Philip and the Ethiopian

[upbeat music]

♪ I got the joy, joy, joy, joy ♪

♪ Down in my heart ♪

Where?

Okay, come on.

I'm wearing a cap.

Not to be disrespectful, it's a cool cap.

That's why I got it on.

But also, this past week,

I had a granddaughter who turned 18.

And I sent her a text and I said,

"Happy birthday, young woman."

And she replied, "Thank you, old man."

[audience laughing]

And then she said, "Ha ha, I think she meant that kindly.

"And I'm not sure."

And I said,

"Gray hair and even a bald head is a sign of wisdom."

And she said, "I know."

So anyway, I just wanted to take a moment to reveal.

[audience laughing]

Yeah, there you go.

Glad you're here this morning.

Philip and the Ethiopian,

we're gonna talk about this passage

in Acts chapter eight this week.

Philip was one of the original deacons,

and he's also often referred to as Philip the Evangelist.

One of the reasons that he's referred to

as Philip the Evangelist is because of chapter eight.

After Stephen had been martyred,

Philip went to Samaria,

and he began to preach, and the whole town,

the whole area came to the Lord.

The whole area, God said.

There was a big revival going on.

In fact, he was confronted by a guy named

Simon the Sorcerer who, well, I don't know if he was,

they called him Simon the Sorcerer.

I don't know, you know, let's just call our kids Simon.

He was a man of faith.

He was a man of faith.

He was Simon the Sorcerer.

I don't know, you know, let's just call our kids

Simon the Sorcerer.

But they called him that,

and he had been a big deal in the area,

and I love this story because when Philip was confronted

by this guy and challenged by this guy,

he didn't do what we have a tendency to do

when we're confronted and challenged about our faith.

He didn't go, "Blah, blah, blah, blah,"

you know, "Out on you, bang, bang, bang."

No, he got him saved.

He converted him.

You know, it was really great,

and so this big revival's going on,

and Peter and John is sent to Samaria

in the first half of this chapter,

and an angel speaks to Philip

and gives him some new instructions.

Would you stand with me?

Let's find out what those instructions were.

Now, an angel of the Lord said to Philip,

"Go south to the road, the desert road

"that goes down from Jerusalem to Gaza."

So he started out on his way.

He met an Ethiopian eunuch, an important official

in charge of all the treasury of the Kandake,

which means queen of the Ethiopians.

This man had gone to Jerusalem to worship,

and on his way home was sitting in his chariot

reading the book of Isaiah the prophet.

The spirit told Philip, "Go to that chariot

"and stay near it."

Then Philip ran up to the chariot

and heard the man, Isaiah the prophet.

"Do you understand what you are reading?"

Philip asked.

"How can I," he said,

"unless someone explains it to me?"

So he invited Philip to come up and sit with him.

This is the passage of scripture the eunuch was reading.

He was led like a sheep to the slaughter,

and as a lamb before its sharers is silent,

so he did not open his mouth.

In his humiliation, he was deprived of justice.

Who can speak of his descendants?

For his life was taken from the earth.

The eunuch asked Philip, "Tell me, please,

"who is the prophet talking about,

"himself or someone else?"

Then Philip began with that very passage of scripture

and told him the good news about Jesus.

As they traveled along the road, they came to some water,

and the eunuch said, "Look, here is water.

"What can stand in the way of my being baptized?"

And he gave orders to stop the chariot.

Then both Philip and the eunuch went down into the water,

and Philip baptized him.

When they came up out of the water,

the Spirit of the Lord suddenly took Philip away,

and the eunuch did not see him again,

but he went on his way rejoicing.

Philip, however, appeared at Azotus and traveled about,

preaching the gospel in all the towns

until he reached Caesarea.

Father, thank you for your word.

Thank you for the life that is in your word.

Thank you for the presence of the Holy Spirit in this place.

Give us ears to hear.

Give us hearts to understand.

In Jesus' name, amen.

You may be seated.

Now, before I get into what I wanna actually

talk about today, I wanna immediately do a bunny trail,

a word about baptism, because I was asked

a few weeks ago by someone,

"What do you have to do to be baptized?"

And I've been asked that many times

throughout the years in ministry,

and what they mean is, "Well, do I need to take some classes?

"Do I need to, what do I need to learn?

"You know, do I need, what do I need to do?"

And this is, this passage pretty much answers it.

There is a verse that you won't find

in almost any of the new translations

because it's not in some of the older text,

but it's, when the eunuch says, you know,

"What would stand in the way of me being baptized?"

That verse says it doesn't change anything,

but the verse says that Philip told him,

"If you believe with all your heart, you may."

And the eunuch answered, "I believe that Jesus Christ

"is the Son of God," and so they baptized him.

And so if you're wondering what do you have to do

to be baptized, believe.

You believe, if you believe, you should be baptized,

you should get baptized, 'cause you see,

we not only are proclaiming that Jesus is our Savior,

we're proclaiming that Jesus is our Lord.

And you know what Jesus said to do?

Get baptized, be baptized, and if he's our Lord

and he's saying, "Be baptized," then hey,

I'm not gonna put, nothing stands in the way

except just saying yes.

So anyway, that's got nothing to do

with what I'm gonna teach about today,

but it was something that I felt like I needed to say,

was supposed to say.

The book of Acts, the book of Acts was written by Luke,

and we know this because Luke wrote the book of Luke,

and in the book of Luke, he addressed it to dear Theophilus.

I wanna tell you some things here.

And the person who wrote the book of Acts says,

"In my former book, Theophilus,

"I told you about this stuff,

"now I'm gonna tell you about some other stuff."

And so Luke wrote the book of Acts, but he didn't name it.

He didn't call it Acts, he didn't call it anything.

He just said, "Here you go, Theophilus,

"I'm gonna tell you some stuff."

It was almost 200 years later when a guy named Arrhenius

named it, called it the Acts of the Apostles,

and the name stuck, and it's rather unfortunate

that the name stuck, Acts of the Apostles.

Because, well, some things that are recorded in Acts

were things that the Apostles, the original 12,

were involved in.

A lot of the things that are recorded in Acts,

Paul was involved in, now he was an Apostle,

but he wasn't one of the original 12.

Philip wasn't an Apostle, he was a deacon.

He was a deacon and an evangelist,

and there are other things in the book

that weren't necessarily done by the Apostles.

However, everything in that book was inspired by

and empowered by the Holy Spirit.

And so a more accurate title for the book

would be Acts of the Holy Spirit.

And if these were simply the Acts of the Apostles,

then it might lead some to believe

and some to even teach that,

well, those guys aren't here anymore,

so that stuff doesn't happen anymore.

But guess who is still here?

The Holy Spirit.

And so because he is still here,

the things he did then, he does now.

He is part of the Godhead, the God who doesn't change,

Jesus Christ, the same yesterday, today, and forever.

Hey, the Holy Spirit is also the same

yesterday, today, and forever.

And so the Holy Spirit does stuff.

Well, who is this Holy Spirit?

The Holy Spirit has multiple titles,

just as the Father and the Son have multiple titles.

The Father is the ancient of days,

he is the Lord God Almighty, the God of Abraham,

Isaac, and Jacob, the great I Am, Jesus.

The Son has multiple titles, he's the Prince of Peace,

he's the King of Kings, and Lord of Lords,

he's the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world.

Jesus introduces the Holy Spirit over in John chapter 14,

John 14 · chapter mention

and the word that he uses to describe him

is a word that contains many titles.

Now, it's a Greek word, and I don't usually use Greek words,

but I can pronounce this one.

And the word is parakletos.

And if you're reading in various translations,

you might see the word comforter,

or you might see the word advocate,

or you might see the word counselor.

And if you're only gonna use one word

to describe parakletos, then yeah,

you can use any of those words.

But what the term literally means is

one called alongside to help.

That's what it literally means.

Philip left the revival in Samaria,

and it says an angel gave him instructions,

and it probably required an angel

to get him to leave a big revival

where he's kind of a central character

and things are really going on,

and wants you to go and walk in the desert for a while,

go take a desert road.

But an angel tells him to do that,

and he meets an Ethiopian eunuch along the way,

an important official, and we read this.

The spirit told Philip, go to that chariot

and stay near it.

Now Ethiopia, the results of this encounter

were massive, were unimaginable.

Ethiopia was actually the first country in the world

to officially proclaim Christianity

as their religion, and today, almost 2,000 years later,

even though it's surrounded by Muslim countries

on all sides, over 70% of the population

of Ethiopia are Christians.

They still claim Christ, and this happened

because Philip was listening to and obedient

to the Holy Spirit.

Now, here's the kicker.

The Holy Spirit wants to talk to you.

He's not just here to talk to certain ones.

He's not just here to talk to apostles.

He's not just here to talk to pastors.

He's not just here to talk to evangelists.

He wants to talk to you.

There is such a thing, and the culture

and the teaching that I was brought up in

was all about the Holy Spirit.

We heard about the Holy Spirit a lot,

and let me just say, you know, we sang earlier.

One of the first things that we sang today

was I have decided to follow Jesus.

I hope by the time I get through this morning,

you'll understand that that is a totally empty phrase

unless it is coupled with the decision

to follow the Holy Spirit,

because you can't follow Jesus

unless you're gonna follow the Holy Spirit as well.

There is such a thing as being filled with the Spirit,

being baptized in the Holy Ghost.

Now, that's what I was brought up with,

baptized in the Holy Ghost, and man, I was several times.

And you know, when you get baptized in the Holy Ghost,

you speak in tongues, and just weird things happen,

and you seek and you tarry until that,

yeah, you know what I'm talking about.

And that's real.

There is such a thing, and I know a few weeks back,

Kevin held a service and invited people to come down

and be filled with the Holy Spirit,

and that's a wonderful thing,

but one of the things that I have learned over the years

is that being filled with the Spirit

is not a one-time event.

Yeah.

If you go and fill your car up with gas,

you know what you're gonna have to do next week?

You're gonna have to fill it again.

In fact, the day that Kevin held that service,

we were out of town, and we were traveling,

and we were gonna listen to it,

but the internet didn't work.

It got broke or something that day, I don't remember,

so we weren't really able to,

and then we watched it later,

and then they cut it off before the real stuff

started happening, which, but anyway,

we were driving that day, and you know what?

We started that day with a car full of gas,

and we had to fill it up the same day.

And just because you've been filled with the Spirit

doesn't mean you're still filled with the Spirit.

Yeah, that'll preach.

Yeah, I mean, it is an ongoing thing, an ongoing process.

And so, even if you, here's what I wanna say.

Even if you've never experienced the baptism

of the Holy Spirit, the fullness of the Holy Spirit,

you still have the Holy Spirit.

The Holy Spirit is still your paraclete.

He is still the one called alongside to help you.

He is still inside of you.

Romans 8, 9 says this.

You, however, are not in the realm of the flesh,

but are in the realm of the Spirit,

if indeed the Spirit of God lives in you,

and if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ,

they do not belong to Christ.

Conversely, what that is saying is if you belong to Christ,

the Spirit's in there.

Now, the tank may not be full.

It may be somewhere down here, but the Spirit is in there.

Let me just say, because I know I kinda grew up sometimes

where some people would take this particular passage

and they would go, see, you gotta be baptized

in the Holy Ghost to be saved.

That's not true.

It does not say God so loved the world

that he gave his one and only Son,

that whosoever believes on him and speaks in tongues

shall not perish but have everlasting life.

No, you, hey, I'm not denigrating speaking in tongues.

I speak in tongues, but I'm just saying

that's not a requirement to be saved,

and it's not a requirement to have the Holy Spirit

living in you.

This last Thursday, Justin was teaching in Galatians

and came across a verse and he said,

you know, we're in the middle of talking

about the Holy Spirit, and this is the reason

why we're talking in Galatians.

Hey, he's getting better every week.

[audience laughs]

He really is.

I mean, the boy's coming along.

Yeah.

Even Michelle likes you now.

I mean, she always laughed at your jokes, but.

But this is the verse he was talking about.

Because you are his sons, God sent the spirit of his Son

into our hearts, the spirit who calls out Abba, Father.

The first paraclete taught us to pray, our Father,

who art in heaven.

The second paraclete comes into our very hearts

and cries out, my Father, my Father.

And so if you belong to Christ, if you're saved,

the Holy Spirit is in you.

He's there, and he's trying to talk to you.

He's called alongside to help you,

and he's speaking to you, and this isn't just

a special occasion event.

We tend to think, okay, yeah, the Holy Spirit will speak

when something big happens.

The Holy Spirit will speak when something big

is really needed.

That's not, no.

In fact, he's unlikely to speak when something big happens

if you haven't learned to listen to him

when something small is going on.

He can't really trust you with a big word

if he can't trust you with a small word.

This is a daily event.

How much help is a helper who only shows up every few years?

I've got a couple of friends up in Antioch,

and they're physically, they're really going through it.

She's got all kinds of issues.

He's dealing with like his fourth or fifth bout of cancer,

and this one has really been rough on him.

They don't go to the church here.

These are friends from back in my theater days.

But anyway, Michelle and I have gone to visit them

several times and gotten to know them

and really, really care about them,

and Michelle has been very concerned

about how do they make it?

How are they able to take care of each other?

And yesterday, I was on the phone with my friend,

and he told me, he said, "We have home health now.

"They come five days a week, and they take care of things,

"and they're getting ready to start coming

"seven days a week."

What if they only came once a month?

How much help would that be?

What if they only showed up every three months?

Or just every now and again?

No, they're gonna be there every day

because they're needed every day,

and the paraclete, the one called to walk alongside of you,

is walking with you every day.

He wants to talk to you every day.

And then when he does speak, we tend to think of it

as a relegating it to the realm of the woo-woo.

But it's actually far more pedestrian than that.

He can speak to you from a burning bush.

He can come and set this bush on fire,

but it's not being consumed, and tell you to go to Egypt,

and confront Pharaoh, and tell him to let my people go.

He can do that.

He's never done it to me.

I mean, that's not usually how he does things.

I've had him tell me to do some pretty big things,

but he never did it that way.

He never did.

He can also speak to you at the grocery.

He can speak to you at the appliance store.

He can speak to you at the shoe store.

He can speak to you at the clothing store.

Come on, this is supposed to step on your toes.

This is supposed to hurt.

He can speak to you at any of those times.

One of my favorite stories that I heard a long time ago,

I think Wayne Barry told it to me, so I think it's true.

But it involves Don Finto.

Don was a pastor at Belmont Church in Nashville,

and Wayne and Gene were going there at the time.

Apparently, they used to have Sunday night services.

After the Sunday night service,

Don liked to go home and have ice cream.

So he'd go home after the Sunday night service,

he'd get out a scoop of ice cream,

oh praise God for ice cream.

Been doing the work of God today,

and now it's time to rejoice.

So anyway, apparently Don was telling the church one time

that he had gone home after the Sunday night service,

and he'd gotten out his ice cream,

and the Holy Spirit said, what are you doing?

And Don goes, well, I'm eating ice cream.

And he didn't hear anything.

And he went, you don't care.

I mean, you're not, are you?

Now I don't know if Don went ahead

and ate the ice cream or not.

But what?

He didn't.

He's a better man than me.

[audience laughing]

Because I'm, full confession here.

I mean, I'm not batting a thousand.

I never claimed to be.

You know, I'm just trying to stay above the Mendoza line

for those of you who know what that is.

But you know, I mean, there've been times

that I've been at home,

and I'm starting to scoop out ice cream,

and God has reminded me of that story.

And I'm thinking, yeah, God, that's a good story.

Very instructive.

He can also tell you when to pick up the phone

and call somebody.

He can tell you when to go and talk to somebody.

There've been so many times that I've called somebody,

and I've heard, oh, you called it just the right time.

Well, somebody told me to.

And that's why it was just the right time.

And he doesn't just speak to preachers about that.

He doesn't just speak to people

who get up on the platform about that.

He wants to speak to every one of us about that.

Well, how do you recognize the Spirit's voice?

[audience member speaking faintly]

I like jokes.

And a few months ago, one of my favorites

was a few months ago, Evan and Charlotte

were over at our house for dinner,

and Evan goes, "I got a new knock-knock joke for ya."

And I said, "Okay."

Yeah, he goes, "Knock-knock."

I said, "Who's there?"

"Charlotte's pregnant."

[audience laughing]

Now, I started laughing.

Yeah, I found it funny.

Michelle didn't start laughing,

but she was jumping up and down on her seat

and going, "Yeah, that's so great, yeah."

I didn't do that, but I was laughing.

Now, and if you were laughing, that's great.

If you weren't, that's okay too.

It probably wasn't funny.

But if you found it funny,

you might wanna hang out with them more often.

I got one for you.

Knock-knock.

>> Who's there?

>> Holy Spirit.

>> Holy Spirit.

>> That's the problem.

That's the issue.

Back in the days before caller ID and stuff like that,

you'd get a phone call sometimes.

I might get a phone call.

Hello, is Arwin there?

May I ask who's speaking?

Arwin was my daughter.

And you know, I didn't know who it was.

I'd never heard this voice before.

If he called back the next day,

you know, I might have an idea who it is.

And if somebody kept calling regularly,

I wouldn't have to ask, "Who is it?" anymore.

The way you recognize the Spirit, learn to recognize

the Spirit's voice is you listen.

Is you listen.

And you start by expecting.

By expecting him to speak.

In fact, it's even okay to ask him to speak.

It's even okay to go, "Hey, I need some direction here.

"Would you speak to me?"

And you might find out that you need

a whole lot more direction than you think you need.

As you begin to learn to listen to him

and begin to learn to follow him.

And then listen, he isn't gonna start

by telling you to go to Africa.

I mean, you know, some people go,

"Well, I don't know if I wanna hear from the Holy Spirit.

"He's probably gonna tell me to do something

"I don't wanna do."

Well, maybe he is, but he's probably not.

He's probably just gonna start out

with something real simple and see if you'll pay attention.

See if you'll actually do it.

Like I said, there's been many times in my life

when I clearly heard about big things.

I heard about big things about going

into the ministry full-time.

I heard about, you know, I clearly heard

about going to Africa.

The hardest one that I ever heard him say

for me to do was go to Smyrna.

Very honestly.

I went, "No."

Oh.

All right, I'll do it.

Oh, and you know, if you start saying,

[mimics

But most of the stuff that I hear about is smaller stuff.

There is a principle in scriptural,

in scriptural, through all of life, and it's this.

Whoever is faithful with little will be entrusted with much.

I said earlier that he's not probably going

to give you a big burning bush experience

to have you go do something.

And if you don't hear from him regularly,

because he can't trust you with it,

until he knows he can trust you with something small,

until he knows that he can trust you,

that if he goes, "Hey, go over to George today,

your friend George, and don't say, 'How you doing?'

Say, 'Are you okay?'"

Go over to Betty and ask her, "Is everything all right?"

Can he trust you to do that?

Or, you know, go to Fred and say,

"I love you, man.

I care about you."

That'll be just the thing Fred needed to hear.

But the Holy Spirit's gotta trust somebody

to take the message.

And over time, you'll learn to recognize his voice,

not necessarily so much how it sounds, but how it feels.

The Holy Spirit's voice feels different

from the other voices that are trying to talk to you

in this world.

The Holy Spirit's voice feels differently

than your own flesh.

And of course, his voice will always confirm his word.

And you'll learn that you can trust him,

and that the Holy Spirit is working both sides

of the situation.

You know, Philip didn't know it,

but this Ethiopian eunuch was reading a passage in Isaiah

and needed somebody to explain it to him.

And the Holy Spirit sent Philip on this mission

and told him to go and stand by this chariot

because he could explain that to him.

He was working both sides of the equation.

And whenever he says to you,

"Go tell Fred how much you love him,"

he knows that there's something inside of Fred's heart

that day that's going,

"Man, I just don't feel like God loves me."

When he tells you to go and ask Betty,

"Is everything all right?"

It's because, no, everything isn't all right.

And that may be why you don't wanna go and ask her.

But he's got something big that he wants to do.

In her life and in your life as well.

But if you're gonna also go,

"Well, he'll confirm the word,"

you need to know something about the word.

How can you know if his voice is confirming the word

if you don't know the word?

You don't have to be a scholar.

You don't have to be aspiring to be a scholar.

But you gotta do something.

You got to at least be trying.

And it's not a matter of,

"Well, I can't ever be blah, blah, blah, blah."

You don't have to be blah, blah, blah, blah.

You need to be what the Spirit needs right now

for this situation.

Father Ray Cash was here a few months ago and he spoke.

I love one of the stories.

He's a close friend of mine.

He didn't tell it at this, but he was telling me.

I love one of the stories.

He was discipling a couple of young men

who had recently come to know Christ.

I think they were bikers or something.

I mean, they were kind of rough around the edges.

But they didn't know much about the Lord.

And he had been discipling them for a little while.

And they brought a friend with them one day

to the discipleship time.

And as the friend was listening to what was going on,

he decided he wanted to get saved.

Yeah, I want Jesus.

I'll take Jesus.

And Ray went, "Well, that's great."

And he went inside to get a Bible.

And he brought it out and he said,

"I'm gonna give you this Bible."

And then he was gonna give him some instruction

in the Bible, but before he did,

one of the guys stepped in and said,

"No, no, no, wait, wait.

"Let me show you something."

And he opened up the book and he told his friend,

he said, "That big word you see at the top there

"where it says John, that's the name of the book.

"And this big number right here, three, that's the chapter.

"And then these little numbers over here,

"those are the verses."

And the guy went, "Wow."

See, Ray was about ready to shoot

about 100 miles over the guy's head.

But the Holy Spirit knew what the guy needed.

Knew where he was in the walk.

And so he can use you.

You don't have to be a scholar.

He can take the verse you read today

and plug it in somewhere in your day.

I mean, there are people all over here

who can go, "Yeah, it happens to me all the time."

It can happen to you all the time,

but you gotta read a verse.

You gotta read a verse before it can happen.

I'm not saying you have to read

chapter after chapter each day.

If you did, that's great, but something.

Make some kind of effort.

And many think that they've heard the Spirit say

to fix something, but they're totally acting in the flesh

'cause they have no idea what Jesus would do.

Because they haven't spent any time in the Word.

They don't know what it feels like.

They just feel like, "I'm gonna fix something."

No, you're getting ready to break something.

And it's not the chains of oppression.

Only He can do that.

If you encountered this Ethiopian eunuch,

or somebody, anybody, reading the passage,

He was led like a sheep to the slaughter,

and as a lamb before His shares was silent,

opened not His mouth, was deprived of justice,

taken from the earth.

Could you tell them who the prophet was talking about?

You should be able to.

It's Jesus, the Lamb of God.

The result was magnificent.

Look at this here.

When they came up out of the water,

the Spirit of the Lord suddenly took Philip away,

and the eunuch did not see him again.

Woo, that is so cool.

You know, have you ever been translated?

No, I haven't either.

But almost every time I go on a long trip,

I think about it, I go, "Lord, translate us."

It just doesn't happen.

But apparently it happened to Philip.

He's just gone.

He was there, and then he wasn't there.

Wow, that's good.

But that's not the part that I want you to see.

He didn't see him again,

but he went on his way rejoicing.

Rejoicing.

He wants to talk to you, the Holy Spirit does,

and if you will let this sink into your being,

expect it, listen for it, go,

"Okay, this is how it's gonna be from now on."

It is life-changing.

It can be life-changing for someone else,

but it'll definitely be life-changing for you.

Because you see, he isn't just the one

who tells us what to do.

He isn't just the one that says,

"Do this, don't do that," that kind of stuff.

I mean, he does that.

The first Paraclete, Jesus,

walked alongside the disciples,

and many times he told them what to do.

He gave them instructions about that,

but he was also the one when the storm was raging.

Is it raining outside?

Hallelujah!

Yeah.

When the storm was raging

and things were really getting rough,

he was the one who went, "Peace.

Be still.

Don't be afraid.

Where's your faith?"

He's the one, and the second Paraclete

can do the same thing, and he does in our lives.

I mean, we all go through stuff.

The Holy Spirit is the one who is able

to speak a word of peace.

He's the one who bestows beauty instead of ashes.

We look at a situation, and the only thing there

seems to be ashes, but the Holy Spirit comes along

and goes, "Let me show you the beauty.

Let me show you where that is."

And he's the one who causes us to cry out,

"Father, my Father."

Yeah, come on out, guys.

I didn't tell you to, but I imagine the Holy Spirit did.

(audience laughing)

I know he did.

Yeah.

When Father Ray was here, he mentioned prayer,

talked about prayer, and he mentioned the morning

and evening offices in the prayer book.

I went, "Yeah, I wanna check that out."

And I haven't really gotten into the evening part yet,

but the morning part, I'm doing pretty much every day.

And it starts off with a brief prayer.

Actually, they got two of them,

and I was flipping them back and forth

'til I got to the one and went, "No, that's the one."

And it says this.

It says, "Open our eyes to see your presence

"and strengthen our hands to do your will,

"that the world may rejoice and give you praise."

Philip obeyed the Holy Spirit.

This guy went on his way rejoicing.

And I suspect Philip may have had a little rejoicing as well.

We oftentimes think we're doing God's will.

And one of the things that I have begun to look for

when I think I'm doing God's will is the result.

Is the result that the world may rejoice and give you praise?

Or is the result that maybe I feel like I won,

but people now despise Jesus

and the faith that I stand for?

If we listen to the Holy Spirit who calm our storms,

who show us beauty for ashes,

He will open our eyes to see God's presence in everything.

That He will strengthen our hands to do God's will

in such a way that the world rejoices, gives Him praise.

Would you stand with me?

This isn't obviously an emotional type of teaching

or anything, but as Pastor Kevin was saying earlier,

sometimes we just need to be quiet and listen.

For those who are gonna pray with people, come forward.

And that's all, I mean, we're gonna worship,

but in our spirits, let's get quiet.

And if you hear him saying,

hey, I'd like to do some work here.

I'd like to do something here.

Go down there and pray with somebody.

Let's talk about it.

Then be obedient.

Let's worship.

Let's worship.

(gentle music)

[music fades out]