Go Wild (Societal Impact)

Hi everyone, this is Emma from Encounter Church,

Henley, and thanks so much for tuning into our

podcast. Our prayer is that through this podcast,

you can have an encounter with Jesus that will

change your life. And now, get ready for an inspiring

message from our preaching team. Hey, it is great

to be here with you all tonight, if we haven't

met yet. My name's Mike, I'm one of the pastors

here at Encounter and I spend most of my time

at Prospect but I wonder, I dabble in Henley

as well and I gotta tell you some fascinating

news. It is 6 .55 and I am not known for preaching

short. 4 .55, 4 .55 and apparently I'm not known

for telling the time either but that's a new

one for me so I will do my best but man who's

excited to hear what God wants to say tonight.

Is it just me? Somebody's got to have some excitement

for the word. It's hot. Thanks Jess. Hey our

teaching text for today is from Matthew chapter

Matthew 13:3–9

13 verses 3 to 9 and really it's more the teaching

text for the series. Here it is. A farmer went

out to sow his seed. As he was scattering the

seed some fell along the path and the birds came

and ate it up. Alright. Once at our home in Valley

View, where we lived many moons ago, I came across

something pretty extraordinary. We had a swing

set, and it had bark chips down the bottom, because

safety, you know. And growing out of the bark

chips was a cherry tomato plant. And it was it

was like one of my the most exciting things I've

ever seen because like this is where my children

go to fall. You know, this is not where things

grow. But out of the bark was growing a cherry

tomato plant. And against all odds, what must

have happened is one of our kids has had a half

eaten cherry tomato and dropped it because again,

children into the dirt and bark chips and somehow

it has grown up into a plant. Now that is very

unusual. I have tried that accidentally with

numerous other fruits and vegetables, has never

worked out for me. So it had already produced

a couple of little mini tomatoes. I was very

excited for how we could move it. I started planning

and by the next day it was dead. Because Jenny

Wardrop, the legendary black thumb of your gardening

horror stories, who I did not expect to be in

the room today as I told this story, but that's

all right, had already killed it. She'd gone

weed spraying and had drowned everything in glyphosate.

and my precious little cherry tomato plant had

died. Because of course if you've seen a cherry

tomato plant, the stems do look like a weed until

you go and go, oh there's tomatoes growing on

it. So just a quick spray and it was dead. And

do you know why it died? A, because Jenny is

like maybe the worst gardener in the planet.

No, no bless her. Like she tries. The effort

is there. It's like God has given her other gifts.

It's okay. But the real reason it died is because

we had valued a neat but dead garden. over a

wild but alive one. We had valued a neat but

dead garden over a wild but alive one. We had

killed the fruits of growth so we could have

control. And this is what happens when we're

not careful with the Spirit of God and the Kingdom

of God. We spent the last six weeks considering

revival. We've been using gardening analogies,

hence the parable of the sower. We've considered

what it looks like in our lives when God shows

up in power. We spent four weeks talking about

things we could do to posture and position ourselves

to be ready. And then last week in week five,

Tex and Pieta at our different locations. preached

about the fact that it's God's revival, not ours.

So if it's going to happen, it's going to come

sovereignly from God. And a working definition

of revival is this, that revival is the quickening

of the ordinary work of God. Now, not our work,

God's work, God's work. That's revival is God's

business. What I mean by this is the ordinary

stuff of God extraordinary to us. And when revival

happens, God's normal begins to happen more frequently

on earth. We see miracles, we see salvations

in their dozens, we see healings, we see people

being broken from addictions, deep transformation

in life. This is the stuff of the kingdom of

heaven that God calls a Tuesday or whatever,

and we call it revival. It's when heaven breaks

into earth, or what Jesus called the kingdom

of God is near. What is miraculous to us is normal

to God. This is the last week of our revival

series and tonight's sermon is meant to be about

what it looks like when the spirit goes wild.

When we actually trust God to do what God wants

to do and let Him do it and get out of the way.

Mark Sayers, your boy puts it this way, revival

is just renewal gone viral. Right? You probably

heard us use the line before, his line, personal

renewal precedes corporate revival. Well, if

enough people do personal renewal and it goes

viral, that's his definition for revival. We're

not meant to control the wildness of the Spirit

of God in our lives. That's not what we're meant

to do. We're meant to respond to it. So what

does it look like? Well, you gotta, there's only

one place you can go if you're exploring revival.

You gotta go to the book of Acts, right? You

have to go to the book of Acts. I love Acts.

In Acts, the church is working out to do what

to do with the Holy Spirit as it goes. It's make

it up as it's go along. I deeply relate to everything

going on in the book of Acts as a church planter,

but really far more as a human being. I make

it up as I go along a lot. However, in the book

of Acts, they have the Spirit of God. They're

not alone. The Spirit of God is with them. Not

in the way that we might normally talk about

it. The way we would normally talk about God

is with you sounds like a hallmark card. like

thoughts and prayers and I don't mean that to

be disparaging I mean this is our default we're

like yeah yeah God's with you I'll be sure to

pray for you later narrator they did not pray

later like this this is the sort of thing we

do by accident but the early church now that's

true it just doesn't have any impact the early

church had authority authority in the Holy Spirit

and they went with it now Acts is brilliant for

us Because it's not Jesus doing these things,

it's a bunch of disciples mucking it up as they

go along, which means we don't really have any

excuses. All the excuses are like, well, obviously,

but that's Jesus. Not anymore, it's not. This

time, it's Peter. You remember how successful

Peter was in his day job? That's right. So bad

that Peter, Jesus had to be, why don't you throw

the net over the other side, like, career fisherman.

But this is what happened to the ordinary bungling

apostles in the book of Acts. They perform miracles.

They meet together every day. They share all

their possessions. They prayed until they got

what they were yearning for. They were under

enormous spiritual attack and physical persecution.

It was all happening and the miracles. Now, can

you do that? I don't just mean the general, can

you do the miraculous? Because I know enough

of you well enough to know what your normal lives

look like. But do you have the spiritual capacity

for that? I don't know if I do. Like honestly,

it's a lot. And so as we come to the end of the

series, I would love you to think of this, not

so much as the end of the series, but as a catalyst

for 40 days of prayer and fasting. And we're

calling it revival to resurrection, because that's

where we're going. We're going to the resurrection

of the Son of God at Easter. Revival only comes

out of resurrection. I want you to ask yourself

two key questions tonight. The first is, do I

want revival? Like, do I really want it? Not

do I want to say my church is having a revival.

Do I want what it costs to have revival in my

life? And the second is, can I handle revival?

Like if revival comes, can I handle it? I remember

when we launched our church, as Tex said, he

was there day one, confused, not yet Christian

that God was leading and he couldn't see it.

Yeah, I actually read that email this week. It

was a lengthy email about how he doesn't know

what's going on, but he thinks maybe Jesus, but

not yet. It's fantastic work. It's fantastic

stuff. And I remember praying for salvation.

And I'd be like, God, give us the nations, give

us hundreds. And I remember a couple of weeks

ago going, What would you do if I gave you 100

salvations today? Like, seriously, what would

you do, Mike? They're like, I don't know. Would

you pray for them? Like, probably not. I can't

pray for 100 people, probably. No. And we don't

have the infrastructure. What about 50? Nah.

20? I reckon we can manage 20. So God was like,

okay, so 20 is revival for you. So if you're

going to steward people's spirits well, I can't

give you 100. That's awful for them. And so God

could only give me what I could manage, give

this church what we could manage. By the way,

we didn't get 20 salvations, so like, don't get

me wrong, it wasn't just asking and getting.

All right, I want to talk about three things

in this message tonight. I will go as quickly

as I can, which I don't really know how to do,

but I'm going to do my best. Three ways, thanks

Tex, it looks like when God... goes viral, goes

wild among us and what it looks like in days

of revival. Here is number one. When we have

revival the word goes wild. The word goes wild.

Acts chapter 8 verses 29 to 39 with a few cut

Acts 8:29–39

out for brevity. How can I unless someone instructs

me? And he urged Philip to come up into the carriage

and sit with him. So beginning with the scripture

that the eunuch is reading, Philip told him the

good news about Jesus. That's verse 35. When

revival comes, the word goes wild. People begin

to be strangely drawn to the scriptures and receive

radical conviction from God. That's the result.

When you let yourself be drawn to the scriptures,

the end result is meant to be personal conviction.

Sometimes we read the Bible as if it's something

to tell other people their faults. That is not

the way of Jesus. Jesus is asking you to immerse

yourself in the Word so that you can learn what

it looks like to be formed in the image of the

Son of God, not to tell someone else what they're

doing wrong. At the Hebrides revival in Scotland,

which I'm sure I've mentioned 50 times in the

last six weeks alone, for months people had been

waiting for God to move and one night a young

man stood up, Bible in hand, I think there's

something to that, and he began reading from

Psalm 24. Who may ascend into the hill of the

Lord, or who may stand in his holy place? He

who has clean hands and a pure heart. He shut

his Bible. Looking at his companions, he said,

Brethren, it seems to me so much humbug waiting

as we are, unless we are rightly related to God.

I must ask myself, are my hands clean? Is my

heart pure? He then began to pray. At that moment

something happened in the barn. A power was let

loose that shook the parish from center to circumference.

God had visited them and neither they nor the

parish could ever be the same again. Let me ask

you church, how seriously do you take your Bible?

What I mean by that, because I hear people all

the time who tell me that Bible reading is hard,

so I'll come to the meaning in a second, but

listen, if you're here and you find Bible reading

hard, you're not alone. But I just want to encourage

you, everything that is good for you is hard,

okay? Generosity is hard, exercise is hard, fasting

is hard, you're about to find that out. But if

you want to see the fruits of revival, watch

what happens when you take reading the Bible

seriously. Here's what I mean, here's what I

don't mean by reading the Bible seriously. I

don't mean doing devotions because you feel like

it's the right thing to do. I don't mean reading

the Bible because you think you're just going

to become a better moral person. I don't mean

doing something that you feel obligated to do

out of a spirit of legalism. What I mean is you

treat the Bible not as a book of simple reading

that you finish and put away and go, I've done

my job today, but as words from God's mouth to

your ears to be believed and obeyed. The point

of the Bible is to obey it. to learn how to live

like Jesus. It's meant to convict us so we take

our preferences and our culture and our background

and let God convict our heart. And we take all

these things and we go, these are realities,

my emotional reality, physical reality, relational

reality, all of this. But God, you are above

and beyond all of it. Convict me Lord, tell me

what I need to do. Tell me how to manage this.

You let God disciple the flesh out of you and

disciple the spirit into you. That's the vision.

Everything that is good for you is hard. It is

hard to do that. Last week, as we were preparing

and praying for the amalgamation with Enfield,

which was very exciting, I had a phone call from

the Gideons. Now, if you're not familiar with

the Gideons, they are the heroes that deliver

Bibles in every hotel and get them out to students

in school, probably prisons too. Everywhere you

can go, Gideon's Bibles turn up. And they are

just amazing. They have never rung me before.

They rang me the week of the amalgamation. They

said, hi, your church has just come up on a prayer

list we have this week. anything we can pray

for so well as a matter of fact yes there is

and so they prayed and then they rang me last

week and they said how did it go and I said well

we received a unanimous vote for amalgamation

now what you probably don't know is that our

prayer was not that we would amalgamate with

Enfield our prayer was that it would be unanimous

so that there was a level of unity that only

God could bring I can work a room well enough

to get a vote I really want to probably Right?

Like that's gross, I'm just being honest. I cannot

create unanimity among two large groups of people.

I can't do it. Only the Spirit of God can do

that. And what we were praying for is not something

we could do in our own efforts, but something

only God could do. Something that only in the

Spirit's power could happen because we wanted

the kind of church where nobody is left behind

and unity is going forwards. And that is what

we got. And when is the last time that you trusted

God, not with the sort of prayers that you could

solve yourself, God, I pray that my sister treats

me better next time I'm rude to her. You can

solve that. When was the last time you trusted

God with God -sized prayers? like really trusted

Him. There is a passage in Scripture where God

compares Himself to an unjust judge. Jesus compares

God the Father to an unjust judge and He teaches

His disciples, just keep knocking, just keep

knocking. If it's a prayer that is big enough

to be worthy of the attention of God the Father,

keep knocking. Don't just do it once and go,

well, I tried. No. God's there going, come on,

how much do you want it? How much do you want

to? God the Father is the only one that can answer

these prayers. When you read the Bible, not as

a book, as a task to be finished, or as something

you think you have to do. When you read it as

a book to be believed in, a book to change your

life, it will convict you. It will transform

you. This is what happened to the eunuch. As

they rode along, verse 36, they came to some

water and the eunuch said, look, there's some

water. Why can't I be baptised? He ordered the

carriage to stop and then went down to the water

and Philip baptized him. The NIV translation

puts it this way, what can stand in the way of

my being baptized? That is a word on fire statement.

When the Word has gone wild, you're not saying

things like, well, why should I have to get baptized?

Explain it to me. Prove it to me. No, you are

so full of the fire of God that you're going,

well, what can stop me? Surely, surely I can

just get baptized now, right? Like, come on,

let's let the fire be lit. The eunuch isn't just

reading the Word. The Word is reading him. It

is preaching to him, convicting him, transferring

him. And this is how God chose to reach Africa.

Beginning with this one man, the theologian and

revivalist pastor Leonard Ravenhill puts it this

way, I'm going to use a few quotes from him tonight,

they're crackers. One of these days, some simple

soul will pick up the book of God, read it and

believe it, then the rest of us will be embarrassed.

We've adopted the convenient theory that the

Bible is a book to be explained, whereas first

and foremost it is a book to be believed and

after that to be obeyed. If you can let the Bible

disciple you like this, you will see your life

become more holy, more transformed. The word

gone wild leads to radical conviction, leads

to transformed lives. Point number two, when

revival goes wild in us, people go wild. Acts

chapter five, verses 12 to 14. The apostles were

performing many miraculous signs and wonders

among the people. And all the believers were

meeting regularly at the temple in the area known

as Solomon's Colonnade, but no one else dared

to join them. Even though all the people had

high regard for them, yet more and more people

believed and were brought to the Lord. Crowds

of both men and women. I love that Luke as he's

writing Acts wants to be so specific. He's like,

oh, just so you know, everyone's coming to the

Lord. Jefferson Bethke says it this way, a man

is at his best when he is living for others.

People go wild in revival, friends, when you

just follow the prompts of the spirit to love

your neighbours. And you don't try and second

-guess it or justify it, but you just love them.

Now listen to the vision in Acts 5 that we just

read. Many signs and wonders. All the believers

meeting regularly. Nobody else dared join them.

There were no spiritual tourists. Only those

believers who were sold out, who said, I'm in

all the way, because they were so visible before

the Jewish and Roman authorities. But all the

people had high regard for them. Isn't that interesting?

What was going on amongst the early church caused

everyone around them to say, I don't know what's

going on, but those guys are great. I want more

of that. Their quality of life was so powerful

that it drew attention. I want what you've got.

But even more than that, verse 14, yet more and

more people believed and were brought to the

Lord. Crowds of both men and women. Because the

vision wasn't to live a nice life that people

looked at and went, that's a nice life. Can I

have that? We already have Instagram at home.

we can envy on our own time. The vision being

brought in the book of Acts was salvation, death

to sin, life in Christ. That's the vision. Now,

sometimes we get stressed about the idea of scheduling

in church on a Sunday and a midweek IDG, middle

of the week. We're like, oh, that is a lot. And

the same people are going, why can't we be more

like the early church? I'm like, my brother in

Christ, they met every day. And I don't think

they were complaining to Peter and John about

it either. Otherwise you get a whole Ananias

and Sefirah situation. You can read the Bible,

work that one out for yourself. Look, I often

hear from people worried about burning out and

it drives me a little insane as a pastor and

it can happen. It can happen. We need to be honest

about that. Here is what I see happen more, at

least at this church. People just don't have

the fuel to keep burning. You only burn out if

you've got the wrong fuel to keep burning. or

if you're in an insane situation. But I don't

think that's what we're in. Pray NYC, Sam Gibson

says it this way. Most people are afraid of burning

out, but in fact they haven't started burning

yet. Couple of weeks ago we handed out plus one

prayer cards at Prospect. where you write the

name of someone on the back who you were praying

for to receive salvation. We asked everybody

if you hear somebody you're praying for for salvation,

send an email to Hannah or chuck a DM to us at

Encounter. I received nine responses. I just,

like I wanted to quit. I wanted to quit that

night. Not because I'm not getting the DMs. I'm

just like, do we care enough about the lost?

What are we doing? Does it break your heart?

It should. It should. Not that I didn't get my

DMs, but that we didn't care enough to send them.

You only burn out if you haven't got enough fuel

to keep burning. So what is your fuel? Or as

Leonard Ravenhill would say, are the things you

are living for worth Christ dying for? Friends,

you probably don't need more me time. You definitely

don't need more screen time. You need to love

your neighbour as Christ loved the church. the

sort of person who suffers from depression or

anxiety, I want to encourage you, one of the

best ways you can help beat that is to love your

neighbour as yourself. It's to be in community

and to lovingly serve one another. If you've

got anxiety, like, don't put too many expectations

on yourself. Be kind about that. But one of the

best ways you can resolve these problems is to

be with people and love people. Take that as

somebody who does have a diagnosis of depression.

One of the best ways you can combat that in the

moment is to be with people. It's the last thing

you feel like, it's the best thing for you. The

fruit of a people gone wild for Jesus, people

gone wild, leads to radical love for others.

That leads to transformed communities. Point

number three, final point, spirit gone wild.

Acts chapter five, 15 to 16, continuing on. As

a result, they would carry the sick out into

the streets and lay them on cots and mats so

that when Peter came by, at least his shadow

might fall on some of them. In addition, a multitude

came together from the towns surrounding Jerusalem,

bringing the sick and those who were tormented

by unclean spirits and they were all healed.

People lined the streets so that Peter's shadow

might fall on them. In my Bible, 14 pages earlier,

that guy denies Jesus. 14 pages later, and a

little bit of time but not that much. People

are lining the streets hoping that his shadow

will heal them. Something has transformed him

because the spirit has gone wild and Peter has

stopped trying to control it. One of Peter's

great issues in his spiritual walk was trying

to control what God was doing through him. Jesus

would do something amazing and Peter's like,

I'm with you all the way and then he'd explain

that and say part of this means I have to die

to myself which I will do literally on the cross

and Peter's like, no sir that is wrong. Jesus

is like, come on man. I'm trying here. But we

do this too, right? We constantly try and control

what the Holy Spirit is doing because it is more

comfortable for us to do so. We want the fruits,

we want the outcomes, but we don't want to just

give it over to God and say, God, you do it.

I need it enough. I need what's going on right

now so much that I want you to bring the crazy

into my life because without the crazy, I'm just

living empty. That's how I feel anyway. In the

story of Philip and the eunuch, the start and

end of the story of this, Philip, the Holy Spirit

goes, go and talk to that chariot. At the end

of that, the Holy Spirit goes, all right, you're

done now. And literally just takes him physically

to another part of the world geographically.

The Holy Spirit is at the start and end of this.

The Holy Spirit is all the way through with it.

So often, if you are at this church, you will

hear us pray, Holy Spirit come. That's what we

want. That is our desperate desire. The presence

of God, not the plans of us. That's what we need.

When the spirit goes wild, miracles become common.

As a pastor, I hear all sorts of stories about

miracles, and I guess we're in the miracle business

in a lot of ways, in the resurrection business

at least. But also I work in a role where I'm

trying to create healthy systems and processes

and structures and all sorts of fairly boring

things to talk about to help you all encounter

Jesus. Not to manufacture it, but just to kind

of... so I don't screw up the moment as much.

Like I'm just trying to create some structures

so that when Jesus is moving, I don't screw it

up. That's kind of the vision there. But sometimes

I wonder, am I listening to God through His Holy

Spirit or am I just listening to good leadership

advice? What am I actually doing in life? So

when the spirit goes wild, the spirit of control

in our lives really rises up. So you can either

have the movement of God in the Holy Spirit or

you can have control. You cannot have both. It's

a Craig Grishow line, he's right though. Let

me give you an example. I heard a fairly recent

story, as in the last 20 years in this state,

about a church in SA and they needed a building.

And so they appealed to the congregation and

said, in faith, we believe that God's asking

us to have a building. We know where we want

it to be. We know where we're going to build

it. And the congregation said, absolutely. And

to do this, most of the key congregation members

went to their banks and they remortgaged their

homes and gave the funds to the church. And then

within a year, the church had the funds and the

land for a building. That's the end of the story.

There's not, in case you're waiting for the fall

after, there's no fall. That's the end of the

story. Now, let me ask you a question. How are

you responding to that story as you hear it?

Because as I heard that story, I had two different

responses at the same time. One of them's like,

praise God, this is what faith looks like. The

other one is like, oh, I'm not sure. That's a

good thing. I'm not sure that's healthy. Do you

know what I mean? Anyone else feeling that tension?

We are called to be people who somehow live in

that tension, right? The systems and structures

are so that we don't become the sort of people

that say, give us all your money and see you're

off to, I don't know, where do you want to go?

Europe? Hawaii. No, it's too hot. All right.

Alaska. Okay, I think I've lost the moment. You

get the drift. You get the drift. The point is

though, here's what I want to do when I hear

those stories, especially if there's not an asterisk

on the end. I want to hear those stories and

go, praise God. End of conversation. Because

it's not my job to manage what the Spirit of

God is doing in somebody else. My job is to manage

my own spirit. And I do that badly enough that

I can't be looking at anybody else and judging

them. My job is to bring my spirit before God

and go, my life is effectively a mess without

you. You've produced enough fruit and love and

grace in my life that I have some structures

that help me get through an average day. But

it's a mess without you. So God, would you pour

out your spirit? Because I want to see what you're

going to do today. I want to be involved in that.

I don't want to do it myself. I can't. So here's

what I can tell you. I'm not asking for your

money. I want it all. I want your heart. I want

your life. I want your soul. I want you devoted

to Jesus with everything you have. You don't

have to do that in this building seven days a

week like the apostles would have done, but out

there seven days a week, absolutely. Only that

will change the world. That's it. Because when

the spirit goes wild, the miraculous becomes

normal and heaven invades earth. One quick quote

from Duncan Campbell, again in the Hebrides.

He was talking about a different town. This dear

old lady saw a vision of the church of the fathers

crowded with young people and saw a strange minister

in the pulpit and she was so impressed by this

revelation she sent for the minister. Duncan

Campbell, very used to dealing with prophetic

old ladies. This is not him though. The parish

minister was a God -fearing man, a man that longed

to see God work. He tried everything to get the

teenagers involved in the church and this dear

old lady says to him, I'm sure Mr Mackay you're

longing to see God work. What about calling your

office bearers together and suggest to them that

you spend two nights a week waiting upon Him?

You've tried mission, you've tried special evangelists,

but Mr Mackay, have you tried God? Have you just

tried asking God? Have you tried the Holy One?

One more quote from Ravenhill. You may be stacked

up with theology, but what good is theology if

it isn't on fire? Our information and our inspiration

is meant to turn into transformation. That's

the purpose. What are we doing with that? Leviticus

puts it even better. The fire on the altar must

be kept burning. It must never go out. What are

you doing to the fire on the altar of your life?

How are you keeping it burning? Because whenever

the spirit goes wild, the miraculous becomes

commonplace. Wounds quicken. Addictions are healed,

chains are broken, families are reunited, relationships

are restored and salvation after salvation after

salvation comes as God draws people near. Do

you want revival? Can you handle revival? Band

you guys can come back up. When the spirit goes

wild it leads to radical faith. And when we take

that radical faith, coupled with the radical

love and radical personal transformation, that

changes the world. That is the vision of the

Kingdom of God, a transformed world. Is the fire

on your altar still burning? Listen, this is

all just an invitation, all of this, right? Some

of you I'm sure, I know because I've had the

privilege of talking to you about it, some of

you have been from backgrounds where you've had

some kind of spiritual abuse or at the very least

an unhealthy system. And for those of you, it

can be really hard to trust the leading and prompting

of the spirit in the framework of the church,

right? Like you're here because you trust God

already or you want to. But sometimes the church

can be a framework that is hard. I'm not really

asking you to trust me here. I'm inviting you

to trust God. I'm inviting you because we believe

our pastors and our elders and our leadership

team, we're fasting and praying just for a move

of God. There's no agenda of like when we're

fasting to discern the church plant. That's great.

But this our agenda is more Lord, more of you.

That's the whole agenda. The whole agenda. And

if God is going to turn up in power and work,

You don't want to be sitting there with your

grandchildren going, well I was there when God

turned up in power or I was there once a month

and my friends were there a lot. A lot was happening.

I had some other stuff going on. Like it's up

to you. This is all up to you. This is carrot

not stick. This is all up to you. But that's

not what I want. I want to be in the room when

God shows up in power. I don't want to miss it.

I was praying tonight, you know, back home this

afternoon, I was like, oh, God, am I, what happens

if the Spirit of God just breaks out and we're

praying for hours and hours? Am I up for it or

am I just a bit tired? Like, I just had to ask

that stuff of myself. Where am I? Do I have the

spiritual capacity to hold revival? The million

dollar question is, what are you willing to let

God do through you? If God comes where he's wanted,

are you someone who wants God? William Carey

says this, expect great things from God, attempt

great things for God. But Habakkuk says this,

the prophet Habakkuk prophesied in a day where

Jerusalem was in ruins, Babylon had taken over,

it was chaos. It was chaos for the Jewish people.

But he said this. In fact, I just want to invite

you, if you're able, could you stand just for

this moment as we come to a close? I just want

to invite you to close your eyes. I'm just trying

to trust the Holy Spirit here. And if this is

new for you, I would just say this. What have

you got to lose? What have you got to lose? Habakkuk

said this, chapter three, verse two. I have heard

the news about you. I'm amazed at what you have

done. Lord, do great things once again in our

time. Make those things happen again in our own

days. Even when you are angry, remember to be

kind. In summary, Habakkuk says this, do it again,

Lord. Friends, we have spent weeks hearing about

revival and learning about revival and we love

to teach you this Church. We love to grow ourselves

and what we know about Jesus. But knowing about

Jesus is irrelevant unless you know Him. Jesus

is not an abstract God to be viewed from a distance.

He's a person or saviour to be loved. and He

pours out His love on you. If you're here tonight,

if you've never experienced the love of Jesus

before, can I tell you, God is here, right here.

Part of the point of the resurrection of Jesus

from the dead is that He is very much alive.

And through the Holy Spirit, He's here in this

room right now, speaking to you, calling out

to you. He's saying, my son, my daughter, come

home. It's time. I gotta tell you, God comes

where He's wanted. The Holy Spirit blows where

He wills. God is looking for people who are hungry

for Him. Is that you? He's looking for people

who are offering their spirits to Him and saying,

God, would you cultivate something in me so that

I can handle more of your spirit? Is that you?

He's looking for people who want the wildness

and beauty of revival more than they want the

empty, stark, dead control of their own lives.

God is looking for a generation. that is hungry

enough for the things of God. He'll blow where

He wants to. The wind of God, the Holy Spirit,

will go wherever He wants to. Thanks so much

for tuning in to this week's message. If you

felt challenged or need prayer, we'd love to

hear from you on Instagram at encounterhenley.

Or if you're interested in how you can support

this ministry, please go to our website. encounteradelaide

.com .au. Thanks again for listening. God bless

you.