Amen! Wow, that was a great time of worship, wasn't it? Let's just give God thanks for our praise and worship team.
We're going to start a new series today, but before we begin, I just want to say tonight—say tonight with me—is Night of Worship. Doors open at 5, we start at 5:30. Get your praise on! Come a little early, spend some time in prayer, and get ready to see what God is going to do.
Next Sunday is Jersey Sunday. I really don't have a team in the fight, but I just hope Kansas City gets beat. I'm not looking towards Andrea because I don't want her to quit this week, but yeah, so yeah, Vance, but I'm not on your side either, so don't do that. But it's going to be fun! Wear a jersey, you know, whatever you want to wear—Gator, Seminole, a pro team, you know, whatever. Dallas, we'll bring band-aids for Brenda.
Hey, I want to introduce you guys to a young couple that's so special to us. We've known them shortly, but the impact they've had on our life has been awesome. This is Stephen and Portia O'Neill, and we are so welcoming you.
So, Stephen now is one of our new employees. Is that a cat or a dog? Right. So anyway, I did love them. But if you're going to own a cat, I guess that one would be a good one. It just looks like... Anyway, I digress. Sorry, Portia. Yeah, let's keep on going.
But we met them a few weeks ago, and he's now become part of our production and communication team, and they both have been such a blessing to us. Come alongside. He's been revamping a lot of the production stuff that we have in here. He's just such a gifted individual.
So tell us a little bit about your background and how you came to Father's House, and how the Lord just sort of drafted you in.
One of the great things I feel like the Lord has called me to do in this last half of my life is to challenge successful business people. This couple here has been very successful in the business world, life in changing people and working here at Father's House. They said they prayed about it, and God brought them along. I am just so thankful.
Tell us a little bit about what you're doing, Portia. I know you're a great part of this team and doing a lot of great things.
Let's give them a hand. We're just so welcome. Thank you, guys. Thank you. I love you.
So we're starting this new series called Overflow. Say overflow. Overflow. Living in the fullness of the Spirit.
So let me just do a little informal survey if you don't mind here at the beginning. I don't know. I hate these things. There we go.
So let me ask you this. How many of you were raised either in the Pentecostal Church, Assemblies of God, Church of God, or Charismatic Church? Would you raise your hand? Okay. Yeah, usually only about a sixth of the church in most services.
How many of you were raised Catholic? Yep, that's always one of the bigger numbers. How about Baptist, Methodist, Mainline, Lutheran, Episcopalian, Church of Christ? All right. And the last category is just heathen. Yeah, I love that.
If you weren't here a few years ago, I did a series more in depth on the Holy Spirit, and it's called I've Got the Power. There's a QR code up in the corner of your notes, and if you shoot that, it'll take you to the series that we did, and it's more in depth. It goes into a lot more depth of saying, let's start from just a blank sheet of paper and forget everything we've learned, and let's relearn according to the scriptures what the Lord would say to us.
So here's what I know as we enter into this series. If you were raised in a Pentecostal Charismatic Church, you've seen in operation these gifts that I'll be talking about. I'm going to talk about manifestation gifts this month. I'm not going to go into the others. You've seen the use of them, and some of us have seen the abuses of them, right? Can I get an amen?
But if you were raised in a mainline denomination, many of you were taught that the gifts are no longer in operation for us today, and many of you maybe came from a background when you looked at people that said that they were spirit-filled or from a spirit-filled background, you sort of saw them as pew jumpers, snake handlers, and it was sort of like those people across the other side of the street. You know what I mean?
But here's what I've learned through the years. Even mainline churches that never taught on the gifts of the Spirit, and a lot of times it was just not an understanding, didn't even know. You've seen these gifts in operation.
Let me call those people, or you call those people, as people that are sensitive to the Spirit. For instance, someone would say, you know what, Steve, I was praying, and you came to my mind, and I don't know what you were going through, but I just really felt like I should pray for you, right?
Someone said, you know, Sonny, I was in prayer, and I ran across this scripture, and I felt like it was a scripture that I need to read. I need to write down and give to you so you can fold it up and put it in your wallet, and when you're struggling again, you can look at that. Does that ever happen to anybody in your life?
And a lot of times it wasn't somebody saying, whoa, that's a word of knowledge. Whoa, that's a word of prophecy. Whoa, that's... Look, I don't know what you want to call it. I guess a pig putting lipstick on a pig by any name is still a pig when it's all said and done.
So I don't know what you want to call exactly everything, but I do know that people that are sincere towards the Lord have had these things happen in their life and never really recognized it was one of the manifestations of the gifts of the Spirit.
So why am I taking the month of February to teach on this particular subject? First of all, because I feel like there is such misunderstanding and confusion about this.
Now, I know we cover it in Growth Track, but I wanted to cover just more in depth on the manifestation gifts, and the third Sunday in, I'm going to talk about that ghost in the room that no one really likes to talk about—speaking in tongues. Yes, I am going to go there, and I still walk straight. I still drive a car straight. I still got sense, and I still like Tootsie Roll Pops, and I'm spirit-filled, okay?
So you don't have to be weird. You don't have to be strange. And we're going to cover that. It's going to be good. So just get ready, all right? Trust me, it'll be okay.
1 Corinthians 12:1, would you read it with me? It's in your notes. "Brothers and sisters, I don't want there to be a misunderstanding concerning spiritual gifts." So that's really one of the reasons I'm teaching this, so that we can get beyond misunderstandings.
Because I'm going to teach you what the Word says, not what Uncle Billy Bob says, or what some of those pastors or those preachers—not really pastors and preachers, but on the internet—they're always squashing anything. And I always look to see what they've done with their life, and they haven't done much except pick on other people, all right?
Second of all, one of the other reasons I'm teaching this is because some of you, I've heard your stories. And you said to me, "Terry, I just feel stuck. I feel like I'm in a spiritual neutral. Lately, I just feel like I've been coasting. And I really don't sense any power."
I can look across this congregation while praise and worship is going on, and I can pick you out—that there is no power operating in your life. It is impossible if the power of the Spirit is working in your life to just stand and to be placid and beige as worship is going on like that. Do you need to get the power of the Holy Spirit working in your life?
So I'm approaching this subject in all humility and hunger, knowing that what I'm trying to do in four weeks is trying to capture the ocean and put it in a jar. It's impossible.
How can I take this whole thing of gifts of the Spirit, manifest gifts of the Spirit, that wide ocean, and do it in four weeks? I can't. But I believe the Holy Spirit can speed up the process for us.
And one of the last reasons I'm teaching is this: because we need the Holy Spirit. We need the Holy Spirit. We need the gifts. We need these manifestation gifts in the Father's House.
In the Father's House, we need these gifts in operation. And guess what else? You need these gifts in operation in your personal life.
Colossians chapter 1 and 11, that's our theme verse. Read it with me. "And we pray that you would be energized." Let's say that with a little indigestion. Indigestion. That's a new word. Indigestion. There's another one. It's not indigestion; it's indigestion. Woo! I feel the Lord on that one.
All right, here we go. Sorry if you're new. I'll be okay in a minute. Let's start again. "As we pray, you would be energized with all His explosive power from the realm of His magnificent glory, filling you with hope." Filling you.
I'd like to be filled up. How about you?
Two men were standing at the foot of the Niagara Falls. One was a local, and he was looking at the falls and listening to the falls. He pointed and he said, "That's the greatest unused power in the universe."
Ever been there? Ever been at the foot of the Niagara Falls? It sounds a little bit like this. So, that. I mean, you just sense the awesomeness of that. So, he said, "Yeah, that's the most unused power in the universe."
And a fellow believer stood beside him, and he said, "No, I have to disagree with you. The Holy Spirit is the greatest unused power in the universe." If you accept that or believe that, give the Lord a hand clap and say, "Yeah, I believe that."
Why would we want to teach in Growth Track about the Holy Spirit in our lives and not experience the power of the Holy Spirit in our church, in our small groups, in our life groups?
I think the man hit on something when he said, "No, greater than the Niagara Falls is the Holy Spirit—untapped, untapped, not touched by a lot of people."
I think sadly to say, a lot of people in many churches are happy with two-thirds of God. They love God the Father. Heard a lot about Him. Yeah, I believe that. God the Son. Yep, yep.
But when you talk about the ghost in the room, God the Holy Ghost, God the Holy Spirit, then we begin to like, "Well, yeah, but I've seen..." Yeah, I know we have.
Look at Acts, John chapter 14. And Jesus said, "And I will pray the Father." Now, Jesus is getting ready to go back and ascend into heaven. Now, before Jesus came and took on human flesh, He was spirit, just like God. He could be anywhere at any time.
But when Jesus came and He became incarnate in human flesh, He was locked into that for all of eternity. When we get to heaven and see Jesus, He's not going to be a spirit floating around. You're going to see Him encased in a physical body. You're going to see the scars. You're going to see the wounds. You're going to see that.
And so He's just getting ready to go back to heaven. I have a lot of people in my church around the world, and I can't be with Tim and Brenda and Chris and Michelle and everybody at the same time.
So when I go back to the Father, I'm going to send you the promise of the Comforter, and when He comes, He will be with you, and He will be in you, and He will fill you.
And so verse 17 says, "The Spirit of truth whom the world cannot receive because it neither sees Him nor knows Him, but you know Him."
Now I want you to take your pen out and underline this in your notes, this phrase: "For He dwells with you." Say, "dwells with you." For He dwells with you. Circle that, underline that.
First of all, He says He's going to come and He's going to dwell with you. He's going to dwell with you, and He will be in you. Say, "in you." Circle that.
So here He says He's going to dwell with you and He's going to be in you. So let's break that down just a little bit.
So first of all, He says when the Holy Spirit comes, I'm going to send Him, and He's going to be beside you. In other words, the Holy Spirit is going to dwell with you, beside you, not in you.
And so what are you talking about, Terry? I'm talking about you and me. Before we ever became a believer in Jesus, before we ever invited the Spirit into our life, the Holy Spirit was pursuing us.
As one of the early church preachers said, the Holy Spirit is the hound of heaven. He gets on our track, on our trail, and He won't let us go. We sing that song. He knocks down the doors. He pushes in the walls. He does everything He can to find us.
Listen, you didn't find Jesus. It's impossible for you to find Jesus on your own. Jesus said, "I send the Holy Spirit. He will convict you of sin and of righteousness and of faith in God."
You never even understand that Jesus can be your Savior unless the Holy Spirit comes along beside you and pursues you.
How many of you, let's see if we can go back in the history of your life. You know, some of you have been Christians a long time. Some of you may be recently. But how many of you remember when the Holy Spirit pursued you?
I mean, you would hear Him knocking on your heart's door, right? You'd hang around people or come to church, and your hands would get sweaty. Your heart would beat faster, and you just knew.
And, you know, you'd grip the back of the chair. Maybe in those old days when we said, "Everybody stand. Now we're going to have an altar invitation." And you're grasping the back of it.
I've seen grown men grasp the back of the chair so much that their hands turn white and blood and almost pass out. Why? Because the Holy Spirit is wooing them and drawing them.
And then all of a sudden, I've seen them step out and walk to the aisle, and the tears of joy flow down their life. Why? Because they yielded to the Holy Spirit's pursuit and allowed Him to come into their life.
And so He said, then He not only dwells with us, but He said He will be in you, verse 17. Jesus said, "And you shall be baptized, baptizo, with the Holy Spirit not many days from now."
You're going to be baptized. You're going to be immersed. It says that when the Holy Spirit, at conversion, when we invite Jesus into our life, He baptizes us into the church.
At conversion, you receive all there is of the Holy Spirit. I heard someone once preach, "You get the Holy Spirit in installments."
When you get saved, you get a little bit of Him. When you get filled, you get a little bit of Him. Look, no, we get all of Him. How can you dissect part of God? You either get all of Him or nothing.
The issue is, He doesn't have all of us. You see, that's the whole thing. So He says, He will come inside you. And then He comes upon us, Acts 1:8.
But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has what? Come upon you. Say, "come upon you." That doesn't mean it's from the outside thing, but it's a release of what's already in you.
John chapter 7, Jesus said, "Hey, let me just, let me maybe help you a little bit and demonstrate this."
So, Jesus said, "I'm going to send the Holy Spirit. This is you. He's going to come. This is the Holy Spirit. He's going to come beside you. He's going to be with you."
That means when I go over here, He's with me. That's right. When I go to honky-tonk, He's going to go with me. That's, anyway, I don't know.
Yeah. When I go to the bar and I get drunk, He goes with me. He said, "No, He wouldn't do that." Oh, yeah, He would.
Because you see, He's the hound of heaven. Jesus said, "He's going to pursue you. He's not going to give up."
You run over here, He's going to go with you. He's going to be right there. Now, there can be a time when He keeps drawing you and pursuing you, and your heart gets hard, and you don't even sense Him anymore.
But aren't you thankful that the farther you ran, the more He came to be with you? He was with you. He was with you.
And He said, "Yeah, give the Lord a hand clap." Sure. I'm so thankful that He was with you.
And then the scripture says, and then He says, "And then He will be in you." The Holy Spirit is going to come in you. And He's going to be in you. And it's no longer that you're empty.
But He's going to be in you. But He doesn't leave it there. Then Jesus said, "Then there's going to be a release of that. He's going to come upon you."
So when you see the release of the Holy Spirit, He says He comes upon you. And so it's not, it's just like you start to overflow. And it just overflows everywhere.
And no matter where you go, there's an overflow of your life. My question to you is this: Are you allowing Him to overflow in your life? Or are you just halfway filled?
Ephesians says this. It says, Ephesians 5:18, "Be ye filled with the Spirit." Now in the Greek, that's in the present imperative.
Let me tell you what it says in the Greek: "Be ye continuously being filled with the Spirit." So that means I might pray for somebody and I slosh some out.
And guess what? I want to be filled again to overflowing. And guess what? I may make a wrong decision and slosh some of it out. And I'm going to pray. I want to be continually being filled with the Spirit until I'm overflowing.
Well, I got my boots wet. That's okay. But do you see what I'm saying? He wants to come inside us, and then He wants to flow out of us.
So let's discover the spiritual gifts. There's three categories of spiritual gifts. There are three different categories that we will look at.
We will look at one, the manifestation gifts. So if you want to take notes, first of all, there's the manifestation gifts.
And the manifestation gifts are the spiritual gifts that we will look at, found in 1 Corinthians chapter 12. And so they're the manifestations of His presence in our life.
It's supernatural demonstration in your notes there on the first page. Manifestation gifts. These are, if you'll write out beside there, these are gifts of the Holy Spirit.
Say gifts of the Holy Spirit. These are gifts of the Holy Spirit. I say Holy Spirit. I don't say the Holy Spirit because I don't say the Jesus. I don't say the God.
You know, we just, and I know linguistically it's like that in the scripture to help us, but He's Holy Spirit. Just like it's God the Father, God the Son, God Holy Spirit.
So it's a manifestation. It's a gift of the Holy Spirit. And then there are the motivational gifts, Romans 12. These are serving gifts.
These are inherent tendencies in us from birth. It's things that we're motivated to do. And these are gifts of Father God. Say Father God.
These are gifts of Father God. Before you were born, He created you in your mother's womb, and He gave you motivational gifts or inherent tendencies.
Some of you have been a teacher from when you were a little kid playing with other kids. You didn't just suddenly become and get the gift of teaching when you became a believer. No, it's just intensified.
I mean, you were playing with your brothers and sisters, and you were always the one that was telling them what to do and how to do it in the right way.
And there are others of you that inherit in you is a gift of helps. You're always serving. I mean, some of you, when I spilled this water a while ago, the first day you were looking for a towel somewhere so you could wrap this up.
And some of you are already planning how you can wipe off my boots. But guess what? I really spilled it, Sam. I went everywhere. But guess what? I'll stand in the water.
But you see, so those are gifts of the Father. And then there are gifts of Jesus. Gifts of the Son, Ephesians 4. These are office gifts.
These are leadership office gifts: the apostle, the prophet, the evangelist, the pastor, the teacher. Say gifts of Jesus.
These are offices, not titles. You know, you see this person's, "I'm apostle, prophet of the third Reich of a reverent fourth."
Look, if you have to tell me the title, then you probably are not secure in the office. You say, "Who are you?" My name is Terry. As John Maxwell said, "I'm your friend."
And so people say, "Well, should I call you reverend?" No, don't call me reverend. I hate that term anyway. It really doesn't make any sense.
People say, "Well, I feel like I should." So years ago, we had a guy come. And so some of you here, you know, you're a reverend. You're a reverend.
People say to me, "Call me PT." That's not a slang word. They're not cussing me out, okay? It's just a phrase a brother came up with.
He said, "What can I call you?" He's new. I said, "Just call me Terry. That's fine."
"Oh no, I couldn't do that. You're a pastor." I said, "Well, you know, it's okay. You can call me Terry."
"No, no." He said, "How about if I call you PT, which would stand short for Pastor Terry?" I said, "That floats your boat. Go ahead."
You know, that's it. Or you can just call me Terry. I don't have to remind you of the office that I fill if I fill that office in the authority of God.
Do you understand what I'm saying? So I'm always leery when I see somebody with a long title before their name, okay? That's just a side trail. I'm sorry. Forgive me, all right?
Let's go back to 1 Corinthians chapter 12, verses 7, looking at the manifestation gifts.
"But the manifestation of the Spirit is given to each one for the profit of all." Say, "for the profit of all." For to one is given the word of wisdom through the Spirit, to another the word of knowledge through the same Spirit.
To another faith by the same Spirit. To another gifts of healing by the same Spirit. To another the working of miracles. To another prophecy. To another discerning of spirits. To another different kinds of tongues. To another the interpretation of tongues.
But one in the same Spirit works all these things, distributing to each one individually as He wills.
These manifestation gifts are not something that you own or possess. You don't have it in your back pocket.
But it's when a need arises in a particular situation, the Holy Spirit can look through this congregation and find somebody who's overflowing, and He can give you a word of knowledge, a word of wisdom, a prophecy.
He can bring great faith into you, working of miracles, all of those things. But you don't own them. He works those through you for a particular time.
Now, so what is the purpose of spiritual gifts for these gifts that will be manifest? It says there, "for the profit of all." Say profit. Say common good. For your benefit. Builds you up. Encourages you. Edifies you.
So that's what these gifts are. It's not so that you can say, "Hell, I'm really spiritual. A word of knowledge works through me."
And then you go into this fake, pious language. No, it's, you know, we're all saved by the grace of Jesus. There's no super state.
Being filled with the Spirit doesn't make you more mature than anybody else. I've seen a lot of people who say they're filled with the Spirit, and they're some of the most immature people I've ever seen in my life.
They get offended at the drop of the hat. They're always critical. They're judgmental. They have no joy. Looks like they've been bad, and you see nothing. You see no manifestation of any joy. You don't see any manifestation of the fruit of the Spirit in their life.
So how are these gifts defined? Word of wisdom. Logos sophias. Word of wisdom is a divine answer or a solution for a particular situation.
It's applying God's wisdom to a particular situation. Always in a particular situation, a word of wisdom, there is a directive for an action.
Now, just to make a difference, people say, "What's the basic difference between a word of knowledge and a word of wisdom?"
A word of knowledge is information about something. A word of wisdom is a directive of how do you apply that knowledge for that particular situation?
So word of wisdom. We'd see that in Acts 27, where Paul is in a storm. The ship is about to crash. He doesn't receive a word of knowledge. "Paul, you're in a storm."
No, he receives in a dream that night a word of wisdom. And what does he tell the guys? He said, "Look, don't abandon ship. Don't jump ship. I've received a word from the Lord last night that we'll all be saved if you stick with me during this."
It was a directive, a word of wisdom for a situation. Why wouldn't we desire that in the church?
Why wouldn't we desire that in our life? That when your kids come up with a problem, that you just pause quietly and say, "Holy Spirit, I don't have the wisdom for this."
And you pause, and all of a sudden, man, you have a directive. You know, "This is how we're going to handle that. This is what we're going to do."
Why wouldn't we want that in our life?
Word of wisdom, word of knowledge, logos gnosis, to know something specific without having learned it by natural means. Reveal facts unknown.
Or like that great theologian we have in the house says it like this, "Heal it or reveal it."
Now, if you don't know who that theologian is, she's sitting on the front row right there. It's my wife, Anita. I've watched her through the years.
You don't give her something and say, "That's okay. Don't try to fix it. It's not going to work." She's going to do everything she can.
She's going to look at every YouTube thing there is, make that thing work and all that, and still not have the answer. And here's what I hear, "Pray. Holy Spirit, heal it or reveal it."
In other words, reveal how we can use wisdom or knowledge in this situation.
John chapter four, the woman was at the well. She loved Jesus, thought He was cool. And Jesus says, "You know what? You've had five husbands, and the man you're living right there with right now is not your husband."
How do you know that? How did Jesus know that? It was a word of knowledge.
You say, "Yeah, but He's God." Yes, but He came onto human flesh and He prayed. He heard the voice of God.
Look, Jesus, Nathaniel comes. Philip brings Nathaniel, and Jesus points at him. He says, "Oh yeah, I knew you. I saw you when Philip came to you and you were setting of the fig tree."
How'd you know that, Lord? How'd you know that? It's a word of knowledge.
These are understanding gifts. For instance, at the end of the service, a lot of times I'll be outside, and someone will come out and they'll be wiping tears, and they'll say, "How did you know?"
I said, "What do you mean, how did you know?" You were talking straight at me today. In fact, I'm going to go home and look and see if you bugged my house because there's nobody could have said that.
And I say, "How did you know?" I said, "I don't know." And sometimes they'll say, "You said so and so and such and such."
And I say, in my mind, I don't remember saying that, but that's what they heard when I said something because the Holy Spirit spoke to them.
And the other thing, sometimes it just happens spontaneously, and I don't go into those sad displays that many of us have seen with preachers before, right in the middle of a sermon.
"What's that, Lord? Yes, Lord. Say it again, Lord. Say it again. Oh yeah, here's what the Lord says." Oh, come on. Give me a break.
That's nothing but arrogant pride. You don't have to get into that voice. You just say to somebody, "And here's what I said. You know, I don't know if this makes sense to you or not, but I just feel like what you've really been going through is this."
Now, if that doesn't make sense to you, just ignore it. Because guess what? I'm not infallible.
I can think I hear something. People say, "Well, how do you know you really hear God?" If I really knew that I hear God, in other words, you're saying, if God would write it down on the paper and notarize it, then I'd be willing to say it.
Listen to what you're saying. No, it's by faith. It's by faith. I just sense it in my knower.
And you know how it happens? The more you do it, the more you know. The more you'll be yield to that. But you've got to be flowing in the Spirit, okay?
That means you're praying for someone, and the Lord gives you a word of wisdom of what they can do about a situation they're going through.
You don't have to kick into an over-dramatized thing and saying, "Oh, blesseth the Lord. Come on. Scare people out."
I feel like this is what... Do you understand what I'm saying? Are we okay? Do you understand this is not going to be freaky?
Gift of faith. The word is pistis. It's a Spirit-given ability to see something that God wants done in a specific situation or a need.
It's sustaining unwavering confidence that God will do it regardless of the obstacles. Now, it's not the same as a measure of faith because we're all given a measure of faith when we become a believer.
One scholar interprets this as wonder-working faith. I like that. Wonder-working faith.
Acts 3, Peter is walking up to the temple, and there's a lame man that's there. And so the man is begging for food.
And so Peter says to him, "Silver and gold," he's asking for money. He says, "Silver and gold have I none, but such as I have I give to you."
And something rolls up in Peter because this is not his first time at church. Now, if this guy found a good place to beg, guess what?
In all probability, Peter has seen him before with his hand out. But on this particular day, something happens on the inside of Peter.
I would say it's a gift of faith. And Peter looks at him, and he looks at him in a different way, and he says, "Look, dude, give me your hand."
He's talking to a lame man who can't get up on his own. And Peter takes him by the hand, and he lifts him up. That's a gift of faith.
A couple of years ago, when Dr. Gregg and the others found some cancer in my lung, sent me to Moffitt, took the test, and the doctor sat there, and he said, "Here it is, look at it," and circled it.
"You got cancer. We're going to set you up for surgery." And I think it was just about four or five weeks. "We're going to go ahead and schedule those for you."
And I'm sitting there, and I gotta be honest. I'm not a great man of faith. No, I was scared.
Only thing I could think about, I'm gonna die, and Anita's gonna marry somebody else. Now that's selfish. But that's what I thought.
That's the first thought, honestly. That's how we all want to be with you. That's what I thought. I didn't think, "Oh, we're gonna go home and pray."
I thought, "Oh, dang, she's gonna marry somebody else." I just, sorry, I should have had more faith.
But Anita says to the doctor, "You know, we're people of faith. We're people of faith. Could you give us a couple of weeks? I wanna pray on this."
As we're going home, she says, "Nope, it's not gonna happen. Not on our watch."
Well, I was happy she didn't want me to die, okay? First of all. But you know the story. The Lord healed that. Went back. Cancer was not there. And we give God glory.
But it's a gift of faith. Because, I mean, I'm struggling right now with this spinal stenosis in my neck and all that sort of stuff that's happening.
She hasn't operated in the gift of faith for that silly thing, but I sure wish she would. You understand what I'm saying?
It's not at her disposal. It's not at yours. So why wouldn't we desire these gifts in the church?
And why wouldn't we desire these gifts in our family?
So here's what I'm gonna say. Here's what we wanna do. We wanna desire and deploy these spiritual gifts.
1 Corinthians 14:1. Would you read this with me? "Pursue love, and desire spiritual gifts, but especially that you may prophesy."
And I'm going to talk about that a little bit more, but I want you to look at that and underline that, circle that, desire spiritual gifts.
It doesn't say pray about it; it says desire them. Desire them.
Every morning when I get up, when I pray, one of the first things I pray is I say to the Lord, "Lord, I'm available. I desire that you would flow spiritual gifts through me today to help someone to build your kingdom."
Now, it doesn't happen all the time, but I want to make myself available to it because the scripture says desire spiritual gifts.
So, no condemnation, but conviction. How many of you this week—don't raise your hand—spent time in desiring spiritual gifts?
I want you to look at that. I want you to look at that. I want you to look at spiritual gifts.
But now we look at that and we say, Scripture says, "Thou shalt not commit adultery." So if I commit adultery, I've just what? Sinned.
"Thou shalt not steal." And if I steal, what have I done? Sinned.
So if he says, "Desire spiritual gifts," and I don't desire spiritual gifts, then maybe there's a sin of omission in my life that I didn't really realize that's something that I should do.
So every day we just start this as a parent. "Lord, I just desire today the manifestation gifts because raising these kids is more than I can handle on my own."
Or some of you that are businessmen and businesswomen.
So I'm just saying, as we move into this series, stick with me. Give me four weeks. Be here every Sunday. It's only going to intensify.
And I promise, I'm going to give you straight Scripture. I'm not giving you what I think, what my background, but I'm going to give you what I see in the Scripture. Fair enough?
So I just ask you to come. Don't miss a week of this. And if you haven't seen the "I Got the Power" series, do that.
Now, as we said in this first installment, some of you that are spirit-filled believers, believe in God.
We're going to say, "You know what, Terry? I really recognize that right now in my life, I don't have much spiritual power. I don't really have much overflow. I'm just barely able to get along myself."
Then how in the world are we going to make a difference in the world that's around us if we're just barely getting along?
You say, "You know what? I really desire to live more of a spirit-filled life."
You say, "I've been filled." Do you know what? It made sense. I want to continually be filled with the Spirit.
If you would say this morning as a believer, "Terry, I want to walk more in the fullness of the Spirit."
Would you pray that that happens in my life? Would you raise your hand and let me pray for you? Hands going up all over.
Yeah, go ahead. Hold them up for a while. I want to make eye contact with you. I want those in my life. I want to flow deeper in that.
You may put your hands down. Let's bow in prayer.
Let me pray for you right now. God, I thank you for your spiritual hunger in this church.
And I pray, God, as we enter into this series, in my own, Lord, I don't have the ability to just put this out in such a way that everybody grabs it.
But I know you, Holy Spirit, are already stirring in the hearts that we could be continually in the presence of God. We need your guidance. We need your comfort.
We need your promptings to help us. And I pray right now, Lord. Through this church that you would give us a surging of your power, your presence. Fill us, God. Fill us to overflowing.
As you continue to pray, and every head still bowed, and please, no one looking around, just a point of concentration right now of what the Holy Spirit may be speaking to you.
And I know the Holy Spirit is moving. At first service, we had like eight or nine people that the Holy Spirit just really pursued them this morning.
Some of you right now, the Holy Spirit has come alongside of you, and He's drawing you towards God.
You know, maybe you come to church, and maybe you've known the story of Jesus, and you've known that story all of your life. You've grown up knowing that.
But it's not just knowing the story of Jesus. But it's knowing that He wants to come into your life and for you to surrender your life to Him.
If you look at your life, and you don't see any evidence of a surrender to Christ, then right now, maybe the Holy Spirit is knocking on your heart's door. He's drawing you.
Please don't resist, but surrender. You have a choice when the Holy Spirit comes alongside you. You can resist Him, or you can surrender.
Please don't resist Him. You can get to the place that you resist Him and turn Him away so many times that the gentle voice of love and the wooing of the Spirit, you no longer feel it.
You no longer sense it. God has to go to more radical means of pursuing you.
But the God, the Father, loves you so much that He sent His Son, Jesus, to live a sinless life, to die on the cross for your sins and my sins.
And on the third day, He rose from the grave, and He was resurrected so that you and I could have new life. You cannot save yourself. It's only by the grace of God.
So, if you're under conviction today, and you sense the Holy Spirit drawing you, and you say, "You know, Terry, I need Jesus. I need Him to save me from my sins. I need the Holy Spirit to empower me."
If that's you today, as this church is praying, every head's still bowed, but if that's you today, would you boldly look at me and raise your hand and say, "Terry, that's me. I need Jesus today."
Thank you in the back over here. Others? Today, thank you here. Just go ahead and raise your hand. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, sir. Thank you.
Others today, just raise your hands. Let me see. I want to make eye contact with you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you down front. Thank you.
Those of you that are watching online, just raise your hand. Thank you, ma'am. Thank you.
Holy Spirit, come alongside you. It's drawing you. Thank you down front. Thank you, God.
Would you pray this prayer with me? Everybody pray this prayer together.
Father, save me from my sins. I want to call Jesus my Lord. Forgive me of my sins.
I confess with my mouth and I believe in my heart that Jesus died for my sins. And on the third day, He rose from the grave.
So as many as call upon Him, Him could be saved. Thank you, Lord. Fill me with your Spirit.
Listen, church, if you don't think it's too crazy, would you just celebrate with me with these five or six who prayed that prayer today? Come on.
Now, listen, we're going to stand right now and worship a little bit more in this song. Don't forget tonight, 5:30, Night of Worship. It's going to be awesome.
But on each side here, first steps table, would you, if you prayed that prayer, if you stood beside or was by side, somebody who raised their hand, take it with you to the first step and say, "We got some material we want to get."
We won't hold you. We just want to give you some materials. Let's stand. Let's worship the Lord. If I haven't met you, I want to be sure to meet you outside.
on Feb 02, 2025
