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Somebody give him praise in this place. Hallelujah. We worship you, Jesus.
We need more of you, more of your Holy Spirit. We pray this morning in Jesus name, Lord, we need you. Lord, you show us throughout your word that we would never to get satisfied or content with where we are. But Lord, you would lead us and guide us into all truth that you would fill us and fill us again and fill us again. That you would move through us, that your gifts, Lord, you said that we were to desire the spiritual gifts. Literally lust after them, to desire them fervently. And Lord, we do. We want you to move. We don't want just knowledge, but we want the moving and power of your spirit, God. And we pray for this today in Jesus name. Everybody say, Amen. Amen. All right. You may be seated this morning. Just a quick announcement, just to let everybody know. I know we got new people here. We don't have the children's church thing. We don't have youth group thing. We don't do a lot of things that traditional churches do. But if children get unruly or loud and start disrupting, you can go down those stairs to the lower part. And there's a room on the side. And actually, the service is being broadcast down there. So is it still where they can see it or just hear it or both? See it and hear it. OK. So so you can go down there still here and see the service if your child gets unruly. And what we found over the years is that's been, you know, parents have started teaching their children how to stay in the service. And it's a little job. You have to work at it a little bit over time. But we found out that the kids being in the main service has been good because we've had kids that have grown up in this church. We just passed 15 years of fire and grace church. Your son grew up in here and they learned a lot of things. Yeah, they learned a lot of things that they wouldn't have heard. And I actually tell you the truth. There's nowhere in the Bible says do a youth group. Right. I find that a youth group tends to sow division in the church. But that's another story for another day. But anyway, that's just so you know, it's down there and you can still hear the service. All right. Y'all ready? Y'all got your Bibles this morning. All right. That's a good thing. All right. I want you to open it up. Let's see. Let's turn first to and I really I really don't know. We're going to go to a lot of different verses this morning. But last week, the Lord had me give you a message about knowing Jesus, knowing Jesus, and what that really means to know him intimately personally about being born again. And then throughout that message, I kind of touched on the absolute necessity on being filled with the Holy Spirit, baptized in the Holy Spirit, led by the Holy Spirit. Now, because of the debate and all that stuff that went forth there back in December, we've literally, I think, tripled the number of people watching and listening. OK, so we got a lot of new people watching and listening. And so I get a lot of questions.
And because I mentioned the baptism, the Holy Spirit last week and with the evidence, the initial evidence, speaking of the tongues, I got a lot of questions about that. So we're going to go into that a little bit today because it's important. There's still some of you in here that though you've heard me preach and teach on this several times, you are still not baptized in the Holy Spirit. Now, let me say this up front, because we have people from all kind of different backgrounds. I'm not saying that you have to be baptized in the Holy Spirit and speak in tongues to be saved when you get saved. And we'll show you by the word of God, when you get saved, the Holy Spirit does come in you. But the baptism, the Holy Spirit is clearly taught in the New Testament as a second work after you are born again. And it is to be filled to overflowing. And when you are filled with what the Bible calls the baptism of the Holy Spirit, the initial evidence of that is the gift of tongues. Now, yes, as you grow and mature, there should be the fruit of the Spirit in your life. All those nine fruits, including the one that's my favorite is temperance, self-control, right? Meaning the Holy Spirit gives you the ability to control yourself. But hear what I'm saying, even a baby Christian can be baptized or filled with the Holy Spirit and began with the gift of unknown new tongues, supernatural tongues, and then began to operate in all the gifts of the Holy Spirit. When I came back to the Lord at 19 years old, it was just about three weeks later. I wasn't in a church. I couldn't go to church, in fact, because I worked on Sundays. That's the whole reason my Christian boss hired me. He hired his heathen, unsaved, you know, 19 year old to work for him on Sunday. So he could go to church. So I couldn't go to church for the first year. But you know what I did? Read the Bible and prayed and truly had repented of my sin and given my life to the Lord. So about three weeks later, I make it to the book of Acts. So I start reading Acts chapter two where he tells them to go to Jerusalem and wait. Now, that is so important because what struck me, and I was 19 years old. I didn't know everything, but it was the Holy Spirit revealing it to me. What struck me was if the apostles who Jesus trained personally for three plus years needed to go to Jerusalem and wait to be baptized in the Holy Spirit, filled with the Holy Spirit, then how much more do I need to be filled with the Holy Spirit and operate in the Holy Spirit? And so I began to pray right there. And I was at the time I had been living there for a season with my stepbrother. We were just working summer break from college. He was from I think he was going to Oklahoma State and I was from going to Troy State at the time. We ended up in Oklahoma, then in Arkansas. He had left, but I was all by myself. So I was just there praying and said, Lord, I need this. And I felt as I prayed, the Holy Spirit come upon me. I mean, I felt his peace and his presence come upon me. And you say, well, how do you know if it's the Holy Spirit?
Well, if you got truly born again, the Holy Spirit bore witness with you. You had an experience with Jesus that you felt that was supernatural. And so that's always the way you know if it's the Holy Spirit, you're going to get the same witness that you did when you were born again. All right. And I remember the Holy Spirit came upon me, but I was sitting there holding my mouth shut. Let me go ahead and tell you right now, when it comes to the gift of tongues and allowing that river to flow, if you don't open your mouth and start in faith in some way, I'm not going to tell you how, because I don't know it's a step of faith you have to take. But if you sit there and hold your mouth shut, that's never going to happen in that regard, because the Holy Spirit comes upon you and you speak with other tongues as the Spirit gives you utterance. And this is probably one of the two biggest hindrances, I'm going to tell you right now, to people who say, well, I've prayed for the baptism of the Holy Spirit and the gift of tongues, but I haven't received it. The two biggest hindrances, well, let's say three. The three biggest, number one, is unbelief and wrong teaching. That's held a lot of people back. Another thing is, and I'm going to show you and put up Acts 5.32 for me. A lot of people have not received the baptism of the Holy Spirit with the gifts of the Holy Spirit in their lives because they have yet to truly surrender to the will of God. You understand? There's a lot of Christians who got born again, but now they're still living, they're living disobedient lives. Can I just go ahead and tell you, you can pray for the Holy Spirit all day long and you're going to receive nothing if you're a disobedient, flesh-living, sin-living Christian. Because look at this verse right here. I could read the whole chapter, but the apostles say, well, we are witnesses of these things, and so also is the Holy Ghost or the Holy Spirit whom God has given to them that obey Him. Now, if you've been seeking to receive the baptism of the Holy Spirit or the evidence of tongues and then operate the gifts of the Spirit and that's not happening in your life, maybe it's time to ask, am I walking in obedience to the Lord? Have I truly repented of my sin? Have I surrendered my life? See, the key when I was 19 years old was, I didn't just repent of my sin, I gave up my life, my plans, my will. This is where a lot of Christians have not come to yet, that part where you're willing to forsake all and follow Jesus no matter what the cost. See, I had the modeling career, the movie thing was opening up, I had plans to play football at Troy, I had plans, I just rehabbed my knee and all that stuff, I had plans, I had all these plans. I was going into pre-med, I had all these plans I was going to do. And the moment Jesus revealed Himself again to me, because He revealed Himself when I was 11 and then He revealed Himself again to me when I was 19,
but this was the call to surrender all, that no more was I to live for myself or do my own will or my own plans. And so many Christians have not gotten to this place of denying self, taking up the cross, and willing to follow Jesus. And until you're willing to do that, you're not obedient, because obedience says, Lord, whatever you have me to do, I'm going to do it. From this point on, I surrender. And I know there's a lot of Christians, especially in this, how do I call it, this seeker-sensitive church growth cult age we live in, that most churches have bought into this lukewarm, watered-down Christianity that offends no one and demands nothing. True Christianity is discipleship. It is turning from sin and turning from self. You are not your own, you are bought with the price. You become a servant, a slave. You have a master who tells you what to do. And you say, yes, Lord, I will do that. I'm going to go ahead and tell you right now, no part of me several years ago wanted to run for governor of Alabama. No part of me. But God did such amazing things through that obedience that are still bearing fruit right now to this day. People got saved. People got filled with the Holy Spirit. People got exposed to truth they would have never heard. And I also have the ears of some of our leaders now that are listening to what I have to say about some things. And that's going to be good for us in the days ahead, I assure you. But see, you don't have to understand everything. When the Holy Spirit, when you know the Holy Spirit and you know how to hear His voice and discern His leading in your life, you don't have to understand everything up front, what He's telling you to do. You just do it. You don't lean to your own understanding. Look, it made no sense to me. I'm like, Lord, you've called me to pastor this church, not run all over the state and run for governor. How am I going to do both? And you know what? He enabled me to do both. In two years of campaigning, I missed three Sundays. And I remember being so tired coming in on a Saturday night from maybe South Alabama and North Alabama and getting in at 2 a.m. and having to get up at 6 and get ready for church. But I look back on that. I remember when the Lord told me to go to Nigeria. That was at the time was not a convenient time for me. There was all kind of things going on in my life. And it was a time of difficulty. And I'm like, Lord, this is not a good time. He said that I ask you if it was a good time.
I said, go, you either obey or you don't. And what do I say, sir? And I go there and God moves every day for a month. The Holy Spirit moves in power when I'm feeling like death warmed over. I'm feeling like I shouldn't even be here. And I go to a healing service where there's about 700 people and everybody in the place got healed. Everybody that was sick got healed. And I felt like a dead empty shell that shouldn't even be there. See, this is another thing. You don't go by the way your emotions feel or the way your body feels. Smith Wigglesworth, my wife just posted this on Facebook. We've talked about this for years. But the man dealt with, you know, he's doing some of the most powerful healing, miracle, evangelistic crusades in the history of the 20th century. People are getting healed of everything from cancer. He's raising the dead, the crippled or walking, blind or seeing. It's amazing what God was doing through this man. It was so powerful what God was doing through Smith Wigglesworth that when he went to San Francisco, they laid people in the street so his shadow could pass over and heal them. Six years doing those type of healing, miracle crusades, he's struggling with kidney stones, passing kidney stones and bleeding and to the point he would almost pass out while he's praying for people. And the Lord told him they were wanting to do surgery. And the Lord told him, no knife will touch your body. So he dealt with that pain. Kidney stones, folks, I haven't had one but I've heard, it's pretty bad. But he was having kidney stones that were causing him to lose a lot of blood too. And yet God's healing people through him, laying hands on the sick and they were recovering. And miracles were happening. He used to say, my body doesn't tell me how it feels, I tell it how it feels. And what he said was, my flesh and my mind and my emotions are not going to determine me obeying God to go preach the gospel, lay hands on the sick, cast out demons. I don't care what I feel like, I'm going to go do it. And I somehow can't get this across to Christians. It don't matter how you feel. You better get up and do what God's told you to do. I don't care how much you don't want to do it. Man, I tell you, he's had me do things. Writing books to me is just painful because I got to sit down and spend hours and hours of research and writing and rewriting and editing and just research again and research again and check and double check. And I'm like, now he wants me to finish another one. And I'm like, I don't want to write a book. I don't want to write another book. Guess what? It doesn't matter. I remember when the Lord told me to write like clay into the sea of 479 pages and it should have been 800 pages. I had to just say, I got to stop at some point.
But I remember writing that and the whole time leading up to it, I dreaded it. In fact, I started and stopped. I don't have time for this. I don't want to do this. His Holy Spirit came upon me and said, you better write this book. Remember last time what happened when you didn't write when I told you to? That's why I'm limping around right now. But I look back now going, how God's using that book? I mean, it's going all over the world, you know? It's opening eyes all over the world to the truth. And in that book, I didn't just preach about creation. I talk about the baptism, the Holy Spirit, the gifts of the Holy Spirit, what is the true gospel, end time prophecy. I talk about all kind of stuff in that book. And it's opening people's eyes, bringing people to the Lord. You get what I'm saying? And I look back going, I'm glad I wrote it in 2019. So it would be ready for 2023 and 2024. This is another reason why you have to obey what God tells you to do, because your obedience now is going to affect a lot of things later on down the road. This is why, folks, if you get anything from me for 2024, it is time to pray and fast and make sure you are hearing the Lord speak to you about what you are to do, where you are to be, where you are to go, where you're to work, where you're to live, where you're to go to church, everything. You need to be led by the Lord, period. And I'm going to tell you right now that if you don't seek, if you're not baptized in the Holy Spirit with the evidence of speaking in other tongues, if you don't have that, you need to pursue that, because that gift and that infilling of the Holy Spirit is going to help you. It's going to help you do what you need to do. It's going to help you hear. I'm going to show you this in a minute about quench, not the Spirit. In fact, you can turn to 1 Thessalonians, Chapter 5. Well, I want to share this with you. I'm not going to tell who it is, but I wonder if Sal and them. They're not here. Oh, they got a sick one. But Sal came up here with me. There was a guy from a young guy from that's that's in a ministry up in Tennessee that called me and he was just having some serious issues, some demonic, serious demonic issues. And, you know, it's about to cause him to lose his ministry and possibly his wife. I mean, it was getting that bad. And really, he had a severe like anger rage problem. He said he said he would go from just just like the nicest, sweetest guy one minute. And he said to the point where he he couldn't control it and wouldn't know who he was. I mean, he was like almost blackout from it. He'd be like, that's not me. Who is that doing that?
So he his parents had visited here. He called me. I told him listen to the deliverance series, which is what I listen. If anybody wants to know about deliverance around here is what you do first. You listen to the entire deliverance series. Okay, maybe two or three times would be good for you. Get the word of God in you because the word builds faith. Then you fill out the deliverance form that's on there. And then you can start praying through it yourself. Okay, this is what we want people to do. And if you feel like you hit a roadblock or you're not getting you're not making progress. Then we try to sit down with you and help you do it. But this is what we want people to do because this is what you should do. All right. So what he's doing, he he he listened. He said, yes, sir. I'm gonna do that. He said he's listening to the deliverance series on our website. We got a whole part of the website just dedicated to deliverance. He said, in fact, it was the deliverance seminar that we did or conference. We did in 2021. He's listening to it. And he said, I started praying over the crowd. He said, and I got to the spirit of rage and anger. And he said, oh, he said, oh, this is for me. And he said, and I said, and some of the I said, some of you in the thing, you know, this is for you because you just felt that you felt that he goes. Yeah, I felt it. He said, I prayed with you while listening in his car. He said, this thing left me. I felt that leave this demon spirits of anger and rage and just flipping out. He said his wife is in office like he is a different person. Then he got filled with the Holy Spirit. He said, I heard you talking about that. So I asked the Lord next thing I know tongues is coming out of me. And I said, and I remembered the verse. He told us sitting right in my office this week. He said, I heard. I remember the verse that says he that prays in an unknown tongue. Let him also pray that he interprets. He said, Lord, I pray that I interpret every time the Lord told him. It was something he absolutely needed to hear. Speaking in tongues, interpretation of tongues. And he shared with them some. I was like, man, this kid is going to be something else. I warned him. I said, they probably going to kick you out of your church at some point here pretty soon, but just keep fighting and keep standing. He goes, I know it's coming. But I mean, he can't he's come from, you know, a staunch Baptist background and he's just finding out, wow, this deliverance thing is for real, which guess what? What did you say when he talked about casting demons out? He said, it's by the spirit of God. See, casting demons out comes from being anointed and having the power and authority to cast them out. And then he gets baptized in the Holy Spirit and the gift of tongues start working in his life and then immediately the gift of interpretation, which the gift of tongues and interpretation together is equivalent to prophecy, meaning you're hearing what the Holy Spirit is saying,
not just what he said in the Bible, but what he's saying to you. And this is so vitally important. This folks, this is basic Christianity. OK, but we have entire denominations, even Pentecostal ones that are now quenching the Holy Spirit. They don't want him. They don't want him to manifest in their services. They don't want the gift of tongues or interpretations of tongues in public. They don't want that. They don't want people shaking or falling down or getting baptized in the Holy Spirit. They don't want tongues. They don't hear they're embarrassed. Let's go to that verse. Oh, we're going to come at it a little different direction. I love this verse in First Thessalonians five there. Quench not the spirit. I need to turn there myself. Could there not be a more clear command? Quench not the spirit. I want to read a little bit of this. We'll read from about verse 12. Let's read this. And we beseech you, brethren, to know them which labor among you and are over you in the Lord and admonish you and to esteem them very highly in love for their work sake and be at peace among yourselves. Now we exhort you, brethren, warn them that are unruly. Comfort the feeble minded. Support the weak. Be patient toward all men. See that none render evil for evil unto any man, but ever follow that which is good both among yourselves and to all men. Rejoice evermore. Pray without ceasing. In everything give thanks for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you. Quench not the spirit. Somebody say that with me. Quench not the spirit. And then very next thing he says despise not prophesying. Now prophesying the reason he put an S there because the spirit of God can manifest the gift of prophecy through a word of knowledge, a word of wisdom, a vision, a dream, tongues and interpretation of tongues. He's letting you know don't despise prophecy any way it comes. But I know there are churches that won't even allow it in their midst. We want to know what's wrong with the American church and the Western church. It's long time ago, probably suffer some of them 20 years ago, 30 years ago. They quench the Holy Spirit. They said, no, we're not going to have any of this tongue stuff. We're not going to have any of these gifts. We're not going to have any of these manifestations. We want to be the mega church in town. We want to be respectable. We want to make sure the world approves of us or our denominational heads. Make sure they don't come down on remove us.
See folks, that's why I'm not in a denomination never could be. I preached in those churches, assembly of God churches for a while, and I knew it was only a matter of time for they gave me the nice left foot of fellowship. Because I was in a church in Montgomery where the new pastor came in saying, we're done with letting worship just go as long as it should. However, along the Holy Spirit, once we're done with having the gift of tongues and interpretation of tongues operating this church or the gift of prophecy, we're not going to have any more people slithering on the floor like snakes and casting demons out of them. We're not going to have any more of that. I can tell you the name of the church in Montgomery. I had the pastor, the new pastor, tell me that face to face, we're going to be the mega church of the city. We're going to be the Pentecostal mega church of the city. I said, no, you're not. I said, I'm going to tell you what you're doing right now. You're quenching the Holy Spirit and he's going to leave you. And then your spiritual Holy Ghost filled your mature Christians are going to get filled with the deadness and the dryness and they're going to leave. And then who's going to come? You're going to get a whole group of people that are either goats trying to pretend to be sheep and enemies and weak Christians and you're going to have a weaker church. And I knew people in that church. I knew people that were godly men and women who were mature that said they stayed a while. But they said, I can't do it anymore. And I'll tell you this right now. The moment you quench the Holy Spirit, you're also going to quench discernment in your life because discernment is not being is not detective work. Discernment is a Holy Spirit revealing something to you that you cannot see otherwise about a situation. Somebody told me last night, I'm not going to say who it was. Somebody told me last night that they go to a church, that they're tithing to Kenneth Copeland Ministries. I was like, there's no discernment there at all. Because I'm going to tell you in the late 1980s, I saw Kenneth Copeland, I turned on TV, and the Holy Spirit immediately said, nope, I don't have to know anything. The Holy Spirit said, no, no, no. And now we know why. Look at it. Buddied up with the Pope and the Vatican and trying to lead Christians into Roman Catholicism like it's okay. It's a wonderful thing. We're going to be in unity. No, we can't be in unity with idolatrous demonic system called Roman Catholicism. And it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure that out. A little bit of discernment. But if you've already said no to the Holy Spirit about the gifts operating in church or quenching praise and worship or just thinking it's not important
and we're going to preach on everything like how to deal with stress at work but we're not going to talk about. See, let me show you this word quench here. Let me put up the definition. These are from the Strongs and the Thayers, the Greek lexicons. You got them? All right, here's the first one here. Now, of course, the Blue Letter Bible uses this. They use the outline of biblical usage which what they're doing is they're taking the definitions from the Strongs and the Thayers and they're just giving you a basic outline. So what it says here to extinguish, to quench the fire or things on fire and the Holy Spirit's from her too is fire, to be quenched, to go out. It says here to quench, to suppress or stifle. Just remember that. We're going to look at that too. You know, the Holy Spirit, let me just read this to you. The Holy Spirit, I just wrote this down this morning. I'm talking about knowing the Holy Spirit. I said he's revealed as fire, spiritual fire, wind, water, rivers of water, anointing oil. He's called the Comforter, teacher, guide. He is the power, the miraculous power of God. He's called the Spirit of Jesus Christ. He's called the Spirit of the Father. He's called the Spirit of truth, the Spirit of grace, the Holy Spirit of God, the Spirit of wisdom and revelation, the Spirit of judgment, the Spirit of burning. These are just a few, but He's Holy Spirit fire. He's come to what? What does fire do? Burn the crap out of your life, to purify you like gold. That was for Shuri. Shuri came to one of our first services back in 2009 with her eight-year-old son, and she had told him that his, that crap was a bad word, and then I said it from the pulpit. I saw her son look at her, and I thought, oh, I just messed up. But look at that, to put out the Holy Spirit fire. I mean, that's like saying the Holy Spirit, maybe sometimes in a church, just a little, just a little flicker starts happening. And you got pastors and deacons and elders, and then people come in and just dump water on it. No, we're not having that. But think about this. Think about the word suppress and stifle, suppress. Oh, yeah. You know, we believe in the Holy Spirit, but we're not going to have tongues in our church. And somebody starts trying to talk about it
or teach it in a Sunday school class or something, and guess what? No, you're not. That's called suppression. Let's look at the definition of suppress here. Suppress and stifle. I got both of them. Here's suppress. To forcibly put to an end, or put it into, here's what I found interesting when I read this. Prevent the development, action, and expression. Now, we're talking about the gifts and power of the Holy Spirit and what He wants to do. To suppress the development, because this is something you need to grow in in maturity, and action and expression. To prevent the dissemination of information. No, we're not teaching on that. I remember when First Baptist Church here a few years ago did a whole series through the Book of Acts and somehow never talked about the gift of tongues. Skip right over it. And yeah, you sat through it, didn't you, Cindy? I heard about it. People told me about it. They're like, how did He skip over it? It's in Acts 2. It's Acts 10. It's Acts 19. How did He skip over that? I'm like, how convenient. There must be a Baptist Bible that erases that. We're going to go to those verses in a minute, but prevent the dissemination of information. Not even willing to teach your congregation what the Bible says about being filled with the Holy Spirit, the baptism of the Holy Spirit. And some of you immediately, I know you come from these Baptist backgrounds. Well, tongues are supposed to only be there if there's interpretation. You have no idea what you're even talking about. That's been planted in your head so that you will be negative about something that you're supposed to really have in your private life to help you in prayer. You're all worried about what happens in the service. That's my job. You worry about what's happening in your private life. And trust me, I wouldn't have made it this far as a Christian fulfilling the ministry God's called me to if I didn't pray in tongues in the Spirit often. And in fact, it was praying in tongues last night when the Lord said, I want you to talk about the baptism of the Holy Spirit tomorrow. Because I'm going to tell you right now, as you pray in tongues and in the Spirit, you get more sensitive to the Holy Spirit. And I was praying. I remember I sat down last night, I was reading the Bible like, again, there's a million things I can preach on, you know, I could I could just, I could start at eight o'clock in the morning and I could preach the eight o'clock at night and never preach the same thing. All right. But that's not what the Holy Spirit wants. The Holy Spirit is going to say, I want you to preach on this or teach on this this day. And sometimes there's a reason. Sometimes, you know, sometimes it's only for one or two people, maybe. Sometimes maybe it's for everybody.
I don't know. But this is important. I'm going to tell you, we, we, we, I'm going to say that I feel like the Lord's having me do this today because it's like, stop skipping over this like, oh, he's teaching on that again, but we're just going to wait till he moves on to something else. Because somebody needs, some of you need a deliverance from that Baptist demon. Yeah. You hear me? That told you that this is somehow bad or negative or because there's people who get into extremes and get into error with it that you should run away from. And I have to look. I know. I wrote a book about the extremes and the errors within the Pentecostal Charismatic Church. I know there's extremes and I know there's wrong stuff and I know there's counterfeit tongues and there's counterfeit satanic demonic miracles masquerading. But like I've said many, many, many times before, just because, you know, we've had offerings here that contain counterfeit money. Yes, we've had counterfeit hundred dollar bills, counterfeit fifties that have come into the ministry over the years. But are we going to say because we've received some counterfeits, we're done with money. That's it. No more. So send any more money. I'm going to throw mine that's in my wallet away because it could be counterfeit. But this is what people do. They throw the baby out with the bathwater type thing. Oh, there's been some counterfeits. There's some problems. So let's let's just stay away from that altogether. I mean, I got people right now saying, oh, you know, that still come after me and come at me because I say the Brownsville revival was a real move of the Holy Spirit was a real revival. Well, I was there. I was there night after night after night. I was there almost weekly for the first year that I went 1996 to 97 and probably almost once a month from 97 on. I mean, I was there a lot. Did some people come in? And and manifest in the counterfeit stuff at the Brownsville revival? Yeah, I saw him getting in the aisles and start whooping and acting like a fool. And it wasn't the Holy Spirit. And I saw ushers come and take them outside. But see, I was there. I was at the altar counseling people who came forward in the altar calls who either repented rededicated their lives to Jesus turned from sin or came down to get touched by God and filled with the Holy Spirit. I saw the tears. I saw the real thing. Night after night after night. And look, I'm going to tell you, in any move of God, in any revival, you're going to have people try to creep in and cause problems. And you're going to have immature people who do immature things. But what was the gospel of Jesus Christ preached in that revival? Every night, Steve Hill got up there.
Give your life to Jesus. Turn from sin. Repent every night. I'm amazed. You know, one of the miracles is how many different sermons that guy came up because he preached about six times a week for five years. Think about that. He'd get home at two. Have to get up at six. Get ready for the next night. And sometimes he'd go preach somewhere during the day and then go preach the revival at night. And they said, they said, oh, yeah, we'll take Mondays off. So as the revival went on, they started taking Mondays off. And then what they do, started traveling on Mondays to go preach somewhere else. And I saw, I saw the Holy Spirit. See, this is what, when the Holy Spirit is moving, unsaved people and hardened, backslidden prodigals. And he's breaking them down. And they're down there. And they're down there weeping. And I'm not talking about little tear run down their face. I'm talking about that ugly cry. Snot and everything, just all over the altar, convicted over their sin, over their backsliding. People would come lay their drugs and their cigarettes on the altar at Brown. Browns would be fit. They just have to, they have to come in and scoop them all up. You gonna tell me that was the devil doing that? You know, we sang that song about Holy Spirit. Come, come rest on us. Let me tell you, if he ever does, what he comes to produce, it's not just miracles and not just the gifts of the Holy Spirit. He comes to deal with us and make us holy. And you ever get really in his glory. The first thing anybody in the glory of God says, like Isaiah, woe is me. I am undone. I am unclean. Remember when Jesus, they fished all night and taken nothing? And the Lord said, let down your nets again. Let's do it again. And Peter said, Lord, we fished all night. We've caught nothing. Nevertheless, it's your word. And he did it. And we know that that was his attitude. You know why? Because the moment they caught the fish, he fell on his knees and said, Lord, depart from me. I'm a sinful man. He recognized immediately when God manifested his glory in that miracle. He realized, you know what? My whole attitude was sin. You see, I want the Holy Spirit. But I will tell you, the Holy Spirit moved at Skyfall this year like I felt at Brownsville and in other really powerful meetings I've been over the years. I tell you what, though,
the thing I'm disappointed in the most is that that kind of glory and that kind of power, that kind of manifestation didn't continue. See, revival is when that continues. And this is something I think everybody, while we were worshiping back there a minute ago, I thought if we would all be hungry, I mean really hungry, for the Holy Spirit to come and send true revival. And that's what we prayed for. I often thought, I want to ask you all, don't raise your hand because I don't want to incriminate you. You can plead the fifth. But how many of you really this week really spent time saying, Lord, pour out your spirit, move Sunday morning in a powerful way in church, touch people, speak to people, heal people, deliver people, let the gifts of the Spirit go. How many of you spent time, I'm talking about praying that day after day, and being, I want you to move in church, God. I want you to move Sunday morning. I want you there. See, I dare say, if I had you raise your hands, a lot of you say, I didn't even really think about that all week long. And I'm sitting back there just going, Lord, I'm so hungry for you to move like you did at Skyfall, like you did at Brownsville, like I've seen you move in places. I want you to do that every Sunday. In fact, I hope at one point it starts going day after day after day. That's revival. Revival is when the Holy Spirit starts moving and you let him keep moving. And as great ministers of the past have said, it's kind of like cranking up the car, putting it in drive and putting your foot on the gas and you get it moving. And a lot of times what happens is we get there and God starts moving and we take our foot off the gas, take our foot off the gas and stop being hungry and thirsty and realizing that as quickly as he comes upon something, he can leave it. Let's put up that one. Did we put up Stifle? We don't want to stifle. Stifle makes someone unable to breathe. I thought that's interesting because the Holy Spirit is referred to as like breath. Whereas the body without the Spirit is like the, I mean, he said the faith without works is dead, being alone, he's like the body is dead too without the Spirit or the breath. And I thought, isn't that interesting that you like suffocate someone, you stop someone from breathing. That's what we do when we quench the Holy Spirit in church. We stop the life of God from being in our church.
That's why these churches are dead folks. That's why they're singing Bon Jovi to open the services. That's why they need smoke machines because he ain't there. The Holy Spirit can move in and sometimes you can see the glory of God like smoke. When I got saved when I was 11 years old and walked the aisle, the glory of God, the smoke of God surrounded me. I walked down the aisle in a cloud. I didn't know what it was at 11 years old. I didn't find out and realize it until years later. Smoke machines. Lord Jesus, laser shows, smoke machines. Music so loud at decibel levels that will hurt baby's hearing. We experienced that recently. Literally had somebody brought, one of our church family brought earplugs because they knew we were going to need them. I miss how bad it is. Now, look, I'm an old 80s guy. I like music kind of loud, but not where it's damaging my hearing. Not where it hurts. You know what I'm saying? I walked out of concerts back in the day and one time couldn't hear for a couple of days. It's not good, right? And guess what? It doesn't have to be loud. One thing we found at Skyfall, Mark and Hannah Pung, they, for Michigan, led worship. She's on an acoustic guitar. He's on an electric guitar. We don't even have a drummer. And it was just, it wasn't loud. It wasn't crazy, but it was anointed. The Holy Spirit was upon it. I'd rather have that. I don't care. I'd rather have somebody with one little acoustic guitar that can hardly sing and they'd be anointed by the Holy Spirit flowing through them than have some sophisticated, you know, highly trained band that's just a bunch of secular, you know, they're just a bunch of carnal Christians through the week. In fact, that's why, look, we still, 15 years, don't have a praise and worship team. And we've had several come and go because you know what matters? The anointing of the Holy Spirit. Not your talent. But if you can mix talent and have the anointing of the Holy Spirit, then we, hey, now we're rocking and rolling. Now we can do, we can do something. But that's so rare anymore. I'll tell you one of the reasons it's rare is because pastors will just let anything go. They'll let anybody up on stage if they got talent. And first thing, I'm going to tell you what, praise and worship leaders come under attack. They are, the devil hates them, especially if they got their hearts right. So they got to be serious Christians. They got to be, they got to be truly dedicated,
truly in prayer, truly in warfare, truly in fasting, or they're not going to make it. But that's for pastors too. See, it's not, folks, it's not gifts, talents, ability, all that, you know, all that's good and needful. But what do we need more than anything? The anointing and power of the Holy Spirit on it. And I'm afraid, and just like I said, these Torah ministries, that's what they're void of. They're void of the Holy Spirit because they're trying to lead people back over here. If you do this list of things, then you're going to be right with the Lord. And the Lord's over here, if you follow me and be led by the Holy Spirit, be filled with the Holy Spirit, you'll do what you need to do. Amen. That's why you don't see the gifts of the Holy Spirit. I went to one of the Torah ministries that has a big following. I did this last night just to check up on it. I went through video after video after, just looking down through the titles of the video. Not one, not one of them, and this is multiple ministry, Torah, not one of them talked about, be baptized in the Holy Spirit, speaking tongues, flow in the gifts and power of the Holy Spirit. Here's how you do it. Not one of them. Now, I know some of them say, oh, well, I know one that does. Yeah, I'd have to see that to believe it. I'd actually have to be in the midst of it and sense whether it was the Holy Spirit or not. Folks, the baptism, now, let's go read, because we've got to break down some things. Go to John, the Gospel of John, and hey, that was just the introduction. Bucko would be happy. Maybe not now, I don't know. He's gotten off into the era of preterism that I'm going to deal with in the near future in great detail. I'm going to do a Christmas mountain of God in the north Christmas-type series, if I have to, on preterism and this whole mud flood, Tataria nonsense that's going on, that we're beyond the millennial reign. I mean, Jesus already, I mean, this stuff, the stuff I'm watching Christians fall for, but again, if you were listening to the Holy Spirit and reading the Bible in its context and with the Holy Spirit helping you, you would not fall into these stupid errors. I guess it's stupid. Now, I'm not saying that there aren't buildings, there wasn't a mud flood. It may have been one. And who knows how much they've messed up the timeline of history? Those two things may be true, but how in the world you get the millennial reign of Jesus happened and disappeared
and all the things that are in Revelation and the prophecies that have yet to be fulfilled, and you say all scripture's been fulfilled, all prophecies have been fulfilled. And I'm just like, well, I'm going to dismantle that whole false teaching in systematic, because there's so many people falling into it. And again, I don't mind you saying, hey, there's some things in history that have not right and have been changed or talked about, but folks, Jesus didn't come and leave. That's about the stupidest thing I ever heard in my life, but we'll deal with it. Well, let's read this, John, chapter 20, verse 19. It's after Jesus' resurrection from the dead, and here's what it says. It says, then the same day at evening, being the first day of the week, Sunday, they did something on Sunday, when the doors were shut, where the disciples were assembled for fear of the Jews, came Jesus and stood in the midst, and saith unto them, Peace be unto you. And when he had said so, he showed unto them his hands and his side. Then were the disciples glad when they saw the Lord. And they said, then said Jesus to them, again, Peace be unto you, as my Father has sent me, even so send I you. And when he had said this, he breathed on them and saith unto them, Receive the Holy Ghost. Now, Jesus breathed on them. He walked up and went, he breathed on them. That's weird. But again, the Holy Spirit, breath, is a symbol of the Holy Spirit. And he breathed on them, being resurrected from the dead bodily, he had the fullness of the Holy Spirit within him. He breathed on them, and he said, Receive the Holy Spirit. Now, if Jesus is standing there in your midst after being raised from the dead, and he breathes on you and says, Receive the Holy Spirit, how many of you are going to bet they did? Now, but what was it for? What was he doing just then? See, they had believed that he was the Messiah, the Christ, the Son of the Living God, God in the flesh. They believed he was the Lamb of God. They believed all that. And even after, you know, the crucifixion and then the resurrection, some of them were struggling, but they still had believed. But what they still hadn't been is born again. And that is to receive the Holy Spirit coming in you for what the Bible calls regeneration, the supernatural experience of your spirit being raised to life, okay? So when Jesus breathed on them and said, Receive the Holy Spirit, that was for salvation, born again experience, regeneration. It was an impartation or infilling of the Holy Spirit to bring the life of God into their spirit for salvation.
But then what does he say? Then he appears with them what? 40 days. And we go over to Acts chapter one, verse one. The former treaties have I made O Theophilus of all that Jesus began both to do and teach until the day in which he was taken up. After that, he threw the Holy Ghost, had given commandments unto the apostles whom he had chosen, to whom also he showed himself alive after his passion by many infallible proofs, being seen of them 40 days and speaking of things pertaining to the kingdom of God and being assembled together with them, commanded them that they should not depart from Jerusalem but wait for the promise of the Father, which saith he, you have heard of me, for John truly baptized with water, but ye shall be baptized with the Holy Ghost, not many days hence. And when they were come together, they ask of him saying, Lord, wilt out this time restore again the kingdom to Israel. And he said to them, it is not for you to know the times of the seasons which the Father has put in his own power, but you shall receive power, dunamis. This is the word, miraculous supernatural power. After that, the Holy Ghost has come upon you, and you shall be witnesses both unto me in Jerusalem and in all Judea and in Samaritan unto the uttermost parts of the earth. And then when he had spoken these things, they beheld, and he was received, taken up, and a cloud received him out of their sight. So Jesus tells them, after this incident, right after he rose from the dead, he breathed on them. He tells them still, wait in Jerusalem for the baptism of the Holy Spirit. So he's not saying they didn't have the Holy Spirit. He's saying, there's something more. I'm going to give you more. Somebody say more. More is good. More of the Holy Spirit is a good thing. And see, this is what happens. When you get saved, you have the Holy Spirit in measure. You have a part. You have some. What the Lord wants to do is fill you to overflowing. That's what baptism means. It means to fill you till you're overflowing. Now, how is that a bad thing? Nothing bad about that. So he tells them. Now, they go to Jerusalem. Everybody knows this. Acts chapter 2. And when the day of Pentecost was fully come, they were all with one accord in one place. And suddenly, there came a sound from heaven as a rushing, mighty wind. Now, let me stop right there. We went from being breathed on to a rushing, mighty wind. He's showing you different degree, different measure. So when you get saved, you receive the breath. You get breathed on. You get a little bit. You get enough to make your dead spirit alive, to make you alive to God. But then he tells you, you're going to need more.
Now, I know there's a lot of people that settle for the little they got. They're kind of like when the children of Israel were supposed to go into the land and the Reubenites said, we're not going to go. We're going to stay on this side. We like this side. And the Lord is like, I told you, you're supposed to go all the way. These people around you, they're going to be thorns in your side. Oh, but we like this place right here. It's comfortable. It's beautiful. We'll go fight. We'll go help everybody else. But we're going to stay on this side. Don't ever do that. As the Lord says, I want you to go all the way into something. You need to go all the way into it. Now, again, I'm not saying you have to do this, to be saved and go to heaven. There's a lot of people who get saved. They love Jesus. They never learn about this. They never understand this. They never pursue this next infilling of the Holy Spirit. God loves them. They're going to make it. Some of them, some of them won't. But there's a lot of tongue talkers that are going to make it and some of them won't. Ouch. Because you got to keep living for Jesus, right? But he says, there suddenly there came a sound from heaven as a rushing mighty wind. And it filled all the house where they were sitting. And there appeared to them cloven tongues like as a fire and set upon each of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Ghost and began to speak with other tongues as the Spirit gave them utterance. Now, what I find amazing is, is that there are people now who say, well, that was just known languages of the world. So this other stuff, it was just so they could evangelize. And there's these excuses. Here we go, right? Yes. At this point, it was known languages, because there was a lot of people there from all over the world, different countries, different languages. And God wanted the supernatural manifestation of tongues to declare the glory, power of God, and the gospel to them in their language. Like I've said, I had an Arab taxi driver one time in Israel. He wouldn't take me where I wanted to go. He came back like he didn't understand English. So I started speaking in tongues. I have no idea what I said to him, but he took me where I wanted to go. So I know it can be known language. I don't speak Arabic, but he obviously understood. And it scared him, too, because he was like, please go. Please go. But he took me. It's funny. He took me exactly where I wanted to go and didn't try to overcharge me. You know, they try to lie about that stuff. He's like, it's this much. I said, yeah, that's right. And I was in Tel Aviv at the time. But the Holy Spirit, sometimes it'd be known language, but a lot of times it's not. Remember, and let's go to Mark 16, 15 through 20. I'm going to show you something here. And then we're going to go to 1 Corinthians 13 and deal with that.
Somebody say, amen. It's good to learn the Bible. See, this is what the Bible teaches. I don't care what denomination you are. I'm non-denominational. I'm not in a denomination. I was Baptist, and then I was Assembly of God, and then I was not. Oh, I actually was Methodist, too, for a while. I attended Methodist search for two years. It's not about a denominational thing. It's not about Pentecostal and not Pentecostal. It's just Bible. It's just what the Bible says. Jesus said this before he ascended to heaven. He said, go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature. He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved, but he that believeth not shall be damned. These signs shall follow them that believe in my name. They shall cast out devils. They shall speak with new tongues. Now, new, if you look up in the Greek lexicon, that word new means never known before. Brand new. OK, so there are tongues of men and of angels. Let's see that 1 Corinthians 13 started verse 1 there. New tongues never known before. What is something new? Something new hadn't existed before, right? It's not old. It's new. Paul wrote here, though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels. Let's pause there for a second. So what's he talking about? Tongues of angels would be what stuff? We don't know languages. We've never heard new languages to us. Right. He said, though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels and have not charity, I become a sounding brass or a tinkling cymbal. Now, of course, everybody was talking about. They love to quote this one here as if a way to speak against tongues. And all it's saying is, look, you still have to walk in love. What is walking in love? Walking in love is telling the truth. They say, oh, me. Amen. Or, oh, me. Right. Walking in love is telling the truth. Living the truth. How do we know we love the children God when we love God and keep his commandments? Right. Let's keep reading. And though I have the gift of prophecy and understand all mysteries and all knowledge and though I have all faith that I could remove mountains and have not charity or love, I am nothing. I agree. 100 percent. And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor. Now, wouldn't that be an act of love, giving all your stuff to the poor? Obviously, it cannot be. How can it not be an act of love if you're doing it in your own mind and not being led by the Holy Spirit? He said, though I give my body to be burned and have not charity, it profit of me nothing. Charity suffers long and is kind. Charity endvieth not. Charity vaunteth not itself or boast not itself. It is not puffed up.
Doth not behave itself unseemly. Seeketh not her own. Is not easily provoked. Thinketh no evil. I love this. Rejoice is not in iniquity, but rejoice is in the truth. Love, love cannot exist apart from the truth. I'm going to tell you that right now. There's counterfeit love. There's human love, but the God kind of love can only exist within the truth. We keep going. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. We're going to read all this. Charity never fails, but whether there be prophecies, they shall fail. Whether there be tongues, they shall cease. Whether there be knowledge, it shall vanish away. Now, he said, for we know in part, we prophesy in part, but when that which is perfect gives come, then that which is in part shall be done away. Now, we're going to keep reading this. So just hold on a second, but I want to say this. I love when these people try to say tongues and prophecies done away with, but knowledge is in the same passage. So has knowledge been disappeared? The need for knowledge, the knowledge of God, the study of the Bible. Do we know everything? No. Knowledge is needful. Now, maybe not to them. Maybe knowledge is passed away for them. Just saying, it's in the same verse. Tongues, prophecy, and knowledge. Stupid is. Stupid does. Right. Okay. Now, let's keep reading. But when that which is perfect up now, well, hold on. When this is taught, this is what I have had. Baptists, Presbyterian, cessationists, ministers say this to me. That that is talking about when the canon of scripture was completed, when the Bible was completed, the Bible is the perfect word of God. I have no disagree with that. I believe it's the infallible, inspired word of God. Okay. But they say that this means when the Bible was finished, when the canon was finished, the New Testament canon, we have that which is perfect. There's no more need for tongues, interpretation, tongues, prophecy, blah, blah, blah. Now, nowhere in this passage does it say that. You have to add that to it. Okay. But let's keep reading the context of this. And I'm going to show you the context and the definition. He says, but that when that which is perfect has come and that which is in part shall be done away with. Let's keep going. When I was a child, I spoke as a child, understood as a child, I thought as a child, but when I became a man, I put away childish things. When you became mature believer. And he says, for now we see through a glass darkly, but then what, what then is he referring to? What is then going back to? Then is going back to when he says, when that wind that which is perfect. And he says, then, but then face to face, meaning when we see Jesus face to face. Now, what does the Bible say in 1st, John chapter three, we see him, we shall be like him. Right. So at the moment we see him face to face at the second coming or at the resurrection, the first resurrection.
When we see Jesus in our and he resurrects us and we get a new, glorified, immortal, incorruptible body. There will be no more need to know in part, to prophesy in part, to have tongues and interpretation. We will be one with the Lord. We will have the mind of Christ. We will be fully with him. And if you go back to that verse where it says, when that which is perfect has come, put up the definition of perfect. This is from the Thayer's Greek lexicon. The definition of perfect is the word tedious. And what is Thayer's their own? I mean, this is used by all of these Baptist preachers, all these cessationist. What does it say? That which is perfect is the perfect state of all things to be ushered in by the return of Christ from heaven. That's their dictionary. So how can you say it has to do with the canon of Scripture when your own lexicon says that perfect Thilios means the consummation of all things at the second coming of Jesus Christ, which is the context of the verse which says when we see him face to face. Right? So there are one passage that they try to use to say tongues and prophecy in the gifts of the Spirit are no longer for today, is completely destroyed by context and definition. Okay? So I'm right and they're wrong. And it's fun to say that. Because you know what? I'm sticking with what the word says and what the words are defined as, not making up crap because I'm theologically uncomfortable. I don't have to do theological monkey gymnastics. I don't have to do it. I don't have to just make up stuff that's not even hinted at. And this is what they do. Every false doctrine is created out of this thin air. Out of twisting something, out of ignoring context definition. So the gifts and power of the Holy Spirit, if this is true, if the context and the definitions, let us know. And if knowledge hadn't passed away, vanished away, unless it's in their heads, then it's all still for us today. Right? Now this is what, let's go to Acts chapter 2, back to Acts chapter 2, verses 36. We'll start there. So here's verse 3. This is as, as the day of Pentecost has happened, the Holy Spirit's filled them. They've spoken in other tongues, supernatural languages they did not learn. 3000 people are, you know, well, thousands are standing there.
And Peter stands up and preach. This is that which was spoken by the prophet Joel. And he begins to give that. What's interesting, he says that in the last days, God's going to pour out his spirit and your sons and daughters are going to prophesy your young men and see visions, your old men and dream dreams, all the way until there's blood, fire and pillars of smoke and the second coming of Jesus. So you get the context of what he's saying. He's quoting the book of Joel, and then he gets to this and he says, as Peter's priest, he let all the house of Israel know assuredly that God has made this, that same Jesus whom you have crucified, most Lord in Christ. Keep going. Now, when they heard this, they were pricked in their heart and said into Peter and to the rest of the apostles, men and brethren, what shall we do? Peter said in them, repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost, the gift. What's the gift of the Holy Ghost? The baptism, tongues, the rest of the gifts. And he says, for the promise is unto you and your children and to all them that are far off, even as many as the Lord, our God shall call. Does that even hit at these things will be different or done away with or cease to exist after the canon or after the apostles die? No. Yet there, folks, there are people that get up in pulpits with straight faces and tell you that this information lies. Here's what the Bible says about it. It's to you and to your children and to all them that are far off as many as the Lord, our God shall call. And what was the content that what we say in the previous verse, the gift of the Holy Ghost. That's what he said, right? So let's just say if there was any confusion among them, of course, people kept being filled with the Holy Spirit. We go to Acts Chapter 10, go to Acts Chapter 10. Peter goes, God sends him to go preach to the Gentiles. The first time the gospel is to go to the Gentiles, he sends the Apostle Peter through amazing vision, speaking to another guy. I mean, just that whole scenario is all Holy Spirit led, right? Just the lead up to this. You go here, you do this. But we're just going to read from verse 44. So Peter's preaching the gospel of Jesus Christ to Cornelius's household, a bunch of unsaved Gentiles. And while Peter yet spake these words, the Holy Ghost fell on all them which heard the word, and they of the circumcision which believed were astonished, as many as came with Peter, because that on the Gentiles also was poured out the gift of the Holy Ghost. How did they know the gift of the Holy Ghost was poured out on the Gentiles? It said, for they heard them speak with tongues and magnify God. Then answered Peter, can any man forbid water, that these should not be baptized, which have received the Holy Ghost as well as we, or just like we did? And he commanded them to be baptized in the name of the Lord, and then prayed they hymn
to tarry certain days. So here we go. The first, this is the first evangelistic outreach to the Gentiles. And what happens? You get saved first. So what happened while Peter was preaching, they obviously believed that Jesus was on the side. They were born again, as he's preaching. He didn't even give all to call. He didn't have to lead them in prayer. They were born again because they believed it, that Jesus was the Messiah, died on the cross of this and rose from the dead. They believed it for their sins to be forgiven. God had already prepared them to receive this. And boom, God doesn't even waste any time. He's like, I'm going to show you, you bunch of Jews that are still kind of locked up in your Jewishness. I'm going to show you what I'm going to do with the Gentiles. They got filled faster. Boom. They received the gift of the Holy Ghost like us. How do we know that? We heard them speak with tongue. This is why I say that the baptism of the Holy Spirit, not salvation, not the impartation of the Holy Spirit, you receive it salvation, but the baptism, the infilling to overflowing, that this is the initial evidence of that is the gift of tongues. Why do I say that? Because that's what I see in Acts 2. And that's what I see in Acts 10. And that's what I see in Acts 19. Go to Acts 19. You see, I'm not going to skip over this important part here, like my Baptist counterpart. And I'm sorry if this offends you. If it offends you that I speak plainly about Baptist doctrine. Baptist doctrine is horrible. It stops at salvation and sometimes doesn't even get that right. And Presbyterian, Lord, Calvinism is the worst demonic poison that exists. All five points are wrong and have done more damage than I can. I can never even express. But now there's there's like there's Pentecostal groups that will say, if you don't speak in tongues, you're not safe. That's an extreme and that's an error. You get saved first. In fact, salvation, you got to be saved first and truly surrender to Jesus for you can even think about being filled with the Holy Spirit. Acts 19 verse 1, let's read it. Now, I know there's Christians that haven't ever heard this. They've never heard this talk. Some of you sitting in here, you may never heard it talk because it's ignored. But here's what it said. Acts 19. And it came to pass that while Apollos was at Corinth, Paul, having passed through the upper coast, came to Ephesus and finding certain disciples. And he saith unto them, have you received the Holy Ghost since you believe? Now, there are people that try to say these people were not believers. What's he talking about believing in?
The Greek word there, pistis or pistuo, for believe, have you received the Holy Ghost since you believe, is for saving, it means saving faith, that you have saving faith in Christ Jesus. So he says, have you received the Holy Ghost since you believe, since you were saved, since you accepted Jesus as your Lord. And then he called them disciples to begin with. Now, they're going to say that they were only knew the baptism of John, meeting baptism in water. See, the Baptists do that. You get saved. I got born again in a Baptist church. Guess what we did next? I got water baptized. That's good. But that's all we knew. My dad, at the time, he had gotten saved in that Baptist church. In fact, my dad and my brother and I got baptized in water at the same time, same day. And my dad, though, kept reading the Bible and he got to the Book of Acts. This literally happened Northside Baptist Church right down the road here when I was 11 years old, probably by that time I was 12. My dad kept reading the Bible, mistake, got to the Book of Acts, started reading it, went to the Baptist pastor, that he loved, and said, what about this? What is this? Baptist pastor said, we don't talk about that. Slam the door in his face of the church. Slam the door in his face. Basically, get out. We're not talking about it. We don't talk about this. That caused my dad to backslide as a baby Christian and his life was difficult for many years. When I came back to the Lord in 87, I visited my dad in January of 88, and I told my dad about the baptism. He told me about that incident because I didn't know about it. And I laid hands on my dad and he was baptized in the Holy Spirit and he was crying and weeping and going, this is what I've been missing all these years. See, this is what I'm talking about. Religion. I don't want dead religion. I don't even want, you know, like I said, I got saved in that Baptist Church down there. God brought me to a born again experience and I had my first encounter with Jesus and I was baptized in water and I thank God for that. But that's not where we stop. And that's the mistake that they made. This is where we stop. No, you don't ever stop. That's why we sing these songs. I want more. I want more of you. But Paul said he found these 12 disciples. Have you received the Holy Ghost since you believe? Verse 2. And then what did they answer? And they said unto him, we have not so much as heard whether there be any Holy Ghost. He said unto what? Then were you baptized? And they said unto John's baptism. And he said, and said, Paul, John, truly or verily baptized with the baptism of repentance saying unto the people that they should believe on him, which should come after him
that is on Christ Jesus. And when they heard this they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. And when Paul had laid his hands upon them, the Holy Ghost came on them and they spake with tongues and prophesied and all the men were about 12. And he went into the synagogue and spake boldly for the space of three months disputing and persuading the things concerning the kingdom of God. But when divers were hardened, mean hardened their heart and believed not but spake evil of that way, therefore before the multitude he departed and separated the disciples disputing daily in the school of one, Tyranus. And this continued by the space of two years so that all which dwelt in Asia heard the word of the Lord Jesus both Jews and Greeks. Now think about this. He found 12 guys and got them filled baptized in the Holy Spirit operating the gifts of the Spirit and they evangelized all of Asia. In fact, it was said by the end of the first century, the Church of Ephesus was over 100,000 members. It was one of the most powerful churches of that day. In fact, when Paul, not Paul, but when the Apostle John was exiled to all of Patmos at 80, 95 and 96, you wicked preterist, we know from all the early church fathers the ones that John discipled. When he left there, when he was released, when the Emperor was, I can't remember if the Emperor Domitian was killed or he just died, he's probably assassinated. But when he is the one that put John there, when he died, he was, John was released. And where did John go? John goes back and becomes the Apostle, the pastor back over the Church of Ephesus. And what did they do? Train, led people and released them, and they would go out. And that's where John was until he died of old age. He's already old at that point. But folks, this is what I'm talking about. Twelve people that really get filled with the Holy Spirit and are led by the Holy Spirit are going to turn the world upside down. And this is what I'm talking about. Enough, enough of this just sitting in the chair on Sunday morning, y'all. Enough. You're getting your prayer time, you're getting fasting time, you make sure you get filled in the Holy Spirit. You pray in the Spirit and then you find out what the Lord wants you to do. And it may be a simple command, get up and go next door to your neighbor and tell them about Jesus. The Lord is going to start telling you to do things. And that is where Christianity gets fun. Yes, difficult sometimes. Yes, uncomfortable because God moves us
out of our comfort zone. But that's when God's power is behind what he tells you to do. And as you obey, what did we just read that verse? Acts 532, he gives the Holy Spirit to them that obey him. Now let's read a little bit more. Maybe the last passage. I'm not going to promise anything. 1 Corinthians 14. And see, here's the thing. Here's the thing. Pastors out here, churches out here. Let me give you a little word. You know, a little word of instruction. It's just, it's going to hurt you. You're either quenching the Holy Spirit or you're not, which is. And if you're trying to be seeker sensitive, you're trying to make sure certain things aren't talked about in your church, like the gifts or other truths in the Bible that you don't like because you're afraid somebody might walk out the door and you might lose a nickel in the nose. Then you're being, you're being truly a Holy Spirit quencher. See, if you're led by the Holy Spirit, you're going to look a little different to other people. You're going to look a little wild. They'll be like, man, he doesn't, he doesn't do things like we do. She doesn't do things like we do. Let me ask something. Do we need another people to get, by the latest church growth book to try to follow the pattern of somebody that's built a big mega church? Do we need another one of those churches or do we need some that are filled with the Holy Spirit operating in the Holy Spirit that look like a little wildfire? Because I'm going to tell you right now, I'd rather have a little wildfire than no fire at all. I'd rather have seasoned people stepping out on the water and maybe, yeah, they stumble and sink a little bit and they get back on their feet. They make some mistakes. I'd rather see some people out trying to walk on the water in obedience to the Lord and trying to operate in the supernatural that's sitting back and doing nothing. We've got to stop that. 1 Corinthians 14. Let's read this. Verse 1, follow after charity or love, which love is obedience and truth and desire spiritual gifts, but rather that you may prophesy for he that speaketh in an unknown tongue speaketh not unto men but unto God for no man understandeth him. Howbeit in the spirit he speaketh mysteries.
Now, let's just stop right there. Obviously, he's talking about a tongue that is not a human language known in the world because he says when you speak in the unknown tongue, he says no man understands. No, nobody. That means, somebody say, what does that mean? No one. No man. That doesn't mean if you were speaking Chinese, a Chinese man would understand you. If you were speaking Spanish, then they would understand you. You get what I'm saying? But when he says, he that speaks in an unknown tongue, supernatural, a tongue of angels, he says no man understands him and in fact in the spirit you're speaking mysteries and the word mysteries means hidden things. Guess what they're hidden from? They're hidden from your understanding and they're hidden from the devil. Every military has a code that the enemy can't understand so they can communicate without the enemy figuring out what they're talking about. This is our code, y'all. This is our secret code between us and the Lord. You say, but my understanding is unfruitful. Guess what? That's why. We'll read it in a second. You pray that you may interpret, but here's the deal. You don't always have to have the interpretation in private because what you are doing when you're praying in tongues or in the unknown tongue in the spirit, as he says, you're building up your faith. You are edifying yourself. You're strengthening your spiritual man, your spiritual body. That is a good thing. You don't have to understand what you're saying. It is a spiritual exercise of faith that builds you up spiritually, charges you up like a battery. You have to have it if you want to do certain things, if you want to go certain places. Let's read this. For he that speaketh, verse 2, for he that speaketh in the unknown tongue, speaketh not unto men, but unto God. For no man understandeth him, how be it in the spirit, he speaketh mysteries. But he that prophesyeth, speaketh unto men, to edification, exhortation, and comfort. So prophesying is when you skip tongues and interpretation and you just speak in your known language something that is inspired and from the Lord, from the Holy Spirit. It's not from you. It's not from your own mind. It's from the Lord. So he's saying that when you prophesy, when you speak in your known language to men who know your language, and it's a supernatural utterance from the Lord, you're going to strengthen them, build them up, encourage them, edify them. In fact, the word edify means to call them near to Christ. But then he says, but he that prays in an unknown tongue, he that speaks in an unknown tongue, edify himself. Is that a bad thing? See, but they'll try to make it out to be a bad thing. And even this they take and twist because they say, oh, you should rather prophesy.
You should just ignore that tongue thing and just prophesy. That's not what this is saying. He's saying, you need the gift of tongues primarily for your private life, your private edification, your spiritual building up. He said, but the gift of prophecy is to build up the church. It's more for public ministry. That's all he's saying. This is not a negative. Chapter 14 here in Corinthians, not a negative on the gift of tongues. Amen. Now, let's finish this up. He says, but he that prophesied edifies the church. He said, I would, or I wish, or I desire that she all spake with tongues. So does it sound like he's poo-pooing on it? No. He said, I would that you all spake with tongues, but rather that you prophesied, for greater is he that prophesied, than he that speaketh with tongues. Except he interpret that the church may receive edifying. So he's saying in public prophesying is mainly for the public service in tongues. He says, if it has interpretation is also the equivalent of prophesying and will edify the church. Everybody good. That's what the Bible says, not what Pastor Dean says. Now, brethren, if I come into you speaking with tongues, what shall I profit you except I speak to you, by revelation, or by knowledge, or by prophesying, or by doctrine, even things without life, giving sound, whether pipe or harp, except they give a distinction in the sounds. How shall it be known what is piped or harped? For if the trumpet give an uncertain sound, who shall prepare himself to battle? So likewise, except you uttered by the tongue, words easy to be understood, how shall it be known what is spoken? For you shall speak into the air, and there art may be so many kinds of voices in the world, and none of them is without signification. He says, but therefore if I know not the meaning of the voice, I shall be unto them, and speaketh as a barbarian, and he that speaketh shall be a barbarian unto me. Even so, ye, for as much as ye are zealous of spiritual gifts, seek that ye may excel to the edifying of the church. Now, the problem with the Corinthians is, they had a bunch of people that loved speaking in tongues, but never really progressed much beyond that. Okay? And he was like, look, this is good, but you guys are focusing way too much on this, and you need to make sure that you're doing this so you can also help the church. And what he's saying is, be led by the Spirit so that you are profitable to the church. You're leading people to Jesus. You're helping believers get stronger. You're helping people, you know, hear the voice of the Lord and learn how to do that. But let's keep going. And he says here, verse 13, Wherefore let him that speaketh in an unknown tongue pray that he may interpret. For if I pray in an unknown tongue,
my Spirit prayeth, but my understanding is unfruitful. What is it then? I will pray with the Spirit or in tongues, and I will pray with understanding also in my known language. I will sing with the Spirit, and I will sing with the understanding also. So he says here, I'm going to do both in my private life. Your prayer life should be both. Right? Now, here, let me just pause for a second. This is the instruction of the New Testament to believers. How is this? Why is this being ignored? Why is it being twisted to be what it's not? And I mean, I could keep reading this. You know, we're it's getting a little long. I need to. But one of the things I want to go down to the end here. He says, we'll read. Oh, I guess we'll just drop down to verse 26. He said, How is it, brethren, when you come together, every one of you hath a psalm, hath a doctrine, and here he goes, hath a tongue. So he encourages this in the service, hath a revelation, hath an interpretation. Let all things be done into edifying. If any man speak it in an unknown tongue, let it be by two or at the most by three, and that by course let one interpret it. But if there be no interpreter, let him keep silence in the church and let him speak to himself and to God. So if nobody operates in the gift of interpretation, keep your mouth shut. But just because I've had people step out in the gift of tongues in the church service, and God give the interpretation to somebody else, but they were scared to open their mouth and say what God told them. Does that mean the first person was wrong? Because there was no interpretation? No. That means somebody didn't obey with a gift of interpretation and operate. But is there some kind of horrible evil that's happened if somebody gives a tongue in public service and there's not an interpretation? No. I mean, we stopped making evil what's not evil. And as a pastor, I know that there's people that are different places in their maturity level with the Lord, and I want them to step out. And if they make mistakes, we will correct it. We'll talk to them. And, you know, there are times that the Lord will have me give a public tongue, especially in our prayer meetings on Wednesday nights and sometimes in church on Sunday morning, and the Lord will tell me who he's given the interpretation to, and I wait on him. I mean, he will tell me your name. Who's going to give the interpretation? I wait. And sometimes they obey, and it's always them that the Lord shall or sometimes not. And that's why sometimes even afterwards, I will ask them, did the Lord give you something? And they're like, well, yeah, but I was scared.
So I wouldn't even pastor out there. I wouldn't even if somebody speaks in tongues in a public service and there's no interpretation, don't ridicule that person. It may be somebody else. It's unknown. It disobeyed. You need to find them. But let's keep reading. Verse 29 says, let the prophets speak two or three. Let the others judge. If anything be revealed to another that said, Violet, the first hold his peace. For you may all prophesy one by one that all may learn and all may be comforted. And the spirits of the prophets are subject to the prophets. For God is not the author of confusion but of peace in all churches of the saints. Now, let's just jump over real quick to verse 38. Verse 37. You can read all this later. I don't have time to deal with all this. Verse 37. If a man think himself to be a prophet or spiritual, let him acknowledge that the things that I write unto you are the commandments of the Lord. But if any man be ignorant, let him be ignorant. If they want to stay stupid, let them stay stupid. Wherefore, brethren, covet to prophesy and forbid not to speak with tongues. Let all things be done decently in order. So if any church is forbidding, stifling, suppressing, restricting information about, forbidding you to speak in tongues or for tongues to operate in tongues. They are quenching the Holy Spirit. They are completely rejecting what the word of God says to do. Now, let me ask you, if you're going to quench the Holy Spirit, totally disobey, clear commandment, how can God do anything? How can God move in your church? How can people get saved? How can people get healed? You hear what I'm saying? You want God to move in your church. And hear me out on this, pastor, out there. You're either depending on the Holy Spirit to build your church, or you're depending on your church growth techniques to do it. It can't be both. Oh, I know. I went to all the church growth seminars back in the 90s from Regent University and everywhere else. I heard the top professors of church growth and seminars teach. It's all a system. It's a system. We don't preach anything offensive. We keep the sermons short. We keep praise and worship short. We make sure we don't get into controversial subjects like eschatology, certainly not biblical cosmology. Oh, no, we can't do that. And we don't talk about or let anybody.
Talk about this tongues thing, because that's just too embarrassing. What did Jesus say? If you're ashamed of me and of my words, I'll be ashamed of you. And Jesus is the one that said, these signs shall follow them that bleed. They shall speak with new tongues, unknown tongues. Now, this is what I'm going to say right here. Everything I taught about this today is in this little booklet. It's called the Holy Spirit Tongues of Fire. I wrote it in 2007. It's just this little booklet. You can go to the website and go to the bookstore and download a free PDF of it. If you want one in print, you can buy one, but it's free there. All right. And you can read it. And it's got all this stuff I talked about that go all through these scriptures. Go get it for free. Listen to this message again. But here's the thing. I remember the old timers used to talk about going to the altar and tearing for the Holy Spirit. And they let me tell you, some of them would seek and seek and seek and seek and seek. And then for some of them, God was dealing with stuff in their lives and getting them to the place where they were obedient and surrendered. But people, it's something you have to desire. It's something you have to seek after something you have to go after. It's not. I mean, I've I've laid hands on people and they received the baptism and the Holy Spirit to give tons of media. I've laid hands on people and the Lord told me it's going to happen when in their private prayer time at some point as they see. There's no form. I don't have a formula. OK, because I don't know. You may not be right with God. Some people come in church and pretend to be Christians. They're not even born again. And some people come to church and they're still sipping saint and they're still doing their their drugs or whatever. And they're still they're not surrendered yet. So I don't know where people are. I mean, people don't always tell me the truth. Imagine that they lie to pastors. Yeah. But hear me out. You get your life right with Jesus Christ and you're hungry and thirsty to be filled with the Holy Spirit. He is ready and waiting at any moment for you to seek him and him to come upon you and fill you and you to open your mouth and step out of faith and it'll happen. And you're going to see that after you start praying in tongues, you're going to see all of a sudden. Wow. Gift of interpretation. I know what I say. It just hit me. It's like filled me. It's like, oh, words came in me that were not for me. I know that's the Holy Spirit. And then I remember I remember what was so exciting. That first happened with me. And then the next thing I knew I was around somebody talking to him about Jesus out on the street. And all of a sudden, the Lord showed me everything is going on in their life and what God's going to do in the future. Word of knowledge. Word of wisdom. Just then I just spoke it out and told him everything about their their recent past and what God was going to do.
And tears run down their faces. They knew it was supernatural. And I was like, I mean, I'm 19 years old. I think this is the coolest stuff I ever in my life. This is so cool. And then the next thing I know, the starting of spirits, all of a sudden I get around somebody and I can sense what spirit is upon them. Oh, and if you don't want me to know what's going on in your life or what spirit might be working against you, don't let me lay hands on you. I don't know what it is. I'm even more like I lay hands on somebody. It's almost all the time. The Lord just shows me what's going on in their life. And it is what you think I've seen mood. I've seen movies. I've seen movies of people what's in their committee. I mean, I was shown one time a guy who was going around at night raping women. He was a serial rapist. So it ain't always pleasant to see the gifts of the Holy Spirit, then gifts of healing and working miracles. I mean, we had the gifts of the spirit. We pray for that young man that came from Tennessee the other day in my office. And Sal was with me and Sal's praying quietly behind him while I'm praying, casting some demons at him. He's had a bowel problem, disease, caused him a lot of problems. And I got to that spirit, started casting it out, and I felt it leave. He said, Sal said at the same time he was praying in tongues, the Holy Spirit brought to him the interpretation of you need to pray over that stomach bowel problem. He said as soon as the Holy Spirit said that to him while he's praying in tongues, said it in his spirit, I started praying for it, casting it out. And then the guy said he felt it all move and leave him. See what I'm saying? This is what it's for, to help people. And Jesus walks up to the woman at the well. I mean, she's looking at Jesus. He just looks like every other Israelite of the day. Nothing special. Give me some water. Give me something to drink. I have something to drink. I have some water to drink. If you drink, you'll never thirst again. She's like, what are you talking about? This is probably the thing. I got some psycho at the well here. Looking around. Is there anybody to help me? Go get your husband. I don't have a husband. No. You're right. You've had five husbands and the one that you have now is not your husband. Whoo. Sir, I perceive that thou art a prophet. See, how specific is five? You've had five. And the one you have now is not your husband. That specific revelation, that's a word of knowledge.
That's what the Bible calls a word of knowledge. This is the kind of stuff the Lord wants you operating in. You should be hungry and thirsty to be able to reveal the secrets of men's hearts. If you're not doing that or that's never happened in your life, you should want to because that helps people. She went like, wow, this is the guy. She said, I know Messiah's coming and Jesus says, you're speaking to him. She goes into the city, tells everybody, brings a whole crowd. He preaches to the crowd. They all get saved. One manifestation of the gift of the word of knowledge by the Holy Spirit brought revival to a whole town. One. And what's beautiful is you don't have to be old. You don't have to be saved for 30 years. You can operate it in as a child, as a teenager, men, women. You can have as much as you want. So let me ask you, are you praying and asking? See, I'll tell you this little story and then I will quit. I had two ants that grew up. They got saved in little Brush Harbor meetings of people who went to Azusa Street and then traveled across the country preaching the gospel in the 20s. This is by the 20s now. So about 10, 15 years after Azusa Street. And they've spread across the country preaching this whole Pentecostal Holy Spirit baptism, tongues, gifts, things. And they would get, you know, the old Pentecostals back in those days would get beaten with hoses, driven out of town. I mean, they were hated. The devil hated them because they had the real thing. And I remember my aunt said some Azusa Street preachers came and set up a little Brush Harbor over here in the country in Casita and a little sawdust floor and little branches, just built a little hut and started having services. And my great grandfather and my great grandmother and my two great aunts, they went there and the power of God hit them and they got saved. And my grandfather ran with Hank Williams Sr. My grandfather played the fiddle. He was like the devil went down to Georgia guy. I mean, he could tear it up and he made his own liquor. He had a still. He made his own beer and wine. And he actually set up these big party dance parties in the 20s during prohibition. And that's how he made his money in the beginning. And it was the power of the Holy Spirit that hit him there. They said that he went to a meeting power of God hitting me came home that night. They said he danced. He got up shouting. Holy Spirit hit him after he got home in a powerful.
He said he got up and danced right out the front door off the front porch into the yard. But all of them got saved and all of them got baptized in the Holy Spirit except for my aunt Zola. Now my aunt Zola bless her. She had a little. She was the only one that had a little attitude. Like she had a hard time forgiving people. So that may have interfered with her for a little while. But it blew their minds. I'm telling you when I got saved it blew their minds because they were like this boy is no hope probably. We prayed for him his whole life. He just gets worse every day. But they kept praying for me and kept praying for me. And of course when I came back I got saved. They were just like they were they they were so happy. But they were just so like looking at me like they couldn't believe it happened. And I start talking to them about the baptism tongue. So one night I find out because I come back and stay with them for a little while. And in November I came back November 1st of 1987 and stayed with them for a while. And I found out that my aunt Zola had not speaking tonight. She had gone to the Church of God Assembly of God. She had been in Pentecostal churches since the 20s. And she'd gone to the altar and she was a woman of prayer. She read a prayer book. She would go out and pray. She loved the Lord. She was living for God. She wasn't living in sin. And I remember when I got there and I found that I said well what time out. Wait a minute. What's going on. I said we're having a family devotion tonight. And I'm laying hands on you. I mean I'm 19 years old. Well I just turned. Well I was 19 still about to turn 20. And they said okay. They were just excited. So we read these verses. We put a chair in the middle. I said Zola get in this chair right here. And I laid hands on her. She's in her 80s you know I mean. And I laid hands on her and the power of God. I mean came upon her. She was shaking. She was crying. But she had them lips sealed. I mean so tight they were turning blue. And I'm like what are you doing. I said I asked her she said I don't want it to be me. I said is the Holy Spirit upon you right now. Do you feel the anointing of God on me when I lay hands on you. Do you feel the anointing of God on you. She said yes. She's crying and she didn't cry. She's power of God is all over. She's trembling. I said just open your mouth. I don't want it to be me. I said it's going to be you and him together. I said you've got to open your mouth. He's not going to listen to me. He is not going to make you open your mouth. And he's not going to make you use your vocal cords. You have to cooperate. It's that same thing I talk about is that when Peter was in the boat and all of it in the boat.
And Jesus is out walking on the water and he says Lord if it's you invite me to come. And the Lord said come on. Now if Peter would have just set his stubborn butt in the boat and said you're going to have to levitate me up off and move me out on the water. It wouldn't have happened. Peter had to act in faith. He had to stand up and step over out into something. He didn't know. He's a fisherman. All he's ever known is if I step out in the water I'm sinking. But he's like I got I want to do this. And he got up in the moment. He did an act of faith. He took a step of faith out of the boat. He walked on the water. And this is what you have to take a step when you feel the Holy Spirit come upon you. You're asking to be feel and you feel the witness of the Holy Spirit come upon you. He's not there to give you a serpent or a stone. He's there to give you that but he gives you the utterance as you speak. You say Pastor Dean it's hard for me to take that steps hard for me to understand because you're doing something you've never done before. And so it's kind of your brain is not can't figure it out because you haven't experienced it. You don't even know but you just have to step. That's all I can tell you. And if you take that step however the Lord leads you you take that step the Holy Spirit gives you the rest. And it is like a river that starts flowing up now. And that's what he talked about the Holy Spirit. Jesus talked about the Holy Spirit being that river coming up out of your belly. Charles Finney I remember him describing it. He said it was like just the gushing of a like a geyser breaking forth in his life. And man what did he do after that. That Joker was in the press in the Presbyterian Church but what nothing about him Presbyterian after that. He was Holy Ghost filled and became one of the most powerful evangelists that ever has been led millions and millions of people to repentance and faith in Jesus Christ in revivals that would last six months in a year. He went to Rochester New York 1831 Power of God Falls. He's going to preach a week he ends up staying there six months a hundred thousand people were converted no TV no radio no advertising. This is what can be done by people who get filled with the Holy Ghost and let him work through their lives. Lives changed miracles happening gifts happening. Don't settle for where you are. You've got to say Lord I want this and more. Now I know I have preached almost two hours on him. I hope that all confusion false doctrine about this religion has been dispelled.
I've taught this many times I could do it blindfolded I don't even have to look up the scriptures but see some of you are still not pursuing this baptism the Holy Spirit and you need to. Some of you have been confused out there. I get to get the questions and messages and emails all the time. They're still confused because they've been so much false teaching about it. I hope today has cleared up any confusion. We systematically went through the Word of God on these and there's more I could have gone through but I hope we remove the obstacles and straightened out the false teaching and the negative teaching about it. So you can understand you say well what is what is it why this foolish babbling and gibbering. Oh let me tell you God takes the foolish things to confound the lie. It's a humbling thing humbling thing. So Pastor Dean I never heard anybody speaking time. I remember I was praying for my two friends Billy and Craig. I came back I led him to Jesus right left to go back out to Arkansas to help the girl coming out Satanism stayed there for a few months come back. I hadn't seen them yet. Billy or Craig. I hadn't seen them and I opened the Bible one day I go to prayer and I open the Bible up and it hits on Acts 2 and the Lord speaks to me Holy Spirit speak. He said go tell Billy and Craig about this. This is the first people I told after my own. I said OK. So I said I called him Billy Craig. Can we meet somewhere. Let's go. Yeah we meet at Craig's house. We'll go over. I got something I got to tell you. So we sit down. I read through this. Acts 2 acts 10 acts 19. I said I have this. Y'all need this. They were like OK. I mean they were just like yes Bible. So let's do it. So I said well I said I'm only hands on you. I don't know what else to do. Well pray for you. So I don't know what else to tell you. So I'm I'm I got one on my left or one of my right. Billy's on my left and Craig is on my right. And I just start praying for Lord. I pray in Jesus name baptized them in the Holy Spirit filled him the Holy Spirit ever speaking other times. Presence of God starts to fall Craig immediately like there was no hindrance but boom. He just nobody told him that he just stepped out faith and just started praying in the spirit and just the glory of God power of God was all of Billy. Just nothing like laying hands on a dead fish. And I'm looking at him like what's wrong with you. Well guess what Craig had never been going to church in his whole life. Billy would been going to Baptist Church regular. So Billy had all this false teaching against it. Right. So that's going on in his head. So I tell Billy I said look told him again said hey man Holy Spirit's here.
And so but he still didn't. So he's getting a little discouraged. I said don't worry. Just keep seeking asking. We go you know a week or two later we're doing Bible studies in different people's houses. And I mean we're just I was just all over the place. We were just going in somebody's home and do a Bible study lead people to Jesus and pray for him. Pray for healing miracles and pray for the baptism Holy Spirit. We just didn't know anybody was just doing stuff. Right. And sure enough about three weeks later we're in a prayer meeting and he's next to me and I lay hands on him again and all of a sudden boom. See I don't know when it's going to happen for you. It may happen in church. It may happen in home at your home. You may be out in the backyard digging a hole in the boom. I don't know. You may be in worship. You may be in prayer. God may deal with you about getting something out of your life that's not supposed to be there and you get that out of the way and then boom. I don't know. I can't say how it's going to happen for you. But you need to seek God until it does. Amen. And don't give up and don't let yourself be discouraged if it's not immediate or you go for a little while. This is something God wants you to seek after until you receive. And guess what. Even after you receive the baptism Holy Spirit and the gift of tongues operate in your life. Guess what. Ephesians God in Ephesians 5 he tells them to Christians who are already filled with the Holy Spirit and the gift of tongues. The Ephesians were a powerful spirit filled church. He tells them be filled with the spirit. The Greek there is present tense. It means be being and continuously ongoing be filled. He said that's what you see. See guess what. We have this in earthen vessels and we leak and we get dry over time and sometimes we start neglecting things that we need to do. And so so we kind of dry up and then we have to ask the Lord fill me again. I don't want to. I don't want to live as a dry empty Christian don't want to do it. And the reason the reason I took my time this morning because this is that important. And it really is you know I just tell you right now that tongues the gift of tongues is the gateway drug. And what I mean by that is the gateway into everything else. You start operating in that and using that in your private prayer life. You are going to see the other gifts begin to operate more powerfully more frequently. It's just the way it is. It's like it just kind of kick-starts you into all the other. You say well Pastor Dean can I operate in all nine gifts. If you follow the Lord long enough you will operate in all nine gifts of the Holy Spirit at one time or another. You may have some that you're going to operate in more frequently because that's what God's kind of given you and called you to do. But I can at one time or another I can tell you I've operated in all nine gifts of the Holy Spirit dramatically powerful. I could give detail and I have before detailed examples.
So this is not just for pastors and those in the five whole minute. It's for all of God's people. It's available. I know with Dr. Larry Lee you say people he was a Baptist preacher and got baptized in the Holy Spirit. He said he said the Baptist people used to come into his head. Do I have to speak in tongues. You know a little sour puss there. I have to speak in tongues. No. He said no. You don't have to. You get to. You understand. It's something to help you. You can drive an old beat up car and somebody can walk up to you and say hey I'm going to give you a new car. You can say no I'm going to keep riding the beat up one. No. It's fine. It's your choice. You can stay in the beat up car or you can get the new car. I'll tell you what I don't know about y'all but using my known language I've gotten to places in prayer where I don't know what else to say or I don't know what I need to pray for and then I start praying in the spirit. I have that to help me pray what I don't know I should pray and then we are praying when we're praying that way we're letting the Holy Spirit pray through us. He's praying the perfect will of God be done in your life or whoever you're praying for and sometimes it's an emergency. Sometimes you don't know the Holy Spirit is going to wake you up or or get you to shake you and there's a heaviness a burden on you and it's like you got to pray right now and you have no idea what or who or how you should be praying and you pray in tongues. That's what happened when I was in Israel and we had to get home on a thousand dollars fly from from Tel Aviv to Atlanta and there was problems the first pair of strike the first infant Tada was going on and people were getting killed and flights were getting difficult to get out and the Lord I remember the flight the you know the what is it they call them the travel agent come back tomorrow at 4 p.m. I've shared this meeting up come back tomorrow at 4 p.m. We'll see what we have you guys are going to have to buy standby ticket and sure enough I get up at 9 that morning I go out to pray when I kind of come back in about 10 or from the roof because that's on place you can find privacy in Israel go up on a roof somewhere I come back down I'm just just heavy there's a heavy troubling depressing type just heavy and I was like I don't know what and I got my brother and the guy from New Zealand and the guy from Australia that we led to the Lord the atheist we led to the Lord we were there and Wes said we got to pray and we start praying and I'm like I don't know what to pray so I pray in tongues for about two or three minutes out loud and when I finished praying in tongues I hear the Holy Spirit give me the interpretation give me where he says go to the travel agent now this is about 10 15 10 30 go to the travel agent now what we took off no joke got ran about 15 20 minutes through the city open the door to travel agents office she's on the phone she said I got two tickets to Atlanta but you gotta get them right now they're only available now like we take him we take him right now
I got two tickets from Tel Aviv to Atlanta for $350 apiece try that today and we went we got to leave you have to come home there were people stuck there because of what was going on at the time for three and four weeks like stuck they couldn't leave they couldn't get a flight out so this is what I'm talking about the Holy Spirit wants you to pray in that tongue and those speaking those mysteries even if your understanding is unfruitful pray that you may interpret you're going to start hearing from the Lord what you need to do or what is going on this is so important now let's stay we're gonna do this song I'm this is what we're gonna do this morning not in a hurry some of you that been wanting me to preach for two hours you got one right there but here's what we're gonna do we're gonna do this song rest on us we'll do that we're gonna pray if you need the baptism the Holy Spirit I want you to come down here and I'm gonna pray for you now this may be your moment this may be your day it may not be the time but we're still gonna pray I'm still gonna lay hands on you and ask God to fill you baptized you in the Holy Spirit I'm asked the Holy Spirit come upon you but this is gonna be up to you to take that next step that step of faith that you have to do in cooperation with him and I'm not gonna tell you what it is I don't know it's different for everybody so I said with stammering lips and another tongue he said sometimes it starts out just a little bit sometimes it's a whole flood sometimes you have to take you a little bit later on it becomes a flood all right but this is all about you wanting to be filled with the Holy Spirit it's not just about the gift so I want to be full and if Lord if this is the if this is the way to begin this is what your word says I want it see I don't care about this that all these denominational disagreements if it's what the Bible says I need then I want it amen all right so as we do this song I want you anybody to if you want to get prayed for does this come stand up here we're gonna pray for you today amen go ahead thank you Lord you can come on if you want to come get prayer for the baptism the Holy Spirit just stand right here get everybody right here just just turn around the spirit was moving
oh let me tell you right now I feel him already I feel him already I feel him already just sing and worship him for a minute let's just just just sing this song turn it up a little bit yes Lord we need you Holy Spirit we want you Holy Spirit Lord I want you to feel these people Lord they want you in their lives I want you to baptize them in the Holy Spirit the evidence is speaking to other times Lord so they can be all that you want them to be they can do all that you want them to do to walk in the supernatural Lord anybody else you're not baptized in the Holy Spirit with the evidence is speaking to other times you at least need to say Lord today I'm saying I want you I want you I want your fullness in my life I'm not gonna be satisfied where I am I want more I want more babe come here and pray with me you just let this song keep rolling I feel the anointing and presence of the Holy Spirit worshiping let this be the cry of your heart Lord come rest upon me come fill me now we're living in the dark deceitful times we need the Holy Spirit the fullness in our lives more Lord more of you more of you Lord yes fire in which let Heaven come down in this place Lord upon your people that are hungry and thirsty for you Jesus you're the Baptizer you're the Baptizer in the Holy Ghost it's time to surrender all walk away from every sin and every weight that holds you back total surrender the name of Jesus right now Lord I pray Holy Ghost fill Baptizer Loose and release Loose themselves and release themselves from all
the enders Lord I pray for the baptism pray for the gift of tongues Lord oh in the name of Jesus be filled with the Holy Spirit be baptized in the Holy Spirit Jesus name Holy Ghost in fire Holy Ghost in fire more Lord now Jesus Holy Ghost fill my brother Lord Holy Ghost fill him in Jesus name to overflow him in the name of Jesus Holy Ghost fire Holy Ghost glory Holy Ghost Baptizer in Jesus name the gift of tongues we loose and release and flow up out of his belly like a river the river of life Jesus name Jesus name Lord more Lord more of your spirit Lord Holy Ghost fill Baptizer in Jesus name Holy Ghost fill right now more Lord more of your spirit Lord more of the Lord wow holy Spirit move upon them you got to open your mouth you feel the Holy Spirit upon you you got to lift up your voice more Lord baptism of the Holy Spirit infilling of the Holy Spirit gifts of the Holy Spirit in the name of Jesus in the name of Jesus. In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth. Be filled with the Holy Spirit. Be baptized in the Holy Spirit. The evidence of speaking at other times. The gift of tongues released and flowing in their lives so they can use it in prayer and worship. Holy Spirit come rest upon them and fill them and overflow up and out of them Lord. In the name of Jesus Christ. That we may be like the early church Lord. To have all that you want us to have. Especially in these last days. Whoo! More, more, more Lord.
Jesus Christ of Nazareth. Jesus Christ of Nazareth. Jesus Christ of Nazareth. Jesus Christ of Nazareth. Whoo! More, more, more Lord. Jesus name. Jesus name. Holy Ghost. Holy Spirit of God. The Spirit of Jesus Christ. Fire. The fire of God. The wind of God. The glories. Fill my system. Fill her to overflow. In the name of Jesus Christ. In the name of Jesus. In the name of Jesus. In the name of Jesus. In the name of Jesus. In the name of Jesus. In the name of Jesus. In the name of Jesus. In the name of Jesus. In the name of Jesus. In the name of Jesus. In the name of Jesus. In the name of Jesus. In the name of Jesus. In the name of Jesus. Jesus. Holy Ghost Baptist. Phil. Phil my brother. The gift of tongues. Supernatural. The tongues of angels. In the name of Jesus Christ. Holy Ghost fire. Holy Ghost power. Holy Ghost glory. The gifts of the spirit being loosed and released in his life. Phil the overflowing. Oh do it again Lord. Holy Ghost Phil Lord. Holy Ghost Baptist. Holy Ghost glory. Phil. Phil. Phil. My brother. In the name of Jesus Christ. Yeah. Your voice is giving praise. Then your known language. Give him praise in the supernatural gift of tongues. Give him glory. You don't have to be crying loud. Oh Jesus. Holy Ghost Baptist. Holy Ghost. The gifts of the Holy Spirit. The gift of tongues being loosed and released and blowing up. Phil more. Phil to overflowing. In Jesus name. In the name of Jesus Christ. Oh Lord continue. Continue the work. More Lord glory and fire from heaven. Holy Ghost glory and fire. Change this man. Make him a new man. A new man on fire and with boldness like he's never had
before. Walking in the gifts of the spirit like never before. Lord in the name of Jesus I ask you to work mildly in this family. Oh Lord work mildly in this family. I bless you. I bless you. I ask you to move your mind. It's powerful. Lord her mom. Lord Jesus. More Lord. More of your glory. More of your anointing. More Lord. A precious feeling of it. Jesus name. Jesus name. Lord pray for my brother right now. Holy Ghost. Power. Phil him more. To overflow. A fresh anointing. A fresh infilling. A baptism of the Holy Ghost with the evidence of speaking another tongue. In the name of Jesus. Jesus. More Lord. Fire of God. Glory of God. Spirit of God. In the name of Jesus. Come on say it to him right now. There's always more. Because of you that are already baptized in the Holy Spirit. Just lift your hand and say more. More. More. I want more of you Lord Jesus. I want more of you Holy Spirit. Woo. More Lord. More Jesus. More Lord. Your glory. Your fire. Your power. I'm gonna tell you something. There is such a power and glory and fire of God upon you. Let me say this. This Smith family right here. The Lord showed me last night that you would be up at the altar and that I was supposed to pray for you and that I had a word for you and I said I don't know what it was. I just know right now he's moving on me to force you guys. Part of what he's saying to tell you is that you have only begun to flow. You have only scratched the surface. The flowing and the gifts and the power that you've been called to. In the area of worship. Leading worship. You've been
hindered. You've been rejected. You've been pushed away. I mean I know about that from our talk last night. But the Lord just wants me to tell you. Do not be discouraged. I see you leading worship in front of hundreds and thousands of people. With the anointing from the glory of God. Your whole family. The gifts and the calling of God upon you are without repentance and no man is gonna shut the door upon you. No man is gonna stop you. No devil is gonna stop you from doing what you are called to do. You believe. But I see you doing what you are called to do. Under the glory and the anointing and the power of the Holy Spirit. You will do it. And it's gonna be the whole family. Your children are blessed. They're gonna be with you in the whole thing. Jesus. Jesus. Jesus. Let's keep worshiping. Holy Spirit. More of your glory. Reveal yourself. Reveal, Lord, yourself, Jesus. More, more, more. We need you more. Oh, Spirit, when you move. This is what I'm talking about. Good. In Jesus' name. See, if you want to be delivered from deception of this age, you gotta have the Spirit of truth moving in your life. The Holy Spirit of God. He can show you.
He can change your whole direction. You're going the wrong way. He's the one you need. He's the one that will turn you around and guide you in the right place. Lord, touch my sister. You know, Courtney, the Lord is trashing all of your own place. He's just destroyed. The fact, if you obey the leading of the Holy Spirit, nothing about your past, even in your walk, it ain't gonna look the same. He's got a whole new place for you to go in the Spirit. What you hunger for from him is gonna give you. But many things in your life are not gonna look the same in today's hands. They look like that. Yeah, go ahead. Let's keep worshiping more, people. Come on. There's more. Hallelujah. Come on. Let's just pray. Pray too. Talk to me. For the Lord would say it to you, my people, I have called you. I have called you to go deeper. I have called you to walk in the supernatural. I will be with you.
Listen to my voice. Follow me. I will show you great things and powerful things. You will do powerful things for me. I will anoint you with fresh oil. I will fill you with my spirit. Just yield to me. Surrender to me. Follow me with all of your heart, soul, mind, and strength. No more one foot in the world and one in me. For I promise that within the gross darkness falling upon the world, that my glory and my anointing and my light would fall upon and fill my people. You can be part of that promise. You can receive that and walk in that, says the Lord. Thank you, Lord. Praise your name. Praise your name. Praise your name. Praise your name. Let's do it one more time before we leave. This song is a song for the day right here. It's a song for our church right now. This is a song we need to be hungry. We need to be crying out this whole year. This whole year, Lord, come. Feel me. Feel my church. Move in power. Lord, let the gifts of the spirit flow through everybody. Pray for your brothers and sisters to yield and flow and listen. Some of you are going to be told, the Lord laid this on my heart a minute or two. Some of you are going to be told to lay some things down. Some of your own plans, some of your own things, to surrender and forsake that so you can move to the next thing he has for you. You hear me? Let's do this one more time. Thank you, Jesus. Because I still sense the spirit of God moving in this place. I don't want to quench you. It's a good time. If you need something from him, you cry out for it right now. I pray right now for this. God, I pray that you fill her.
Fresh infilling, fresh impartation of the Holy Spirit. Lord God, you hear your voice to discern what you have for her, your direction for her life. What you want her to do, Lord, what you want her to step out in. Holy Spirit, fill. Fill Jesus' heart. Lord, I break off all hindering spirits. I bind every demonic force trying to hinder her hearing. I bind and rebuke those forces that are commanded to go. Lord, discernment. Lord, Holy Spirit, the gift of discerning the Spirit, Lord, is the gift of discernment and a hearing ear. Lord, more now than ever before. I pray for her. Thank you. I thank you, Lord, for her faithfulness in this church and in her private life. Being a real Christian, Lord, I thank you. Give her the desires of her heart, Lord, that are from you. The name of Jesus. Yes, Lord, Lord, Lord, Lord. Sing it to her. Come on, let me hear it. We worship you. We invite you, Holy Spirit, to come rest upon us and fill us to overflow her. Use us to turn the city upside down and the state upside down. And our nation, Lord, you can bring a revival that will affect the whole nation. We want you, Holy Spirit. Yes, there's always more. You'll be filled,
Lord. You're fired. You're anointed. You're powered in the name of Jesus. Let us be transformed, Christian, Lord, to do your will and to walk in power, to have that power to be with you. And the secrets of men's hearts are revealed as we speak to them. Yeah. Just one more time. Come on, we're going to do it one more time. Lord, more. Rest on. Lord, I pray for healing. Healing and restoration is strength physically in the body, Lord. Everything that's been wrong in my brother's body, Lord, but I pray it be healed now in the name of Jesus. That he be restored and made whole in the name of Jesus. In the name of Jesus, that there be no more hindrances. No more hindrances physically. Lord, I pray that they've been through enough, Lord. I say enough's enough. Stop the devil. Stop sickness and disease. Stop physical problems interfering with them doing what they are called to do. Yes, Lord. In Jesus' name, my sister Jesus. The healing power, the healing American power of Jesus, I pray, will flow in her body and heal everything that's still wrong in the name of Jesus Christ. Healing flow, healing flow, healing flow in the name of Jesus. In fact, we'll pray over everybody. Anybody that has the sickness
or disease or a problem or something going on in their life right now, just raise your hand. We're going to ask the Lord to let healing, the gift of healing flow. The Holy Spirit gift of healing flow in this place. Father, you see these hands. I pray for your Holy Spirit to come. The gifts of healing and working the miracles to come and flow into their bodies and bring healing today. Bring healing, God. Make them whole. Make this sickness, this disease, this pain, this injury, whatever it is. Repair, restore, renew their physical body. Lord, we've been all attacked by these biological weapons. Lord, reverse all damage done by these weapons of sickness and disease, these biological weapons in the air. Let lungs be healed. Stomach and intestines be healed. Woos that won't heal be healed in Jesus' name. Jesus' name. Backs, necks, stomach disease that's crippling the body. Let it go. We command it to go now in Jesus' name. And we ask you, Lord, for healing virtue. Healing virtue today, Lord. Lord, some of us been waiting a long time. Lord, I rebuke doubt. I rebuke arthritis. Jesus' name. Lord, we rebuke Alzheimer's. We rebuke all these weird and different things attacking me. Depression. We bind the spirit of heaviness. We bind the spirit of depression. We bind the spirit of suicide. We bind these spirits and command you to go. Come on, go for this in Jesus' name. We bind the spirit of infirmity. You spirit of infirmity. You spirit of disease and sickness. Go! Loose them and leave now in Jesus' name. Jesus' name. I pray right now for this throat where this devil has attacked the voice and the vocal cords. I pray for healing restoration for this to go to loose. I pray vocal cords be loose and release now in Jesus' name. And they be restored back to normal in Jesus' name. There's always more, y'all. There's always more. In Jesus' name. Lord, I pray for my
brother, Lord. You lead him. You lead him, God, into that place, that relationship with his. God, wait to set him free from the past. All the wounds of the past. Everything, God, makes him feel hurt, wounded, neglected, angry. Melt all that past away, Lord. Melt all those spiritual wounds. All those parts in his heart. It was wounded. Melt them away. You came to heal the broken heart. I pray it be healed now in Jesus' name. Every wounded part in his heart. There's a lot of men that are tough men. They're manly men, but they've been hurt by their parents. They've been hurt by the people in the past, been rejected, and those wounds are there. And I pray, Lord, for those wounds to be healed now in Jesus' name. You're the only one that can heal those wounds, Lord. And we pray for healing now in Jesus' name. Amen. I'll tell you what. I have felt him in here today. Amen. Anybody receive the baptism of the Holy Spirit and the gift of tongues. I see some hand. Amen. Amen. Let me tell you, some of you that didn't, don't be discouraged. Go home and get in your prayer closet the rest of the week and keep seeking him until you feel him upon you and flowing through you and the gift of tongues flowing through you. And I want you to do this. I want you to promise me too that this week you're going to pray for next Sunday service every day, because again, I think this is the beginning. We're beginning on Good Day. The last two Sundays. I know I didn't make it the first Sunday of the year, but these last two Sundays, knowing Jesus, knowing the Holy Spirit, what more? What more? We get those things right. And boy, there's all kinds of things we can do. Let me tell you, I've reminded years ago, many years ago, I was pastored in a church in Montgomery, and there was a young lady that I say, young, she's a few years younger, me at times. But she had a beautiful voice. Oh, she could sing. And she in her heart was right. She was her heart. She was in the right place, but she just kept running into bad church and bad leadership and wall after wall. And she got so discouraged. She didn't want to even try to get up and sing
anymore. And I remember she came forward. She came to church with her husband one Sunday. And I remember she came up for prayer. And I mean, when when the Holy Spirit was like, it's like I remembered like it was yesterday, and this is probably 20 years ago. And she came up and I went, I walked over and I laid hands on her and I saw her leading worship. And I said, it's in front of six, seven hundred people. And I said, I see the sanctuary. It's like the carpet and the chairs are like burgundy, maroon color. Do you know, in about a year, God opened the door in a church. It was about six hundred, seven hundred and the carpet and the chairs. And she was fully in that in her gift. So I want to tell you, you're not going to be your family. You're not going to be stopped. You understand? And the Lord is going to bless you with the real thing because you refuse to compromise because a lot of people, a lot of people would just take whatever door opens where there's, you know, you know what I'm saying? If you got the talent and the gift of God, doors can open that you don't need to walk through. And your integrity is why he's going to give you. And I saw you. I don't know. It was like hundreds of people. Then it was thousands of people. And then, but it was revival. It was like when I remember Brown's, it was like the glory of God was on Lindo and their praise and worship team, just every service. And they were just flowing in it. It wasn't about being fancy. It was just the anointing was there. So I saw that. So I don't I can't tell you when or where. I just tell you, I saw it's going to happen. He's going to give you everything he's shown you and more. Praise God. All right. Well, I guess we ought to go eat. I hope nobody's waiting their food outside. And they what is what's the ones that deliver food? DoorDash just dropped it off and out in the cold. Listen here, we're going to we're going to dismiss here and go, you know, we do our thing downstairs. And so anybody that wants to stay, if you got to leave, I understand. But if you want to stay and for a while you go get something to eat, bring it back. We eat together downstairs. May be a little cold down there. I don't know. You may need your jacket. But is it warmed up down there now? Okay, good. But you all know the drill. I got to say it. Make sure the kids don't get on to me. Hug some next before you leave. All right. Y'all hug some next before you leave. We love y'all. God bless.