"RESISTING THE SPIRIT"--NICHOL/WHITESIDE

                                              RESISTING THE SPIRIT

                          "Through the Spirit strives with man, man has the power

                              to resist.  Stephen says,"Ye do always resist the Holy

                         Spirit; as your fathers did, so do ye." (Acts 7:5l) How did

                             their fathers resist the Holy Spirit?  In (Neh. 9:30) we

                         have the answer. "yet many years did you bear with them,

                              and testified against them by your Spirit through your

                        prophets; yet would they not give ear." It is impossible to

                              resist words; we may reject words, and, in so doing

                       resist the power or person speaking the words. The Holy

                             Spirit spoke through the prophets, reproving the

                       fathers of their sins; but they did not give ear. They

                            rejected the word, and for this reason, Stephen says,

                       they resisted the Spirit."

                      "Building the ark was in itself a powerful sermon to the

                           people. Such labors showed them that Noah believed

                      what he preached, and was a constant warning to them.

                          Human nature was the the same then as now.

                      Unbelief was stubbborn and resisting. It scoffed at the wiser

                          course of faith and humble obedience. No doubt the

                     people condemned Noah as a fool  and pronounced

                         building the ark a crazy expenditure of time snd means.

                    To them the preaching and warnings of Noah were only the

                        babblings of a crazy fool. To the most conservative

                   among these believers Noah was not a practical man, only

                        only a dreamer of dreams. But all, whether conservative

                  or radical, resisted while Noah labored and warned. But

                       when the flood came, they must have realized that Noah 

                 was wise and they were fools. They might resist God in

                       His entreaties, but they could not resist Him in His wrath."

Our greatest need is, that we are living before the same God that was

dealing with Noah and the world at that time.

Byrl Brockman