Ephesians 4:30 – “And grieve not the Holy Spirit of God, whereby ye are sealed unto the day of redemption.”
Grieve not the Holy Spirit is an express command from God to all believers. Just like all other commands from God to us, this one is for our benefit also. We are duty bound to obey His commandments in other to reap the rewards. Every instruction of God is for our good and carries great benefits. Our obedient to these instructions uploads the benefits therein into our lives. If you are willing and obedient, you will eat the good of the land says Isaiah 1:19. The Holy Spirit is given to us to accomplish certain vital assignments in our lives. The value of the Holy Spirit in the lives of believers is immeasurable. The expression, grieve not, in our reference scripture implies we must be careful to understand the dos and the don’ts of that command. It calls for caution in our actions. It confers on believers the responsibility of being careful not to anger the Holy Spirit. We have bosses in our different organizations and we are careful not to provoke them to anger. Because by so doing, we will be attracting to ourselves their wraths and we may lose the job and the benefits attached therein. We must therefore be conscious not to aggrieve the Holy Spirit because He is greater than our bosses. His benefits in our lives are eternal and far greater than any human benefits on earth.
Purpose of the Holy Spirit in our lives
The purposes and importance of the Holy Spirit in the lives of believers are spelt out severally in the bible.
The Holy Spirit is the seal of God upon our lives till the day of redemption. From the moment we believe in Christ until we will see him in glory, the Holy Spirit is a seal of Gods authority and Gods approval in our lives. The Holy Spirit is also our Guide, our Teacher and our Comforter in the journey of life. It is therefore important that we see Him as a friend who should not be offended. The Holy Spirit is actually a person with the character of a dove; very gentle. So, we are admonished and commanded to make sure that we do not grieve Him. Rather, we should see Him as the most valuable Friend and Partner in our journey of life. No believer can run this race well and end well without Him.
Things that can grieve the Holy Spirit
Grieving the Holy Spirit means to offend Him, to hurt Him, to make Him unhappy and do things that will hinder Him from fulfilling His assignments in our lives. Therefore, we are commanded not to grieve the Holy Spirit.
Ephesians 4:29 and 31 give us clue to the things we do that could make the Holy Spirit offended. Verse 29 says, let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth This is a warning to all believers. Corrupt communications should not come out of our mouths. Don’t be somebody who speaks things that are defiling, corrupt words, discussion that pollutes the heart. It should not be known with us. We should not be people who jest unnecessarily, who talk lousily without care. The Bible says, let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth. Verse 31 then says, Let all bitterness, and wrath, and anger and clamour and evil-speaking be put away from you with all malice. In other words, if you are the kind of person who is always bitter, quarrelling, fighting, you are going to grieve the Holy Spirit. You are going to offend the Holy Spirit. We are therefore warned that we should put bitterness away from our lives.
Brethren, please put bitterness, wrath, anger and fighting away from you. People will surely offend you, but be careful how you react because you are a carrier of the Holy Spirit. We must learn to apply caution to what we say and how we act. The Holy Spirit is the one guiding us, teaching us and directing us, therefore we must not offended Him. We must take away from our lives all bitterness, and wrath, and anger, clamour, evil-speaking, with all malice. In other words, if you are the kind of person who is always bitter, quarrelling, fighting, you must begin to pray that God will take them out of your lives. If we have unforgiving spirit, we are telling the Holy Spirit to go out of our lives. We are also telling Him not to have control over our lives. He is not happy when a person in whose life He dwells in, is bitter, angry or wrath. It is not His character.
Married men and women should note this. Between husband and wife, a number of times they quarrel. Many people say we cannot do without quarrelling. By having that mindset you are going to offend the Holy Spirit. Therefore, we need to be very careful about this matters by taking heed to our actions and the things that proceed from our hearts.
The bible says concerning our hearts:
“For from within, out of the heart of men, proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders, thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lasciviousness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, foolishness: All these evil things come from within, and defile the man.” Mark 7: 21-23
Therefore, we must take care of the meditations of our hearts, we must guide our actions and we must weigh our words.
Cultivating good relationship with the Holy Spirit
Then the Bible says, speak words which are good; speak words which edify, loving and kind words. When such words flow from our mouths, they are indications of the state of our hearts, because our hearts are the store houses of words we speak. The Holy Spirit is holy and operates in a clean and pure environment. So we must endeavor to purify our hearts as a basic step towards cultivating a good relationship with Him.
Secondly, the Holy Spirit desires our fellowship. The benediction states this fact clearly: the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God and the sweet fellowship of the Holy Spirit. Fellowship is a friendly, cordial and love-driven relationship. We must desire this fellowship with the Holy Spirit, we must value this fellowship and we must do everything to protect the health of this fellowship.
May the Lord help us to heed this commands given to all believers in Jesus name.