Matthew 3 - the Holy Spirit and Fire — Shane Idleman

Are you ready for another controversial topic? Yeah? I wasn't expecting that response, but that'll do. Any time we talk about the Holy Spirit and you start putting in their words, baptism of the Holy Spirit, fire of the Holy Spirit, people either get excited or, oh, I don't know where this guy is going with this one.

Removing Preconceived Notions About the Holy Spirit

Why is it, where's that uncomfortable feeling coming from? You know, so what I want to ask you tonight is just remove all preconceived notions about what you've heard or how you were raised. Let's just look at what the Bible says.

What does the Bible say about this very important topic of the Holy Spirit and fire? And actually, we're in Matthew 3. I'm not going to spend a lot of time in Matthew 3 because this is more going to be topical.

And what I'm going to do is springboard off of some words that Jesus said. And the reason I'm doing this is because this topic, did you know that this topic has been the cause of many church splits, of division?

I've seen a church split over this issue many years ago. It will divide Christians. They'll have conferences saying one thing and conferences saying the other. And I'm often amazed because the Spirit, the Holy Spirit, is the Spirit of unity.

It's the Spirit of truth, the Spirit of unity. He is the Spirit of unity, the only thing that truly unites believers. Think about that. The only thing that really unites believers is the Spirit within me and the Spirit within you uniting.

That's where the, and when I'm reading in the New Testament, especially in the book of Acts, Christians would die for each other. They would sell things and give to each other. Now we're upset if somebody looks at us wrong.

We didn't say hi to me, you took my parking spot. You know, we address something in love and people get upset and they bail out. There's so much disunity. And I'm just reading, as you're reading the Bible, it doesn't make a lot of sense because the Spirit is the Spirit of unity, the Spirit of truth, the Spirit of bringing us together.

That's why we come to worship, most of us, is it not? The Spirit crying, Abba, Father. Now I know this is a controversial topic and I've read on both sides. I have no friends on both sides. And what I want to do is try to just bring it all together, you know, because the Bible speaks volumes about the Spirit-filled life.

And I don't think it's anything to be afraid of. It should be welcomed. Paul talks about being filled with the Spirit of God. Do not quench or grieve the Spirit of God. Peter, being filled with the Spirit of God, preached.

Paul, being filled with the Spirit of God, preached. Do you know what else is absolutely amazing? We're gonna get to this probably next week, is when Jesus Christ himself was baptized. The Spirit fell from heaven.

We don't know what that looked like. It's Matthew trying to say what this looked like. The Spirit descended from heaven. The Father spoke and then Jesus, after that, went out into the wilderness. The Bible says, filled with the Spirit.

Isn't He part of the triune nature of God? Why would He need to be filled with the Spirit? Well, it's not real hard to fathom, other than the fact that somehow, He needed in His coming in the form of a man, even though He is fully God and fully man, He needed the Spirit's empowerment to begin His ministry.

If you think about that, it really brings it home to us. We're trying to do all this stuff in our own flesh. That's where all these arguments break out. If you have two Spirit-filled believers, they'll work through something.

But when carnality gets in there, and lukewarm living, and jealousy, and envy, that's what comes in. Paul says, those are works of the flesh, for the works of the Spirit are evident. Love, joy, peace, contentment, long-suffering, gentleness, kindness, self-control.

Would you like to have those characteristics in your life? If somebody is filled with the Spirit of God, the Bible said that they are filled with love, and joy, and peace, and gentleness, and kindness, and goodness, and long-suffering, and patience, and self-control.

Self-control, yeah, you can't control yourself. That's a fruit of the Spirit. And what I wanted to do is I wanna recap, I think Fred will put it up here, the mission statement. And this is not a mission statement for the church.

This is a mission statement for Matthew, because I know I'm going to be in Matthew quite a while, maybe a year and a half, two years, I'm not sure. So I was praying one day, I said, Lord, this whole series in Matthew, what am I, I need some kind of, well, that's the point of a mission statement.

You get your thoughts all captured, and you bring them together, and in a few sentences, this is what I'm trying to do. And this is exactly what I'm trying to do, to bring centrality and relevance to Jesus's words, to understand theology in a deep, yet impacting way, and to compare and contrast biblical truth with error, to allow the power of the gospel to truly shape and challenge hearts, so that deep, meaningful change takes place.

So with that in mind, that's how I prepared this message. I'm gonna go topical, and try to have these things impact theology in a deep, impacting way. And I wanna compare, and I wanna contrast, but at the heart of it all, I want hearts to change.

That's the purpose here. And let me read something from Ephesians 4. Paul's saying to the church in Ephesus, I therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you to walk worthy of the calling which you were called, with all lowliness and gentleness, with long-suffering, bearing with one another in love, endeavoring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.

And that word endeavoring there is unique. It's almost like you have to strive to do it, because it's not gonna happen on its own. You have to endeavor, endeavor to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.

There is one body, one Spirit, just as you were called, in one hope of your calling, one Lord, one faith, here's that word, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all.

Pneumatology and the Spirit-Filled Life

So before I dig into this, let me set the stage a little bit. Let me tell you a little bit about my story. It'll help to give you a little background. But I've studied probably this topic more than any other topic.

And it's what theologians call pneumatology. And it's where we get our word pneumatic, pneumatic tools. Do you have pneumatic tools? They're air tools, right? And so the study of the Holy Spirit is pneumatology.

The study of salvation is sotrology. The study of end times is eschatology. And they put all these big words to just really make it more complicated. But I love this topic because to me, this is where real, meaningful change takes place.

This is where you truly are transformed by the power of God. You're actually filled with the Spirit of God. I mean, if you just think about that, the God of the universe is going to fill us with His Spirit.

And from that, that's how we're going to minister. That's how we're going to witness. That's how we're going to be a living witness, a living sacrifice. And it's vitally important because all of the biographies that I've read, I love reading church history and biographies.

All of the great men and women of God who did something for God were men and women filled with the Spirit of God. You don't read a lot about carnal Christians in church history. There's nothing there.

They were carnal before they were filled with the Spirit of God. But why is that? It's because it's that Spirit-filled life. It's not something to be feared. I think it's something to be embraced. And this is part of my struggle, and I'll just be transparent tonight, is I'm caught in the middle of two camps.

I've talked about this before. I actually talked about this two years ago when the church first started. I had talked about the Holy Spirit and His role. I think the title of the series was The Forgotten God with Francis Chen's book, and I kind of went off of that.

So I've been kind of waiting for two years to speak about this again. And that's why I'm not really in a hurry. I want to take my time. But I'm caught in the middle, and here's where I'm caught in. Some of you are caught here, and some of you are caught on the other side.

Some of you don't know where you're caught, but I'm trying to catch you somewhere. On one side, I have this deep passion for the truth of God's Word. The truth has changed my life. I love to study systematic theology.

Ask my wife, I'll go into bed early, give me a book on systematic theology, I'll fall asleep an hour later. And do it the same night, the same night until I get through this volume of systematic. I just love reading about the nature of God, to have theology, that's what it is.

It's a study of God. Because when you have truth, when you understand the true nature of God, that's powerful. So I love theology. I mean, we should be students of the Word of God. However, I love to experience the power of God.

And he radically changed my life. I'll never forget 1999. I mean, I was broken beyond, I mean, this is about as broke as you can get. You know what, God sometimes has to bring you to rock bottom, and then finally, okay, you can have all of my life.

I understand the plan, I'm not God, you are. And as he began to break me, and just, I mean, I was just, I mean, it's not, I was raised, and my brother's here, he'll know, with my dad, you just, men don't cry.

You just don't cry at all, right? It's tough, you're a man, you don't cry. And I couldn't stop crying. I mean, I was just bawling over my sin, my sinful condition, and I believe it's what the Bible talks about, being radically filled with the Spirit of God.

Worship changed. Now all I can do is worship God. I have to, I just wanna worship, get country music television off. Get all these BET off. It just makes me sick to my stomach. I have this passion now that I've never felt before.

I have this love and this joy and this peace, and I'm just filled with the Spirit of God. I have to tell everybody about Jesus. I can't believe what God has done in my life. Half the people thought I was just a religious nutcase.

Oh, that shame, he'll get over it. So I experience God in a mighty way. I love those times of worship, where sometimes I'll sit down to read the Bible, and instead I'll put on worship, and I just can't.

An hour and a half goes by, and I'm worshiping God, and he's breaking me. I'm weeping, and I'm just putting the sermons together. I love experiencing the power of God. So you see how I'm caught in the middle?

Because a lot of times in the church, we have one or the other. Either it's all emotion, if it's odd, it's God, anything goes. You can act any way you want to do. You can cackle like a whatever, bark like a dog, quack like a duck, do all these different things, and the name of the Holy, just put the Holy Spirit stamp on it, and you're good.

Mm, that's a little scary, because the Holy Spirit is the Spirit of truth. Paul himself would say, let all things be done decently and in order, as much as it's up to you. Now, being a fan of revivals and reading the Welsh revivals, the American Great Awakenings, it was not always just sitting in your comfortable pews, looking up, we didn't look up at PowerPoints, but hymnals, people would fall down in the presence of God.

They would be convicted and just sit there and weep, and men would begin weeping there, and that person, all night prayer meetings, God would touch them mightily. So I'm not discounting any of that. So see, I love to experience God, but I also love the other side, where I love theology, we've gotta bring the theological aspect into this.

What is God's nature? What does he say? Who told us to check our discernment out the door? We're not supposed to check our discernment out the door. We're actually supposed to use discernment, and when I use discernment, this group says, well, you're just quenching and grieving the Spirit of God, brother.

You just gotta, you just, you can't do that. You just gotta let the Holy Spirit reign, and there's some truth to that. You can't put God in a box, and we're gonna start at this time, we're gonna do this, we're gonna do this.

I got it. But if what I'm experiencing in my life, the worship, the studying, the preaching, the loving God's Word, the witnessing, all the time, if that's quenching and grieving the Spirit of God, then you must redefine your definition, because I think you're absolutely incorrect.

These people don't even open the Word of God, rarely. So my advice to them is, read your Bible. And I often ask them, have you ever read the Bible through at all, the whole Bible? Nope, I haven't. Well, see, you need that balance.

But the other side needs to experience the Bible they're reading. You see the dilemma? You can have sound doctrine, you can be straight as a gun barrel, theologically, but be just as empty. There's no round in the chamber.

There's nothing. The Pharisees and the Sadducees had their theological positions down. They knew it. They had the letter of the law, but not the Spirit of the law. So biblical Christianity is theology meets the power of the Holy Spirit.

Actually, that's what preaching is, theology on fire. That's all preaching is, you're taking theology and you're impacting with the Spirit of God, you're giving it life. That's the Spirit-filled life.

So that side needs to read the Bible. This side needs to experience the Bible that they're reading. And what does this side call me? Oh, you're just emotional. Let me, I wrote down some exact terms. Unstable, easily led astray.

Really? I'm anchored to the same foundation of truth you are. I'm not unstable. The Holy Spirit, when he fills you, actually makes you very committed, not wavering. You're solid, not fanatical. So that's been my challenge throughout.

I mean, I'll go speak at some places and they're all emotional, and I'm like, guys, I don't think that is a good idea. That's not, oh man, I can't be part of this group. Come on, brother, if it's odd, it's God.

Anything goes. The Holy Spirit's the, well, how do you act when you leave there? Do you treat your wife better? No. You forget all about Christ when you leave that event. You don't get into the word of God.

There's no hunger and passion for him. There's not a deeper relationship with Jesus Christ. It was all experience, and that can be dangerous. But the other side, you're preaching about fire as if you're sitting on an iceberg.

You see the dilemma? I mean, they're just, and Jesus said, if you believe on me, as the scriptures say, out of your belly will flow rivers of living water. Now, in the Greek, that's a past participle of deeper dimensions here, and let's take the present tense of that word, and if we work it back throughout here, the sentence is seeing this structure, and here's how it would apply in the nuances in the preposition here.

It's like, do you, are you, do you know what Jesus said? If you believe on me, as the scriptures say, out of your belly is going to flow rivers of living water. Have you experienced that rivers of living water?

Yes, I understand you have a PhD in geology, and a PhD in church history, but do you know anything about the risen Christ? Are you filled with the spirit of God? Because it's sure not coming out in your preaching.

So see, that's my, I'm just being transparent. I've had to walk this fence all the time. I love the experience. God, please, more, oh, that's not quite where I want to go. And yes, I love theology, but that's as dead as a doornail.

We might as well just close this place up and call it a cemetery. So you have the circus, and you have the cemetery. And God's word says, would you please come to the middle? There's nothing wrong with experiencing God.

We should, we should experience him in a mighty way, heal people, deliver people, break people, shape them, mold them, fill them mightily. And sometimes that's not pretty, I understand that. I've prayed with people where they couldn't stand up.

They were gonna fall down under just the conviction of their heart. At men's conferences, they would be, I'd be preaching, I'm like, should I just stop now? Because these guys are sobbing. This row's about ready to just fall on the floor.

These guys want to, they're just, they're weeping. What's going on here? Because God's spirit's breaking people. That's good. That's a good thing. And I remember one conference I was at, I was up here, and there's a lot of guys just up front, and they're weeping, or they're in their chairs.

And it was a hard message, I'll be honest with you. It wasn't a, it was a, you know, it was a hard message for men. And somebody said, oh, pastor, we need to stop and pray for these guys. I said, uh-uh, let God break them right now.

They need to go to Him. We don't need somebody to come over there, how are you doing, sir, you okay? Oh, yeah, I'm fine. We need God to break them. We need to, would be to God that everybody would be up here for the next two hours crying out.

Then they'll come out better husbands, better fathers. They'll go home weeping instead of yelling. They'll just, they'll be, a porn will abhorred them, not be addicted to it. That's what the spirit-filled life does.

So you see, I live in this world, it's difficult. Because you wanna have strong doctrine, you wanna have strong theology, you're leading a church, so you wanna use discernment, you wanna use wisdom, you know, but on the other hand, you know, you want people to experience God.

So that's why I say, Lord, it's your church, what do you wanna do? And we also have to respect differences. The way that God has shaped a person, how they'll have their church services. Obviously, we do it a little bit differently, but it's not wrong with the church down the street or this church tomorrow morning.

It's a lot different than how we do it. A lot different. Well, who's right? Well, there's different ministries. First Corinthians 12, there are different, the different ministries in, I don't wanna try to find it, but he says there's, some he's called this and some he's called this, some have different giftings, and it's all for the edifying of the body of Christ.

So I just wanted to share that with you because that's where I live. I live wanting to balance the truth of God's word and the power of the Holy Spirit. Because you'll see throughout the Bible as well, the Spirit falls upon truth.

He's not falling upon air, and Simon the sorcerer was filled with the Spirit of God. No, he wasn't. Peter was filled with the Spirit of God and denounced him. The young woman who brought her master's great gain by divination was filled with the Spirit of God.

No, she wasn't. And then what you have in the Old Testament, just a quick history here, the Old Testament, people actually weren't like we are now. They weren't, as believers, filled with the Spirit of God on a continual basis.

God would come upon Samson. God would come upon Elisha. God would come upon Elisha, and they would prophesy mightily. God even came upon Saul. God's Spirit came upon these guys for feats of extraordinary things, prayer and miracles.

The Spirit’s Indwelling Presence in the New Testament

But now, now you understand Jesus's words when they said, Jesus, don't leave us. He said, oh, I have to go, because if I don't go, the comforter will not come. The paracletus will not come. What does he mean?

Better than Jesus? Yeah, because now he resides in us. And that's what, in the New Testament, uses the word paracletus, to come alongside of us. And then the Holy Spirit indwells us. He's in us. And then there's another preposition, epi, in the Greek, and that is upon us.

So that's how the Holy Spirit, it's not a weird thing, oh, I need to wear the Holy Spirit. No, the Holy Spirit is welcome here. I mean, fill this place. Fill us with your glory. Fill us with your presence.

If God truly filled this place with his glory tonight, there would not be a dry eye in this room. You wouldn't leave here till after midnight. You would be so awed and struck by the power of God that it wouldn't care what's for dinner.

You wouldn't care what's on TV. You would be transpired and inspired and encouraged to worship God. That's what the spirit-filled life is. So with that said, it's nothing to fear. It's something to cherish.

And now you'll understand better Jesus's words. These people draw near to me with their lips and honor me with their words, but their hearts are far from me. See, it's very easy to say I'm a Christian or it's very easy to quote scripture, but really it's a condition of the heart.

John the Baptist, Repentance, and Spirit-Fire

Now, let's pick up where we left off. Matthew chapter three, verse seven. And this is John the Baptist baptizing. Remember when all the people were coming down to John the Baptist in the Jordan River?

I talked last week about the truth about repentance. So if you weren't here, go back and watch that video because it kind of builds the scene into where we are now. Now, John the Baptist is baptizing people.

And he sees the Sadducees, the Pharisees, the religious leaders coming down to be baptized. So he says, you brood of vipers, who warned you to flee from the wrath that is to come? Therefore, bear fruits worthy of repentance.

And don't say to us that Abraham is our father, for God is able to raise up sons of Abraham from these very stones. So he's challenging them, listen, there's false security you have. And even now the ax is laid to the root of the tree.

Therefore, every tree which does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. Now, here's where we left off and here's where it's gonna get controversial. I indeed baptize you with, I indeed baptize you with water unto repentance.

That's what John the Baptist was doing. But he who is coming after me is mightier than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to carry. And here's the very controversial term out there. Watch it, here we go.

And he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. See, to me, I don't get scared at that verse, I leap for joy at that verse. But what is he talking about? Well, let me finish real quick. His winnowing fan is in his hand and he will thoroughly clean out his threshing floor and gather his wheat into the barn, but he will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire.

Well, in a nutshell, the winnowing fan, they would throw this wheat or whatever it was up in the air, the chaff would blow away and all the good stuff would fall to the ground. What Jesus is saying, he's saying the chaff will blow away, that stuff is destructive, that's set for the fire.

That's people who are not right relationship with God. He's saying, John the Baptist is saying, the good and the bad will be judged, basically. There's coming a time of judgment and Jesus is going to be the judge of that.

That's why he says here, his winnowing fan is in his hand. He will separate these people and he will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire. Why don't we hear that much in the church? We hear about the turn the other cheek, love your neighbor, Jesus, but not the Jesus that's gonna burn, send people to hell and eternity separate from God.

We can say that because Jesus said it. Jesus Christ himself said it. So we don't need to be scared of these things. So that brings me back to the point. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.

Okay, hold your thought there. Now let's fast forward to Acts chapter one, verse five. By this time, Jesus has been crucified. He's getting ready to ascend and be with his father, but he's still here talking to his disciples.

For John truly baptized with water, but you shall be baptized with the Holy Ghost, not many days hence. So why is that such a controversial term? The reason is a lot of people have used that baptizing the spirit to excuse a lot of weird behavior.

That's just the bottom line. Baptizing the Holy Spirit and then anything goes. No matter what you do, you can act as if you're in church and you act very odd, if you put the Holy Spirit tag on it, you're good.

So that's why we watch Christian TV. I've been to events. It's like the Holy Spirit's not here. This is weirdness. So that's why we have to be careful. That's why this term has gained a lot of bad press, even though it's a very good term.

Jesus said, you'll be baptized with the Holy Spirit and with fire. Now this is a highly emotional topic because it challenges comfortable and it disturbs the normal. Let me say that again. This topic challenges the comfortable and it disturbs the normal.

Comfortable, normal Christians do not like to talk about this topic because it inspires change. It talks about the spirit-filled life. I like what Leonard Ravenhill said. We need to close every church in the land for one Sunday and cease listening to a man so we can hear the groan of the spirit which we in our lush pews have forgotten.

I mean, that's a sermon in itself. I could just came up and quoted that and gave Chelsea continue. We need to close every church in the land for one Sunday and cease listening to a man so we can hear the groan of the spirit which we in our lush pews have forgotten.

Defining Baptism and Filling by the Holy Spirit

I will tell you right now that most people are afraid of the spirit-filled life. I mean, when I first heard those terms a long time ago, it's weird, wacko, Pentecostal, crazy, Jesus freaks Jesus nuts.

But until the Spirit of God fills you and changes you and you say, oh, now I'm one of them. Uh-oh, now I'm a better husband, I'm a better father. Now I can preach God's Word. I mean, I have videos back 20 years ago in my early 20s.

I was at a conference talking, not even preaching at a fitness conference. I couldn't even just read something, had to sit down real quick. Well, I hated public speaking, so I hated it. So for God to do that, it shows me it's His work.

He's filling me with His Spirit. He's leading me, He's guiding me. As I empty myself, He fills me with the Spirit. It's not a bad thing. So I want to just open your hearts to that. Don't be afraid of this, but we need to define it.

Now there's division over this as well. I actually took this week and read this book again. What great evangelicals believed about the Holy Spirit in the 1800s and 1900s? For anybody from Spurgeon to D .L. Moody to Adonai Judson to Hudson Taylor to Oswald Chambers, what did they believe about the Holy Spirit?

It's a very condensed version, so I want to tie that and get this in my, I had to go like 40 or 50 pages a day to get through it. And not only their thoughts, but biblically, the doctrine. What I get from the baptism of the Holy Spirit occurs here, but it also occurs when Paul's talking about the church.

And to me, when we become believers, we are baptized into the body of Christ. That's what that, theologically, I don't really dispute, these aren't hills to die on for me on the terms. If somebody says, man, you need a baptism of the Holy Spirit, fine with me, but there's other people who, you dare not say that.

Theologically, the baptism of the Holy Spirit is when a person becomes a believer, they are baptized into the body of Christ. That's what it is. So he's saying, you'll be baptized with the Holy, you'll be baptized into the body of Christ and you'll receive that fire, that unction, that anointing, that Spirit-filled life.

And then we read, Paul says, be filled with the Spirit, don't quench the Spirit, don't grieve the Spirit. There are subsequent feelings of the Holy Spirit. So it's not like just, well, I'm a believer and that's it.

You can surrender to the work of the Spirit and be filled mightily for His work. And there are times you'll be filled, you'll feel like a spiritual high. There's times in here sometimes I'll preach and I just go to bed on a spiritual high, I wake up on a spiritual high.

And you guys can feel it, you feel the difference. Other times I'm like, oh, Lord, help me get through this. What happened? I fasted all day. Well, you know, the wind blows where it wants. He comes on, I can't tell the Holy Spirit to do this.

Okay, you're gonna do this, you're gonna do this. It's His vessel, it's His job. And there's other times where I'd go travel and speak, I didn't get much sleep. I'd say, I've had a headache in the morning.

Oh my, this is gonna be difficult. And then, pow, it just, something happens in that place. A one and a half hour speaking engagement turns to four hours. My wife texts me, are you on the road yet? Not yet.

And it's interesting, sometimes she'll ask, how did it go? And I just say, it went good, I'll tell you about it later. Or if I say one thing, she knows that it went really well. I say, fire fell. And she knows that the Holy Spirit infused the words more than normal and filled me, my, and people were changed left and right, and God filled it.

So I'm not worried about this word. But if you want the theological correct definition, baptized in the Holy Spirit is when we become part of the body of Christ. And then we're filled with the Spirit later on.

Filled with the Spirit. Peter being filled with the Spirit. Paul being filled with the Spirit. But I like what R .A. Torrey said many years ago. I'd rather have the power of the Holy Spirit and not quite get the term right, than get the term right and miss the power of the Spirit.

So see, and that's really where the divide's been. Even reading this book, you know, people will say, some will say baptized in the Holy Spirit, filled with the Holy Spirit. To me, we're kind of saying the same thing.

Because baptized in the Greek is baptismo, overwhelmed. You're overwhelmed with the Spirit of God. That sounds pretty similar to filled with the Spirit of God. It's one and the same. That's what it is.

You're filled with the Spirit of God. And here's what, and you might say, well, what is the Spirit of God? Well, it's a mystery that we're not going to know on this side of heaven, that's for sure. But we have the triune nature of God in the Bible.

You know what the triune nature is? The Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit. There is one God. We only worship one God. We don't, people accuse us of worshiping three different gods. We worship one God. Hero Israel, I the Lord your God am one.

It is one God. Then even in the Hebrew, you'll see God being used as El, Ella, and Elohim. Singular, dual, and plural nature of God. Let us create man in our image. What? What? Create man in our image?

What are you talking about? So throughout the Bible, you see a triune nature there. And you can't really describe, you can say three persons, but are they really persons? No, because the Father is Spirit.

Those who worship Him must worship Him in Spirit and truth. So there's the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. That's God. And God, the Holy Spirit, comes as a believer, and He resides in the believer.

I mean, that's heaven's atmosphere in the life of the believer. That's the Spirit-filled life. If you want a quick definition, heaven's atmosphere is in the life of the believer. I still have this sinful, fallen body that gets sick, that gets jealous, that gets bitter, that gets upset.

But then the Spirit-filled life, as I surrender to that Spirit-filled life, that flesh has to take a back seat. So see, that's what the Spirit-filled life is, bringing down heaven's atmosphere to here.

Regeneration, Indwelling, and Continual Filling

So what the Holy Spirit does, the Bible says that the Holy Spirit regenerates. Nobody can come to the Son unless His Father draws Him by the Spirit. So the Spirit regenerates. Then the Spirit indwells us, baptized in the body of Christ.

He now indwells us. We're baptized. And then He fills us. Or if He doesn't fill you, guess what you're doing to Him? You're quenching and grieving the Spirit of God within you. And I was trying to think of an analogy.

I'll probably bring one next week because I might have to do part two. Okay, Lord, help me understand this thing. And it came to me the other day. My wife and kids were at my in-law's house, and they were swimming.

Actually, they just had their feet in the pool, sitting on the steps. Just their feet in the pool. And I was thinking, my wife says, oh, we're swimming. I'm saying, you're not swimming. Your feet are in the pool.

The kids are swimming. You see the difference? They come out wet. Their hair is wet. Everything about them, they're immersed. They're baptized in the pool. That's swimming in the pool. You're just sitting by with your feet in it.

That's not swimming. But hold it. How many people are like this? How many Christians are like this? Just, there we go. There we go. I get this. I'm good. I'm good. I don't want too much of that Holy Spirit stuff.