Ephesians 4.30a-Prohibition Forbidding Grieving the Holy Spirit
Wenstrom Bible Ministries
Pastor-Teacher Bill Wenstrom
Tuesday November 18, 2025
Ephesians Series: Ephesians 4:30a-Prohibition Forbidding Grieving the Holy Spirit
Lesson # 298
Ephesians 4:30 Consequently, each and every one of you as a corporate unit must continue to make it your habit of not grieving the Spirit, who is holy, originating from the one and only God by means of the exercise of whose omnipotence all of you without exception have been sealed for the day, namely, redemption. (Lecturer’s translation)
Ephesians 4:30 is composed of the following:
(1) prohibition: mē lypeite to pneuma to hagion tou theou (μὴ λυπεῖτε τὸ πνεῦμα τὸ ἅγιον τοῦ θεοῦ), “each and every one of you as a corporate unit must continue to make it your habit of not grieving the Spirit, who is holy, originating from the one and only God.” (Lecturer’s translation)
(2) declarative statement: en hō esphragisthēte eis hēmeran apolytrōseōs (ἐν ᾧ ἐσφραγίσθητε εἰς ἡμέραν ἀπολυτρώσεως), “by means of the exercise of whose omnipotence all of you without exception have been sealed for the day, namely, redemption.” (Lecturer’s translation)
Therefore, Ephesians 4:30 begins with a prohibition, which required that the recipients of this letter, who were members of the Gentile Christian community in the Roman province of Asia, continue to make it their habit of not grieving the Spirit, who is holy, and who originates from the Father.
This is followed by a declarative statement, which describes a ministry performed by the Holy Spirit at justification on behalf of each member of the body of Christ, namely, He sealed every one of them for the day of redemption.
The latter is a reference to the believer receiving a resurrection body at the rapture or resurrection of the church.
The prohibition presents the logical result of obeying the various Spirit inspired commands and prohibitions presented in Ephesians 4:25-29.
In other words, it indicates that if the recipients of this epistle obey the various Spirit inspired commands and prohibitions presented in Ephesians 4:25-29, they will never grieve the Holy Spirit.
However, if they disobey them, they will in fact grieve the Holy Spirit.
Therefore, the prohibition in Ephesians 4:30 summarizes the Spirit inspired contents of Ephesians 4:25-29.
As was the case in Ephesians 1:13, 17, 2:18, 22, 3:5, 16, 4:3, and 4, the noun pneuma (πνεῦμα) in Ephesians 4:30 refers of course to the Holy Spirit.
The articular construction of this word is monadic, which indicates that He is “unique” or “in a class by Himself” since He is God and whose holy character transcends that of his moral rational creatures, namely, human and angelic beings.
As was the case in Ephesians 1:13, the noun pneuma (πνεῦμα) here in Ephesians 4:30 is modified by the adjective hagios (ἅγιος), which means “holy” and is used to describe the third member of the Trinity, the Spirit and denotes the state of being holy.
This adjective describes the transcendent character of the Spirit in that His character is superior to the character of both angelic and human beings since the latter are inferior to Him due to the fact that He is their Creator and they are sinners.
The noun theos (θεός) refers to the Father which is indicated by the articular construction of the noun, which in the New Testament commonly signifies the Father unless otherwise indicated by the context.
Furthermore, in every instance in which the word has appeared in this epistle up to this point in the Ephesian letter, the Father is this word’s referent (1:1, 2, 3, 17, 2:4, 8, 10, 16, 19, 22, 3:2, 7, 9, 10, 19; 4:6, 13, 18, 24).
The articular construction of the noun theos (θεός) expresses the idea that there were many gods in the world, but the God Jewish and Gentile Christians worship was the one and only true God in contrast to unregenerate humanity, which worshipped the pantheon of Graeco-Roman gods.
This noun functions as a genitive of source, which means that the person of the Holy Spirit “originates from” God in the sense that the Father sent the Holy Spirit to permanently indwell each member of the body of Christ at the request of His Son to do so (cf. John 14:26).
The verb lupeo (λυπέω) expresses the Holy Spirit’s sorrow, which is caused when a child of God commits a mental, verbal or over act of sin.
Thus, it speaks of the Holy Spirit experiencing emotional distress when a child of God commits a mental, verbal or overt act of sin.
The second personal plural form of this verb lupeo (λυπέω) refers of course to the recipients of this letter, who we noted are members of the Gentile Christian community in the Roman province of Asia.
This form of the verb refers to them not only as a corporate unit but also as individuals.
The latter of which is indicated by the fact that Paul is using the distributive sense of the second person plural, which emphasizes no exceptions expressing Paul’s concern for the recipients of this letter not only as a corporate unit but also as individuals.
The meaning of this verb is negated by the negative particle me (μή), which denies any idea of committing this sin against the Holy Spirit and together, they form a prohibition.
This negative particle denies any idea of these Gentile Christians causing the Holy Spirit sorrow or emotional distress because they have committed a mental, verbal or overt act of sin, which is the result of disobeying any of the Spirit inspired commands and prohibitions in the Scriptures.
Of course, no human or angelic being can literally cause the Holy Spirit to experience sorrow or emotional distress.
Thus, the apostle Paul, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, employs an anthropopathism, which is ascribing the human emotion of grieving to the Holy Spirit, which He does not possess in order to communicate the Spirit’s attitude towards the believer when they commit a mental, verbal or overt act of sin.
Paul is thus using language of accommodation to communicate the Spirit’s attitude toward the believer when they sin.
An “anthropopathism” is language of accommodation through which infinite God reveals Himself to the finite man.
Anthropopathisms ascribe to God human characteristics, which He does not have, in order to explain God’s policy or viewpoint to us in terms of human attitudes.
The Bible ascribes the following human emotions to God that He does not possess in order to convey His attitude towards man in terms that man can understand.
The following is a brief list of anthropopathisms found in the Word of God. Examples of Anthropopathisms: (1) God hates (Rm. 9:13). (2) Harbors jealousy (Ex. 20:5a; 34:14; Deut. 4:24; 6:15a). (3) Changes His mind (Gen. 6:6). (4) Vents violent anger (Jer. 4:8; 12:13; 25:37; 51:45; Ezek. 5:15).
These qualities are incompatible with God’s essence, but such statements are descriptive and gain the attention of the reader.
Therefore, in Ephesians 4:30 Paul issues the recipients of Ephesians a prohibition, which required that they do not grieve or cause the Holy Spirit to experience emotional distress because they have committed a mental, verbal or overt act of sin as a result of disobeying any one of the Spirit inspired commands and prohibitions recorded in Ephesians 4:25-29.
The present imperative conjugation of the verb lupeo (λυπέω) is a customary present imperative, which has the force of a general precept and makes no comment about whether the action is going on or not.
However, in Ephesians 1:15, Paul commends the recipients of this epistle for their post-justification faith in the Spirit inspired Scriptures.
Correspondingly, he also commends them for obeying the Lord Jesus Christ’s Spirit inspired command in John 13:34 and 15:12 to love one another as He has loved them.
The present tense of this verb lupeo (λυπέω) is a customary present tense, which is used to signal a regularly occurring or habitual action on the part of the subject of the verb.
Therefore, it expresses the idea of the recipients of this epistle “continuing to make it their habit of” not causing the Holy Spirit grief in the form of emotional distress because they have committed a mental, verbal or overt act of sin as a result of disobeying any one of His commands and prohibitions recorded in the Scriptures.
Therefore, by issuing this prohibition, Paul is performing preventative maintenance.
He is warning them ahead of time to not make it a habit of grieving the Holy Spirit.
He is not telling them to cease from this act implying that they were in already in the process of doing so.
But rather, it is a prohibition designed to prevent them from grieving the Holy Spirit on a habitual basis, which would hinder the Holy Spirit from performing His function of forming Christ-like character in them.
In other words, he is not implying that they were already involved in this sin of grieving the Holy Spirit but rather he is expressing a general precept.
Please note that I am not saying that Paul does not want them to commit this sin ever again because as long as they possess an indwelling old Adamic sin nature and live in the devil’s world they will be tempted to sin and they will sin.
The Bible states that the believer is deceiving themselves if they say they can stop sinning altogether while they still have an old sin nature and live in the devil’s world (cf. 1 John 1:8-10).
Interestingly, this prohibition in Ephesians 4:30 is similar to the language used by Isaiah 63:10, which speaks of the Israelites rebelling against the Spirit and thus grieving Him.
Isaiah 63:10 But they rebelled and offended his holy Spirit, so he turned into an enemy and fought against them. (NET)
