The Role Of the Holy Ghost in the End –Time Soul Winning Campaign
By Pastor Fiso Oyeniji
Introduction
There are three important things to note in the topic at hand, and these are:-
1) Soul Winning
2) End – Time
3) Holy Ghost
As it were, the job being proposed to be done is soul winning, and the season during which the job is to be done is end time; while Holy Ghost is the tool thrust forward for doing the job. Therefore, the ordinary man who is listening to this lecture would necessarily need to know what soul winning is; why the emphasi on end-time; and how about the Holy Ghost?
Exegesis
The lecture examines the nature and substance of the Holy Ghost and located his place in the Godhead as being the same as that of the son, even after the homoousios (homoousioς) formula subscribed to by the Nicene creed of 325 A.D. Jesus and the Holy Ghost are therefore co-eternal and of the same essence; and whereas the Holy Ghost can be taken as the invisible risen Lord, the earthly Jesus is word incarnate, born not made, being of one substance with the Father, the Holy Ghost.
The Holy Ghost is, therefore, a divine person, who operates in natural eternal agreement with the Godhead, and who therefore for the purpose of God’s eagerness on His creation, has a rudimental role to play in the question of soul winning.
The lecture then proceeds to pick up the role of the Holy Ghost as being the same as the ones given by the Lord during His valedictory speech in the gospel according to Saint John Chapter 16 verses 7-13. It is finally submitted that because of the peculiarities of the end-times, those roles had become so important that without them the job of soul winning campaign may remain totally impossible
Soul Winning
By basic definition, to win a soul means to convert over to Christ a person that is formerly opposed to the gospel of Christ. Also, as put by James, the Apostle, “He who converts the sinner from his error saves a soul from death. James 5:20 Soul-winning is done by telling the sinner about the wonderful story of love that made God to offer His only son, Jesus Christ, for sacrifice, to the end that whosoever believes in Him shall reign with Him in the eternal home.
Therefore, by soul winning we mean the making of a sinner to accept Christ and on that basis abandon his erstwhile sinful way. Soul winning is, therefore, a gospel of salvation
The Holy Ghost
Blunt and straight I would like to say that the Holy Ghost is Jesus. Not the earthly Jesus, but the risen Lord. It is the bible that said it. In 1st John chapter 5 verse 7, it is revealed that the Godhead is constituted of the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost. In the old Testament the Holy Ghost is referred to by people of that time simply as the spirit of God. However in the New Testament the spirit of God is known as the Holy Ghost or as the spirit of Christ. Paul in his letter to the Ephesians said that the spirit of God that was reported as moving on the surface of the waters at the dawn of creation is no other person than the very Lord Jesus Christ. Said Paul:
“To make all men see what is the fellowship of the mystery, which from the beginning of the world had been hid in God, who created all things by Jesus Christ.” Eph 3:9
John in the book of Revelations said that the name of Jesus is the Word of God; and in his synoptic gospel he said it was this Word that was sent out in the beginning to create all things, and that nothing was created except by the Word! (Rev. 19:13; John 1:1-3). The whole story of the bible therefore is that God sent His Word in the person of Holy Ghost to create the world; thereafter, he made the Word to take the form of man, who came to the earth for redemption of man’s soul; appearing after death, as a spirit-man, to his disciples and other Saints; and did this for a whole of 40 days, before he went back to heaven, justified: (1Tim 3:16). He once more made a quick visit to the earth in the person of Holy Ghost on the day of Pentecost to baptize man with the Holy Ghost and with fire. He later chose to call Paul without showing any physical appearance, and in that estate, He, in the words of Herbert Brown, “justified, forgave, and took Paul out of Adam and placed him in Jesus, caused him to be born again, baptized in fire, sealed and anointed right there in the dust on the road to Damascus.” Not completely done, He appeared again in the form of a grey bearded old man, with air as white as wool, and eyes as a ball of fire, to talk to John at the Island of Patmos. All these things were done by God alternating in form and appearance between the Word Jesus, and the Holy Ghost (1 John 5:8). As said in the book of Hebrews:
“God, who at sundry times and in divers manners spake in time past unto the fathers by the prophets, hath in these last days spoken unto us by his Son, whom he hath appointed heir of all things, by whom also he made the worlds.” Hebrews 1: 1-2
When, therefore, we call Jesus the Holy Ghost, we are speaking of the wisdom of God in a mystery, even the hidden wisdom, which God ordained before the world unto our glory; which the princes of this world did not know, for had they known it, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory. 1 Corinth. 2:7-8.
And not to forget, the motto of this great ministry is ‘The eagerness of God on HIS creation’ It is obvious that what our father, the Apostle, had in mind by this, is the insatiability of our Lord Jesus Christ in carrying out the campaign of soul winning at all cost and in diverse forms to ensure that no soul is unjustifiably lost. That same Jesus is here with us, even now as Holy Ghost. Though we cannot see him, He is seeing us, ever prepared to do our biddings. He that is God and yet he is called son, the Word incarnate, the spirit of the most high God that came to earth to dwell as flesh and is now back in heaven sitting at the right hand of power. He, the same son, by whom the Lord God shall come to judge both the quick and the dead.
The Role of the Holy Ghost in soul winning generally.
The role of the Holy Ghost in soul winning generally is the same role played by the Lord Jesus Christ during His earthly journey. And while He was going, He had this to say:
“Nevertheless I tell you the truth, it is expedient that I go away: For if I go not away, the Comforter will not come unto you; but if I depart, I will send him unto you. And when he is come, he will reprove the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment.” (John 16:7-8).
As a matter of fact, the Holy Ghost is better placed than the earthly Jesus in the soul winning job. The Lord while on earth had many limitations as a man, but which the Holy Ghost would not have. Said the Lord:
“I have yet many things to say unto you, but ye cannot bear them now.
Howbeit when he, the spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth;
for he shall not speak of himself; but whatsoever he shall hear, that shall he speak; and he will show you things to come.” John 16:12-13.
By all this, the Lord Jesus Christ has by himself spelt out very clearly the role of the Holy Ghost in the end time soul winning campaign. But to fully appreciate these roles, we need to first examine what are the challenges of the so called end- time!
End – Time Peculiarities.
The following are the problems peculiar to the end- time, and which a soul winner would need to wade through in order to conduct his soul winning campaign:
1) Fake prophets
Of these the bible said,
“They shall show great signs and wonders; in so much that if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect.” (Matthew 24: 24)
Therefore an end-time Soul-winner gifted as a miracle worker will be out there in very ugly competition with the fakes.
2) False doctrines
For various reasons of self aggrandizement, the end-time would be full of false doctrines, and that will take the end-time soul-winner more than average knowledge and patience to successfully confront.
3) Commercialization of Religion
Has it not been written:
“For all seek their own, not the things which are Jesus Christ” (Philippians 2:21).”
Because of things like unemployment and other problems associated with the end-time, many whose belly is their God will for the purpose of fame and earthy things set up churches and ministries, using all forms of deceit and practices never heard of, to compete on the field for the souls of men (Philippians 3:18). The end-time soul-winner has, indeed, many problems on his hands.
4) Absence of faith (result of frustration)
Majority of those whose souls need to be won would be already frustrated by the contemporary events of the end-time; for it is written,
“Because iniquities shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold” Matthew 24: 12.
There was for instance the story of an unusual iniquity just before I left America last month. A man who is a husband, a father and the president of his church council was discovered to be living two different lives at the same time. For over a period of 30 yrs, he has been a serial killer with the trade name, BTK. Meaning Bind, Torture and Kill. As at the time of his arrest, he has killed over 10 persons.
Tell me with this in the mind of the people, what respect do you expect for Christians, nay Soul-winners? It is as bad as that!
5) Poverty and disease
These are now so common-place all over the world. We have to thank God in Africa because; it appears the more the civilization in modern medicine among the Caucasian race, the more unfathomable are the type of diseases with which they are afflicted. And in those so called developed countries, you will note that poverty is evenly distributed. Their bills are their God. The word of God is looked at as a make-up (Matthew 24:7-8)
6) Lack of love
You don’t talk about love in the midst of a pervert and crooked nation. Almost everyone is in the same race for materialism. We have the same complaints, the same bitterness, the same pride, the same ambition. Hear Prophet Malachi
“The good man is perished out of the earth: and there is none upright among men: they all lie in wait for blood; they hunt every man his brother with a net. That they may do evil with both hands earnestly, the prince asketh, and the judge asketh for a reward; and the great man, he uttereth his mischievous desire: so they wrap it up. The best of them is as a brier: the most upright is sharper than a thorn hedge: the day of thy watchmen and thy visitation cometh; now shall be their perplexity.” Micah 7:2-4
As if in utter bewilderment, the Lord Jesus Christ beheld all these things and counseled:
“Watch ye therefore, and pray always that ye may be accounted worthy to escape all theses things that shall come to pass, and to stand before the son of Man” Luke 21: 36
7) Increased knowledge
Prophet Daniel prophesized it and it has come to pass. Said the scriptures:
“But thou, O Daniel, shut up the words, and seal the book, even to the time of the end; many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall be increased.”(Daniel 12:4)
In the end-time, no question shall be accepted as foolish concerning the Bible. The soul-winner must bring up himself to meet the challenges of education and knowledge.
8) Powers of darkness
They now abound all over the place. While it is done underground in Africa, it manifests in physical forms in the developed countries. Violence upon violence, mile after mile. Satan now has his fingers busy in the affairs of the Church, because he knew that he has but a short time. (Rev. 12:12)
9) Abomination of desolation
The Bible says,
“She that lives in leisure is dead while alive” (1 Tim. 5:6).
The leisure of urban life, the returns on modern education, and the comforts availed by development in science and advancement of technology has robbed the world of our day the type of Spartan life lived by the Patriarchs and the Apostles. Therefore in the same manner that Jesus wept over Jerusalem, the Holy Ghost is shedding tears over the world of our time, saying “O earth, I am leaving you desolate, so that your abomination may continue to abound.”
Just before the lamp of God goes out in the temple of the Lord
We are indeed in the end-times. All the signs are there, and they are ominous. In the face of the myriads of problems that have been listed here, by what means shall a soul-winner succeed?
The truth is that, if things are left to be going on this way, very soon, soul-winning campaign will be rendered completely impotent and darkness will cover all the earth.
Role of the Holy Ghost in the End – Time soul winning campaign
The first and most important thing to note in Soul-winning is what Paul, the Apostle said in his second letter to the Corinthians, he said:
“Ye are our epistle written n our heart, known and read of all men” (2 Cor. 3:2)
The job of Soul-winning assumes that one man is good and the other is not. One man is knowledgeable the other is not. One man is Christ-like, while the other is not.
How shall it be then, if the man whose Soul you are about to win has to discover that you are worse than him in knowledge, in Christ-like life, and in beauty of character. You have failed before you start.
Now the Bible says that “Blood and water cannot inherit the kingdom of God.” (1 Cor. 15: 50). When we say “Kingdom of God” we are talking about peace, love and the calm of paradise, for it is written: “The kingdom of God is not meat and drink, but righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost” (Rev. 14: 17)
Unfortunately every man is blood and water. But if being natural men, we as soul winners cannot possibly attain to righteousness, peace, and Christ-like life, how do we think it shall be possible for us to convince the rest men about righteousness and peace, etc. Will thou lift mount Olympus? Will blind lead the blind? Will thou not first remove the molt in your eyes, O’ ye hypocrites? These are the questions confronting every Soul-winner today.
The solution to the question is that every person intending to be a Soul-winner should, first, find solution to his base nature and get regenerated, and the only means of regeneration given to mankind is in the receiving of the Holy Ghost. For it is written:
“And there shall come forth a rod out of the stem of Jesse, and a Branch shall grow out of his roots: and the spirit of the LORD shall rest upon him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the LORD; and shall make him of quick understanding in the fear of the LORD: and he shall not judge after the sight of his eyes, neither reprove after the hearing of his ears: but with righteousness shall he judge the poor, and reprove with equity for the meek of the earth: and he shall smite the earth with the rod of his mouth, and with the breath of his lips shall he slay the wicked. And righteousness shall be the girdle of his loins, and faithfulness the girdle of his reins.” Isaiah 11:1-5
It is now that the Soul-winner is ready for the end-time Soul-winning campaign. He has got the wisdom and understanding to deal with the problems of frustrated persons, the spirit of counsel to know how to tackle the nuisance of fake prophets; knowledge to answer all questions that were once considered as foolish, and the fear of the Lord that would provide him with righteousness as the girdle of loins and faithfulness as girdle of the reins. All this indeed make up the role of the Holy Ghost in the end-time Soul-winning campaign. The role is indeed enormous!!!
Have you received the Holy Ghost since you believed? (Acts 19:2)