14 day plan

The Purpose of Pentecost

Day 5 of 14

CSB

1 Corinthians 2:12-13

12Now we have not received the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who comes from God, so that we may understand what has been freely given to us by God. 13We also speak these things, not in words taught by human wisdom, but in those taught by the Spirit, explaining spiritual things to spiritual people.

Reflection: The understanding of the Holy Spirit

One of the great wonders of receiving the Holy Spirit is the sense of understanding and perspective it brings. In Ephesians, Paul refers to the Holy Spirit as the “Spirit of wisdom and revelation”. It is so important that we aren’t trying to understand God simply from a human point of view. His ways are above our ways, his thoughts above ours. We need his Spirit to help us see from his perspective.

I remember very clearly as a 16-year-old, when I first encountered the Holy Spirit, one of the first things that I noticed was how much more I was receiving from reading the Bible. It was as if it had suddenly been decoded or translated from a foreign language.

Later on in Ephesians, Paul refers to the word of God as the “sword of the Spirit”, and the Apostle Peter says the writers of the scriptures were “carried along by the Holy Spirit” – so we see clearly the synergy between the word of God and the Spirit of God. They are impossible to separate and are most effective when working together in our lives.

Question: What things within your faith and the scriptures have you struggled to understand and need to ask the Holy Spirit to help you with?

Prayer: Thank you, Holy Spirit, for being with me and opening my heart and mind to your truth. I surrender to you today all the thoughts and questions that I am wrestling with. I ask that you help me to have the mind of Christ and see from your perspective. Amen.

© 2017 Holman Bible Publishers

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1 Corinthians 2:1-16

Paul’s Proclamation

1When I came to you, brothers and sisters, announcing the mystery of God to you, I did not come with brilliance of speech or wisdom. 2I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. 3I came to you in weakness, in fear, and in much trembling. 4My speech and my preaching were not with persuasive words of wisdom but with a demonstration of the Spirit’s power, 5so that your faith might not be based on human wisdom but on God’s power.

Spiritual Wisdom

6We do, however, speak a wisdom among the mature, but not a wisdom of this age, or of the rulers of this age, who are coming to nothing. 7On the contrary, we speak God’s hidden wisdom in a mystery, a wisdom God predestined before the ages for our glory. 8None of the rulers of this age knew this wisdom, because if they had known it, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory. 9But as it is written,

What no eye has seen, no ear has heard,

and no human heart has conceived —

God has prepared these things for those who love him.

10Now God has revealed these things to us by the Spirit, since the Spirit searches everything, even the depths of God. 11For who knows a person’s thoughts except his spirit within him? In the same way, no one knows the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God. 12Now we have not received the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who comes from God, so that we may understand what has been freely given to us by God. 13We also speak these things, not in words taught by human wisdom, but in those taught by the Spirit, explaining spiritual things to spiritual people. 14But the person without the Spirit does not receive what comes from God’s Spirit, because it is foolishness to him; he is not able to understand it since it is evaluated spiritually. 15The spiritual person, however, can evaluate everything, and yet he himself cannot be evaluated by anyone. 16For

who has known the Lord’s mind,

that he may instruct him?

But we have the mind of Christ.

© 2017 Holman Bible Publishers