WIND

John 3:8

The wind blows wherever it pleases. You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit."

                The wind is howling outside of my office window. It began howling early last evening and continued throughout the night. It is a cold wind that cuts through a person. Tiny flakes of snow dance in the wind as it whips the trees and scatters their leaves.

                Wind is a powerful force, yet it is insubstantial. A person can not capture the wind or measure its volume. Yet the wind can transform a landscape. It sculpts the sand dunes of western Michigan and the farm fields of North Dakota. The wind has the power to tear limbs from trees or the roof off of a house. The wind can be harnessed to generate power, but it cannot be contained or controlled. The wind blows where it wants to blow and there is nothing we can do about it.

                The Bible has two words for wind. In Hebrew the word for wind is ruah. In Greek the word for wind is pueuma. The Bible uses these same two words to mean spirit. The Hebrews equated the wind with the breath of God. God was the one in control of the wind and therefore it represented the activity of God in the world.

                When Jesus was meeting at night with Nicodemus, as recorded in John 3, Jesus used a play on words when he equated the activity of the wind with the activity of the Holy Spirit. His play on words gives us some insight into the activity of the Holy Spirit in our world.

                Just as we cannot control the activity of the wind, so we cannot control the activity of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit, being God, is totally independent of human influence. The Spirit indwells every believer, but the believer does not control the Spirit. The Spirit is the moving force within the believer’s life; changing and transforming the landscape of his or her life.

                The Holy Spirit is the prime mover in the salvation and sanctification of the believer. Jesus told Nicodemus, “I tell you the truth, no one can enter the kingdom of God unless he is born of water and the Spirit. Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit.” (John 3:5-6) It is the Holy Spirit who is the agent of the new birth that Jesus told Nicodemus about.

                The “wind” of the Holy Spirit is still blowing through our world today. He is shaking up Christ’s church, with the purpose of purifying it and empowering it. He is awakening people all over the world to their need for a Savior, who is Jesus Christ. He is empowering believers to be salt and light in their communities. He continues to blow away the fog of unbelief and replace it with a spiritual clarity that allows those who place their faith Jesus to understand the deep truths of God.  

John 14:15-17,25-27

"If you love me, you will obey what I command. And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Counselor to be with you forever-- the Spirit of truth. The world cannot accept him, because it neither sees him nor knows him. But you know him, for he lives with you and will be in you.

"All this I have spoken while still with you. But the Counselor, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you. Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.