- Father, we thank you that
we can have a friendship with the Holy Spirit. And we ask Lord that you would begin to open our spiritual eyes to see the need for the presence of the
Holy Spirit in our lives. Holy Spirit, we want you to feel at home in us. Take up residence as you do,
but feel at home, Holy Spirit. May we honor you, and may we be called
friends of the Holy Spirit. In the name of Jesus, we pray, and I want you to say it
because you believe it, say amen. Now, I remember looking at
various men and women of God when I first began to seek the Lord and I would receive
teaching and impartation from many wonderful ministries who had dynamic ministry
and preaching and so forth. But I remember that
there were a select few who just seemed to stand out. There was something different about them. Something marked them. Something was unique about their demeanor, the way they carried
themselves, the way they talked. And it wasn't even necessarily something that could be pinpointed
in the natural realm. It was just something about
them that was special. Something about them
that made them stand out from other ministries, from other ministers,
from other preachers. And this is not necessarily a criticism on those other men and
women of God who I watched. They're all wonderful. But there was something special, something different, something unique, like a light that was
shining on their faces. And I began to discover that
these individuals had carried that unique relationship
with the Holy Spirit. It is friendship with the Holy Spirit that makes the difference. We've seen it all. We've had wonderful
preaching, wonderful teaching. We've seen demons cast out. We've seen the sick healed. We've seen people speak in tongues. We've seen the spiritual gifts at work, but there's something about
friends of the Holy Spirit and the way they minister
that just stands out. There's a real peace about them. There's a real power about them. There's a real authority about them. Now, what is that? That's because they're
carriers of the glory and you are a carrier of the glory too. I wanna show you how to
befriend the Holy Spirit, why it's important to befriend him, but I also wanna show you how. But before we do that, I have to lay some groundwork. I have to show you some things that are foundational
to your understanding of who the Holy Spirit is. Now, once you understand these truths and you see how they
build one upon the other, then you get a fuller picture of what this friendship truly means, what it truly means to walk
with the precious Holy Spirit. So I was saved at the age of 11. Now, I don't often share
this part of my testimony because I don't necessarily like to glorify the forces of darkness. But I think in sharing this
portion of my testimony, there is some glory that
goes to the Holy Spirit. In fact, all the glory
goes to the Holy Spirit, goes to the Lord. But when I was growing up and
many people don't know this, that in my family, my great-great-grandfather
was actually a warlock. He was a witch doctor. He practiced witchcraft. And in fact, he was a
very powerful warlock and he was known for his ability to tap into the spiritual realm. Now, as I've said before, born again believers
cannot be under a curse. However, if you're an unbeliever, you're open to spiritual assault in a different way than
the believer would be. And so, there was definitely
some spiritual warfare over my life that I can
remember even experiencing as a young boy. At the early age of seven, I was very aware of
the supernatural realm. And I don't say this often,
but I'll say it to you. I saw visions of hell. I, with my own physical
eyes, saw demonic spirits. In fact, I went and
visited my childhood home just a couple years ago. Britain, you were with me. Steve, you were with me. And the lady must have
thought it's strange but I was able to convince
her to give me a tour of my old childhood.
- [Steven] Right. - Don't ask me how I convinced her. But it took just, I think,
a little bit of cash and then just some
convincing and she was like, "Okay, fine."
- [Steven] Yup, yup. - And so we went in and
she began to give me a tour of my childhood home and I was actually able to
navigate myself around the house. And I showed Steven,
Britton, certain places where I had spiritual encounters. I remember being in my father's
office looking in the corner and seeing a demonic spirit
with my physical eyes. Wasn't a vision. Wasn't a daydream. Wasn't a nightmare. I saw the demon and I would speak to it. It would speak to me. - [Steven] Wow. - And the same thing was true
of another demonic spirit that I saw in my room. Now, I say all this to really set the pace of what I'm going to say here because it was out of demonic
torment that Jesus rescued me. And I remember it being
about seven years old and just having my mind
harassed by demonic spirits. It wasn't possession, oppression
or necessarily a curse. It was demonic torment. I would hear demonic voices. - [Steven] Wow. - I would see demonic faces. In fact, there were times when I'd wake up in the middle of the night, turn around and see
certain spirits standing in the middle of my room
with my physical eyes. And this went on for a couple of years and it wasn't until I was 11 years old that I finally gave my heart to Jesus. So you have to imagine from seven to 11, I had this weight on me, this heaviness on me, this sense of this
great struggle around me in the atmosphere. I was aware of the spiritual realm and I was dealing with depression and I was dealing with anxiety. And I remember feeling
that heaviness on me everywhere that I went
and I would lie in my bed- People of God, I say this
before you and the Lord, I would lie in my bed as a nine-year old, as a ten-year old, as an
eight-year old sweating, just thinking about
those tormenting thoughts that were coming against me. I remember crying as a little boy, just wanting to be rid of this. And I didn't tell my
parents hardly anything that was happening. They would've prayed with me, I'm sure. And so, it was at the age of 11, I was attending a Bible
conference with my family. Now, if you're a pastor's kid, then you know that a Bible conference is pretty much the family's
vacation for the year. And so, we went to this Bible conference. It was a week long, Monday
through Friday conference. And I remember skipping the services because as I was standing
in the worship service, these demonic beings would become agitated and I did not wanna be in the service. - [Steven] Wow. - So I would go back to the room and I remember lying on the bed, just staring at the ceiling, waiting for service to end. And I would be lying
there, sweat coming down, as the torment would intensify over me. And finally I said I've had enough. I can't deal with this anymore. I need Jesus. Now, growing up as a pastor's kid, I had memorized scripture. I had learned the Bible. I knew Jesus historically,
philosophically, socially. I did not know him personally. And so, in order to
experience the real thing, I had to put my pride aside and admit that what I had all along was counterfeit and that truly was the challenge for me. And so, I remember my family
comes back from the service. I tell my dad, I said, "Dad, I need to give my heart to Jesus. I need to get saved." So my dad dismissed
the rest of the family. They just kind of went on a
walk and he sat across from me. There was two beds in that room and he sat across from
me on the other bed. I joined hands with him, bowed my head, and he began to lead me in a prayer. Now, in the scripture, we
don't see the sinner's prayer, but you do see sinners who pray. And so we're praying. And as we're praying, I remember I began to cry. I was crying so intensely
that my mouth was shaking, tears were streaming down my face. I couldn't even say the words because I was so overcome with emotion. I was trembling. I was crying. I could feel the heat
of my tears on my face. I'm praying with my father and I'm inviting Jesus to be my savior. I'm surrendering my life to him. And I'm telling you this right now, I sensed Jesus walk into that room. - [Steven] Wow. - And when Jesus walked in, every demonic spirit walked right out. I believe they ran out. And the power of God filled that room. And I remember sensing almost
like these pulses coming from the center of my body, pulses of euphoria and
joy and peace and love. I met Jesus, the son of the living God, and that torment, that
heaviness was broken off of me the instant I gave my heart to him. And so I was saved, gloriously born again, redeemed,
saved by Jesus himself. - [Steven] Wow, wow. - Now I began to seek the Lord. At the age of 11, I immediately wanted to know more about Jesus, this Jesus who set me free. I had heard about him. I heard so much about him. And now I was like,
"Wow, I heard about you and now I get to meet you, Jesus." And so I remember digging
into the scripture. I would pray four to eight hours a day. I would read 20, 30,
sometimes 40, 50 chapters of the Bible a day. And this continued for two years. And even though I knew the Lord, even though I was seeking his face, even though I was reading the word, I sensed as though I was running on empty. Now this isn't to say that
salvation isn't enough. On the contrary, salvation is everything. I mean, when he saves you, he redeems you. He justifies you. He empowers you. He breaks sin, all those things. But I knew not necessarily
that something was missing. That's how I would've worded it back then. Back then, I would've
said something is missing. Now, the way I understand it is that I wasn't quite
yet fully surrendered in all areas of my life. And to this day, probably I'm still not. I surrender daily. We all die daily and little
by little we decrease so the Lord can increase. There's always a way that
we can be more like Jesus. So therefore, there's always a way that we can surrender more and therefore none of us
have truly surrendered all of ourselves to him. We trust ourselves to him. We give ourselves to his process, but there's no guarantee that all of it will be
completed now in an instant. Having said that, something in me knew that
I wasn't fully surrendered. Again, back then, I would've worded it as
something was missing. So, I began to read books. I began to watch TV preachers. Some of them, I realized
I need to change this, this is not of God. Some scripture concordances
and commentaries and I'm- I had the highlighters
and I was just digging in. I would listen to the word
and I would consume the word, every sermon, every preacher,
every singer, every worshiper. I was just so hungry to know
everything that God had for me. And that hunger's still with me today. That's why I continue to be
taught by the Holy Spirit. But, I remember surfing
through the channels. It was TBN. Say what you will about TBN, but God has used that
network to impact many lives. And so, I'm flipping to the channels and I'm watching preachers
and I'm getting familiar with ministry and different teachings and I'm learning about the
baptism with the Holy Spirit. I'm learning about water baptism. I'm paying more attention
now in church that I'm saved to the various guest
speakers that we would have, of course, to my father's preaching, to my pastor's preaching. And I was just consuming it all and I would seek out mentors too. And then one day, I'm
flipping through the channels and I come across this
Christian television program and there was just something
different about it. Remember how at the top
of the broadcast here, I was talking about how some people just have something different on them. Again, many preachers, many people who move in power, many people who move in deliverance
and healing and prophecy and all those wonderful
things that we need but there was something different, something I couldn't
quite put my finger on. I couldn't quite identify it,
but I knew I had to have it. And so I'm watching this on the television and this is before
everything was on demand. And so I just so happened to tune in. I tune in and I hear this heavenly music, this choir singing. And as the choir is singing, the cameras panning across the crowd, slowly changing from one
camera angle to the next, people are worshiping. It was as if they were raptured
in this glorious ecstasy and they're just so caught
up in the presence of Jesus. People with tears
streaming down their faces, some trembling, some just lost in the song and their adoration of Jesus. It was almost, forgive me for saying so, it was almost hypnotic. And I felt in my spirit
something pulling me like a magnetism, something
drawing me to that. And I didn't quite understand it then, but I knew I had to have it. And so then suddenly the worship ends. Now, I had watched various
other Christian programs before and this was typically the moment where they would now cut to the preaching and the preacher start and
the lesson would start, the sermon would start,
something like that, or Bible teaching. But this was different. Suddenly they cut to
something I hadn't seen on television before. And there's a man bringing a
woman up with her wheelchair and this man is announcing, "Pastor, this woman came tonight." She was in a wheelchair. I don't remember how long
she was in a wheelchair. I don't remember what was wrong with her. All I know is she was in a wheelchair and then she began to
run across the platform. All the place erupted in praise for God. - [Steven] Wow. - The place went wild, cheering
and jumping and shouting and celebrating this woman in tears, jumping up and down,
running across the platform. And I saw, as the
preacher approached them, it almost looked like a
weight came on the people. He just walked up to them and the power of God comes on them. They fell out under the
power of the Holy Ghost. And I just knew that I knew that I knew that there
was something there. So, I went and I bought
a book by this preacher and this book was on friendship
with the Holy Spirit. This is the verse in the book that I read that gave me what I'll call holy jealousy. - [Steven] Ah. - Second Corinthians 13:14, this verse will change your life. Second Corinthians 13:14. "May the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the fellowship of the
Holy Spirit, be with you all." What does that mean? The fellowship of the Holy Spirit? Fellowship is communion. Fellowship is friendship. Fellowship is me talking
to you, you talking to me. Fellowship is like when I
go have lunch with Ruben or when I'm in the car on
a trip with Tim and Steve, or when I'm sitting with
my wife on a date night, that's fellowship. We're communing. We're talking. We're getting to know one another. We're enjoying each other's company. That's fellowship with the Holy Spirit. Now, when I read that I was shaken because before I had
imagined the Holy Spirit as some like mist or cloud
that hovered about the air whenever the power of God was moving. Or I thought that perhaps he was a force or just an influence or a
sensation or an idea about God. But no, I came to understand that
the Holy Spirit is a person. Hear me now, the Holy Spirit is a person. I know some of you heard that before, but do you realize that for many, that's a light bulb going off right now? They go, "What? The Holy
Spirit is a person?" He's not just power. He's not a sensation alone though he does bring
sensation within sometimes. He's not an experience alone, though you can have experiences
with the Holy Spirit. He's not just emotional movement though he will at times
move your emotions. The Holy Spirit is a person and the scripture says that
you can fellowship with him. You can commune with him. You can have a friendship
with the Holy Spirit. And I promise you this, the Holy Spirit wants
a friendship with you more than you want a friendship with him. - [Steven] Wow. - The Holy Spirit is more committed to you than you are committed to him. He wants that. If you want that, I want you to type it in the
comment section right now, say, "I want that." Type it right now, let it be known publicly
that this is what you want. Even if you watch the replay, write it in the comment section. "I want that." And I wanted that. I read that verse, everything in me said I have to have this. I have to have this wonderful friendship with the Holy Spirit. And so one day I'm reading the word and I didn't know what I was reading. There were times I would
read the scripture, especially books like Leviticus, where I would get lost in thought because I was not necessarily interested in what I was reading. I was reading it just because you know, I felt obligated to read every
book of the Bible back then. That's how it was. It was more of a
discipline than a delight. Now, of course it's a delight. But I was reading, and do you ever do this thing
where you're in the scripture and you start reading and
then you come down 10 verses and then you realize, "Wait a minute, I didn't know what I just read." And then you have to start over and then you go back to the verses again, you go, "Wait, I wasn't
paying attention again." Or you start reading and you realize you got lost in thought, and you were talking about something else in your mind completely. That was happening to me. And I said, "How can I
understand the scripture?" And then I read this verse, James 1:5. "If you need wisdom, ask our generous God and he will give it to you." - [Steven] Come on. - "He will not rebuke you for asking." So I said, "Okay, God. I see it right here in the scripture that you want to give me
wisdom that you can do it." So I said, "Holy Spirit,
you inspired the scripture, help me know the word." And I began to seek this
fellowship with the Holy Spirit and my seeking of this
friendship culminated into one evening. I became so hungry for that presence. Now I've often said that
desperation is a great initiator, a terrible sustainer. Desperation implies that
I'm missing something. So desperation has its place. I think of people like
Hannah in the scripture. Desperation can serve a purpose, but desperation must never be a lifestyle. Because if I'm continually desperate, it means I'm continually lacking. So at this point though, I was completely lacking in
my walk with the Holy Spirit. I did not know about
this friendship with him. And I wanted that. So... I purposed in my heart. I said, "Okay. I am going to have a friendship
with the Holy Spirit." So, I shut my door to my bedroom. I turned on my light. I opened my Bible. I began to play some Christian music. - [Steven] Hmm. - I turned on the fan because it got a little hot in the room and I wanted to be comfortable. And I told the Lord, I said, "Lord, I am not leaving this room until you touch me, until I have some encounter with you. I'm not going to eat. I'm not going to sleep. I'm gonna pray and seek your
face until something happens." I didn't know what I wanted. I didn't know what I expected. I didn't know what the
encounter would be like. All I knew was that I wanted
to know the Holy Spirit. So I work myself up, man, I'm ready. I start praying and pressing
in and doing all those things that we were taught to do. One hour goes by. Do you know what happened? Absolutely nothing. If you've been there, type "Amen" in the
comment section right now. You've been in those
moments where, you know, you purpose in your heart to seek God, you feel like, man, 45 minutes
must have passed already and then you look at the clock and only 10 minutes have gone by? That happened several times in that hour. And so I'm praying, I'm pressing in, I'm doing everything I know to do that. First hour goes by and
absolutely nothing happens. I was a little frustrated,
but I said, "You know what? I'm going to really press in." And so then I began to
reach for my emotions. I began to try to guilt
God into a response. "God, if you're there. Father, are you listening? Lord, do you hear me? God, do you love me?" That's what we do often. We try to guilt God into responding to us, not recognizing that he
doesn't necessarily respond to emotions, he responds to faith. So I'm crying, I'm pleading,
I'm working up my emotions. I'm trying everything that I know to do, but it wasn't noise that
brought about power. It wasn't emotionalism
that stirred God to move. Who among us could persuade
God to move anyway? - [Steven] Right.
- God is gonna do as he wills. So I did that for an hour. Nothing happened. And then I began to reach for
the aggressive side of prayer, spiritual warfare, if you will. Now, in my earlier years of ministry, I taught all of these
things on spiritual warfare that now I realize aren't
necessarily biblical. So, I correct the record now. But man, in my time in prayer, I was rebuking that demon of distraction though demons do distract. I was imagining demons
hovering over different corners of my room, pointing at that corner and rebuking it. "I rebuked the spirit of
this, the spirit of that." You know, we as Christians, we attach demonic spirits names to almost any problem that we might have. "Oh, I'm stuck in traffic. It's the spirit of bad traffic." - [Steven] Right. - Like, no, you just left later than you probably should have. Sometimes we try to spiritualize
our lack of discipline and we blame on demons, which should actually
be blamed on the flesh. That's a whole different
sermon for a different time. So I'm over there rebuking spirits. "Spirit of this, spirit
of that, I rebuke you. I rebuke you." I got aggressive. Man, I was pleading the blood. I was applying the oil. I was waring in the heavenlies. An hour of that goes by, nothing happened. Now it was at about this time that I began to regret my ultimatum. I thought, well, maybe I
should at least leave to eat or have a snack. Lord, I have a snack, you know. Maybe I'll take a nap or something. I'm regretting it, man. This is now a third hour
in, nothing's happening. And I'm just saying to myself, why did you make such a promise to God that you wouldn't leave
until you had an encounter? So I reached for my intellect, my wisdom that I had
been taught the theology. I began to quote scriptures
and pray the word, which is good, but the problem is I was
depending upon systems and God doesn't reply to systems. He responds to sincerity. So I'm praying, I'm pleading,
I'm applying the intellect, everything I had ever
been taught about prayer. It all failed. Four hours went by, absolutely
nothing is happening. Emotion failed. Aggression failed. Intellect failed. And so I grew frustrated. And I lift my hands, I'm pleading with God, I say, "Holy Spirit, I don't know how to pray. Please help me to pray." - [Steven] Hmm. - "I don't know how to find Jesus. Help me find Jesus." Now I had come to the point where I had exhausted
everything that I had. I emptied myself. I had nothing left to give. I had no more tears to cry. I had no more prayers to pray. I had no more emotions to go off of. I had no strength in my
body left to pursue God. I gave up. I was done with myself. But you see, that's when the Holy Ghost shows up. Every single time,
that's when he shows up. When you've come to the end of yourself, that's the beginning of the Holy Spirit. - [Steven] Come on. - And so I came to the end of myself. I tried everything I knew to
do and it failed me miserably. Oh my goodness, it failed. And so I heard a gentle whisper. You know why I was able
to hear that whisper? Because I stopped clamoring in my mind. And sometimes we can be so desperate for an encounter with God, that we ourselves become a distraction to ourselves having an encounter with God. So I worked myself up and I'm asking the Holy Spirit, "Please, please, please teach me to pray." And the still small
voice, now that I'm quiet, now that I'm done talking, now that I'm done trying in my own effort, a still small voice speaks to me. You see, people of God's spirit family, there is no man or woman of God on earth, no matter how anointed they are, who knows the way into
the presence of God. Only the Holy Spirit knows the
way into the presence of God. And if you'll surrender,
he'll show you the way. And so, I'm there in my room. I hear this gentle whisper to my heart and the Holy Spirit
begins to speak with me. He says, "Turn off the fan." - [Steven] Mm-hmm. - Why? Because it was distracting me. I turned off the fan. "Turn off the light." I turned off the light. He wanted me to turn off the light because I was paying attention to all the details in my room. The Holy Spirit said, "For
now, close the scripture." So for that moment, I
closed the scripture. You do need the word and it's not more spiritual
the less word there is, but the Holy Spirit uses
the word as the foundation. But for that moment, I put the word aside. And then the Holy Spirit
said, "Turn off the music." I said, "But you can't
move without the music." That's how religious I was in my mind. And I turn off the music. I stopped trying my systems and I just surrendered in that moment. I did nothing else but stand there quietly and focus on Jesus. And when I tell you the presence of the Holy Spirit entered my room, I'm telling you, it was like my room became
a little piece of heaven. The ordinary plain settings
of everyday life, my bedroom, had shifted and had become something new. I was standing in the
glory of almighty God. My eyes were closed, my hands were lifted. And I could feel pulses
of electricity moving up and down my body. I felt a way to heavy glory. I felt intense heat hovering around me. My hands were outstretched. And I thought if I move my hand, I might feel my hand brush
up against the robe of Jesus. I didn't even wanna move.
- [Steven] Wow. - That sense of his presence lasted for just a couple minutes no more. I don't know exactly how long, but couldn't have been
more than a few minutes. But had I sought that for a hundred years, those few minutes would've been
worth every year of seeking. I had come to meet the Holy Spirit. My life was never the same. My life was never the same. And you can meet him too. I'm gonna make my next point. I wanna talk to you about
who is the Holy Spirit. Then I'm gonna show you
how to host the presence of the Holy Spirit daily. Then I'm gonna show you how
to befriend the Holy Spirit. Then I'm gonna show you how to
surrender to the Holy Spirit. And then if we have some time, I'll show you what the Holy
Spirit does in your life. Now there's a lot of material to cover so may make sure you have notes. I'm gonna pause for a moment. Make sure you do like, comment and share. You're just joining the stream, maybe this is your first time, subscribe to Encounter TV,
click the notification bell. We put out content, Bible teaching, sermons on the Holy Spirit,
prayers, spiritual warfare. We also show footage of
the power of God moving. We also feature the worship
ministry of Steven Moctezuma and we do live streams
like this all the time, like this and of live events. So like, like, like, comment, comment, comment, share, share, share. I'm gonna take a pause to do that. Rose Anne says 500 or more. Louis Morris, "I want a
friendship with the Holy Spirit." Well, you're gonna get it. You're gonna get that
friendship with the Holy Spirit. I'm sold out for Jesus rights, I need to meet the Holy Spirit. Shore says, "I wanna
meet the Holy Spirit." Joshua says, "Please have time." Okay, we'll take the time. Debbie Henderson is commenting hearts. Ayeye says, "I wanna meet him too." So many of you saying,
"I want this friendship." Do you want that friendship
with the Holy Spirit? I mean, truly. I know we say things like this, but I wanna know how many
are sincerely wanting that. So just go ahead and leave
it in the comment section what you're thinking, how you're
enjoying this live stream. That's my testimony by the way, for those of who don't know. And let's get now into the word, but Steve will check in
with you and the live chat. - Yeah, so I've been
watching the live stream and you guys are amazing right now. I want to go ahead and focus
on a great comment here. Yasmin, while you were preaching said, "When you focus on Jesus, the Holy Spirit always shows up." How true that is. So again, guys continue to like, continue to comment. Like I said, let's reach
our goals this livestream. So, really awesome. - Someone asked a question and
I wanna address real quick. Someone said, "Holy jealousy?" You gotta remember there's
two types of jealousy. Jealousy is not necessarily
an evil thing unto itself. Jealousy can be evil. It can be ungodly. Ungodly jealousy is based in fear and demand what doesn't belong to it. Godly jealousy is based in love and demands what belongs to it. If my wife took some
other guy out for a date, you bet there would be some holy jealousy because that would come
from my love for her and I would demand what
is rightfully mine. Those are my date nights,
not some other guys, okay? So that's the difference in
the holy and unholy jealousy, for those of who wanna
know the difference. And how many of you notice
what I'm talking about? There are just some people
who carry it differently. Yes, all men and women of
God are powerfully anointed, but have you ever noticed that there's just something
different on certain people. There's a peace on them, an authority on them, a power on them. There's joy. There's a difference in them. And I'm talking about
people of the Holy Spirit. If you've noticed that, just let me know in the
comment section right now. Okay. Who, not what, is the Holy Spirit? Those of you taking notes, we're gonna get a lot of scripture here. So, the Holy Spirit is a person. The Bible refers to the Holy
Spirit as a he, never an it. - [Steven] Mm-hmm. - The Bible speaks of the Holy Spirit in terms of personality. And when I say personality, I'm not talking about human personality. I'm talking about just
being a sentient being who is aware of himself and has feelings, has a will and has a mind of his own, which I'll show you now. So number one, we just read this, but I'll reiterate it here. You can fellowship with the Holy Spirit. Second Corinthians 13:14 says, "May the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the
fellowship of the Holy Spirit, be with you all." Secondly, the Holy Spirit can speak. - [Steven] Mm-hmm. - Acts 8:29, "The Holy
Spirit said to Philip, 'Go over and walk along
beside the carriage.'" So there we see the Holy Spirit
speaking, so he has a voice. The Holy Spirit has a will. First Corinthians 12:11 says, "But all these worketh that
one and the selfsame Spirit, dividing to every man
severally as he will." The Holy Spirit can be grieved,
which means he has feelings. Ephesians 4:30 says, "And grieve not the holy Spirit of God, whereby ye are sealed unto
the day of redemption." That's an important one. The Holy Spirit has feelings. I'll never forget one time
I was sitting in the car with one of my ministry partners and we're sitting there and
this gentleman is a major donor in that they give a lot of
finance to the ministry. God has blessed our
ministry with many people who give really large amounts
of money to help the cause, so this was one of the
gentlemen who does that. And I'm sitting in the car with him and we're talking about
the Lord and the ministry and the future, and suddenly I get a phone
call from my brother, who at the time worked in
the partner department, and he says, "Hey, I just want you to know that I received an interesting
phone call from someone who demanded that I
make racist statements." And he thought it was kind of odd. He said, "They basically
wanted you to affirm inside with some of the racist
things that they were saying." And I told my brother, I said, "Well, of course you
didn't agree with that." He said, "Of course I didn't." He said, "But I just
thought you should know." This person basically called
my brother a bunch of names for not agreeing with
the racist statement. And then they told my brother, "You know, I can give you a lot of money." So you're very, very- and forgive me for being
so rude for saying this, but this is what the person said. They said, "You must be
stupid, stupid, stupid." That's what the person said to my brother. And my brother said, "Look, no amount of
money you're gonna give to this ministry is gonna
make us say something or agree with an idea that's racist. It's not gonna happen." So the person hung up. My brother said, "Hey,
I just want you to know. So if you see like a refund asked for or a partnership cancel..." We didn't know if this person had donated, was a partner or was going to donate, so he said, "Hey, if you see
a large donation come out, just know that it was
probably this person asking for a refund." I said, "That's fine." I said, "We don't need that." I mean, I don't wanna deal
with someone that's difficult and people can't control
us with their money anyway. So I hang up the phone
and I turn to my partner who I'm sitting with in the
car, my ministry partner. And I say to the gentleman, I basically told the
story of what had happened at our office. And I said to him, "Well,
we don't need to worry about that donor. We have you to rely on." And the moment I said that, I sensed the Holy Spirit
get angry with me, like conviction set in on me immediately. I said to my donor, I said, "We don't have
to rely on that person. We have you to rely on." Oh man, when I said that, this very intense presence- You know, the Holy Spirit's a gentle dove, but he also comes in like
a mighty rushing wind and he also sometimes burns like a fire. And so I remember feeling
this intensity in the car and my donor turns to me, he says, "Did you feel that?" I said, "Yes, I felt that." And right there in the car, I knew why the Holy Spirit was angry. I said, "Holy Spirit, I'm sorry, but please forgive me." And I told the Holy Spirit, in the car I said, "You're
my source, not man." And I pointed at my donor. I said, "You're my source, not man." And then the Holy Spirit
lifted that conviction. The Holy Spirit became grieved over the fact that I spoke
that my reliance was upon, that my trust was in an
individual rather than him. Oh and he got angry with me real quick. And the Holy Spirit corrected
that, but I grieved him. I grieved the Holy Spirit. He has feelings. Romans 8:14 reveals
the Holy Spirit is God. "For all who are led by the spirit of God are children of God, the Holy Spirit is referred to as Lord." Second Corinthians 3:17 says, "Now the Lord is that Spirit; and where the Spirit of the
Lord is, there is liberty." The Holy Spirit is referred
to as the spirit of Jesus. Acts chapter 16, verses six
through seven, say this: "They passed through the
Phrygian and Galatian region, having been forbidden by the Holy Spirit to speak the word in Asia; and after they came to Mysia, they were trying to go into Bithynia, and the Spirit of Jesus
did not permit them." Now, three things to note
about the Holy Spirit and who he is. Number one, he's omniscient. First Corinthians 2:10-11 says, "But it was to us that
God revealed these things by his Spirit. For his Spirit searches out everything and shows us God's deep secrets. No one can know a person's thoughts except that person's own spirit, and no one can know God's
thoughts except God's own Spirit." So only you can know your thoughts only you and the Lord that is. And only God's spirit
can know his thoughts. This reveals to us that everything that God knows, the Holy Spirit knows. Therefore, the Holy Spirit is omniscient. Psalm 139:7 reveals that the
Holy Spirit is omnipresent. "I can never escape from your Spirit! I can never get away from your presence!" He's omnipotent. The scripture says in Luke 1:35, "The angel replied, 'The Holy
Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most
High will overshadow you. So the baby to be born will be holy, and he will be called the Son of God.'" So the scripture here tells us that the same power of
the Most High belongs to the Holy Spirit. So the power of the Most
High is one and the same with the power of the Holy Spirit. That's Luke 1:35. So, if the Holy Spirit is omniscient and omnipresent and omnipotent, then the Holy Spirit is God. He's not a lesser member of the Trinity. I think that sometimes we imagine that because we mention the Holy Spirit third, that therefore he's the
lesser of the three. No, the Holy Spirit is
equal in divine power, is equal in divine authority. He is just as divine as
the Father and the Son. The Holy Spirit is God. Now let me show you
something interesting here. This is powerful. Go to Isaiah chapter six. And by the way, I'll
stop here for a moment. You guys, we're almost at
1800 concurrent viewers and this is-
- [Steven] Come on. - Our livestream is growing fast. This takes usually months to
get to this kind of audience so thank you to those of
you who are part of it. Let's share this right now. Let's go for 2000 today. And again, that matters because
numbers represent people. Now, let me show you something. Isaiah chapter six, watch this. Isaiah six, verses eight
and nine says this, "Then I heard the Lord
speaking 'Whom shall I send as a messenger these people?'" Pay attention to the language
here, what's being said. "Who will go for us? I said, 'Here I am! Send me!' And he said, 'Yes, go,
and say to this people, 'Listen carefully, but do not understand. Watch closely, but learn nothing.'" So, this is Isaiah having
an encounter with God and God is speaking to him this message. Now watch this, watch this. You wouldn't know this
until you compare it with the New Testament, but this is actually talking
about the Holy Spirit. I'll show you. Look at Acts chapter 28. I'm gonna read verse 25 and 26. And Acts 28: 25 and 26 is actually referencing Isaiah 6:8-9. Watch this now. Watch it come together real nicely. "And after they had argued back
and forth among themselves, they left with this final word from Paul: 'The Holy Spirit was right when he said to your ancestors
through Isaiah the prophet, Go and say to this people: When you hear what I say,
you will not understand. When you see what I do,
you will not comprehend.'" So in Isaiah 6, he's referred
to as the Lord or as God, or as the Most High, but in Acts chapter 28, we actually see that it's the Holy Spirit
speaking to Isaiah. So, the Holy Spirit is God. That's who the Holy Spirit is. The Holy Spirit is God with us. Now here's a powerful thought. Where is God the Father? Some would say everywhere at all times. Wait a minute, wait a minute. Think about in the book of Genesis, how the Father had to come down to see what was going on in the earth. - [Steven] Mm-hmm. - Think about how the scripture describes that the Father is seated upon a throne. So the Father is seated
in heavenly places. Where is the Son? Watch this now. Acts 7:55. "But Stephen, full of the Holy Spirit, gazed steadily into heaven and saw the glory of God, and he saw Jesus standing
in the place of honor at God's right hand." Now on a side note,
something interesting here, this is actually the only time that you see Jesus standing at
the right hand of the Father and in all of the
references, he's sitting. In Colossians 3:1, the scripture says, "Since you have been raised
to new life with Christ, set your sights on the reality of heaven, where Christ sits in the place of honor at God's right hand." So then, Jesus sits at the
right hand of the Father, the Father sits upon a throne. But according to Psalm 139:7, the Holy Spirit goes everywhere. Do you realize that the Holy
Spirit is the omnipresence of God? The Holy Spirit is the everywhereness, if I can word it that way, the everywhereness of God. The Holy Spirit is God's omnipresence. So then, to say the Holy
Spirit is with me is the same as saying the Father is with me. To say the Holy Spirit
is with me is the same as saying the Son is with me. Now, some people get confused here. Because if you emphasize
any one of these attributes, people start to think that you're contradicting the scripture. So if you talk about
how the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit are three persons, people will say, "Wait a
minute, he's only one God." If you talk about how the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit are one God, people will say, "Wait a
minute, he's three persons." But you have to realize it's both. He is three persons and he is one God. This is the mystery of the Trinity. So people are talking past
each other when they argue. "No, he's three persons." "No, he's one God." "No, he's three persons." "No, he's one God." It's all true. That's the Trinity mystery. So then when I commune
with the Holy Spirit, watch this now, it's as if Jesus himself
is sitting there with me. It's as if I have an audience
with the Father himself. The Holy Spirit is the spirit of God. The Holy Spirit is the spirit of Jesus. He sits with me. He talks with me. He walks to me. The Holy Spirit is God. He is God everywhere. He is Jesus in you. Let me say that again. The Holy Spirit is God everywhere. Jesus in you. - [Steven] Come on. - Now imagine Jesus sitting with you in physical form. It's the same thing when the presence of the
Holy Spirit is with you. So, knowing that the Holy Spirit is in me, I must understand how to host the presence of the Holy Spirit. I'm gonna get into the point now, how to host the presence
of the Holy Spirit. But Steve let's check in with the chat. - So again, guys, you
guys are doing so amazing. The chat has been going on nonstop. I love this comment here by Kenneth. Kenneth says, "Yes, yes, sir. The Holy Spirit is the
omnipresence of God. Hallelujah!" So everybody continue to
like, comment and share. - So if you wanna know
who the Holy Spirit is, the Holy Spirit is God. He's God the Father
everywhere and Jesus in you. That's who the Holy Spirit is. Now I can go on and on and on about this. In fact, I actually had a
clip that went viral online about a year or so ago, where I talk about who is the Holy Spirit. And some of you probably
found us through that clip where I just list all the things that the Holy Spirit is and does and we we're gonna get into
a little bit of that today. But most importantly,
the Holy Spirit is God. He's God the Father
everywhere, he's Jesus in you. So how do I host the presence? First, you must recognize. First, you must recognize that every believer has the Holy Spirit. The scripture declares in
Ephesians 1: 13 and 14. "And now you Gentiles
have also heard the truth, the Good News that God saves. And when you believed in Christ, he identified you as his own
by giving you the Holy Spirit, whom he promised long ago. The spirit-" Watch this now. "The Spirit is God's guarantee that he will give us the
inheritance he promised and that he has purchased
us to be his own people. He did this so we would
praise and glorify God." Romans 8:9, "But you are not controlled
by your sinful nature. You are controlled by the Spirit if you have the Spirit
of God living in you. And remember, that those
who do not have the Spirit of Christ living in them do
not belong to him at all." So, every believer has the Holy Spirit. You could not be saved
without the Holy Spirit. The moment you're born again, the moment you put your faith in Jesus, the Holy Spirit takes up residence in you. God does not give you a smaller
portion of the Holy Spirit for the eternal cannot
be divided into portions. God does not give you a baby Holy Spirit. God does not give you a
new convert Holy Spirit. God does not give you a
less potent Holy Spirit, if ever there was such a thing. No, when are born again, the same Holy Spirit
who was in Christ comes to dwell in you in fullness. So once you know this, once you know that you have his presence, the question then becomes,
how do I host him? Well, what does it mean to be a good host? When I have people over, I try to make sure I have food for them. I get them something to drink. I sit them down. I say, "You can sit here." I put the temperature where they want it. I put something on the
television that they want to see. I host them. I make them comfortable. You know, there's this
couple who we love dearly and if you're watching
you guys know I love you. Every time we go to their house, they make everyone take off their shoes. And I felt like just
saying, "No, it's okay. We'll just go home." But you know, some
people they have you over and they have all these rules
and these strange things that make you feel uncomfortable. You sit down, but not on these couches, but sit over here. And you know, the idea of hosting is to make people feel comfortable, to make people feel welcomed, to make people feel at ease. And so, you know, we have
the Holy Spirit's presence in our lives. So my question to you is this: Is the Holy Spirit comfortable
taking up residence in you? - [Steven] Mm. - Does the Holy Spirit
feel at home in you? Or does he take up residence and you go, "Okay, Holy Spirit, you can't have this. You can't have that. You can't go there. You can't touch that." And the things that you're
putting before your eyes, are they breaking his heart? The things you're listening to, are they breaking his heart? What you see and what you hear, do those things remind the Holy Spirit of things that break his heart? The question is, how do
you host the Holy Spirit? Is he at home in you? Now there's this thing in the world. There's this philosophy in the world called moral relativism. And that philosophy can be
summarized in this phrase, "to each his own." So this person believes this,
that person believes that, I believe this, to each his own. You believe what you believe. I'll believe what I believe. The problem with that is
that only works so long as each doesn't actually believe his own because eventually there's
going to be some contradiction, but that's how the world lives, in the irrational, in the illogical. Everyone just believe
what you wanna believe. You have your truth. I have my truth. There's no such thing as the truth. That's moral relativism. And that is a mindset in the world. Now, as Christians, we understand that the word of God is truth. As believers, we know that
we take the word of God as the final authority. Now here's what's interesting is that the church has its own
version of moral relativism. The church has its own
version of the phrase, "to each his own." You see in the church world, we don't say "to each his own." In the church world, we don't say, "Well, there are many truths." What do we say in the church world? What do Christians say? We say, "Well, I'm not
convicted about it." - [Steven] Mm. - Well, that's your conviction, but these are my convictions. Wait a minute, wait a minute. Wait a minute. Since when was it about your convictions? Since when was it about your standard? Should not we live by the
Holy Spirit's convictions? And would the Holy Spirit
set different standards for individuals when it
comes to basic holiness? That's something to think about. You see, if you wanna be a
friend of the Holy Spirit, if you want to stand out, if you want to have that
uniqueness about you, you have to learn to live
at a higher standard. - [Steven] Amen. - You can't do what unbelievers do. You can't even do what some Christians do. Now you can call this legalism. You can call this legalism. You can call this religion. I'm not saying you have to
do these things to be saved. Sure, if you're truly saved,
you'll want to live holy. But you know there are some things that you won't be able to do, some places you won't be able to go, some things you won't be able to watch. You know, there's things
that I won't watch that some Christians
are perfectly fine with. That's not me slamming other Christians. I'm in no way better than other believers. We are all sinners saved by grace. But maybe, just maybe, God's calling you to a higher standard because that's what it takes. You see, when you get saved, you lose your unsaved friends. But when you start to walk in friendship with the Holy Spirit, you begin to lose your
lukewarm friends too. They begin to tell you things like, "Oh, you take it too seriously." "Nah, you're taking that too far." "Well, you gotta live a little." Well, and I understand some
people are really weird and they get really strange and it's not really the
Holy Spirit talking to them. You can't even have a normal
conversation with them about how they're doing that day. But I'm not talking about weird people. I'm talking about holy people. I'm talking about people who understand that they're gonna have
to raise the standard of their living, that they're not gonna
spend hours on Netflix, that they're not gonna
spend hours on social media, that they're not gonna
allow certain things that are distracting and secular. You're just gonna have to
live at a higher standard. Is it worth it? Absolutely. No sin is worth the
anointing on your life. No compromise is worth the sweet presence of the Holy Spirit himself. You can't replace that. You can't replace and you have to learn to protect that anointing, protect that relationship
with the Holy Spirit. That's how you have to live, not in paranoia, not in fear, not in legalism, not in superstition and all
these rules and regulations, but simply out of love for the spirit. You carry that relationship
with the Holy Spirit and you guard it. You protect it. You don't let anyone- That is my friendship
with the Holy Spirit. If it hurts him, I won't do it. - [Steven] Mm. - If it makes him even
slightly uncomfortable, I move it out of my life immediately. I don't want it. I just want him. So, you wanna make the
Holy Spirit at home in you. Here's how to host his presence. Number one, avoid the demonic. This should be simple enough. I remember one time I was
ministering in the Midwest and I think it was a youth service. I don't quite remember. But I do remember
pulling up to the service and noticing that there
was some spiritual warfare in the atmosphere. I just knew there was
gonna be some resistance. So I get into the service. I'm standing there in the front row, getting ready to preach. The worship is continuing
and suddenly out of the blue, I sensed this almost like a brushing across the back of my neck. - [Steven] Hmm. - And I got chills all over my body, like a brushing across the back of my neck and I got chills all over my- It wasn't a physical brushing, but like in the spirit I
can sense something here. And there was something
very ugly, very dark right behind me, right
over my right shoulder. And I just sense this heaviness. I turned around and I'm looking behind me and there's this guy dressed in all black. He's got these thick, like those plugs that they do in the ears where they extend them. They look like a... It almost looked like his
ears were made of playdough, like it was stretched out all big. - [Steven] Right. - He had a lip piercing, a nose piercing. He had tattoos all over. He's wearing all these black clothes and he's carrying a satanic Bible. - [Steven] Hm. - I turned to look at him and he's got his eyes locked right on me. And he's looking at me and he just had this
weird grin on his face. He grinned at me and just
starts nodding his head like, "Yeah, it's me that you're feeling." So I said, okay, that's fine. I get on the platform. I began, I said, "Everybody take three minutes
praying the Holy Ghost." Boy, that guy, you could see
his whole demeanor shift. He was very uncomfortable
in that atmosphere and he ended up leaving the service. But the point is the demonic
and the spiritual clash. Don't allow the demonic in
your life to any degree. Not even a little bit. And I am talking about actual
activity that's in the call. I gonna say this and this
may offend some people, but let me just say this since this is such a basic point, you know, people talk about how well- Can Christians become demon-possessed? Of course they can't. They can't be cursed,
oppressed, possessed. You all know I have teachings out on that. They can face spiritual warfares, so don't hear what I'm not saying. Christians can be delivered
from certain bondages, but people ask me things like that. Well, you know, "What about
if a Christian goes in and practices this witchcraft?" Can I just be real with you? I don't think a Christian
would have anything to do with that in the first place. "What if a Christian starts
practicing witchcraft?" I don't think a Christian would. If they do start practicing witchcraft, I don't think they're a real
Christian to begin with. So, as people who host the
presence of the Holy Spirit, you want to avoid the demonic. This doesn't mean you go avoiding people who need deliverance and freedom. No, God sends you to
them to drive out demons. You need to do that. But what actually begins
to happen here is you begin to recognize demonic things and you avoid your
participation in demonic things. Number two, you wanna host the presence
of the Holy Spirit, minimize the secular. Now, the secular is more
subtle than the satanic. Let me say that again. The secular is more
subtle than the satanic. Certain things diminish the
power of God on your life. There are certain things that
cause your faith to be stifle. Think about in Mark
chapter five, verse 40, where Jesus goes to the home of Jairus and he goes to raise the
little girl from the dead and the people in the
building, in the house, start to laugh at him. What does he do? He throws them out. He removes them from his life. There may be a point where you
have to start disconnecting from secular people who have
too much of an influence on your life. I sense a strong anointing on that. There's someone watching me. You know that people who are secular are influencing your life and I'm not talking about
quarantining the gospel and never reaching another lost soul. Again, we're in the
world, not of the world. You have to participate in conversations and interactions with
people who are of the world, of course. But I'm talking about giving
someone a place in your life where they have influence. The Holy Spirit will not share influence. Let me say that again. The Holy Spirit will not share influence. He will remove people from your
life who are influencing you in the opposite direction you should go. That's a fact. The Holy Spirit, James
says, is jealous over you. So there will be some things
that are secular in your life that the Holy Spirit will
minimize that influence. Now, again, we can't be completely
detached from the world. Some people say, "Well, I
don't go to this business because they believe in that." Or "I don't go here because
they believe in that." Do you realize that
everything in this world has touched something unclean? That everything in this
world can be connected to some type of demonic or sinful agenda? Just a reality. So I'm talking about not participating. I'm talking about minimizing the influence of the secular in your life. Now, there was this service
that I was administering at in Southern California and man, the prophetic was so strong. I started seeing in the prophetic- This only happened to me
like two or three times. I was actually able to
hear, you may call me crazy, I was able to hear the thoughts
going on in people's heads and I was calling it out
through the prophetic. I can't turn that on and off at will. I wish I could, it'd be kind of cool. But it's only happened a couple times in almost 20 years of ministry. I think maybe three times I've had it to where I could hear in
the spirit so clearly, and man, the prophetic
anointing came on me so strong and I say prophetic anointing not that there's an actual
literal prophetic anointing. It's one anointing and the
prophetic expression was stirred by that anointing. So I'm walking around the service and I'm calling people out, pulling them out of their seat saying, "You're going through this,
this, this, and this..." and very specific things
about their lives. And so I'm in this flow, I'm enjoying it. I felt like I was in a
whole different world. And this girl comes into the service, walks in from the back door, walks down the side aisle, moves across the front row and sits down right in front of me. And then she gets on her phone. I watched her because she
was so distracting about it. I watched her come in and sit down. And the moment she did, (snaps finger) it lifted from off of me. - [Steven] Hmm. - And I literally... This is what I did. I had the microphone in my hand. I watch her. She sits down. I go, "Well, church, I sensed it lift. I'm released to the Lord. I'm gonna turn it over now." And I handed the microphone
over to the pastor because this girl walked
in and just sat down, decided to be a distraction to everyone. She's a young teenager. Now I didn't call her out. I didn't get the
conversation with her after. I just knew that because
of the distraction, I was pulled away from it. So I don't even necessarily
say it was the girl's fault, but I had become focused on her because she distracted
me and I lost sight, that pinpointed sight in the spirit, I lost it for that moment. It lifted and I had to move on. Why? Because of the secular. Did she do anything sinful? No. Was she practicing witchcraft? No. Did she do something
blatantly obviously wrong? No. It was just a secular distraction. Sometimes, I really do believe that the mundane world itself is an insult to the glory of God.
- [Steven] Wow. - I do wanna acknowledge a milestone here. We have just reached over 2000 of you watching online. Spirit family, you are awesome. I love you. This is a community like no other. This livestream is growing
fast and I do mean fast and so we're very grateful for that. So, I'm thankful for you. Don't forget to like, comment, share. And if you're new to the
channel, make sure to subscribe. We'll make you feel right in home. Content about the holy spirit,
prayers, spiritual warfare, videos of the power of God
at work, worship clips, you're gonna love it. We livestream every Wednesday. So guys, go ahead and
leave a like right now. Remember if you get to 3000 likes, now that's when we're
doing that second giveaway. Now, the third thing you must do to host the presence of the Holy Spirit. So number one, avoid
the demonic completely. And I don't even know I kind of struggled with even putting that point
in there in the first place, because I thought, man, if
I avoid the demonic, I mean, true Christians already know this, so I'm of the belief, maybe
not totally convinced, but I'm kind of leaning toward the idea that anyone who really has
fascination with the demonic or wants to get involved with that, is probably not even a
Christian to begin with. - [Steven] Wow. - But number two, minimize secular. This is not the sinful,
this is just distractions. These are things in life
that come instead of. So the problem with the
secular is not necessarily that it's sinful. The problem with the secular
is that it's instead of, meaning it's usually instead
of time with the Lord, time in his presence and so forth. Now, number three on how to host the
presence of the Holy Spirit, subject the flesh. So number one, avoid the demonic. Number two, minimize the secular. Number three, subject the flesh. First Corinthians 9:27, a
frightening verse really when you think about it,
and this is frightening, watch this. "I discipline my body like an athlete, training it to do what it should do. Otherwise-" Now this is Paul the apostle writing this. Get this. "Otherwise, I fear that
after preaching to others, I myself might be disqualified." Whoa. That Paul the apostle would write that? That's how much of an enemy the flesh is. You see? You can cast devils out and
you can be free of the demonic by giving your heart to Jesus, being filled with the Holy Spirit. Here's the problem with you. You can't cast you out of you. You're stuck with you until
the day of redemption, until the day we receive
our glorified bodies. You can't cast you out of you. The flesh does not come and go. The flesh shrinks and grows. The flesh shrinks and grows. It grows stronger and weaker depending upon how you interact with it. Now, there was this one time
when I prayed for this woman who got healed, I don't even remember
what she got healed of. It could have been something with her ear if I remember correctly. I prayed with the woman. I was tired. I was exhausted. And I do my very best when
I'm praying with people after services. By the way, if you ever
come to one of our services, after the cameras go off,
nine times out of 10, if we don't have a flight to
catch or something like that, Steve and I will stay after the service and we'll pray with
everyone who wants prayer. This way- You know, we have people
driving in for hours. We'd hate for them to
go away without prayer. So we'll pray with every
single person who wants prayer. If it takes us three hours,
we're there for three hours. And you know, this woman comes up, I'm exhausted, I'm tired, I'm praying with her
believing for her miracle. She gets healed. And she says, "Thank you,
thank you, thank you." And I said, "You're welcome." I'm half asleep. She walks away. And as she's walking away,
I realize she thanked me, not the Holy Spirit, not the Lord. So, you may call me religious, but these are the types
of things you have to do. This is the standard. I ran after her. And I said, "Ma'am, I
don't wanna sound rude and I'm not trying to
correct you just for fun." I said, "But I need to
make it clear to you, I did not heal you. Jesus healed you and he's the only one
who deserves the glory." So I'm doing all this. I think it's like this intense moment. She goes, "Oh yeah, I know. Thank you, thank you." And she just keeps walking away. To her, it was just probably
something weird that I did, but to me, it was a check in my heart and the Holy Spirit revealed
to me that's how it begins. That's how it begins. - [Steven] Wow.
- Little by little, little things we don't
allow ourselves to correct. So, you want the Holy Spirit
to feel at home in you. Number one, avoid the demonic. Number two, minimize the secular. Number three, subject the flesh. Now I'm gonna show you how
to befriend the Holy Spirit. Let me know in the comment section, how you're enjoying this. Steve, how's the chat doing? - So the chat's doing
amazing like always, guys. We are so close to our like goal for the first giveaway here. All you gotta do is go ahead
and get a hundred more likes. So continue to like and
continue to comment guys. I am with you in the chat. - I'm so excited that we broke through and we got over 2000 people watching now. And that's just on YouTube. I don't even know about replays
in the app and all those, so hard to count what
even we do on the app because we don't check those
statistics as accurately. But anyway, it's exciting milestone. We've only been doing this for
about a month and a half now and already, this is a great audience. Remember, every Wednesday, 6:00 PM. We'll be here with you. You get to be a part of the spirit family. Okay. How to be friend to the Holy Spirit? You wanna walk in that way. You want to truly know who he is. You wanna befriend him. So I showed you how to host him, how to make him feel comfortable. Now I wanna show you how to actively go about having a friendship with the Holy Spirit. And I see the comments coming in, Ramona and Lori and Rose and Becky and Nicki and Evangelist and JM and Louis and Celeste and Donna and Nini and Eva and Majorie and Karina and Yula, God bless you all commenting. How to befriend the Holy Spirit? Number one, understanding. Understanding. First Corinthians 2:14 says, "But people who aren't spiritual
can't receive these truths from God's Spirit. It all sounds foolish to them
and they can't understand it, for only those who are spiritual can understand what the Spirit means." Do you know that the Holy Spirit is perhaps the most
misunderstood person on earth? People mock him. They make fun of his power. They misunderstand his nature. The Holy Spirit truly is the
most misunderstood person on earth. And I feel like the closer
you get to the Holy Spirit, the more misunderstood you become. You know, one of my
frustrations in ministry, and I don't even know if
this should be a frustration, I'm just being transparent
and honest with you is I don't really fit into a category and I asked the Lord about that. I said, "Lord, I feel like I
don't have a place to belong." You know, in some circles, they would say, well,
you're too theological. And in other circles they
say you're too extreme on the spiritual gifts. It's like the biblical balance and the spirit field power
have balanced out so well that it's hard to find a category. And I said to Lord, "Lord,
I just feel sometimes-" Like not that we're alone, I don't want to have like
a pity party or anything. But I said, Lord, I would like
to find a place of belonging and the Lord spoke to me and he said, "That's what it's like
for the Holy Spirit." - [Steven] Mm. - You know, everywhere
the Holy Spirit goes, they either accept or reject him. And in most places the Holy
Spirit goes, they reject him. They misunderstand him. They treat him like he's a problem. Too much of the Holy Spirit
and there's an issue there. Well, the Holy Spirit isn't a liability. The Holy Spirit is our only chance at winning the world to Jesus. So if you wanna be a
friend of the Holy Spirit, you can't be ashamed of him. You have to embrace him. Sometimes you're gonna pray in tongues and people are gonna look
at you like you're weird. Sometimes you're gonna say things and people are gonna look
at you like you're strange. We, who are spiritual, are strange people to those who are not. Now, I'm not saying we can never be weird. Some people are weird, trust me. You don't need to be weird. But those who are spiritual are
often looked at as outcasts, different. We don't quite fit anywhere. We don't quite have a place we belong. We don't quite squeeze neatly
into certain denominations. We just love the word
as the Holy Spirit does and we love his presence and power. Some places you go, it's emphasize on the power, power, power, but no word. Other places, the word, the
word, the word, but no spirit. Ah, but friends of the Holy
Spirit, we embrace it all. We love the word. We know the importance of the word, but we also love his
power and his presence. And so in doing so, we become
strange, unique, different. Nobody knows what to do with us, what's the category you fit in. Somebody wrote an article on me. In fact, they did like an
article on all these preachers. They just kind of gave a breakdown. It was a positive article and they were complimenting everybody. You know, this preacher
is this, known for this, this preacher's known for this. They said... On me, they wrote, "He doesn't quite have a category and we don't know where
to put him, but..." I thought, okay, well, I guess
that's kind of a compliment. But I felt like, "Oh, well,
do I not have a place to fit?" And the Holy Spirit told me,
"That's what it's like for me." People reject, they don't know what to
do with him sometimes. They don't quite know where he fits. But if you are gonna be a
friend of the Holy Spirit, you're gonna be the same way. You're gonna feel a
little weird sometimes. You're gonna feel like
you don't have a place that you belong. You'll only feel comfortable in places where the
Holy Spirit is welcome. And that's okay, but you have to embrace him. Please don't be ashamed of him. Please don't be ashamed of his work. Please don't be ashamed of how he moves. Don't be ashamed of the Holy Spirit. So that's number one. You wanna be a friend of the Holy Spirit, you have to have
understanding for how he is. You ever have a friend
sometimes people don't get them? You have to say, "Oh,
oh, he's just like that." Sometimes with the Holy Spirit, not that he needs our protection, but sometimes you will
find yourself saying, "Well, that's what the
Holy Spirit's like." And that's okay. Number two, you need reverence for him, obeying the Holy Spirit. Now I read this verse earlier, but I think it's worth repeating. Ephesians 4:30, "And do not bring sorrow
to God's Holy Spirit by the way you live. Remember, he has
identified you as his own, guaranteeing that you will be saved on the day of redemption." So it's possible to
grieve the Holy Spirit. Don't grieve the Holy Ghost. I tell this story sometimes. One time I went to a Bible conference and I was very excited about
hearing the guest speaker. So I got there early. I had my Bible. I had a notepad and I had a pen. I go, I sit in the front row. I'm ready to hear the message and receive. And this was right at the beginning when the ministry just
started to take off. So sitting in the front row,
ready to hear the preacher, and some pastor walks
up to me and he says, "Well, well, well look at you Diga, you think that just cause
you get a little popular, now suddenly you get to
sit on the front row." - [Steven] Wow. - And I wasn't offended by that comment. In fact, I was more like,
"Oh my goodness, what- What did I do to make that impression?" I thought maybe I should check my heart. Maybe I am on the front
row for the wrong reasons and not just because I'm excited. So the next night I came back, it was night number two or
three or something like that, and I said, okay, I'm gonna come back and I'm gonna sit in a
different seat this time. This way I don't give
the wrong impression. So I get there earlier. I have my notepad still. I have my pen, I have my Bible. I sit in the very back. Same thing, another pastor comes up to me, a different one this time and says, "Wow, you think that just because you're a little popular now that you have to hide in
the back from people?" And that's when I realized. You can't please people. You can't please all the people. And you know, I'm gonna
be honest with you. In the beginning years of ministry, I had a little bit of a fear of man. I was concerned with what
people thought of me. I felt threatened sometimes
with people's impressions of me and I wanted to please everyone. I wanted to be diplomatic. I wanted everyone to like me. But as I've grown older and older and as I've had more and
more time in ministry, I've come to the place
where I don't even respond to the critics anymore. I don't even respond to distractions. I just focus on Jesus. I no longer fear the
opinions of other preachers. I no longer fear demonic powers. Now this may sound arrogant, but my definition of arrogance is simple. Remember this, arrogance is when your confidence
exceeds your competence. This is my definition of arrogance. Arrogance is when your confidence
exceeds your competence. There's some people, yeah they're arrogant because they trust more in
their ability than they should. But I'm not showing
confidence in my ability. Greater is he who is in me
than he who's in the world. I don't fear demonic spirits. People talk about, "Oh, be
careful when God promotes you, new levels, new devils." There's no devil that
can walk on your level. when you're walking in the power of God. No way. Demons cannot swim in the depths of God. And so I don't fear men. I don't fear demons. You know what I'm afraid of? Grieving the Holy Spirit. - [Steven] Ah. - I'm afraid of polluting
that anointing on my life. I'm afraid of diminishing
the sense of his presence. I don't want to hurt him. I don't want to grieve him. I want him to feel at home in me. That's my greatest fear. People talk often about their sensitivity to the Holy Spirit. Oh, I'm sensitive to the Holy Spirit. He talks to me 24/7. And to some degree, I'm
sure he can do that. But sensitivity to the Holy
Spirit isn't about how clearly or how often you hear him. Sensitivity to the Holy Spirit is about how quickly you
respond when he speaks. Now, I told this story
a couple weeks back. It's very embarrassing, but
I'm gonna share it again. I burned my hand. Don't ask me how. I burned my hand making oatmeal and everyone here's laughing at me now. You can laugh in the comments, it's okay. I don't take myself too seriously. I burned my hand while making oatmeal. And I remember the skin on my
hand had become very sensitive to the touch so that when I touched it, there was this instant reaction. When I touched it, I
would jerk my hand back. That's what sensitivity is. You're sensitive to the touch
and the voice of the spirit, so that when he speaks, I react. When he talks, I move. When he makes a command, I obey. That's sensitivity to the Holy Spirit. That's about obeying
him and reverencing him. Amos 3:3 asks, "Can two walk
together, less they agree?" How are you supposed to
walk with the Holy Spirit if you don't even agree with him on the direction of your life? How are you supposed to
walk with the Holy Spirit if you don't even agree
with him about the commands that he's given you? Now, if we're to walk
with the Holy Spirit, we must reverence the Holy Spirit, obey the Holy Spirit. So number one- You want a friendship
with the Holy Spirit. Number one, understanding. Number two, reverence him. Number three, trust him. Romans 8:11 says, "The Spirit of God, who raised Jesus from
the dead, lives in you. And just as God raised
Jesus Christ from the dead, he will give life to your mortal bodies by this same Spirit living within you." Now that phrase, "give life to your mortal
bodies by this same Spirit," that's a whole different
message unto itself. You could preach a whole 45
minutes on that phrase alone. But right here, the spirit
of God who raised Jesus from the dead is what I wanna focus on. Think about the fact that Jesus began in ministry
only after being baptized and receiving that touch
of the Holy Spirit. Jesus healed the sick. (inaudible) How God anointed Jesus of
Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power. Jesus moved by the Holy Spirit. But consider the fact
that Jesus was also raised from the dead by the Holy Spirit. What trust that the son of
God placed in the Spirit that he took a trust fall
backwards into the grave and trusted that the Holy
Spirit would catch him? Wow, wow, wow, wow, wow. If Jesus trusted the Holy Spirit, you should trust the Holy Spirit. God trusted the Holy Spirit with Jesus. - [Steven] Mm-hmm. - Think about this. God trusted the Holy Spirit with Jesus. In the same way, Jesus trust
his church to the Holy Spirit. Wow. We can trust our lives to him. You can trust the Holy Spirit. So number one, understanding. Number two, reverence. Number three, trust. Number four, communication. Now this is key in any relationship, but let me emphasize this. Psalm 1:39, verses seven through 10, "I can never escape from your Spirit! I can never get away from your presence! If I go up to heaven, you are there; if I go down to the grave, you are there. If I ride the wings of the morning, if I dwell by the farthest oceans, even there your hand will guide me, and your strength will support me." This is beautiful because
there's nowhere I can go to escape the presence of the Holy Spirit, nor would I want to escape the
presence of the Holy Spirit. But this is perhaps, this key right here, is perhaps one of the
most life transforming if you can apply it. So number one, how to
befriend the Holy Spirit. Number one, understanding. Embrace him even despite
his strange nature. Number two, reverence him. Obey his commands and obey swiftly. Number three, trust him. You depend on him with your
life, have faith in him. Number four, communicate. Communicate with him. Be aware of his presence. Do you realize that the
presence of the Holy Spirit goes with you wherever you go? I've had so many believers
come out to me and say, "Brother David, I don't feel
the Holy Spirit anymore. Did he leave me?" Or "Brother David, I sinned. Did the Holy Spirit abandon me?" Here's the wonderful thing
about the Holy Spirit. He's more patient than we are sinful. He doesn't abandon us
when we may make mistakes. He works with us when we make mistakes. So he's there. Whether you feel him or not, whether you believe it or not, the Holy Spirit is with you. Don't wait for your feelings to validate a truth you
should know by faith based on the word. Don't wait for your
feelings to validate a truth that you should know by the word. I don't trust in my feelings. I don't need my feelings to
tell me, "Oh, God is with me." I know it by faith and I know it because the word says it. Therefore, the Holy
Spirit goes where I go. This is the practice
of the presence of God: to consciously be aware as
often as you possibly can of the presence of the Holy Spirit, to often be aware that he goes with me when I'm driving in the car, that he goes with me when I'm at work, that he's with me when I'm
studying for the tests. The Holy Spirit doesn't just
empower preachers, prophets, evangelists, and apostles. The Holy Spirit empowers
mothers and fathers. He empowers brothers and sisters. He empowers you on the job. He empowers you in your academic pursuits. He empowers you in everyday living. Everywhere you go in
everything that you do, the Holy Spirit can be involved if you'll simply involve him. How do I involve him? I become aware. I keep in my mind before
my mind that truth, that wonderful reality that he is with me. In sorrow, he's with me comforting me. In moments of triumph and
victory and accomplishment, he's with me celebrating
that accomplishment. In moments of confusion,
he's there guiding me. In moments of fear, he's encouraging me. In moments of loneliness, he is present. In everything I do, everywhere I go, no matter the circumstance,
no matter how I feel, the Holy Spirit, my friend, is with me. - [Steven] Amen.
- And he's with you too in everything you do. So now then, the power comes when I
live in that awareness. You know, when I first started driving, I'll admit, and again, I may be divulging
too much information about myself on this live stream today, but I'll admit I didn't drive
exactly according to the laws of the land. I was enjoying the speed of
the vehicle and so forth. But when I began to date my Jessica, my driving habits changed. Why? Because she likes to
put her makeup on in the car. So I had to learn to drive
a little more conscious of another person in the car. And then the day I took my
Aria home from the hospital, my baby girl, well that changed my
driving habits completely. Now it was no longer just
driving for the comfort of my wife. It was now the ultra focus
on my daughter's safety. Oh man, I stopped at every stop sign. I didn't just roll through
'em like they're yield signs. I stopped at every stop sign. I obeyed the speed limit. I used my signal for every turn. Why did it change? As my awareness of their presence changed, so did the way I drive. - [Steven] Hmm. - My driving changed
based upon my awareness of their presence. And in the same way, the way you live changes completely when you're aware of the
Holy Spirit's presence, when you're communicating with him. Why would you put that
thing before your eyes when he's standing there right with you? Why would you put those
things in your ears, that music in your ears, when he's standing right there with you? When you become aware of the
presence of the Holy Spirit, it changes the way you live. So, how do you befriend the Holy Spirit? Number one, understanding. Number two, reverence. Number three is trust. Number four is communication. Communicate with him. Be aware of him and his presence. Now I wanna show you how to
surrender to the Holy Spirit. And then again, if there's some time, I'll show you what the Holy Spirit does in the life of the believer. I may have to put this in
a whole different message because- - [Steven] It's good. - There is so much here, you guys. There is so much about the Holy Spirit. Now, I do wanna say, those of you watching before
I get into this next point, on how to surrender to the Holy Spirit, do me a favor, like, comment and share. Like, comment and share. And we do have enough likes
to trigger that book giveaway. I think there was a slight
dip in the internet. So, I think that there was
a slight dip in viewership. So let's get that viewership back up. Everyone watching right
now, go and like this video and I want everyone to
leave three comments. Help us gain some traction to regain that little dip in viewership. We had something with the internet, I think on YouTube's end, cause everything here
in the system is fine. But I'm gonna read now some comments here. Israel says, "Jesus is
king and loves you." That's correct. Cindy says, "Yes and amen." Danny, "Holy Spirit of God." Israel writes, "Amen." Emily wrote fire emojis and Justin says, "Already liked." Well, thank you Justin. We appreciate that. Many, many, many comments coming in from many of our viewers. We so appreciate and love you. The spirit family, no
community like you online. Steve. - Yes, so I'm excited too as well. I mean, you guys have been amazing so far during this stream. 1.7k likes right now. Let's continue to reach our goal. Like Diga saying, make sure
you like, comment and share. - Okay. Now, I wanna show you how to
surrender to the Holy Spirit and how to walk in the
Holy Spirit's power. Cause really, they're one in the same. You know that you should
surrender to the Holy Spirit. You know that you need to
give yourself more of him. But the question then
becomes, how do I surrender? There are so many benefits
that come from surrendering to the Holy Spirit. When you surrender to the Holy Spirit, there's power on your life. The spiritual gifts are stirred. Your prayer life is transformed. The word of God becomes clear. Your evangelism becomes bolder. But how do you surrender? Every believer has the Holy Spirit, but does the Holy Spirit
have every believer? Yes, you have the Holy Spirit, but does the Holy Spirit have you? That's the question here. So once you befriend him, you learn to surrender
and to walk in his power. Less of me, more of him. John 3:30, "I must decrease,
but he must increase." So you want to walk in
the Holy Spirit's power. Here's how you surrender now. Number one, know and obey
his word without compromise. Isaiah 66:2 says, "My hands
have made both heaven and earth; they have everything in them are mine. I, the Lord, have spoken! I will bless those who have
humble and contrite hearts, who tremble at my word." If you want to walk in
the Holy Spirit's power, you wanna surrender, you have to obey the word. But if you wanna obey the word,
you have to know the word. Number two, you want to
surrender to the Holy Spirit, you have to be attentive to his voice. Now this is different than
being aware of his presence. Aware of his presence is
I communicate with him. Attentive to his voice, I'm listening for his
communication with me. First Corinthians 6:19 says, "Don't you realize that
your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, who lives in you and was given to you by God? You do not belong to yourself." Now, there was this
powerful ministry connection that we made one year
and I almost missed it. Okay, I'm not perfect. Sometimes I miss these opportunities. I almost missed an opportunity. So, we just got done with a
service in Northern California and I was heading over to the car. And as I'm heading to the car, our good friend, Patrick
Kowski, Steve you were with me, we were all kind of just
moving as one to the car so that we can get to the night service, which was quite a drive away. And so, well actually there
wasn't a night service that night. I think we were just going back to- I don't remember what it was. Anyway, we were going for some reason, I think we were meeting
the pastor for lunch, there was some type of
time constraint on it. And so, we're moving toward the back door and praying with different
people on my way out and I feel this little tap on my shoulder. I turn around and it's this woman, we call her Mama Sophia. Now, we all know and love her. And she gives me her card or something. She handed something. I don't know if she's giving a card. I don't remember exactly. It was such a fast-paced moment. - [Steven] Yeah, mm-hmm. - And she's asking me
for a way to contact me. She said, "I want to
connect with your ministry." And I heard the words come out of my mouth before I even realized what I was saying. I said, "Well, I'm gonna
give you my cellphone number and let's do dinner tonight." And Steve, you looked
at me, you were shocked. - [Steven] I was very shocked. - Because I don't do that because I'm very protective of my privacy. I just knew that I knew. And I gave her my number. We had dinner that night and you guys, that trip that we did
to Taiwan was a result. - [Steven] Mm-hmm, mm-hmm. - A major part of the
funding for this studio was a result. My book being translated into Chinese... - [Steven] Right. - Was a result of this connection with this sweet woman
who we call Mama Sophia. But what happened in that moment? I was attentive to the
Holy Spirit's voice. This is is a game changer because when you become
mindful of his voice, it's the ultimate advantage in life. Slow down. If you're moving too fast to
hear him in those moments, you're moving too fast. - [Steven] Come on. - This is the ultimate advantage in life because God will align
things perfectly so, for you to be destined for
what he's called you to do. So you wanna surrender to the Holy Spirit, know and obey his word, cherish his word, really. Cherish it. Number two, be attentive to his voice. Number three, this is so key, Oh Lord, help me deliver this. This is so key right here. Live in repentance. First John 1:9 says that,
"We confess our sins, he is faithful and just
to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from
all unrighteousness." When you get tripped up in some mistake, when you begin to get caught
up in some sinful habit, don't start to let the enemy gain ground. I think sometimes in our lives, when sin becomes a part of our lives, we give up things little by little. We give up things. And this is not something
that we should do. By no means, this is not
something that we should do. We have to live in repentance
and make it a daily practice. Please hear me people of God, this is so basic but it's so key. You have to learn to repent
of the little things. - [Steven] Hmm. - You have to learn to turn from sin while it's still a little thing. Now, technically speaking, all sin, big or small,
is a big offense to God, but I'm talking about its
influence in your life. Some sins gain more influence, more strength over our
lives than other sins. And this is why we have
to live a lifestyle of daily repentance, daily refreshing your
commitment to the Lord. And if you learn to address
things when they're small, you'll never have to deal with
something when it's large. And that's how you live surrendered life. And number four, the final way to surrender
to the Holy Spirit, number four is to act in faith. Hebrews 11:1 says, "Now
faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the
conviction of things not seen." Acting in faith, I have the assurance based upon what he has said. You have to learn to take steps of faith. Sometimes the Holy Spirit
will call you to do things that cause you to be a little nervous. That's okay. Take that step of faith. So to recap, how to surrender to the Holy Spirit and how to walk in his power. Number one, know and obey
his word without compromise. Number two, be attentive to his voice. Number three, live in repentance. Number four, act in faith. Now I wanna show you some
things that the Holy Spirit does and then we're gonna take your questions. I'm just gonna read some verses. And in fact, Tim, we'll do
a lot of this next week. Next week- Oh, don't miss next week's livestream. Next week's livestream
is gonna be intense. You think this was deep and intense. Next week's gonna be the Holy Spirit in every book of the Bible. - [Steven] Oh, come on. - I'm gonna show you the Holy Spirit from Genesis to Revelation next week, so make sure you're subscribed if you want to be a part of that. I'm gonna show you, yeah the
Holy Spirit is in every book of the Bible, okay? So I'm gonna show you that next week. Make sure you're a part of it. Okay. Some of the things that
the Holy Spirit does, I'm gonna give you the point and then I'm gonna show
you the reference, okay? Number one, the Holy
Spirit helps us to pray, Zechariah 12:10. Number two, the Holy
Spirit teaches us the word, John 14:26. Number three, the Holy Spirit helps to make us holy, Galatians 5:16. Number four, the Holy
Spirit helps us to worship. That's John 4:24. Number five, he convinces
us of our sonship. That's Romans 8:15. Number six, he performs
the miraculous through us. That's Galatians 3:5. Number seven, he gives us faith. That's Second Corinthians
chapter four, verse 13. And number eight, he gives you boldness. I wrote this about the Holy Spirit and I think this is a nice
quote to end the message on. The Holy Spirit is God. The Holy Spirit is heaven's
greatest evangelist. The Holy Spirit is God's
presence within you. The Holy Spirit is Jesus without barriers. The Holy Spirit is the
one who makes Jesus real. The Holy Spirit is your comforter. The Holy Spirit is your friend. The Holy Spirit is your intercessor. Now I'm gonna pray that you have an encounter
with the Holy Spirit, the same way I did. I'm gonna introduce you to him right now. You already know him, but maybe you're just not
really that acquainted with him yet. I wanna introduce you. I want you to write in
the comments right now that you're ready to meet the Holy Spirit. Just write, "I'm ready." You heard me talk about it. You heard me talk today
about the importance of it, how to host his presence,
who the Holy Spirit is, how to surrender to the Holy
Spirit and walk in his power. I've shown you what he's done. I've shown you what he
can do in your life. Now it's time to allow him to work in you. I can sense such a strong anointment. Right there wherever you are,
in your room, in your house, don't log off now. This is what it's all been moving toward. You see the word is
preached as a foundation for a move of God. - [Steven] Hmm. - I used to say things like,
"Oh, well God really moved." I threw out my sermon notes. Well, wait a minute, wait a minute. The word is the foundation upon
which the Holy Spirit moves. - [Steven] Mm-hmm. - And right now, right now,
you're gonna come to know him. Don't worry about what
you feel or don't feel. Forget all that. It's a matter of faith, not feelings now. Here's what I want you to do. As long as you're not
driving, close your eyes. If you're driving, pull
over somewhere safe and then close your eyes. Lift your hands right now, right now. Close your eyes and lift your hands. And I want you to say this out loud, say, "Holy Spirit, David said, you can be my friend." Now say this to him, say, "Holy Spirit, I want to be your friend." I can sense him near
even just saying this. Some of you I'm sure
you can sense him near even just saying. Close your eyes, lift your hands. Say this to him. Say right now. And some of you're gonna sense his power. Some of you even now
are feeling like heat. Some of you feel like electricity. Some of you feel like
a weight coming on you. Whatever you sense, just
don't worry about it. Just begin to talk to him. Say this out loud. Say, "Holy Spirit, I want to be your friend." Now, Holy Spirit, I pray that your presence would
come upon them now, that your power would
begin to move through them. Let them sense you in the room. Let them sense your very
being standing before them. They're asking you Holy Spirit to involve yourself in their lives. I can feel like heat
on my hands right now. - [Steven] Mm. - And the air conditioner
is full blast on my hands. And I feel like heat moving through me. Holy Spirit, do for them what you did for me, Reveal yourself. We invite you, Holy Spirit,
to reveal yourself now in every home, in every car, in every school, in
every place of business, everywhere they're watching from. Let your presence be known now. Take a moment, take a
moment, take a moment. Just begin to pray in
the Holy Ghost right now. Just ask him to touch you. Thank you, Lord. His power's moving. His power's moving. Just receive his touch. Forget about everything going
on around you right now. Don't worry about anything. Make no prayer request at this moment. Right now it's just about
you and the Holy Spirit. He's with you right now. He's standing there with you right now. Thank you, Holy Spirit. (speaking in tongues) Some of you are sensing him now. Whether you sense him or not, know by faith, he's hearing you. Holy Spirit from this day forward, involve yourself in their lives. Commune with them. Help them to see Jesus. Your precious name we pray. Wow. And I want all of God's
people who believe that to say amen. - [Steven] Amen. - Can you do me a favor? Because I really want to know. I want you to write in the
comment section right now, what you just experienced. Write it in the comment. It doesn't have to be a long explanation. Just write it in the comment section what you experienced
right now in this moment, in the powerful moment in his presence. I could see tears going. I see people saying, "Amen, amen, amen." All over the world, people are having Holy Spirit encounters. That's what we love to do.
- [Steven] Come on. - We love to see people have encounters. Some people say, "I got heat on my hands." Others are just putting
those crying emojis. And someone said, "At
peace, peace, peace". There's a lot of people who
said total peace right now. Tears. "I'm crying." "I felt him touch my hand." Did you see that? Someone said, "I felt him touch my hand." Look at all this heat, heat, heat, peace, peace, peace, peace, heat on my hand, heat on my hand. "My left ear began ringing." "I felt this pre-" Look at this. All over the world, God's people are having
encounters with the Holy Spirit. Look at these testimonies. Even on the replay, I want you to write. If you're watching this on the replay, still write down what
you are experiencing. Whoa, whoa, whoa. This is powerful. Now, if you didn't feel
anything or sense anything, don't worry. It doesn't mean nothing happened. It just means that what
happened in the spirit wasn't sensed in the natural realm, but he's still with you. Now I'm gonna get into the
Q and A in a little moment. But before I do, I wanna read a portion
of scripture to you. Go real quickly to Luke
chapter number five. I'm gonna read 11 verses here. Chapter five, I'm gonna read 11 verses. Now don't log off. We're gonna do a Q and A right now, but I want you to hear this. And also, continue to share this with as many people as you can so that other people can be blessed by what the Lord is doing
through this stream. Chapter five verse one, "One day as Jesus was
preaching on the shore of the Sea of Galilee, great crowds pressed in on him
to listen to the word of God. He noticed two empty
boats at the water's edge, for the fishermen had left them
and were washing their nets. Stepping into one of the boats, Jesus asked Simon, its owner,
to push it out into the water. So he sat in the boat and
taught the crowd from there." So here's Jesus approaching this fisherman and Jesus wants to use
the boat of the fisherman. Now, if somebody came to me and said, "David, we want to use your cameras." I would be hesitant. Or if someone came up to me and said, "David, I wanna borrow your car. Let me take it out for a spin." Depending upon who it was,
I would be rather hesitant. Now these cameras, I would say, you can use it if Tim is there and only Tim touches the camera, or if Britain's there and only
Britain touches the camera. Because I don't like to
loan those things out. I'll say, "I'll buy you one." But I'm not gonna let
necessarily loan these out to anyone and everyone. And you might have something like that, maybe you're protective of. Like maybe a pet or maybe a home or maybe a possession that you have that you're very protective of. And so, Peter's boat, Simon Peter's boat was his
means of making a living wage. His boat was his business. His boat was how he ate and
how he paid for his home. That was his livelihood. And Jesus says, "Hey, let me jump in there and teach from it." Now, if I'm Simon Peter,
I'm gonna be going, well, what if he says
something controversial and everyone riots and destroys the boat or what if he needs to
get away from the crowd? And he takes it and
somehow damages the boat. That's some of the stuff that would be going through my mind. But Peter let the Lord
in the boat to use it. Now watch what happens. Peter lets Jesus step into his livelihood and because Peter used his
resources to platform the gospel, look at what happened. "When he had finished
speaking, he said to Simon, 'Now go out where it is deeper, and let down your nets
to catch some fish.' 'Master,' Simon replied, 'we worked hard all last night
and didn't catch a thing. But if you say so, I'll
let the nets down again.' And this time, their nets were so full of
fish they began to tear! A shout for help brought their
partners in the other boat, and soon boats were filled with fish and on the verge of sinking." In other words, there was so much blessing that came his way, he
wasn't able to contain it. "When Simon Peter realized
what had happened, he fell to his knees
before Jesus and said, 'Oh, Lord, please leave me
- I'm such a sinful man.' For he was awestruck by the
number of fish they had caught, as were the others with him." Now I'll stop there. But notice here, that the night before, he caught nothing. There was nothing. He had nothing. But after he used his resources
to platform the gospel, blessing came on his boat. I want you to write this in the comments, "Blessing on my boat." "Blessing on my boat." What is your boat? Is your boat a job that you have? Is your boat a business that you own? Is your boat a portfolio of investments? Is your boat real estate? Is your boat your income and resources? Your boat is whatever God gave you as resource in this world. Will you let Jesus into your boat? Will you use your boat
to platform the gospel? When you let Jesus step into your boat, the boat becomes blessed. When you let Jesus into your boat, the boat becomes blessed. So I wanna challenge you. Let Jesus into your boat. Maybe you're a business owner, use the resources of your
business for the gospel. Maybe you're in real estate, use the resources of your
business for the gospel. Maybe you are doing well in
investing in different things like cryptocurrencies
and stocks and so forth, use your resources for the gospel. Maybe you work a regular
job, you have an income. Use your resources for the gospel. Some money you've put aside, make it really safe for yourself, use your resources for the gospel and God will bless the boat. Go right now to
DavidHernandezMinistries.com/donate. Make a one time donation or become a monthly ministry supporter. I need as many of you as are able today to become a $30 a month partner. And if you can't become
a $30 a month partner, become a $10 month partner. I wanna challenge you to
partner with us monthly, give a one time gift or even do both. We've had some people say, "Hey, I'm gonna partner at $10 a month and I'm gonna give a one
time gift of a hundred." We've had some people say, "I'm gonna partner at a
hundred dollars a month. I'm gonna give a one
time gift of a thousand." Or any combination of that. But everything you give
goes into the ministry and it helps us. It helps us to spread the gospel. Use your boat for the gospel
and God will bless your boat. Maybe you're frustrated or
maybe you're doing well, but you want to reach higher, use your resources for the gospel and there will be
blessings upon your boat. So I'm gonna look for those
names in a little bit, but there's a slight
delay on the live stream. So I may not see them
all appear right away, but I see Flora and Lalaine and Grace and the Dear Patrick family
and Marvin and Curtis, and so many other names coming in. Go right now, DavidHernandezMinistries.com/donate. Will you consider a gift of $25? $25 to help support the gospel. Maybe a gift of $50? There are some watching, maybe you can do a hundred. Some who could do even more, but give to the gospel today. You're funding these live streams. You're funding the media. You're funding the events. You're funding the Holy Spirit
school and so much more. By the way, my staff is projecting that we're gonna have
a surplus this month, which means that anything that
comes in over will help us with our studio. A percentage of the surplus is going to go toward the new studio. Steve and I leave tomorrow to Texas to go check on the property and we are in a long negotiation guys. We wanna work the perfect
deal for the ministry. So the negotiation is long. The property's still there, but the negotiation has taken a while because we want all the
little things taken care of. So our team is working on it, but a percentage of the
surplus this month will be able to go toward the studio. So whatever you give
extravagantly, generously, it's going to go toward that. A percentage of it will. Jenny. thank you. And thank you to Nini, our dear friend. And thank you also to Marie Tubow. Many of you giving online. One more time,
DavidHernandezMinistries.com/donate. Go give a one-time gift, become a monthly partner or do both. Help us spread the gospel. Help us win souls. Let Jesus into your boat. Let your boat be used to
platform the gospel and watch. There's gonna be a blessing that comes. Your boat won't even
be able to contain it. You're gonna need others to- You're gonna need to
share that with others. Others are gonna be coming saying, "Hey, can I get some of that?" You're gonna send something to your family and send some to your friends. Resources will come, but it's giving to the gospel. Thank you to Jason for becoming a monthly ministry supporter. And one more time, I do wanna remind you, those of you in Southern
California or near the region, Orange California, this Sunday, August 29th of 2021. So, if you're watching this
replay two years from now, don't show up. But August 29th of 2021,
that's this Sunday, gonna be a powerful service, a time of impartation. We're praying over and giving
away bottles of anointing oil for free. We're not charging for those. It's free to attend,
but make sure you come. Look, if you've been sensing
in your heart a drawing like maybe you should come
to one of these events, this is the one. Get there, be a part of what God is doing and allow the Holy Spirit
to touch your life. Again, this Sunday. For more details on that, go to DavidHernandezMinistries.com/events and make sure- Even if you're coming in from
another state, come on down. You may say, "California, I
heard it's pretty strict." Yes, but not in Orange County. Orange county right now
is the land of the free, the rest is California. But come on down, be a part of what God is doing
this Sunday, August 29th, gonna be powerful, powerful, powerful, as always be a part of it.
