Hey everybody, this is Pastor John Ewart from Inglewood
Baptist Church in Rocky Mountain, North Carolina.
Thank you so much for tuning in to our podcast.
You're going to hear from God today as we share from his word
about important issues facing your life that can guide you
according to the Bible. Well, I want to welcome
everybody to this session. For those of you who are here
physically, again, I know we want to pray for those who are
at the school right now with our student ministry.
Some of our students are playing music, some are speaking.
And so it's a wonderful time where many of our students are
going to share the gospel, others are going to hear the
gospel. But I appreciate you being here.
Those listening online continue to watch as we continue to help
categorize and designate our podcasts as we are working hard
to continue to develop even more.
We, we've been having meetings about the many other things that
we're looking to develop. So there'll be a lot more
resources coming your way. So tonight as we continue, we're
still in core training, we're talking about our bedrock and we
only have a couple of this session and next week of this
series left. In two weeks, we're going to
have a prayer meeting. Our fall adult prayer meeting.
I hope everybody will come. Don't run away because of that.
You need to be here where we're going to have a guided prayer
meeting together in here in two Wednesday nights.
Our next session, our next time together, I want to talk about
God's actions for us. It'll be a celebratory time of
Thanksgiving and praise where we actually talk about all the
things that God does for us, and we need to honor Him with that
before we stop talking about Him in this series.
Tonight I want to talk about our actions against God.
And some of the things that are sin against God.
And of course we would recognize and we could honestly say that
all sin is against God, but there's some specifics that we
want to look like look at especially toward the Holy
Spirit. Sometimes these things are hard
to understand when you're from Oklahoma, you make fun of
Arkansas. Anybody in the room from
Arkansas? I just, I just want to make sure
I offend you personally so. You know, you know, the
toothbrush was invented in Arkansas.
Did you know that any other state it would have been called
the toothbrush? Thank you very much.
So when you're from Oklahoma, because you're from Oklahoma,
usually you get made fun of, you know, especially by Texas, God
bless the Republic. But but when you're from
Oklahoma, but your best, your best bets Arkansas, right?
Dylan's from Arkansas, but he's he's a field of faith.
But I don't know if you've heard about that poor Arkansas coyote.
I mean, it's 1 poor old dog, hard to understand.
He was caught in a trap, chewed off three of his feet, and he
was still. Trapped.
You think for a minute. Just think for a minute.
You'll laugh at that tomorrow at breakfast.
Some things are hard to figure out and some of our actions
against God are kind of hard. And so we're going to talk about
a couple of these things, but let's do a quick overview of the
doctrine of sin. We really didn't talk about the
doctrine of sin too much. I'm not going to spend much time
on this, but but just to remind us, I think we know all of these
things. You know, Sinner enter, sin
enter, enters sin enters the creation.
And by the way, I had a wonderful visit today.
I'm going to say her name, Tim. I think it thriller if she ever
heard her name. Had a wonderful visit with Joan
Holly today. Anybody remember Joan?
Y'all know John? What a wonderful visit.
Great hug and I sat there and was just told all kinds of stuff
about a lot of you, so it was great.
Tim Looper and I took notes. So some of you will be getting
emails and texts. Michelle will be reaching out
for some personal appointments over the next couple of weeks.
It was a wonderful time. I love visiting our shut
insurance with our deacons. It's been fantastic.
Anyway. Let's do a quick overview so.
Sin enters the creation in Genesis chapter 3.
Adam and Eve choose to disobey God.
They choose to disobey God's word and God's will.
We know that. I think most of us in the room
and ever since that moment, everybody except Jesus has been
born with a sin nature. And this is one of the places,
and I'll probably talk about this at Christmas, but this is
one of the reasons why the doctrine of the virgin birth is
actually very important, often overlooked, often not emphasized
enough. I'm not sure we spend as much
time on the incarnation as we should.
The crucifixion and the resurrection and the ascension
don't mean anything without the incarnation.
So it's an interesting thing. And so we're all born with a
sinful nature. So we're all sinners.
We all fall short. At some point in our own
existence, we have chosen to sin.
We. And so remember my definition of
sin. Sin is anything and everything
that we say. Or we do, or we think.
That is contrary to God's Word or God's will for our lives.
So ever since that moment, we've fallen short.
And so even our creation itself, and we've talked about this in a
past session, even our creation itself has fallen.
I talked about that when we talked about the problem of evil
a few sessions ago. So we're surrounded by the power
and the presence of sin. One day we won't be look forward
to that day. But for now, here's where.
Here's where we are. So there are various kinds of
sin, categories of sin that we can sin against various people.
So I'm going to ask for testimonies.
What is the worst sin? No, I'm kidding.
The worst sin you've ever committed.
The problem is is people would share.
So open mic night. I was having a meeting earlier
today and we were talking about Sunday night open testimony mic
nights. Yeah, we're not having those So.
So anyway, one of the. One of the areas of sin,
seriously, we can sin against ourselves and this isn't
something maybe you may not think about this as much,
especially in one area. First Corinthians 618 says flee
from sexual immorality. Every other sin a person commits
is outside the body, but the sexual immoral person sins
against his own body. So there's actually sins against
our self. That's not our primary
discussion tonight. And obviously we can sin against
one another. That one I think we wrap our
head around fairly easy. And Matthew 5 says so if you are
offering your gift at the altar and there remember that your
brother has something against you.
Leave the gift there before the altar and go first.
Be reconciled to your brother and then come and offer your
gift. But our primary discussion
tonight are when we sin against God himself again.
I recognize that every single sin is against God.
Every single sin is a failure in God's eyes.
Every single sin is a violation of God's will.
So every sin is a sin against God, but some are directed.
Directly toward him. And I want to talk about these
for a moment because one of the most, I guess the word would be
solemn, sad, maybe scary themes in all of Scripture concern sins
against the Holy Spirit. How?
Do we sin against the Holy Spirit?
And so one of the greatest types of evidence.
However, and this goes back to what we talked about in the last
session in our Trinity, perhaps one of the greatest types of
evidence that the Holy Spirit is actually a person is.
The fact that you can sin against him.
And so this, this isn't just a thing, this is a person, one of
the three people of the Trinity. So believers and non believers
alike can sin against the Holy Spirit, but there are certain
sins that only unbelievers can commit and others that believers
will commit. One of the things we acknowledge
is in all of our sin, we don't get to fool God, we can't fool
God. We don't.
We don't get to sin. We don't get to get away with
it. Sin will have a price.
It has a wage and we recognize that Paul talks to Galatian, to
the Galatians in chapter 6. He says do not be deceived.
God is not mocked for whatever one sows that will he also reap.
For the one, for the one who sows to his own flesh will from
the flesh reap corruption, but the one who sows to the Spirit,
will from the Spirit reap eternal life.
So there's a reaping and sowing relationship in sin.
There's a judgment side of this. You're going to earn your wage.
And the wages of sin is, of course, death.
So we need forgiveness. So let's dive into the one that
perhaps is the most controversial.
It's the one that I believe has been misinterpreted a lot and
also feared at times when it's misunderstood, but should be
feared perhaps even more when it is properly understood.
And that's blasphemy against the Holy Spirit.
Of all the sins against the Holy Spirit, this is the worst.
And and you? Might say, well, why is this one
the worst? Because to I live to blasphemy.
The word blasphemy means to speak against it means to
slander in its basic meaning, right?
And so this is the one sin which there is no forgiveness.
This is the one sin that can't be forgiven.
Thus, it's often called the unpardonable sin because the
pathway to forgiveness is rejected.
Now that that's the key phrase, it's because you reject the.
Only pathway to forgiveness. Therefore you can't be forgiven.
There's no other way to be forgiven, and you've rejected
the one way to be forgiven, so you can't be forgiven.
So I. Want to talk about this for a
minute? All the other sins against the
Holy Spirit that we'll talk about are actually committed by
believers, by us. But this one, this one is
committed by unbelievers. The blasphemy of the Holy Spirit
is committed by those who do not believe in Christ as Lord and
Savior. So you got to hear what I'm
about to say, and I mean this. I think I can prove this.
A true Christian cannot commit blasphemy of the Holy Spirit.
OK, so so if you're sitting out there, I wonder if I just did
that. It depends on if you trusted if
you're a Christian. No, you didn't.
You've done something else and and let me let me share with you
why that is. So in its greatest description,
which is in Matthew chapter 12, and it's a lengthy passage and
I'm going to read the whole passage, it's committed by
enemies of Jesus who are right there watching him physically.
And they accuse him of casting out demons and healing by the
power of Satan after Jesus had clearly stated to them, to their
faces that they were cast out by the Spirit of God.
And they're right there in that. And you can't, you can't take
this out of context. And so this is an important part
of this. The context is.
Vital for proper interpretation. That's true of all scripture, by
the way. But especially in this kind of
story, you can understand who these people were, what they
just saw right before their very eyes, physically right in front
of them, and what Jesus said to them and what they say in
return. Let's walk through that a
little. So in Matthew chapter 12, verse
22, let me read this whole story to you.
Then a demon oppressed man who was blind and mute was brought
to him, and he healed him so that the man spoke.
And saw so it's an amazing. Miracle.
I mean, this guy had a lot of trouble.
Demon possessed death and mute are blind and mute and all the
people verse 23 were amazed I I would be too.
I don't know about you. I'd be pretty amazed at that and
said can this be the son of David In other words, can this
be the Messiah Can Jesus Christ actually be the Messiah because
of what we've just seen because of what we've probably heard
before and what we what why we're here in the 1st place to
be around him. Verse 24 but when the Pharisees
heard it, they said it is only by beelisable the Prince of
demons that this man casts out demons and knowing their
thoughts and that's crucial he not just her.
He didn't just know their words. He knew their heart, he knew
their mindset, he knew what they believed and he knew what they
didn't believe. And you got to remember that
part of the story, this. Is Jesus dealing with these
people? And knowing their thoughts, he
said to them, every Kingdom divided against itself is laid
waste and no city or house divided against itself will
stand. And then and then he almost gets
it's like this isn't what you guys just said isn't even
logical in verse 26. And if Satan casts out Satan,
he's divided against himself. How then will his Kingdom stand?
I mean, this doesn't even make sense.
What you people? Are saying you're.
Working so hard to deny me, you're not even logical anymore.
I mean, if you're saying Satan's casting out Satan, I mean that's
just stupid. That's the Hebrew word to be
Aramaic. Jesus probably spoke Aramaic.
So in verse 27, and if I cast out demons by Beelzebel, by whom
do your sons cast them out? Because you got to remember
there were Jewish exorcist. You remember the sons of Skiva
that Paul encounters? So there were there were
professional traveling or stationary Jewish exorcists,
right? So.
If you say I can't do how, how are you excusing your guys for
who do who do this or claim? To do this right.
Therefore, they will be your judges.
In other words, your own words about me condemn you because of
what you say about them. So here we go.
But if it is by the Spirit of God that I cast out demons, then
the Kingdom of God has come upon you.
How can or how can someone enter a strong man's house and plunder
his goods? Unless he first binds the strong
man? Then indeed he may plunder his
house. Whoever is not with me is
against me, and whoever does not gather with me scatters.
Therefore I tell you, every sin and blasphemy will be forgiven
people, but the blasphemy against the Spirit.
Will not be forgiven. And whoever speaks a word
against the Son of Man will be forgiven you.
You can even say things about me and.
You can still be forgiven. But whoever speaks against the
Holy Spirit will not be forgiven, either in this age or
in the age to come. Either make the tree good and
it's fruit good, or make the tree bad and it's fruit bad, for
the tree is known by its fruit. You brood of Vipers, you.
Say guys, say things sometimes. How can you speak good when
you're evil? For out of the abundance of the
heart, the mouth speaks. Don't forget, he knows what's in
their hearts. He's not just hearing some
random statement, some political agenda, some radical statement
of of I'm trying to please the crowd by what I'm saying out,
that he knows what's in their hearts.
For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks.
The good person out of his good treasure brings forth good, and
the evil person out of his evil treasure brings forth evil.
I tell you, on the Day of Judgment, people will be of
account for every careless word they speak.
For. By your words, you will be
justified. And by your words, you will be
condemned again. Don't forget context.
So. They saw with their own eyes
what had just been. Done by Jesus.
And they give credit to Satan. Chuck Swindoll says this.
He says, note that this is a combination of irrefutable proof
of Christ's identity and the Spirit's power and intentional
rejection. So we see not only obviously
that the Spirit of God worked by healing this man, by freeing
this man from demon oppression, but in the face, Swindoll goes
on. In the face of clear and
convincing proof of the Holy Spirit's miraculous work through
Christ, they attributed that work to Satan and dismissed
Jesus, God's Messiah, as. Satan's Messenger.
And don't forget that last phrase by Swindoll.
They're dismissing Jesus. He's not of God.
He's. A messenger of the devil.
OK. So these Pharisees are
completely opposed to believing in Jesus as their Savior, as the
Messiah. Now.
We we can translate that into a word today.
It's called being lost. They're lost.
They're not saved. They're actually rejecting the
idea of repentance. So this is willful unbelief,
continuous rebellion, and ultimate denial.
Billy Graham says this. He says the unpardonable sin
involves the total and irrevocable rejection of Jesus
Christ. OK, so this isn't just saying
something ugly one day. Off hand or off the cuff?
This is a purposeful rejection of Jesus and who He is.
And I, I'm standing right here and watching him do this and
hearing Him say to me what he just did.
And I'm saying, no, I do not believe in you.
And lostness, complete lostness, undeniable.
I will not turn back from my lostness.
Won't. Be forgiven, lost people.
Go to hell if they're not saved. I'm going to do a series for you
somewhere down the road called Heaven, Hell, Heaven, Hell and
the hereafter and or what happens to me in the moment that
I die? Some combination therein.
We're going to talk about heaven, We're going to talk
about angels, we're going to talk about demons.
We're going to talk about hell. We're going to what's this thing
called Hades? What's the bosom of Abraham?
Where was Lazarus and the rich man?
What's Sheol? What are all these?
Things we're going to talk about that down the road.
But the problem is these people reject Christ and so they have
no hope. It is refusing finally and
completely to embrace Jesus Christ after the Holy Spirit has
worked and continually offered Him as the solution to their
lives and their sin. No, I don't want Him.
Nope. That's not who He is.
So this isn't atheism. It's, it's in a sense worth
that. It's not that they don't believe
in anything. They believe in the wrong thing.
This is Satanism. Most people today, if anyone.
Many scholars argue that this is an impossible sin to commit
today. I don't know if it's impossible,
but. The total rejection of Christ.
And this isn't just that person who's ignorant over here either.
This is the person who in a sense think of the person who's
heard the gospel, seen the gospel, seen, seen Jesus,
watched all this work and says, no, that's not true.
I don't believe that that's wrong.
He's not real. Well, that person is doomed.
And that's where these Pharisees were.
And you got to think about who these people were.
Who were the Pharisees. I mean it's not like these were
just fly by night people walking down the street.
These were religious leaders who could who could probably quote
to them the very messianic prophecies that Jesus was
fulfilling every day. And yet they refuse at Christmas
time. So forget I told you this now
and pretend later. It's just astounding.
And you're wowed by it in December or something if I do
this again. But what?
One of the dumbest groups of people in the in the in the New
Testament to me. And that's my kind word for
them. One of the dumbest group of
people in all of the New Testament were the wise men who
were sitting around Herod when the the, the three are just not
three. We don't have many.
There were when the wise men when the Magi from the east,
these Persian kingmakers and I'll tell you who they are
exactly later. They're wizard type people
riding in white Arabian horses. They weren't riding camels and
there weren't three of them. They had a small army with them.
These were the Persian kingmakers.
You got to understand This is why the host city stirred up at
Christmas time. Herod gets real nervous because.
Paranoid anyway, kills half his family all the time and the dog
I think because he doesn't want to lose his throne but.
But his counselors? Where's the Messiah supposed to
be born? Bethlehem, They all knew it.
They all could quote it. How many of them went to go find
him? None of them.
Dumbest group. Of smart people I've ever seen
in the Bible until. Maybe these guys, these.
Guys should have known better. These guys knew better.
They. Knew better up here.
They refused to believe. And they didn't just refuse to
believe. They're denying the very
identity and mission and purpose of Christ and claiming in a
sense he's a demon himself. Which doesn't even make any
sense. So as long as the Spirit is
convicting and drawing you, you have not committed this sin.
When? The Holy Spirit stops striving
within you. You could be in danger.
Acts 751 says this. You stiff necked people,
uncircumcised in heart and ears. You always resist the Holy
Spirit as your Father's did. So do you.
So resisting the Spirit is a is a sin committed by unbelievers.
This is unbelief. This is lostness.
This is a sin of the heart, not just of the lips.
This isn't just saying something bad.
This is much more than that. It's.
A belief down deep and and because of this sin, people
resist the spirit, they fight him.
They need to repent, believe, but, but they don't.
And. They're lost and they're
unforgiven, but we need to be careful with this issue.
We need to be very careful about drawing our conclusions about
others we might know Jesus. Could say what he did in Matthew
chapter 12 because he knew what was in their hearts and minds
and. So I don't have the right or the
authority to say you committed this sin because I don't know
your heart and your mind is in that way.
So we need to let God make that decision.
We can't judge this sin so. We need, we must never stop
urging men to repent, to believe, since we don't know.
Who? Will or who won't?
And we don't know when the Spirit has stopped dealing with
somebody. But the only unpardonable sin is
ultimately rejecting the truth and the and the identity of
Christ. It's rejecting completely and
finally. The witness of the Holy Spirit
which declares that Jesus Christ is the Son of God who alone can
save us from our sins. And it's total rejection of
that. Not only just total rejection,
it's actually the application of that.
No, that's not really a lie. That's not really not true.
That's actually from Satan. I don't know if I've known.
Anybody go to that last step? I.
Know people who deny Him. I know people who reject Christ.
I know people who say it's not true.
But. To sit there and say it's not
only not true, I believe in Satan, but I don't believe in
you see, you got to hear that part of it.
You got that part. They're Satanists.
That Satan is the one who has the power, not the Holy Spirit.
So it means rejecting Christ and what the Bible says about him.
It's a very dangerous position, obviously, and ironic that it's
ironic that later they condemned Jesus for the charge of.
Blasphemy when they themselves had committed it far more
severely. So this is not a place a true
believer can be in. So let's talk about a couple.
Others, we'll circle back in a minute.
But let's talk about a couple of places where we do, as
believers, sin against the Holy Spirit.
One of them would be called grieving the Holy Spirit.
So. This sin can be committed by
believers. Ephesians chapter 4 verse 30
says, And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were
sealed for the day of redemption.
Now. It's comforting to hear that
we're sealed now. I've talked about that before,
that passage before when I talked about salvation in a
sermon. And, and so that means we are
and we'll remain saved. So he's Speaking of the things
we do that are inconsistent with the nature of the Holy Spirit.
And we actually hurt the heart of the Holy Spirit.
We actually, we actually can, can give him pain.
We wound him. We grieve him, which again, is a
testimony to the fact that this is a person.
This isn't just a thing. So we can bring.
Pain to the Holy Spirit by what we do or we don't do.
The Holy Spirit loves us just as the Son did.
In fact, Romans 1530 says, I appeal to your brothers by our
Lord Jesus Christ and by the love of the Spirit.
To. Strive together with me in your
prayers to God on my behalf. So so grieve is often described
as a love word and in other words, we can hurt and and anger
anyone, but we can only grieve those who love us.
So how do we grieve the Holy Spirit?
Let me. Talk about this for a minute.
Ephesians 420 But that is not the way you learned Christ,
assuming that you have heard about Him, and were taught in
Him, as the truth is in Jesus. To put off your old self, which
belongs to your former manner of life, and is corrupt through
deceitful desires, and to be renewed in the spirit of your
minds, and to put on the new self created after the likeness
of God in true righteousness and holiness.
Therefore, having put away falsehood, that each one of you
speak the truth with his neighbor, for we are members one
of another. Be angry and do not sin.
Do not. Let the sun.
Go down on your anger and give no opportunity to the devil.
Let the thief no longer steal, but rather let him labor doing
honest work with his own hands so that he may have something to
share with anyone in need. Let no corrupting talk come out
of your mouths, but only such as it's good for building up as
fits the occasion that it may give grace to those who here.
So. Here.
Here's how we're supposed to. Here's what we're not supposed
to do. Here's what we are supposed to
do. Here's.
How to live the Christian life then verse 30 and do not grieve
the Holy Spirit. Don't grieve the Holy Spirit by
whom you were sealed for the day of redemption.
That verse I read before. Let all bitterness and wrath and
anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with
all malice. Be kind to one another, tender
hearted, forgiving one another as God in Christ forgave you.
So so whatever's not like Jesus grieves the Spirit that that's
why you, you hear me say, and we're trying so hard to say,
we're trying to help you define what it means to be like Jesus
by right now laying a foundation of these 7 essentials on Sunday
morning. And we're going to build on
that. We're going to go deeper with
those. Things too, I promise.
I'm just trying to lay a foundation right now.
But we also have to recognize, OK, so who is, who's the spirit
like? What's the spirit like?
So the Spirit, the Holy Spirit, this is Spirit of truth.
So truth is a big part of this part of that passage.
John 1417 says even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot
receive because it neither sees Him nor knows Him.
You know Him, for He dwells with you and will be in you.
So truth he's the spirit of. Faith 2nd Corinthians 413 Since
we have the same spirit of faith according to what has been
written, I believed and so I spoke.
We also believe and we also speak.
So he's the Spirit. Of truth, he's the spirit of
faith. He's also the spirit of grace.
Hebrews 10/29 How? Much worse punishment, do you
think will be deserved by the one who has trampled under foot
the Son of God and has profaned the blood of the covenant by
which he was sanctified and has outraged.
The spirit of grace, there's a verse relates pretty closely to
Matthew 22, probably so. How bad is that going to be for
that person? He's also the spirit of Holiness
Romans 1 and was declared to be the Son of God in power
according to the spirit of holiness.
By his resurrection from the dead.
Jesus Christ. Our Lord.
So these characteristics of truth, of faith, of grace, of
holiness, and we could list many more, the Holy Spirit delights
to take these things of Christ and reveal them to us and help
us develop these things in our life.
And he does it with we need to have a sense of joy, a sense of
peace, a sense of gladness in our hearts when we do this and
we grieve Him when we don't do it.
Now listen to me. When we grieve the Holy Spirit,
it costs us. It affects us because when we
grieve the Holy Spirit, his ministry to us shifts.
This is an important thing to know.
So instead of trying to impart to us truth and faith and grace
and holiness and joy and peace and purpose and all the things
we want out of Christianity, when we grieve him like this,
when we sin like this, all of a sudden the spotlight has to
shift. Because his primary job at that
point, he's going to suspend that part of his ministry to us.
Because when I commit a sin, when I'm disobedient, if I
depart from the clearly seen pathway of the will and Word of
God, I'm going to lose that part of His ministry temporarily
because He's now going to focus on conviction.
And repentance, because until I recognize I've sinned, I don't
get that other part back again in full force.
He's going to focus on my confession, he's going to focus
on my repentance, he's going to focus on my forgiveness.
And that's going to be his primary job in my heart.
So there's a price to pay. So as soon as I repent, soon as
I'm forgiven. It's like the light goes back
on. Right.
And he'll, he'll again, he'll illumine my mind and, and help
me to see and to understand and begin to satisfy.
So you got to see how sin effects prayer even in this
conversation. But but don't make the mistake.
Grieving doesn't mean losing the Holy Spirit.
In my sermon on salvation, I tried to help you understand the
difference between the words relationship and fellowship, and
it comes into play here again. I lose my fellowship with the
Spirit in the same way that fellowships different, but my
relationship hasn't changed. He's now going to work hard.
To discipline me, He's going to work hard to chastise me.
He's going to work hard to correct me.
He's going to work hard to convict me.
Not because he hates me. Not because he's mad at me.
Not because he wants to cause me trouble.
It's because he loves me. I've got.
To help you stop that and. Recognize that's not who you
need to be if. You claim to be a follower.
Of Christ the Holy. Spirit's going to help you be a
follower of Christ. Whether we like it or not.
So I know people I. Know people who have had
experiences with Christ. But.
Don't seem to be living for him anymore.
I've mentioned to you I have a family member.
I don't have to guess about her. I've had too many conversations
with her. I believe with all my heart she
had a genuine conversion experience.
But now she doesn't walk with the Lord and she is the
angriest, most miserable human being I've ever known.
I love her, but I have a hard time helping her because until
she repents of all the lies and all the sin in her life and
confesses that and comes back to the Lord, she's going to be the
way she is till she dies. Just think about it.
The Holy Spirit lives inside of you, but you don't live for him.
So there's a there's a war going on all the time.
It's a constant battle in there, constant fight in there.
And that's where all your energy goes.
Your your energy just goes to the conflict.
So you don't live life well? You're distracted.
You have no clarity. You.
Have trouble telling the truth. You have trouble being honest.
You have trouble being transparent.
You can't do anything. You got to hide.
You got to. I mean, you're just fighting
everything all the time because, you know.
Who you really are and you know, God's pounding on your heart and
your mind constantly saying that's not who you're supposed
to be and you're hurting me, the Holy Spirit says.
You're grieving me, the Holy Spirit says.
So He doesn't cease to seal us. He doesn't remove himself from
us. He simply focuses on that
conviction. And I'm not very useful to the
Kingdom until that's repaired and and it is possible to even
sense that the presence of the Holy Spirit has left you.
Listen to Psalm 5111. Cast me not away from your
presence and take not your Holy Spirit for me.
And I don't know if you remember the context of Psalm 51, but
this is the Psalm of Confession of David after he recognizes his
sin with Bathsheba. After the prophet has come to
him and confronted him about his sin of having Bathsheba's
husband killed in battle and and having an adulterous
relationship with Bathsheba, the prophet confronts him and David
recognizes I am that man and this is his song of confession.
Psalm 51. And so we recognize that he
sealed US. Ephesians helps us and promises
us in Ephesians one in him you also, when you heard the word of
truth, the gospel of your salvation and believed in him,
we're sealed with the promised Holy Spirit.
But again, verse 30, we can't grieve him.
I've read that passage twice now.
We can't grieve him, even though we've been sealed for the day of
redemption. And then Romans 823 And not only
the creation, but we ourselves, who have the first fruits of the
Spirit, groan inwardly. As we wait eagerly for adoption
as sons, the redemption of our bodies, so.
If the Holy Spirit were to withdraw himself from a
believer, he is sealed. He would deny the whole scheme
of salvation. It's not how it works.
You got to look at the whole doctrine of salvation.
It's not how it works. But when he's grieved, he does
bring about an absence of joy, an absence of power in our life
until we confess and renounce our sin.
So. We're wretched not because he
had abandoned us, but because we turned our backs on Him, Psalm
32 says. For when I kept silent, my bones
wasted away through my groaning all day long.
For day and night your hand was heavy upon me, My strength was
dried up as by the heat of summer.
Salah, I acknowledge my sin to you, and I did not cover my
iniquity. And I said, I will confess my
transgression to the Lord, and you forgave the iniquity of my
sin. Salah Later in Psalm 32 verse
11, it says be glad in the Lord and rejoice he the change of
heart. You got to see the change of
spirit here. Be glad in the Lord and rejoice,
O righteous, and shout for joy. All you upright.
In heart. Starts off pretty miserable,
groaning, wasting away. Ends up.
Pretty joyful because of his repentance.
That's what repentance will do for us.
So we're sealed forever. He's.
Our owner's earnest pledge, he secures us, he gives us this
continuous knowledge that we belong to God.
And, and, and sometimes I don't think we have any clue.
I don't know if we have any clue how much power, how much work is
going on for us on our behalf that we don't know anything
about. As the Holy Spirit holds us and
seals us, as the sun intercedes for us, there's a lot of work
going on for us. And if we were to yield totally
and surrender completely to this, it might just be
overwhelming. And for some of you, that might
be what needs to happen. So.
We can grieve Him because He loves us, but there's one more
here. We can quench Him.
Quenching the Holy Spirit, which is different than grieving the
Holy Spirit. To blasphemy is a sin committed
by unbelievers. Grieving and quenching are sins
that are committed by believers. First Thessalonians 519 says
very simply, do not quench the Spirit.
So, so the word grieve suggests the sense of being hurt or being
made sorrowful. It has to do with the way we
bruise the heart of the Spirit. I, I, I want you to think like
that you can hurt him in our individual lives, quench means
something else. It means to put out, it means to
put a damper on something, right?
And so it's important to remember that Scripture often
refers to the Holy Spirit as a anybody guess a fire.
And so think of that imagery when we think of this word, when
we quench the spirit, we put the fire out.
Now that doesn't mean we expelled him, but that we
extinguished the power, the love that the Spirit has as He seeks
to carry out His divine purpose through us.
So how are some ways we quench the spirit?
Well, a fire goes out when the fuel supply is withdrawn if we
don't stay active. And this is another reason why
we're building these little foundation stones called the
seven essentials. If you're not engaged in the
Bible, you're not abiding in prayer, you're not in uniting in
fellowship, you're not committing to service this
Sunday if you're not responding and worship with all.
And so if you're not involved in these, these are things that
give you the. Resources for fuel.
When When we do not stir up souls?
When we don't use the means of grace, when we fail to do these
things and share about these things, the other, the fire of
the Holy Spirit's dampened. So these things are channels
through which God gives us fuel to keep the fire burning.
And. So the Holy Spirit wants to use
our spiritual gifts to maintain and build.
I, I don't, I don't know. I don't know if you've ever done
this. I, I've done this because, you
know, I don't, I don't claim to be too handy or even too
intelligent. So, so, so as the rain comes and
blesses us and I and I hope they're inside the gym and not
out on the field, which they had a contingency plan for that.
So they're probably in the gym but but.
I don't know if you've ever done this, you ever gone out to your
grill and I'm going to cook up the burgers.
You. Know that propane grill and
we're going to and everybody's excited.
Everybody's excited. Homemade hamburgers.
You. Know growing up, my Mama used to
make them in the skillet. You know, I kind of like skillet
burgers, but every now and then you got to put them out there on
the grill and get that charcoal flavor of the grill on them
burgers. And then everybody's getting
you've marinated the burgers you've met in that special mix
of the meat and everything that goes in and you go out there and
you you turn on the get the grill of the gas.
And nothing get. Out the skillet, Mama.
You're out of gas. I used to drive a I've mentioned
this truck to you before and I've even probably mentioned
this part to you before, but I used to drive this old pickup
truck when I was in Arizona, right?
I used to tall rock. I told you the story about the
big engine and and you know it got horrible gas mine.
Well, the gas gauge didn't work half the time.
I remember more than once I'd be out on the highway in Prescott,
AZ up in the mountains and I'm coasting to the sight.
No power steering either in this old truck.
So you know that you. Remember that you remember
you're cranking that steering wheel to get it over to the
shoulder and it looks like I got half a tank.
I got nothing that can happen to you spiritually if you
disconnect yourself. One time in the Philippines.
In the Philippines we had, it was really complicated and so
those of you who've travelled or lived overseas, you know this
sometimes you have, we have 110, right?
Our electricity is what we call 110.
Don't worry about what that means.
Overseas, you have anywhere from 200 to 220 and a an appliance
that's supposed to run off a 210 will blow up when you plug it
into a 220 right in your home, you might have a 220 for your.
Dryer or something and that'd be about it.
Depends on your house. Well, some missionaries left and
they left me their dog and they left me their popcorn popper and
I didn't have a popcorn popper. You remember those air popcorn
poppers that shot them out the top?
And obviously they brought that from the States.
Man, this was fancy Uptown. I was excited about some
popcorn, you know what I'm saying?
Been about a year and a half since I'd had any popcorn.
Plugged it in the wrong plug smoke.
We need these basic fuel sources to keep the fire burning
brightly. You know how it is when you
build a fire, you got to have wood, you got to have fuel, you
got to keep it going so. If we don't stir that up, we're
going to lose it. So the Holy Spirit wants to us
to use these spiritual disciplines and then we we have
an output, our flames or our spiritual gifts that we use to
maintain and build and encourage one another.
And so, so one way we do this, one way we quench.
Is we just remove the fuel supply?
A second way is we we extinguish it.
We throw water or dirt on it or smother it with a blanket.
I'm thankful that the people who bought our house in Roseville
had bad eyesight because that grease fire that one time in our
kitchen that made the route, the ceiling and the light fixture a
little black, We just called that antiquing.
Willful sin throws a blanket on the spirit.
He's just got to shift gears at that point, kind of like when in
grieving, right? And so when we criticize or act
unkindly or belittle the work of others by careless words, we, we
can smother a fire in any kind of willful sin.
We can put it out, we can grieve.
So when we grieve, we quench these, these are connected.
And when we quench, we grieve. And so we need to be careful.
We don't have to do this. We can say no to sin.
We can say yes to the Spirit. You have to make a choice as to
what. You're going to do.
And and what's interesting in our lives is, is that is that I
don't know that we think enough sometimes.
And I'm actually talking about this on the student retreat this
week and we're talking about worship all weekend long and
then Sunday morning preaching on worship.
So it's just a continuation of their retreat.
But but to think about the think about what what we can do to
God. See now.
I need you to wrap your head around that for a minute,
because most world religions don't let you do that.
See, Islam would never a law can't be touched by you.
A law is is above and distant. He's transcendent, he's
transcended. That's the sin of man has no
impact on the law except making him angry to punish you.
And yet we can actually grieve. We actually hurt.
That's the love, that's the, that's the intimacy, that's the
relationship that God designed from Genesis chapter one and
two. He.
Wants you to have that level of intimacy with him.
To where you could actually hurt him.
Well, here's what else that means.
If we are to be like him, that's the level of transparency and
intimacy that we're supposed to have with one another.
See one of the dangers, one of the hard things about church is
that. You can get hurt.
I've dealt with that many, many times over the years.
Church hurt is a unique hurt. Because it it ought to be
loving, it ought to be transparent, it ought to be
safe, it ought to be secure. And yeah, we can hurt one
another, or we can choose not. To do that, we can choose to
bring each other joy, just like the Spirit wants to bring us
joy. We can be vehicles, we can be
channels, we can be conduits of what He wants to do in our life
as we seek to serve Him. So we need to be careful about
the choices we make. They can end a disaster, they
can end a unbelief, They can end in lostness, they can end in
joy, Purpose. One year we were in Malawi.
I'd think of the country, sorry, we were in Malawi, East Africa,
and we were. We were getting ready to get.
On some small boats and off some small boats in a river.
And there were hippos and crocodiles in this river.
And I had a friend who is helping to lead the trip and,
and I'm trying to be nice about my friend.
My my friend Gerald was a large man, OK?
Looking at me. Right now I am a tiny man
compared to my friend Gerald. He's.
A very large man. Large man.
He was a gigantic man. Not necessarily tall, but
gigantic. Am I good?
Am I all right? OK, large man.
And have you ever tried to step from a dock to a little boat?
So Gerald is standing on the dock and we're all sitting there
going, Gerald, that's not the way to do that.
That's not the way to do that. Don't do that.
You're making a bad decision. Don't do.
I mean, there's like everybody on the dock saying don't do
that, Gerald. And he puts.
His foot there and guess what happens?
The boat goes that way, Doc. Don't move, don't do it so.
Gerald splash into the river now, my friends, all up and down
the river. You heard splash.
Splash, splash, splash. You know who's coming?
All of them. Dinner time, it's like somebody
rang the bell and I mean, they're coming.
Now we're all sitting there leaning off the side of the dock
trying to help a 400 and something pound man soaking wet
get out of the river. I've never seen a large man fly
before. He hops out of that.
I'm I'm not, I don't I we're trying to help him, but I'm
telling you, it's like we're reaching out one minute, had a
hold of him, next moment he's behind us on the dock.
You know what I'm saying? We got to watch out for each
other. Don't do it.
Don't you take that step. See, that's a dumb move.
Bad decision. You're.
Going to grieve him. You're going to quench him.
Don't you do it? And when you do it.
Instead, we didn't sit there and say, see you dumb, stupid idiot,
you jump. We told you not to do it.
You know, listen there, come there, they come right there.
You. We didn't do any of that.
We're on our bellies with our hands down and crocodile
infested water trying to grab professional wrestler out of a
river. That's a church, isn't it?
I know I harp on you about stuff like connect groups.
There's a reason you need a community that's saying don't,
don't do that. Don't do that.
That's a bad choice. That's a bad decision.
And then and then when you make. The bad decision, because we all
will, right? We all make bad decisions.
Somebody's there to either catch you, grab you, or get you out
and help you back out of that. Because I promise you, there's a
lizard who's coming after you. A snake in a garden.
And we got to protect one another.
We got to help one another. The Holy.
Spirit does that for supernaturally.
So he's going to convict you, Don't you do that?
That's sin, don't you? Don't you touch.
That fire, it's hot. Stop it.
That's what he does. That's part of his job.
He helps us not only to stop it, but He helps us to see this is
the light, this is the right way, The right step, big boy, is
to step back on that dock and stay put till they get you a
better way to get on that boat. He'll illuminate our minds.
He'll reveal to us the Word and will of God.
He'll help us to understand it. So he not only stops us, he
helps us to know. He illuminates for us.
And then what he'll do is he'll say it's because of him.
It's. Because of him, it's because of
the Son. It's because of the Son that you
can do that. See, the Holy Spirit will never
testify about himself. He'll go.
It's always about the Son. It's about him and what he did
and because of what he did. Don't do that.
Don't do. Do this.
Here's the here's the way,
right, here's the way. Don't do.
That because of what He's done, next week we're going to talk
more about all the things He does for us.
I don't know who wrote this. I wish I did.
Resist not his incoming. Grieve not his indwelling.
Quench not his outgoing. Open to him as the incomer.
Please him as the indweller. Obey him as the outgoer in his
testimony of the things concerning Christ, whether
through yourself or through others.
Father, thank you that even when we fail you, as long as you're
still working in our lives, Father, because of your spirit
of grace, because of the spirit of truth, because of the spirit
of faith and love, Father, we can be restored.
Ultimately, Father, we know because at the end of the Bible
that tells us that there are going to be people who never
ever, ever trust in you. They will not believe in you.
They'll reject you. They'll follow Antichrist,
they'll, they'll follow Satan. And Father, they won't be
forgiven. They.
Can't be forgiven because of their willful rejection of you.
I just pray, Father, that if there's anyone who can hear my
voice, they, Father, they would recognize that you're working in
their hearts so that they won't reject you, but they'll be
accepted by you as they accept you as Lord and Savior.
Help His Father be a testimony of the way we're supposed to
live. Not to grieve the Spirit, not to
quench the Spirit, but to bring the Spirit joy, to bring you
joy. Father, by the way, we live and
serve, love one another. Thank you for the church, the
church that will hold us accountable, the church that
will help us remain steady, the church that will catch us when
we begin to fall or even help restore us after we've fallen,
because we all need that. We need each other and we need
you. Thank you, Father, for letting
us learn a little more about you.
I pray, Father, you'll bless us in Christ's name, Amen.
God bless you all. Thank you.
Thank you so much for listening today.
And I also hope that you'll go to
ourwebsite@englewoodbaptist.com as well as our app and find many
other resources that will bless you and your families.
Thank you once again.