Sermon Tone Analysis

Ephesians 5:18

 

! Introduction

            Many years ago when our son was in Sunday School, one of his teachers gave him an evergreen tree.

He planted it in our back yard and throughout the summer he was faithful in watering the tree regularly.

It was a dry summer and we did not water the rest of the lawn so the grass around the tree was much more lush than any of the rest of our lawn and the tree grew well.

Even the next spring the grass around that tree grew much thicker than anywhere else.

The presence of the water made a remarkable difference and was a presence of life in our yard.

In John 4:14, Jesus told the woman he met at the well, "The water that I will give will become in them a spring of water gushing up to eternal life."

This tells us that there is something different about people who are filled with Jesus.

If water makes a noticeable difference on plants, the presence of the Spirit must make a difference on those indwelt by the Spirit.

Today is Pentecost and on this day we remember one of the most significant events in the life of the church.

On this day we remember that the Holy Spirit came and from that day on has been the source of power and direction for the church.

Does the presence of the Spirit among us make the kind of difference water does on plants?

What kind of a difference do we expect?

When the Spirit came on the disciples on the Day of Pentecost, the difference was certainly noticeable.

In fact it was so noticeable that people thought they were drunk.

Neufeld suggests, "…we will miss the energy and enthusiasm that is to pervade the corporate experience of the church if we allow no spillover from the image of intoxication."

What was the evidence of the presence of the Spirit in the life of the early church?

Days later Peter was present when Jesus healed a lame man through Peter's words.

Acts 4:8 indicates that Peter, full of the Spirit, spoke with boldness in his defense before the Jewish leaders.

Acts 4:31 indicates, "they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke the word of God boldly."

After the gospel had gone out to the Gentiles, there was a conflict in the church which needed to be resolved.

In Acts 15 there is a description of the discussion they had in trying to resolve the conflict and in the end we read in Acts 15:28 that they were confident enough in their solution that they were able to say, "It seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us..." Much later after Paul had completed his missionary journeys, he was returning to Jerusalem.

On his journey he encountered various prophets who told him that he would be bound in Jerusalem, which prepared him for a difficult time in which he was arrested and prisoned.

This is how it was in the early church.

Do we see such power, boldness and direction today?

Do we have evidence that the presence of the Spirit is making a difference around us so that we can say, "That is the work of God?" If not, why not?

Are we missing something God wants for us or is more happening than we are aware of?

Are we looking for evidence in the right places and in the right ways?

In the early days of the Anabaptist movement and in the early days of the Mennonite Brethren experience, some of the people involved in the renewal movement were involved in ecstatic experiences which they attributed to the Holy Spirit.

Things did not work out so well and we may suspect that some of the manifestations of the Spirit were not from the Spirit at all, but were manufactured by people.

In reaction to that, I wonder, however, if we have become too suspicious?

If the disciples on the day of Pentecost were thought to be drunk, surely the staid and lifeless way we sometimes live the Christian life is not what God intends.

Are we open to the work of the Spirit within us and in our midst?

Matthew Henry says, "…we ought not to be satisfied with a little of the Spirit, but to be aspiring after measures, so as to be filled with the Spirit."

Our life as Christians must be lived in the power of the Holy Spirit because that is what Pentecost means.

How is that to be lived out in our life?

In order to gain understanding, let's examine Ephesians 5:18.

!

I.       The Command to be Filled

!! A.   The Context

            As we have been studying Ephesians we have discovered with joy all that God has done for us.

He has redeemed us, given us a new life, made us His children and given us an inheritance and all of these things have been given to us in Jesus.

In Ephesians 4:1 we saw that because of the richness of what God has done, we are called to live in a worthy manner.

In Ephesians 5:1 we are called to be imitators of God.

In Ephesians 5:15, we are called to be careful how we live, being wise, making the most of our days because the days are evil and understanding what God's will is.

A part of the call to live worthy, or to live as imitators of God, is the call in Ephesians 5:18.

!! B.   The Command

            This verse says, "Do not get drunk with wine, for that is debauchery; but be filled with the Spirit…" This morning, I want to look just at the phrase, "Be filled with the Spirit."

In order to understand this phrase well, we need to examine the verb "be filled."

In grammatical terms it is a present, passive, imperative second person plural verb.

And each of these make a difference.

!!! 1.     Present

            Verbs have three tenses – past, present, future.

The past tense of a verb speaks about what was done in the past.

The future tense of a verb speaks about what will be done in the future.

The present tense of a verb speaks about what is happening in the present.

So when we understand that this verb is in the present it tells us that this is not something that happened in the past.

It is not, "you were filled."

It is also not something that will happen in the future, "you will be filled."

Rather, it is something that must be continuously true in the present.

Today and every day, we need to be filled with the Spirit.

We can't rest on the fact that we were filled yesterday and we can't hope that someday we will be filled.

The present tense tells us that we need to be filled today.

!!! 2.     Passive

            Verbs also have primarily two voices, that is an active voice and a passive voice.

The active voice indicates what we must do.

The passive voice indicates something that is done to us.

So when we are talking about being filled with the Spirit, if it was in the active voice, it would be our responsibility.

We would need to fill ourselves with the Spirit, but the voice of this verb is not active, but passive.

The meaning of the Day of Pentecost is that since that day every believer and every church has the Spirit of God living in them.

There is no Christian who does not have the Spirit of God in them.

There is no church where the Spirit of God is not present.

In the Old Testament, the Holy Spirit did not live in every follower of God.

The Holy Spirit came upon certain people to accomplish God's work in the world.

In Joel 2:28, however, God promised, I will "pour out my Spirit on all flesh."

When Jesus came to earth and was about to begin his ministry, John the Baptist said that he was baptizing with water, but that Jesus would baptize with the Holy Spirit.

As Jesus was about to ascend into heaven, he promised the disciples in Acts 1:8, "But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you."

In Acts 2 what all these promises were pointing to was fulfilled.

Since that time, we know that every person who comes to Christ has the Spirit.

In fact, becoming a Christian means having God come into our life and making new.

Romans 8:9 assures us of this truth when it says, "But you are not in the flesh; you are in the Spirit, since the Spirit of God dwells in you.

Anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him."

The filling of the Spirit, however, is not the same as the presence of the Spirit.

The Spirit was present with all Christians after Pentecost and yet, there were times when the Spirit filled the believers in a particularly powerful way.

For example, Acts 4:31 says, "When they had prayed, the place in which they were gathered together was shaken; and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke the word of God with boldness."

Being filled with the Spirit, is something that is done to us.

The Spirit who already lives within us, fills us.

!!! 3.     Imperative

            When we realize that being filled is something that is done to us because it is in the passive voice, we may think that there is nothing we can do about it.

It isn't about what we do, but about what is done to us, so there is nothing about being filled that is our responsibility.

But to think that way is to miss the fact that the verb "to be filled" is also imperative.

Imperative means that we have something to do.

It is a command, it is an assignment.

We, as people who are indwelt by the Spirit, are also told that it is up to us to be filled with the Spirit.

Penner says, "The Spirit-filled life is a command, not an option.

It is the normal, rather than an unusual experience of Christian existence."

That tells us that even though God's Spirit is present with us, we are not always filled with God's Spirit.

It tells us that even though God is the one who fills us with His Spirit, there is something that we must do about being filled.

!!! 4.     Second Person Plural

            We should also take note that any verb also has a person involved.