Fresh Fire | Pastor Eileen Hunter-Wolf | Venture Church

He love Venture Church. Happy Independence weekend? Have you had

a great Independence weekend? Pretty amazing? Two hundred and fifty

years and summer is officially here in the Pacific Northwest.

Do not worry. I will not keep these glasses on

for very long. But I just had to get my

outfit together as everyone was very patriotic up here. I

just realized that I love our nation and I am

thankful for America. We have some progress to make right.

We are not fully there, but we have come a

long way. And so my prayer is that God would

heal our land and that this is still a place

that we can gather freely and worship the Lord. So

can you put your hands together? For two hundred and

fifty years? Well, if I haven't met you yet, my

name's Eileen, and I am the small group's pastor on

our ventured team, and I love what we are doing

here in this house. Is you heard, Pastor Brandon. There

are so many exciting things that are happening here, so

many transitions because God is moving and we're glad that

you're a part of it. We're glad that you're here today.

I just want to say a big shout out to

our pastors who Pastor Brandon and a pastor Die, such

amazing visionary leaders. I'm very grateful to be under your leadership.

I've known them for thirty five plus years. I'm saying,

I know we look pretty good. And really, our hope

adventure is that this is not just a place that

you attend, but this is where you belong. This is

where you get to grow, grow in relationship with God

and grow in relationship with each other. So if you

are not connected in a small group, I'm your girl.

You need to connect with me. I want to see

you grow in friendship and relationship with other people. Today

we are starting our series, as Pastor Brandon mentioned, and

it is about more more, and we are talking about

the Holy Spirit. And this is my prayer as we begin.

You know, Hamy said, yes, I want more of God's

truth in my life. I want more of God. I

want more clarity, I want more wisdom. I want more

of Him. But what if today, as I preach this message,

that the more that we are talking about is indicative

about you giving him more view that you draw closer

to him. It is more of your heart that you give,

It is more of your time, and so that's my prayer,

that He would start a fresh fire in us and

that he would ignite the passion of Jesus, and that

would be the thing that we do this summer. Come on.

Summer may be about laying back, but I want you

to lean in for these next few weeks and just

dive into what Holy Spirit may want to show you,

what God's presence may want to show you. Jesus would

say that you have ears to hear and ey Sissy,

that God would give us the ability to hear him,

see him and know him. Would you pray with me? Father,

We just thank you for your presence. We don't take

that for granted. It's such a privilege to be able

to worship you, to honor you. We love you. We

ask God that you would help me get out of

the way. And Lord, say what you want to say

to us today. Maybe there was someone in this room

that you saw walking in. I want you right now

to lift up a prayer for them. If someone stood out,

go ahead and lift up a prayer, ask God to

touch them, and then ask God to touch you, that

he would open up your heart and that you would receive.

And lastly, would you say a prayer for me, that

I would just be on assignment, that I would do

exactly what Holy Spirit, what God's presence wants. Today. Lord,

we're so grateful. We lean into you lead us. We

pray all these things in Jesus' name. Come on. Everybody

said amen, come on, everybody said amen. All right, here's

the rule. You don't want me to be boring. Don't

you be boring? So if there is truth that is

ignited in you and you are passionate about it, I

need you to talk back. I need you to say

come on, I need you to say, yes, it is something.

It come on. It is something about just responding to

what God wants to do. And as we open up

this scripture, I just I just feel like that is

what God wants. Well, let me start off by telling

you that it was many years ago. As I have

four grown children, these homegrown children are a blended family,

and if I could ever tell you the story, it's

pretty amazing about what God has done in my life.

But it was decades back that I was an expectant

mom and there I was, she was about to be

my first born, and I had decorated the room, I

had set the furniture. I even knew what pictures I

wanted for family pictures. I had prepared the place and

I was just almost a few weeks out before I

would be holding her. And I got a call during

that time from my mother in law, Mother Hunter. Now

Mother Hunter picked up the phone and she asked how

I was doing. And I could hear this uncertainty in

her voice. And with that uncertainty, of course, I leaned

in and I said, well, what's wrong? And she is

from the Detroit area and she had a mention to

me that her home had gotten broken into again. So

she said, when I come out to visit the baby

and to be there, would it be okay if I

don't just visit but I stay? And I said, She said,

you just think about it, you pray on it, and

you get back to me. I just I remember leaning

back and thinking, God, what are you? What are you doing?

My home is so tiny and here I was preparing

a place for our little one, and that other room

is now gonna be forfeited. And I thought, God, I'm

not so sure I feel comfortable with what you're doing.

Have you ever been in that space where God just

shows up in the middle of your journey, in the

middle of your situation, and you just kind of feel like,

I'm not so sure about this God. But God instead

of us, you know, just kind of disregarding something because

we cannot fully embrace something. God says, lean in, trust me.

I want to take you on a journey. I just

need you to trust me, Eileen and I did as

we jump into our scriptures. I just believe. But that

is the big question that we have. Are we willing

to make room for more of God's influence of our

in our lives? And that more takes me to our

text today, I'm gonna be talking about fresh fire, welcoming

the person of the Holy Spirit. Well who is the

Holy Spirit? And maybe you're like in one of two camps,

because that's normally how it goes. We talk about fresh

fire and we talk about the Holy Spirit, and you're like,

come on, let's go, let's do this thing. We want passion,

we want fire, we want God to manifest. Maybe that's

the camp you're in, And maybe I believe that there

are some of us here in this camp that we're

not quite sure. We're kind of like me and my

mother in law. Maybe you're familiar stranger and you can't

just quite wrap your brain around. Well. I get God

the Father, I get God the Son, But Holy Spirit,

I mean, who is he? Is he? Come on? Is

he a dove? Is he fire? Is he wind? Is

he a flowing river? Who is Holy Spirit? And in

those spaces oftentimes we just say, you know what, say

that for somebody else? I just that feels kind of weird.

Have you ever met some weird Christians? You may be

sitting near one. I get it. But here's the thing is,

people can be weird, but God is not weird. And

that's what we want to unpack today. Is he a dove?

Is he a fire? Is he wind? Is he a

river flowing up inside of you?

Well?

These are manifestations, these are metaphors, These are figures of speech.

But the Holy Spirit just comes down gently like a dove,

that he is like a fire consuming things in our lives,

that he is like a wind that we cannot contain,

that he it is like a river flowing inside that

brings refreshing. These are just manifestations, These are metaphors, These

are figures of speech. We say Jesus is the bread

of life. Do we think he's a low for bread. No,

and we say that we are the salt of the earth.

And here is the reality, is that the Holy Spirit.

He is not this energy, and he is not this

force that we harness. He is not an it. He

is Deity. He is God. And in the scriptures it

reveals to us this. We're gonna jump right into the text.

It says this, and John fifteen. You can look on

the screen or you can open your bible, but it

says that if you love me, keep my commands, and

I will give you another advocate to help you and

be with you forever, the Spirit of Truth. The world

cannot accept him because it neither sees him nor knows him.

But you you know him because he will live, He

will be with you, and he will live in you.

And this isn't a moment where the Jesus is talking

to the disciples. This is called the Upper Room discourse.

And in this moment it's John chapter fourteen, John chapter fifteen,

and John chapter sixteen. These are the last moments that

Jesus has on earth. So you know, these are good

heart to heart conversations that he's having with the disciples,

and he reveals to them because he knows that they

can't quite wrap their mind around what God is doing

and who Holy Spirit is and what you're saying. I

thought this was going to kind of turn out different. God,

are you with me? You walk in your life and

you say, God, I'm sure you got my memo. This

was definitely not what I thought this was gonna look like.

I didn't think my marriage was gonna go like this.

I didn't think I would be graduating and not know

what to do for a job. I just didn't realize

that this is what you wanted to do. And there

were the disciples. They were in there. They were distressed,

they were sorrowful. But Jesus says, hold up, don't worry.

I'm about to go to heaven. And they were kind

of like what And in that moment, he says, but

I've promised you this gift from heaven, this Holy Spirit,

and Holy Spirit will come, and he says he will

be another advocate. Come, I'll say another, Come, I'll say another.

The word another there means not another of a different kind,

but it's the Greek word alos, which means another of

the same kind. He says, when you see Holy Spirit,

you are gonna see me he's gonna represent me. You

know how I showed you the Father, and that's what

Jesus did. He says, you are going to see Holy

Spirit another advocate, but he is going to testify. He's

gonna say the exact same thing I'm saying. You know

how I was a teacher and a rabbi and a

coach and a mentor. He says, I'm gonna show up.

But Holy Spirit he's gonna do exactly the same thing.

The Father will send him to you. He comes from eternity,

So this help that you're getting, it will come from Heaven.

And it's such a great relief to know that God

sees us on the journey, no matter what we're struggling with,

no matter what we're facing. And he says, hold up,

I've got you. In order for you to get through this,

you're going to have to lean in and receive what

I have for you. So he says, I'm gonna say,

and you another advocate. So is Holy Spirit just junior God?

Is he a dove? Is he a fire? Is he

a win? No? He is fully God in every way.

He is fully God. And here's the deal is that

they didn't realize that when he showed up that he's

been there all along. There's something that we call the Trinity.

And I know it's not a word that you find

in the scriptures, but it's the concept. It's the theology

that says that there is one God and enrolled in

three persons. There are three different roles. We have God

the Father, we have God the Son, and we have

God the that's right. So he was there at the

moment of creation when God said in the beginning, and

the earth was formless and it was dark, and it says,

the Spirit of God have and that word spirit is

the rock of God. It means it is the breath

of God. It is the spirit of God. God was

there in the beginning. We see him when Mary is

told the good news and it says, the Holy Spirit

will overshadow you. He will be there, and Jesus comes

to us. We see him in the ministry of Jesus

when he's about to embark on the mission of God.

It is the Holy Spirit as they come to the

Jordan River and the heavens open up and Jesus comes,

and it's the Holy Spirit descending like a that's right,

gentle and peaceful, but he rests on him. Jesus goes

on to say, as he continues to do the work

of ministry, that he does it all with the presence

of the Holy Spirit. He said, the spirit of the

Lord is upon me and he has anointed me. So

he wasn't doing anything without Holy Spirit. Why should we?

He was telling the disciples, this is so important that

he is fully God. This is not a junior God,

and this is not a manifestation, this is not an entity.

That he is fully God. But he is also distinctly

his own person in the Trinity. It is important for

us to know that the Holy Spirit has a personality.

A person is attributed three things, a mind, a will,

and emotion, and we see this throughout the scriptures. The

scriptures declare that the Holy Spirit searches the mind of God,

so he knows exactly what God is thinking in that

awesome and he's been given to us to help us.

He says that he has a will. In the early Church,

they would consult with the Holy Spirit and they'd say

it was good for us and the Holy Spirit that

we do this. The Holy Spirit also said, hey set

apart Barnabas for me Barnabas and Silas for the work,

and they said that this was the Holy Spirit. So

he has a will, he has a mission, and he

has emotions. You can grieve the Holy Spirit. You can

know that he can be lied to and it won't

go well with us, But you know that the Holy

Spirit has emotions. He has things that stir him, that

call him to come. And here's the reality is that

is all a part of who God is. He is God.

He's not weird. There is a mystery because we are

human and he is divine. We can't wrap around everything,

but we can wrap around what God revealed his scripture,

and we see that in his scripture he reveals who

he is. So now he's telling the Holy Spirit is

telling the disciple, I mean Jesus is telling the disciples.

He's saying this to them. I have an advocate, another advocate,

and he will be a helper to you. Come on.

I want you to turn to your neighbor and say

help is here. Turn to your other neighbor and say

help is here. It is closer than we think. It's

closer than we think. Sometimes some of us right now,

at this very moment, are struggling to push through the

situation that we're facing, whether that's an intersection where we

have to have faith to keep going, to take another step,

to keep on moving. And God is saying I've got

the help and it comes from Heaven. He says he

is an advocate. He is the Promised Helper. That word

advocate is the Greek word from the original language that

means barah, which means come alongside, and gletos, which means

to really that he is called to a specific role.

So the Holy Spirit has a specific role of how

he can help you. So it's okay to welcome him

into our lives, to lean in to receive why because

we can trust God, we can trust what Jesus said,

we can trust the word. And so he says that

he is the Promised Helper. But he doesn't stop there.

He goes on to say, I've got to tell you

this that he's also the Spirit of truth. The Holy

Spirit is the spirit of truth. Aren't you lad in

a world of ai when it's really hard to discern

what is real and what is true, that we can

have the truth. You know, we live in a day

and age where if it's true for you, then it's true.

But that word true. When Jesus was speaking to his disciples,

he was saying that this is a truth that won't

lead you astray. It is consistently dependable. That word truth

means reliable. And do you know that we live in

a day and age where our social feed, even our

news feed. Absolutely it is frustrating to figure out what

is opinion and what is truth. And the reality is

that God wants to shape your story. Oftentimes we say

that we have our truth, but in reality we're saying

that it's our narrative, our story, our emotions, it's how

I feel. But how many of you know your feelings

can be real, but they aren't always true. And what

I mean by that is sometimes, like let's just say

you go at work or you're here at church and

someone just walks by and you kind of feeling overlooked,

You're feeling rejected, You're feeling like, hey, what's up. I'm

not chop liver, I'm trying to get your attention. You

just walked right on by me. Should I say something

to them? And you're having all these things happening inside

of you, And really what's true is that they were focused.

They had to get a job done. They were moving

ahead and they didn't mean anything by it. You see

what I'm saying that sometimes we rely so much on

our feelings, but our feelings can't be the compass to

what is true. So Jesus says, hey, let me tell

you what is really true. You're gonna find it in

the Spirit of truth. And why are you gonna find

it in the Spirit of truth? Because he is gonna

say exactly what I say. The Holy Spirit will represent me.

He is not weird. You open up the book. He

is gonna have the character that you find in the Word,

you are gonna find it in Holy Spirit. It's awesome.

He doesn't go on a tangent. He is not weird

and spooky. He may manifest in moments that go beyond

what our human mind has the capacity to take in,

but those moments are places where we lean in, we trust,

we receive why because the Holy Spirit is the game changer.

The Holy Spirit will change who you are from the

inside out, and there's nothing like it. You can't will yourself,

you can't make it happen. You can't get around certain

folks to create an atmosphere. It is the work of

the Holy Spirit. He is the game changer. He changes

who we become as we become followers, as we live

in Christ. Have you ever watched the reality game Survivor?

How many Survivor fans here? Yeah? Season fifty. I had

to check out on that one because I really get

to like honed in and my family does watch Survivor.

But this is what Jesus look to the disciples, and

this is what he says. He says, it is to

your advantage that I go in the game Survivor. There

it is about contestants being dropped off on an island.

They build their fire, they build, they get gather their food,

they compete in challenges, they go into tribal council. But

when a contestant gets the secret advantage, this is what happens.

They have the ability to be protected. Not everybody is

privy to know what they know, and this is the

advantage that they get to go to the next round

with the information that they know. Don't you know that

Holy Spirit looked at the disciples and he looks at

us and he says, it's to your advantage that you

receive him. He will give you the insider information of

how I feel, what I would do in this moment,

the Holy Spirit is the game changer. This is what

I want you to know. That he is God, that

he has a role, he's a person in the Trinity,

that he is our advocate and our helper, and I

like to say he's a coach. I remember being on

the track team and realizing, you know, I was a

sprinter and most of you ladies know that my sport

of choice is cheerleading, but I did play track and

I did run track. Excuse me, I did track and

field throughout my high school years. And I remember the

coach just pulling me alongside and their star player was

not going to be able to make it for a

couple of meets, so she tried to train me to

run her race. And I was the kind of person

I was on the blox, I was like exploding, go

come on, and it's fifty yards. I'm just I'm getting

to the finish line quick. But she was trying to

train me for the four hundred, where I would have

to take the lap all the way around. And I

realized when I had the gun went off and I

had to go that it was the voice of the

coach that got me to the finish line. Now, the

coach wasn't running the race for me. But what I

heard in my heart, in my mind was keep your form,

and when those legs get heavy, keep pumping, And when

your lungs feel like exploding, keep breathing, keep breathing, keep

breathing all the way to the finish line. And that's

how it is with our coach, the Holy Spirit. He

has these heart to heart conversations. Why because when we

accept Jesus into our heart, he is the one that

makes his residence. Ephesians one three says he takes up

residence in us. Now we are not God, but we

have the Holy Spirit who gives us truth and helps us.

Isn't it so beautiful? I know for some of you

are like, wait a second, I thought Jesus was in

your heart. Jesus is at the right hand of the Father.

The Holy Spirit represents Jesus. He is the one that

makes Jesus famous. And this is how he does it.

And this is what I want you to understand. That

the Holy Spirit has the power to convict, He confirms,

and he carries, He does all these things in our lives.

And we're going to walk through these next several weeks

learning about the Holy Spirit. But I want you to

know that the Holy Spirit in the scripture found in

John sixteen eight, it says, this are you with me?

And when he comes, he will convict the world of sin.

This is the reality. You and I do not recognize sin.

We were born in a world of darkness, and our

culture will lead us further from God if we let it.

Even ourselves, we can move in the direction that's opposite

from what God has until the Holy Spirit puts the

spotlight on the thing that's separating you from God. And

that's what Holy Spirit does. He brings the spotlight and

shows you and I that sin actually is destructive. We

don't see it. I remember a time when I left

a gallon of milk in the back seat of my

car I came from the groceries, and a week later

I could smell her. Here's the reality is. We don't

see sin for what it is. We don't see that

that late night conversation or hanging out or that habit

or going to that karaoke, whatever it may be, that

it could be an open door and we really don't

recognize it till Holy Spirit puts the spotlight on it.

This is what Holy Spirit does. He convicts the world

of unbelief. He reveals what sin conceals. The Holy Spirit

doesn't stop there. He then begins to illuminate and in

your life and in my life. He shows up, takes

residents and he starts, you know, kind of rearranging the

furniture in your life, and all of a sudden, that attitude.

He goes, oh no, don't do that. That's enough, don't

say that. And the reason he does that is because

he brings for the spirit of Christ and he illuminates

what is true. Sometimes you get up here and you

or sometimes you're in a service and you're like, oh

my gosh. Pastor Brandon is talking like who put a

bug in my house? When he's preaching the gold. When

he's preaching, it's like about me. That's Holy Spirit just

illuminating things so that you and I can do this. Lastly,

he illuminates on the inside, so that we're kind of

like that house that you see in the dark in

a world that's dark, and you look at the house

at night and you see the lights on because the

light's happening on the inside, and that's good. But Holy

Spirit then takes and he extends the light, and he

brightens up who we are because he wants to illuminate

things in our life, because he wants to extend the

love of Jesus through you. He does this. And we

heard last week about how Holy Spirit there's over two

thousand people group of people that are on our watch

that have not heard the gospel. And I know those

people are across the seas, but how about the people

across your street? How are the people in your house?

And what Holy Spirit begins to show you is that

I bear witness of Jesus, but you too are a witness,

and he begins to show you something that is so beautiful.

He puts you on God's mission. You live a missional

life where you serve and the gifts that He's given

you is not just about you. It's about other people

and extending the love of Jesus to them. I want

everybody in this place to stand. You know, Mother Hunter,

she ended up coming to live with us. She took

the baby's room, the baby stayed in our room, and

it was okay. But what was amazing was I was

up and close and personal with my mother in law.

I never knew this about her you know, she lived

in Detroit, and she was she was born right at

the brink of the depression, and she walked through in Michigan, Detroit,

Michigan Jim Crow Laws. And she was an African American woman,

so she knew what it was to feel overlooked, rejected, misunderstood.

She knew what it was to feel hate. What I

saw about her that impacted my life so greatly was

the these prayers that she would write. They were called

her Jesus prayers. And when she was in her eighties,

because we only had her three more years, I wouldn't

have known that she got to see all her grandchildren

before she went home to be with the Lord. And

I wouldn't have known that. But these Jesus prayers, she

would personally hand them out, This eighty year old black

woman would hand them out to anybody. She didn't care

if you had a three piece suit, and she didn't

care if you wore a burca at a doctor's office,

at a park, at church. And over three hundred and

ninety two of those letters went out. And it was

because what God had for her could not be contained

just for herself. Holy Spirit wanted to fan a flame

and ignite something in her that would touch other people.

And that's what I want to encourage you today. What

does Holy Spirit want to say to you? Does he

want to put the spotlight on something? Could he possibly

want to convict us of something, let's welcome it. Or

does he want to illuminate something, convince you and give

you confidence to know you can do it. Keep breathing,

keep going, I'm telling you, or possibly Holy Spirit could

be saying, listen your life. This gift I've given you

is to serve this community, and I want you to

do it. I want you to get the courage to

go ahead and talk to that person. Just encourage them.

I don't need you to break down theology for them,

just love them and show them that you care. And then, really,

Holy Spirit wants to do all those things. And I

want to invite you back to our question, are you

willing to make room? Yes, more of God, but Lord,

you get more of me, You get more of me.

I've asked Pastor David to lead us into this worship song,

and I want to invite the presence of God. Holy Spirit,

who is completely God wants to come and help and

shine the light on us. Would you join us in

this worship song.

Let us speak, Come ooh awhere of your prescience. The

hd us six feeds big gluio you good. Bid us speak,

Come ooh awhere of your friendssens. Let us six feed

big glio your good theyde us speak, Come oo the

way of your friendssis.

Let's see seed become your goods. Yet a speaker aware

of your grassis, let us six seeds. The speaker go

the way of your friends. Taste the six seeds in

theoria your specause.

The speaker, you go away, love.

Your grand give the first you come six because a

good whisper your speak confidents place the sho god is

lost to be by your speak confidences place.

Shore gods the cock.

To become by your facist who speaker there, speaker, love

your dreads. There's six speeds there a speaker, look your dreads.

There's six seeds.

In the first service, as Eileen was preaching, the Lord

is kind of downloading on me. And I'm frantically in

the margin of my Bible sketching out notes for the

message that I'm gonna preach next week. But I want

to tell you the story where you're gonna see who

someone was, and then you're gonna see who that person

ends up later in life. And it's an amazing difference.

And I'm gonna ask the question over and over again.

What happened now, I'll tell you now. The punchline is

he got touched by the Holy Spirit and who he

was to who he ends up being is a radically

different human being. And that's my purer for you too,

that over this month you'd allow the Holy Spirit to

begin to soften your heart, to move on your life

and begin to change you. One of the things that

Eileen described with the Holy Spirit that when the Holy

Spirit comes, the Holy Spirit convicts, and it the Holy

Spirit doesn't convict you to make you feel guilty and

to make you feel horror about about yourself.

The Holy Spirit.

Convicts you so that you can be changed, so that

it can unlock something new in your life. And that

is my prayer that this week the Holy Spirit would

come convict the areas of your life that need to

be unlocked.

When that happens, don't run from it.

Just take a moment and say, Lord, I lay that

at your feet, I give that to you, Will you

forgive me? Come back next week with that area of

your life unlocked, ready to see if what happened in

this man's life that we're going to talk about next

week can happen in yours. That's what I want to pray.

I'm going to close our service with prayer. Again, I

want to thank you guys for being here. Means a

lot that you're here fourth of July weekend. Sorry that

you came thinking you were coming early to the eleven

thirty service or late to the ten again nine and

ten forty five. Check out our What's Next page on

our app that will give you some practical ways that

you can respond to this message. We also want to

mention that underneath the awning and honor of the fourth

of July, we have popsicles for everyone, And again, whatever

popsicles you don't take, me and the staff are going

to eat next week and we don't need more popsicles,

so please take them on your way out. But let

me pray for you, Lord Jesus. I do ask that

this week your spirit would come convict our hearts. For

those that are watching online, listening to this podcast, or

that are here live, God, I pray that your spirit

would come and convict us and Lord give us the

opportunity to repent and have that area be unlocked. So

we are ready to receive everything we can from you. Lord,

move in our midst this week. God, I pray for

everyone that you would give them a blessed by your

spirit week. In Jesus's name, I pray Amen, thank you

for coming to Venture Church.

See you next week.