Lightly edited for readability while preserving the speaker’s meaning and substantive statements.
Now, you're everywhere all the time, but you manifest your presence in concentration, Lord. Power different times on different people, on different groups, on different churches. Lord, you can concentrate and manifest your presence and your power and your glory in great and mighty ways. And Lord, we need that. We need that again. We've seen great revivals. We've seen great power. I've seen great miracles. I've been in revival, Lord. We need that again. This church, this region, Lord, this nation. Lord, we need you. We need you. We need revival. We need your presence. We pray for this in Jesus' name. Amen. And amen. You may be seated. Goodness. Well, this morning, I felt very strongly the Lord um wanted me to share with you a little bit about what happened uh Friday night, and the Lord really gave me a message that kind of leapfrogs off of that. But uh found out kind of late in the week that John Kilpatrick, Pastor John Kilpatrick, of the uh Church of His Presence down in Daphne, Alabama, who used to be the pastor at the Brownsville Assembly of God in Pensacola during the Pensacola Revival, we found out he was going to be here and uh in Auburn at his church, at the City Church. And so, um after going to with Mike to pray for his uncle and to uh finally made it to the church. John Kilpatrick, uh I I tell you, his gift he's really has a gift to minister to ministers. I mean, that's a real gift. But, you know, the man I guess he's in his 60s somewhere. I don't know his age, but he's I guess he's close to my father's age. He's got to be in his 60s. But, he's been in the in the church, he's been being trained to be a minister from the time he was a teenager. So, you you don't talk about a lot of experience in the ministry. Um And, you know, I went to the revival in Pensacola many, many times. Many, I can't even I lost count how many times I I went once a week. Uh even their praise and worship leader came up to me. He was at the Brownsville Revival School of Ministry and their praise and worship leader, he said, "Your name sounds familiar. Were you at the school?" I said, "No, but I was at the revival nearly every day." And, he was like, "Oh, okay." You know, so he was down there during during the revival that happened and, you know, I know there's a lot of people on Facebook. I saw somewhere the other day where some guy said that the Pensacola Revival was fake. Uh let me tell you something. I was there. Day after day, night after night, month after month, year after year, I went
from the beginning to the end. And, uh I counseled in the altars at times as a pastor being there. I because I was a pastor, because I was friends with the Van Lanes, the children's pastor who's on staff, I was always see usually seated near the front. So, I saw. I didn't just hear about it. I saw and heard the messages that were preached there by the evangelist Steve Hill, by John Kilpatrick, by Dr. Michael Brown, by all these different guys. When the school started, the different professors they had there were wonderful men and women of God. It was just a powerful It was a powerful move of God and I I watched the and felt the presence and power and glory of God come in to that church night after night. And, I saw people in there both unsaved, backslidden, prodigals. I saw them come under the conviction of the Holy Spirit in their seats. Many people start weeping. Many people would start crying. Many people would start repenting before the altar call was ever given. But let me tell you, when the altar call was given, I watched people get up from their seat and run to the altar not for a manifestation, not to see a miracle. They ran to the altar under conviction of sin to repent of their sins weeping their eyeballs out. I mean, it was real repentance. It was the real preaching of the cross and there was real repentance and real salvation and real prodigals came home. It was a powerful move of God. And yes, there were manifestations because when the Holy Spirit comes in power, people will shake. People will cry. People will laugh. People will hit the floor. People will uh you will see miracles. You will see demons manifesting and coming out of people. You'll see all kinds of things. So, you know, you you know, if you got a problem with that and saying it's fake, you got a problem with the New Testament. You got a problem with what God did when he moved on Daniel and knocked him to the ground and Daniel had no power or strength to get up and when he was shaken under the power of the Holy Ghost or when Jesus spoke to the to the uh you know, the whole group of soldiers that came to get him and he he said, "Who you seeking?" He said, they said, "Jesus of Nazareth." And when he turned and said, "I am he." It says they all went backward and fell to the ground. So, don't tell me it's not biblical to fall to the ground. I've been hit by the Holy Ghost so hard that that I was leaning forward, I still went backwards to the ground. All right? And no minister I remember the first time I went to Brownsville, I don't go down. I don't do courtesy drops for anybody, right? And I remember Steve Steve Hill, the evangelist, walked off the platform and I said, "Lord, if this is you, I mean, I'm in a crowd of of 3,000 people. I said, "Lord, if this is you, have him come right down and pray for me."
Man, it was like the Red Sea parted and all those people and he came right straight for me. Before he could even get his hand on me, the power of God hit me and I went flew backward and hit the ground and when I got up, I had a stronger anointing of the Holy Ghost on my life than I had before. So, people can say it's fake all they want to. It was a powerful revival. It was a real revival in every definition of revival that I've ever read about or studied in the past of the histories of revival. And I'm going to tell you and it and and praise be to God that it was Pentecostal revival. Yes, people were baptized in the Holy Spirit with the evidence of speaking in other tongues. People were healed. People were delivered from demons, but all that wasn't even the focus. The focus was on repentance and souls getting saved and because they honored God and weren't ashamed of his words of any part of it, God moved in that place and because that church was a place of prayer and because they were men of God who were serious about the gospel, the power of God came in that place. And let me tell you, we need that again. And I'll say this, the the anointing and the power of God is still on Pastor John in a powerful way and he preached Friday night one of the most powerful messages I've ever heard, period. And I've heard him preach some pretty good ones, right? Well, I mean, we 2009, 2010, we were going down there pretty regular to his church in Daphne, down in near Mobile. Powerful. And one of the things that he was talking about, there's two things that that he really emphasized in his message that this pastor needed. This minister needed. He talked about the power of words. And he talked about the us having issues and offenses in our lives. And let me tell you, here I am, I'm a pastor, I'm sitting there because I I love and respect John. I don't know we don't agree on every single doctrinal detail, but he's a man of God and I respect him highly. And but I was sitting there because I knew I needed I needed to be fed. I needed I I went to church that night because I needed something. I didn't even know what I needed. I just knew that I was oppressed, that I was having difficulty, I was kind of getting dried up, and I was kind of I was just I was asking the Lord, "What is wrong? What is going on?" Um and I'm going to be very transparent and open and blunt with you this morning because I hope that me sharing this will help some of you. Okay? But before he got into his message real good about us having issues with people. And how that blocks intimacy and fruitfulness in our spiritual lives. He talked about a series that he did a while back and I remember him talking about it. And I I think I heard part of it, but a series he called um uh ungodly or something breaking soul ties and uh
ungodly vows that we make. And he used the illustration of a woman that when she was young uh like 7 or 8 years old, her bedridden mother got pregnant, had a baby. And that the father made her take care of the baby. And then the mother, the bedridden mother, got pregnant again and had another baby. And so this this child at 7, 8, 9, 10 years old, she was having to clean the house, take care of babies, cook. I mean, she was really being misused by this family, right? And she became very frustrated as any child that age would. Being so much responsibility and pressure being put on them. And so, he said this woman's This woman said in her frustration when she was 9 and 10 years old, "I will never have children." She spoke those words out of her. "I will never have children." So, many years later, she got married, fell in you know, fell in love with the guy and got married and started trying once decided she wanted to have children. And they kept trying and trying and trying and trying and trying and trying and trying and could not. Could not get pregnant, could not Went to the doctor, went to the fertility specialist, all of that. And the doctor examined said, "You both of you are perfectly healthy. There is no reason why you should have a problem with this." But the doctor being he said a Christian and a spiritual person, sent them to a pastor he knew. And he said the first thing the pastor asked Uh-oh. The first thing the pastor asked the woman, "Have you ever said anything out of your mouth about not wanting to have children or that you would never have children?" And she just broke down. And realized that she had spoken that curse. She had made that oath, that vow over her life. And when she renounced it and broke that curse and that vow and asked for God's forgiveness and corrected her words, she got pregnant immediately. And she said she has three children now. Nothing physically wrong with her. so I want to talk to you today about the power of words. Now, when you start talking about this, you know, we got all the all the haters are out there, right? Because we got the Pentecostal haters, the charismatic haters, the word of faith haters, and you start talking about the power of words, the power of confession, the power of what you speak out of your mouth, and they go, "Oh, that's the word of faith movement. That's heresy." Uh you know, you can be become so anti something that you become anti-Bible as a Christian. You understand?
Just because some people get over into the ditch on this side, or they get over into the ditch on this side, does not mean you should ignore what the Bible teaches on any subject. You hear me? So, today we're going to talk about what the Bible says about the power of your words. And you need to understand that some of you are going to have to go back and say, "God, forgive me for this oath, this vow, this negative thing that you've even spoken over yourself." You've cursed yourself. You've hindered yourself. You've blocked yourself. Those of us in this church, I'm going to tell you right now, there's some of you that have said negative things about this church, and you need to break it off if you want things to change. Right? I'm having to do it. Cuz I gotten frustrated with some of you. So, I've said things that I shouldn't have said about our church. And I would I would tell you, the pastor has some power in his words about his church. So, just trust me on that, right? Now, I want to start with Proverbs chapter 18. Proverbs chapter 18. Those of you been in the church any amount of time, in the church world, been a Christian, been born again, been reading your Bible, ought to come across this verse at some point. But we got to go quite a few places. This is a teaching this morning. And I'm pretty fired up about it. Because I felt a huge oppression lift off of my life by dealing with a couple of issues, but it even the dealing with the offense issue that I'm going to talk about toward the end of this, the dealing with the offense issue has to do with changing your words as well. I'm going to show you that. And also your words have a lot to do with what your level of faith, where you really are in faith. Okay? I can tell where somebody is but in the in their walk of faith by what comes out of their mouth. Cuz Jesus said it. You know, you can not like it, haters, but the bottom line, Jesus said from the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks. It's full of unbelief and negativity, that's what's going to come out. And guess what? If you're full of of unbelief and negativity, not only is that going to come out of your mouth, but that's what you're going to get in your life. You're going to reap what you sow. Even with your mouth and your words. So, let's look at the power of words. Proverbs chapter 18, verse 21. This is not Pastor Dean, this is not Kenneth E. Hagin, this is not the word of faith movement. This is scripture. Death and life are in the power of the tongue, and they that love it shall eat the fruit thereof. Now, what's interesting about this when it says they that love it? What is it referring to? Is it referring to death? No. Is it referring to life? No. It's talking about they that love the power of the tongue, the truth.
The truth about the power of the tongue. What you love about it is the fruit you're going to have to eat. Do you love the death side? Or do you love the life? There's power in the tongue. There's power in those words. You know, Jesus made this statement in John 6. He said, "The words that I speak unto you, listen to me." He said, "They are spirit and they are life." They're more than just words. Well, listen to me, folks. You can believe this or you can not believe this, but according to this passage here, your words, our words, not just God's words, but our words are also spirit and life. And they can be life or they can be death. Somebody say this. The power of death The power of death or the power of life or the power of life is in my mouth. is in my mouth. Ooh. You can kill things with your mouth. Literally. Now, Jesus gave us this example. Let me show you what I'm talking about. Go to Mark chapter 11. Mark chapter 11. Y'all with me? Verse 12. We're going to start reading from there. Now, this is Jesus. This is not Kenneth E. Hagin. This is not the Rama church. This is not Kenneth Copeland. This is not Creflo Dollar. This is Jesus. This is the gospel of Mark. Believe it or not believe it, that's your problem. Right? Jesus here, this story. Verse 12, we're going to read from verse 12 through verse 26. And this is powerful because let me tell you, even this passage connects the two things that I'm going to talk about today. It talks about the power of words, this passage, and the and the issue of forgiving others. Connected. Right? Watch it. Verse 12, Mark 11 verse 12, and on the mall when they were come from Bethany, he was hungry. And seeing a fig tree afar off having leaves, he came as Jesus came if happily he might find anything there on. And when he came to it, he found nothing but leaves for the time of figs was not yet. And Jesus answered and said unto it, "No man eat fruit of thee hereafter forever." And his disciples heard it. And they were and and then they went on to Jerusalem and he went into the temple and we're going to skip down to verse 20. So they went into the temple.
And so the next day in the morning says it in the morning as they passed by, they saw the fig tree dried up from the roots. This fig tree that Jesus spoke words to. He saw this fig tree dried up from the roots. And Peter calling to remember sayeth unto him, "Master, behold, look at the fig tree which you cursed is withered away." Let me just say the definition of a curse is to speak death or negativity on something. That's the definition of a curse. It's real simple. Anybody can be a witch. You understand that? There's a lot of Christian witches. Cuz all they do is speak curses. And witches and Satanists and all these people, they understand the power of words. That's why there's everything they do is is around spells, speaking things. Right? They understand the power of words. Look what Jesus he said Peter calling to remembrance verse 21 sayeth unto him, "Master, behold the fig tree which thou cursed is withered away." And Jesus answering sayeth unto him, "Have faith in God. Now listen to this. For verily I say unto you, That whosoever shall say unto this mountain, Be thou removed, and be thou cast into the sea, And shall not doubt in his heart, But shall believe that those things which he saith shall come to pass; he shall have whatsoever he saith. And I was reading your Bible. And my Bible's written in red. Right? That's Jesus talking. He went on to say this, Therefore I say unto you, What things soever ye desire, when ye pray, Believe that ye receive them, and ye shall have them. And when ye stand praying, Forgive, if ye have aught against any: That your Father also which is in heaven may forgive your trespasses; but if ye do not forgive, neither will your Father which is in heaven forgive your trespasses. Now why did God connect this issue of speaking words and your level of faith to having issues with people, forgiveness and unforgiveness? We'll see in a minute. All right. Let's look at another passage here. Want to turn to James chapter 3. This one really came alive to me even more this morning as I read it and looked up some of the words in it. James chapter 3. And I put in the description of our radio show this morning. Titled this message The Power of Our Words, but I said, The tongue is a fire that can only be put out by the tongue. Let me explain that. You know how firefighters, when there's a a fire that
gets out of control. A lot of people think they they just dump water on it. Well, when they start trying to dump water on it and it doesn't work, what do they have to do? They build backfires. You know this you know this about being a fireman when you're days of doing that, right? They use fire to put out fire, right? I know an oil well sometimes when oil wells catch on fire, they they literally use explosives to blow up an explosive near the oil well fire so it'll suck all the oxygen out and the fire will go out after the explosion. So, sometimes you fight fire with fire, right? I don't want to tell you this this issue with the tongue being a fire and causing a wildfire that's destructive can only be stopped by the tongue. And I'll explain that as we go, but let's read this in James. Start in verse one. My brethren, be not many masters, knowing that we shall receive the greater condemnation, for in many things we offend all. And can I just stop right here for a minute? Um the Bible says that us leaders, teachers, pastors, ministers, that we will offend you. So, some of you are going to have to forgive me. Some of you are going to have to forgive another pastor or minister or someone who's hurt you or offended you or said something you didn't like. Uh I got plenty who I Some guy this morning I was debating about the baptism of the Holy Spirit and the evidence of speaking in other tongues. And he said, "I just have to disagree with you." And I said, "Well, you're not disagreeing with me. You're disagreeing with Acts 2, Acts 10, Acts 19, Mark 16, uh 1 Corinthians 14." So, you think you're not disagreeing with me. Right? But I'm sure I had offended him. And he said, "Well, I just don't believe it." I said, "Well, you you can That's your prerogative to not believe it." I said, "But your belief is not biblical." This is a Christian I was talking to, right? Now, that probably I gave him the truth, but it probably offended him. Right? So, I probably, you know, wasn't nice enough or sweet enough or didn't do it kind enough or something. I don't know how you can tell on Facebook anyway, right? I didn't cuss him out. All right. Look what he says here. Let's go to verse three. Or verse two, I'm sorry. For in many things he said we offend all. If any man offend not in word, the same is a perfect man and able also to bridle the whole body. Behold, we put bits in the horses' mouths that they may obey us and we turn about their whole body. Now, listen closely to this. Behold also the ships, which though they be so great and are driven of fierce winds, yet they are turned about by a very small helm, the rudder. Withsoever the governor listeth or wherever the the captain of the ship
wants it to go. Even so, the tongue is a little member. It's a little tiny part of your body, but it defiles the whole body. Now, that word defile means it makes it unclean, impure. And let me tell you, uncleanness and impurity separates you from the presence of God. Your tongue can do it. You can open your mouth one time and separate yourself from God. Cuz you can make yourself unclean. Now, look what he says. He says, the tongue Verse five, even so the tongue is a little member and boasteth great things. Behold, how great a matter a little fire kindleth. The tongue is a fire. Listen to this. The tongue is a fire, a world of iniquity. It's like the world here, the word is cosmos in the Greek. It's a whole cosmos of injustice and foulness and evil. The tongue, the words that come out of our mouth. Right? He says it's the tongue is a world of iniquity. So is the tongue among my our members, it defileth the whole body and setteth on fire the course of nature. And it's set on fire of hell. For every kind of beast and of birds and of serpents and of things in the sea is tamed and hath been tamed by mankind, but the tongue can no man tame. It is an unruly evil full of deadly poison. Therewith bless we God, even the Father, and therewith curse we men, which are made after the similitude of God. Out of the same mouth proceedeth blessing and cursing. My brethren, these things ought not so to be. Now, look at this and I'm going to look at I'm going to pull up my little notes here that I There's just one word. He says that the tongue sets on fire the course of nature. Did you see that? This is the definition of the course of nature here. It says a wheel as a runner, figuratively a circuit of physical effects. So it's saying here that the tongue sets on fire the entire world around you and has physical effects on things. Remember Jesus did to the fig tree? Did those words have physical effects on the fig tree. Yes. Your words have power. They have a lot of power. Remember, I'm going to go back to that. Death and life are in the power of the
tongue. When you speak words, they are spirit and they are life and they will either carry the life force of God, the truth, the power of the Holy Spirit, or they're going to carry death, demonic power with them. This is This is a principle that cannot be dismissed from the scriptures and it cannot be dismissed from the world. Again, the world understands this. AND I SAID IT IN our description of the show today. I said, you know, our forefathers of faith, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, the people in the in that that are considered the fathers of our faith. We are children of Abraham. The Bible says, cuz we are faith in Christ Jesus and Jesus was the seed of Abraham coming down through David. And if we're of faith, if we have faith in Jesus Christ as the Messiah, the Jewish Messiah, and our Messiah, then we are the children of Abraham. That's what the Bible says, right? And these men Listen, you read the stories in the Old Testament in the book of Genesis. What was going on between Esau and Jacob to get the their father's blessing spoken over them. The firstborn blessing. What is that? He was just going to lay hands on them and speak a word. AND THERE WAS A WHOLE shenanigans of deception for the mothers knew the power of those words of that blessing. Those powerful words, especially listen to me, fathers, just don't understand how much power you have over your children. Your words. I mean mothers too. But the father sits in that place of authority. That's why so many kids are messed up. You know why? So many kids, especially especially boys, so many of them are messed up. Cuz what does a man need to hear from his father? You know this from What is it? Wild at Heart? One of the greatest needs of a man to hear from his father is, "Son, you have what it takes to make it. And you have my blessing. I'm for you. I believe in you. You'll be a man. You'll become a man." And I'm saying that daughters don't need that as well. They do. I'm just saying this is the deepest need. Little girls from their fathers need to hear that they're beautiful. And fathers need to watch them when they want to twirl and dance and spin. They want their father's attention. They want to know their father thinks they're beautiful and smart and
talented. That's what girls need the most. And when we speak words like "You'll never amount to anything." Or, you know, "You're a failure." Or "You're stupid." Or when those words are spoken by parents to children, you just have no idea what spiritual death is moving into their spirit and their soul and it will affect everything they do. I'm not saying you can do it all right and there's still rebellious, hard-headed kids that are going to do what they want to do. But it's our job to do our part, right? And listen, I have three girls. I can tell you all three of them done the same thing. The the the main thing that comes out of their mouth, "Daddy, watch." "Daddy, watch. Daddy, watch." But boys need to hear, "You can do it, son." "You can do it." And a lot of us may have heard that and you know, problem with us human beings is we're very inconsistent, aren't we? We're not consistent in these things. There are people right now, grown-ups, who can't seem to get out from under a cloud of failure and depression and discouragement because they never felt like that they were good enough or they they received their their parents' blessing. Now, that don't mean you know, parents, it doesn't mean we have to agree with everything they do cuz we don't. And we don't have to bless sinful or bad behavior, either. But they have to know that we believe that they can accomplish anything, good thing. Right? But speaking these things, you know, I realized that in my frustrations as a pastor and a minister and I get frustrated sometimes with the ministry, I realize that I've spoken things over our church and our ministry even though God is ministering to people and helping people and and people are getting saved and people are coming to repentance and we we we're seeing the fruit of this, you know, we were two two and a half hours on with um some people that have just just telling us their lives have been transformed by uh listening and to the ministry and and learning what they needed to learn and
that's always a blessing. But I realized that a lot of my own problems came from two things recently and and and it began in December and I'm not going to speak about the exact thing it was, but let me just say some of you already know what it is, but I have no idea who's watching and who's listening, so I'm not going to say. But in December, there was something done to me that was very hurtful. Very hurtful. Now, my mode of dealing with things uh when you get someone hurts you or offends you or betrays you or misunderstand you, tells a lie about you, whatever they do. You know, we're all we're going to be we are going to be hurt, wounded, offended, you know, by people. You can't avoid it, right? There's always going to be somebody creating drama. Right? In our lives. Even if it's just us creating it ourselves. Somebody's going to create drama, all right? And what's hard about it is when it hurts you. Now, men and women usually react to things differently. Men, when we get hurt, we get hurt and we may even shed a tear over it a little bit, but our hurt usually to the way we defend ourselves or the way we try to overcome it is we get angry. That's just the man way of doing thing. When a man feels hurt or he's not respected or he's not valued especially by people he really should be. His hurt always will manifest I would say always but 99% of the time it's going to manifest in anger. And then when you suppress that anger anger turns into depression. And then everything makes you angry. You know, when the refrigerator won't work right or you drop the hammer and yeah I'm everything but will bug the snot out of it. I'm speaking truth. Right? You stump your toe, you don't just say ouch you want to break the coffee table in half. Take an axe to it. I Am I telling the truth? Men? Now women what you tend to do you guys Lord have mercy. You get emotional and sad and upset and talk talk talk talk talk talk talk talk talk talk talk talk talk about it. Right? Usually. I'm not saying it's all the same but it's more emotional and I think sometimes because your emotions are so sensitive and that's okay. That's what God made you to nurture the children. Daddy's are to discipline the children, moms are to nurture the children. We're made different. That's why we have different bathrooms.
All right? I catch a man going in the bathroom with my daughter he'll be a woman when he comes out. You hear what I'm saying? But that digress here a little bit. But Stop it. Where was I? Yes. But a lot of us men and and women do this, too. But a lot of us, you know how we especially if you're a firstborn. Who was a firstborn in here? Mhm, me. When a firstborn, what you tend to do is suck it up. I can take it. I'm just tough. I'll just deal with it and be okay. And that's usually a man way of dealing with things, too. It's like, "Ah, it's no big deal. I'm all right." Right? And that's what I did back in December when this person did something that was very hurtful to me. I was hurt. Then it shifted to anger. And then it shifted to, "Ah, I'm all right. I'll just let it go. I'm not going to let it ruin my Christmas or my time with my family." But see, all I did was push it down. And let me let me share with you, when you start pushing these things down, it's like trying to hold beach balls under water. Right? You can do it for a little while. But get a second beach ball. Get a third beach ball. Believe me, they're going to come cuz you're going to get offended by somebody else. Somebody else is going to cause drama. There's going to be another problem. There's going to be another hater. There's going to be another Judas. And so, now you're trying to hold three, four, five beach balls under water. Guess what? They start popping up at the wrong time. You're trying to hide the beach balls. You're in a place where there's not supposed to be any beach balls, but you can't hide them. They keep start popping up, right? And they usually pop up and we take it out on our spouse or we take it out on our kids or we take it out on somebody at work and blow up, and we're like, "What is wrong with me? What is going on with me? That was over nothing. Why am I blowing up and going off on somebody?" Right? Because you trying to hold down the beach balls underwater. And God never meant for you to do that. Right? So, I go to this service Friday night. Pastor John starts talking about issues. Talking about the woman with the issue of blood, but he said he was talking about how we have issues, and some of them is with Adam for years. Right? Issues with people, primarily. And I'm sitting there realizing that since December, I've been under this cloud of oppression, and depression, and discouragement, and negativity, and demonic attack that I can't seem to shake, and just I have just been just feeling like everything is caving in on
me. Right? Even though God's blessing the ministry, God's blessing us financially, uh more than ever before. We, you know, so I'm sitting back going, "Things are okay. Things are pretty good. A lot better than when we first came here." All the difficulties we went through. And I'm And And so, I'm sitting there during the service, and I'm just like, I And this is what you should do. Listen to me, folks. You listening? You You You need to go to church. I I'm going to tell folks, listen, I got to get on this. Go to church. I know some of you having a hard time finding church. Some of you listening, some of you watching. But it's it's different. Trust me. I can listen to messages, and yeah, they might minister to me, but and that's good, and I might get a truth, and I might be able to put it into action, but there's something about being in a service where it's happening, where the spirit of God is moving, and I needed to be where I was. And so, I'm sitting there being honest with myself. You know, a lot of ministers sit when they sit in other churches, listen to other pastors and preach, they're sitting there going, "Well, you know, he should probably talk about this and that and and we're all, you know, how we would do it and different and or better or And I'm and I wasn't doing that. I was sitting there going, "I got so many issues. Lord, show me what my issues are." You have to be honest with yourself. Cuz sometimes we can have offenses and we can have issues and we don't really realize you know, we get distracted. We're trying to hold the beach ball down in the water, but we're going to work and we're driving a car and we we just we we get to you know what we do? We get to thinking it's normal trying to hold all this underwater. And we and we can't do it for long. And so I was sitting there, "Lord, what is my issues?" And the Lord told me just as clear as a bell, he said, "You You have an issue with this person who hurt you back in December. And you're bitter and you're angry and you're hurt and you have unforgiveness toward them." Well, what does unforgiveness do? Unforgiveness hinders your prayer life. It hinders your faith. It hinders your intimacy with God. It hinders everything. But now, here's the good news. Remember I said that the fire that the tongue starts. Now, sometimes the tongue that starts the fire somebody else, sometimes your own tongue, right? And when somebody hurts you, you're going to say something. Even if they're not around, you're going to say something to them. About them, right? That devil. That little snot. I I'd love to smack them right and knock their teeth out of their mouth. We say stuff, don't we? I was talking to Patrick beforehand. We were talking about Yeah, you always know if you have an issue with somebody when their name comes up. Your blood pressure starts going up. Teeth start gritting a little bit. see jaw muscles flexing.
Yeah, I got I got issues. I got issues with this person. But listen to me. Y'all want to know how to forgive somebody? Everybody thinks it's hard. I don't know how many people think how hard it is to truly forgive somebody who's offended you or hurt you or wounded you or done something wrong to you. It's really not hard. You want me to tell you why? Because it's done by faith. And everything that is done by faith must be done by the mouth. Even we get saved, it says for by faith are we saved by by grace through faith. And then it says what? Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God. Then it says we must confess with our mouths the Lord Jesus and believe in our heart that God has raised him from the dead and we shall be saved. You can't be saved without confessing Jesus as your Lord and savior. You have to speak it out. It's the word of faith. That's That's Romans chapter 10. You have TO SAY IT. WE CAST OUT DEMONS by saying it. In the name of Jesus, demons, I bind you and command YOU TO GO. COME OUT OF THEM. YOU SAY IT. RIGHT? PEOPLE ARE SAVED BY THE PREACHING OF THE GOSPEL. That's speaking IT OUT. THE ENTIRE KINGDOM OF GOD operates on believing the word of God in your heart and speaking it with your mouth. THAT IS FAITH. FAITH BELIEVES IT IN YOUR HEART, speaks it with your mouth, and then any other actions that need to be put with it, you put with it. That's faith. And that's walking in faith. And living in faith. That's what we're called to do. Believe the word of God, the truth, in your heart, speak it out of your mouth, and then act as if you believe it. Right? Now, here's how simple it is. This is how simple Friday night was for me to GET THROUGH FROM WHAT'S BEEN PLAGUING ME FOR MONTHS. It was simple. I did two things because God dealt with me about this person that I had unforgiveness and bitterness toward. It hurt me. And I had an issue that I had spoken negative things over myself, my ministry. And so I did two things. Simple. And I want to tell you, before I left that church, I felt like a new person. And this is what I did. All I did was say, "Lord, forgive me for holding unforgiveness toward this person. It's sin. It's wrong. Forgive me. Jesus, wash this sin away from me. You forgave me a great many sins, many things I did wrong to you, to other people. You have forgiven me of many things. I am supposed to forgive others. So me not forgiving and holding this in and being angry and being hurt and wanting my revenge in some way.
All of this is destroying me. So Lord, forgive me. And then I said this, "Lord, I forgive and I named the person." That's all I did. I said it out of my mouth. "Lord, I forgive and I named the person." And then when he gave the altar call and I went up to the altar, you know what I I said Lord I said, "Lord, I really only want good for this person. I only want them to be okay. I only want them to be right with you. I only want them to be saved and know that they're ready to die and go to heaven if I want them All I want is good for them." You you know when you have an issue, one of the ways you know you have an issue with somebody is you kind of want something bad to just a little bit. All right? Just so they'll, you know, they deserve it. They need to wake up. They need a little smack in the head. They need God to hit them or they need God You know, they need something bad to happen so they would If that's what you're doing, you're a witch. You're cursing them. You're wishing harm upon them, evil upon them. You know hatred, the term You know what hatred is defined as, don't you? Let me give you the definition of hatred from the Greek from the original Greek language the Bible was written in, the New Testament. It means to not love someone as you should and to desire to have ill will or desire something bad to happen to them. That's hatred. Do you know that? To not love them as you should and to kind of hope something bad happens to I would guess that some of you have some people you hate. You would never admit it, but you do have people you hate. Guess what? You better deal with that. You better deal with that hatred, you better deal with that bitterness, you better deal with that offense, you better deal with that unforgiveness. You better repent of it to God and ask Jesus to forgive you and then you need to say out of your mouth. I don't care you YOU DON'T HAVE TO FEEL IT. Faith is not feelings. FAITH COMES BEFORE FEELINGS. RIGHT? FAITH JUST SAYS, "OKAY, GOD, you said for me to forgive them, SO I'LL SAY IT. I'LL START THIS THING BY THE POWER OF MY WORDS, BY CONFESSION OF MY WORDS. I said, 'Lord, I FORGIVE THIS PERSON.'" AND WHEN I SAID IT, IT LIFTED OFF OF ME. The oppression, the darkness, the depression, the demons I've been fighting, guess what? Some of you say, "Well, I bind demons and I rebuke them and I resist them, but they don't leave." THEY DON'T LEAVE BECAUSE THEY GOT LEGAL right to stay because you won't forgive somebody. Hey, oh, Pastor Dean. This good preaching. This This preaching will save your soul.
It'll save you from going to hell because guess what? If you read Matthew chapter 18, in fact, let's just turn there. Matthew chapter 18 the in the story where Jesus was teaching about forgiveness. I'm not going to read the whole thing, but the servant who wouldn't forgive, even though he'd been already forgiven, Jesus had forgiven him all of his debt, the great debt. And he went out and wouldn't forgive his other his his fellow servant. Notice what it says to this. This what Jesus said. Verse 28, Matthew 18:28. Jesus said this. But the same servant went out and found one of his fellow servants which owed him 100 pence and laid hands on him and took him by the throat saying, "Pay me that thou owest." And his fellow servant fell down at his feet said beside him said, "Have patience with me and I will pay thee all." And he would not but went and cast him into prison till he should pay the debt. Now, how you going to pay a debt in prison? You can't pay a debt in prison. So, basically what you've done is you put someone in an impossible situation. They can't do anything about it. Listen, there's a lot of There's a lot of What you don't realize is unforgiveness towards someone, bitterness, a grudge, an offense, it doesn't just harm you. It harms that other person, too. I know one individual right now who's such a bitter, angry, unforgiving, mean-spirited person, and he's a Christian. His unforgiveness, his bitterness, his bad attitude, his anger is hurting a bunch of other people in his family. You never sin alone. Your sin always affects others around you. Just remember that. But this is what he said. So he would not, the fellow servant went through his other his friend in prison. Verse 31, so when his fellow servants saw what was done, they were very sorry and came and told their lord all that was done. Then his lord, after that he had called him, said unto him, "O thou wicked servant, I forgave you all your debt. I forgave all your sins. Because you desired me, because you asked me. Should not you have also had compassion on your fellow servant, even as I had pity on thee?" And his lord was wroth or very angry and delivered him to the tormentors till he should pay all the debt was due unto him. So likewise shall my heavenly father do also unto you, if you from your hearts forgive not everyone his brother their trespasses. So hear what I'm saying. Come here. Let Let me Let me see this bag right here. Let me see your bag, Faith. All right, Aleah, come here. You can be my You can be my helper for a minute. Okay?
We're going to say that this purple this pink bag here Come around over here on this side so people can see you. That this purple bag, you can just put it on one shoulder if you want to. Just Just however. This purple bag is all of Aleah's sins and debts and transgressions and iniquities. Right? And she comes to the lord. This is what this story is showing. She comes to the lord and she says, "Lord, you know, I owe you this debt. Please me. Right? So, the Lord in this story, which is Jesus, God says, "Okay, I'm going to forgive you the whole thing." Right? So, he takes the whole every bit of it. All your sins, all your iniquities, all your debts, he takes them away, throws them away over here. Right? And you're forgiven. But then you go and you grab Emery and you tell her Go go tell her, "I want everything you owe me." Grab Right? And then you throw her in prison. Now, come back. When you do that, you won't forgive. Here's what happens to all your sins, debts that were forgiven. They're put back on you. You get them all back. And then you're delivered over here to some demon spirit tormentors. Right. All right. You can go sit down. One preacher years ago said this about this passage. He said, "I don't know what those tormentors are, but I don't want any of them." Right? Well, I can tell you what they are. They're demon spirits. And they will torment you. And and and let me tell you, spiritual and mental torment is terrible. And it will manifest itself in your physical body. It's been a scientific proven fact that stress, things like stress, but things like bitterness and anger and unforgiveness cause physical problems in your body. So, hear what I'm saying. Some things are as simple as just speaking it. I'm going to give you one more passage before we close. I want you to go to Mark chapter 9 to prove my point here that sometimes you just have to correct what you're saying. Y'all don't mind this today, do you? You learning something? Mark chapter nine. And I said one more passage. That may be a little fib. Preachers, Pentecostal preachers are allowed three or four closings. Okay? Mark chapter nine. Here's a story.
And I want to show you how faith and unbelief they're linked to what you say. Listen to me. All right? Mark chapter nine. This should be a familiar story. Uh verse 14, we'll start reading there. Speaking of Jesus and when he came to his disciples, he saw a great multitude about them and the scribes questioning with them and straightway or immediately all the people when they beheld him were greatly amazed and running to him saluted him. And Jesus is asked the scribes, "What question you with them? What What do you What is all this about?" And one of the multitude answered and said, "Master, I have brought unto thee my son which hath a dumb spirit or a deaf and dumb spirit. And wheresoever he taketh him, he teareth him and he foameth and he gnasheth with his teeth and he pineth away. And I spake to thy disciples and they should that they should cast him out and they could not." So the disciples had already been casting out demons, but now they couldn't because they've gotten lazy. They didn't pray. They didn't fast. They weren't ready. So Jesus comes up on the scene and he answered and he said, "O faithless generation, how long shall I be with you? How long shall I suffer you? Bring him unto me." And when they brought him unto Jesus and when he Jesus when he saw him straightway the spirit tore him and he fell on the ground and wallowed foaming. And Jesus asked his father, "How long is it a go since this came under him?" He said, "Of a child. And oftentimes it has cast him into the fire and into the waters to destroy him." So, this guy had a a this this child had a powerful demon that was trying to kill him. It was tearing him. It was causing the you know, foam, have like epileptic fits, but it was trying to kill him. And look at what the man said in verse 22. "But if you can do anything, speaking to Jesus. Now, if you can do anything, have compassion on us and help us." You don't say that to Jesus. His words revealed he did not believe. And maybe his unbelief was strengthened when the disciples tried and could not. You know, sometimes we go for help, sometimes the church or we go to a pastor or we go for counseling or we go for something and things don't change immediately, and we get in more unbelief, right? And negativity. Look what he says. Jesus didn't say, "Oh, it's okay that you it's okay that you're saying if you can do anything." Jesus didn't say that. Jesus said in the end verse 23, "If you can believe, all things are possible to him that believe it." Now, if a preacher did this today, they'd be looked at as a mean fellow preacher, right? You're just mean. You don't care about people.
Come up and say, "If you can do anything." No, if you can believe. If you have faith. If you have faith. If you believe this can happen, you have to have faith for things to happen in the kingdom of God. All the kingdom of God operates BY FAITH. WHY DO YOU THINK JESUS SAID SO many times, "Your faith has made you whole." He would heal somebody and HE DIDN'T SAY, "I MADE YOU WHOLE." He says, "Your faith in me made you whole." Your faith. Not the faith of God, not the faith of Jesus, NOT THE FAITH OF THE MINISTER, YOUR FAITH. YOU HAVE TO HAVE FAITH. FAITH means you believe what God's word says, not what THE WORLD SAYS, NOT WHAT THE circumstances say. You believe what the word of God says, the truth, and you speak that and you act on that. Amen? Now, there was a lot more going on here, but I want you to see the man, all he did, this man who said, "If you can believe, if you can do anything, Jesus." Showing his unbelief, his doubt. And Jesus said, "No, if you can believe, if you can show true faith." What does the man do? The man says, look verse 24, and straightway the father of the child cried out and said with tears, he's crying now. He's broken down, he's weeping. LORD, I BELIEVE. HELP THOU MY UNBELIEF. LORD, I believe. IT WENT FROM IF you can do anything, help us, to no, LORD, I'M SORRY, I BELIEVE. HE JUST SPOKE IT. HE MAY NOT HAVE FELT ONE OUNCE OF IT. WE GO BY FEELINGS TOO MUCH, FOLKS. Don't we? OH, IF I FEEL spiritual today, I'll be spiritual today. Right? That's your problem. Cuz feelings are up and down every single day, right? Emotions are up and down every single day. I remember watching Smith Wigglesworth, one of the great Pentecostal ministers of faith and healing and the baptism of the Holy Spirit. He used to say, "I don't My body doesn't tell me how it feels. I tell it how it feels." I need to start doing that more. You understand? The power of words. This man, all he did was corrected his words. And what did Jesus do? The minute the man said, "I believe, help my unbelief." It says, "When Jesus saw the people came running together, he rebuked the foul spirit, saying unto him, 'Thou dumb and deaf spirit, I charge thee, come out of him and enter no more into him.' And the spirit cried and rent him sore and came out of him, and he was as one dead,
insomuch that many said, 'He is dead.' But Jesus took him by the hand and lifted him up, and he arose." All the man did was went from saying, "If you can do anything, Jesus, help us." To "Lord, I believe." Sometimes that's all you need to do. Sometimes you just need to say, "You know what, God? The world says that I should, you know, I shouldn't give to the church first. I shouldn't give cuz they're all thieves and liars. But God, your word says, so I'm just going to believe. I'm going to tithe. I'm going to give. Whatever." I'm just using that as an example. You see what I'm saying? We choose to say, "I believe. God, you'll take care of it." Right? The doctor may say, "You have a disease. There's nothing I can do for you." God says, "I am your healer." By your stripes, Jesus, we were healed. But the question is, will you believe? I was telling my wife before and I I I will end with this, this last thing here. Mark chapter 6. I'm sorry, there may be one more thing. We we Mike can testify this cuz Mike was with me nearly 30 years ago. He was around. Were miracles happening, Mike? Yes, there were. A lot of them were happening. But I'm going to tell you why. I I My wife and I were talking Nancy and I were talking this morning and I said, "It really has dawned on me. You know, we've had 30 years now of even more lukewarm, watered-down Christianity that does not believe in the supernatural. I mean, just like the debate I'm having a debate with Christians this morning on a Facebook post about the baptism of the Holy Spirit with the evidence of speaking in other tongues. I give them the scriptures. Acts 2, and all 120 were baptized in the Holy Spirit and spoke with other tongues. Acts chapter 10, everyone in Cornelius's household that heard Peter sermon that day were baptized in the Holy Spirit and spoke with other tongues. Paul goes to Ephesus in Acts chapter 19, he finds 12 guys who are disciples, so he finds 12 Christians who are not baptized in the Holy Spirit yet and the evidence of speaking in other tongues. He tells them about it, he prays for all of them, guess what? Not 11, not 10, but all 12. So, we have these examples, all 120 or everyone in Cornelius's household, all 12. Jesus said, "These signs shall follow them that believe, not some of them that believe." He said, "These signs shall follow them that believe, they shall speak with new tongues, right?" So, we're I don't even know why this is a debate among Christians. The baptism of the Holy Spirit. You say, "Well, well, wait a minute, Pastor David, if you get saved, doesn't the Holy Spirit come in you?" Yes, when you
get saved, the Holy Spirit comes in you. The baptism of the Holy Spirit is a separate experience. It's an infilling. It's an immersion. It's a It's a gateway into the supernatural to help you pray supernaturally, to help you move into the other supernatural gifts of the Holy Spirit. So, I don't know You can sit there and go, "Well, I have the Holy Spirit cuz I have salvation." I'm like, "That's good." So did the 120. They were saved. That's why they were obeying Jesus in the upper room praying for 10 days, not because they didn't have anything better to do. But they were obeying Jesus cuz Jesus told them there's something else going to happen to you. It's called the baptism of the Holy Spirit. And when the baptism of the Holy Spirit came on the day of Pentecost to the 120 WHO OBEYED JESUS, ALL OF THEM spake with tongues, supernatural tongues. And this happened in Acts chapter 10, Acts chapter Acts two. So, I don't even understand why there's even a debate. But we have had so many YEARS NOW OF CHURCHES AND seminaries that have been infiltrated by Jesuits and Catholics and liberals and just phony phony professors teaching our young men and women that these things are not for today. That Jesus doesn't heal anymore. That the gifts of the Spirit are not for today. All this nonsense, RIGHT? SO, WHAT WE HAVE CREATED, what we've allowed to be created with the Baptist church and the Methodist church and the Presbyterian All these churches that deny the supernatural of God, the gifts of the Holy Spirit, the baptism of the Holy Spirit, the gift of tongues, healing, miracles. Jesus is the same yesterday, today, and forever. All these churches they preach this stuff and preach it, they put it in in the study Bibles and all these commentaries and all these notes and what they've done in America, particularly in America and the West, is they have created a bunch of people who uh live in an atmosphere of unbelief. You You want to know what? You go to Africa and let me tell you, the Pentecostals are the ones evangelizing and winning the Africans by the millions to Jesus and people are getting healed. I can go to Africa and preach on healing and I I did a healing service in Africa. Right on a Wednesday morning at 10:00 in THE MORNING AND 700 people showed up to a church that would seat 300 and everybody in the building got healed that morning. BECAUSE THEY DON'T LIVE IN an atmosphere that doesn't believe in the supernatural. They've seen the voodoo and the juju. They know that the devil's real, so they know that they need the power of God and they read the Bible and they just believe what it says. And little women were coming in there. They don't have They can't go to doctors. They're poor. And they come in there with their little babies that they don't have any money to take them to a doctor and I laid hands on babies that morning WHO WERE BURNING UP WITH FEVER. I'M TALKING ABOUT BURNING
UP WITH FEVER. AND I KNOW THE PASTOR TOLD me later, he said, "Everyone got healed." He said there were people there who had incurable blood disease, cancer, every kind of disease you can imagine that they could not go to a hospital or doctor if they wanted to. SEE, THEY HAVE TO BELIEVE. JESUS IS THEIR ONLY HOPE. NOW, WE CAN RUN TO THE DOCTOR AND GET A pill or a happy pill. I mean, we run to the doctor just to get, you know, to not feel so depressed. They don't realize those those things are screwing us up, right? Jesus went to his own hometown. In Mark chapter 6. I'm fired up this morning. Verse 1, and it says he went out from there and he came into his own country and his disciples followed him. And when the Sabbath day was come, he began to teach in the synagogue. And many hearing him was astonished saying, "From whence hath this man these things? And and what wisdom is this that is given unto him? That even such mighty works are wrought by his hands. Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary, the brother of James and Joses and Judah and Simon? Are not his sisters here with us? And they were offended at him." They were like, "This is just a This is just a regular guy." Uh you know, what what's he doing? And just said Jesus said unto them, "A prophet is not without honor but is in his own country and among his own kin and in his own house." And look at verse 5. This is Jesus Christ says this about him, "And he could there do no mighty work, save he laid his hand upon a few sick folk and healed them. And he marveled because of their unbelief." This is America. America is Nazareth. As Nazareth was toward Jesus, America has become toward the true gospel and the scriptures. And most of these unbelievers are Christians. Full of unbelief. Full of negativity against what the scriptures teach. And I'm just going to tell you right now, you can listen to you can listen to me. You can come to a thousand church services. You can get anointed with so much oil that you slide back to your car on your belly. Our pastor and elders can anoint you with they can grease you up. Pray the prayer of faith over you, BUT YOU WILL NOT be healed. YOU WILL NOT be baptized in the Holy Spirit with the evidence of speaking in other tongues. You will not get anything if you're in unbelief. Simple. Jesus said, I mean, Mark James said it this way. I mean, he was blunt he was very blunt.
He said, what did he say? He said, "Hey, you want to ask God for something? You want to ask God for wisdom?" He said, "Let Let the man that needs wisdom ask God, but let him ask in faith, nothing wavering." He said, "That man will receive." But he said, he said, "The man that asked in unbelief will receive nothing." Zip. People all the time say, "God can heal anybody." What was it what did the guy say this morning? "God can heal anybody, but" or that article last night? "God can heal anybody he wants to, but he didn't do that anymore." Well, he's not going to do it for you, buddy, I assure you. Yeah, he said, "God didn't heal through people." And I'm like, "My Bible says that believers shall lay hands upon the sick and they shall recover." So, see, your unbelief cancels it out for you. BUT WHAT WE DON'T UNDERSTAND IS the unbelief we live in an atmosphere of it. AND IT AFFECTS US. THINK ABOUT THIS. JESUS WAS PERFECT, SON OF GOD, GOD IN THE FLESH, ANOINTED OF THE HOLY GHOST, never sinned. He goes to Nazareth, they're full of unbelief. And it says he could not do mighty miracles. Only could pray for a few sick folk had fevers. Faith got healed of a fever this weekend. God, I hope we can change this atmosphere of unbelief into faith. I've seen Listen, those of you may have never heard me talk about this. Those listening by blog talk, those some of you here. Listen. I can testify that in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth of the Bible, the Jesus of the Bible the Jesus of the New Testament that I have laid my hands one time on a deaf woman and said, "Lord, open her ears in Jesus' name." And they opened and she started hearing. The Lord has had me lay hands and pray for a woman who was crippled in a wheelchair and had not walked for 2 years, could not walk. The Lord spoke to me and said, "Tell her I said unto her to rise and walk." I told her, said, "The Lord said for me to tell you that he said for you to rise and walk in the name of Jesus." She got up and walked. This was in Montgomery when I was at Evangel Temple. One of their staff members of their church went with me, witnessed the whole thing, shared it on tape. I got it somewhere. Mary Woodall, sweet lady. She's in heaven now. I've seen cancer disappear. Broken bones healed instantly. Torn ligaments healed instantly. Mike was healed instantly when he visited my
house. The first time we ever met, Mike was healed instantly of torn ligaments in in his hand. Instant. In Jesus' name. I've seen the dead raised. Cast out many demons. This book is true. It's true. It's the truth. God has not changed. If the problem if there's a problem, it is not with him. It is with us. And we just don't want to admit it. We want to come up with doctrines, "Oh, he just doesn't do that anymore." No, IT'S YOUR UNBELIEF. IT'S YOUR PRIDE. IT'S YOUR ARROGANCE. It's your stubbornness. It's your you're you're deceived. You got idols in your life. RELIGION IS AN IDOL. GUESS WHAT? THERE'S A LOT OF GUYS WHO BELIEVE what I'm talking about, that are Baptist preachers, BUT THEY WON'T SAY IT BECAUSE THEY'RE AFRAID TO LOSE their salary and their position and their Baptist friends. So, guess what? You get nothing. Zero. You cannot be ashamed of the word of God and think you're going to receive anything from it. I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ. And the gospel of Jesus Christ is not just that he died on the cross for sins. He took the stripes for healing. He was bruised for our iniquities. He expects us to obey his word. And that means to forgive those who hurt us. It means to correct what's coming out of our mouth. Stop cursing yourself. Stop cursing your marriage. Stop cursing your children. Stop cursing your church. Stop cursing your pastor. Stop cursing other pastors. And when I say curse, I'm not talking about speaking negative. Start praying for them, blessing them, speaking good over them. You will see if you will get rid of the negative talk out of your mouth and you'll forgive people that hurt you and quit talking bad about them. IF YOU'LL START SPEAKING good and you'll start praying for their good, you will see situations turn around. And now listen, it might take time. Listen to me on this and I promise you this is it. This is truly it. Remember it talked about the tongue being like the rudder of a big ship? Listen to me, this is important point. Hey, hey, everybody look here. I want you listening. Remember? It says the little the little rudder can turn the big ship where the captain wants it to go, right? Well, let me ask you something. Any of you been on a big ship? Right? A big ship that's moving through the water, when the rudder turns, does it just flip
around immediately and go the other way? No. That little rudder can turn that big ship, but it's going to take some time. And it's going to take some time holding that rudder in the right position. You hear what I'm saying? Some of you want instant grits. Microwave. But you're going to have to start speaking things right and praying things right and moving in faith and keep it turned in that direction to get that ship to turn all the way around. But if you never start turning the ship, it'll never turn around. And the problem with a lot of people is they get their tongue like you'll hear a message like this today and you'll start getting your words right. You'll start speaking the word of God. You'll start speaking blessing and good things. You'll start praying good things. You'll start speaking faith. And you'll start getting the ship turned around. It'll start turning. And then somebody ticks you off and you turn the ship back this way. Right? And you look like a drunk driver. Turn it and then you turn it back and then you turn turn it back. Right? Consistency is the only way to change anything. How many of you know bad habits get you in bad places, right? Good habits get you in good places. Consistency. You want to be good at golf, you have to keep playing golf. You have to keep practicing golf, right? Same thing with anything else. And I want to tell you this, listen to me closely. The baptism of the Holy Spirit, the evidence of speaking in other tongues. Why do you think that that's important that God wanted his people to have it? If the tongue is a world of iniquity that can set the course of nature on fire. If the tongue is so hard to control, doesn't it make sense that God would want you to surrender your tongue to the Holy Ghost?