Session 4 / The Holy Spirit

Hey, everyone, let's get into session four now. We're going to talk about the Holy Spirit. Now, I love this chapter, and I love this conversation, and I love the Holy Spirit. And I want to, you know, honestly, I love all these topics because of the essentials of really knowing and following Jesus. But for me, when I was young and following Christ, and then I heard about the Holy Spirit, and once I got filled with the power of the Holy Spirit, it literally was a game changer. Everything began to shift. It goes from kind of my strength to now operating in His strength. Let me read this in Luke chapter 24, it says this in verse 46, He told them, this is what is written, that Christ will suffer and rise from the dead on the third day, and repentance and forgiveness of sins will be preached in His name to all nations, beginning at Jerusalem. You are witnesses of these things. I'm going to send you what my Father has promised, but stay in the city until you have been clothed with power from on high. You see, He's talking about the Holy Spirit. He's in this final kind of moments, talking with the disciples. He's about to ascend into heaven, and He's in these final stages of releasing His disciples, but He lets them know, listen, I'm going to send you power. I'm going away, but I've got to send you something. I'm going to send you the Holy Spirit. I'm going to send you the Comforter. I'm going to send you the Counselor, and the Holy Spirit is going to empower you, is going to fill you, is going to walk with you, and in John chapter 16, verse 7, another verse around this, very truly I tell you, it is for your good that I'm going away. This is Jesus talking. This almost sounds kind of wild. Jesus is telling the disciples, it's good that I go away. He says, unless I go away, the Advocate will not come to you, but if I go, I will send Him to you.

So Jesus had taken on the constraints of humanity, just physical form, one human, Jesus on earth, the God became man, and now here He is, He's saying, listen, I'm going to go, but when I go, I'm going to send you the Holy Spirit. I'm going to send my Spirit, the same Spirit that raised Christ from the dead, I'm now going to send, and He's going to empower you, He's going to live with you, He's going to strengthen you, He's going to transform your life. And as a believer, I want to encourage you, don't try to follow Jesus without this greatest gift that He said, I'm going to send. He actually literally tells the disciples, listen, I mean, think about this, Jesus had spent several years with the disciples, training them, developing them, coaching them, they had seen all these miracles, they'd seen the power of God, everything happens, and now Jesus has died, He's raised from the dead, and all the disciples now have seen this, I mean, this is an incredible time, I mean, unbelievable time that the disciples are in, they've just now seen the supernatural resurrection of Jesus, and they're ready to go, they're ready to preach the gospel, they're ready to get the word out there, and Jesus tells them, go and wait for the gift, go and wait for the Holy Spirit. So before you do anything, I need you to have the power, I need you to have the presence of the Spirit of God empowering you to actually be able to fulfill your purpose. So we were not designed to live for Christ and to fulfill our destiny and to fulfill our purpose without the power of the Holy Spirit. I love this in 2 Corinthians chapter 13 verse 14, it says this, May the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all. I want to just highlight for a second kind of the two primary functions of the Holy Spirit, and honestly you can kind of see that there's a bit of a theme in prayer, in worship, and also in the Holy Spirit, that you'll see that the word fellowship, it kind of feels like a little bit of a churchy or Christian word, because you don't really use that unless you're talking about, you know, the Lord of the Rings, fellowship of the rings or something. You don't really use this word in many settings, but this word fellowship is there because it actually has more of a dual meaning.

Fellowship actually means relationship, and it also means partnership. So when the Bible says that, I want you to know the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, it says I want you to know the relationship, I want you to know the closeness with God. And the truth is that here on earth, before we're in heaven, when we're face-to-face with the very presence of God, and we're seeing God in that close way, I mean that's going to be an unbelievable moment, but until we're there, this is the closest, most powerful encounter we have with the very presence of God, it's through the Spirit of God, it's how we can be close to God, and know Him, and feel Him, and hear Him. speaking to us is through the power of the Holy Spirit. We get to know him personally and closely and directly. And so when we have fellowship with the Holy Spirit or closeness with the Holy Spirit, this is how we have it. Do you wanna know God personally? Do you wanna have this personal and close relationship with God? Then it's through the Holy Spirit. And in Acts chapter one, four and five, it says this. On one occasion, while he was eating with them, he gave them this command. Do not leave Jerusalem, but wait for the gift my father promised, which you've heard me speak about, for John baptized with water, but in a few days, you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit. And in verse eight it says, you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in Judea and Samaria and to the ends of the earth. So you'll receive power to be a witness. So you receive the Holy Spirit for closeness and personal connection with the very presence of God,

but you and me also are gonna receive power. How do I actually live out this life of faith and live for Christ? It's through the power of the Holy Spirit. We're not designed, we don't have to try to make this thing happen on our own strength. It's actually by the power of the Holy Spirit. In the Old Testament, there's a great verse that says that they're gonna accomplish this thing that God has given them to do, this rebuilding of a wall, not by might or not by power, but by my spirit, says the Lord. How are you gonna fulfill what God's put on the inside of you, those dreams, those passions, or even how are you gonna be a great friend or a great husband or a great mother? How are you gonna love people when they've hurt you and they've wronged you? How are you gonna do that? Through the power of the Holy Spirit, equipping you, working with you, and going before you. There's so many great scriptures. In Galatians chapter five, verse 16, it says this. I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. For the flesh desires what is contrary to the Spirit, and the Spirit what is contrary to the flesh. They are in conflict with each other so that you're not to do whatever you want. But if you are led by the Spirit,

you are not under the law. The acts of the flesh are obvious. Sexual immorality, impurity, debauchery, idolatry, and witchcraft, hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissension, factions, and envy, drunkenness, orgies, and the like. I warn you, as I did before, that those who live like this will not inherit the kingdom of God. But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. You see, in this passage, we see that there's this desire of our sinful nature and the culture around us that is trying to get us to follow its way, to keep in step with culture of sin and depravity and all kinds of garbage that ultimately only leads to death and ultimately leads to dysfunction and pain in every area of our life. But the Spirit of God, when we follow the Spirit, we not only get close with God, we not only have power, but as I follow the Spirit, it actually begins to show up in my life that the fruit of. So that means that the byproduct of spending time listening to

and being led by the Holy Spirit, the byproduct of that is that I begin to see gentleness showing up in my life, kindness showing up in my life, mercy showing up in my life, love showing up in my life. If I look at my life and feel like, man, I ain't got none of those fruits of the Spirit. Well, it's all good, because the good news is the more you spend time with the Holy Spirit, the more you allow Him to speak into your life, the more you'll start seeing the fruit of this show up in your life. We all start somewhere. We all got work to do in this category. And the Holy Spirit wants to begin to lead and guide you into the fruit of the Spirit, because as you begin to walk that stuff out, man, that's where, again, the transformation happens. That's where you're gonna find joy. That's where you're gonna find that peace. And every part of your life transforms as I allow the Holy Spirit to guide my life. Now, before I kind of wrap this up, I gotta talk about the supernatural power of the Holy Spirit, because this is the beauty of following Jesus. This is one of the most powerful things about our Christianity,

that we're not, again, like I've said many times, we're not just following religious formalities. We have a relationship with God, and He has given us His very Spirit. So we have the Spirit of the living God that's here to empower us and fill us, which literally means that we get to operate in the power of the Holy Spirit. or that is available through the Holy Spirit. Have you ever heard of people getting healed supernaturally? Have you ever heard of maybe people who were dead that came to life? Have you ever heard of people maybe who couldn't see and their eyes were open? Have you ever heard of even people, maybe sort of what might think of as a small miracle, maybe having neck pain and getting healed? You know, the other day, before I was preaching at a church, I felt the Holy Spirit speak to me, and this is a part of the gifts of the Holy Spirit. I had a word of knowledge, it's called, where the Holy Spirit shows me that He wants to heal somebody. And I felt like God wanted to heal somebody specifically. There was a jaw issue that God wanted to heal. And I said, is there anybody in the room right now that that's who this is? And there were three people that would say, yeah, I got issues in my jaw.

I got some discomfort or, you know, I don't, I can't remember what all the issues were, but I felt like God wanted to heal them. They came forward, we laid hands on them, the power of God hit them and they got completely healed. All three of them were healed. Well, that's amazing, that's incredible. And it's not because of me, but it's because the power of the Holy Spirit wants to work through you as a follower of Christ to actually be able to minister life, healing, hope and strength into everyone. You know, the power of the Holy Spirit is not just available for preachers. That isn't just for me because this is what I do. It's available for every single believer. And right now in your workplace or maybe in your school or even in your home, there could be things that God wants to give you wisdom, supernatural wisdom to know maybe if there's a decision that you need to make. Now, I know many people who with their work and their job, there was a problem that they just couldn't solve, didn't know what to do. And they said, Holy Spirit, speak to me. And literally in the night, in a dream, the Holy Spirit gave them the answer that solved the problem. See, we're not on our own. This is what I'm just wanting to help us understand. We're not on our own in following Jesus,

that God wants to empower you and fill you with his spirit. And actually the Holy Spirit gives each and every single one of us as followers of Christ different gifts that we get to use to encourage others, to build others up, to help people get freedom, healing and breakthrough. And the Bible says that when the Holy Spirit came on the believers in that beginning day, it says the Holy Spirit came with power and they began to speak in other tongues. There was this supernatural language that began to come out of them. And maybe you've heard of about that before, maybe you haven't, but when you speak in tongues, it's usually not a language that you understand. It's usually not a language that anyone understands, except for it's a spirit to spirit kind of conversation that's happening. So when I was first filled with the Holy Spirit and I began to speak in tongues, I began to speak in this other language, it was like, man, I don't know what I'm saying, but as I pray in the spirit, they call it, as I prayed in tongues, pray in the spirit, the Bible says in the book of Jude that it actually builds yourself up, you build yourself up in your most holy faith, the Bible says that as I pray in the spirit, it actually builds my spirit, strengthens me. I wanna encourage you, if you're not yet

been filled with the power of the Holy Spirit, if you're not yet seeing the evidence of speaking in tongues in your life, I wanna encourage you go for it. Maybe you're not sure about it and you're just gonna keep growing and learning a little bit more about it. Read the book, I have several different references here that talk about how people are filled, how the power of God is filling people, but I wanna encourage you, get another spirit-filled believer that can pray for you and help see the power of God begin to fill your life. And as you do that, you begin to pray in the spirit, begin to operate in it, every single day you can pray in the spirit. And actually, talking about worship earlier, one of my favorite ways to worship is actually worship in tongues, worship in the spirit. And it's powerful, it'll begin to transform your prayer life and when you pray for people, sometimes you don't even know what all to pray, but begin to pray in the spirit, you'll find that the perfect will of God and the power of God begins to flow. Whenever you're facing challenges, things you need God to do, begin to pray, begin to use that Holy Spirit power that God's given you, lay hands on people, you'll see them healed, you'll see them set free and delivered,

you're gonna see wisdom coming, you're gonna see strength coming. And like I said, the Holy Spirit is gonna come, the power of God's gonna fill you and it's gonna be for closeness, you're gonna feel close to God like you never have when you're in the spirit. And you're also gonna have power like you never knew, not power to be some like power hungry, like superhuman, but actually power to fulfill the word of God, to fill the purposes of God and to push back the enemy's work on earth and to extend the kingdom of God as you operate and walk out in the spirit of God. you