Holy Spirit

( 10th February 2024 )

Continuing with Imageries of the Holy Spirit
Imagery: Dove
■ Luke 3: 22
and the Holy Spirit descended upon him in bodily form, like a dove, and a voice came from heaven, “Thou art my beloved Son; with thee I am well pleased.”
●In the Old Testament , the dove was used for sacrifice ,especially when the person could not afford to buy and offer the bigger ,costlier animals like bulls and calves .
●The Imagery dove speaks about the nature of the Holy Spirit.
●The Holy Spirit is loving , peaceful , innocent , harmless , pure , graceful , honest , and sacrificial
■Luke 3:21-22

●Mathew 3:16

●The dove alights or rested on Jesus Christ .
■In Genisis Chapter 6 onwards, we read about the great flood that God sent to earth
■Genisis Chapter 8:8
Then he sent out a dove to see if the water had receded from the surface of the ground. 9 But the dove could find nowhere to perch because there was water over all the surface of the earth; so it returned to Noah in the ark. He reached out his hand and took the dove and brought it back to himself in the ark.
●Noah sent out a dove to see if the water had receded from the face of the earth
●The dove found no resting place
■Mathew 3:16

●There is a spiritual explanation to both the above verses
●God was looking for a perfect man so that the dove could rest on him .
●The Holy Spirit found a perfect man when He sees Jesus and decides to rest on Him.
●So the dove decends and rested on Jesus
●This, in fact, demonstrates the Heavenly Father’s divine approval of the Son’s mission on this earth 🌎
●The Son was sent by the Father , and after the Son had lived on this earth for 30 years ,after which the Father’s approval of Jesus Christ’s perfectness came when the dove descended on Jesus.
●When the Holy Spirit descended on Jesus ,the voice came from heaven saying:
” This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased .
●Now the Holy Spirit decends on us .
●This happens just because of Jesus Christ.
●Old Testament believers never had the indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit.
●But New Testament believers can experience the indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit.
●This is not because of our perfection but because of the obedience of Jesus Christ
●From Genisis to Malachi , from the time of the Great flood to the end of the Old Testament time ,the dove was searching for a perfect man .
●In the Gospel of Mathew, we find that the dove finds a perfect place to land, Jesus !
■Characteristics of a dove
● Psalms 55:6
So I said, “Oh, that I had wings like a dove!
I would fly away and be at…
●The dove always flies swift and straight
●When you receive the Holy Spirit, you too will show similar characteristics
●You will become a person with no crookedness . You will act according to your own words without any deceit
■Psalms 68:13
You will be like the wings of a dove covered with silver,
And her feathers with yellow gold
●When the Holy Spirit moves in your life, things will become beautiful*
●Nothing will remain broken
●Many people in this world are spiritually broken, mentally broken. They never find time to mend their broken state and over time get used to their broken state
●But things become beautiful when the Holy Spirit comes
■A good example of this is seen in many advanced foreign countries which were once established on Godly and Biblical principles
●In such nations we notice beauty and order everywhere.
●On the contrary in other nations we find confusion everywhere, confusion in handling traffic , confusion in the way their buildings are constructed
●There is disorder everywhere and we find no beauty anywhere
● When the Holy Spirit comes into your life , there will be beauty in your character
●Another character of the Holy Spirit is constant in love
●The dove always has just one partner for life , like other birds it never has multiple mating partners

■Isaiah 59:11
We all growl like bears, And moan sadly like doves ;
●Another feature of the dove is its moanful nature
● If you have the Holy Spirit you will be moanful in prayer
Or in other words you will have wet eyes .
■Mathew 10:16
“I am sending you out like sheep with wolves all around you. Be wise like snakes and gentle like doves.
●Another nature of the dove is that its *gentleness *
Having the Holy Spirit will bring this gentleness into our character
■The next character of the dove is that it is particular in food and won’t eat anything unclean even if it’s hungry
■So the Holy Spirit does many things for us

1. He brings peace to our souls .
2. He comes quietly and refreshes us.
   3.He establishes a personal relationship with us.
   4.He produces
   gentleness within us , we no more have a harsh and critical spirit when the Holy Spirit is in us
3. He leads us towards honesty, purity and a harmless nature
   ●If anyone does something evil towards us ,we are not called to recomensate with evil
   ●Try always to defeat evil with good
   ●Don’t harm anyone
   6.He brings God’s divine approval that we are indeed children of God
4. He leads us towards a beautiful, grace filled ,Christian life !