On Sunday, Pastor Gaby shared the fourth sermon in the sermon series on “The Holy Spirit”.

The title of the sermon is “Be Filled With Holy Spirit”. Paul charges the Ephesian church to wake up from their sleep and not walk as fools but as wise. He tells them not to be drunk with wine but to be filled with the Spirit (Ephesians 5:14-19).

In Ephesians 4, Paul challenges them to take every unwholesome talk, bitterness, slander, anger and the like out from us. Paul is encouraging the Ephesian church to live as children of the light and to be imitators of Christ.

If we want to be imitators of Christ we must not grieve the Holy Spirit and we must be filled with the Holy Spirit. The scripture says that Jesus had to go to the Father so that the Holy Spirit, our Helper, could come to be with us. He is called the ‘Paracletus’ which means ‘the One who comes alongside’. The Holy Spirit is our Helper who has been sent to come alongside us to help us walk in the will of God.

Ephesians 5:18 emphasizes that we not be drunk with wine but be filled with the Spirit. In Greek, this verse talks specifically about control. What is controlling your life? Is it alcohol, fornication, addiction? We must give control of our lives only to the Holy Spirit so that we can be filled by the Holy Spirit.

1 Corinthians 2:11 tells us that the Spirit searches all things, even the deep things of God. No one knows the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God. Many believers are trying to move forward by their own strength but we can only move by leaning on the Holy Spirit.

The Holy Spirit will reveal two things to us:

1. The will of God for our lives – Scripture teaches us that no one knows the mind of God except the Spirit of God. Because we have the Spirit of God living on the inside of us, He reveals the deep things of God to us and we can know the will of God for our lives.
2. The presence of God – the Spirit of God is the One who makes the presence of God real to us. He is the manifest presence of God.

Let it be the cry of our hearts to be filled with the Holy Spirit afresh!