Filled with the Spirit

All Christians are commanded to "be filled with the Spirit" (Ephesians 5:18). Those who are filled with the Spirit yield to the love and power of God (Acts 1:8; Ephesians 3:19). How can we be filled with the Holy Spirit? The Bible gives us clear instruction about being filled with the Spirit.

On the Day of Pentecost the disciples were both baptized and filled with the Spirit (Acts 1:5; 2:4). They were baptized by the Spirit to become the body of Christ collectively. They were individually filled with the Spirit. Nowhere in Scripture are you commanded to be baptized with the Spirit. Believers are commanded to be filled, and to keep on being filled with the Spirit (Ephesians 5:18).

We are filled with the Holy Spirit through prayer. "And when they had prayed . . . they were all filled with the Holy Spirit" (Acts 4:31). The apostle Paul wrote his prayer for all believers to be filled with God's Spirit (Ephesians 3:14-21). Those who are filled with the Holy Spirit are filled with the power of God's love.

We are filled with the Holy Spirit yielding to Jesus Christ as Lord through prayer and obedience. For that reason, A.W. Tozer could say, "The Spirit-filled life is not a special, deluxe edition of Christianity. It is part and parcel of the total plan of God for His people."

Condemned or Justified

Justification is a legal term. In court, one accused of a crime is either condemned or justified. Based upon the merit of Christ, sinners are justified before God. His sinless life and substitutionary death on the cross for sinners is the basis for our justification. We are justified "through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus" (Romans 3:24).

We are justified by faith in Christ. "Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ" (Romans 5:1). Faith is trust and confidence, relying upon Christ alone. By faith in Christ, sinners are justified with God.

We are justified by grace alone through faith in Christ. Faith receives the grace of God in Christ. Faith is the evidence that the believer is justified before God. It is the assurance of faith. "Therefore it is of faith that it might be according to grace, so that the promise might be sure to all the seed" (Romans 4:16).

We are justified by faith alone in Christ unto righteousness. The only way we can become righteous before God is by faith alone. Righteousness is the gift of God to us. "But to him who does not work but believes on Him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is accounted for righteousness" (Romans 4:5).

Confess Jesus Is Lord

"That if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved" (Romans 10:9). Is Jesus your Lord? If so, you believe that Jesus is risen indeed. Therefore, you confess Jesus is Lord.

Jesus risen from the dead is the singular most important doctrine in the Christian faith (1 Corinthians 15:17). The salvation of every believer rests upon the resurrection of Christ. It's the miracle you must believe to be saved. Confessing Jesus as Lord is the earliest confession of the Christian faith. It focuses upon the resurrection of Jesus as our confession of faith.

You are willing to confess Jesus is Lord, when the Spirit of God convinces you (John 16:7-11). The Holy Spirit illumines the mind and brings you to repentance, a change of mind, concerning the resurrection of Christ. Then and only then, you will truly confess that Jesus is Lord, because you know the truth personally. "No one can say that Jesus is Lord except by the Holy Spirit" (1 Corinthians 12:3).

Believing the gospel and confessing from your heart that Jesus is Lord means you are saved. The word saved means to be delivered from the condemnation and judgment of your sins. Also, it means to be delivered from the wages of sin which is death (Romans 6:23). To be saved is to receive eternal life through the resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ.

The Spirit's Abiding Gifts

The Christian life is Christ in you. The Spirit of Christ, also know as the Holy Spirit indwells every believer (Romans 8:9). Upon believing the gospel of Christ, you are indwelt by the Holy Spirit, "having believed, you were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise" (Ephesians 1:13). The Holy Spirit is in you with the abiding gifts of faith, hope, and love (1 Corinthians 13:13).

The Spirit of Christ abides in you with the gift of faith. It is the faith of Jesus Christ. "Looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith" (Hebrews 12:2). The Holy Spirit abides in every Christian with the gift of faith. It is faith from Christ and faith in Christ. Faith is trust, confidence, and reliance upon Christ.

The Spirit of Christ abides in you with the gift of hope. It is your hope in Christ. The Holy Spirit brings hope in Christ. It is the hope of glory, which means the hope of the believer's glorification. Everything you are, or hope to be, is in Christ. We are "looking for the blessed hope and glorious appearing of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ" (Titus 2:13).

The Spirit of Christ abides in you with the gift of love. It is the Father's love for us in Christ and our love for Christ. Love is a gift of the Holy Spirit and the greatest evidence of Christ in you. Without the love of Christ, there is no real and true Christian life. Christ in you is the love of the Holy Spirit in your heart (Romans 5:5).

The Trinity Revealed

The Trinity of God is revealed as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The Bible clearly reveals the Trinity in your eternal salvation. There is election by the Father, redemption by the Son, and regeneration by the Holy Spirit. The three eternal Persons of the Holy Trinity work in perfect harmony from the beginning to the completion of your salvation.

Water baptism reveals a public testimony to the Trinity. Jesus commanded us to baptize believers in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit (Matthew 28:19). Praise Father, Son, and Holy Spirit for your eternal salvation. The triune God saves you to the praise of His glorious grace (Ephesians 1:6, 12, 14).

God the Father chose to save us by grace through His Son Jesus. God the Son came to reveal the fullness of God's grace (John 1:14). That grace for sinners was fully revealed at the cross of Jesus. His substitutionary death guarantees your eternal salvation, for you and all who believe the gospel (1 Cor. 15:1-4). His glorious resurrection is every believer's justification.

God the Holy Spirit is revealed as the Spirit of grace, applying eternal salvation to your heart. The Holy Spirit seals every believer as the guarantee of your eternal salvation, complete unto glorification in the day Christ returns (Ephesians 1:13-14).

God's Desire for All

"For this is good and acceptable to God our Savior, who desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth" (1 Timothy 2:3-4). God desires all to be saved from death, judgment, and everlasting punishment. God sent His Son into the world to make the one and only sacrifice which is sufficient to save sinners (Romans 3:23; 5:8).

God desires all to trust in Christ. None who sincerely trust in Christ will be turned away (John 6:37). No one who believes in Him will be disappointed (Romans 10:11). God's call to salvation is for all nations, Jew and Gentile (Romans 1:16; Acts 1:8). The gospel of Christ is freely offered to all people.

God desires all to repent and believe on the Lord Jesus Christ (Acts 16:31; 17:30). This speaks of our responsibility. Those who refuse to repent and believe on the Lord Jesus Christ are responsible for their own just condemnation (Luke 13:3, 5). All who repent and believe the gospel of Jesus Christ will be saved (John 3:36; Acts 2:37-39).

God desires all to come to "the knowledge of the truth" (1 Timothy 2:4). Jesus said, "I am the truth" (John 14:6). The Spirit of truth uses the word of truth to bring us to the one who is the truth (John 16:13; 17:17). God will not save anyone who rejects the truth. Those who reject the truth, believe the lie. They perish, "because they did not receive the love of the truth, that they might be saved" (2 Thessalonians 2:10).

What Is Foreknowledge?

God's foreknowledge includes his people in Christ. He foreknows us as justified and glorified in Christ. God foreknows our salvation as done. In Romans 8:28-30, God's purpose in salvation is a prolepsis (i.e., to see before). God foreknows all who shall be in Christ (1 Peter 1:2).

Although God foreknows us in Christ, everyone is commanded to repent and believe the gospel (Luke 13:3, 5; Acts 16:31). However, only those who repent and believe on the Lord Jesus Christ will be saved. As believers, we experienced the gospel in power with assurance. That was the Holy Spirit working in our hearts (1 Thessalonians 1:5).

God foreknows us justified by grace through faith in Christ. We are justified through the death of Jesus Christ for our sins. Justification is by faith in the power of his resurrection. Justification means all our sins are taken away through the blood of Jesus (1 John 1:7). God declares us justified by faith in Christ. "It is God who justifies" (Romans 8:33).

God foreknows us glorified in the image or likeness of Christ. Glorification is salvation complete. "We shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is" (1 John 3:2). What is future for us as believers is now in the foreknowledge of God. Therefore, God foreknows us as glorified in the very image and likeness of our Lord Jesus Christ.