"Be Filled With The Spirit" (Ephesians 5.18)

by Moule | Category: General | May 1966

We have here a precept not for a crisis but for the whole habit of the Christian's life. Not the least reference to works of wonder occurs in the context. "Psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs," are the manifestation of the Fullness especially and at once in view, and the blessed habit of thankfulness, and the habitual readiness to forget self in the interests of others, and then all the lovely details of a sanctified home. And we must observe that the preceptive verb (plerousthe) is in the present or continuing tense. It enjoins a course, a habit, not a critical effort or venture. It lays it upon the believer so to use the open spiritual secrets of his life in the Lord as to enter upon and walk in a state of divine Fullness which shall be above all things, useful and rich in blessing for the needs of the daily path, and shall result, whatever else it results in, in a temper of continual modesty and unselfish serviceableness towards all around him.

Moule | May 1966
General