And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption. (Ephesians 4:30)
This verse is of upmost importance in it’s context. The word grieve means to give pain. How possibly might the Holy Spirit be pained? Simply stated it is in disregard and disobedience to the admonitions given in the surrounding verses. Surrounding this verse on the Holy Spirit, is the behavior which ought to characterize the believer.
It is improper to talk of our home in Heaven if we knowingly are walking and living in a worldly manner. It is confusing and inconsistent to glory in our privileges found in Christ while choosing to behave according to the flesh.
But notice even choosing to live in a way that grieves the Holy Spirit will never drive Him away. He is given to us, and dwells within us until we are presented without fault before Christ. He does not leave…ever! That is another aspect of good-news!
Yet when we choose disobedience to God’s ways, the Holy Spirit is grieved. And for that reason we live enduringly through seasons of apathy and unhappiness. It is for that disregard to God’s ways that there is a loss of joy and an absence of communion with God.
Consider this—as long as the Holy Spirit lives in me without grief, He is free to open the things of Christ and reveal them to me—the result is a heart filled with gladness and God given purpose in life with a depth of joy not as the world can give.
But the moment I choose to disregard and disobey the things of God, the Spirit ceases to do the very work He is given to do in us. He is restrained from doing the very things He delights to do. He is restrained from doing the very things which give me a deep joy with eternal significance… a joy that is beyond the shallow, fading trinkets and amusements this world offers me.
So what reverses the grief I cause the Holy Spirit, and causes depletion of joy? Consider David as he exhibits these very things in Psalm 32:3-7:
When I kept silent about my sin, my body wasted away through my groaning all day long. For day and night Your hand was heavy upon me; my vitality was drained as with the fever heat of summer.
I acknowledged my sin to You, and my iniquity I did not hide; I said: “I will confess my transgressions to the LORD.” And You forgave the guilt of my sin. Selah
How wonderful to think on that!
Maranatha!