Praying the Trinity

0:46What does "hallowed be thy name" mean?

Hallelujah. Hey, listen, if you’ve got your Bibles, you don’t have to turn anywhere today. I know that sounds strange. If you’ve been with me for the last few weeks, we’ve been preaching the Bible around here. Amen. We’ve gone hard in the pages. And they say basketball players go hard in the paint. Preachers go hard in the pages. Amen. And so we’ve been really walking through the scripture with you. We’re getting into a series where things are gonna be a little different. And so for the next few weeks, I’m gonna be preaching the Bible, but we won’t be looking at an isolated piece of text.

We’re gonna be talking through quite a few things. So, we have been in a larger series on the Lord’s Prayer, and we’re trying to get the Lord’s Prayer down in our spirit, because we are looking at it as a template to pray. So what I wanna do right now is I wanna say the Lord’s Prayer together. Can we do that? Can I have the Lord’s Prayer here? Everybody saying this out loud. Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us.

And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory forever and ever. Amen. Come on, give the Lord a spirit-filled praise right there. So we just ended a series called Our Father. We talked about the Our Father portion of the Lord’s Prayer, and we talked about grace, the grace that is found through the finished work of Jesus Christ at Calvary. We talked about your status of righteousness in the finished work of Christ. So we just finished a series talking about you. We were talking about Jesus, but we were talking about you, how what Jesus did pertains to you and makes you the righteousness of God in Christ.

Well, in this series, we’re gonna start talking about the hallowed be thy name of the Lord’s Prayer. We’re gonna talk about the name of the Lord. And the name of the Lord, we’re gonna look at God’s character which is revealed by His name. So we talked about who you are, and now we’re gonna talk about who God is. Now, in the last series, I had a friend tell me, that he noticed this that I preached and preached, and then at the end, in the last 10 minutes, I gave you 10 things that you could take to the Lord in prayer. But I wanted to fill you up on the Word of God before I told you what to go do.

This series is gonna be a little different. For the next three weeks, we’re gonna, throughout the messages look at these names that you can call upon when you are in prayer. So this is gonna be a lot of implementation throughout the preaching. So in this series, talking about hallowed be thy name, we’re gonna look at 10 names of God. Now, I wanna let you know why we’re gonna do 10, because if you are familiar with the names of God, if you’ve ever read a book on the names of God, you’ve ever heard preaching on the names of God, you’ll know that there are lots of names for God in the Bible.

Most of those names are just God with a descriptor, but there’s a lot of names that describe God’s character. Well, I have chosen the 10 and arranged them in a certain way that will get into your memory. I want you to be able to walk away from these messages and recall the names of the Lord so you can pray. So you’re not running for a book or running for a handout or running for something just so you will know the names of the Lord.

4:32The names of God and the Trinity in prayer

And so in this message today, we’re actually gonna look at three names and we’re gonna do so by looking at the Trinity, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

Now, the reason we’re gonna look at the Trinity is a few reasons. One, it’s good theology. it’s also good orthodoxy, but for our purposes today, like I just said, it’s good for the memory. It’s good for the memory. Our Catholic friends have even helped us with this. They have something called the sign of the cross. You ever seen them do this? That’s Father, Son, Holy Spirit. So if you forget the Trinity, you call a Catholic and say, “What’s that thing y’all do?” Amen. That’s the phone call everyone likes. What’s that thing y’all do? Amen. So the Trinity, that’s what we’re gonna look at today.

Now, I’m not gonna be teaching on the Trinity. I wanna be clear, this is not a theological, doctrinal message on the Trinity. However, we did talk about it in a Wednesday night recently. We talked about the doctrine of the Trinity, and about a year ago, I preached a message on the Trinity that was pretty thorough that you can find on YouTube. But I do wanna share something with you real quick. I’m sure you’re aware that our church is going through a transition right now. Something’s happening. There’s a metamorphosis happening, and in January, our church will become Citylight Church.

Amen. And part of that is we’re getting a new website, new coffee mugs. Someone said, “I want merch.” There’s gonna be some merch out there next week. Amen. Praise the Lord. And one of the things that we’re doing on our new site is we are working on making sure that we can provide you resources from the preaching that are helpful to you. And one of the things that every message is gonna have is, this is something I’ve been working on for a long time, but every message is gonna have sermon notes, a transcript, and a list of all of the scriptures that I use when I prepare messages, not just the ones I read.

What y’all don’t know is sometimes you may hear three scriptures in a sermon, and there’s actually 65 in the background working, okay? And so this will have all that information. And when the new website launches sometime in November, you’ll be able to go on and download these for any of the past messages. So make a little mental note, put a reminder in your phone, text your best friend, whatever it takes. Remember that you can go in the future and download this resource on the Trinity from blank.com. I can’t tell y’all what it is yet, amen. But just so y’all know, jasonmayfield.com and jasonmayfieldisgoodlooking.com are both taken, amen.

Hallelujah. So are y’all ready to get started this morning? All right, let’s do it.

7:37God the Father: El Shaddai and El Elyon

Number one, the Father. The Father, the Trinity. Father, Son, Holy Spirit. The Father. The Father is exalted. He’s exalted. I’ll tell you what, I’ve been trying to go back to my iPad and it’s freaking out on me. That’s why we have a printer in this church, amen. Hey, I feel like everybody’s a little sleepy. Turn to your neighbor and say, “I know it’s 62 degrees outside, but your air conditioner bill’s gonna be lower.” Get excited in the house of the Lord. Hallelujah. Hallelujah.

Lord, y’all know I like loud. I wanna be loud, and I want you to be loud so I don’t feel nervous about being loud, amen. Amen. Hallelujah. So number one, the Father. The Father is exalted. The Father’s exalted. If you wanted to go deeper into some names of God, you’ve got names like El Shaddai, which is God Almighty. If you’ve ever heard that. El Shaddai. If you know the song, amen. But El Shaddai, he’s God Almighty. There’s another name for the Lord, El Elyon. El Elyon means God Most High. He’s God Most High. God the Father, He’s exalted. Leviticus chapter 11 says this.

It says, “For I am the Lord your God. Consecrate yourselves therefore, and be holy, for I am holy.” In Exodus chapter 3, Moses is encountered by the Lord at the burning bush, and this is what the Lord says to him. He says, “Then he said, ‘Do not come near. Take your sandals off your feet, for this place on which you’re standing is holy ground.’” When God shows up, it’s holy ground. Why? Because he’s holy. God is holy. God is above us. I know you think Jesus is your homeboy. But God is holy. He’s set apart. He’s different. He’s above. He ranks higher. Everything comes into submission under his authority and under his name.

God is holy.

9:45How to approach God with reverence in prayer

And even though we just came out of a series where we talked about your righteousness, and we talked about, the reason we talked about your righteousness is because Hebrews says that you should come boldly before the throne of grace in your time of need. Because of the grace of Jesus Christ, which has given you a righteous status, you have the ability to come before the throne of God. You get to come before the Father and present your request and present your need. But even though you get to go boldly before the throne of God, even though you may not have to worry about the guy at the door, and you may not have to worry about the couple people you gotta walk past to get to the throne, when you get to the throne of God, it serves you well.

I feel like preaching this morning. It serves you well to remember who you’re talking to. I know that for some people, God is just this superstitious figure that we kinda project some of our thoughts and our feelings on to help us. No, God is God. And if He’s God, He’s gotta be God. And if He’s gonna be your God, He’s gotta be your God. It might help sometimes if we treated God like God. Amen. He’s holy. He’s above. He’s the Father. He’s the one who speaks from heaven and things thunder and shake, and dark clouds come about. Every time the Lord speaks from heaven, something crazy happens in the earth.

You wanna know why? ‘Cause He’s God. This ain’t that hard. Your Bible starts with this phrase: “In the beginning, God.” He’s God. He’s God. He’s high. So one of the things that I do, ‘cause we’re talking about how these things matter in prayer, one of the things that I do, I don’t do it all the time. to be honest with y’all, since we got here, I haven’t found my secret place yet down here, which being the pastor of this church, you want me to do that as soon as possible. I meet with the Lord, but I haven’t found my spot. In other places, I’ve had my spot.

When I have my spot figured out, I like to go to the Lord in prayer and get down on my knees, and put my face in my chair that I meet with the Lord in. And the reason I do that is for no other reason than I wanna remember who I’m talking to. Come on. I just wanna remember who I’m talking to. So I have a tendency to kneel in prayer. Now, I want you to hear me, that there’s gonna be a relational dynamic with the Lord. If you become a person who prays and seeks the face of God, there’s gonna be a relational dynamic with the Lord, and there’s gonna be moments when you meet with God, and you You talk to the Lord and you’re not gonna come in there right.

And you’re gonna act wrong, and you’re gonna act like a little snotty brat, amen. ‘Cause I don’t know if you know this, one of the reasons it’s important to remember that He’s God is ‘cause I don’t know if y’all remember this, but we’re all just a bunch of little dirt creatures. That the breath of God, the Ruach of God breathed into and brought life into us and sometimes you go get before the Lord and you act like a little dirt creature. And you just have to remember that this is God you’re talking to. This is the Lord you’re talking to. And yeah, there are relational dynamics.

There’s grace for that. The Lord knows who you are. The Bible says that He created our frame. That’s what the psalmist said. So the Lord knows how you’re gonna act, how you’re gonna behave, but at the same time, at some point, you gotta jerk yourself back into reality and remember who you’re talking to. This is the Lord. And I’m gonna acknowledge this, okay? I’m a little sensitive in this area. I don’t know what it is. See, God brought me out Well, like the psalmist said, He brought me out of the pit, out of the miry clay. He set my feet upon a rock. God set me in a broad place.

See, the Lord rescued me out of so much that I… Has God rescued anybody out of anything in this church? You’d think I’d get an amen right there. I don’t know. But the Lord brought me out of so much that I… I wanna honor the Lord. I don’t mess around with the Lord because What happened in me only happened supernaturally. Come on. The fact that I’m a preacher and not an out-of-work alcoholic who’s really not an alcoholic, but a drug addict. See, in my family, we just called you an alcoholic, but you’re really a drug addict. But we didn’t want everybody… All the snooty people in my family didn’t wanna accept that they had drug addicts in the family.

Amen. And so the fact that I’m none of that, and I’m a preacher, And I got a good-looking wife. Nice kids. Big Power Ranger collection. I might be saying too much now. Amen. the Lord’s brought me out, so I get sensitive about God jokes. Jocelyn, when she was younger, she’s trying to figure out, life and school and being my kid, which, I wouldn’t wish on anybody, but two people got it. Amen. And she’s trying to figure that out. I remember she’d make God jokes to me ‘cause they don’t see everything I do, but they see Bibles around the house and the pens and the writing and the notes, and they see me watching stuff on TV, and they do see me when I get… If y’all think this is preaching, no, this is when I’m cooking spaghetti, something can get on me, and I’ll tell you right now, God is good?

I’ll have a good time. I’m not kidding. That really is how I am. It amps up a little bit up here, but this is really who I am. I am. I walk around. Y’all think I say amen and hallelujah a lot in a message. God, I walk around, I say, “Hey, thank you, Lord. Hallelujah.” That’s just who I am. Well, Jocelyn would make these God jokes sometimes, just good little, harmless God jokes, and she would see me wince. But I’m gonna tell you, she hit me one morning with one. I don’t know, I must have come out of praying some craziness in my office ‘cause I do have those moments.

She hit me with one, and we’re on the way to school, and I pull into the Publix parking lot down in Florida, and I start telling her all the stuff I’m telling. “Hey, He’s separate. He’s holy. He’s not a joke. He’s serious. God is the real deal. He’s…” Now, listen, I’m not a perfect dad, but I’m gonna honor the Lord. Amen. Amen. And so I just want you to know I’m sensitive in this area, and maybe I’m harping on it for that reason. But I wanna say this. I don’t know what this is in people. I’m just telling you there’s no condemnation. This isn’t a condemnation church, but I’m about to hit you between the eyes.

I just need you to know. Come on. I don’t know what this is, but we got folks, especially down here in the South, who try to normalize God to such a degree that we go around and we talking about the man upstairs, and then you’ll have people who say, “The big guy.” And I’m gonna tell you right now. You wanna learn how to worship the Lord? Let me give you a quick life hack right here. This a cheat code, if you will. knock that off. Don’t do that anymore. He’s not the man upstairs. He’s not the big guy. He’s not the big fella. He’s not the big cheese. He’s none of those things.

He ain’t the hot dog man, amen. He’s none of those things. He’s none of those things. He’s God most high. He is God Almighty. He is the Father, the Lord of all. And if you say, “I don’t know what to refer to Him as,” the Lord. The Lord. And listen, you may feel that may be your flesh not wanting to come into submission to the Lord. I don’t know. God rescued me out of stuff. If He wants me to serve Him, I really, whatever. I’m good. Okay? Whatever you want, Lord, I’ll go do it. Now I gotta be careful ‘cause I’m trying not to go to Africa, amen. So I can’t say too much.

I can’t keep going. That’s why we building them tabernacles in Africa. I figure if you send money, you ain’t gotta send yourself, amen. We’ll pay for it. Hallelujah. But no, but He’s the Lord. Maybe your flesh is trying to resist coming under the authority of the Lord. I don’t know. Maybe you got something going on in your life I don’t know about. But if you’ll just start to refer to Him as the Lord, I promise you it… I don’t feel like me and the Lord have some subservient, I’m a little peon. No, but I feel like the Lord’s very interested in me, and He likes me a lot, and He wants me around, and He likes it when I show up, and He wants to be a part of my life.

He wants me to be a part of what He’s doing, and He, I feel like the Lord’s just brought me in, and so it doesn’t feel weird. When I say the Lord, it doesn’t make me feel like a little peon. It makes me feel warm. I just feel the Lord. I heard John Kilpatrick say that about 30 years ago. He said, “When I say the Lord, there’s something comforting about it.” And so you need a name for God. He’s the Lord. So He’s God. So when you come into prayer, He’s God the Father. He is God Almighty. He’s the Lord Most High. He’s El Shaddai. He’s El Elyon. Amen. Amen.

He’s the Lord.

18:30Does Jesus understand what we go through? (Hebrews 4:15)

Number two, God the Son. God the Son. The Son is empathetic. The Son is empathetic. Hebrews 4:15 says, “For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weakness, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin.” We do have a tendency to really harp on how Jesus is perfect, which is true and if that’s not in your theology, we gotta work on you a little bit. Jesus is perfect, but I need you to remember this. He is not unaware. He is not removed. He is not aloof to the human condition. He came down here.

He was amongst His people. The Bible says in John 1 that He was manifest in the flesh. He came and dwelt. This is something else John 1 says. He dwelt among us. He was around. He’s been through it. He knows. He sympathizes with your weakness. Yes, He was without sin, and yet He sympathizes with your weakness. He knows. Jesus looks at us and sees the mess we do and the nonsense we do, and He knows. He knows. He may not be cool with it, but He knows. I went to see my barber this week, and I don’t think he watches the message, but if he does, thank you. Look, nobody has told me how good I look today, and I’ll be honest with you, I’m not preaching next week because of it.

I’m gonna take a week off. No, I’m just kidding. I’ll be preaching. But I went to see my barber this week, and he asked, he goes, “How’s the church going?” I said, “It’s going good,” blah, blah, blah. Told him some of the stuff that’s going on. And then we got to talking, and it was within, like, two minutes. He’s talking to me about how he’s gonna hit all this alcohol he gonna drink, and he’s dropping F-bombs and S… And it’s funny, he doesn’t ever do it until he asked me about the church the other day, and then it’s like F this and S that, and like nothing.

And I’m just, “Oh, yeah!” And it’s for two reasons. One is ‘cause he’s cutting my hair, Pastor John. This ain’t… I’m not your pastor right now, amen. And I just, “Do a good job.” Yeah, that’s great. The other reason is ‘cause I sympathize. I sympathize. I can sit in there and I can act like I’m just somebody that I’m not. I’m just a little dirt creature who happens to, by the grace of God, got set up on a high place, and I mess up sometimes, and I don’t do good sometimes. And I, man, sometimes I wanna say the F and the S too. I know y’all don’t… Believe it or not, sometimes it’s ‘cause of y’all I wanna say it.

Amen. So I get it. So I’m not gonna sit there and act above and beyond what’s going on with him. I sympathize. Well, the Lord sympathizes. He sympathizes. Isaiah chapter 7 calls him Emmanuel. God with us. He’s holy, but he’s not disconnected. And that means that when you go to prayer, there’s nothing that you’ve done that his blood will not cleanse. But also, when you go to pray, there’s nothing that you will pray that is so offensive to him that he will remove his favor from you. Because of the blood of Jesus Christ, you are everything that you need to be in this moment to have the full acceptance of the Lord in his presence for your righteousness, for your redemption.

You’ve got everything you need from the Lord because of what happened at Calvary. Amen. And so when you walk into prayer, and you confess your righteousness, which we taught you to do in the last series… if you haven’t listened to it, go back. It is worth the time. It’s worth the time to listen to the Our Father series. You’re gonna hear some things you may not have ever heard in a church. I believe it’ll bless you. But when you go in and you begin to confess your righteousness and then all of a sudden you come in, “Hallowed be thy name,” and now God is holy and you’re a little dirt creature.

I just wanna give credit where credit is due. That was from R.C. Sproul, so if you’re offended, you can be offended at R.C. for that. But you’re a little dirt creature, and that can be jarring ‘cause all of a sudden you go, “Well, I’m the righteousness of God, but but He’s holy and I’m separate.” And then you come back and it’s God the Father, but it’s God the Son who is your righteousness, and he brings you right back in and gives you a place.

23:04What it means that Jesus is our advocate (1 John 2:1)

In fact, 1 John says this in 1 John chapter 2. It says, “My little children, I’m writing these things to you so you may not sin.”

The ideal situation is that you get it right. The ideal situation is that you don’t sin. Let me be clear about that. In a perfect situation, you don’t do the stuff you’re not supposed to do. However, if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father who is Jesus Christ the righteous. We have an advocate with the Father who is Jesus Christ. So you’re the righteousness of God in Christ, and when you come in there and you get confronted with the holiness of the Father and your actual condition, don’t get discouraged. You’ve got an advocate. Someone will speak up on your behalf.

When you feel like you don’t belong before the throne of grace, don’t worry. At some point, God the Son’s gonna speak up and say, “He’s here with me.” Come on. Somebody give him a praise right there. He’s God the Son. He’s near. He’s not far off. The Bible even says that He draws near to the brokenhearted. He draws near to the brokenhearted. I think, aren’t we all brokenhearted to some degree? Haven’t we all got something going on? I’m gonna preach a message in several weeks. Don’t miss any Sunday between here and the end of the year. If you miss a Sunday, you’re gonna miss something good.

And if you do miss a Sunday, you need to watch the message or listen to the podcast. I’m telling you, I feel a stirring in my spirit on some of the things I’m gonna be sharing. I’m feeling a stirring in my spirit in general. Can I just take a pause here for a second? And just tell you that I felt such a strong sense of the presence of the Lord during worship this morning. Amen. And I wanna tell you, and I know we have a lot of guests. I see you this morning. I’m trying not to scare you, but I feel like being the scary, weird Pentecostal this morning, ‘cause I’m really feeling some stuff.

In worship this morning, I sensed the presence of the Lord so strong. Last week we let you know that we wanna be praying as a church family to see our income increase, our weekly income. Our weekly income here at the church is around $6,000. We wanna see that increase to $20,000 a week. And you may say, “Well, why $20,000?” First of all, ‘cause it’s $20,000. Amen. That ought to be self-explanatory right there. But the second reason, and really this is the first reason, is that we can’t make that happen. There’s nothing we can do that produces $20,000 a week worth of income.

If it happens, nobody’s gonna be sitting back going, “Oh well, he’s just a great leader.” No. We’re gonna be sitting back going, “That was God who did that.” That’s a God thing. And I think some of you need to see God do a miracle so you can have a miracle in your life. You need to see the testimony and draw on it. Now, that being said, one of the reasons we’re praying for that I want you to know, there’s a reason. A little while ago, during worship, I would’ve took off. I probably wouldn’t be preaching. We’d probably be in the altar right now. There’d probably be some stuff happening in the church.

But I know this ain’t gonna make sense to some of y’all, so you’re gonna have to trust me, okay? That is a money problem. That is not a spirit problem. That’s not an anointing problem. That’s a money problem. You know why? ‘Cause we don’t have the money for me to walk away from the keyboard. We don’t have the money for me to not be behind the keyboard. So we need to pray and believe God, ‘cause I believe something’s happening in our church right now. Amen. There’s something happening. And I’m not trying to make life easier for me, I’m just trying to do some other things.

I’m trying to pick up the wireless microphone and take the service over so somebody can get what they need. By the way, in worship, because God is greater than our situation, God is greater than what we’re going through, I actually believe someone… I’m just in the Spirit right now. I’m kinda prophesying. I believe someone in worship this morning got something that they came in here for, and I don’t know who it is. I couldn’t stop. I couldn’t acknowledge it. But somebody, and you may not even know. Sometimes with some of this stuff, I don’t know how you know.

How do you know if you got a financial breakthrough? Are y’all on Chase Bank right now? I don’t think you are. Do y’all get calls on Sundays when something happens? “Sir, we got a deposit.” Amen. But I don’t know if it’s financial, physical, something in the family, something you’ve been praying. Somebody got something this morning in the Spirit, and I just… And listen, it ain’t for everybody. I’m not trying to be that guy. Somebody got what you needed this morning, and you’re gonna go home or you already know, and you’re about to find out it happened. It happened in Jesus’ name.

Amen. This is a season in our church where God is doing something fantastic. There’s a… ooh, I feel I could run right now. I know some of y’all are thinking, “You aren’t even saying anything this morning.” Well, I said a lot over the last four weeks. Amen. And now I’m just ready to sit in it. Hallelujah. I’m telling you, God’s doing a great work in our church in this season so don’t miss any of these messages. I believe it’s gonna help you.

28:24The power of the Holy Spirit in a believer (1 John 4:4)

Number three. Father, Son, the Holy Spirit. Unless you’re over the age of 70, then it’s the Holy Ghost. Amen. But I have an old soul, that’s why I say it so much.

The Holy Spirit, He’s empowering. He’s empowering. If you’re born again, you’ve got the Holy Spirit of God living on the inside of you. If you’ve given your life to Jesus Christ, the Holy Ghost is in you. Hallelujah. You’ve got the Holy Spirit, and the Holy Spirit gives you power. He gives you power. Power. Power to overcome, power to advance, power to achieve, power to live right, talk right, do right. Power to sense, to see, and to speak. We talk about that power quite a bit in our church. A power for the Holy Spirit to speak to you, for you to get a word from God, to sense something, to see something supernaturally, and then to speak it out into the atmosphere.

I’m telling you, there’s a power for that. There’s a power to sit still. There’s a power to show up. Amen. There’s a power to stay away. Amen. And He gives you all that power. I’m talking about power. 1 John chapter 4 says this, “Little children, you are from God, and you’ve overcome them.” Somebody say, “I’ve overcome.” “For He who is in you is greater than he who is in this world.” Amen. Hallelujah. I’m gonna take the preacher that I came up under when I got saved when I was 12 years old, started going to church, and my pastor, he didn’t preach a whole lot of stuff.

He stayed in a real small zone. Sometimes he’d preach the same message, 18 months in a row But we knew it, and it got in us. And one of the things that he would say all the time is he would just get up and he’d get to feeling good, and finally he’d say, “Greater is he that’s in me than he that’s in the world.” You need that in your spirit, that the Holy Ghost inside of you. Greater is he that’s in you than he that’s in the world. Listen, it feels like we get stuck in whatever we’re stuck in. Sometimes you wanna be thinking about principalities and rulers and the government and the shadow people who are running everything or whatever it is y’all read on that website, amen.

And you wanna thank that. And then sometimes it’s your boss and the people you work with, and sometimes it’s sin and you get stuck. No, it’s all of it. All of it. Greater is he that’s in you than he that’s in the world. He’s greater than whatever’s going on in the government. He’s greater than whatever’s going on at work. He’s greater than what’s going on in the family. He’s greater than whatever is warring inside of you. Come on. He’s greater. Greater is He that’s in me than he that’s in the world. Amen. Come on. You’ve been seated by the Spirit. You’ve been sealed by the Spirit.

You’ve been sanctified by the Spirit, and you’re made strong by the Holy Spirit of God. Hallelujah. If you’ve got the Holy Spirit, you’ve got everything that God has. Hallelujah. And yet, you can have more. Hallelujah. You’ve got all of Him, and you can have more of Him. If you’ve got the Holy Ghost, you’ve got something. Amen. He knows all things. He searches all things. He teaches all things. The Holy Spirit is not some small little… It’s not something that identifies churches. It’s not, “This church has got the Holy Ghost, and this church doesn’t have the Holy Ghost, and this…” No.

Every church has got the Holy Ghost. Come on. And let me just say this. Every church has got the exact amount of the Holy Ghost they want. Whatever you want, he’ll give. You ask, you receive. Amen. Paul came up to this handful of believers in Ephesus, and he says, “Have you received the Holy Ghost since you received?” And they just answered this. They said, “We ain’t heard about the Holy Ghost. What is this?” Which by the way, that’s a response we get in our church a lot. What is this? What is this? But listen, these people were saved. They didn’t even know who the Holy Ghost was.

Some of y’all think people can’t go to heaven ‘cause they’ve got bad theology. If you can’t go to heaven with good theology, y’all are all going to hell, so am I. We all got bad theology. You think you got God figured out? My Lord, I told you earlier, he’s holy, he’s almighty, he’s the Most High, he’s above all. His ways are above our ways, His thoughts are above our thoughts. So there’s some churches that may not believe like we believe that I believe God has touched. As long as they get the cross right, and they get the resurrection right and they get the deity of the Lord Jesus Christ right, they’re going to heaven.

My God. But he asked them. He said, “Have you received the Holy Ghost since you received?” And they said, “No, what’s the Holy Ghost?” He tells them, and they got it. It’s that simple. You want it, you got it. Come on. You want the Holy Ghost? Come on. Let me say this. I had a busy week, which is when I get flippant in the pulpit, and I gotta be careful. Next year, 2027, I’m just gonna say it and put myself on notice. I probably should. Go ahead and start playing. That’d be great. I like it. I like it when you play, Jeremy. One, it’s good, and two, I’m not doing it.

Amen. I like both of those things. Next year, 2027, there’s gonna be some form of an outpour of the Holy Ghost in this church. Come on. Come on. We’re gonna see people empowered by the Holy Spirit. I was in a denominational meeting the other day, and they were talking about the younger generation of ministers, which they were talking about me, and I really appreciated that. Amen. Amen. I’m the younger generation. Hallelujah. And they said that the younger generation, there’s people are not getting the baptism of the Holy Spirit in our churches anymore. And they were tossing around all the reasons.

I was just keeping my mouth shut in a rare state. I don’t know why I was. But I’ll tell you what, most guys my age don’t know what to do with it ‘cause we haven’t experienced it. For the last 20 years, everybody’s been trying to just do a good nice prepackaged church, and we do a little bit of that around here. We wanna do things well. But I came out of the Revival Era. I saw God do stuff. I’ve seen people get thrown across the room, and knocked down, and speak in languages they don’t know, and pray in tongues, and get healed right there. I’ve seen all kinds of stuff.

We’ve seen it in this church. Amen. And so in 2027, what we’re gonna do is we’re just gonna ask God to move in a powerful way, and we’re gonna become a template for some of these churches in our fellowship that wanna see how to get God to do something in the service. We’re just gonna show them how to do it. Amen. And I think there’s gonna be an outpouring of the Holy Ghost next year. Amen. We’re gonna see people empowered. So if you want the Holy Ghost, you’re in a good church for it. Somebody say amen. Amen. I gotta stop here in a minute ‘cause I’m about to get… Most of this ain’t on the paper.

Praise the Lord. So if you’re ever praying for something, ‘cause I wanna end here, I wanna talk about prayer for a minute. If you’re ever praying for something, and you take something to the Lord and you start to ask yourself, “Can I have any confidence that this is gonna come about, that this is gonna happen, that God’s gonna do this?” Well, the answer is found in the Holy Ghost. Because the Holy Ghost says, “Yes, because greater is he that’s in me than he that’s in the world.” I just told you, He searches all things, He knows all things, He teaches all things.

The Holy Ghost can bring about an answer to anything you take before the Lord immediately. You can get it in the Spirit. The Lord spoke to me years ago and said, “Before it manifests in the flesh, it must manifest in the Spirit.” Amen. The Holy Ghost can bring things about in your life. Now, you might be saying this morning, “How’d you get all of that?” ‘Cause I haven’t quoted a lot of scripture. All that stuff I just said about the Holy Ghost: Ezekiel chapter 36, verses 26 through 27. John 3:5 through 8. John 14:16 through 17. Romans 8:9 through 11. 1 Corinthians 3:16.

1 Corinthians 6:19. 2 Corinthians 1:21 and 22. Galatians 4:6. Ephesians 1:13 and 14. Ephesians 4:30. Titus 3:5 and 6. 1 John 3:24. 1 John 4:13. Micah 3:8. Zechariah 4:6 and 7. Isaiah 11:2. Luke 4:14. Luke 24:49. Acts 1:8. Acts 10:38. Romans 15:13. Romans 15:16. Romans 15:18 through 19. 1 Corinthians 2:4 through 5. Ephesians 3:16. That is not even half of the list right here of all the scriptures that I’m preaching from this morning. I’m telling you, the Bible says this stuff. If you’ve got the Holy Ghost, you have got something significant. Give the Lord a praise right there.

37:16How to pray the Lord's Prayer: an example prayer

Okay. Let me close here, talking about prayer. Okay, so how do you pray this stuff? ‘Cause this is the thing, we want you to be able to implement this. So when you pray this… Now, we have a simple model of prayer that we’re gonna start with in 2027, the seven-minute prayer guide that we have. Thank God for one thing, ask Him for three to five things. Just ask the Lord. But then we want you to evolve into this, the Lord’s Prayer. Okay? So you come in and you begin to pray, “Our Father,” and you confess your righteousness. “I’m the righteousness of God in Christ.

He has made me new. He’s made me clean. I’m sealed by the Holy Spirit. I’m a new creation.” You can begin to confess your righteousness so that you know. And then you say, “Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name.” And now we start to talk to God about who He is. First of all, He’s God the Father, He’s holy. He’s God the Son, He’s empathetic. He’s God the Holy Spirit, He’s empowering. And so you just begin to pray like this. Now, this is weird, ‘cause I don’t normally pray like this in front of people, but I will tell you, I pray in front of people, but I’m trying to pray the way I would pray.

I wanna demonstrate it for you. I want you to see it. I wanna tell you, it’s gonna be uncomfortable now, but it’s gonna be real uncomfortable in four weeks. In four weeks, I’m setting the stage up like my secret place, and I’m gonna demonstrate for you what it’s like to spend time with the Lord every morning. So if you’ve ever thought, “I don’t know what it looks like” See, I grew up around people who talked about prayer, but I never saw them pray. They talked about reading the Bible. I never saw them doing it, so I didn’t know how anybody did this. And so I’m gonna try to take you in.

The Bible says that Jesus went a stone’s throw away and He prayed. I always liked that, a stone’s throw away. I’m not gonna bring you to my house. You’re not gonna come and do this with me at 5:00 in the morning. We’re not gonna do that, okay? ‘Cause most of the prayer will be like, “Could you get this lady out of my room right now, Lord? I don’t know what she’s doing in here.” It’s weird, it’s uncomfortable. But we’re gonna do this a stone’s throw away. So you pray. You say, “Lord Jesus, I thank you this morning. Our Father, I thank you, Lord, that I’m the righteousness of God in Christ.

Lord, I thank you that you’ve assured my salvation, that I have an advocate in Jesus Christ the righteous, that I am not what I do, but everything that I do today will be inferior, whether good or bad, to the finished work of Jesus Christ, and that the blood of Christ at the cross speaks a better word than the blood of Abel, and it speaks a better word than anything I’m gonna do today, good, bad, or indifferent. Thank you for that one. Now, I’m just in it now. This isn’t planned. I’m just feeling this. And so you begin to pray that way. Father, I thank you that I am the righteousness of God in Christ.

Lord, I thank you that you’ve perfected me, that I am perfect in some degree because you’ve perfected those who are being sanctified. And God, while I’m in process, I thank you that I have full status before you. I thank you that I am somebody in the finished work of Christ. I thank you that when I come boldly before the throne of grace, I am somebody today. I’m more than the sum of my parts right now. I’m more than what I’ve been through, what I’m going through and what I will go through. I’m more than what I’ve done, doing, or will do. I am the righteousness of God in Christ.

That full credit has been extended to me. I have no fear because there’s no fear in love, because perfect love casts out fear. And Father, I thank you that in this is love, not that I have loved you but that you have loved me by giving your Son as propitiation for my sin. God, I thank you that you’re satisfied when you look at me. Who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Lord, I honor you today. Anything that I say in prayer today, Father, I just… Lord, I mean respect with everything I’m gonna say today. I don’t mean anything ill, I don’t mean anything poorly, I don’t mean anything… I’m not trying to come off any kinda way, God.

I know who you are and you know who I am, and my situation might have me a little under stress. That might come out while we talk, but Lord, I want you to know that I honor and I respect you. You are God most high. You are God almighty. You are above all things. You are before all things. You are above all things. You’re beyond all things. God, I honor you today. You are God the Father. You are holy. You are set apart. And I recognize the disparity between you and me today. And Lord, I thank you that because I’m lowly, you draw near to the lowly and the contrite and the brokenhearted.

Thank you, Lord. But I also thank you that not only are you holy, you are also empathetic towards me. You are God the Son. You made a way for me. You’ve experienced what I’ve experienced, and at the cross of Calvary, you’ve taken on everything that I have ever done, everything that I’ve ever felt, everything that I’ve… You’re not a far-off God. You are a God who is aware of my condition, of what I go through. Thank you for the cross, not only that it saves me, but that it makes me the righteousness of God in Christ, but that it also makes me known by you, and you’re God the Holy Spirit.

Father, I thank you for the spirit that lives inside of me that’s greater in me than anything that’s in the world. Father, I thank you that there’s nothing that I can’t do today by the power of the Holy Ghost. And any time that I miss it today, I just confess right now that it’s because I didn’t tap into the supernatural power of God living on the inside of me. Father, I thank you for everything that we’re advancing in and taking territory in every area where I’m seeing advancement in my life. I believe it’s the power of God living on the inside of me. And Father, I ask that you would propel everything that’s going on around me right now.

Everything that I ask for today I believe is possible by the power of the Holy Ghost. Then you continue. That’s how you pray this stuff. You ever wondered how people pray a long time? I’m just demonstrating. Y’all felt it come in, right? Lauren didn’t. She said, “You’re gonna have to do more for me.” Amen. She’s spiritual. She prays five hours a day. I’m just kidding. She doesn’t. She prays seven. Amen. No, I’m serious. That’s just… it just comes. That’s the power of prayer. Listen, maybe this is for you, and then I’ve gotta wrap up. I gotta be done.

43:50Why prayer brings spiritual power

The Lord spoke to me years ago, and he said this.

I was in prayer, and the Lord gave this to me right there in prayer. I’m face down in the chair, and he just said “You know, when you…” ‘Cause I’m a Bible reader by nature. I’m not a prayer person. Bible, I don’t struggle with. Prayer, if I don’t feel good, if I wake up with a mild irritation, I’m like, “I just don’t know if I’m gonna pray today,” you know? And some days you do have that. You just go, “Well, Lord, touch it in Jesus’ name. Amen,” you know, and I prayed. But I was in prayer. I had my face down in the chair, and the Lord spoke to me. He said, “You know, when you sow the seed of Bible reading, you’ll reap a harvest of revelation.”

Amen. So when you get into the Word, revelation comes out of it. That’s what comes from that. You get into the… We just talked about that last week, talking about the new name of the church, talked about how that’s really a big thing for us, is how revelation power flows out of being in the Scripture and helps you to flourish in life. So that’s a word. You get a word when you’re in the Scripture. Then he said, “If you sow a seed of worship, you’ll reap a harvest of success, because if you’ll make much of God, I’ll make much of you.” So if you sow a seed of worship, you’re gonna reap a harvest of success.

That’s what you’re gonna reap, but then also exposure. The word he actually gave me was exposure, but at the time I was trying to get booked, ‘cause I was an evangelist. And the Lord said, “Well, I’ll give you a harvest of exposure.” So a harvest of success, but then he told me, he said, “But if you’ll sow a seed of prayer, you will reap a harvest of power.” We started this year with a series on the power of the Holy Ghost. Does anybody remember that? Feels like it was 28 years ago, doesn’t it? We were just talking about this before service, me and Sherry, about how God has done so much in our church in such a short time this year.

Amen. But God is on the move. And we talked about this at the beginning of the year. You can go back and check this message out, how there is a release of power in your life through prayer, and you only get it through prayer. And I’m telling you, there is something that happens in the secret place. I can’t explain it. It doesn’t come through Bible reading, which you don’t get me to discredit very often, ‘cause I’m big on the Bible reading piece. It doesn’t come through worship. Most of the church, if I was to diagnose the church of the Lord Jesus Christ in America, the problem with most of the church is they think they get something out of worship they don’t get.

‘Cause we come in and the doodads get on us, and we think, “Okay, well, this is it. We’re gonna, I’m gonna receive everything I need right here.” And even though this morning I believe God did something in worship, that’s the grace of God. That is not, that’s not the place that you get. That’s the place you give. Worship isn’t about us. Yeah. We sing some songs that you like, but if we come in here and sing Mary Had a Little Lamb for three hours, we just need to worship the Lord. Amen. It’d be weird, but we should do it. Amen. So we think we receive in worship.

We’ll turn a little worship song on. We think that… No, it comes in prayer, opening your mouth in the presence of the Lord, making your request known, talking to God. And I’m telling you, a lot of the power isn’t the answer. And I can’t explain this. I would just encourage you, go try it out on your own. But the power isn’t the answer. The answer’s great. God answers prayer. I want the answer. If I didn’t want it, wouldn’t have brought this stuff up in the first place. Amen? So I want the answer, but there’s a power that comes on you in prayer. It’s hard to explain, but you come out of prayer differently than you went in and it’s one of the only things that seems to operate at a one-to-one ratio.

I encourage people to sow seed and believe God for financial miracle, but there’s no one-to-one. It’s not like you can sow a $1,000 seed and get a $10,000 miracle. There’s no math to that. But with prayer, time in the secret place, there is almost a one-to-one ratio. The more time you put in prayer, the more you get out of the more power you walk in. And I’m gonna tell you, I started to see pastors, and I can’t explain this. Guys who I kind of would like, they had bad theology. They didn’t know the scripture very well. They’d be quoting stuff out of context, and that would bother me ‘cause I’m a Bible guy.

I like the Word. That’s my thing. But then they’d have miracles follow. I’m talking miracles. Listen, you may think, “What’s a miracle?” Well, when you got a church of about 200, and you bring in a few million dollars a year, folks, that’s a miracle. And some people would sit back, “Well, that preacher’s doing something shady.” What? What produces that kind of result? How do you get… That’s what we were talking about earlier, and I said, we’re praying for this financial miracle because there’s no way to get $20,000 a week out of 120 people. If I got all of y’all to drink the Kool-Aid, $20,000 a week ain’t in this room to give when candy costs $28 a bag, amen?

It just ain’t in the room. God has to do that. God has to do it. So you wanna see power, and it comes in prayer. So I started to see these guys who would pray, and miracle stuff would follow. Miracle stuff. That’s why we’re gonna be a praying church, ‘cause I want some of that miracle stuff. Amen. I wanna see God do something here he ain’t doing nowhere else. I’m gonna tell you, I appreciate churches that get out in 90 minutes. I wanna be one of them, but I don’t wanna get out in our 90 minutes the way other people get out in 90 minutes. I don’t wanna get out in 90 minutes and go to the buffet.

I wanna get out in 90 minutes and go, “Did you see that lady walk for the first time?” I wanna see a miracle. I wanna see a miracle. I wanna see a hurricane coming towards our area, and rather than thinking “Lord, I don’t know what we’re gonna do,” I wanna be able to call Pastor John and him say, “What are we gonna do as a response to this?” Well, as long as the drivers are okay and they’re not too busy, we got three semi-trucks sitting behind the church full of supplies, ready to go. Well, how big are we gotta be to do that? We could shrink. We can go down to 10 people.

If God is in it, anything is possible. Amen. I wanna see God do a great work. Hallelujah. I just feel like taking a moment. All across the room, can we just lift our hands to heaven for a minute? I’m sorry I’m a little casual today. I ought to be more professional for y’all. I just feel the Holy Ghost in the room. Thank you, Lord. We worship you today, Jesus. Father, we’re coming to the secret place. Lord, we would just give you fair warning, look out. Look out, people in this church are running to the secret place. Lord, your calendar is about to fill up with meetings every day.

Our people are running for you. We’re chasing after you. We’re hungry for your presence. Father, I speak against everything that has kept people out of prayer in this church, whether it be the discomfort or the condemnation or the content. Father, I’ll give them the content. Lord, I’m asking you to keep revealing your grace to them so that there won’t be a condemnation that keeps them out. And Lord, just make them comfortable. Just give them a comfort when they step into the presence of the Lord. Thank you, God. Thank you, God. We worship you today. Hallelujah.

I’m not trying to be this guy. I’ve been trying to hold it back all day. We’re a spirit-filled church. It’s just on me. I’m gonna pray in the Spirit. And if you think it’s weird, I’m sorry. We do weird stuff around here. There ain’t gonna be no interpretation either. I just gotta get it out. I’m like a shook up Coke. If you pop my top, I’m gonna fizz. Thank you, Lord Jesus. Hallelujah. Send your power. Touch this church with a power we don’t even know what to do with. Thank you, God. Thank you, God.