The Ministry of The Holy Spirit

I'm going to teach you guys how to pray in tongues once you're speaking about the Holy Spirit. And the next. Next slide, please. Spiritu Santo vein. This is Portuguese.

So I want everybody to repeat. Holy Spirit, come now. In Portuguese. Right, Spirit, don't go now, redneck on me. Spirito Santo veno.

It's not that Spirit. We gotta roll the R's, right? That's when it kicks in. You never know what's gonna happen. Holy Spirit night.

Spiritu Santo vein. One more time.

And that's right, Bilingual. I'm impressed. This is awesome. So my goal tonight, and thanks, Stephanie, Pastor Stephanie again, for allowing me to. My goal is to lay a foundation.

We're going to go very basic tonight. I know that you guys are veterans in this. You probably can be teaching here a lot better than I can. But the Wednesday Night Crew, you're my crew. I've seen you drinking water.

Nobody's doing this. You guys are bringing. But the eyes are just like Gideon, right? So I'm your fan. Just to let you know, I love the Wednesday Night Crew.

I'm always here with my wife. So you're my people.

But the first conclusion that I got. And please save your stones. Don't throw stones at me. Next slides. Is that God doesn't exist, simply exist.

That really shocked me.

He is like, he doesn't fit. Next slide, right. He doesn't fit on that little box that we're trying to put him in every time. And I was looking at the definition of exist is a Latin word for existere is to come into being or to exist. Something extracted out of something.

And we exist because there used to be dust, the breath, the ruach of God. And then there's man. This microphone exists. Those chairs exist. Our clothes exist because they used to be cotton processed fabric.

Now it's a jacket, right? But God, he doesn't. He is.

So I would like to show a quick video, Men in Black, the movie. Please don't pay attention to the alien at the end. That's the only part I don't like. But it's a cool video. Very quick.

30 seconds maybe. Can we play that video super quick?

Is that sound? Maybe.

That's the video. So that put things in perspective, right? As far as the grandiosity of the universe. And I love reading the Google reviews about the church. And Raquel told me not to tell this, but I'm going to tell it.

I like to read the one star reviews. And the last one that I read somebody, I came here Wednesday night and Somebody preached out of the Book of Enoch. The person didn't even pray right. One star. So now it's me speaking about aliens saying that God doesn't exist.

Please don't take us out of context.

It's crazy. But if you find a church with five star reviews, don't go there, right? Pastor J says all the time, it's only five stars. Don't mess it up. Let it be, let it.

Second Chronicles. There we go. Let's make it holy. The temple I'm going to build. That's Solomon speaking, right?

The temple I'm going to build will be great because our God is greater than all other gods. But who is able to build a temple for him? Since the heavens, even the highest heavens, cannot contain him? Who then am I to build a temple for him, except as a place to burn sacrifices before him? Beautiful.

Solomon. Got it. And then we see Moses. Now the burning bush, which is one of my favorite stories of the Bible. Where.

Next slide, please. Where I love the Suppose I go to the Israelites. You guys all know this story, right? Suppose I go to the Israelites. I love the suppose there.

So God says to Moses, I am who I am. And when you go deeper on that next slide is in Hebrew. I don't speak Hebrew, but I like to understand a little more and go deeper. I appreciate when being from Brazil, when somebody tries to speak Portuguese with me, even when they say it wrong, but they are honoring me, trying to speak my language. And I appreciate that so much.

And that's why we do Shabbat at the house. And I pray in Hebrew. Just reading. I don't know what I'm saying, but it's pretty and I'm butchering. But I know that God receives it because I'm trying to just honor him.

That's the heart behind it. So it could be better translated as I exist. I will exist. I will be. I am who I will be.

And I'm gonna go a little quicker just because of time. I don't wanna. But it's amazing that I don't think we place the right weight on the. On the I am who I am, right? That God said it's very powerful.

I see this on John again.

13. When Jesus about to be arrested, right on New Testament, he says, I am he. I mean the guards come. Romans guards and the Sanhedrin police to arrest Jesus. I was reading that some theologians say they have about 600 men, which is a lot to arrest Jesus, which is like.

I didn't know it was 200. It's a tenth of a legion according to the Roman guards. And I just like the last part. Jesus said, I am he ego ami in Greek, which is I am right. And I think it was Jesus holding back when he said that.

Look what happened to the guards. They drew back and fell to the ground. We're not talking about the mob police here. It's like the Navy SEALs of the time, right? And just by the word, professing the word.

Beautiful. So if you have a connection with Dallas Jenkins from the Chosen or Mel Gibson, I would love to see this scene in a movie one day. I would love to see that. It'd be very powerful. So if you have their phone numbers, let me know a little bit about the nature of God.

The more I study the nature of God, the more I want to be on my knees. I spent 13 years working here at the refuge on staff, and I was preparing this for Pastor Jay, for Nathan, Pastor Terry, for all the pastors. And I didn't know that the world was getting me that strong until recently.

I found a new passion, which is teaching. I don't think I'm very good at it, but I know that's a calling in my life, and I'm very excited to be here tonight. But the more I study the nature of God, the more I want to be on my knees and just worship him, because he's just so powerful. And the more I studied the character of God, the more I want to love him. It's hard to explain this because I wasn't like this 10 years ago.

It's different now. It's a beautiful journey. I understood that the Bible is a love book, you know, it's a God that loves us unconditionally. And it's a bloody book, but it's a. It's a love book for sure.

And we need to understand Deuteronomy 64, the Shema, Israel, like, hear, O Israel, the Lord our God is one. I know that's very common to us in our culture. Of course we know that the Lord is one. We all know that. But it's not like that around the world, especially in this context here.

A lot of polytheistic nations around, right? And God said, I'm the one. Was very like, whoa, I am the one true God. I was a. There's an Indian family that moved to my neighborhood, and I was meeting with them, trying to be intentional about connecting with them.

They barely can speak English. And she loves plants. My wife loves plants. You know, whoever went to my house. You guys see it Lots of plants.

And I was talking to her about the plants. Oh, how is this? Oh, this is for tea. For some kind of. If I have knee pain, whatever it is.

How about this? Beautiful. What's this? Oh, this is for. And how about this one here?

No, this one here is for the gods. Like, I live in Kelso water. It's like 50 yards from here. And I was like, polytheistic mindset. Real.

Like, on our backyard, Right? Crazy to think that a lot of places in the world, they don't understand that concept. God is one on our backyard, but at the same time, you need to understand that he's three. And I'm gonna be focusing on the Holy Spirit tonight. So.

There is an analogy that I was thinking about. Let's suppose that I am Steve Jobs, and I created this laptop.

This laptop is the universe. I am Steve Jobs. I'm outside of the universe. And the parts of this laptop start to talk. The keyboard is talking to the speaker, that's talking to the motherboard memory.

And they realize that, wait a minute, this is so organized. There needs to be somebody that created this. And Steve Jobs is outside saying, hey, guys, it's me. I created you. And they start talking some more, and they say, but wait a minute.

There is an energy that comes in and brings life to our circuits. And everything works so well. How can we subsist in God from the outside? This Holy Spirit, Right? God.

Steve Jobs from outside says, hey, God, it's also me. But from your perspective, it's hard to see it, but it's me. And then the hard drive says, but I remember I got a virus one day, and a guy came in and reformatted and took care of the virus. And the camera says, I remember I saw him. The memory says, I remember him.

And, like, it's Jesus, but I'm saying God, it's also me. From that perspective, it's three, but he's one. So it's very important for us to understand that. And I know you understand that just to reinforce. So you see the Creator, God from the outside.

We see the Spirit bringing life, and we see Jesus restoring it, reformatting us. Right? New birth. Right. It's beautiful.

It's very hard for us as a mono personality to understand our Trinity, even though we are bodies of spirit, but we are a mono personality, finite. Trying to understand an eternal God, it's an impossible task. So that's why I put trying to understand the tri unity, which is another term for the Trinity. And this is a graphic that I modified I didn't create that, but I think it's very cool. Next graphic.

I wish my laser pointer would work, but it doesn't.

So you see God in the middle. He is the Father, he is the Son. He is the Holy Spirit. The Father glorifies the Son. The Son glorifies the Holy Spirit.

The Holy Spirit glorifies the Father. It's a continuous, indivisible God. Right? But the Son is a distinguished expression of the Holy Spirit. That is a distinguished expression of the Father and a distinguished expression of.

Of the sun. But they are one.

There's no way to understand that. We think we can, but it's basically impossible. But that helps at least me to see things like this. One thing that's very important. Next slide.

There are many studies here, Pastor Jay, in many series on the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is God. We see Ananiah Ananias in Sapphira. You lie to God, to the Spirit, and then you lie to God. So we don't have time to go deep on this.

But he is God. He is a person. He's not an energy. He's not a movement. He's not Goosebumps.

This could happen, right? Because there is no way to have a relationship with an energy. That's why he's a person. Right? And it's relational.

God and the Holy Spirit empowers us to be like Jesus. He will add, I love Mylon Lefebvre. At least I heard that from him for the first time he came here. He will add the super to your natural. Right.

This is cool, right? Of course, I cannot do his accent. That's very cool.

And he talks so slow. That's cool.

So without a triune nature, creation would not be possible. Incarnation would not be possible. Salvation and atonement would not be possible. Resurrection would not be possible. This can be an amazing study, but we don't have time to go deep tonight.

Love would not be possible because God is love. You're going to see a little later. He loves the Father, the Son, the Spirit. They love each other in themselves. That's why he can be love.

That's interesting.

The Holy Spirit ministry in the Old Testament. We see it throughout the Bible. See in Genesis 1, you see, you know, he's participating on creation. We're going to read that later. We see him recognized by Pharaoh, recognized by men.

Holy Spirit strived sinners gave supernatural powers to leaders. We see him up and down. Joshua, Othniel, Gideon and many others. Samson is the most famous one. Maybe we all know Samson from Sunday school, Bible school class.

I was thinking about that. I was probably 20 plus when I went to a Sunday school for the first time. And I was thinking about that. Just an internal journey into myself. And I felt so like as a foreigner, because I couldn't understand, are you washed by the blood?

Said what? Are you saved? I'm not lost. I couldn't understand. So I think it became my pet peeve in Christianity.

Let me try to explain this. At least there's a purpose for this, right? So I don't want people to feel left out because they don't understand. So I'm trying to please receive my love. I might not be completely right.

I think nobody is. We're trying to understand eternal God. It's not easy, but it's beautiful. The closest. The closer we get, oh, my gosh.

We're beautiful from here. I told Pastor J the other day that the song, you Keep Getting better. What's that song? And I was like, pastor J, I think this song is not theologically correct. Because God, he cannot get better.

He's already there. How can we improve God? But that's from our perspective, right? The closest you get, oh, my gosh, he's beautiful. And then you go like, oh, my gosh, oh, my gosh.

And then you're on your knees, on your face, like, just appreciating the beauty of God from that aspect. I agree. He keeps getting better from our perspective. So Genesis 1:2, right there in the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. And you see the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters.

You guys know that by memory, I'm sure. Holy spirit on Genesis 1, when people say, is the third person of the Trinity, I don't know. I don't like that third there. I know that theological, ah. He was the third one to be revealed on Genesis 1.

I don't understand that. But that's okay. He doesn't take offense on that. But just like I think we should appreciate this spirit, I should appreciate this spirit more than I do.

And judges, see Gideon, back down, back up. Samson, down, up. So there's a little graphic that I designed that I wish I could use my laser pointer, but I can't. So let's go to that graphic, please. It's very simple.

So it's a timeline. You see creation, sea, fall, redemption, and consummation. Hard to read from here because of the drum cage, but it's a very generic timeline. You see creation, God the Father, Son, Holy Spirit, creating everything. See, they fall right after it.

And you keep going, you see 400 years of prophetic silence between New and New, Old and New Testament. You see the redemption, Jesus coming. You see Pentecost, they're going to be talking about that tonight. And consummation is the end of this age. Right, Right there.

Let's go to the next graphic. So we see the Old Covenant up to the cross because we think. I used to think that in our books, you get your Bible, you open in Matthew. Oh, that's where the New Testament starts. It doesn't start there.

Matthew was. And the other disciples or whoever was alive on that time, they experienced the transition. And I'll talk the transition in a little bit. So the Old Covenant ends. So covenant and Testament are interchangeable words like the Old Testament or New Testament or Old Covenant, New Covenant or New Testament, they can be interchangeable there.

So shed of blood on the cross when Jesus died.

The New Covenant starts. So if you go to the next slide, the yellow part, the arrows, you see the Holy Spirit coming up and down, up and down, up and down. And then sometimes we read that we don't pay attention when the prophecies were spoken about Jesus, when the Holy Spirit come and remain. That changed the game right there. I know you guys are very good at this.

Sorry, I'm just repeating this. But I think it's good to bring to our memory a refresher course on this. So the Holy Spirit comes on the day that Jesus being baptized and remain. Right. I don't know what John saw because he sees him coming.

That's the Lamb of God. That takes away the sin of the world. I don't know. It was an internal thing. He met Jesus before, when Elizabeth was pregnant.

They had a belly encounter. That's what the Bible says. But I don't know if they had encounters after. But he saw something in Jesus he knew. No miracles, no fireworks.

He's just walking towards him. But then when the baptism happens, we see the Father speaking, see the Son being baptized and the Spirit coming down as a dove. And now he's remaining for the first time, for the first time in human history after the Fall, the Spirit can remain first in him, Jesus. And then in the resurrection, he goes, presents himself to the Father and he says, there is something better than me by your side. It's me inside of you.

Right? The indwelling of the Holy Spirit. And that happens in Pentecost. So we're going to get there. I'm just ahead of myself here.

I was thinking if we had a time machine, if we could bring David King David here. And I always thought of that. And we had a time machine here at Clubhouse Rock Refuge Kids. We got rid of it. I don't know why.

I love the time machine could bring David here tonight. We cannot.

But I would ask him, man, how was it when you played your harp? Or your harp, whatever it is. Harp, right. And the presence came and, you know, Saul got free and he could. He'd be like, if he's here, like, whoa, what's this?

Like, shocked everything. And then once he got adjusted and understood, like we were in 2025, I will show him this graphic. We're here. You're here. So we are right here, right?

Go back to the old graphic. The timeline.

The timeline.

So you were here. One more and one more. This red circle. You were here. So he understood.

And he would say, wait a minute. You are living on a time that I just dreamed of that the prophet Joel said, the prophecy you're going to be talking about, you tell me about it. I've never experienced the Holy Spirit inside. He couldn't. And we can, you know, have it.

24. 7 available, right? And so I was thinking about that, and the phone came to my mind. My first cell phone. That's what I showed earlier.

And I had this skinny battery. I don't know if you guys remember that the cell phone in Brazil cost $3,000 then. Very expensive, right? But I remember the freedom now. I was starting my business, then going to college.

And now I can go out and somebody can call me, I can sell it or whatever it is on the phone was. So we thought we were cool because of that, right? And my buddy had two.

Receive calls, make calls, $3,000. Never complain about an iPhone that costs a thousand bucks. We have more power here, computer processing power than the spaceship that took man to the moon. Apollos. Oh, the Apollos.

Thirteen, whatever. We have more processing power here now. Cameras, phones, our lives are here now, right? But we. I'm 52, so whoever is my age, a little younger, we experienced the transition of not being connected and not knowing what connection besides a landline or a public phone.

And in Brazil, I don't understand that to use a public phone you have to buy a token. You cannot use a quarter like you used to use here, right? So can you imagine? I have to find a phone, find some place to buy the token and use the pay phone. If at night everything is closed, you're done.

Collect call gotta be collect, right? At least here you have the quarter. We always have quarters. There's no way to Call. Is it a landline, public phone or no connection.

We love this then. So we got the transition right now. Fast forward to a post digital world. My oldest son is here, Gabe. He's 23.

He doesn't know what this connection is. He was born in an age that you have Internet in your pocket. So we are transitioners, right? We face the digital revolution of not being connected to being hyperconnected. They don't know what's what.

Landline. They don't even know. I showed them a cassette tape the other day. They didn't know what that was, but it happened so fast. We laugh.

It's like it's happening, but right in front of our eyes. We don't even realize that. So are we the people of God, not appreciating that hyper connection like we should? Because we're taking the Holy Spirit for granted. I was.

I don't know about you, I was. We just take for granted. But focusing on the Holy Spirit, the promise of the Father, Acts 1, 4, 5. That's the way Jesus. That's the way God designed.

The interface between God and humanity is through the Holy Spirit. So that's Jesus talking. After the resurrection, gathering them together, he commanded them not to leave Jerusalem, but to wait. Very important word for what the Father had promised, which he said, you heard from me. For John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now.

And in the Greek where it says will be baptized with the Holy Spirit, the baptism in Greek is and the Holy Spirit. There's a little difference.

So we see. I was thinking when I was reading that, and you see in Acts 1, Judah had died. He's out. And I think the disciples got bored. And while they were waiting, maybe they should have waited a little longer, I don't know, to choose the next apostle.

What did they do?

They rolled lots. They cast lots. Right? Which is a very Old Testament way of thinking. They would pray, but they didn't have that connection yet.

It's on the brink of happening. Right? It's about to happen, but they haven't experienced it. I wonder if they had waited to take that decision. I'm not saying that Matthias.

Am I saying that right? Matthias was the wrong choice. I'm not saying that. But I wonder if they had waited a little longer to decide after just a thought.

They cast lots. But we're going to see the promise of the Father. Five points there. It was given through the prophet Joel. Pastor Terry preached beautifully, Sonny, about this.

The inclusion of gender, age on that prophecy. Right. It was proclaimed by John the Baptist. It was referred to by the Lord himself. The Scriptures are there.

It was anticipated by the Lord after the resurrection. It was fulfilled on the day of Pentecost. This is powerful. Right there in Joel 2. 28.

Just refresh. Next slide. You guys know this by memory. And it shall come to pass afterward that I will pour out my spirit on all flesh. All 100%, 100% inclusion.

Your sons and your daughters shall prophesy. Your old man shall dream dreams, and your young man shall see visions. So everyone's included in this.

And I see, I find this interesting too. In Acts 19, when Paul, he goes, I mean, Luke's narrating this, but they go to Ephesus. And yeah, Paul, he says on verse three there, then what baptism did you receive? Like, he says, sorry, did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed? I wonder what prompted Paul to ask that, what kind of behavior he saw it, to ask the question.

They answered, no, we have not heard that there is a Holy Spirit. They didn't even know about it. So Paul asked, then, what baptism did you receive? And they replied, john's baptism. And he says, john, baptism is about baptism of repentance.

He told the people to believe. I cannot read from here, but I'd like to focus on those two baptisms. The baptism of water, the baptism of John, and the baptism of the Holy Spirit. And that's where we're going to focus tonight. So the next graphic.

In the early 90s, when I got saved, we focused so much on the salvation from the testimonies. I was this. I was this. I was this. I used to use drugs or whatever, drink, but never on the salvation too.

All salvation from. And that's what the baptism of water, the baptism of John takes care. So he takes care, he forgives. It deals with the sin from our past. It's like resetting it.

Nothing new. We all know that. Just a refresher course, like I said. But the baptism in the Holy Spirit is a salvation too. Once you are saved, okay?

Now you're going to be guided on that journey to develop your salvation through the baptism of the Holy Spirit. So there's a salvation from that. The guys in Ephesus were practicing and living, but they didn't have a clue about the salvation too. And Paul asks them. And then they lay hands.

Paul lay hands. And they receive the Holy Spirit. Start praying tongues. And we know it's a Pentecostal church. We know the movements, right?

I wrote just a quick note here. The baptism in the Holy Spirit. It launches us into our prophetic purposes. Right? The enemy is not omniscient like God, but he can see one's potential, the gifts, the inclinations.

And he's going to do everything he can to distort those gifts, right? And destroy it. Abuse. You name it. The gift is pure and beautiful, but the enemy gets it.

So if you don't have the Holy Spirit to purify us and we can re point again to the right direction, the gift. There's a lot of abuse. And that's what Jonathan mentioned about spiritual abuses in churches and everywhere, really, not only churches, but.

And that's what we're going to be talking about tonight. So that's the focus now. The ministry of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit guides believers into all the truth. St. John.

He builds and empowers us to become like Jesus and help others to do the same. And then we have the fruit of the Spirit. How is that translated? In practicality, in our lives, we have the fruit of the Spirit and the gifts of the spirit. We have nine expressions of the fruit.

We have nine gifts. Galatians 5, 22, you guys know, by memory, Sunday school gifts of the Spirit. We have nine too. One Corinthians and Romans.

We can replace the word fruit with the word result. The result of life, guided by the Holy Spirit, produces love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self control, all eternal values. The gifts, they influence the eternity, but they are more temporary values. And I'm not saying that the gifts are less important than the fruit, but we see very, very clear on the word of God that there is an order that we need to pursue. We learn with many an God is a God of order.

He said it 30 times here. I won't do these moves because I cannot move. I can't move.

But so as believers, what's the most important thing we should pursue? The fruit of the Spirit, of the gift of the Spirit. And I realized that's the wrong question after I designed this. But there's no time to change. So because they are complementary, right?

They need to work side by side. But the problem is when we reverse the order, which order? Next slide. Eagerly pursue. And Jonathan mentioned that when he taught here last two minutes before this.

Eagerly pursue and seek to acquire the fruit. Earnestly desire and cultivate the gifts. This order is very important. When there is chaos, he doesn't throw peace. He.

He throws orders. Order, right? So that's 1 Corinthians 14. Eagerly pursue and seek to acquire this love, the fruit of the spirit is love, right? Paul was a specialist in love.

Make it your aim, your great quest. That's the Amplified Bible. And earnestly desire and cultivate the spiritual endowments, gifts, especially that you may prophesy, interpret the divine will and purpose. Inspired preaching and teaching. Very important.

Today is February, Valentine's month, First Corinthians 13. I won't read the whole thing, but if I speak the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I'm only a resounding gong, a clanging symbol. He talks about love and love and love, what it is. Paul knew what love was. I want to know what love is.

Paul, he knew it.

So focus your efforts on acquiring the fruit and earnestly pray for the best gifts God has for you. James 1:17. If I'm reading right, God is a gift giver. He always knows the exact perfect gift to give. Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly light, who does not change like shifting shadows.

So the gifts are always coming from above.

And what's the purpose of the gifts? First, Peter, God has given each of you. That's another inclusion I've never met. I'm 52. I've met a lot of people.

I have a lot of friends. Thank God. I've never met a friend that doesn't have gifts. We all have gifts, each of you, right? A gift from his great variety of spiritual gifts.

Use them well to serve one another. The gifts will benefit me for sure. But that's not the purpose. The purpose is. That's why I love the Wednesday crowd.

We see the gifts in action here. Everyone operating here. Have you seen. Have you listened to Summer Daniel praying, Pastor Jay preaching, Pastor Terry teaching. It's beautiful when they're operating on their gifts.

Beautiful, Beautiful. So focus your efforts on growing your fruit. Work out your salvation. I just got a text from Mike Roberts and he said, Dallas Jenkins. So I'll be calling him soon.

Thanks, Mike. Appreciate it.

Work out your salvation. What is that? Work out your salvation.

Philippians 2, 12, 13.

Continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling. For it is God who works in you to will and to act in order to fulfill his good purpose. When you understand that, the salvation too, God took care of it. Jesus dying is impossible, for it's an impossible test for any human being. Unless you have a draw your blood, go to the lab.

No sin on your blood. Then you can do it. Nobody qualifies but Jesus, he did it, took care of that. That's what this workout, the Salvation thing is not talking about that. He's talking about a life guided by the spirit.

You work out that fortification of the gifts, right? That's the workout process here. Because there's nothing you can do, we can do to be saved. It's already done. Jesus did on the cross.

So nothing new. This is. Hopefully you got your tracking with this. Hopefully this has been helpful.

Salvation is Jesus accomplishment. Salvation 2.

You will discover your real identity as a son. That's what he provides. We kind of find out who you really are through that salvation to not from sin, but to Now I'm reformatted. I know who I am. Sonship, game changer.

You will discover the purpose you were created for. I had a problem with Jeremiah 1:5 because I was like God before you. He says to Jeremiah, before I formed you in your mother Zumba, knew you deeply, know you, and I appointed you to be a prophet to the nations. So God knows us before he formed us and separate gifts and purposes for us. And I was like God, but what about my desires?

What about my plans and my purposes? That's not fair. And I very gently, hey, buddy, I designed you. I know you better than you know yourself. And when I realized the purpose he had for me was so much better, then what I had in my mind just blew me away.

So trust the Lord for this. Isaiah 30:21 was the word, the verse that brought us here to America. Some of you know my story, our story. Whenever you deviate or take left or right, you hear the voice behind it. This is the way.

Take it. I was like, God, I don't want to hear your voice behind. Did I step in front of you for years praying this God, I want to obey. I'm obeying, trying to do my best to obey your voice. But why is the voice behind?

I couldn't understand. And recently a couple years ago, God speaks to me with pictures, images, and just saw a dad holding a bicycle saddle seat teaching a kid how to ride it. That's why the voice is behind. I hadn't stepped in front of him and just the guiding hand of the Holy Spirit. Just like I got you, buddy.

Change the game.

So, one thing. What's the most trustworthy evidence of a person filled with the Holy Spirit? Clue. The answer is on his own name. It's a word that we don't use in churches.

You don't see a lot we see here, but in general, holiness.

Right, holiness. In simple terms, I just wrote, it's a life separated for the purposes of God. Growing up Roman Catholic I think holiness was for the saints. We read in books and the apostles. And it's not for me.

I cannot be holy. I'm just a guy. Like, how come? It's impossible, but simple. It's a separation, right?

We pick our separation. We either pick. We choose sin and we're separated from God, or we pick God and we're separated from sin. A lot better option. So a cultivation of your relationship with God through the Holy Spirit.

That's what it is, holiness.

Jesus said on Matthew 7, he talks about the false prophets. The interesting thing, he says this. It's a very well known passage. You know them by their fruits. He doesn't say by their gifts.

And again, I'm not saying that the gifts are lower standards than the fruit. I'm not saying that. Please don't hear what I'm not saying. But just like an alert. You know them by their fruits.

And he talks about the trees, right? Thorn bushes and figs. And we know that. Therefore by their fruits you know them.

And the danger is. One of the most scared passages of scripture that I Learned is Matthew 7. Next one, he says this, not everyone who says to me, lord, Lord, we went through the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. Many will say, that's the part that makes me tremble. Many will say to me on that day, lord, Lord, did we not prophesy gift.

In your name, and in your name drive out demons, gifts in your name, perform many miracles, gifts. And that's when you're like, oh, there it comes. Get ready to fall down. Then I will tell you them. I'll tell them plainly.

I never.

That hurts. I never knew you away from me, you evildoers. Some version says, you who practice iniquity, right? It's a cyclical sin, right? So it looks like you can operate on the gifts.

At least I understand that way. It's correct if I'm wrong. But you can operate in the gifts without being known by Jesus. Isn't that scary stuff? That's why you see so much abuse in general.

Why? Order, order, pursue the fruit, desire the gifts. If you pursue the gifts, Bad. Very clear example in scripture, Simon the sorcerer. Remember that Simon sees, he's a Samaritan guy, probably.

Philip is preaching in Samaria. Everyone's accepting the gospel. Church is growing. They sent Peter and John to reinforce. They got there and start praying for laying hands on people.

People are baptizing in the Holy Ghost. Simon the sorcerer sees it. He wants to buy it. He wants to buy it. When Simon saw that spirit.

Acts 8. When Simon the sorcerer saw that the Spirit capital S Holy Spirit was giving a delaying on the apostles hands, he offered them money and said, give me also these ability gifts so that everyone on whom I lay my hands may receive the Holy Spirit. It sounds so holy and so legit. I want to lay hands on people. But I think Peter got the interpretation of this, the discernment and just destroyed him.

Right? Caterpillar tractor coming. 3, 2, 1. Peter answered, May your money perish with you because you thought you could buy the gift of God with money. You have no part or share, man.

I felt bad for Simon.

Hopefully Peter was right. And he was, of course. But you have no part or share in this ministry because your heart is not right before God. Repent of this wickedness and pray to the Lord in the hope that he may forgive you for having such a thought in your heart. For I see that you are full of bitterness and captives to sin.

Whoo.

So let's focus on the fruit. Now. I was practicing this word because it's hard for me as a Portuguese, Brazilian Portuguese speaker. The fruit of the Spirit is a singular plurality. That's a hard one for me to say.

That sounding right. Singular plurality. That's hard. Let's see. Galatians 5, 22, 23.

You guys know this by memory. The fruit of the Spirit is love. First one, Paul is writing this specialist in love. Love, joy, peace, long suffering. You guys know this by memory.

And the whole emphasis in love is like, I was thinking about that the other day. Like, we are very good in liking ourselves, but we're not very good in loving ourselves. That's why when Jesus comes and he looks at Deuteronomy, he says, you know, love thy neighbor as yourself. But what if you don't love yourself because we like ourselves. Very bold example.

I see donuts. I'm gonna have 12 donuts because I like myself. Not good. This is not love. Right?

Love is saying no to temptation, to just a very simple example. But Jesus comes and says. He changes the game. He elevates that. He says, love thy neighbor.

Like, I loved you unconditional.

Beautiful. So I was thinking, awake, how can I represent the fruit? I was looking at Bible schools and like kids and they show strawberries, grapes and bananas. And I said, it's fruit, it's one fruit. So I thought about a pineapple.

But pineapple is kind of prickly and it's one fruit. So I picked an orange. It's a little cuter. Round, ergonomically, fits good in your hand.

But when you open the orange, look, all you see the segments. It's one fruit, but nine expressions. I haven't. I don't think there's nine there. But like, just for the example, is love and the eight expressions of grace.

But it's one fruit. I think for me, it fits here a little better if I think of one fruit because it's biblical and what Paul says, and there is a book that I. It's a classic. Was written in 1957 by a guy named Watchman. Nee.

Right. I'm sure you guys know this very well. Look at this. The common concept of sanctification is that every item of the life should be holy. But that's not holiness.

It is the fruit of holiness. Holiness is Christ. It is the Lord Jesus being made over to us to be that. So you can put anything there. Love, humility, power, self control.

Today there is a call for patience. He is our patience. Tomorrow, the call may be for purity. He is our purity. He is the answer to every need.

That is why Paul speaks of the fruit of the Spirit as one and not of fruits as separate items. I love this. Isn't that beautiful?

When we guide our lives with the Holy Spirit, we're going to produce fruit as a consequence. So First John 4. God is love. Very clear. We know that because God is love.

Right the very end of the verse seven.

And they ask Jesus, how do you know my disciples if you love one another? I think we need to practice this more in our churches around the world so people can. Man, they are so loving. What's that? Sometimes we don't see that as we should.

So conclusion. And I'm coming to an end. The fruit of the Spirit creates the environment in which the gifts of the Spirit can mature, develop, and flow healthily on a daily basis.

Nothing new, but that's proper order. The fruit defines the gifts, not the other way around.

So Bishop Tony Hall, April Jonathan will be teaching on that with a lot more details in the weeks to come. So I'm excited about that. This is just the foundation. So they'll be dissecting every gift and teaching about it. It's going to be very nice.

And they are great people. And they are guided by the Holy Spirit, by the fruit. So mark 16, 15, 18. That's right after the Great Commission. And Jesus says, and these signs will accompany those who believe in my name.

They will drive out demons. They speak in new tongues, right? These all gifts, Gifts, gifts, gifts. But he just launched the Great Commission. Before he said to them, go into all the world and preach the gospel to all creation.

Whoever believes and baptize, be saved. So these signs will accompany, will follow. So what are the purpose of the signs or the gifts? If you're driving from Charlotte, trying to get to the research campus in Kannapolis, GPS tells you exit 54, there is a sign there that says research campus 8 miles. The sign is not a destination.

The sign points to the destination. You cannot get to the sign. Oh my gosh, this sign is so awesome. Stay there. Worship, idolize.

Points to the destination and we know the destination. Conclusion number two. I just have two.

The gifts of the spirit are simply signs and not an end in themselves. The proper usage manifestations of the gifts, signs should always direct you to the final destination. Jesus, right? It's all about Jesus. And to finalize completely now, John, it's all about him, guys.

In the beginning was the word, right? In verse three, through him, all things were made. Without him, nothing was made that has been made. In him was life. And that life was the light of all mankind.

The light shines in the darkness and the darkness has not overcome it. It's all about Jesus, guys. It's all about Him. All the gifts should point to him and they're complementary, so fruit singular, providing the environment for the gifts. Always in that sequence.