Do Not Quench

Our text for this study is 1^st Thessalonians 5:19-22.  The previous three verses emphasized attitudes that will enhance your life and make you a magnet drawing others to Christ; these four verses emphasize elements essential for healthy Christian growth.  These instructions are given in short, quick, and powerful format:

Do not put out the Spirit's fire; do not treat prophecies with contempt. Test everything. Hold on to the good. Avoid every kind of evil. [1 Thessalonians 5:19-22 NIV]

I want to ask you a question.  Are you healthy?  That is a question you have probably heard, and answered, many times.  We are bombarded with health everywhere we turn today.  You can buy hundreds of books or subscribe to numerous magazines that purport to teach you healthy living techniques.  Every diet program now claims to be a healthy eating program.  Even gyms are now called health clubs.

Americans spend billions every year on health.  Just watch the TV ads one night and see how many of them use your health as their main selling point.  Every breakfast cereal is supposedly designed for your health.  Shoes are sold for your health.  You can buy humidifiers and dehumidifiers and air purifiers and water filters all for your health.

Lots of toys are now designed with the exercise and health of children in mind.  Even video games--the scourge of healthy living--are now being redesigned with intellectual health in mind.  You can buy video games that will help teach children to read, or learn math.  Instead of shooting down invading aliens gamers can now obliterate dangling participles. 

Vitamins have become a multi billion-dollar industry.  Many Americans are spending hundreds of dollars a month on vitamins!  My Grandfather, 95 years old, has taken vitamins by the bucketful for as long as I can remember.  For years he was an avid reader of Prevention Magazine because (as he is so fond of telling me) an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.

Because of the health consciousness of consumers you can buy organic foods claiming their apple is healthier for you than the apple you buy in the grocery store.  DJ and I were buying some peaches at a farmers market in Colorado.  The worker was handing out free samples and they were delicious.  The lady beside me asked him, “Are the peaches organic?”   He laughed and said, “No!  Organic just means full of bugs.” 

And, of course, none of this even counts doctors and medicines, which we know we need for good health.   Healthy living, you are bombarded with it daily.  Chances are you think of it frequently.  But when was the last time someone advised you about your spiritual health?   How often have you even thought about it?  It came to the apostle Paul’s mind, and he gives 5 quick commands at the end of 1^st Thessalonians. These are general commands to help us with our spiritual health.  His commands follow a simple pattern: do not, do, hold on, hold off. 

There are actually two do not's.  The first one says ‘Do not quench the Spirit.’  The Spirit being referred to here is not our human spirit, but the Holy Spirit who dwells in all true believers.  During His earthly ministry Jesus promised His followers that after He had gone away He would send the Holy Spirit.  This Spirit would take up residence and live right inside all Christians.  Through the Spirit, Jesus would always be with us. 

This was a new thing.  Previously, believers of God did not have the direct presence of God with them at all times.   During Old Testament times the Holy Spirit would occasionally come upon certain people to empower them for specific tasks; now, according to Jesus’ promise, the Holy Spirit would be a permanent resident in every believer. 

The Holy Spirit performs many tasks on behalf of believers.  He teaches us, He guides us, directs us, and rebukes us.  He gives us encouragement, comfort, peace and joy.  Through the Spirit we are strengthened for service; our lives are transformed.  He pours out the love of God in our hearts.  He seals us for eternity--giving us confidence and security in our salvation.  It is the Spirit that gives us understanding of God’s Word and empowers us to continue growing in faith and maturity. 

The Holy Spirit is the greatest resource a Christian could ever have for all of life’s needs.  However, much of the work that the Holy Spirit does, He does in conjunction and cooperation with each individual believer.  Which means much of the productiveness or effectiveness of His work depends on us. 

If you want to be spiritually healthy in your life you cannot quench the Spirit.

The word ‘quench’ is a fairly strong Greek word that literally means to snuff out or to extinguish.  Obviously it is within no human being’s power to extinguish the person of the Holy Spirit.  What the apostle Paul means here is that we must be careful not to hinder, not to quench the work of the Holy Spirit in our life.  The moment you first become a Christian the Holy Spirit is yours and He begins His sanctifying work in you.  The word sanctify is a fancy word for the process that God takes you through to change you and conform you into the image of Jesus Christ.  All of us who are saved are being made more and more like Jesus every day.  It is the Holy Spirit who effects that work in each of us and He does it through those different tasks that I mentioned earlier. 

But have you ever noticed that some people seem to change and to grow more mature in their faith much faster than others?  Why is it that two people can be in very similar circumstances but one is strong and vibrant while the other sputters and flounders?  Much of the answer has to do with this command, do not quench the Spirit. 

Now if I were to hazard a guess I would suspect that almost everybody in this room would want to obey this command.  I’ve not talked to very many believers who have said, “I’m satisfied being a mediocre Christian struggling through life.”  Most of us have a great desire to be victorious in Christian living. 

If that is what you want then you cannot quench the Spirit’s work in your life.  So how does a person quench the Spirit?  What are the things we need to avoid?  The easiest and most obvious way we quench the Spirit’s work is through sin.  When we harbor unconfessed sin in our lives it’s just like hamstringing the Holy Spirit.  One of His main jobs is convicting of sin and until we deal with the sin in our lives He is not going to move on to other work in us. 

You can also quench the Spirit by ignoring His presence or acting like He is not at work in you.   The Spirit guides, but where do you turn when you have to make a decision?  The Spirit teaches, but where do you look for information?   The Spirit brings comfort and peace but where do you seek consolation?   The Holy Spirit is not going to force Himself upon you.  He is a gentleman and will wait patiently for you to turn to Him.  We quench the Spirit when we turn everywhere or anywhere else.

We can also quench the Spirit’s workings when we suppress His promptings.  I would guess that most of us have experienced this.  Inside you get this urge that leads you to do a certain thing, or not do something, or maybe to say something to someone, but your desires take you another direction and you suppress the Spirit in order to follow those desires. 

But perhaps the number one way we quench the Spirit is by ignoring the Word of God.  Scripture is the main channel for the Spirit’s working, so when we don’t respond positively to God’s Word we in effect quench the Spirit. 

I think that is why the second ‘do not’ command is ‘do not despise prophetic utterances.’  This injunction is pretty easily understood when we define the main terms involved.    Despise is a strong Greek word that literally means ‘to consider as absolutely nothing or worthless’ or ‘to treat with contempt or look down upon.’ 

prophetic utterances can refer to either a spoken or written proclamation.  The verb ‘to prophesy’ literally means ‘to tell forth’ and was generally used in the sense of a courier proclaiming the message of an authority.  For instance, a page might travel to a village in order to speak forth the king’s edict and that would be called prophesying.  In the Bible the word is always used in the sense of men of God speaking forth the Words of God.  Proclaiming God’s message to mankind. 

Before the Bible was complete as we have it today this sometimes meant speaking forth new revelation.  Now, since we have the completed Word of God the primary meaning of prophetic utterances is what we would call biblical preaching.  If you really want the Spirit to work in your life so you can grow strong and healthy as a Christian then don’t ignore what the Bible says. 

Chances are good that we are all guilty of despising God’s Word once in a while, but it is the habitual practice of despising God’s Word that weakens so many Christians.  Perhaps one of the most discouraging things for me as a pastor is when someone comes to me for advice or counsel and l take them to the Bible and say, “This is what Scripture says you should do.”  Then I watch them go out and chose to keep doing whatever they were doing, or decide to follow the advice of pop psychology, or seek the counsel of their unsaved friends. 

God’s Word has all the answers we need for life.  2^nd Peter 1:3 tells us that through the knowledge of God--which we find in the Scriptures--God has granted to us everything we need for life and godliness!  When we turn to any other source for instruction we invariably end up despising God’s Word. 

It is amazing how much easier most of life’s decisions are when we make the determination that the Bible is--and always will be--our highest authority.  When we decide that what it says goes, many of our decisions are already made for us.  Dilemmas frequently disappear. 

A person can despise God’s Word in several different ways.  Out right rejection of what the Bible says is, of course, the most obvious.  Back in Colorado before I became the pastor of this church I had a discussion with a person who was going to the same church as me, and who claimed to be a Christian.  I told them that the Bible says that the only way to God is through Jesus Christ.  They said they didn’t believe that so I showed them several different passages in the Bible that irrefutably show that Jesus is the only way.  When I finished they said, “Huh, well I still don’t believe it.  I think as long as a person is sincere all religions will eventually lead to God.”   Outright rejection of God’s Word.

That is probably what most of us think of when we hear the phrase ‘despise prophetic utterances.’  Forget what the Bible says, I don’t care.  But there are other ways to treat God’s Word as if it doesn’t matter.   

We can despise God’s Word by manipulating certain texts to make them say things that the Bible doesn’t really say.  In the book of Ecclesiastes you'll find the phrase ‘There is nothing better for a man than to eat and drink and tell himself that his labor is good.’  That phrase has been ripped out of its context and used to promote a hedonistic and self-gratifying lifestyle.  Just in case you are wondering, that is not what the Bible teaches.

We can despise God’s Word by picking and choosing which part we want to follow.  Many people approach the Bible as if it is a big smorgasbord where you can dish up the items you want and leave the rest sitting there. 

Scripture can be despised simply by neglecting it.  It is a book that gathers dust on the end table rather than being read and taken into your life. 

Again, if you want to be a strong, vibrant, healthy Christian then these two things you absolutely must not do:  Do not quench the Spirit; do not despise prophetic utterances.

I’m pretty sure most of us aren’t going to shake our fist at the sky and say, “God I’m not going to let your Spirit work in my life and I don’t care what you say in the Bible I’m going to think and believe and do my own thing.”  The important question for us to answer is “Are there any ways in which we have been quenching the Spirit or looking down upon God’s Word?”  Maybe not blatantly but perhaps casually, it could be by neglecting the Bible or looking to other sources for answers.  Maybe you have been resisting the Spirit’s work in your life in a particular area and you realize it is time to yield and give in.  You will find there is no greater way to spiritual health and vitality than by submitting to the Holy Spirit’s work and accepting God’s Word as supreme.