May 24, 2026 | Who is The Holy Spirit?

This is the holy gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ according to Mark.

Glory to you, Lord Christ.

And he began to speak to them in parables.

A man planted a vineyard and put a fence around it, and dug a pit for the wine press, and built a tower, and leased it to tenants, and went into another country.

When the season came, he sent a servant to the tenants to get from them some of the fruit of the vineyard, and they took him and beat him and sent him away empty-handed.

Again he sent to them another servant, and they struck him on the head and treated him shamefully, and he sent another, and him they killed.

And so with many others, some they beat, and some they killed.

He had still one other, a beloved son.

Finally he sent him to them, saying, They will respect my son.

But those tenants said to one another, This is the heir.

Come, let us kill him, and the inheritance will be ours.

And they took him and killed him and threw him out of the vineyard.

What will the owner of the vineyard do?

He will come and destroy the tenants and give the vineyards to others.

Have you not read the scripture?

The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone.

This was the Lord's doing, and it is marvelous in our eyes.

And they were seeking to arrest him, but feared the people, for they perceived that he had told the parable against them.

So they left him and went away.

This is the gospel of the Lord.

Praise to you, Lord Christ.

Almighty God, Almighty Father, we thank you for this day that you've given to us.

We thank you for the gift of your Son.

And Lord Jesus, as we gather together here to listen to your word, we are mindful that you have said to us to wait upon you until we receive the promise of the Father to be filled with the person of the Holy Spirit.

And so on this Pentecost celebration today, we wait upon you.

Awaken us, Lord, awaken us, we pray.

Fill us, we pray, that we might be ambassadors of your gospel to the world.

In your name we ask it, and to the honor and the glory of our Father in heaven.

Amen.

Good morning.

There is a moment in Peter's Pentecost sermon where suddenly we see a scene in heaven.

It's been a long and awaited scene.

Down through the halls, the corridors of the Old Testament, there is a promise given to us that a Savior is going to come.

A Savior is going to come and deal with this broken relationship between us and God.

He's going to rescue us from our sins.

He's going to deal with the power of sin over our lives.

He's going to deal with the issue of death.

And when he is done, he is going to be exalted, and he is going to send forth the promise of the Father, the person of the Holy Spirit to fill the church.

That scene is painted.

You hear it in the sound of Joel, for example, the prophet, there's a coming a day when I will pour out my spirit on all flesh.

There's a waiting going on in the Gospels in John chapter 7.

John 7 · chapter mention

If you could turn me down a little bit, I would love to be turned down.

There's people here that would like me.

In John chapter 7, Jesus cries out, If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink.

John 7 · chapter mention

Whoever believes in me, as the scripture has said, out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.

Now this he said about the Holy Spirit, whom those who believed in him were to receive, for as yet the Spirit had not been given, because Jesus was not yet glorified.

He would take the great work of what Jesus would do upon the cross, upon the great work of rising upon the third day, of his ascension to the Father, literally to the glories of heaven, the great day of coronation, the ascension itself.

And then Peter says in Acts chapter 2 and verse 33, this event happens.

Acts 2 · chapter mention

It says, This having been exalted to the right hand of God, and having received from the Father the promise of the Holy Spirit, he is now sent forth that which you are seeing and hearing.

In this moment, the Father gives him the gift of the person of God the Holy Spirit to the Lord Jesus, now glorified, and the church gathers on Pentecost Day, and the Holy Spirit comes upon the church in glory and in power.

That is Pentecost.

And during the days of our Lord Jesus, before he ascended, he prepared his disciples.

He said that he was going to ask us to wait in the city.

Wait.

I'm going to send the promise of the Father.

Wait.

Stay in the city until you're clothed with power from on high.

Same thing.

This this stay in Jerusalem.

Wait for the promise of the Father.

For as John baptized with water, so you shall be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now.

There is this command by the Lord to wait upon the Lord because the promise of the Father, the person of the Holy Spirit, is about to come upon the church.

And as T read, it is full of promise.

You shall receive power, Acts 1.8 says, when the Holy Spirit comes upon you, you shall receive power.

Why would we need this power?

You shall receive power when the Holy Spirit come upon you, for you shall be my witnesses to the ends of the earth, to Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and to all the remotest parts of the earth.

Even Greenville.

Listen to that.

Absolutely.

This is the promise.

He's calling us with a purpose.

Each one of us has a purpose, and that purpose is to be his witnesses.

He's calling us to be his witnesses.

Now, most times we think about that as proclamation, but I want to show you it's it's multiple, it's it's a multiple idea of witness here.

But that's what he's calling.

You've got a purpose, you've got a plan.

This is why when Pentecost Day happens, the Holy Spirit falls upon all of us.

The young, the old, the male, the female, the educated, the uneducated, every one of us.

He's calling every one of us who belong to him to be his witnesses.

We've got a purpose for as long as we have breath to testify of the glory and the wonder of the Lord Jesus Christ.

And that happened.

I don't know if you understand what, I mean, the joy of this moment that happened on Pentecost Day.

This is the love of God poured into the hearts of the people.

This is as if heaven itself became alive.

And suddenly you realize it's not just about the present time.

Heaven became alive.

The angels, the archangels, it's like you see this glimpse that we're not just meant for this life, we're meant for the life to come, the kingdom of God to come.

There is a life that is past this grave, where we shall be with the Lord forever.

This is why he promised the thief on the cross.

Today you shall be with me in paradise.

Oh, these people of Pentecost suddenly realized eternity is real, and we've got a message to bring.

We've got to tell people about Jesus for as long as we have breath.

Absolutely.

And when I was in college, I've got to tell you something.

There was a group of Christians that gathered together, and the spirits of God came upon us, and it was like, it was like, it was just like that.

I knew from that day on I wanted to do nothing else but tell people about Jesus, this new birth that comes in Christ, that we can be changed.

We don't have to be saddled, saddled down by the by the sins and the corruptions of this world.

And so what happened to Barnum?

Yes, little me, you know what I did?

I went back to the church, the Episcopal church from where I came.

I wanted them to tell them, I get it now.

I know what it's like to be born again in Christ, and I know this great gift of the Holy Spirit.

What is going on with him?

They labeled me an enthusiast.

They told me not to go into the ordination process and I needed to calm down.

And then the bishop sent me to the most progressive liberal school to broaden me.

But inside, inside, inside, I couldn't wait.

That poor seminary, I couldn't stop.

Because Jesus is alive, because he's called us to bear witness of him.

And so then I went to my evangelical friends.

My evangelical, I meet with pastors all the time.

And it's like the language of the Holy Spirit is gone from them.

It's like we're all deathly afraid to speak about the person of the Holy Spirit.

In some sections of the church, my my wife used to say this all the time.

In the section she grew up, I will not mention the denomination.

Very carefully.

We believe in God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Scripture.

We don't want to deal with him.

And I find this in my ministry to pastors because I keep referring, he is the power and the strength to be able to deal with you being a pastor proclaiming Jesus to people.

But we don't want to talk about him.

And so a friend sent me one of his sermons on the Holy Spirit.

He said, I want you to hear, I'm preaching about the Holy Spirit of God.

And I listened to it.

And he did a beautiful job because, in one sense, what he did is do the job that needed to be done.

And that is this is that what happens at Pentecost is the setting aside of the church for mission.

What happened on Easter night is the power of new birth.

Two very different conversations.

It is at the cross of Calvary that the church of the Lord Jesus Christ is born.

It is at the cross of Calvary that we hear on Easter night the Lord Jesus saying, Receive the Holy Spirit, be born again in Christ.

That's the key of being born again, new life coming inside of us because of what Jesus did upon Calvary's Hill.

And that's why he said, You must be born again to receive and see and enter the kingdom of God.

And so Jesus talks about him.

He will guide you into all the truth.

He will convict us of sin.

He will teach us everything that Jesus has said to us.

He will bring us wisdom.

And this, what this pastor did is show us all of the things that the Holy Spirit will do for our lives.

I call this the gospel inversion.

And I hear it everywhere, especially in this affluent culture.

It's like the preachers are getting up and changing the nature of the gospel.

It becomes me-centered.

Me-centered.

It's what the Holy Spirit can do for me.

It's what the Lord can do for me.

It's all about me feeling good.

It's all about me getting my life straight.

It's all about me dealing with broken relationships.

It's all about me dealing with the issues I have in life.

It's all about me dealing with health issues and problems.

He's here to help me.

And this is what I call a gospel inversion.

Because it's like we take him and put him in a trophy case and say, we expect you to do this.

Does that make sense to you?

I had a pastor, I was walking alongside not long ago.

And he and he just was dealing with such a hard issue in his own life.

He said, You know, all my days, I've always felt like a person put in a trophy case.

I was like the trophy child.

I was the firstborn.

I could do no wrong.

I had the reputation of being polite and kind and and and I excelled in everything.

And my mom and dad always looked at me as the trophy child.

And then I went to school and I excelled in school and I excelled in sports and I excelled in all kinds of things.

And people saw my reputation and what I could do for them.

And it's kind of like I was by my own classmates put in a trophy case because this is who he is.

It's a label.

And then I went through seminary, he said that I became a pastor, and that everybody sees me as the gifted pastor.

I'm just back in the trophy case all my days of what people expect me to do for them.

And he said that nobody really knows me.

Nobody talks, nobody asks me about me, who I am.

They never say, What's going on with you?

What do you he said?

Nobody knows me.

I wonder if you've ever felt like a trophy person.

Sometimes that's the way we treat our children.

Sometimes that's the way we treat our spouses.

Always what they do to perform for us, but never knowing them and asking about them.

And just as he was speaking, I saw it.

This is what we've done as a church.

We have put the Holy Spirit in a trophy case.

Oh, we'll speak about him.

Every good church, liturgically minded that says the Nicene Creed, we always mention the Holy Spirit.

We believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life, who proceeds from the Father, who through the Father and the Son is worshipped and glorified.

But who is he?

Who is he?

Is it really about what he does for you, or is it really you wanting to actually know and give yourself to what he wants, not what you want, what he wants.

And so I'm gonna take you for the remainder of this hour of a time for preaching to 2 Corinthians chapter 3, the passage that we had read today.

2 Corinthians 3 · chapter mention

This passage is so important because in this passage we see his heart.

And what I love about it is it starts out with this image of the veil.

Behind the veil in the temple is the glory.

Here in this passage, behind the veil is the word of God, and it's like we're our minds are hardened, and the veil lies over our heart, and we cannot see.

And I see that in so many of the churches.

There are too many churches that do not have converted pastors in their pulpit, and they should be done with.

What we need in our pulpit are people who actually testify of knowing Jesus.

Is that not right?

Having the new birth in Christ, not just giving us religious services, but at the same time, we need the ability to come to know this person.

And what's being said here is as we turn to the Lord, that veil is removed.

It's said actually twice in verse 14, their minds were hardened.

To this day, when they read the old covenant, the same veil remains unlifted, because only through Christ is it taken away.

Yes, today, whenever Moses is read, whenever the word of God is preached, a veil lies over the heart.

But when one turns to the Lord, that veil is removed.

And I love the imagery of it, because what happened on Calvary's Hill?

That veil was torn from top to bottom.

And we had not only access into the glory, but look at this.

We actually get to behold the Lord in his beauty.

And that's what this says.

It says this in the last two verses of 2 Corinthians chapter 3.

2 Corinthians 3 · chapter mention

Now the Lord is the Spirit.

And that's the clearest statement that we're dealing with we're dealing with the Holy Spirit, who is the third member of the Holy Trinity.

God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit.

We're dealing with the person of God.

When Jesus said, I am going to ask the Father, he will send you another counselor, another advocate, another helper to be with you forever, whom the world cannot see, the world does not know, but you will know.

For he not only dwells with you, but he will be in you.

This, this, this one that we're dealing with, this Lord, this God, this giver of life, this helper that comes alongside, he is God.

Now the Lord is the Spirit, where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.

And I want you to see his heart today.

I want you to see what he does in verse 18.

Is he literally his job is to lead us to Jesus.

Look at the way the text reads.

We all with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord.

That's what he does.

And Jesus said that in John chapter 16, verse 14.

John 16:14

You want to know about the Holy Spirit?

He shall glorify me.

He will take what is mine and he'll declare it to you.

He has a passion, not just to come and bless you, and he does.

He has a passion to lead you to Jesus.

That's what he does.

To lead us to behold Jesus, to give us a love for Jesus, to give us a relationship with Jesus.

So that you can almost hear the sound of Paul echoing whatever this is Philippians chapter 3, verses 7 and 8.

Philippians 3:7

Whatever was to my prophet, I now consider loss.

Loss for the sake of knowing Christ.

The surpassing worth of knowing Jesus Christ.

And that's what the Holy Spirit does in all things, that's what he does.

And when he leads us to Jesus, we are changed.

It is by beholding him that we are made different.

So look how the text reads that.

So now in the new creation, he's doing that same work inside of us.

He's growing inside of us his character, inside of us.

And that's why you've got all kinds of statements of the scripture.

Put on compassion.

Paul hollers in Colossians 3 put on compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, patience.

Can you do that?

Can you be compassionate?

Can you be kind?

Can you be humble?

Can you be gentle?

Can you be patient?

No, no, but the one who is coming is going to do a work inside of you.

His character coming into us.

He is compassionate.

He'll build compassion inside of us.

He is kind.

He'll build kindness inside of us.

He is gentle.

He'll build gentleness inside of us.

Because he's changing us from one degree of glory to another.

This comes from the Lord who is the Spirit.

This is why I do my job.

This is why I pastor pastors.

My job is to do and ask the Holy Spirit to empower me to help people see Jesus because it's in coming to Him that we're going to understand what it's like to live this world, to find the wisdom that we need, to do the life that we need, to answer the questions that we have, to be the church that we're supposed to be.

And that's why I say to you what my wife always said about this.

You want to talk about being a witness in the power of the Holy Spirit?

She would say the strongest witness to a dying world is a transformed life.

Aren't you just sick of preachers who are preaching but they're not living the life?

Aren't you just sick of Christians who've got lots to say, but their lives are not being lived in a way that's honoring to the Lord?

Friends, this is the pulse beat.

Philippians chapter 1, verse 27.

Philippians 1:27

Let your manner of life be worthy of the gospel of Christ.

It's how we do relationships, it's how we do life.

Are we the aroma of Jesus one to another?

And that's the beauty of it.

I want him to change me so that I might bear witness of him everywhere I go, not just by my words, but my being.

And so we have a choice.

Choice.

Is it about an inverted gospel?

It's about what you do for me.

And when you don't do for me, I am so upset with you.

You need to get back to what you're supposed to do and to bless me.

It's in the Bible.

Somewhere.

That's the inverted gospel.

Do you know what the real gospel is?

It's found in the person of Jesus' mother Mary.

She was told that the Holy Spirit will come upon you.

The power of the Most High will overshadow you.

Therefore, the child to be born to you will be called holy, the Son of God.

Oh, I doubt she understood what that meant.

We're still trying to figure out what that meant.

All she said was, Behold, the bondservant of the Lord, be it unto me, according to your word.

That's the gospel.

It's submission to him and being obedient to what he's called us to do in the power and grace of the Holy Spirit.

It's that posture.

And that's why I would say to us as a St.

Paul's family, there have been three things that have governed us as a family these 14 years, plus utero, 14 years and nine months.

We have believed in the Lordship of Jesus Christ over this church.

Have we not?

We have committed to love one another as He has loved us, have we not?

And the third thing is we've committed in submission and obedience to follow the pillar of cloud by day and the pillar of fire by night.

Now, if you don't know your scriptures, you'll that comes from the Old Testament.

Let me summarize, it means we're going to follow the lead of the Holy Spirit.

In the wilderness, step by step, play by play.

That's what happened.

They followed the cloud by day, the pillar of fire by night.

Read the end of Numbers chapter 9, and you'll find when the Holy Spirit moved off the tent of meeting, everybody packed up, ready to go.

Numbers 9 · chapter mention

And then off the Holy Spirit went, they would go.

The cloud by day, the pillar of fire, and then he'd stop.

Everybody would set up tent.

And when he got up, we got up.

When he went down, we got down.

That was the that was what happened in the wilderness.

And St.

Paul's was built on this principle.

There was no way on in heavens or earth, if you knew T and Libby like I knew T and Libby, there's no way they were leaving Polly's island.

I'm telling you right now, Spirit of God lifted up and moved to Greenville, and they went.

Everything the leadership and the vestry has done, not perfectly.

They're not trying to lift us all up, but the design, the heart desire in every decision of the vestry and of the leaders of this church and the staff of this church is to follow the pillar of cloud by day and the pillar of fire.

Am I right?

See that?

Get the Pentecostal going here.

See that the thing, the thing about this is that I'm gonna tell you something.

We don't want that.

We want to be in control of our lives.

We don't want someone else in control of our lives.

I'd rather have the inverted gospel because it's more comfortable.

But you want to talk about obedience to the Holy Spirit, obedience to the Lord, submitting to the Lordship of Jesus, and moving out as He's instructing us by the Holy Spirit, it gets scary.

And that's why I had, I'm I Cindy was so kind.

She didn't tell me why this gospel text was read on Pentecost.

This gospel text is never read on Pentecost.

But I'm gonna tell you the pattern, the pattern behind this.

Is the pattern is we want to live our own lives and we want God on our terms.

And so the church dies, the people of God die.

Because he doesn't stay with us if we don't stay with him.

He removes himself as we remove ourselves from him.

And so what does he do?

This is the pattern right from the beginning.

He sends prophets, he sends messengers, he sends teachers to bring us back to him in relationship with him to awaken the church.

And what do we do?

That's what the parable of the tenants is all about.

What do we do with the prophets?

What do we do with the scribes?

What do we do with the people coming to bring the word of God to us?

What do we do with them?

Kill, beat, toss out.

And then the Lord thunders.

Mark chapter 12, verse 6.

Mark 12:6

I love the thunder of this voice.

They will respect my son.

I will send my son.

They will respect him.

Did we?

We want the Lord on our terms.

And so I tell you, I'm going to take that parable and advance it now to say this.

We shall send the Holy Spirit.

They will respect him.

Have we?

Respected him.

The New Testament pleads, please do not grieve the Holy Spirit.

Please do not quench the Holy Spirit.

Please do not resist the Holy Spirit.

Please do not insult the Holy Spirit.

Please do not blaspheme the Holy Spirit.

And yet, because we want to live our lives our way, we don't want to follow the cloud by day and the pillar of fire by night.

We want things done the way we want it to be done.

And you need to get on our schedule rather than the humility of submission.

I want you to be Lord of my life.

I want to be born again in Christ.

I want to live my life not for the things of the flesh and the pleasures of this world.

I want to live for you, all of me.

I want to submit myself to you completely.

Just like Mary said.

And so last fall, the cloud began to rise.

And T and Libby and the leaders and people, it's time to go, isn't it?

And following the pillar of cloud, the pillar of fire, he announced in December, it's time to go.

And so these past months, the search team and the vestry have met together and they're operating on the same principle.

Same principle, same principle.

We're not in control.

We want the pastor you want.

We're following the pillar of cloud, pillar of fire.

We're not going to move out of the unity of the Holy Spirit because the promise of New Testament is that we seek the face of the Lord, when we come together in prayer, He's going to guide us, He's going to lead us.

And when all is said and done, we're going to be able to say, Acts 15, 28, it seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us that we do this.

There it is.

There's the thunder of St.

Paul's.

We're going to follow Jesus as Lord.

We're going to love one another passionately.

And you know what we're going to do at the end of the day?

We're going to follow that pillar of cloud by day and the pillar of fire by night.

And it's hard to do because what happens is that we fall in love with each other.

I'm telling you, four weeks from, five weeks from the Sunday, when T and Libby take their last, it's going to be hard for us to let them go.

And they're going to go.

They're going to follow the pillar of cloud, the pillar of, don't ask them where are they going.

They're going to follow the pillar of cloud and the pillar of fire by night.

Yes, they are.

Well, that's something that we've seen, witnessed over all these years.

And that's what's going to happen to St.

Paul's.

We're going to follow the Holy Spirit.

That's what we're going to do.

And what's behind us and what's in front of us are one and the same because Jesus Christ is Lord of this church.

That's the promise given.

Why is it, why is it we put him in a trophy case?

Are you living for Jesus with everything you are?

You are you loving each other as he has loved you with everything that you are?

Are you willing to say, Lord, I don't know what you have for me?

My time left here might be short.

I might have a long time, but however long time I have, I just want to be your witness in the way I conduct myself.

And then to tell everybody about you before that day comes.

Have you given your all, submitted your all to Jesus Christ?

Well, we can't know you without receiving the gift.

Lord, speak, your servants are listening.

We submit unto you, Lord, in all humility.

Mold us and shape us to continue, Lord, the work that you've begun, as we submit unto you, all to your glory.

We love you, Lord, because you first loved us.

And we pray in the powerful, life giving name of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

Amen.