If you're following along in a King James Bible, you'll hear me read from the King James Bible, “the Holy Ghost.” If you are reading any other version that is modern, usually modern refers to anything translated after 1956; never mind, as opposed to 1611, that's a little bit more modernized, you'll be reading “Spirit.” And of course, if you trace back the languages you can see immediately that where even in the King James there's the use of the word “spirit,” that word is coming directly from the Latin, spiritus. The King James translation, of “Holy Ghost” is coming to us, if you think about other languages like German Geist, is coming to us from an Anglo-Saxon or a Proto-Germanic stream, and probably if you trace back the root of this word you're going to find it means, “breath, wind,” those are the related words to “ghost,” the word we are using in English. So the next thing we have to clarify━see, I told you it sounds rather elementary but in fact it's probably the most needful foundational pieces to put in order. The next question is why is this person referred to as Holy? Why don't we refer to the Son as the “Holy Son” or the Father as the “Holy Father”" Although some religions do refer to the Father as the Holy Father and they're not just referencing the person, the person of God in the Bible, they may be referencing people on earth which Jesus vehemently says, “Call no man on earth father.” He was specifically meaning that as, there's one Father, His Father in Heaven. The rest of it is earthly fathers, which is fair for us to use, but in terms of spiritual religious connotations, there's only one and that is our heavenly Father. But the word “Holy” that comes every time you read the “Holy Spirit” or the “Holy Ghost,” is not, we shouldn't confuse that it is being referenced, that the person of the Holy Spirit is being referenced as “holy” as unique, holy, apart from the Father and the Son, but rather that His work, if you think about it, His work has much to do with separating out people. And the word as we use it “hol”" has the connotation of religious purity and cleanliness, but that has nothing to do with the word “holy,” it's simply something that is set apart for God's use. So if you think about it the people who are called and chosen are being set apart for God's use, they are being set apart through the vehicle of the person of the Holy Spirit. So you get a glimpse into why we would distinguish Him as holy and furthermore there are other spirits, there are evil spirits, there are other types of spirits. This is why in 1 John, John says, “Try the spirits,” to know exactly where and whence they're coming from. So that gives an idea of “holy” in part, it's not exhaustive but it just gives an idea. I would say this though, that the work of the Holy Spirit is in fact, and I'll go down the list of many, many Scriptures today, but is in fact helping those who have been called and chosen in the application of Christ's finished work in the heart of the individual, therefore when we call something holy, set a part, an individual becomes holy and set apart. That is not religiously purified and stain-glass-ified, and everything else, it simply means set apart by God. That Spirit of God coming to take up and dwell in a believer is why you'll read where it says, “Ye are the temple of the Holy Ghost.” So there is a lot of simplicity in what I'm saying, but soundness for those people who are not familiar with what I'm doing. Now I'm laying down in these messages primarily doctrine, these are not the type of messages that are going to let you leave here and you feel like you can just fly away because it was so uplifting and so━they are doctrinal at their core. See it's very, it becomes very clear to me that we can from the pulpit teach people how to lean on God's word and how to have faith, and that's probably the most important thing in making it through, foremost trusting in Christ. At the top of the list, that He is risen, but as you move away from those parts it seems that people are less and less clear on what exactly they believe. And you get a group of people together and ask them on a doctrinal matter, they'll have a lot of different ideas; some are biblical, some are sound and some are not. Unfortunately, most of my young adult life I did not have sound doctrine, and unfortunately that led me to a lot of errors and things that I thought dogmatically, “Well, I'd been told this therefore.” But we're only concerned with what is in God's book, and with that being said I want first to clarify, you've heard me say this before, but I want first to clarify the translators of the King James did a great disservice in Romans by using, in reference to the Holy Spirit, referencing in the 8th chapter, “the Spirit itself,” referring to the Spirit of God as an “it”" This is one of the worst things that's happened because people do not personify or include the third person of the Godhead as a person! So even at the beginning when I started talking I actually, a little Freudian, I said “it” as well. It's just kind of one of those things you do, but reality is we're talking about the third person of the Godhead; the Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit. Now why, when we get into the book, there are references to the Spirit of God that have more close connection to the Father, and then you got references to the Spirit that have closer connection to the Son, and then you've got references to the Spirit that are all about the Spirit, the person of the Holy Spirit's work; personality and some insight into who this third person of the Godhead is. See, my goal in all of this is to take away the, woo-woo factor that people have done and make this really, it's, it must be as tangible and as real. When you're reading about Jesus Christ, if Jesus Christ is not real to you, you're going to refer the person of Jesus Christ as a far removed, perhaps mystical, and maybe even caricatured figure. The same thing is true of the person of the Holy Spirit. So we begin and I'm going to write a few of these out if you want to, you don't have to take notes, they'll be on my tablet here and you'll see them. But these that refer or are referenced in conjunction with the Father begin right there in Genesis 1:2, “The Spirit of God.” And then, I'm just writing, this is not exhaustive, but I'm trying to give you an example of, of the references that are related more to the Father, and then we'll look at those related to the Son. Luke 4:18, which is a reference, this is Christ reading out of an Old Testament passage but He says, “The Spirit of the Lord,” Spirit of the Lord. Remember, “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,” and He's reading out of Isaiah 61. 1 Corinthians 6:11, and I may, I wrote these down by memory so if I missed a chapter or something don't come after me to crucify me; it's by memory, “Aha! She made a mistake!” There somewhere in the vicinity, I'm sure my spot checker critics who criticize every word that comes out of my mouth, I'm sure will take note and go immediately to the Bible they never open to check it out. “The Spirit of our God,” the reference I made to Isaiah 61, which is that very same passage of; it's identical that occurs in the Old Testament where Christ is reading, “The Spirit” and identical but there's some you'll see slight, “of the Lord,” and here it's “the Lord God” is inserted there; there's a reason for that. In Matthew 10 and verse 20, this is Christ speaking, and He says, “For it is not ye that speak, but the Spirit of your Father which speaketh in you,” so the Spirit, “the Spirit of your Father.” And then again, I'm trying to give you a varied idea. The apostle Paul, he uses this in 2 Corinthians 3:3. He says “the Spirit of the living God.” So these all are connected to the Father, and in fact, in the Old Testament you'll find these examples, for example in Genesis 6:3 where God says, “My Spirit shall not always strive with man.” So you can see there's, there is separation, but there again, they're attached to the Father. And, we'll give you one more to the New Testament, Romans 8:11 which is, “The Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead,” which is an exact reference to the Father and Spirit, versus (let's take a new page) those references that are closer related to the Son. Romans 8:9 speaks of “the Spirit of Christ.” Philippians 1:19━these are important don't just think I'm just rattling off stuff here. I want you to see that there, in what we've pictured a circle and these three are one, they are related in some way, acting in some way, but each, in fact, the Spirit is subordinate to Christ, Christ is subordinate to the Father. And I will demonstrate that through something in a minute, but the idea here is that there are in the Scriptures we've got abundant references to show that we're not talking about a person, Holy Spirit who is acting independently of Himself, but rather that the references may be in fact related to the Father at times before Christ came. In the coming, in the time of the coming of Christ and His subsequent ascension, and while we wait for His return, related to the Son, but there will never be a time where you find the Spirit bearing witness of Himself, which is why I've told you many times if you go into a church, you know, you're free to go where ever you want, I━this is not a cult, this is not someplace where you're bound and you got to be here. If you go into a church somewhere and somebody's talking about and busy magnifying and focusing on the Spirit, and we're not talking about laying down doctrine now, we're talking━and I've been in churches where I've seen this propagated, you need to turn the other way, because Christ clearly said that when the Spirit comes; it's expedient for Him to go away, that “When the Spirit comes, He will speak of Me, He will glorify Me.” So it's important for us to understand, it's important to study the doctrine, it's important to lay out solid, clear thinking about this, so that when asked if we have a discussion with other people we're able to be clear: what exactly do we believe? And I think a lot of times even in this church, well taught, sometimes there's areas we're not exactly clear. We have, we'll call them more grey areas and that's because there hasn't been a lot of foundation on a certain doctrine laid out. Some of it is so complicated that I don't even want to get into it, and I'm not speaking of this doctrine right now, I'm speaking of those, oh, the age-old problem of Calvinism and Arminianism and all of the isms that are involved in, “Is it predestination or is it not?” I don't even want to open that can of worms up because it's so deep and profound, and I think one will never really truly get to define exactly and put something in a box per se. So on those questions I may not be silly enough to open up that door, you never know. However this is one where putting down this information gives, does give clarity. Let me continue here, Philippians 1:19, we have “the Spirit of Jesus Christ.” Galatians 4:6, “the Spirit of his Son,” which we could say is in part related to the Father and to the Son, this is one that could be bifurcated, as well as Acts 5:9, “the Spirit of the Lord.” So that gives you an idea of some of the Scriptures relating the Spirit to the Father, some of the Scriptures related to the Spirit being related in, in work to the Son. And elsewhere, now, now we get to the good part here, so hold your breath. Elsewhere the Spirit is called “the Spirit of holiness,” and you can read right by these passages. I think I have many times too, in studying. “The Spirit of holiness,” where that's referring to the person, whether you believe this or not, the person of the Holy Spirit declared to be “the Son of God with power according to the Spirit of holiness by the resurrection from the dead,” that is referring to the Spirit, the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of holiness. Elsewhere in 1 John, “the Holy one,” “the eternal Spirit,” that's in Hebrews 9:14, or “the Spirit of life,” “the Spirit of truth,” so we're now beginning to see, we'll call it dimensions of the person, holy, holiness, holy; eternal, that means just like the Father and the Son, eternal, Spirit of truth, why because He proceeds from the Father and the Son who are the truth. Jesus said, “I am the truth, I am the way,” the Spirit of truth. We looked at that word “the Comforter,” which paraklete, parakletos in the Greek which is “alongside,” or if you look at and breakdown the compound it can also be “alongside or with the out-called ones” of the church. In pictorial words, we see the Holy Spirit in the semblance of a dove descending on Christ as He's baptized by John the Baptist, the presence of fire, water or even oil are representatives of this person. We know; I'm going to go back to something I started to say earlier, we know that in the Greek, pneuma hagios, pneuma hagion or hiu, the “Holy Spiri”" of God is neutral. That means not masculine and not feminine, God's no dummy when He used the Greek language to use that neutral. Now back in the Old Testament the Spirit of God, the Ruach of God; this is going to be a booger for some of you: the Ruach of God is feminine! So when it says that the Spirit clothed Gideon, just don't even try to figure out what you're going to do with that one, leave that one alone. But throughout the whole Old Testament: female. And God knew what He was doing in picking that Greek language with its precision that we wouldn't be put into a problem linguistically to have to try and figure out, “Well, how does this apply to men and to women”" And it's equally important to note that, as I said He is a person, even though neutral in gender, and there is a reason for that, because He is in the work, the finished work of Christ being applied to mankind, He is the instrument or the vehicle, so it's important that He is neutral. Now as I said He is a person though, a neutral person, He has knowledge, and not just random knowledge, “What man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of a man that is in him? even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God.” He has knowledge, all the knowledge of God is with Him. He has a will, not independent of Himself however, His will is according to the will of the Father. You see, when it speaks of the gifts in 1 Corinthians 12, speaking about how these gifts are “distributed by the Spirit as he wills,” but His will is not independent as if He can choose to do something that is not a part of the Father's will, but He does have a will. He has a mind. See, I think we tend to maybe not out all this into thinking about the person of the Holy Spirit; He has a mind, “He that searcheth the hearts knoweth what is the mind of the Spirit.” He has a mind. He loves, He has emotions, and when I say He loves and He has emotions, we read and I've been referencing this for the last few weeks, the fruit of the Spirit begins with love. I said the mark of the discipleship of those following Christ: love, and “the love that is shed abroad in our hearts,” by what vehicle? The Holy Spirit: Romans 5:5. This individual can also be grieved; this is in Ephesians 4:30 and we'll talk about what exactly this means because a lot of times people think, “Well, I've received this gift and I don't have to think about anything else.” But the Spirit can be grieved; we'll talk about that today. He can make intersession for us; that's out of Romans 8:26. He also speaks to the churches through the word. If you recall multiple times to the seven churches in Asia, the book of Revelation, I'll give one reference, this is Revelation 2:7 “He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches”" referencing the fact that He speaks today to us through His word. When the word of God is being spoken or read, He is speaking to us in that wise. He can be insulted, Romans 10; I'm sorry, Hebrews 10 and verse 29 speaks about doing “despite to the Spirit of grace,” which is referencing the person of the Holy Spirit; He can be insulted. Now think about this does this sound like an “it” to you? (No ma'am) Not to me either. He is indeed omnipresent, and I say that in this way. The Psalmist in Psalm 139 said, “Where should I go from your presence?” speaking of if he goes to the utter heights or if he makes his bed in hell, but the essential meaning of that is “Wherever I go, Your Spirit is there; I cannot escape,” and specifically verse 7 of that psalm kind of capstones that. He is in a way towards the things of God omniscient, why, because “The Spirit searches all things, yea, the deep things of God.” He has; again, I referenced knowledge and a special work in the regenerative process of fallen mankind. You see, as I put all these out, it sounds like I'm putting together a list for you, and I am. Why? Because people say, “Well, why study this? Why put this down just like this?” Why, because it's doctrinally sound to give someone foundation. Now if, if all we did every Sunday is spend time speaking about the person, the Holy Spirit person, and did nothing else, we'd also be in error, why, because this is doctrine to lay a foundation on a subject, but the most important thing that we know from studying about the Spirit of God is His instrumentality in the process of our salvation, in the work that is being done inside of us as we grow in grace, and ultimately our last breath taken. Now I'm going to say something that's a personal; I seldom voice a personal opinion on something, but I'll say it's a personal opinion that I could go so far as to say would be sound in the fact that beyond this point, it is unknown except to say that when a person dies, the essential being of that person, the person that was, just like pulling the plug, is shut down and is no more; just the shell remains. But what was the essential spiritual person, coupled with the Spirit of God; that is what is, what goes into the presence of God. The body is here, absent from the body, present with the Lord, and there's no way that the spirit of the individual apart from the Spirit of God is making its journey into the presence of God because that the way, essentially, you find your way home is through the vehicle of the Spirit. So we can talk about from start to finish in a prevenient fashion, all the way into eternity. So it's important to lay these down so that we don't overlook this as a full picture of the whole council of God, not just teaching on the Holy Spirit, but His work in the regenerative process of man that is, we've looked at this many times, John 3. And there is it crystal clear, “Born again from above,” Christ's words: “You must be born again from above” to either enter in and to see the kingdom of God and heaven. The Spirit also does a quickening work. It is the Spirit that quickeneth, “the flesh,” He says, Christ says, “profiteth nothing.” It's the Spirit that maketh alive. We've used the King James, “quickeneth” to make a live, to bring alive. In fact, Paul says elsewhere, “We were dead in trespasses and sins, until the time that we were made alive━quickened by the Spirit.” So it's in that frame of reference. He is actively present, the Spirit of God, that is, both from the beginning of Romans 1:4 and 11, “He bears witness.” Does this sound like an “it” to you still? (No, Ma'am.) That's what I said. Even in the Old Testament, Nehemiah 9:20 says, “He teaches and instructs,” His Holy Spirit, the Spirit of God teaches and instructs. So when you get to the New Testament and it talks about “He shall lead you in all truth; he shall guide you,” that's age old. That's not some new revelation that Christ was revealing to His disciples, although it may have been new for them, but I don't think so because they were well versed in the only Scripture that existed then, which was the Old Testament, and Nehemiah 9:20 talks about the fact that the Spirit of God teaches and instructs. Sometimes the Holy Spirit will restrain and prevent and hold back an individual, although the Spirit will never act against your will, but if someone is being obedient to the word of God, such as the apostle Paul was in Acts 16, you'll find it says that the Spirit restrained them from going into one place and essentially guided them into another. Now I know there's so much confusion out there. This is why I'm doing this. It's almost like setting the record straight. Sometimes He acts as our advocate. We need someone sometimes to help us. I think I quoted this somewhere; He helps us to pray sometimes. He helps us in our weakness to communicate with God. Sometimes we find ourselves unable to pray, but our thoughts, our mind is focused on something, He helps us. He makes intercession for us. Now again, dimensions of this person, not “it,” the Spirit can be lied to. I make that funny face because there are a lot of people that think, “Oh, come on now. You, do you believe all this?” Absolutely, and it's interesting that that particular passage where it references people lying to the Spirit of God just happens to be, by the way, about money. So while there's a whole universe of clowns out there that like to say that, you know, “God's work never cost a thing,” talk to the original koinonia community there in Acts 5, because it says that they sold all that they had and laid it at the apostles' feet that they should distribute it as was needed within the community. That doesn't sound free to me. And these that sold a piece of land that withheld some portion or some part of the proceeds that should have gone to the apostles to do what they needed to do, they withheld. And it says right there in Acts 5, this is Ananias and Saphira, husband and wife, the Bonnie and Clyde of the day, they're confronted and asked why they'd lied to the Holy Spirit, “Why did you lie to God?” So there again, you have an attachment, a connection to the Spirit acting on behalf or representing and connected in relationship to God, not acting on His own. And let me just, before I move on too quickly, because it seems to be that you know, people want to brush this off, but why do you think when you read the passages referring to the Corinthians, who claimed to be so spiritually gifted, and yet they were cheap? When Paul said, “Now concerning the collection,” that came right after him, 1 Corinthians 15, talking about the Resurrected Christ and how “if Christ is not risen, our faith is in vain, but Christ is indeed risen, seen by abundant witness, last of all me, one born out of due time,” speaking of himself, “Now concerning the collection,” and he goes on to talk about that. And if you go on and read 2 Corinthians you realize that these folks, they reveled in their spiritual gifts of tongue-talking and prophesying and all the other goodies that they had, but they were cheap, stingy and they had not done what Paul had said, which is give. And this is what separates; sorry, you know, there's people out there that are not going to like this. This is what separates the people who act, they put on the act of being saved and being a Christian, versus those people whom God has reached into their heart, quickened with His Spirit and changed. Why I'm telling━why am I saying this to you? Because I used to live in the realm of absolute, “It's all about me,” and you know, I used to think about the church as, we're talking 30, 35 years ago, “Why would somebody give money to the church?” I had that mindset: “Why would somebody do that? Only if, only of course, if I could in a very pharisaical way be seen maybe at the height of the holidays giving a small offering somewhere,” until I learned the truth about what God's word says, and I realize that's absolutely the worst position you could find yourself in, doing it to be seen of men. What did Christ say? “When you do this, don't let the left hand know what the right hand's doing; do it in secret. Don't make a spectacle of yourself.” And He was referring to giving. So you know, there's a lot of people, who because they don't have doctrine and it's not━maybe they have a little bit of doctrine, but it's not sound, it's not out of the book. There are errors all the way, all over the place. This is why Paul cautioned those people at Galatia, and he said, “Don't be tossed with every wind of doctrine,” something that blows your way and it sounds good to your ears at the moment and you, you heed that wonderful whatever it is that came, but then two or three months later, or six months later, a year later you're doing something else. We're not to be swayed because we know what we're dealing with, and this word never changes. That's the beauty. I can stand here and I can preach this message to you and in ten years from now it'll be the same good doctrine because it's coming out of this book, which is why we still play Dr. Scott's teaching around the clock on different streams available in a different, a different, a plethora of different ways, because it has not changed. God's word does not change. That's the wonderful thing if you're doing it according to the book. If you have some independent thing that you're going off on, good luck, you'll have to ditch your CDs or whatever you're producing in a couple of years when the next deal comes along that you want to get on and surfboard on. The Spirit can be blasphemed against. These are the words of Christ, Matthew 12:31-32. He says, “All manner of sin will be forgiven,” except what sin: “blasphemy against the Holy Spirit.” We'll look into that. That's a must, especially if you're wondering what exactly does that mean, because to blaspheme, we know we take it in the English way of saying to blaspheme is to, for example, take the name of the Lord in vain, to do something that is against or contrary to. We'll have to look into that━not today, but I'm giving you dimensions related to the personality or things that can affect the personality of this person of whom we are talking about. Now the Father is all the fullness of the Godhead, invisible, whom no man has seen, nor any man can see, 1 Timothy 6:16. The Son is the fullness of the Godhead manifested visible, and the Spirit is the fullness of the Godhead acting upon and in the creation and the creature. So you know, we talk about this now, I hope I've at least given, I've spent the last almost 40 minutes giving you some solid core points that if you now progress through this series, will give you some idea that these are not random thoughts. We're discussing a person, indeed a person who has feelings, a person who interacts with us. You know, one of the greatest tragedies, I referenced that Scripture that talks about “you are the temple of the Holy Ghost,” or the Holy Spirit; one of the greatest tragedies is those who are of the fundamentalist frame who will basically tell you, “Don't, don't do this and don't do that and don't breathe, don't look, don't, don't drink, don't smoke, don't, don't, don't, don't, don't; because you're the temple of the Holy Ghost.” Well, here's the problem with that. Even if you checked off every box of their 'dont's' you'd still be confronted with the fact, and I'd still be confronted with the fact that we're sinners, we're sinful and we sin. So how many boxes would you like to check? This is why I tell you, you know, yes, we have to be mindful that if we're even remotely interested in the things of God and we're trying to apply ourselves to learn the things of God, it means God has quickened us. He's made us alive, placed His Spirit in us. That shouldn't prevent an individual from living their life. It should make you aware of God's presence. There's a difference between being aware of God's presence and living your life with an awareness. You know the times you've said, “Gosh, I feel so alone; I feel so lonely.” Have you ever, have you ever said that? Stop in that moment if you ever get to that point again, stop and think about what you're saying. God gave you someone to be with you, not that you can see or feel. It's that famous conversation I've told you about with Dr. Scott: “Can you see your salvation?” “No.” “So what would make you think that you can see these other things?” It's all by faith. You're never alone. You may feel━that's by the way, that's the flesh crying out. That's the flesh talking, saying, “I feel alone and lonely,” but the spirit person is never alone. Distinguish between the two and in the moment when you're flesh is crying out, you'll maybe open up your Bible to Galatians 5 or to other places where it talks about the battle of the spirit and the flesh, and you'll realize, yes, the flesh is very powerful, but greater is He that is in me than any other force operating, including, by the way, the flesh, very powerful, but if I'm really trusting, I know I can overcome through the power of the Spirit placed in me. Now that's not one of these, you know, click your heels three times and you'll get to wherever you need to go. It's a battle. It's something that we'll be constantly striving until this clay house is laid down. Now all of this was background for me to begin talking about something that will lead, as I said, as an aid into these future messages. In the book of Acts, and I'm, I'm using the book of Acts because it seems to be the easiest place to do this from. In the book of Acts, there are references many times over to being filled with the Spirit. Acts 2:4, it says, “They were all filled with the Holy Ghost”" the Holy Spirit. And then again in Acts 4:31, we have the same, that same thing, “And when they had prayed, the place was shaken where they were assembled together; they were all filled with the Holy Ghost,” and I could keep going on and on and on. Now what's interesting about this is “to be filled,” and I said I would do this, I never got around to it, so in the Greek, not in the English, but in the Greek is a verb in the indicative, which means it's factual. It is, in this case, aorist and it is passive. Now for those who don't know what that means, the Greek has three voices: active, middle and passive. In the active voice, I'm doing something; I do it, I'm acting. In the middle voice in the Greek, I'm being acted━I'm doing the action for myself. We call that “reflexiv”" in the English; we have to add “for himself,” or “herself.” I am━a Scott favorite here, I am cutting a piece of pie for myself. And in his case, by the way, that was really true. One of, one of these days I'll share with you his famous, you know, “Buy 12 pies, because you know, I want to taste every flavor and I'll have one piece and make the staff eat the rest of them. If you want to know, staff people, where I got that from, I did copy him, because he did that. He was famous for saying, “I just want one bite,” and then he'd make you eat the rest, so no wonder why some of the staff people have expanded their horizons. And passive means I stand by and I am being acted upon. I do not; I'm not participating in the activity, it is happening to me. So for example, when it says they crowned him king, they actively crowned him, king. They did something to him to make him king; he did not do it of himself; “himself” would be in the middle voice. So each time you read that they were filled with the Holy Ghost or the Holy Spirit, it's a passive act. It means that God was doing that activity to these people. Why? They were gathered in one place, they were hearing the word of God being preached. It was, there was no New Testament at the time, so I really want you to think about it. It's not “Oh, they were listening to the Gospel of Luke.” There was no New Testament at the time. There was only the Old Testament Scriptures. They were listening to the proclamation of, if it was the rhemas, the Scriptures of, of Old and the proclamation that Christ is risen; that He is indeed the Christ. So with all of that an activity, an action of God was poured out onto these people for their simple faith and trusting and hearing and being quickened, being made alive by hearing the message. So I want you to kind of park that thought for a minute because if God does the activity of filling (you're going to love this), the activity of quenching, where it says, “Quench not the Spirit,” quench not the Spirit, which is 1 Thessalonians 5:19. This is an active action we may indeed do ourselves. In other words, the same thing is true when it says, “Grieve not the Spirit,” that is out of Ephesians 4:30. And there is another reference that I'll get to regarding activities we may do: lying, resisting; that's out of the book of Acts. The claim was “They always resist the Holy Spirit.” Let's put it down here: resist, grieve and quench. These are activities we may do. The filling part, God does. Now I want to just kind of, just introduce some things here because it's very obvious that I won't get beyond a certain point, which seems to be the theme of these messages. They keep going and going and going, but if God does an activity such as filling people with His Spirit, let's just take for example, “Quench not the Spirit of God,” this 1 Thessalonians 5:19. It suggests, if you read the Greek word for “quench,” which is used, by the way of extinguishing or putting out a fire. Remember, I said that's one of the pictorial words that we use to reference the Holy Spirit, fire, of putting out the fire, but the fire is never completely put out. You'll find that same word, by the way, “quench” is used when Jesus quoting a rhema of the Old Testament, when He says smoking flax shall He not break, and/or maybe I'm not quoting this properly, but He says a bruised reed shall He not quench, smoking flax shall He not break. I think I just quoted that backwards, but the word is in there “to quench” as He will not put out completely. He will not extinguish. The same thing is there, the admonition in the imperative Greek is to not put out the Spirit of God. So the question has to be asked, an individual doing something, does the Spirit of God depart from that individual? After all, one of my favorite passages to quote is from the Old Testament, “All souls are mine,” God speaking. So is it that the flame, the Spirit of God is completely put out? Or is it that it is reduced down to, by our acts of, and again, if you read specifically Ephesians 4, the 4th chapter, and 1 Thessalonians 5, you read a bunch of admonitions, which come down to essentially what we may willingly, and it's not like we, we're ignorant about this, be putting out or quenching or extinguishing or dampening what God is doing by the very fact, and I'll give you a first thing that makes it abundantly clear. You hear the word of God, something in your inside goes, “Yeah; that might be me.” Ever have that happen? “That might be me.” I told you this is a mirror for all of us to look at. It's not just you, it's me too. We all look in the mirror and we might say to ourselves, “That might be me,” and then you basically, even though conviction came, remember that, I told you, conviction comes by the Holy Spirit. Even though the moment of conviction came, you just continued━it's like passing by an accident. And even though no one's at the scene and you know full well you might have been able to stop, you just go about your business. It's just like that. It's going to be on your mind for a while, you're going to be thinking about it, and then conveniently you'll put it out of your mind. And eventually there'll be several of these, many actually, many occasions until finally you'll stop thinking about it. It won't even bother you anymore. Now when that happens, you have a problem. And this is, I'm going to tell you something, these are hard passages to deal with because people don't like to hear this. Part of the person of the Holy Spirit's work is to enlighten our mind about spiritual things. Not to enlighten our mind about the world, but to enlighten our mind about spiritual things to conform us to the image and likeness of Christ. So if we keep hearing, but we keep saying, “Yeah, but that's somebody else,” I did, by the way, I did that for years. I don't want you to think that that is the condemnation kiss of death. I want you to know that there's hope because eventually if you're open to it, God's going to begin to work a work that will open up your eyes, your spiritual understanding. This is why Paul prayed that their eyes, the Ephesians, that their eyes, the eyes of their understanding might be opened because there comes a point where this book can no longer be a two-dimensional something you do for twenty minutes on a Sunday morning, but rather something that is transformative. And not that you do the transformation, because that becomes works and that becomes something not of God, but, and now I'm going to tie things together. Romans 6 talks about “to whom ye yield your members,” it's the yielding process. It's not about I'm going to yield perfectly and I yielded now, and not all these things are going to take place. It doesn't happen like that, otherwise I'd be a robot and I, there'd be no flesh attached to me. The flesh, the flesh is going to fight like hell; I don't want to yield. I don't want that. And this is why I keep going back to this. These, at least these three that I've touched on: to quench, to grieve and to resist, very, very important. Let's talk about this “resist” word, was used in the book of Acts towards those who actually were familiar with their own Scriptures, and he says, “You always do resist the Holy Spirit.” You resist the word, directly resisting the truth as it is revealed, “No, we don't want to hear this doctrine.” Weren't there people that followed Christ that did the same thing in the 6th chapter of John? Some said, “This is too hard for us. We're, we're leaving.” And Peter piped up and said━he was, the question was asked, “Will you go also?” And he said, “Lord, where should we go? You have to words of life.” It's like saying why do some people gravitate towards the book and salvation and latch on, and other people, it has no meaning or value for them? It doesn't have any affect. The same words bring life to some and death to others. Refusing, as I said, the conviction and probably there's a couple of, of good examples if you go and read where Paul is preached in front of Felix, in front of two of the rulers and he's pretty much laid out the presentation that beforetime, when he said this, other people said, “What must we do to be saved?” But to these people, out of the mouth of one, he says, “Well, you almost persuade me, but I don't know about this,” and he become indifferent to it, like “Well, why should I be bothered with this?” right? So here is what I would say to you to kind of sum up this message. We're talking about a person and as much as it is possible for us there's, the details that I've given, it's as much as a foundation as can be laid to really understand God hasn't just left us to our own devices: “You figure this thing out that I'm calling Christendom.” Which is why, boy, it's another unpopular statement that I'm going to make, but I seem to make a lot of those and it's just crowd favorite, you know. Which is why you have people that are trapped in certain belief systems and certain religious, under the guise of Christianity, but they never have become enlightened. It's very rare to find a catholic church that will teach on this subject. Why? Because what you have is you've got a hierarchy in the church itself, which puts itself as the representatives of God, not just as mouthpieces preaching the word like God gave some apostles and so forth. No, no, their word is the terminus for everything, end all, be all, but you've also got a structure that elevates Mary before Christ. So if we're even going to talk about the Spirit of God, there may be a place somewhere, but it's highly doubtful that you're going to get doctrinal information to give you the understanding that this is indeed a person, not to be elevated above the Father or the Son, but to be understood as having, as Christ condescended and took on flesh to come down to earth so that we could see exactly He was the exegesis of God in the flesh put on display. The Holy Spirit is essentially the reverse of that, abiding in these crocks of clay until our time to depart from here and be with the Lord comes, as I said, making it so that our journey into the presence of the Lord, we're not just wondering souls, some doctrine that preaches these are souls that are let loose, somehow the just fly away into the mystic abyss of Nowhere-land. It doesn't work like that and it doesn't look like the 405 either, trust me. So what I want you to leave with here today is a little bit clearer picture. We're talking about a person, and a person, who by the way, cares about you, doesn't have an independent will for you. That is something that is between you and God that we've discussed in terms of the will of God, but rather, you have someone who is helping you and guiding you. And the rejection of instruction from the word of God is probably the place where people begin to lose their footing in terms of the clarity they could have when God has given this gracious gift. At your own time, please do me the honor, if you would, to read in your own time, the 4th chapter of Ephesians, and you'll find that much of that 4th chapter, it's not taught on that much, but much of that 4th chapter has to do━in your own time, please don't do it now. I hear pages turning. Your own time is not this time because we're all here together. But that 4th chapter has a lot to do with Paul making correction about, we'll call it behavior. Now I'm not standing here telling you how to live your life. I'm definitely I'm, if there was an antithesis, if there was a picture in the dictionary that could be the complete opposite of perfection, my picture would be in the section of the opposite to give an example. I would never put myself up in the place to say, “Oh, I've arrived.” I haven't. I, I look at the Scriptures, I read the Scriptures, sometimes I'm grieved because I, I desire to be changed and to be different, but I know I can't make those changes that are everlasting and eternal changes. Only God can. He does them through His agent, the person of the Holy Spirit. So I take these petitions to God in prayer and ask for some help. I don't have to beg Him, because He knows exactly what I need. And I think at times, some of the things that I say I, “It displeases me that I'm like this or I don't want to be like this, Lord, change me,” that's a wonderful prayer because what does Ephesians say? We are His workmanship, and if we are His workmanship, if He's, going to another picture, if He's the Potter and we're the clay, then I want to be molded. Not into something I want to be. I did that for the first 35 years of my life. I want to be molded into what He wants me to be. And by the way, if that isn't love to God and if that isn't God's love to me, I don't know what is. Now God has the power to do all this. That's what makes Him God, power, not love, but the agency through which He works that gracious gift that is given unto me, I intend to explore every avenue, not make this some mystic journey where we can all get confused. And maybe perhaps, at this time it's a good point, a good place to point this out that the next time you see somebody on TV who's doing some hocus-pocus or, you know, rolling out the coat and all the people fall down, you'll just say, “Come on, really?” because that is not the functioning that God intended, by the way. That, that's like Simon the sorcerer, somebody who's maybe possessed of a demon spirit, but certainly not the Spirit of God. The Spirit of God does all things organized that we might understand and come to know who He is. He's not in the business of trying to wall us away. He did that in the Old Testament with the children of Israel. He's in the business right now of trying to draw us closer, and how can you come close to somebody if you can't get to know them, know how they are, what they're like? So I want this to be a message that says God cares about you and the fact that He's led me to open up these passages makes, it warms my heart, because it makes me know this foundation I've laid will set some clarity in the church for what God has done. When people say, “Oh, the Lord's done nothing for me like this other person over there that's got that,” are you kidding me? First start with the fact that you were hell bound and I was hell bound. First start there, if you happen to believe in heaven and hell, if you don't it means nothing, but start right there and then secondarily the fact that you're interested, that you're here, that you're learning, that you're listening means God has placed the earnest━do you remember we taught on that arrabon, the earnest of our inheritance in you. That is the person, the deposit of the Spirit in you. He cared enough to condescend to these filthy rags to say, “I care about you and it matters to Me, and I have put My seal upon you. That is My seal of ownership, bought and paid for with the blood of Jesus Christ. Now you My son, you My daughter, you might find it hard to be in the world and wrestle your way through it, but I've sent someone to be with you who will guide you and will lead you if you will be, like Paul says, led and walk in the Spirit.” To be continued. You have been watching me, Pastor Melissa Scott, live from Glendale, California at Faith Center. If you would like to attend the service with us, Sunday morning at 11am, simply call 1-800-338-3030 to receive your pass. If you'd like more teaching and you would like to go straight to our website, the address is www.PastorMelissaScott.com
