Seeking God by Zac Poonen

there are some wonderful examples in scripture of those whom god chose when they were very young and it has challenged me because i gave my life to christ when i was a teenager this one okay as i look back over my life the only regret i have is i wish i had given my life to christ earlier because looking back from now i see all those early years were wasted you don't realize it then when you're going through it you don't realize that life is short and you've got plenty of years to live but i wish i had that extra years in which i could have been available to the lord some of the things you do now and decisions you take and things you do in your life you will not realize the full effect of it till many years later and then it'll be too late to set it right the bible speaks about people who took certain decisions and the effect of it was much later right in the beginning why did adam and eve listen to the devil more than to god you know when god created them he spent he asked them to spend one day with him it was called the sabbath day they were they were created on the sixth day and god asked them to spend one full day with him uh so they spent one day adam and eve spent one day in fellowship with god the very first day of their life and the reason why god did that was so that they would know how wonderful it is to have fellowship with god and knowing that the very next day they went and listened to the devil because because the devil offered them an immediate satisfaction of their physical senses you know see how wonderful this this fruit is it will make you taste nice and it'll taste nice and make you wise and all that now that's written right in the beginning of the bible to teach us that satan will offer certain things to us he doesn't tell us it's poisonous he doesn't tell us the long-term effects of it he will tell you how much you can enjoy it right now those days there were no other human beings but today he adds one more argument he says everybody's doing it so what's wrong and you're doing it but he offers us that immediate enjoyment supposing the devil had told eve you know you're really going to enjoy this fruit that was right and tastes nice and all that is good but you know what's going to happen this you're going to be kicked out of this beautiful garden and this tame lion that you see there will become wild and you're going to live for 900 years and you're going to be fighting with your husband for 900 years you're going to have a son who will murder your second son and then all your children grandchildren and all your seed for thousands of years there'll be war and sickness and disease and suffering and all types of problems but for some time you'll enjoy it do you think she would have taken it no if she had seen the whole future god had shown her listen you can eat this but this is what's going to happen next year 10 years 30 years 40 years is going to happen she wouldn't have touched it and there are a lot of things that look very attractive to you in the world particularly when you're young and they are attractive sure it's fun to have a boyfriend and girlfriend and a lot of the movies that people see i have to say that i'm sure they must be enjoying it otherwise they wouldn't spend so much money to keep seeing movies they must be enjoying it but they don't realize the long term effect which will plague and trouble you for years to come and that's what the devil hides now we can say that we're in a much better position to understand because we've got a whole bible to see the result of people who took those wrong decisions adam and eve had no example so [Music] i think god is not going to expect as much from them as from us i believe the punishment of adam and eve is going to be one millionth of the punishment he gives to other people who have read all this in the scriptures and still choose the devil above god you know whenever you choose something in the world you're really saying to satan i'm going to choose you above god you may not realize it but that's what actually you're saying and the bible says that god cannot be fooled i want you to look at this verse galatians chapter 6. and verse 7 galatians chapter 6 and verse 7. do not be deceived do not be deceived the sentence begins like that means you be careful because this area you can easily be deceived if you're not careful god cannot be mocked whatever a man sows that he will also reap so just like a farmer he saw something and you don't see anything immediately particularly trees and all you know if you plant a mango tree you won't see the fruit for years and there are bad mango trees and good mango trees and if you're not careful when you plant it years later when the fruit starts coming you say hey i put a wrong seed here it's too late to do anything about it you've got to cut it down and plant another one take another 10 years to get the fruit so some seeds are like that you sow something you don't see the result for many years even good or bad and that's why some people don't take sin seriously and that's why some people don't persist in doing good because they think what what am i getting from it what am i getting out of it you know here it goes on to say verse nine first of all verse eight if you sow to your flesh one day you're gonna reap corruption from it it may take many years but one day that corruption will come but if in your younger days you sow to the spirit you will reap eternal life therefore it says in verse 9 don't get discouraged in doing what's good because in due time you will reap if you don't give up and that's the wisdom which i wish [Applause] i could give to all teenage boys and girls but i'll tell you most of them don't understand it they think no no it'll be all right with me they mess up their life they get into all types of relationships which cause all types of problems and there are scars in their mind through these experiences that they can never get rid of god will forgive them but you must remember even though god forgives us our sins we get certain things we cannot get back supposing you spend five years in sin say from the age of 15 to 20 you decide you're gonna live in sin and when you're 20 years old you repent okay good but you've lost five years you can never get it back for example the year 2010 even almighty god can't give it to you almighty god cannot give it back to you it's gone it's gone forever and if you wasted it it's wasted i look at it like this you know you can use an illustration like this that god gave you when each of us were born we decided how many years we're going to live on earth and supposing you count each day as one rupee and or 10 rupees i i think it's worth more than that let's say 100 rupees each day is 100 rupees so one year is [Music] about 36 500 rupees if you live for 10 years that's three and a half lakhs and if you live for 50 years it's about 20 lakhs [Music] and so look at it like this that god gives you all these millions of rupees when you're born and you're if you waste it it's wasted you can you're not going to get it back it's gone you still have some money but so many of so much of it is gone it's gone it's gone and every day you live without god what god gave you is just being wasted but every day you live for god there's a sense in which you can say that what you have gets multiplied you know it's like a businessman two businessmen they both say two children of a father they both inherited ten million rupees each and one one of one son just wasted wasted wasted vision the other chap invested it and in the end of 20 years one son has got about 1 million left and the other who started with 10 million has now got 100 million now i'm using the example of money because that we understand that but we must realize that time that god gives us is not something we're going to get back again so we must be wise there's a very beautiful prayer in psalm 90 in psalm 19. and verse 12 lord teach us to number our days so that we may present you a heart of wisdom at the end of it so that we can apply our life to wise things a lot of the happiness and joy and peace that i experience today i mean i can't describe it it's when peter says joy unspeakable and full of glory in 1 peter chapter 1 it sounds like a fantastic statement but when peter wrote that when he was around 65 years old i can understand that it's really joy unspeakable full of glory but peter didn't get that in one day he sold and soul and sword and sword and came to a wonderful light where i mean he was living with god every day but it took time and he when he started when he was young so what i'm saying is if you start when you're young your life after many years others will envy you and say how did you manage to get a life like this and you'll know that it didn't happen overnight supposing you went by two two compounds and in one you saw a beautiful garden of flowers and the other all weeds and stones and grass that is not cut et cetera and you compare the two and you why go to this chap and say how did you get such a beautiful garden this chap next door doesn't have anything well he'd say i worked at it i worked at it and i worked at it and worked it and then people passing by see what a wonderful thing is our life can be like that but if we listen to the what our friends tell us saying immediate joy then let's get some fun right now long term you're going to suffer for that and i want to tell you something else that every sin will one day be punished [Music] and it says in i don't know whether you know this verse ecclesiastes chapter 8 you know where ecclesiastes is right psalms proverbs ecclesiastes chapter 8 and verse 11. that's a good verse to know ecclesiastes chapter 8 and verse 11 it says because the punishment against evil deed does not come immediately therefore people's hearts are set on doing evil for example i when i was in the navy we used to get alcohol very freely on the ship and so a lot of people became drunkards because you didn't have to spend much money everything was duty-free and all of a sudden you'd see this 45 year old man dying died he looked very healthy to us but as he drank little by little his liver was getting spoiled and spoiled spoiled finally died it's like that with people who smoke cigarettes every cigarette you smoke your lung becomes a little blacker the lung of a baby is pink beautiful pink but people who smoke it's just like if you go behind the lorry and inhale those fumes your lungs will become black it's the same thing when people smoke the lungs become black and black and black they get lung cancer and they die but they don't see it immediately you know it's it's an invisible destruction uh something like that happens in your soul every time you sin you sin you do again something wrong something wrong you don't see anything just like the guy who's smoking and drinking he says i'm okay i'm okay and he looks okay but inwardly something is being destroyed suddenly when he's 45 he's dead there's something like that in our soul [Music] something gets destroyed every time we commit sin and it gets worse and worse and worse and worse and worse and some part of us is destroyed completely you know i've heard of young people who take drugs and afterwards they repent and they are forgiven god forgives any sin even if you're 70 years old and you repent god will forgive you but the guy who's taken drugs and who's forgiven is a part of his mind which is permanently damaged which he can never get back i mean god can forgive the sin but he's not going to repair that part of the mind which is permanently damaged that is what i mean by reaping what you have sown he won't be able to concentrate he won't be able to do his work properly even though he's forgiven now he's become a child of god but he has to live with that and you say why doesn't god heal it god can heal that mind but if he heals that mind people will take sin lightly they'll say ah it doesn't matter because god will still make me okay no he won't so god keeps that mind of the man defective and you know part of it dead to teach him don't do any more it's like [Music] you know when we are young we are sexual beings and we are attracted to the opposite sex that's normal but if you see movies and in those movies you see something related to sexual stimulation it doesn't have to be pornographic just you know ordinary movies that are shown in theaters which are stimulating without any actual sex scenes but stimulating with romance and this like that um it's very interesting to watch and nice story to listen to and watch it but there's something deposited in your memory which will remain there forever even after your sins are forgiven supposing after some time you say lord i'm sorry i watched all these filthy movies lord say i've forgiven you but the memory of that will never go from your mind ever even after 50 years you will remember what you saw see i can remember things that i read in my unconverted days when i was 16 years old some things you don't forget some of those things i want to forget but i can't forget it's in my memory has god forgiven me for reading all that rubbish yes he forgave me long ago [Music] but the memory is there after 55 years what can i do about it i can only say oh god don't let me add any more rubbish i see i'm glad that i stopped reading such rubbish when i was 19 years old so so i didn't add any more otherwise my life would have been a torture today with all that stuff if i had accumulated in my mind i can imagine a lot of people who are careless for many many many years reading all this rubbish and i think it must be terrible i've never watched too many movies in my life thankfully because my parents never allowed me to go for movies and because i was converted at 19 but the few that i did see some memories are there in my mind after so many years i can't get rid of it [Music] and i say boy i wish i had never seen them i can only wish now have i been forgiven oh yes i've been forgiven but um the memory is there but i'm telling you from my experience [Music] so be careful when you're young what you read and what you see don't think oh it was wrong but i'll ask jesus to forgive me you'll forgive me he will forgive you but you will still reap what you have sown even after 50 years think about it now god has made it like that there's a difference between forgiveness and reaping what we have sown there's nothing i can do about it i wish i could go into my memory and remove certain things from there i can't i wish sometimes god would remove it but god doesn't remove it and i know why because the fact that i remember things i read 55 years ago which i shouldn't have read [Music] warns me today hey be careful because if you put some stuff into your mind again that'll hang on to you forever too so dear young people be careful what you read what you see what you watch [Applause] don't think that you can just ask jesus to forgive you and the effect of it will be removed completely it will not be removed i have tried to be a wholehearted christian for most of these 50 years 52 years but in spite of that i cannot remove certain things from my memory so i know that you can be a wholehearted christian and still you will not be able to remove the things that you put into your mind when you are young if you have bad memories of fighting with your parents and yelling and screaming at them you won't be able to remove it from your memory one day when your parents are dead and gone and you can't even say a thank you to them or are sorry to them these memories will haunt you for years that's why i say to young people it's not worth it fighting with your parents you disagree i mean express your dad mom i don't want to do that please don't force me to do it fine but don't go into a fighting match with them because that produces the most strongly you say things remains in your mind maybe some things you don't agree with your parents you can speak to them definitely i'm not saying just be like a dumb person and do whatever they say if you disagree say dad mom please let me express my opinion but say gently always remember that they took so much trouble for you when you were a little baby and helpless otherwise you wouldn't even be living today don't forget the sacrifices they made for you and they don't want evil for you none of your parents want evil for you but they know some things are harmful for you which you don't know yourself so be thankful and don't let your goal in life be to become popular with your friends in your neighborhood or in school or college because if you become a slave it is being a slave most young people are slaves some of you are probably slaves maybe many of you are slaves slaves do what will other people say about me if i do this what will other people say about me if i dress like this or if i do that what will other people say about me if i don't join them in this thing that they all want to join in they're a slave to that opinion what will other people say do you want to be a slave [Music] that's terrible being a slave you're a child of god you're a slave to the opinions of unconverted people you think those unconverted people know more than almighty god and you know that way you can miss out on some wonderful thing that god has for you in the future by listening to the opinion of others what they think about you you have to be free from that and it's not easy because everybody likes to be popular in school and college and to be accepted you don't want everybody to reject you and you're sitting there all by yourself nobody's your friend and so in order to okay i have to become popular with some girls or boys because otherwise i'll be lonely i'd say i would rather i tell my children how was it with jesus when my children were going to school i used to tell them how do you think jesus was when he went to school you have you have to wait till you're 30 years old before you follow jesus you can follow jesus when you're 10 but jesus is also 10 at one time so follow the 10 year old jesus some of you are 16 17 18 20. follow the 16 year old jesus the 20 year old jesus that's why he came as a baby you know so that we could follow him at different ages whatever your age is say lord you were once on earth my age and i can i used to tell my children think of how jesus went to school was he worried that i'll be lonely and unpopular if i say no to i'm sure the boys in the school in nazareth were just as naughty and worldly as today maybe they didn't have all the opportunities to sin like today's children have because there's so much of rubbish that people watch on television and if you have a television at home [Music] it can be a mixed blessing because all types of things come through there just like on the internet and few folks have access to the internet the internet is like a library the television is like a library where good books bad books really filthy books so you go into this library where you're going to go you're going to go for the good books or the bad books of the really filthy books that's your choice [Music] but if you keep on seeing filthy stuff it's going to affect you so a lot of your students in the class in college watch all that stuff they've been influenced by that remember in the school in bangalore some of the seven-year-old children had been watching this world wrestling federation television programs where they throw each other over the head and all that type of stuff i mean they don't realize that those people are just acting pretending to fall and pretending to be hit but these seven-year-olds think that they're really getting hit and they go to school and practice it on their fellow seven-year-old students in the class and [Music] one parent in cfc bangalore came to me and said what shall i tell my child to do when this other guy is practicing wrestling and hitting on him it's very difficult yeah i said we've got to be different and tell them we're going to ask the lord to protect us that's one thing but it's good that others in your class see that you're different and you know god will bless you for that i i can tell you fortunately in the days when we lived my children were at home we never had any television at home there were others who had but we decided not to have it and my children were like you dad why can't we have television at all i said sorry we don't have it well we can't watch cricket i say okay i know there's an important trick at my child that you go to a neighbor's house and watch cricket for one hour and come back i'm not against you watching cricket but a lot of other things i don't want you to see now today i'm thankful that i did not fill their mind with rubbish it's like feeding them with a little poison every day you you know today my boys are 35 40. you will appreciate the value of all these things only then so be very careful now as to what you watch what you read because you will reap what you saw on the other hand if you read what is good i'll tell you honestly my life to a large extent has been founded on [Music] from the age of 21 to 26 or 28 seven years from the time of my baptism to the time of my marriage seven years i spent most of my time while i was working studying the bible and today i'm so thankful because it gave me so many good thoughts and it produced good spiritual dreams [Music] because i filled my mind that also you reap what you saw and cleaned out all those dirty stuff if you want to clean out the dirty stuff in your mind pour the clean water god's word into it a little bit every day it will clean out your mind slowly your memory will still remember certain things but it will become very difficult now if i want to remember what i read 55 years ago i have to make an effort and struggle to remember it thank god it's there but i can't access it easily if i were to use an illustration it's like on top of those bad files of 55 years ago i piled up so many uh good files of the word of god that is so much at the bottom that very difficult to take it out very difficult for me to remember it but so if you fill your mind with god's word when you are young it will protect you from so many things in the future it's not a popular thing even in you know in cfc for example bangalore i'll tell you what i told some of the young girls especially i said in cfc's young girls of the children whose parents are in cfc i say there are two types of girls in cfc i'm not talking about the world there are those who are following the fashions of the models and the film stars of the world and pattern their hair and their dress and everything like that and there are others who are more modest and reserved and who are not following all those passions and i said to the young girls i said you have a choice now which of these girls are you going to follow that's up to you you can choose to follow this one because you want to be popular with this group or you're going to choose to be popular with that one but which do you think jesus would approve all so i said i have to say that you should not even be like some girls in cfc bangalore no you should not follow them because their parents allow them to dress in ways which i would never allow anyone to depress if i had a daughter but what what to do we were not some type of communist system saying everybody must do this we give freedom and i thank god that some young girls have really chosen the right decision to be taken that freedom of choice to make the right decisions the same thing with young men there are some young brothers in cfc who watch the wrong type of movies they're not converted i don't know why their parents have allowed them to grow up like that and i see that a lot of others who don't do it at all so i tell the young brothers you can have a choice who you're going to be friendly with you make friends this is not in the world is it right in cfc you make friends with this type of brother you're going to be corrupt like him but there is another alternative in the church of people who are really seeking to follow the lord and if you keep fellowship with them you'll grow spiritually so we shouldn't come to a church thinking everybody here is spiritual all the young people are spiritual they're not they're not all the young people in cfc are not spiritual all the young people in your church are not spiritual but god wants you to be spiritual and the first step to that is very simple so you know some people think i have to reach a great height before i can be a christian no you can be a born-again person in one moment i'm going to tell you how see we are all born we're all born facing selfishness and sin and that's why children fight and grab and we're all like that and as we grow up our conscience tells us some of these things are wrong and we still do those wrong things and we don't really have god we've got a little bit of religion which our parents give us we're taught to pray before we eat and go to church and all that but it hasn't really gripped us and because of that we go into so many worldly habits but if you decide one day to be a christian all you have to do is lord i am a sinner and i want i don't have the strength to give up some of my bad habits but i want to turn around how long does it take to turn around not 10 years two seconds you turn around and say lord i've got a long way to go to become spiritual but i have turned around that is called repentance i turn around and i asked jesus to forgive my whole past life lord i'm sorry for the way i hurt you i see that these sins are what crucified you you came to earth because of me sometimes you know i used to think like this i'm the only sinner in the whole world all the others are good people and i'm the only one and jesus comes from heaven to die for me that makes it personal and i say lord thank you you took my sin on the cross and that means sin must be such a terrible thing i don't understand it but it must be such a terrible thing that even almighty god could not find a way to save me from it except by allowing his son to die on the cross but i say lord it must be something terrible and i want to hate it i don't have the strength to give up you know when i was converted i didn't have the strength to give up all my bad habits immediately i struggled i struggled but i said lord i'm on your side now i'm not on the side of the enemy anymore i haven't won the full victory over everything but i'm on your side and i'm gonna fight i'm gonna fight and some things it took me many years to overcome many years it didn't happen overnight but i was born again born again means i had turned around and when i take baptism i took baptism about a year and a half after i was converted i wasn't saying when i took baptism now i'm a perfect man i'm not a perfect man i can't even say that today but i when i took baptism i was saying i have turned around i've decided to follow jesus i may slip and fall tomorrow but i'm going to get up and after my baptism i slipped and fall many times like all people but we get up and run again so i want to invite all of you to make that decision and you don't have to postpone it right here in this camp even today or tonight in this meeting or when you go home and sleep tonight as you lie down in bed think of what you heard in this meeting you know sometimes it's difficult to take a decision in the midst of other people we like to be alone with jesus and you'll be alone with jesus when you sleep tonight and all the lights are out everybody's asleep i find those are some of the best times to speak quietly in my heart to jesus without even opening my mouth i want you to say to the lord thank you lord jesus for dying for me i want to make a decision today to turn around and receive you as my lord and my savior and you know i had a problem after that to believe as god really accepted me and there's one verse that really helped me and i want you to look at that it was john chapter 6. and verse 37 john chapter 6 and verse 37 that verse really helped me the last part of it the one who comes to me i will never cast out john 6 37 the second part of that verse the one who comes to me i will certainly not cast out or reject certainly he will not reject you and i'll tell you in my case i think i must have first asked jesus to come into my heart maybe when i was 13. i didn't know whether he came and i used to go for meetings and between 13 and 19 i must have asked jesus to come into my heart maybe 500 times or 1000 times i don't know and i was never sure how do i know that he's come or not i didn't feel any different but one day i believed this verse i said lord now i know you did not cast me out i just believed it i didn't have any feeling or experience or any such thing no sensation no light no sound just god's word lord i believe it i've never seen an angel in my life i've never seen a divine light or heard god's voice with these years never i've never had a sensation of shaking and all like some people say my life has only been based on what i've read in god's word and it's changed my life i can tell you that don't look for all these experiences that some people testify to i had this i had this some of it may be imagination and some of it may be because they are very emotional type of people and you may not be that type so what the reality is there so i said lord i believe you have not cast me out and somehow from that time i never doubted it so i want you to take that verse and believe that if you pray like that jesus will not reject you he's accepted you and you can be his once you're sure of that you should not wait to take baptism because baptism is a testimony you know like you bury a dead man you don't keep him in the house after he's dead you're saying lord there's something in me that is dying something else is alive i'm now a new person not perfect but a new attitude towards sin it's like a pig has become a cat you know the pig is one that loves dirty stuff and muck and all that any pig that you see is always dirty but any cat that you see is always clean have you ever seen a dirty cat it's almost impossible dirty pig you see everywhere it's in fact difficult to see a clean pig but a clean cat everywhere every cat that you see is clean it's nature but now my question is here's a cat that's been a cat for six seven years do you think it never got dirty in its life oh yes it may have fallen into dirty water but god got out and licked itself clean maybe some other time some car went by and splashed dirt on it licked itself clean so when you're born again i'm not saying you'll never get dirty no it's like a cat the cat can never say i never got dirty but i'm a clean person that's what happens when you're born again you know some people never get baptized because you say oh then after baptism people say why you sinned again well if i slip i get up the cat is not going to say i'm going to walk through this world and never get dirty that's impossible but i can't say if i get dirty i'll cleanse myself immediately that's the difference between me and a pig so the difference between a christian who is born again and the one and others who are not born again is not that christian never falls but if he falls he gets up like the cat whereas the other person loves the sin so i say that because sometimes you may have such a high standard of christianity that you'll never be able to reach it and that's another thing the devil does i find among christians the devil does two things one he makes the christian standards so low that people live in sin and call themselves christians and then he knows he can't fool you with that so he makes the christian stand it's so high that you can never reach it and you die like that don't let the devil make a fool of you when you say you become a christian you are you're not saying you reach the finishing line you're just saying you turned around and came to the starting line i'm at the starting line i'm just beginning i'll tell you i haven't reached the finishing line i'm still running some years ago i started but if i kept waiting at the starting line i would never be where i am today so what i'm telling you is don't wait at the starting line just say lord i want to begin how long am i going to keep waiting at the starting line you've got to begin running and the other thing you know some people ask when were you born again i say i don't know i know i got assurance of salvation when i was about 19 but sometime between 13 and 19 i may have accepted the lord i don't know which one it is the date is not important and even the exact date when i got assurance of salvation i don't know i can't give a date like somebody and most people like you who are born in christian families from your childhood your parents may have asked you many times to ask jesus to come into my your heart and you may have done that many times one of those times may have been real when he really came in i just thank him and say lord i'm going to now live with assurance that i don't have to reach a high standard before i'm a christian i'm just in the race i've started running and i've decided to run if i slip up i'll get up and i want to have a i want to still be friendly with all my worldly friends but i'm not going to let them pull me in the wrong direction anymore like before i still keep those friends but they must know that i'm not going to go with them you know i remember a few days after i got this assurance of salvation i was in the naval base at cochin and some of my colleagues in the navy came and said hey zach let's go to this movie which is in the naval base we had a cinema theater and i did not have the courage to say no i'm a christian because i myself used to take them to the movies earlier how to say no to them and they'll think i've gone off my head to say i'm a christian now i don't go to the movies so i got up and i went with them and as i was walking towards the movie theater i said oh god please get me out of this situation somehow i don't want to go i'm your disciple now but i don't have the courage to say no to these friends of mine so i was going with this prayer in my heart and when we reached the movie theater there was a notice on the board saying we couldn't get the movie real so the movie will not be screened today and i i don't know whether i said hallelujah or what but i was so happy they were the other two were very disappointed and they didn't realize i was so happy that god answered my prayer i came back home so happy that such a weak person like me god answered my prayer by making the whole naval base could not see the movie just for my sake that is wonderful what god will do for one of his children and then this is the interesting part the lord told me that means in my heart next time i will not do that for you next time you have to say it know yourself but by the time i had become so encouraged that god did this for me the next time they came i said sorry i stopped seeing movies yeah they'll think this guy's crazy for a little while and then finish they'll make new friends and go with them a lot of people made fun of me so what if they made fun of me i became stronger spiritually don't be such a coward that you're afraid of people making fun of you you must be bold think jesus i used to think lord you were not ashamed to hang in an underwear on the cross you know jesus had only an underwear when he was hanging on the cross i used to think what a shameful thing to stand in front of people with an underwear stripped i said lord you are not ashamed to hang in an underwear for me for my sin i will never be ashamed to stand up for you in the presence of my friends the other thing that can confuse some of you is when you talk here talk about the holy spirit i want to say it very simply the holy spirit is the spirit of jesus christ you don't have to wait and pray and tarry and fast and all that no no no no you have to just come to jesus and say lord all of my life is yours please let your holy spirit come and take possession of my whole life that simple prayer he will do it you know jesus will not come into every area of your life unless you ask him if you say i want forgiveness of sins okay only forgiveness of sins the rest is also free and you ask jesus to come into every area of your life clean up he will do it that is meaning that means like a house with 10 rooms if you ask him to come to only one room you have him there but every room is not filled with light but if you open every room of the house to jesus you'll be filled with light and that's being filled with the holy spirit so jesus waits for you you don't have to wait for jesus jesus waits for you to yield every area of your life to him say lord i don't want to read books which you don't want me to read i don't want to watch movies which are going to pollute my mind i don't want to do things with my friends which hurt you i want to go by my conscience i want to yield every area of my life to you i want you to fill every part of me with the holy spirit jesus you come and put on the switch in all the ten rooms of your heart and you're filled with the holy spirit you may not have any experience i've never had any experience of sensation or any such thing you don't even have to speak in tongues no god does not give the gift of tongues to everybody don't worry about that by faith say lord every area of my life is yielded to you and the day you're born again you can also be filled with the holy spirit so don't wait you don't have to wait 10 years and just believe and say lord fill me with the holy spirit help me to walk in the power of that holy spirit every day let's bow our heads now spar our heads in prayer all of us now i want you to pray this prayer in your heart if you're ready for it you can pray in your heart silently to god say lord jesus thank you for speaking to me today i really want to turn my whole life over to you i'm sorry for the way i've lived but i give my life to you lord jesus i really thank you for dying for me all that you went through for me i want to turn to you completely i want to open every room in my heart to you fill me fill my life with your holy spirit come and live in me forgive my sin i want to be a child of god and i want to go forward and take baptism as soon as possible and obey you and live for you the rest of my days give me that power i know you'll do it because you said anyone comes to me i will not cast out can you pray that prayer right now [Music] don't look at yourself look at jesus don't let the devil stop you say lord jesus i'm yielding to you i believe you've accepted me thank you

Channel: SermonIndex.net

Views: 4,262

Rating: 4.9160838 out of 5

Keywords: Revival, Character Of God, Free Sermons, Video Sermons, Jesus Christ, What Is The Gospel, SermonIndex, What Is The Truth, Zac Poonen

Id: hZbJ8J2rP_w

Length: 56min 34sec (3394 seconds)

Published: Sat Apr 10 2021