Pastor Jeff emphasized the importance of the Holy Spirit in the lives of believers, highlighting that the Holy Spirit is God and serves as our Helper. He reassured the congregation that the Holy Spirit empowers, convicts, seals, and guides us, enabling us to live out our faith in a way that glorifies Christ. Pastor Jeff also discussed how the Holy Spirit is actively involved in our spiritual growth and how we must remain open to His leading. Ultimately, the message reinforced that relying on the Holy Spirit is essential for a fruitful Christian life and for making Jesus known in the world.
Sermon Transcript
Well, good morning. Will you help me welcome all of our brave campuses that are worshiping with us today?
Also want to extend a happy new year to each and every one of you. And as you know already, we begin every calendar year on the first Sunday by starting 21 days of prayer and fasting. We'll be gathering on all of our campuses from 6 to 7, Monday through Friday, and from 8 to 9 on Saturday mornings. If you did not pick up a prayer journal, please pick one up on your way out. These can be helpful to you.
You can date it, you can take notes, you can write whatever you want. If you have your own questions, things you'd rather do, that's great. This is just to be a help for you to grow closer to the Lord Jesus Christ. And as I've said many times, the goal of us praying together as a church is that we as a church would fall more in love with the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.
Amen. And with that, let's continue our worship this morning as we seek the face of the Lord and get ready to hear from his living and active word. Would you pray with me? Our Father in heaven, we give you all the glory, honor and praise, and we thank you for your son, Jesus Christ, the God man who came to this world and died on the cross for our sins, rose from the dead and ascended into heaven, who's coming back to judge the world. We thank you for your Holy Spirit that you've given to each and every believer who dwells in all of us who know you.
And we pray this morning, Lord, that you'd be helpful to me as I preach your word, because we as a people believe that every time your word is faithfully and accurately proclaimed, that you are speaking. So our prayer this morning is, speak, Lord, for we're ready to hear. And so now, for all those who have gathered who desire to hear the Lord Jesus Christ speak directly to you, who will believe what he tells you and who will, by faith, put into practice what he shows you. Will you agree with me very loudly this morning by saying the word Amen. Amen.
We've been studying the person of the Lord Jesus Christ. And what we talked about was the fact that he came to this earth as the God man, as incarnate flesh. He served a ministry. He had a message that he was gonna die on the cross for the sins of the world, be raised from the dead. And he fulfilled everything he said he was going to do.
And then he ascended into heaven. And I think for many Christians, sometimes if you were asked this question, think about this question. If you could have Jesus Christ come back here and just live with you on a day to day basis, live in your house, but to do that, you would need to exchange all the gifts that he's given you and all the different things. But you could have Jesus Christ living with you. How many would say, I'd take that right now?
I wouldn't. But that's what the disciples said. The disciples said the same thing because Jesus, after he had done everything that he was going to do, ascended into heaven. And he told them before he went that that's exactly what he was going to do. And the disciples were saddened by this.
And so he began to give them a teaching. And he told them at that time, which you're gonna hear about in the scriptures today, that it's actually to their benefit that he goes away. It's actually advantageous to them that he goes away because he promised that if he went away, he would send another called the Helper or the Holy Spirit, to be with them forever. And this gift of the Holy Spirit is even better than having the presence of Jesus on this earth. And we need to understand why that is.
Because for many people, when it comes to the person of Jesus, there's doctrinal things that we can talk about that are refreshing. But if you've been in a church for a while, you've heard a lot of them. But when it comes to the person of the Holy Spirit, the third person of the Trinity, there's a lot of errant teaching. There's a lot of people that have had different experiences in churches, and some get so far caught up in experience that we call them Holy Rollers. And many of us say, if that's what it means to have the Holy Spirit, I want nothing to do with that.
That's craziness. And so we go a different way. And we call ourselves the frozen chosen. You know, God selected us, we're good, we're fine. Don't ask me to be emotional about anything.
But if we really don't understand who the Holy Spirit is, those are the two extremes that we'll go to. But what I believe is that God's given us the Holy Spirit for every person who believes and that he's busy doing ministry. And the more you understand of the person of the Holy Spirit and who he is, the more you're gonna grow in your faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. So as we begin this month to take a look at the Holy Spirit, we're gonna look at all sorts of different things. Cause every time we talk about the Holy Spirit, first people's questions, what do you believe about speaking in tongues?
That's all people want to ask. We'll talk about tongues, we'll talk about miracles, we'll talk about anything that the Bible reveals. And we'll take a look at it from a biblical perspective. But let's take a look at who this Holy Spirit is and why he is advantageous to us. So if you have a copy of the Scriptures this morning, I invite you to turn your Bible to John, chapter 16.
John, chapter 16. We're going to be in verses five through 15. And I'm going to highlight four truths for you this morning about the Holy Spirit so that you will understand him better, you will know who he is, and you'll be able to respond to him. In John, chapter 16, starting in verse five, Jesus says, but now I'm going to ask him who sent me? And none of you ask me, where are you going?
But because I have said these things, you to you, sorrow has filled your heart. So again, like I said, Jesus is telling them, I'm going to the Father. You know, I'm going to the Father. And yet you guys are so sorrowful. And here's the interest.
Jesus has just got done explaining to them what he's going to do, that as the God man, he's going to go to Jerusalem, he's going to get crucified, he's going to be rejected, he's going to be dead on a cross. Three days later, he'll rise from the dead. So he is going to go pay for the sin of all humanity. That's what he's doing. So Jesus is seeking the Father.
Even that very night, he seeks the Father and says, if there's any other way, let's do it that way. But not my will, dad. Your will be done. And he goes to the cross. So here Jesus, in the most significant part of his ministry, going to die for the sins of the world, is very, very concerned and wants his disciples to pray.
And what are they worried about? They're worried about themselves because Jesus told him it was going to be hard. And Jesus told him that he was going to be leaving. And like many disciples, they were far more concerned about themselves than they were about Jesus. And that's where they are right now.
Because they don't want Jesus to leave. They've spent three and a half years with him. They've heard what he's done, they've watched what he's taught, they've been with him. They've seen him do miracles. They've seen him do all sorts of different things and speak with every different member of society.
And now he's leaving and they don't want him to go. But notice what Jesus says in the very next verse. In verse seven, he says, but I tell you the truth, it is to your advantage. That means your benefit. It's.
It's good for you. It's to your advantage that I go away. For if I do not go away, the helper will not come to you. In other words, he says this. If I don't go away, I can't send you the helper.
The Greek word is parakletos. It means to come alongside. It's someone that's going to help. In other words, here's what Jesus was telling his disciples, those that had spent three plus years with him. He was saying, you need help.
You need help to do what I'm calling you to do. And if I don't go away, I can't send the one who's going to come help you. So it's to your advantage that I'm going away. Friends, there is the advantage of the Holy Spirit. Because for many believers in Christ, they come to Christ because they realize they couldn't do it on their own.
They couldn't get this Christian life done. They saw what God required and they couldn't do it. So they repent and believe that Jesus is the Christ. But they spend the rest of their days as Christians now believing that they can do it by themselves. I got news for you.
You can't. If you could, he wouldn't have needed to send the helper. Okay, listen, look at your neighbor and tell him you need help. Okay? You need help.
You can't live the Christian life by yourself. Okay, back up here. Some of you needed that word more than others, apparently. I saw married couples like, finally, he's giving me a chance to talk. We all need help.
We can't live the Christian life independent of the Holy Spirit. So I'm going to give you four truths about the Holy Spirit of who is this helper and what is he doing? And the first is the most significant truth I'm going to tell you in this entire series, maybe the most basic and the most profound, but the most important. The first thing I'm going to tell you about the Holy Spirit is that he is God. He is God.
I thought of different ways of writing that out and clever ways I couldn't get around. He's just God. And you need to Know that when we shown the. The picture of the Trinity, which I think we have, if we can put that up on the screen, when we've shown the picture of the Trinity, we've told you that the Godhead is made up of three distinct persons of one complete essence. It's three in one.
It's not three individual gods that make up the Godhead. It's one God in three distinct persons. And there's no way of explaining how that works. The Father has always been the Father, the Son's always been the Son, and the Holy Spirit has always been the Holy Spirit. And to be God, you've always had to existed.
So the Father is not the Son of the Spirit, the Son is not the Father of the Spirit, and the Spirit is not the Father or the Son, but they're all one God together. And that's our Godhead and that's who we serve. And you need to know this, that the Holy Spirit is God. Okay, let me give you some truth from God's Word that will show you that first of all, in creation we learned that Jesus Christ created all things. In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
And in Colossians 1:15, all things, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities, things visible or invisible, were all created by Jesus. But if you take a look in your Bible in Genesis chapter one, where it says in the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth, you will also see in verse 2 that the earth was formless and void and darkness was over the surface of the deep. And the Spirit of God was moving over the surface of the water. So where's the Holy Spirit in creation? He's right there.
So before anything's created, you have the Holy Spirit. And what is the Holy Spirit doing? The Holy Spirit is waiting and waiting and waiting until Jesus gives the word to create. And then the Holy Spirit moves at the word of Jesus. The Holy Spirit is still moved by the word of Jesus.
Amen. And so you see the Holy Spirit in creation. Before anything's created, there's the Holy Spirit. We also see the Holy Spirit at the baptism of Jesus in John chapter 3. In John chapter 3.
I'm sorry, Matthew, chapter 3. In verses 16 and 17. Matthew, chapter 3, verses 16 and 17. After being baptized, Jesus came up immediately from the water. So you have the God man standing in the Jordan River.
And behold, the heavens were opened and he saw the Spirit of God. That's the Holy Spirit descending as a dove and lighting upon him. And Behold, a voice out of the heavens said, this is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased. So you have the God man, Jesus Christ, standing in the Jordan River. You have the Heavenly Father speaking words, and at the same time, the Holy Spirit is descending like a dove.
You have all three. You have the Trinity, God right there that we can see a picture of at the Jordan. There's even more. Do you believe this book?
It's not rhetorical. Do you believe this book? Okay, I believe this book is inerrant. I believe it's authoritative. I believe Genesis 1:1 through Revelation 22:21 is all of God's word.
That God wrote his word and that nothing he speaks goes against this Word, and that everything in this word is true and that this word will last forever and ever. Amen. That's what I believe, that's what I proclaim, that's what I preach, that's what I teach. Even parts I don't understand fully, I don't need to understand fully. God understands and he's right.
But who wrote this book? Who penned these words? You'll hear a lot of people in our culture say, well, it's just a bunch of men over a period of time that wrote this book. That's not what the Bible says. In second Peter, chapter one, verses 20 and 21, it says, but know this, first of all, that no prophecy of Scripture is a matter of one's own interpretation.
For no prophecy was ever made by an act of human will. No prophecy, nothing written in this book was some human being that sat down and said, I think God is like, I had a revelation. I think God is like, nothing happened like that but what happened. But men moved by who the Holy Spirit spoke from God. The Holy Spirit again is referred to as God.
So who wrote this book? The Holy Spirit wrote this book. So everything in this book is the Holy Spirit writing to show you who Christ is. So every time you read this book, this is the Holy Spirit's words revealing who Jesus Christ is. So everything in this book is true because the Holy Spirit wrote the book.
So we have the Holy Spirit in creation, we have the Holy Spirit at Jesus baptism, we have the Holy Spirit who wrote the Word. You see the Holy Spirit throughout the New Testament when he leads Jesus into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil and he's there ministering to him. You see the Holy Spirit all throughout Jesus's ministry. You see him in the Old Testament. We're going to talk about this in a little bit where he would come upon people for A period of time and then leave.
But in the New Testament, it's a little bit different that we'll talk about. But if I can give you just even one more proof text, just to show that the Holy Spirit is God, I would take you to Acts, chapter five. You remember this story about a couple named Ananias and Sapphira? Unfortunately, it's the only thing we know about this couple. Unfortunately, that's what the Holy Spirit put in this book.
And what happened was this couple had decided when everybody was bringing all their goods together, to give to the church. And Ananias, the husband, had sold a piece of property and said that he brought all of it to the church to give to it when he had only brought some of it, which was totally fine, you don't have to give all your money to the church. But he lied about it and said, I'm giving all my money from this. And so here's what happened. But Peter said in Acts, chapter 5, verse 3, Ananias, why has Satan filled your heart to lie to the Holy Spirit?
So who did he lie to? Okay, let's. I'm going to do this one more time. They were in school now. Okay, why has Satan filled your heart?
To lie to the Holy Spirit. So who's he lying to? The. Okay, so he's lying to the Holy Spirit. And to keep back some of the price of land while it remained unsold, did it not remain your own?
And after it was sold, was it not under your control? Why is it that you have conceived this deed in your heart? You have not lied to men, but to God. He lied to the Holy Spirit. And the Holy Spirit is God, the Holy Spirit's God.
You need to understand this. Most people in the church do not understand this. Here's how they think of the Holy Spirit. They think of the Holy Spirit as a force, as an it. Let it fill this room.
Let it happen. Let it. The Holy Spirit is not an it. Pronouns matter. Pronouns matter in our culture.
Because if you're in utero a boy, then you're he, him. And if you're in utero a girl, you're she, her. That's just how pronouns work in the Godhead. Pronouns matter, too. The Holy Spirit is not an it.
Don't refer to the Let it, let it, let it. The Holy Spirit is a he. The Father is a he. Jesus is a he. The Holy Spirit is a he.
He is not a force. He's not a force just to make you tingle. He's not a force just to make you feel good. He's not a force just to make you act crazy. He's the God of the universe.
He's the third person of the Trinity whose job is to make Jesus Christ look very, very good. And when the Holy Spirit is doing his job right, Jesus is getting a lot of glory and the Father is being honored. That's the Holy Spirit's job. The Holy Spirit is not about you. The Holy Spirit is not to make you feel good.
The Holy Spirit is about making Jesus look good. And you need to understand that. Cause revival is not a force or a feeling or emotion where we just play music until we can't stand it anymore and we're all revved up and now we're all fired up and revival's breaking out. That's like a Metallica concert, right? I mean, that's not revival.
Revival is when the Holy Spirit is putting Jesus on stage display and making him look so good that people in that community are repenting and believing that Jesus is the Christ. And they're bearing fruit to show that Jesus is the Christ and they're living for him. Because that's the Holy Spirit's job, to make Jesus look good. Amen. So pardon me if I don't think that every time people get excited, there's revival breaking out.
When Jesus is being elevated and the word of God is being put above people and His Word is authoritative and people are placing themselves under the Word and Jesus is being elevated, that's when revival's breaking out. That's what that looks like. So don't miss this point, because we're going to talk about a lot of different ministries and gifts and ways in which the Holy Spirit works. But when we talk about the Holy Spirit, we're talking about God. He's God.
He's not a force. He's not an it. He's not. He's not less than he submits to the Son and the Father, but he's not any less than the beauty of the Trinity. And why Paul uses it when he talks about marriage of wives, submitting to husbands is not because wives are less than their husbands.
They're equal. They're one. But just like the Holy Spirit submitted to the Son and the Father, and like Jesus submitted to the Father, wives are to submit to their husbands. It's a picture of the Godhead, right? The Holy Spirit's God.
Jesus Christ is God. The Father is God. Amen. Are we clear on that? We have to be clear on this or we're gonna miss out on what we See?
And the Holy Spirit's job is to make Jesus Christ look really, really good and to magnify his name. Amen. Let me give you a second truth. The second truth is the fact that not only is he God, but he empowers believers. He empowers believers.
Notice this. He said in verse seven. I tell you, the truth is to your advantage that I go away. For if I don't go away, the Helper will not come to you. But notice what he says next.
But if I go, I will send him to you. How do we know that Jesus made it back to the Father when He ascended? Because he sent the Holy Spirit. That was a sign. I made it back.
I'm at the right hand of the Father. I'm ruling in power over the universe. I sent the Holy Spirit back. And in Acts, chapter two, we see the Holy Spirit come upon the apostles. And what do we see them do they start speaking in tongues.
And that there is other languages. And it's clear that it's other languages because people are saying, we heard God in our own language. They're preaching the gospel. And they're like, how do they know this language? How do they know that language?
Those guys are from Galilee. They don't know anything. And they're preaching the gospel in all these different languages. And the Holy Spirit was uniting the church, and the Holy Spirit has come. So I want to tell you what's so important about the Holy Spirit coming and why is he advantageous?
And why do I need a helper? Because Jesus promised just two chapters earlier, in John, chapter 14, verse 16, he said, I will ask the Father and He will give you another helper that he may be with you. For how long? Forever. That is the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive because it does not see him or know Him.
But you know him because he abides with you and will be in you. So let me give you. Let me give you five ministries that happen when the Holy Spirit gets a hold of your life. Five ministries that happen when the Holy Spirit gets ahold of your life. Here's what he does.
The first is called regeneration. He regenerates you, and he has to regenerate you. Because the Bible says that there's no one. Good. No, not one.
And that the wages of sin is death. So all people are born spiritually dead. You're born spiritually dead. I'm born spiritually dead. Everybody's born spiritually dead.
So the biggest problem that you have in this life is not where you're going to attend school, or who you're going to marry, or how many kids you're going to have, or what house you're going to buy, or how you're going to steward your finances, or who you're going to hang out with, or what city you're going to choose. None of that stuff's as important as this. Your dad. Apart from Christ, that's your number one problem. That's the number one problem of everybody on the planet.
So that's why Jesus said in John 3 and Nicodemus, you must be born again. What do you mean? Because you're physically alive, but you're spiritually dead. Well, who is the one in the Godhead who makes you alive? The Holy Spirit.
Notice what he says in Titus chapter three. In verse five, he says, he saved us. And let me just make this clear. You didn't save yourself. And you didn't even participate in it.
It wasn't like God looked down at you and you were doing some good things and you said, I think I'll choose God. And he's like, okay, I'll choose you too. Let's come together. This will be perfect. No, he saved you.
You didn't find Jesus. Jesus found you. He saved us. What? Not on the basis of deeds which we have done in righteousness.
He didn't pick you because you're good. He didn't select you because you kept the law. He didn't look at you and say, great Job. No, no, no. But according to his what?
Mercy? Mercy means this. I'm not going to give you what you deserve. You deserve punishment. I'm going to give you blessing.
That's mercy. You were caught. You were guilty. But I'll pay the penalty. You go free.
That's mercy. Here's what mercy is. You, because of your deadness and your rebellion, because you've rebelled against an eternal God. Since you were conceived and came out of took your first breath and have been rebelling against God ever since, you deserve hell. And if God sent every single person to an eternal hell, he's just in doing so.
He's holy in doing so because he can't bring sin into his presence. So what does he do? He doesn't save people according to their righteousness. How does he save them according to his mercy? What should we be praying for?
Lord, have mercy. Lord, save me. Lord, don't save me because of what I've done. Save me because of what I haven't done. Lord, have mercy.
When Peter went down in the water, remember his three word prayer? Lord, save Me, he needed help. That's how God saves, by his mercy. How does he do it? By the washing of regeneration and renewing by the Holy Spirit who does the work the Holy Spirit does.
Every single believer that has. That's every single believer has been born again. And the only way to be born again is for the Spirit to take your dead soul and make it alive. If you've been born again, you say, I didn't know all this stuff was going on. You don't.
There's myriads of things the Holy Spirit did the moment you were converted. But when you repented and believed in Christ alone for the forgiveness of your sins, that he died for you and paid it all, that he rose from the dead, that he's the only Christ. And you repented and believed at that moment you were regenerated by the Holy Spirit, he said, saved you. He made you alive. He's the one who we give praise to for making his life the Holy Spirit regenerated you.
So he said, I don't know if I believe in the Holy Spirit. If you're a believer, you do. Because the Holy Spirit is the one who's made you alive. Amen. At the same time that he regenerates you, you know what he does?
He baptizes you. He baptizes you. Notice in First Corinthians, chapter 12, 1 Corinthians, chapter 12, verse 13, he gives a picture of what this looks like. And this is what I call the baptism of the Holy Spirit. Now, there are many people who are solid believers who believe this a little differently than me.
We'll talk more about this when we go, but I believe this is the clear teaching of Scripture. Notice what he says. He says, for by one Spirit, we were all baptized. Who's that? That's every believer.
We were all baptized into one body. Whether Jews or Greeks, whether slaves are free, we were all made to drink of one spirit. So here's what baptism is. Baptism means to immerse. So it means to repeatedly dip or immerse.
So let's say you had a white cloth and you were going to baptize it in purple dye. You would repeatedly dip it, or you would immerse it in until the white cloth became purple. That's what it means to baptize. So baptism happens. There's spirit baptism that happens at the moment that you're converted.
What do you get baptized into? You get baptized and immersed into Christ. Positionally, you're seated with Christ, you're with Christ, and you get placed into the family of God, which is the church universal. So at the moment that you're converted, you get baptized into Christ and immersed into Christ and you become part of the church universal meaning if you live in India and you're Indian and you are born again, you're part of the church of Jesus Christ. If you're from Israel, you're part of the church of Jesus Christ, from Germany, from America, wherever you're from, you're part of the church.
And what happens is when you get baptized into Christ and you're baptized into the family, guess what you're going to start doing? You'll start looking for other believers because you'll want to be around them. When people get saved, they want to be around other believers. You go from thinking, those Christians are so weird, they're dorky, they're, where do I find one of those? I'm just like them, right?
That's what happens, right? That's the baptism of the Holy Spirit. You've been immersed into Christ positionally, you're seated in the heavenly places. That's what happens. Kim and I have helped with Billy Graham crusades and different things and have done counseling for them.
And you call these people after they make professions of faith. And even the Billy Graham association will tell you only about 4% of those people actually make their way into a church. Now, I don't know statistics as to who's actually converted and who's not converted. And I'm all for the proclamation of the gospel anywhere at any time. But what I'm telling you is when you have a true believer, you don't need to, quote, follow up with them to have them find a church.
Because if they're a true believer and they've been baptized into Christ, they'll want to find one. That's what happens. When Philip led the Ethiopian eunuch to Christ and baptized him and disappeared, he didn't need to say, well, you need to go find a church. And here's he assumed the eunuch would find a church. Why?
Because he's a Christian. And when you're a Christian, you'll want to be around other Christians. It's part of the baptism of the Spirit. That's what the baptism of the Spirit is. So when I'm asked a question, or if you're asked a question, have you been baptized with the spirit?
Your answer is, okay, let's try again. Because somebody's gonna ask you this question. Have you been baptized with the Spirit? Have you? If you're a believer, you have.
You've been baptized into Christ, you've been baptized into the family of God. So you don't need to go looking for this other baptism thing that makes you speak in tongues and do all sorts of things. You don't need to do that. You've been baptized into the family of God. Let me give you a third one.
A third, third work of the Holy Spirit to empower believers is he seals you. Or a better way of saying it is he marks you. So in ephesians, in chapter 1, verses 13 and 14, he talks about exactly what happens at the moment you come to Christ. He says in him, you also, after listening to the message of truth, the gospel of your salvation, having also believed, means you've heard the gospel, you place your faith and trust in Jesus. You were sealed in him or marked in him with the Holy Spirit of promise, who is given as a pledge of our inheritance with a view to the redemption of God's own possession, to the praise of his glory.
So when a person who is dead in their sins is regenerated by the Spirit, baptized in the family of God, at the same moment that all of that happens, this also takes place. This is what happens to a believer. They are sealed or they're marked. And what that means is it's like a deposit or a down payment. So the Holy Spirit is saying, I got you.
It's earnest money. It's as good as done. So positionally, you're in the heavenly places. If you were to die today, I'm presenting you faultless before the Father. In the meantime, practically, you're still here.
We're still growing in things. We're still working out things. But you're marked means this. If you're a believer in Christ and in Christ alone, it means that what Jesus Christ paid for on the cross, there's been an initial deposit placed on your life. That's a guaranteed future payment in the future means you can't lose your salvation.
Now, when I get pushed back on this, people say, well, I know a person that was with Christ and now they're not with Christ. Listen, I taught the parable of the soils, did I not? I don't believe in the eternal security of the hardened soil. I don't believe in the eternal security of the rocky soil. And I don't believe in the eternal security of the weedy soil, because I don't believe any of those people are Christians.
But in the good soil that produces 30, 60, or 100, I guarantee you're gonna be in heaven. So as a believer in Christ, if you've Been regenerated. You don't need to spend your time saying, am I going to heaven? Am I going to heaven? Did I do it right?
Did I get it right? He did it right. He paid for you. He saved you. He guaranteed it.
He made the down payment. It means this. You belong to him. It's like when you put earnest money down on a house. Nobody else can take that house.
It's yours. When the Holy Spirit puts Ernest down on you, nobody can take you. Jesus says, no one can snatch you out of my hand. No one can snatch you out of the Father's hands. You belong to me.
That's what happens at the moment that you believe. Is that good news this morning or what? That's really good news. So let me give you a fourth one that happens. You've been regenerated, baptized, sealed and marked.
You didn't even know all these things were going on. Now you guess what? You've been indwelled. There's the indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit. And the indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit is what Jesus promised back in John 14, which I read to you earlier, that he will ask the Father and give you another helper, that he may be with you forever.
So the Holy Spirit, when He comes, he comes to indwell you forever. In Romans chapter 8, in verse 9, he talks about the Spirit of Christ and how important this indwelling is in the life of every single believer. He says this. Romans 8, 9. However, you are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you.
But if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ or the Holy Spirit, he does not belong to him. Do I have the Holy Spirit? Do I have the Holy Spirit? If you're born again, you have the Holy Spirit. And not only do you have him, but guess where he resides?
In you. And guess how long he dwells there? Forever. You talk about good news. That's good news.
He's in you forever. He indwells you. He's with you. Colossians 1 says, It's Christ in you, the hope of glory. Do you know what that means?
That means that because he's in you, he can help you live and make possible what is impossible. Without his presence in your life as a non believer, you can't live holy as a believer. With the Holy Spirit in your life, you can. Not necessarily perfectly, but what? Increasingly, all the time.
And that's the difference. It's like last night I got home from vacation. Last night we got home about 8 and ready to get into my own bed and great stuff. And apparently, because I don't know anything about mechanics, in my house, we have a water pump that was broke. Cause my kids were saying, dad, there's no water.
No water in anything. We couldn't get any water. So we ended up spending the night at Kim's parents. And it was fine. But my friend told me, you know, you should look at a YouTube video.
So he pulls one up. It's 10 minutes long. He starts scrolling through it, and I'm thinking, what are we doing here? Because this guy's looking at the same thing I'm looking at on my wall. And he's like, I don't want to pay the money for this.
I'm just gonna take it apart. And he starts pulling it off the wall. He starts talking about a thing called, like, a motherboard or something, I don't know. And starts moving wires. And he's like, look at all the money you'd save.
And I'm like, I would destroy my house. But can you imagine? Like, watching a YouTube video wouldn't do anything for me. But if the guy that fixed it could come live inside of me and then I could see the video. And then he's talking to me in my head and saying, here's how you.
I'll move your hand here. I'll do this. I could do it with his help. Friends, as Christians, you have a helper on the inside to do in and through you what you could never do by yourself. Amen.
And yet so many people, when you ask them, hey, this is how God's asking you to live as a husband. And say, God's asking you to live as a wife. This is what you need to be as a child. This is what you need to do in school. This is what you need to do in your job.
I can't do that. You're half correct. You can't. But with the Holy Spirit inside of you, it's possible you can. That means there's no sin that's too great to overcome.
It means there's no marriage that's too far gone to be saved. It means there's. There's no. You know. Do you understand what I'm saying?
What you couldn't. Your bad habits that you couldn't change before you can change. You lived in immorality, but it's possible with the Holy Spirit, to live morally. Did you know that? That's why we can't make excuses.
We can make excuses. If it was like, Jesus, you're God, you could do it. I'm not. I can't. He's like, right, But I put God in you and he can, and he's in you.
That's why as a believer, you'll constantly be hearing conviction about things you need to change. Cause it's the Holy Spirit working in you to grow you in ways that you weren't living before. Amen. And that's the indwelling presence of the Spirit. So I'm always concerned with people that are like, I don't know if the Holy Spirit's in me.
If you're new to the faith, I get it. Or if you haven't been taught this before. I get it. But when I read the Word, I hear things in my heart. I sense what God is saying.
And I know he's talking to me about different things. Why? Because his Spirit lives in me. And I'm a different man than I was before. His spirit lived in me.
And I'm continuing to be a different man because he lives in me. Let me give you a fifth one. And this one is not automatic. This one's partnership. And we'll be talking about this in the coming weeks.
But this is the. This is the filling of the spirit. And the filling of the spirit. One of the verses it comes from is Ephesians, chapter 5 and verse 18, where he tells them, do not get drunk with wine, for that is dissipation or debauchery. But be filled with the spirit.
He's like, don't get drunk. Because when you're drunk, it's not you that's acting. It's the source inside of you that's helping you make the bad decisions you make. If you've been around people that drink too much, it's no longer them saying the things. It's the alcohol saying the things or the drugs saying the things.
Or if you happen to be at our 4 o'clock Christmas service and people are cussing at me, it happened to be alcohol that's doing the work. Do you understand what I'm saying? Because it's control. I say don't get drunk. Don't be controlled by that.
But be filled with the spirit. And filled doesn't mean that the Holy Spirit is like a. You know, you're like a balloon. And he's feeling. That's not what it means.
Filling is this. It's control. Don't be controlled with alcohol. Be controlled by the spirit. Let the spirit take over.
When you're filled with the spirit, it means you're yielding To Christ means before your feet hit the floor in the morning, you're saying, lord, today is your day. This is the day you have made. What does my life need to look like? What attitudes do I need to prepare for? What needs to change in me?
What does my behavior need to look like? Lord, prepare me for everything that's coming down my day. Because I want to be yielded to you in any given moment. So that as I'm doing what you're calling me to do, I'm a reflection of you. And you can be more and more and more controlled by the Spirit, more filled with the Spirit.
We'll talk about this when you're not. You can be a Christian and you can actually grieve the Spirit. Did you know that grieving the Spirit is when you know the Lord's called you to do something and you don't do it and you feel on the inside like, oh man, I did it wrong, I shouldn't have done it that way. I shouldn't have said that. I shouldn't have done that.
And you do that over and over and you grieve the Spirit. And then you, then you say things like this. I hear a lot of Christians say, maybe I'm not a Christian anymore. No, you're definitely a Christian because non believers don't grieve the Spirit. You're a Christian, but you're not living out and being controlled by what the Spirit wants you to be controlled by.
Because as I've said many times from this pulpit, he doesn't come in to be resident, he comes in to be president. He comes in to take over. And so as he's speaking to you, if you're not gonna do what he says, you can grieve him. And if you do that long enough, you can quench him for a while. You're like, I don't really hear God anymore.
I don't know what happened. Well, here's what happened. There were things that the Lord was showing you to do that you never did and you never put them into practice. And I know the prayer I pray before every serm is that you would hear the Lord believe what he says and put into practice. And maybe that sounds rote, but if you actually do that, you will continue to be filled with the Spirit.
That's what it means to yield to Christ. And the Spirit of God is active in your life, teaching you these very things so that you can do that. Which means if you're a brand new believer or you're a seasoned believer, every single one of you has been regenerated, baptized, marked and dwelt. And you can be filled to the full where you. Where you are.
Amen. Isn't that good news this morning? And here's why this is so important. Cause there's so many believers that don't know this. And then they think, well, I heard what Pastor Jeff said, or I heard my pastor preach the Bible.
I just can't do that. It's too hard. It's not hard. It's impossible. Apart from the Spirit of God taking over your life and yielding to Him.
So he is God. He empowers believers. Let me give you a third one. He convicts the world. He convicts the world.
Notice what he says in verse eight and following. And when he comes, this Holy Spirit that the world doesn't see, the world can't see the Holy Spirit. The world can't recognize the Holy Spirit. And when he comes, he will convict the world. Concerning sin and righteousness and judgment.
Concerning sin, because they do not believe in me. Concerning righteousness, because I go to the Father and you no longer see me. And concerning judgment, because the ruler of this world has been judged. So when the Holy Spirit comes, what's he going to do? He's going to convict the world of three things.
Sin and righteousness and judgment. Sin. Sin is not just bad things you do that's an effect of your sin. Sin is this. He's going to convict the world that Jesus is the Christ, that He's the only way and that you're rebelling against Him.
And if you keep going your way, you will get what you deserve. He's convicting the world of sin now. It's not our job to convict the world of sin. The Holy Spirit does a great job. You don't need to leave church and go tell everybody you know they're a sinner.
The Holy Spirit doesn't need your help. The reality is though, if you begin to live as a Christian, speak as a Christian, use the word of God, the Holy Spirit will use you to convict other people of their sin. Because the Bible makes clear, here's the problem. The problem's not that you're bad. The problem is you're dead.
And the problem is the only one that can make you alive is God through His Holy Spirit. And Jesus Christ is the only way to get that done. And so if you're not believing that, you're still dead in your sins. Even though you're a philanthropic, wonderful, moral, everybody loves you, best selling book person, you're still going to hell, right? So The Holy Spirit comes and convicts of that, of sin, convicts of righteousness.
Why? Because when the righteous one came, the world rejected him. So after dying on the cross and rising from the dead, he left the world and sent another one. And while the world can't see him, he's still convicting the world of righteousness. Why?
It's why even little kids know what's right and wrong kind of intuitively. It's even why you know, even the older you get when you've done something wrong, you're like, oh, shouldn't have done that. Why? I mean, if we're just oozing forms of mass that just evolve, like, why would we feel that way? Well, we're not.
Cause we're created in the image of God. And number two, the Holy Spirit's convicting us. There's a right and a wrong and you know it. And even when you cross the boundary, you know it. It's why in every culture in the world, even anthropologists will tell you that cold blooded murder is considered wrong.
There's not a culture in the world where they would say, if you get mad at somebody, just kill him. That's awesome. Everybody would say that's wrong. Why? Where do they get this moral compass?
Where do they get this understanding of righteousness? Because the Holy Spirit's working. Right. And then of what? Of judgment.
Of judgment. Jesus Christ judged the devil at the cross. He's already a defeated foe. He has no power over the believer. He can't touch you.
He needs to. You need to be aware of him. But you don't need to fear him. You need to fear the Lord. Amen.
But even for the non believer, you're aware. Even if you're the most hardened atheist and you're like, oh, I don't believe any of this stuff. You know, deep down judgment's coming. How do you know? Because the Holy Spirit's showing you you're going to give an account for everything in your life.
And the beauty of this is when he convicts the world, he even convicts believers of sin, of righteousness, of judgment. I used to think that walking with the Lord when I was a younger Christian was going to be more like being a kid. Like you'd get to a place where your parents didn't talk to you as much about stuff anymore. You know, like you could get to this place where I've been a Christian now 30 some years. I don't hear the voice of the Lord like that anymore.
I'm pretty good. But here's what I would tell You. The more I walk closely with the Lord, the more I hear his voice, the more I hear his promptings, the more I hear his convictions. Yes, I know positionally, I'm good. Yes, I know I'm indwelled by the Spirit.
But he's constantly showing me ways I can be a better husband and a better father and a better pastor, better in relationships, better with my money. He's constantly showing me those to the extent that I'm open to them. And I find that that voice never goes away if I'm open to it. The only time that that begins to get quieter or shut off is when I begin to think these four terrible words. I'm doing okay.
I am doing okay. Three words, four words, whatever. When I start thinking I'm okay, that's when I'm not hearing, I'm fine. I'm really good. I'm really good.
I'm really good. I'm really. And then God usually sends some crisis into your life to get your attention, where you're like, no, maybe I'm not as good as I thought I was, and I needed your help here or somebody else that speaks into your life where you needed to hear what they had to say, whatever it is. But that's what he's doing. He's convicting the world of sin, righteousness and judgment.
So if you come to church. I don't like coming to church. I always feel convicted. That's good. That means the Holy Spirit's active.
If you can go to church every single week your whole life, and you never feel conviction, ever change churches? I mean, go somewhere else. Cause I find that the Holy Spirit, even when I'm reading the word, preparing to preach, he's convicting me about several different things. And why does he do this? Why is the Holy Spirit so concerned about this?
First Corinthians 6:19 tells us in the Old Testament, Jesus dwelt in the. God dwelt in the tabernacle, then he dwelt in the temple. Where does he dwell today? He's indwelling us. So that's.
Why do you not realize that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit? I mean, you've heard parents talk like this to their kids. Don't talk like that in church. Don't say that in church. Don't run like that in church.
It doesn't matter what this building does. You're a temple. And everywhere you go, you represent Christ. And the Holy Spirit is trying to make your temple magnifying Christ. And everywhere you go in your Marriage.
You go to a football game, you go to a party, you go wherever you go. The Holy Spirit is saying, I want to make Jesus known in this place. I want to be high and lifted up in this place. And you're the temple. You can complain about church.
I don't like the church. I don't like this. Turn and put a mirror on yourself. Say lord, as your temple. How am I doing?
Rhetorically, Lord, how am I doing? Am I really reflecting in such a way that people look at me and say, man, she or he. They're really a temple of the Lord Jesus Christ. Not perfectly, but you can tell they're growing increasingly and they want more of Christ in their life. Because you're the temple.
Think about that. You're Christ's ambassador. Everywhere you go, you represent Christ. And that's why the Holy Spirit has got a ministry where he's empowering believers, but he's also convicting the world about those things. Because one of his ministries is sanctifying.
One of his ministries is to make you more holy. Be perfect, therefore, as I'm perfect, or as Hebrews 10:14 says, for by one offering he has perfected for all time those who are being sanctified. I love that. By one offering on the cross, Jesus has perfected every single believer. If you've repented and believed positionally, you're already perfect.
If you were to die today, you're perfected in his sight, but you're still being sanctified. Positionally, you're already there, but practically you're working it out positionally. The Father looks at me through the lenses of his son and says, pastor Jeff's perfect. Practically. He looks at me and says, we still have a lot of work to do.
We're still growing Him. He's still growing in holiness. And when you say the word holiness in church, here's what most people think. Oh, here it comes. The stuff I can't do anymore.
Can't drink, can't smoke, can't watch tv, can't date girls that dip tobacco. Can't do this, whatever it is. And then whole denominations are formed around these little pet ideas that we don't play cards and we don't drink and we don't do this cause we're holy. That's not what holiness is. Holiness is not necessarily what you avoid.
It's who you're pursuing. And here's what I find in my 30 years of a journey with the Lord. The things that the Lord's put on my heart to stop doing and start Doing differently has nothing to do with any of you. Nothing. I don't have TV in my house to this day.
I don't totally know why. I think I'd be addicted to it and watch it all the time. But I don't think it's wrong to have tv. I've told you many times, when there's games on, invite me over, I'll come. I just can't have it in my house.
But I don't think it's wrong to have cable tv. You know, we can separate the church on your views of drinking and Christmas and Santa Claus and everything else that you want to know. The question is not what should you give up, it's who should you pursue? And the question is this, Jesus. How can my life most reflect you?
And what does that look like in me? And it has nothing to do with anybody else. And here's what I find. If you're really pursuing Christ and growing in holiness, the things he has, you change will seem ridiculous to you. Like, why?
Why do I have to do that? Why? Because it doesn't matter what anybody else has to do. Your holiness journey is going to look different than my holiness journey. Do you understand?
John the Baptist came, and he neither ate nor drank, and Jesus both ate or drank, and they called him a drunken and a glutton. Both were righteous. I mean, do you understand what I'm saying? It's not what you avoid that makes you holy. It's who you're pursuing and who you're trying to magnify that makes you holy.
So the question is not what do I need to give up, Lord? How do I best reflect your glory to everybody I'm around? That's the question. And then whatever he shows you, it's not for you to tell other people what they need to do. That was the Holy Spirit telling you what you needed to do to get right with Him.
Amen. He's sanctifying you. He's growing you. He's convicting you. Praise God that he's doing that.
Let me give you a final one. Not only is he God, not only does he empower believers, not only does he convict the world, but notice this, he glorifies Christ. And I want you to see how he does this. He says, I have many more things to say to you, but you cannot bear them. Now, I love that about Jesus.
I mean, I feel like I have so many things to say about the Holy Spirit. We could talk on this for weeks on end and never be done talking about it, but Jesus will Unveil things over time so you can get them and understand them. There's things I understand now I didn't understand 30 years ago. There's things I understand now I didn't understand 10 years ago. There's ways the Lord brings things into your life.
There's things I'll understand five years from now. I don't even get now. Why? Because the Lord reveals them over time. Amen.
And notice what he says. Jesus says, but when he, the Spirit of truth, comes, that's the Holy Spirit. He will guide you into all the truth, for he will not speak on his own initiative, but whatever he hears, he will speak and he will disclose to you what is to come. What is He? The Holy Spirit is your guide.
I mean, if you're new to Colorado and you were going to climb a 14, or you could look online, you could get a trail map, you could do all that. Or you could get a Sherpa that would go with you and tell you what you needed to do and where you needed to climb and how you needed to eat and what you. The Holy Spirit is an internal Sherpa. Not trying to downplay his deity by saying something like that. I'm just trying to give an analogy that he lives in you and he's with you, and he'll go with you, and he'll teach you how to do the very things that Christ has called you to do.
He's guiding you every step of the way. If you're new to your marriage, you honestly, you can read Ephesians 5 your whole life, and if you're new to your marriage, you don't understand it. I know this cause every time we meet with couples that are getting married, they've nailed it before they got married until we see them three months later, and they're like, we don't quite get this yet. And I'm like, of course you don't, because you haven't lived it yet. Right?
You don't understand what it's like to be a parent until you have a child. You don't understand what it's like to walk with Jesus until you let the Holy Spirit take over. And he's the guide. He's guiding you into all truth. And where are you going to get the truth from the Word.
Now, I have a theology that I believe the Holy Spirit is alive. He's a person. He still speaks today. I believe the Spirit can speak subjectively to you. We're going to talk about that.
I believe that. But 95 to 99% of what you need comes right out of this book as the Holy Spirit illuminates it. This is where he comes. This is why. Because he's guiding you into all truth.
Well, I don't want that. I want a specific word. Learn all this first. You'll realize you could plumb the depths of this for your entire life and never reach the bottom. We're talking about the eternal God of the universe.
This is where he's getting his truth from. He's getting his truth from the Father. He's going to disclose to you everything that you need in the moment for you to take your next step of faith with Christ. And here's the beauty of it. Notice this.
He says in verse 14, he will glorify me. That's what Jesus says. For he will take a mine and disclose it to you. All things that the Father has are mine. Therefore, I said, he takes of mine and will disclose it to you.
So the Holy Spirit's job is to make Jesus look good. To glorify Jesus. I mean, the Holy Spirit's job is to magnify his name, to manifest his presence, to multiply his influence. That's what the Holy Spirit's job is. He's to make Jesus look good so that Jesus Christ is high and lifted up and the Father is honored.
That's what the Holy Spirit does. That's who he is. That's what he does. Now, here's the question. How does he do it?
And this is where we're gonna spend a lot of time in the coming weeks. But I'll just give you a taster. In John, chapter 14, if you go back two chapters, verses 12, 13 and 14, he says he's going to do it through you. He goes, truly? Truly.
I say to you, he who believes in me, the works that I do, he will do also. And greater works than these will he do. Because I go to the Father, whatever you ask in My name, that I will do so that the Father may be glorified in the Son. If you ask me anything in My name, I will do it. So what's he say?
He says, truly true. I tell you, you're going to do greater things in scope than I did. I mean, when I read through the Gospels, I never see Jesus preach. And 3,000 people get saved in one sermon. But when Peter, the knucklehead that he is, preaches his first sermon, 3,000 people get saved and get baptized in that same day.
And all the ministries of the Holy Spirit we just saw happen. Through who? Through Peter. Why? Because You're a temple of the Spirit.
So who does God want to use to bring glory to Christ? You. When you attend church, it's not about, did I like the sermon, did I like the pastor, do I like the music, did the power come on on time? Because it. And it's nothing like that.
It's, how can I align my life with the Holy Spirit so that Jesus Christ is more magnified, so that I'm blessing His name everywhere I go so people see Jesus in me and I'm humbling myself before him so God can do great things in and through me. Jesus wants to use you like that as his ambassador. Well, which Christians? The really special ones or me too? All of us are really special.
All of us have significant work to do. All of us are gifted differently. We'll talk about that. All of us have different measures of gifting. We'll talk about that.
But God wants to use each and every one of you for his glory to do even greater things than these. Because Jesus went to the Father and he said, if you ask anything according to my name, I'll do it. Say, well, that's not true. Because I prayed that God would do this and he didn't do it. And I prayed God would do that and he didn't do it.
So the Word's not true? No, no. He said, if you pray anything according to my will. He said, if you pray anything according to my name. So maybe you weren't praying so that Jesus would get glory.
Maybe you were praying for something you wanted done. See, I find a lot of people that attend church, you know, once every, you know, blue moon and, you know, don't give and don't care and don't read the Word and don't pray and don't do anything. Then when something happens, they pray for God to do a miracle and God doesn't do it, and then they don't like God. But maybe if your life was aligned with him, and maybe if your daily routine was to pray more and to seek his face and to study his word and to allow the Holy Spirit to take and manifest Christ in and through you, and you were growing that way, maybe, just maybe, your prayer life would change. Maybe the prayers that you would start to pray would be different prayers, and you wouldn't just be praying for you.
You'd be praying for how Christ can be manifest in this world. And when you start praying for how God can use you to make Jesus more famous, he's going to answer that prayer. But I'm going to tell you this, it'll be uncomfortable for you because there's something in you that he's going to shift and change along the way, right? That's what the Lord does. He says the same thing in John, chapter 15, verses 7 and 8.
If you abide in Me and my words abide in you, ask whatever you wish and it will be done for you. My Father is glorified by this, that you what bear much fruit and so prove to be my disciples. What does he say? When you bear fruit, when you're yielded to the Holy Spirit, when you're controlled by the Holy Spirit, when you're allowing Christ to manifest his presence through your life, when you're doing things God's way, when you used to respond this way and now you're responding this way, when you used to act this way, but now you're acting this way. When your attitude used to be this and now it's that.
When you begin to go that way and you begin to bear fruit, right? And you begin to see the Holy Spirit producing fruit in your life. The Father gets glorified, the Son gets glorified. How does God get glorified? See, you'll see this later, but everything that Jesus did in his earthly ministry in the Gospels, we see him do through his people, the Church, in the book of Acts and following.
So it's not about, well, I wanted to trust Jesus and then just sit in church pews or rows or whatever for the rest of my life. It's when I'm born again and I was dead and now I'm alive. God wants to use me as his ambassador and his temple, to let the Holy Spirit pour his life out through me in such a way that people would know if the Holy Spirit hadn't come in him, if the Holy Spirit hadn't come in her, they would not be doing what they're doing right now. And they're continuing to grow. And I got news for you.
That's what he wants to do in you. And most of you didn't even realize when you got here this morning all the work that the Holy Spirit's doing. He's thinking about you all the time. The Father's thoughts for you outnumber the grains of sand. He's for you.
He's not against you. The conviction that you feel is because he's in love with you and he created you and he wants to grow you and he wants to use you. It's not you better or else. And you got to change this. It's not what some Fiery red tomato face.
Preacher says it's what the word of God causes. When you really read the Word of God, I know what I used to be and I know who I am. I like what God's making me. I like what I'm becoming. I'm not perfect.
Ask anybody close to me. Not even close. Positionally I am. In practice, I'm not. But I love Jesus because of the gifts that he's given to me.
And I'll tell you, it's to your advantage to have the Holy Spirit. It's good that Jesus went away. It's good that he ascended. Because he ascended, you're able to have everything that he told you about this morning. Isn't that good news?
That's really good news. Amen.
See, our God loved you so much. He didn't just want to save you. He just didn't want to take you to heaven someday and let you live your life here. He wanted to use you as his temple, as his vessel. That's why there's always a wrestling going on in your heart.
And let me just, let me just dispense one other myth before we close. Because sometimes when you hear a message like this, it's like, I go all in. I go all in. I kind of want to go all in, but, man, if I go all in, I'm going to probably have to do that.
I went to a Lutheran grade school. We had missionaries come from New guinea every single year. And I remember being five years old and I remember thinking, that's cool that they do that. But I never want to live in New guinea and eat iguana. I don't want to do that.
And I was always fearful if I went all in with God, I'm going to be on the mission field, you know, eating iguana and all that kind of stuff. Here's the truth. I never wanted to be a pastor. I didn't want to do this. I fought God for a long, long time.
Here's what I would tell you. If you go all in with Jesus, you'll find your greatest satisfaction. That's what I know. And it doesn't mean you're going to do anything like anybody else. You get to do it the way God designed you to do it, with your gifts and your skills and your personality and your way.
You get to be freed up to be completely you. You understand what I'm saying? You don't get to do it like anybody else. He wants to use you. He's creative.
He just wants you to go all in with him and yield to Him. Amen. That's why we give him praise. Not just because of his regenerating power and saving us and baptizing us and sealing us and doing all those things, but because he wants to use us to bring him great glory. Amen.
Amen. Would you stand? Our Father in Heaven, we give you praise for who you are. We give you glory for who you are. Lord, remind us today of all the ministries that we heard about the Holy Spirit.
And that was not an exhaustive list, Lord, but some of them. Lord, help us be reminded this week when we go out. We're not trying harder. We're not trying to put ourselves on display. We're depending more upon you to change who we are so we can walk in your ways.
We thank you for the gift of the Holy Spirit who dwells in every single one of us who believe. And, Lord, we ask you to move mightily as we continue to sing praise to you. And it's in Jesus name we pray. Amen and Amen. Can we give God praise for who he is?