Ephesians 4:30

“Do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God with whom you were sealed for the day of redemption.”

We are not to grieve the Holy Spirit of God.

the word “ to grieve” has a similar meaning in Greek as in Hebrew. It means to cause sorrow or grief or to distress. Paul is telling us we must not distress the Holy Spirit.

this follows immediately after the instruction to not let any unwholesome to come out of our mouths. Some commentators suggest that this is important because the Holy Spirit is especially concerned about our communication within the fellowship and to unbelievers. The words that we use and the ways we talk to one another are important to the Holy Spirit and can cause Him grief or distress.

it is also true that our habitual or repeated sins of any character can distress the Holy Spirit. We are told repeatedly in the scriptures that we are to be holy just as the lord is holy. To be constantly in sin is to desecrate the holy vessels that God has called us to be and which Christ died to purchase.

the fact that we can grieve the Holy Spirit is a reminder of the personhood of the Spirit. We can sometimes think of the Spirit as being an impersonal force, perhaps because we fail to adequately grasp who the Holy Spirit is.

we must affirm that the Holy Spirit is God, and therefore a person, in the same way that the Father and the Son are also God and persons .

we use the word “spirit” very loosely at times - the spirit of Christmas, team spirit, the spirit of Australia. In this context the word means a vaguely conceived connection, a bond, or a shared purpose. This is not the character of the Holy Spirit.

the Holy Spirit is God active in the world- whether the context is seen in individual believers, in non-believers, in a culture, or in the church.

when we grieve the Holy Spirit, we grieve God. This occurs through our sin and rebellion, and it opposes the whole concept of our salvation.

Paul here describes the Holy Spirit as” the Holy Spirit of God.” He could have referred to him as the Spirit, or the Spirit of God, or the Holy Spirit. In this way, Paul is emphasising that the Spirit of God is Holy. This is not a name or a title, but a description of the nature of the Spirit of God.

god is Holy. When we use the word “holy” about God, we don't mean the same thing that we mean when we describe a created thing or a person as holy.

to say an object is holy means that it has been set apart for God's purposes. The object then cannot be used for ordinary or profane purposes. Similarly when the scriptures say that we are to be holy, they mean that we are now devoted to God's purposes and we cannot do just whatever we want to do.

to say God is holy is to say that God is untouched in anyway by sin. We can't say this of any created thing because, just by being in the world, they are touched by the general state of corruption which sin has brought into the creation.

god is holy because He cannot do anything that is opposed to His own character. The Spirit of God is likewise holy. Jesus, the Son of God, was tempted in every way that we are, but He remained without sin. He is holy.

because God is by His nature untouched by sin, He does not change in His holiness. We are assailed in every direction by temptation, and often we give in. We can be righteous one minute, and commit some grievous in the next minute, but God’s holiness is constant and unchanging .

the Spirit of God is holy because He is God, and He does not change .

We were sealed with the Holy Spirit of God for the day of redemption.

a seal was often placed on a document to serve two functions.

firstly, it served as a guarantee of the source of the document. It was a sign of ownership. The document could be trusted as a genuine letter from a king, because it contained the king's seal. The Holy Spirit’s presence in the life of the believer is a sign that we belong to God.

the second purpose of a seal was to guarantee the document’s authenticity. A letter that was sealed could be trusted to be free from alterations as long as the seal remained intact.

the Holy Spirit is a sign or a seal that we are the real thing as far as Christ is concerned. We carry the mark of God in our spirits to show that we are not a forgery. Our salvation is real because the Holy Spirit is really in us.

the presence of the Holy Spirit seals us for the day of redemption.

the day of judgement, when the sheep are separated from the goats, and the wheat from the weeds, can make us feel anxious. Judgement sounds like it is about condemnation or punishment.

the day of judgement is, for christians, the day of redemption. We will be declared free and righteous on that day. The Holy Spirit in us will be seen as the true sign of our salvation .

christians have nothing to fear from God’s judgement. We know, or we should know, that Jesus’ death on the cross has bought our salvation. We look forward to eternal joy spent in the presence of God.

those who do not know Christ will be judged and condemned to the lake of fire.

Our culture does not deal well with binary, or black and white, decisions. We like to have grey zones where the edges are blurred, where laws have loopholes. God has stated clearly that those who die in Christ will be raised to eternal life, while those who die away from Christ are doomed to hell.

to choose for Christ is the most important decision any person can make.

key points in this verse:

• to grieve the Holy Spirit means to cause him pain or distress

• Our words and our sins can distress the Holy spirit

• the Holy Spirit is God and is a person not a force

• god is totally untouched by sin and cannot sin

• We are sealed with the Holy Spirit as a sign and guarantee that we belong to God

• for Christians the day of judgement is the day of freedom