How to Tell if You Are Filled with the Holy Spirit

We have two passages from the Word of God that we're going to read today. The first is Ephesians chapter 5, verses 18 to 21, then Colossians chapter 3, verses 16 to 21. Ephesians 5, 18, and be not drunk with wine in which is excess, but be filled with the Spirit, speaking to yourselves in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord, giving thanks always for all things unto God and the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, submitting yourselves one to another in the fear of God.

Colossians chapter 3, beginning at verse 16. Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom, teaching and admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord. And whatever ye do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God and the Father by him.

Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands as it is fit in the Lord. Husbands, love your wives, be not bitter against them. Children, obey your parents in all things, for this is well-pleasing unto the Lord.

Fathers, provoke not your children to anger, lest they be discouraged. May God bless his word to our hearts. Every person has to be filled with something, and there's no reason in all the world why he cannot be filled with the Holy Spirit.

The normal experience of believers in the early church was an experience of fullness. As you open the word of God to the book of Acts, you're impressed with the fact that repeatedly the Christians experienced the fulness of the Holy Spirit. In Acts 2, verse 4, they were all filled with the Holy Spirit.

Over in chapter 4, verse 8, then Peter was filled with the Holy Spirit. Chapter 4, verse 31, and when they had prayed, the place was shaken where they were assembled together, and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit. In chapter 6, verse 3, they're going to choose officers for the church.

Wherefore, brethren, look among you for seven men of honest report, full of the Holy Spirit and of wisdom. In chapter 7, verse 55, when they're about to kill Stephen, but he being full of the Holy Spirit, looked up steadfastly into heaven and saw the glory of God and Jesus standing on the right hand of God. In chapter 9, verse 17, when Ananias came to Saul of Tarsus to give him his sight, brother Saul, he said, the Lord, even Jesus, that appeared unto thee in the way as thou camest, hath sent me that thou mightest receive thy sight and be filled with the Holy Spirit.

In chapter 13, verse 9, when Saul, who is now Paul, is out on his first missionary journey and he is confronted by one of the devil's counterfeits, then Saul, who also is called Paul, filled with the Holy Spirit, set his eyes on him and said, O full of all deceit. Now, as you page through the book of Acts, you cannot miss the fact that the everyday garden variety, grassroots Christians, were filled with the Holy Spirit. It wasn't simply the preachers and the prophets and the evangelists and the missionaries.

Everyone was filled with the Holy Spirit. Now, this doesn't seem to be the normal experience today. For some reason or we have gotten away from this.

And when you do find a believer who is filled with the Holy Spirit, it seems abnormal. In fact, when a Spirit-filled believer shows up in a group of people who are not living by the power of the Spirit, they make him rather uncomfortable. I had a marvelous week, thank you for praying, at Dallas Seminary this past week, and had an interesting discussion with some of the students there who were saved right out of the Jesus movement.

Marvelous. They were all kinds of hippies and yippies and other things out in California, and the Lord saved them. They felt a call to ministry and came to seminary and brought with them, said several of the professors, a marvelous breath of fresh air.

I think every church needs this. Have you ever sat in a room in a meeting for a long time and you got used to it, and then somebody came in and said, my, is the air stuffy in here? And you say, no, it's fine. We've been here for six hours.

It's great. He says, man, you should go outside and see how it is out there. This can happen in churches.

We can get so accustomed to what we're doing and so accustomed to the atmosphere that when some outsiders come in, somebody who's just saved out of Wells Street or some other place in Chicago, and he says, boy, it's a little stuffy in here. Let's open the windows. You see, at Pentecost, a breath of fresh air began to blow, and they inhaled deeply of the wind of God, and they were filled with the Holy Spirit.

Now, this is supposed to be the normal experience that you and I should have. And in order for us to have this normal experience, we have to understand some basic truths. And so this morning in answering this question about the fullness of the Holy Spirit, let's seek to answer four basic questions.

Now, two of them I'm not going to spend a great deal of time on, but the last two I will. Here are the four questions. Number one, what is the Holy Spirit? Number two, what does it mean to be filled with the Spirit? Those two questions we'll take care of quickly.

The third question, what are the evidences of the fullness of the Spirit? And finally, how may we be filled with the Spirit? Question number one, what is the Holy Spirit? I wouldn't bring this up except for the fact that there are people teaching today that the Holy Spirit is not a person, he is a thing. There are those who tell us that just as God was seen as the Father in the Old Testament and the Son in the four gospels, he's seen as the Spirit in the epistles. Just one God, but not three different persons.

The theologians have a technical term for this. It's called modalism. God reveals himself in different modes.

This is not true. The Holy Spirit is a person. Back in chapter 4 and verse 30, Paul said, grieve not the Holy Spirit.

Now, you have to grieve a person. You can't grieve a thing. You can't grieve an impersonal force.

The Holy Spirit is a person, and he is God. Throughout Ephesians, you're going to find Paul emphasizing the Trinity, God the Father and God the Son and God the Holy Spirit. Someone says, well, why do we need a Trinity? Well, of course, God is a Trinity.

God the Father planned my salvation, and God the Son purchased my salvation, and God the Holy Spirit perfects my salvation. What God the Father planned from all eternity and what God the Son purchased on the cross, God the Holy Spirit personalizes and perfects in my life. The Holy Spirit is the great completer of the work of God.

Now, he is a person, and he is God. And when you were saved, he moved into your body and made your body his temple. When you were saved, you became a part of the body of Christ.

This the Bible calls the baptism of the Holy Spirit. For by one Spirit are we all baptized into one body, and this is the work of the Holy Spirit and conversion. Now, our second question, what does it mean to be filled? Paul says, be filled with the Spirit.

There are two errors here that need to be corrected. Number one, when Paul talks about being filled, he is not talking about quantity. The Holy Spirit is not a commodity like water.

Water is a symbol of the Holy Spirit, but the Holy Spirit is not water. And you don't say, well, today I'm filled with the Holy Spirit up to my knees, and then I'm filled with the Holy Spirit up to my lungs. No, you don't measure it in geographical or quantity terms.

Nor is being filled with the Holy Spirit to be equated with the baptism of the Spirit. I get all sorts of literature. This is one of the occupational hazards of preaching on the radio.

But I get all sorts of literature from people who are sure I'm a heretic, because I don't tell people you must be baptized with the Holy Spirit. Now, friend, I'll be glad to tell you to do this if you'll show me where it is in the Bible. We are commanded to be filled.

Nowhere are we commanded to be baptized. Someone says, but Pastor, don't quibble over words. I certainly am going to quibble over words, because these words are inspired.

Go to your pharmacist and say, now, don't quibble over words. Aspirin, arsenic, what's the difference? Go to your mechanic at the garage and say, don't quibble over words. Carburetor, alternator, what's the difference? We do quibble over words.

I recall preaching up in Detroit many years ago and sitting in the dining room of the hotel where the evangelistic team was staying. We just had dinner, and my friend who was with me said, why don't you have a piece of pie? They have real good pie here. At that time I was much thinner than I am today, and a piece of pie wouldn't hurt me too much, and so I said, fine.

I said, what kind do you have? Well, she said, we have apple and peach and cherry and blueberry. I like blueberry. I said, I'll have blueberry pie.

So she came back five minutes later and put a piece of peach pie in front of me. Now, peach pie is not one of my favorites. I try to be scriptural and eat those things that are put before me, but not if I'm paying for it.

And I said, I asked for blueberry pie. You know what the waitress said? She must not have needed tips too badly. She said, that's all we've got, take it or leave it.

I left it. That's all I left. You see, there is a difference between blueberry pie and peach pie.

There's a difference between arsenic and aspirin, and there's a difference between the baptism of the Spirit and the fullness of the Spirit. And if you confuse these, you're playing into the hands of the devil. He loves to have us confuse the terminology of the Word of God.

The Word of God was written by the Holy Spirit. Paul says in 1 Corinthians 2, in words which the Holy Spirit speaks. Now I'm not going to change those words.

In the Bible, to be filled means to be controlled by. Luke enjoys using this word. For example, go back to the gospel of Luke and chapter 4 and verse 28.

Our Lord is preaching in the synagogue at Nazareth, and he says that there were many lepers, verse 27, in Elisha's day, but he only healed Naaman. Verse 28, and all day in the synagogue when they heard these things were filled with wrath. What does that mean? Controlled by anger.

Up till now, their minds and bodies and hearts were not controlled by anger, but when Jesus began to preach, they were filled with anger, controlled with anger. You'll turn the page to 5.26. Our Lord healed this man, and they were all amazed, and they glorified God and were filled with fear, controlled by fear, saying, We have seen strange things today. Chapter 6, verse 11, and they were filled with madness or fury and discussed one with another what they might do to Jesus.

Now, we talked about the fullness of the Spirit in Acts. We could turn back to Acts and see how this word full is used in other ways. Chapter 3 of Acts, and verse 10, and they were filled with wonder and amazement, controlled by wonder and amazement.

Chapter 5, verse 17, then the high priest rose up and all they that were with him, which is the sect of the Sadducees, and were filled with indignation. The word means jealousy. Ever been filled with jealousy, controlled by jealousy? Now, you can page through the Bible, through the Gospels and Acts, and you'll find this word filled used to mean controlled by.

And so when Paul says, Be filled with the Spirit, he means be controlled by the Spirit. That's why he introduces wine. A man who gets too much wine in his system gets controlled by the wine, and his mind can't think straight, and his tongue can't speak straight, and his emotions are confused, and his responses are confused.

Now, the Holy Spirit is just the opposite. The Holy Spirit is not like wine, a depressant, a narcotic. The Holy Spirit is a stimulant, and when the Holy Spirit comes into your life, he sharpens your mind, and he loosens your tongue, and he fills your heart, and he controls your body.

The fullness of the Spirit simply means to be controlled by the Spirit. Now, you'll notice the command in verse 18. But be filled with the Spirit.

It is a command. If we are not filled with the Spirit, we're disobedient. It's a command.

It's a command to all Christians, not just to preachers and missionaries and deacons and elders, young and old alike. It is a command that involves a constant experience. Literally, he's saying, be ye being filled with the Spirit.

He's saying, let it be a constant experience, not just once a week, not just once a year, but moment by moment. And you'll notice it's in the passive voice. It doesn't say, fill yourself with the Spirit.

It says, be filled, which simply means make yourself available. God is the one who does the filling. Which leads us now to our third question.

What are the evidences of the Spirit's fullness? Paul did not say, be filled with the Spirit, and when you are, you will speak in tongues. Or when you are, you will perform miracles. He doesn't say that.

Paul tells us here that when a person is filled with the Holy Spirit, there are three evidences of it. He is joyful, that's verse 19. He is thankful, that's verse 20.

And he is submissive, that's verse 21. You see, Paul is not talking about miracles or signs or wonders. He's talking about character.

He's saying here that when a person truly is filled with the Spirit, the first evidence is joy. Speaking among yourselves, talking about a local fellowship of believers, in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord. A joyful Christian.

Now, in the Bible, joy does not mean silly humor. Paul is not telling us to become comedians. There's nothing wrong with a sense of humor.

It gives good balance to your life. A missionary executive that I knew very well, who is now home with the Lord, told me one day, I will never send a missionary to the field who doesn't have a sense of humor. He'll never make it.

But Paul's not talking about that. Paul's talking about that deep confidence, that deep bubbling over of God's blessing that we have in spite of the way we feel, in spite of circumstances, in spite of difficulties. The deepest joy I have ever known, I think, was lying in an intensive care ward in a hospital, just a razor's edge away from death.

My body hurt, but in my heart there was such a joy I can't describe. One verse kept going through my heart, Great is the Lord, and greatly to be praised, and his greatness is unsearchable. No human being can do that.

The Holy Spirit has to do that. There are some Christians who never smile, who when they sing, sing as though they are in great emotional pain. I know people have different personalities.

I'm not saying that the Holy Spirit is going to radically change your personality. What I am going to say is this. If you're filled with the Spirit, there's going to be joy, and other people are going to know about it because it'll bubble over.

He's talking here about sharing joy in singing and testifying and praising God, making melody in our heart to the Lord. It comes from the heart. It's not just on the lips.

When a person is Spirit-filled, he's joyful. Now verse 20 tells me that when a person is Spirit-filled, he's thankful. He doesn't go around griping and complaining.

There are some people, you never meet them, but they have something to complain about. I wonder what would happen to the cause of Jesus Christ if every Christian would start the day saying, Dear Father, help me today not to be a complainer. Nobody would believe it.

You see, the opposite of joyful is sad. What right do we have to be sad? What is there to be gloomy about? The best is yet to come. We may lose a few battles, but we're going to win the war.

And what is there for us to complain about? Do all things without murmurings and complaining, says Paul. When the Holy Spirit of God controls us, we're joyful and we're thankful. Now, he tells us we're thankful not for some things, but for all things.

We're not thankful at some times, we're thankful at all times. That's a marvelous thing when something comes to our lives that hurts, and we're able to say, Thank you, Lord. I don't understand this, and I don't enjoy it, but from my heart I want to say thank you, because you're working something out.

I don't understand it, but thank you, Lord. You see, the Holy Spirit says to me, If you will let me control you always for all things, you'll be thankful. And you'll be able to say, Well, I know all things are working together for good to them that love God.

The third evidence of the Holy Spirit is in verse 21. When a person is spirit-filled, he's submissive. Now, this word submit bothers some people, and the very fact that it bothers them proves they don't know much about the fullness of the Holy Spirit, because when a person is joyful, when a person is thankful, and when a person is submissive, he's glorifying God.

Jesus was joyful. Oh, he was a man of sorrows, but he rejoiced, and he said to his disciples, My joy I want to give to you. Had he never been a man of joy, they would have said, What joy? We've been living with you for three years.

We've never seen you have any joy. They didn't say that. They said, Thank you.

We want your joy. And he was thankful. Over and over again, you find Jesus saying, Thank you, Father.

Thank you. And he was submissive, even unto the death of the cross. He was spirit-filled.

Now, the carnal person doesn't want to submit. Notice it says in verse 21, Submitting yourselves one to another in the fear of God. When a person is spirit-filled, he submits to God, and having submitted to God, he has no problem submitting to others.

Then you know what Paul does? Paul says the first place you're going to discover the Spirit's fullness is at home. Husbands and wives submitted to the Lord and to each other. That's verses 22 through 33.

Then he says children, chapter 6, verse 1 down to verse 4. He says, Husbands and wives submitted to the Lord and to each other. Children submitted to the Lord and to their parents. Servants, verse 5, 6, 7, 8, submitted to the Lord.

He's talking about Christian servants and to their masters. Masters, verse 9, submitted to the Lord and to their servants. Here is an amazing thing.

Here is true spiritual unity. You don't have a wife saying, Well, I'm going to do it my way. They both say, We'll do it God's way.

We don't have children saying, You can just do it your way. I'm going to do it my way. No, they say, We'll do it God's way.

But it all begins with the Holy Spirit. If you try to practice submission without the fullness of the Spirit, you'll have more trouble than you had before. Is it rather interesting that the Holy Spirit of God wants to begin to work in our homes? He's not talking about the church.

He's not saying deacons be submitted, elders, missionaries, Sunday school teachers, choir members, ushers. No, no. He says if your spirit filled, the first place it will show up is where you live.

You may not have a husband or a wife, may have a roommate. There may be some abrasion there, maybe like two pieces of sandpaper. What are the evidences of the Spirit's fullness? You're joyful, thankful, submissive.

And that submission begins at home. And then it moves out to work. Then it moves out to the church.

He does that in chapter six, which leads us now to the most important question, perhaps of the morning. What must we do to be filled with the Holy Spirit? Who is the Holy Spirit? He's God, and he lives within you. What does it mean to be filled? It means to be controlled by.

What are the evidences of fullness? Joyful, thankful, submissive. How are we filled? The fact that he mentions wine, I think, gives us a clue. You'll recall in Acts chapter 2 at Pentecost, when the Holy Spirit came with that rushing, mighty wind, they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues, which was a part of that ministry.

There was a reason for it. And all the Jews from other parts of the world heard the praises of God, thanksgiving to God from the lips of these apostles. And a crowd gathered and said, this is an amazing thing.

We each hear in his own tongue. That was the reason for that. And somebody said, ah, these fellows are drunk.

These men are filling new wine. Is it not interesting that when the Holy Spirit filled the church at the very beginning, the unsaved world says they're drunk? They wouldn't accuse us of being drunk today. They might accuse us of having too much night haul.

They wouldn't accuse us of being drunk. Paul is not bragging about drunkenness. Paul is not glorifying drunkenness.

He says, don't be drunk. Whatever you do, don't get drunk. But he says, just as wine controls a person, so the Spirit wants to control you.

Just as a man who's had too much to drink is singing and he's joyful, but he doesn't know what he's doing. You will sing and be joyful, but you'll know what you're doing. The Holy Spirit doesn't bypass your mind or your heart or your will.

He uses what you are to glorify God. What must we do to be filled with the Spirit? Well, you have to be saved. There is a Spirit that wants to fill unsaved people.

He's mentioned back in chapter 2, verse 2, in which time past ye walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the Spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience. If you're unsaved, you've got a Spirit living in you, but it's the Spirit of disobedience, it's the Spirit of sin, it's the Spirit of Satan, it's a Spirit that will control you and take you to hell. And so the first step, of course, is obviously to be saved.

Now, when you're saved, you're baptized by the Spirit into the body of Christ. Now, get this distinction. The baptism of the Holy Spirit means I belong to his body.

The fullness of the Holy Spirit means my body belongs to him. Now, there's the simple difference. When you were saved, the Holy Spirit said, I will baptize you into the body of Christ, identify you with the body of Christ.

You belong to his body. The fullness of the Spirit means your body belongs to him. So what do we do to be filled with the Spirit? Number one, you can't be filled until you're empty.

This doesn't mean empty of self in the sense that you cease to be a human being. You can't do that. Remember in John chapter 2, when Jesus turned water into wine, here sat these six water pots empty.

You can't fill that which is already filled. And so I have to come and say, Father, here's my pride. I want you to take away my pride.

And here are my appetites that you don't approve of. And just come to him and get cleansed, a cleansing. The Holy Spirit is the Holy Spirit.

First, we must be saved. Secondly, we must be cleansed and empty. Thirdly, our motives have to be right.

Why do you want to be filled with the Spirit? I recall early in my ministry, I wanted the Holy Spirit to do a great work in me because I wanted to have the biggest church in Indiana. It's a poor motive. I think that fruit, more fruit, much fruit glorifies God.

And I'll be glad for the day when the Holy Spirit of God so possesses at Moody Church that we fill every seat. But that's a poor motive. There are those who want to be filled with the Spirit that they might be spiritual giants, show everybody up on campus or in the church.

Poor motive. We should want to be filled with the Holy Spirit for the reason that the Holy Spirit was given. Why was he given? Ye shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and ye shall be witnesses unto me.

The only valid motive for the fullness of the Spirit of God is to glorify Jesus Christ. So we must be saved and we must be cleansed and empty, and our motive must be right. We must realize that we don't get the fullness of the Holy Spirit as a spiritual luxury for us to enjoy.

No, no. The fullness of the Holy Spirit is a necessity. It's an absolute essential if we're going to serve God.

Jesus said, without me ye can do nothing. Not some things, not a few things, but nothing. I think we must yield to him.

I don't know how the Holy Spirit of God can take possession of me if I don't yield to him. This is why at the beginning of each day we say, now Lord, take my heart. I want the Spirit of God to love through me.

And take my body, I want him to live through me. And take my mind, I want him to teach me. And take my will, I want him to work in my life.

Take all of me that there is. Here I am. And just by faith, ask the Holy Spirit to fill.

I don't read here that it's any evidence of the Spirit's fullness that your face shines, although Stephen's did. Maybe if someday you're facing a mob about to stone you, your face will shine too. I don't read that any ecstatic voices were heard.

No. But I'll tell you, my friend, if as you go through the day you find yourself joyful, in spite of circumstances, and thankful, in spite of circumstances, and submissive, you find a deep joy in yielding to others and helping others. Not going through life saying, what are they going to do for me? But saying, what can I do for others? If this is your experience, you know what? You're filled with the Spirit.

And it's a wonderful way to live. Because no matter how much we get jostled and kicked, we're joyful, and thankful, and submissive. We aren't going around causing fights and troubles.

And then the Lord gives us opportunities to witness. And as we witness for the Lord, the Holy Spirit continues to work. There are those days when we, and maybe those hours, when we sense a coldness and a hardness.

We've got to stop and say, Lord, is there something in my life that's grieved the Holy Spirit? And then confess it. Now over in Colossians chapter 3, Paul lays down a basic essential for the Spirit's fullness. Did you notice this? Colossians 3, 16 through 21 is parallel to Ephesians 5, 18 through 21.

Notice this. In Ephesians 5, Paul said, be filled with the Spirit. And if you are, you'll be joyful, thankful, and submissive.

In Colossians 3, 16, Paul says, be filled with the word of God. Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly. How can you tell whether or not a person is filled with the word of God? Notice verse 16 of Colossians 3, teaching and admonishing one another in psalms, and hymns, and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord.

If you're filled with the word of God, you'll be joyful. Verse 17, whatever you do, do in the name of the Lord Jesus. Giving thanks, you'll be thankful.

Verse 18, wives submit, husbands love, children obey, fathers provoke not. When I studied algebra, they said things that are equal to the same things are equal to each other. If A equals C and B equals C, A equals B. Be filled with the Spirit and you will be joyful, thankful, submissive.

Be filled with the word and you'll be joyful, thankful, submissive. In other words, the fullness of the Holy Spirit depends upon the fullness of the word. I'm a little bit worried about some of my friends who claim to know a great deal about the Holy Spirit but know very little about the word.

If the word of God dwells in me richly, then the Holy Spirit has got something to work with, and the Holy Spirit of God takes the word of God and he fills us. As the word of God fills my heart, the Spirit of God can land there. As the word of God fills my mind, the Spirit of God can think there.

In other words, to be filled with the Spirit means to be controlled by the word. So when you spend time in the word and the word dwells in you richly, then you come and say, Father, fill me with your Spirit, and the Spirit of God can take over. Some years ago, a large ship sank in a harbor, and the government spent every kind of device they could and all sorts of money to try to raise it and couldn't raise it.

They used everything. Finally, a man came along one day and he said, I'll raise that ship for you. They said, we've done everything.

He said, just watch. He went and got some barges at low tide, put the barges at low tide right up above the ship, and put cables to the barges and the ship. When the tide came in, the barges went up, and the tide raised the ship.

Somebody here today says, Pastor, I've been trying for so long to get control of my temper, my stubbornness. I'm a bear at home. Oh, I can sing the hymns at church, but boy, let me get home.

I'm a bear. There's no joy in our home. We don't have any fun in our house.

I'm no fun to live with. It's like spending time in jail. Somebody else says, Preacher, I've got an awful habit of complaining.

Somebody else says, I've got some hidden sins I really need to get victory over, and I've done everything. Have you let the tide come in? That's the answer. Not to fight, but just to let the tide come in.

Just say, Oh, Holy Spirit, fill me. Cleanse me. I yield myself to you.

Here is my body. Use it to magnify Christ. Here is my mind.

Teach me about Christ. Here is my heart. Help me to love Christ.

Here is my will. Help me to obey Christ. Take me.

Cleanse me. Fill me. Then by faith, ask.

Jesus said, If you being evil know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more shall your Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him? Then the tide comes in, and what you and I cannot do of ourselves, he does in and through us. This is the normal experience of the Christian. Be not drunk with wine.

That's a substitute. It'll tear you down. Be filled with the Spirit.

Gracious Father, we confess that so often we pretend to be Spirit-filled, and we don't want pretense. We want reality. We remember that Jesus said, If any man thirst, let him come unto me and drink, and out of his innermost being shall flow rivers of living water.

This spake he of the Spirit. We are thirsty, O God, and we're glad that for our thirst you have supplied the quenching, satisfying Holy Spirit of God. We would not ask for his fullness that we might be seen or praised.

We would ask for his fullness that our characters might glorify Christ and that our service might magnify him. I pray for those here today, O God, who thirst for fullness, that you will satisfy them. I pray for those who need to be saved.

I pray for those who need to renounce sin and disobedience. O God, help us to be a Spirit-filled church. Take from us all that would grieve the Spirit of God, whether we think it's big or little, important or unimportant.

Do, O God, cleanse us and fill us. When the unsaved come to fellowship and to see what's going on here at the Moody Church, may they be amazed. May our conduct and our joy and our thanksgiving and our ministry be so effervescent and so exciting that perhaps they'll even think we're drunk.

O Lord, help us now, for Jesus' sake. Amen.