April 6
“And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption.” (Ephesians 4:30)
The Greek word translated “grieve” means “to distress, to cause sorrow.” It is the same word used to describe Jesus’ distress when He was praying to God in the garden of Gethsemane. This word is also translated “cause sorrow” or “made sorrowful,” “distressed,” and “hurt.”
Do you ever think about how you might be making the Holy Spirit sorrowful or distressed, or how you might be hurting Him and grieving Him? Did you realize that you and I as children of God can make the Holy Spirit of God, who fully participated in the creation of this unbelievably amazing universe, sorrowful? We are not told exactly what things cause the Holy Spirit to be grieved, but this command in Ephesians chapter four appears in the middle of commands to not be angry, to not steal, to let no unwholesome word proceed from our mouths, to not be bitter and wrathful, etc.. So it seems that these types of sins would be included in the types of behaviors that would grieve the Spirit.
I really don’t think about the feelings of the Spirit of God much. I think I have the idea that when I sin against God, I might make Him mad at me, or He might not want to be close to me, or He might punish me in some way, but I honestly can say that I don’t think in terms of Him being grieved, saddened, made sorrowful, or hurt. And because I think of God as being tough and angry, rather than being humble and sensitive, I tend to think of sin as more of a transaction where I sin and God punishes me, and I think in terms of whether or not I am willing to pay the price or even whether or not I care. (Yes, we can get so blind in our sin that we don’t even care about the consequences, even though we very much should and will when we come to our senses again.) I’m now trying to analyze my mind and the wrong thinking that takes place when I knowingly do what I know God is displeased with.
This sinful attitude is awful, I realize, but what I am usually never thinking about is that my behavior is actually hurting God, that I am actually causing distress to Him. If whenever you sin and your wife (or husband or children or parent) cried and was distressed over that sin, if you knew that every time you committed sin you pierced their heart and made them weep with sorrow, that would have a much greater impact on you than if you thought they didn’t care or would just be annoyed or angry with you or seek to get revenge on you. The latter could become a game of consequences, which we may or may not care about, but the former, grieving them to tears, now that is a different situation altogether. I don’t want to grieve them or make them sorrowful. I don’t want to distress them or make them cry. I have many sins but wanting to intentionally hurt someone else is not one of them. Knowing that I am hurting someone else when I sin is taking the consequences from just impacting me to now affecting them and impacting them, which I don’t want.
Think about this, and we will discuss it more tomorrow.