what spirit-filled Christian living is. There are many various understandings of what it means, but first and foremost we must see what the Word of God says a spirit-filled Christian looks like. And this is sort of a litmus test. Perhaps you might be wanting to ask yourself, am I filled with the Holy Spirit? And if not, the words we just sang, those are prayers that we would pray that the Holy Spirit would send a revival. Holy Spirit revival comes from me, but it would start in our own hearts. And you should be praying, O Lord, that I would be one of these ones that you have vivified, that you have rekindled afresh a love for Christ, and thus a love for holy and wise living in a dark and perverted world. Let me just read the text we are going to look at this morning, and then we'll try to unpack it as best and as quickly as we can. Verse 18, this is basically what Jocelyn just recited, but I don't mind doing it again. It's the Word of God. And do not be filled with wine, or do not be drunk with wine. is debauchery, or it leads to debauchery, however you want to translate it. Rather be filled with the Spirit, addressing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody to the Lord with your heart. Giving thanks always and for everything to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. Submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ. Father, we just pray. You will take your word that you will transform us from one degree of glory to another as we behold Christ. The one to whom we look to when we read the word. We don't just look at the dead letter of 2 Corinthians 3. Oh how we need the Holy Spirit to make it alive. To grant repentance unto life. Lord, that we would truly understand what Peter meant when he said, when we were right with God through faith in Christ, times of refreshing would come. O Lord, we pray for greater times of refreshing, Lord. Not only for unbelievers who would become converted and saved, but also, Lord, for some of us who are Christians, but our lives have grown dull. And our lives have grown dry. And we feel parched. And we ask, Lord, that You would send those rivers, streams of living water, that would well up within us and would transform this world. O Spirit, as we saw last week, as Christ has preached You are at home, that You are attracted to the Gospel and how You, as it were, dance for joy when the Savior is proclaimed. Oh, would You work in us and through us. Would we, as it were, dance for joy and sing and make melody to Christ as we see Him. Lift it up on the cross, lift it up in His resurrection, lift it up in His exaltation. Oh, Father, we pray, come, do Your mighty work this morning. Through the Spirit as we look to Christ we ask in His name. Amen. 518, we saw last week, Gordon Fee, the New Testament scholar, said he believed this was Paul's most important command. And so I found another man whom I admire, who says the same thing. John MacArthur, in his commentary, says this. Outside the command for unbelievers to trust Christ for salvation, there is no more practical and necessary command in scripture than for the one that believers be filled with the Spirit. And of course, as we saw last week, that it is impossible to carry out the rest of Paul's commands in a way that honors Christ apart from the Spirit. We know that we're not able to look carefully how we walk. We know that we will walk not wisely, but foolishly. That we will not walk as children of light. That we will not walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which we're called, apart from this filling, empowering presence of the Holy Spirit. And perhaps as we saw last week, the question that we often ask most often, and which I as a pastor am asked most often from Christian is, what is God's will for my life? The question is simply answered by Paul, keep being filled with the Holy Spirit. Or as we saw in Galatians 5 last week, keep in step with the Spirit's leading. MacArthur says, no Christian can fulfill God's will for his or her life apart from being filled with His Spirit. And so we should come here on Sundays and we should ask every time, this week and for the rest of our lives, God, that I would be filled with your Spirit. Really, I pray it would never become something that becomes mechanical, but if you don't know what to pray, pray the Psalms we just sang. Holy Spirit, would you come, and would you lead, and would you guide, and would I submit, and would you show me, lead me into all righteousness. I would encourage you for homework, you can read John 14 through 16, where Jesus begins to comfort his disciples with the ministry of the Holy Spirit, a comforter, another one like Christ, God, would come and he would help them in all the various circumstances that were basically about to unfold in their lives. And though not unpacked by Paul here, one of my favorite illustrations by J.I. Packer, is that if you want to understand if you're filled with Christ, filled with the Spirit rather, is you're looking to Christ in worship. The Spirit's ministry is like a spotlight that doesn't draw attention to itself, but rather draws attention to Christ. And so when people say they're filled with the Spirit, and it's all about the Spirit, it contradicts what Jesus Himself taught. When a person is Spirit-filled, they are Christ-centered and Christ-saturated. OK? And so that is God's will, that you would be filled with Christ. And as you are filled with Christ, as we alluded to in 2 Corinthians 3.18, you are conformed into His image, which is the great will for God for all of His elect in Romans 8.29. Why did God predestine His people that they would be conformed into the image of His Son? To be conformed into the image of His Son, you must be filled with the Spirit. The Spirit conforms us into the image of His Son. And just like as a marinade, the longer it steeps and the longer it sits in that marinade, the more that old shoe leather piece of meat becomes supple and juicy and tender and becomes what it should be. So that's what I'm hoping that as I'm preaching this morning, The Spirit would fill us and we would be drawn towards the Savior. So I have three points this morning. There will be some overlap with what we looked at last week, but I wanted to sort of unpack in more of its entirety some things that were overlooked last week. The meaning of being Spirit-filled is the first point. The second is the primary means of being filled with the Spirit and then the result or what it looks like to be filled with the Spirit. First, The meaning of filling. It basically means to be under something that is dominating your life. The Greek word, pleurao, basically in this context has the connotation of total control. So to be filled with the Spirit is to be under His control entirely. He is in total control of your life. So if you want to say, am I Spirit filled? Are you totally being controlled? by the Spirit. In John 16.6, John uses the same verb. He says that those disciples who are filled with sorrow will be controlled by that sorrow. In Luke 5.26, the person who is filled with fear is controlled by fear. In Luke 6.11, the person filled with anger is controlled by anger. In Acts 6.5, Ananias was filled, his heart was filled with Satan, and thus he was controlled by Satan, much like Judas. And so from these usages of that same verb, when you are filled with something, you become controlled by it, which makes perfect sense where Paul says in Ephesians 5.18, don't be drunk, or don't be filled with alcohol, don't be drunk with wine. Because you come under its control. And so, to be filled with the Spirit is to come under His total control. The verb is also a present tense. And you can translate it, be being filled. It's not just a one-time filling that happens at conversion. You can translate it, keep being full, in with by the Holy Spirit. This continuous aspect of being filled with the Spirit thus involves day to day, moment by moment, submission to the Spirit's control. So it's not enough that you felt controlled or filled with the Spirit during the worship part of the service. When you leave here you need to be praying, I need to be submissive to His leading, I need to be under His influence, I need to be submitting to His control over my life. MacArthur says, this means we cannot rely on a past filling, nor live in expectation of a future filling. We can rejoice in those past fillings and hope for future fillings, but we can only live in the present filling of the Holy Spirit. And so that's why it needs to be a prayer that is oft repeated. When you wake up, Oh God, fill me this day. At lunchtime, Oh God, Would I be filled with the Holy Spirit? As you get home, oh, that I would be filled with the Holy Spirit so I can be a husband that loves my wife the way Christ loved the church. A wife filled with the Spirit is able to submit to her husband. It's a great prayer when you're struggling with sin or temptation. Let me not give in to the sin. Oh, that I would be filled with the Spirit if your Christian is convicting you. Oh, be filled in those moments. Put to death the deeds of the flesh by the Spirit, Romans 8.13. So the Greek word has the idea of being under total control of another. The present tense signifies that this is a moment by moment thing. It's not enough just to be filled with the Spirit on a Sunday morning. And finally, the verb is a passive voice, which is a fancy way of saying that we are recipients of the filling. You can't fill yourselves. You have some responsibility in the command, but ultimately this is God's sovereign goodness and His sovereign will. We are the recipients of being filled, not the agents. This does not mean that you're inactive in it though. Okay, though you're passive, though you're to be filled, There are still steps that we need to do. And the illustration we used last week was basically that of a sailboat. And what you can do is, you cannot control the wind, like Jesus. You cannot cause the waves to start moving you. But what you can do if you're in a sailboat is what? Put up the sail. And pray that the wind would start to blow. And really that is the Christian's duty. You have no power, as we saw in John 3, to cause the Spirit to move. But if you put up your sail when he does move and when he does blow, you will be chilled, as it were, with the Spirit. We are to yield to the Spirit's convictions, cooperate with the Spirit's leadings. And to allow the Spirit's work be done in us. Being filled with the Spirit is the exact opposite of grieving the Holy Spirit. Ephesians 4.30. And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption. And so in a specific situation, the Holy Spirit, if you're a Christian, will be working in your life. And you can put up the sail or you can take it down. You can be filled with the Spirit, or you can quench and grieve the Spirit. Being filled with the Spirit will enable you to walk wisely. Being filled with the Spirit will enable you to redeem the time. Taking down the sail will cause you to walk foolishly. Taking down the sail will cause you to waste your life. So the meaning of filling. I had three quick points. The Word is to be under total control. It's a present tense, which means all the time. And it's a passive voice, which means we should pray that God would fill us. I would encourage you to come out to our prayer week, because we're going to be praying that last song, that God would revive our hearts. Oh, how we need more of the Holy Spirit's influence and domination in our lives. Jesus Christ was filled. He had the spear without measure. And though God, He needed to be baptized and He needed to be anointed with that Spirit as the faithful servant of Isaiah 42, who in the power of the Spirit would be obedient to every jot and tittle that God, His Father, required of Him. If we, likewise, want to be obedient, we need to be filled with the Spirit. If Christ needed the Spirit in His ministry, how much more we as sinners If the Son of God, perfect, spotless, sinless, He needed us to fulfill all righteousness, how much more us in our day-to-day lives and decisions that we make? How much more do we need the Spirit to fight sin? How much more do we need the Spirit to walk in obedience? The meaning of filling moves to the means of being filled with the Spirit. As I said, we are to put up our sails. But what does that look like? Last week we looked at the ones that Paul unpacks for us, but I want to look at the primary means. And this will keep it nice and simple. You might forget the four listed last week, but I hope you will not forget this one. This is all throughout and all pervading through Scripture. What is the primary means for you to be filled with the Holy Spirit? Move two books over, and what I want you to do is take note of the almost identical wording. I alluded to this last week, but we didn't get time to really camp at it, and so let's just read it. He has a command, and when that command is heeded, there are results that flow out of it. And you're going to see the results are almost identical to Ephesians 5.18. So let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs with thankfulness in your hearts to God. And whatever you do in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through Him. That is almost, word for word, identical. It's a parallel passage which you must write. So if you are one of those people and you're writing your Bibles beside Ephesians 5.18, write Colossians 3.16. And you need to ask yourself, Paul, what should I be filled with? Should I be filled with the Spirit or should I let the Word of Christ dwell in me richly? Which one? And my answer is that the two are basically not interchangeable, but dependent upon one another. And so to be filled with the Holy Spirit is to let the Word of Christ abide in you richly. It's amazing that when you're looking at this Gospel, that it becomes living when the Spirit attends to it. Just like, as it were, the Word became living in Genesis 1. The Spirit was there. And then the Father, using the Word, John 1, brought creation into existence. Life is the result of Word and Spirit. And so when you say, what is the primary means of being filled with the Spirit? It is simply this. Letting the Word of Christ dwell in you, not just in any old way, and not in a superficial or dead, dry way, but let the Word of Christ dwell in you richly. So let me give you my paraphrase. To be filled in, by, with the Spirit is simply to take the Gospel of Jesus Christ and let it saturate every part of your being. To let the Gospel of Christ permeate every facet of your mind and to let it marinate every part of your soul. Colossians 3.16 is telling us then how we can be filled With the Spirit. Are you lacking the fullness of the Spirit right now? What you need to do now is think about Christ. You need to think about what He has done for you on the cross. You need to look and live. Sorry, front row. They always said I look at the people in the front row, so you get sound duties chance. I'm really looking at Daryl. How are we filled and kept filled day by day, moment by moment, in with by the Spirit of God? Let me give you two paraphrase translations. I like the NLT, it says this. Let the message about Christ in all its richness fill your lives. And so if you feel dead and dry this morning, that the Spirit is really sort of at the periphery of your lives, Let the message of Christ fill every part of your life. Eugene Peterson, sometimes can be good, sometimes cannot. I like this translation, so I'll roll with it. He said this, let the word of Christ, the message, have the run of your house. Give it plenty of room in your lives. That's a good translation. Let the word, let the gospel have run free course over your life. Give it plenty of room. Are you giving the message plenty of room in your life? Or are you just giving it scraps? Are you just reading maybe a verse or two quickly before you go to bed? Reading a little bit of a chapter before you fall asleep? That's not the Spirit-filled life. And I know the same message comes every Sunday, but that's because God is talking to us as simple children. We need the same message hammered over and over into our head. Why? Because we seem to forget it so often. Go back to the Gospel and read it first thing in the morning. Meditate it on your lunch break. Put it on your smartphone. Put it on your fridge. That's one thing I've noticed at the de Guzman house. They've got scriptures everywhere. I love it. Let the Word of God, let the message of Christ have full course over your lives. The Spirit fills the heart He feels at home in. I'll say it again, because I thought about this and it's kind of illiterate. The Spirit fills the heart He feels at home in. Does the Spirit feel at home in your heart? And I'm not getting Arminian on you, because that's the very language of Paul's prayer in Ephesians chapter 3. For this reason I bow my knees before the Father from whom every family in heaven and earth is named, that according to the riches of His glory, You might be strengthened with power through His Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ might dwell in your hearts by faith. Paul's praying this. In Ephesians 3, he's basically saying, oh, would you fill these believers with the Spirit? And you say, no, no, no, in Ephesians 3, Paul is praying that they would get love. What is the first fruit of the Holy Spirit? In Galatians chapter 5. The fruit of the Spirit is love and some respectable commentators say that is the main fruit and all the other ones are expression of it. 1 Corinthians 13. So basically the Spirit fills the heart, it feels at home in. And I thought of Frank and Eva. who are not here this morning so I don't mind giving this illustration but they just moved in to a new place and we went to see them on Friday and they were telling us all the work it took to make the home homely to make Eva feel comfortable they were showing us all the bags of garbage the person who had been there before was a pack rat and Eva didn't feel at home there she couldn't be herself there wasn't the freeness until they cleaned up the garbage and then they were able to paint and decorate it. And I thought, that's a beautiful picture of what we should be doing. That the way Frank wants Eva, as it were, to have not full reign over the house, but he wants his wife to feel at home. There's a difference when your wife feels at home. You can live in a house and not feel at home. You can visit someone's house and not feel at home. Which made me think, Does the spirit feel at home in your heart? And if not, what needs to go and what needs to go up? You need to do some decorating? This is the importance of reading. meditating and of memorizing scripture and I was thinking of all those pictures Eva had in her house or if you go to my house you can tell I'm married because everything matches there's nice little crystal what Christina did is she sets up for the fall and she loves it I just let her do it to me it's not a big thing like I'd be fine with white walls 365 days of the year but my wife She's different, and she feels at home when she can put things up that make her comfortable. What makes the Spirit comfortable? Memorizing scriptures that drive you and point you to Christ. This is why we have you memorize Ephesians 2, 8 through 10, Romans 8, 1, Romans 5, 1 through 5. All these beautiful reminders. There's no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. The Spirit loves those kinds of things, not just up on the walls of our houses, but really, as it were, up on the walls of our hearts. This is why you need to preach the Gospel to yourselves every day. And I would say, every moment you can. I know it's a cliché, and they say, always preach the Gospel to yourself, but it's something you must do all the time. It's interesting that if you were to turn to Ephesians 6, 17, that Paul is saying that in this battle against the spiritual powers in the heavenly realms, right, we're not battling flesh. And so Paul says in 2 Corinthians that our warfare is not fleshly, but it's a spiritual armory that we use. What is the primary weapon we use in our fight against Satan and sin in the world? It's the Word. And take up the sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God. And so if you want to do battle in this life, not just against the overt sins like struggling with lust and temptation, I'm talking about the other sins like anxiety, not trusting the Lord, despondency. How do you fight against all those satanic attacks? When you feel low, when you feel proud, when you feel pressured to sin. Be filled with the Spirit! How? That doesn't seem so vague. Let the Word, and I would translate Logos, the message about Christ. Let the Gospel dwell in your heart richly. So meditate on the Gospel. And as you meditate on the Gospel, oh how the Spirit dances. I always think of Elizabeth, when she was praying it with John. What did the Spirit do? She was filled with the Spirit when what? When Mary came. Is Mary something special? No, it's because Mary was carrying the Son of God in her womb. And the Spirit, as it were, filled Elizabeth. And no, she didn't speak in tongues. She spoke praise to God! Just like everyone else who is filled with the Spirit in the Book of Acts or the Gospels. Are you reading the Scriptures regularly? See, this is where you get to see the pastor's heart, where I'm not being a legalist. I could say, now, read the Scriptures for 10 minutes every day. I'm saying, let the Word of Christ dwell in you richly. Make room for it in your lives. Set your alarms. Christina's good. Sometimes I come home just burnt out and we put the kids down. I just want to just vegetate and watch Chopped, which is a Food Network thing. And she's saying, we haven't read our Bible yet. So we read the Bible every day. And we read five to ten chapters depending on their length. And we're in Isaiah 40 tonight. That's going to be great. Because when I leave this afternoon, you know what's going to happen? I'm going to feel that I completely dropped the ball on the sermon, and I should have said this, or I shouldn't have said that. And these people were falling asleep, and I just felt very dead. So I'm going to have these temptations, and I'm going to need, as it were, a fresh filling. What am I going to need? I'm going to need to let the Word of Christ abide in me richly. Comfort, comfort my people, saith the Lord. What? I have punished her iniquities doubly. That's Christ on the cross. But I'm going longer than I should. Preach the gospel to yourself every day. The sword of the Spirit is the Word of God. The spirit won't fill the one who has no gospel residing in their heart. Just as the word apart from the spirit is lifeless, 2 Corinthians 3, so also the spirit apart from the word is powerless. I know that sounds blasphemous. But read Galatians 2 and 3. Oh, you foolish Galatians, who has bewitched you? Having begun in the Spirit, are you trying to become perfect or complete his work in the flesh? And he goes on to say, these works of the Spirit, did you do them by the works of the law or by hearing with faith? So how did God do these miraculous things through the believers in Galatia? The Spirit did not work independently from the Word. The Spirit worked in their life as the Word came and they believed in it. So if you want to be filled with the Spirit, you cannot be filled with the Spirit apart from the Gospel of Jesus Christ, which I said last week. So many Spirit-filled churches are really bankrupt and have everything but the Holy Spirit of God in there. Why? How can you judge them, Pastor? There's no Gospel. It's a legalistic sermon or it's an entertainment. The Spirit is not there. He doesn't feel at home in those churches. He feels at home in a church that is constantly lifting up their affections and their gaze towards Christ. Let the Word of Christ, the message, have run of your house. Give it plenty of room in your lives. The Spirit dwells in those kinds of houses. As you are filled more with the Word of Christ, It will control your thinking and your actions, and you will thereby come more and more under the Spirit's control. How does the Spirit lead? The Word is how the Spirit leads. He doesn't just say, OK, I want you to play hopscotch for 20... No, the Spirit takes the Word He inspired, 2 Peter 1.21, the Spirit moved the prophets to write it, and then the Spirit moves as we let this Word dwell richly in our hearts. This is how the Spirit speaks. of the Spirit. Do not be filled with wine, which is excess, rather be filled with the word in excess. And that word will start to flow out of you, and you will start living radically different. So the meaning of filling I've given, the means of filling I've given you, let's close now with the result of filling, or what does it look like? P.T. O'Brien, a commentator, says this, If drunkenness leads to dissolute behavior, then spirit-filled Christians whose lives are characterized by singing, thanksgiving, and submission present a very different picture. So you know when someone's drunk, or at least I do. When we were at hoop-up days, or however you pronounce it, handing out tracts, I was able just to say, yeah, that guy's high or he's drunk. Huh, I know it. So you know when someone's drunk. You know, if they're stumbling around and they're slurring their speech and they stink like alcohol, you know they've been filled with it. But also you'll know if somebody's spirit-filled. And according to Ephesians 5, Paul gives us what a spirit-filled Christian looks like. And I would say, this is how a spirit-filled church should run. This should be what we look like on a Sunday morning. The participles, which is a fancy word of a verb with an ing, explain not just the means of how we're filled, but also what it looks like. So what does a spirit-filled Christian look like? First, they speak. Second, they sing. Thirdly, they give thanks. Fourthly, they are submissive. When my brother and I left our charismatic church, I was saved in a Pentecostal church, they had different ideas of what it meant to be filled with the Spirit. And so I'll never forget when we left, a co-worker of my brother said this to my brother, and I don't think he was saying it in pride, but he may have been. So take it with a grain of salt. He said, it's really sad that you guys are leaving. I don't doubt for a minute that you guys are saved, but you're going to waste your life. He says, you're going to be Christians, but you're not going to be spirit-filled Christians. And the reason he said that is because we had come to a disagreement with them on the understanding of biblical or unbiblical speaking of tongues. And for them, the greatest evidence of being filled with the Spirit, the sign of the Spirit, was speaking in tongues. And we were leaving because we thought that the service was more like 1 Corinthians 14, where it was a chaotic gong show. And the God of Order wasn't there. And he said, you're leaving speaking in tongues, you're not filled with the Spirit. I wish I would have known the scriptures, because I would have said, hey, how about Ephesians 5, 19 and 20 as evidences of the Spirit. So to him, a Spirit-filled Christian speaks in tongues. I think misappropriating Acts chapter 2 and some of the other verses. Paul says this is what a spirit-filled Christian looks like, and this is a great litmus test. The first one is speaking. And I can assure you that when you're filled with the Spirit, it has everything to do with your tongue. But not speaking gibberish, but rather speaking Christ-exalting words. So be filled with the Spirit, comma, verse 19, speaking to one another. That one another assumes a community setting. Okay, so often we think of being filled with the Spirit just as, you know, I went out to the mountains and I was just completely filled with the Spirit and I spoke with tongues. Okay, I'm not going to argue. But Paul says that when you're filled with the Spirit you speak to others. Wow. Could it be that Paul's understanding of a temple is again corporate? Like in Ephesians 1 and Ephesians 2 and Ephesians 4? That as the Spirit fills the temple, the temple is not just us, but really the temple is the church. And so if you're filled with the Spirit, you will begin to speak. You will begin to use your tongue. And you will not just speak upward, you're gonna speak horizontal. Now don't take this as blasphemous, that we come here to worship God, but our motivations for coming to church on Sunday is not just vertical. And I know a lot of people say, no, we just come here to give all the praise to God. Yes. But there's also a horizontal aspect that is absolutely and fundamentally necessary when you come here to church. There's also the edification of others. Ephesians 4.15. He talks about the children in the prior section who are being tossed to and fro. Rather speak the truth in love. And verse 16 talks about how when you speak the truth in love, this speaking the truth causes the church and individual believers to be built up. So you don't just come here to get your God fix, you come here also to be an encouragement to other believers. We come to church to build one another up, as we speak to one another the truth in love. He uses the exact same word in 4.26. Therefore, since we're in this new creation, or 5.26, no longer lie, but speak to your neighbors the truth for it remembers one of another. It is absolutely necessary in our growth in Christ-likeness to speak. When Jesus came to the earth, did he just sit here and worship? No, he spoke to his disciples. Words of life. So a spirit-filled Christian is not an isolationist. He who seeks His own desire, Proverbs 18.1 says, isolates himself. He breaks out against all sound judgment. So being filled with the Spirit is a community thing as well. It's a private thing, but more often than not, a church is filled with the Spirit, as individuals are filled with the Gospel. When interpreted in light of Colossians 3.16, speaking also has the idea of instructing. Let the Word of Christ dwell in you richly. speaking and instructing one another in all wisdom. Okay? So be careful of what you speak to one another, not just what you speak or sing to God, but let it be life-giving words. What do you speak? Psalms and hymns and spiritual songs. You speak to one another, psalms and hymns and spiritual songs. When the people of God hear one another speaking and singing the Word of God, their hearts are encouraged and strengthened. Ever had that? When you just come in and there's this booming congregation, truly singing with all their heart to God, that's encouraging. And the Spirit within resides. Sometimes I love to just close my eyes and listen to you guys. Even with some of you in your off-key voice, that's fine. It's still a beautiful sound to the Lord. Something I really disdain, and I use that word intentionally, is these new worship services where you have a team and the speakers are so loud and no one sings. That drives me up the wall. That's one reason I'm not really a big fan of solos. I'm not going to get into that. But sometimes solos can puff up the person, but we're to gather together, we're to sing to one another, we're to sing to God, but we're also to, as it were, sing together. And we sing the Word of God, and when we sing the Word of God together, that was the beautiful thing when we gather at Marvin and Dini's and we just have our favorites picked. Those are awesome, awesome times of worship together. I'm not going to get into the definition of psalms and hymns and spiritual songs. They're basically all songs that are spiritually oriented towards God the Father and Christ. I know some psalms only advocates believe that you can only sing psalms and so they get rid of the hymns and they get rid of the new ones. They have no warrant for doing so. There's three distinct words, but really they all sort of come together into just songs that are spiritual. There's hymns, There's Psalters or Psalms and there's also what we call, you know, maybe more... What are the short ones called that we sing repetitively? Whatever they're called. What are they? Choruses. Thank you. The most important word is not so much psalm or hymn or song. The most important word is spiritual. Pneumatikos. Spiritually inspired. Okay? That's what we sing. Songs that are spiritually inspired. Therefore, word-centered and Christ-oriented. Okay, so we know the Psalms are already Spirit-inspired, 2 Timothy 3.16. All Scripture is God-breathed. The Psalms, you can never go wrong singing the Psalms. Really, some churches that completely throw the Psalms away, I don't know why. You can change the melody, the melody doesn't, I couldn't care less. There's something about singing the Word of God. hymns and songs, as long as they're spiritual, I'm content with. Most people, are you contemporary, are you traditional, are you mixed? I really don't care. Are you singing songs and hymns and spiritual songs? Are they all God-centered, Christ-oriented? That's all I care about. And if you leave a church because you don't like the tune, but there was... something's wrong with your heart. It's unfortunate when people leave a church because they don't like the style. Who cares? The star always is submissive to the content. So, some of us like to judge. How do you know if a particular song is inspired? It's not by how it makes you feel. That song was so inspired. I used to listen to Metallica and I felt inspired. People listen to music all the time and they're inspired. But that's not pneumatikos. It's not a spiritually inspired song. No, it's not how does it make you feel. I'm not saying emotions are wrong, but that's not the primary arbiter of whether a song is spiritual. Rather, it's content. You can test if the hymns or songs are inspired by comparing them to what? The scriptures, just like you would do with prophesying in 1 Thessalonians 5. Don't hate prophesy, but test it and keep that what is good. There's a lot of stinky hymns that should be thrown in the dung pile, but keep the ones that are good. My sin, oh the bliss of this glorious thought. My sin, not in part, but the whole, is nailed to the cross, and I bear it no more. Praise the Lord. That's a spiritual song. We keep it. It points me towards Christ, who bore my sin on the cross. We want to sing that. The Spirit loves when His people sing songs like that. So we go to the Word and we say, is it theologically consistent? Does it magnify God rather than man? Is it word-saturated, Christ-centered? Yes, that's why I don't listen to much GCM. The melodies are catchy, but really, it just bankrupts. Anyways, I'm going to get emails for that. The first evidence, speaking to one another, psalms and hymns and spiritual songs. Second, singing, which is related. MacArthur says this, in addition to a hunger for God's Word, one of the first evidences of a person's new life in Christ is a great desire to sing His praises. Think of the pilgrim's progress. Every time he's delivered, what does he do? He's a little songbird. He's just quoting a little psalm. What does the psalmist do? He sings. It is fitting, Psalm 33, verse 1 says. It is right. It makes natural sense. for the justified or the saints or the upright ones to sing God's praises, to give Him thanks. It makes sense. It's the new song of the new birth that flows out of us. Sing to the Lord. Psalm 96, a new song. Sing to the Lord all the earth. Sing to the Lord, bless His name. Tell of His salvation from day to day. Declare His glory among the nations. His marvelous works among the peoples. And you can read the rest of Psalm 96. That's what happens. If you are filled with the Spirit, you cannot help. There's a song that is on a CCM. How can I cease from singing your praise? How can I ever say enough? How unfailing is your love? I love that song. How can I keep from singing your praise? If you're a Christian, you should be singing God's praise in the shower. On Sunday mornings, I tell you, this is one of my traditions. I love putting on hymns. I listen to the newer renditions through Indelible Grace. The love of Christ is rich and free, fixed on His own eternally, nor hell nor earth can... Those are great things. And the Spirit sings when we sing about Christ. So we sing firstly to the Lord. Although believers sing amongst themselves, the songs are ultimately directed towards whom? Christ. The Lord. Kurios. Christ. This is whom we sing. Your blood is washed away. I send Jesus. Thank you. We sing to the Lord. Not to each other, but to the Lord. As Johann Sebastian Bach famously said, the aim of all music is the glory of God, and I would add, in Christ. Okay, so when you're filled with the Spirit, you will sing, and rather than singing to yourself, because you guys all sang this morning, the difference between you singing and praising your voice, and singing and praising your Savior, is that one was not Spirit-filled and the other was. We can sing, we can go through the motions, but when you're filled with the Spirit, whom do you really sing to? You don't... So, Ryan's no longer with us, he's in Sus. I loved listening to Ryan Anderson sing. Guy couldn't hit a note if his life depended on it. But you know who he was singing for? The Lord. He couldn't care less if people knew he was tone-deaf. I would watch him with his eyes closed. I love watching him sing. He's not singing. I have to watch myself. Does the person in front of me think I've got a loud, booming voice? Does he know I'm really harmonizing? Does he know I'm doing a really hard harmony? I'm not singing to the Lord. And when you're absolutely enraptured with Christ and filled with the Spirit, you couldn't care less who was there. You sing, like Paul and Silas in prison, to the Lord. You sing with your hearts. Paul reminds us that singing is more than lip service. Jesus quotes in Matthew 7 to the Pharisees, who would have known probably most of the Psalms. He says that these people, quoting Isaiah, they worship me with their lips, but their heart is far from me. In vain do they worship me. So the difference between vain worship and true worship is, are you filled with the Spirit, which is why you should always pray, Oh God, let me get rid of anything that grieves you, Spirit. Let me meditate on Christ and come into these doors ready to sing to you with all of my heart. Heart basically signifies the whole of one's being. I don't need to unpack that, you know what it means. When someone says, I love you with all my heart, that means they really, really love you. I think the Old Testament parallel is the word nefesh. Psalm 103. Bless the Lord, O my soul, and all that is in me. Bless His holy name. That's what it means to praise the Lord with your heart. Bless the Lord, O my soul, and all that is within me. So you dance, your arms are up, you sing loudly, you sing reverently, you sing with every ounce of energy you can. That's how you sing to the Lord. So the next time you're going through the motions in worship and you realize you're being phony, and that happens to me all the time. I don't think there's a Sunday where I'm like, do I mean what I'm saying? Let me give you some suggestions. First, stop singing. Second, repent. Third, meditate on the gospel. I don't care if you're not singing. Close your eyes and think of Isaiah 53. Think of 2 Corinthians 5-1, He who knew no sin, became sin for me, that God might accept me. Think of those glorious truths. So stop saying repent, and then meditate. Let the Word of Christ abide in you richly. Then start to sing, O to the overflow of your understanding of the Gospel afresh. If you don't get Psalm 103 verse 1, then just move down. So bless the Lord, O my soul. And all that is within me, bless His Holy Name. Bless the Lord, O my soul. Forget not all His benefits. What's the first one? Who forgives all of your iniquities. He heals all your diseases, who redeems you out of the pit, and crowns your life with steadfast love and mercy. If you keep reading, it says that the steadfast love of the Lord endures forever. Meditate on God's covenant, electing love. Meditate, it says, that your kingdom reigns forever and ever, and your sovereignty, your throne rules over all. Meditate on His sovereign goodness. How about meditate on the fact that He knows that you're but dust, and yet He still is willing to forgive your sins as far as the east is from the west. If you get Psalm 103 verses 2 and following, Psalm 103 verse 1 makes sense. So meditate that God gives limitless grace to those who fear Him, to those who meditate on His gospel. Verse 1 is not hard. Bless the Lord, O my soul, and all that is within me. Bless His holy name. who forgives all your iniquities, etc. Speaking, singing, thirdly, thanking. Okay, so this is Ephesians 5.19. He's just unpacking, right? And 20. A spirit-filled person not only sings and makes melody in their heart, they not only speak the Word of God, they also give thanks. And there's a medieval legend that tells of two angels sent from God to go down to earth and to collect the prayers of God's people. And one of the angels is to get all the requests, all the petitions of God's people, and the other angel is commanded to go get all the thanksgivings of God's people. And this is a medieval tale, you're not going to find it in the Bible. But as they're coming back, the first angel who is sent to gather all the requests and supplications and all the petitions of God's people, he had to make a whole bunch of trips, there were so many. The angel who is designated to gather all the thanksgivings of God's people made it up to heaven with just a handful of them. And the reason why I say this is we're so prone to not give thanks. Romans 1, 21 says, the thankless person is a vile, ungrateful sinner who rejects who God is and what He has done. Pride is the essence of thanklessness. Being filled with yourself, leads to thanklessness. Okay, so you're either filled with self, or you're filled with spirit. If you're filled with self, you're not a thankful person. But if you're filled with the spirit, you're a thankful person. You recognize who God is, who you are, and what God has done in spite of who you are. Paul reminds us, those who are filled in by and with the spirit, instinctively become thankful. Are you not thankful? Get filled in with by the Spirit. When? Always. Your life as a Spirit-filled Christian will be characterized by thankfulness. Not just at a meal, not just before you go to bed. Paul says always. So when are you to be thankful? Always. For what? For the good? No, for everything. Giving thanks to the Lord always and for everything, which includes the good and the bad. Which should remind you, here's your homework, read Romans 5, 1-6, read Romans 8, 18-39, and read 2 Corinthians 4 and 5, where the Spirit explicitly comes to those who are weak and frail, to those who are hurting, to those who feel completely empty. The Spirit comes especially in those times. Romans 5, Romans 8, 2 Corinthians 3 and 4. The Spirit can enable you to give thanks, like Job, even when everything is taken away. Why can you give Him thanks? James 1.17 we've seen. The Father of Light gives what kind of gifts? For every good and perfect gift comes down from above from the Father of Lights. The greatest gift is the next verse, of His own will, He caused us to be born again through the Word. So why can you be thankful? Because God only gives good gifts to His children. But what about this pain and this anguish and this trial? It's good. Romans 8.28, I know it's abused, but it's a good one to remember. If you actually get Romans 8.28 in your heart, you can be a thankful person all the time. Right Noni? Rod and Noni have lived that text out. I've never seen a family live that text out. So I don't mind them quoting it. Anyone want to quote it for me? What's Romans 8.28? For we know that all things work together for good to them that love Him, to those who are called according to His purpose. And his purpose is to conform you into the image of Christ who was made perfect through suffering. His ministry was made perfect through suffering. Hebrews says, so God is conforming you into the image of Christ even through the crucible of suffering. Read Proverbs, it talks about how gold and silver go through it. God does that with our hearts to refine us, to take away all of the impurities. So you can give thanks to God always. And you can thank Him for everything. Why? Because the Spirit fills you. And as you're filled with Romans 8.28, the Spirit says, yes, this is true, it's a verity, you can cry, Abba, Father, in the pain. God has not left you as an orphan. And Romans 8.18, though we're called to suffer with Christ, it says, for I consider, I reckon, that the present sufferings are not worthy to be compared with the glory that is to be revealed in us. That's what the Spirit does, is He takes the Word of God, and He drives it deep into your heart. And He gives you a song, and He gives you thanksgiving, even in the pain, even in the turmoil, even in the confusion. For from Him, and through Him, and to Him, are all things. To Him be the glory forever and ever. Amen. That's how Paul ends some of the most tricky verses in the Bible. Are you a thankless Christian? Are you having a pity party right now? Because you feel God has wronged you or cheated you, you're a thankless Christian, or a thankless unbeliever. I know that sounds harsh, but sometimes we just need to square with it. What we're saying is, God is not good. You need to come to your senses with the psalmist. You would do well to remember Spurgeon's words, that anything above hell is grace. That's what happens when we forget the Word of God in the Gospel. We begin to presume God owes us. You know what God owes every single one of us here this morning? He owes us damnation. And yet He offers us salvation. How are we to give thanks to God? In the Greek it comes before God the Father, so that's why I have how. You give thanks to God in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. Simply put, when you pray in Jesus' name, what does it mean? It means you pray in accordance with who Jesus is and in accordance with what He has done. So when you give thanks to God the Father in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, you give thanks to God the Father on the basis of who Jesus is and what He has done. It is that simple, which would cause you to remember the gospel again. Because apart from the gospel, you can't even give praise to God that He accepts. Hebrews 10.19 will remind you of that. To whom? You give thanks to God the Father. In the name of Christ. because of what Christ has done in accordance with God's sovereign plan. The final thing that we're going to look at more next week is submitting. Speaking, singing, thanking, submitting. We're going to wait until next week. But these are the results of what it means to be filled with the Holy Spirit. Are you filled with the Spirit? If not, ask the Lord to fill you with the Spirit. But then also get into the word. Let it dwell richly in your hearts. And the evidence of this is God's people will gather together and they will speak to one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs. They will be singing. All these are present tenses by the way. Singing and making melody to the Lord with their hearts. Giving thanks always and for everything in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ to God the Father. Are you a singer? Are you a thanker? Are you submissive? The diagnoses, if I was Martyn Lloyd-Jones, would be simple. You're just not Spirit-filled. You're grieving the Spirit, or you're not giving the Spirit what He needs to fill your life. The Spirit fills you as you're filled with the Word of God, particularly the Gospel. That's what we're celebrating this morning. We as believers are celebrating the table. A nice, visible, tangible expression of what Christ has done for ill-deserving, undeserving, and hell-deserving sinners. This is part of the means of grace. Part of getting under God's waterfall of grace. And so please, as you partake of this, preach the gospel to yourself. Don't just be like, okay, what's for lunch? This is the Son of God's body. This symbolizes the Son of God's body broken for me. This is what the ravages of sin did to my Savior. This symbolizes His blood, His life-blood shed for me. The wages of sin is death. But the free gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. Don't waste the Lord's table if you're a believer. May God use it to preach to you the Gospel that you would leave here singing, making melody in your heart, thanking God for what He's done in Christ. So let's pray and then we'll partake of it. Father, we thank you for the Gospel. And I want to re-articulate what Marvin read out of Romans 10. That you're a willing God. And we know that you're willing to save to the uttermost. because you sent Christ into the world and you saved sinners like us. And I pray if there's anyone sitting here who's unsaved and they feel unworthy, let them understand that you only call unworthy sinners to yourself, that you alone would get the glory. May they turn away from their sins and in their turning would it be their deliverance and salvation, even as Isaiah said. Father, may they see that though they are undeserving, Christ came into the world to save the sick. That Christ came as the physician to heal those that need help and not those who are well and righteous. I do pray, Father, in the name of Christ, that you would be pleased to honor yourself in either or both the salvation of sinners this morning and the sanctification of your saints. Father, we pray that this service truly has have been an occasion for us to be filled with the Spirit, to glorify our Savior. When we think of the song we so often sing, your blood has washed away my sin. Jesus, thank you. The Father's wrath completely satisfied. Jesus, thank you. Once an enemy, now seated at your table. Jesus, we thank you. And Father, we thank you in the name of Christ. That You would love us so much that You would give us Your one and only Son. That whoever would believe on Him should not perish in hell, but have life everlasting in His name. Father, get the glory this morning. And Father, would You restore us and would You make us like Christ this morning as we reflect upon His work. Fill us with the Spirit we ask in His name. Amen.