Today on Fellowship in the Word, Pastor Bill Gebhardt challenges you to become a fully functioning follower of Jesus Christ. Christianity is God living out in you. Paul said, how did you come into Christianity? By faith. How do you live in Christianity?
By faith. What did God do when I came into Christianity? Everything. What's God do now that I'm a believer?
Everything. That's what the role of the Spirit of God is. He calls it the surpassing greatness of His power.
And He says, let me describe it to you. It's the working of the strength of His might, not yours. And then He said this, let me illustrate it, which He brought about in Christ when He raised Him from the dead and seated Him in His right hand.
What kind of power do you have? Resurrection power. Thank you for joining us today on this edition of Fellowship in the Word with Pastor Bill Gebhardt. Fellowship in the Word is the radio ministry of Fellowship Bible Church located in Metairie, Louisiana. Let's join Pastor Bill Gebhardt now as once again, he shows us how God's word meets our world. And in Galatians, chapter five and verse 16, Paul says this. He said, but I say, walk by the Spirit and you'll not carry out the desire of the flesh. When he says walk by the Spirit, Paul always means live by the Spirit. You need to live your life by the Spirit of God. He's saying that to those believers and to us as well. If you're going to be a Christian, you have to live by the Spirit of God. And you have that choice.
That's kind of up to you. Notice what he says. He said, for the flesh sets its desire against the Spirit, the Spirit against the flesh. He said, for these are in opposition to one another and so that you may not do the things that you please. By the way, that's a description of your life and mine. Spiritually speaking, you and I are schizophrenic.
We're all that way. We either want to carry out the desires of our flesh or we want to carry out the desires of the Spirit. He's indwelling us. But notice this choice is going to be up to us.
How we go. Notice then he says this. He said, but if you're led by the Spirit, you're not under the law. He said the deeds of the flesh are evident.
They are immorality and impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, outburst of anger, disputes, dissensions and factions, envy and drunkenness, carousing and things like these. He said, of which I forewarn you, just as I have forewarned you that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. So the flesh just brings about sin.
That's what it does. He says, so why would I want to live a life of sin? Some of you struggle with that. You know that. And I'm reading that list that describes the way you behave.
You see, you say, why would I want to live that life? He says, but the fruit of the Spirit is love and joy and peace and patience and kindness and goodness and faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. He said, against such things, there is no law. The fruit of the Spirit. Notice what it doesn't say. It doesn't say the fruits of the Spirit. Christians misunderstand this first. This is the fruit of the Spirit. In fact, all these make up just the fruit. All right, because here's what Christians have told me.
They'll say something like, you know, I love people and I have joy at some of the time and peace. I got to work on patience. I'm not very patient. That's not what he's talking about here. That's called the human good of your flesh. Some things you're better at. Some things you're better to resist.
But he's not talking about that. He's saying when the Spirit of God controls your life, you bear this fruit. And think about this fruit. When you bear fruit, it's always in context of relationship. You can't have fruit without relationship. For example, you can't have an apple if you don't have an apple tree. You see, you have to have an apple tree if you're going to have apples.
It's always based on relationship. That's why Jesus in John 15 picked it up and said, look, I'm the vine. You're the branches. You see, the only thing you need to do is stay attached to me. You need to abide in me. He said, if you abide in me and I abide in you, you'll bear much fruit.
He said, apart from me, you can do nothing. The whole idea of fruit, the Spirit of God bears the fruit. And notice this fruit. When you look at it, he said, love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.
You know who that is? That's Jesus. You bear the character of Christ. The Bible calls that being conformed to the image of Jesus Christ. He said, if you allow the Holy Spirit, if you walk with the Holy Spirit, he said, you'll bear this kind of fruit in your life.
Now, I want you to think about that. The Spirit gives all creation physical life. He gives those who are born again spiritual life. He produces the character of Christ within us. He empowers us to be a witness, according to Acts 1.8, for Jesus Christ.
According to Ephesians, he produces unity in the context of the church, of so many diverse people with different backgrounds. And according to Romans, he intercedes for us, Paul says. He prays for us. When we're not sure how to pray for ourselves at all, he said, I'll do that for you. He is the spiritual dunamis of our lives. The Spirit of God is the power of our lives. And yet for many of us, we don't even seem to realize it.
And for a lot of us, we never utilize it in our lives at all. So Paul has a prayer. Ephesians chapter one, Ephesians chapter one, Paul is going to pray.
And what's interesting is this chapter starts out wonderfully and then Paul breaks into prayer. In the beginning of the chapter in verse three, he says, Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places. How many blessings has God given you if you're a child of God in the heavenly places?
All of them. There's no blessing, he said, I won't give you. You have all that. So it sounds like it's a done deal then.
This is going to be great. But there's something between the blessings and heaven. You and I call that life. We've got to get up every day and go to work. We live in families. We have a context to live out our faith.
We have we live on a cursed planet. We have sinful bodies. Our flesh is sinful. So Paul says, I want to pray for you. And in verse 18, he says this. I pray that the eyes of your heart will be enlightened, that you will know what is the hope of his calling. What are the riches of the glory of the inheritance in the saints and what is the surpassing greatness of his power toward us who believe? These are in accordance with the working the strength of his might, which he brought about in Christ when he raised them from the dead and he seated them in his right hand in the heavenly places.
Why did Paul pray this? Because potentially you and I may never experience this. He's praying for you and he's praying for me. You may never experience this in your life. You see, there's no guarantee you'll experience this.
You're going to have a lot to say whether you experience this or not. The first thing he said, I pray that the eyes of your heart would be enlightened. You see, there has to be, is what he said in Romans 12, a renewing of your mind.
I've got to think about this differently. Secondly, he said that we don't don't know the hope of his calling. Do you know the hope of the calling of God?
Now, that's a bad word in English. You've heard me say it many times, hope, because I think for a lot of Christians, hope always means to cross your fingers and hope. That's never what the Greek word means. The Greek word hope means future certitude. Jesus is coming back. That's called the blessed hope of the church. OK, so the hope of his calling is the surety of heaven, the surety of eternal life. He said, I want you to know the hope of your calling. I say it over and over again, the worst thing that could happen to you can happen to you.
I read the end of the book and you win. You see, why? Because a lot of Christians don't know that. They don't know that they don't have peace.
And the reason they don't have peace is they don't know the hope of the calling. It's a surety. It's a guarantee. It comes from God. He said a lot of them don't realize the inheritance.
And again. What are you going to inherit? And the answer is everything.
I mean, think about that. Everything, everything that Christ inherits, you'll inherit. He said, I want you to understand this. And then he makes this statement, though. He said, and what is the surpassing greatness of his power toward us who believe? He said, I want you to understand the surpassing greatness of the power that you have.
That's what I'm trying to talk about this morning. Do you have any idea the power you have? You see, I don't think we think that way at all. See, it's in the person of the Holy Spirit.
I won't ask for hands because I'd get them all, if they were honest. How many of you are disappointed in your spiritual walk? I think almost everyone would say I'm really disappointed in myself. And you know what happens when we're disappointed in ourselves?
I hear Christians say this kind of thing all the time. You know, I'm really disappointed in my spiritual walk. You know what I'm going to do? I'm going to try harder.
Let me say something right now. Don't waste your time. You can't do this. It's a supernatural life. You can't live this by trying harder. This isn't, oh boy, I'm going to make New Year's resolutions.
I'm going to try harder. That's not what Christianity is. Christianity is God living out in you. Paul said, how did you come into Christianity? By faith. How do you live in Christianity?
By faith. What did God do when I came into Christianity? Everything. What's God do now that I'm a believer?
Everything. That's what the role of the Spirit of God is. He calls it the surpassing greatness of his power. And he says, let me describe it to you. It's the working of the strength of his might, not yours.
And then he said this. Let me illustrate it. Which he brought about in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him in his right hand. What kind of power do you have? Resurrection power.
How much power is that? How much power is to have resurrection power? Think of man, all the years, all the centuries, all of us together cumulatively. How much power do we have? I'd have to say the splitting of the atom may be our greatest single act of power. And we were able to create bombs to kill each other by the millions.
That's what we did with our power. But let me ask you something about man. Can he raise a dead person? Does man have the power to raise someone who's dead?
Nope. He doesn't. He doesn't have that kind of power. But you have that kind of power. That's what Paul just said. You have that kind of power.
You see, that's where we get so indifferent to this, it doesn't relate to us in any sensible way. Well, the question is, how do we get it? How do I tap into it? Turn a few pages to Ephesians chapter 5, verse 18. How do I tap into this power that we're talking about?
How do I allow this power, the power of the Holy Spirit, to be in control of my life? Here's what Paul says, verse 18. He said, do not get drunk with wine, for that is dissipation.
Not a real good word. Let me just say it this way. Getting drunk stupid.
Everybody knows that. You get drunk, you're stupid. And the reason you're stupid is alcohol now controls you. And that inevitably can get you in a world of trouble. He said, that's dissipation.
Letting alcohol control you is foolishness. Then he says this. But be filled with the Spirit. He doesn't mean filling up like a gas tank. He doesn't mean I'm filled up with the Spirit to my knees, and now the Spirit is not a liquid. He's not a gas. He's a person. He's in control, or you're in control.
That's what he is saying. Be controlled by the Spirit of God, the way alcohol can control you. Be controlled by the Spirit of God. And he said, whenever that happens, look what happens to you. Speaking to one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs.
Singing and making melody in your heart. He said to the Lord, always giving thanks for all things in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ to God, even your father. And be subject to one another, he said, in fear of Christ. When the Spirit of God controls me, I worship God.
And I don't mean corporately, just on a Sunday morning. I mean daily, in my heart. I sing and make melody in my heart. I worship God. I give thanks to God for all the circumstances in my life.
On the horizontally, what's it look like? The best way I could see it is, he says, be subject to one another. That word subject is hupotasso. And hupotasso means to voluntarily line yourself up under.
I have less rank than you. Paul said to the Philippians, consider everybody else as more important than you are. That's what happens when the Spirit of God controls you. If you're a wife, you subject yourself to your husband. If you're a husband, you subject yourself to your wife. If you're a parent, you subject yourself to the child. If you're a child, you subject yourself to the parent. If you're a slave, you subject yourself to the master. And if you're a master, you subject yourself to the slave. Now, I don't mean in the sense, the roles don't change. Each person there has a role to fulfill.
He's not talking about roles. He's talking about our attitude. This has tremendous humility built into it. Again, the character of Christ. Now, to give some enlighten on this, go with me now to Colossians chapter 3. Colossians chapter 3.
Paul's going to give us another set of insights as to what do I mean, how do I get controlled by the Spirit of God? He starts out in verse 12 of Colossians 3, and he says, so as those who have been chosen of God, that's us. He said, holy and beloved, that's us. He said, you need to put on the heart of compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience, there against the fruit of the Spirit. He said, bearing with one another, forgiving each other, he said, whoever has a complaint against anyone, just as the Lord also forgave you, so also should you. He said, behold, beyond all these things, put on love, which is the perfect bond of unity. He said, let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body.
And be thankful. And then he says this, you need to let the word of Christ richly dwell within you. You need to allow the word of God to richly dwell within you, to have a meaningful relationship with you.
Now you're going to say, well, why is that so the key to the filling? Watch. What happens if I let the word of Christ indwell me richly? He said, with all wisdom, teaching and admonishing one another with psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with thankfulness in your hearts to God. He said, whatever you do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks through him to God the Father. Then he says, wives, be subject to your husbands. Husbands, love your wives. Children, be obedient to your parents.
Fathers, don't exasperate. Your children, slaves, in all things. He said, obey those who are your masters on earth.
And he says, masters, grant to your slaves justice and fairness. It's the same result. If you're controlled by the spirit of God in Ephesians, you will act exactly the same way as when you let the word of Christ indwell you richly in Colossians.
They're equal. It's how the spirit of God controls you. You see, that's the beauty of this. God has set up a system where you should never fail, but we do. The Holy Spirit inspired the writing of the word of God. We call it inspiration. The words are his words. We believe in the inerrancy of scripture.
Every word, verbal plenary, all the words, every word, inspired by God in the original autographs. But he not only inspired the word and he protects the word, but he also says he teaches you. That's what Jesus said, the Holy Spirit's your teacher. He'll give you spiritual insight into the word of God.
But he's not done. He also says, I'll give you the power to obey it. I'll be the power for you to obey the word of God. That's what the Holy Spirit can do in your life. You see, he not only inspired the writing, he's teaching me how to use it, but I can actually obey it in my life.
How's he doing in your life? We all prayed that you and I would utilize the Holy Spirit in our life. God commanded us to be filled by the Holy Spirit in our lives.
I want to ask you some blunt questions. It's just between you and the Lord. Are you persisting in disobedience? You persist in it. You see, you live with the whole, over and over again, you're just consistently persisting a disobedience of God.
If you're honest with yourself, let me ask you a second question. Do you really neglect your faith? Now, you want your faith, by the way, when something bad happens to you. Then you'll run to God and tell him, oh, I'm God, I'm back, I'm sorry, if you can help get me out of this. But I mean, do you neglect your faith?
Is it compartmentalized to you? Thirdly, is there somebody you haven't forgiven because they hurt you deeply? We just read the verses.
We're to forgive, just as Christ has forgiven us. You're holding onto that in your flesh, sort of a root of bitterness in your heart. You see, if that's happening, you know what the word of God says is happening in your relationship with the Holy Spirit? You're quenching him. He has great power, but you know what? He won't work without you. He'll only work with you. That's the Spirit of God.
He'll work with you, but he won't work without you. That choice is yours. You can live in the flesh, or you can live in the power of the Spirit of God. You have to let the Spirit of God lead your life, change your life, and empower you. That's his role.
If I was using an imagery, I'd sort of say it this way. The Holy Spirit is sort of like the sergeant. You and I are the platoon.
We just simply follow the sergeant. He's more like the drum major. We're the band.
Wherever the drum major goes, we want to go. That's the way this thing works. That's his role in our life. We are to stay in step with him. It says in the Bible, if we do, we bear fruit. Whenever you bear fruit, God's glorified.
It's for the betterment of all the people around you, and it's for your own good. That's the beauty of all this. I don't know if you think about that enough. The same power that pushed the stone away from a grave, the same power that pushed the stone away and caused Christ to be raised from the dead can shove away all the doubt in your life.
He can overcome any single barrier that you have for him. It's that kind of power. You have resurrection power. My prayer for you is I just wish you would sense that in your own life.
A two-wheeled tricycle doesn't really function, and a two-legged tripod will never be what it was designed to be. But the same is true of us. We have to avail ourself of the greatest thing that God has offered us, the Spirit of God. In Jesus' last words, you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you.
Let's pray. Father, I don't believe that we decide not to utilize the Holy Spirit in our lives. But I think, Father, through neglect or apathy or indifference, we don't. We don't realize this treasure, as Paul says, that we have in these earthen vessels, the incredible presence of God through his Holy Spirit, the capacity that we have to walk rightly before you, to enjoy what Jesus called the abundant life, a life of joy and hope and peace, to be used by you in great ways, to minister to the needs of others, and to help in the process of leading people to a saving knowledge of our Savior. Father, I pray that you would deeply go into the hearts of each and every one of us and make us deal with this question, Do I really utilize? Am I dependent on the Spirit of God in my life at all?
Or am I now trying to live out my Christianity by the flesh and I am reaping what I am sowing? Father, I pray that of all these kind of messages, this one hits home for us because it unleashes your power in our lives. This we pray in Jesus' name.
Amen. And you can listen to Fellowship in the Word online. At that website, you will find not only today's broadcast, but also many of our previous audio programs as well. At Fellowship in the Word, we are thankful for those who financially support our ministry and make this broadcast possible. We ask all of our listeners to prayerfully consider how you might help this radio ministry continue its broadcast on this radio station by supporting us monthly or with just a one-time gift. Support for our ministry can be sent to Fellowship in the Word 4600 Clearview Parkway, Metairie, Louisiana 7006. If you would be interested in hearing today's message in its original format, that is as a sermon that Pastor Bill delivered during a Sunday morning service at Fellowship Bible Church, then you should visit our website, fbcnola.org.
That's fbcnola.org. At our website, you will find hundreds of Pastor Bill's sermons. You can browse through our sermon archives to find the sermon series you are looking for, or you can search by title. Once you find the message you are looking for, you can listen online, or if you prefer, you can download the sermon and listen at your own convenience. And remember, you can do all of this absolutely free of charge. Once again, our website is fbcnola.org. For Pastor Bill Gebhardt, I'm Jason Gebhardt, thanking you for listening to Fellowship in the Word.
Whisper: medium.en / 2024-01-31 20:15:25 / 2024-01-31 20:25:42 / 10