The Counterfeit Won't Kill It | Pastor Eric Morris

I want you to feel encouraged. I want you to feel hopeful. I want you to know that God is still working in your story. Our mission here at Victory City is to help every person take a step closer to Jesus. And can I tell you, man, as you're growing in the Lord, you're taking a step. So let's lean in. Let's see what God has for us this week. And I know you'll be blessed for it. And I love you. Good morning, churches. Our Bible is out. We're going to go to Acts chapter 8. So excited to be with you. And didn't Pastor Isaac do just a great job last week in the ministry of the Word? Isaac had just come off of surgery and I asked him. You said, "Are you sure?" And he was like, "Yeah, man, I want to preach." And it's just incredible to see some of our young ministers grow in the Lord and proud of him. And some of the other pastors on staff, they're doing a great job. Alex, great job, lean communion. Good stuff, man. So we're going to embark on the next kind of chapter in the book of Acts that we're grouping together. And I'm kind of phrasing or titling this next section led by the Spirit. How to be led by the Spirit. I don't know about you, but when I read the book of Acts, there's a lot of wild things I see in the book of Acts. You know, people being healed, blind eyes being opened, demons being cast out. A lot of signs and wonders is one of the things that you regularly see. And as we moderns who have been conditioned by naturalism or materialism, not in material like I buy things, but believing only in the natural world, that there's some type of Richard Dawkins-esque materialistic explanation, what we often do is we lose the category for the supernatural. And when we lose the category for the supernatural, we miss out on really the power and beauty of a supernatural God that can move mightily. And today we're going to start this journey, and I kind of want to lay out some guardrails, if you will, before we journey into seeing God move and really, as we preach these messages, the Scripture says that faith comes by hearing. And so as we teach these messages, my aim is to increase your faith for the supernatural and to see your lives begin to operate in the supernatural in the everyday. You know, I'm believing for testimonies to come out of our church where you prayed for a co-worker,

and God did a miracle, where you prayed for people who were enemies of God like Saul, and the Lord has a supernatural conversion for people in your life. And I'm excited about this series, and I want to lean into it. But I feel like this morning we've got to have a little teaching so that we can have some guardrails and know what to aim at. Does that make sense? You with me? 930. If you will, just let me greet our Bartlett Innovation Unit. Gentlemen, I love you. God bless you. Just one quick thing on our prison ministry. This past week, because of your generosity, we were able to purchase a $27,000 basically full kit sound system that we're going to be able to take into these prisons that don't have opportunities in two weeks. I'm meeting with the God behind bars director who oversees the national ministry for all the prison ministries because we're praying, "Hey, God, let us continue to see doors open for us to preach the gospel into penitentiaries." And so, man, I just want to say thank you for your generosity. It's going... Also, we had 17 people give for the first time at Victory City Church. So, I don't know if that was you last week, but praise God, thank you. So, we're in Acts 8. Now, this may be redundant for some of you, but I need to cover it again. The type of literary style that we're seeing in the book of Acts is a historical narrative. And sometimes one of the challenge in narrative is to read too much into narrative. And what we're supposed to do in a narrative is to pull out the principles within the story. And that's what I want to do for you this morning. So, we're in the book of Acts, chapter 8. Let's set the context so we know the environment in which this is happening. And it says in verse 1, "In Saul approved of his execution," referencing back to Stephen. We talked about that two weeks ago. I hope that message is still encouraging you. And it says, "And there arose on that day, great person."

Again, let's remind ourselves what scattered means. This is agrarian language for when persecution hit the church, the church scattered like seed. So it didn't scatter in fear like the disciples did after Jesus. It's scattering in seed. And here's what you need to know about the church, that no matter where persecution happens around the globe, when it comes to Christians, God always takes persecution and turns it for good. And so the scattering actually turns into growth because that seed's now in the wind that gets planted into new areas and regions. And it says they were all scattered throughout the regions of Judea and Samaria. Samaria's really important. Samaria was the other side of the tracks in Jerusalem. These were half breeds. They weren't fully Jewish people because they were part of the 10 tribes of Israel. The 10 tribes of Israel, that were captured by the Assyrian army. And then they began to intermingle and begin to worship other gods. And so the idea of a Jew going to Samaria was kind of going, "Man, I don't want to go to these type of people." But you see the gospel jumping boundaries between people that would normally go, "Ooh, we don't talk to them." The gospel says, "Yes, we do. We go to everybody." And it says, "And except the apostles, they stay local.

They're the bravest. They stay where the persecution is hottest." And this is devout men buried Stephen and made a great lamentation over him. But Saul was ravaging. The language they're ravaging is to be like torn apart with like a dog. It's being ripped apart. That's the scale of persecution. And you would think that with that scale of persecution, the church would stop, but they don't. In fact, Paul is not just ravaging the church. He's actually going door to door, house to house, trying to discover whether you are a Christian and then putting you in prison. So it's like somebody shown up your house this afternoon and saying, "Hey, I heard you went to the 930 service at Victory City Church. Come with me." That's the scale. Now let's move here. It says, "Now those in verse four, those who were scattered went about preaching the word. Those there is plural." So the author, Luke, is trying to tell us something here and saying this, that when persecution falls in the church and as they scatter, there are multiple people preaching and proclaiming the word. And then it moves down and he goes,

now let me tell you a singular story of what's happening. So in the singular story, you're supposed to see what's happening everywhere. And it says here that Philip went down to the city of Samaria and proclaimed to them the Christ. Now, Philip, again, let's kind of jog our memories here for a second, Philip started out in chapter six as someone who was waiting on tables. So do I have any dream team members in the house? Come on, put your hands up. If you're a dream team member, yeah, you serve the church. It's like a dream team member now going to manor and proclaiming Christ. It's like a dream team member going to a city. So the purpose in this narrative you're supposed to see is that the gospel and the spirit of God does not just fill the professionals. He fills the whole church and then the whole church proclaims the gospel. So how you and I are supposed to read this when we see Philip is this, ah, God can empower me. Come on, everybody, say me to proclaim the gospel everywhere I go, everywhere I go, right? So tomorrow when you show up to work and you're a Texas Longhorn fan, how many of you guys you're going to proclaim? Yay, whoa, come, right? We have no problem proclaiming our fandom, right? Even my friend Brandon Johnson is proclaiming his fandom

for the Washington Redskins, commanders. Ah, sorry, not bad. Don't say me an email. Ah, we have no problem proclaiming the things that we feel important to us. Oh, there's another commander's jersey right there, right? And everybody's got it. You guys should be friends. (audience laughing) We have no problem proclaiming certain things. And so here the purpose is supposed to get us to see that man we're supposed to proclaim the name of Jesus. Now back to the site, well, let's read it, let's read it and then I'll talk about it. And it says and he went down and proclaimed Christ and the crowds with one accord paid attention to what was being said by Philip and that when they heard him, they saw signs. Now, signs is really important. I want us to be a church that believes for signs and wonders. And it says for unclean spirits crying out, so Philip was encountering some demons. We don't believe that there is demonic forces that both fill people and oppress people and are under the guide of darkness in our world today. We are like that's scary and I want to think about it. Well, Philip had no problem going and proclaiming the gospel encountering unclean spirits and then came out of many who had had them. And it says that many were paralyzed or lame who were healed and then you see the result. So there was that much joy in the city. Now as your pastor I want to increase our faith to believe that we can be a church that sees signs and wonders not just in the church but in our lives on an everyday basis. I'm praying that our church believes and signs and wonders so much that we see miracles in our apartment complex. We see miracles on the aisles of HEB. We see miracles down on 6th street where you're down there witnessing not clubbing. Come on somebody. Now what I found in modernity is that a lot of people begin to use the Holy Spirit as almost like a roller coaster ride.

It's almost like a vibe. It's almost like this entertaining energetic experience. We call it a Christian high. And the pursuit of the Holy Spirit really becomes something that we just want for our own experience. But the Scripture actually tells us man if you're going to be filled with the Holy Spirit the Holy Spirit is going to send you into places to proclaim the gospel. You're going to encounter demonic forces and you're going to have to pray for the sick in Jesus name. Can I ask you, you don't have to answer this, when was the last time in public you prayed for a healing? Have you ever prayed for a healing? I can remember in a church service one time when I saw a woman filled with a demon. She began to manifest in the service and as a 19 year old kid I was terrified. I was like what in the world is going on? Let me just ask you really quick what would happen at Victory City Church if someone manifested a demonic spirit in our church? Would you find a new church? Would you immediately leave? Would you pull your phone out and go this will be a great clip? I can remember the poise of the pastor in that moment. A woman had come down front and began to speak vile things and her body was uncontrolled. And the pastor just paused and said in the name of Jesus come out of her she collapsed on the floor. And Jesus named that spirit fled. Now here's the thing is modern people. Anytime it starts to move into the supernatural we get a little nervous. What's going on? How do we do this? I can remember as a college student there was a Bible Institute in downtown Dallas that used to have worship nights. And these were long worship nights, three to four hour worship nights. But we were Christian and we were single and we were ready to mingle. So we were like let's go find somebody. You know. And this Bible Institute was a little wild. They colored outside the line sometimes but we were desperate. And the talent pool that our current college was tapped and so we were like let's branch out. Let's see if there's anybody else that loves Jesus.

And you know we were just praying for that moment when the pastor would so join hands. And Jesus named yes I will. What's up girl? Later we went to IHOP afterwards and there was a lot of people about midnight, red IHOP. And we were just talking about the worship night. And there was this one guy there that started kind of talking weird. He was like man I was just like manifesting during service. And I was like what are you talking about homie? And nowadays we talk about manifestation is like visualizing our future. I'm manifesting my spouse, I'm manifesting my job. Which I've got issues with that but that's not a different message. But he was talking about how he was just manifesting the spirit and he was having like this Holy Ghost joy ride. And I'm going to generalize for just a second because I'm sitting at that dinner going what in the world are you talking about homie? You seem crazy. And I'm going to generalize maybe unfairly here and I want you to try to put yourself in either category. You're either a person that when it comes to things of the spirit you get really nervous and you don't want anything to do with it. You maybe grew up in a denomination where they didn't talk about signs and wonders, they didn't talk about the miraculous. And so you like really safe, nice church. And so when the things of the spirit comes up you're like no. Because I don't understand it, it seems a little weird to me so I'm going to reject it as a cat. but you're open to the spirit in probably the wrong way, almost like I'm wanting this personal experience. I'm wanting this Christian high, and here's what I want to talk to you about. I'm probably going to say both are wrong, both are wrong, and let me help you. So let's go to the right pattern through the narrative, let's see Philip. Now let's see what Philip does here. It says that Philip proclaimed the gospel, he pushed against unclean spirits, and he prayed for the sick. Again, we are supposed to read this narrative, and you and I are supposed to see ourselves as potential phillips. Philip was not one of the original apostles. Philip was a convert that began to serve the church, and now because of his service in the church is thrown into ministry,

and now he's preaching in a city, and you see the pattern here, and this is supposed to lay out the groundwork of going, this is what it looks like to be someone filled with the Holy Spirit, and the first one is this, the proclamation of the gospel. As people who are filled with the Spirit, we should proclaim the gospel. Does that mean that you walk into work tomorrow morning and you go, "Everybody, I have a proclamation, please pay attention to me." No, but it means in your conversations, in your relationships with the people you meet, are you proclaiming Christ as King? Have you proclaimed the good news of Jesus, the Holy Spirit should on the inside of you empower you to be a witness, that's what the Book of Acts is all about, to be a witness, and the tragedy is that a lot of believers have never, ever actually witnessed about Jesus. Why is that? We are more afraid of people's opinions, we are more afraid of looking weird, we're insecure about why I don't want to have the right answers, but here you see a man named Philip who goes from serving tables to now proclaiming the name of Jesus in a city. Can I tell you that Victory City Church, what I'm wanting to do is raise our faith to see you and I become better proclaimers of the gospel. The second thing is this, is pushing against evil spirits. Come on, what would you do on Tuesday if you encountered a demon? Somebody ought to change your pants, that's exactly what you do. Listen, when you're enlisted into Christ's kingdom, you have enlisted into spiritual warfare. There are forces of darkness and evil that are influencing our world, and have even more than likely influenced you at times. But when you carry the light of the gospel and the power of the Spirit, you have victory over darkness. That's why Christ says, "I have given you authority here on earth to speak the name of Jesus," which means this. People filled with the Holy Spirit are going to do spiritual warfare, and the greatest tactic of an enemy is to deceive you into thinking that it's not even real. We in our modern society believe that everything is down to what we just need to re-educate people, if we gave people more information. Can I tell you that it's not information that casts out demons, but it's the Spirit of God living on the inside of you when you stand up as a vessel and say in Jesus' name, you have no room in this place, you have no space, you have no authority, but in Jesus' name, get out. Can I tell you that you can take authority over your home, you can take authority over your children, you can take authority over every step and place you put your foot because you walk with the Spirit of God. I carry the Spirit of God in me. Now, don't get it twisted, it's not you, it's the Spirit of God that lives on the inside of you. There's a bold faith when it comes to living by the Spirit of Jesus' name. The third thing is to pray for the sick. Come on to pray for the sick, or do we go, "Well, I don't know what's going to happen." Can I tell you that your job is not the outcome, your job is the obedience? Some of us were timid to pray, we don't want to pray because nothing happened. Well, here's the thing, God is sovereign and maybe He chose a different path for that person. Our job is obedience. I want the faith to pray for the sick.

There's a couple in our church that just walked through a challenging season, and I was reading Augustine who wrote in the 400s in a book called The City of God. And the faith of people began to wane when it came to testimonies of healings and meaning. They just don't hear about him anymore. It's not that they don't happen anymore They don't hear about him So there was a couple in our church that I was talking to yesterday that Experienced a real miracle in their life and praise God for a testimony and one of the things I asked this couple I said would you write your story because I would love to read it to our church because it's by the word of our testimony that increases our faith Right and so my thing is this if you've experienced a miracle in your life, please write us I would love to read the testimonies of the miracles signs and wonders Happening in our church because I know that God is moving. I know that God is providing I know that God is setting free. I know that God is healing why because he is a healer in Jesus name So you see the standard here now how much of this is about Phillip none Phillip is a servant. It's not about him Silhouette Philip will serve tables Phillip will preach in Samaria and what we'll learn next week in the back half of this chapter Phillip will go to a desert road for a single person The point is when you are filled with the spirit of God for the supernatural for the miraculous. It's not about you It's about the Lord And then we see the counterfeit is a man named Simon It says but there was a man named Simon in verse 9 who had previously practiced magic This is not Las Vegas magic sleight of hand magic. This is magic that derive from Persia the root word There is magi which is witchcraft and In the city and it amazed the people of Samaria Saying that he himself was somebody great notice what he's using his witchcraft for He's using his witchcraft so that the people of the city believe that he is great even so much saying in verse 10 They all paid attention to him from the least to the greatest saying this Man is the power of God that is all great again They reiterate Luke does in verse 11 and they paid attention to him because for a long time He had amazed them with his magic But when they believed Philip as he preached the good news about the kingdom of God in the name of Jesus

They were baptized both men and women and look at the miracle even Simon himself believed and after being baptized He continued with Philip and seeing signs and great miracles performed He was amazed look at all the times amazed is used in that passage You see, I think the world is easily amazed We are amazed by celebrity. We are amazed by the wealthy Now it says now when the dust apostles actually I'm gonna skip now. I'm not gonna read that you can read that later Then you see something happen in verse 16 Verse 17 Peter and John then laid hands on them and they received the Holy Spirit now Look at verse 18, and I want you to see this. We're gonna pick this up right here now when Simon saw that the Spirit was given through the laying on of hands Laying on of the apostles hands. He offered them money He wanted to buy that which is a gift And then this gives a motivation in the understanding and we're gonna talk about this and unpack this Saying give me this power also that anyone whom I lay hands on May receive the Holy Spirit We're gonna pause here One of the challenges that I see in the social media era and it has been happening for a long time is There have been charlatans of the faith televangelists People online you can even see them now who want to co-op the power of God for personal ambition and gain You see guys on stage that will Make a fireball motion and everybody falls out. I have a real problem with that And what's happened is because we've seen charlatans I would call them crooks. I would call them deceptive people Have you used the power of God to re-establish or re-assert their own platform? For selfish gain What that has done is that has created a counterfeit that has deceived the church in such a way where a lot of people go If that's what the Holy Spirit is I don't want it who are very well-meaning people, who see stuff like that, and go, "Yeah, they may deceive

a few," but the large portion of Christianity goes, "There's something weird. I don't want anything about that." And therefore they go, "Man, if this Holy Spirit thing is just this weird thing where people are using it to build a platform, create fake miracles, you get to see the documentary where the guy was having prophetic words, but he had a near piece in. We see stuff like that a lot. In fact, there was recently a large ministry in America where the guy was doing research on Facebook to know what prophetic words to give to people. It's charlatans. It's counterfeit. I used to be a bank teller and sometimes people that banks, I don't know if you know this, but they try to create counterfeit bills. I don't know if you've ever tried that. And what you're going to see in the book of Acts, I'm going to come back to the bank teller in just a minute, you're going to see in the book of Acts where a lot of times people are trying to counterfeit moves of God. We saw it in Ananias and Sephira. It was a counterfeit generosity. It was calculated. I want the praise without the sacrifice. You're going to see it in Acts chapter 19 with the sons of Sceva where they try to use the name of Jesus to be demon slayers and then demons go, "I know Jesus. I know Paul, but who are you?" And here's my point is the counterfeit never kills the real thing, but what exposes the counterfeit is the real move of God. Back to my bank teller. I used to hand her dollar bills and 50s and 10s all day long and only in the handling of real money, the cinnamon, I touched the fake money, I knew it was fake. Why? Because I knew what the real thing felt like.

Come on church. If we get to know what the real thing feels like, we'll know when we touch a fake thing. But that doesn't mean we throw the real thing away because the real thing exposes the fake thing and we should not stop pursuing the real thing in Jesus' name because there's real power in the name of Jesus, there's real power in the spirit of God. And Simon tries to use the spirit of God for selfish gain and selfish ambition. I've seen it in churches where someone wants to be the Holy Spirit person, "I'm the prophetess." I'm the apostle, I'm the healer, I'm this, that, and the other. God will fill up, shows you that a person filled with the Holy Spirit has no problem serving tables, he has no problem preaching, he has no problem going on one man missionary trip down to a desert road. Why? He's a servant. It's not about him. It's about Jesus. What does Philip gain from it? Nothing. But a whole city receives the gospel. Evil spirits are pushed out and the lame are healed in Jesus' name. Who is the Holy Spirit for? He's not for you and I in our platform and our game. He is for His kingdom, His way, the spiritual way of light against darkness in Jesus' name. And this is what the Scripture shows us. It's laying it out showing you that there is real counterfeit, but what does Peter do? And for my skeptic, I know who you are, I don't, I just said it. But I know there are skeptics in here. And some of your skepticism has been real. But look what Peter does, but Peter said to him in verse 20, "May your silver perish with you." Peter rebukes him because you thought you could obtain the gift of God with money.

You thought you could own this gift. Verse 21 says this, "You neither have lot, you neither have part nor lot in this matter for your heart is not right before God." What does Peter say? It's a heart issue. Something is off in your heart. Peter says, "Repent, therefore of this wickedness of yours and pray to the Lord that if possible, the intent of your heart may be forgiven you." When it comes to the Holy Spirit, what's the intent of your heart? Is the intent of your heart to pursue the Holy Spirit so that you have a spiritual experience? Whereas the intent of your heart, God, I want more of your spirit so I can be used for your kingdom. A lot of times we want the thrill of the Spirit, but we don't want the mission of the Spirit. [BLANK_AUDIO] Because how many you guys know it's pretty vulnerable to talk to somebody you don't know and go hey, can I pray? That you would be healed right now Because what happens if nothing happens Well, I look like an idiot But again your jobs not the outcome your jobs obedience Come on, how many you guys know somebody at your workplace right now? I know they're filled with a demon in Jesus name I'm having fun Peter rebukes him So I want you to see the pattern of the narrative that shows up here which gives us hope for the things of the spirit I'm gonna close and we're gonna be done in just a minute We're gonna go for the next few weeks into this But I wanted to set some guardrails up so that you could have confidence in your pursuit of the supernatural Lean in with me Philip shows us the pattern Philip filled with the spirit proclaims Christ pushes out darkness Praise for the sick

Simon Who was practicing witchcraft comes to believe but he still wants the power of the spirit for selfish gain Peter rebukes him The pattern that we are supposed to infer from Scripture is this God doesn't like it either and he will root it out God doesn't like charlatans and that's why the charlatan ministries are often exposed That's why charlatan people who want to build platforms are often exposed and have it you notice it that God will always Expose people who use his gospel for their own selfish gain and even though they made to be able to deceive people for many many years God will always expose their sin And that's why you never ever hear about the people and the ministries and the churches and the saints of Jesus Who are practicing faithful? Why because it never was about them anyways? It was always about the kingdom of God Now you want to live a thrilling Christian life You want to live the most un-mundane Christian life you begin to walk by the spirit You want to see God do miracles you want to see God drop a word into your heart Can I believe I believe that God has given you prophetic words for your neighbor for your family member? God wants to fill you with his spirit so that you would be an agent for his kingdom a witness for his kingdom now Imagine with me today if our whole church believed this If every single one of us to the depths of our course at God I want to serve you for your kingdom fill me with your spirit to be your vessel on earth. It's not about me It's about your kingdom what God could do in a church like that Philip had no idea he was gonna be witnessing in a city Can I tell you that some of you you have no idea what God can do through you? He's just looking for an open vessel God will you use me? God will you pursue will you would you would you help me to preach your word proclaim your word? We see here that Peter calls him out and look what he says the indictments pretty pretty gnarly He says for I see that you are in the gall of bitterness The gall of bitterness is a reference to the Old Testament found in Deuteronomy 29 So Peter's not just making up this Term he's actually referencing Deuteronomy 29 and Deuteronomy 29 says beware Less there be among you a man woman or clan or tribe whose heart is turning away today from the Lord our God to go Serve the gods of those nations

pause Peter is linking Simon's desire To use the power of the Holy Spirit to build his own platform as idolatry Now, let me just say a really challenging word here Your preference for other people's opinions God sees it as idolatry You worship what other people think of you More than you do your faithfulness to the Lord So I mean name something really challenging. I love you Not this this Could it be that your fear of looking weird [BLANK_AUDIO] And that's something I think if you're really struggling to be faithful, if you're really struggling to be a witness, it's something that if I were you I would bring to the Lord and go God I'm really struggling because I'm like you probably won't tell me, but you know. God I don't want to do X, Y, and Z because I'm afraid of what other people would think of me and I want my reputation, I want it curated, I want it protected, I have it the way I like it, everybody thinks I'm this and I'm that and I've got all that, I've managed my image in such a way so that everybody thinks I'm whatever you're trying to curate. Put that be idolatry, throw the rest of Deuteronomy up there for me John, and we're going to finish out and it sees beware lest there be among you a root bearing poisonous and bitter fruit. Peter says something really harsh to Simon, who Simon is now an insider, he believed he was baptized but his heart was still corrupt which there's a warning there. You can claim the name of Jesus, you can be baptized, you can have your mom fooled, you can have your husband fooled, you can have your wife fooled, but the Lord knows the heart and Peter looks and he goes there's a root of bitter, there's something often you and it's exposed by the fruit of your life. In Deuteronomy it was saying this, that there's a division, there's those who are pursuing the Lord and then there's man, woman or clan that are pulling away from the Lord to other

idols. Could that be the challenge of the church today? Like we're all supposed to be, yeah, Jesus is King, Jesus is Lord, but our lives don't look like that. We come to church to check a box, but we don't really want to go Holy Spirit, fill me to be your vessel because man when the Holy Spirit comes on you, you begin to loose, cool. The Holy Spirit's maybe do things that I'm uncomfortable with, die to that flesh, put to death the flesh. What Isaac talked about last week, man I want to feed the spirits of the fruit of the Spirit and your life is a field and the fruit is going to reveal itself at some point and so do you have the fruit of the flesh or the fruit of the Spirit? Revivel Knights is coming up and I want to close with this. I really do want to see our church become a church man like the Book of Acts because the same God that worked in the Book of Acts is working in Flugerville. Revivel Knights is designed not to be this emotional like rah rah. I love when we post ads on social media, all the hate we get in the comments. Y'all should go read some of the comments that people, one guy posted that we're just Zionists, I don't really know what that is, I do, but we're not that. It's not just another service to attend, what we're really praying for and what I'd love for you to pray and believe is that on Revivel Knights, we would have an encounter with the Holy Spirit and the Holy Spirit would fill our lives so that then we as the church, what do we say every week, we've just been to church, now let's go, so that you would be filled with the power of the Holy Spirit in your everyday life. How powerful would a testimony be for you to come back and go, I prayed for this person and got healed him. I encountered a demon this week and that person was free from it. It's not always just about the demon, it's about the person in the bondage to the demon and now they're set free because light came to them. And you want to see the church get rowdy, start taking ground for the kingdom of God, we'd be filled with the Spirit and so that's what we're praying for.

And so maybe you can't make any of those nights because you're scheduled, but would you lean in with me and over the next two weeks, will you just pray, this prayer right here, Holy Spirit will you move, will you fill us, will you fill your you fill me? Will you fill me to be used for your glory, for your glory? Amen? Amen. Let's pray. Dear Heavenly Father, I just pray in Jesus' name that God, the Scripture that instructs our heart. Father, I pray that we leave here today seeing Philip as the model, proclaiming Jesus, pushing against darkness, praying for the sick. Father, I pray that the enemy does not use the counterfeit for us to remove the whole category. Father, I pray in Jesus' name if there are those here who have pursued the Holy Spirit for selfish ambition, Father, I pray that they heed the words of Peter and repent. They turn. Father, I pray in Jesus' name for those who struggle with the idolatry of people's opinions. God, number one, I would pray that they would see how worthless their opinions are. And the value of pleasing the Lord. Father, I pray that this week my church would not just be at church, but Father, they would be the church in their city, in their community, in their homes, on their streets, on line. In Jesus' name we pray. Everybody said together. Amen. Amen. Hey, come on.