A Breath of Fresh Air

Welcome to the Reem Sound Church of God podcast.

Wherever you're listening from, we hope you are blessed by

today's message. All right, let's stand for the

reading of God's Word. Now.

This morning's message will be deliberately concise and short,

hopefully, because I can't wait to get you to the altar.

I have asked God to do something for every one of you today, and

I want to see that happen and I want to give time for that to

happen. We're going to read from Genesis

Genesis 2 · chapter mention

chapter 2 and then John chapter 20.

John 20 · chapter mention

Genesis 27. And the Lord God formed man of

the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the

breath of life, and man became a living being.

John chapter 20, verse 21. So Jesus said to them again,

John 20:21

peace to you, as the Father hath sent me, I also send you.

And when he had said this, he breathed on them.

He breathed on them. And what he had said this he

breathed on them and said to them, Receive the Holy Spirit,

receive the Holy Spirit. I want to speak this morning on

this thought, a breath of fresh air.

Let's pray. Father, I thank you for the word

of the Lord. I thank you for what you have

put into my heart today. Help me to communicate it God in

a way that is pleasing to you and is a blessing to the people

who hear it. I pray this in Jesus name, Amen.

You may be seated. Have you ever felt like you

needed a breath of fresh air? Something about fresh air.

We live in farming country. When folks come up to visit us,

sometimes depending on the time of year, they will say what is

that smell? And I'll say that is a great

smell because that's the smell that tells me I'm going to get

fresh corn on the cob in a little while.

Don't ever despise the smell of the farm country, but some

people that's not a breath of fresh air.

Now I will tell you what does bother me.

Route 41, Avondale, that area going to Delaware, how in the

world of those people live in mushroom country.

I would be looking for a breath of fresh air every day.

But I want to talk to you about a breath of fresh spiritual air.

And the prayer that I prayed before the Lord for this service

was that God would breathe on each one of you, that each one

of you would have an experience with the breath of God, the

Spirit of the Lord. There are two, and as far as I

can tell, and someone may prove me wrong of this, there are two

historical biblical facts where God directly breathed into man.

There are many references to the breath of God, the wind of the

Spirit of God. Like in Ezekiel 37, breath and

wind are used interchangeably, the same thought the Spirit of

God. But there are there are two

times in the Bible where human beings are actually breathed in

or on by the Lord. That begins again in Genesis 27

when the Lord God formed man from the dust of the ground and

breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man

became a living being. I have tried to visualize this.

When you think of all that God created, this was the first man.

This was the first human being and God created him out of the

dust of the earth. And I tried to get a mental

picture in my mind of this really perfect human body.

This body that has a head full of hair.

It has the the two hands and arms and two legs.

Everything is perfect about this body, but there is absolutely no

life in that body. In other words, it was almost

like an oversized doll that would would be manufactured in a

toy factory because it was perfectly aligned and and it

looked great, but there was nothing until the Bible says

that God breathed into the nostrils of that man that there

had been no human life there. There were no human beings.

This is the first one, and the only way he comes alive is that

God breathes personally into his nostrils the breath of life.

Think about that. Go home and and let that one be

something you give some thought. What was that like when Adam

suddenly opened his eyes and looked into the face of God who

was breathing into his nostrils? The second time we read about

that is this personal kind of breathing of God on individuals

is in John chapter 20 and this happens on the Sunday evening of

John 20 · chapter mention

Jesus resurrection on that Sunday evening John 2021 says so

Jesus said to them again, peace to you as the Father has sent

me, I also send you. And when he had said this, He

breathed on them. It doesn't say he blowed on

them. He said he breathed on them and

said to them, receive the Holy Spirit.

So on what we call Easter Sunday, a resurrection Sunday,

there were two services. There was a morning service at

the tomb, and at that morning service angels showed up, and

then there was an evening service that took place behind

locked doors in fear, and that one angels didn't show up.

Jesus himself showed up, came through a locked door and walked

right into the room. What an amazing thing.

So encounter services are historically long in the sense

they've been around. They had encounter service.

They had two services on Sunday. On Easter Sunday, one of them

wasn't expected to be a service, but Jesus showed up.

And how many know when Jesus shows up?

You got church going on? Hey, man, I said you got church

going on. So this story is told us and

Jesus is breathing on his disciples and this is the

beginning of a 40 day period where Christ is showing himself

alive after his resurrection. So again, remember Sunday

morning they come to the tomb, angels are there, there's

rejoicing over a risen Christ. And in the evening, the Bible

says beginning at verse 19 of John 20, the same day, at

evening being the first day of the week, when the doors were

shut, where the disciples were assembled for fear, for fear of

the Jews, Jesus came and stood in the midst and said to them,

Peace be with you. And when he said this, he showed

them his hands and his side. Then his disciples were glad

when they saw the Lord. So Jesus said to them again a

second time, Peace to you. As the Father has sent me, I

also send you. And when he had said this, he

breathed. He breathed on them.

I don't know what that was like. I've tried to visualize that.

Here are the disciples. They're gathered together.

They're fearful. Jesus appears out of nowhere.

The door is locked, folks. But Jesus comes in and the Bible

says he speaks peace to them, and he speaks it twice in a

short amount of time. If any people needed to hear

about the peace of God, it was these disciples who were afraid

that they were going to be next to be knocked off, and they were

living an abject fear. Let me just say this, there was

something about the gathering of those disciples of the Lord that

Jesus showed up. You know, when we gather

together on Sunday, as the New Testament calls it, the Lord's

Day, we're not doing that to inconvenience your weekend or

add some stressful thing to you that you got to figure time out

for. But we are inviting you because

Jesus invites us to come together that he might minister

to us. The Lord wants us to gather

because he has something for us. And in this case, He spoke peace

to their troubled lives. How many know that we all could

use a word of peace every now and then?

I mean, with all that's going on in your world and all of your

personal issues and all of your family issues and all of your

your job issues and all of the crazy things that are happening

in our world, does anyone they need more drama in their life?

I agree. No is the answer to that.

If you want more drama than you are a psychopath and you need

help. There's enough drama going on in

the world in which we live. But Jesus speaks to those people

and in that short little conversation and one sided, he's

doing the talking. He is giving them a message of

peace. And I love verse 20, it says in

John 2020. And when he had said this, he

showed them his hands and his side.

And then his disciples were glad.

They went from fear, they went from trembling to glad when they

saw the Lord. My desire is when you come into

the House of God every Sunday, when you gather with us here

somewhere in that service, I don't want you to see the

worship leader. I don't want you to see the

pastor. I don't want you to see the

worship team, a musician. I want you somewhere in that

service to say I saw the Lord. You might not have seen him with

your natural eye, but with your spiritual eye.

Because the need of today, we've had enough of us.

We need the Lord. I walked away from here last

Sunday. I thought I preached the worst

message I preached in years. Not that the message was bad,

that the way I did it, it was horrible.

I went away. I was as discouraged as the day

is long. But you don't really need to see

me good or bad. You need to see the Lord Jesus

Christ and brother, Brother Hugo Morales, he rescued me after

service because he had something different to say about that

message. And I thought, Lord, thank you,

Jesus, because I certainly don't see what he saw.

But we need to see the Lord. I said we need to see the Lord.

So Jesus is preparing them because He is preparing them to

receive the Holy Spirit. In John 16, seven, He said this.

Nevertheless, I tell you the truth, it is to your advantage

that I go away. For if I do not go away, the

Helper will not come to you. But if I depart, I will send

them to you. So Jesus said there's something

coming, I've got something more. I've been with you temporarily.

I've been with you one at a time, a few at a time, a few

thousand at a time, but not with everyone.

But the Holy Spirit is going to come when I leave.

I'm going to send him. And so in this meeting, Jesus

breathes on them what that looked like and said receive ye

the Holy Spirit. It was something amazing about

what Jesus did when he he breathed on them.

I don't know what that looks like that he did.

I know this. I can assure you that he didn't

line them up and and have them fall on the floor.

He wasn't putting on a show, but they needed to feel the nearest.

So he breathed on them. He got close enough they could

feel his breath. I prayed that for you.

I prayed that for everyone of you that in this service before

it closes, you will experience the Lord in such a way it would

be as if the breath of God was being breathed on you. 40 days

later, on the day of His ascension back to heaven.

Listen to what he says and acts. One form being assembled

together with him, He commanded them not to depart from

Jerusalem, but to wait for the promise of the Father, which he

said you have heard from me. Yes, let me let me just say

this. When Jesus breathed on him and

said received the Holy Spirit, there was no manifestation

recorded. There's nothing said about

anything happening. He just breathed on.

But now 40 days later, he says, for John truly baptized with

water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many

days from now. Therefore, when they had come

together, they asked him saying, Lord, will you at this time

restore the Kingdom of Israel? He said to them, It's not for

you to know the times or seasons which the Father has put in his

own authority, but you shall receive power.

You shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you.

This is 40 days after he breathed on them and said,

receive the Holy Spirit. You receive power when he's come

upon you, and you'll be my witnesses to me in Jerusalem and

all Judea and Samaria to the end of the earth.

So Jesus in John 20 breathes on the disciples, extends an

invitation which you could take or leave.

He said, receive ye the Holy Spirit.

He didn't make them do it. He said receive this Amen.

He didn't, he didn't, He didn't demand.

He just said, I want you to receive the Holy Spirit.

And what was a breath? Then 50 days later, 40 days and

10 more that they waited, turned in to not just a breath, but a

rushing mighty wind that filled all the house where 120

believers were gathered and the Bible said they were all filled

with the Holy Spirit. There is something special about

the infilling of the Spirit. The Spirit of God had been with

him. Jesus said he's with you, but

he's going to be in you, in you. Now for whatever it's worth to

all of you, I believe that every born again believer has the Holy

Spirit. I do, I believe that, but I

believe there's an endowment from power for power.

I believe there is something more that God will give us if we

receive what He wants to give us.

There's witnesses. In fact, let me just, there's a

quote, I don't know how many familiar with the name Samuel

Chadwick, but he was a great Methodist preacher in England

and author of writer and he said this over 100 years ago.

He said the Christian religion is hopeless without the Holy

Ghost. He said the Christian, this

whole concept is hopeless if the Holy Spirit isn't in it.

The way we live our lives, the way we walk, the way we talk,

the way we have victory is a product of the Holy Spirit.

Thank God it's not dependent on man, but it is dependent on God.

And the Holy Spirit is just as alive today as he ever was a

man. So there is a need for the

breath of God. Adam needed the breath of God to

live physically. Couldn't live.

Perfect structure, perfect looking human being in every

way. Head full of hair, handsome

dude. No life until God breathed into

his nostrils the breath of life. You know, we often try, if we're

not careful, to live this life in our own strength, in her own

power. But we have to understand that

it is the life that Jesus gives us.

It is the breath of God that we receive by faith.

The apostle James said this. He said draw near to God and he

will draw near to you. Now you can't feel someone's

breath that you aren't close to, James said.

If you want God to be close to you, he said.

Then you take steps and you begin to draw near to God.

Be close enough that you can feel his breath, close enough

that you can hear his voice. My concern today in this service

is to pray, and I'm not even really at this particular time

preaching about, although it's certainly part and parcel of

this passage, the baptism of the Holy Spirit.

But what I am saying is that many of us, we need the breath

of God, We need the breath of God and we need to hear the

words of Jesus when he said receive.

Jesus said to those disciples, receive the Holy Spirit,

receive, open up, open up to God.

And I want to say to people in here today, because some of you

are here, you're worn down, you're discouraged, you're

suffering battle fatigue, you're finding it hard.

I want you to let Jesus breathe on you today.

I want you to draw close enough to him that you will sense the

breath of God. Now, I'm not talking about a

physical breath, but I'm talking about something spiritual.

How many believe that God is real?

This Bible is not just a textbook of historical origin

and fact. It tells us about a living God,

an ever present Holy Spirit that is with us.

The Holy Spirit is among us today.

And I want to say to you today, the keyword in this passage is

received. He's looking at people that

group gathered in fear, that group not knowing if they would

survive the next day, if they'd be hauled into prison, if they

themselves might be crucified. They had no knowledge of what

was going to happen to them. And they're sitting in fear.

But Jesus comes in, breathes on them and says receive.

So I want to say that to you today.

I want you to receive. It may be receive the Holy

Spirit, the baptism, the infilling of the Holy Spirit.

It may be that you need to receive encouragement.

You may need to receive healing. You need may need to receive

joy. You may need to receive peace.

The question is, will you receive well?

You open your heart up and say, Lord, I need something from you.

I need a breath of fresh air. I live in a stale a world, a

world of stale stagnated breath. I need the breath of God.

When when we watch and we see what's happening on television

and, and, and in the movies and everywhere else that we look and

we see so much profanity and so many, so much lewd speech and

talk. Wouldn't it be great to have a

breath of holy fresh air breathe on you today?

That God says, I want you to receive what you need.

I want you to have what you need.

Here's what we know about the Lord First Corinthians 1545 and

says, and so it is written, the first man, Adam became a living

being, a living being. But the last Adam, which is

Jesus by the way, became a life giving spirit, a life giving

spirit. So when Jesus breathes on you,

you come alive. When Jesus his breath reaches

your need and reaches your desperation, It's then that the

touch of the Lord causes new life to come into you.

So I've said what I want to say because I want the Lord to

breathe on you. I want worship team come back.

I want everyone in this room to get a breath, a fresh spiritual

air. Every person.

I don't want to leave anybody out because I have a feeling

that there is no one here that couldn't use a breath of fresh

air. I need to come up to the top for

a moment. Just breathe in.

Remember that old, old course? I don't know if it was a

Methodist course or what. So simple.

Let it breathe on me. Let the breath of God now

breathe on me. Let it breathe on me.

Let the breath of God now breathe on me.

Thanks for joining us today. If you'd like to connect, visit

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