In my basic Discipleship⁸⁹ series, I cover what I consider to be the four most important concepts of discipleship that are absolutely essential if a Christian is to go on into maturity in his walk with Jesus. They are understanding our salvation in Jesus, learning how to relate to Jesus for the answer to our needs as it relates to daily time in the Word and weekly Church Fellowship, and how to properly relate to and deal with sin in one’s life which is talked about in Chapters 7 and 8 of this Section.

I have found in thirty years of Evangelism that a Christian stands or falls depending on his mature understanding in one of these four areas. No matter what a Christian’s problems may be, if he or she has an adequate understanding of these four concepts of discipleship and daily puts them into practice, he or she will come to the answer to any problem he or she may have. He or she will also grow to maturity in Jesus and have a stable Christian walk. I also find though that if a Christian lacks understanding and practice in any one of these four areas, they are having deep problems spiritually and in some cases are at a complete standstill in their walk with Jesus.

I weekly go out on the field, just as I am getting ready to do today, and share the Gospel with men. As I do this I often meet people who are born again Christians but who are no longer walking with Christ. They will say something like this:

I accepted Jesus five years ago. But I had this sin problem I could not get victory over and decided I could not live the Christian life and so gave it up.

They are right in that they are not able to live the Christian life, in fact no Christian can in his own strength. Jesus never intended the Christian to do so. What this believer’s problems is, is not their sin problem, but ignorance about how to experience Jesus’ love and forgiveness and how to draw upon Jesus strength and might to live the Christian life on a daily basis.⁹⁰

Several years ago Campus Crusade for Christ celebrated their thirtieth anniversary. I received a letter from them asking me to share with them and Dr Bill Bright, its founder, what the single most important thing was I gained from this ministry. Without hesitation I wrote back and said that it was Dr. Bill Bright’s teaching on how to experience God’s love and forgiveness on a daily basis.⁹¹ In thirty years of ministry, I have found that the single greatest stumbling block to Christian maturity is not knowing how to experience Jesus’ love and forgiveness on a daily moment by moment basis. If the new believer does not learn how to cope with and relate to weakness and sin in his life in his relationship with Jesus on a daily basis, this one problem alone will keep him from being able to go on to anything else. This is because Satan will continually heap unjustified condemnation onto that person until they give up walking with Jesus in defeat. For this reason I consider this chapter, which teaches a Christian how to cope with and experience Jesus’ forgiveness over their sins on a daily moment by moment basis, to be the single most important principle of Discipleship a Christian can learn. Learning how to deal with sin in one’s life is all wrapped up in what it means to be filled with the Holy Spirit, so what we really want to deal with here is what it means to be filled with the Holy Spirit and how to stay filled with the Holy Spirit.

BY BEING FILLED WITH
    THE HOLY SPIRIT

The Apostle Paul commands in Ephesians 5:18, "And do not get drunk with wine, for that is dissipation, but be filled with the Spirit."

The Apostle Paul commands in Galatians 5:16, "But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not carry out the desire of the flesh."

Jesus said in the Gospel of Luke and the book of Acts,

"And behold, I am sending forth the promise of My Father upon you; but you are to stay in the city until you are clothed with power from on high." (Lk 24:49).

"But you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be My witnesses both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and even to the remotest part of the earth." (Acts 1:8).⁹²

Basically there are three levels of maturity in the working of the Holy Spirit in our lives: Being Filled With, Walking, and Being Baptized in the Holy Spirit. A Christian cannot really understand what it means to walk in the Spirit until he first understands what it means to be filled with the Holy Spirit. A Christian cannot understand the value of the Baptism of the Holy Spirit as related to ministry outreach and release until he first understands what it means to be filled with the Holy Spirit and what it means to walk in the Holy Spirit.

Being filled with the Holy Spirit is allowing Jesus to be Lord of our lives.

The Baptism of the Holy Spirit is allowing Jesus to be Salvation, Lord, and Source of life to others through our lives. As Jesus Himself said, "I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father, but through Me." (John 14:6).

This chapter is going to deal mainly with the work of the Holy Spirit as related to self-sanctification which is being filled with the Holy Spirit. Walking in the Spirit also deals with self-sanctification, but there are many different angles to what this means. These different angles are dealt with extensively in my Advanced Textbook titled, Relationship With Jesus The Key To Effective Ministry.⁷⁹ The Baptism of the Holy Spirit is self-sanctification also, but it is Jesus’ sanctification in our lives to make us vessels useful for ministry outreach and release specifically. This is dealt with also extensively in the Advanced Textbook.

In 1 Corinthians the Apostle Paul talks about three kinds of people: The Soulish Man, The Spiritual Man, and the Fleshly man. About the soulish man Paul states,

"But a man who is motivated and controlled through his soul does not accept the things of the Spirit of God; for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them, because they are discerned through the spirit." (1 Cor. 2:14).

The word in the Greek for soul here is yucikov"¹¹⁷ (sukikos). Sukikos means literally to be motivated and controlled through the soul. A soulish man is a believer or non-believer who is completely motivated and controlled through his soul; that is, through his intellect and feelings. For the sake of our discussion here we will talk about the soulish man who is not saved, who has no life or relationship with God in his spirit.

The soulish man is a man without God. This does not mean that he may not believe in God or may not be religious, but because their is no communication or relationship between him and God through his human spirit, his perception of the world and what he thinks are God’s activities are completely motivated and controlled through the reasoning of his thoughts, his soul.⁹³ Paul states about the soulish man,

"This I say therefore, and affirm together with the Lord, that you walk no longer just as the Gentiles also walk, in the futility of their mind, being darkened in their understanding, excluded from the life of God, because of the ignorance that is in them, because of the hardness of their heart." (Eph 4:17-18)

If a soulish man were to call upon God, God would not hear him because there is a barrier between him and God as a result of his unforgiven sins.⁹⁴ He has not appropriated Jesus’ forgiveness through His death on the cross. He either does not care or is trying to gain God’s forgiveness through his own works.⁹⁵

When a soulish man observes the activities of God’s people motivated and controlled through the Holy Spirit, these activities appear as foolishness to him. They appear as foolishness for two reasons: First, because the things of the Spirit of God are not earned but are freely given by God. The Apostle Paul states in the first book of Corinthians and the book of Galatians,

"For the word of the cross is to those who are perishing foolishness, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God."  (1 Cor 1:18).

"Does He then who provides you with the Spirit and works miracles among you, do it by the works of the Law, or by hearing with faith? Even so Abraham believed God, and it was reckoned to him as righteousness." (Gal 3:5- 6).

The hardest person in the world to talk to about the Gospel is a religious person. This is because he has spent his life trying to gain God’s favor through his works determined through the reasonings of his soul. Therefore his heart and mind, his soul, is blinded to God’s free gift of salvation through Jesus. Paul, in relating this fact to the soulish Jews, wrote,

"For I bear them witness that they have a zeal for God, but not in accordance with knowledge. For not knowing about God’s righteousness, and seeking to establish their own, they did not subject themselves to the righteousness of God." (Rom 10:2-3)

Second, the things of the Spirit of God are foolishness to the soulish man because the things of God are discerned through man’s spirit in union with the Holy Spirit.⁹⁶ Because the soulish man is dead spiritually and does not have the Spirit of Jesus dwelling in him, thus has no link with God’s Spirit, he has no means of knowing the activity of God in the present, nor does he have an inner witness of the value of what Spiritual men are doing. As a result he is guided by the prince of darkness, Satan, and without realizing it even opposes the work of God thinking he is rendering service to God.⁹⁶

Discernment is a by-product of being born from above through the Holy Spirit cultivated through a deep knowledge of the Word of God and a daily surrender and obedience to the Lordship of Jesus Christ.⁹⁸ Jesus said in the Gospel of John,

"Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one receives birth¹³¹ of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. That which receives birth¹³¹ from the flesh is flesh, and that which receives birth¹³¹ from the Spirit is spirit. Do not marvel that I said to you, ‘You must receive birth¹³¹ from above¹³².’ The wind blows where it wishes and you hear the sound of it, but do not know where it comes from and where it is going; so is everyone who receives birth¹³¹ from the Spirit." (Jn 3:5-8).

The soulish man cannot discern truth in a situation because when it comes to relationship to self, man, and God, these are subjective issues; that is, issues centered in man’s mind and heart, his soul, and in his spirit. The Bible plainly says that only the Holy Spirit knows the thoughts of man and the thoughts of God.⁹⁹ Because the soulish man has no means of communication with God through his dead human spirit, he can never know the true heart of a problem and thus truly discern a situation.

When a soulish man reads the Bible, he receives condemnation because he is reading it with his soulish mind. He is not able to see God’s love, forgiveness, and plan for his life in the Scriptures because this kind of understanding and discernment only comes through the inspiration of the Holy Spirit through man’s regenerated human spirit which he does not have.¹⁰⁰ This is why Evangelism is so important because a Christian does have the inspiration of the Holy Spirit and is able to show God’s love and forgiveness in Jesus’ Word.

Life does not come through reading the Bible alone. Life comes through entering into relationship with Jesus Christ. Jesus then causes the Bible to become alive to us through the ministry of the Holy Spirit through our spirit as it is relevant to the need of the moment.¹⁰¹

About the Spiritual man Paul states,

"But he who is motivated and controlled through his spirit¹¹⁸ discerns all things, yet he himself is discerned¹¹⁹ by no man. For who has known the mind of the Lord, that he should instruct Him? But we have the mind of Christ." (1 Cor 2:15-16).

The word in the Greek for spirit here is pneumatikov"¹¹⁸ (pneumatikos). Pneumatikos means literally to be motivated and controlled through one’s spirit. A spiritual man is a believer who is completely motivated and controlled by the Holy Spirit through his human spirit. This is a person who is completely surrendered to the Lordship of Jesus Christ one-hundred-percent. He is a person who by free will choice does not act or speak out of the reasoning of his thoughts, his soul, but only out of the initiative of Jesus Christ through his spirit.

The spiritual man discerns the truth about all situations and needs because he does not judge things as they appear outwardly.¹⁰² He goes to Jesus about all things through worship and praise in Spirit and truth, and gains Jesus’ evaluation about all things through the ministry of the Holy Spirit.⁹⁶ He does this because he is aware of the complexity of man’s constitution and his complete and total dependence on Jesus for everything. He takes Jesus’ admonition about being as a little child to enter into the kingdom of God literally.¹⁰³ He puts no trust in himself or in man about anything, but only trusts in Jesus in the light of His Word.¹⁰⁴

Everything that he does, whether vocationally, marriage wise, or ministry wise, is motivated out of the prayer,

Jesus, in what vocation, relationship with the opposite sex, and ministry can I best glorify Your name, usher in Your kingdom, andccomplish Your will on earth as it is in heaven, and bring the most people, or people that you want me to, into a saving knowledge of who You are?¹⁰⁵

This is the attitude of his heart daily in all that he does, says and pursues.

Because the spiritual man does not act out of his own initiative in anything that he pursues, whether spiritual, practical, or ministerial pursuits, he succeeds in all he does, meaning by the definition of success by God’s standards. This is because Jesus promises His provision when we obey His personal dictates to our lives through the ministry of the Holy Spirit.¹⁰⁶ Some times when we are a success in the Lord’s eyes, we are a failure in the worlds eyes. In the world’s eyes Jesus was a total failure at the end of his life: His apostles deserted him and he died alone on a cross a humiliating death. But was Jesus a failure?