Why Does The Word Of God Say, Do Not Grieve The Holy Spirit?

Why does the word of God say do not grieve the Holy Spirit? That's our message. The text is taken from Ephesians 4 and 30.

As tensions rise among nations in the world, some of which are nuclear armed, the likelihood of a world leader pulling the trigger on a nuclear bomb, becomes more and more possible every day. It should concern us all that there have been a couple of these leaders who have made serious nuclear threats recently. We live in a time where if someone says they're going to kill someone or that they are thinking about committing suicide, there's a good possibility that they will at least attempt to go through with their threat. This is the generation of the cold-hearted, coldblooded, last days earth dwellers that the Bible warned us about. At their fingertips, they have deadly information that enables them to do almost anything imaginable. These are truly the perilous times the Bible warns us about.

Father, we give You thanks and praise for Your love and mercy. Thank You for this word. Bless it as it goes forth. Give wisdom, knowledge and understanding to the listeners. And oh God, give us an awareness of Your Holy Spirit and who He is and how we are to deal with Him. We thank You for causing us to be sensitive about the things of the Spirit. Bless us, Father, in Jesus name we pray. Amen.

But the good news is that the Word of God says born again believers in Christ are sealed by the Holy Spirit until the day of redemption. This word sealed means that we are royally marked. We are stamped or labeled as God's precious possessions. And redemption day means the day when the purchaser will come to claim his purchased possession. This day of redemption is the day that all believers in Christ are waiting for. The day of the gathering, the day of the rapture as it is more commonly called. Therefore, when the Holy Spirit comes into the heart of the believer, He is a guarantee that on an unknown day in the very near future, Christ will come to rescue and restore the believer unto Himself and the Father. Christ tells us that this day of His return will come quickly. Though it seems long, it is actually not so long. And He has promised that He will bring rewards for His faithful children.

Now to grieve someone is to cause them pain, sorrow and sadness by behaving in a manner that is not pleasing to them. The hurt person may respond in anger or they may withdraw. They may experience sleep disturbances or changes in their appetite. In light of this, we are warned not to grieve the Holy Spirit with whom we are sealed. And the Lord never sends out a warning unless there are real consequences if we do not heed His warnings.

In Ephesians 4:30, we are told the following. And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God. By whom you were sealed for the day of redemption. Let all bitterness, wrath, anger, clamor, which means commotion and uproar, and evil speaking be put away from you with all malice. And be kind to one another, tender-hearted, forgiving one another even as God in Christ forgave you. There are a whole range of emotions that people go through as they are grieving.

Feelings such as sadness, shock, numbness, and anger. Then there's withdrawal, sleep disturbances, or changes in their appetite. Grieving can eventually lead to depression and other anxiety issues. Of course, the Holy Spirit has enough healthy emotional muscle to deal with the downside of grief, but too often we don't. He is well able to deal with the grieving process. Nevertheless, He continues to be pained for us because in the end, we will be the big losers. He knows that there are painful consequences that await those who make Him sad by their sinfulness.

Apparently, grieving the Holy Spirit is something that people of God do to Him quite frequently. We don't normally think or believe that we're able to hurt God's feelings, but clearly He allows us to do this and is pained. For instance, in Ezekiel 6:9, the Lord God says that He was broken by the whorish hearts of His children which had departed from Him and with their eyes which go a whoring after their idols. In other words, it hurt Him greatly when we were not faithful to Him.

Some other things that the Holy Spirit may experience might be irritability and frustration and perhaps loneliness and isolation. And this may be because He lives in our hearts and yet we're not communicating with Him. He may also experience anger and this can at some point lead to the wrath of God falling on the individual.

Consider this. There are at least two billion people on earth who call themselves Christians or believers in Christ. Can you imagine the spiritual impact of many of these two billion people grieving the Spirit of the Living God day after day? There were just over a million Israelites in the desert. And we see how the Lord reacted toward them because they grieved God's Holy Spirit 40 long years. All those who went out of Egypt as adults never entered the promised land. Is there a warning there for us?

During the Israelites 40-year journey through the wilderness, there were many times that they grieved the Lord. Psalm 78 and 40 says, "How often did they provoke Him in the wilderness and grieved Him in the desert?" In fact, Israel tempted the Lord as an entire nation in at least 10 major ways in the wilderness.

The first temptation was at the Red Sea when Israel gave into despair, but He delivered them and destroyed Pharaoh and His army in the Red Sea. The second temptation was at a place in the desert called Mara because the water at that spot was bitter and God was angered by their lack of faith in Him. The third way that they angered the Lord in the wilderness was by complaining about hunger when they came to the wilderness of sin. And these are only three. There are seven more.

In the days before the flood, according to Genesis 6:5, the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. And the Lord said that He was sorry that He had made man on the earth, and He was grieved in His heart, scripture says. Because of this, He made a decision with a heavy heart to destroy man.

Is God different today than He was back then? Has He become a kinder, gentler God who can no longer be grieved? A God who will not destroy mankind again? Apparently, there are many so-called believers in Christ living today who believe that God will not behave in such a destructive manner ever again. Perhaps they say to themselves, "We're living in the 21st century, the modern day, when we live in paneled air conditioned homes and drive luxurious automobiles with cushioned seats. We're able to travel by jet planes to almost any part of the world in a matter of hours and at reasonable costs. With all this advancement and modernization of the earth, the wrath of God makes no sense to us," they perhaps say. Well, this is foolish thinking to many, apparently. All this about God does not make sense to them.

What kinds of things can we do to grieve the Holy Spirit? What would this grief that we can give to Him look like? Well, there are quite a number of things that we can do that would cause pain to our Father. For starters, we can rebel against God or His Son and we can also resist His Holy Spirit.

For instance, we can harbor bitterness in our heart, wrath, anger. We can speak in evil ways. We can hold malice toward others and have unforgiveness in our heart. We can be unrepentant over the wrong that we do. And finally, we can grieve Him by walking in the flesh.

These are only some of the many ways that we can grieve God and His Holy Spirit. And this grief is the kind of grief that parents can experience as a result of their children's disobedience. And of course, we are God's children. One startling reaction we can expect from God if we grieve His Holy Spirit according to Isaiah 63:10, is that the Father may turn into an enemy and fight against us.Well, if you don't believe, here's the text. But they, the Israelites, rebelled and grieved His Holy Spirit. So He, God, turned and became their enemy. And He Himself fought against them. Well, how did He do this? He did this by sending the powerful Assyrian army against Israel to punish them because of their continual refusal to recognize His presence in their lives. Before He was stoned to death, Steven talked about how Israel always resisted the Holy Spirit.

It is recorded in Acts 7:51 where he told the Jewish people, "You stiff necked people with uncircumcised hearts and ears, you always resist the Holy Spirit just as your fathers did." Which of the prophets did your fathers not persecute? He talked about how they even killed the ones who prophesied about the coming of Jesus Christ. And after he had said these things, the Word of God says that they cried out with a loud voice. They stopped their ears and then they ran at him as an entire group and they cast him out of the city and stoned him until he was dead. And the witnesses to this crime laid down their clothing at the feet of a young man named Saul, who later became Paul.

When we grieve the Holy Spirit, a charge is made to our account according to Romans 2:5, which says, "But because of your stubbornness and unrepentant heart, you are storing up wrath for yourself on the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God." The New American Standard Bible Version. So those who are refusing to acknowledge their sins and turn away from them are accumulating punishment which they will receive during the great tribulation.

There's a special warning here about those who have a hardened and unrepentant heart. They're living in situations or behaving in ways that are displeasing to God and acting as if they're not grieving Him. In many instances, these are unwilling to change their ways and act as if they're not doing any wrong.

And finally, in 1 Thessalonians 5:19, we are admonished as follows. Do not quench the Spirit. This means do not extinguish, do not put out, do not stifle or restrain the Holy One who lives in your heart. This warning speaks to the ways in which the Holy Spirit is like a fire. The Holy Spirit power in the life of the believer is a burning flame and disobedience is like cold water that can douse the flames of this precious fire in the heart of those who walk with the Lord. Several years ago, the speaker started hearing the voice of God on the inside telling him not to say certain things from time to time.

Sometimes this would happen in the middle of a lively conversation and the word would be halfway out of the speaker's mouth. When this first started happening, he would quickly reason to himself whether there was anything wrong with what he was about to say. And then if it seemed harmless, he would go ahead and say it anyway and would immediately experience the conviction of the Holy Spirit.

After a while, the speaker began to realize that God was trying to keep him walking in the spirit. And does the Word of God not say, "Walk in the spirit and you will not fulfill the lust of the flesh?" Well, my friend, the Holy Spirit is constantly trying to keep us walking in the Spirit to keep us on track. But so often, we are so much in and of the world that we are clueless and we are rendered un-useful to God.

Without realizing it on those occasions when the Holy Spirit cautioned him not to say something and he insisted on saying it. The speaker was grieving the Spirit of the Living God. He now regrets that he caused the Holy Spirit pain by his callous disobedience. God bless His Holy Word and thank you for listening.

If you do not know Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior, we want to give you an opportunity to make that commitment today. Simply engage your heart and say this prayer after me which makes the big difference because Jesus Christ paid the price by laying down his life for you. Please say this prayer after me:

-Father, I am a sinner.

-I am sorry for all my sins.

-Dear Lord, I crave Your forgiveness.

-I thank You for mercy and for Your grace.

-Today, I accept Jesus Christ as my Lord and personal Savior.

-Dear Lord Jesus, welcome to my heart.

-Please give me the Holy Spirit to lead me into all truth

-Today I give You the key to my heart because I now belong to You forever.

-Thank You for saving my soul. Amen.

Welcome friend to the body of believers in Christ. We are all here awaiting the return of the Good Master. But in the meantime, we encourage you to become water baptized as quickly as possible. Let your pastor know that you've committed your life to the Lord and you want to be baptized the way Jesus Christ was.

Begin reading the Word of God every day. It is your daily food. Begin in the book of John and then go to Matthew, Mark, and Luke. Pray daily. Attend at your local church and one glad morning the Savior will come and receive us all unto Himself. And we shall indeed forever be with the Lord. God bless and keep you in Jesus mighty name. Amen.