If you would open up your Bibles to Acts 9. I'll be reading just one verse, but Acts 9 verse 31. Acts 9 verse 31. If you would stand with me as we read the word again. Acts 9 verse 31. Then the churches throughout all Judea, Galilee, and Samaria had peace and were edified. And walking in the fear of the Lord, and in the comfort of the Holy Spirit, they were multiplied. The grass withers, the flower fades away, but the word of our God will stand forever. You may be seated. Father, we ask now for the blessing on the preaching and on the hearing of your Word. We ask that you would come in power, in might, knowing that you desire men who stand behind the sacred desks to preach in the demonstration of the Spirit and of power. So we ask that you would help us now, both preacher and hearer, that you might be glorified, knowing that the Lord Jesus Christ himself comes and preaches peace to those who are far off and peace to those who are near. May we hear his voice, that we might be the faithful sheep who follow their faithful shepherd by the word. We ask this in Jesus' name. Amen. So we're in our series going through the Heidelberg Catechism. We're on Lord's Day 20 this week. And I'm gonna read the question and the answer. If you look at the back of your bulletin, you'll see the question and answer for this week. And the question for 53 is, what dost thou believe concerning the Holy Ghost? First, that he is co-eternal God with the Father and the Son. Secondly, that he is also given unto me, makes me by a true faith partaker of Christ and all his benefits, comforts me, and shall abide with me forever. So Pastor Ryan, a couple weeks ago, gave a wonderfully helpful sermon on the person and work of the Holy Spirit. And so instead of doing an overview of the Bible's teaching from one text and then going to a lot of places like Pastor Ryan did very effectively and faithfully, I'm going to really focus on, as it says in the last part of this question, or the second to last, that the Spirit is given to comfort believers. But I'm going to be preaching this text and then at the end of verse 31 of Acts 9, we see that the church was walking in the comfort of the Holy Spirit. And so in verse 31, it says again, then the churches throughout all Judea, Galilee, and Samaria had peace and were edified, and walking in the fear of the Lord and in the comfort of the Holy Spirit, they were multiplied. The context of this chapter, because we don't want to just rip it kicking and screaming without knowing the overall context, this is right after Saul of Tarsus, met the risen Christ on the road to Damascus, because in Acts 9 is when he was converted and repented and put his trust in the risen Christ. And we see right away after he gets converted, he goes to the synagogues and preaches that Jesus is the Christ, that the Christ is the Son of God. Right after his conversion, he's preaching publicly the truth of the saving work of the promised Christ, who is Jesus of Nazareth. And then we see what's happening is some of the people, the disciples who made up these local churches, didn't believe that Paul was actually legit, or Saul at that point. He goes by both in the Scriptures. They didn't think he was a legit convert to faith in the risen Christ. So Barnabas comes alongside and encourages the church and says, no, Saul is legit. God has really met with him and he has really come to repent of his sin and believe upon the resurrected Christ just like you and me. And so the churches are encouraged to receive him. And in this context, this is what marked these local assemblies of God's people. That they were having peace and were edified, walking in the fear of the Lord, and had the comfort of the Holy Spirit. So my three points, if you're taking notes or if you want to kind of think through points, My first point is the church having peace and being edified. My second point is the church was walking in the fear of the Lord. And my third point is that the church was experiencing, the church is, were experiencing the comfort of the Holy Spirit. And so for the first point, about these churches having peace and were being edified. It says, then the churches throughout all Judea, Galilee, and Samaria had peace and were edified. Some of your translations might say, then the church. I think it's better based on the textual tradition to hold that it's then the churches, plural. That there were churches, individual local assemblies throughout this entire region, Judea Galilee and Samaria that were marked by these. So just like there's many local churches in this area, there was many or at least a couple local churches in these regions that were characterized by these marks of a healthy church. And so first these churches were marked by peace and edification. Well first that means that they had objective peace. the objective peace of Romans 5.1. Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have, as a present reality, peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. That at one time we were at enmity with God We were God's enemies under God's divine wrath because we were lawbreakers. Now through the death, the burial, and the resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ, we now have objective, permanent peace with God. And we can say, because we are children of Abraham by faith, we are friends of God. And so these churches had objective peace with God built on. the Lord Jesus Christ. But they also had subjective peace. This is the Philippians 4 piece. Do not worry about anything, but by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God. And the peace, not peace with God, but the peace of God will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. And so these churches had both peace with God, but they had the peace of God as they were not being prone to worry, but instead were casting their cares on the Lord because he cares for them. And so they had both objective peace, where they were now friends of God, but they also had the subjective peace of God's abiding presence with them. But they also had, third, the peace with their brethren. Hebrews 12 verse 14 commands us to strive for peace with all people. And Romans 12 says, in as far as it depends on you, have peace with all men. And so they also had a relationship, a fellowship within the body, peace with the brothers and sisters in Christ. And so this was the peace that marked these churches, peace with God, the peace of God, and peace with one another as brothers and sisters in the Lord Jesus Christ. And so just boys and girls, as you might think about what would it look like for you to have peace with brother and sister? What does that look like? That looks like you guys are getting along. You have unity. You're kind to one another. That's what was happening in these churches. There was fellowship. There was unity. And there was getting along with one another for the sake of the gospel. Secondarily, it talks about these churches were being edified. And edification is a big way of saying these churches were being built up in our most holy faith. These churches were growing in the grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. These churches, under the ordinary means of grace of the preached word, of the visible word seen in the ordinances of baptism and the Lord's Supper, by prayer and by fellowship, these churches were being built up in the truth. As Acts 2.42 says, they were giving themselves to the apostles' doctrine. That's the preaching of the word. They were giving themselves to the fellowship as a body of Christ coming together to fellowship with one another and stir one another up towards love and good deeds. They were giving themselves up to the breaking of bread, which is shorthand for the Lord's Supper. And then lastly, they were giving themselves up to the prayers, the apostles' doctrine, the fellowship. the breaking of bread, and prayers. This is what was marking a church that was edified by the grace of God, that they were giving themselves to these things that God had promised, by His Spirit, to bless. And God desired for His churches to be edified, and God's primary means of edifying His church is through these ordinary means of grace, the apostles' doctrine, fellowship, breaking of bread, and of prayer. Secondarily, these churches were not only having peace and edified, first point, they were secondarily walking in the fear of the Lord. And there's much more I could say on these things. The primary reason I'm I'm going a little bit quick is to really focus at the end on the comfort of the Holy Spirit. But secondarily, these churches were walking in the fear of the Lord. You can't read the Bible from Old Testament to New Testament without realizing the fear of the Lord is an important thing. Even if you read skimming through the Old Testament wisdom literature, the law, and the prophets. You can't help but seeing over and over and over again the importance of walking and knowing the fear of the Lord. Because Proverbs 1.7, the fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge. Proverbs 9.10, the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. And so if you look at all throughout the scriptures, this big, big emphasis on the fear of the Lord. And what did it mean that they were walking in the fear of the Lord? What this would ultimately mean is they knew God for who He was. that they had a high view of God. The Bible never says God is good, good, good. The Bible never says God is just, just, just. The Bible never says God is love, love, love, even though He's all those things. But the Bible does say God is holy, holy, holy. And what is the angel's response? You have no sin, no sin. They cover their face, they cover their feet, and they fly and forever cry out, holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts. The whole earth is full of his glory. In Hebrews chapter 12, it doesn't say God was a consuming fire. It says God is, present tense, a consuming fire. And so the church was marked by a reverential, that's a big way of saying a great view of God. Think of it this way, if you were going to go to the Grand Canyon and you stood next to the Grand Canyon and you rightly understood where you were at, you wouldn't go to the Grand Canyon in a flippant way. You wouldn't mess around near the cliff of the Grand Canyon, would you? You wouldn't say, you know what, this is just a fun place to be, I'm gonna get as close as I can, and maybe I'll fall, maybe I won't. No, because you would have a awe for the bigness of the Grand Canyon, that if you fall, it'll swallow you up. And so when we come into the presence of God and we're a church that's healthy, it's going to be a church that's walking in the fear of the Lord. Not being flippant towards who God is, but having a great and an awesome view of the God of all the earth. And so we must come to God, if we will come to him rightly, with reverence and with godly fear. And so it's important to see this healthy church that they knew the fear of the Lord. It wasn't a secondary issue. It was a primary issue. Because think about the writer of Ecclesiastes. He says, let us hear the whole matter. Fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the whole duty of man. The writer of Ecclesiastes could have said a hundred different things of what the whole duty of man was. But what he wanted to say to the people, that if you want to know what the whole duty of man is, fear God and keep his commandments. And we see a healthy church here, not coming to God flippantly, but if we come to God rightly, we come to him as one who is holy, holy, holy. So when you come to corporate worship, you don't come like you're going to a friend's house to kick back and relax. You come to corporate worship, if you come rightly, with awe and wonder and expectation, because God, who is our Father, wasn't one day or long ago in the Old Testament a consuming fire, but is present tense. a consuming fire. And so we come with reverence and awe and walking in the fear of the Lord. And Albert Martin, a pastor I really appreciate, wrote a book on the forgotten fear of God. And he sums up what the fear of God is very succinctly. How do you know a church? How do you know that you are personally walking in the fear of the Lord? How can you know that this church is walking in the fear of the Lord? How can you know as an individual? God, I want to walk in the fear of the Lord. How do I know I am? And Albert Martin. With his wonderful way of saying things, succinctly and boldly, he says, walking in the fear of the Lord is caring more about God's smile than men's smile. Walking in the fear of the Lord is caring more about what God thinks about what you do than what man thinks. caring more about what I'm choosing to do has God's smile and approval and blessing, more than I care if anyone in the world smiles over it. Because ultimately, who cares if men smile, if God frowns? But and who cares? Ultimately, from our vantage point, if God's smiling, who cares if man frowns? Because if God is for us, who can be against us? Walking in the fear of the Lord as a church, as an individual that marked these churches, where they came to God with reverence and with awe, and they cared more about what God thought about them. than what the secular, unbelieving world thought about them. They were more concerned with God's smile than with man's. Third point, which is the main thrust of this sermon, if you look at the end of verse 31, so they were walking in the fear of the Lord and in the comfort of the Holy Spirit. They were multiplied. So the Holy Spirit's primary, One of his primary jobs as a person, as a he, as the third person of the Godhead, equally co-eternal with the Father and the Son, is to give believers in the Lord Jesus Christ. the comfort that only he can provide. And there was many ways that I was considering going about this, but I think there's one primary way in which the Holy Spirit comforts God's people. One way in which the Holy Spirit of God is a comfort by reminding us of who we are in union with the Lord Jesus Christ. The Holy Spirit, because what is the Spirit's work? Not to make much of himself, but to make much of the Lord Jesus Christ. To make much of the person and the work of the Lord Jesus Christ. And how does he comfort us? By reminding us who we are in Christ. So the Holy Spirit comes to comfort us by reminding us of forgiveness of sins. The Holy Spirit comes and reminds us When we're down, when we're discouraged, when we just fell into sin, when we're struggling against the sin, he reminds us that because of the wrath quenching substitutionary death of the Lord Jesus Christ, God has forgiven all of my sin. That there is never going to be a time where God holds my sin against me. That the Holy Spirit reminds me that because Christ died for sin once for all, that I will never die for my sin. And I won't die in my sin. And so the Holy Spirit comforts you as a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ by reminding you that past and present and future sin has once and for all been dealt with through the wrath quenching death of the Lord Jesus Christ. That what can wash away my sin? Nothing but the blood of Jesus. The Spirit of Christ comes with the comforting balm that even when we sin, even when we fall, even when we war against sin, He comforts us to know that God in Christ forgave and continues to forgive as our Father all of our sins and will never hold them against us. And I love the verse in Psalm 130 as it's connected with the fear of God and forgiveness. If you, O Lord, should mark iniquity, O Lord, who could stand? The answer is so obvious, no one could stand if God marked our sins against us. But then he answers, but with you there is forgiveness so that you may be feared. that God forgives us that we might fear Him. But God promises that He forgives all of our sin in Christ. Because if we walk in the light, as He is in the light, 1 John 1, 7, the blood of Jesus Christ's Son cleanses us from all sin. Secondarily, the Holy Spirit comforts us. by reminding us of our justified status before God. He comforts us to remind us that we are perfectly and completely accepted by God on the basis of the Lord Jesus Christ. He comforts us to remind us that on the cross All of my sin, my lying, my stealing, my lust, my greed, my anger, my disobedience to parents, every one of my sin as I was breaking pre-conversion and even struggle against post-conversion, breaking of God's Ten Commandments, that my sin was laid upon the Lord Jesus Christ. And He bore my sin in His own body on the tree. All of my law-breaking, all of your law-breaking in Christ was laid on Jesus Christ. And all of His righteousness is laid upon me. and laid upon you if you're in Christ. So now you forever and always stand with a perfect righteousness before God. All your sin has been taken away and you stand before a holy God with a perfect righteousness over your account. because God has taken your sin away in Christ and has given you Christ's righteousness by faith. And so 10,000 years from now, as a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ, you will not be more accepted by God than you are today, because at this very moment, you are as accepted by the Father as Jesus Christ himself is, because you stand clothed in the righteousness of the Lord Jesus Christ. And then he also reminds us and he comforts us by the doctrine of adoption. The doctrine that we are children of God. That we are united to Christ and therefore God is our heavenly father. That we have God as the one who cares and protects and loves us. And no matter your father earthly father's role, whether he was a good, bad, or indifferent, you have a perfect father in heaven who loves and cares and protects his children. And as the Lord Jesus Christ says, if you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him? That we are adopted by God and therefore in God's family and protected and cared for by the God who loves us as our Heavenly Father. Fourth, he reminds us that he's growing us in sanctification. He reminds us that we're not only in the family, but the dominion of sin has been broken. That we are no longer under the enslaving power of sin. As Romans 6.14 clearly says, for sin shall not have dominion over you, for you're not under law, but under grace. that the Holy Spirit comforts us to remind us that we are no longer enslaved to sin. It'd be one thing for God to forgive all of our sins, which is a wonderful blessing. But if he kept us enslaved to our sin, it wouldn't be as good of a gospel as it could be. But the glory of the gospel of Jesus Christ is that he not only forgives all of our sin, He frees us from the enslaving power of it. That we are no longer debtors to the flesh. We are no longer enslaved to our sin. And even though sin remains in a believer, sin will no longer have reign over a believer. Because if we died with Christ and we've been buried with Christ, we've also been risen to newness of life with the Lord Jesus Christ. The spirit also comforts us by reminding us. that he who began a good work in us will bring it to completion. We can sometimes fear, am I going to be able to keep pressing on? Am I going to be able to keep persevering to the end? Am I able to keep pursuing God and his purposes? Well, praise God, God promises that if he justified you, he will also glorify you, Romans 8.30. That God promises in Philippians 1.6 that God, who began a good work in you, will bring it to completion. As one person said it, at our conversion, God gives us the Holy Spirit, right? We have the Holy Spirit as believers. And what is the spirit called? in the Bible, the down payment of our inheritance. Think about when you buy a house, what do you do? You put a down payment on it, right? And if you can't come up with the rest that you need, both the house and your down payment are taken from you, right? But you lose both. You give the down payment, but if you can't come up with the money you need, the rest of the funds, you lose the house. And so God the Father, through the Son, gave us in our justification the Holy Spirit. So the only way a believer can stop being a believer is if God loses the Holy Spirits and he loses you. Because what was God's down payment? The Holy Spirits. And when you're buying a house, you lose the down payment if you can't fulfill your end of the deal. But God is not going to lose his Holy Spirits. And so the only way a believer won't persevere the end is if God stops being God. because God has given us his spirit that we might persevere as a down payment. And then lastly, the Holy Spirit reminds us of our future glory in the new heavens and the new earth. There's a popular book out, I don't know how popular it is now, but it's called Your Best Life Now. The only way that can be true is if you die and go to hell. The only way it can be your best life now is if you die and go to hell. Because the Bible says my best life is to come in the new heavens and the new earth. And so the Holy Spirit comforts me through all my trials and comforts you through all your trials, through all your sorrows, that there will be one day when sin will be obliterated. There will be one day when sin and sadness and sickness will be completely obliterated. There will be one day when the life of toil and pain and sorrow and sickness and fear and regret and anguish will be done away with. when God brings in through his son by the Holy Spirit, the new heavens and the new earth where righteousness will dwell. And the Holy Spirit comforts us that your best life and my best life is not now, but it's later when God brings in his everlasting kingdom through the son by the spirits. So in some application points, whether you're young or old, wherever you're at, my question is, are these things a comfort to you this very day? Have you come to embrace the one who brings the comfort, the Lord Jesus Christ, by the Spirit? Have you come to see your sin as needing someone to forgive your sin? Have you come realizing that your righteousness won't cut it before God and that you need a Savior to forgive you of all of your sin and make you acceptable to God? because the Spirit's primary work is to bring sinners to the Lord Jesus Christ, is to bring men and women, boys and girls, to God in Christ. And so you can't have any of this comfort unless you come by repentance and by faith to the Lord Jesus Christ. So boys and girls, my question for you is, Have you come to repentance and faith in the Lord Jesus Christ? Have you come to feel and experience the comfort of the Holy Spirit? And have you come to realize your sin before God, and therefore running to the Lord Jesus Christ as the only Savior? Second, are you seeking by God's grace? And if you're here at evening worship, you at least maybe think about it more than others. But are you seeking to use God's means of grace to be edified in your Christian life? As I was teaching this morning in the class, I was saying there is no microwave fix to personal godliness. Personal godliness is be under the word. I was saying read the Bible and pray. And by implication, being under the preaching of the Word and by seeing the visible Word in the sacraments. Is your life one of saying, I need God's ordinary means of grace in my life? I need Apostles' Doctrine, I need fellowship, I need the breaking of bread in the Lord's Supper, and I need to join God's people in prayer. Because this is the means that God has given you to grow in grace. Hopefully everyone who understands my voice who is a believer says, I want to grow in personal godliness. I want to be more godly and be able to war and have more victory over my sin. Hopefully that's everybody who's a believer. And if that's true, the remedy that God has given you is not some extraordinary event that you go to to get all hyped up and come back. God has not given you these extraordinary things to get this high and then hopefully it lasts for a little bit. but it's the ordinary means of grace week in and week out during the Lord's day and throughout the week as we're being fed and nourished on God's inspired word. If you wanna grow in godliness, be in the word and be under the preaching of the word in the Lord's house on the Lord's day. There is no secret. So for you, if you wanna grow, you must be under these means that God has given. And also, is your life marked as these churches in the fear of the Lord? Is your life marked by caring more about God's smile in your life than man's? Is your life marked by a desire before God to say, I am not ultimately, even though we do care about people, I'm not ultimately concerned about what man thinks. I'm ultimately concerned about what God thinks. because that's what it means to walk in the fear of the Lord, that our minds and our hearts and our wills are consumed with what does God think and am I pleasing God more importantly than pleasing man. And lastly, as the main thrust of the sermon, the comfort of the Spirit. Are you finding comfort in the doctrine of who you are in the Lord Jesus Christ? Are you reminding yourself that all my sin is forgiven? Are you reminding yourself that you stand before God perfectly acceptable in His sight through the Lord Jesus Christ? Are you encouraged that you are not an orphan, but you are God's child bought by the precious blood of Jesus Christ? Are you reminding yourself that when sin comes to tempt you, that you can say no to it? Why? Because sin doesn't reign in your body anymore. Are you reminding yourself of the comfort that I'm no longer enslaved to sin, that you are no longer enslaved to sin in Christ? Are you reminding yourself that God will complete what He began in me? Are you reminding yourself that God has worked in me to will and do according to His good pleasure? And are you reminding yourself that even through the toughest and hardest of times, that your best life is to come in the new heavens and the new earth where righteousness dwells? that you must know the comfort of the spirits through the word of God as he reminds you of the person and work of the Holy Spirit for his glory and for your good. Amen. Let's pray. Father, we thank you for this time. May you bless it to your people for your glory and their good in Jesus name. Amen.