Dr. Rogers told the story of a pastor who left the pastorate after twenty years, and decided to become a funeral director.  Somebody asked him, “Why did you do that?”

He said, “Well, I spent about twelve years trying to straighten out John.  He never did get straightened out.  I spent fourteen months trying to straighten out the marriage of the Smiths, and it never did get straightened out.  I spent three years trying to straighten out Susan, and she never did get straightened out.”

“But, now that I’m a funeral director…when I straighten them out, they stay straight.”

Well, contrary to what we may sometimes believe…it is not the job of the preacher to straighten anybody out.  The honest truth is that I cannot straighten out anyone.

That is the role of the Holy Spirit. 

I can preach the truth and get it into your head, and perhaps even be very persuasive…but only the Holy Spirit can impart the truth and get it into your heart where it matters the most.

John 16:7–11 (NKJV) — 7 Nevertheless I tell you the truth. It is to your advantage that I go away; for if I do not go away, the Helper will not come to you; but if I depart, I will send Him to you. 8 And when He has come, He will convict the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment: 9 of sin, because they do not believe in Me; 10 of righteousness, because I go to My Father and you see Me no more; 11 of judgment, because the ruler of this world is judged.

 On my own, I cannot even convince you of the truth of what you just read.  That isn’t really my job.  In my own power I cannot convince someone to believe in a spiritual truth.

A preacher once said, “The truth of the matter is, anything that I could talk you into, eventually somebody else can come along and talk you out of.”

A natural man cannot receive spiritual truth without supernatural help.

If you share your faith with others, (and I hope you do—every Christian should!) you need to understand that it is not your job to get people to accept the gospel, nor even to fully understand the gospel.

It is your job to get people to hear the gospel and leave the rest to the Holy Spirit.

Whenever Charles Haddon Spurgeon would approach his pulpit to preach the gospel, he would be muttering under his breath: “I believe in the ministry of the Holy Spirit.”   

Spurgeon understood a concept that we all need to apply to our lives: Everything we do for the Lord Jesus Christ is totally dependent upon the ministry of the Holy Spirit.

As the old song goes: “All is vain unless the Spirit of the Holy One come down.” 

Francis Chan authored a book titled, “Forgotten God.”  He deals with the role and ministry of the Holy Spirit…and how many times believers live as if He doesn’t exist and they have completely forgotten about Him.  That is the perfect title for a book on that subject because many believers have simply “forgotten” about the Holy Spirit.

For the next few weeks we will be looking at the role of the Holy Spirit in the conversion process of a new believer… and how these steps can only be accomplished by the Holy Spirit.