While I was in college, all my summer jobs were doing manual labor outside in the Florida sun. One job was working on a golf course in a retirement community called Sun City Center. I spent all day every day riding mowers, pushing mowers, slinging a weedwhacker, raking sand traps, or whatever other random thing the Superintendent dreamed up. Each morning began before dawn with the temperature in the high 70’s, and each afternoon ended in the high ‘90’s. It was gloriously hot. I was young and stupid, so I could handle the swelter. I even kind of reveled in it.

Every day I went to work in the morning with two quarters in the pocket of my jeans. They stayed there all day until around 4:00, when I had my daily appointment with the Coke machine.  act out

Clink! Clink! Kachunk! Ahhhhhh!  Thirst quenched.

Satisfying our thirst is just about the only time we use the word “quench” in today’s American English. The Old English verb cwencan meant far more: to put out, snuff out, smother, suppress, cool down, or overcome something. So you could quench a campfire, quench a candle flame, quench a lamp, quench your anger, quench a desire, or, yes, quench your thirst.

I learned how to quench a campfire at Boy Scout camp. Here’s the procedure:

1. Let the fire burn down until it’s just a pile of glowing coals
2. Pour plenty of water on it to quench it thoroughly
3. Use a shovel to separate the steaming embers
4. Pour lots more water on them
5. Use your shovel to stir up the mud to make sure the fire is truly out
6. Test for heat at various spots throughout the stew.
7. Repeat the above steps as necessary until the whole mess is stone cold.
8. Bury the whole place in dry dirt or sand
9. Do not walk away from the campsite until you have made sure the fire is truly, totally out.

That’s how to quench a campfire.

In today’s passage, the Apostle Paul is going to use a Greek word that maps almost precisely onto the English word “quench”: literally or figuratively, to put out a fire. He’ll tell the church at Thessalonica, and the First Baptist Church of Dundalk, not to quench the Holy Spirit.

Now that is super weird. It seems to suggest, or at least assume, that mere humans can defeat God. Most of us immediately feel squeamish about that, especially those of us who remember how persistently and insistently the Hebrew prophets thundered that nothing can thwart God’s works or purposes. How could a mere man quench the Spirit of God?

On top of that, plenty of us remember and rejoice in the promise God gave us in Philippians 1:6. And I am sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ. If I’ve once been born of the Spirit, God guarantees I’ll continue to live by the Spirit and grow in the Spirit until the very end of human history. How on earth could I truly quench the Spirit of God?

That doesn’t matter just for the sake of understanding Bible doctrine. If I truly can stop the work of the Spirit in real life, then I absolutely can lose my salvation. In fact, truly and totally quenching the Spirit the way the Boy Scouts taught me to quench a campfire would ensure my salvation’s failure. It would damn me.

What in the world is Paul talking about when he tells us not to quench the Spirit?

We are almost to the very end of Paul’s first letter to the Thessalonian church. He is cleaning up some important issues that he didn’t get a chance to deal with so far in his epistle.

Here he’s handling the crucially important matter of the Holy Spirit and his gifts, specifically the spiritual gift of prophecy. (By the way, that fact in itself tells us something about how quenching the Spirit would relate to our salvation or the loss of it. We’ll think about that.)

1 Thessalonians 5:19-22

¹⁹ Do not quench the Spirit. ²⁰ Do not despise prophecies, ²¹ but test everything; hold fast what is good. ²² Abstain from every form of evil.

I’ll invite you to listen with me for 5 clear commandments related to how we must respond to the Holy Spirit of God and his work in our lives.

In general, do not quench the Spirit

Paul tells the Thessalonians, and us, Do not quench the Spirit.  Bible scholars have been squabbling over these words almost ever since Paul wrote them, for all the reasons I just laid out.

First of all, it is ridiculous and even blasphemous to suggest a human being could stop, defeat, or destroy God. But that’s not what this passage is talking about. He was talking about how our habits and choices interact with or even undermine, counteract, or resist the work of the Spirit of God.

God has set up his creation in such a way that he actually interacts with us and other thinking creatures. We make real choices in response to the reality in which God has placed us, and God really interacts with those choices. In many specific situations, God chooses to react to and interact with our choices in ways that look like he is being limited. But when we look closer, we see that this is simply an artifact of the interplay between the sovereign and unlimited freedom of God and the real and responsible but limited freedom of man.

Here’s an example. In Genesis 19, the angel tells Lot he can do nothing to Sodom until Lot reaches safety in another city. It’s not that Lot’s arrival would somehow unleash God’s power. It’s just that God had told the angel how the whole thing worked: First, God’s people are removed to safety. Then, God rains down fiery judgment on Sodom and Gomorrah. The angel just says that things can’t move to step 2 until step 1 is completed.

Or consider when Jesus visited his hometown of Nazareth and his parents’ friends and neighbors cynically, snarkily dared him to do there some of the miracles he had famously done in other towns. Mathew, Mark, and Luke all tell their own versions of the story, each choosing which details to include or emphasize. Mark says that Jesus could do no great work there, except to heal a few poor people. Was this because their unbelief somehow blocked the power of God? The passage doesn’t say that, although I have heard entire sermons or even sermon series claiming that it does. What it says is that it was because of their unbelief—specifically their snooty, cynical, envious refusal to recognize or trust in a hometown boy who was starting to show himself as a genuime messenger from God—that Jesus didn’t do many miracles in Nazareth. They didn’t just doubt or question him. They disrespected him and mockingly demanded miracles from him. God’s answer was, “I don’t play that way.”

There are times, in both the Old Testament and the New, when God declares what he won’t do by saying “I can’t do that.” It’s like when a toddler wants his mommy to give him a cookie right after he smacks her in the face, and she answers, “Honey I can’t do that.” She’s not saying she doesn’t have power or permission to give him a cookie. That baby is just learning how things do or do not run around her house. Punching Mom in the jaw is not likely to turn out very well for baby’s team. So it is with God. When he says in the Bible that he can’t do something, he’s just letting us know how things are in his universe.

Here in this passage, Paul is not saying that believers can somehow extinguish the Holy Spirit himself. Rather, he is warning Christians that offending or insulting the Spirit of God will lead to a disciplinary decrease in his activity in our lives. Paul borrowed language from the Old Testament prophets to admonish the Ephesian church about the same thing when he warned them not to grieve the Holy Spirit. He’s warning them (and us) not to stunt or smother the work of the Spirit in their lives by repeatedly disregarding his Word or downplaying his works and so disrespecting him.

Do you understand what the Holy Spirit does in the life of the believer?

The Spirit produces qualities such as faith, love, zeal, and spiritual understanding. These are like a fire in the heart. Faith helps us see God’s promises. Love warms our relationships with God and others. Zeal motivates us to serve Christ with energy and devotion. Spiritual understanding sheds light on God’s truth.

These graces cannot be completely destroyed in a true believer, but they can grow weak. Faith can become clouded by doubt. Love can cool. Zeal can fade into apathy. Spiritual discernment can become dull. This often happens when Christians tolerate sin, spend their time under unhealthy influences, neglect prayer, drift from worship, or ignore God’s Word.

The Spirit also gives believers gifts for serving the church. These gifts are meant to be used, developed, and shared. When Christians refuse to serve, bury their abilities, or fail to use the opportunities God has given them, they are, in effect, quenching the Spirit’s work.

Churches can also quench the Spirit by treating God’s truth lightly, discouraging faithful service, or showing contempt for the gifts God has distributed among his people.

In short, Paul’s command is a call to keep the fire burning. Stay close to 8Christ. Pray faithfully. Listen to God’s Word. Use the gifts God has given. Obey what the Spirit reveals in Scripture. Do not allow sin, neglect, or indifference to dampen the work that God is doing in your heart and in the life of the church.

At best, it will stunt the growth of the Christian or the church. At worst, it can reveal that there never was any real spiritual life there at all. False conversion—a fake new birth—is a real possibility. The reason some professing believers live a Christian life that is disturbingly similar to that picture of a Boy Scout putting out a campfire, aggressively, doggedly looking for every way to quench every last bit of fire or even heat, is that they never have truly been born again. They’ve experienced something of the Holy Spirit, but not genuine new birth. That possibility is terrifying because it is truly a possibility. Don’t live that way.

In specific, do not despise prophecies

The second command explains what Paul means by the first one. “Do not quench the Spirit” is the general principle. “despising prophecies” was one specific way Christians were quenching the Spirit in Thessalonica.

Now whenever modern day American Christians hear the word “prophecy,” we tend to jump immediately to predictions agbout the future. We think about Daniel, Revelation, beasts, horns, timelines, and charts.

But in the New Testament churches, prophecy was broader than that. Most often it referred to a Spirit-enabled, openly spoken message that communicated God’s truth to God’s people for their encouragement, correction, comfort, and instruction. It was a gift that the Holy Spirit gave to some believers in each church. Do you remember how often we saw that in our study of the Book of Acts?

Apparently, some people in Thessalonica had become cynical about these messages. Maybe there had been abuses. Maybe someone claimed to speak for God and turned out to be wrong. Maybe a few spiritual showoffs had made everybody else uncomfortable. Whatever the reason, the church was developing an attitude that said, “We’re done listening.”

Paul says that’s the wrong reaction.

It is true that some people abuse spiritual gifts. It is true that some people claim divine authority they do not possess. It is true that there are false teachers. But the existence of counterfeits does not mean we throw away the genuine article.

If someone passes a counterfeit 100-dollar bill, the bank does not stop accepting Benjamins. They go back to basics and re-learn how to identify the real thing.

The same principle applies here. God’s people should never become so skeptical that they are unwilling to hear what God has to say.

For us today, that means we approach God’s truth with humility and expectancy. Every time Scripture is preached, every time God’s Word is taught, every time a Christian brother or sister shares biblical wisdom, we ought to listen carefully. God still speaks through his Word. The Spirit still takes that Word and applies it to hearts. Sometimes he even shares startlingly specific messages for particular people.

Don’t develop a hard heart. Don’t become spiritually cynical. Don’t roll your eyes whenever God begins to work. Don’t despise what God may be doing.

This is a particularly relevant commandment for Reformed Baptists like us. We make it a point to guard against theological error and insist on biblical precision. Sometimes that can become a point of pride. When that happens, we’ve fallen into sin. We’re quenching the Spirit.

Don’t despise prophecies.

Instead, test everything you hear

Now Paul swings to the other side of the road. Some churches make the mistake of rejecting everything. Other churches make the mistake of believing everything. Paul says do neither.

Notice the balance. He does not say, “Reject all aupposed prophecies.” Neither does he say, “Accept prophecies uncritically.” He says, “Test everything.”

The word means to examine, evaluate, investigate, and prove something genuine.

In other words, Christians are not supposed to check their brains at the door. God has never asked his people to be gullible. Just because somebody says, “God told me” doesn’t mean God told them. Just because somebody sounds confident doesn’t mean they’re correct. Just because something is emotional doesn’t mean it’s spiritual. Every message, every teaching, every claim must be tested against the revealed Word of God.

The Bereans in Acts 17 are the classic example. Even when the Apostle Paul himself preached to them, they went home and searched the Scriptures to see whether what he said was true. Think about that. They fact-checked an apostle. And Luke said that made them more noble than most. If they examined Paul’s teaching, then we certainly ought to examine everybody else’s.

The Paul who insists on their sensitively, open-heartedly listening to the Spirit of God was not in any sense anti-intellectual. He was not at all opposed to careful, critical, biblical, hard thinking. In fact, he demanded it. Do you remember what he said to the Corinthians in his second letter to them?

10  ⁴ For the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh but have divine power to destroy strongholds. ⁵ We destroy arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God, and take every thought captive to obey Christ,

Pay close attention to that. Paul says he is specifically engaging in intellectual combat. He is ripping apart ideas and tearing down philosophies that are opposed to Jesus Christ. Paul is one of the apostles of Jesus Christ who are working together to lay the foundations of the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ by teaching the gospel of Jesus Christ and how it applies. The Apostles believed that they were being inspired by the promised Spirit of Jesus Christ to write authoritative scripture for their age and all the ages to come, including ours.

The Bible is our standard. Not denominations. Not personalities. Not traditions. Not feelings. Not popular opinion. The question is always: Does this agree with what God has already said? Every other stronghold must be torn down, and no structure may be built which does not match the plumb line of the scripture itself.

The Holy Spirit never contradicts the Scriptures he inspired.

Hold tight to whatever’s good

The picture is gripping something tightly and refusing to let go. Once you’ve examined something and discovered it is true, good, biblical, and God-honoring, Paul says, “Hold fast.” After testing comes standing. After discernment comes determination. After confirmation comes conviction,

We live in an age that treats conviction like a disease.

People say, “Don’t hold your beliefs too strongly. Keep everything flexible. Leave all options open.”

The Bible says the exact opposite when it comes to truth.

When God reveals truth, grab hold of it.

Hold fast to sound doctrine.

Hold fast to the gospel.

Hold fast to biblical morality.

Hold fast to God’s promises.

Hold fast to God’s character.

When culture shifts, hold fast.

When circumstances become difficult, hold fast.

When doubts arise, hold fast.

When everyone else seems to be drifting, hold fast.

A drowning man clings to a life preserver because he knows it can save him. The church must cling to the truth because we know it is life itself.

Stay away from whatever’s bad

The final command is the negative counterpart to the previous one. Hold fast to what’s good. Stay away from what’s evil. The idea isn’t merely recognizing evil. It’s avoiding it.

Do you remember how Paul used this same word back at the beginning of chapter 4? There he says that we are to abstain from sexual immorality. Same word in the original language. It means way more than “just don’t do it.” It means, “stay away from it.”

Sometimes Christians think maturity means seeing how close they can get to sin and error without actually crossing the line. Paul has a different approach: How close can I stay to Christ? and how far can I stay from evil?

• If you discover a teaching that is false, reject it.
• If you discover a habit that weakens your walk with Christ, abandon it.
• If you discover an influence that consistently pulls you away from God, separate yourself from it.

The Christian life isn’t simply about knowing the difference between truth and error. It’s about embracing truth and rejecting error. It’s about loving what God loves and hating what God hates.

A good doctor doesn’t simply identify cancer. He removes it. Likewise, believers don’t merely recognize evil and error. We remove them and stay away from them.

Notice what Paul has done here. He hasn’t given us a complicated formula. He hasn’t handed us a twelve-step process.

He has simply described a healthy relationship with the Holy Spirit.

• Don’t smother his work.
• Don’t discount his truth.
• Carefully evaluate what you hear.
• Embrace what is good.
• Reject what is evil.

Many Christians spend their lives wondering why they feel spiritually cold.

• Why the joy is gone.
• Why worship feels mechanical.
• Why prayer feels empty.
• Why their relationship with Christ seems distant.

Sometimes the answer is not complicated.

Somewhere along the way, we’ve allowed the fire to grow dim.

• We’ve ignored what God was saying.
• We’ve resisted what God was doing.
• We’ve tolerated what God told us to leave behind.

Paul’s words are an invitation to open the vents again and let the fire breathe.

This morning, God is not asking you to manufacture spiritual power. He is asking you to stop resisting his work.

• If there is sin you’ve been excusing, confess it.
• If there is truth you’ve been ignoring, obey it.
• If there is a gift you’ve buried, start using it.
• If there is a prompting from God’s Word that you’ve been resisting, surrender to it.

The Holy Spirit is not a force to be manipulated. He is the third Person of the Trinity, living within every believer. He loves you, guides you, convicts you, equips you, and points you continually toward Christ.

So don’t quench him. Instead, welcome his work.

• Listen carefully to God’s truth.
• Test everything by Scripture.
• Hold tightly to what is good.
• Stay far away from what is evil.

As you do, you’ll discover that the fire God ignited when you got saved still burns brightly for his glory and your good.

Before we’re done, let me speak to those who suddenly find themselves questioning whether the fire Paul is describing has ever really been lit in your hebart at all.

The Holy Spirit does not dwell in people because they are religious, moral, baptized, or church members. He dwells in those who have been made new by the Spirit of God and truly, savingly put their faith in Jesus Christ.

The bad news is that all of us are sinners. We have rebelled against God, fallen short of his glory, and earned his judgment. But the good news is that Jes8us Christ came to do for us what we could never do for ourselves. He lived the perfect life we failed to live, died on the cross for our sins, and rose again from the dead.

And today, if you will turn from your sin and place your trust in Christ alone, God will forgive you, save you, and give you new life. The very Spirit Paul speaks about in this passage will come to dwell within you.

Christian, church, don’t quench the Spirit. If that’s what you have been doing, here is some good news. In chapter 12 of his book, Matthew describes Jesus healing a crowd of people who are chasing him down, desperate for help. He heals them all, and tells them keep quiet about it. Matthew explains,

 This was to fulfill what was spoken by the prophet Isaiah:

“Behold, my servant whom I have chosen,
my beloved with whom my soul is well pleased.
I will put my Spirit upon him,
and he will proclaim justice to the Gentiles.
He will not quarrel or cry aloud,
nor will anyone hear his voice in the streets;
 a bruised reed he will not break,
and a smoldering wick he will not quench,
until he brings justice to victory;
and in his name the Gentiles will hope.”

Friend, if you’ve never trusted Christ, your greatest need today is not to rekindle a fire. It’s to receive life from the Holy Spirit. As John says it, The Spirit and the Bride say, “Come.” And let the one who hears say, “Come.” And let the one who is thirsty come; let the one who desires take the water of life without price.

Come to Jesus. Turn to him in faith. He will not turn you away.

Eternal Father, in this very moment, we turn again from our sin and ourselves to you and your glory,

Trusting only in your Son’s sacrifice for our sins to make us right with you.

We want to shelter ourselves in the shadow of his cross,

Bathe ourselves in the blood that he shed there for us,

Rest ourselves on his redemption

Robe ourselves in his righteousness,

Renew ourselves in his resurrection,

Lose ourselves in his Lordship,

And find ourselves in his friendship.

We want him to become for us, for today and forever, wisdom from God, and righteousness, and holiness, and salvation.

For he is the One who suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring us to you, our Father.