Acts 5:3*But Peter said, “Ananias, why has Satan filled your heart*
to lie to the Holy Spirit*and keep back*part*of the price of the land for yourself?*4*While it remained, was it not your own? And after it was sold, was it not in your own control? Why have you conceived this thing in your heart? You have not lied to men but to God.”
To whom? To whom did Ananias lie? To God, as we read in verse 4, whereas the previous verse, verse 3, said that he lied to the Holy Spirit, of course, for the Holy Spirit is God.
Some who reject the Trinity, like various cults, claim that the Holy Spirit is not a person, but an it, a non-person, not masculine, and not feminine for that matter, but a neuter.
But you don’t lie to a neuter. You don’t sin against a force. If you lie, you lie to a person. If you sin, you sin against someone!
And likewise, an object doesn’t talk, a neuter doesn’t speak, but a person speaks.
In Acts 13, verse 1:
13:1 Now in the church that was at Antioch there were certain prophets and teachers: Barnabas, Simeon who was called Niger, Lucius of Cyrene, Manaen who had been brought up with Herod the tetrarch, and Saul.*
13:2 As they ministered to the Lord and fasted, the Holy Spirit said, “Now separate to Me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them.”
So, the Holy Spirit said. He speaks. Because He is a person, and an individual at that!
And again: you don’t lie to an object; you don’t sin against an object: if you lie, it’s to a person, if you sin, it’s against a person.
And an object doesn’t speak, but a person speaks.
I realize of course, in an age when millions of people think, irrationally and showing their own stupidity, that computers are becoming sentient, that they are coming alive,
and in an age with our technology and text-to-speech synthesizers, so that your phone can read your emails to you, that it takes just a tad bit more thinking to realize that objects don’t speak, but that people speak.
But objects don’t speak, they don’t get lied to, and they don’t get sinned against.
In fact, you can take a brand new Samsung Note 7, and smash it with a hammer; maybe you claim it was self-defense, so it doesn’t immolate you, maybe not, but regardless, you haven’t sinned against your phone.
It couldn’t care less if you smash it to smithereens because it can’t care at all,
about anything, because it’s not a person; it’s an object, and you can’t lie to or sin against objects, and neither can they speak to you,
if you have hears to hear, and a mind to understand.
SIN: And I’ve been mentioning sinning against the Holy Spirit.
Eph. 4:30*And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed…
As we see in Acts 7, Do not resist the Holy Spirit
And in Hebrews 10, you can insult the Holy Spirit, but of course, it means nothing to insult an inanimate object. If you burn your toast, and you say: You stupid toaster, you should be melted down and turned into a waffle iron! That wouldn’t mean anything, at least not to the toaster. It might mean that you’re a little nuts, but it doesn’t mean anything to the object!
Heb. 10:29 Of how much worse punishment, do you suppose, will he be thought worthy who has trampled the Son of God underfoot, counted the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified a common thing, and insulted the Spirit of grace?
And the H.S. has a will, which, by the way, is a required characteristic of persons. Possession of a will doesn’t mean that something is a person, for a horse can have some semblance of a will. But you can’t be a person unless you have a will.
A will is a necessary characteristic of a person. So as Paul writes:
1 Cor. 12:11 But one and the same Spirit works all these things, distributing to each one individually as He wills.
Also of course, we read in John 16, that the Holy Spirit convicts the world of sin.
John 14:15**15*“If you love Me, keep*My commandments.*16*And I will pray the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may abide with you forever—*17*the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees Him nor knows Him; but you know Him, for He dwells with you and will be in you.*18*I will not leave you orphans; I will come to you.
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