Ron Dunn Podcast - The Spirit Of Revelation

Episode Date: November 16, 2022

Ron Dunn continues his sermon series from Ephesians with a message on the Spirit of Revelation

The book of Ephesians, chapter 1, and we're continuing our study in the Holy Spirit's ministry in the life of the believer as taught in the book of Ephesians. A lengthy title, but we're looking really at what the book of Ephesians has to say about the ministry of the Spirit in our lives. And last time we dealt with the feeling of the Holy Spirit, the feeling of the Spirit. We hear the word of truth, and we believe it. And once we believe it, then we are filled with the Holy Spirit of promise. And that sealing of the Holy Spirit comes at the commencement of our salvation for the confirmation of that salvation. The sealing of the Spirit is for the confirmation of our salvation. Now tonight we're going

to look at the illumination of the Holy Spirit and this is for the continuation of our salvation. We're going to begin reading in verse 15 of Ephesians chapter 1 and we will read from the end of the chapter. Verses 15 through 23. Ephesians 1, 15 through 23. Wherefore I also, after I heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus, and love unto all the saints, cease not to give thanks for you, making mention of you in my prayers, that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give unto you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of him, the eyes of your understanding being enlightened, that ye may know what is the hope of his calling, and what the richness of the glory of his inheritance

in the saints, and what is the exceeding greatness of his power to us who believe according to the working of his mighty power, which he wrought in Christ when he raised him from the dead, and set him at his own right hand in the heavenly places, fall above all principality and power and might and dominion in every name that is named, not only in this world, but also in that which is to come, and hath put all things under his feet, and gave him to be head over all things to the church, which is his body, the fullness of him that filleth all in all." Now that is one long sentence as you read through it. And it is a prayer of Paul and a prayer for the spirit of illumination.

The Christian life is dynamic, not static. And when you use the expression, the term Christian life, by the very word life, you are saying that the Christian life and Christianity and being saved is not a static experience, but rather it is a dynamic experience,

an ever-increasing, an ever-enlarging, an ever-increasing and ever-enlarging and ever-expanding experience. Christian life is not a period but rather it's a straight line. It's a tree, not a post. It's something that is alive, something that is growing, something that is bearing fruit.

And the more you study the epistles of Paul, the more you come away with this impression that Paul always intended, expected, and actually commanded that these believers expand in their Christian life and lengthen their course and that their Christian life ought to always be progressing. There is a continuation of the Christian life. It is more than just a step or a stand,. There is a continuation of the Christian life. It is more than just a step or a stand, but it is a walk. It is not simply a crisis experience, but it is a crisis experience that proceeds into a process, a process of life, always increasing, always

heading towards a goal. And Paul always has this in mind as he writes to these believers concerning the increase or the continuation of the Christian life. For instance, in Ephesians here, first of all, he says in verse 15 that he hears of their faith in the Lord Jesus and love unto all the saints, and he thanks God for it. But notice Paul doesn't stop with merely thanking God for the love that they have and thanking God for the salvation that they've experienced but he goes on and prays that even after they have been saved and even in the life of what they have experienced

he prays that they may experience even more in other words Paul is never satisfied with what he finds in the lives of the believers he wants them not to be satisfied but to go on. You find this same truth in the book of Philippians. In Philippians chapter 1, he says in the third verse, I thank my God upon every remembrance of you, always in every prayer of mine for you all, making requests with joy. And so he says, I'm thankful for what God has done in your life. But now look in verse 9, he starts to pray. And this I pray, that your love may abound yet more

and more in knowledge and in all judgment. Paul's not satisfied. Christian life is not static. It is dynamic. If it becomes static, it becomes stagnant. It actually becomes poison and sickly and dies. So Paul says, I thank God for you because of the work that he started in you, but I pray this, that your love may abound more and more and more into all knowledge. You'll find the same thought in the book of Colossians, chapter 1. In the third verse, he says, We give thanks to God and the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, praying always for you, since we heard of your faith in Christ Jesus,

and of the love which you have to all the saints, and for the hope which is laid up for you in heaven. And that's great. Paul says, I thank God for your faith, for your love, for the fact you're going to heaven. But notice in verse 9, For this cause, what cause? Because we have heard of

your salvation. For this cause, since the day we heard it, do not cease to pray for you and to desire that you might be filled with the knowledge of his will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding, that you might walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing, being fruitful in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God. And so these are enough to show us that the Apostle Paul is always anxious that the Christian life progress and increase. Augustine said that when a man says, I have enough, he is lost already. And the moment you stop growing, you start regressing. The moment you stop making headway, you start backsliding. There is no stationary point in the Christian life. You

either go forward or you go backwards. And if you've not made any progress in your Christian life today, then you've lost ground. You never stay where you are. You are not where you are today. You're not today where you were a week ago. You're either farther down the road or you have slipped back. The Christian life is always dynamic, never static, never stationary. And so Paul is saying, as he writes to these Ephesian Christians, now you have been sealed with the Holy Spirit. Now I want that same Holy Spirit to carry you further.

And I want you to receive the Spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of God, the eyes of your heart, not understanding, but it's the eyes of your heart being enlightened that you may know. And then he goes on to describe

what he wants them to know. And so we are going to deal tonight with a very important aspect of our spiritual growth, and that is the spirit of illumination, the spirit of illumination. And let me just make this simple statement. There can be no growth without illumination. There can be no growth without illumination.

Now, there are three ingredients to this book. This book is the record of revelation. It is the record of God's revelation. And there are three ingredients that make up this book. Number one is manifestation. Manifestation is the historical act of God. Manifestation is God revealing himself by what he does or by what he says, primarily by what he does, because he is a God who performs a god who acts for instance creation is a manifestation of god and when god manifested himself in creation he revealed himself as what as a god of power

as a god of order when he destroyed the world with a flood of waters god was acting and god manifested himself now what was god manifesting What did he reveal about himself when he destroyed the old world with the flood of waters? He revealed that he was a God of judgment and a God of holiness. The cross is a manifestation of God. It is God revealing himself by what he does. And what does the cross reveal to us? It reveals to us that God is a God of love

and a God of redemption. And we know what God is like by what he does. And we see him in Jesus and we observe his actions and his attitudes and his reactions in Jesus. And when we see Jesus acting, we know that God is revealing himself in the actions of Jesus Christ. And so, first of all, there is manifestation, the historical act of God, whereby God revealed himself. He came out of the hidden heavens onto the stage of human history and says, this is the kind of God I am. Watch and see what I do, and you'll understand what kind of God I am. All right, the second ingredient is inspiration. Inspiration is the supernatural ability that God gave men to record accurately what they

saw God do. That's inspiration. Inspiration is the supernatural ability that God gave to men so that they could accurately record what they saw God do. And so, when they saw Jesus die on the cross, now they saw God do something. But what was to keep them from misinterpreting the cross, as some teachers have misinterpreted it? One of the great men of our age said that when Jesus died on the cross, he died a disillusioned man.

He died an absolute failure. Now that man looked at the manifestation of God and he interpreted that and he wrote down, but he wrote it down inaccurately. Why? Because he wasn't inspired by the Holy Spirit. And so the Holy Spirit came upon the scripture writers and gave them a supernatural ability to look at what God had done and was doing and to understand that and interpret it and write it down accurately and correctly. And that's why this book is the infallible, inerrant word of God.

That's why it is dependable, because God supernaturally endowed men to write without error or misrepresentation or misunderstanding what they saw God do. Well, that's well and good, but it still leaves you and me in the dark. Because a great many people can pick up this book and they can read it and they come away saying, I do not understand. As Philip asked the Ethiopian, understandest thou what thou readest? He says, how can I except someone shall guide me? And so the third ingredient is illumination. Illumination. Now this is where you and I come in. We don't have any part in manifestation and we don't have any part in manifestation. And we don't have any part in inspiration, but we do have part in illumination.

And there must be illumination. Illumination is that supernatural ability that God gives us to understand the inspired manifestation as we read it. God, as we take up this book and read the inspired manifestation, you know, we can interpret it wrongly and we can read it inaccurately. We're not infallible as we read this book. And so it is necessary that the Holy Spirit

come upon us and illumine our minds and flood the eyes of our heart with light and give us a supernatural ability to understand what we're reading. I've seen this happen over and over again. A man who is unsaved can read this book and he can learn a lot of facts about it, but it never ministers life to him. And he does not comprehend its spiritual truth. But once that man is saved and the Holy Spirit of God comes to indwell him and that Spirit of God then begins to flood his soul with life, he picks up that book again and he reads it. And this time he his soul with light, he picks up that book again and he reads it. And this time he reads it with understanding,

with spiritual intuition, and it ministers life to him. I remember two or three years ago, one of our teenagers that went away to college had been living in rebellion. And one Sunday he got it all together and came and just as best he knew how, committed his life to the Lordship of Jesus. I saw him a week later. I was going into my office. It was on a Sunday morning and he chased me down. He had his Bible in his hand and he was waving it like this, you know,

like some fanatic. And his face was just glowing. And he said, oh, preacher, he said, this week I've had the best time reading this Bible. He said, I never knew there was so much in this book. Now, what happened? There wasn't anything new in that book. Now, he had read that book before. First, he didn't have much of an appetite to read it. And when he did read it, he didn't get much out of it.

What happened? He got his life in such a relationship to the Lord that the Holy Spirit could do his ministry of illumination. And when the Spirit of God took over in that fellow's life and he read this book again, those same old musty dried up passages came alive and ministered life to him. There must be the illumination of the Holy Spirit. Now, I want to say three things about this illumination. Number one, the subject, or rather the source of this illumination, the source of it. And we've just been talking about that. The Holy Spirit is the source of this illumination.

Notice what Paul says in verse 17. He says, I'm praying that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give unto you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of him. Now, you'll notice as you read in your Bibles that the word spirit is not capitalized. Some translations may give you a spirit of revelation or a spirit of wisdom. Now, when the definite article is before the word spirit or the word Holy Spirit, it is referring to the person of the Holy Spirit and is emphasizing the person of the Holy Spirit.

When you find the word spirit or Holy Spirit or God without the definite article, it is referring to the manifestation of that Holy Spirit, or the characteristic of that Holy Spirit, or the bestowal, or the gift of that Holy Spirit. And what Paul is emphasizing here is not that they might receive the person of the Holy Spirit because they already have him. They receive him as salvation. He has just said in verse 13 and 14 that when they believed, that they were sealed with that Holy Spirit of promise.

And so they've already received the Holy Spirit of promise. Paul doesn't need to pray that God will give them the Spirit, but what he is praying for is that that Spirit which they have, who indwells in them as the Father, will give them the manifestation and the bestowal and the spiritual work of that spirit in wisdom and revelation. The source of illumination is the Spirit of God. He is the divine interpreter. He has a copyright on the knowledge of God, and he is the only one who can communicate

from one person to another spiritual truth. In 1 Corinthians 2, the passage that we've read many a time, where he says, The natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness unto him, neither can he understand them. And a few verses preceding Paul says that no man understands the things of a man except the Spirit of that man,

and no man can understand the things of God except the spirit of God and God has not given to us the spirit of this world but he is what he has given to us his spirit and so God has given to us his spirit so that we might know it says the things that are freely given to us of God you see he has not given us the Holy Spirit that we might have He has not given us the Holy Spirit that we might have things. He's given us the Holy Spirit that we might know we have them. And there's a big difference. And that's what revival is. That's what entering into victory is.

It's not getting something you didn't have before. It's knowing something that you didn't know before. Because when I received Jesus Christ, I received all of Him, and I received all of God there was in the person of Jesus Christ, according to Colossians 2, 9, and 10, but I didn't know it. And the Holy Spirit was given so that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God.

The source of all illumination is the Holy Spirit. You say, well, now this means that we don't have to study. What you preached last Sunday night, I can just discard that because you've had some additional light, and now you're saying that you don't have to study. That's not what I'm saying. What I'm saying is that you can study and study and study and study, but unless the Holy Spirit illuminates your heart and mind, you won't get anything out of it except a

few dry facts and doctrines. And the difference between just dry old doctrine and living truth that ministers life to you is the illuminating power of the Holy Spirit. And you see, the Holy Spirit can't illuminate the Word unless you get into the Word. I wonder if there's not some of us walking around and saying, Lord, I wish you'd just illuminate my mind and show me what's in the Word.

And the Lord is trying to say, well, if you'd open the Word, then I could turn the light on. You know, we used to have a little joke, you know, when you were in school that the night before the test you would sleep with the book under your pillow and pray that by osmosis or whatever, the Sandman or whatever it was, would just somehow communicate the words

that are in that book to your mind. And that's where a lot of Christians are. I am becoming more and more burdened and convinced and convicted about this, that the greatest sin of our church and of most churches is our ignorance of the Word of God is our ignorance of the Word of God. Our ignorance of the Word of God.

When I open the book, I pray, as what Paul did, how do you receive this spirit of revelation? Pray. Paul said, I pray that the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ may give you the spirit of wisdom and revelation. And so I pray pray and I say, Father, as I open the book, I'm trusting in your Holy Spirit

to teach me, to illuminate my mind, to enlighten the eyes of my heart that I may know the things that are freely given to me. And as I submit to that Holy Spirit, allow him to have his sway in my life, as I read that book, the light of the Holy Spirit shines on that page and shines into my heart,

and the Holy Spirit begins to communicate to me spiritual truth. That is the reason that you can read the same passage over and over and over again and get something new from it. It is like a well that never runs dry. The source is the Holy Spirit. All right? Second, the subject of this illumination is found also in verse 17. May give unto you the spirit of wisdom and revelation.

Now notice, in the knowledge of him. In the knowledge of him. What is the sphere or the realm, the subject of this illumination? It is the knowledge of God, the knowledge of God. It is essential knowledge. It is essential truth, ultimate truth. In other words, he doesn't illuminate your mind so that you can work math better. Now, I think the Lord can help you do that, but the spiritual illumination is not to reveal to you history or biology or geometry

or trigonometry or Hebrew, which I wish he had have done, or Greek. God deals always with ultimates, with the essential. And the essential truth is the truth of God, the truth about God. And knowing Jesus is essential truth. And the Spirit illuminates our minds to essential truth in the knowledge of Him,

in the knowledge of Him. That is the whole truth, the ultimate, the essential truth. By the way, the test of any doctrine is it always leads to Jesus. If you have a line of teaching, a line of doctrine that is leading you away from Jesus, it's not true because Jesus Christ himself is the truth. And in him, the Bible says, are hidden all the treasures of knowledge and wisdom. And so if you bring a passage of scripture to your interpretation and your interpretation leads you away from Jesus, leads you away from the gospel, leads you away from the person of Jesus Christ, you know that

you are off into error because truth centers in Jesus and every road always leads to Jesus Christ. He is essential truth, essential truth, but this is also experiential truth. The word that the apostle uses here is for know is the word that to know by experience, to know by experience. In other words, he's not speaking here of intellectual knowledge or information, just knowing doctrine, just knowing doctrine. And one of the curses of many evangelical churches is that we're filled up with doctrine. We're filled with doctrine. And we can spot a heretic the moment he opens the Bible. And we would never dream of going to a church that did not believe the book from cover to cover. And we are filled in our minds with doctrine and facts.

But that's not where God wants us to know it, not in our heads but in our hearts. He says the Holy Spirit will enlighten the eyes of your heart. Now, the King James says understanding, but the Greek word is kardia. We get our word cardiac. It's the heart, the heart, the seat of a man's emotions, the seat of his will, the seat of his intellect.

It's not saying that God is just wanting to put facts and information, just going to a study course, memorizing verses. That's not it at all. But the Holy Spirit wants you to have experiential knowledge about God, to experience, to know him personally. And that's the subject of this illumination. And I'll tell you something, when the Holy Spirit begins to enlighten your heart and open your eyes to see the truth of the Word of

God, you're going to come to know God better and better and better. And you know, I find that there are some people, many people, that know God better than I know him. Now, they don't know any more facts about him than I do, because I've been to school. I took systematic theology, and I want you to know I made straight A's in systematic theology. And I tell you that because otherwise you would not believe it. And there are a lot of people that know more facts about God than I know, but that doesn't disturb me, because all I have to do to get more facts about God is just to study a little bit more and a lot more harder. But I tell you what disturbs me is that I know a lot of people who don't know nearly as many facts about God as I know, but they know God better than I know him. They know God better than I know him. It was said of, I believe it was Richard Baxter, a great preacher,

that when he spoke of the other world, he spoke as one who had been there. Experiential knowledge. He not only knew facts about God, but he knew God and experiential knowledge alright now in closing I want us to look at the substance of this illumination

the substance of this illumination in what way does he illuminate us you'll notice in the 17th verse he says that he may give unto you the spirit of wisdom and revelation then verse 18 the spirit of wisdom and revelation. Then verse 18, the eyes of your heart being enlightened.

Wisdom, revelation, that you may know, the eyes of your heart being enlightened, that you may know. And that word know has to do with appreciation. So there are three things, three things that make up the substance of this illumination. Number one is interpretation. Number two is revelation. And number three is appreciation. So there are three things, three things that make up the substance of this illumination. Number one is interpretation. Number two is revelation. And number three is appreciation. All right, let's look at the first one, interpretation, wisdom. That means practical insight. Now, we're going to have to take wisdom and revelation together to understand how they relate to each other. Interpretation and revelation. Now, wisdom and revelation.

How are they related? When the Holy Spirit illuminates us, he gives us wisdom and he gives us revelation. Revelation is what we know. Wisdom is what we do with what we know. With revelation, we possess the truth. With wisdom we practice the truth. Revelation is truth stated. Wisdom is truth related to everyday life. So the wisdom has to do with taking the knowledge that we have of God that has been revealed to us and interpreting that in the light of our daily experience and taking what we know about God and

using this as we move in and out among our daily life. So there is revelation, God giving us facts about himself, truth about himself, wisdom, that truth expressed and practiced in a very practical way. Now, as I was studying this, I thought to myself, as I have often done in various passages, that this is written wrong. The chronology is wrong, and that order needs to be reversed. It ought to be that he may give you the spirit of revelation and wisdom because you can't practice truth until you possess the truth. You can't relate the truth until you have that truth stated to you. And so it seems that he would say, first there is revelation, then there is interpretation. Isn't that right? I mean, I'm interpreting the night. Why? Because it's been revealed. First revelation,

then interpretation. How can you practice what you do not possess? Revelation is what you know, and wisdom is what you do with what you know. How can I do something with what I know if I don't know it yet? But the order is all right. It is divine. It is inspired. Revelation, rather wisdom than revelation.

You see, the condition of revelation is wisdom. The condition of possessing truth is practicing truth. Now, Paul is praying that they will increase in the knowledge of God. They already have revelation to a certain extent. God has already disclosed himself to them. That's what the first 13, 14 verses are all about, the revelation of God. Now he's saying, I am praying that God will give you the spirit of wisdom, of practical insight, of interpretation, so you can take what you already know about God and translate that into your daily life,

squeeze it into shoe leather, and practice it and relate it to your daily life, and then he will give you more truth to translate and interpret. And that is the divine order. That is the divine condition. First of all, I have revelation received in salvation. The moment I was saved, God showed me some things I'd never seen before, disclosed to me some truths I had never known before. All right, there is a beam of light on my path. Now I must walk in the light that I have,

and when I come to the edge of that light, then God will extend that light a little bit, and I'll walk to the limit of that light, and when I get to the edge of that light, then God will extend that light a little bit and I'll walk to the limit of that light and when I get to the limit of that light, he will extend the light a little bit farther and I'll walk to the edge of that light. When I get to the edge of it, he will extend it a little bit farther

and when I walk to it. So it is wisdom and revelation. Wisdom and revelation. God reveals and you practice it so that he may reveal more, so that you can practice more, so that he he may reveal more so that you can practice more so that he can reveal more so that you can practice more.

That's the divine order. And some of you are saying, well, God isn't revealing anything to me. I'm not getting any new truths from the word of God. Why don't you go home tonight and check up and see

if you've lived up to everything you know. At the evangelism conference in Portland, Oregon at Southern Bass Convention this year, Brother Manley Beasley was first on the program

and he spoke for about 15 minutes. And then he quit. He said, I'm going to quit right here because, he said, I've already preached more than you'll live up to in six months.

And he closed his Bible and sat down. And with that, he stated a very essential biblical truth that the condition of additional revelation is obedience to present revelation. He gives you the spirit of interpretation.

The Holy Spirit, first of all, as he illuminates your heart and mind, will give you practical insight, wisdom, in how to live and what to do with the truth that you've received. And when you live and practice the truth that you have received, then he will open your eyes and give you more truth and more truth and more truth. So that God is always enlarging your capacity to receive truth

and with enlargement comes responsibility comes obedience and you know the thing that we are missing the thing that we are missing in our lives and in this in this area of the abundant life and the spirit-filled life, and I touched on it a little bit last Sunday night, the thing that we're missing is that the way of maturity is just everyday discipline in obedience. Just dogged, unglamorous, unsensational obedience. Everyday. Just day by day obedience, just day by day obedience.

And what the problem has been with so many of us is that we have wanted God in one glorious heaven-shattering experience just to make us instantly mature. And we have been praying and seeking for an experience. You know, we had one, and the fire's gone out, and now we're just living in the smoke of it. And we want to get back that old feeling, that old thrill. And so we'll seek and we'll pray and we'll wait and hope. Maybe in the next revival, the next conference, something will happen so we'll seek and we'll pray and we'll wait and hope maybe in the next revival the next conference something will happen and we'll be propelled again by that feeling and that's not the way god operates it is just a day by day walking in the light that you've received and when you come to the edge of that light then he extends that light a little farther and you do

not pray that light extended you walk walk that light to be extended. It's just day by day obedience. Interpretation, revelation, and the third thing is appreciation. In verse 18, he says, the eyes of your understanding being enlightened that you may know. Now, it's not the same word,

Greek word for know that is used in verse 17 this word for know literally means that you may see and it has the idea of comprehending something perceiving something understanding something so as to appreciate its value for instance you've used the expression when somebody's been explaining a truth I I just don't see it. Now, you don't mean that you actually don't see it with your eyes, but what you mean is, I just can't appreciate your line of reasoning.

And I just can't go along with you there. To me, I don't see it. The Holy Spirit gives us appreciation of the things that we've received from God. And we don't have time to go into it, but he gives us appreciation for the past, the present, and the future of our salvation. Let me just mention them briefly. Number one, he gives us appreciation for what God has done for us in the past,

that you may know what is the hope of your calling, the hope of your calling when the hope of your calling, when God calls you to salvation. Number two, and what the riches of the glory of his inheritance in the saints that points towards the future. Number three, and what is the exceeding greatness of his power to us who believe according to the working of his mighty power. That's the present. That's what's going on right now. Every day that you and I live, there is a power working in us. And it's resurrection power.

It's God's power working in us. And you need an appreciation of that. And you need an appreciation of what salvation meant. And you need to appreciate what God has reserved in heaven for you. And you need to appreciate what God is able to do in you and through you right now. And as the Holy Spirit is able to minister in your life and perform His ministry of illumination, He'll open the eyes of your heart so that you'll learn and appreciate all the things that God has given you and done for you.

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