The Holy Spirit: Reproducing Christlike Character

SPEAKER 02 : 0:01

Welcome to the In Touch Podcast with Charles Stanley for Monday, August 25th. Are you frustrated with failed attempts to live like a good Christian? Our series continues with a reminder that your ability to live a faithful life comes only through the power of the Holy Spirit.

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What is it in your life that separates you from the unbeliever? What is it about your lifestyle that makes you very evidently different from the average person. Is there anything about you that makes you different? Or are you one of those who just sort of fits in with the world, runs with a crowd, does what the other folks do, because you do not want to be isolated and pointed out as one of those Christians. Well, God has a great deal to say about all of this, very important to him, because he says so much about it. And the title of this message is The Holy Spirit Reproducing Christlike Character. And I want you to turn to John chapter 15, if you will. And in this passage, it’ll be very evident that fruit… is very, very important to our Lord Jesus Christ because of what he says. He says, I am the true vine and my father is the vineyard dresser or the vine dresser. Every branch in me that does not bear fruit, he takes away. And every branch that bears fruit, he prunes it that it may bear more fruit. You’re already clean because of the word which I’ve spoken to you. Abide in me and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself unless it abides in the vine, so neither can you unless you abide in me. I am the vine, you are the branches. He who abides in me and I in him, he bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing. If anyone does not abide in me, he is thrown away as a branch and dries up. And they gather them and cast them into the fire and they’re burned. If you abide in me and my words abide in you, ask whatever you wish and it shall be done for you. By this is my Father glorified that you bear much fruit and so prove to be my disciples. Now you recall that Jesus spoke these words the night before his crucifixion and he was very intent on reminding them of some very important things. One of which would be that he was going to send the Holy Spirit who would be the helper. That’s how he identified the Holy Spirit. He says, I’m going to send you one who will be your helper. He’ll be in you, with you, and upon you to equip you and enable you to do and to be, to remember, to recall, and to live. Apart from the work of the Holy Spirit in our life, we cannot live the life that God has called us to live, neither can we do the work that God has called us to do with any effectiveness whatsoever. Look, if you will, back in John chapter 16 for a moment. You remember what he said in this passage when he was talking to them before he left? He said, in verse 7, “‘I tell you the truth, it is to your advantage that I go away.'” It’s essential that I go expedient to your advantage. He says, first of all, if I don’t go away, the helper that is the Holy Spirit will not come to you. But if I go, I will send him to you. And he knew that it was absolutely essential to the life he called us to live, to the work he’s called us to do, that the Holy Spirit come. But the second reason it was essential for him to go, that he didn’t mention at this particular point, was… It was essential that he be crucified and go to the Father because without the crucifixion and the ascension before the Father, there would be no redemption. So it was essential that he leave them, first of all, to be crucified for the forgiveness of our sins. Secondly, that the Holy Spirit would come and then living on the inside of us, enable us to be and to do what God Almighty has called us to do. Jesus says, I’m the vine, you’re the branch. Remember that Paul says that Christ is our life? When you take a branch and you graft it onto a vine and the graft takes, the sap that runs in the vine runs in the branch, producing the stem and the grapes. So what you have is one life, the life in the vine. is now the life of the branch. And the sap that runs in the vine is now running in the branch. And the sap that runs in the vine now running in the branch is now producing fruit. Beautiful, luscious, delightful, appealing, attractive grapes. Big, juicy grapes. Why? Because there is a beautiful relationship between the branch and the vine. And the sap that’s flowing in the vine is now flowing in the branch, producing the grapes. Now, Jesus said, if you took this branch away from the vine… What do you have? You have death. Because what you have now is a branch disconnected from life. And therefore there’s not going to be any production of grapes. And the leaves are going to wither and the branch is going to die. But he says, you and I, having trusted Jesus Christ as our Savior, God the Father placed us into a spiritual relationship with Jesus Christ which is eternal and forever. That is, we are eternally secure. And what makes this secure is this, that the Holy Spirit is now living within us, and so that the life of Christ is our life, we have been sealed by the very life of the Lord Jesus Christ through the Holy Spirit. We have the life of Jesus Christ within us. Notice what Jesus says in this passage in verse 4 and 5. He says, verse 4, “…abide in me, and I in you, as the branch cannot bear fruit of itself.” Unless it abides in the vine, so neither can you unless you abide in me. I am the vine, you are the branches. He who abides in me and I in him, he bears much fruit. For apart from me, you can do nothing. So that Jesus Christ is living within us and the Bible says that we’re living in him. And the result of that is fruitfulness. It is the work of the Lord Jesus Christ within us. God knows that you and I will never be able to express the life of Christ out of our resources. He knows the Holy Spirit will express them through us out of His resource. What’s that? Christ. It is His life, not our life. And you’ll notice there are two verses here that probably have bothered some people. Verse 2. You notice he says, Every branch in me that does not bear fruit he takes away. Well, that could mean one of two things. If that branch were laying on the ground and not producing properly, he may lift it. That’s one interpretation of takeaway. Or if a person who is a believer is not bearing any fruit and finds themselves more into the works of the flesh and hurts and hinders their testimony to the degree, and only God knows what that degree is, God may take them off the scene. There is a sin unto death. And so you can’t be dogmatic about which one of those interpretations in that verse he means, but either one of them could be true. But look in verse six now. He says, if anyone does not abide in me, he is thrown away as a branch, dries up, they gather them and cast them into the fire and they are burned. That’s pretty strong language. He says, if anyone does not abide in me, so what happens? Again, I want to go back to explain this. There are many people who go to church who look like they’re in the vine. There are many people who do many good things and who profess to be in the vine, in Christ. And so they look like it, but look at their life and you don’t see the fruit. You see, the truth is the unbelieving world has a legitimate right to look at your life and my life and see some evidence of Galatians 5.22. And that is, but the fruit of the Spirit is because we are in a union with Christ, whereby the Holy Spirit’s primary responsibility in that union is to produce through us the character of the life of Christ. They have a right to expect it. No matter how wicked and vile they may be, it is not our responsibility to blare back at the unbeliever and say, yeah, but no. Look who we are, followers of Jesus Christ, filled with the Holy Spirit, relying upon Him, and the fruit of the Spirit in the life of the believer is love, joy, peace, and all the rest. Now, so he says, some look like they’re in, but they’re not. So let me ask you a question. You look at those verses and you say, I don’t see that in my life. I don’t seem to have peace with God, peace with me, or peace with anyone. I have a difficult time loving me or anyone else. I really can’t say that I have a lot of joy. I smile sometimes, but no real joy. I have to work at trying to be kind and thoughtful. It’s very difficult for me to get my emotions under control. And your very lifestyle… is selfish, self-centered. You can’t look back at a single time in your life where you asked the Lord Jesus Christ to forgive you of your sins. And here you are trying to be good, trying to do good. And my friend, I don’t doubt your sincerity. And God doesn’t either, but it won’t work. You see, until you come out of death into life, it’ll not be there. Now, you may be able to, for momentary times, see some evidence of this in your life, but it’s not there. Because you see, it all begins with the relationship to Jesus Christ. That’s where it begins. Now, let’s say that you are a believer, and yet the fruit’s far from being what it ought to be. You say, one of the reasons that sometimes I’m unkind and a little thoughtless is because my situation, my circumstances are so difficult for me right now. Well, I want to show you something very important in this passage. You see, God isn’t interested in my comfort, ease, and pleasure. He’s interested in fruit. Christ-like character. So what does He do? Go back to verse 2. He says, every branch in me that does not bear fruit, he takes away. And every branch that bears fruit, listen to this. There’s evidence of joy and peace and love and goodness and gentleness and kindness and self-control. All of this is evident in your life. He says, every branch that bears fruit, he prunes it that it may bear more fruit. So, oh. Now I’m understanding. Listen, even the adversity that God allows or sends into our life, even the difficult trying times, hardships, I mean tough times, don’t shun those to say, where is God? Don’t look at that as the saying, well, God, if you loved me, you wouldn’t allow this in my life. Listen, any man who has a vineyard is going to have a pruning knife if he wants fruit. I used to live up in the mountains of North Carolina in a place called Fruitland. And the reason they call it Fruitland was because it was apple country and still is. And I can remember when I first moved up there and I would be visiting some of my members and sometimes the wife would say, well, he’s out in the orchard and he’s pruning the trees. And so I would go out. Then I remember the first time I remember this man’s name. And I remember he was pruning a tree and not knowing any better. I said, man, you’re going to kill that tree. He turned and looked at me. He said, you stick to preaching, I’ll take care of the pruning. And I remember that because I didn’t know anything about pruning and he knew about it. And then, you know, we got to be friends and he began to explain to me. He said, you know, if you’re going to have good fruit and a lot of fruit, you have to prune these trees. And sometimes it looks like you’re going to kill them. Well, I got a lesson out of that that I’ve never forgotten. Sometimes I thought, God, more? Yes, more. And what does he do? He gets the pruning knife out and the sandpaper and the chisel and the hammer. And what does he do? He just goes to work on us. And we think, oh God, if you love me, you wouldn’t allow these things to happen. Yes, he would. You know what he’s doing? Pruning you for the best fruit. Pruning you for more fruit. Pruning us for much fruit. Because he says, that’s what glorifies my father is much fruit. And so one of the primary purposes that you and I go through difficulty and hardship, you know what God’s doing? He’s pruning us. Now listen, if you let a branch just keep on growing and don’t prune it back, all kinds of little shoots grow out that sap or that drain the sap and keep that sap from producing the best fruit and the biggest fruit. He’s not killing the vine. He is removing those things that detour the sap that makes for big, delicious, luscious, appealing, irresistible fruit. That’s what God’s looking for in our life. And so He allows it into our life. Because, you see, He’s not interested in whether we bleed or not. He’s interested in whether we bear fruit or not. And so that’s what He’s saying in this passage. Now, how does that happen in our life? He couldn’t have used a simpler illustration. Here’s what he’s saying. First of all, for me to bear fruit, I must be in the vine. That is an experience whereby I receive the Lord Jesus Christ as my personal Savior. Secondly, I must keep the flow of the Spirit. No quenching, no grieving. That is confession and repentance daily if necessary, whatever is necessary to keep my heart clean before God so that the Spirit of God can flow freely. Thirdly, I must yield myself to the Holy Spirit. What is the whole message on walking in the Spirit or walking by the Spirit, but what? Relying upon the Holy Spirit. That is, relying upon Him to do for me what He knows I cannot do for myself. And friend, there’s not a single one of us who had it within us to live the Christian life. We can’t. We can’t reproduce that kind of character. That is the work of the Holy Spirit within us, living His life, the life of Jesus Christ within us. You remember what the Holy Spirit said? He said, Jesus said about the Holy Spirit, He’ll always point you to me. He only speaks of me. The Holy Spirit is always pointing us to Christ. It is the Spirit in the vine that’s in the branch producing that life. So I must live yielded. It isn’t a passive life. It is a life of continuously making the wise decision at that moment to yield to the Holy Spirit. At that moment, in that circumstance, no matter what’s going on, I choose to yield to the work of the Spirit. You see, he uses the term abiding in him. You know what that means? Just living in him, resting in him, which brings me to the next point, and that is to trust him. Now, I’d like to make this hard if I could, but I can’t. God never intended for it to be. In essence, here’s what he says. The Holy Spirit who’s living within us, in any situation, any circumstance, whether it’s difficulty, trial, heartache, or great joy, something good that comes to you, How are we to respond? We ought to respond by faith in the presence and the power of the Holy Spirit to respond through us What? The life of Christ, how He would respond. That’s what it’s all about. It’s appropriating the life of Christ that is within me. By the power of the Holy Spirit, that the Holy Spirit may express through me the life of Christ. For example, somebody comes up to you tomorrow, and I mean, they just let you have it, and they blast you away. You know that you’re not guilty of what they’re accusing you of, and besides that, they’re embarrassing you in front of four or five of your other fellow employees. They’re really letting you have it. Well, how are you going to respond? By faith, you just simply say, Lord Jesus, I want you to express your life through me by the power of the Holy Spirit in response to this. Lord Jesus, I want you to express your life through me by the power of the Holy Spirit in response to this. You say, oh, that doesn’t work. Yes, it does. It is the fruit of the Spirit, the supernatural person of the Trinity living within us. And you know what will happen? You will find yourself at peace, responding to circumstances the way you’ve not responded before. Not because you’re stronger than you’ve ever been before, but because, listen, you’ve chosen to trust and to rely upon the Holy Spirit who’s living within you to do the very thing He came to do. What? To live the life of Christ through us. And so when they finish blasting you away, here’s what’ll happen. The Holy Spirit will enable you to love them through you. You’ll be able to love them because you understand they don’t know what they’re talking about. Secondly, your joy isn’t based on how they treat you, but in who you are in Christ. Your peace isn’t wrapped up in your circumstances, but because Jesus said He’d be your peace. And so you can be kind, and the word gentle there, a better word is humility. You can respond in a humble spirit. You can be good in return. And instead of letting your feelings just fly all over the place, they’ll be kept in submission, self-control, and faithfully, you can go about what God’s called you to do, and they’ll be scratching their head. Why didn’t he respond back? Let me tell you something. There’s one thing the world can’t handle. You know what it is? genuine unadulterated spotless love they cannot handle it they don’t know what to do with it because you see the holy spirit is exercising patience for you which is the ability to endure hardship now you say well how do i know that works you’ll never know it till you try it you’ll never know it till you try it well let me ask you a question If that’s not the way to do it, how do you do it? In your own strength and beginning with me, what miserable failures we’ve all been. Amen? But he says, but the fruit of the Spirit is, it’s the work of the Spirit to do in you what you cannot do for yourself. So I want to ask you a question. Now, if one of your friends who is an unbeliever were talking to another one of their friends. And they said to your friend, show me a real Christian. Will your unbelieving friend be able to point to you and say, there’s one. Without fear of embarrassment or contradiction. You see, Jesus isn’t nearly as interested in all the things that you and I do as he is interested in the fact that the Holy Spirit is reproducing moment by moment, day by day, in and through our life, the very qualities that describe the Savior. Love, joy, peace, gentleness, kindness, goodness, self-control, patience, faithfulness. That’s what Jesus is looking for. And you know what? When he finds that, everything else gets taken care of.

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Thank you for listening to The Holy Spirit, Reproducing Christlike Character. If you’d like to know more about Charles Stanley or InTouch Ministries, stop by InTouch.org. This podcast is a presentation of InTouch Ministries, Atlanta, Georgia.