Windstorm V: Anointed Vessels & New Societies - Windstorm: A Study In Revival

Tonight is actually going to be the fifth night of the five nights called windstorm.

Did you guys get notes when you came in?

Okay, you guys got notes.

Great.

Okay, so turn in your Bibles.

And some of this will be new for some of you who didn't come.

Acts 2.

We've taken a foray away from Mark during this time.

And here's what we've been doing for the last uh four nights and then tonight.

We've been looking at Acts chapter 2 as a template and a spiritual launching pad for what God has done in the church through the centuries.

Acts 2 · chapter mention

So we have looked at from time to time the Reformation.

At times we've looked at the first and second Great Awakening.

At times we've looked at the Moravian Revival.

At times we've looked at the Welsh Revival, Azusa Street, and culminating actually last night with the Jesus movement, which would be the 1960s and 1970s.

If you're not on my blog, then you'll miss this unless you sign up tonight.

And that is the roadcs at gmail.com.

You can sign up, or you can go to Steve Holt online.

But I'm gonna the blog tomorrow morning coming out from me is on is part one of the Jesus movement.

So if you're interested in what happened in Haight Ashbury in San Francisco and when God began to move in 1966 to 1968, the music that we listen to today, the uh the uh way we do our teaching is is largely related to that Jesus movement.

And so I shared a little bit about that last night.

I'll share more in the morning.

I actually have some to cover here tonight.

But um, so that's what we've been doing.

And so we have looked at so far six characteristics of what we call a windstorm.

When the Holy Spirit shows up in power, a windstorm.

The first was a burning desire leading to unity and prayer, and that was in Acts 1.14.

Then we looked at divine disruption.

When the Spirit comes, he disrupts everything.

And that was Acts 2.1.

Number three, we looked at when the Holy Spirit comes, he fills people with his spirit.

And we called it spirit spilled, being spirit-spilled.

Acts 2, 2 through 3.

Then fourthly, we looked at mission magnetism.

We looked at when the Spirit of God comes on a church or on an individual or on a city, it magnetizes mission in one's life.

Fifthly, and this was fun last night, we talked about fresh worship.

How many of you came up here during that prayer time that God would come and visit you in the arts?

Look at that, man.

Tons of people came up.

At this church, we believe that God wants to anoint young people at the earliest age with the arts, with writing skills, with music, with worship, with uh with musical instruments, with uh poetry.

And one of our 17-year-olds just came up, and I'm gonna read this later, gave me a poem she wrote today.

It's beautiful, beautiful poem.

And then we also looked at, and this was kind of interesting, the sixth one last night was Enlivened Effects.

Enlivened effects.

And all this is online now, you guys.

So you can go online and you got part one, part two, part three, part four, and my notes are in there.

So you can embed it on our website now, Colorado, I mean, uh, theroadcs.org, when you go to sermons, we've got all my personal notes are in there.

So you can look that up.

But enlivened effects basically and essentially was that when the Spirit of God comes, weird stuff happens.

I mean, all through history, from from Pentecost, where they said, oh, these guys are drunk with wine.

So that's not guys coming up going, oh, hallelujah.

This is not a bunch of guys going, oh, praise God.

He showed up.

Oh, we love Jesus.

No, these were guys that were like staggering out of an upper room.

They must have been falling over.

Wait, anybody seen anybody drunk?

Maybe you've been, but you know what that's like, right?

So that's what it looked like.

And then in the first great awakening, we talked about Jonathan Edwards, didn't know what to do.

I mean, Jonathan Edwards was this was this nearsighted uh 17th century, uh 18th century Puritan.

He read his sermons like this.

I mean, he's the most non-emotional, most um unanimated preacher you could have.

And then the Spirit of God came in the first Great Awakening, and people are screaming and hollering and falling on the floor under the power of the Holy Spirit.

Same thing in the second Great Awakening, same thing in Cain Ridge Revival, same thing with Azusa Street, same thing with the Jesus movement.

And so we talked about that.

And here's what we said: don't judge a work of God by the effects, judge it by the fruit.

It's really important, you guys.

It's really important at the road because I believe God's gonna come again in a mighty way with another great awakening in our country.

He is empowering churches today.

You know how you know?

One of the ways you know is because you see the power of evil rising.

God will never leave his people without a witness of the power of his Holy Spirit, even as he allows the enemy and evil to rise up, he's raising up empowered churches.

Isn't that exciting?

So we so we're in for a great adventure.

I mean, the net I don't know what's gonna happen, but we're due.

We're pretty due.

Seems like about every 50 years or so, God visits our nation with another opportunity for his power and his spirit to move.

So that's what we talked about.

So here's what I want to talk about seventh, eighth, and ninth tonight.

So I'm gonna have to really go to work fast.

You have some of the quotes there, and we'll try to cover those.

But verse 14, Acts chapter 2, verse 14, the Spirit of God has come.

Acts 2:14

Uh people are confused.

They see these guys staggering out of the upper room, looks like they're coming out of a saloon.

And then there's this but Peter part.

It says, but Peter, standing up with the eleven, raised his voice.

Number seven, anointed vessels.

Number seven, anointed vessels.

Whenever God begins to move, he raises up, he builds into anointed vessels.

When the windstorm of the Spirit comes, he uses preachers, he uses evangelists, he uses regular people, he uses people that have actually no vocational training whatsoever in the ministry, and they start being used mightily by God.

Powerfully used by God.

One writer explaining this phenomena says, with these stirrings of the spirit that are a precursor of revival, there is born in many such hearts a wholesome, listen to this, a wholesome dissatisfaction with this vague and mystic view of being filled with the Spirit.

What he's saying is that when God is moving in a powerful way, he puts a holy dissatisfaction on your life.

If you're not, if you're a little bit dissatisfied, if you are getting a little tired of your boring Christian life, if you're saying, God, I've got to wake this thing up again like it was many years before, that's exactly what God would want.

That's a good thing, not a bad thing.

So here's here, and we talked about this, and I want to revisit it again for you that were here, and that is this when an anointed vessel of God is someone who recognizes they don't have the filling and the power of the Holy Spirit, maybe like they once did, or maybe they've never had it, but they don't get depressed about it.

They don't get bummed out about it, they start going after God in a new way.

And then God visits them.

And so here's Peter.

Remember that guy?

Peter?

Every time Jesus needed Peter, he's asleep.

The guy's always asleep.

How many of you go to sleep real easily?

So you can relate to him.

He's like you.

You know, you he he was always tired or something.

And then when he's supposed to like answer a question, he always brushes his feet and his teeth with shoe polish.

Because he's always got his foot in his mouth.

And so that's what he's like.

Well, look at this, look at this prophetic, this prophetic word that he gives in his sermon.

But Peter, standing up with the eleven, I think it's around verse 16, raised his voice and said to them, Men of Judea and all who dwell in Jerusalem, let this be known to you and heed my words.

For these are not drunk as you suppose, but since it is only the third hour of the day, but this is what was spoken by the prophet Joel.

Now I want you to hear what he says next, because it relates to every one of us in this room.

And it shall come to pass in the last days, says God, that I will pour out my spirit on all flesh.

Your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your young men shall see visions, your old men shall dream dreams, and on my men's servants and on my maidservants I will pour out my spirit in those days and they shall prophesy.

He's saying here, irregardless of age, irregardless of gender, irregardless of maturity, irregardless of socioeconomics, he is coming in the last days upon anyone who's available.

It doesn't matter your vocation, it doesn't matter your education, it doesn't matter your socioeconomics, the Spirit of God in the last days, guys, is going to empower people who want to be empowered.

No limitations.

We just had a worship meeting back here.

We're talking about scheduling worship and children's worship, and we're talking about the fact that at the road, no ceilings.

Or maybe I should say it this way: no floors.

If we've got an eight-year-old back there that's anointed by God and spirit-filled and can play the bass well, I want them up here.

We saw that at Christmas Eve.

Christmas Eve, I mean, this place was jammed and it was awesome because it was multi-generational.

Nothing would give this pastor more joy than have a multi-ray, uh a multiracial, multi-generational, multi-ethnic band that's up here all loving Jesus together and going for it.

And so what happens is in a lot of our churches, we get this professional mentality.

And then we got to break that.

We're not even gonna start that here.

Because when God's spirit comes, guess who he comes on first a lot of times?

Children.

I mean, it's really amazing what children are open to.

The only time children lose their openness is usually because their parents have taught them not to be open.

Because we, you know, right, right?

I mean, I've done it.

I've done it with my kids.

I've had, I've had my son even recently with this big vision that he had, and then I just says a few things.

He walks out and I go, man, Steve, you are an idiot.

Because the Spirit of God was on that, and then I and I threw cold water on it.

I don't, I don't want to be like that, do you?

I mean, we want it, we want God to be working in our kids' lives in a mighty way.

And when I say holy anointed vessels, I'm not talking about preachers and pastors primarily.

I'm talking about the body of Christ.

When God comes, he anoints everyone.

And there's this work of the spirit.

Some of you young people in here are 15 years old.

You're 16 years old.

And God's going to use you to evangelize your high school if you'll let him.

He's going to fill you in the spirit.

I was part of the vineyard movement back in the 90s.

And the stories that I heard of the Spirit of God coming in the early 80s through a guy named Lonnie Frisbee, which I'll talk a little bit about tonight.

He's actually the beginning of him.

He's called the hippie preacher in my blog.

What happened?

Spirit of God came in a meeting.

They're having this meeting, and he gets up, he was giving his testimony in a gymnasium.

It was a church about this size.

And all these young people came up, and Spirit of God came.

They got filled with the Holy Spirit.

Some of them got saved.

And they went back to their high school and like half the high school got saved.

They had one baptism with 400 kids from one high school, got baptized at one baptism.

Now they have an ocean to work with in Orange County.

We don't, but we got Memorial Lake, right?

Freezing cold.

That's how you find out if you're really saved.

Well, what happens when God begins to move is there's also anointed preaching from the pulpits.

Look at verse 22.

So when Peter begins to preach, he says, Men of Israel, hear these words.

Jesus of Nazareth, a man attested by God to you by miracles, wonders, and signs.

First thing he starts off with, church, is Jesus.

Jesus.

Jesus focused preaching.

Jesus focused preaching.

Not focused on the preacher, but focused preaching toward Jesus.

Jesus is the focus, guys.

Jesus focused preaching.

And in the first, in the great Protestant Reformation, there was a phrase that they had, solo Cristo.

Solo Cristo, meaning by Christ's work alone are we saved.

The Reformation called the church back to faith in Christ as the sole mediator between God and man.

While the Roman church held that there is a purgatory and that the souls there detained are helped by the intercession of the faithful, and that saints are to be venerated and invoked, that their relics are to be venerated.

Remember, I talked about that the other night, how you would go into a Catholic church back then, and that was the only church you had.

The Roman church was the church.

That was the only church you had.

And you went in, and there was here's the tooth of Peter.

Here's some hair follicles from Mary Magdalene.

Here's the uh the hat that Thomas wore when he denied Jesus.

I mean, it was just all kinds of crazy stuff.

And then I mean, you think that's weird?

They had some weirder ones than that.

So during the Reformation, when God's Spirit fell in a mighty way through Martin Luther, they began to judge everything by whether it exalted and glorified Christ.

As John Calvin said in the Institutes of Christian religion, quote, Christ stepped in, took the punishment upon himself, and bore the judgment due to sinners.

With his own blood he expiated the sins which made them enemies of God and therefore and thereby satisfied him.

We look to Jesus alone for divine favor and fatherly love.

So you can depend on the merits of your own good works and constantly fall short.

Or we can surrender all of our works to the merits of Christ that he accomplished through a sinless life and went to Calvary and died for the sins of the world for and be saved.

That's the Reformation message.

And if you're here tonight and you're depending on your merits, how good of a person you are.

It is a gift of God, not as a result of works that no man should boast.

You will never be good enough.

You will never be righteous enough.

You will never be able to forgive your own sin.

We come to Christ fully and we throw ourselves down before Him and we say to the Lord, I have nothing to offer to you.

I'm a sinner, I will always fall short.

And I need your merit.

I need your righteousness.

You can never be good enough, church, but you can always be bad enough.

And you come and you lay it before him, and that's how we are saved.

We surrender all.

The great Him.

I surrender all.

All to Jesus, I surrender.

Because He takes it all.

He takes all of your sin upon Himself at Calvary at the cross, and He releases His forgiveness, His love, His grace, and His power back into you.

That's the best news that the world has ever known.

And I would say tonight, if you've never given your heart to Jesus Christ, if you've never fully released all of your heart to Him, you can do that.

Because when you do that, new life flows into you through the blood of Christ.

So here's this little 17-year-old girl that gave me a hug tonight.

Haley Popovich wrote this poem yesterday.

It's called The Old Rugged Cross.

Let me read it.

Those who are broken, come as you are.

Lay down your hurt and your pains, your burdens, and your fears.

The cross was heavy.

He was in pain.

But he knew what needed to be done.

He carried it all for us, the broken sinners.

He is our Savior.

How beautiful.

He paid the ultimate price.

His blood spilled, his body broken.

He loves us.

Because of his sacrifice, we are free.

We are always loved, no matter what happens.

An abundance of love, grace, patience.

Your grace is enough.

Please come just as you are.

Burdens, fears, and pain bring it all.

You are welcomed, for the price was paid on that old rugged cross.

A good word.

Number two, one of the characteristics we see in a move of God is Bible-based preaching.

So first we see Jesus-focused preaching, and then we see Bible-based preaching.

Just scan at this sermon by Peter in Acts chapter 2, verses 17 through 21, he's quoting the Old Testament.

Acts 2:17–21

Verses 25 through 28, he's quoting the Old Testament.

Verse 34 and 35, he's quoting the Old Testament.

Peter is preaching from the Bible.

And one of the great Reformation themes not only was solo or sola cristo, but sola scriptura.

The scripture alone is our standard.

The doctrine that the Bible alone is the ultimate authority was the formal principle of the Reformation.

In 1521, at the historic interrogation of Luther at the Diet of Verms, he declares his conscience to be captive to the Word of God, saying, quote, unless I'm overcome with the testimonies of Scripture or with evident reason, for I believe neither the Pope nor the counsels, since they have often erred and contradicted one another, I am overcome by the Scripture text which I have adduced, and my conscience is bound by God's word.

Church, your conscience should be bound by God's word.

That in your life, as you have questions and issues related to maybe It's moral issues or ethical issues, you always go back to God's word.

It's not how you feel about it.

I don't care what Dr.

Phil says about it.

I don't care what Oprah's opinion is.

If it doesn't line up with scripture, you reject it.

And so sola scriptura is the vision, church, that we have a standard.

We actually have a way to know how to live, and God gave it to us through his love letter called the Bible.

One thing I loved about becoming a believer when I was 18 is life became simpler.

I actually knew kind of what to do in my life that I didn't know before.

Because it was just like it was just chaos before that.

Or my mom and dad's opinion.

Which was a good opinion.

But what were they standing on?

And so I began to realize early on that I could begin to read God's word.

And so we'd get up each morning and read God's word.

I was like, wow, this is good stuff.

This is practical stuff.

And so began to grow in that.

And the reason I say it got simpler is because God began to show me the boundaries.

He showed me how I could be happy.

He showed me how I could find joy.

That if I'd follow his word through the power of his spirit and give glory to God, I could be happy.

And who doesn't want to be happy?

And so I signed on.

I put on the jersey.

And I became a Jesus disciple because of that.

So we see Jesus-focused preaching, Bible-based preaching, and then thirdly, this is really important, heart-centered preaching.

Heart-centered preaching.

Preaching that only not only touches the mind, but the spirit and the heart.

Verse 37.

Verse 37.

Now, when they heard this, they were cut to the what?

The heart.

And said to Peter and to the rest of the apostles, men and brethren, what shall we do?

When God is moving in a place, the hearts of men and women are cut to the core with a conviction to go after God.

In writing about Gilbert Tennant, a friend and fellow preacher with Jonathan Edwards, it was said of his sermons, many had their countenance changed.

Their thoughts seemed to trouble them, so that their loins were loosed and their knees smote against each other.

Great numbers cried aloud in the anguish of their souls.

Several stout men fell as though a cannon had been discharged and the ball made its way through their hearts.

That is anointed preaching.

That is the power of the Holy Spirit through a heart-centered preaching.

At the road, we talk about whole-hearted disciples, being whole-hearted disciples.

We can't become whole-hearted disciples if we're not growing to give our whole life and our whole heart to Jesus Christ.

Whole-hearted preaching.

Verse 41.

Then those who gladly received his word were baptized, and that day about 3,000 souls were added to them, and they continue steadfastly in the apostles' doctrine and fellowship and the breaking of bread and prayers.

Then fear came upon every soul, and many wonders and signs were done through the apostles.

Eighthly, supernatural blessing.

Supernatural blessing.

When a windstorm comes, when the power of the Holy Spirit comes, there's supernatural blessings.

People get saved by the droves.

That day, 3,000 got saved.

Acts chapter 4, verse 4, 5,000 get saved.

Acts 4:4

Acts chapter 5, verse 14.

Acts 5:14

Believers were increasingly added to the Lord, multitudes of both men and women, so that they brought the sick out into the streets and laid them on beds and couches, that at least the shadow of Peter passing by might fall on some of them.

I mean, this is a work of God.

That day, I don't I don't know when it was.

I'm gonna say 78 or 79, Canyon High School, Yorbalinda, California.

This hippie preacher named Lonnie Frisbee took his coat off, swung his coat in the air, and asked for the Holy Spirit to come, and every one of those kids up front were just slain and knocked down.

And one of my friends got his got his hands all wrapped up in the mic and he started speaking in tongues into the mic.

Now, I don't know what you believe about speaking in tongues, but this guy did not believe it.

And he became a believer in like five seconds because he was the one doing it.

And his life was transformed.

So I meet him 15 years later, and he's still walking with God.

He married uh Robert Shuler's daughter.

Remember the hour of power guy, Robert Shuler?

So Robert Shuler's daughter, he married.

And we were at a playground one day, and I said, Hey, and I was new to the to this church and everything.

Anyway, he started coming.

I said, Hey, were you a part of that thing at Canyon High School?

And he goes, Yeah, remember that part in the story?

Because there's a book about it.

The guy who got wrapped up in the mic and started like screaming into the mic and everything.

And I said, Yeah, he said, that was me.

I said, No way.

That must have been weird.

He says, embarrassing, it was humiliating, but I got filled with the Holy Spirit.

Supernatural blessings.

It is said that from 1735 to 1745 in the United States, when the first Great Awakening took place under Jonathan Edwards, that somewhere around 50,000 people came into the church.

From 1857 to 1859, in the great revival of the second Great Awakening, it is computed that half a million people joined the church, not made decisions for Christ.

Nothing against any evangelist.

I love all evangelists.

I love you, Victor.

Okay.

I think Billy Graham's ministry by far is the most anointed, spirit-filled ministry of the 20th century.

But where I have a problem is how they count numbers.

We've saved this country about 10 times over if we add them all up.

And the way they do it in these crusades is they count how many, they take the cumulative total of all the nights of a crusade and say that number of people were touched with the gospel.

What I know for a fact, because some of my friends were there, people go back the second and third night, too.

And so what that is, there's this little kind of evangelist competition thing going on.

Churches do it all the time.

How big's your church?

How many people do you have coming?

We don't count here.

I don't know how many are here, except that we we probably need more seats next week.

That's all I know.

Because God's not impressed with numbers.

But what he is impressed with is hearts aflame for him.

And so when God begins to move, he's not just getting people to sign on a little envelope or something.

Oh, I got saved tonight, and would you please follow me up and I need a Bible or whatever.

And that's fine.

I mean, that's cool.

I'm not against that.

The way the stats were done back then were those who joined the church.

So these are people who became Jesus' disciples.

They didn't just fill out a card.

They didn't have cards back then to fill out.

They actually joined the church.

So this was legitimate decisions that resulted in powerful encounters with the Lord.

The Jesus movement is classically characterized by long hair, bell bottom wearing, track delivering, finger in the sky pointing, Christian young adults of the late 60s and 70s.

Starting in the Haight Ashbury district of San Francisco, a small group of counterculture and a few seminary-trained young people began to reach out to drug-infested hippies.

They started a Christian commune, an outreach that touched between 30 and 50,000 people.

The movement spread into Southern California through a hippie preacher named Lonnie Frisbee.

Teaming up with John Higgins and Chuck Smith at Calvary Chapel, Costa Mesa, the movement grew in strength and vitality.

Soon, thousands of young people were being won to Christ all over Orange County and LA.

The Jesus movement spread as on fire hippies planted Christian communes, new churches, and ministries all across the nation.

Hundreds of thousands of young people were swept into the church.

Churches like Calvary Chapel, Hope Chapel, Vineyard, Jesus People, and Jews for Jesus were birthed through this movement.

In 1972, Campus Crusade for Christ held a massive event in Dallas, Texas, called Explo 72.

And 85,000 Jesus people attended the five-day event.

The Saturday all-day closing concert drew a crowd estimated at 180,000.

Billy Graham came and spoke, and so did Johnny Cash.

In a time when young people were searching for salvation politically and ecologically and free love through sex, drugs, and rock and roll, Christ came down in a windstorm.

Recently, Christianity Today magazine selected their annual Book of the Year award.

They chose God's Forever Family, the Jesus People Movement in America by Larry Eskridge.

It boldly proclaims, quote, that the Jesus People Movement was one of the most important American religious movements of the second half of the 20th century, and that it must be considered one of the formative powers that shaped American youth in the late 1960s and 1970s.

We are products of that, many of us here.

I came to know the Lord in 1976 when kind of that movement of the Spirit came over into the southeastern part of the country.

And man, just tons of my friends were coming to know the Lord at that time.

God wants to do that again.

This is what God does.

He wants to do that with this generation in a mighty way.

Eighthly, and I mean ninthly, look at verse 44.

Now all who believed were together and had all things in common.

They sold their possessions and their goods and divided them among all as anyone had need.

So continuing daily with one accord in the temple and breaking bread from house to house, they ate their food with gladness and simplicity of heart, praising God and having favor with all the people.

And the Lord added to the church daily those who are being saved.

Ninth, new wave society.

New wave societies.

God comes and when he begins to move, he plants new kingdom churches.

This is God's way.

God always plants new kingdom churches when his spirit moves.

When you read the book of Acts, from Acts chapter 2 on, these guys go out and they plant churches all over Asia Minor.

Acts 2 · chapter mention

When God moved in the first Great Awakening, which was mainly and almost exclusively in the northeastern part of our country, Northampton Mass, around Boston, it flowed out to a great movement that went south and westerly at that time.

Second Great Awakening went further west.

Azusa Street was a worldwide movement.

When God moves in power, he sends you out.

Everybody's going, oh no.

Does this mean if I get filled with the Spirit, I'm going to be a missionary?

Not saying that.

Though it could happen.

And I'll tell you this: if it does happen, you'll love it.

I love being a missionary.

My wife and I loved our 10 years in Japan.

It was so fun.

And if you don't love it, don't do it.

Because it really stinks if you don't.

And we met a lot of missionaries that didn't, and they needed to be kicked out because they were horrible.

But that's not the way it's going to be around here.

What God does is when he fills you with his Spirit, He gives you a desire to do great things through Him.

Jonathan Edwards writing of the windstorm in Northampton, Massachusetts, said this.

I love this quote.

Listen to this.

In the spring and summer following 1735, the town seemed to be full of the presence of God as it had never, as it never was so full of love, nor so full of joy, and yet so full of distress as it was then.

Our public assemblies were so beautiful.

The congregation was alive in God's service.

Everyone earnestly intent on the public worship, every hearer eager to drink in the words of the minister, the assembly from time to time in tears while the word was preached, some weeping with joy and distress, others with joy and love.

Still others in pity and concern for the souls of their neighbors.

That's a revival.

That's an awakening.

Church.

Don't settle for mediocrity.

Don't settle for status quo.

Go after God.

Seek Him.

Get up in the morning.

Say a quick prayer for Peyton Manning and the Broncos.

And then open the word.

Seek God.

He loves you.

He's for you.

He's with you.

He wants to bring revival in your life.

We've seen this week that people say they've had visions and dreams from the Lord.

We've seen healing.

We've seen several people give their hearts to Christ.

Only God can do that.

Seek Him.

Go after Him.

During the first Great Awakening, the movement of the Spirit had moved through the middle colonies and it went south.

In 20 years, between 25 and 50,000 were added to the church.

With the Azusa Street Revival of 1906 came such an outpouring, not just of the spirit, but of mission outreach and church planting as the world has never seen.

Greater than the first century, mind you.

Dr.

C.

Peter Wagner writes, in all of history, no other non-political, non-militaristic, voluntary, human movement has grown as rapidly as the Pentecostal charismatic movement.

And so, church, we join on this road of where Jesus is going.

Jesus wants to rock this city.

Jesus wants to make a difference in this city.

Jesus wants to bring churches together.

Jesus wants to come and break the power of the devil.

The devil has ruled over this city far too long.

There is a religious spirit over this city.

There is a spirit of pride over this city that needs to be broken and only God can do it.

And there will be demonic counterattacks.

There will be works of the enemy.

We are in a pitched battle.

I know of people this week who came and got filled with the Holy Spirit and touched by the Holy Spirit, and they're going through hell right now.

Because listen, listen, the devil never gives up without a fight.

And if you've been into pornography, if you've been into drugs, if you've been into angry outbursts, if you've been into immorality and you say no to it, and you start saying, I'm going to follow Jesus Christ, you think the devil's going, okay, fine.

Oh, yeah, I'll go find someone else to haunt.

I don't think so.

You're into a pitched battle.

But greater is he that is in you than he that is in the world.

And there is power in the blood of Jesus, and you've got to claim the blood of Jesus over your heart, and you've got to claim the blood of Jesus over your soul, and you've got to claim the blood of Jesus over your mind, and you've got to claim the blood of Jesus over your kids, and you gotta claim the blood of Jesus over your student life and over your singleness and over your sex life.

You've got to give it all to him, and if you do, he will come.

If you do, he will come.

That's what he does.

That's what this book says.

I read it somewhere.

This is how he works.

The MO of Christ, Luke 4, 18 and 19, is to set the captives free and to heal the brokenhearted.

So if you're here tonight and you've got chains, if you're here tonight and your heart is broken, you have come to the right place.

Because there is a fountain of blood.

That is we come to that fountain of blood and we drink from the fountain of blood, his blood, he will heal you.

He will heal you in ways that will surprise you.

Because that's what Jesus does.

And that's why the greatest revolution the world has ever known has always been the Jesus revolution.

And that's why God comes with his Jesus revolution.

He begins in one person at a time.

He begins in your heart.

And if you're here tonight, and this means nothing to you, that your heart is so cold that it touches not a warm place within your heart, I would ask you, cry out to God, God, restore me again.

And He will.

I've been there.

I know what it's like to have a broken heart.

I know what it's like to be cold-hearted.

I know what it's like to feel like I'm never gonna find that deep devotion from the Lord again.

I'm just too broken.

It hurts too much, and I don't want to risk again.

I'm here to tell you if you'll step out again and you will trust God, He will meet you, He will heal you.

It won't happen overnight.

It won't happen overnight.

It may take days, it may take weeks, it may take months, but if you'll keep coming back to the well that never runs dry, he will pour of his spirit into you like living water.

And you will drink the fill of that living water and he will cleanse you.

And he will cleanse you and he will restore your heart.

Let's stand.

So tonight, as we go into worship, and for you that are new to the road, we do worship at the end of our service.

We see worship as a response to the taught word, response to truth, response to scripture.

I want you to try to take your mind off of your job, off of whatever you came with that's on your heart.

And I want you to close your eyes if you can.

And I want you to give your heart into worship.

For some of you, it might be the first time, but you should raise your hands like this and just look at the words, whichever screen they're working on.

They never work over here.

By the way, in two weeks, Chapel Hills is going to restore all of the projectors.

It's gonna be great.

So it's it's this one.

But I want to give, I want you to give yourself to Jesus.

I want you to give yourself to him.

And some of you need to pray to receive Christ.

You just need right now to say, Jesus, I give you my heart.

I want to be a true Jesus follower tonight.

I want to be a Jesus disciple tonight.

I want you to give your heart to him.

And if you do that, I want you to tell someone before you leave.

I want you to tell someone you know, say, I gave my heart to Christ tonight.

And then if somebody says that to you, then you put your hand on their shoulder and say, Man, that is awesome.

Let me pray and bless you.

And you say a quick prayer for them.

All right?

So right now, Father, in the name of the blood of Jesus, as the worship team comes up, we settle our hearts.

We settle our hearts.

We we drop our worries, we drop our struggles.

We we drop trying to be something that we're not, playing games, trying to merit salvation.

God, would you come right now and empower my heart to worship you?