The believers at Pentecost “were all filled with the Holy Spirit” (Acts 2:4), but the one Apostle, Paul, called and sent to the Gentile “body of Christ” never anywhere in his thirteen epistles says the members of “the body of Christ” are filled with the Holy Spirit.

In contrast with Pentecost, it’s undeniably clear from the record that the Corinthians and the Galatians, for example, we are not filled with the Spirit. In fact, Paul’s letters to these churches contain much of rebuke and correction. It’s also evident that believers today are not — even the best of them — wholly filled with the Spirit.

Today the filling with the Spirit is now a goal, an attainment, which Paul, by inspiration, sets before us. Thus we are not all “filled with the Spirit” in the manner of the Messianic Pentecostal believers. While the “Spirit of Christ” does indeed dwell within our human spirit by God’s grace immediately upon salvation (cf. Jn 3:6, Col 1:27), we must daily “yield” to the Spirit (Rom 6:13).

Paul, as “the Apostle to the Gentiles” (Rom 11:13) in this age of pure grace exhorts believers and prays for them, that they may be “Be filled with the Spirit” (Eph. 5:18); “be filled with the fruits of righteousness” (Phil. 1:11); “be filled with the knowledge of His will” (Col. 1:9); “be filled with all the fulness of God” (Eph. 3:19), yet none of us have been filled with any of these.

What does Paul mean by saying “… be filled with the Spirit” in Eph. 5:18b?

First we must understand that we were filled already with “the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus” when Christ’s life was deposited into our human spirit the very moment we were regenerated (born again (cf. Rom 8:9). We thus became “one spirit” with Christ’s Spirit in our spirit (cf. 1Cor 6:17). However, we as humans also have a soul that consist of mind, emotion and will that was Not automatically filled with Christ.

So, when Paul exhorts believers to be “be filled with the Spirit” and be “filled with all the fulness of God” he is encouraging believers to yield their mind, emotion and will to the Spirit of Christ… so as to come under the influence of Christ’s Spirit. We need to see the whole verse; “And be not drunk with wine (its spirits), wherein is excess; but be filled with the Spirit; (Ephesians 5:18). Noting the context of the verse, Paul is using an analogous comparison between “the Holy Spirit” and the ‘wine spirits.’ We all know that ‘wine spirits’ can influence one’s mind, emotion and will; superseding one’s natural state. If we ‘yield to the Spirit’ we are walking by His power within.

Thus Paul is saying we need to come under the influence of Christ’s Spirit and this will affect our soul’s expression by Christ’s life flowing from our spirit; thus being “filled with the fruits of righteousness” (Phil. 1:11); “filled with the knowledge of His will” (Col. 1:9), so long as we yield to Christ’s Spirit within us.

The reason why we today are not automatically filled with the Spirit as occurred on the day of Pentecost is another matter entirely and I am not addressing that here. I have in other papers. The reader shouldn’t fail to first recognize the fact that while the believers gathered in the upper room at Pentecost were all “filled with the Spirit,” the grace believers of today’s “dispensation of the grace of God,” and since that time, have not all been filled with the Spirit. Moreover, while it is distinctly stated, again and again, that the Pentecostal believers were, baptized with the Spirit, not once does Paul in his epistles teach that members of “the body of Christ” are baptized with or in the Spirit. Instead he exhorts them to appropriate God’s grace by faith so that they may be filled or be under the influence of the Spirit... in their soul.