So that's good.
So over the next four weeks, we'll be talking about,
I think we'll be talking about, there's no guarantee,
but I think we'll be talking about Pentecost
and for the next four weeks, starting today.
And we'll take it through four stages.
So I want us to go to Second Kings.
Second Kings.
Hey Mia, you want to come up now?
What?
Every time I call you, you say no, come.
Mia, come, you and I will sing a song.
Second Kings 2.
And let me first go to verse 9 and then we'll trace our way back.
And so in verse 9 it says,
When they have crossed, Elijah said to Elisha,
Tell me what I can do for you before I'm taken from you.
Let me inherit a double portion of your spirit, Elisha replied.
You have asked a difficult thing, Elijah said.
Yet if you see me when I'm taken from you,
it will be yours, otherwise not.
And so when we talk about Pentecost,
one of the things we desire is more of the Spirit of God.
Let's just call it double portion for now.
But the question is, how do we get to this place
where we have more of the Spirit of God?
When we already have said that we have all of the Spirit of God.
How do we get to this place where we have more of the Spirit of God?
When we have already established from the scriptures
that we have all of the Spirit of God?
I want to say to you that double portion,
Hey, okay.
Okay, that was not what I was planning to do.
Okay, while I'm talking about that,
if someone could fix this and bring this a little lower.
Jeevan, you look highly capable, come.
So I'd like to say that when you talk about double portion,
double portion is not about an increase in the quantity of the Spirit.
It is an increase in your capacity to contain the Holy Spirit.
Down.
That's good.
Double portion is not about an increase in quantity of Spirit.
Double portion is an increase in your capacity to receive Him.
A double portion of the Spirit is not an increase in the quantity of the Spirit
because the Holy Spirit is a person.
You can't quantify Him.
But a double portion, pursuing a double portion
is an increase in your capacity to contain Him or your capacity to receive Him.
And so the hope is over the next four weeks, we can talk about
how do I increase my capacity to receive the fullness of the Spirit?
Because Jesus seemed to have accomplished it, so why not me?
So double portion is not,
is not an increase
in the quantity of the Spirit because He is a person.
But it is an increase
in your capacity
to receive Him.
It is an increase in your capacity to receive Him.
Hey, are there any more pens because this one's kind of beginning to die?
So to look at how we can increase in capacity,
let's go from chapter two, verse one to nine.
And I know you're familiar with this.
So second Kings chapter two, verse one to nine.
Yes, I know, Elijah replied, but do not speak of it.
The company of prophets with Jericho went up to Elijah and asked him,
do you know what the Lord is going to, that the Lord is going to take your master from you today?
Yes, I know, he replied, but do not speak of it.
Then Elijah said to him, stay here.
The Lord has sent me to Jordan.
And he replied, as surely as the Lord lives and as you live, I will not leave you.
So the two of them walked on.
Fifty men of the company of prophets went and stood at a distance,
facing the place where Elijah and Elisha had stopped at the Jordan.
Elijah took his cloak, rolled it up, struck the water with it.
The water divided to the right and to the left,
and the two of them crossed over on dry ground.
When they had crossed, Elijah said to Elisha,
tell me what can I do for you before I'm taken away from you?
Let me inherit a double portion of your spirit, Elisha replied.
You have asked a difficult thing, Elijah said.
Yet if you see me when I'm taken from you, it will be yours otherwise not.
So I'd like to suggest to you, and over the next four weeks,
explore this pattern that one of the ways we can increase in our capacity
to receive a double portion of the spirit is to go through Gilgal to Jericho to,
or is it Bethel?
Or is it Bethel?
Gilgal to Bethel to Jericho to the Jordan.
And so today we'll only talk about what this could mean for us.
So like in the story of Elijah, always remember guys,
sorry, it's Gilgal Bethel Jericho.
Gilgal, yeah, Bethel Jericho Jordan.
So that's the process.
So over the next four weeks, we'll talk about Pentecost,
Gilgal Pentecost, Bethel Pentecost, Jericho, and finally Pentecost Jordan.
And the intent is, how can I increase in my capacity to receive or contain or walk in
the double portion of the spirit?
When we already know that his fullness is present in us, how do we do this?
So one of the first principles we need to establish is, like in the story of Elisha,
allegiance is the starting point of relationship with the spirit.
Allegiance is the starting point of relationship with the spirit, allegiance
is the starting point of relationship with the spirit.
It's a word that's rarely used nowadays.
Allegiance is the starting point of relationship with the Spirit, like in the story of Elisha.
The reason Elisha received a double portion of what was upon Elijah was because of his
allegiance to Elijah.
There were others who were raised under Elijah, but they did not have the allegiance that
Elisha had with Elijah.
Like in the story, allegiance is the starting point of relationship with the Spirit of Christ.
Allegiance confronts, once I say I have an allegiance, it also means that I confront
every other competing allegiance.
This is why the word allegiance is not used very often now, because we live in a society
that compromises, that is pluralistic, that requires so much accommodation and tolerance
that allegiance is never singular nowadays.
And so allegiance confronts other allegiances, and only after it confronts other allegiances,
every competing allegiance, only then can you enter into communion with the one you
have allegiance to.
So Gilgal is where we will start today, but remember that all of this begins with this
idea of allegiance to the Spirit, and in allegiance with the Spirit, I begin to come to this place
where I begin to confront every other competing allegiance.
Once you do this, love for God or love for the Holy Spirit, love will fuel allegiance.
Once you decide this, love will fuel allegiance.
Once love begins to fuel allegiance, it will prioritize things.
So when Don gets married or when Manoj gets married, the first thing that is required
is the words they speak when they say I do.
It is not as if they can back that up with anything but words, and they're saying I pledge
allegiance to you, I betroth myself to you.
So that is a pledge.
That pledge is then fueled by love.
Once it's fueled by love, what happens is priorities change.
Everything is prioritized differently once allegiance happens.
But first comes the words that pledge allegiance.
Then comes the love that fuels that allegiance, and then comes priorities that prove that
allegiance.
Words that pledge allegiance, and words must be honest to the extent you can from your
heart and you pledge allegiance.
Love then begins to fuel that allegiance.
And then priorities that you have thereafter proves that allegiance.
It's the same with Elijah and Elisha.
He uses these words in 2 Kings 2, 4, and the words are as long as the Lord lives and as
you live, I will not leave you.
Words, pledge.
Then love fuels it.
As in I won't, it doesn't matter, I'm not going to, I'm going to cross the Jordan, I'm
going to come to Jericho, I'm going to come to Jordan, Bethel.
I am not.
Love fuels it and then prioritizes it.
All the others had the same thing going for them, but they did not go down this route.
Fifty-one of them waited on one side.
Fifty of them waited on one side.
This is what increases capacity, guys.
So it doesn't matter whether you want to receive from the Lord or receive from a person, or
receive from an institution, or receive from a corporation.
It doesn't matter.
This is how it works.
If I want to receive from you, if I want to receive from the church, if I want to receive
from a corporation, if I want to receive from Elon Musk, if I want to receive from Jesus
Christ, if I want to receive from the Holy Spirit, the principle is the same.
No other method is able to cut through hard granite rock and create a channel that allows
this to happen.
I was reading a summary of a book written by a guy who saw how they built the Panama
Canal and the amount of work that is involved in building a canal that cuts through and
and builds these docks that raises water, lowers it.
And you read it and you think to yourself, my God, this was a lot of work, but someone
had the audacity to even attempt it.
This cuts through so much granite that you get to the heart of God much faster.
Any questions?
We never hesitate to offer words as long as you can put some honesty or sincerity behind
it.
We hesitate to offer words because we think we will not be able to sustain it.
You will not be able to sustain it.
You are absolutely right.
But the best you can offer is what you think every time you say or you have said, I do,
you thought you were going to sustain it.
Foolish are you if you thought when you stood there and says to all those things the pastor
reads out in a hurry and you say I do, if you thought you were going to be able to fulfill
that I would warn her in advance that this guy is incapable of doing this.
But words are the best we offer because it comes from a heart of sincerity.
Words are what I want to do now in this one minute and then in the next minute I will
offer it again and then the third minute I offer it again.
Allegiance is always pledged with words.
It is fueled by love.
It is proven by priorities.
Any questions?
This increases capacity.
It is never a question of God grudging to give what he wants to give.
It is a question of can I receive what he wants to give.
Yeah, every day, every day our capacity keeps increasing.
Yeah, every day.
A woman cannot imagine what she will be nine months down the line.
It's impossible to imagine that when she is pregnant.
Every day she increases.
But when you look at a Phoebe or a Mia and think to yourself my God this was in someone's
body, think to yourself impossible and yet every day and it happens a million times every
day in different parts of the world.
It is the increase in capacity that allows you to partake of double portions.
It is not an increase in the quantity of the spirit.
So focus on increasing capacity.
Any questions guys?
Allegiance is pledged with words.
Allegiance is fueled by love.
Allegiance is proven by priorities or actions.
So I can pledge my allegiance to you because I'm sincere.
But it is love for you that will fuel it as in I can keep it up tomorrow, the day after.
But it is there's a stage after that where my priorities have to show that yeah my allegiance
to you matters.
So the first place that Elijah and Elisha went to was Gilgal.
And Gilgal you find it in Joshua 4 verse 19 and 20.
Joshua 4, 19 and 20.
Joshua 4.
See you don't have the problem of turning pages.
Joshua 4, 19 and 20.
On the tenth day of the first month the people went up from the Jordan and camped at Gilgal
on the eastern border of Jericho and Joshua set up at Gilgal the twelve stones that they
had taken out of the Jordan.
He said to the Israelites, in the future when your descendants ask their father what do
these stones mean tell them Israel crossed the Jordan on dry ground for the Lord your
God dried up the Jordan before you until you had crossed over.
The Lord your God did to Jordan what he had done to the Red Sea when he dried it up before
us until we had crossed over.
He did this so that all the people of the earth might know that the hand of the Lord
is powerful and that you might always fear the Lord your God.
So the first thing we know about Gilgal is that it was a reminder, it was a generational
reminder, it was a generational reminder of the power of God.
It was a generational reminder of the power of God and this stood for two thousand three
thousand years till something else replaced the Red Sea crossing and the Jordan crossing
and what replaced it was the Spirit of God raising up Christ.
Till Christ rose the one thing that Yahweh was known for was the Red Sea crossing.
Deliverance of a people by a sea opening and people crossing through.
That was the ultimate, like if you think of some guy's accomplishment you always take
the biggest accomplishment.
Oh by the way the smallest building in Toronto is the Toronto Hall of Fame.
But if you think of someone, sorry, stop it, yeah.
So when you think of someone and you think of their accomplishment you take the height
of their accomplishment and that's what they are always known for.
So if you take Edmund Hillary it is climbing Mount Everest.
If you take the Oilers it is winning the cup for years on end.
If you take the number of runs in cricket it's a guy called Don Bradman.
So there are these specific things that you connect with the greatest achievements and
when it comes to the Bible Yahweh was always known for one thing and that was the Red Sea
crossing and then it was reenacted again when Jordan was opened the same way.
Only in the case of Jordan there was no enemy army chasing.
So this was the ultimate achievement and then in the New, that is in the Old Testament and
that stayed till one day in the New Testament a dead man rose and that was Christ.
And so now the one thing that God is known for is the Spirit of God raising up Christ.
To see how impossible it is you should pick up a dead fly which will soon come into your
house in summer. You put a dead fly on the ground and try raising it up from the dead.
You should shout at it. I would suggest mouth to mouth doesn't work because it will go
into your mouth. So you can try everything with that fly.
Try raising up that fly. It blooming will not live.
I've tried this. I've tried raising a fly. Not because I wanted to raise a fly but because
it shows you the absolute deadness of a small insect. You can do nothing to it.
There's nothing you can do. Dead is so dead.
I remember trying to raise my father. He was so dead that doesn't matter how many times
you tell him to rise nothing would happen. But Christ rose from the dead.
And then you have people rising from the dead. Like our friend there.
That is a miracle. But Christ was the first man who rose from
the dead after being in the grave for three days.
Christ rose from the dead not to die again. That is the beauty of this.
Lazarus will die again. Marcus will die again. Jesus does not.
It's a new standard. And so Gilgal is a place where God sets up a generational reminder
of the power of God. And so when it comes to the Holy Spirit,
the new standard for power is the Holy Spirit. He was the one who raised Jesus from the dead.
It says so in Romans 8. If the Spirit of Christ that raised Jesus
from the dead now dwells in you, then in the same way that he raised Jesus from the dead,
he will raise you also. So Gilgal is a place where there's a generational
reminder of the power of God. One of the things this church talks a lot
about but does not match in its walk is the power of God on constant display.
But the day will come and it will happen. And the day is not far away.
The day is not far away. I won't be limited to a couple of guys going
to Perth or Sydney or London or Dublin. I'm talking about a common thing.
One of the common things in this church is hearing. Everybody seems to be able to hear.
One of the common things in this church is the ability to worship without much problems.
You don't need drums. You don't need nothing. You can worship.
One of the common things in this church is understanding how the body works.
In the same way, one of the common things that will surely happen in this church is
the power of God on display very naturally through its people.
The day is coming. It hasn't come yet. We are more talk than walk.
But it is very, very close. It's like a balloon that's waiting to burst.
Another few drops and it'll burst. That's how close we are.
It's a very thin filament that separates us from that place.
The youth met at my house, my apartment on Friday and I don't know why, but they left
about 60 balloons all over the place. My neighbors thought there was a machine gun
firing in the morning. I was on my knees.
But we are very close to this very natural display of power.
It won't be a conference. It won't be a big thing. It'll become a natural part of us.
I assure you of this. I assure you of this just based on the way God is going to do stuff.
It's going to be a very natural part of our lives. That's what I love about this church.
Most of the things that people write books about happens here quite naturally.
So Gilgal was a generational reminder of the power of God.
The reason I talked about this church breaking into it is because this church has to now
perpetually through generations produce a group of people that will know that the power
of God is a very natural thing. We cannot be named Acts 29 and not step
into it. The second thing Gilgal was, if you go to
Joshua 5 verse 20, Joshua 5.20, or not 5.20, Joshua 5 verse 1 to 8, 1 to 8, 1 to 8, 1 to
8. Let's start at verse 2. At that time the Lord said to Joshua, make flint knives and
circumcise the Israelites again. So Joshua made flint knives and circumcised the Israelites
at Gibeath Haraloth. Now this is why he did so. All those who came out of Egypt, all the
men of military age had died in the desert on the way after leaving Egypt. All the people
that came out had been circumcised. But the people born in the desert during the journey
from Egypt had not. The Israelites had moved about in the desert for 40 years until all
the men of military age when they had left Egypt had died since they had not obeyed the
Lord. Verse 7, so he raised up sons in their places and these were the ones that Joshua
circumcised. They were still uncircumcised because they had not been circumcised on the
way. Verse 9, and then the Lord said to Joshua, today I have rolled away the reproach of Egypt
from you, so the place has been called Gilgal to this day. On the evening of the 14th day
of the month, while camped at Gilgal on the plains of Jericho, the Israelites celebrated
Passover. The day after Passover, that very day, they ate some of the produce of the land,
unleavened bread and roasted grain. The manna stopped the day after they ate this food from
the land. There was no longer any manna for the Israelites, but that year they ate of
the produce of the land. The second thing Gilgal does is it is a place where a sign
of ownership is entered into. And it is a place where shame, reproach, old conditions
and mindsets are rolled away by God.
Gilgal is a place, first we said, which is a generational reminder of the power of God.
Gilgal is also a place where a sign of divine ownership is established. Why, where else
do we see this? We see this in Genesis 17, where God says to Abraham, hey Abraham, I
want you to circumcise every male, be it a servant, be it a son, every male in your
group has to be circumcised as a sign of a covenant that I now am your Lord. And in the
same way in Joshua 5, we see sign of ownership being established, where it is literally saying
you are mine now Israel. Your fathers and mothers died, they did not obey. As you start
afresh, I want to establish a sign of ownership. I want to stamp you with a sign of ownership.
And secondly, in stamping you with a sign of ownership, I want to take away your shame,
your reproach, your psyche, your old condition and your mindsets. I want to roll it away.
And so he actually names the place Gilgal, because Gilgal means to roll away.
Once we understand that a sign of ownership is necessary, we'll have to start competing
with other ownerships in our life. We'll have to start competing or dismantling or breaking
away or cutting off other ownership in our life. And we'll just talk about five signs
of ownership. And why are we talking about this? Because if we can navigate through Gilgal,
we increase our capacity to receive a double portion. The great thing about double portion
is next year I can receive a double of the double that I have. I just keep increasing.
Any questions before we go on? If anything is unclear, please ask.
The Bible has always had signs of ownership. There was one point where a slave, if he was
set free, would take his ear and nail it to the doorpost. Other signs of ownership was
when a priest would be consecrated, they would take the blood of the bull or goat and put
it on the ear, on the toe and on the hands, on the thumb. In Jewish belief, circumcision
was a sign of ownership. So signs of ownership have always existed. Once you were branded
thus, it meant that nobody else owned you. And if allegiance is a matter of being faithful
in service to an owner, and if allegiance is what causes double portion, then great,
let me step into it. I would need more of the Holy Spirit. For where we are going, we
all need it. It changes us. The power of the Holy Spirit is not just for people to
get healed. The power of the Holy Spirit is so that I change. Boy, do I need change.
So here are some things that you have to be aware of so you can break out or cut away
the ownership or the mastery of these usurpers in your life so that you legitimately are
owned by only one. So one of the things that I must break away from is things of my former
life. Things of my former life. All of us still struggle with sins, habits from our
former life, as in our life before we got born again. In Ephesians 422, it says that
putting away my old self and being renewed in the likeness and the image of God. I may
be wrong, but I don't think there's anybody in this room who does not struggle with sins
and habits from a former life. And by struggle I mean, for some of us the struggle is so
intense that we succumb to it. For some of us the struggle still exists, so we have to
walk circumspectly. For some of us in some areas, we don't even have to struggle because
we escape the gravitational pull of sins and habits from our former life. But that is one
of the things we have to get rid of. Ephesians 422 talks about it. Ephesians 422. In doing
this I suddenly increase in capacity because when I'm emptied of the things of my former
life there is more space. One of the ways you can measure your purity and your intimacy
with God is your desire for holiness. A desire for holiness, a desire, and the operative word
here is desire. A desire for holiness is a measure of your intimacy and purity. A desire
for holiness. How, how, it's such a, such a, such a, such a, such a, such a, such a, such
a litmus, eh? Because it's one thing to be holy because you're a Christian, it's one
thing to be holy because you're active in ministry, but a desire for holiness, a yearning
that it is important for me to be holy, to be set apart. Holiness matters to me, it is
critical to my life. I'm not a complete person if the desire for holiness is missing. A desire
for holiness is a measure of my intimacy and my purity. When the desire is absent, immediately
begin questioning life, eh? When the desire is absent, purity and intimacy will begin
to unravel. Just keep that in mind. So the first one is your former life. Things that
you struggled with in your former life. The next one, I didn't know what to call it. I
wanted, I didn't know whether to call it my human life or my soul life, so I'll call it
both. These are usurpers who try to exert mastery over my life and it lessens my capacity
to receive the Holy Spirit. When I say human or soul, I mean my intellect, my emotions,
my politics, my environment, not my environment, my intellect, my emotions, my life, my life,
emotions, my politics, my culture. These begin to, these begin to just diminish my capacity
to receive the Holy Spirit. And these are often hijacked, these are often hijacked to
delay, divert, or deceive me and brings me to a place of diminishing. It diminishes my
ability to receive the Holy Spirit. It diminishes my ability to receive more of the Spirit of
God who already lives within me. I was checking on some scriptures on Nicodemus. Nicodemus
was a guy who, please remember, as much as I love the movie Chosen and the series, Chosen
is a narrative that is built out of scripture. It is not scripture. So when we see Nicodemus
in the Chosen thing, it's very easy to think of Nicodemus as such a wonderful guy. And
he may have been that. But Nicodemus struggled with this. In John chapter 3, you find him
approaching Jesus at night. Why? Because Nicodemus was one of the Pharisees and it was not possible
for him to come out in the open because he was scared of what his people would say if
he was found associating with Jesus. So in John chapter 3, you hear him coming at night
and having that conversation with Jesus. And then again, in John chapter 19, verse 39,
he's coming again at night. This time he's coming with 100 pounds of spices. Why? Because
he wants to put those spices on Jesus' body and bury him. And he still does not want to
be out in the open. Our intellect, our emotions, our culture, our alliances, our political
thinking, you have no idea how powerful political thinking is, especially in the United States.
It is crippling the work of the Holy Spirit. The thing behind politics, guys, is not ideology,
it is money. And yet politics is super important to Christ because Christ is about a king and
a nation. And politics is also about power and cities and nations. It is important to
him. Well, that's not for today. Nicodemus was a guy who struggled with this. Mary and
her sons, Mary, his mother, and her sons, when you read Mark chapter 3, verse 20, you
see Mary and her sons discussing that Jesus is out of his mind or that he's crazy. We
need to do something about it. Emotions took over. And then after discussing that in verse
31, Mary and her sons actually go and stand outside the place Jesus is preaching and says,
ask him to come and meet us. And that is when Jesus has to take the kind of unnatural step
as a son of saying, who is my mother and who is my brother? But they that follow my will.
Why are we talking about that? Because we don't realize how much our emotional and intellectual
makeup affects the work of the Spirit in our lives. We don't realize this. We think it
is natural. It is not natural. Some things are natural. Some things need to be changed.
We can't change it all at a time. So I go and ask the Holy Spirit, so in this area
I seem to be struggling when it comes to emotions. I can be on an up or a down or I can be lashing
out or holding back or I can be afraid or I can be too abrasive. So in this area could
you help me? Because there's a certain reaction that keeps coming out. Culture. You think
your culture doesn't affect you? You think being Indian doesn't come with a baggage?
There is an attempt nowadays to redeem things from culture. It is important that you redeem
things from culture. But first get rid of the garbage. If you can't get rid of the garbage
you won't be able to see the treasure. Try to find a gold ring in one of those big thingies.
Oh it is so funny. When I used to stay in the old building I was tossing garbage and
my keys went down the chute also. It's the only keys I have. And so now I'm not going
to find them. Five minutes later I'm in that huge thing. It was so hard to find my key
and you know my biggest fear? Someone else sending garbage down. So my prayer was not
father let me find the key. My prayer was father while I'm finding the key let no one
throw garbage down because God knows what's coming down that chute. And I searched and
searched and searched and couldn't find it. Nobody threw garbage down. What had happened
was I threw the garbage down with such force that the key missed the whole bin and went
out. That is the first time I had to have a shower because I handled my keys. So it's
very hard to first get rid of some of this garbage that collects in my life because of
my intellectual, emotional, political and cultural beliefs and systems before you go
looking for the treasure. Jesus can find treasure in trash. You're not like that.
You can be like that one day. Athens, if you read Acts 17 you see what culture did to Athens.
When you read Acts chapter 17 verse 10 to 16 you see that their favorite thing was to
have discussions about resurrection, about new life, about this, about that. But they
would not believe anything to the point that Paul had to say in 1 Corinthians 1 that the
Jews look for a sign and the Greeks look for knowledge. Cultures come with baggage.
Your culture comes with baggage. It prevents the Spirit of God from doing the work of God.
We must attempt to get rid of it by asking the Spirit of God to show things in my culture
that prevent me from behaving a certain way. Why are we doing this? So that we can increase
in our capacity. Okay, moving on. The third thing we have to deal with is our personality.
Our personality. This is a huge one. Jesus, I don't know whether he knew it or not, but
one of the things Jesus does in Mark chapter 3 verse 17 is he calls John and James the
sons of Boanarges. I don't know how to pronounce it. Basically it means sons of thunder. He
names them that because he knew what they could be in terms of their personality. And
then you find in Mark chapter Luke 9 verse 54 John and James are so upset that the Samaritans
are not receiving Jesus that their response is, hey Jesus, if you want we can do you a
favor. We can just call down some fire and frizzle all these guys out. That is a reaction.
Remember one guy saying to me, Jacob, if you want to call down fire from heaven, make sure
you're wearing an asbestos suit. Meaning if you call down fire, you'll get burnt too,
so be careful. And Jesus turns to them and he says, you are not of the same spirit. Your
emotions and my, sorry, your personality and my personality is a certain type. I mean,
if I stood next to Matt, you would know our personalities are different, right? Matt is
a gentle soul. I'm a gentle soul. See, you laugh at it as if it's a joke. It's that bad.
The point is our personalities are not all God. I want to say this in all humility and
with much respect and gratitude. In most churches, a lot of things that I do would not have been
tolerated by the church, but you have. You have. And so I, for a moment, I'm not under a delusion
that my personality is Christ's personality. It's not. It's not. It's not. It's not. It's not.
It can rub you wrong. It can sometimes be a barb that pokes you. But thank God that
there are some good parts that prevents you from leaving. But our personalities need to
change. As my personality changes, then I become more, I increase in capacity to receive
more of the Spirit of God. At the end of the day, Jesus, it is the same Jesus who was gentle
with the tax collector and the prostitute who did take a whip off and started chasing
the moneylenders out. So it's not a personality type. It is that my personality does get in
the way and yours does too. I pray God that you admit it. Some of our personalities are
shaped by our background and our environment. But then we have the Holy Spirit, right? These
are ways to increase. Personality is distorted by experience and background. One of the classic
examples is Gideon. Gideon is threshing wheat in a wine press. He's afraid. He's speaking
what has happened to him. Can God be trusted? He has not been around. We have been messed
around with, beaten up so many times that I do not even trust when you call me mighty
warrior. I'm the least of the tribe of Benjamin. My family is not of much value. This is what
he's saying to an angel of God. To begin with, when an angel appears, you straighten up.
But this guy cannot straighten up because his personality is so deeply affected by his
environment and background. But then there is the Spirit of God. That changes Gideon.
And God allows time for you to change. Gideon did not go pull down the Baal statues or idols
in the daytime. He did it during night. When he was told to go do it openly, he did it
quietly. God is okay with that because as the personality is changing, you are improving.
But my God, if I don't make an attempt to change it, then you will have to live with
Christ plus something. It affects our responses. It installs triggers in our life. It affects
our life. I must change in this man. The next one, theology. All of these things we come
with and if it doesn't change, it becomes a problem. Theology. Acts chapter 10, verse
9 to 17. Here is a man who is arguing with God saying, I will not eat these creepy crawlies
that you are lowering in a sheet because I am a good Jew and I want you to know Yahweh
that there is no way I am going into a Gentiles house. Cornelius has sent people, they are
waiting outside to take Peter. It is going to be the moment when the earth is changed
where finally the Gentiles are participating with the Jews in the grace of God poured out
through Christ. And three times God had to lower that sheet with creepy crawlies in it.
He didn't do it three times to confirm what he was trying to say to Peter. He had to lower
it three times because Peter was not willing to change his theology. He is arguing with
Yahweh, the one who gave the laws in Leviticus about what is kosher and what is not kosher.
We have our own theologies too. If Acts 29 doesn't change, if I don't change, if you
don't change, we will have the same problem. Third time finally he comes to his senses.
God had to do it three times because he did not listen the first time. Had he listened
the first time it would have been done with. What is your theology on things? Does it match
up with the nature of God? So important. Adorn the doctrine of God by adorning the nature
of God. Adorn the doctrine of God by adorning the nature of God. You don't adorn the doctrine
of God by adorning the Greek and the Hebrew. I was saying to Tuni a few days ago, you don't
have to be educated to be a good dad. We think education means something. It doesn't. You
can have illiterate dads that are splendid fathers and you can have highly literate dads
with doctrine and a few letters after the name that are crappy fathers. Adorn the doctrine
of God based on the, adorn the doctrine of God by adorning the nature of God. Meaning
my theology should change based on my increasing knowledge of the nature of God. My theology
must change based on the increasing nature of the knowledge of God. Increasing knowledge
of the nature of God. If it doesn't then you're holding on to something from the past then
you will not be able to participate in the greatest move amongst the Gentiles that happened
in Acts chapter 10. You will be Peter the Great who did not make it. Change your theology.
All of us have pet theologies. One of the questions I often ask when things, you know
when theology gets really difficult, when what we believe in is not working. When what
we believe is working it's great, it's easy to believe. But when we, what we believe is
not working that is when we come up with stuff. Because we want to, we want to somehow fit.
Be careful of that. That is not how this works. By name, if I don't get healed or I don't
get delivered or I don't get what I need or I don't understand this or I don't understand
that, I can't now take it and shape it so that I can fit in it. That's creating Michelangelo's.
That's painting God as a human with a beard and slightly old. Sistine Chapel. God looks
like man, slightly older. We can't do that. When theology doesn't work then I have to
go and find out God, what is your nature? I don't understand why things are not happening
but I've got to look at your nature. How do I look at his nature? I look at his nature
by looking at the visible image of the one who represented his nature. And there I begin
to start the process of I do not understand it, it is not working. But I see it working
in this man's life. Who is your son? The brilliant, radiant and visible image of you, the invisible
God. He I will trust, me I will not, for let God be true and every man a liar. Start there.
That is your fundamental place of starting. Let God be true and every man a liar. There
would be fewer books in the world if we could stick with this. That's where we start from.
Then we build from there. Don't know what your previous background is. Hindu, Muslim,
Buddhist, Pentecostal Protestant, Catholic. Pack it away. Come out of the tomb. Let them
go and find it neatly wrapped and kept away. You didn't even take it with you. Let them
build a shrine around it and call it the Shroud of Turin but you leave it. Come out of the
tomb. Did you come from an orthodox church, a Pentecostal church? They both have enough
rituals there that can drown you. Put them away. Fold them. You move on. One of the things
that Romans chapter 7 says, and this is critical. Romans chapter 7 says that as long as a man
is married to a woman, he cannot marry another because if he, he talks about the woman, as
long as a woman is married to a man, Romans chapter 7 verse 1 onwards, as long as a woman
is married to a man, she cannot marry another because if she marries another she is an adulteress.
But if the man dies, then she is free to marry another. You would think he's talking
about marriage. He's not talking about marriage. He's saying if you belong to Christ and if
you want to marry Christ, you will have to have what you were married to before dead
so that you can join yourself to Christ, your bridegroom. You cannot be in one system and
marry another system. That is adultery.
Last one. Spiritual caliber. As in, when we do well, we've got to be careful that that
doesn't become something that limits the capacity that I have to handle the spirit. Spiritual
caliber. Sometimes it is possible to be doing so well at Acts 29 or in your own individual
lives or use our church as a model for others to copy and all that stuff that the spirit
of God is not able to do anything more because we are so full of what the spirit of God has
been doing. One of the cool things that happens at Gilgal is that they gather around the only
calibration that we follow and that is the Passover lamb. They gather around to eat the
Passover meal again. They had eaten it long ago in Jerusalem. This is a new breed, a new
bunch of guys who don't know their fathers and mothers who disobeyed and they gather
together to eat the Passover lamb. What they don't know is that as soon as they finish
eating the Passover lamb, manna is going to stop. These kids had only grown up on manna
and the moment they eat it, the next morning they go out and they're squat. There's nothing
lying on the ground. Must have been like crazy. It's like kids who were born during
COVID. They can't understand why people don't have that white thing over their faces anymore.
Mama, alien. Masks are off. Most kids think that's how you're born. And so there are these
40 year olds. They'll make a movie about this. You just watch. There are these 40 year olds
who have known nothing else but manna burgers, manna dosas, masala manas. That's all they've
known. Quail wrapped up with masala in manna. Manna burgers. Beyond manna burgers. That's
the worst. Put vegetables in it and give it to you and call it beyond manna. And so this
is what they were accustomed to and then they have Passover meal and suddenly it's all over
and so the only constant with the Holy Spirit is change. The only constant with the Holy
Spirit is change. And that is something God has done brilliantly in this church where
change is not something you're averse to or if you're averse to it you are not showing
it anymore. But change is the only constant. It's authored by, fueled by and sustained
by the Holy Spirit. And so the only constant with the Holy Spirit is change. And that is
the only constant that it's authored by, fueled by and sustained by the Holy Spirit. And
it's the only constant. And just remember that sometimes our spiritual caliber can limit
the capacity of the Spirit. Next time we'll do Bethel. I would suggest that you go home
and look at this. The great advantage of teaching is I look at it before I come and
then look at it after we are done. You have to try and look at it after you hear it. What
is it in your former life that you can ask the Holy Spirit to break away or cut out and
let him help you? If it happens instantly, blessed are you. Some of us have had to struggle
with it. What about your intellectual, emotional, cultural baggage that is delaying, diverting
or deceiving you? If it could happen to Nicodemus, Jesus' mother and brother, Peter, then it
can happen to you. What about your personality, which has been distorted by experience and
background, where you speak like Gideon, where there's an instant trigger or a response that
affects everything you do, so much so that Jesus has to turn around and say, Jacob, you're
not of my spirit. What about your theology? What are you holding on to? What have you
shaped to match your circumstances? And finally, are you so full of what the Holy Spirit was
doing two months ago that you do not allow the Holy Spirit any room to continue doing
what he really wants to do? This is what the act of yielding looks like, guys. And so I
end with a sign of divine ownership that we can practice. And I left this out for the
end. The sign of divine ownership that we can practice is communion. That is the sign
of divine ownership. So let's just partake in communion and then we can go. Wow, not
bad. 101 with all those reports. I'll be here as far as I know, God willing, for the next
four Sundays. My trips will be in between the week to places like New York or Los Angeles
or Vernon. So if you need to get in touch with me, feel free. Guys, pray about what we need
to do. Not pray about. Begin to try and talk, have conversations with God about what we
need to do with this building because our lease expires in a month. And don't know what
to do next, whether to continue here, whether there's some other place waiting for us, whether
I should approach the owners or not, I don't know. So we'll just keep it for a second and
then I'll give it to you. Yeah. So just begin asking, having conversations with God about it,
let's see what happens. Because I don't think the owner has realized that there are no checks
in July. So, then if you want to buy this place, feel free. Hey, don't. So after your marriage, you'll
have a reception in Vancouver also? Yes. Okay. Derek, you escaped. You had a super small
marriage. Yeah, I think that would be better. I think you should both do it together. Yeah.
Because he escaped doing a big wedding in Kerala. He used COVID as an excuse, invited 20 people
out of which 18 was family. And then he didn't have a reception when he came back here either.
Derek, you escaped. You had a super small marriage. Yeah, I think that would be better. I think
you should both do it together. Yeah. Because he escaped doing a big wedding in Kerala. He used
COVID as an excuse. Yeah. I have a feeling these guys will go cheaper on us and just
combine. In the end, there'll be four people having one reception.
Come, guys. What are you?
Oh, you're bringing the same... Oh, sorry. I thought it was the cup. No, no, you can wait.
Yeah, I just wanted the cup. Yeah. So, guys, I just want us to remember that today when we are
partaking of this, we are saying this is a sign of divine ownership. And so one of the things
that I know you've heard before is this idea of the bride listening in as the bridegroom would
come and offer the father the terms of betrothal. And it would be that he would provide for us,
that he would bring us back to the house of the bridegroom. And so I think that would be
a good idea. And I think that would be a good idea.
And so I think that would be a good idea.
And so I'll go with what I've heard. The bride would listen to it and there would be two cups
kept there. And if the bride agreed to the
price and to everything that was suggested during betrothal, she would take the cup,
she would drink it, and she'd turn it upside down, saying that
I commit to this betrothal. And the betrothal was, I only have eyes for you,
I am yours now and nobody else's. It was a sign of divine ownership.
So at the risk of even dirtying some of the chairs that we sit on,
or maybe your palm,
let's do that. Let's eat of this bread and drink of this cup and pledge our allegiance with
words, in your own words to the Lord, saying this is my small sign
of ownership that I want to enter into. Own me. You already own me, I'm just acknowledging it.
It's not even own me. It is you have paid the price. I am yours. 1 Corinthians 6, so beautiful.
Do you not know that you are not your own? You were bought with a price. Therefore now
you are a temple of the Holy Spirit. Yeah? Let me just read the
scripture. 1 Corinthians
6, towards the end.
Yeah. Let me start from verse 17.
But he who
is joined to the Lord becomes one spirit with him. Flee from sexual
immorality. Every other sin a person commits is outside the body.
But the sexually immoral person sins against his own body.
Don't worry about understanding that right now. Understand 6, 17. But he who is
joined to the Lord becomes one spirit with him. And now go to verse 19 and 20.
Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God?
You are not your own, for you were bought with a price, so glorify God in your body.
So we are already owned, but there's just a sign saying, I love my ownership.
Thank you. Yeah? So guys, if you want to come and distribute.
Father, can I just skip on the day that you were
betrayed and go this route today? Okay. Let's take it.
And the cup too. And then once we do, just do that symbolic act and
we'll be done.