YOU CAN ALWAYS BE
FILLED WITH THE SPIRIT
IN MY INVOLVEMENT with multitudes of Christians, I have come to the sad conclusion that so many who profess faith in the Lord Jesus know very little about the Christian way of life. This is tragic indeed.
For many believers, the Christian faith is not more than a religion. But Christianity is not a religion. Christianity is not a religion in that religion is man's futile attempt to appease God. Christianity is a wonderful relationship with God. This relationship begins at the moment one believes in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. An understanding of certain basic realities is fundamental to a right expression of faith in Jesus Christ. For instance realities like God's love for us (John 3:16); man's sinfulness (Romans 3:23); the consequences of sin (Romans 6:23); God's solution to man's sinfulness (Romans 6.23); and man's non-meritorious responsibility in believing and accepting Jesus as his personal Lord and Savior (John 1:12); are all crucial to a proper spiritual birth into God's royal family.
Having understood these realities, the moment faith is expressed in Jesus Christ, that individual becomes a Christian and the most rewarding adventure of his life begins. The moment anyone becomes a Christian that individual becomes a recipient of the supernatural life that can only be executed through the supernatural means provided by God alone.
The Christian's relationship with God from beginning to the end is based on His grace alone... Under grace, we receive salvation free and we are expected to continue to live out that salvation only by God’s grace through what He provides. God in doing this deserves and receives all the glory.
At the moment of salvation, the Christian receives a new life in Christ Jesus. To be able to execute this new life, he must do so through the supernatural power graciously provided or made available to him by God ...Therefore without a proper understanding and utilization of these power provisions, no Christian can execute the Christian way of life in a manner that glorifies God. If a Christian is more occupied with the teachings of men instead of the doctrine in the Word of God, that Christian cannot go far in his walk with God. If a Christian wants to live the Christian life in the energy of the flesh, he is bound to be trapped in the dungeon of this world's system. And he will be ineffective, no matter what he appears to be doing.
The purpose of this book which is in two parts is to teach the Christian how he can live out the Christian life through one of the power provisions made available to him by God. This is the enabling power of the Holy Spirit. Though I cannot afford to be exhaustive and generous with the use of words in this presentation for obvious reasons, I challenge every reader of this concise book to take time out to read and meditate on the issues raised herein.
In this first part, two issues about the Holy Spirit will be considered namely: who is the Holy Spirit, and the Holy Spirit and the Christian way of life. In the part two, I shall deal with the issues about the enabling power of the Holy Spirit or how the Holy Spirit can always be allowed to fill the believer. In addition, we shall explore the benefits of being always filled by the Holy Spirit so that we can be sufficiently motivated to execute our spiritual portfolio properly.
It is my prayer that these Christian Possibility Teaching Series add vigor to your Christian life such that you will become a winner in your walk with the Lord both in time and eternity...
...this is very important against the background that perhaps very few issues in Scriptures have over the years generated so much controversy as the ministry of the Holy Spirit. No one can deny the fact that such exist today amongst well meaning believers. This ought not to be so. For one thing, if there is one thing that believers should be united, and be grateful for, it should be the work of the Spirit in our lives. The controversy that the ministry of the Holy Spirit has been subjected to over the years can only be explained in my view, as our unwillingness to vigorously study the pages of the Word of God for understanding that will profit us all...
... Who is the Holy Spirit? He is the third person of the Trinity. Why did He come? He came to give us the enablement to become Christians and to properly live out the Christian way of life in this dispensation of grace. This is not to say that the Holy Spirit has not been there all the while. Rather, we must understand that the ministry of the Holy Spirit in this dispensation of grace is radically different from what it was in the dispensation of the law or Jews.
Whereas under the dispensation of law, the Holy Spirit never indwelt people on a permanent basis, however, under grace, He came to indwell believers on a permanent basis. In other words, under the Old Testament, the Holy Spirit's relationship with man can be described as enduement. This is not the case in the New Testament where we know from the pages of the Scripture that a primary function of the Holy Spirit under our present dispensation can aptly be described as enablement.
Passages that document this truth in the Old Testament include Numbers 11:25; 24:2; Judges 3:10, 6:34; 14:6; I Samuel 10:10, 16:13, 19:20, Luke 2:25, etc. Please notice the constant phrase or its equivalent used to describe the Holy Spirit's involvement with them "The spirit rest upon" "the spirit of God came upon," etc. These phrases underscore the idea of enduement and they speak of the non-permanent nature of the Holy Spirit's ministry during the previous dispensations, especially during the "times of the Jews". However, under our present dispensation, passages that document the enabling power of the Holy Spirit include Acts 8:17, Romans 8:16, Galatians 4:6; Ephesians 5:16-26; I John 2:27, 3:24; 4:13, 5:6; just to mention a few.
Why are all these observations important? To simply enable us appreciate that the grace policy of God towards the Christian, cannot be fully realized without the enabling power of the Holy Spirit. The purpose of the ministry of the Holy Spirit today is to enable every believer to continue to enjoy God's ability to carry out what He has invited us to partake in.
We must understand that never before in the history of mankind has God's grace policy been so abundantly bestowed on mankind. We are living in a most wonderful and gracious moment of history. Not only is our salvation a direct product of grace, but the post-salvation life of all believers is also based on grace alone. Hence the gracious provision of the enabling power and presence of the Spirit of God to enable us to execute the Christian life in a manner that brings glory to God....