Holy Spirit; grieving, quenching

A. GRIEVING THE HOLY SPIRIT

 And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you are sealed until the day of redemption. (Eph 4:30).  

The Holy Spirit descended on the Lord Jesus, not as an eagle with deadly beak and claws but as a dove (Matt 3:16). He is so tender hearted, He can so easily be hurt by our unkind words, by our pushing him away when he wants to help us to take a further step along the road of sanctification.

B. QUENCHING THE HOLY SPIRIT

 Do not quench the Spirit. (1Th 5:19).  

 The Holy Spirit is like a light within our spirit. A candle can be quenched by blowing it out or squashing the flame with our two fingers. Although the Holy Spirit is the mighty Creator of heaven and earth, He will never push himself on us and only does for us what we allow him to do. He is a gentleman.

Now, when a born-again Christian persists in withstanding him, He is grieved, and withdraws further and further, to the remotest corner of our heart. His light therefor becomes so weak that we become callous and can do just about anything unthinkingly. Our conscience becomes blunted and insensitive so that the glorious work that Jesus did within us becomes unreal, just a vague remembrance; it means nothing to us anymore.

From there, it is just a small step to WILLFULLY deny, reject him. We can do this by committing some kind of sin with the specific intent of mocking him. We can also do this by, from the depth of our heart, no longer to believe in Jesus as the Son of God who died and was resurrected for our sins.

So, losing our salvation is not the result of sinning more and more, like drinking or sleeping around, until God gets fed-up with us and casts us away. The key word is “WILLFULLY” (intentionally) rejecting Christ, just as we heartily accepted him when we got saved.

What sin does, is that it paves the way to the point where our salvation means nothing to us anymore and we let go of it like Esau who sold his birthright for a plate of lintels (Gen 25:29-34). What a terrible thought! Look at the following verse:

Heb 10:26 – 29 For if we sin willfully after we have received the knowledge of the truth, there remains no more sacrifice for sins, but a certain fearful looking for judgment and fiery indignation, which shall devour the adversaries. He who despised Moses’ Law died without mercy on the word of two or three witnesses. Of how much worse punishment, do you suppose, will he be thought worthy of punishment, the one who has trampled the Son of God, and who has counted the blood of the covenant with which he was sanctified an unholy thing, and has insulted the Spirit of grace?

The breaking of our bond with God, comes from our side, never from his. He will never let go of your hand; it will be you plucking your hand from his.  Such a person loses his salvation and can never be saved again – all that remains for him is eternal punishment in hell.

C. THE BAPTISM IN THE HOLY SPIRIT and other matters relating to the work of the Spirit will be dealt with under the topic of MAN.

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