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"What Father among you
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if his son asks for a fish
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will instead of a fish
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give him a serpent?
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Or if he asks for an egg
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will give him a scorpion?
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If you then who are evil
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know how to give good gifts
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to your children,
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how much more will your heavenly Father
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give the Holy Spirit to
those who ask Him?"
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Now, brethren, I would
just challenge you here.
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How much more will your heavenly Father
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give the Holy Spirit to them that ask Him?
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One thing I want you to see right off
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and absolutely clearly
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and make no mistake about:
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These are saved men
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asking Jesus to teach them to pray.
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These are not lost men asking Jesus
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how to be saved.
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Now that's important
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because the way to be saved
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is not to ask God for the Holy Spirit.
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You understand that, right?
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Because there can be
a misunderstanding here.
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People can look at this and they can say,
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well, if they're asking
for the Holy Spirit,
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maybe that means that they
don't have the Holy Spirit
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and people that don't have the Holy Spirit
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are lost people,
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and so you go the Father and
you ask Him for the Spirit,
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and basically, if, you know,
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Paul says this in Roman 8,
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if you don't have the Spirit,
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you don't belong to Jesus Christ.
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Right? So maybe it's people
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who don't have the Spirit,
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who don't belong to Jesus Christ
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coming to the Father to get the Spirit
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so that they can get saved.
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I don't know if any of you
have ever thought that,
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but that is obviously not what that means.
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What you have is you have the idea
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of a child going to his father,
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which is very consistent
with the disciples
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asking Jesus to show them how to pray
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to their Father.
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And that's how Jesus started, right?
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Pray this way: "Father..."
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"Our Father..."
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So, what does that mean?
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Obviously every single Christian
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has the Holy Spirit,
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so if we already have the Spirit,
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and if the Spirit once
takes up residency -
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by the way,
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one of the promises connected
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with the New Covenant
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is that God's going to
give His Spirit to us.
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He's going to put His Spirit within us.
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And if we don't have that Spirit,
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what is it? About Romans 8:9 I think?
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If we don't have the Spirit,
we don't belong to Christ.
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And obviously, we don't go
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having the Spirit, losing the Spirit,
having the Spirit, losing the Spirit.
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Once that Spirit is given,
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He is with us always.
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Forever.
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Jesus said that.
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Jesus said that this Comforter was coming,
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and He would be with them forever.
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And so what do we make of that?
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Why are we praying for the Holy Spirit
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if we already have the Holy Spirit?
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Well, it's interesting,
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if we look at the parallel passage
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over in Matthew 7,
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it doesn't say "Holy Spirit" there,
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it says "good things."
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It almost seems to me like
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what Luke does is He reaches
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in the bag of good things
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and He brings out the best thing.
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And why would I say the best thing?
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Because Jesus, back there
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in that area where John started -
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the John 14, 15, 16 realm
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where Christ is leaving His disciples -
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do you know why He was telling them
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that He was leaving them peace
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and that they ought not to be afraid?
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Because He was telling
them at the same time
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that He was going away.
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He was going to be taken away,
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but He said this to them:
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Look, it is more profitable for you
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that I go and the Holy Spirit come.
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There is something
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about having the Holy Spirit
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that is more profitable for the church
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than if Christ remained here bodily,
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earthly Himself.
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And Jesus realized it.
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The Holy Spirit was going to unleash
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such power into the church.
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You think about just what happened
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in the life of Peter.
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Here's Peter walking with Christ
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bodily on the earth,
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and look what he was like,
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versus when Christ leaves,
the Spirit comes,
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now Peter's filled with the Spirit,
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where before he was denying Christ
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in front of little girls.
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Now he's standing boldly
before the Sanhedrin
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and he's proclaiming Christ.
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And Christ Himself said
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Peter was going to go all the way
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to laying down his life for Christ.
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The Spirit of God
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endued the church of God
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with power from on high.
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And basically, I think the way
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we want to take Luke 11,
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how much more will our Father
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give the Holy Spirit to them that ask.
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It's the idea of the
influences of the Spirit,
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and we all have to admit
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that even in that early church,
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they had the Spirit there.
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The Spirit came down on that church
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on the day of Pentecost.
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But some of those very same men
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upon whom that Spirit fell in that day,
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we find later accounts
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where filled with the Holy Spirit
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there was boldness,
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there was all sorts of things
breaking out in the church.
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The power of God is not
static in the church.
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You can't come to that
conclusion by the book of Acts.
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You can't come to that
conclusion historically.
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You can't come to that conclusion probably
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if you've been a Christian
any length of time,
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you realize it in your own life.
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In the life of the church,
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we have ebbs and flows.
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Brethren, a pastor friend has said,
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brethren, if we have such
promise in the Scriptures,
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every time we come to pray,
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we ought to be asking for the Holy Spirit.
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For what?
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What does the Holy Spirit
bring to the church?
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It brought to that early church
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boldness and courage
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to proclaim the Gospel.
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The Holy Spirit brings the Word to mind.
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Remember? He said if they get imprisoned
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or they're brought before these leaders
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that don't worry ahead of time
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what you're going to say?
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Have you guys ever experienced that?
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You've been in a situation -
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maybe you haven't been in prison,
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but you've been in a situation
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where immediately you needed something
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and God gave it to you.
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Brethren, He brings the
fruits of the Spirit.
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The chief one is love.
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You just can't get away from it.
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The New Testament is basically this:
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Christ gave a new commandment.
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That commandment is a commandment of love.
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That is the greatest test of Christianity.
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Love.
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And the Spirit is the one
Who gives it to us.
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A love for Christ Himself.
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A love on the horizontal
plane for one another.
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A love in the church.
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We heard about peace.
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He gives that peace.
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My peace I leave with you.
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Where does that peace come from?
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We find in Galatians 5 distinctly
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that peace comes from the Spirit of God.
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This Spirit is the one Who gives gifts
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to the church.
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Do we want gifts?
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Do we want laborers?
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Do we want men and women
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who have abilities to minister,
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to show mercy,
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to give, to teach, to serve?
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Absolutely!
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All that gamut of gifts.
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Even the supernatural element.
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Brethren, it's the Spirit of God
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that gives those things.
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The Spirit of God is that Spirit
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which we are warned against quenching.
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Quenching has the idea
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of throwing water on a fire.
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You throw water on a fire,
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it diminishes its heat.
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It diminishes its light.
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The Spirit is what infuses the church
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with light and heat.
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We need to pray for the Spirit.
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When the Spirit helps us,
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when the Spirit empowers us,
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it's only then, brethren,
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that we can advance
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and we can take ground.
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It's the Spirit of God
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that puts that fire in the
hearts of men and women
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to go forth, to lay down their lives
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for the Gospel's sake,
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to sacrifice.
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It's the Holy Spirit that we need
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in order to have a powerful Gospel.
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It's the Holy Spirit
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that causes men to be born again.
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We want to see life in this church.
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We want to see growth.
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Don't we find also,
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what is it about 2 Thessalonians 2:13?
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1 Thessalonians 2:13
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We find there, brethren,
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we are sanctified by the Holy Spirit.
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Sanctification. Any kind of growth.
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Don't we also find in 2 Corinthians 3:18,
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that by the Lord Who is the Spirit,
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that's how we behold the glory of Christ?
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And are transformed into His image
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from one degree of glory to another?
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Brethren, the Spirit of God
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is also an intercessor in our prayers.
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We find that in Romans 8.
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The Spirit is a Spirit of adoption.
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And He bears witness with our spirits
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that we're children of God.
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Beloved, do we want
assurance in this church?
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I'll tell you what,
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it's when we have a hope of salvation,
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and a deep-founded assurance
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that you can lay your
life down for Christ.
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People would go around
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doubting, wondering,
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not sure if they're in,
sure if they're out,
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very difficult for people like that
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to really launch out and
do anything for Christ.
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Brethren, we need the Spirit's power
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and His working in our midst.
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And what we have here is a promise.
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What we have here is disciples
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coming to Christ and saying,
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"Teach us to pray."
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And He wraps up this whole
instruction on prayer
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with this: be persistent.
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Ask and seek and knock.
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And above every other thing
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that He talks to us about asking for,
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He says seek from your
Father the Holy Spirit.
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I believe that when it says
ask for the Holy Spirit,
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the idea is that we are to ask
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for His influences,
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for His fiery influences.
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Brethren, we don't want
to quench that Spirit.
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We want to ask for it.
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Did that about use up that 20 minutes?
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Pretty close.
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I just leave you with this thought.
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"How much more will the heavenly Father
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give the Holy Spirit to
those who ask Him?"
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Did you catch those last words?
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To those who ask Him.
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Brethren, you let your Calvinism
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take you in a direction
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where you logically start to conclude
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that your prayers don't matter -
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James says you have not
because you do not ask.
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Brethren, if you've got
a sort of Calvinism
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that doesn't believe that statement,
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then dump it.
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Prayer matters.
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God hears prayer.
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God gives the Holy Spirit
to those who ask.
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Jesus does not say
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that if you don't ask, don't seek,
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don't knock, God is sovereign,
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God has His decrees,
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and He's going to do it anyways.
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He doesn't say that.
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He says He gives the Holy Spirit
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to them that ask.
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Brethren, God forbid we get to the end
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and we find we could have had more
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if we would have asked for it,
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but we just didn't ask.
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God help us to not get to that place.
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Amen.
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You're dismissed for the moment.