In the first three chapters of the Book of Revelation Jesus wasted no time in dealing with the church. These seven churches, I am convinced, are the 7 kinds of churches that existed then and that exist today. I know we have thousands of denominations, but they all fit in one of these seven categories. 

My focus, as I study these churches, is on demonstrating that this hyper message on grace and love is very damaging and that God himself will deal with us when we become spiritual punks who do nothing to confront the sin, bad theology and bad teachings that are constantly infiltrating our churches.  In the name of mercy, grace, peace, unity and love, we are compromising our faith. We become friends of the world as we water down the gospel. In the process, we become enemies of God. James 4:4 tells us, “You adulteresses, do you not know that friendship with the world is hostility toward God? Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God.”(NASB)

Before we go into what makes us spiritual punks, lets deal with our first problem… ignoring the Spirit of God. The expression “He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.” is repeated seven times; one for each church.  We have seven kinds of churches and to each of these churches Jesus tells them to listen to the Spirit. 

I know that some churches place a lot of emphasis on the Word and, they should, everything is confirmed there. However, the problem is when we grab God’s Word and we go as far as teaching and preaching out of that book without the Holy Spirit. Beloved, this New Covenant is not of the Letter, but of the Spirit. Second Corinthians 3:4-6 tells us, 

Such confidence we have through Christ toward God. ⁵ Not that we are adequate in ourselves to consider anything as coming from ourselves, but our adequacy is from God, ⁶ who also made us adequate as servants of a new covenant, not of the letter but of the Spirit; for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life. (NASB)

The Spirit does not come to, in anyway, contradict the Scripture; to the contrary, it is through the Spirit that we get proper insight of the Scripture. If you want to understand the Word of God properly, let the Spirit teach you. If you want to minister God’s Word properly, lets the Spirit guide you. “He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.” 

Our first problem is that we do not listen to what the Spirit is saying to the churches. We are listening to what our denominations are saying to the churches and what is worst… what the culture is saying to the churches or, what a seminary is saying to the churches or, what our own personal agendas and ambitions are saying to the churches. But Jesus, our King and Lord is saying… “He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.” 

In John 1:4 the Bible makes reference to the Seven Spirits who are before the throne. It is important to study these seven Spirits because they are also mentioned in Revelation 3:1. What are these seven Spirits? Isaiah 11:1-2 actually named each one of these Spirits,

Then a shoot will spring from the stem of Jesse,
And a branch from his roots will bear fruit.
² The Spirit of theLordwill rest on Him,
The spirit of wisdom and understanding,
The spirit of counsel and strength,
The spirit of knowledge and the fear of theLord. (NASB)

Before you think that I am getting weird hear let me make it clear that there is only One Spirit (Ephesians 4:4) However, what we are looking at here are the functions or activities of the Holy Spirit moreover, in the Old Testament. In the New Testament the Holy Spirit has more involvement in God’s people that he did in the Old Testament. To start, we are blessed with the indwelling of the Holy Ghost (First Corinthians 3:16); but let’s stop there. What are the seven Spirits of God stating by Isaiah?

1. The Spirit of the Lord

The Holy Spirit is the Spirit of Jesus. He comes from the Father and his main job is to testify of Jesus (John 15:26). Who can better testify of Jesus than his Spirit? Do we think that we can do a better a job?

• The Spirit of Wisdom

chokmah (חָכְמָה, 2451), “wisdom; experience; shrewdness.” This word appears 141 times in the Old Testament. Like chakam, most occurrences of this word are in Job, Proverbs, and Ecclesiastes. The chakam seeks after chokmah, “wisdom.” Like chakam, the word chokmah can refer to technical skills or special abilities in fashioning something. The first occurrence of chokmah is in Exod. 28:3: “And thou shalt speak unto all that are wisehearted, whom I have filled with the spirit of wisdom, that they may make Aaron’s garments to consecrate him, that he may minister unto me in the priest’s office.” This first occurrence of the word in the Hebrew Bible bears this out as well as the description of the workers on the tabernacle. The artisan was considered to be endowed with special abilities given to him by God: “And he hath filled him with the spirit of God, in wisdom, in understanding, and in knowledge, and in all manner of workmanship (Exod. 35:31).^[1]

• The Spirit of Understanding

binah (בִּינָה, 998), “understanding.” Binah appears 37 times and in all periods of biblical Hebrew even though it belongs primarily to the sphere of wisdom and wisdom literature. This noun represents the “act of understanding.^[2]

• The Spirit of Counsel (Essentially, divine advice)

• The Spirit of Strength

geburah (גְּבוּרָה, 1369), “might.” This noun is found 61 times in the Hebrew Old Testament, predominantly in poetic books and in Isaiah and Jeremiah. The first occurrence is in Exod. 32:18: “And he said, It is not the voice of them that shout for mastery, neither is it the voice of them that cry for being overcome: but the noise of them that sing do I hear.” The primary meaning of geburah is “power” or “strength.^[3]

• The Spirit of Knowledge

daʿaṯ: A feminine noun meaning knowledge, knowing, learning, discernment, insight, and notion. The word occurs forty of its ninety-one times in Proverbs as one of the many words associated with the biblical concept of wisdom. The root meaning of the term is knowledge or knowing. In Proverbs 24:3, 4, it is the third word in a chain of three words describing the building of a house by wisdom, the establishment of that house by understanding, and finally, the filling of the rooms of the house by knowledge.^[4]

• The Spirit of the Fear of the Lord

yirʾāh: A feminine noun meaning fear. The word usually refers to the fear of God and is viewed as a positive quality. This fear acknowledges God’s good intentions (Ex. 20:20). It will motivate and delight even the Messiah (Isa. 11:2, 3). This fear is produced by God’s Word (Ps. 119:38; Prov. 2:5) and makes a person receptive to wisdom and knowledge (Prov. 1:7; 9:10). It is even identified with wisdom (Job 28:28; Prov. 15:33). The fear of the Lord may be lost by despair of one’s own situation (Job 6:14) or envy of a sinner’s (Prov. 23:17). This fear restrains people from sin (Gen. 20:11; Ex. 20:20; Neh. 5:9); gives confidence (Job 4:6; Prov. 14:26); helps rulers and causes judges to act justly (2 Sam. 23:3; 2 Chr. 19:9; Neh. 5:15); results in good sleep (Prov. 19:23); with humility, leads to riches, honor, and life (Prov. 22:4). The word also refers to the fear of briers and thorns (Isa. 7:25); and the fear of Israel that would fall on other nations (Deut. 2:25).^[5]

When we insist in not listening to what the Spirit has to say to the churches we are missing out on so much. We are missing out on the full development of the Fruit of the Spirit (Galatians 5:22-23), we are missing out on the Gifts of the Spirit (First Corinthians 12) and we are missing out on the 7 essential characteristics of the Spirits of God; a church without the Spirit of Jesus, without divine wisdom, divine understanding, divine counsel, divine strength,  divine knowledge and a church without fear or reverence for God. Well, good luck with that! 

To be continued…

^[1] W. E. Vine, Merrill F. Unger, and William White Jr., Vine’s Complete Expository Dictionary of Old and New Testament Words (Nashville, TN: T. Nelson, 1996), 290–291.

^[2] W. E. Vine, Merrill F. Unger, and William White Jr., Vine’s Complete Expository Dictionary of Old and New Testament Words (Nashville, TN: T. Nelson, 1996), 273.

^[3] W. E. Vine, Merrill F. Unger, and William White Jr., Vine’s Complete Expository Dictionary of Old and New Testament Words (Nashville, TN: T. Nelson, 1996), 151.

^[4] Warren Baker and Eugene E. Carpenter, The Complete Word Study Dictionary: Old Testament (Chattanooga, TN: AMG Publishers, 2003), 245.

^[5] Warren Baker and Eugene E. Carpenter, The Complete Word Study Dictionary: Old Testament (Chattanooga, TN: AMG Publishers, 2003), 471.