9 min read old-sermon

The Spirit’s Filling (Ephesians 5:14-18)

  • please open your Bibles with me to Ephesians 5
  • can you point to wasted periods in your life?
  • perhaps you’ve been a Christian for a while, but you can identify a period in which you wasted your time
  • have you ever made unwise decisions?
  • have you ever been a believer, and yet experienced a period of sleepiness and sluggishness in your life?
  • have you ever had the queasy feeling that you aren’t in the will of God, or that you don’t know God’s will?
  • read with me a few verses from Ephesians 5
  • we’ll begin reading in the middle of verse 14
  • (Ephesians 5:14) This is why it is said: “Wake up, O sleeper, rise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you.”
  • (Ephesians 5:15) Be very careful, then, how you live–not as unwise but as wise,
  • (Ephesians 5:16) making the most of every opportunity, because the days are evil.
  • (Ephesians 5:17) Therefore do not be foolish, but understand what the Lord’s will is.
  • Paul says it’s possible to be a Christian, and yet be asleep
  • to be a Christian, and yet waste your time
  • to be a believer, and yet be unwise
  • to be a Christian, and not know what God’s will is
  • Paul gives a remedy to this sort of living
  • the next verse, Ephesians 5:18, is unexpected and unparalleled in the Bible
  • it is the imperative that is the key to all the others in this passage, and in fact the ultimate imperative in Paul’s writings
  • (Ephesians 5:18) Do not get drunk on wine, which leads to debauchery. Instead, be filled with the Spirit.
  • we’ve already established last week that every believer has been baptized in the Spirit
  • friends, here is the reality: if you are a believer, you have been Spirit-baptized
  • all believers have been
  • we’ve all been baptized in the Holy Spirit
  • we’re all recipients of the gift of Jesus at Pentecost, the gift of the Holy Spirit
  • there’s no such thing as a second class of Christians, a class better than ordinary, run-of-the-mill believers
  • we all have received the gift of the Holy Spirit
  • but the reality is that many Christians lead defeated Christian lives
  • their lives are not on target, they are not living wisely according to God’s will
  • the problem isn’t that we don’t have enough of the Spirit
  • every believer has complete access to the Spirit’s fullness at all times
  • the problem isn’t that we don’t have enough of the Spirit, it’s that the Spirit doesn’t have enough of us
  • this is what Paul means by his command, “Be filled with the Spirit”
  • the purpose of this command is that we experience the filling of the Holy Spirit, that the Spirit be given a place in your life that he wants and that he deserves to have
  • we understand what it means to be filled with an emotion
  • we know what it means to be filled with grief, or joy, or other strong emotions
  • when we are filled with a given emotion, that emotion dominates our being and describes what we are really like
  • it in fact describes what controls us
  • there’s a story in the book of Acts about Ananias and Sapphira, a married couple that lied to God about what they were giving him
  • Acts 5:3 describes Ananias by saying that Satan filled his heart
  • in other words, Satan dominated his impulses
  • whenever we are filled with something, that means we are controlled by it
  • Paul tells us that we are to be filled and controlled, and I might add, empowered, by the Holy Spirit
  • only when this happens can we live what is called the victorious Christian life
  • this is the key to growing in our faith
  • the more filled with the Spirit we are, the more we will grow as believers
  • the less filled with the Spirit we are, the slower we will grow as believers
  • in 1989, I was dating an attractive young lady
  • now in case you’re wondering, no, I wasn’t married in 1989, so it was okay to be dating
  • this woman I was dating, we’ll call her, say, Charlene
  • and we went down to see the Symphony of Fire show down at the lake
  • Charlene at that time had a newfangled car, a 1988 Chevrolet Beretta
  • and it had a gauge in the car that would tell you how far the car could drive with the gas currently in the tank
  • as we left the parking lot, we were stuck in a traffic jam
  • and this gauge went down from 30 km to 15 km to 7km
  • and we hadn’t even moved
  • we pulled the car over on the road, parked it, and took a public transit, and had to go retrieve the car the next day
  • now no-one in their right mind would say that we lacked a good attitude
  • we were in love; we had a great attitude
  • but the problem wasn’t our attitude; the problem was that we had run out of gas
  • no-one would ever tell us that we didn’t try hard enough
  • it didn’t matter how hard we tried
  • the problem wasn’t our effort, the problem was that we ran out of gas
  • no-one in their right mind would have suggested that we lacked faith
  • I don’t care how much faith we had, the car was out of gas
  • but let’s think about the Christian life
  • if you ever go through a spiritually dry time, the problem is that you aren’t filled or controlled or dominated by the Spirit
  • some people say, “you need a better attitude”
  • some people would say, “you’re not trying hard enough”
  • others would say that you lack faith
  • but these things forget the real problem
  • the problem isn’t that we have a poor attitude or aren’t trying hard enough or that we lack faith
  • the problem is that we’re not filled with the Spirit
  • you see, it’s impossible to live the Christian life on our own
  • if we could pull it off, God would be necessary
  • but in John 15:5, Jesus said, “Apart from me, you can do nothing”
  • that’s why before he returned to heaven, he promised us the Holy Spirit
  • and without the Holy Spirit, we can do nothing
  • the Christian life is a supernatural life, and we need supernatural help to live it
  • the only thing that makes us more powerful than before is he that is in us
  • we need the Holy Spirit to provide us the enablement we need to overcome sin
  • we need to be filled with the Holy Spirit
  • think of the disciples
  • if anyone could live effective Christian lives without the Spirit, it was them
  • they were trained by the Master
  • they had seen lame men walk, blind men see, and the dead rise
  • they knew about the Father and the Son
  • they had even performed miracles themselves
  • nobody could have been more convinced, more motivated
  • but they were still missing something
  • that’s why in Acts 4:1-8, Jesus told them, “Don’t you dare begin ministry until you’ve received the gift of the Holy Spirit!”
  • you see, living the Christian life isn’t difficult, it’s impossible
  • you can’t live the Christian life apart from the help of the Holy Spirit
  • if the disciples dared not move until they had been assured of his presence and power, how foolish we are to leave the house every morning without giving the Holy Spirit a thought!
  • it’s why we experience so much defeat in our lives
  • we can’t live the Christian life in our own strength
  • we have a choice
  • as one person says, we can live the adequate Christian life, or we can live the wonderful, Spirit-filled life
  • which one are you going to choose?
  • so let’s look again at Paul’s command in Ephesians 5:18
  • (Ephesians 5:18) Do not get drunk on wine, which leads to debauchery. Instead, be filled with the Spirit.
  • you’ll notice it’s a command
  • God isn’t into giving suggestions
  • this isn’t, “If you would like, maybe it would be nice to be filled with the Spirit”
  • it’s a command
  • do it!
  • it’s absolutely essential that we be filled with the Spirit
  • you’ll notice it’s for all of us
  • you can’t see this in the English, but in the Greek, the command is in the plural
  • you could almost say, “Now y’all be filled with the Spirit”
  • it’s not a command for one Christian, or an elite group of Christians, it’s for all Christians
  • this morning the command is for all of us to be filled with the Spirit
  • it’s for you to be filled with the Spirit
  • you’ll notice that it’s a continual command
  • the verb is in the ongoing tense
  • it could almost be translated, “Keep on being filled with the Spirit”
  • in other words, we don’t get filled with the Spirit today and it’s enough from here on out
  • we need to be filled with the Spirit daily
  • the filling is not perpetual
  • we have to keep being filled, or we will run low
  • the results of being Spirit-filled follow in Ephesians 5
  • to be filled with the Spirit does not lead to repeated charismatic experiences, as some claim
  • it leads to a transformation of our characters, actually opening ourselves to the transforming presence of Christ
  • the Spirit becomes the dominating influence in our lives
  • his filling transforms our worship, our thankfulness, and it leads to transformed relationships of mutual submission
  • (Ephesians 5:19) Speak to one another with psalms, hymns and spiritual songs. Sing and make music in your heart to the Lord,
  • (Ephesians 5:20) always giving thanks to God the Father for everything, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.
  • (Ephesians 5:21) Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.
  • how many people here would like their worship and relationships transformed?
  • just a few more questions remain
  • what does it mean to be filled with the Spirit?
  • as I said earlier, it means being controlled by the Spirit
  • the contrast Paul gives is interesting
  • Paul says, “Don’t be drunk with wine”
  • when we’re drunk, we’re what? under the influence
  • Paul contrasts this to being under the influence of the Holy Spirit
  • he says, in effect, “Instead of being under the control of liquor, which leads to debauchery, be under control of the Holy Spirit, which leads to a transformed life”
  • J. Oswald Sanders writes:
  • In the heart of the believer who is filled with the Spirit, He reigns supreme over the will, the emotions, the intelligence, but with his full consent and cooperation. The word [filled] carries the idea of being filled to the point of saturation, a fullness that leaves nothing to be desired…So to be full of the Holy Spirit means the habitual experience of having the Holy Spirit in the free and unhindered exercise of all his attributes – knowledge, power, holiness, peace, joy – exercising his sway and dominion in every realm of life.
  • let me wrap up by giving you some reminders, and then telling us how we can be filled with the Spirit
  • reminder #1: you can’t live the Christian life without the Spirit
  • as I said, without the Spirit you have the adequate Christian life
  • with the Spirit you have the wonderful, Spirit-filled life
  • which would you rather have?
  • reminder #2: abnormal experiences aren’t necessary to Christian maturity
  • we’ll talk about the more spectacular gifts of the Spirit, such as tongues and prophesy and healings
  • suffice it to say today, that the filling of the Spirit leads to transformed lives, and not always to charismatic experiences
  • reminder #3: the Spirit’s fullness is for all of us
  • it’s not for a group of elite Christians, or more mature ones
  • it’s for baby Christians, it’s for mature Christians, it’s for all of us
  • reminder #4: it’s a continuous experience
  • yesterday’s filling was yesterday
  • are you filled with the Spirit today?
  • we need to be filled with the Spirit continually
  • I’ve left the most obvious question until now
  • how are we filled with the Spirit?
  • I’ll mention two ways this morning, and they’re from Charles Stanley’s book, the Wonderful Spirit-Filled Life
  • ONE: we are filled with the Spirit as we come to the place of TOTAL DEPENDENCE
  • listen to what Stanley writes:
  • “The Spirit-filled life begins once we are absolutely and thoroughly convinced that we can do nothing apart from the indwelling strength of the Holy Spirit…The Spirit-filled life begins with an overwhelming realization that we are absolutely helpless and hopeless apart from the empowerment of the Holy Spirit…[Until then], we will always be out there doing things for God in our own strength”
  • let me ask you, have you reached that point of total dependence in your life?
  • that without God’s help, you can do nothing
  • TWO: we are filled with the Spirit as we come to the place of TOTAL SURRENDER
  • until we surrender to the Spirit’s control in our lives, until we come to the place in which we give everything over to him, and remember, do this continually – we won’t be filled with the Spirit
  • remember, to be filled with the Spirit means that we are controlled by the Spirit
  • in order to be controlled by the Spirit, we have to surrender everything to him
  • let’s sing this little chorus together
  • Spirit of the living God, fall fresh on me
  • Spirit of the living God, fall fresh on me
  • melt me, mold me, fill me, use me
  • Spirit of the living God, fall fresh on me
  • let’s pray now that we will reach the place of total dependence and total surrender to the Spirit, that he may fill us and use us and that we might live the wonderful, Spirit-filled life
Darryl Dash

Darryl Dash

I'm a grateful husband, father, oupa, and pastor of Grace Fellowship Church Don Mills. I love learning, writing, and encouraging. I'm on a lifelong quest to become a humble, gracious old man.
Toronto, Canada