1. Two contrasts and two comparisons (17-18)
2. To be filled with the Spirit is to overflow with praise (19)
3. To be filled with the Spirit is to overflow with thankfulness (20)
4. To be filled with the Spirit is to overflow with humility (21)
EPHESIANS 5:17-21
I love my kids with all my heart. But have you ever noticed what happens to people when they become parents? Our kids can cause us to absolutely lose our minds. It’s amazing how otherwise normal, sane, intelligent people can be reduced to stammering idiots. Watch a frustrated parent sometime. Moms are the most fun to watch—from a distance. They lose all normal speech functions. They can’t even finish a sentence. “I told you… if you… what if… I’m gonna… AAAH!” Sometimes they’re better off with the stammering. Because when they are able to get a sentence out, it doesn’t make any sense. They can come up with some of the most impossible statements. “Don’t look at me in that tone of voice.” “Stop crying or I’ll give you something to cry about.” “If you fall out of that tree and break your leg, you’d better not come running to me.” “You’d better shut your mouth and finish your dinner.” Hmmm… stop crying or you’ll cry more. Don’t run if you break your leg. Eat with your mouth shut. Doesn’t make very much sense, does it? That’s because those are completely impossible situations. You can’t run with a broken leg and you can’t eat with your mouth closed. Paul starts out our passage this morning by laying out two parallel sets of equally ridiculous contrasts. Just like you can’t run with a broken leg, you can’t be foolish and understand the will of the Lord. Just like you can’t eat with your mouth closed, you can’t be a drunk and be filled with the Spirit. Notice that I said that verses 17 and 18 are parallel. Under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, Paul uses a writing tool called parallelism. That means that corresponding parts of each verse are equal. In other words, “be ye not unwise” points to both “understanding what the will of the Lord is,” and “be filled with the Spirit.” So, if you’re unwise, you don’t understand God’s will and you aren’t filled with His Spirit. Saying a drunk understands the will of the Lord and is filled with the Spirit is as ridiculous as saying, “Stop crying or I’ll make you cry.” It’s nonsense. It doesn’t make sense. It is irrational. By making those parallel contrasting statements, Paul is making a point. He’s telling the Ephesian Christians that the only rational choice they have is to be filled with the Holy Spirit. Then he goes on to explain what that means. Do you think that message still applies to us today? There are people all around us who say that they can live any way they want to live and still call themselves Christians. They say they can live exactly like the world and still be a Christian. Paul says that’s ridiculous. He compares living a sinful, debauched lifestyle to being unwise and foolish. He says that you’re a fool if you live that way. And fools aren’t filled. And if you’re not filled, your faith is flawed. And if your faith is flawed, there’s a good possibility you’re not forgiven. And if you’re not forgiven, you’re not saved. You see, being filled with the Holy Spirit is a requirement. It’s not an option. In our passage, Paul uses the word “filled”. The word literally means to fill to overflowing. Just like these rivers that have overflowed their banks in the past week because of all the rain. The verb tense in the original language makes it a continual, ongoing action. In order to be in the will of God, you must be continually, constantly, filled to overflowing with the Holy Spirit every moment of every day. Anything else is utterly ridiculous and foolish. I don’t want any of us to leave this place foolish this morning. I want each of us to be in the will of God by being filled to overflowing with the Holy Spirit. But what does that mean? Is it some sort of mystical, out-of-body experience? Something you have to work yourself up into a frenzy to make happen? Is it speaking in tongues, and falling down, and chaos and disorder? No. It’s really much simpler than that. And a whole lot less dramatic. This morning, we’re going to look at three ways you can know if you are filled with the Spirit. First, if you are filled with the Spirit, your life will overflow with praise. Look with me in verse 19:
EPHESIANS 5:19
To be filled with the Spirit is to overflow with praise. Wednesday night was the last night of our revival meetings. I told everybody then that I wish I’d been smart enough to plan it that way, but it turned out that each night we had very distinct types of music. Sunday night we heard Black Gospel. Tuesday night, our praise team brought us some contemporary praise choruses. Wednesday night a group called Called Out brought us some good Southern Gospel music. They were three completely different styles of music, but they all had one thing in common. They all were praising our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. I’ve been around lots of music ministers who love this verse. They love it because they use it to point out the different styles of music that should be sung in church. While a case can be made for that, that’s not the point that Paul is making here. In fact, there’s not much difference that scholars can come up with between psalms, hymns and spiritual songs. Psalms were praise songs taken directly from Scripture. Most were from the Book of Psalms, but not all. Hymns were songs with religious content, but didn’t necessarily quote Scripture directly. Spiritual songs were probably personal testimonies put to music. Musical style and instrumentation was probably interchangeable among all three types. It was the words that distinguished the categories, not the musical style. Now, all that’s interesting. And I think the biggest thing it shows us is that most of the disagreements we have over musical styles are based on our personal tastes and desires rather than Scripture. But that’s not the point. And we know it’s not the point because of the first word Paul uses in this verse. He opens a verse where he talks about praising God in song with the word “Speaking.” How odd is that? Well, it’s not odd when you see what his point is. Think about all the songs that we sing in church. Does singing songs show that you’re filled with the Holy Spirit? Music can get you emotionally charged, but does it do anything to fill you? Not if you aren’t living what you’re singing. Turn with me to James 3:
JAMES 3:8-12
If you are filled with the Spirit, the fountain of your mouth won’t bring forth bitterness and sweetness. You won’t sing “Blest be the Tie that Binds, our hearts with Christian love, The fellowship of kindred minds, Is like to that above.” You won’t sing that and at the same time harbor anger and hatred and bitterness toward your brother or sister. You won’t sing, “I love to tell the story, ‘Tis pleasant to repeat, What seems each time I tell it, more wonderfully sweet, I love to tell the story, For some have never heard, The message of salvation, From God’s own holy Word.” If you’re filled with the Spirit, you won’t sing that song and at the same time never share the Gospel. You won’t sing, “Serve Him with Gladness, His great love proclaim” if your only service is pew-warming. You won’t sing, “In Your church Lord, be glorified, be glorified today.” If you’re filled with the Sprit, you won’t sing that song while you’re sitting on your couch at home during Sunday school and church services. We sing good songs. But do we speak good songs. Do our words and our actions match the songs that we sing? Instead of focusing on whether the music style is the kind we like, maybe we ought to worry if our life style matches the words we sing. Is your life a praise chorus? Does the life you live overflow with praise? If it does, that is the first sign you are filled with the Holy Spirit. If you are filled with the Holy Spirit, your life will overflow with praise. And your life will overflow with thankfulness. Look back in Ephesians 5 at verse 20:
EPHESIANS 5:20
To be filled with the Spirit is to overflow with thankfulness. A family was sitting around the dinner table one evening waiting for their dad to get in from work. Finally, he came in late because it had been a rough day. When he came in, he sat down at the table and offered thanks for the food. As soon as he finished his prayer, he began to complain and grumble about how awful things were going at work. The boss was a jerk and the workers were lazy. Then his wife brought in the food. Since he had come in so late, the food that was supposed to be cold was warm and the food that was supposed to be hot was cold. The main dish was overcooked and dried out. The bread was hard. And he made sure and pointed out what was wrong with everything. Finally, after hearing all the complaints, his youngest daughter asked him a question. “Daddy, do you think God heard you when you prayed a few minutes ago?” “Well, yes sweetheart. Of course He did.” Then she asked, “Do you think He heard everything you said after that?” “Why, yes sweetheart. God hears everything.” Finally, she asked, “Which one do you think He believed?” See, that man might have offered thanks with his words, but his actions showed something entirely different. Once people find out I’m a pastor, they inevitably want me to pray for them. Even before God called me into the pastorate, when people found out I was a Christian, they would ask for prayer. People ask for prayer for sickness and disease. Family problems and marital problems. Prayer for a big decision or trial of life. Prayer for Aunt Bertha’s big toe that is bothering her. Those things are great. We’re called to pray for one another’s needs. But how many times has anyone come up to you and asked you to thank God for them? I can’t remember very many. A legend tells about two angels that God sent to gather the prayers of the saints. One was supposed to gather all the petitions and the other was supposed to gather all the thanksgivings. The first angel had to make several trips to carry up all the petitions. But the second angel carried up all the thanksgiving prayers in one hand. Being thankful isn’t an option for the Spirit-filled believer. But what does that mean? What are we supposed to be thankful for? Chrysostom, one of the early church fathers went over the top in his thankfulness. He thanked God for Satan and Sin and Hell. That’s not what Paul meant when he said we are to give thanks always for all things. We need not be thankful for things that offend God like evil. What we can do is thank God for delivering us from evil. We don’t have to thank Him for the tragedy. But being Spirit-filled means that we thank Him for being with us in the midst of the tragedy. It means we thank Him for working all things including tragedy together for our good. In Luke 17:12-19, Jesus never asked the ten lepers to thank Him for their leprosy. He just wanted them to thank Him when He healed them from it. And you remember the event. How many did return to thank Him? Only one. There are different levels of thankfulness. It’s fairly easy to be thankful for blessings. It’s easy to “count your many blessings, name them one by one.” It’s easy to thank God when you get a pay raise, or you get over an illness. That’s the easy kind of thankfulness. Another kind of thankfulness that’s pretty easy is a thankfulness of hope. I know that victory is coming, so I am thankful in advance of what God’s going to do. But what if the victory doesn’t come? What if the healing doesn’t come? That’s the hardest kind of thankfulness. The kind of thankfulness that is expressed even in the midst of the storm. Thankfulness that God is in control even when everything around seems to be in chaos. The kind of thankfulness that is able to go on in the middle of things like the terrible events at Virginia Tech this week. If you are Spirit-filled, your prayers won’t just be filled with asking. They will be filled with thanking. No matter what is going on around you. Thankful for God’s provision and blessings. Thankful for the hope you have in Jesus. And yes, even thankful for the storms and trials of life. Thankful that God is in control, even in the middle of the storm. Thankful that He works all things together for your good, if you know Him. If you’re saved. If you’re Spirit-filled. Is your life overflowing with thankfulness? If it does, that is the second sign you are filled with the Holy Spirit. If you are filled with the Holy Spirit, your life will overflow with praise and thankfulness. It will also overflow with humility. Look in verse 21:
EPHESIANS 5:21
To be filled with the Spirit is to overflow with humility. Well, here we have it. The “S” word. While verse 21 is the third trait of being filled with the Spirit, it’s really an introduction to the next 21 verses. We’ll be covering those 21 verses over the next few weeks. Nobody likes the “S” word. Nobody wants to talk about the “S” word. It would be easy to understand if the word was “sin”. But it’s not—it’s “submit.” We don’t like to talk about that word because we hate that word. Why do you think we hate that word so much? We hate that word because it convicts us. We try to ignore it. We try to redefine it. We try to rationalize it away. Can you imagine what it would be like if we actually did it? If we ever got to the point where we actually submitted to each other? What would that really look like? Well, first there would be no power struggles in the church. It really wouldn’t matter who was placed in charge, because everybody would do everything they could to make it easy on everybody else. Everyone would consider everyone else’s feelings over their own. We would never have to look for someone to do a job. We would have no shortage of nursery workers, kitchen workers, Sunday school teachers, van drivers, work day participants. If a need arose, we would just do it. We wouldn’t even need to be asked or told or recognized. Every one of us in the church is called to submit to each other. There are no kings in the church except King Jesus. There is no hierarchy. There are no bosses. There are leaders, but we are to be servant-leaders. Now, how can that happen? How can we get there from here? We can only get there if we are filled with the Spirit. If we are not overflowing with that kind of humility, guess what? We’re not filled with the Holy Spirit. And if we’re not filled with the Holy Spirit, Paul says we’re out of the will of God and we’re being foolish. In other words, you are being a fool if you think you can be filled with the Spirit and engage in power plays in the church. “Well, I refuse to get walked on or treated that way.” Why? Your Lord was. And that’s all you are called to do. Philippians 2:5 says, “Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus.” Well, what kind of mind was that? Surely He didn’t intend for me to submit to someone who has walked on me. Surely He doesn’t mean that I am to submit to someone who has hurt me. Well, what did He mean? Philippians 2 goes on to say in verses 6-8: “Who being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God, but made Himself of no reputation and took upon Him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men. And being found in fashion as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient unto death—even the death of the cross.” That’s submission. The only One who really has any rights at all—God incarnate. Jesus Christ emptied Himself of all His rights as God and submitted Himself to people who beat Him and scourged Him and hung Him on a cross. Why? Because He loved us. He understood what the will of His Father was. And He prayed, “not My will but Thine be done.” Do you understand God’s will for you? Do you understand He wants you to be filled with the Spirit? Do you understand that that means you will overflow with praise? Not just in the songs you sing, but in the life you live? Do you understand that being filled with the Spirit means you will overflow with thankfulness? Thankfulness not only for the blessings, but thankfulness even in the midst of the storms. Do you understand that being filled with the Spirit means you will overflow with humility? The kind of humility that Christ showed when He suffered and bled and died for you? Are you filled with the Holy Spirit this morning? Or are you a fool? There is really no other option. There is no middle ground. Where do you stand this morning?
