This message is one of the Times Square
Church Pulpit Series.
It was recorded in the sanctuary of Times
Square Church in Manhattan, New York City.
Other tapes are available by writing World Challenge,
PO Box 260, Lindell, Texas 75771, or calling
903-963-8626.
You are welcome to make additional cassettes of
this message for free distribution to friends.
However, for all other forms of reproduction or
electronic transmission, existing copyright laws apply.
Thank you, choir, orchestra.
I add my welcome to all of our
visitors today.
We love you.
We thank the Lord that you're with us
this morning.
And we covet your prayers as we continue
in this great city to proclaim the gospel
of Christ.
I'd like to just have a heart-to
-heart talk with you this morning.
A very simple message, the ministry of the
Holy Spirit.
The ministry of the Holy Spirit.
Nothing new, very, very simple, but something that
God's been speaking to my heart and has
been a source of encouragement to me in
our present family trial.
The ministry of the Holy Spirit.
Will you turn to John 14, please?
The 14th chapter of John, beginning at verse
15.
I want to read a few verses.
John 14.
And God's blessing to those in the annex
and the overflow rooms, though you're not here
in this main auditorium, we're all one, the
same spirit.
In this room, as in the room you're
sitting, we trust that the word of the
Lord will encourage and lift your spirit today.
John 14, begin to read verse 15.
If you love me, keep my commandments.
And I will pray the Father, and he
shall give you another comforter, that he may
abide with you forever.
Even the spirit of truth whom the world
cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither
knoweth him.
But you know him.
Now, that's amazing.
You know him.
For he dwelleth with you and shall be
in you.
I will not leave you comfortless.
I will come to you.
Oh, God, thank you for sending the Holy
Spirit.
Jesus, thank you.
You're a very spirit that comes in our
times of need always.
You're never away.
You're always present, and you're here this morning.
Lord, there are people that have walked here
into this house that attend this church and
those who are visiting, and they brought with
them this morning pain and hurt and misunderstandings
and so many things that pressed them.
Some that woke up this morning, there was
just a heaviness and there was a pain,
and it may be lingering yet.
And we pray, Holy Spirit, that if they
would just turn to you, open our hearts
to hear what the Spirit has to say,
what the Lord has to say to us
in the way of encouragement and comfort, we
pray.
We acknowledge you, Holy Spirit.
Without you, we can say nothing of impact.
We can do nothing of lasting value.
We trust wholly and completely in the work
of God and the grace of our loving
Savior.
In Jesus' name, amen.
God sent the Holy Spirit to bring to
Christ a chaste bride.
He came to love and protect and keep
the bride of Christ from the wicked one.
If you're in Christ, you're in his bridehood.
And the Holy Spirit has been given.
Christ said, I will send you the Comforter.
This is the name that Jesus gave to
him.
This is the name the Heavenly Father gave
to him, Comforter.
I've spent years studying the Holy Spirit in
my earlier days.
I wanted to know more and more about
the Holy Spirit.
After all, we talk about being Spirit-led
and Spirit-filled people.
And I went through the Puritan's volumes and
tried to study the names of the Holy
Spirit, the Paraclete, and many, many names of
the Holy Spirit and his work.
You see, the Holy Spirit was there, creation.
He was, the whole world was created through
the power of the Holy Spirit.
Christ was, Jesus was there in the Father.
All things were made by him and for
him.
And I believe in a Trinity, God Father,
Son, and God the Holy Ghost.
But there is a special ministry of the
Holy Spirit.
And the Holy Spirit, when I began to
study him, it was not as edifying because
the Bible says that he has come to
glorify Christ and bring back to us all
the words that Jesus said.
He did not speak of himself.
And so every time I tried to get
deeper into the study of the person of
the Holy Spirit, the more frustrating it was
for me because all the Holy Ghost wanted
to talk about was Jesus.
And he kept leading me back to the
study and the hunger and reaching out for
more of an understanding of who Jesus is
and what he has accomplished.
Scripture says, when he, the spirit of truth,
has come, he will guide you into all
truth, for he shall not speak of himself,
but whatsoever he shall hear, that shall he
speak.
And he will show you things to come.
He shall glorify me, Christ is speaking, he
shall glorify me.
He shall receive of mine and shall show
it unto you.
He will show it unto you.
This little message this morning is not so
much about the person of the Holy Spirit,
but the ministry of the Holy Spirit, what
he has been called to do.
And I think, you know, we talk about
the Holy Spirit being grieved, and I think
the grief of the Holy Spirit, more than
the sins that we commit, is this one
great sin of unbelief and not allowing him
to do what he has been called to
do.
Walking in the Spirit, to me, is a
very simple matter.
Allowing the Holy Spirit to do what I
read he's called to do.
It's plainly there in front of me.
He's called to guide me and lead me
into all truth.
He's called to comfort me also in my
time of need.
Now, when Jesus called him a comforter, that
was an infallible prophecy.
This suggests that we're going to need comfort.
Why would he call him a comforter unless
he knew we were going to need it?
It was infallible prophecy of the ministry and
the work that he was called to do.
Bringing to our remembrance everything Jesus said to
us.
And then he went on, Jesus said, I
will not leave you comfortless, I will come
to you.
I will not leave you comfortless, I will
come to you.
Now, I don't think the disciples understood that.
Because, you see, just before Jesus ascended to
heaven, he called his disciples together.
And what a sad group this was.
What a tragic moment for them, they thought.
Their sole source of comfort had been the
person of Jesus Christ.
The man Jesus, who looked just like them,
talked like them, walked with them.
And all their teaching, their guidance and everything
they had was from him.
And now he said he's going to the
Father.
And he's just said, I want you to
go into all the world and preach the
gospel.
And they're thinking, well, here I go now.
Where do I get my guidance?
Where do I get my comfort?
Where do I get my authority?
He's going up.
I don't think they comprehended.
He says, I'm going to leave you, but
I'm not going to leave you comfortless.
I'm not going to leave you to your
own devices.
I'm not going to leave you to having
to figure out everything that's happening in your
life.
I'm going to come back to you.
I will not leave you comfortless.
I will come to you.
The Holy Spirit is the Spirit of Christ,
though he has his own personality.
You know, a lot of people think of
the Holy Spirit as some kind of holy
smoke.
You know, he just drifts over the whole
world.
It's like an aura, some kind of influence.
No, he's more than influence.
He has a personality, the very personality of
the Father and the Son.
He has his own distinct essence.
He's of the essence of the Father, but
distinctly called, a personality that he has, and
a work and a ministry that God has
assigned to him.
The Scripture says that when he, the Holy
Spirit...
By the way, we hear it said that
he's going to pour out his Spirit upon
the whole world, but the Scripture said when
the Spirit comes, he will reprove or convince
the world of sin because they believe not
in me.
That means he's going to show the world
that the foundational sin, the root sin that
causes all other sin is unbelief.
And he says, I am come and I'm
going to reprove or I'm going to convince
the world of sin because they don't believe
in me.
And this is the work of the Holy
Spirit.
It's based on this foundational truth that unbelief
is the foundational sin.
It's the sin of all sins.
It's the mother of all sins because they
don't believe in me.
They don't believe in my blood.
They don't believe that I am the Redeemer.
And the Holy Spirit has come to convince
men of unbelief, of their unbelief that the
only way to Christ is through faith.
And secondly, of righteousness because I go to
my Father and you see me no more.
Jesus is saying here clearly, I have witnesses
now.
There were many, many witnesses there that saw
him ascend to heaven.
I go to my Father.
Listen to it again.
He says, convince the world of righteousness because
I go to my Father and you see
me no more.
What are you saying?
I'm sending you forth as witnesses that God
the Father took me to glory.
Now a generation has called him a winebibber.
That generation has called him a liar, a
cheat, a phony.
Scripture says very clearly that they had rejected
him.
But you see, the witnesses are now, the
Holy Spirit says, I'm going to convince the
world of righteousness through your testimony that God
took me up and God would not take
a wicked winebibber to heaven.
He would not take a wicked man.
You're my witnesses.
This is the Holy Spirit.
We have these witnesses still telling their story
here in this fired word of God.
The witnesses that he ascended to the Father.
He was a righteous man.
A man that could be trusted pure holiness.
And of judgment because the prince of this
world is judged.
And this is the Holy Spirit testifying to
the world that Jesus judged the power of
Satan.
Of judgment because the prince of this world
has been judged.
At the cross Jesus judged the prince of
the world and took away his power to
condemn those who are living in Christ Jesus
by faith.
Hallelujah.
Now the Holy Spirit is right now living
on this planet.
Now I know some of us wish that
Jesus was still here on earth.
The man Christ Jesus.
That he could come like he's in Philadelphia
this morning and he's going to be in
New York tonight.
In our evening service.
And walk down this aisle and he's going
to sit here in some kind of form.
And you're going to know it and he's
going to stand up here and just offer
you words of comfort.
Well, if he were here in the flesh
he could only be in one place at
one time.
Everybody in China would have to wait.
Everybody in India would have to wait.
The whole world would have to wait because
he's in Times Square Church on Sunday night.
What the Lord is saying, you see, I'm
going to come back to you but I'm
coming back in spirit.
And I'm going to cover the whole earth.
I'm going to shed forth who I am
and the knowledge of who I am and
what I've said and what I mean.
And what I plan to do and I'll
show you things to come.
I'm going to do this all through the
spirit that covers the whole earth.
Glory be to God.
The Holy Spirit is just as real in
this place as you are.
And I am.
You look me in the face and I
hear you.
You see me wave my hands.
You can hear me talk.
You see my hair gray as it is.
You see my body but the Holy Spirit
is just as real as I am.
You are sitting there.
He abides in you.
And this is what you've got to come
to understand.
He is a reality.
He has a personality.
He's one of the God.
And He is not out in the cosmos
somewhere taking care of the cosmos and the
stars.
Yes, He's put all of that in divine
order but He abides right here.
He lives in me.
He lives in you.
Amazing, amazing.
The Holy Ghost abides.
He said I've come to abide and to
live in you.
He desires you to lay hold of the
concept of this reality.
The sending of the Holy Spirit is a
very personal matter also.
For you've not received the spirit of bondage
again to fear but you have received the
spirit of adoption whereby we cry Abba Father.
The spirit itself bearing witness with our spirit
that we are children of God, heirs of
God, joint heirs with Christ.
And this refers to part of the ministry
of Christ.
It has to do with a custom, oriental
custom in Christ's time.
When adoption was underway, when the process was
underway, the child, this could be most likely
a children's home.
It could be a vagrant that's picked up
and is taken legally to the court.
And the child, though the father has his
eye on the child and says this is
the child that I want, this child cannot
call him any more than a father.
He's a father.
He has children.
He is a father.
He can't call him my father.
Abba is my father until the papers are
legally signed.
And you see this is the work of
the Holy Spirit.
Jesus Christ adopted you and me at the
cross.
He pointed you out.
He said, I want him.
I want her.
I want you.
And he chose us.
You didn't choose him.
He said, I chose you.
I chose you.
You were not a Jew.
You were not in the vine.
You were outside the vine.
And I adopted you.
I took you in.
I made you a spiritual Jew.
I made you a part of this vine.
And I took you into my family and
made you an heir, a joint heir.
But there was a time there was someone
had to bring the child to the father
and show the papers to the judge and
say, this is the legal adoption.
It's been signed.
Folks, it was signed by the blood of
Jesus Christ at Calvary.
And the Holy Spirit brings you to the
father.
And the Holy Spirit says the work has
been done.
You're no longer an orphan.
You can now call him your father.
And for the first time, this child embraces
the father.
The father embraces and says, you are mine
legally.
You cannot be taken from me.
You are mine eternally.
You are my everlasting.
You're my child.
You're all my other children.
You're heir of everything I am.
Here you go.
You're adopted.
And this is the work of the Holy
Spirit to bring us to the father with
the knowledge and the continuous knowledge and the
acceptance of our being adopted to the heavenly
father, adopted to Christ the father through Jesus
Christ our Lord.
I'm adopted.
And what an affront to the Holy Spirit
that we cannot accept the work that the
father signed to him to bring us to
the father and continually give us this assurance
of adoption that I am adopted.
I'm not alone.
I have resources.
I'm a brother to Jesus.
He's my kinsman.
He's my brother.
He's my savior.
I am a joint heir with Jesus Christ
and the Holy Spirit's work in me.
It's not just that I'm able to speak
with a heavenly language, speak in tongues, or
that I have gifts.
Those gifts really can't operate in the power
of the anointing as they should unless you
have this knowledge that you are loved, that
you are adopted, that I have a heavenly
father who so cared for me and so
loved me.
I have a Christ who died for me.
And I have a Holy Spirit who has
brought me to the knowledge, to the inner
knowledge that I am so loved.
And you see, the grief of the Holy
Spirit is that we don't accept that, that
we still live as orphans, though we know
legally that we've been adopted.
You hear that.
I'm adopted son of God or daughter of
the heavenly father.
Yet we live like poverty-stricken street urchins,
without faith, without appropriating the promises and the
comfort and all of the things that he's
promised us and appropriated to us.
But you've not received the spirit of bondage
again to fear.
You're not to fear being left alone anymore.
You're not to fear that the devil's going
to destroy you.
You're not to fear the devil going to
come and say, you're mine, that you have
no rights to the heavenly father's glory.
But you have received the spirit of adoption.
That's the Holy Spirit.
It's the spirit of adoption.
That no matter how I may wake up,
whatever kind of black cloud may be hanging
over my head, I am to allow the
Holy Spirit to do his work of encouraging
and comforting me.
You're adopted.
You're not alone.
All the power of God is yours if
you'll trust in that.
And just allow the Holy Spirit.
Open up your mind and your heart, Holy
Spirit.
Begin to just cry out, Abba, Father, the
Holy Spirit.
If you allow the Holy Spirit to speak
and you walk and live in the Holy
Spirit, that's the cry that's going to come
to your heart.
Abba, she's my father.
Yes, I know there's a whole church choir
full of people that are adopted.
Yes, I know Pastor Dave's adopted.
I know Pastor Doug, but I'm adopted.
He is my father.
And there has to be that personal contact,
the Holy Spirit doing a personal work in
you.
I am loved.
It's an amazing thing that most of us
as believers, especially if you've walked in righteousness,
you've had a hunger for God, you can
say, I love the reproof of the Holy
Spirit.
I love Him when He deals with sin
in my life.
I love it when the Word comes forth
because I so want to please the Lord.
I so want to please my Heavenly Father.
And some of you are so capable of
receiving correction, so capable of receiving the reproof
of the Holy Spirit.
Oh yeah, you don't even mind being spanked
by the Word of the Holy Spirit because
you know it's going to produce some kind
of victory in your life.
But what a tragedy that a majority of
people who love reproof, many, many of them
have never accepted the fact that they're loved,
that the Holy Spirit has loved them, that
God has so loved them that He has
sent the Holy Spirit to keep them and
to show that love.
And there are many of you sitting here
now, no matter how hard the message is,
you receive it, you weep and you cry,
but you've never really enjoyed, you've never really
settled in, and you've never relaxed in the
presence of Jesus.
You're so busy wanting to please Him, you
won't allow the Holy Spirit to shed abroad
the love of God in your heart.
And that's what He's come to do.
The Scripture said He's come to shed abroad
the love of God through the Holy Ghost.
Not just to the whole world, but shed
abroad all through your human being, through your
mind and your spirit and everything else, to
shed abroad in your heart the love of
God that He is loving.
It says the love of God, not the
love for God.
Many of us love God.
Oh, we love Him with everything in our
heart, but we never receive His love.
Some of you here right now have never,
ever allowed the Holy Spirit to bring you
into the fullness of God's love for you.
I know what it was for a number
of years, my earlier years as a young
pastor, so struggling to please God, so struggling
to live in such victory.
And it's like a young preacher who came
to me not too long ago, and he
said, Pastor Dave, recently I had a voice
mimic the Holy Ghost.
And a sweet little voice came to me
and said, if you want to please me,
this is the Heavenly Father speaking, and if
you want to please me, you're going to
have to read more Scripture than you've been
reading.
You're going to have to pray many, many
more hours.
And you're going to have to eat just
certain foods, and I'm going to give you
direction.
I'm going to tell you what foods to
eat so that your body will be stronger,
because your body is a temple of the
Holy Ghost.
You're going to have to keep all of
these nutritional things, and you've got to do
this and that.
And all these things were outlined to me.
And he said, but such condemnation and guilt
I couldn't keep up.
You see, that's what legalism does.
Legalism takes on a mimicking voice of the
Holy Spirit and tries to get you into
some kind of bondage.
It takes you away from the promises of
the New Covenant and takes you back under
the Old Covenant, where God will bless you,
the enemy says.
This voice will say, God will bless you
if you do this, you do that.
And if you fail, you're going to pay
the price.
The Spirit's going to be lifted from you.
He's going to get mad and grieved and
leave you until you learn your lesson that
He's going to come back when you're better.
No, no, no, no, there's nothing in the
Scripture that has anything to do with that
at all.
He said, I will never leave you, I
will never forsake you.
The grief of the Holy Spirit is that
you won't allow Him to do what God
sent Him to do.
Because of fear, you're looking at your circumstances
rather than that of His glorious promises.
Hallelujah.
This mission of the Holy Spirit is an
eternal mission.
It doesn't last for just a few years.
It's absolute eternal, the Scripture says, eternal.
Because the love of God is shed abroad,
that means poured out in our hearts by
the Holy Ghost which is given to us,
that's Romans 5.5. I want you to
go to Isaiah 66 for just a moment,
if you will, please.
And there's just two verses I want you
to see in the 66th chapter of Isaiah.
Isaiah 66.
I want you to look at verses 13
and 14.
Folks, God has been speaking through the prophet
Isaiah to a people who Scripture says went
on forwardly in the way of their own
heart.
Now, these were God's people, but they had
compromise in their lives.
But you see, the Holy Spirit has been
called the Hound of Heaven.
You can't chase Him away.
He's been saying, if you've received Christ as
Lord, He is not going to leave you
in any of your circumstances, He's not going
to run.
He's just going to keep coming at you,
not going to come in anger.
He's not going to come and try to
rebuke you.
He's going to come and remind you of
who you are.
Your adopted state, your adopted standing rather, not
the state, but your standing is permanent, that
you are a child of God, you've been
adopted.
And the Holy Spirit says, I'm not going
to let you chase Him away because my
Father sent me to keep you.
My Father sent me on a mission to
comfort you when you're down and when you're
hurting.
Now, Isaiah says that, when I read this
the other day, it just, bless me, verse
13, As one whom his mother comforteth, so
will I comfort you, and you shall be
comforted in Jerusalem.
And when you see this, your hearts shall
rejoice, and your bones shall flourish like a
herb, and the hand of the Lord shall
be known toward his servants, and his indignation
toward his enemies.
As one whom his mother comforteth.
This was written to me this past week.
Please pardon the personal indulgence here, but I'm
not speaking this for sympathy, but out of
trying to illuminate the Scripture here.
As you know, our granddaughter is in our
home, and the doctor says terminal, and she's
been in and out of, she's semi-conscious.
And yesterday we thought we were losing her,
but I watched Debbie, my daughter, Tiffy's mother
and dad, and I just stood back watching.
It was amazing.
You see, in our home, there's nobody, there's
no sorrow.
There's pain, but no sorrow.
And all of the children, all our children
and grandchildren go through the house singing Amazing
Grace.
And the room where she's in, they're singing
praises to the Lord and worship.
And I watched, though this little child could
hardly open her eyes, and watched mother lean
over and say, Tiffy, I love you.
And watched the father, he's been there night
and day just bathing and caring as a
mother.
A helpless child.
And the gift that this mother has of
ministering to this child, I just sit back
and amazed at the human love, the gift
of love.
Didn't he say, if you'd been earthly, know
how to give good gifts to your children,
how much more your heavenly father.
You see, the Bible said he's a comforter.
I know what that means.
I know the comfort of the Holy Spirit.
What an incredible thing to come out of
a room like that, a heavy hearted grandfather,
and just suddenly you walk out and you
feel the power of people's prayers.
You know in your heart and you say,
Jesus, you can raise that child up just
like that.
You can speak a word and you can
heal that child anytime you want.
And you know I believe that.
I have more faith now in God's healing
power than I've ever had in my life.
But I know something else.
I know that the Holy Spirit was given
a mission.
And I'm giving him opportunity and my family
gives him opportunity and permission and openness to
do what God has called him to do,
to comfort.
But that requires faith.
You've got to believe that when you're in
a trial, God's going to be there.
The Holy Spirit's going to be there.
God sent him on a mission and he's
not a liar.
It's impossible for him to lie.
Now if you're going through something, I'm saying
all that for one reason right now.
Some of you need a Holy Ghost hug.
You need the Holy Ghost to allow him
to embrace you.
Because you see, he's been sent on a
mission of love.
It's a mission of love.
Oh, that he could open our eyes and
our understanding to see that he didn't come
to condemn you.
He didn't come to condemn me.
I can't conceive how some people can live
with this abominable doctrine.
They come in a hospital room, as I
said last week, and call Debbie out and
said, I want to know where the sin
is in your life that caused this cancer.
And I get emails.
I'm getting emails from all over the world
that people have heard about it.
And I listen to this and I get
to think, don't they know the Holy Spirit?
Don't they know the Word of God at
all?
Don't they know that the Holy Spirit comes
in the time of need?
I'm not looking for some quack doctor.
I'm not looking for some special nutrition.
I'm leaning on the power of the Holy
Spirit.
And folks, I'm telling you now, if you're
here this morning, and you came here with
a cloud over your head this morning, or
you're going through a trial, you're going through
something.
And I'll tell you something.
I see people that don't even want to
talk to me.
They don't want to talk to our family
because they have a 13-year-old granddaughter
or a 12-year-old granddaughter.
And they're afraid that I might infect them
or that if they, for some reason or
another, that there's something going on in my
life and I might transfer it somehow to
them.
And I feel so sorry for them.
I feel so sorry for them.
The ministry of the Holy Spirit is a
love ministry.
The tragedy today of seeing how the Holy
Ghost is being abused, how people talk about
the Holy Ghost coming down and they make
animal noises.
Folks, I dare you to come in to
my granddaughter's bedroom that is full of the
Holy Ghost and the peace of Christ and
go into some kind of a jerking motion
and bark like a dog.
I dare you.
When you would say that the Holy Ghost
is just going to jiggle you around and
throw you around and toss you like a
ball.
No, no, no, no.
If you come in a room and the
Holy Ghost comforts you there, you're going to
feel peace like you've never known.
It's going to be like a river and
you're going to feel the love of God.
The love of God.
I look at my granddaughter and, oh, my
heart goes out.
But I know in my heart that God
has a reason for everything that He does.
And we're facing hard times, folks.
New York City is facing bankruptcy.
They're going to be very difficult times.
Many, many thousands are going to be laid
off.
We're going into some hard, perilous times.
And every single state in the United States,
every single one of our states is in
deep economic trouble.
It's not just economic, though.
You can have, and I'm not trying to
scare you, but there can be a phone
call to you at any time.
You may be sitting here, what if I
face a tragedy?
What if one of my children is affected
or someone close to me is affected?
Well, folks, would you take it from me?
Would you take it from me?
And from the Word of God, when the
comfort is needed, He's there.
He's there.
You may not need it right now, but
when it comes, you're not going to fall
apart.
And some of you think you're the weakest.
You think, oh, I'll fall apart.
You're going to be the strongest.
Because I've watched one of, you know, forgive
me for being so personal, but I remember
one of my daughters married with children.
And in a time of testing, she came
weeping to me.
She said, Dad, I'm so sorry that I
haven't been the kind of daughter I should
have been.
I'm so sorry I've caused you so much
pain.
I said, what?
She said, I just didn't, I wasn't the
kind of daughter.
Well, there were times that I had to
chasten her.
There were times that she did things that
grieved my heart.
But there was never one time, ever, in
all of anything that she'd ever done, she
was less than my daughter.
There was never one time that I didn't
love her with everything in my heart.
And you may be sitting here this morning
struggling under a burden of sin.
And you are cast down by sin.
And you're carrying a burden.
You hate this thing that's in your life.
And you say the Holy Spirit is going
to give up on me.
No, the Holy Spirit is going to be
there constantly to remind you that Jesus still
loves you and He has the power and
the ability to bring you through, but you
can't give up.
You say, Holy Spirit, come right now.
Comfort me with the knowledge that the Holy
Spirit who abides in me has all the
power and all the strength I need to
get to victory, because that's His covenant promise.
It's His covenant promise.
I never ask anything from you that I
will not supply the power to accomplish.
I give you all the power and authority
you need if you will trust me.
To sum this all up, and I'm going
to close in just a moment.
There's so much more here, but I don't
want to go any further with it.
I feel towards accomplishing His work, I can
assure you, no matter what you face, no
matter what we face, He that is in
you is greater than he that is in
the world.
He's going to see His people through.
Glory be to God.
Yeah, I hurt, but I've never had such
peace as I've known.
And out of the suffering that you go
through, there have been a few times, with
this I close, there have been a few
times I've, the Holy Spirit's, when I've been
counseling people or talking to people, the Lord
is going to take you through a lot
of suffering.
But you see, that's not a bad thing,
it's a hopeful thing.
That in the suffering, you see, there are
a lot of people God can't trust with
suffering.
They can't trust Him with it.
And He'd probably let you avoid a lot
because you would be crushed under, and you
would not trust Him.
The Lord knows all that.
But God's going to trust some of you
with it, because out of it comes something
of the grace of God that comes from
the comfort of others.
I would say as a pastor, if He's
comforting me in this, it's for your sake
and the body's sake.
And the suffering that you're going to go
through is not just for your sake, but
out of it will come a testimony that,
because I get, when you go to the
hospital, you see there's people screaming and falling
on the floor in terror.
They can't look death in the eye.
They can't handle suffering.
There's no Holy Spirit, there's no Christ, they
have no one to turn to.
But you see, we don't suffer as others
suffer.
We don't sorrow as others suffer.
They're suffering, yes, but we have the Holy
Ghost.
And His ministry, I say it again and
it's that close, His ministry, His calling, is
to comfort you.
And I'm saying, He won't comfort you in
your sin, but He will comfort you in
reminding you that God still loves you, and
He's going to bring you out.
If you will reach out by faith, and
they hold of His covenant promise.
Will you stand, please?
I told you it's just a simple word.
In the annex, in the overflow room and
upstairs, in here, in the main auditorium.
Just hold everything, hold everything, please.
Now, I don't know who I'm speaking to.
But I know the Lord would not bring
this message like this, wouldn't bring it at
this time, this place, unless there were those
who needed it.
And if you came in this auditorium this
morning, carrying a heavy burden, fear and suffering,
concerned about your finances or concerned about physical
problem you have or someone near you, I
don't know what it may be, or burden
of sin is just overwhelming you.
I want to pray this morning for those
who need what I've needed, and that you
receive what I've received from the Lord.
Marvelous, incredible grace and strength of the Holy
Spirit.
And what you need is to allow the
Holy Spirit to embrace you this morning, and
receive His love in your heart.
Now, you don't have to come forward for
that, but if you're carrying a heavy burden,
you feel that you need someone to pray
for you, others that are here will pray
with you.
I want you to step out of your
seat and come.
If you've been backslidden, don't run from His
love.
You will never again feel, perhaps, the love
that you're going to feel from the Holy
Spirit even now, just calling you and saying,
Listen, I'm not giving up on you.
Don't give up on yourself.
How many of you are here this morning
who had a very difficult time believing and
feeling that God loves you?
You have a hard time raising your hand.
You have a hard time believing God loves
you.
All right, you can put your hands down.
The Lord doesn't condemn you for that.
And I'll tell you something.
Most of you who had your hand up
right now are probably, more than anyone else,
wanting to please God.
You want to please Him with everything in
your heart.
You say, I don't want to fail God.
I love Him.
But you have to allow your heart to
be open now.
He's not mad at you.
That's the Holy Spirit.
He wants to come upon you.
We talk about being filled with the Holy
Ghost.
If you're going to be filled with the
Holy Ghost, you're going to be full of
His love.
You're going to accept God's love for you.
You're going to accept your forgiveness for your
sins.
You're going to believe what God says.
Jesus said, I'll come to you and I'll
comfort you.
And He'll comfort you with assurance right now
that you're accepted in Christ.
Look at me, please.
He accepts you totally.
Right now, He accepts you.
You're His.
You're adopted.
Your part is simply to believe.
Believe that with all your heart.
That brings you into this wonderful new covenant.
God says, I'll be merciful to your sins.
And in your struggle, I'll never leave you.
I'll be there at all times.
You don't have to be afraid.
Maybe your father, your human father or mother,
they may have forsaken you.
But you can't hold that against God.
He's not that kind.
And just what Isaiah the prophet said, though
he's a heavenly father, he'll minister to you
as a loving mother.
A real kind of mother.
A mother who stays right with you through
it all and will keep whispering in your
ear, I love you.
Do you hear me?
I love you.
And just as Debbie says to Tiffany 40,
50 times a day, don't be afraid.
Don't be afraid.
I'll never leave you.
I'll never forsake you.
Would you just bow your heads and say
this right now with me, Jesus, forgive me
for not accepting your love.
Holy Spirit, open my heart to receive the
love of God.
I believe what the Bible says, that you've
been sent to me to shed the love
of God all through my heart and all
through my body, my spirit and my mind.
Thank you, Father, for sending the Holy Spirit.
Holy Spirit, you abide in me, you live
in me, and you will not be silent.
You will speak to me, you will guide
me, you will lead me, and you will
bring to my remembrance all the words that
Jesus spoke and say this with me now,
Lord Jesus, forgive my unbelief, all my sins,
and give me the faith of the Holy
Spirit that I may truly rest.
I want to leave this church this morning
with peace in my heart, accepting your love.
I am loved.
God loves me.
Christ has forgiven me, and I'm adopted.
I give you thanks for that, Lord.
I give you thanks.
I give you praise.
I give you honor.
Lord, we can't comprehend your love.
We come and sing about it, we talk
about it, but how how so often we
refuse to rest in it.
Lord, I ask you to end the struggle,
end the fight, end all this human effort
trying to please you, and just allow the
Holy Spirit to come in right now and
say, God loves me.
Say it, God loves me.
I am loved.
God's not mad at me.
Hallelujah.
One last word.
Two things the Holy Spirit comfort, how he
comforts us, two ways.
Lord showed me this last night and it
just it'd be another part of the theme
of my life.
First of all, I am loved.
And secondly, I am leaving.
Aren't you leaving?
Aren't your bags packed and ready to go?
Is this your home?
The Holy Spirit is reminding us you know,
I was thinking in the choir, they sing
a song we'll be with Christ.
You know how easy that is to sing
it in the choir to sing we will
be with Christ?
Do you know how different it is when
you stand in front of somebody you love
and they're dying and say, we will be
with Christ and look in that little face
and say, she's going to be with Jesus
shortly.
Can you understand?
It's a whole different kind of trust but
all the joy takes away all the pain
Chuck, because we're leaving.
She's just a little ahead of me and
you and your loved ones they're just going
ahead of you and all those that have
died and gone.
If you really love Jesus you thank Him
for life you do everything He asks you
to do but you say, I'm ready to
I'm ready to go.
I'm leaving.
Holy Spirit you're going to go through the
day saying, I am loved and I'm leaving.
And that's the comfort of the Holy Spirit
that He's going to see you all the
way through.
Thank you.
Raise your hands and just thank the Lord
right now.
Lord we give you praise we give you
thanks.
You're faithful you're faithful and you're loving.
Glory to God.
This is the conclusion of the message.