Prior Book | Prior Chapter | Prior Verse | Next Verse | Next Chapter | Next Book | Viewing NASB and Amplified 2015 | |
NASB | Joel 2:28 ¶ "It will come about after this That I will pour out My Spirit on all mankind; And your sons and daughters will prophesy, Your old men will dream dreams, Your young men will see visions. |
AMPLIFIED 2015 | Joel 2:28 ¶ "It shall come about after this That I shall pour out My Spirit on all mankind; And your sons and your daughters will prophesy, Your old men will dream dreams, Your young men will see visions. |
Subject: Why did God wait to send the Holy Spirit |
Bible Note: I'll take a shot at answering your questions if I may. First of all, I don't believe the Holy Spirit works in our lives to a miraculous degree, at least not nearly as frequently and to the level of public viewing as He did in the timeframe of the Bible. But I do think he helps us avoid sin by strengthening our conscience and reminding us of what we've studied in God's Word. I've mentioned before in other posts; I believe any miracles in today's world is manifested directly from the Godhead to the recipient here on earth, with no 3rd party human participating other than by prayer. Second point is why Jesus' death ushered in this dispensation with the Holy Spirit involved in this way. I think we need to see God's plan for all of mankind much like we see our children grow and mature. When our children are very young, we start them out by having them pick up their toys and do very simple chores which have to be described in very specific terms, listing each task separately and follow up on them constantly. As these kids grow and mature, they take on more and more responsibilities and learn to do their chores, homework and other tasks that show them to be growing toward ultimate adulthood. Then they're finally out on their own like mine are now and very rarely do they need our advice and counsel. Our God sees His creation in the same way. He wants all mankind to grow up and get away from our addiction to this physcial world and actually learn to prefer thinking about and preparing ourselves for the next, the spiritual world. He's building our home in Heaven with that goal in mind. He started out in the Garden of Eden with a very personal one-on-one relationship with Adam and Eve. We all know where that went and we all do our part of that ruination every day, every hour of lives that we don't live perfectly like Christ Jesus. Next Jesus came to this earth to seek and save the lost, to show us the Way, the Truth and the Life. His Words sum it up best: when we see Christ through faith, we see the Father. Thus we learn instead of getting an "eye for an eye," we are to forgive our enemies and try to lead them to Christ by living an imitation of Christ. Now that Christ was made the perfect sacrifice and provided the perfect redemption plan to go back home to our Father, we must live that living sacrifice till He decides to take us to that home in Heaven. The perfect Assistant in this process is the Holy Spirit. As I've mentioned in other posts, He helped out much more prominently during the first century with miraculous powers bestowed on a select few, the Apostles and those onto whom they laid their hands. His main purpose in doing that was to confirm the fact that the words they spoke and the deeds they performed, the acts of worship they established had His seal of approval. Now that we have the Holy Scriptures, "completely furnished unto every good work," we don't need that close up support of miracles. We have historical documents, credible testimonies and archelogical artifacts proving the truth and the origin of the Bible as coming from the Holy Spirit. Basically in summary, again, our God wants us to graduate from this world of the finite, physical limitations and look forward to a world of the infinite and spiritual where God truly does rule everything. Here in this world, God allows the Devil to rule, at least in the hearts of mankind that don't want God in their lives. But in the next world, the Devil will be reduced to nothing just like all the rest of the world who reject God. So you see, that's why it took so long to send Jesus. God has His own time table; we can't rush it nor can we slow it down. We just say "Yes, Lord, your will be done." By the way, while He wants us to graduate to that next world, He also wants us to wait for His signal that we go; we DON'T get to choose. I hopes this helps. Good questions and God bless. |