Wenstrom Bible Ministries Marion, Iowa Pastor-Teacher Bill Wenstrom wenstrom

1. Wenstrom Bible MinistriesMarion, IowaPastor-Teacher Bill Wenstromwww.wenstrom.org

2. Sunday August 4, 2013The Filling of the Spirit: The Command of Ephesians 5:18Lesson # 1

3. Please turn in your Bibles to Ephesians 5:18.

4. The command to be filled with the Spirit appears in Paul’s epistle to the Ephesians.

5. Paul spent a large amount of time in Ephesus, which was one of the seven churches of Asia mentioned by the apostle John in the book of Revelation and not only did Paul spend a lot of time there but John did as well.

6. Ephesus was the gateway to the Roman province of Asia, which is now known as Turkey and was steeped in paganistic worship as noted by Luke in Acts 19, which entailed alcohol and sex.

7. In Ephesians 5:18, Paul makes a reference to their former pagan practice by prohibiting them from getting involved with drunkenness, which was a part of their former pagan worship of the Greek god Dionysus.

8. Ephesians 5:18 And do not get drunk with wine, for that is dissipation, but be filled with the Spirit. (NASB95)

9. This passage can be divided into two sections, namely a prohibition and a command.

10. “Do not get drunk” is composed of the negative particle me, “not,” and with it, we have the second person plural present passive imperative form of the verb methuskomai, which is the passive form of methusko and is related to methuo, “to drink to intoxication.”

11. The passive form means “to get drunk, to become intoxicated” and is an inceptive or ingressive verb marking the process of entering into the state of being drunk with wine or intoxication.

12. The word only appears three times in the New Testament (Lk. 12:45; Eph. 5:18; 1 Th. 5:7) and in each instance, it is used in a warning about the dangers of drunkenness.

13. There was a problem with drunkenness in the ancient world just as there is a problem with drunkenness today in the twenty-first century.

14. There were actually believers that were getting drunk at the Lord’s Table in Corinth (1 Corinthians 11:20-21) and the Scriptures warn against drunkenness many times (Proverbs 20:1; 23:20-21, 29-35; Romans 13:13; 1 Corinthians 5:11; 1 Peter 4:3-4; Galatians 5:19-21).

15. In Ephesians 5:18, the verb methuskomai is in the present imperative form indicating that this is a general precept since there is nothing in the book that would indicate that the Ephesian believers were making it a habit of getting drunk.

16. In fact, in Ephesians 1:15 Paul states that the Ephesians already “have love for all the saints,” thus the Ephesian believers were already permitting themselves to be fully influenced by the Spirit since they could not operate in the love of God if they were getting drunk.

17. Here we have a present prohibition, which has the force of a general precept, which makes no comment about whether the action is going on or not.

18. The passive voice of this verb in Ephesians 5:18 is significant in that it is a rare permissive passive, which implies consent, permission, or cause of the action of the verb on the part of the subject and it indicates that the Ephesian believers are told here not to “permit” or “allow” themselves get drunk.

19. “For that” is composed of the preposition en plus the instrumental of cause, which is singular relative pronoun ho.

20. The preposition en plus the instrumental of cause is used to indicate the basis for the Ephesian believers to obey the prohibition and not to get drunk.

21. The word for “dissipation” is the noun asotia, which refers to behavior, which shows lack of concern or thought for the consequences of an action, thus it means senseless deeds.

22. In some languages asotia in Ephesian 5:18 may be rendered as “what one does without being able to think about it,” or “what one does when the mind is absent.”

23. We would say that it is “non-sensicalbehavior” or we could simply say “a waste,” or “stupidity.”

24. Ephesians 5:18 And do not get drunk with wine, for that is dissipation, but be filled with the Spirit. (NASB95)

25. “Be filled” is the second plural present passive imperative form of the verb pleroo, which means, “to be fully influenced” since the English word “influence” accurately, conveys the meaning of pleroo here in Ephesians 5:18.

26. The word conveys the believer’s relationship to the Holy Spirit who is a person.

27. The word “influence” conveys this more than the words “possessed, controlled,” or “filled.”

28. “Filled” would be used of liquids, which we don’t have here while “possessed” denotes ownership, which is not the sense here and “controlled” has the connotation of someone doing something against your will, which is not the meaning of pleroo here in Ephesians 5:18.

29. Webster’s New Universal Unabridged Dictionary defines the word influence: (1) Capacity or power of persons or things to produce effects on others by intangible or indirect means. (2) Action or process of producing effects on others by intangible or indirect means. (3) A person or thing that exerts influence.

30. If we were to paraphrase Webster’s definition of the word, we would say that Paul wants the Ephesian believers to permit the omnipotence (intangible means) of the Holy Spirit (Person) to produce Christ-like character (effects) in them.

31. The passive form of the verb is a permissive passive voice, which indicates that the apostle Paul wants the Ephesians to “permit” themselves to be fully influenced by the Holy Spirit.

32. Now, we have the present imperative form of the verb pleroo here in Ephesians 5:18 where Paul is issuing a command.

33. The force of the customary present imperative is simply continue andis a command for action to be continued, action that may or may not have already been going on.

34. It is often a character building command to the effect of “make this your habit,” “train yourself in this,” etc.

35. The command in Ephesians 5:18 is a character building command meaning that Paul wants to build the character of Christ in the Ephesians.

36. He wants them to “make it their habit” to permit themselves to be fully influenced by the Spirit because that will build the character of Christ in them, which is the Father’s will.

37. “With the Spirit” is composed of the preposition en plus the neuter singular instrumental form of the noun pneuma, which is a reference to the Holy Spirit.

38. Now, is the Holy Spirit the content with which one is filled, or the means by which one is filled?

39. Some understand the Spirit as the content with which one is filled with water like a glass, but grammatically this is not the case but it is better to understand the Spirit as the means by which one is filled, not the content.

40. The Greek is an inflectional language that uses various cases that determine how a word is being used in a clause or sentence and it is a rule of Greek grammar that a verb may be used with more than one case to distinguish certain ideas or to make ideas clear.

41. In the Greek text, “with the Spirit” represents the preposition en plus the noun pneuma in the instrumental dative case.

42. If we were to interpret this construction as referring to the Spirit as the content with which one is filled would be grammatically suspect since normally a verb of filling takes a noun in the genitive case to express the idea of content and not the dative instrumental.

43. We don’t have a genitive of content here but rather an instrumental case.

44. For example, the noun in the genitive case refers to material, the content of the filling, as when the house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume when Mary anointed the feet of our Lord in John 12:3.

45. With the accusative case the noun in the accusative refers to the thing filled as when grief fills the heart in John 16:6 but when the noun is in the instrumental case it refers to the agent or instrument that causes the filling.

46. The instrumental case indicates the means by which the action of the verb is accomplished indicating that the omnipotence of God the Holy Spirit is the means by which the church age believer is to continually allow himself to be fully influenced, possessed or controlled by the Spirit.

47. Ephesians 5:18And do not permit yourselves to get into the habit of being drunk with wine because that is non-sensical behavior, but rather permit yourselves on a habitual basis to be influenced by means of the Spirit. (My translation)

48. The apostle Paul is using a contrast in Ephesians 5:18 between the mental state of someone who is under the influence of alcohol and drunk with that of one who is under the influence of the Spirit.

49. The filling of the Spirit enables the believer to become like Jesus Christ in thought, word and action or in other words, it gives the believer the ability to acquire the character of the Lord Jesus Christ, which is called the “fruit of the Spirit” (Galatians 5:22-23).

50. Being influenced by means of the Spirit is directly related to the believer’s mental attitude whereas walking by the Spirit is directly related to how the believer conducts himself.