It's exciting to hear what God is doing on the
university campus, and to know that we as a local
church have the joy of being a part of that.
Would you open your Bible, please, with me to
the book of Ephesians, the fifth chapter. We
have been talking about the work of the Holy
Spirit in our lives. and the will of God. I'd
like for you to read with me Ephesians 5, beginning
in verse 15. You follow along as I read. Therefore
be careful how you walk, not as unwise men, but
as wise, making the most of your time, because
the days are evil. So then do not be foolish,
but understand what the will of the Lord is.
And do not get drunk with wine, for that is dissipation.
but be filled with the Spirit, speaking to one
another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs,
singing and making melody with your heart to
the Lord, always giving thanks for all things
in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, to God,
even the Father, and be subject to one another
in the fear of Christ. There's a little prayer
chorus that we sang the last time we were together
in this text. I'd like for you to sing it with
me now. Let's bow before the Lord and sing, Spirit
of the living God, fall fresh on me. Spirit of
the living God, fall fresh on me. Spirit of the
living God, fall fresh on me. Melt me, mold me.
Spirit of the living God, fall fresh on me. Lord,
we do pray for that fresh work of your Spirit
in our lives as we come to this holy word of
God. In Jesus' name, amen. When I was in high
school, like many of you, I took a course in
driver's education. I think that's a wise thing
to do, because not only does it save money on
insurance premiums, ultimately, but it also makes
one a safer driver. During that training, there
is a lot of time that is spent in the classroom
before one ever gets into a car. You have to
study the laws. perhaps watch some films on safety,
and you have to learn the way that an automobile
operates. But can you remember the first time
you got into a car and you slipped in the driver's
seat behind the wheel? It may have been the driving
instructor next to you, or perhaps, as it was
in my case, one of your parents was there. But
all of a sudden, there you were in the driver's
seat where you'd wanted to be for so long. And
you put that key in the ignition and you turned
it on. Do you remember that sense of exhilaration
that came to you as you realized that now you
were going to drive the car finally? Well, it's
with that same sense of anticipation that I come
this morning to this text. We have studied in
the book of Ephesians, particularly in the last
part of it, how God wants us to conduct ourselves.
We've examined the Word of God which says that
we are to walk in truth, we are to walk in love,
we are to walk in honesty, we are to walk in
light or in purity. We have seen something of
God's purpose for us, the Church, those He is
calling out. We have studied about the gifts
of the Holy Spirit and how those are given to
us personally as believers for the building up
and the unifying. of the church. But now today
in what we're going to study, we are going to
look at God's provision for the power for all
of this. We're going to learn, as it were, how
to put the key into the ignition. We have done
the classroom work, but God wants us to know
how to turn on the power, and that is what our
text speaks about. The fuller paragraph that
we're studying deals with the will of the Lord.
That is something that God wants us to know and
to understand. He does not want us to be in the
dark regarding His purpose for us. God's will
is not so much something we find as that which
we follow. It is not so much discovered as it
is obeyed. Charles Solomon has said, The issue
is that in most cases, We already know considerably
more of the will of God than we care to obey.
What we want is more information rather than
having to obey what we know. Maybe that's the
case with some of us this morning. I remind you
that the will of God is explicitly stated for
us in our text, at least in part. In the first
place, there is the command, be careful how you
walk. God tells us to evaluate our lifestyle.
our conduct, our choices, our commitments, the
use of our God -given gifts and resources, and
to be sure that they are all under the lordship
of Jesus Christ. He says, be careful how you
walk for two reasons. In the first place, because
of life's privileges, God brings to us many opportunities,
and we are to be careful to buy them all up,
to make the best use of them. but we are also
to evaluate our lives because of the present
evil. Evil is at war against us. Therefore, we
are to be careful how we walk so that we don't
fall into the traps of Satan and of the world
system, all of which is arrayed in battle to
defeat us in our Christian life. Be careful how
you walk. And then he tells us, do not get drunk.
He says this leads to excess and the squandering
of our stewardship. He calls it dissipation.
And from our study of some of the principles
of God's word, we concluded that it's best and
wisest for a child of God to be an abstainer
entirely when it comes to this matter of alcohol
or drugs, anything that would control and dominate
us. But now we come to a third command, which
I want to focus on primarily this morning, and
that is the one that says, be filled with the
Spirit. That is the will of God for you, my friend.
It is God's will that you and I be filled with
the Holy Spirit. Now what does that mean? The
word filled means to be controlled by, to be
dominated by. So he's really saying to us, Be
controlled by the Holy Spirit or be empowered
by the Holy Spirit. And it's in the present tense,
which means that he wants us to go on being filled
with the Holy Spirit as an habitual, continuous
experience in our Christian life. The suggestion
is that there are successive fillings. The filling
of the Holy Spirit is not a once and for all
experience. That is true regarding the indwelling
of the Holy Spirit. He comes into us at conversion
once and for all, never to leave us. It is true
regarding the baptism of the Holy Spirit. That
is a once -for -all experience at the moment
of conversion, when the Holy Spirit places us
into and identifies us with the body of Jesus
Christ. That is true regarding the sealing of
the Holy Spirit. At the moment of conversion,
once and for all, we are sealed into Jesus Christ
by the work of the Holy Spirit. But the filling
of the Holy Spirit is different. The filling
of the Holy Spirit is successive. It is to go
on as a continuous experience. When he says be
filled with the Holy Spirit, he is making an
obvious contrast to the pagan worshipers of Dionysius
that we discussed a couple of weeks ago. They
felt in order to get in touch with God, you had
to become intoxicated and work yourself up into
a frenzy in which essentially you lost control
of yourself, often to demon spirits. The Apostle
says, Be filled with the Holy Spirit. Don't be
drunk with wine. Don't be involved in that kind
of loss of control. But put yourself under the
control of the Spirit of God. I think the most
beautiful illustration I've heard of this idea
of being filled with the Spirit is that of a
sailboat. If you've ever been in a sailboat,
you know that it's a lot of fun. You get out
there into the waves. and you put up the sail.
And when that wind hits the sail and the boat
begins to move, it's exciting. For suddenly you
find yourself empowered by an invisible force.
You can't see the wind, but you can feel it.
You can't see it, but you understand what it's
doing for you, and you've captured it in that
sail. so that it empowers the boat and moves
it along. It fills the sail. So what the apostle
is saying is that you and I, as a continuous
experience of life, need to have the sail up
so that the Holy Spirit can empower us and fill
us and move us along. And notice that it's a
command. This is not an option for us to consider.
This is a command to be obeyed. It's imperative.
Therefore, not to be filled. The will of God
is that you and I be filled with the Holy Spirit,
and He gives us some good motivation for doing
that. He tells us that the Holy Spirit produces
some wonderful results in our lives. Please note
that the filling of the Holy Spirit is never
an end in itself. The filling of the Holy Spirit
is always intended to produce something in our
lives, and he gives us four results in our text.
The first one in the first part of verse 19,
fellowship with one another. He says speaking
to one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual
songs. There's a parallel passage in Colossians
3 that elaborates a bit more. There it says teaching
and admonishing. The speaking that is being done
here is the speaking to one another in the fellowship
that we enjoy as believers. That fellowship is
not merely sitting down around a table and eating
a good chicken dinner. Nothing wrong with that.
But there are some churches who think that that
is fellowship. Fellowship may happen there, but
that's not fellowship. Fellowship is not even
getting together in your home with a small group
and chatting about the weather or some other
topic that you enjoy talking about other than
spiritual things. Real fellowship is when we
get together and share the things of God. It
is the Holy Spirit who makes that fellowship
possible so that we speak to one another, we
teach, and we admonish, or that means rebuke
one another. He says that we are to do this with
psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs. This gives
us a little insight into what comprised the coming
together of believers in those early days of
the Church. They utilized the psalms. This word
is psalmus. It refers to the Old Testament psalter,
the 150 psalms in our Old Testament. This word,
by the way, means literally plucking of strings.
That's the verb for psalms. And there you obviously
get the picture of David composing his tunes
and his words as he wrote about half of the psalms.
And then they also incorporated in the early
church hymns. This is where we get our word hymns.
The Greek word is humnos. It refers to worshipful,
poetic compositions. These were not ones that
came out of the Psalter, but these are ones which
those people wrote in that day, and apparently
they especially focused on the work of Jesus
Christ, the coming of the Son of God into the
world, his incarnation, his work at Calvary,
his resurrection from the dead, ascension back
to heaven. We possibly have a couple of examples
of humnos in the New Testament. I think of Colossians
1, verses 15 to 18, which is a very compact,
poetic statement regarding Jesus Christ. Another
one, Philippians chapter 2, the incarnation,
Jesus Christ, who thought it not robbery to be
equal with God, but made himself of no reputation,
and so on. Another very compact, poetic composition
regarding the Son of God, ahumnos. They shared
these kinds of things as they fellowshiped together,
and also spiritual songs. The Greek word is ode,
and from this we get our English word ode. A
spiritual song is simply a song or poem arising
within the spirit of a person. It was more of
a spontaneous expression, a testimony, if you
please. especially focused on the experience
of the believer. Now, in our singing together,
we might compare this to gospel songs, which
really are not hymns of praise to God, but they
are expressions of what we have experienced of
the Christian faith. Those are spiritual songs
as contemporary examples, at least, along with
our personal testimonies. So he's saying here
that the Spirit of God, when he is in control
of us, produces fellowship. That's what God wants
us to know as we come together like this. But
it's hard to have deep fellowship when we're
together in a large celebration of worship. The
place you really get into fellowship is in a
small church, a smaller group, or in a flock.
For there you can open yourself a little more
intimately to fewer people and become more deeply
acquainted and there share transparently what
God is doing in your own life. We all need to
do that. Now the Spirit of God, secondly, produces
worship to God. The last part of verse 19. Singing
and making melody with your heart to the Lord,
he says. Literally, he says, singing and psalming.
Here we have the verb form of that word psalm
used a moment ago. Singing and using instruments
to reflect the real feelings of the heart is
what the apostle has in mind at this point. Notice
it is to be with the heart that we worship God.
The heart is the center of one's personality.
In the New Testament, it seems almost synonymous
with the word mind. He is saying that as we come
together to sing and to make melody in our hearts
to God, it's to be with understanding. We are
to know what we're doing. We're not to come and
just go through a routine. We're not to carelessly
perform ritual. But as we come together with
God's people, we are to be aware of what is happening
around us and with the understanding. as well
as with our emotions and our wills, we are to
worship the Lord. I think a beautiful illustration
of this would be a wind chime. Have you ever
seen one of those? Some of you have them. Three
or four metal tubes that hang together, and as
the wind comes against those, they are gently...
rocked back and forth, and they brush against
each other to produce a very pleasant sound.
Now, frankly, when the wind is high in a storm,
it's not too pleasant. I have walked out in storms
before and taken our wind chime down because
it was driving me nuts. But a wind chime, a soft
wind chime, is a very pleasant sound. You see,
that's the picture here, the Spirit of God blowing
upon his people, moving in the hearts of his
people. And as he does that, then the gentle
sound of worship being raised to God, singing,
making melody with our understanding, with our
hearts to the Lord, the Spirit of God produces
that. And then he says, thirdly, the Spirit of
God produces thanksgiving in verse 20. Ceaseless
praise and gratitude to the Lord, acknowledgement
of the benefits which we have received as his
people. The Spirit of God, when he is filling
a person, will create a thankful person. A complainer
is never filled with the Spirit of God. When
are we to give thanks, he tells us, notice the
word, always. That means we are to give thanks
to God after the blessing. Exodus 15, an example
of that. God delivered his people from Egypt,
and the first thing they did beside the Red Sea
was to have a praise service to the Lord. Thanksgiving
to God. The horse and the rider he has dumped
into the sea, they said. We are to give thanks
to the Lord in the midst of our distress. You
read Jonah chapter 2 real carefully, you'll find
that he was still in the belly of the big fish.
When he had a prayer meeting and gave thanks
to God, in the middle of his distress, he was
giving thanks. Can you give thanks to God for
that situation you're in? Only by the Spirit
of God can you do that. And it's an act of faith.
And then we need to give thanks to God before
the battle begins. Jehoshaphat did that in 2
Chronicles 20. In fact, as he sent the army into
battle, against the foes united against them.
The ones who were leading the army were those
who were appointed to be singers to the Lord.
And they gave thanks to God for his loving kindness,
which endures forever. And as those singers led
them into battle, giving thanks to God. The Lord,
it says, set ambushes for the enemies, and they
destroyed themselves before the army ever had
to attack. You see, the time to give thanks is
always, whatever our situation. And for what?
Again, he tells us three simple words. For all
things. William Hendrickson says, Gratitude must
be felt and expressed for blessings physical
and spiritual, ordinary and extraordinary, past,
present, and future, and even for things withheld
and for things received. It should be borne constantly
in mind that the one who under the guidance of
the Spirit issued this admonition was himself
a prisoner while he so commanded. But in spite
of his chain, no rather for his chain, he thanked
God. He was able to take pleasure in weakness,
injuries, hardships, and frustrations. This may
seem very strange. It is, however, entirely consistent
with the rest of Paul's teachings, for it harmonizes
beautifully with the assurance that to them that
love God, all things work together for good.
and that in all these things we are more than
conquerors through him that loved us. That's
why we can give thanks for all things, because
all things are under his control. It may not
be pleasant. It may be heartache and grief or
challenge and stretching involved. But oh, thank
God for it, friend. The Spirit of God will produce
in you that gratitude that will give thanks for
all things. And then how are we to do it? In
the name, he says, of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Why? Well, because he's our approach to God and
because he himself is our greatest cause for
thanksgiving. Give thanks to God in his name.
God is the origin. He is the source of all things.
what is sometimes called the first cause. So
often, you know, we give thanks to other people.
We write thank you notes or we express a thank
you, and we should do that. We should do that.
But we tend to forget that those people who were
kind to us in some way were actually the ministers
of the Lord. And we need to give thanks ultimately
to God the Father for all of the blessings. that
he gives and, as has been stated, even for those
that he withholds for some good purpose. The
Spirit of God produces a thankful heart. And
finally, the Spirit of God produces submission
to one another. Verse 21. This word, subject,
is a military term. It means to line up under
another who is your superior. What he is saying
here is that all of us are to willingly serve
others. We are to be dominated rather than demanding
domination. There is to be a mutual deference
about us. As the Apostle says in Romans chapter
12, deferring to one another in honor. As he
says in Philippians chapter 2, counting others
is more important than ourselves. And we are
to do this, it says, in the fear of Christ, that
is with reverence for him who is the head of
the body. Why is it that we can, in the fear
of Christ, be subject to others? Defer to them.
Why is it? Because Jesus Christ is the head of
both of us. And I need not fear subjecting myself
to you, because your head is my head. And as
both of us are in fear of him, that is, have
reverence for him, respect for his awesome position
of majesty as God, then we're going to treat
each other in love. Neither of us is going to
seek to take advantage of the other. There's
not going to be manipulation and politicking
going on because we can, in the fear of Christ,
subject ourselves to one another. And it's the
Spirit of God who produces that within us. Now
we come to the key question, how is this filling
of the Spirit of God experienced? I want you
to notice that the verb is passive. It is something
that happens to us, but it's a command at the
same time. So you put that together, and what
he is saying is that here is something that you
and I must allow. Here is something that we have
to cooperate with for it to be real. That's the
point. You see, there are conditions for the
Spirit of God to be filling us. Often we look
upon the filling of the Spirit as one option
and walking in the flesh as another option. And
somehow we're in between and we can go one way
or the other. That is not the case. It's like
a light switch. It's either on or off. Either
we are filled with the Spirit or we're walking
in the flesh. It's one or the other. There's
no in between. There's no middle ground here.
Being filled with the Holy Spirit is the normal
Christian life. It's not something that is for
just an elite few. It's not something just for
those who have learned the secret. But the filling
of the Spirit of God is the normal experience
for the child of God who's walking in obedience
to the Lord. Now the conditions for being filled
with the Holy Spirit are simple. In the first
place, we have to confess all known sin. If the
Spirit of God is grieved or quenched, He is not
going to control us and empower us, obviously.
Those terms are in opposition to one another.
If He is dominating, then He is not being quenched.
He's not being put down. If He is in control,
then He is not being grieved in our lives. So
we need to confess all known sin. That's where
we begin. Secondly, we need to acknowledge our
need for the filling of the Holy Spirit and our
desire for it. If we somehow are self -complacent
or satisfied, like the Laodicean Christians,
for example, and we say, well, I am full, I am
rich, I have need of nothing, then the Spirit
of God is not going to be in control. If our
lives are filled with something else, and they
can be, As the book of Acts points out, if our
lives are filled with some other object or person
or activity or involvement that we put first,
then the Spirit of God will meekly and gently
step aside and let you have your way. Let me
have my way until we learn better. So we have
to acknowledge our need for the filling of the
Holy Spirit and desire it. That means having
a broken spirit, not a satisfied spirit. It means
allowing our hearts to be broken before God and
say, Oh God, I need you. Truly, there is no greater
need that I have in my life. And it means to
seek the Spirit of God with some urgency. It
means that there needs to be a deep desire within,
like thirst. That's why Jesus said, if any man
thirsts, let him come to me and drink. If we
hunger and thirst after righteousness, we will
be filled. Do you acknowledge your need for the
Holy Spirit's control in your life? Do you desire
it? A third condition is to yield ourselves without
reservation to God. Romans 12, 1 and 2. Present
your bodies a living sacrifice. Romans chapter
6. Present to the Lord, he says, the members
of your body. The Spirit of God will be pleased.
to control that which is given to him. And the
fourth condition is very simple, but it simply
says, believe that the Spirit of God has done
this. You see, you need not even ask the Holy
Spirit to control you, because that's the natural,
normal thing he will do if the obstacles are
taken out of the way. Do you get the point? It's
like an artesian well. It's like a fountain that
produces from within unless there is something
stopping it up. So once we have dealt with whatever
the obstacles are, the Spirit of God immediately
does begin controlling and filling us so that
when we have confessed our sin and acknowledged
our need and desire for it, And when we have
yielded without reservation to God, at that moment
the Spirit of God begins to empower us and to
control us. And we need to say, Lord, thank you.
I believe that you are controlling me. There's
no pleading involved. It's His desire to do so.
I repeat, this is the normal Christian life.
Our part is to remove the obstacles. The walk
in the Spirit is not one of feelings, but it's
one of faith, believing that God does what he
says he will do. Every genuine Christian has
all of the Holy Spirit, but the command here,
you see, involves the Holy Spirit having all
of us so that he can do what he wants to do.
Some may say, I would willingly yield all into
God's hand and empty my heart that he might fill
it. But there are many things which keep me bound,
and I am unable to root those things out of my
life. Of course, writes one commentator, God
does not expect us to purify ourselves or to
expel first by our own efforts that which hinders
his work in us. We would not accomplish this.
All he asks of us is our consent, our consent
to let him enter into every part that he may
transform and purify all. All he desires is the
complete submission of our will, contrary to
which he will not act, since he created us free
beings. My Christian brother and sister, are
you this morning prepared to obey this command
of God? Will you do it now? Would you bow with
me? This morning these conditions are laid before
you. To obey this command, to allow the Holy
Spirit to fill you, confess all known sin. Have
you done that? Will you do it now? Be specific
enough. that you know what you're talking about.
Certainly God knows. Will you acknowledge your
need for the Spirit of God and tell the Lord
you desire it, that you thirst for this reality
of the Spirit's control in your life? And now
will you yield without reservation to God everything
you are, everything you have, every potential
that lies within you, the gifts and talents the
Lord has given you as a stewardship, your resources?
Will you yield? My friend, if you have done that,
then will you at this moment simply believe that
the Spirit of God is in control, like a well
of water springing up within you. Once the obstacles
are out of the way, he will burst forth in all
of his power and glory to control your life.
Father, I thank you for this truth, and I pray
that there will be scores, if not hundreds of
us this morning, who will come into a deeper
understanding of the will of the Lord. And may
we obey it. And I pray that having filled us
to our capacity at this point in our walk, that
you would deepen us and enlarge our capacity
so that we may be vessels useful to you. Lord,
I pray that every area of our lives will be searched
out by the Holy Spirit and purified. Some of
us are battling battles that we don't know what
to do with, but we bring those battles to you
and we give you our consent. We yield to you,
Lord. We ask you to fight that battle for us.
Thank you. Lord, thank you for being here and
ministering in this time of worship this morning.
Let's prayerfully sing together. Father, I adore
you Lay my life before you How I love you Jesus
I adore you. Lay my life before you. How I love
you. Spirit, I adore you. Lay my life before
you, how I love you. Would you stand with me,
please? Let me assure you that that is a prayer
that God hears, and God is delighted to answer
that prayer already in your life. Let's bow together.
Now, Father, I pray as we are dismissed from
this place, make us aware of your presence wherever
we are, that we're never left alone to face the
battle by ourselves, but that the Spirit of God
is within us forever, that he's there to empower
us. And so now may we go forth from here. empowered
like sails filled with wind. And may the beautiful
produce of the Spirit of God and fellowship and
worship and gratitude and submission be evidenced
in us. For Jesus' sake, amen.