Life and Health by the Holy Spirit

We've been studying together various ways in which the Holy Spirit, as our indwelling helper or comforter or counselor, gives us supernatural help to lead the kind of Christian life that the New Testament reveals is God's plan for his believing people.

So far, we've looked at the following forms of help we receive from the Holy Spirit. First, he brings us revelation and interpretation of God's word. And that's God's word both written and living, both the Bible and the personal word, the Lord Jesus Christ. Second, through the Holy Spirit, we are lifted onto a supernatural plane of living. The epistle to Hebrews says we've tasted the powers of the age to come.

Thirdly, yesterday, I spoke about supernatural direction and power and ability in prayer, which the Holy Spirit brings to us.

Today, I'm going to explain how the Holy Spirit imparts supernatural life and health to our physical bodies.

We need to understand, first of all, that Jesus came to give us life. Oh, that's such a beautiful realization. This is what Jesus says about his coming and his purpose in John 10 verse 10:

“The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I have come that they may have life and have it to the full.”

You see, we have two persons set before us there. We need to distinguish very clearly between them. There's the life-giver, Jesus, the life-taker, Satan, the devil. The devil only comes into our lives to take life. He comes to steal the blessings, the provisions of God. He comes to kill us physically and destroy us eternally. Every one of us needs to understand that if we permit the devil to have any place in our lives, that's what he's going to do: steal, kill, and destroy to the measure in which we permit him to do it.

On the other hand, Jesus came to do the exact opposite. He came that we might have life and that we might have it to the full or more abundantly. Now, it's very important for us to realize that this life that Jesus came to give us is administered by the Holy Spirit. We only have this life in proportion as we allow the Holy Spirit to do his work in us. If we resist or refuse the work of the Holy Spirit, then we cannot experience the fullness of divine life which Jesus came to bring us.

We need to understand, first of all, that it was the Holy Spirit who raised the dead body of Jesus from the tomb. Paul says this in Romans 1 verse 4 about Jesus. He says,

“through the Spirit of holiness Jesus was declared with power to be the Son of God by his resurrection from the dead.”

The Spirit of holiness is a Greek translation of the Hebrew phrase for the Holy Spirit. It's interesting to me that though Paul was writing Greek, he was thinking in Hebrew.

And so when he says through the Spirit of holiness, it's the same as saying through the Holy Spirit, Jesus was manifested, declared to be the Son of God by the power that raised him from the dead. That's the power of the Holy Spirit.

Then further on in Romans chapter 8 verses 10 and 11, Paul goes on to say the same power that raised the dead body of Jesus from the tomb is also now dwelling in our physical bodies. In my talks last week, I pointed out that in a certain sense, this was the climax of the redemptive process of God in this age, that God himself in the person of the Holy Spirit should indwell our physical bodies and make them his temple, his dwelling place.

And so in Romans 8 verses 10 and 11, Paul says this:

“But if Christ is in you, your body is dead because of sin, yet your spirit is alive because of righteousness.”

When Christ comes in, when we are converted and regenerated, an old life ends, a new life begins. The old carnal life is terminated, and our spirits come alive with the life of God.

Then Paul goes on to say in verse 11 what it means for our physical bodies. And he says this,

“If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit who lives in you.”

It's very clear. The same person, the same power that raised the body of Jesus from the tomb is now dwelling in the body of each yielded believer and is imparting to that mortal body the same kind of life that he imparted to the mortal body of Jesus and raised him with an eternal body.

Now, I want to say very clearly, this process of imparting divine life to our bodies will not be consummated until the general resurrection from the dead. We do not now have resurrection bodies. It's very important that we see that. But what we do have is resurrection life in mortal bodies. And Paul implies, in fact, he goes on to say in various different passages, that resurrection life in our mortal bodies can take care of all the physical needs of our body until the time that God separates spirit from body and calls us home.

You see, it's important to understand how our bodies were formed in the first place, because it all relates together. In Genesis chapter 2 verse 7, we read this:

“The Lord God formed man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath or the spirit of life, and man became a living being or a living soul.”

What was it that produced man's physical body? It was the inbreathed Spirit of God that transformed a form of clay into a living human being with all the miracles and marvels of a functioning human body.

It was the Holy Spirit who originally brought our physical body into being. Logically, he's the one to sustain it. You see, this is so logical if only Christians can see it. Divine healing, divine health are most logical in the light of scripture. For instance, if your watch goes wrong, you don't take your watch to the bootmaker. You take your watch to the watchmaker. Now, apply that. If your body goes wrong, where do you take your body? In my opinion, the logical thing to do is to take it to the body maker, and that is the Holy Spirit.

Here in the United States, we're very familiar with seeing on the chassis or the body of one of the commonest cars in the United States, the little phrase, "Body by Fisher." Well, when I look at a fellow Christian, I say, "Body by the Holy Spirit." That's what gave him his body, that's what sustains his body, that's what gives power to his body.

Listen to Paul's testimony. I'm always impressed by this, what he was able to go through. 2 Corinthians 11:23 through 25:

“I have worked much harder, been in prison more frequently, been flogged more severely, and been exposed to death again and again. Five times I received from the Jews the forty lashes minus one. Three times I was beaten with rods, once I was stoned, three times I was shipwrecked, I spent a night and a day in the open sea.”

It's almost incredible that a man could go through all that and be so active, so healthy, so courageous. What was the power that sustained Paul in all that? The power of the Holy Spirit.