Amen. Well, last week we talked a little bit about receiving the Holy Spirit. We talked out of Acts chapter 19, and then a little bit out of John 14. So we really didn't get very far, but we covered some good basic foundations. One passage that I meant to put in front of us right from the beginning, because you know, if you've come from some sort of a religious background, there can be barriers built up in you to receiving the Holy Spirit. And so I want us to turn, as we begin today, to Luke chapter 11. And Luke chapter 11, of course, Jesus is teaching his disciples how to pray. There, they ask him, How can we pray? But you know, one thing leads to the next, leads to the next, and as he's teaching them, you know those wonderful sayings, those wonderful teachings that we're familiar with, I tell you, ask, and it will be given to you, seek, and you will find, knock, and it will be open to you. For everyone who asks, we're in Luke 1110, there, for everyone who asks, receives, and the one who seeks, finds and the one who knocks, it will be opened. And then he starts to explain a little bit here that's talking about pursuit, amen, and that's what we're doing here, week by week, especially as we're digging into the things of the Holy Spirit. We're asking, we're knocking, we're believing, amen. Oh, come on, amen. And then down into verse 11. I'm so glad that Jesus clarifies this for us. Because again, like a lot of the times, if you've been brought up in religion, there's kind of this idea that, yes, I'm going to ask, I'm going to pray, I'm going to knock, but there's this hesitancy and this unbelief that can creep in. And a lot of the times we have good religious labels to or sayings to throw out there. It's like, well, I'm believing. I'm asking, I'm knocking, but only if it's God's will, right? And we kind of like, you know, we'll stand back and we're not really going to believe that if I knock, I will have this open to me. If I ask, I will receive. It's kind of like, well, if God wants to, he's going to do this. Well, Jesus makes it very clear here that God wants to. And not only does it make it very clear that God wants to, he also makes it very clear that you will not get the wrong spirit if you're pursuing the Holy Spirit. Can I say that? Again, this is so important, if you've been brought up in any sort of religious background that struggles with what we believe in around here, the filling of the spirit, speaking in tongues, and yes, that's not all there is to it, but it is an important gift, the operations of the gifts of the Spirit. There's teaching out there that we're all deceived somehow. There are millions of Christians out there who have called out to God, who have received prayer, believing and asking and knocking and saying, fill me with the Holy Spirit, and we got a different spirit. Well, then Jesus lied here. I'm sorry. Don't get me wrong, there are other spirits we do need to discern. You know, we need to make sure that we're not getting off track and into things we shouldn't be involved in. But if your heart is after the Holy Spirit, then Jesus promises you that the Father will give you the Holy Spirit. So he says in verse 11, what father among you, if his son asks for a fish, will instead of a fish, give him a serpent, you know, and I know we're talking animals here, but it's pretty clear analogy, right? It's like you're asking for something that is good. You know, fish was the most common form of meat that they would have. It's, you know, a good thing, and I'm not going to give you a fish. I'm going to give you a serpent. And let's face it, serpents in the Bible are pretty symbolic, aren't they? Of evil, of danger, of something that we are supposed to be crushing under our feet, not wanting to interact with. So he says, What father among you, if his son asks for a fish, will give, instead of a fish, a serpent, or which, if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion. And then, if you who are evil, thank you Jesus for that. I mean, compared to God, we're all a little bit evil, aren't we? And I mean, he's talking to those folks there, so I'm not going to feel the full weight of that. Okay, for you, then it was them there, right? Not me, not you. It's convenient way to read that, if you then, who are evil? Know how to give good gifts to your children. I mean, as much as our children, maybe sometimes we would like to, you know, we don't necessarily feel inclined to do good things for them, because they're our kids, and they know where all our buttons are, and they've been pressing them all day long, and now they're asking for something. It's like, really now you're asking now, but even if we are reluctant and hesitant to give our kids good things, sometimes, because we're not so good as our Heavenly Father, you're not going to give them something that's going to kill them, right? If you are Jesus, help us. If then you who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children. How much more will your heavenly Father give you the Holy Spirit to those who ask for him, full stop. That's the answer. Jesus says, you ask for the Holy Spirit. You're not getting a scorpion, you're not getting a snake, you're not getting a demon, you're not getting something else. You are getting the Holy Spirit. Is that clear enough for everybody? There it is in black and white, or in red and white if you're reading one of those Bibles. But I wanted to make sure that we have that right off the get go here. And you know, I was so encouraged last Sunday, because I feel like we're just getting started on this topic of the Holy Spirit. And you know, I feel like I'm more in teaching mode than preacher mode. And sometimes when we're teaching, we feel less spiritual for some reason. How many of you know that teaching is just as much a spiritual gift as preaching? And you know I love we were pressing in on Thursday night and praying the Word of God out of Matthew 13, the parable of the sower. And I couldn't help but notice how, in the parable of the sower, it talks about the Word of God being spread out there, and how, you know, only a portion of the Word of God actually ends up producing fruit in our lives. And I noticed again, or maybe in a new way, for the first time, how the very first thing that the enemy does to steal the potential of the Word of God in our life is to not allow us to understand it. And you know, sometimes in our spirit filled circles, we're so bent on the experience and the manifestation and the power, and we're just trying to preach it into people and, you know, have the right atmosphere and all of these things sometimes, and that's really what I feel like I'm doing over the next few weeks. Here is I'm just breaking down barriers in our understanding that are not allowing the Word of God to get in and to produce the fruit it's supposed to produce. And I was so encouraged last week, because, again, I didn't really feel like I was giving a raw get down here to the altar and get filled with the Holy Spirit. But then I start receiving messages Sunday and Monday saying so and so got filled with the Holy Spirit so and so, you know. And I got two three messages like that. And I don't know if anybody else, but it just shows you that sometimes we need to dial back and just really get in the Scripture and get clear understanding so the Word of God can penetrate even on these spiritual sorts of issues, because, again, spirit and emotion are often tied together, but our emotions are not all spiritual, right, and sometimes we can be satisfied if we get the emotions to the right place, in the room or in our, you know, in our own individual lives, but we can miss out on the spirit because our understanding is still lacking and we're still not entering into all God wants. So I'm just going to hit on some things quickly here, laying these foundations. Genesis, chapter one, verses one and two, the Holy Spirit is present and active from the very beginning of creation. How many of you know that Father, Son and Holy Spirit are revealed and are active and present right from the get go? I mean, it's maybe not clear in black and white language. You know how the sun fits in there. John's Gospel spells that out for us. But let's just look at Genesis, chapter one, verses one and two, in the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth, and the earth was without form, and void and darkness was over the face of the deep. Deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters. John, chapter one, makes it very clear that the Father, what he's doing here is he's speaking forth His Word. And Jesus is that Word. Amen in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. So we have Father, Son and Spirit active, working together from the very beginning of creation. The Holy Spirit is the power of God. But as we said last week, he's more than just a power, a life force. He's more than energy. He is a person, right. There he is in creation, Genesis, chapter two, and we move down to where God, I mean, he's already created mankind. We see in the six days of creation and the seventh day of rest that follows. But chapter two, kind of dials in, and we get the story of Adam and Eve and how he creates Adam there in the garden. And we get this picture, if we just start off from. Where should we go to here from verse seven in chapter two, then the Lord God formed the man from the dust of the ground. In other words, there's an earthly part to all of us. Amen, we are made for this earth, right? That was always God's good plan. But he didn't just want us to be like, you know, all of the other creatures, all of the other animals. He made us as the crowning accomplishment of His creation, like my brother referred to Psalm chapter eight, he didn't give you the reference, but he's made man a little lower than the heavenly beings, but he's made him right to to rule over, to have dominion over all of His creation, man was made for this earth, but he was made in the image and likeness of God. And not just it wasn't just like God took a God shaped mold and, you know, mashed some dirt in there, and then it's just like zap. Now, get going. No, He breathed some of himself into man. It's not just that we look like God or that we have certain things similar with God, but we actually were originally created to carry the very life of God inside of us. And I can only understand then that when God warns Adam and Eve, don't eat from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, the day you eat of that you will surely die. I read my Bible, they eat from that tree. They didn't just drop dead, in the sense that you and I think about death, but something inside them died, and it was that Holy Spirit, life on the inside as they were originally created to walk in. And it's not until Jesus comes and we're born again and we receive Him, that the spirit comes to dwell in us again, that we now get to be what God always intended us to be. How many of you know that God's plan from Genesis to Revelation never really changed? God always intended mankind to represent himself, to have the life of God dwelling within him, so that we would have full fellowship relationship with God, and that we would go about our lives in authority, as Greg spoke about this morning, encouraging us that we would be God's representatives on the earth. What we lost in the garden Jesus came back to restore. So I'm getting excited, which is why we never get through our notes, right? We I say that like you're part of this. It's your fault too. I had 10 pages of notes last week, and I got to a page. Okay, I got 10 pages today. I don't know where we're going to get I'm going to try and just move through it as best we can, because next week I got some stuff that we really got unpacked too. But verse seven there the Lord God formed man from the dust of the ground, and he breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, the Ruach, right? That's that Hebrew word breath, right. That's the spirit of God was hovering over the waters the Ruach of God. Was upon the waters now that that wind, that breath, that life, is coming into man, and man became a living creature. And so that's all we'll look at with the creation story there. I'll just mention a couple of psalms that, again, talks about the Holy Spirit as creator and active in creation. PSALMS 33 verse six says this, by the Word of the Lord the heavens were made and by the breath Ruach of his mouth all their hosts, the spirit is, Yes, God, but he is that active force at work bringing God's Will into effect. The word that we hear about, you know, God speaks, let there be that is the expression of the secret will of God. God has a desire within himself. The Father desires within himself to accomplish something. Then he expresses that. The word is the the expression the embodiment of the will of God. And then the Holy Spirit comes to, I'm looking for the white right verb. It's really hard to use exact right language with these things, but the Holy Spirit is the One Who makes that will come into effect. Psalm 104 verse 30 again, says this, when you sent forth your spirit, your Ruach, they were created and you renewed the face of the ground. So we kind of already talked about this, but just digging into that root word Ruach, and I'm not saying that everywhere the Old Testament uses that word, is it talking about the Holy Spirit, right? We need to go through we need to interpret each passage to understand what's going on. But I found this definition the Hebrew term Ruach can mean wind and breath. It can also refer to the life principle of persons. And so there's different ways this word can be used. We need to we need to unpack them. We need to study them. So we already looked at how he gave life to Adam in the garden. And then, of course, Eve is this perfect creation that God takes part of Adam, and again, he brings them together. I do find it interesting. I'm just going to point this out before we get moving along. Remember that in the very beginning, God creates man in His image and likeness. But then, as we said, Man falls. There's something that has died within man. And I find it interesting that the book of Genesis says this. In Chapter Five, it says this, I'm starting in verse one. This is the book of the generations of Adam. I guess I should mention. This is after Abel and Cain and all of that. Right now we're jumping forward in the story to where they're going to have other children, and we're going to see their their family line kick off, because obviously Abel is gone and Cain rebelled, and all of the rest. So it says in Genesis five, verse one, this is the book of the generations of Adam. When God created man, He made Him in the likeness of God, male and female. He created them, and he blessed them, and he named them man or mankind, humanity. And they were created when they were created. Now, when Adam lived 130 years, he fathered a son in his own likeness, after his image, and named him Seth, I find that really an interesting statement in Scripture, because don't get me wrong, all of humanity still bears the image and likeness of God, but we also, the apostle Paul makes this very clear in his letter to the Roman church, we also bear the fallen nature of Adam and Eve, and I think that's part of what we're seeing in this passage. Something was lost. We still bear that broken image of God. We are still God's children, in that sense, but we need to be reborn as new creations, as adopted children of God, that likeness is restored and renewed. The apostle Paul talks about this in many different places, in many ways. He talks about how we are being transformed into the image and likeness of Christ, because Christ is like a new Adam. Okay. Am I getting too theological for you this morning? It, although you could use some theology, by the way, because we all have theology, and not all of our theology is right, you could use some teaching, some theology. And you know, in my life, I have always considered it a favor when somebody has challenged my theology. You know, I'm sure God was preparing me as a young man even before I really gave myself to him. I was brought up in a Christian household, but we were out of church, so I didn't have a really strong Christian influence. I'd never read my Bible. I still recognized or viewed the Bible as a source of truth, but I wasn't committed to it in that way. But, you know, I went to public school, and I had Jehovah's Witness friends. I had Catholic friends. I had new ager friends, you know, in the Wicca and, like all sorts of Neo pagan stuff, we had all sorts of interesting conversations in over lunch and in the high school hallways, you know, I think about Pastor Brent shared, you know, being in the bar talking about God, right? And everybody's got theology, everybody's got some idea of what, who God is, what spirits are out there, but it's not all true. So that's why we need to study Amen. Anyway. That's kind of a side note as we get into this. But even though man, something in mankind, died when they sinned, God would visit people, and he would pour out His Spirit on people to empower them all through the Old Testament in order to do supernatural things. And that's part of what we love about the Bible, right? I don't know about you, I wouldn't be so excited about the Bible if there weren't miracles, I don't understand. There are some people out there that they dedicate their whole life to this book, studying it, teaching it, and they don't believe in miracles. I'm like, I do not understand. I do not understand how that's even possible. And so we see all through the Old Testament that God would come upon different men and women of God to empower them to do different things and and we can categorize this in different ways. You know, you think about the prophets. For example, they were empowered by God to speak the oracles of God. These are not just their words, although their personality and their way of expressing those truths obviously come in or else, you know, you wouldn't. If you opened Isaiah, it would sound like Daniel, and if you open Daniel, it would sound like Malachi. And you know what I'm saying, like he uses different people and their personalities, their their situation still comes through, but it's been empowered. It's been elevated. It is supernaturally empowered to do something more than they could ever do. And you know that's worth pointing out, because again, when we are filled with the Holy Spirit, and we are empowered by God to do things that doesn't erase your humanity. It doesn't erase your personality even I mean, that's why there's all sorts of different preachers, all sorts of different teachers, all sorts of different ministers, and even denominations that have different flavors, because there's still our humanity, you know, and God always intended it to be this way. God wanted to join Heaven and Earth through humanity. Take some dirt, take some spirits, put them together, bridging Heaven and Earth was always man's purpose, right from Genesis. Isn't that cool? So, I mean, we could go through list after list, scripture after scripture of different men, and some of them you'd be familiar with. You know, you think about Moses. The Spirit, obviously, was upon Moses, and then he prays for Joshua. And a part of Moses' spirit goes to Joshua. I'll just read some of these passages to you. Numbers, chapter 11, verse 16. Now this is actually where Moses is praying for the elders of Israel. It says, Then the Lord said to Moses, gather for me 70 men of the elders of Israel, whom you know to be the elders of the people, and officers over them. Now that's an interesting thing, by the way. You'll notice that these people already were functioning in. Something. Now God is coming to empower them to a new level of authority, a new ability within that role. I kind of point that out, because sometimes, and don't get me wrong, God can take the nothings of this world and raise them up, but an awful lot of the time, like when we look at Jesus' disciples, we sometimes overplay the fact that, oh, they were backwoods, fishermen, stuff like this, but they were working men, you know, he didn't find somebody that was sitting there waiting for, you know, Heaven to fall upon them, lazy, doing nothing. God came and empowered people that were working, that were seeking the Kingdom of God. So these elders, they're already recognized as elders among the community. And it says, Bring them to the tent of meeting, and let me and let them take their stand there with you. And I will come down and talk with you there, and I will take some of the spirit that is on you, and I will put it on them, and they will bear the burden of the people with you, so that you will not bear it alone. I love that image. And really the apostles, you know, we see this happen in different ways at different times, in the book of Acts and through Scripture is that God never intended one super anointed, you know, glory, one guy to go up on the mountain to experience the glory, and everybody else just has to come to that God guy. God always wanted to empower the body, to empower a people, to be a different sort of a people. Now, again, now this is referring to Joshua with Moses in numbers 27, verses 18 and on it says So the Lord said to Moses, take Joshua, the son of Nun, a man in whom is the spirit, and lay your hand on him. And for sake of time, I'll just end it there. When it comes to Joshua, I do find it interesting. It says there that the spirit is already on Joshua and Moses is going to lay hands on him. Well, Deuteronomy seems to understand this a little bit differently. So let's turn to Deuteronomy, chapter 34 verse nine, for a moment. And it says, And Joshua, the son of Nun, was full of the Spirit of wisdom, for Moses had laid his hands on him. So I don't view this as a contradiction. I'm not 100% sure, chicken or egg. I mean, MO You know, you've got Moses, is a man of God, filled with the Spirit of God, and then you've got Joshua, who's his apprentice, who is his protege, coming up behind him. We see those beautiful passages. How did Joshua prepare himself to take on Moses' role? He would linger in the tabernacle after Moses got busy doing other things. You know, all of these beautiful things. But there's something about again we talked about this last week. There's something about laying hands on people that does something. It did this all the way back into the Old Testament, and it most certainly happens when we fast forward into the New Testament. Now, for the sake of time, we're not going to read all of these different people's stories, because I could preach every single one of these stories to you and be really happy doing it. But the book of Judges is one of the coolest you know, it's a tragic story. Really. The Book of Judges is basically just a setup for how much the people of Israel needed a godly king, because they would have these moments of breakthrough and deliverance and revival, we could even say, turning back to God and seeking the Lord. But it was always short lived, and it only lasted for as long as the particular leader of that generation was around. But wow, some of those leaders were awesome guys, very imperfect guys, right? So we read through the book of Judges, and the first guy that it talks about is Othniel. Everybody say Othniel, if you struggle with your ths, that'll be a fun one for you. Um, you know. And he's a guy who it says, And let me find it for you. And the Spirit of God, the Spirit of the Lord, was upon him. Now it doesn't really talk about what that looked like. We just know that the Spirit came upon him to be able to overthrow. Israel's enemies. Okay, I'll just read some of these others. Gideon. It says in Judges, chapter six, verse 34 the Spirit of the Lord clothed Gideon. I love that. It doesn't just say it came upon him. It clothed him like what does that even look like? The Bible talks about all sorts of spiritual garments. He's clothed with the Holy Spirit, and he goes out, and you know, God again, he shows himself mighty. He shows Himself powerful through these men. We know the story of Gideon. He narrows down his army to 300 men against 1000s and 1000s of enemies, and God routes the enemies. Jephthah, the Spirit of the Lord, was upon him. That's a colorful story. We don't have time to unpack that story for you, other than to say, don't make silly vows. Okay? Judging by the volume of that laughter, some of you need to read your Bible more. Some of you know exactly what I'm talking about another. Others of you are like just a who Samson. I mean, come on, everybody knows the story of Samson, right, again and again and again. In the story of Samson, it says the Spirit of God came upon Samson, it says, And this is an expression that, first of all, it says it began to stir in him. And then it says in Judges 14, verse six, the first time we really see him do something supernatural. It says The Spirit of the Lord rushed upon him. I love that language that sounds a lot like the day of Pentecost, doesn't it? And the Spirit came like a mighty rushing wind. So Samson experienced some of this. But Samson is just like I kind of want to meet the guy, and I kind of don't want to go near the guy, you know, because Samson, in one moment, the Spirit of God comes rushing on him, and it says that he tears apart a lion like it was a little baby goat. That's some crazy stuff. I mean, it's one thing to look at the top of the ski slope and be like, I'm doing this anyway. It's another thing to see a living, breathing lion and just run up and start to wrestle, you know, and that's what this guy's doing. And he attacks this lion. But then, you know, like the very next passage, and then he sees this woman that's good in his own eyes. And, you know, it's walks into the brothel, you know, like, what? Yeah, that stuff's in the Bible too. We've been reading through different books of the Bible at home over breakfast. First we read Luke, as it was the Christmas season, and then it's like, well, we finished Luke, we should go right into Acts. And that's all pretty good. Then we're like, what should we read next? Well, let's go back to Genesis. In the back of my mind, I'm like, are we ready for this? Genesis gets pretty colorful people, and I know that obviously, in the New Testament, we've been given something more than Samson was given Amen. We have the Spirit of God dwelling inside of us, not just coming upon us to carry out these supernatural acts. But at the same time, I want to stress to you that just because the Spirit of God can use you mightily or use somebody else mightily does not mean that God is necessarily endorsing all of their character or everything that they do, right? And that's part of why we need discernment in the body of Christ, right? Because it's just a reality that Paul talks about. Again, he says, the gifts and the callings of God are without repentance, you know? And I remember this story actually that illustrates this, I don't know. It kind of leaves you scratching your head a little bit. There was this preacher that was out evangelizing on the streets of Guatemala. And, you know, there, it's very common, if the town's of any size whatsoever, you'll have the one street in town where it's just, you know, cantina and bar after bar, and their cantinas are drinking establishments, and bars are usually places of prostitution. And so he was, he was preaching to this one guy. And this one guy, he was down, he was out, he was drunk, and he the guy starts witnessing to him, and the drunk starts saying back, it's like, I know all of this. I've been there. I've done that. I used to be a preacher. I'm an Evan. List, and of course, he's down there. He's dirty, he stinks, he's drunk. And the preacher's like, you're an evangelist, right? And the drunk basically said, Yeah, and I'm a better evangelist than you are, you know, as this preacher is trying to win him to the Lord and encourage him, you know, to transform, get his get back on his feet. And he's like, yeah, if I stopped drinking and got cleaned up, I could go and preach and see more people get saved than you could drunks like to boast, right? Well, I guess he wasn't just boasting. So they kind of, like, got in each other's face about this. Like, you know the religious spirit in the pastor's like, there is no way you know, because you we completely discredit that this guy could have a gift. This guy could actually have a calling on his life. And so the story goes, I didn't, I didn't meet the guy. This was a story being told to me. So I believe it's true. Is that, basically, he got cleaned up, and he went and he held some meetings, and what was powerfully used of God, and saw a whole bunch of people get saved. So I just say that, that, you know, we love gifts, we love the calls. We love to see God move in power, and we're believing to see more of that here in our church, but we never want to be so enamored with the gift and the power of God that we lose the importance of character and living according to God's Will and really reflecting the nature of Christ. Come on. We get a little bit of a glimpse again. The Old Testament gives us these different images and pictures of the Holy Spirit and how he would empower different people. He would anoint prophets, priests, kings, these judges. But we also do get a few passages from the prophets that let us know a little bit about his nature. Let's just look for a moment in Isaiah chapter 11. And Isaiah 11 is something that we often go to around Christmas time because it is a messianic prophecy. You us so Isaiah, chapter 11, talks about this. This shoot from the stump of Jesse. In other words, the kingship in Israel have been cut off, right? Jesse was David's father, and David's sons, the generations after him, were the kings of Judah, the kings of Israel. And that all got destroyed when Israel was invaded. And Isaiah has seen a time where it's like that dynasty, that family tree, that kingship, that God had established in Israel, have been cut off, but there's still life in the root. And he says in Isaiah, verse 11, chapter 11, verse one, and there will come a shoot from the stump of Jesse and a branch from his roots shall bear fruit. And it says this, it says, And the Spirit of the Lord will rest upon him. And this is where he begins to let us know what the Spirit of the Lord is like. It says that He is the Spirit of wisdom, spirit of understanding, the spirit of counsel. And might we love, that might stuff, right? There's lots of that in the judges and the spirit of knowledge and the spirit of the fear of the Lord. This is often referred to as the seven fold spirit. We're not saying that there's Father Son and Spirit of this, and spirit and that. And you know, this is all different attributes or aspects of the same Holy Spirit. And it's that spirit that we know that was upon Jesus. And for the sake of time, today, we won't go and look at those passages, but you know, Jesus proclaims to the to his hometown in their synagogue, that the Spirit of the Lord is upon me. These prophecies out of Isaiah, out of Isaiah 11, out of Isaiah 61 this is coming true that the Spirit of God that created, the Spirit of God that was breathed into humanity, the Spirit of God that the prophet spoke about, that's not just going to come and visit once, now and again, and raise up a man for the hour to deliver a generation the Spirit of God is going to be poured out. Joel says, on all flesh. And that is the anticipation that we enter into when we open. Our New Testament, right? Again, we could talk about these different prophecies. Joel chapter two is one of the clearest ones, but perhaps we should just look at a couple of other ones to really again. Just set the stage for what Jesus was walking into and what the Spirit was going to pour out on the day of Pentecost. So we'll get to Joel two in a little bit. But in Isaiah, chapter 32 it says, until the spirit is poured out from on high. This is Isaiah 32 verse 15, until the spirit is poured out upon us from on high and the wilderness becomes a fruitful field. And the fruitful field is deemed a forest. Isaiah looks forward not just to a day when there will be a messiah on whom the Spirit is, but a day on which God will pour out His Spirit on his people, and what was once desert will come to life. Once, was unfruitful, will now be fruitful. We need the spirits to be fruitful. We need the spirits to be empowered. We need the Spirit to usher the kingdom forward that was inaugurated in the coming of Christ. The Church does not exist without the Holy Spirit, and the church will not grow without the Holy Spirit, and the church will cease to exist if it loses the Holy Spirit. The Apostle Paul warns us in his letters to Timothy, says, Watch out for people who have a form of godliness but don't have the power. And again, we can get all hyped up about that and power needs to look like rah, rah, all of these things, but we can never, ever, ever, ever church, lose the desire, the pursuit and the openness, the yielding to the Holy Spirit, or we will cease to be a church and we will only be an empty shell, a form that is not what God intended. Whole denominations have emptied themselves of the power and are an empty form. It's sad to say that there have been whole nations come to Christ, where you can hardly find a Christian today. And you know, let's not go too far. We are a nation that you know, as Europeans came and settled, they built churches and they preached the gospel and they established their laws based on the Word of God. But that does not guarantee that we will always be a Christian nation, and a lot of people today are offended at the fact that we would even consider ourselves in any way a Christian nation, because we've been emptying ourself of the power and we relied on forms. And I don't want to get political today, I could, but I want you who those, especially who are politically minded today, to remember as important as it is to be engaged, and there's some concerning things happening right now. I will just say, Google, see nine, find some petitions to sign. It's not a good law they're trying to push through right now. I will say that I it and do it sooner than later, because they're trying to push it through to the next stage of legislation this week. Okay, I just got political You're welcome. Some of you love me for it. Some of you won't. But what I want to say to those who you know, that's your that's your area of interest. You're always looking at what's going on in the political realm. It takes more than just having Christians in the right places. As important as that is, it takes more than writing and signing petitions. It takes more than just being engaged politically, and we should be engaged in the right ways, in the godly ways. It takes being the church of the living God, full of the Spirit. Because if we're not won over to God ourselves, and we don't love God, and we don't pursue God, and we're not sharing that love and that pursuit and welcoming others in and growing the kingdom by the power of the Spirit, then all the political stuff is just posturing. It's just an empty form that's lost its power. And I thought I was preaching on the Holy Spirit this morning. Again, the prophets say, and this is in Ezekiel, 39 verse, 29 and I will not hide my face anymore from them when I pour out my Spirit upon the house of Israel, declares the Lord. There was an expectation in the people of Israel that these prophecies must come to pass. Zechariah, 12 and verse 10, it says, And I will pour out on the house of David and on the inhabitants of Jerusalem, a spirit of grace and pleas for mercy, so that when they look on me, on whom they have pierced, they shall mourn for him as one mourns for her only child and weep bitterly over Him as one weeps over a firstborn. That's a real set up to the day of Pentecost, right there. And what the message that Peter preaches. You know, whenever I get into the book of Acts and I read these sermons, I'm like they know. I know they preached more than what's down here, because I can read through that passage in about three minutes flat. And I know that they probably preached at least as long as I do. There was a hunger in God's people for the Spirit of God, and I hope there's a hunger in us that we were created for more than just you know, we're not just the next best animal on the planet, despite what they might have taught you in school, we were created in the image and likeness of God to have the very life of God on the inside and His Spirit poured out upon us, clothing us, rushing upon us, moving in our midst, to be able to do the works of the kingdom. I'm so grateful that we have been given a gospel and a message and a kingdom that is bigger than our human ability to carry this thing forward. If you ever read the Bible and you're like, I don't know how I can do all of that. That's a good thing, because that is bringing you back to the place where you recognize I need God. I need the Holy Spirit. I need more than religion. I need more than good teaching. I need the supernatural life giving force of God on the inside of me. And I never get far enough. Lord, what do we do this morning? I want to read the I want to read everything in Acts to you today, I really do. My wife listens to this great Hispanic preacher out of the states, and it doesn't quite translate as well. You know how preachers have their little sayings when they're preaching? You know, to get little response most people, it's like glory to God hallelujah, who's with me and his is just like, do I stop or do I go on and all this video keep going. You know, I'm like, I love that. So do I stop or do I go on? The mixed multitude is undecided. I looking at our watches like I don't know how much more we can take, you know, and it's okay. I will say this to you. It's okay for not every moment of church to be exciting. The Bible actually warns us again. Not only does it warn us about there will come a time where there's people who are devoid of power, but they only have a form of godliness, but on the other side, it also says that there will come a time when people they have itching ears and they will not endure good teaching. In other words, yes, we're supposed to have power and substance and reality to what we're talking about. But that doesn't mean that we shouldn't be able to just sit and be taught and receive something out of the Word of God. I could use more of the Word of God in my life. I could use just sitting under I you know, thank God for, if you we are so privileged here to have a Bible college, you know. And I thank God for Ananda and others who continue to work there. And obviously, I'm still in. Involved. I haven't been teaching this year, but there's something so amazing when you can just put everything else on pause and say, I need the word of God on the inside of me, first and foremost. And yeah, not every day in Bible college is a revival meeting, but it'll strengthen you. It will fill you up. Thank you, Lord. I better not go into acts to you today. Why don't we stand on our feet? Because if I get an ax, we're going to be here for a long time. Worship team. There you go. They got the cue. Yeah, you think I'm a long winded preacher. The apostle Paul shows up in town. He's preaching so late, young people are falling out of windows. The young, energetic ones are falling out of windows. I can just imagine the news the next morning, gospel preacher comes to town. Kids fall out of windows, break their necks. Oh my, yeah, exactly, raise them from the dead and keep preaching that. That's the punch line, right? Gotta love that. Lord give us that power. Well, Father, this morning, if we've done anything here, we have simply opened our hearts and our minds to receive a clearer picture of this amazing Holy Spirit that has always been active. He's never gone away. He's always been there, Lord God. He has been there from day one. He's been there from literally our first breath as humanity. Lord God. And help us to recognize that we're not really living unless we have the Holy Spirit breathing in us, Lord taking our humanity and making us something more, Lord God. We are more than this world has defined us to be. We're more Lord God. We're more than smart animals. We're more Lord God than anything else. We are your sons and daughters created in your image and likeness, Lord God. But there's something missing if we don't have you in us, upon us, clothing us, rushing upon us, Lord God. And I know Jesus that that's going to look different at different times, in different seasons, in different places. But Lord God, we yield to you again as a people, and we say, Lord God, we don't want to live without you. We don't want to do church without you. We don't want to go through 400 years of silence and desert as the children of God, the Israelites went through waiting and longing, Lord God, I thank you with that what the prophets promised. You sent the day you ascended to your Father, Lord God, on the day of Pentecost, you sent your Holy Spirit, and we don't have to wait anymore, Lord God, we can receive your Holy Spirit. We can be filled. We can be empowered and Lord times of refreshing can come from your spirit. Come as a wind, Lord God and blow through us. Blow through our church, blow through our houses, blow through our nation. Lord God, blow through Lord Jesus, oh, Lord God, come as water. Come as water. Lord God, bubbling up, springing forth rivers of living water on the inside of us, empowering our worship, empowering Lord God, our ability to pour life out on other people. Jesus, oh, come as oil today, Lord God, come as oil and pour out Lord God that anointing, that joy upon. On us today, Lord Jesus. Oh Jesus. Jesus, come on. Thank you, God, thank you. I'll just take us back to that first passage. It can be as simple as asking your father give me this Holy Spirit. He will not deceive you. He will not hold out on you. He will give you the Holy Spirit. And we saw last week, the apostle Paul laid hands. We didn't get there today, but all through the book of Acts, that's the pattern. So ask right now, can we pray together and say, Father, give me your Holy Spirit living inside, resting upon me, filling me to overflowing, clothing me, Lord, God, I want more of you.