Ephesians overview – 3:14-19, Filled by God to be alive with Christ (Rom 6), part 3.

Quench (sbennumi - put out like a fire) the Spirit – not following the commands.

The Holy Spirit empowers us like an inner furnace when we obey by faith.

We arrive at this conclusion through the context of the passage in 1Th 5:19.

After several commands concerning our conduct in life, a new sentence is begun:

1Th 5:19-22

Do not quench the Spirit; 20 do not despise prophetic utterances. 21 But examine [dokimazo] everything carefully; hold fast to that which is good; 22 abstain from every form of evil.

Hold fast [katecho] to the good [kalos – honorable, admirable]. Abstain from all form [eidos – an appearance or external form] of evil.

How do we discern the external appearance of evil? We examine everything.

So simply put, and yet, taking it to heart is a life long fight, and a good fight at that. As David faced Goliath, the battle is the Lord’s. The Holy Spirit is within us to strengthen us with power when we choose to hold fast to the honorable and abstain from any appearance of evil.

Living the Christ-life is the way of guarding the treasure within you, which is the Christ dwelling at home in our hearts.

2Ti 1:14

Guard, through the Holy Spirit who dwells in us, the treasure which has been entrusted to you.

Col 2:3 Christ, in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. Eph 3:17 strengthened with power by the Spirit so that the Christ may dwell at home in our hearts. Hold fast to the good and abstain from the evil so you do not quench the Spirit. It is a supernatural life for born-again believers who obey and hold fast to good. The more areas of our life we hand over to the Trinity, the more supernatural results will we see.

We can only live it by the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit empowers us like an inner furnace when we obey by faith.

This experiment, if that is the right word, is that we have been made the subjects that fit the Lord’s kingdom, being made new within, existing in the Lord’s kingdom in position while not living in the environment of that kingdom. We are in His kingdom but not yet physically there, currently residing in Satan’s kingdom. It drives Satan nuts when our light shines in his world.

We are light in a dark world filled with self-centered, proud, lustful people. We love the Lord’s kingdom of justice and righteousness and truth while we are surrounded by unjust kingdoms ruled by power hungry, money loving, unwise, lying people. We carry within us the keys to the kingdom of God, the gospel, and find that so many don’t want to enter.

The plan of the Father, in the end, was not to make a just and wise kingdom of fallen men with Jesus on the throne enforcing the law. Yet in fact, this will be done for a thousand years in which God will fulfill all covenants to Israel. And as is told in the scripture, Christ will have to rule with a rod of iron because there will be many who turn lawless, though living in a kingdom where righteousness is perfectly enforced. There is a great difference between a kingdom where righteousness has to be enforced and one that is filled with perfectly righteous men who need no enforcement. Who don’t even talk of good as something to do, except maybe as a joke, but talk of life itself which is inherently good.

So we suffer in this world, always examining everything to see if it is good or evil, knowing that one of Satan’s key weapons is deception.

Yet our King has gone before us, behind enemy lines, exposing Himself to the world, taking upon Himself every temptation it could throw at Him, every heartache that is inherent in it, every suffering that its petty residents could summon, physically and verbally, and He overcame all of it, and not by fighting against it, but standing in the truth and trusting the Father. And then He told us before He left us here to wait for Him:

He told us to wait for Him and to be like Him while we do, for He has made us able.

We examined a few passages in John revealing our Lord’s words in the Upper Room and in Gethsemane just hours before His trials. We return to our Lord’s prayer in Gethsemane.

Joh 17:24-26

"Father, I desire that they also, whom Thou hast given Me, be with Me where I am, in order that they may behold My glory, which Thou hast given Me; for Thou didst love Me before the foundation of the world. 25 "O righteous Father, although the world has not known Thee, yet I have known Thee; and these have known that Thou didst send Me; 26 and I have made Thy name known to them, and will make it known; that the love wherewith Thou didst love Me may be in them, and I in them."

This prayer shows just how much God loves the human race.

Joh 16:33

"These things I have spoken to you, that in Me you may have peace. In the world you have tribulation, but take courage; I have overcome the world."

In this experiment, we are tried in every promise, in every truth, in every virtue due to the fact that we live in a fallen world whose prince is Satan and that we new creatures within are still housed in the flesh.

We have to fight the “good” fight, run the race, finish the course, laying aside every encumbrance and the sin that so eagerly entangles us, and run with endurance while fixing our eyes on Jesus. Our lives are to be characterized by words like resistance, diligence, perseverance, patience, striving, running, fighting, reaching. And we do it all surrounded by the love of God that will never separate from us, and the Holy Spirit within who will never leave our side, and the word of God in our soul that will always be available to us. It is imperative that we overcome every obstacle.

We have to make decisions to walk in sanctification or holiness, and it is the love of God for us that strengthens our decisions for God, for from that love flows all blessings and gifts, including Christ Himself.

This is what Paul prays for us in Eph 3.

It is vital to know the truth of Rom 5:12-21, for from it comes the victory to live the life given; explained in chapters 6-8. Too many Christians, or professing Christians do not know it. Do you live a weak Christian life, partial obedience, uncaring for the entirety of the Christ-life? Without committing blatant evil, are you defeated in many spheres? If so, and if a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ, you are like a millionaire gone mad and roaming the streets looking through garbage cans for sustenance.

Rom 6:1-2

What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace might increase? 2 May it never be! How shall we who died to sin still live in it?

It is a fact that we died to sin because of the obedience of the One; Rom 5:19 For as through the one man's disobedience the many were made sinners, even so through the obedience of the One the many will be made righteous.

But it is clear in Rom 6, as much as it is in our own experience, that we can still live in sin. But that fact does not make us concede defeat by sin. Paul challenges our conclusive or demonstrative faith with several questions: first, “How shall we who died to it still live in it?” (vs. 2)

Then, in case you couldn’t answer it:

Rom 6:3

Or do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus have been baptized into His death?

Concluding in:

Rom 6:4-7

Therefore we have been buried [aorist indicative] with Him through baptism into death, in order that as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life. 5 For [the conclusion is immoveable] if we have become united with [sumphutos: planted with] Him in the likeness of His death, certainly we shall be [future indicative] also in the likeness of His resurrection, 6 knowing this, that our old self was crucified with Him, that our body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer [present infinitive: no time element, continuous, i.e. what type we are] be slaves to sin; 7 for he who has died is freed from sin.