A New Spirit
Ezekiel 36:23–29
A new spirit I will put within them. Ezekiel 11:19

While studying in Basel, my wife and I participated in a Bible study that met in our apartment. There was a girl in the study for whom we had been praying for some months prior to her attending. She had been converted years before in England under the ministry of Stephen Alford, but as the result of an unhappy engagement to the wrong man, she had turned on Christianity and had become entangled by one of the pseudoreligious sects that are flourishing in our day. While we had been praying, the Lord had been working, and one Friday night she turned up on our doorstep just as the Bible study was to begin. She was included that night and the nights that followed. This particular evening we had come to Paul’s great chapter on love in 1 Corinthians 13. And as we studied this passage together, thinking over all the aspects of this new life to which the Christian has been called, this girl made a comment that showed the Lord was working in her life. She said, “When you read over all these things and realize what it means to be a Christian, you begin to realize that you could never be one without God’s help.” And she prayed that night along these lines.

Now it is exactly for this reason that God has given us his Holy Spirit. You see, man is separated from God by his sin, and God has removed that sin for all who will come to him in the righteousness of Christ. But God is not satisfied that sin be removed in this judicial way alone. He is also anxious that believers actually live righteously in this world. And he has given us his Spirit that we may do so. The Holy Spirit will teach us what God would have us do. He will move us to want that perfect will of God. And he will empower us to live in accordance with it. Ezekiel knew this truth and expressed it six hundred years before the sending of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost. “A new spirit I will put within them. I will remove the heart of stone from their flesh and give them a heart of flesh, that they may walk in my statutes and keep my rules and obey them. And they shall be my people, and I will be their God” (Ezek. 11:19–20).

Taken from Come to the Waters by James Boice ISBN 9798887790954 used with permission from P&R Publishing, Phillipsburg NJ 08865

Scripture quotations are from the ESV (the Holy Bible English Standard Version) copyright 2001 by Crossway a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. All rights reserved.