Dr.Charles Stanley ( walking by the Holy Spirit

Hey, this is StrongBerry, how y'all feeling out there today?

I hope everybody is doing well.

If you're not doing well, let's find a way to get well, look well, and be well.

Right now, we're going to praise a little bit with Dr. Charles Stanley.

The most neglected subject in the Bible is the work of the Holy Spirit and the life of the believer.

You would think that is important as that subject is, that all people will be talking about it,

and all people will be referring to the Holy Spirit.

But there are millions of people who sit in church week after week after week, year after year,

never hear a single sermon dedicated to the Holy Spirit in his work in our life.

When it's so crystal clear from the Scripture that you cannot live a godly life,

you cannot serve the Lord adequately.

Unless you understand how he works in your life.

And you certainly cannot understand the truth of God's Word apart from the Holy Spirit.

One of his primary responsibilities is to interpret the Word of God for us properly.

And yet, sometimes you think, well, whose fault is that?

Is the people who sit in the peor as the man who stand in the pulpit?

And I think, probably, it is the man who stand in the pulpit.

And the truth is, not anyone who preaches the gospel apart from the Holy Spirit

and they're no one in the Spirit, and then do men of God's power upon his or her life,

doesn't make any difference who it is.

Apart from the Holy Spirit, it's not going to be nearly as effective.

It's not going to have the fruit that that work would have with the Spirit of God,

the one upon whom the speaker was depending to get the job done.

It's his responsibility. It's the work of the Holy Spirit.

And if a lot of people, it's just one of those subjects, they just say, well,

I talk about Jesus and God, I don't know who this Holy Spirit is,

because I used to read the Bible and it talked about the Holy Ghost.

Well, I can remember growing up, naturally, we only had the King James Version,

and it was translated Holy Ghost instead of Holy Spirit.

I remember thinking as a kid, I'm not that ghost business.

I'm not sure how I handled that because I didn't understand that.

So, and then, of course, some people think, well, the Holy Spirit's all about tongues.

You have to speak in tongues, and so they just totally disregard it.

The truth is, and I want to say it again, you cannot interpret the Word of God properly.

You cannot live a God-lit life, and you cannot serve God adequately,

apart from the power of the Spirit of God working in your life.

So, what I want to talk about in this message is walking by the Holy Spirit.

And I want you to turn it if you will to Galatians chapter 5.

And I want to just look at a couple of verses here, because there's so much that we could talk about.

But I want to put it all in one message, because I want you to get the full impact of how important the Holy Spirit is in your life as a believer.

And if you're noticing the fifth chapter of Galatians, here's what he says in verse 16.

But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not carry out the desires of the flesh.

Now, what are the desires of the flesh?

We're talking about those desires that find their source within that part of us that has a desire to live outside the world of God.

In other words, when Paul speaks to the flesh, he's not talking about flesh and blood.

He's talking about part of something within us.

That is, when a person is saved, the Spirit of God comes into your life to dwell.

And so, we're transformed, we're brand new creatures in Christ.

But that does not remove that propensity, that tendency at times, that desires to do something outside the world of God to send against God.

And so, when a person is living in the flesh, they are expressing that inner desire to do something, go somewhere, have some attitude that is not godly.

We all have to deal with it every single day of our life.

And so, when he says here, I said, you walk by the Spirit, and you will not carry out the desires of the flesh.

Then, if you look in the 25th verse of the same chapter, Paul says again, if we live by the Spirit that is controlled by him, dominated by him, the Holy Spirit, let us also walk by the Spirit.

That is, if he is really in control of our life, let us walk by the Holy Spirit.

Now, when we have to start this, we have to start, first of all, answer the question, well, who is he?

And somebody that says, well, I don't know who he is, I don't know who Jesus is, I don't know who God is, I don't know who the Holy Spirit is.

There are three persons of the Trinity.

There is one that God had, one God, three persons that Father does His work, the Son does His work, the Spirit does His work, and the work of the Holy Spirit is a vital part in every single believer's life.

It is tragic that people can go to church and listen to the sermon year after year after year, and never understand the work of the Spirit and wonder why they fail in their Christian life, why things don't work out, why God does not answer that prayer, why they feel so weak, why they are so tempted, why they yield and only know and only goes.

And there is a very specific reason for that, because when you look to see the work of the Holy Spirit and who he is, and that he is a person of the Trinity, and that God has called him,

and sent him into your life and my life for some very, very specific purposes.

So we are talking about someone whom the Father has sent into your life and my life, because we could not be, nor could we become, nor could we ever accomplish what he has in mind apart from the Holy Spirit.

If I were to ask you, what is the Holy Spirit, who he is, what does he mean to you?

And for many people, they have to say, well, I know it's in the Bible, because I read the Holy Spirit. Well, does he a person? Yes he is.

The Holy Spirit is as much a person as Jesus, because the Scripture, if you notice, calls him, he and the Holy Spirit, whom?

And when you look at the work he does, and what he does in your life and my life, he has to be a person.

So the Holy Spirit is a vital part of every single believer's life.

So I want us to look for just a moment. I'm going to take you through some of these verses to start to get you oriented here.

And I want to start with this 14th chapter of John, and we just mentioned a couple of them here, and I want you to see what the Holy Spirit does in our life.

And the helper here in the Greek is paracleta, which means one who walks beside us, one who is, and he calls him here a helper.

It is the same word translated comfort us. So both of which mean that we have someone with us who helps us, who comforts us, along with some of the things here.

You'll notice in verse 26, he says, but the helper, the Holy Spirit, whom, not yet, which, but whom, the father will send in my name.

He will teach you all things. That is, the work of the Holy Spirit in the life of the believer is that he teaches us the truth.

And unless the Spirit of God interprets the truth for us, it won't be correct.

They're all kind of theologians and all kind of ideas and all kind of religions out there, believe all kind of stuff.

Because it's man made religion, man made theology apart from the work of the Spirit of God when there are no contradictions in this book.

Now listen, he says, not only will he teach us all these things, but second, then, he will bring to your remembrance all that I teach you, all that I meant for you to understand.

That is, he is also a reminder, for example, let's say somebody says, well, I'd like to witness to somebody, but I'm afraid I'll forget the verses.

Remember this, you have a Holy Spirit to remind you. One of his responsibilities is to remind us of the things we need to remember.

And primarily, of course, that is the Word of God. Then if you will look in the 15th chapter and look in the 26th verse of this 15th chapter, John, he says again, when the helper, that is the Holy Spirit comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, that is the Spirit of Truth.

He's often in the Scripture called the Spirit of Truth, who proceeds from the Father, he will testify about me. That is, the work of the Holy Spirit is to testify about who Jesus is, what he does in his place and I like.

Watch this, the Holy Spirit never talks about himself. It's always about Jesus. That is part of his responsibility.

Then, if when you look at this 16th chapter and the 8th verse, here's another work of the Holy Spirit, you think, for example, that you got saved because you chose to be saved. Well, that's true to something great.

But first of all, what got you realizing that you needed to be saved? You got under conviction. Verse 8 of the 16th chapter, when he, the Holy Spirit, when he comes, he will convict the world.

Listen, concerning sin, righteousness and judgment, and concerning sin because they did not believe in me, concerning righteousness because I go to the Father and you no longer see me, and concerning judgment because the rule of this world has been judged.

I have many more things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. And so that when the Spirit of Truth comes, he will guide you into all truth.

He convicts us of our sins. He is our teacher, and he guides us into all truth. And verse 14 says, he will glorify me. That is, the Spirit of God is continually pointing us to Jesus and helping us to see who he is, how he fits into our life and why we so desperately need him.

And so when you look at all these verses, and then you come to Romans chapter 8, so we can chapter 8 for a moment.

And I want you to notice a few verses here that are also so very important because in Romans chapter 8, Paul describes in a few verses here a great deal.

He says, for example, beginning in verse 11, but if the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his spirit who dwells where and you.

Every single believer has the Holy Spirit and dwelling in. So watch this. Every single believer has a person of the Trinity and dwelling us in our spirit.

Listen, we talk about being filled with the Spirit. A person is filled with the Holy Spirit when they are living in obedience to him and following him and walking in his ways.

And so he says the Spirit in dwells us. Look, if you were in the 14th verse, for all who are being led by the Spirit of God, these are the sons of God.

He not only guides us, but he description says he leads us and in dwells us. And in verse 15, for you've not received the Spirit of slavery leading to fear again, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons by which we cry out of a father.

That is, he is the one who gives us assurance of our relationship to the father. That is the Holy Spirit testifies to every believer you are one of God's children.

You have been adopted into the kingdom. And so we come to buy that through the Holy Spirit. And then he says in verse 16, the Spirit himself testifies with the Spirit with the children of God that is bear witness.

And for example, somebody says to you, well, are you saved? You say, I'm sure I'm saved. Well, why are you so sure? Well, you could give them a lot of reasons, but the real truth is the Holy Spirit bears witness gives you assurance.

It reminds you that you trusted Christ as you saved. Remind you the promises of God, therefore you can with assurance say, yes, I know that I'm saved. It is the work of the Holy Spirit that does that.

Then if you will turn back to Acts chapter 1 for a moment, remember what he said to them. He said, no, look.

You sit down in the city of Jerusalem, sit down in the city of Jerusalem until you are in dude with power from on high.

That is, you're not ready, for example. And then the 24th chapter of Luke, he gives us that part of the great commission.

And then he says, of course, in Matthew gives us a great commission. And then also in Mark, but in Acts look what he says now in verse 7.

He said to them, it is not for you to know the times of the seasons, which the Father has fixed by his own authority, but you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you.

And you should be my witnesses, both in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria and in other most parts of the earth.

So what was he saying? He's saying simply this, even though you've seen all this, even though you've heard all this, even though you've witnessed all the things that I've done, you're still not ready to do the work that I've called you to do until the Spirit of God in dwell you.

Now the Old Testament, the Holy Spirit, would come upon God's servants and the part and come at Pentecost, the Holy Spirit descended to this earth to endure all believers so that from that point on, every single person who is a child of God is in dwell by a person of the Trinity called the Holy Spirit.

And so when I look at what he does, and the awesome power available to us, I think, have foolish for us to try to do anything apart from the Spirit of God.

Now, that's who he is. That's what he does. And the issue now is, what does it mean to walk by the Spirit? How do we walk by the Spirit? Well, I want to put a definition up on the screen here, and I want you to write it down because every single one of us needs to understand this.

Listen, to walk in the Spirit, or by the Spirit, the way you want to call it, is to live moment by moment, not today and maybe tomorrow, moment by moment, what?

In dependency upon him, sensitive to his voice in our life and in obedience to him, those three words, dependency, sensitive to him and obedience.

So if I'm walking in the Spirit, you'll notice that I'm not doing that all Monday and then all Thursday and maybe next Sunday, but how often? Come on, Tim, how often?

Moment by moment. That is, every day of our life, as a believer, I am to walk aware of the Spirit of God in our life. He said, well, now how can we do that? How has that possible? Well, I want to talk about that.

But what it's really saying is, I'm to live a God in life. You can go to church every Sunday, you can pray a little bit every once in a while, you can give a little money, you can read about once in a while.

That's not the Christian life. The Christian life is living submissive to the Holy Spirit who entrails you for the purpose, the primary purpose of Jesus Christ living his life in and through us. That's why he came. He came to do in us and through us and for us, which you and I can never do ourselves.

And so to walk, listen to walk by the Spirit, it's the war moment by moment, but depending upon him, sensitive to his voice in our life, and as a result of that, what's going to happen? We're going to live a God in life.

We're going to live a life of obedience. So I hope you rolled that down. That's what walking by the Spirit. That's the Christian life.

Because would you not agree that if a person goes to church and listens to servants, he even takes notes, goes to work the next day and just curses somebody out.

Well, you laugh because you probably know a few folks like that. That's not, that's not Christian living. Now, I didn't say they weren't saved, but it's not Christian living.

Because the Christian life is a life in whom the Holy Spirit is dwelling and through whom the Holy Spirit is expressing the life of Jesus.

So that comes to the whole question here of being filled with the Spirit. What does it mean to be filled with the Spirit? To be filled with the Spirit means that I'm told it's an end to him, that he has his way in my life.

By moment, it's his way, not my way. Now, here is a big point. I want you to get this. How do we walk by the Spirit? That is, we know he's indwelling us.

We know that he is doing all these things and teaching and guiding and leading and filling and empowering and conducting and enabling and all these things.

So what's my responsibility? It comes down to this. And that is if I'm going to live moment by moment in the power of the Holy Spirit, I must listen.

I must be sensitive. Listen to the initial promptings of the Spirit. Now, what do I mean by that? Simply this. Now, let's take for example, listen, say you're a Christian and all of a sudden you see something that gets your eye or gets your attention.

And you know, as soon as you see that, or you look that way or whatever it might be, something inside us says, don't go that way. Go ahead in that direction.

Who is that? That's the Holy Spirit. Or have you ever been driving and you going some particular direction? And all of a sudden you get this strong feeling.

It took a right right here. Where did that come from? Well, there's nobody in the car but you. That's the Spirit of God warning you of what's about to happen, which was a wreck. And the other one you turned right.

Listen, the Spirit of God within you speaks to your Spirit. That is with strong implications and strong inclinations. The Spirit of God arouses us to think and to think his way.

The Spirit of God is an active person in our spirit giving guidance and direction how we to live because he said, why did he come to guide us to lead us and to empower us and to reveal to us and to impart truth and the truth of God's word to us.

And so when I think about this whole idea of him prompting us in the way he prompts us, he does so by strong inclinations.

Now somebody says, well, suppose I don't suppose he prompts me and I just keep going. Well, what would you call that? Let me ask you this, if you're a trivial boy, you said you're a trivial son, take the trash out now.

He says, I'll take it out, but I got something else to do right now. I'll take it out later. That's just pure disobedience. In other words, that's disobedience.

And here's the way many people live and you don't realize this. If the Spirit of God prompts you to do something, obedience is that you do it when he says do it.

Rebellion is when you do it when you want to do it or you don't do it at all. And anyway, you cut it is disobedience. In other words, if the Spirit of God prompts you to do something and you don't do it, give me any other word that best describes what you did than disobedience and rebellion.

It's not doing what God says do. That's what it is. That's a rebellion against God. So when he prompts us to do something, how does he do that? He speaks to our conscience and to the Spirit within us. Now watch this. The Spirit of God's never going to tell you not to do the right thing.

It's always the right thing at the right time and the right way. Listen, the Holy Spirit is not the no obligation to explain to me why. Why should I turn right here? Why should not turn?

Because there's some things you and I can't see. We can't foresee. He's protecting us. And listen, it is foolish not to live moment by moment by the Holy Spirit because he's there for our benefit. Listen, by the way, God doesn't need any of us.

He doesn't. He can get his work done without any of us, but he loves us enough to seal us as a child of God. And one of his works is to seal us under the liberty.

He says that in 1st, in Ephesians 1, verse 13, the Spirit of God seals us. Now watch this. That means when you trusted him as you saved him, the Holy Spirit came into your life to dwell. And not only does he come to dwell, but he seals you as a child of God.

That is, you are forever a child of God. And as I say to my friends who do not believe that, and I'm sorry they don't believe it. Here's what he says, in him, you also having listened to the message of truth, the Gospel of God's salvation, having also believed you were sealed in him that is in Christ with the Holy Spirit of promise. Now what's the promise? Here's the promise. Who is given us a pledge?

Now listen, if I promise you something and I pledge that to you, you expect me to fulfill it. But when God gives you a pledge and he seals you, he gives you a promise. He has awesome power to do anything and everything he'll keep his promise.

That's the work of the Holy Spirit. That's who he is. And I would simply say this to you. Why did David say he loved to meditate upon God's Word? Because you see, he had a mindset. And we see in his life when he turned away from that mindset what kind of trouble he got into.

You and I have the Holy Spirit. We have the Holy Spirit in a way that he didn't even understand, could not have understood it that time. You are indwelt by a person of the Trinity, Almighty God, the Holy Spirit who is here to enable us, equip us, manage us, guide us, lead us to do anything and everything that it is his will for us to do until accomplished in life.

You say, well, I'm just a homemaker. There's no such thing as just a homemaker. You happen to have one of the biggest jobs I know of. If anybody needs the Holy Spirit in their life, it is a mother. Look what you have to do.

You have to take care of the children. Plus you have to take care of your husband. Sometime put up with him. But in other words, you have an awesome job educating your children, keeping home all the hundreds and hundreds of tasks that you have.

The Holy Spirit is just as if he's just as available ready and desirous to help you to be a godly mother as he is to help in the past to preach a godly sermon. That's who he is.

So here's the choice you have. You can set your mind on the things of God and trust this indwelling person of the Holy Spirit who is promised to God you, lead you, enable you, equip you, give you authority and all the other things that we've mentioned.

Here you have the Holy Spirit living within you, ready to live through you, the very life of Jesus Christ which means that your attitude and your actions are going to be godly.

It's a choice we make. He said, what do I have to do to get all that done? Just surrender. Just yield. Just tell him, okay, God, I give up my way, I want your way. What does he do? He takes over.

Now, is it not true that's what you want your children to do? You want them to trust you and obey you? Why? Because you know what's best for them and you give your life for them. He's already given his life for us.

To walk in the Spirit is to depend upon him totally, to rely on money, to be sensitive to what he's saying to us and to obey him. That is life and it's very, very, very best and it's available to every single person who wants God's best.

Father had grateful we are for your awesome love for us and the thing that you've done so much in preparation for our daily life, that we can wake up with you, live with you and go to bed with you every night with perfect assurance that we have your favor, knowing that you forgive us when we're weak and knowing that our hearts desire is moment by moment to walk by your Spirit.

That is my prayer for every person who hears this message. Let there be some radical changing going on in people's attitudes, radical changing about sin that they put up with and thought the God that you paid no attention to it, and radical right doing because they want your best.

I pray the Holy Spirit, seal this message, execute it in every life, arouse the conviction so that all that you desire for us will have the wonderful privilege of enjoying in Jesus' name. Amen.

We give an invitation for people to exist.