‘And grieve not the Holy Spirit of God in whom you were sealed unto the day of redemption.'
The word for grieve may be rendered ‘make sorry, fill with regret'. That the Holy Spirit can be grieved emphasises His personality and the depths of God's concern for His people. The fact of His grief over sin here contrasts with His wrath against sin in those who refuse to respond to the light. His people have been sealed by the Holy Spirit in readiness for the coming day of final deliverance, and He is now at work in perfecting them, and their failure to respond therefore grieves Him but does not incur His wrath, because if they are His they will in the end submit to His will. But we must beware of complacency, for as Paul will shortly remind us, ‘Because of these things the wrath of God comes on the sons of disobedience' (Ephesians 5:6).
‘Until the day of redemption.' Compare Romans 8:23. This is the day when sin will finally be dealt with, when Jesus Christ will come to deliver His own and call men into judgment, and creation will be ‘restored', the day made possible through the redeeming death of Christ.