What The Bible Says: Holy-Spirit FillingSample

WHY WE NEED HOLY SPIRIT HELP

Are you heavy-hearted? Doubting the gospel? Struggling with assurance of salvation? Paralyzed by fear? Wrestling with a tough decision? Are you battling the flesh, or fighting temptation? Do you ever wonder, “What’s wrong with me? I’m saved. I’m a Christian. Why am I not experiencing all the things has God promised me in His Word, like joy, victory, peace, and confidence?!”

Every one of these struggles reveals the need for Holy Spirit help. If you are a Christ follower, you cannot lose the Holy Spirit; He will always be living in you. But He will not always be filling you. And Holy Spirit filling means access to Holy Spirit help. 

Over the course of this week we will consider the attributes of the Holy Spirit, and what God’s Word says about how to give Him full access to your heart, soul, and life.

In Ephesians 5:18 we’re told, “And do not get drunk with wine, for that is debauchery, but be filled with the Spirit.” “Debauchery” is a term which means an overflowing of wickedness and all that flows from drunkenness and other destructive behaviors. But some translations use it more metaphorically as it’s used here, where Paul contrasts these two types of “fillings.”

I believe Paul’s parallel statement could be rightly translated: “Do not be drunk with wine, for that is excessive, but be filled with the Spirit,” implying, “for in that there is no excess.” You can certainly have too much of something that you would lean on instead of the Holy Spirit. You can be consumed by, addicted to, and wrongly attached to some other source of human strength, and it can become too much. But for all of us, in this matter of the Holy Spirit who is life in Christ, we can never have too much! We are to be “filled,” meaning permeated; thoroughly influenced; controlled. 

To live the Christian life without the filling of the Holy Spirit is absolutely impossible.

To live the Christian life with the filling of the Holy Spirit is to have life abundant.

Ask God to help you meditate on Galatians 5:16–25 today.