As much as you want part 2

Last Sunday we saw that when it comes to the Holy Spirit and to the fruit of the Spirit, and other spiritual disciplines, we only have as much of them as we want. In other words, it takes effort and work for us to grow spiritually and to develop the God-honoring life we are called to live. It takes intentionality for us to have more and more of the Holy Spirit in us, and when I say that I think many people picture a glass that is part empty, or filled all the way, but the truth is that God doesn’t remove some of Himself and then give us more of Himself in a physical way like a half-empty glass, but it is a description of how closely connected we are with God’s Holy Spirit that lives in us, and how much we allow Him to be in control of our lives. So, when some people talk about a person being “Spirit filled” they are really referring to the fact that God has a deep connection to their spirit, and is given large amounts of control in that person’s life, which then allows God to do great things for His kingdom through that person.

Last week we began to look at how we, as followers of Jesus, can give the Holy Spirit greater control of our lives (I actually got this from one of my favorite pastors and authors, A.W. Tozer):

Give yourself to God. - In other words, come before God and surrender control of different areas of your life to Him (the ultimate goal being that we eventually surrender every corner of our beings to God).

Ask God for the Holy Spirit. - Again, if you are a follower of Jesus and have been saved, you already have the Holy Spirit in you, but whereas the first step is us giving up control of our lives, the second step is asking God to take control through His Spirit. They are basically two sides of the same coin. It can also be something like asking the Spirit to speak to us, to help us understand Scripture, or something else.

Obey. - Once God speaks to us, and reveals to us what He wants us to do, we have a choice about whether we are going to obey Him or not. The more we obey God’s voice in our lives, the more we will hear Him and sense Him working in our lives, but when we don’t obey, then it interferes with our relationship with God and makes it harder to hear Him.

Believe. - Some of the things God will ask us to do are going to be hard or even impossible for us to do on our own and in our own power, so it requires us to believe and have faith in God’s power, faith that He will provide or bring the change we need to happen, and faith that He is in control and knows what He’s doing even when we don’t. That faith in those moments grows our overall faith in God moving forward, and builds our relationship with God.

Today we are going to look at ways that we can develop a long-term lifestyle or walk with the Holy Spirit. These things are not just actions we do once in our lives and then move on, they are a continuous set of practices and habits that lead us into a life of investing in our relationship with God and deepening it by adjusting how we are living our lives. But before we go into this, let’s go before our Lord and ask Him to help us as we study and as we then go and try to put these things into practice.

Let’s Pray...

Like I mentioned just a minute ago, I want us to look at what it means to walk with the Holy Spirit. I was reviewing a book by one of my favorite authors, A.W. Tozer, and I came across some pretty good insights that I think will be helpful to us as we look at how to do this well.

Walking with the Holy Spirit:

There are several important aspects to consider when you walk with someone. Some of you may know or you may have seen some of our church staff out on a walk during their lunch time here in town. Some people walk together, others walk on their own, but walking has become a popular activity among the staff in the past several months. One of the things that is important when you are deciding whether or not to walk with someone is that you agree on the same destination. If one person is walking to CVS, and the other person is walking to Christian Faith Center, they are not going to be walking together. Another issue is the matter of the direction, or path they are going to use to get there. If two people decide to walk to Christian Faith Center, they can go down Lyon Street then jump over to E Watson, or down Church Street and take a left at Peachtree.

At some point or another, if they are going to walk together, they must agree on the same destination and the same route to get to that destination. (There may be other details as well, but for the sake of simplicity, let’s keep it at these two.)

The same thing is true about walking with the Spirit. If we are going to walk with Him, we need to agree to the same destination, and to the same route. The Spirit of God, which is the part of God that we have the closest relationship to, has a plan for your life and my life. Our choice is to walk with Him or to not walk with Him. Each one of us has a decision or a choice to make about whether or not we want to join Him. Joining Him means we give up or surrender our own plans and priorities and we join Him in his plans and priorities.

Unfortunately, there are things that get in the way of us walking with the Holy Spirit.

Obstacles to Walking with the Holy Spirit:

A Divided Heart: Wanting both what the world offers and what Jesus offers.

The problem is that many of us are not willing to give up all to obtain all that God wants for us. There are people who are facing both ways, on the one hand, they are facing the world, and they still desire some of what the world has to offer, and on the other hand they are facing towards Christ and they want what He promises. They just aren’t willing to let go completely of one so that they can have the other one completely.

Viewing Christianity as a social club, not a spiritual family.

A social club is a place to make friends, maybe business connections, not a place to be challenged or where hard things are required of you. They want to hear all about the love of God, and God’s blessings and goodness. But don’t ask them to study the Bible themselves, just tell them about it. And don’t linger on the teachings that are hard to follow or make them feel uncomfortable, get to the stuff that makes them feel warm and happy inside; the stuff that makes them feel like part of a special group of people.

Viewing Christianity as an insurance policy.

Some people think of Christianity as an insurance policy both for here on earth and for life after death. Here on earth, they think that if they are Christians God will bless them and keep them from having to suffer too much. (They obviously haven’t heard that suffering is part of what God calls us to on this earth.) Secondly, they see Christianity as an insurance policy that gets then into heaven after they die. For these benefits, some people are happy to support the church, and missions, and other religious programs. They are willing to volunteer and give financially. They are also willing to give up certain habits and bad behaviors, all because those are parts of what is required of them to do in order to have this insurance policy.

I’m not saying that supporting the church and supporting missions, and volunteering and giving up bad habits is wrong, on the contrary, we want to see these things, but these things can be done by people who don’t have a thriving relationship with the Holy Spirit. Non-Christians can give generous donations to worthy causes, and they can stop bad habits and replace them with good habits, and they can volunteer to help others, all without a relationship with God. The point isn’t the behaviors themselves, but the relationship that is behind the behaviors.

Jesus understood that even during His ministry, some people were there for many of these same reasons. Some people wanted to be close to Jesus, and to follow Him, but they weren’t quite ready to give up everything and hold on only to Him. Some liked being part of the crowd that went from one place to another to be part of “action;” part of the “in” crowd. Some people wanted the benefits of being with Jesus, like seeing the miracles, watching people be healed and released from demon possession, or being fed free food.

At different times, Jesus addressed these different obstacles to walking with Him, and eventually, after He ascended into heaven, walking with the Spirit.

He taught that

Matthew 6:24 CSB

24 “No one can serve two masters, since either he will hate one and love the other, or he will be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money.

He also addressed the problem of people who pretended to be His followers, and did many of the things followers do, but whose hearts weren’t really committed to Him.

Matthew 7:21–23 NIV

21 “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. 22 Many will say to me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name and in your name drive out demons and in your name perform many miracles?’ 23 Then I will tell them plainly, ‘I never knew you. Away from me, you evildoers!’

Jesus knew that some of His followers were not true believers, so at one point after he had given them a particularly difficult lesson that many had a hard time understanding or accepting, Jesus said this:

John 6:63–66 ESV

63 It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh is no help at all. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life. 64 But there are some of you who do not believe.” (For Jesus knew from the beginning who those were who did not believe, and who it was who would betray him.) 65 And he said, “This is why I told you that no one can come to me unless it is granted him by the Father.” 66 After this many of his disciples turned back and no longer walked with him.

Jesus didn’t want people who pretended to follow Him but weren’t willing to do the hard things that it took to be a real disciple of Jesus. Being a true follower of Jesus isn’t easy, Jesus never said it would be, and he understood that one way to filter out the people who were there for the wrong reasons was to let them decide on their own if they were willing to follow even when things were not all sunshine and butterflies, but instead were tough and challenging. So what are some of the solutions to these obstacles I mentioned before?

Solutions to the Obstacles:

A fully-committed heart that is willing to give up all for the sake of walking with the Spirit.

Immediately after talking about not having a divided heart between serving God and money, Jesus talks about how God takes care of the needs of His people when they follow Him. He makes his point in a verse many of us are familiar with:

Matthew 6:33 CSB

33 But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be provided for you.

Jesus told His disciples that if they concentrated on seeking God’s Kingdom, and that involves seeking God Himself, that then God would provide for the needs they had. So this way they could focus on what was most important to God and trust Him for the other things in their lives that were also necessary. Seeking God’s Kingdom first doesn’t mean we neglect our responsibilities or commitments, but it means that we approach those responsibilities and commitments with a Kingdom perspective. The way you approach your job, provide for your needs and your family’s needs, take care of the things that need taking care of, etc., reflects that God and His kingdom is the most important thing in your life. So you will be a good and diligent employee, you will be a trustworthy part of your family, you will be a faithful friend, and you will trust God in each area of your life to take care of you as you approach each different area in a godly way.

A solution to viewing Christianity as a social club is...

Viewing your Christian faith as a commitment to God and to His spiritual family.

John 1:12–13 CSB

12 But to all who did receive him, he gave them the right to be children of God, to those who believe in his name, 13 who were born, not of natural descent, or of the will of the flesh, or of the will of man, but of God.

1 John 3:1–3 CSB

1 See what great love the Father has given us that we should be called God’s children—and we are! The reason the world does not know us is that it didn’t know him. 2 Dear friends, we are God’s children now, and what we will be has not yet been revealed. We know that when he appears, we will be like him because we will see him as he is. 3 And everyone who has this hope in him purifies himself just as he is pure.

Being a Christian isn’t just membership in some club with special benefits, it means that we have become family together with other Christians and children of God. Our allegiance is not just to ourselves, but to God and His family. We will study next week about Spiritual gifts, and how those gifts are given to each of us in order that we may help and contribute to the health and growth of the Church as a whole. As part of that commitment to God and to His people, we should rely on the Holy Spirit to help us understand the role He wants us to play in the bigger picture of His plan for His church.

Finally, a solution to viewing Christianity as an insurance policy is...

Viewing your Christian walk as an investment with eternal benefits and payoffs, not just an insurance policy.

I have insurance, and I have investments. The way I approach them is very different. Insurance is something I set up to bail me out of an emergency (or my family, in the case of my life insurance). I signed up for it, and even though I pay my premiums on a regular basis, I don’t really think of it, except to remind myself that I have it and for a sense of peace every once in a while. My investments, though, are something I think of a lot more often. I actively look for ways to make them grow, I look for opportunities to make new investments, I am more involved in making sure they produce something of value both for now and for the future.

My faith in Jesus, and my journey with the Holy Spirit is an ongoing walk that I continue to invest in; I look for opportunities to grow, and for new opportunities to make additional investments. Sometimes I invest in myself, by working on developing different fruit of the Spirit in my life; other times I invest in other people by sharing the Gospel with them, or helping them grow spiritually in their own lives. Sometimes my investment is in the form of obedience, even when it’s hard to obey; other times it’s in the form of initiative and seeking God out in His Word.

Ultimately, I know that this investment will pay off not just by bringing me peace and joy and a feeling of purpose in this life, but it will continue to pay dividends throughout eternity as God has promised that my investments in His kingdom result in treasures in heaven (whatever those may be). Those treasures might be the joy of seeing loved ones in heaven with me. Or they might be some sort of reward for obedience or faithfulness to what God has asked of me. Or it might be some kind of responsibility or trust that I will be given in heaven because I was responsible and trustworthy with what God gave me here on earth. Whatever it may be, my investment has rewards and consequences that last for eternity, so I can be encouraged to be faithful and keep pressing on when things get hard here on earth, because the result of that investment is so big.

So, let’s quickly look at some of the ways we can invest in the eternal. Let’s look at how we can invest in our relationship with the Holy Spirit.

Investing in your relationship with the Holy Spirit:

Why is it a good idea to invest in our relationship with the Holy Spirit? As we looked at in the first sermon in this series, I told you that the Holy Spirit is a person, just like the God the Father and Jesus the Son are persons. I don’t mean that the Holy Spirit is human, He is not. I mean that the Spirit is an individual, He has a will, and feelings, and a personality, and other attributes that make Him an individual being separate from other beings. He is a being who desires relationship with us. Just like it takes me time to get another person here on earth (I’ve been married to my wife, Shannon, for almost 21 years and I still am learning new things about her), it takes time to get to know an infinite, all-powerful and complex being. So, we should be constantly seeking to know the Holy Spirit more, and to understand Him and relate to Him more deeply. This pursuit that will last all our lives, and continue into eternity.

Our goal should be to know God better five years from now than we know Him today. Hopefully you know Him better than you did five years ago. It is tragic that some people have accepted Jesus as Savior, but have not done much since then to get to know God more and more. Still, no matter whether you have been growing in knowing Him every year, or if you’ve been stuck in one place for a long time, we can make a decision to grow in our relationship with God from today forward. Here are five ways that we can do this:

1. Honor Jesus Christ.

A while back we were studying the Gospel of John, and we saw that Jesus said:

John 7:38–39 CSB

38 The one who believes in me, as the Scripture has said, will have streams of living water flow from deep within him.” 39 He said this about the Spirit. Those who believed in Jesus were going to receive the Spirit, for the Spirit had not yet been given because Jesus had not yet been glorified.

Jesus was promising that those who believed in Him would receive the Holy Spirit. What was the first thing that happened in the book of Acts when the disciples received the Holy Spirit? They told people about Jesus. They honored Him, told others about Him, and experienced the power of the Holy Spirit in the process.

A little later, Acts 4 tells of a time when Peter and John were on their way to the Temple and they came across a lame, or crippled man. They healed him and he came into the temple with Peter and John, and everyone was wondering how this man was healed because everyone knew who he was and they knew he couldn’t walk. Peter didn’t take the credit for himself, he honored Jesus and used the opportunity to share about Jesus and His sacrifice and salvation to everyone in the crowd that day, and the Bible tells us that 5,000 believed that day. Peter and John were arrested, and they once more honored Jesus when they were called to defend themselves...

Acts 4:10 CSB

10 let it be known to all of you and to all the people of Israel, that by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom you crucified and whom God raised from the dead—by him this man is standing here before you healthy.

Throughout these different opportunities to honor Jesus, the disciples experienced the power of the Holy Spirit in ways they had not at other times.

Always remember that you will know the Spirit more intimately as you make more of Jesus Christ the Lord. Honor him by obedience, honor him by witness, honor him by testimony; and as we honor Christ, we will have fellowship with the Holy Spirit.

2. True disciples walk in righteousness.

God cannot have fellowship with a man or woman that is not living right or walking right. Read the words of Jesus teachings and Paul’s letters and see if He does not expect His people to be clean and right. Jesus says in Luke 6...

Luke 6:43–46 CSB

43 “A good tree doesn’t produce bad fruit; on the other hand, a bad tree doesn’t produce good fruit. 44 For each tree is known by its own fruit. Figs aren’t gathered from thornbushes, or grapes picked from a bramble bush. 45 A good person produces good out of the good stored up in his heart. An evil person produces evil out of the evil stored up in his heart, for his mouth speaks from the overflow of the heart. 46 “Why do you call me ‘Lord, Lord,’ and don’t do the things I say?

In other places, Jesus tells His disciples that if they love Him, they will obey His commands.

The idea that I can come to Jesus by grace, and have all my sins forgiven, and have my name written in heaven, and at the same time I can raise hell on my way to heaven is found nowhere in the Bible. We are saved by faith in Jesus Christ alone, one way that we prove that our faith is real is living a life of goodness and righteousness. No, we don’t earn our salvation by doing good works, but just like flowers don’t bring on Springtime, Springtime is recognized because of the flowers. In the same way, good works don’t bring salvation, but salvation is recognized in a person’s life because their lives change and they start walking in righteousness.

Sin is what interrupts our walk with the Holy Spirit, and obedience to God is how the relationship with the Spirit is maintained.

A third way we can invest in our relationship with the Spirit is we can...

3. Seek to know Him in His Word.

Remember that He inspired the writers of the Bible and He will be revealed in its pages. Read it much, read it often, study it, think it over when you read it, try to understand it and ask the Spirit to help you understand as you study it. The Bible is not a dead book between covers; it is a living book. What that means is that God uses this book to actively speak to us, reveal Himself to us, and change us. God is in this book, and if you want to find Him go into the book.

Don’t try to grow your relationship with the Holy Spirit without the Word of God. Too often people try to understand who God is and who the Holy Spirit is based on their ideas, or on someone else’s ideas that are not biblical, or that take biblical passages out of context or mis-apply them. Not long ago, I was talking to an older man. He told me that every person who had a sincere faith and who was following their own beliefs faithfully would be welcomed by God into heaven. The situation we were in was not one that really lent itself to me correcting his mistake, but it saddened me that he thought that he himself was a faithful Christian even while some of his ideas about God and Christianity were completely contrary to what the Bible actually teaches. This friendly and seemingly kind man had made a serious mistake in developing his understanding of God and Christianity. This happens to many people who call themselves Christians because instead of digging into the Bible, or as Pastor Nick likes to say it, diving into Scripture and seeking desperately to know God and know His teachings, know His priorities, know the message of the Gospel, many people are comfortable with a vague idea of what the Bible says, and they actually fill in the details with what they hear other misinformed Christians tell them, or worse, they fill in the gaps of their faith by what they hear the world around them saying is right, what they feel God must be like, and how they want to live their lives. We cannot truly understand God unless we are regularly reading the Bible, studying it, thinking about what it means and how it applies to our lives.

A fourth way to grow our relationship to the Spirit is to...

4. Recognize the Spirit.

Cultivate the art of recognizing the presence of the Spirit around you. God’s Spirit fills the world; you cannot walk away from where He is. If you are interested in Him, you will find Him where you are, so keep your spiritual eyes open and ask Him to show you where He is active. Years ago there was a Bible study that came out called Experiencing God. It was a great study, and I recommend it to you if you haven’t done it, but one of the steps it talked about was to look around and try to identify where God is already at work around you, and join Him there. When we join the Spirit in places that He is already working, then we get to be part of what He is doing to draw others to Himself.

Finally,

5. Reflect and Change.

Ask yourself a hard question. “What is it that has been hindering me from walking closer to God?” If you have not grown closer to God, why is that?

As one way to discover the answer to this bigger question,

Here are some questions to use as you go through your priorities and things that take up your time and thoughts:

How does this draw me closer of push me farther from God?

How does this make me more or less sensitive to God and what He cares about?

Does this make me love God more or love the world more?

Does this make me want to spend more time in God’s Word or less time?

Does this make God happy or disappointed?

Hebrews 13:20–21 CSB

20 Now may the God of peace, who brought up from the dead our Lord Jesus—the great Shepherd of the sheep—through the blood of the everlasting covenant, 21 equip you with everything good to do his will, working in us what is pleasing in his sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory forever and ever. Amen.