The Person of the Holy Spirit

(upbeat music)

Good morning.

- And his roadie.

- And his roadie, you're a lot more than a roadie.

I'm honored to be with you for sure.

And humbled at the opportunity,

whoops, went the wrong way.

Thank you.

To speak with you, speak to you for a little while,

share with you for a little bit.

I've kind of got the spirit of Alan trying to hit me, so.

Yeah, I know.

It's all right, I don't mind doing that.

It's just, it kind of breaks my concentration

or consecration.

Yeah.

And if you're at home and you're not here,

but you see us or you see me, hi.

Glad you're able to join us.

Last week was the beginning of a series

that Pastor Kevin initiated.

This kind of, if I understand him correctly,

it's gonna run till Advent.

And the theme is the Holy Ghost.

And I think by and large, the content of this series

will come from the book of Acts,

specifically dealing with the personality and the practice

and the dynamics of the Holy Ghost out of that book.

And last week when Pastor Sheard,

about five minutes into that message, he said this,

(coughing)

and I was really impacted by it

because with the history that Pastor Bobby was alluding to,

we were, a few of us, a very, very few,

an ancient few of us were here actually

before Pastor Kevin got here.

But Kevin's been here for years.

But it occurred to me when he was kicking off the series,

how serious he was about the series.

And it also occurred to me based on my history,

I could be wrong, I have been wrong

probably since this morning.

(audience laughing)

But it occurred to me, as I recall,

this will be the longest series that's ever happened

at least since I've been here in this church.

So, yes, right.

So dealing with the Holy Spirit,

if I can use the word dealing,

for this congregation and those that are not necessarily

part of the congregation, but are streamers,

and of course what's in Pastor Kevin's heart

and a lot of our hearts beyond here to the community

and from the community to the region,

from the region to the state, from the state to the nation,

and from the nations of the earth.

'Cause one of the things you don't know

when you bring a message or you minister,

even if it's in spoken word or song or written word,

you have no idea where it goes.

You have none.

Wherever you think it goes,

it is way beyond where you think it goes.

'Cause that too is the work of the Holy Ghost.

The Holy Ghost does what he wants to

with the ministry for the kingdom as he sees fit.

So I just wanna stress before I move down to my teaching

that the importance of what we're doing together

as a corporate body over the next,

really till almost the end of the year,

is really important.

It's really important.

And our pastor, our lead pastor said it was important

in order to survive.

Now you can hear survived in more than one way.

You can hear survived like desperation.

You know, I thought I was gonna be killed

or I thought I was gonna be kidnapped

or whatever negative you look at in terms of survival.

Survival does not sound like an abundant living word.

It doesn't sound like all good things are working for good

for those that are called for the good according.

But the point of being a survivor, if you will,

is that whatever you're carrying,

why ever you're here,

whatever you're doing as unto the Lord

for the sake of the kingdom,

can only be done in your life and your life

and your life and our lives if we're here.

Now, forget about where we're going

when we cross over Jordan, put that to one side.

I'm not talking about the hallelujah part.

I'm talking about patient endurance.

I'm talking about long suffering.

Oh boy, aren't we having fun yet?

But if he said that, we need to pay attention to that

because he's the lead pastor in the house

out of deference to his position.

That's why I'm saying that.

So I'm gonna do, oh yeah, I need to do this.

I need to explain, to give you a little context

for why I'm doing what I'm doing.

Stop it.

In around January, Pastor Justin, thank you.

Yeah, you'll be old someday.

Pastor Justin contacted me and said he was starting

a men's ministry series on the Holy Ghost.

And he asked me, he said the Holy Spirit had showed him

that he needed to contact elders, older folks,

semi-decrepit people that had a history

with things of the Holy Spirit.

And for some reason he said, could I do it?

No, I'm not sure why he did that.

I ain't dead yet, my bell still rings.

(congregation cheering)

Bob Dylan.

I don't know where that came from.

And I said, I'd be glad to.

So in that teaching, Pastor Kevin was there.

And about a month or so after that,

Pastor Kevin contacted me and said,

we're gonna start a series in big church.

He didn't say big church, I said big church.

And he said, would you come teach on the Holy Spirit?

And I said, I'll be honored.

So that's why I'm here today.

He didn't ask me to preach.

I'm not gonna preach.

I can preach, but I'm not gonna preach.

He didn't ask me to bring a TED Talk.

There's six people here that listen to the radio.

That's all right.

Or wherever TED Talks show up.

Because I can tell a bunch of stories.

I'm quite capable of doing that, but that's not why I'm here.

I'm here to teach.

So having said that, I'm gonna do three things,

or try to very quickly in this session.

I'm gonna ask three questions and answer three questions.

And the questions are these.

Who is the Holy Ghost?

Where is the Holy Ghost?

And why is the Holy Ghost?

Or why is the Holy Ghost?

Why is there a Holy Ghost?

So here we go.

(keyboard clacking)

Okay, real quick.

In Deuteronomy, in the commandments,

the first commandment, scripturally,

is "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart,

soul, and strength."

Move to the New Testament.

The disciples asked Jesus, this is for you,

it's not my notes.

The disciples asked Jesus, what is the greatest commandment?

And Jesus responds, 'cause he had done his homework,

he responds with this response.

He says, "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God

with all thy heart, soul, mind, and strength."

Now, Jesus wasn't misquoting the Old Testament scrolls.

Can we picture that happening?

Can we picture Jesus going, "I didn't, that's,

why did I say that?"

That's not what it says in Deuteronomy.

But he added the word mind.

And the word mind there is not intellectual.

It's intelligence.

It's being able to think some thought.

It's not based on IQ.

It's not based on, is it S-E-T, what is that?

What is it?

- S-H-E-T. - S-H-E-T, thank you.

Thank you.

It's not based on how well you test.

It's not based on a curve.

It's not based on A plus down to F.

It's not based on that.

It's based on how you are fearfully and wonderfully made.

Each of us, which had nothing to do with how we got here.

I said I wouldn't preach.

We're here without any say so about how we're put together.

(audience laughing)

So the fact that cumulatively our minds gather data,

so that we can talk and think and write and figure stuff out

is not based on the information that comes to us.

It's based on how the mechanism works or if it works.

And it works because we are fearfully and wonderfully made.

So if you're a low score grader, what odd sentence.

It doesn't matter that you're that way

because the capacity for you to think

is based on who built you.

Seen the after and I'll, you know.

(audience laughing)

I think that was Connie.

Is that Connie?

Yeah, okay.

(audience laughing)

With the mind you have,

love the Lord thy God with all our heart, soul,

mind and strength.

Now Paul picked that up.

And in Romans 12, he says,

present your bodies as living sacrifices,

holy and acceptable to the Lord

and be renewed in the spirit of your mind.

So Paul, I'm playing fast and loose with scripture,

but I'm not violating scripture.

Just let me through it, okay?

Paul takes the thought that Jesus added

when he put mind in for the original,

love the Lord with heart, soul, strength.

When Jesus added mind, Paul picks it up and says,

if you're living as a worship sacrifice,

if your life is a living sacrifice in worship,

then one of the things you need to do

is let your mind be renewed in the Holy Ghost.

So very quickly, very politely, very in reverence,

would you put your hand on your head

and pray this prayer after me.

Holy Spirit,

please

renew my mind.

Okay, amen.

Two resources for this series

that I would highly recommend.

You can screenshot it or you can find it on

streaming if you do streaming.

For time's sake, I'm not gonna say anything

about either one of them, although that's very difficult,

but they're both available in printed form, in PDF form.

The first one is available in audio book form

and the other one, the second one is available

in a message from Miles Monroe about the book itself.

In my life, in my life,

these two books underneath scripture

have been the most important books in my life

about my relationship to the Holy Ghost.

So my recommendation to you

isn't because I've read the books.

Obviously I wouldn't say it if I hadn't read the books.

It's because pastors said,

we need the Holy Ghost in order to survive,

not the next 20 minutes.

We need to survive what we ain't in yet.

Can I get an amen?

Look, we don't know this.

We don't know.

We know what happens at the end of this.

We know what happens when Michael referenced

somebody dying or two funerals,

Saturday or Friday, whatever, okay.

As we age, we all get used to this.

I'm more used to it than many of you

because it seems to be like it's happening all the time.

And the lifestyle that I've lived,

I've got a whole lot of people that I was connected with

that I haven't been connected with in a long time.

And many of those people are noteworthy people

and they just keep popping off

'cause everybody in this room is going to pop off.

So if you're in Christ, if you're redeemed,

you know what's gonna happen.

But between now and when you die, we die,

or the Lord comes back,

we don't know what's going to happen

unless we have prophetic insight.

So this is important and I'll move along.

Oh, great. Thank you, Jesus.

Okay, this is, I think this is part one.

Let me see.

No, maybe not.

Did I go too far?

Hold on.

Bear with me.

Oh no, that's it.

Sorry.

Yeah, Pastor Barbie, that's what I need.

I need Pastor Barbie.

More than she realizes.

First question, who is the Holy Ghost?

The first page of the Torrey book,

the book I just referenced,

the person and work of the Holy Spirit,

the first page, the opening page of the book says this.

I need a microphone.

Okay, here stand by me.

Oh no.

No, it works.

What do you mean, oh no?

Before one can correctly understand

the work of the Holy Spirit,

he must first of all know the Spirit himself.

A frequent source of error and fanaticism

about the work of the Holy Spirit

is the attempt to study and understand his work

without first of all coming to know him as a person.

It is of the highest importance

from the standpoint of worship

that we decide whether the Holy Spirit is a divine person,

worthy to receive our adoration, our faith, our love,

and our entire surrender to himself,

or whether it is simply an influence emanating from God,

or a power, or an illumination that God imparts to us.

If the Holy Spirit is a person and a divine person,

and we do not know him as such,

then we are robbing a divine being well

of the worship and the faith and the love

and the surrender to himself, which are his due.

It is also of the highest importance

from the practical standpoint that we must decide

whether the Holy Spirit is merely some mysterious

and wonderful power that we in our weakness and ignorance

are somehow to get hold of and use,

or whether the Holy Spirit is a real person,

infinitely holy, infinitely wise,

infinitely mighty, and infinitely tender,

who is to get hold of us and use us.

- The Holy Spirit, Holy Ghost,

Holy Ghost and Holy Spirit, this is free.

Holy Ghost and Holy Spirit,

the word spirit and ghost historically

in those languages, in those times is interchangeable.

When you hear the word, when we say the word ghost,

what we tend to do is think about all the things

that have to do with ghost, all of the things,

all of that stuff that we've accumulated.

If we were then, the word Holy Ghost,

ghost would just mean spirit.

It's a synonym.

Okay, capisce?

So don't let me referring, 'cause Justin does it too,

well, there's others, but if I refer to the Holy Ghost,

I'm not like trying to be super spiritual,

nor am I trying to parse the Greek.

What I'm effectively doing is I'm comfortable calling

the Holy Spirit, the Holy Ghost, because it's in my Bible.

You got to go to the KJV to get it, but that's still,

in some circles, the KJV still applies.

Oh, ow, ouch, ouch.

Oh, I haven't moved from that, I need to move from that.

Right, okay.

The Holy Spirit is a person.

He has personage.

He has elevation and worth because of who He is,

supernaturally.

Now, watch.

I'm gonna mess with your theology.

Theology is the study of God, and it basically,

basically, just love me, has three categories,

personal theology, my study of God,

corporate theology, our study of God,

and enlarged theology, which is everybody else

that has theology about God.

One, two, three, and they build together.

Hal can have theology, Hal and me and all these people here

and all of y'all can have theology together,

and people outside this house that love the same Father,

Son, and Holy Ghost can have theology.

So anytime somebody that's got a mic or is teaching

or whatever they're doing says something

that messes with your theology, just extend grace.

Oh no, wake up, just extend grace.

Quit getting your toes bent out of shape

'cause somebody didn't say what you think scripture says.

If they're violating scripture

and you know they're violating scripture,

you still don't have to beat them upside the head.

Look up what grace says, what grace means,

and figure out how, oh, Wayne, don't get so hard.

Try and apply grace to people's lives.

Let's start here.

Okay, so extend to me grace.

Now, what we do is we elevate Father, Son, and Holy Ghost,

just like that, Father first, Jesus second,

Holy Ghost third.

I understand that.

Don't start pulling your feet in, okay?

Look, I understand that, and that's not wrong.

It's not incorrect.

But Father having more going on than Jesus has more going on,

and Jesus having more going on

than the Holy Ghost having going on is kinky theology.

Why would you say that, Wayne?

I'm glad you ask.

(congregation laughing)

Sequentially, I'm gonna run through scripture

with several verses, make a few comments,

and then we'll read through with where is the Holy Ghost?

In order to get to where is the Holy Ghost,

I gotta deal with Father and Son.

I got to, I can't go, oh, well,

we're in a series on the Holy Ghost,

so let's forget about Jehovah and Jesus.

(congregation murmuring)

Okay, so I'll do better over here.

For the Lord has chosen Zion.

He has desired it for his dwelling place.

This is the Psalmist speaking of Jehovah.

This is my resting place forever.

Here I will dwell, for I have desired it.

There are two Mount Zions.

There's a Mount Zion in Jerusalem.

We could go there to visit,

but right now would not be a good time.

And there's a spiritual supernatural Zion somewhere.

See, this is where theology gets quirky.

You want me to say where it is?

I haven't been yet.

And neither have you.

So if you wanna tell me where heaven is,

you're being presumptive.

(congregation laughing)

I can tell you how to get to heaven,

but I can't get you to heaven,

'cause I don't know where it is.

Okay.

So God has chosen Mount Zion.

So scripturally speaking, and this is where you have to,

grace me a little bit, okay?

I'm gonna be up here a few more minutes.

That's where the Father is.

He's omnipresent, so He's everywhere all the time.

Psalm 139, let me get it on the record,

Psalm 139 verses seven through 12.

Read it in your own time,

and then sort through what it says.

He's everywhere all the time because He's omnipresent.

But that passage of many other passages is saying

He is in, or on, or abiding in Mount Zion.

Okay.

Jesus speaking to His disciples, by proxy, that would be,

thank you, I was gonna say some of us,

but let's just be, let's be gracious, let's be gracious.

It applies to us.

"My sheep hear my voice, and I know them,

and they follow me.

I give them eternal life, and they will never perish,

and no one will snatch them out of my hand.

My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all,

and no one is able to snatch them out of my Father's hand.

I and the Father are one."

Real quick, watch.

Jesus is speaking, He says, "My sheep know my voice,

and I know them, and they follow me."

Then He says, "They can't be stretched out of My hand."

Period.

I don't mean resolute, a period.

Next sentence, "My Father, who has given them to me."

Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait.

Jesus just said, "I gave them eternal life,

and they will never perish,

and no will snatch them out of My hand."

But now He's saying, next sentence,

"My Father has given them to me, and is greater than all,

and no one will be able to snatch them

out of My Father's hand."

So Jesus has just said to His disciples, us,

right now, I know I don't look like Jesus, I'm a messenger.

He said, "My Father has given me His sheep,

which are My sheep,

and they can't be snatched out of My hand,

'cause they can't be snatched out of My Father's hand."

And then He closes that out by going,

"I and My Father are one."

Okay?

Then He says,

"And I will ask the Father, and He will give you

another helper, person, personage, Holy Ghost,"

stay with me, we're headed somewhere,

"to be with you forever."

That's that heaven thing again, it shows up.

I don't know if you noticed,

it's peppered all the way through Scripture.

He's saying, I'm gonna request from Dad,

a person, not a feeling, not a thing,

not an emotion, not an aspect,

not sort of like,

I'm gonna ask Him to send you exactly what you need

in the form of a personage,

to accomplish stuff that you're gonna need

that person in your life to do.

(congregation murmuring)

This is important stuff, ladies and gentlemen,

brothers and sisters.

Then He says, two chapters later,

talking to the same posse,

"Nevertheless, I tell you the truth,

it is to your advantage that I go away.

For if I do not go away, the Helper, the Person,

the Holy Ghost will not come to you.

But if I go away, I will send Him to you."

We just read that He was gonna ask the Father to send.

Now He's saying to the disciples, I will send Him to you.

You see, He said, I and the Father are one.

So that's sealed.

And the Father is on Zion, supernaturally.

And Jesus is with the disciples on the same,

the same planet we dwell on.

And He's saying to them, now watch, watch, watch.

He's saying to them, you don't know what happens next,

but I do.

And there's a hillside and a cross

and unbelievable stuff that you,

not only can you not fathom what it means,

you're not prepared for it.

What, pause.

We know what happens later because we're living now.

So the impetus of Jesus saying that to the disciples

doesn't hit us like it hit them.

It doesn't, it does not, it does not.

So when Jesus said, it's better that I go away,

just for a moment, just for like five seconds,

put yourself in the space where Jesus was talking

to other human beings.

And He says, it's better if I leave.

And you and I are tight, you're hanging out.

You spent three and a half years with me.

You've watched me, Jesus.

All this dynamic is happening.

And you're just coasting through it.

You're going, man, every day we get up,

I don't know what's gonna happen,

but it's just unbelievable.

And I look at you and your cronies and I go,

I'm gonna leave.

And it's better that I leave.

Now you can't pull together, well, why is that?

You're not asking the question.

Your brain, your mind, heart, soul, mind, strength.

You're going, what's He talking about?

Right?

Makes sense?

Right.

But He knows what's gonna happen.

So effectively He's going, I'm gonna see to it

that the Holy Ghost shows up as an embodiment of who I am

so that when He shows up in your life and I'm dead and gone

and crucified and buried and resurrected and ascended

and gone to the Father,

you'll have the person of the Holy Ghost

at work in your life.

(congregation murmuring)

Some of the people in this room,

no, no, no, I can't go there.

We'll get there in a minute.

I can't go there.

What's up next?

What's up, doc?

Yes, yes, yes, yes.

Shifting to Paul, Paul says,

do you not know that you are God's temple

and that God's Spirit dwells in you?

Paul is doing this.

Paul is a believer, duh.

That's Greek from the Hebrew.

Paul says to believers,

have you forgotten that the Holy Spirit indwells you?

It's not like a hypothetical.

It's an academic, is that the right word?

Thank you, thank you so much.

We got people awake in the house, hallelujah.

He's saying, in case you have forgotten,

you are the indwelling of the Holy Spirit.

The Holy Spirit indwells you.

And he actually goes on from there, right?

Is it there?

Yeah, do you not know?

Right.

And then the next verse, which is the kicker,

is if is a conditional word,

this verse is not written to unbelievers.

It's not written to marginal believers,

whatever that means, 'cause I don't know what that means.

It's like saying, oh, well, she's a little pregnant.

(congregation laughing)

Let me lighten that up a little bit.

And you lose your job, you get canned, you're fired.

It's like saying, I'm a little unemployed.

If you have no gig, if you got fired from the gig you had,

then you just aren't working.

Okay, so the passage says, if, that's condition.

If you have been raised in Christ,

seek the things that are above where Christ is,

seated at the right hand of God,

set your mind on things above, not on things of earth,

for you have died and your life is hidden with Christ in God.

So here's the deal.

God is on Mount Zion.

I skipped a verse, but I'll do it on the fly.

Jesus is at the right hand of the Father,

ever interceding for the saints.

I'm just gonna go, I can't get fired

'cause I'm not on staff anymore.

(congregation laughing)

When the text says Jesus is at the right hand of the Father,

ever interceding for the saints,

some translations say us, ever interceding for us.

Look, remember when we did this?

We prayed for our now minds to be renewed.

And I said, don't, you know,

be careful with your toes and extend grace.

When a believer is writing to other believers and says,

Jesus is at the right hand of the Father,

ever interceding for us, the us is us.

Make sense?

It's not them.

It's not us and them.

Now don't get ahead of me.

I'm not clustering.

I'm not building and circling the wagons.

I'm not going, oh, we're all redeemed.

We're going to heaven, hallelujah.

Tough luck for them.

No, no, no, no, no.

That's already worked its way into the body of Christ.

And it's an enormous problem.

Oh no, no, no.

It's an enormous problem

'cause it's not the spirit of Christ.

Let all the thirsty come must mean all the thirsty.

Oh, I can't preach.

No, no, no.

God's on Mount Zion supernaturally.

Jesus is at the right hand of God,

ever interceding for those that are in the house,

so to speak.

And then it says in the passage in Colossians,

you have died and your life is hidden with Christ in God.

So let's just do this

so we can lighten the place up a little bit.

Let the redeemed of the Lord say what?

- Sow.

- Okay, so this is for us.

So, this sow is for us, okay?

If we are in Christ, we are hidden with Christ in God.

Stay with, focus.

If we're hidden with Christ in God

and the Holy Spirit has been extended into our lives,

then the Holy Spirit is in us.

We are hidden with Christ in God.

The Holy Spirit is indwelling us.

Know ye not that you are the temple of the Holy Ghost,

1 Corinthians 3.16.

And Jesus is the right hand, the Father,

and the Father is supernaturally speaking,

seated in Mount Zion.

So, second question, where is the Holy Ghost?

The Holy Ghost is here and here.

If you have a house, oh my God,

if you have a house and you've converted an apartment

or part of your house into an apartment

and you put it up on, what do you call it?

Airbnb or one of a kazillion things now, whatever.

Remember, I'm old.

And somebody rents the apartment

and they come to your city, they come in for whatever reason,

they're coming and they get the code,

they've paid the deposit, they explain when you do the code,

you get the key and you're able to go in

and they go into the apartment.

You actually see them drive up.

You see them in the driveway.

They drive up and they stay for two nights and three days.

And while they're there, they come and go.

But they're abiding, they're dwelling in your house.

They're under your roof.

This is not a secondary building.

Are you with me?

Are you with me?

Okay, okay, okay.

So while they're there,

now when they drive off in the car,

when they're there, they're there is you're there.

There may be doors, there may be walls, maybe a hallway,

but they're where you are.

But if they don't come into your main house,

or you don't go into the apartment,

which is in your house, but you are overseer of,

then you don't have a relationship.

They can come and go.

They can be nice, they can be rich, they can be happy,

they can be idiots.

(audience laughing)

They can be irresponsible, they can be immoral.

Don't let me mess you up with this.

We're not throwing these metaphors out.

The long and short is this, this.

You cannot be in a relationship

unless you're in a relationship.

So it's possible to be indwelled by the Holy Spirit

and have no, she said it, I didn't say it.

(laughing)

Let me lighten this up a bit

and have a marginal relationship.

Stay with the metaphor.

Comes for two nights, three days,

gets in the car and drives off.

And you go over and clean the apartment

or you've hired somebody to clean the apartment

and they've come and gone.

But you didn't interact with them.

You didn't have to, wasn't required.

When they rented, oh Jesus,

when they got permission,

what's the thing we've been doing all year?

The theme of what we've been doing all year,

I can't think of it.

Somebody help me.

Entitlement, no, no, no.

All access.

If the person that's, oh,

if the person that's rented has all access

and they show up and they've done it legally

and ethically and morally and they're there

and you don't relate with them,

even though they have all access,

you're still not in relationship.

Why are you yelling, Wayne?

(congregation laughing)

Great.

Who is the Holy Spirit?

It's a person.

Where is the Holy Spirit?

In us?

Here.

Why is there a Holy Spirit?

(congregation laughing)

Ah, right.

Pastor Kevin asked me,

actually last week he said,

he didn't mention my name,

but he said this would be about the Trinity.

I can't talk to you about the Trinity.

I don't have enough time.

And I'm not really,

I'm not really qualified to do much of that.

I'm gonna give you two sentences from Paul

that say all that needs to be said about the Trinity.

And then I'm gonna make a turn and close.

I'm headed toward the back of this.

Paul says,

now there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit.

There are varieties of service, but the same Lord.

There are varieties of activities,

but the same God who empowers them all in everyone.

That verse right there is one sentence.

All of you English.

When Paul hits a groove,

Paul's not concerned about where the period comes.

Paul is processing the data.

I understand how that works

because there's a little of that in my life

if you haven't noticed.

When he makes a statement like that

in one sentence, all you can do, all I know to do is go,

that had to be the Holy Ghost to give him that.

How could anybody sort that out?

And what we just did about where the Father is,

where Jesus is, where the Holy Ghost is,

all of that is interconnected to this.

Then he says, there's one body and one Spirit,

just as you were called and one hope.

Am I there?

Did I pass it?

Where am I?

Bear with me, I'll find it.

There it is, there it is.

There's one body and one Spirit, just as you were called,

he's talking to saints,

you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call.

One Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all

who is over all and through all and in all.

And then there's one other brief verse.

No, I missed it, that's all right.

Ah, that's okay, that's where I wanna be, okay.

So those two verses effectively, scripturally sum up

if there's such a thing as summing up the Trinity.

They sum up the Father, Son and Holy Ghost.

Remember a few minutes ago, I was talking about categories

and in our minds, we tend to go, Father's a big shot,

Jesus is my Redeemer, hallelujah for that

and oh yeah, Holy Ghost.

Come on, come on, come on.

Be honest.

You don't have to, I'm not waiting for you to respond.

That's not my point.

Be honest inside yourself.

You're not a bad person if you've done that,

if you relegated the Holy Ghost to some minor role.

You're not a bad person.

You're just in a dynamic where we caught up in a thing

where we've diminished the worth and the value

and the substance of the Holy Ghost

because we don't pay attention to scripture

and the outworking of scripture.

The reason I run these verses by you

is to give you some foundational understanding

of the fact that the scripture is telling us who he is,

where he is and why he's here.

Now, number three, why is there a Holy Ghost?

And I've got, oh, fabulous.

I've got four minutes.

Pastor Kevin mentioned last Sunday,

and I encourage you to go back and look

since we're gonna be in this for six months.

It's pretty important to see how we started out.

He mentioned power.

He mentioned empowerment.

He mentioned what the Holy Ghost can do,

the dunamis of the Holy Ghost in our lives.

But Acts 1.8 says this.

Do I have it in the right place?

But you shall receive, is that?

Yes, yes, yes.

You, he's talking to us.

You will receive power

after the presence of the Holy Ghost has come,

you will be my witnesses,

and you will do witnessing in all kinds of places.

All of that, real quick,

all of that is connected to the Great Commission,

so-called Great Commission.

He tells his disciples to go make disciples.

So go find people that can be discipled and disciple them,

and find them in Judea and Samir, and I don't know.

You see what I'm saying?

The Great Commission is being set up

to be fulfilled for Pentecost.

And Pentecost is when the Holy Ghost came where?

Here.

Why?

Because Jesus said, "It's better that I go away."

If I leave, Holy Ghost will show up.

Okay, so I can't go any further with this,

'cause I had to do a closing,

and I've got two minutes maybe, so let's do this.

This'll wake everybody in the room up.

(audience laughing)

(audience laughing)

If I ask you

who that is,

I know.

(audience laughing)

Yeah.

Your response could be, probably would be,

you might not use these words,

would be, "I know of her."

Said another way.

If I said, "Is this person on the planet?"

Your response would be, "Yeah,

because you know of her being on the planet."

If I then said, "Do you know any data

that relates to who she is?"

Based on what you've heard, and seen, and watched,

and listened to,

you could fill in information about Taylor Swift,

because you know about Taylor Swift.

Pull your toes back in.

Knowing of her means you're aware that she exists.

Knowing about her means you've got information

that you have collected from wherever

that gives you the ability to go,

"Well, she's a singer, she writes, she's famous,

she's made a lot of money,

she loves this football dude," or whatever that is,

however that works.

"Gee, I thought I'd get more out of that."

(audience laughing)

Elite from this row, no, right?

(audience laughing)

If I then said, "Are you in relationship with Taylor Swift?"

Can I see your hand?

Nobody in this room is in relationship with Taylor Swift,

although we all know of her, and we all know about her.

Now take what I just said,

and apply that to your relationship,

or lack thereof, with the Holy Ghost.

Barbie, are you here?

It's so quiet.

(audience laughing)

He has that effect.

We have been given a divine opportunity

to move into relationship with the Holy Spirit,

not just to hear about Him, not just to know about Him,

but to participate in an actual relationship with Him.

A lot of times in my own life, or in your life,

I would imagine that when we pray,

it's like this esoteric prayer,

"Holy Spirit, help me and lead me."

But what if it's just the same as me looking at Hal

and going, "Will you help me?

"Will you show me the way to do this?"

The reality of the relationship,

and the commitment between us,

takes it out of the atmosphere,

and puts it into the reality of where we are.

And the Holy Spirit is extending an invitation

to have a relationship with you,

to offer to you that intimate place to walk with Him,

for you to be empowered to get that strength

that the Holy Spirit does bring.

So we're gonna stand, we're gonna worship for a moment,

and if you are one who has been ministering in prayer,

if you would come.

The invitation today,

see, the enemy would love for you to walk out and go,

"Oh, I know about the Holy Spirit,

"and we have a relationship,

"and you might have an acquaintance,

"but if you want a relationship with the Holy Spirit,

"to have that power, to have that guidance,

"to see the fruits growing in your life,

"to see the manifestation of the gifts of the Holy Spirit,

"because that's all within that package."

I want you to come if you need strength in your life,

if you need wisdom in your life, if you need direction,

this is your time.

Come and somebody's gonna agree with you.

Father God, I thank you for the gift of your Son,

and Jesus, I thank you for the gift of the Holy Spirit.

I thank you that it's not twins, but it's triplets, God.

I thank you, Lord, that there are three

who are moving on our behalf,

and Father, you said where there's a triple cord strand,

it's not broken, so Father,

we lean into the three today, God,

and I ask for all of those, Father,

who don't have an understanding,

I thank you, Lord, that you said

that our hearts are awakened morning by morning

to be taught of you.

Teach us today, Father God,

and Lord, let your Spirit fill this house,

fill this place, the invitation to relationship,

in Jesus' name, if you would come, come forward.

(gentle music)