Series

What do you call a Christian who doesn’t act like one? You know what I’m talking about: the person who is arrogant and argumentative; the one who is known for spreading gossip about their “friends”; the one who has secret addictions; the person who harbors a grudge. They are believers in Christ—they can tell you how they came to know Him. But their lives fall considerably short of the goal for a Christian. What do you call such a person? The Bible calls them worldly, immature. 1 Cor. 3:1-3, “Brothers, I could not address you as spiritual but as worldly--mere infants in Christ. [2] I gave you milk, not solid food, for you were not yet ready for it. Indeed, you are still not ready. [3] You are still worldly. For since there is jealousy and quarreling among you, are you not worldly? Are you not acting like mere men?” [4] For when one says, ‘I follow Paul,’ and another, ‘I follow Apollos,’ are you not mere men?”

The Corinthian believers had all been baptized with the Spirit, as Paul said in 1 Cor 12:13. And they had all the gifts operating in their church, including the more supernatural ones like tongues and prophecy and healings and miracles. But they were acting very immaturely—like infants, he says. Their jealousy, quarreling, and the division of the church into factions were sure signs that they were not filled with the Spirit. They weren’t “spiritual”; they were worldly.[1] The word means that a person like that is not living under the influence of the Spirit, but they are acting more in accordance with their old sinful nature—like “mere men”, rather than Spirit-filled and -empowered men. They may be Christians, but they don’t act like it.

Somebody said that the best advertisement for Christianity is a Spirit-filled Christian; and the worst advertisement for Christianity is a worldly Christian. Why do Christians have such a terrible reputation in our culture? Why do Christians treat each other so poorly? Why do we fight and bicker with each other over non-essential matters? Why do Christians divorce at the same rate as the general society? Why do so many Christian teens wind up pregnant out of marriage? Why is the Church so broken and ineffective? It’s because so many of us are not living by the Spirit (Gal 5:16); we’re not keeping in step with the Spirit (Gal 5:25); we’re not living according to the Spirit (Rom 8:4)—because we are not filled with the Spirit. Instead, we are living in accordance with our lower nature, which is more in tune with the values and attitudes of the world than those of Christ.

I spoke two weeks ago about the baptism with the Holy Spirit, and today I want to speak about the fullness of the Spirit. Here’s a little table which will help us see the difference between these two concepts.

Think of your life like this glass. This glass has water in it, representing the Holy Spirit who comes to live in every believer. Once He comes into our lives, He will never leave us. But this glass is a lot like many Christians—it is not filled with the water. We have the Spirit, but we are not filled with Him. Many times the reason for that is that we have walled off parts of our life from the Spirit’s influence. A man looks like a fine Christian husband and father on the outside, but inside, there is a secret compartment where he indulges his fantasies with pornography; the Spirit does not have all of him. A teen goes to youth group and church, but she keeps lying about her life to her parents; they have no idea what she is into. A woman goes to Women in the Word, and teaches Sunday School, but she harbors deep bitterness toward another woman who hurt her. Each of these people have walled off closets in their lives where they will not allow the Spirit to enter. If we want to be filled with the Spirit, we have to surrender to His control, to allow Him to influence us in every area of our lives. You have the Spirit, but does the Spirit have you? It’s not a question of how much of the Spirit we have; the question is, How much of you does He have?

The Bible speaks of being filled with the Spirit in several different senses, for different purposes.

In a few passages, it looks like being filled with the Spirit was the expected norm for a mature believer. For example, when they chose the first “deacons”, the men who were going to see to it that the Greek speaking widows were not neglected in the distribution of food, they looked for seven men, “who are known to be full of the Spirit and wisdom” (Acts 6:3). Luke specifically records that they chose Stephen, a man full of faith and of the Holy Spirit. When we look for people to serve as elder and deacon, we, too, are looking for people whose lives give evidence that they are filled with the Spirit. This is not something that only a few people can attain—it’s what is expected for all of us. This is the normal Christian life. I don’t mean normal in the sense that everybody is like that; I mean that this is the norm, the standard, the goal toward which all of us should strive.

The second category of people who are described as being filled with the Spirit seem to be equipped by Him for ministry.

Some of those ministries were “offices”, like leader, or prophet, or apostle. Joshua is a good example. Deut. 34:9, “Now Joshua son of Nun was filled with the Spirit of wisdom because Moses had laid his hands on him. So the Israelites listened to him and did what the Lord had commanded Moses.” Can you imagine the job Joshua had? He had to fill the really big shoes of Moses, who had led the people out of Egypt, and through the Red Sea. He had delivered the Ten Commandments from God to them, written on stone tablets with the hand of God Himself. Moses had shepherded them through forty years in the Sinai desert, and now Joshua had to take over from him. He was being given the office of leader of God’s people. But God filled him with the Spirit—the same Spirit of wisdom that Moses had had, and that gave him the power to lead wisely. The people recognized that Joshua was a wise and godly leader and they followed him as they had followed Moses.

When the risen Christ met Saul on the road to Damascus, He then sent Ananias to Saul to get him started on his ministry. Acts 9:17, “Then Ananias went to the house and entered it. Placing his hands on Saul, he said, ‘Brother Saul, the Lord—Jesus, who appeared to you on the road as you were coming here—has sent me so that you may see again and be filled with the Holy Spirit.’” Saul was going to be an apostle, like the others who had walked with Jesus during His earthly ministry. He had to be equipped for that role, which would be extremely dangerous, and extremely important, as he would write much of the New Testament. God filled him with the Spirit to enable him to do that.

So sometimes, the Spirit fills a person to equip them to fulfill a role, an office in ministry. Other times, it seems like the filling of the Spirit is given to equip a believer for some specific, more short-term ministry.

2. Specific ministry Exodus 31:1-5; 35:34; Luke 1:41-45, 67-79; Acts 4:7ff; 31; 7:54-58; Acts 13:6-12.

One of the most interesting is Bezalel (you remember him, don’t you?) He was the man who was picked to build the tabernacle of God in the desert, after the Israelites had come out of Egypt. Exodus 31:1-5, “Then the Lord said to Moses, [2] "See, I have chosen Bezalel son of Uri… [3] and I have filled him with the Spirit of God, with skill, ability and knowledge in all kinds of crafts-- [4] to make artistic designs for work in gold, silver and bronze, [5] to cut and set stones, to work in wood, and to engage in all kinds of craftsmanship.” It’s an interesting idea isn’t it?—that the Holy Spirit might fill people and enable them to be great artists for God. I think we can see that in the lives of musicians like J. S. Bach, and G. F. Handel, and there have been many others as well.

There are a number of places where it says people were filled with the Spirit and prophesied. After the angel told Mary she was going to have a son, she went to see her relative Elizabeth, who suddenly broke out into prophecy: Luke 1:41, “When Elizabeth heard Mary's greeting, the baby leaped in her womb, and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit. [42] In a loud voice she exclaimed: ‘Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the child you will bear!” She went on to declare that Mary was carrying her (Elizabeth’s) own Lord. She knew things about Mary that she could not have known unless they were revealed to her by the Spirit. And she spoke truth in response to that knowledge.

When the persecutions started after Pentecost, the believers were filled with the Spirit to equip them for that situation. Peter and John had been arrested, and after they were released, they went back to the believers and reported everything the leaders had said. Rather than praying for protection from the authorities, as we would have done, they prayed for God to stretch out His hand and perform miracles through the name of Jesus, and they prayed for boldness in their witness. Acts 4:31, “After they prayed, the place where they were meeting was shaken. And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke the word of God boldly.”

There are a number of other examples of people who were filled with the Holy Spirit, and by that, they were equipped for some ministry, either an office they would fill for a lifetime,[2] or for some specific ministry need at the moment.[3] Have you ever experienced anything like this? I think many of us could tell of times when we just sensed we were supposed to do or say something, and it turned out really well, better than we could account for in our humanness. I know that the first talk I gave in Cameroon, I was filled with the Holy Spirit, and God did something unusual in that situation.

The Bible never commands us to be baptized with the Spirit. Every reference to the baptism of the Holy Spirit is in the indicative mood, rather than the imperative; they are statements of fact—usually something that has happened, or will happen to believers—not commands. This would indicate that we should not seek the baptism of the Spirit. That is something God does for us when we place our faith in Christ, and not something we have to pursue on our own.

But when it comes to the fullness of the Spirit, we not only have lots of examples of people who were filled, but also the command in Eph 5:18, “Do not get drunk on wine, which leads to debauchery. Instead, be filled with the Spirit.” As I’m sure you have heard, the verb in this verse is in the present tense. That means that we should keep on being filled. The baptism of the Spirit is once for all. The filling of the Spirit is something that has to be repeated over and over again.

And the reason is because we “leak”. Paul tells us it is possible for us to grieve the Holy Spirit (Ephes. 4:30), and to put out the Spirit’s fire (to quench Him) (1 Thes. 5:19) by our attitudes and our sin. We go through life, and life wears on us. We are distracted by the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the ostentation of living (1 John 2:15, 16). People get under our skin and we react badly to them. The economic turmoil in the world gets to us and we start to worry. All these things drain the Spirit out of us, and we need to be re-filled. This is something we should ask for daily, because we need His power to live the Christian life every day.

Many people, though, have prayed to be filled with the Spirit, and don’t feel anything different. They wonder if they have truly been filled. So how can we tell if we are filled with the Spirit?

First, notice the contrast in Eph 5:18, “Do not get drunk on wine, which leads to debauchery. Instead, be filled with the Spirit.” Rather than being under the influence of alcohol, which tends to make us lose control, we should be under the influence of the Spirit. When we are, the results are very different from when we are drunk. One set of those results comes under the heading of the Spirit in us.

In Greek, this command to be filled is followed by four present participles that define what it looks like when we are filled with the Spirit.

“Be filled with the Spirit… Eph 5:19, Speak[ing] to one another with psalms, hymns and spiritual songs.” I don’t really think this means that we have to stop talking and start singing to each other. At least you hope it doesn’t mean I’m going to sing my sermons! But it does suggest something of the wonderful reinforcement we receive from worshiping God with like-minded people, people who share our love for Christ. Sometimes, our songs in church are even addressed to each other, as in the chorus, “Come, now is the time to worship,” and the hymn, “Come, Christians, join to sing loud praise to Christ our King.” Christian fellowship in a small group, where the topic is about spiritual matters fits here as well. People who are filled with the Spirit love speaking to one another about the things of God. When people stop wanting to fellowship with other believers, that’s a clear sign that they are no longer filled with the Spirit.

“Be filled with the Spirit… Eph 5:19, …Sing[ing] and make[ing] music in your heart to the Lord.” Here the singing is directed to the Lord. One of the first indications that a person is genuinely saved and the Spirit is operating in their life is that they have a desire to worship with God’s people. Psalm 122:1 says it well: “I rejoiced with those who said to me, ‘Let us go to the house of the Lord.’” You know people who call themselves Christians who almost never go to church; they are not filled with the Spirit.

…“be filled with the Spirit”…Eph 5:20, “always giving thanks to God the Father for everything, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.” Another mark of being filled with the Spirit is that we can give thanks to God no matter what our circumstances. We not only thank Him for the good times, and the good gifts He has given us, but we can thank Him for everything—even the hard things that He allows into our lives. We can’t do that in ourselves—it takes the Holy Spirit filling us to enable us to do that.

The fourth sign in this passage that we are filled with the Spirit is that we are submissive.

“Be filled with the Spirit… Ephes. 5:21, Submit[ting] to one another out of reverence for Christ.” Most English Bibles set this verse off in a new paragraph from the ones before it, but in Greek, this participle and this phrase, is exactly parallel to the previous three. A sure mark of the Spirit having control of our lives is that we are willing to submit ourselves to each other. We don’t insist on our own way; we subordinate our rights and desires to those of others; we submit ourselves to God-ordained authorities in our lives. Again, our sinful nature won’t do that; we have to be completely filled up and dominated by the influence of the Holy Spirit.

Another way to tell if we are filled with the Spirit goes right along with these four things; it’s the fruit of the Spirit.

In 1 Cor 3, as we saw at the beginning of this sermon, Paul criticized the Corinthians for their immaturity, for being unspiritual, worldly, because their character flaws indicated they were not under the control of the Spirit. They were jealous, and arguing and bickering with each other, and they had factions going in their church; it was a horrible situation. When Paul gets to chapter 12 of his first letter to them, he goes into detail about the gifts of the Spirit, but then in 1 Cor. 12:31 he says, “…And now I will show you the most excellent way.” The most excellent way of relating to one another is not on the basis of our different spiritual gifts, as important and valuable as they are; the best way to relate to each other is in love.

He says in the first few verses of chapter 13 how much more valuable love is than any of the gifts: He specifically mentions speaking in tongues, prophecy, knowledge, faith, etc. Love, of course, is the first and greatest of the fruit of the Spirit, and this is really the proof positive that we are filled with Him. When the Holy Spirit has control of our lives, then He is free to develop the character qualities of Jesus in us: love, joy, peace, patience, gentleness, goodness, faithfulness, humility, and self control (Gal 5:22,23).

This is consistent with what we saw in Ephesians 5, where two of the four marks of being filled with the Spirit are fellowship with one another and submission to one another. Character is the acid test of being filled. All of these things are indications that the Spirit is in us, filling us up, becoming the dominant influence in our lives—the Spirit in us. He causes us to love God and love others; He helps us become more like Christ in our character.

But there is another way the Bible speaks of the Spirit’s influence on a believer, and that is through the phrase, the Spirit on/upon us, giving us power for ministry.

The Bible often says the Spirit came on people to give them power for effective ministry. Just one Old Testament example: Judges 6:34 says the Spirit of the Lord came upon Gideon, and he rallied the Israelites to fight their enemies. Gideon was a naturally fearful man—he had been hiding in the wine press when the enemies attacked the last time. But when the Spirit of the Lord came on him, he was filled with courage, and led his men bravely, even to the point of being willing to severely reduce the number of his troops, so that the Lord could get the credit for the victory.

This seems to be what is meant in many cases where people are said to be filled with the Spirit. Joshua was filled with the Spirit, and led the Israelites wisely and well. Micah, filled with the Spirit, was a powerful prophet of God. John the Baptist was filled with the Spirit to be the forerunner of the Messiah. Zechariah and Elizabeth were filled with the Spirit and prophesied. When Peter was filled with the Spirit, he preached boldly to the religious authorities who had arrested him. When the disciples were filled with the Spirit, they witnessed boldly in spite of the threats against them.

This filling of the Spirit for powerful ministry is episodic[5]; it comes and goes. A lot of the instances where the Bible talks about the Spirit coming on people are in the Old Testament. Under the Old Covenant, the Spirit did not permanently live in God’s people as He does now, but God would often pour out His Spirit on people to equip them for specific tasks. We may be filled like this for a short time, fulfill the purpose for which that power was poured out, and then not be able to do that again.

Since we are commanded to be filled with the Spirit of God, the obvious question is, How do we do that?

VII. How to Be Filled with the Holy Spirit[6] John 7:37-39; 1 John 1:9; Luke 6:46; Eph 5:18; 1 John 5:14,15

The Bible gives us some guidance here, and these are all things we can do repeatedly.

· Desire to be controlled and empowered by the Holy Spirit. John 7:37-39, “On the last and greatest day of the Feast [of Tabernacles], Jesus stood and said in a loud voice, ‘If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink. [38] Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, streams of living water will flow from within him.’ [39] By this he meant the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were later to receive.” Are you thirsty for more of God? This promise is made to those who are thirsty. Do you want more love, more power, more of Him in your life? That’s the first step.

· Confess your sins (1 John 1:9). The Holy Spirit will not fill a dirty cup. First, confess every known sin in your life. If it’s been a while since you’ve done that, you might take a thorough inventory of your life. There are some Spiritual Inventories on the Information Counter to help you with that. Then ask Jesus to cleanse you thoroughly, to purify you from all sin, in confidence that His death on the cross was more than sufficient to pay for all your sins.

· Surrender your life to Jesus Christ as Lord (Luke 6:46). Maybe you need to examine your life specifically for secret compartments that you have sealed off from the purifying influence of the Spirit. Confess them; break off the lock; throw open the doors and ask the wind of the Spirit to come in and blow out all the trash and spiders and rotten stuff that you have harbored in there. Bow before Jesus and acknowledge that He is your Lord and Master.

· Ask specifically for God to fill you with His Spirit. “Lord, please fill me with your Spirit. Fill me up, Lord. I’m thirsty; I’m hungry for more of you. Come into my life and take over; empower me to be the kind of person you want me to be. Empower me to serve you effectively in this world.”

So then you claim it by faith. Whether you feel anything different or not, you know it’s true.

· Spiritual breathing. This is something we can and should do every day—every moment if necessary. Exhale sin; inhale the Spirit = surrender the control of your life to Him. Receive His Spirit again, as He has commanded and promised.

Some people frequently ask for the Holy Spirit to fill them, and it seems like their lives are a slow, sometimes irregular, movement toward greater Christlikeness and effective ministry. Other people report that they prayed for the fullness of the Holy Spirit, and something dramatic happened that transformed them almost overnight, and which lasts a lifetime. My own experience is more of the former. I’ve asked to be filled hundreds of times in my life, and I have never noticed any radical changes as a result of that. But I have seen that over the 49 years I have walked with Christ, He has progressively changed me more and more into His image. I have a long way to go, but you should have seen me 49 years ago! I’m a different person in many ways, thanks to the power of the Spirit. But I know Christians who have had an encounter with the Holy Spirit in which He seemed to bring more dramatic, long-lasting changes into their lives.

Given the fact that we do have different experiences with the Spirit, here are some points for each of us to keep in mind as we relate to one another.

If you are like me, you may have prayed for God to fill you with His Spirit on numerous occasions, and nothing particularly notable has happened. How should you relate to people whose experience is more dramatic? Assuming that they show the biblical marks of being filled with the Spirit, we should never question or deny the validity of their experiences. Instead, we should rejoice with them at God’s gracious ministry in their lives. But neither should we be jealous, or deny the validity of our type of experience with the Spirit. The Spirit is like the wind: He blows where He wills. He is completely free to work in someone else’s life differently than He does in ours.

If you are one of those who has had an encounter with the Holy Spirit that made a dramatic, and permanent change in your life, rejoice! Thank God for that, but don’t assume that He wants to work the same way in everybody. It is understandable that you will want to share your experience with friends; you will want to encourage them to seek the filling of the Spirit that you have had. But again, let the Spirit decide who gets what. Don’t put others down, or tell them there is something deficient in their faith just because their experience doesn’t match yours.

And then, to all of us I would say, there’s more to God than we have experienced so far; keep asking. There are depths of His love we have not known; keep seeking. There are dimensions of His power for living and ministry that we have not yet appropriated; keep knocking. No matter what you may have experienced of the Spirit, keep pursuing God, seeking His face, pressing in. The primary condition for being filled with the Spirit is to be hungry for Him. God said in Psalm 81:10, “I am the Lord your God, who brought you up out of Egypt. Open wide your mouth and I will fill it.” Like baby birds eager to be fed, let’s open our mouths wide, in confidence that God desires nothing so much as to fill us with His Spirit and unleash us on the world as His representatives. The God who brought Israel out of Egypt, through the Red Sea, sustained them through forty years in the desert, drove out nations before them to give them a homeland—this God invites us to open wide our mouths, with the promise that He will certainly fill them. Let’s do it.

John R. W. Stott, Baptism and Fullness (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1975), ch. 2.

Zeb Bradford Long and Douglas McMurry, Receiving the Power (Grand Rapids: Chosen Books, 1996)

Fred A. Hartley III, Prayer on Fire (Colorado Springs: NavPress, 2006), ch. 5.

Have You Made the Wonderful Discovery of the Spirit-Filled Life? Campus Crusade for Christ booklet, 1966.

[1] The words translated “worldly” here (sarkinos, sarkikoi) have also been translated “carnal”.

[2] The prophet Micah was assigned by God the unpleasant ministry of preaching to the kings and leaders of Judah at a time when they were deep in sin and far from God. It’s the sort of job that might make a man like Jonah run the other way. But Micah said, Micah 3:8, “But as for me, I am filled with power, with the Spirit of the Lord, and with justice and might, to declare to Jacob his transgression, to Israel his sin.” Wow! Filled with the Spirit of the Lord, this man had the power to speak boldly for God to the most powerful men in his nation. He pointed out their sin, and called them to repentance. It was a dangerous job, but he was equipped to do it by the power of the Spirit. It doesn’t appear this was just a one-time experience; this was equipping for his life’s work.

The angel told Zechariah that when his son, John the Baptist, was born, Luke 1:15, “he will be great in the sight of the Lord. He is never to take wine or other fermented drink, and he will be filled with the Holy Spirit even from birth.” As a result of that filling, the angel promised, John would bring many Israelites back to the Lord, and he would turn the hearts of the fathers to their children and the disobedient to the wisdom of the righteous—all to prepare the way for Jesus the Messiah. That was John’s role in life, not a short-term equipping.

[3] Elizabeth’s husband, Zechariah, also prophesied. After John the Baptist was born, his father was able to speak again, after having been mute for the entire nine month’s of Elizabeth’s pregnancy. Luke 1:67-68 His father Zechariah was filled with the Holy Spirit and prophesied.” He then spoke an eloquent statement of praise to God for His faithfulness to His people Israel, and predicting that John would be a prophet of God who would prepare the way for the Messiah. That isn’t anything Zechariah could have figured out on his own. John didn’t look any different from any other baby he had ever seen. But the Spirit filled him and enabled him to speak truth about that situation.

After the outpouring of the Spirit on Pentecost, the apostle Peter was filled with the Spirit. He healed a man on the temple steps, and the religious authorities got upset and arrested him because he was preaching to the crowd about Jesus. The next day, all the religious leaders got together for a summit to discuss what to do about this problem. Acts 4:7, “They had Peter and John brought before them and began to question them: ‘By what power or what name did you do this?’ [8] Then Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit…” began to preach to them, and accuse them of murdering the Messiah! That was an amazing thing! Peter has to know that his life is on the line, but he speaks boldly anyway. Jesus had said that when the Holy Spirit came on people, they would receiver power and be His witnesses, and Peter certainly did that!

When Stephen was being martyred, he was filled with the Holy Spirit, and was enabled to see the glory of God and Jesus at the right had of the Father; he had the power to face martyrdom with courage (Acts 7:54-58).

[4] See also Genesis 41:38; Ezek 3:24; 36:22-28; 37:10-14; John 14:16-17; Romans 8:9-11; 1 Cor. 3:16; 6:19-20; 2 Cor. 1:21-22; 2 Tim. 1:14

[5] Long and McMurry’s word. Zeb Bradford Long and Douglas McMurry, Receiving the Power (Grand Rapids: Chosen Books, 1996), p.121.

[6] See: Have You Made the Wonderful Discovery of the Spirit-Filled Life?, booklet by Campus Crusade for Christ, 1966; Long and McMurry, p.107ff; Fred A. Hartley III, booklet Holy Spirit, Fill Me, (Christian Publications, 2006).

[7] John R. W. Stott, Baptism and Fullness (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1975), p.73ff.