The sermon opens with a personal anecdote from nineteen years earlier, when the preacher first arrived in Melbourne and, needing quiet space to prepare sermons away from his small children, became a regular at the Flemington public library. There he struck up a conversation with an older Pentecostal pastor who asked whether he had been "baptized in the Holy Spirit" and whether he spoke in tongues. The preacher uses this exchange to name a common charismatic misunderstanding: that Spirit-baptism is evidenced by tongues and miracles. Against this, the sermon insists that baptism in the Holy Spirit is not a second, subsequent experience marked by supernatural phenomena, but the once-for-all reality every believer already possesses through new birth. Citing 1 Corinthians 12:13 and Ephesians 1:13-14, it argues that all who are united to Christ, having believed the gospel, have already been baptized into one body by one Spirit and sealed with the promised Holy Spirit as a guarantee of their inheritance. Scripture, the sermon notes, never commands believers to seek Spirit-baptism, because it has already been given; what Scripture does command, in Ephesians 5:18, is something different — that believers be continually filled with the Spirit.

The sermon situates this command within its immediate context: "do not get drunk with wine, for that is debauchery, but be filled with the Spirit." Drunkenness is set against the wise, careful, watchful walk described in verses 15-17, since believers live in "evil days" while Satan, knowing his time is short (Revelation 12:12), works with particular ferocity. The sermon marshals sobering statistics on drink-driving fatalities and on alcohol's link to sexual assault to underline how drunkenness destroys wise living and dulls a person's grasp of God's will, leaving them vulnerable to the enemy's deception. Being filled with the Spirit is the positive counterpart: a life of vigilance, wisdom, and redeeming the time, empowered from outside oneself.

Turning to the phrase itself, the sermon surveys three ways the New Testament speaks of being "filled with the Spirit." First, it describes a specific empowering for a particular task, granting boldness and courage — as when Peter, filled with the Spirit, answers the Jewish rulers fearlessly, and when the gathered believers, filled with the Spirit, speak the word of God boldly (Acts 4:8, 31). Second, it describes an ongoing characteristic of certain mature believers who habitually walk in obedience — Jesus himself, "full of the Holy Spirit" (Luke 4:1), and Stephen, chosen among the seven as a man "full of faith and of the Holy Spirit" (Acts 6:3, 5). Third, and this is the sense of Ephesians 5:18, it is a standing command for every Christian, framed in the present tense — "keep on being filled" — because indwelling the Spirit does not guarantee constant obedience. Believers still fall into sin, coldness, and folly, so they must continually ask to be filled again, much as one must breathe continually though one was born only once.

The sermon then asks what evidence marks a Spirit-filled life, turning to verse 19: speaking to one another in psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs, singing and making melody to the Lord with the heart. Against Pentecostal claims that tongues or physical healing are the proof of the Spirit's fullness, the sermon observes that giants of church history — Luther, Calvin, Jonathan Edwards — left no record of speaking in tongues, yet were used mightily by God. Quoting John Stott, it insists the primary evidence of the Spirit's fullness lies not in supernatural phenomena but in these spiritual qualities: worship and fellowship, a right relationship with God and with others. Congregational singing — illustrated with lines from "O Come, All Ye Faithful" and "I Need Thee Every Hour" — becomes a picture of mutual exhortation and heartfelt dependence on God, not mere words but songs "from the heart."

Finally, the sermon presses application. This command binds every believer, not only pastors — it is not optional. Yet it is also passive: believers cannot manufacture Spirit-fullness by effort: they can only ask, echoing Paul's prayer in Ephesians 3:16-19 for the Spirit's power to strengthen the inner being so that Christ's love is known in its breadth, length, height, and depth. This asking is paired with meditating on and treasuring God's word, and with stepping out as Christ's witnesses. Stephen's martyrdom (Acts 7:54-60), full of the Spirit even as he is stoned, is set beside Peter's more visibly successful preaching that won three thousand converts — a reminder that the outcomes of Spirit-filled obedience differ, but the call to seek fullness remains the same for all. The sermon closes by urging the congregation to pray for boldness ahead of an upcoming Christmas outreach event, that they might invite the lost and the estranged to hear the gospel.

Bible Verses Used

• Ephesians 5:15-19: the sermon's main text, contrasting drunkenness with being continually filled with the Spirit and its evidence in singing and heartfelt worship.

• 1 Corinthians 12:13: cited to show all believers were baptized by one Spirit into one body at conversion.

• Ephesians 1:13-14: cited to show the Holy Spirit seals and guarantees believers as God's own the moment they believe.

• Acts 4:8, 31: examples of being filled with the Spirit for bold, specific proclamation of the word.

• Luke 4:1: Jesus described as "full of the Holy Spirit," illustrating Spirit-fullness as a settled character trait.

• Acts 6:3, 5: Stephen and the seven chosen as men full of the Spirit and wisdom, showing Spirit-fullness as visible maturity.

• Ephesians 3:16-19: Paul's prayer for strengthening by the Spirit in the inner being, offered as the pattern for how believers ask to be filled.

• Revelation 12:12: cited to show the devil's urgency and fury because he knows his time is short, heightening the urgency of watchful, Spirit-filled living.

• Acts 7:54-60: Stephen's martyrdom as a Spirit-filled witness, contrasted with Peter's more visibly fruitful preaching.