Global Rain
But it was 7 years after moving to the mountains, that my spiritual career was also jolted. While watching 3ABN during our morning exercise routine up in the mountains, I was captivated by an ad promoting "Operation Global Rain." The program invited all Adventists around the globe to devote the next 10 days to praying for the outpouring of the Holy Spirit just like the disciples did in the upper room before Pentecost. It was timed to end on 3ABN's annual Ten Commandment Weekend, which that year would end on July 7, 2007. Oh, wow! How cool was that! 7,7,7 and it was a Sabbath! I was sure that with a critical mass of Adventists all praying together at the same time during the same 10 days, the world would be shaken to its foundations. Little did I know that I was to be shaken.
Praying for the Spirit After downloading the study guide and group leader directions, I was startled by the suggestion that leaders were to encourage attendees to "pray to the Holy Spirit." I had never heard of anyone doing that; hadn't read anything in the Bible or Spirit of Prophecy to that effect. It jolted me into deciding right then and there to start my own research project. I got our my 9 pound copy of Strongs concordance and started collecting every text that had anything to do with Spirit, Ghost, Holy or otherwise. I organized them into groups: Spirit of God, Spirit of your Father, Spirit of Christ, Spirit of Jesus, Spirit of His Son, Lord is that Spirit, Spirit of Prophecy, Holy Spirit, Holy Ghost, The Spirit, My Spirit... The list was long and quite an eye opener. But it was in reading before and after each finding in the Bible to understand the context, that I discovered the Rosetta Stone of such Spirit things: John 14. For the first time I actually read past the first 3 verses--so well memorized by every Adventist. Oh, I had heard verse 16 and 17 quoted, the promise of another Comforter. But here I was reading verse after verse myself looking for piecing together a trail of verses all dealing with the Spirit. The Spirit of truth was the Comforter. He was not seen by the world because they didn't know Him, but He would be in the disciples. And they knew Him because He dwelled with them. Hmm. Next Jesus says He won't leave them comfortless, He will come to them...and be in them. That rang a bell. "Christ in you the hope of glory." In Colossians 1 I was pretty sure. Yep, verse 27.
I will come to you...We will come and make our abode...
The trail was getting warmer. Then Jesus announced that He would manifest Himself to the disciples. And one of them (another Judas) asked how He was going to do that and not manifest Himself to the world. Ah-Hah! This disciple made the connection between Jesus and the Spirit of truth...Well, of course! Jesus said back in verse 6 He is the truth. So He is referring to some time in the future when He would come to them. "In that day you shall know that I am in the Father, and you in Me, and I in you" verse 20. Pentecost maybe? How would Jesus answer his "how" question? Next verse: "If a man love me, and keep my words, my Father will love him, and WE will come and make our abode with him" verse 23. Jesus didn't actually tell him how. He simply added that it would be He and His Father that would come. Suddenly an avalanch of texts started tumbling into my mind. "...the Spirit of your Father which is in you" Matt 10:20, "...it is not I that live, but Christ liveth in me" Gal 2:20."where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I in the midst of them" Matt 18:20."lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world" Matt 28:20."the second Adam was made a quickening Spirit" 1Cor 15:45."that Christ may dwell in your heart by faith" Eph 3:17."the Spirit of Christ which was in the prophets" 1Peter 1:10,11.
The Spirit is a Person! I was thrilled to realize that the Holy Spirit has a face and a personality that I already knew! Of course "the Holy Spirit is as much a person as God is a person" because Jesus is the express image of His Father's person! This then released a flood of more texts that linked the Father and Son together."You say in your law that the witness of two men is true: I bear witness of myself, and my Father bears witness" John 8:17,18."The Father loves the Son and has given all things into His hand" John 3:35."For the Father loveth the Son" John 5:20"the only begotten Son which is in the bosom of the Father" John 1:18."the Son can do nothing but what he sees the Father do" John 5:19."as the Father raises up the dead and quickens them, even so the Son" John 5:21."all men should honor the Son, even as they honor the Father" John 5:23."For as the Father has life in Himself, so has He given to the Son to have life in himself" John 5:26."We have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous" 1John 2:1."He is antichrist that denieth the Father and the Son" 1John 2:22."If that which ye have heard from the beginning shall remain in you, ye also shall continue in the Son, and in the Father." 1John 2:24."Truly our fellowship is with the Father and with His Son" 1John 1:3.And there are nearly a hundred more!
The Bible became a new book. I was reading it with new eyes, and I hadn't even had cataract surgery yet! As I explored another of John's works, I found even more gems to add to my growing collection. Such as "...the seven Spirits which are before the throne" Rev 1:4. Jesus appears walking among seven golden candlesticks (the seven churches of Asia). And to each one Jesus gives a message, introducing Himself as "He that holds the seven stars", "the First and the Last, which was dead and is alive", "He which has the sharp sword with two edges", "the Son of God", "He that has the seven Spirit of God, and the seven stars". Jesus has the seven Spirits of God. This is shown in chapter 5 where He appears as a Lamb that was slain, "having seven horns and seven eyes which are the seven Spirits sent forth into all the earth." Rev 5:6. If there was any doubt that the Son of God, the Word, the Lamb, was God, it is wiped away as He stands before the throne having all power (omnipotence), and all seeing, all knowing (omniscience), and omnipresence going "into all the earth."
The Spirit is a Person! I was thrilled to realize that the Holy Spirit has a face and a personality that I already knew! Of course "the Holy Spirit is as much a person as God is a person" because Jesus is the express image of His Father's person! This then released a flood of more texts that linked the Father and Son together."You say in your law that the witness of two men is true: I bear witness of myself, and my Father bears witness" John 8:17,18."The Father loves the Son and has given all things into His hand" John 3:35."For the Father loveth the Son" John 5:20"the only begotten Son which is in the bosom of the Father" John 1:18."the Son can do nothing but what he sees the Father do" John 5:19."as the Father raises up the dead and quickens them, even so the Son" John 5:21."all men should honor the Son, even as they honor the Father" John 5:23."For as the Father has life in Himself, so has He given to the Son to have life in himself" John 5:26."We have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous" 1John 2:1."He is antichrist that denieth the Father and the Son" 1John 2:22."If that which ye have heard from the beginning shall remain in you, ye also shall continue in the Son, and in the Father." 1John 2:24."Truly our fellowship is with the Father and with His Son" 1John 1:3.And there are nearly a hundred more!
The Bible became a new book. I was reading it with new eyes, and I hadn't even had cataract surgery yet! As I explored another of John's works, I found even more gems to add to my growing collection. Such as "...the seven Spirits which are before the throne" Rev 1:4. Jesus appears walking among seven golden candlesticks (the seven churches of Asia). And to each one Jesus gives a message, introducing Himself as "He that holds the seven stars", "the First and the Last, which was dead and is alive", "He which has the sharp sword with two edges", "the Son of God", "He that has the seven Spirit of God, and the seven stars". Jesus has the seven Spirits of God. This is shown in chapter 5 where He appears as a Lamb that was slain, "having seven horns and seven eyes which are the seven Spirits sent forth into all the earth." Rev 5:6. If there was any doubt that the Son of God, the Word, the Lamb, was God, it is wiped away as He stands before the throne having all power (omnipotence), and all seeing, all knowing (omniscience), and omnipresence going "into all the earth."
