointings---if we think it will attract more people. We cannot use strange fire like Nadab and Abihu, or like our modern entertainers who use smoke-machines to imitate the glory of God. We cannot offer strange incense in order to get the applause of men.
1 John 4:6: We are of God who knows God hears us; he who is not of God does not hear us. By this we know the spirit of truth and the spirit of error.
Those to whom Isaiah was preaching did not have the indwelling of the Holy Spirit of Truth. But the Lord God of truth sent His son to redeem us from our sin and failures. He gave us the Holy Spirit of truth to lead us into all truth. We have this guarantee that as long as there is a remnant church, “Truth will not fall in the streets.” “Truth will not fail.” No matter how darkness covers the world, the darkness will not cover the Church.
Carolyn Sissom, Pastor
Eastgate Ministries Church, 10115 West Hidden Lakes Lane, Richmond, TX