Church Builders #3

Walking in the Spirit

Living a Spirit-filled life might be the most often overlooked aspect of discipleship. We readily acknowledge that God is the creator and sustainer of our universe. We understand that salvation is by His grace and that Jesus died for the sins of His people! To become a Primitive Baptist you have you have to be able to quote Romans 8:29-33 and Ephesians 1:4. That might be a slight exaggeration, but not so much :-)

But how much attention do we give to the Holy Spirit? This third aspect of the Trinity is oftentimes ignored in our everyday lives, is it not? I have recently become convicted of this reality in my own personal walk. I will soon be secularly unemployed and have been seeking a new job. Needless to say, it is a tough climate to be doing such! Unfortunately, I have allowed this setback to be too much of a distraction. There have been nights that I have stayed awake worrying about things that have not yet happened. It has been a distraction in my studies and at times downright overwhelming. In other words, I have not been walking in the Spirit. If I were, this (and other) difficulties would not be so paralyzing.

I find the same to be true in our church bodies. We allow the inevitable challenges of life to elicit worldly responses instead of spiritual. We let worry and uncertainty to prevent us from doing what the body of Christ is called to do; act as the salt of the earth and shine light in this world of darkness (Matthew 6).

• We fear the consequences of sharing the doctrines of God’s sovereign grace because it is diametrically opposed to what much of the rest of our society believes.
• We despair because of our small numbers and think no one would want to be a part of our community of believers.
• We allow anger and bitterness to take over when inevitable conflict occurs amongst those who make up our church body.
• We constantly worry about when ‘the other shoe is going to drop’ when things are progressing well.

These attitudes all result from the church neglecting to walk by the Spirit. It is vital to understand what the Holy Spirit does for us. Notice what Jesus says to His disciples about the Holy Spirit:

John 14:16-18 - And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you for ever; Even the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye know him; for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you. I will not leave you comfortless: I will come to you.

First, we notice that the Holy Spirit is a comfort to the church. He is literally there for our aide. Strong’s defines the Comforter as the one who gives divine strength needed to enable us to undergo trials and persecutions on behalf of the divine kingdom. Do you see that we have divine empowerment as God’s people? The Spirit miraculously gives us (the church) strength that the world knows nothing about.

Second, the Holy Spirit testifies of the truth. As mentioned earlier, many have an intellectual knowledge of the truths contained in scripture. Hopefully, our churches testify of divine truth and experience the blessings of truth to some degree. But it is easy to forget them in the midst of trials. Thanks be to God that our Comforter can encourage us with the timeless truths of the Bible. In our verse above, Jesus would soon be crucified and ascend to Heaven. He would no longer walk in the midst of the disciples. But they would not be left to figure things out on their own. He would dwell in their hearts and encourage them in truth and righteousness through the Spirit.

Finally, we notice the permanence of the Holy Spirit. Jesus promised to not leave us comfortless. You may ask why then do we worry, doubt, act in the flesh, etc? It is not that the Spirit has left us. The Bible teaches that He will never leave us nor forsake us (Hebrews 13:5). God is unchangeable. The difficulties arise when we forsake Him. The Apostle Paul warns us not to quench the Spirit in 1 Thessalonians 5:19. How does this happen? Based on the surrounding verses of this warning, it occurs when we are in the flesh. Forgetting to pray, being unthankful, ingratitude, flirting with evil, rendering evil for evil, and many more worldly attitudes cause us to extinguish the Spirit of God in our lives and in the life of our churches.

The good news is that the Spirit of God has not moved one inch. He is where he has always been. He dwells in the heart of every born-again elect child of God. Our responsibility is to continually recalibrate our lives to the standard of scripture. It is there that we find the divine comfort and encouragement of the Spirit of God. This is where we need to be as a church body. The alternative is unpleasant darkness. I encourage you to read about the Church of Ephesus in Revelation 2. The Spirit can remove itself from a body of believers if they insist on repeatedly quenching the Spirit and leave their first love.

On a positive note, our churches will grow both in grace and knowledge of the truth when we walk in the Spirit. I have been studying the Book of Acts over the past several days. If correct, I have noted sixty mentions of the Spirit in this book. That is significant! We oftentimes refer to Acts as the place to go to discern the correct practical/doctrinal pattern of our churches. Lord help us to also remember that everything that we do as a church should revolve around the Holy Spirit as well.

We please God and are personally comforted when we are filled with the Spirit. Lord help us to apply this truth!

Ephesians 5:14 - Wherefore he saith, Awake thou that sleepest, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give thee light. See then that ye walk circumspectly, not as fools, but as wise, Redeeming the time, because the days are evil. Wherefore be ye not unwise, but understanding what the will of the Lord is. And be not drunk with wine, wherein is excess; but be filled with the Spirit; Speaking to yourselves in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord; Giving thanks always for all things unto God and the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ; Submitting yourselves one to another in the fear of God.