29th February 2024 - Stir up the gift

Well, there's somebody in this room I've known longer than you, Dave.

My dear friend Frank A Japung from Ghana. Come on, wave stand up

brother Frank and we met in nineteen eighty seven. Frank, how many were

not born in nineteen eighty seven and a half And some of you're like,

yeah, that's I was just yeah we were kids then, right, Frank,

and he leads an incredible network of churches New Testament Assembly. He's from

Mussy in Ghana. And then Delroy Powell, who Dave and I were at

your church a few years ago and did superphetic things. So let's welcome our

friends. Sayah, wow, thank you. Well, Frank came all the

way from Ghana. I came to the United States. This is an international

meeting. Great to be with you. Wow, this is great. We

need a bigger room. We need come on, we need to pray that

new venue in because God has a God wants to grow his church. How

many think that growing is good? We have a saying healthy things grow.

Just check out with the parents, right, if you keep feeding those kids,

they grow, Yeah, just keep feeding them. So this is exciting

days and I kind of have a prophetic word. I'm kind of holding till

we get into this. I don't know when it's going to come out,

but I have a word for our CF maybe for some of you two.

But Dave asked me to share on this exciting topic of stir up the gift

of God and what does that mean? Well, as Dave said it,

you have a gift, you have Christ in you, right, but we

have to stir it up because we're in a battle. How many feel the

battle? All right? The rest of you are dismissed. We're here.

We're here to train for warfare and stir up the gift because we have the

best gift in the whole world to give people. Right. I got one

of amen from the pastor, but we pay him to say amen. But

we have the best. We have the best gift Christ in us right and

the Holy Spirit. You know when God, God is just a giver.

God gave us his best gift, right, Jesus Christ, all in agreement.

You can talk. Not only can you put take your shoes off,

you can talk, and these meanings is good. God God likes a talking

church. Wouldn't it be awful if the church never talked? So God gave

his best gift. Then Jesus came, and when he ascended, he gave

his best gift, Holy Spirit. Right are you with me? So the

Holy Spirit not to be outdone, but he's part of the Trinity. He

then gave his best gift on the day of Pentecost. What did you get

spiritual language? When he poured out the Spirit Acts Chapter two. When the

Holy Spirit came, he poured out The first thing that happened to those humans

on the planet was they began to speak in spirit language. They'd never done

that before. That's what a gift to be able to communicate to the Godhead

personally with words that you don't have to make up. You don't have to

think, you don't have to go to Bible college, you can just speak

spirit language. It's a powerful gift. Now, that's why the devil hates

it so much. That's why there's controversy. There's arguments. Theologians have tried

to explain it away. But you know what, Spirit language is such a

powerful gift that you and I have the privilege of exercising, and out of

that comes then other giftings. So the Holy Spirit pours out his gift of

the Holy Spirit immediately. Those those unlearned men. The Greek word is idiotes.

Guess what that? Guess what word we get from that? That's what

they said. How can these idiots be speaking these languages? Well, because

they have a supernatural gift. So we're here tonight to just talk about the

gift and to stir it up. Look at that what that means. So

the way we're going to do that is we're going to look and I'm going

to call this a very strong message. These are Christ's commands concerning spiritual gift.

They're not just suggestions. They're not like, well, you know,

now that you're a believer and you got the Holy Spirit, you could it's

all right, you don't have to. You know, we don't have to.

But there's really a command, which in the Greek language is called the

imperative tense, that some of these words are given by Christ to like you

need to do this. I want you to do this, so determine me.

The First Corinthians, chapter twelve, that's we're going to start. I

gave Dave a few verses, but I might be all over the map,

if that's all right. Fir Corinthians twelve which is the kind of one of

the early churches, the Corinthian Church, were Paul the Apostle. Paul writes

some of his best theology concerning spiritual gifts, and that's how that starts out.

In First Corinthians twelve. He just finishes a whole teaching on the Lord's

Supper about communion. Now he switches topics and he says, now concerning spiritual

no, I caught you, I trapped you. The word gifts is on

the screen, it's in your Bible, probably in Italics, but in the

Greek it's not there. It's not the word gifts. It's just now concerning

spiritual and that word in the Greek is what we call the masculine plural.

Am I too? Is this too educational for anybody? All Right, you're

like, I didn't come to go to school. I didn't come here to

go to school. It's okay, you're gonna get a little bit of grammar.

But now concerning spiritual it's it's masculine plural in the Greek, and it

would really read now concerning spiritual people. Masculine plural also includes the feminine.

So Paul saying, now, concerning spiritual people, how many think I'm a

spiritual person. I'm in church on a Thursday night. I must be spiritual,

right, Paul saying, in a broad context to the Corinthians concerning spiritual

people, I don't want you to be ignorant or uninformed? What does it

mean to be a spiritual person? While I listened to Christian music, I

must be spiritual, I sing, I sing Christian songs, I go to

church. All the things we think is a behavior doesn't make you spiritual.

What really tests your spirituality is what comes out of your mouth. That's why

I said we need to be a talking church. You really don't know if

someone's spiritual or which means that what they do is being driven by the Holy

Spirit in their life. Concerning he says, I don't want you to be

ignorant. I don't want you to be uninformed. Paul says, I'm here

to teach you about that, and then he says, now you know that

when you were pagans, how many used to work? How many were a

pagan? I was a pagan? Of course you were. No, I

was born a Christian. No you weren't. You might have had good behavior.

Ask any parents. They're not born with good behavior, right, parents,

When you were pagan's watch, you were led astray to mute or voiceless

idols. Isn't that interesting? Before we came to Christ, we were all

pagans, and guess what you were being led? And I heard the phrase

being led by the spirit. Right, I'm being led by the spirit.

Well, even when you're a pagan, you're being led. And it's interesting,

Paul's that you are being led to a voiceless idol. They were worshiping

idols back then, statues and wooden carvings and stone carvings, and they couldn't

talk. That's what Paul saying. You used to worship idols and they couldn't

talk. We serve a God that talks. That's why we're a talking church.

You were led astray, going to the wrong direction, to voiceless idols.

However, you were led, so we all have I just call it

lead poisoning, right, We're all being led by something. And that word

lad is the verago in the Greek. It literally means the picture is this?

To be led means It was used in agriculture to describe a farmer would

put a rope around the neck of an animal. And then pull on the

animal. That's what that word means, to be led, to be literally

be tugged by an object, to go in a certain direction. And we

all have leanings, right, I feel led to do this, I feel

led to do that. So I said, we have lead poisoning. So

I'm just led. And sometimes, well, the question is who's leading you?

Because here, as Pagans, they were being led. The enemy had

a rope around their neck and was pulling them on all the wrong directions.

So Paul says, therefore, now verse three. Therefore, based on what

I want you understand, what a spiritual person is. It has to do

with how you're being led and what spirit is leading you. Therefore, he

says, I want you to understand. That's the antidote to being ignorant,

the antidote, he says, I don't want you to be unlearned. Therefore,

I want you to understand that no one watch speaking. There's the keyword,

no, no one what speaking in the spirit of God. That's the

difference between someone being led to an idol to idle worship. And we have

idols today. Sometimes we drove some of them here. I know Americans have

a love affair with their cars. They love their cars. I mean people

love cars. We love objects, we love buildings, we love clothes.

There's things that become idolatrous. But no one speaking in the spirit can ever

say Jesus is a cursed. The Spirit of God, the Holy Spirit,

would never cause you to say Jesus is a cursed And no one can actually

say Jesus is Lord except in the Holy Spirit. When you get born again,

right, you confess with your mouth, believe in your heart, Jesus

is Lord. You can get anybody to say that if you pay them enough

money, right by going around with one hundred pound note and said say Jesus

is Lord, Thank you, Jesus is Lord. We can go around the

neighborhood, go to every knock on every apartment, say here's one hundred pounds.

If you'll say Gesus is Lord, I'll give you one hundred pounds.

Okay, Jesus is Lord. Are they born again? Not necessarily you have

to say it by the spirit. So that's he's making the difference here of

speaking by the spirit. So this this is the beginning of this whole teaching,

which goes for three chapters. Chapter twelve, Chapter thirteen, Chapter fourteen

is one topic, and the topic is what how to speak by the spirit.

That's how you know that the gifts are operating because they manifest. And

later on he talks about the manifestation of the spirit is given by the Holy

Spirit. The Holy Spirit manifests in our myths, whether it's the nine listens

that he gives, teach is given what utterance of wisdom? I learned all

these in the King James, so I read other things like the Word of

wisdom, word of knowledge, Prophecy, tongues, interpretation, tongues, miracles.

All those those gifts manifest what we talk. That's why prophecy is so

important. Prophecy is just being able to speak by the spirit you. Prophesy

means to forthtell. Pro Foteo is the Greek word pro photo to forth tell,

to forth tell something that doesn't come from you, It comes from a

higher elevation. Prophecy is an elevated statement. It means to assert one statement

over another. When you prophesy, it means what God comes by the Holy

Spirit and gives us something to say, to assert into a situation, to

assert over your thoughts. That's why when you read your Bible, you're being

prophetic. Say, well, I'm not very prophetic. Have you ever read

your Bible? You're prophetic? Why God is asserting his thoughts from his word

into your mind? Be ye transformed by the renewal of your mind. The

Christian mind is what's getting renewed with the thoughts of God. God putting his

thoughts into you. That's being prophetic. His thoughts come in and they change

your concepts. So this whole idea, Paul says, I don't want you

ignorant about this, and so he gives guidelines to educate, not to stop

come on, not to quench the spirit, but to cause the spirit to

move when we get together, and not just when we're together, not just

on Thursday night, not just Sunday morning. We need to be spiritual people

twenty four hours a day. Even when you're sleeping. You might have a

dream for Gods asserting his thoughts into your unconscious life. Isn't that amazing about

dreams? Now? Some are not, Some are just too much pizza,

right, It's like, why I had this crazy dream while that wasn't God?

And you have to discern these things. So gaining knowledge is the beginning

of manifestation. How do we manifest the gifts? Well, first you got

to learn about them. We have to learn about them, and so Romans

ten seventeen says faith comes by hearing. All these work by faith Romans twelve.

There's also another set of gifts. We call them, actually, we

call them your created gifts. You're created with certain gifts, whether it's service,

or hospitality or mercy. Some people are just merciful by nature. That's

a created gift. God made you that way, and so we need to

learn how God made us so we can manifest the very gifts that He gives

us. When you receive Christ. If an evangelist lest say Billy Graham,

Reinhart Bunkie, whoever speaks the gospel, it manifests salvation when it's heard by

the spirit. Like I said, when you say by the Spirit, yes,

I'll respond Jesus Christ's Lord. There's a manifestation of salvation in a human

being because the Word comes. Faith comes by hearing the word comes. So

if it works for salvation, if you can manifest the gift of salvation,

how many know it's a gift? Are we on the right camp here?

How many never raise your hand in church. That's the rest of you.

Okay. So I never raised my hand. But if salvation is the gift

of God and it manifests through the preaching of the Word, so can the

Holy Spirit gifts. All the gifts can manifest when we see what the Word

of God says and it causes manifestation. Preach the word, then you say,

receive. How to receive the Holy Spirit? Paul said to the believers

in Acts nineteen, Have you received the Holy Spirit? Since you believe?

Gee, didn't know there was one. What did Paul do? Laid hands

on him, said receive, receive. That's all they did. Received.

You can't earn it, you can't. There's nothing you can do other than

just receive the gift. And they began to prophesy and speak in tongue.

So this whole thing about how God manifests in us is through the preaching of

the Word, then the receiving of what the Word says. And then you

have to say something. How do you get saved? Confess with your mouth

right, just like on the day of Pentecost. Holy Spirit has something to

say, and you begin to speak and languages spirit language, So we say

something, Okay, it activates the gift and then what manifest? Sometimes that's

a bad word. I was a lady at church, boy she manifested the

other night. Well, what did she manifest? It's okay to manifest,

to bring forth what the Holy Spirit wants to do in our midst. And

this is just for training. We're here to be trained tonight to do what

take the gift out there? We don't. It's not just for us.

Gifts are not for yourself. Don't raise your hand, but do you actually

go out and buy yourself birthday present? As my birthday tomorrow, I'm going

to go shopping for myself. I probably some people do, but you know,

you buy a gift for someone else. And that's this whole idea.

So turn over to chapter fourteen of First Corinthians and Paul says, pursue love,

follow after love, and earnest desire spiritual gifts. Now this is a

command. This is written in the imperative tense in the Greek. Paul say,

like, you know, you guys, just would you just try to

love each other and occasionally, you know, if you feel led, just

you know, maybe desire on Sunday morning, just desire spiritual gifts. Can

you just try it, Corinthians, Just try Paul's. Paul's writing is an

apostle with authority, pursue love, follow after love, and desire spiritual gifts.

This word desire three little syllables in the Greek zalato is, literally means

it's the idea is to boil up with heat. There should be a fervent

desire, to be hot, to be fervent. I love this definition.

It's a compelling force that comes from the Holy Spirit that causes you to take

a leap into the supernatural desire spiritus why you're gonna have to take a step

of faith and boil up on the inside. That's why we worship. There's

just there's actually ways to do this. We're gonna talk about tonight, to

cause there to the boiling up of the Holy Spirit in you and take a

step into the supernatural. Watch to bless someone else. See, we're so

self conscious, like, well, what if I make a mistake and what

are people gonna think? See that self conscious? I don't know. I

don't want to embarrass myself. That's actually pride. It just says it's all

about me. So I'm not gonna manifest because what if I'm see the church.

We're here to train. This is a school. We call it schooling

for ruling. We're going to rule and rain and we have to learn how

to manifest the Holy Spirit. We're here to be trained. We're here to

be equipped. Fivefold. Ministry is to equip the saints. What for the

works of the ministry which manifests, Yes, with our hands, with our

heart, with our head, but also with our mouth. The gifts.

So it's interesting and the King James that says, covet spiritual gifts. You

know, don't you know? The ten Commandments are pretty strong. I'll shalut

not cove it. You know, we say, don't you're coveting. We

think of coveting as a negative word. Well, I have good news tonight.

There is one thing in the Bible. You're allowed to cove it.

Not your neighbor's wife, not his money, none of another stuff. Paul

says, you can covet spiritual gifts. I want you to earnestly, des

I gotta have it. I want to have it. I'm envious because I

want to bless somebody, and again not for yourself. That's so I can

show off on Sunday morning. I want to get up and get the microphone.

I got a word I want to manifest so I can be seen Versus

I want to bless somebody else. The gifts aren't for you, right,

So this whole idea of follow after love. Now, love is the engine

inside of you that stirs up the true heart of God to manifest for someone

else. And that's not your love. That's not familiar love. That's not

love you have for your spouse or your children or a family member. This

is the most amazing love. It's supernatural, doesn't come from you. It's

called agape. There's four different Greek words from love, and so this one

is agape love. That's supernatural love. It's the love you have when you

have no reason to love. It causes you to love somebody when you when

they're very unlovable. And where does it come from? Holy Spirit? Romans

five said, the love of God is shut abroad in our hearts by the

Holy Spirit. It's not an emotion. Because I travel so much, and

I'm in a lot of foreign countries. A lot of times end in a

meeting, I don't I can't read one thing on the screen. Oh my

gosh, who is that guy? That's a younger version of me. That's

what. No glasses, no beard, and still no hair. Okay,

So so I'm in a meeting sometimes, and I might be the first time

in a church. I can't understand anything on the screen. It's in Chinese.

I'm sitting there. I can't speak their lanth which and I've got a

minister and the people I've never met before. I can't even have a normal

conversation. I have to use an interpreter. But inside I have to say,

Father, love these people tonight through me. I'm just a vessel that

you can pour your love through me into those people that I've never met before.

I may never see him again, but may the love of God be

shed and brought in my heart by the Holy Spirit. That's how I can

get up and prophesy over a total stranger, having never met them, with

an interpreter, and God can touch their heart because why the love of God

is said in my heart for them. I have to stop. I can't

be selfish. I can sit there and go I'm tired, I'm jet lag.

What am I doing here? What was I thinking? Coming across the

world. You can get very carnal, selfish, tired. And then you

say, but that's not why I'm here. I'm here to bless the saints,

to build the body of Christ. That's my calling. So that's our

calling together, So passionate, burning, driving force broke something. Is this

whole idea of earnestly desire spiritual gifts? Now watch the rest of that sentence,

especially say, especially with a beautiful British accent, that was wonderful,

especially that you may prophesy. Now you think, why did Paul emphasize prophecy

there? Why you think you know, especially that you could heal people.

There's a lot of sickness, right, and it's not getting easier. People

just get sick. So Paul, why don't you say, especially that you

could use the gift of healing, because wouldn't that be like the most important?

Not necessarily and why prophecy? I look at it this way. Of

the nine gifts of the spirit, as I said, prophecy is communication with

Heaven, as heaven and earth, communicating. That's the prophetic, that's all.

It is the most valuable thing we have, is the ability to communicate

with God and for him to talk to us. Hey man, So you're

actually when you're praying, you're being prophetic. Right, You're now taking your

your words, your thoughts to a point and communicating to God. Now here's

the best cheap system of all. How many just like pray? And then

you feel like like, I don't even know if you heard me. I

don't know if we have a saying. I don't. I think my prayer

bounced off the ceiling and came right back in my lap. I just don't

feel like God's I'm connecting. We feel defeated sometimes with our prayer life.

I got two nods of the head and other people are going mine's fine that

you can pray for me. I call it the kryptonite of Christianity. Write

Charris, how's your prayer life? Ask anybody how's your prayer life? Well?

On a scale of one to ten, maybe a five. You know,

we have all kinds of way. How do you measure your prayer life?

Sometimes you just can't. Why we don't have enough earthly words. And

that's why God gave us the Holy Spirit to cheats. It's biblical cheating,

holy cheating. What Paul said, what is it? Corinthians? I'll pray

with my spirit and then I'll pray with my understanding. I call. For

years, I said, I was a reverse prayer. What does that mean?

I would pray with my understanding until I was completely out of understanding.

Like, I don't know, I've tried. How many often we go to

God and we think we have to come to God with the answer for our

predicament. Now, God, here's what I need you to do to solve

this problem in my life. And God's going I could solve it a lot

easier if you get out of the way, right. Yeah, So paulses

Corinthians, what again, the gift of the Holy spirit? What pray with

your spirit first? Why? A holy spirit knows exactly what to pray.

According Romans eight twenty six, he prays according to the will of God,

perfectly, perfectly raise every time, according to the world of God. So

why don't we always come and try to pray in English or your known language.

We pray with understanding, limited vocabulary to try to get to God and

say, now, God, I need this, and he needs that,

and she needs that, and would you stop that and start that and whatever.

We're trying to plead with God until we're kind of like I just don't

know what else to do. Don't pray in the spirit, but do that

first, Paul said, I will pray with my spirit, and then I'll

pray with understanding. Sometimes you pray in your spirit and all of a sudden,

God just goes chill out. I like that for an answer to prayer.

What don't do anything? What I've got all these issues I got,

This person has problems, they're bout. God says, I'll take care of

it. Now that you've prayed, I'll take care of it. See,

we think we have to come and take care of it so that God can

do his work. Are we funny? Are we just funny? How we

our prayer lives get so complicated when we have the Holy Spirit. So prophecy,

then is representative of all the gifts of the spirit. So that's why

Paul said, especially I want you to pursue and desire spiritual gifts, especially

prophecy. Why it's like the trunk of the tree that takes you to the

branches and all the branches of the other manifestations of the gift. So when

you're praying for someone, and I'll give you an example years ago, when

I was passing our church in Florida that we planted out of Tampa. We

went down to Fort Myers, a couple hundred miles from there, and a

lady in our church had a serious back problem. She was actually had been

in bed for two weeks and we were praying for and she was going to

the doctor, and Mary Jane and I went over one evening to pray for

her, as you do as a pastor. Aren't you supposed you have gone

before two weeks? I don't know somewhere it's like, so going over to

pray for. And we got to the room and we went to pray for,

and the Holy Spirit just whispered this. He said, unforgiveness, just

softly in my spirit. Unforgiveness. Oh so I just said gently, I

said, Sis, before we pray for your back, can you just ask

the Holy Spirit if there's anybody you need to forgive? I just ask him.

I just feel like the Holy Spirit wants you to ask him. I

wasn't saying. I just got a word of knowledge and God told me you're

an unforgiveness and that's why you're sick. And if you just shape up.

And some people think that's that's the best use of prophecy like shamescold judgment begins

at the house of God. That's not what New Testament prophety is. To

build us up, right, to build us up. So through ephetic word

to me, God spoke to me. See got asserted. He asserted a

statement into my life. Because I'm coming in as a pastor to pray for

the sick. Right, God says, no, no, no, no,

no, I got a better plan. What have her forgive somebody?

I'm like, okay, he asserted that into my thinking. I share it

with her. Prophetically. It was a prophetic word. I say, before

we pray, I have a prophecy for you. You're walking in a forgiveness.

I don't do that. I said, can you ask the Holy Spirit

just see if he brings to your mind someone you need to forgive. Can

you do that? And she just nod her hut. Yeah. We wented

seconds. I said, has God has shown you anybody? And she just

nodded her head. Can you forgive them? Nod of the head, and

then a tear came down her cheeks. Said you forgive them, haven't you?

She goes, I haven't. A little motion. I said, okay,

now we're going to pray for you. I'm sorry, am I too

loud or not loud enough? Okay? So after she forgave and we didn't

have name, we didn't have an incident. It wasn't complicated. It's like

forgive them, and then we just prayed. My wife laid hands on her

near her back, and I just prayed a prayer of faith, short prayer.

I said, can you can you move? Is there anything you can

do? And she she tried. She kind of moved up and she went,

I got it. No, no, it's worse, great great faith

right? Oh sorry, no, I said, what She goes, the

pain's gone. I said, can you sit up? And she sat up,

and she swiveled and she got out of bed and stood up. She

goes, I haven't been able to stand up in two weeks. God healed

her on the spot. I see. The spirit of God was in control

of that meeting. He knew exactly what she needed. See, healing is

always in the will of God, but it's not always his priority. And

that's tough for us because we just want to snap our fingers. Great physician,

he know now and all we do that now. Gee, we have

all our techniques and we want that, and we are going to pray for

the sick until Jesus comes. Okay, but it's not always his priority.

He wanted her to walk in unforgiveness, or I wanted her to walk in

forgiveness toward this person. So you can't. And that's that's why the prophetic

is so important to hear God's answer in a situation. What's going on here

God, So Paul says, pursue love, desire spiritual gifts, but especially

what that the Holy Spirit's telling you how to manifest them, especially what that

you may be prophetic in the use of spiritual gifts. And so the prophetic

is very important. Now let me give you one more tip here, which

I think is wonderful. Go down to verse five. I didn't give you

this day, but if you're in one Corinthians chapter fourteen, look at verse

five. He says, Now, I want you all to speak in tongues.

Paul just gave his little quick elementary teaching that if you speak in tongue,

you're speaking to God, not to man. No one understands you.

That's the beauty of it. You won't even understand. Isn't that good?

What'd you say? I have no idea, but God did. That's why

it's so perfect. Okay, So then he that speaks in tongue builds himself

up. This is all good in hearing. But verse five is so import

Now he says, I want you all to speak in tongues. I want

you to that's Paul right to these Corinthians. But this is the Bible.

God says, I want you all to speaking tongues. Watch, she says,

but even more to prophesy. Now in the Greek, even more in

the King James says. Rather almost sounds like either or no. In the

Greek. It's a purpose clause. Watch this now, I want you all

to speak in tongues in order that you can prophesy. What are you saying?

What's Paul saying to the Corinthians. I want you to use spiritual language,

the gift of spirit, language that comes with the Holy Spirit. Why

because it just opens up your heart and mind you yield to the supernatural flow

of the Holy Spirit in your life. You can't speak in tongues just I'm

just gonna do it. You can go out to an unbeliever and they can

speak gibberish, and that's what people tell us it's just a bunch of gibberish.

It's supernatural. That's why the devil hates it. Don't look at it

like really yeah, just I mean, talk to someone about Jesus, but

then mention tongues and is over. They're either with you or they're against you.

It's it's not like wells like. Devil hates tongues because see, you

get to communicate to God and he he can't understand it either, and it

opens up the prophetic flow in your life. So pauses, I watch all

the speaking tongues. What does it do to yield your tongue to another force?

Causes you to yield your rights, yield your members to the Holy Spirit's

control. And when you do that, yielding to God is a humility that

brings grace. Humble yourself under the mighty hand of God, he begins to

pour out grace. He gives grace to the humble. It humbles you.

Bringing the tongues is so weird. It humbles you. It's like, but

it's supernatural. So instead of being self conscious about it. And by the

way, ninety percent of your tongue talking, maybe ninety five is all done

in private and only in a kind of a the right kind of setting.

Would you actually do it? Maybe in a prayer meeting where everybody's spirit spirit

filled. But even then I've been in some small prayer meetings. It gets

kind of crazy. It's almost like a competition. You ever been in one

of those meetings by the only one? I guess we only do that in

America. I guess some people's like, why what do you hear my tongue?

Then they get louder, and then they get this, and then it's

not a competition. We're not out to impress anybody because nobody understands it.

That's the point. So ninety plus percent of your tongue talking is to God.

But then see what that does is it opens up your spirit, causes

you to yield the most unruly member of your body, the tongue. According

to James, that's one member, no man contained. James, three,

are you with me? The tongue, no man contained? Holy spirit can

if you yield. You got to yield it. And that's why it's so

hard, and that's why the double hates it. There's two things that Dovile

hates. I call it T and T. You know what TNT is?

So akron them for dynamite. Right. Two explosive doctrines in the church,

tongues and tithing anyway, won't get into that. We didn't come out on

Thursday night to hear about tithing. I know, But how do you know

that's a gift? Giving is a gift. It's actually in Romans twelve.

Some people have a gift to give, and you know what, you'll never

know who they are because one of the things that comes with the gift of

giving anonymity. They don't want anybody to know. Now, the people that

want you to know, they don't have a gift of giving. They just

want to be known. You know how much I gave last week? Or

very prideful right, people that love to give to God and to bless others.

You'll never know. It'll be one of those like I'm sending a check.

I don't want them to know. That's a real heart to give.

You don't want other people to know about it. So that's a gift.

All these things are gifts. So what do we do, sir? It

up? Go to two Timothy, chapter one and verse six two Timothy one

six and Paul again. Now he's writing a pastoral Epistle to Timothy, so

that he can preach it and teach it to the to the believers. He's

responsible for two Timothy, Chapter one, verse six. Paul says, for

this reason, I'm reminding you how many we have to be reminded. That's

why we come to church week after week. We get reminded because you get

out there. It's a battle, and the media is reminding you every day

of their agenda. Right and the world, the world's agenda is flooding us

now that we have our wonderful little devices, the little rectangles. How many

have the rectangle? Some of you're reading your Bible on it. That's good

use of it. But sometimes there's other uses that consume us. And so

the world's messages are coming. So, Paul says, I'm going to remind

you, as he said to Timothy. I want to remind you to what

the phrase fan into flame, the gift of God. That's that word charisma,

the charisma of God, that's the supernatural endowment. That's where the word

grace comes from. Charus, that's the Greek word for grace. Stir up

the grace that's in you. It's there, but you got to stir it

up. That's a beautiful word. Is another compound word, Anna, Zoe

perett oh Anna, Zoe perett oh Anna is a prefix which means repetitive.

Zoe is where we get the word zoe, which is a Greek word for

life, the life of God. Bias is the word for biology. Right,

that's our biological life. But there's zoe, which is spiritual life.

That's the life that God gives you. When you get men, you come

alive. Right, you say I came that you might have life and have

it more abundantly. That's spirit life is zoe. So Anna, zoe peret.

What is the word for fire, stir up the fire of God?

Why? Repetitive? Active? You can't just go one time. That's why

praying in tongues. You can't just go shah bah oh, nothing happened.

Well, you might need a shah bah blah blah dah bah blah bah whatever.

It just you gotta stir, and so you stir yourself. This is

what we call in the Greek the it's kind of the reflexive mode. In

other words, you got to do it. Well, if God would just

move on me, then maybe i'd maybe I'd pray for somebody. Oh,

Kenneth Hagen used to say, if the Holy Spirit isn't moving, then you

move the Holy Spirit. It's like I was just texting but one of my

kids right before the meeting that had an answer to prayer, and they said,

prayer works, and I wrote back, prayer works as long as you

work prayer. Come on, somebody, as we say, down to the

south, come out on somebody, somebody say amen to have an amen.

Prayer works as long as you work prayer. So Paul is saying, what

you stir up the Holy Spirit is how many know the Gospel can come to

you and you're lost. But then the Holy Spirit sets your will free to

choose. Well, I think, well, I I made a great decision

one day. I just decided to follow Jesus. You didn't he set you

free to follow him. There's a lot of controversy around these two words free

will. To me, it's almost an oxymoron. You're not born free,

You're born in sin. Come on, somebody, you read the same Bible

I am. Just go back to Jesus, right, and God has to

set you free to choose. Jesus said very clearly in John you didn't choose

me, I chose you. So this whole thing about so when salvation comes,

you activate the gift of salvation with your will. Same with the Holy

Spirit. You activate the gifts of the Spirit by your will. So when

we went to pray for that sister in our church, I had to choose

to submit my will to the Holy Spirit and said forgiveness. I was like,

I, no, I'm here to pray for healing. I could have

willed my way into that prayer and she probably would still be in bed today.

It's like, God is mercy withoul A healed her. But you know

what I'm saying. You have to say, God, what is your will

here? And I have to activate spiritual gifts based on your will. That's

why it's as he wills. So I don't read that. I think the

Samuel five this is a just rendition. Second Samuel five in verse twenty two,

where David's going to war and David, in his wisdom, learned,

I'd go to war. You know, that's pretty good warfare strategy. Maybe

some of our world leaders should take a tip from David. Anyway. Second

Samuel, chapter five, this is when Dad was up against the Philistines and

he goes to the stronghold, and I'm going to take you back just a

little bit. In verse nineteen, David inquired of the Lord and said,

shall I go up against the Philistines? Will you give them into my hand?

And the Lord said to David, go up, for I will certainly

give the Philistines into your hand. And so David went up. They came

to bel Parizm, and he defeated them. And he said, the Lord

has broken through or burst through my enemies like a bursting flood. So I'm

gonna name that place bay, I'll parism the Lord of the breakthrough. God

is the God of the breakthrough. I appreciate that here a few years ago.

If remember power of breakthrough, breakthroughs are always internal, they're not external.

David's breakthrough was what I heard from God. I'm gonna go up against

the Philistines. That was the breakthrough. He had a breakthrough and courage,

a breakthrough in heart, a breakthrough in commitment. Why it happened on the

inside. The battles went on the eye. You gotta win the battle on

the inside. The greatest battles you have are not the battles around. You're

the battles within you, and sometimes the battle is obeying God. When everything

is say I should go up against the Philipines, shouldn't I? Yes,

go, I'll give you the victory. Great. Then you come to verse

twenty two. The Philistines came me up yet again, and they spread out

in the valley of Rephaem. And when David inquired of the Lord, he

said, you shall not go up. Oh, but you just defeated.

I'm like, do it again? Can I not? If the Lord's not

with you, do not go up, Go around to the rear and come

against them from the opposite of the balsam trees. You know that God has

great military strategy. God knows how to take the devil out. He could

snuff him anytime anywhere. He's just a fucking But that was not more powerful

the God. But God wants to always teach us what obedience. I know

it's a tough word. This wasn't about can God route the enemy? Of

course he could. He just did it. But when David said, shall

I go up again? David smart? Now shall I? Now not?

This time? Don't go up against him. I want to go around and

attack them from the rear. You shall not go up, go around to

the rear, come against them from the opposite of the balsam trees. Watch

this, and when you hear the sound of marching in the tops of the

balsam trees, then watch rouse yourself. Stir yourself up, for the Lord

has gone before you to strike down the army. This whole idea is is

David, when you hear, basically, when you hear my spirit move the

sound of the tree, when the wind moves, I would say, when

you catch the wind, rouse yourself. Sometimes you can come into a church

service and the Holy Spirit can start to move and you can just sit there

like a chair, just sit a chair within a chair, no movement,

just totally like whatever. And then you look over the people that are moving.

They're kind of wild charismatics, aren't they looking about? They're doing their

thing. What's happening is that they're rousing themselves. They're stirring up the Holy

Spirit in them. And see, that's why worship will do that. Worship

will change the atmosphere because it's not about you. You're worshiping God. David

was a worshiper. He knew how to connect with God. Worship's not for

us. It's for God. That's why. Here's a little tip. And

my youngest son is now the worship leader at our church. I just I

just love watching the worship. But when people say, which you think of

worship today? It was all right, I didn't get much out of it.

Well, here's the good news. Nobody was worshiping you. That's what

I tell people. Well, the worship was a little dry today. Well

that's okay, they weren't worshiping you. Okay, that's funny times. But

it's like worship has forgot is what to stir us? This whole idea of

soldiers and warfare. We're in a war and we have supernatural weapons to come

against sickness, and words of wisdom and words of knowledge, and how to

discern spirits. It's the discerning of spirit. I hear people say all the

time, well, you know, I have the gift of discernment. You

know what they're saying, I have the right to judge my child for that

language. It's not the gift of discernment. It's the gift of the discerning

of spirits. You're discerning what spirit is in operation in somebody. Then you

can say I'm discerning the in that person. You can't say, I,

well, I'm just very discerning. That's why I see all the sin in

people's lives. I just have discernment. I can see how bad they're It's

like no, no, no. And that's a gift. As He wills.

He operates that as he will. You don't walk in at twenty four

to seven. You walk in the Holy Spirit twenty four seven. But the

manifestations of the spirit are as He wills. See, you can't. We

can pray for the sick, but you can't. You can't make somebody well

unless God does. You're well with me, right, we see, we

get a little bit weird sometimes even the way we teach it. So soldiers

have to learn how to use their weapons of warfare at their home base.

What is the church for? This is where we train soldiers and then they

go to the foreign land and go after the enemy. All the American troops

that are fighting around the world, they do their training in America or at

their bases, and then they go out into the field and win the war.

So we have to learn to use our gifts, our weapons of our

warfare. That's what church means. This tonight's an equipping night to equip us

with a mentality. A lot of soldier training is not hand to hand combat

and how to shoot a gun is. It's mental. They have to train

soldiers how to think like a soldier, and we have to train the body

of Christ how to think like a spiritual person. Now, concerning spiritual people,

I don't want you to beignorant. Doesn't mean I listen to Christian music

and I read my Bible. That's a good start. But spiritual people,

it will manifest by the way you talk. And one of the ways to

train the tongue and bring it into submission again is spirit language. So what

we do is we exercise spiritual gifts and then use of Hebrews chapter five.

We're almost done Hebrews chapter five. And this is why small groups are so

great. We have a saying in our church. And we have a large

church, not super large, about fifteen sixteen hundred. And you know we

say we're a small group church. We don't say, well, we're a

large church. No, we're a small group church. What does that message

send to people? We do life in small groups. That's where life.

We have another saying. Life change happens in circles, not in rows.

You can come in and sit in a room like this and this is not

a large crowd, but you know what, you're sitting in rows and you're

receiving teaching. This is equipping. But you know where life change happens,

maybe when you leave here, or on another night, you're in somebody's house

and you're sitting around a couple of chairs and you're in a circle and you're

facing people and you're sharing your problems and they're praying for your life. Change

happens in circles, and so that's why, that's where change happens. And

yes, sometimes we'll have an alter call. I'm all for alter calls.

Yes, come on up if you need prayer, that's all good. But

you know what real life change happens in a discipleship circle where you get together

and share what's really going on. Right, So I look at y'all.

Y'all looks so good. I can just tell there's no problems in this room

because you're all just sitting there, behaving and looking at the clock and doing

this, and like, how long is this American going to go? Well,

it's only afternoon for me, no anything, But you know, what.

We all have stuff going on because we know people. Even if you

don't know people, you got stuff going on called loneliness. We all got

stuff going on. So exercise and use Hebrews chapter five, talking and not

turning Hebrews chapter don't you love that with turn in your bibles for your young

people? This is actually a bible. It's not an app exciting, isn't

it. I still like the rustling of the leaves anyway, Hebrews chapter five,

verse fourteen. All right, paul sit or whoever wrote, well,

think it was Pauline style. But the writer of Hebrews. Solid food is

for the mature, for those who have their powers of discernment, watch trained

or exercised by constant practice to distinguish good from me. Well, now there's

a lot in there. But the whole idea is you have your spiritual senses.

Exercise. You have spiritual senses like you have natural senses. They're like

a muscle. You have to exercise them, stir them up. So when

you go to the gym to work out, you're stirring up your actual natural

muscles. You have to stir up your spiritual muscles too. Who by reason

of use now where are you going to use your gifts? So far tonight,

I'm using my gift to teach you. But other than that, you're

not having an opportunity yet unless you have the gift of listening. I wish

that was a gift, right, So most of the women in the room

wish it was a gift that men had. But anyway, we're meddling now.

So exercise by reason of use? Where are you going to do that?

On our church? You know, we have hundreds and hundreds and hundreds

of people on any given service. You can't all exercise spiritual gifts. That's

who Neaul was writing into the Corinthians. He was writing to a small group.

He was writing to a house church. And that's why Paul said,

you can all prophesy. Well, now, if you got even more than

fifty people in the room, you can't all prophesy to be there all night.

Right. If everybody did a two minute prophecy, that's one hundred minutes.

That's without breathing. So you're looking at two hours of prophecy. If

everybody's going to go around private this, it's two or three. So these

guidelines were given so that you can exercise and have opportunity to move in the

gifts. And that's what pastors and leaders they do. They're here to help

shepherd you, stir up the gifts. So one more time, Paul says

this, I want you to have your powers of discernment or gifts exercised by

reason of use, so you can distinguish good and evil. So either use

it or lose it. Use it or lose my tongue. I went to

Cuba in January. I hadn't been to a Latin speaking country in about four

years. It's been about four years. And man, my Spanish is so

horrible. It was so rusty. I mean, I can barely get by

at all anyway. But man, I've just felt like, oh my gosh,

I haven't thought even had a Spanish thought in four years. Now,

After about three or four days, it was slowly coming back, and then

I went home. But I was like, I don't have to think so

hard, but you know, use it or lose it. And that's the

same way. And one more scripture're gonna give you out of Luke twenty four

and then we're just we are going to pray, but I'm not going to

sit here and demonstrate and manifest. That's what y'all are going to do.

That's what this is all about, getting y'all to do it. Hey,

I'm from the North in the United States. I grew up in the western

part of New York State, so I never did y'all growing up. I've

lived in the South all these years. I'm trying, but they all think

I still talk too fast, and I probably do. But I learned that

there's y'all and then there's the plural of y'all. You know what that is.

That's all y'all, how all y'all doing. It's like, well,

that's how the Southerners I'm learning Luke Chapter twenty four, at the very end

where we right before we get the great commission. Luke twenty four Versus is

all about the disciples on the road to a mass. You know the story.

They're walking on the road to a mas and Jesus shows up. They

didn't even recognize them, right, how man, Sometimes Jesus can show up

and you don't recognize them. Takes discernment. It takes spiritual exercise to know

when the rustling of the trees happen, when the spirit is moving. And

so here I'm going to back it up for just a minute. Back in

verse twenty five, he said to them, old foolish ones and slow of

heart to believe here's Jesus with him. They thought he was the gardener,

or some guys just shows up so slow.