The Mission Continues Part 2.2
The Jesus Mission Continues • Sermon • Submitted
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· 8 viewsThe Fellowship of the Holy Spirit: It must be cultivated.
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The Jesus Mission Continues Part 2.2 - The Fellowship of the Holy Spirit: How it must be cultivated.
The Jesus Mission Continues Part 2.2 - The Fellowship of the Holy Spirit: How it must be cultivated.
PREACHING OUTLINE
Introduction: Most Jesus followers often say they desire the will of God and the inspiration and empowerment only the Spirit of God can bring, but they continue to face in two directions. Like Lot’s wife they know to leave the world but they look back yearning for what they left. They want the things of the Spirit of God - but they also some of the world. They think the Spirit of God does not mind but they do not realize that friendship with the world creates hostility with God’s Spirit.
Ha-Foke-Bah
De-Cola-Bah
Ha-Foke-Bah
Ha-Foke-Bah
Mashiach-Bah
Turn it, and turn it, everything you need is in it.
Reflect on it, grow old and gray with it.
Do not turn from it.
The Messiah is in it.
10 But they rebelled and grieved His Holy Spirit. So He became their enemy and fought against them.
30 And don’t grieve God’s Holy Spirit. You were sealed by Him for the day of redemption.
1 But for right now, friends, I’m completely frustrated by your unspiritual dealings with each other and with God. You’re acting like infants in relation to Christ, 2 capable of nothing much more than nursing at the breast. Well, then, I’ll nurse you since you don’t seem capable of anything more. 3 As long as you grab for what makes you feel good or makes you look important, are you really much different than a babe at the breast, content only when everything’s going your way?
9 Then Peter said to her, “Why did you agree to test the Spirit of the Lord? Look! The feet of those who have buried your husband are at the door, and they will carry you out!” 10 Instantly she dropped dead at his feet. When the young men came in, they found her dead, carried her out, and buried her beside her husband.
1 Hear this word that the Lord has spoken against you, O children of Israel, against the whole family which I brought up from the land of Egypt, saying: 2 “You only have I known of all the families of the earth; Therefore I will punish you for all your iniquities.” 3 Can two walk together, unless they are agreed?
Bible: Contrary to what most Christians like to think, the Spirit of God grieves vexingly when we break the unity of the Spirit, and this may explain why so many Jesus followers do not experience the inspiration nor power nor blessings nor gifts of the Holy Ghost.
All these passages are a reflection and a warning
A reflection on who Israel grieved during their journey from Egypt to Promised Land.
Isaiah was reflecting on the whole of Israel’s rebellion in the wilderness not just one act but each act that made up all the rebellions.
Isa 63:10
10 But they rebelled and grieved His Holy Spirit. So He became their enemy and fought against them.
The verb עָצַב ʿāṣab “grieve” describes acute emotional turmoil and anger that is produced in you when someone you love is hurt, injured, or violated.
Illustrate עָצַב ʿāṣab: How Jonathan felt when Saul, his father, was throwing spears to kill his best friend David (1 Sam 20:33). It says he experienced fierce anger.
Illustrate עָצַב ʿāṣab: How the Jacob’s sons felt when their sister Dinah was raped by Shechem.
Illustrate עָצַב ʿāṣab: How you feel when someone has offended, injured your wife, husband, or child. Now do you feel it?
Here is Isaiah’s point, the Holy Spirit is grieving as part of the Triune God, grieving in anger because Israel is rebelling against the God who has shown so much mercy and has kept his covenant of loyalty and love.
It is not just a reflection, it is a warning that washes over every generation, a warning that grieving the Holy Spirit has real-world consequences.
Contrary to what most Christians think, these passages are as applicable today as they were during Isaiah’s lifetime or at anytime. You say to me, “how do I know?”
1 Cor 10:11
11 These are all warning markers—danger!—in our history books, written down so that we don’t repeat their mistakes. Our positions in the story are parallel—they at the beginning, we at the end—and we are just as capable of messing it up as they were.
I cited above two different Passages from 1 Corinthians and Acts to show you how parallel our story, the story of Jesus followers, and Israel really are.
In 1 Cor 3:3 Paul is flabbergasted by the immaturity of the believers.
3 As long as you grab for what makes you feel good or makes you look important, are you really much different than a babe at the breast, content only when everything’s going your way?
Israel was content with God as long as they got what they wanted when they wanted it.
Paul says I want to lead you into triumphal faith like Joshua and David but as it is I got be like Moses and caretake a generation that yearns for the cucumbers of Egypt and only serves God when it is easy to serve Him.
I suppose I don’t need to recall to your mind the case of Ananias and his bride Sapphira who felt like virtue signaling their benevolence before everyone after the fact. And then faced immediate death. Much like Israel who decided to virtue signal their obedience after God told them they were going to wander in the desert and many of them also faced death.
Here is what I am saying, Danger: You, like Israel, can cultivate a relationship with the Holy Spirit where you become His enemy.
That brings back to this old question that Amos the prophet presented Amos 3:1-3
1 Hear this word that the Lord has spoken against you, O children of Israel, against the whole family which I brought up from the land of Egypt, saying: 2 “You only have I known of all the families of the earth; Therefore I will punish you for all your iniquities.” 3 Can two walk together, unless they are agreed?
We understand a couple of things about this question:
It is not referring to just walking down the street…covenant relationship.
It is a rhetorical questions, equivalent to a positive declaration that two separate entities do no enter a covenant without agreeing on the terms. It is an affirmation that if the two walk together, they must in some sense be one.
If two are going to walk together the must....
agree that they want to walk together
agree that is mutually beneficial to walk together
agree on expectations to be met and what happens when they are not
Anyone who has ever been married or known someone who is married I think would understand this basic idea. Let me say it clearly just in case: For two to walk together in agreement, they must be unified on the important issues of their walk and companionship and direction if they are committed to traveling together.
After intro like that you are thinking, I know what comes next. He’s going to start talking about some stuff that is going to trigger some very real feelings inside of me, or he is going start pointing a finger or this is going to get messy. I get it and I am actually with you. Preparing for this message was not easy. And several times along the way, I wanted to resist.
It is funny how the Holy Spirit brought back a single quote from a book I read about 18 months ago by Brene Brown. The quote was, “In you must go.” She uses this great illustration from Star Wars and Luke’s experience at Yoda’s swamp. I love it. She says
Walking into our stories of hurt is like walking into that cave in Yoda’s swamp. It can feel dangerous and foreboding, and what we must ultimately confront is ourself. - Brown, Brené . Rising Strong (p. 75).
I want us to walk into Yoda’s Swamp together and let’s be honest with ourselves about some of the things we are doing that grieve the Holy Spirit and keep us from cultivating vital companionship with Him.
Those things that Jesus followers do that grieve the Holy Spirit.
Demand assurances and top-secret clearance now.
This means they want God to be their Insurer.
This means they want God to not allow them to get blindsided.
They think the agreement is, “I do good things for God so he has to do good things for me.” Included but not limited to:
Getting me a good job with great pay.
Let me know of future problems or difficulties.
Keeping my children happy and healthy and healing them immediately if ill.
Bailing me out of the trouble I get in and covering my tracks.
Getting me into heaven with no questions asked.
Practice virtue signaling but not true virtue.
This means they are good at looking good. Illustrate what is happening with Google, Amazon, Apple and other companies shutting down Parler after the fact.
Jesus warned about Virtue Signaling, remember he said, “Be careful not to practice your righteousness in front of people, to be seen by them. You will have no reward from your father in heaven. Don’t sound the trumpet like the hypocrites” - Matt 6:1
They think the agreement is, “I make you look good and you make me shine.” Included but not limited to:
Make me shine to my boss.
Make me shine to my rabbi/pastor.
Make me shine to my peers and people I want to respect me.
Make me shine to strangers that I don’t really care about at all.
Give moral license to entitlement tendencies.
Here is what I mean:
You give yourself license to not follow the rules others have to. For example, other people might need to start at the bottom and work their way up, but you shouldn’t have to.
You give yourself license to ask people for favors and to be put off when others ask you for a favor. You feel massively put upon when other people ask you for small favors but expect that when you ask people for favors, it’s no big effort. You expect other people to be kind and generous to you but you show little to no mercy to other people and are willing to hang out others to dry.
You give yourself license to disregard rules that are intended for everyone’s comfort. For example, you ignore signs asking you to please turn your phone off or not use it during this time.
You give yourself license to freeload. For example, you live with your parents and drain their bank account without any thought of how you need to be responsible for yourself and repay them in some degree.
You give yourself license to inconvenience others without care to what it will mean to them. For example, you cancel appointments or reservations repeatedly; you make plans with friends and then bail on those plans without considering that your friend may have organized other plans around fitting you in; you run into a store one minute before closing without thinking about the fact you’ll be delaying the shop assistant from getting home on time. You think, "It’s only 5 minutes” without considering that the assistant may have somewhere they need to be.
You give yourself license to create a so-called safe space where you are free to criticize others but they are not allowed to respond. You treat anyone who challenges your criticism as inherently flawed or deviant at the level of being an enemy or worse the devil But you don’t believe that to be true of you.
You give yourself license to be a leader without having earned it or get the most credit for a project while doing hardly any of the work.
They think the agreement is, “I believe in you and you have highly favored me, above all.” Included but not limited to:
Everything.
Every relationship.
All the time.
Act inconsistently with their status as redeemed people.
This means when things are good God is their Father and they are his child but when things are bad God has abandoned them, orphaned them, and how dare He call himself my father.
They think the agreement is, “As long as God does good things for me I am His child.” Included but not limited to:
Maximize my pleasure and happiness.
Maximize my comfort and personal security.
Maximize my health and wealth
Maximize my eternal security over personal responsibility.
Agree that I have no major sin issues and you will not make me feel bad about mistakes I made.
Get me into heaven with no questions asked.
If we don’t want to grieve the Holy Spirit, I am going to borrow another phrase Brene Brown, “we need to own our own stories” because “denying our stories and disengaging from emotion—means choosing to live our entire lives in the dark.” - Brown, Brené . Rising Strong (p. 75).
But even more than that, it means turning your relationship with the Holy Ghost upside down and inside-out. The warning of the Scriptures is that prolonged grieving of the Holy Ghost makes an enemy out of a friend.
Pointers to help you cultivate companionship with the Holy Ghost.
Sensitize yourself to how good it feels to practice private virtue over virtue signaling.
Honor your body as a Temple of God and Holy Spirit will honor you.
Acknowledge the conviction of the Holy Spirit
Resist shaming from the Devil, Self, or Others.
Engage in the lives of other people for their sake and not yours.
Develop a robust submission to the Holy Spirit.
This is an acronym: S.H.A.R.E.D-Life
Conclusion: Now I want to recommend that you find out what it is that has been hindering you in your relationship with the Holy Spirit. Some of you may feel like you have not made progress in your spiritual life for some time. You do no know God as well as you like. Maybe, you know that you have grieved God’s Spirt in some way in your life.
Perhaps right now you don’t see any reason to change anything at all in your life. If the Spirit is not leading you please don’t start self-internalizing and looking for sin or evil that does not exist. Don’t start loading up self-criticism just to feel a connection to what I am saying. That is not the Spirit of God nor is that my goal. I want you to experience real spiritual transformation based on the Spirit’s work in your life.
For others of you, repentance may be necessary. Biblical repentance is when you turn from evil ways to restore a wonderful relationship with God. Unbiblical repentance is when you promise to work harder at being good to gain God’s favor. There may be some necessary and intentional cleaning up you need to do in your life to restore your relationship with Holy Spirit. When you do He will warm you heart and refresh soul, comfort you and bless you and make your life a fragrant aroma in God’s presence. This is how we cultivate the Spirit’s friendship and companionship.