Grieve Not The Holy Spirit

Grieve not the Holy Spirit passage texts: Ephesians : 1 – 32, and Ephesians 4:30

Ephesians 4:30 –“And grieve not the Holy Spirit of God, whereby ye are sealed unto the day of redemption.”

Introduction: Grieve Not The Holy Spirit

Do not grieve the Holy Spirit Meaning

It is worthy to note that Paul said, “Grieve not the Holy Spirit of God” and not “Do not make the Holy Spirit angry.” The term “Grieve Him not” is more delicate and tender.

There are certain individuals who possess a hard character, and they are not affected by the fact that an individual is angry with them. In fact, a lot of people are not really impacted by hearing that someone is upset with them.

So, the question now is: why is the heart so hard that it is not moved when we know that we have caused others grief?

Understanding Grief

Grief is a sweet combination of anger and love. It is anger, but all the gall is taken from it. Love sweetens the anger and turns the edge of it, not against the person, but against the offense.

• When you offend a friend who is not patient, there is a sudden reaction which will lead him to bursting into anger.
• If you offend a loving father in the same manner, he will be grieved.

However, though he is angry at the sin; and yet there is love to neutralize and modify the anger. The loving father looks upon the sin itself as being the problem. He grieves for the fact that you are already injured by the offense.

There may be the bitterness of myrrh, but there is all the sweetness of frankincense in this sweet term “to grieve.”

• Anger in its pure state generates hostility, but grief generates pity.

How Can We Grieve the Holy Spirit?

The term “Grieve not the Spirit” can be understood in these different statements:

• Do not excite His loving anger.
• Do not vex Him.
• Do not cause Him to mourn.

Note that one of the names of the Holy Spirit is “The Comforter”, so it is important that we do not grief him.

So, we can grieve the Holy Spirit by not listening to His voice. For us to appreciate further why we should not grieve the Spirit, we will examine the following 3 key points:

1. The love of the Holy Spirit.
2. The seal of the Holy Spirit.
3. Grieving the Holy Spirit.

1. The Love of the Holy Spirit

When you are persuaded that someone loves you, every effort will be made not to displease him or her.

• He loved us from the beginning. In the eternal covenant of grace, He was one of the high contracting parties in the divine contract, whereby we are saved. His love is:
• Eternal
• Infinite
• Sovereign
• Everlasting
• Cannot be dissolved
• Cannot be decreased
• Cannot be removed from those who are the objects of it

It is His love that whispers inside us as we grow to avoid mischief despite our stubbornness and finally leads us to our Master, Lord, and Saviour.

The Attributes of the Holy Spirit’s Love

His love is manifested in His various attributes, clearly seen first in His names and subsequently in His actions towards us as:

• Elohim – Creator
• Adonai – Sovereign
• Jireh – Provider
• Nissi – Banner
• Ropheka – Healer
• Shalom – Peace
• Tsidkenu – Righteousness
• Mekadishkem – Sanctifier
• Sabaoth – Lord of Host
• Shammah – The Lord is here
• Elyon – Most High
• Rohi – Our Shepherd

2. We Are Sealed by he Holy Spirit

The Spirit Himself is expressed as the seal, even as He Himself is directly said to be the pledge of our inheritance.

The sealing can be perceived as having a three-fold meaning:

1. Sealing of Attestation or Confirmation

• It confirms that I am truly a child of God.
• “The Spirit itself also beareth witness with my spirit that I am born of God.”
• After that, we have believed in the Son of God, the Father seals us as His children, by the gift of the Holy Ghost.

“Now he which hath anointed us is God, who also hath sealed us, and given the earnest of the Spirit in our hearts.”

2. Sealing of Appropriation

When men put their mark upon an article, it is to show that it is their own.

• The farmer brands his tools so that they may not be stolen.
• The shepherd marks his sheep so that they may be recognized as belonging to his flock.
• The king himself puts his broad arrow upon everything that is his property.

So the Holy Spirit puts the broad arm of God upon the hearts of all His people. The following scriptures confirms that He seals us:

• “Thou shalt be mine,” saith the Lord, “in the day when I make up my jewels.”
• The Spirit puts God’s seal upon us to signify that we are God’s reserved inheritance—His peculiar people, the portion in which His soul delighted.

3. Sealing of Preservation

Men seal up that which they wish to have preserved, and when a document is sealed, it becomes valid henceforth.

• Now, it is by the Spirit of God that the Christian is sealed, that he is kept, he is preserved, sealed unto the day of redemption.

3. The Grieving of the Holy Spirit

The Spirit of God is in your hearts, and as such it is very easy indeed to grieve Him.

Sin is as easy as it is wicked.

Ways You May Grieve the Spirit:

You may grieve Him by:

• Impure thoughts.
• Indulgence in lascivious expressions.
• Covetousness.
• Tempting others to go into iniquity by our evil example.
• Neglecting prayer, if our closet door is cobwebbed.
• Forgetting to read the Scriptures.
• Your unbelief.

Indicators When the Holy Spirit is Grieved

• The Spirit bears long before deciding on an appropriate action.
• Suspends His operations.
• Leaves completely.
• Leaves your life behind, but takes away His actual presence.

When the Spirit of God goes away from the soul and suspends all His operations, what a miserable state we are in.

Such miserable states include:

1. When He Suspends His Instructions

• When we read the word, we cannot understand it; we go to our commentaries, they cannot tell us the meaning; we fall on our knees and ask to be taught, but we get no answer, we learn nothing.

2. When He Suspends His Comfort

• We used to dance, like David before the ark, and now we sit like Job in the ash-pit, and scrape our ulcers with a potsherd.
• There was a time when His candle shone round about us, but now He is gone; He has left us in the blackness of darkness.

3. When He Takes From Us All Spiritual Power

• Once we could do all things; now we can do nothing.
• We go preaching, and there is no pleasure in preaching, and no good follows it.
• There is the machinery there, but there is no love.
• There is the intention to do good, or perhaps not even that, but alas! There is no power to accomplish the intention.

People Who Grieved The Holy Spirit Of God

A typical example is the case of Ananiah and Sapphira (Acts 5:1-10).

Their Wrong Actions:

The man and his wife pretended to be more generous than they actually were (i.e they sought recognition by fraud).

Keynote Lesson: Giving should be willingly – 2 Corinthians 9:7 and Giving is not for show – Luke 18:10-14.

Conclusion – Grieve Not the Holy Spirit

In conclusion, you need to obey the voice of the Holy Spirit, adhere strictly to the Word of God, and do not grieve the Holy Spirit at any time.