this morning. Boy, that's hard to read from here. Maybe it'll be easier to read there. I don't like the font I picked, but well, it doesn't look bad up there. It looked kind of like manuscript, you know, like the Dead Sea Scrolls, but I think it's too old. But we're on truth three, and what we're doing is I'm taking you through as if I was discipling you, and I'm explaining the elements of discipleship. Now you say, explaining? Yes. When I was on staff with John MacArthur, he used to tell us, he said, people are always asking me how I preach. He said, the way I define it is, I believe in explanatory preaching. He said, if you cannot explain to people how to go from where they are back to Corinth in the first century or to Ephesus in the first century, and then explain to them how to get back to today. with that truth. He said you haven't really done your job. Explanatory preaching is not just presenting the truth but explaining why God presented that and how we're to live that. So we're looking at the third truth of discipleship. The first truth is that we have to be saved. You can't be a disciple if you're not saved. In fact, being a disciple, being born again, being saved are all synonymous terms. The second thing we saw is that there must be this, and that's why we're reading through the Bible in the year, we must be scripture-fed. In other words, our souls, if we're born again, can only be fed by the pure milk and the meat of the Word. So there must be If there's a genuine salvation event, there comes a genuine hunger. And we went through that and looked at that. Now, the third element is that we were designed by God if we're saved. And if He has implanted within us that hunger for the Word of God, we were designed by God to operate filled with the Spirit. And anytime we're not, we're off the plan, we're off the plan. the general operating procedure. And so, what we're looking at this morning, and if you want to open in your Bibles back to Ephesians 4 and 5, we're looking at the amazing plan God designed to keep us filled. You see, God designed us to operate filled, but he knows that we live in a world, in a time, and in a body that is very leaky spiritually. We live in our flesh. We're a born-again new creation within, but we're still encased in the old flesh that is antagonistic and downright Warring against everything God wants to do our flesh doesn't want to go along with the new creation We are in Christ, and so there's a constant struggle so this morning What I'd like to look at is explaining, and discipleship is all about, and people constantly labor with, can I really disciple someone? You know, I haven't been to Bible school. All discipleship is, if you just simply want to define it, discipleship is explaining to someone else what God has said. See, it's not what I've said, it's not what I feel, it's what God has said. And so, last time, we looked at, I already covered that, save scripture fed, I already wrote that down. There we go. Last time, we looked at the idea of getting full, staying full, and living full. Now, basically, what I would like to do this morning is build on that. Now, we had the incredible, in fact, I still have I took two. How many of you filled out your little funny money thing last time and turned it in on Sunday night? I told Nathan Clifton, I said, Nathan, that was such a powerful weekend of ministry that you offered. I know he labored, but the Lord used him to just just communicate. I was watching as he taught, and as someone who is in the communications business, I saw the way the Lord used him, just gripping my heart. And so I hope that the Missions Conference doesn't end, as he said, with the end of the conference, but that we'll go on. Living life the way God designed it to be lived is what we're looking at this morning I want to explain to you first of all from Ephesians 5 in verse 18 how God designed us. He designed us to be filled with the spirit But he says we're gonna move back to Ephesians 4 30 in a moment. He says watch out If we are involved in certain things, it punctures what the Spirit of God wants to do in our life. And Ephesians 4.30 says that we can grieve the Spirit of God. And if we persist in that grieving of the Spirit of God, we actually are deflated. As we grieve the Spirit of God, the fullness begins to depart. In fact, in my personal Bible reading, I got started early, and I just am in 1 Samuel, and so I just zipped through Judges, and there's one of the saddest notes in the Bible. It's about Samson, and it says in the Old King James, Samson wist, that means he didn't know, the Spirit had departed from him. See, Samson only accomplished what he accomplished through the Holy Spirit. And when he told Delilah about his Nazarite vow and his hair, and she shaved it off, his strength left him by the power of the Spirit. And you know what I think about? I think about that is what's going on in so many believers' lives. They can't figure out why they can't do the great things they used to do anymore, and it's because they are no longer filled with the Spirit, and God designed us to only live the way described in this book we're supposed to live when we're filled and we keep filled with the Spirit. Well, last time we looked at how to get full. That's Ephesians 5.18. And what it says in there is, Do not be drunk with wine, in which is dissipation, but be filled. And that's an imperative, and it's a passive imperative, and it's in the present tense, and we went all through that. So, to get full, all you have to do is surrender and desire and ask the Lord to do what he promised. To stay full is what we're looking at this morning. Last time, we looked at some of the benefits, which is when you live full, you have all those wonderful evidences of Christ's personality, love and joy and peace. And we began to have his gentleness, and we began to have his ability to not get irritated at the behavior of other people, which is It's just impossible, it's supernatural. But we looked at that last time, but this time what we need to see is God designed this plan to keep us full. And what I see is a lot of people In fact, I think in pictures, and that's why I have a phonographic mind. I'm narrating the pictures I see. And that's why, I mean, I love, I can go anywhere in the world that I've studied the archeology, and I can just narrate because I see in pictures, and I love doing that. And the same with the scriptures. I see it. You know, when I see the spirit-filled life, it reminds me of living out in Lawton. Do you know what's in Lawton? Hills. Do you know what the hills are covered with? Bicyclists. And I mean, they're spray painting our roads everywhere. Arrows, you know. I mean, they'll have three or four different groups and they've got all their colored arrows and turn here and, you know, this is the watering hole and all that stuff. And if you were riding along, you know, like on, what is that, R, one of the national scenic highway or back roads or whatever it is, you know, with all those hills and the trees. And if you're going like this and all of a sudden you come up on a pack of about 100 bikes, bicyclists, And every one of them are walking along, pushing their bike like this. Wouldn't you immediately think, what are they doing? They must have a flat tire. Maybe a comrade is in the ditch and they're all walking, looking for him. But they're not operating like they're supposed to, right? If they're just walking along, pushing that bike, there's something going on. Those bikes. you know, 10, 20, 30, I don't know how many speeds those things have these days. In fact, I was riding my son's and at one side said three and the other said five. He said, what year are you? And I said, 35. You know, I don't know how many, but it said three on one side and five on the other. And I just, I was on 35. And he said, good, leave it there, dad. Don't do anything, you know, you'll fall. And so a bicycle was not designed for you to walk next to it. Now it works that way. And I've seen people, like in China, I saw someone once that had about an eight-foot-long bale of cotton on top of the seat, and they were using it like a hand truck. Yeah, you can do that, but that is not what a bicycle was designed for. It was designed for you to ride it. Now, if the tires get flat, I can see pushing, because you'll just destroy your rims. Now, I want you to think about that. that picture when we look at what God designed us to be in chapter 5 because God designed us to operate best when full and if we follow what God says and if we are filled with the Spirit Ephesians 5 18 that is how we operate and so what is happening is many believers go through life Not filled, and it's like they're walking through life, pushing their little bike that God designed for them to sail through life. I mean, did you know on 35 you can actually really sail along? In fact, if you go down to 25 and 15, you don't even have to stand up, you can go up those hills. Yeah, so many believers. don't operate their bike the way God designed them to be. So with that picture in mind, apply that to our life in Christ. Simply stated, our life in Christ is to live out what God designed us to be. Life is most of all about who we are in Christ, and that determines what we do. Who we are Dictates how we behave in fact you put it this way if you believe right you'll behave right But it starts with believing the truth about who we are in Christ what God designed us to be That's the essence Since God uses the term filled right there in verse 18, we start to think about the truth illustrated in life. Filled is a normal state of life that we are to pursue as believers. It is not only for the few. It's not just that a few people finally get up to the state of being spirit-filled. That's normal. Can you imagine going down here on Stadium to one of these car lots and buying a new car, but it doesn't run? You expect if you buy a car, it's fully functional and it runs. God says normal state for believers is filled. It's not for the few. It's not for the rarefied. It's not for the super saints. It's for every saint, every believer, each of us today. Now, spirit-filled living is so much like riding a bike. Either we get our tires filled or they're empty. Either we keep our tires repaired or they go empty. Either we go through life riding as God designed us to do on full tires, or we trudge through life pushing what God designed for us to ride, and we live with flat, tired, spiritually empty lives. Have you ever seen people pushing a car? You know, it's out of gas. Was a car designed to be pushed? Was it designed to have all of your friends huffing and puffing behind you, pushing you along through life? Yet, that is a picture you can get in your mind of what living the Christian life looks like from God's perspective when we don't operate the way he designed us to operate. I mean, what would you think of someone that bought a brand new car and had all their friends pushing them around town? Is this a joke? Haven't you ever started that thing? Do you understand what discipleship is? Discipleship is finding people who are manually trying to make their Christian life work and come alongside them and say, have you been to the gas station? Is this thing out of fuel? Have you lost the key? Do you know how to start it? Have you ever had driving lessons? Do you understand what I mean? That's what discipleship is. Because many people are operating the Christian life not how it was designed. And discipleship is just coming alongside of them and say, I went through this too. I used to walk my bike all the time. And you just explain to them what the Lord said. Pillar one, and I'm gonna go through three pillars with you, three pillars of the spirit-filled life. And pillar one is God designed us to only operate, you can only have the boldness sharing the gospel, you can only have victory over the constant onslaught of the flesh and sin, or of doubt and discouragement, or whatever spiritual struggles you're going through and I'm going through, we only operate, God designed us, when we're full. his spirit. That's the first pillar. That after someone is saved and they evidence salvation and the hunger for the Word of God, when you get into the spirit dimension with them, the first underlying truth is the normal state of is that we operate full of the Spirit. Now, go back to your picture in your mind. The normal state of a bicycle that is in use is that it works. It's used to ride places in full condition. That means the tires are full. You can jump on it at any time and just pedal off. Full tires means the bike is functional. It's what it was designed to be. That's what Ephesians 5.18 says you and I were designed to be. Not under the influence of anything, like be not drunk with wine wherein is excess, but be constantly being filled with the Spirit. That is normal. Paul commands us that we are to stay how we were designed by God to be, which is full. And then he mentions, look at verse 19, the evidence. He says, this is what life is like when you're riding along through life with full tires, being filled with the spirit. You speak to one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, verse 19 says. You sing and you make melody in your heart to the Lord. Verse 20, you're giving thanks always for everything to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus. And verse 21, we have this submissive spirit. And it just, I mean, if we had time, it actually goes through every dimension of life, all the way down through chapter 6 and verse 9. Submission to one another flows into parent-child relationships, husband-wife relationships, employer-employee, and back and forth, all the way through life. But all of that flows from verse 18, being filled with the Spirit. Well, number two, and this is probably the critical lesson. I think most people go along with the Spirit-filled part. But what they struggle with is They don't know. Once they get off with a flat tire, they think that they've ruined their spiritual life. They think they're bad. They think no one else has ever had a flat tire. They think that nobody else is walking along pushing their bike. And they're actually In fact, I hate to, well, he's not here this morning, and so I'll tell. I took, when we first got here, we were on the 100 homes, and one of the homes was a dear couple, and they actually handed us a Calhaven brochure of the Calhaven bike riding trail. And they said, you have five sons and you've got four of them here. You really need to get bicycles and you can borrow ours and you need to try the Calhaven. So we really worked on it and we got our bicycles all up and we did it. We got on the trailhead at I don't know where and we ended up we saw water. Okay, I almost died. But I will tell you, the funniest thing happened along the trip. One of my boys is, well, they're all adventurous, but one of them is very adventurous. I mean, riding a bike for him is kind of like being in a circus. I mean, he goes real fast, and he goes off the ground and lands over here, and then he's going over logs, and I mean, it's just like, Come on, just stay on the trail. I'm barely making it, staying like this. And he would cut through the woods and come out ahead of us and jump over stuff. But about an hour into the trip, he was so far back, and I'd go... You know, I thought, you're worn out for a reason, you've been wasting all your time. And his face was red, and you should have seen him pedaling, and he'd get up in sight, and I'd cruise on, and then about a half hour later, he'd be out of sight, and I'd go like this, you know, and he'd be red-faced. When we finally got to the water, I looked at his bike, his tire was flat. all that jumping over the, he landed on something and punctured or got it off the rim, I don't know what he did, but he didn't, I mean, he felt so bad that this bicycle, his dad got him to go on the trail, and he didn't stay on the trail, that he hoofed about 10 or 12 miles on a rim, and his face was beet red, I mean, I thought he was gonna have a heart attack. Did you know that's what goes on at church? People are totally flat-tired, but they don't want to admit it to anybody. And they're trying their hardest to keep up with everybody else here, trying to be happy, trying to know something about the Lord, trying to serve the Lord, trying to do what they're supposed to do, and they are totally flat. And normal spiritual life... Now see, this is what's so important. Normal spiritual life knows that we are going to be constantly in need of repairing the leaks that come in life. Now, look in Ephesians 4 in verse 30, right here is the verse. And think about this. as a reminder of the leak causers. Do not grieve the Holy Spirit by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption. Now, what is normal Christian life? Paul alludes to another way our spiritual lives can become. The first way is 518. We are supposed to stay full. But Paul says there's a second way. level that Christians can get in. They can get into this dangerous territory of letting things come into their life that are total enemies of spirit fullness. And these things grieve the one that fills us and causes his power in our lives to be dissipated by the little choices we make. Now, stick with me, because this is probably the mystery. In all the years that I've discipled, for three decades, this is the piece where people, they know spiritfulness is what God wants, but they cannot figure out how to get out of their flat tire life. They think they're cursed for the rest of their life, to be way behind and red-faced, huffing and puffing, trying to keep up with the spiritual pack. And they don't realize that there's this giant repair truck that follows them all the time. And it can instantly, new tire, refilled, you know, aired up. Have you ever watched the races? They have that little truck that's right there to help them, you know, handing out water bottles to them and fixing their tires on these big races. That's the spiritual life. Only the designer of the bike, the one who gave it to us, is the one that wants to repair and refill. Now think how that works. Have you ever had a bike with a leaky tire? You always have to check the tire, grab the pump, get it back to full inflation. You find you need it when you jump on it. It can't hold you up. In fact, every time I go out with my boys, that happens. I go, oh, you guys, hold on. The tire is soft, the bike won't work the way it should. That is the state we as believers find ourselves described in Ephesians 4.30, when we grieve the Holy Spirit. In fact, the word grieve in verse 30 is lupeo in Greek. It means to make sad, to make heavy, to make sorrowful, and to make distressed, lupeo. The Holy Spirit is a person. And our choices that we make either gladden and please him or lupeo him, make him sad, sorrowful, grieved, heavy. And that process makes our spirit-filled lives leak. When we grieve the spirit, we're leaking out the pressure, the fullness of our lives. Using the bicycle analogy, think about a soft tire. There are many reasons tires lose their pressure. They can have punctures, the wheel rim can be bent, a valve can be cut, so many possibilities. Now, I'm not a master bicyclist. On another 100 homes, We went to a home where we're talking about the real thing. This guy has things he puts on his feet that hook in. He doesn't even have pedals. His feet hook right into the bike. I mean, if you fall over, you're committed. You're attached to that thing. I mean, and they wear those space suits, you know, that, you know, are just so amazing. In fact, there's one I won't even point at you, Dale. I know that you wear that all the time. And so, there are many ways, but I'm not a master bicyclist, but Paul, in chapter four, gives a list of actions that puncture, damage, and hinder our spiritual lives. And so, what I call these, and now remember, This is not normal Sunday morning preaching. Actually, that's why I warn you in the front. This is face-to-face. And I actually say, hey, could I give you some driving tips for your spiritual life? If your life is like riding a bicycle, let me give you some tips. Oh, come on. How did I do that? Uh-oh. There we go. Oh, don't go too far. Driving tip one. Beware of these items that leak out our spirit fullness. And I say, mark them with me. And look in your Bibles. And I'll just point them out to you. Ephesians 4.25 says, any falsehood in our life. Now, listen carefully. I will illustrate, audio form, what falsehood does in our life. That's leaking air. Falsehood, verse 25, is a part of those choices we make that rob us of fullness of the Spirit. Secondly, sinful anger in verse 26. It says, be angry and sin not. There is a righteous indignation, but being upset that someone has bothered me, has hindered me, has hurt me, has slighted me, has whatevered me, is not righteous. You ever meet people, they're just kind of like Who's that cartoon character that had the cloud over him, you know? You can tell, I used to read the Sunday cartoons. That's the only thing we could do on Sunday when I was little, just read, you know, that was fun. And we would read those cartoons, and there was one guy that had the little cloud over his head. That reminds me of people that are angry. They're just, they, their sinful anger, our sinful anger, whether we have much or little, It's deflating the fullness, the Spirit. How about this? This could be why we have a whole generation, I'm concerned about how much they're going to be able to serve the Lord. Through media, through games, through movies, through even music. In fact, What was I saying? It was in Tumblr and it had some cute name and I went to it and you know what it was? It had a cute name but boy when you got there it wasn't. It was something called World of Warcraft and it was the faces of the creatures. If you could illustrate what the facial expression of Satan's world would look like. There's some artists that have done a good job in there. And what people don't realize is that that leaves a place. Don't leave a place for the devil. Any theft, I'm talking about tax theft or padding the expense accounts or being paid and not working, any rotten talk It just empties, grieving the spirit. Ephesians 4.31 says, any bitterness, any bitter attitudes, all of these are punctures. These are damaging to our spiritual life. So tip number one, beware of items that leak out. Driving tip two, when punctured, pull over and get repaired. Don't try and keep up. Don't act like everything is just fine, you know, and you're just gonna try harder. See, what that's talking about is when your bike tire gets soft because of wear or damage or puncture, do you park the bike and say it's useless and will never work? That's what some people do. When they are totally sidelined because any of those anger or theft or lying or whatever is in their life, they just quit. They said, I just never can be used by the Lord again. What would you think of a child that you bought them a perfect, brand new 35-speed bike, or however many they have, and they just left it in the garage? You said, why? Well, the tire's flat. You'd say, you need a little lesson. How to get it repaired. And what's even nicer is, When you have a truck following you, the Lord himself wants us to not be empty. He wants us to be repaired. And that's why he tells us, in fact, look in chapter 4, the repair kit is right in chapter 4. Look across in verse 20. You have not so learned Christ. Verse 21 of chapter 4 of Ephesians, if indeed you've heard of Him and been taught by Him as the truth is in Christ Jesus. And here's the repair kit. Verse 22, put off concerning your form or conduct. The reason that you are starting to have a little repair needed is you are going back to the old ways. Put it off. Stop that, the Lord says. Put off concerning your former conduct, the old man which grows corrupt. Verse 23, be renewed. Lord says, I'm following you. I want to repair you right on the spot. My goal is not for you to be red faced and so sad that you are deflated and you're trying to keep up with the pack. Pull over and let me fix you right now, the Lord says. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to already have forgiven us and to cleanse us, to get us back. to get us, look what it says in verse 24, put on the new man. Actually what the Lord does is, he doesn't patch up the old tires, he just puts on, we have a new beginning with him. That's what's so neat about Christian life, that we have a new beginning. If anyone is in Christ Jesus, they are a new creation. The old is passed away and the new is coming. There's just an endless string of new beginnings in Christ. So, Driving tip two, when punctured, pull over. Do tires get injured when you ride on them? Yes, it's expected. It happens quicker if we choose to ride over nails every day, if we crash the bike against the curbs, if we ride through piles of trash and sharp objects. But here's the spiritual lesson. Spirit-filled life explained by Paul is this, avoid those things that grieve the spirit. That list in 425 to 31. When the spirit is grieved, we get less and less able to operate the way we were designed to operate. We slowly go flat. We can't get through life the way we're designed. Pause and ponder that. If you're peddling your spiritual life and not making it, park and ask the Lord. confess, say, yep, I've been running over all those nails of untruthfulness, stuff, whatever it is, you know, jealousy, whatever sin, grieving and quenching, and ask him to refill. Driving tip number three, expect tire damage. You know what some people think? This is the most fascinating part when I sit with people. I say, you know what, you're going to be punctured, you're gonna have blowouts in life, and they go, I thought when I got saved I was more than a conqueror. In Christ you are. But we don't happen to always operate in Christ. Expect tire damage. Expect the struggles that we go through. Life is full of dangers. Life is full of punctures and sharp objects and many unseen and unexpected events. Disciple makers come to spiritual bikers and say, it's all right, we all get leaks. You are not a bad bicyclist. You are normal. And here's what you do to ride longer between leaks. Just because you lose your fullness, it's not time to give up and never ride. It's time to pull over and get repaired, to get reinflated and to go on. That's the normal life of a believer. No one stays full every day, all day, from start to finish. Not Paul, not the heroes of the faith, and not any of us. Expect tire damage. Expect things that rob us of operating in the fullness of the Spirit. Here's driving tip number four. Use the tire repair kit. Get to know the put off, be renewed, and put on of verse 22, 23, 24. That's what it's all about. It's all about saying, God, I agree with you. I know that every time I get near whatever, I respond in the wrong way. And so God says, if you confess to me that you're leaking and ask him to check what happened and come to him as the only one that can refill us, then he'll get us right on immediately after fixing us. It's normal to need to get repaired. And the Lord is right there next to us. And he wants us operating the way he designed us to be in Christ more than we can ever comprehend. And here's the final tip. By the way, this is what spiritual maturity is. Start avoiding things that damage your tires. Right? That's what sanctified, mature, and godly living is all about. If you always crash when you operate in the dark, stay in the light. If you cut your tires every time you are on a certain road, avoid it. Tell others how you're always deflated and ask them to remind you not to go that way. Do you see how we work together? Do you see how the Christian life is lived in community? You know, I remind that one son, because I notice him starting to jump, you know, we'll go back to Calhaven and whoop, over one of those logs he'll go and I'll say, Do you remember when you were red-faced four years ago, a mile back? Yeah, yeah, okay. And he kind of stays kind of on the road. That's what the community in Christ is for. We work together. We're all on bike tires that are equally vulnerable. We help each other stay safe on the road and repair flats. God wants us to avoid anything that punctures and destroys our ability to stay filled. It's spiritual maturity to avoid things that always damage our tires. Why? Because, and here's the last pillar before communion. 1 Thessalonians 5, if you wanna turn there and mark it, this is a very strong word. Do you know what 1 Thessalonians 5, 19 says? Do not quench the spirit. That word speaks of a dousing, an extinguishing. It's used for like a fire retardant where you just foam the whole thing and bury it so it's just out. The Holy Spirit is first illustrated in the New Testament Church as a flame of fire. This is foaming and suffocating that flame. And here's the third pillar of the Spirit-filled walk. Any unrepaired leaks that we leave unmitigated, undealt with, lead to a life flat tire living. A life of being agonizing that everything that you know about Christ, the assurance, the joy, the hunger, the more than conquerors, the wisdom, the boldness, the passion, the compassion, everything isn't working. And there are actually believers that go for days and weeks and months and in a state of quenching the spirit. Communion is when we say to the Lord, you designed me to operate full of your spirit. I know that when I get in certain realms of media, when I go to certain events, when I am around certain people, it starts leaking my spiritual fullness. And Lord, I want to have you repair and restore and refill me. And I want you to keep me full of your Spirit. But I know if I sin that I don't have to keep going through life like nothing's wrong. I just pull over, confess, forsake, be renewed, put on the new man. Remember, no matter how far back we are, it's only one step to get right back where we should be, and that's confessing and forsaking. So let's bow right now, and as we bow, I invite the elders and deacons to prepare to serve us communion. And we're going to sing a song that's kind of like a reminder of who we are in Christ. And it's before the throne of God above, I have a strong and perfectly a great high priest whose name is love, whoever lives and pleads for me. Communion is where we look up and say, Lord, I want you to restore to me the joy of my salvation. I want to be refilled. I want you to give me a fresh new beginning. And by your grace, I want to more and more and more deny those things in my life that make your spirit grieved. And I don't want to live one day of my life quenched. Father in heaven, we bow before you this morning. And as we prepare to take these pictures in our hands of your body and of your blood, we're reminded that you died, that we should no longer live under our own power, but you died so that we would live filled and overflowing with your spirit. I pray that we would renounce flat-tire living, that anybody here that's red-faced and huffing and puffing, we can't tell, we all look like we're great this morning, but down deep in their hearts they know they're operating in their own power, and everybody seems to be needed to push them to make it through life. Rather than a pit crew that gets them back on the road, they just want to sit in their car and be pushed. I pray they repent of that, that they'd confess why they're out of the fullness of your spirit to you. You already know they just need to agree and then ask for your precious refilling and immediately we're right back on the road. Surrounded by other fellow travelers and we say that apart from him we can't do anything. He's the one that fills us and energizes and you oh Christ are the one that repairs us. May this be a communion where we follow your amazing plan to stay filled with your spirit by being careful of anything that grieves and quenches your spirit. Thank you for this bread. Remind us as we sing our worship to you in the name of Jesus we pray, amen.