Joshua and Judges: The doctrine of leadership part 71 - Essential qualities of leadership: The filling of the Spirit; spirituality is productive; Gal 5.

Title: Joshua and Judges: The doctrine of leadership part 71 - Essential qualities of leadership: The filling of the Spirit; spirituality is productive; Gal 5.

 

Announcements / opening prayer:  

 

 

Principle: Spirituality is productive. Spirituality is not the avoidance of sin so much as it is the outworking of the life that is Christ.

 

GAL 5:13 For you were called to freedom, brethren; only do not turn your freedom into an opportunity [base of operations] for the flesh, but through love serve one another.

 

Christian liberty and restraint are not paradoxes in the plan of God. Grace, having and understanding the gifts of God, is the only real power of restraint in this world.

 

Neither the legalist nor the licentious antinomian has real restraint or freedom. They are both in bondage to the flesh.

 

The true restrainer is the Spirit and the word with the result that love is manifested in the life of the believer so that he does not live for self but alive to God in Christ Jesus. There is a great ignorance in the church concerning the ministries of God the Holy Spirit.

 

Paul now continues on the subject of love as the result of freedom, but in a curious light.

 

GAL 5:14 For the whole Law is fulfilled in one word, in the statement, " You shall love your neighbor as yourself."

 

Christ fulfilled the Law through love. God so loved the world that Christ was given to the world and His sacrifice fulfilled the Law.

 

Now we are under a law of love, which is serving and sacrificing for our neighbor in love, as Christ loved us. This law is the way of Christ.

 

The one word that fulfills the whole law is love and the love of Christ is now our law of life. It is the fruit of the Spirit. We must learn God's love, choose to love, strive to increase His love within us all by means of walking with the Spirit, being filled with the Spirit. We put our faith in Him to carry us along as we purpose to do His will.

 

1CO 8:13

Therefore, if food causes my brother to stumble, I will never eat meat again, that I might not cause my brother to stumble.

 

1CO 9:19

For though I am free from all men, I have made myself a slave to all, that I might win the more.

 

1CO 10:32-33

Give no offense either to Jews or to Greeks or to the church of God; just as I also please all men in all things, not seeking my own profit, but the profit of the many, that they may be saved.

 

1CO 13:4-5

Love is patient, love is kind, and is not jealous; love does not brag and is not arrogant, does not act unbecomingly; it does not seek its own, is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered,

 

It is interesting that there are so many references to the law of love in 1Co. There was jealousy and strife among them. They took their birthright of freedom of the adult son and used it as a base of operations for the flesh.

 

2TH 3:7-9

For you yourselves know how you ought to follow our example, because we did not act in an undisciplined manner among you, nor did we eat anyone's bread without paying for it, but with labor and hardship we kept working night and day so that we might not be a burden to any of you; not because we do not have the right to this, but in order to offer ourselves as a model for you, that you might follow our example.

 

HEB 10:24

and let us consider how to stimulate one another to love and good deeds

 

Php 4:5

Let your forbearing spirit be known to all men. The Lord is near.

 

Php 1:9

And this I pray, that your love may abound still more and more in real knowledge and all discernment

 

 God is love. God the Son revealed that love through His teaching and ultimately at Calvary.

 

God the Holy Spirit produces the fruit of love, GAL 5:22. Love fulfills the law of the Spirit of life, in Christ Jesus.

 

1CO 13:1 If I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but do not have love, I have become a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal.

 

1CO 13:2 And if I have the gift of prophecy, and know all mysteries and all knowledge; and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing.

 

1CO 13:3 And if I give all my possessions to feed the poor, and if I deliver my body to be burned, but do not have love, it profits me nothing.

 

EPH 3:18-19

comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled up to all the fulness of God.

 

Fullness of God means fully satisfied, satiated, and content in all things. The filling of the Spirit fully influences our souls to teach us, lead and direct us, and to empower us in love, and when we are matured in love, we become fully satisfied, made full with the fullness of God.

 

GAL 5:14 For the whole Law is fulfilled in one word, in the statement, " You shall love your neighbor as yourself."

 

He follows this truth of truths with its practical, everyday application.

 

GAL 5:15 But if you bite and devour one another, take care lest you be consumed by one another.

 

GAL 5:16 But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not carry out the desire of the flesh.

 

Following a ritual or completing a list of rules relieves the demand of investment of an entire life and limits commitment to a short period of painful time.

 

Unfortunately, this is the definition of Christianity to a lot of people, even Christians.

 

When the ritual or the list is completed, it gives the reward of allowing the person to do what he wants and to fool himself that God is finally pleased the task is done. This is a false comfort that anesthetizes the conscience so that a person may go about his life in his own way. This why the selling of indulgences was so popular. You could pay a fee and get a ticket to heaven that was tangible and visible, like a ritual.     

 

There is little blessing for any Christian until he abandons the principle of living by rules and learns to walk by the Spirit in God-ordained liberty and in fresh and unbroken fellowship with his Lord.