So quiet. Ephesians 5 is where we'll be. I guess you're ready to go. I hope you had a nice Thanksgiving holiday. And again, we're gonna turn our attention to verses 17 through 19. Or let's go ahead, 17 through 21. In which Paul says, wherefore be ye not unwise, but understanding what the will of the Lord is. And be not drunk with wine wherein is excess. but be filled with the Spirit, speaking to yourselves in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord, giving thanks always for all things unto God and the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, submitting yourselves one to another in the fear of God. And let's pray. Father, we ask that you would help us, of course, always to understand your word, And you have communicated to us in words and you have made us verbal people. We speak in words and understand them. And we pray for the enablement of your spirit to enlighten our minds and grant to us understanding. And then Father, we ask that we would live in that state which you are instructing. that this would not just be academic and intellectual to us, but experience. And we ask this in Jesus' name, amen. So again, we're dealing, we're talking about the ministry of the Holy Spirit broadly, and last week I introduced the topic of being filled with the Spirit, and we looked at some things about that, and we noted that Paul's Discussion about being filled is not new or radical or kind of off the wall, but that God has announced that he will fill the earth with his glory and that the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea. He filled his temple with his glory and the tabernacle with his glory. He has filled people with his spirit. being filled with God is an important concept to him. And the church we saw in the book of Ephesians is his temple, his body, the fullness, the very fullness of God. And so we kind of looked at that concept of fullness in its broadest possible usage and context. This morning I want to begin by turning our attention specifically to the book of Ephesians and then we will turn our attention specifically to the instruction to be filled with the Spirit. The first three chapters of Ephesians are instruction as to what the church is. I say this a lot. I'm hoping that we're beginning to embrace it. It is, right, In a true biblical sense, we have come to church today. And the Bible occasionally uses language that will support that, that we are in church. And we don't have any problem with that concept. A little bit larger concept, and one that I think is a little more problematic to us, is the idea that we are the church, that the church is not really the building, but that the church is the people of God. And understanding that and grasping what that means has all kinds of implications for ministry that we will talk about at a different time. Our understanding of what's supposed to happen when we come together is, I would argue, heavily colored by how we understand what the church actually is and what the church is supposed to do. And the Bible tells us what the church is. It's not up to us to identify what we think a church is, or even, folks, what we think a church ought to be. The Bible is very explicit about that. So chapters one, and I just wanna take a little bit of time this morning and read some selected highlights from the book of Ephesians. What the church is. What is the church? Well, Ephesians one, verse number three. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ, according as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before him in love, having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself, according to the good pleasure of his will, to the praise of the glory of his grace, wherein he hath made us accepted in the beloved. Now this is part of a longer poem that celebrates the Trinity's role in salvation, but let's just start here. What is the church? The church is saved people. The church is saved people. The church is not lost people who assemble in a building called a church. And if I may digress back to something that is of monumental importance to me, right? The church's role with reference to lost people is to evangelize them outside of the public services. And biblically, everything that goes on on the inside in the public services is oriented to the true church, saved people. It is not about lost people. It is not even about evangelizing lost people, and it is certainly not about making ourselves as accommodating to them as is humanly imaginable. The church is saved people, and church services are for saved people. Over to chapter two and verse number 13. The church is saved people. Secondly, the church is one people, one people. Verse number 13, but now in Christ Jesus, ye who sometimes were afar off are made nigh by the blood of Christ, for he is our peace, who hath made both one and hath broken down the middle wall of partition between us, having abolished in his flesh the enmity, even the law of commandments contained in ordinances, For to make in himself of twain of two one new man, so making peace, and that he might reconcile both unto God in one body by the cross, having slain the enmity thereby, and came and preached peace unto you which were afar off, and to them that were nigh, for through him we both have access by one Spirit into the Father." Right? So at this point in time, you don't necessarily know who Paul is talking about, but you know what Paul is talking about. Jesus Christ has done a work of reconciliation that is more than reconciliation of God and sinner. It is reconciliation of two groups of people who have been at enmity, He has made both one, verse number 19. Now, therefore, ye are no more strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens with the saints and of the household of God and are built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief cornerstone in whom all the building fitly framed together groweth into an holy temple in the Lord, in whom ye also are builded together for inhabitation of God through the Spirit." And what Paul is getting at here is that the barrier between Jew and Gentile, between Mosaic covenant people and outside covenant people, has been broken down by the work of Christ and they are united in him. This is what Paul means when he will argue that there is no longer Jew or Greek, that there is only Christ and those who are related to him. Now, again, because I just have to make the disclaimer because it comes up somewhere. That doesn't mean that all men are now women and all women are now men. It doesn't mean that at all. It just means with reference to our relationship before Christ, we all come in on the basis of Christ's blood. And we are then one people. The church is one people. Paul will tell the Corinthians to give no offense, not to the Jews, their people, not to the Gentiles, They're a people, neither the church of God, because it is a people. And so, right? And sometimes pastors are the most egregious offenders of this doctrine. We have our little assembly and it is ours and every other assembly within the immediate vicinity is viewed as the competition and is hostile. But biblically, we are one people. God has one people. that is the church, chapter three, verses 14 through 21. What is the church? It is saved people who are really one people. Because it really is a binary world, folks. You either believe in Jesus Christ or you don't. It is a binary world, and all who believe in Jesus are united in him in a real sense, although we meet in local assemblies. one people to God's glory. And the purpose is then to God's glory. Verse number 13 of Ephesians chapter number three, wherefore I desire that ye faint not at my tribulations for you, which is your glory. For this cause, I bow my knees under the father of our Lord Jesus Christ, of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named. that he would grant you, according to the riches of his glory, to be strengthened with might by his spirit in the inner man, that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith, that ye, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth and length and depth and height, and to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that ye might be filled with all the fullness of God Now to him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us, unto him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus throughout all ages, world without end. Amen. So the church is, save people, his people, who are one people, who exist for his glory. That's what the church is. And of course, again, the way that it works out in practicality is that God has his people portioned out in local assemblies. And each of those local assemblies then constitutes, biblically reality, a church. We are a church. We are not a fragment of a church. We are a total church. we are the people of God. Peter calls us, calls you, I guess to be more technically specific, you God's heritage or the portion, right? Every portion has a pastor. Every portion has a pastor. God has one people. They exist in time and place and And so that in a very real sense, we are as much one with believers in Peru or Kenya or the Philippines or India today, as we are one with people who lived 100 years ago, 200 years ago, who lived on the day of Pentecost. God has one people and the unifying person is Christ. So what the church is. Paul then in chapter four, turns his attention to how that people lives, right? If we are one people who are God's people, how do God's people live? In other words, what do verses like Ephesians 3.21, unto him be glory in the church, what does that look like in practice? What does that look like in practice? And again, folks, the Bible explicitly informs us what it looks like for the church to glorify its Savior. So if you look at chapter 4, verses 1 through 7, it looks like individuals and local communities of believers, local churches, laboring, laboring together to maintain the unity that already exists. Verse number one, I therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you that ye walk worthy of the vocation wherewith ye are called, with all lowliness and meekness, with longsuffering, forbearing one another in love, endeavoring to keep the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace. There is one body, Paul has already taught that, Ephesians 2, there is one body and one spirit, even as you're called in the hope of your calling, even though it came to you individually, there is only one body and one spirit, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and father of all, who is above all and through all and in you all. But unto every one of us is given grace according to the measure of the gift of Christ. So here's part of where the rub is, right? There is one body. And Paul really elaborates upon this in 1 Corinthians 12 through 14. And yet the body has many parts. And unfortunately, since the parts are human beings, they do not always gladly recognize the contribution of other body parts. And so we are very inclined to have various forms of conflict. And so how does the church live? And one of our first responsibilities, I mean, Paul is gonna devote, just like he devoted three chapters to what a church is, he's gonna devote three chapters to how we live, and what is his lead? His lead is, live up to your calling, which is going to require a right way of thinking, lowliness of mind, and a right way of acting, forbearing one another in love. Because we're all one, and yet we're all different. And he goes on to elaborate on that. It looks furthermore, to go back to Ephesians chapter 4, it looks like laboring to achieve spiritual maturity. Spiritual maturity is not accidental. It is deliberate. Which, if you think about it, folks, I mean, and this would be an illustration, I think, that the Bible would take up in kind. Nobody becomes good at anything accidentally. Nobody accidentally becomes a good piano player. Nobody accidentally becomes a skilled carpenter. Nobody accidentally becomes skilled in technology, right? It is a product of not just simply time and work, but concentrated work, work towards a specific end and purpose, and that is true in the church, verse number eight. Let's go back to verse number seven. But unto every one of us is given grace according to the measure of the gift of Christ. Wherefore, he saith, when he ascended up on high, he led captivity captive and gave gifts unto men. Now that he ascended, what is it but that he also descended first into the lower parts of the earth? He was buried. He that descended is the same also that ascended up far above all heavens, that he might fill all things. And he gave some. He gave some. Apostles, and some prophets, and some evangelists, which most of us don't understand, and some pastors and teachers, and I'm not trying to insult you, but we've been exposed to guys who travel around holding week and two week long campaigns who call themselves evangelists, who are ministering to the church, and that's not really what an evangelist is, but that's another story. Or was I? I digress. My spiritual ADD kicks in. He gave some apostles, verse 11, some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors and teachers. And for those of you who are academically minded and more educationally minded, there is a conjunction there that connects pastors and teachers, and there's some debate about the grammatical rule because some people argue that there are pastors and then teachers, And there are most in the conservative world that would argue that because of the grammatical construction of the conjunction, pastors and teachers are connected, that I am the pastor teacher, that I'm not the pastor, and then some are teachers. But that's, again, that's one of those things that we could take up at another time. It's called the Grenville-Sharps rule, if you care, if you want to research it. To this purpose, verse number 12, right? Why do all of those people exist? Let's go back and ask that question. Why are there apostles? and prophets, and evangelists, and people like me. What do we do? Where do we fit? We fit here, verse number 12, for the perfecting of the saints, for the completion of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying, the building of the body of Christ, till we all come in unity, because remember, there's only one, of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, that we henceforth be no more children tossed to and fro, carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the slight of men and cunning craftiness whereby they lay in wait to deceive. But speaking the truth in love may grow up into him in all things, which is the head, even Christ, from whom the whole body fitly joined together and compacted by that which every joint supplieth, according to the effectual or effective working in the measure of every part, making increase of the body unto the edifying of itself in love." And again, so I'm going to come back to this, folks, right? Because this is, right? How does the church live? It lives primarily in light of the fact that it is related to God as his people, and it is pushing to that end so that, folks, Anything that we do as an assembly has to contribute to this in some way. This is the mission. This is the mission. My job description, and I appreciate it more than I could ever tell you, the fact that I do not spend any time, hardly at all, fighting an uphill fight against this, but my job description is pretty well laid out, right? It's laid out in Ephesians 4, 12. For the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ. That's the calling of the pastor because that's the calling of the church. so that church services have to contribute to that end. That is how, if I may go off on a further, that is how you can really validate the success of a church, not simply by its statistics, but in this realm. So let's go on. What does it look like, right? Because I'm trying to get somewhere and I don't want to burn up all of my time working as quickly through the book of Ephesians. How does the church live? It labors to maintain the unity that Christ has purchased with his blood, which requires a generous, forgiving, self-sacrificial mentality. It labors to achieve spiritual maturity. It labors to live like safe people and not lost people. Verse 17, this I say therefore, and testify in the Lord that ye henceforth walk not as other Gentiles walk in the vanity of their mind. And down through verse number 21, Paul will continue in that theme. What does it look like to live, right? Well, it's a laboring for unity, not compromise unity, again, let me stipulate to that, not compromise unity, true unity. And it labors to maturity, right? Because the goal is that every believer is a full-grown adult believer. And it labors to live like safe people, not as lost people, which here are defined as Gentiles. And again, you have to understand that That in Paul's world, these are the three distinctions, Jews, Gentiles, church. He's not arguing just Gentile-Jew distinction, but unbeliever distinction. And this is because of the work of Christ, verse number 20, ye have not so learned Christ. You are to put off the old and put on the new, verses 22 through 24. Put off the old man, put on the new man. Chapter five, verse number five, you are to walk like God, or we are to walk like God. Verse number one, be therefore followers or imitators of God as dear children and walk in love as Christ also hath loved us and has given himself for us an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweet smelling savor. But fornication and all uncleanness or covetousness, let it not once be named among you as become a saints, neither filthiness, nor foolish talking, nor jesting, which are not convenient, but rather giving of thanks. For this you know that no whoremonger, nor unclean person, no covetous man who is an idolater, hath any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and of God. Let no man deceive you with vain words, for because of these things come at the wrath of God upon the children, of disobedience, be not therefore partaker with them. Walk like God, not in sin. Verse number eight, for ye were sometimes darkness, but now are ye light, and the Lord walk as children of light. So when Paul begins to talk to us about what it looks like to live out as a Christian, beginning in chapter four and verse number 17, He really begins to hammer that instruction home through a series of contrasts. Don't walk like Gentiles, walk as children. Don't walk in darkness, walk in light. Walk like God in righteousness, not like lost people in sin. There are a series of contrasts so that the life of a Christian in chapter four, verses 20 through 21, which we did not read, is both taught by Christ and about Christ. He is both the professor and the curriculum in Ephesians four, 20 through 21. And all of that, folks, to point out to you that verse number 18 is one more, chapter five, verse number 18, is one more in that list of contrasts. Be not drunk with wine wherein is excess. but be filled with the Spirit. Right, so I mean, we have these contrasts, right? Don't walk in the vanity of your mind like the Gentiles do. Walk this way. Walk like God. Don't walk in sin. Don't walk in darkness. Walk in light. Don't walk in drunkenness. But be filled with the Spirit. So let's turn our attention now for the next little bit, a little bit more directly to verse number 18 itself. Verse number 18 contains two imperatives or commands. These are verbs, and again, for those of you that are grammatically minded, we are talking now about the mood of the verb. What is it doing? It is giving us an instruction. The first command is do not be drunk with wine. That is a prohibition. You may not be drunk. The second one is an imperative command, but you must be filled with the spirit. That is a command. These are not suggestions. It is possible, it is possible to view those imperatives as strong encouragements, but I think they're more than that. I think they are put out to us as expectations. But secondly, right, because you have two commands, and again, we're just gonna look at this a little more detail. The imperatives are given to us in the passive voice. And the voice asks this question, Are we receiving the action of the verb or are we performing the action of the verb? Am I doing it? You know, one of the old simple illustrations is, am I hitting the ball or am I being hit by the ball? And if I'm being hit by the ball, that would be a passive voice. The ball is acting upon me. These are both passive. And here's, okay, so with reference to the first imperative, do not be drunk with wine. The imperative could be, but is not, don't drink. The imperative is, do not be drunk. Do not be drunk. If you drink, you will be influenced by the alcohol that you drink. That's why it's passive. In other words, folks, to move it completely out of the religious realm. It is not physiologically possible to consume alcohol and be unimpaired by the alcohol that you consume. It is going to have an effect. I grew up in an unsaved home, or possibly an unsaved home. I certainly grew up in a home in which alcohol flowed freely and my parents would host parties. So it was not at all uncommon for me to see people under the influence of alcohol when I was a child. Different people had different capacities to absorb alcohol and, you know, the science will tell us at what rate your body can absorb alcohol and the impact of alcohol. But everybody that drinks alcohol is going to be impacted by the alcohol that they drink. That's why it is given in a passive voice. You cannot drink alcohol without being impacted, which by the way, okay, because you and I are living in a world after 100 plus years in which conservative Christians firmly and roundly denounced alcohol in all forms as an evil, have now found new liberty to go out and embrace alcohol as a welcome friend. I would just point out to you that alcohol has an action upon you regardless of the quantity. You can multiply the influence of the alcohol by influencing the amount of alcohol that you drink, but nobody can drink alcohol without being impacted by the alcohol they drink because it's the nature of the alcohol to impact the human body. It becomes measurable at a very small amount. In other words, what I'm saying is I would in general be discouraging of it, even though I don't know that I could publicly condemn it, because nobody takes a drink towards sobriety. From the first drink to the last drink, it is a trajectory away from sobriety, not towards sobriety. To go back to verse number 18, right, the imperative, do not be drunk, passive, Because that's, and we'll see this, ultimately what we're getting at, folks, is the influence of the alcohol, not the consumption of the alcohol. But be filled with the spirit, which also is passive. You don't fill yourself with the influence, the influence of the spirit is there. The influence of the spirit is there. Now, we will see that there are things that we can do that would, right? A clear and simple way, for instance, to avoid any impact of alcohol is to never have any alcohol. If you never have any, you'll know who I'm talking about, but I'm gonna mention his name. Our favorite state trooper can tell you about the time that he was testifying in a drunk driving case And the defense attorney made some comment to him about the effects of alcohol. And he said, don't know. And the judge stopped the trial and said, now, wait a minute. Do you know what you're testifying? Yes, sir. I know what I'm testifying. I've never had dropped alcohol. So I cannot tell you firsthand about the impact of alcohol. So there are things that we can do, folks. On the other hand, I can sit down and drink myself into drunkenness. Ben Hadad did. He was drinking himself drunk in the pavilion. There are things that I can do that will impede the work of the spirit and things that I can do that will enhance the work of the spirit. But the spirit has his own influence. I am under his influence. That's why it's a passive verb to go, to go back to that, right? It is a command. I am being commanded to have someone else control me. That's the command. I'm being commanded not to let alcohol be that control. I'm commanded to let the spirit of God be that control. Thirdly, to go back to the grammar of verse number 18, they are present in tents. They are present in tense. The action is continual. The present tense verb carries the idea of right now, and Greek has lots of nuances to its verb tenses. It can be all the way in the past, it can be it happened one time and never happens again, it can be one time and always going on with lingering effects, all of those things. The present tense just means right now. Whatever time of day it is, whatever time of night it is, whatever season in life you're in, however your day is going, good day, bad day, up day, down day, it is a present tense imperative, always be under the influence of another. Fourthly, the verbs, they are imperatives that are passive, that are present in tense, that are plural in number, which again is something that doesn't emerge clearly in the English, because we tend not to talk that way. But the point is that all Christians are to be filled. Spirit filling is not for the clergy class of Ephesians 4.11. It is for moms at home, and it is for people in the workplace. And one of the reasons for that, folks, if I can direct your attention downward is because in Ephesians 5.18, Paul is viewing the filling of the spirit as it relates to a very important task. Remember, how does the church live? What is the church? It is God's people, one people to God's glory. That is our driving focus. How will we labor towards maturity and unity if we do not do it together? It's not individual effort. It is collective effort. And this is why the verbs are in the plural. Be not drunk with wine wherein is excess, but be filled with the spirit. Again, grammatically, filled is the controlling idea. That we would, I would put it, that's like the main verb. Be filled with the spirit. then being filled with the Spirit in the plural is going to look like something. And Paul explains what it looks like through the use of three participles, or what could be called helping verbs, which come across to us in English very helpfully with ing endings. Verse number 19, speaking. Filling of the Spirit, folks, and again, to go back, you can go back to last week's lesson. Filling with the Spirit hands down beyond any shadow of a doubt in the New Testament, is always followed up by some dimension of speech. People were filled and they spoke in a certain way. And they said certain things. So there is speaking, singing, making, those are all companions. Verse number 20, giving, Thanks, verse number 21, submitting yourselves, which completes the idea, by the way, of chapter four and verse number one. I beseech you, therefore the prisoner will beseech you that you walk worthy of the vocation wherewith you are called with all lowliness of mind, with long suffering for bearing one another in love. Paul said the same thing to the Philippians, right? Paul is not inventing some mutual submission where it ends up that nobody is really in submission to anybody because we're so busy deferring. Paul is advocating for a very deferential atmosphere in which we are deferring to each other rather than engaging in superiority with each other. Mutual deference. So that the filling of the spirit, folks, being influenced by the spirit has congregational implications in Ephesians 5. It can have, folks, in the book of Acts, evangelistic implications. The filling of the spirit of God is a great ally in the evangelistic portion of Christianity. But it is also a great ally, it is an essential ally in the task that the church has to glorify God by living like God in unity with other of God's people. The requirement for that is the filling of the Holy Spirit. So that Spirit-filled people in the church are going to sing to each other. And they're going to mutually give thanks. And that's going to be, by the way, for each other at times. and they're gonna submit themselves, submitting each other, recognizing their place. So there's kind of a snapshot of the grammar of the verse. To go back now, to kind of move away from the grammar, but just to look at the verse, be not drunk with wine wherein is excess, but be filled with the Spirit. Whatever filling is, whatever it means to be filled with the Spirit, folks, It is the antithesis of being drunk with wine. That's the contrast. We don't get to invent spirit filling as having something different than the way it is being used. Do not be like this, but be like this. Now, if you have an ESV or a New American Standard Bible, All right, verse number 18, be not drunk with wine wherein is excess. If somebody's looking at an ESV or a NASB, the word is debauchery. Wherein is debauchery. But I mentioned this last week and let me tell you what the Greek literally says. It says without salvation. Be not drunk with wine. We're in this behavior that is without salvation. Nobody, to put it, right, in case, nobody becomes a better Christian through booze. Nobody becomes a better Christian through booze. Drunkenness is the behavior that results from alcohol. To Paul, we're not talking about a quantity problem. Now, we have a way. We can draw people's blood. We can draw people's breath. And we can come up with a mathematical calculation of how much alcohol is in their blood. And in most states, if it's 0.08, you are under the influence, and you're going to be arrested and taken away to jail. We don't know what Paul I mean, alcohol use was widespread and prevalent in the Roman world. It was a sanitary method of treating water. Romans, generally speaking, diluted their wine to a variety of degrees. for that purpose, and part of being a barbarian to a Roman was drinking undiluted wine. They were not really a nation of drunks, although they had that capacity if they wanted it. To Paul, it's a question of influence, not quantity. At whatever point in time it is that the alcohol is controlling you, you have crossed a threshold that is a biblical prohibition. And I mention that, folks, because, again, Being filled is the antithesis. It's not a quantity. The word spirit is the word pneuma, which to us means air, and it's not like you're down 10 pounds of PSI. It's not like you need to get inflated back up to a particular pressure. The antithesis is influenced. Paul is giving us this contrast. He's not saying that the only way to act like a lost person is through the influence of alcohol, right? Nobody would, I hope, draw that inference. Well, as long as I'm not drunk when I do it, it doesn't matter what I do, because drunkenness is the problem. Paul is just pointing out what everybody knows. Alcohol influences behavior in a contrary way to godliness. And the spirit influences behavior towards godliness, not away from godliness. Be influenced by the spirit. And we don't need to be constantly filled because we constantly leak, as some would teach, Finney would teach. We need to be filled because The command is to always be at every moment under the influence of the spirit, whether you're taking a shower, taking a bath, going to the office, talking to one of your children, teaching one of your children, disciplining one of your children, talking to an employee, disciplining employees, singing in a congregational song. Every moment of the day, we are to be under the influence of the Lord. And let me ask you to turn over to the companion book, Colossians chapter three, the most helpful commentary Paul does in Colossians what he does in Ephesians in an abbreviated fashion. Two chapters about what the church is, two chapters about how the church lives. Colossians chapter three, verse number 16. Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom. The word richly just simply means abundance. Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, in abundance, in all wisdom. In other words, what we're looking for is more than simply the ability to regurgitate Bible verses. That would be my understanding. Wisdom is the ability to use the knowledge you have, not just the ability to possess knowledge. And if we say, well, what does that have to do with Ephesians 5, 18 through 21? Well, look at the rest of the verse. Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom, teaching and admonishing one another in Psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord, and whatsoever you do in order, deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God and the Father by him. You have the same, right? You have the same consequences from what appear to be two distinct actions. And it's not like a multiple choice test where you can pick one, where your option is to have the word of Christ dwell in you, or whether your option is to be filled with the spirit. They are one in the same thing, folks. They are one and the same thing. So to be filled with the spirit, I gotta wind this down, to be filled with the spirit is a normative. We talked about this last week. There are extraordinary times of filling like John the Baptist. This is a normative experience for every believer, male and female, young and old. Every believer is to be filled with the spirit, which means to be under their influence, right? The spirit here is not a material quantity. It is an influence. that is wielded. It is to be Bible-saturated and influenced. To be filled with the Spirit is to bring the Bible to bear on every single one of life's situations. That's just simply mature Christianity. I mean, go back to Jesus's temptation in the wilderness. Go back to the life of Christ. You could pose no question to him. You could ask him nothing that he could not relate to the Bible, that he could not turn into, as we would call it, a teaching moment about his relationship to the Father or godliness or sinfulness. He had the spear without measure. He was under the complete control and influence of the Spirit. And then finally then folks, what this really means is that the norm is not that we have some physical dimension to our feeling. To have a feeling of excitement or necessarily or enthusiasm, certainly gratitude. To be physically affected, shocked, earthquakes, tremors, cloven tongues of fire. Not that those didn't happen, but they don't fall into the world of the normative filling. This is a body of people who are influenced by God's word through God's spirit so that they live like God, spirit-filled. Okay, I gotta stop. Happy to talk to you privately. We will be back at 11 o'clock.