Priscilla Shirer - How to Experience God for Yourself

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
You gotta have your own relationship.

Speaker 2 (00:03):
You have to make your own choice. You have to
go and gather him up for yourself.

Speaker 1 (00:08):
You have to taste and see for yourself how good
he is. You can celebrate him in the testimonies of
other people, in the experience of other people, till you
were blue in the face. But there's got to come
a time where you decide, I'm gonna stop sitting on
the periphery and applauding his experience with other folks. You
gotta decide today will be the day that I go

(00:29):
and gather him up for myself.

Speaker 2 (00:33):
Years and years ago, man, my babies were little.

Speaker 1 (00:36):
I remember this because I traveled to Memphis on one
particular occasion.

Speaker 2 (00:40):
And I remember this because I was exhausted.

Speaker 1 (00:42):
I was so tired. You know, my kids were small
at the time, and I happened to take this particular
trip by myself, and I traveled to Memphis, and I
remember being so excited when the lady picked me up
from the airport that was a part of the church
that I was gonna be ministering at. She took me
to from the airport to the hotel.

Speaker 2 (01:00):
It was early evening. I was so glad.

Speaker 1 (01:02):
Anybody ever been glad to just go to bed at
eight pm?

Speaker 2 (01:07):
I could not wait.

Speaker 1 (01:08):
I laid down in the bed, ready to get a
good night of sleep, and I was jolted awake about
two o'clock three o'clock in the morning because there was
a train that went by right outside the window of
our hotel.

Speaker 2 (01:22):
The conductor of the train was sitting on the horn
as the long train.

Speaker 1 (01:26):
Blazed right outside of the hotel where I was sleeping.
I sat straight up in bed, sort of alarmed by
the noise, went and looked out of the window and
realized that literally the train tracks were right there, and
it was one of those very long trains with a
lot of cars that went whisking by. It took a
while for the train to finally pass by and settle.
I tried to go back to sleep as best I could.

(01:50):
Lady came back to pick me up that particular morning.
Because the conference started, I had to be there very
early in the morning, so it was about six thirty
or so anyway that I was gonna have to get
up and get dressed and get ready for a seven
fifteen or seven thirty pickup, And so I got in
the car and I didn't really really say anything.

Speaker 2 (02:06):
No big deal. We had a great day at the conference.

Speaker 1 (02:08):
I went back to sleep that night, thinking, of course,
that the night before had been a fluke and that
that train wasn't coming by again. Went to sleep about
eight thirty nine pm, so glad to get a good
full night of sleep. But three am, you guessed it,
that train went roaring by right outside the window. I
sat straight up in bed, not believing that this was

(02:29):
happening again, and I couldn't even get back to sleep
that night.

Speaker 2 (02:32):
I couldn't wait for that sweet lady to come pick
me up. The next morning, I sat down in the.

Speaker 1 (02:38):
Car and I said, so, hey, did you know that
there is a train that goes by about three o'clock
in the morning. At least the last two mornings that
I've been here, that train has gone by in the
middle of the night. Woken me straight up out of
my sleep, and she had this look of complete.

Speaker 2 (02:56):
Horror and regret written all over her face. She said,
I am so sorry. I didn't even think about the fact.

Speaker 1 (03:04):
That that train goes by, because those of us who
live in this community have grown so used to the
sound of the train that it doesn't even occur to.

Speaker 2 (03:14):
Us when it's passing through anymore. It occurs to me
that those of us who.

Speaker 1 (03:21):
Live, particularly in this western part of the world, where
the presence of God has been so lavishly given.

Speaker 2 (03:28):
To us, where on every street.

Speaker 1 (03:30):
Corner we see another church with a pastor that preaches
the good news of Jesus Christ, where we can turn
on Christian radio stations, or go across town to the
Christian bookstore. Where we live as women in a day
and age and generation where there have never been ever
in history, so many bibles study resources by women for women.

Speaker 2 (03:51):
What could it be that.

Speaker 1 (03:53):
We've grown so used to the blessing of the presence
of God that when the train of.

Speaker 2 (03:59):
God's glory falls, when.

Speaker 1 (04:01):
God's presence comes and marks and permeates our presence, that
we don't even recognize it anymore. That God has so
blessed us, that we're too blessed for our own good,
that we don't see the fingerprints of God in our lives,
That when there's even just a hint of disappointment or discouragement.

Speaker 2 (04:23):
Or frustration or irritation in.

Speaker 1 (04:25):
Our life, that we are blinded to the fact that
even when things are dark the light of God's presence
can still be found. If we'll just open up our eyes.
May we never be desensitized to the presence of God.
And if you have your Bibles and you want to
look with me at a passage of scripture, I'll just

(04:47):
read it to you that I want to point out today.
If you still, you know, actually use a Bible with
paper pages like I do, or your iPhone, your iPad.
Any manner of eyemass is fine. In Luke chapter two,
there are a group of people who are to be
in the presence.

Speaker 2 (05:01):
Of God, and they're not even going to recognize it.

Speaker 1 (05:04):
I will tell you as you turned to Luke chapter two,
that the author Luke wrote this gospel and recorded these
stories really to show us how to have an encounter
with Jesus, to not miss him when his presence is near.

Speaker 2 (05:17):
And by the way, this is our goal as believers.

Speaker 1 (05:19):
This is the reason why He died on the cross
of cavalry, so that we could not just know about him,
but so that we can encounter him. We're not just
supposed to read in the Old Testament about how he
divided the Red Sea or caused the walls of Jericho
to come tumbling down, or met with a man named
Moses in the form of a burning bush, or showed
up as the Angel of the Lord in a wine

(05:41):
press while a fearful, timid Gideon was beating out wine
threshing wheat rather in that wine press. We're not just
supposed to read about others that had an encounter with Jesus.
We're not just supposed to see and applaud and experience.

Speaker 2 (05:57):
The testimonies of other people.

Speaker 1 (05:59):
They're supposed to to encourage us to realize that if
regular folks like that can encounter Him, so can we.
And Luke comes along and he writes story after story
and his gospel to show us that we.

Speaker 2 (06:11):
Can have an encounter with Jesus.

Speaker 1 (06:14):
These people that he is writing to and that he's
writing about, we're in a time of national decay. There
is chaos happening and swirling around them morally and socially,
and you and I can relate to that because they
were not just in a time.

Speaker 2 (06:29):
Of national decay. So are we.

Speaker 1 (06:33):
Our country is in a state of more social decay
and decline than we've ever seen before. And the more
God is marginalized and segmented to the periphery of society.
The worst things are gonna get the more he is
completely ignored and disregarded, the more we're gonna see the
influx of chaos and destruction.

Speaker 2 (06:53):
But today I don't want y'all to worry about the
White House. I want to get to your house. I
want to talk about the destruction and the decay.

Speaker 1 (07:01):
Happening, maybe underneath the roof of your own home. Luke
is writing not just then, but now to people who
need a savior, Folks who are waiting on a hero
to show up and rescue them from the plight of
their own circumstances. Luke was writing to them, but by
the Holy Spirit, he is writing to us today, for

(07:23):
any of you who are in a state of decline
in some area of your life where we're seeing against
the backdrop of darkness, this need we have for the
Savior to manifest himself, for us to not just know
about him from afar, applauding him in the testimonies of
other people, But if anybody wants to experience him themselves,

(07:45):
then Luke is writing to you. And I want somebody
to know this today, that sometimes sometimes your difficulties are
less about the enemy being against you, and more about
God wanting you to wanting to show you what it
looks like when he is for you. Sometimes it's about
him finally wanting his daughter's eyes to be open so

(08:08):
that when he shows up, they're sensitive enough to see him.
Lukechapter two, verse twenty five says, and behold, there was
a man in Jerusalem whose name was Simeon. This man
was righteous and devout and looking for the consolation. He
was looking for some hope, y'all, looking for the consolation

(08:28):
of Israel.

Speaker 2 (08:29):
And the Holy Spirit was upon him, and it had
been revealed.

Speaker 1 (08:33):
To him by the Holy Spirit that he would not
see death before he had seen the Lord's Christ.

Speaker 2 (08:39):
And he came in the spirit into the temple.

Speaker 1 (08:42):
And when the parents brought in the child Jesus to
carry out for him the custom of the law, he
took Jesus.

Speaker 2 (08:49):
He went over to this.

Speaker 1 (08:50):
Couple, grabbed this forty day old child into his arms,
and he blessed God and said, now Lord, you can
let your servant depart in peace, because because according to
Thy word, my eyes have seen your salvation, You have
prepared your salvation, and the presence of all the people.
A liked revelation, the glory of thy people Israel. And

(09:12):
Mary and Joseph, they were amazed at the things that
were being said about their son, Jesus Christ. Here on
this occasion, Mary and Joseph have come into the temple
for the purification ceremony. It was traditional, it was ceremonial
that about forty days after a baby was born and
the purification process had taken place, that the parents of

(09:34):
a new baby would bring their baby into the temple
to offer specific sacrifices, a burnt offering, a sin offering,
and just to present their child to the Lord. Now,
traditionally when folks came into the temple, they would bring sacrifices,
and if you look back into the book of Leviticus,
the details of those sacrifices are given. They would need
to have a pigeon for a particular sacrifice. They would

(09:57):
need to have a lamb for another sacrifice. There is
a caveat. I'm just gonna take a little rabbit trail
for a second, because I love that y'all like rabbit trails.
There's a little caveat given in Luke Leviticus, chapter twelve
that says that if someone is not wealthy enough if
they do not have the resources to actually purchase a
lamb for this sacrifice, that they actually can just bring

(10:20):
two pigeons. And I didn't read all the details here,
but a few verses earlier than where we started, in
verse twenty five, it tells us that Mary and Joseph's
come into the temple with two pigeons or two turtle doves.
They don't have a lamb, which indicates to us that
they have expended so much of their resources that they
are in a state of poverty at least enough, but

(10:42):
they were not able to afford their own lamb. They've
got two pigeons. It's all they had to bring on
this occasion. As they bring their new baby into the
tabernacle to present him to the Lord, they've got these
two pigeons, which means that when they walked into the temple,
people would have looked at them and recognize them as
a couple that was an ins that had insufficient funds,

(11:05):
as a couple that was lacking, as a poor couple.
They would have been looked down upon. People would have
marginalized them because they did not have the accoutrements of
wealth that everybody else in the building had so they
did not have a lamb, and yet they have in
their possession the lamb that takes away the sins of
the world.

Speaker 2 (11:25):
Can I just say to anybody who is in the
room and you felt.

Speaker 1 (11:29):
Like an outcast because you don't wear what everybody else wears,
You can't afford to drive what everybody.

Speaker 2 (11:35):
Else drives you, you.

Speaker 1 (11:36):
Don't have the resources to live in the neighborhood where
everybody else lives. Listen, my friends, even.

Speaker 2 (11:41):
If you do not have a lamb, you might be.

Speaker 1 (11:44):
In the perfect position to make sure you have intimacy
with the lamb who takes away the sins of the world.

Speaker 2 (11:52):
And can I tell you.

Speaker 1 (11:53):
That sometimes it is our affluence that keeps us from
having the Lamb of God in our intimacy and.

Speaker 2 (12:01):
Fellowship with him like never before.

Speaker 1 (12:04):
The people that I have met that have more of
an integral, intimate, ongoing, fervent, passionate relationship with Jesus Christ,
they are not the people sometimes that live in the
mansion on the hill. It's the people in a hunt
in a village with thatched rooms and dirt floors, who have,
in their desperation, had an encounter with Jesus Christ.

Speaker 2 (12:29):
And y'all, I have met people in.

Speaker 1 (12:30):
Third world countries who pray for us. Ooh, they pray
for us. They feel bad for us because they say,
we pray anemic, self centered prayers. They listen to our
prayers that are so focused on having more comfort than
we already have.

Speaker 2 (12:52):
Where in their desperation.

Speaker 1 (12:54):
They have met with Jesus, they have seen Him with
their own eyes. They have been marked by the presence
of God. They have watched God show up in so
much splendor, and they want that for us. So sometimes
when we can afford our own lamb, it pushes out

(13:14):
the opportunity and the margin that should be reserved for
the lamb. Comfortable people pray anemic prayers. It's desperation, it's insufficiency,
it's lack, it's emptiness. When you find yourself in that
state where, like Mary and Joseph, you don't have enough

(13:36):
to buy your own lamb anymore, that might be the
perfect setup for your encounter with the Lamb of God.

Speaker 2 (13:44):
And so they are coming into the temple with the lamb.
He's in their arms. They walk in to the temple, y'all,
they're at church. There's a group of people, including.

Speaker 1 (14:00):
Religious leaders, pharisees, and sadducees that have all gathered around,
probably hundreds of people, all carrying their sacrifices that have
joined in on this occasion.

Speaker 2 (14:11):
And they've been waiting. All of these people have been
waiting on the Messiah. They've been waiting for the Kingdom
of God to be at hand.

Speaker 1 (14:20):
They've been waiting on a king to ride in on
a white horse and to redeem them from all that
has been lost at how they've lost as a nation.
They've been waiting for somebody to rescue them from the
oppression of Rome. They have been looking for a hero.
And the hero comes in and they do not recognize him.

Speaker 2 (14:41):
They are at church.

Speaker 1 (14:44):
And they do not recognize the presence of God. The
reason why is because he has come in a package
that they do not prefer. He has come in a
package that does not align with their expectations, and so
because he does not look like what they wanted him

(15:06):
to look like, about what they had in their own
estimation prepared as the package that would be, in their estimation,
the best package for the King to arrive. Because their
circumstance does not look like and he has not appeared
the way that they preferred. They downplay the Messiah when
he arrives. I want to submit to you that Jesus

(15:27):
is there in this difficult moment in your marriage, in
this trying moment in your finances, in this struggle on
your job, in this difficulty, in this relationship you're rubbing
corners with your boss or your spouse, or this struggle
you're having on your university campus or in your high
school campus, this hard time that you were having. He

(15:48):
is there. He just may have come in the package
you don't prefer. And that oftentimes the fingerprints of God
are not recognized, not because he's not there. It is
just because we have set up about what he looks
like and how he will speak and how he.

Speaker 2 (16:05):
Will move the prayer request. The solution that.

Speaker 1 (16:08):
He will bring doesn't align with the prayer requests that
we have prayed. We have boxed God into the way
we want him to answer, instead of believing that his
ways are not our ways, and his thoughts are not
our thoughts. As high as the heavens are above the earth,
that's how high his thoughts are above our own.

Speaker 2 (16:27):
And so we box God in when.

Speaker 1 (16:29):
We say, Lord, answer my request in this particular way.
Do you know that you limit not God, but you
limit I limit our experience of God When we say, Lord,
answer my request exactly this way.

Speaker 2 (16:43):
I have learned to pray. Here, Lord, is my request.
You said that I can make it known. Here's how
I would like to see you move in my circumstance.

Speaker 1 (16:50):
Thank you Lord that I can come boldly and make
my request known. So I've made my request, But at
the end of that prayer, I've learned to pray, Lord.

Speaker 2 (16:58):
Do it or do something better? Because do you know there.

Speaker 1 (17:07):
Are categories of options that our brain doesn't even know
are available and accessible to us. And if we limit
God to what we can think and what we see
as the way, we have not even considered the categories
of opportunity that this divine, Holy almighty being has accessible

(17:29):
to him.

Speaker 2 (17:30):
Y'all, He's not just thinking about you.

Speaker 1 (17:32):
He's thinking about your children, and your grandchildren and your
great grandchildren.

Speaker 2 (17:37):
And those that aren't to come, and how.

Speaker 1 (17:38):
His kingdom purposes are gonna be outworked in this generation.
And so on this occasion, the Messiah shows up and
nobody recognizes him except somebody say accept.

Speaker 2 (17:50):
Accept A guy named Simeon.

Speaker 1 (17:54):
He had been told and promised just like we have,
he would see the manifest presence of God.

Speaker 2 (18:04):
He'd been told it, he'd been promised, just like we've
been promised, because of.

Speaker 1 (18:10):
Our relationship with God through Christ, Jesus, and the Holy
Spirit in dwelling us, that we will see the fingerprints
of God working in our lives. This is called the
manifest presence of God.

Speaker 2 (18:23):
It is unique to omnipresence.

Speaker 1 (18:26):
Omnipresence means that God is everywhere all At the same time,
I'm so grateful for God's omnipresence because God's omnipresence means
that when I fly back to Dallas where I live,
when my new friends that I just met from Uganda
fly back to where they live, that when you all
fly back to where ever it is you've come from,
whether all over different areas of California or Afar, it

(18:47):
means that no matter where we go, He is as
much with me as He is with you, because He
is omnipresent. But if you're anything like me, you're grateful
for his omnipresence, but you want more than that.

Speaker 2 (19:00):
You want the manifested presence of God.

Speaker 1 (19:03):
I'm talking about where you can look back over your
circumstances and realize that His fingerprints were all throughout that thing.
I'm talking about where you can see footprints in the
sand as you actually recognize that God was walking beside
you the whole way.

Speaker 2 (19:17):
I'm talking about what other people.

Speaker 1 (19:19):
Call coincidence encounters. You see the sovereign hand of God
that was aligning your footsteps and setting you in the
right place at the exact right time, the manifest presence
of God. I wanted to know what made Simeon's eyes open,
to recognize what nobody else in this scenario did. I
figured whatever opened up his eyes might open up our

(19:40):
eyes as well.

Speaker 2 (19:41):
Are you ready?

Speaker 1 (19:42):
Three things that I want to point out to you?
It says in verse twenty six about Simeon. It says
that it had been actually verse twenty five. I want
to start there. There was a man in Jerusalem whose
name was Simeon. He was righteous, devout, looking for the
consolation of Israel. We could spend a whole lot of
time in those three, but here is where I want
to hearten. The Holy Spirit was upon him. The Holy

(20:07):
Spirit was upon him.

Speaker 2 (20:10):
It says.

Speaker 1 (20:13):
That he came into the temple Verse twenty seven in
the Spirit. Verse twenty six says it had been revealed
to him by the Holy Spirit. Look at the presence
of the Holy Spirit permeating this text.

Speaker 3 (20:29):
Look at how the author has over and over and
over again highlighted the work of the Holy Spirit in
opening up Simeon's eyes to be able to recognize the
manifested presence of.

Speaker 2 (20:41):
God before him, in the person of Jesus Christ.

Speaker 1 (20:44):
Luke here he is just in the second chapter of
this book, and by the way, just in these first
two chapters he has already alluded to the Spirit ten times.

Speaker 2 (20:54):
The work of God's Spirit is so powerful.

Speaker 1 (20:57):
And so needful to a fruitful experience life of the believer,
that even before the Book of Acts, even before Pentecost,
even before the Spirit.

Speaker 2 (21:06):
Has come, Luke points out the movement of the Spirit
here in the life of Simon. This shows you how
important the spirit's work.

Speaker 1 (21:15):
Is, how critical it is to making sure that your
spiritual senses, your spiritual radar, is heightened, so that you
can detect the presence of God. The Holy Spirit was
upon him. Now I want you to see the work
of God's Spirit. This is just the first characteristic of
Simian but I want to just take some time for

(21:36):
just a few moments on it. The work of God's
Spirit is so important it deserves a little bit of
our attention.

Speaker 2 (21:41):
Here.

Speaker 1 (21:42):
There are three ways that the Holy Spirit is described
as relating to Simon in these few verses. Just a
few ways that the Holy Spirit relates to Simian in
these few verses. The first thing it says is that
the Holy Spirit was upon him. Now listen, I want
you to know that if you have placed faith in
Jesus Christ, the Holy Spirit lives on the.

Speaker 2 (22:03):
Inside of you. Ephesian Chapter one says, at.

Speaker 1 (22:07):
The moment you believe you received the Holy Spirit, you
were sealed by the Holy Spirit of promise.

Speaker 2 (22:14):
I want you to know that at the moment you
became a.

Speaker 1 (22:16):
Believer in Jesus Christ, you received the most incredible gift
you will ever receive this side of eternity, and that
is the very presence of God living on the inside
of you.

Speaker 2 (22:27):
The Holy Spirit is not a ghost or a wind,
or a fire or a dove.

Speaker 1 (22:32):
He is often symbolized by those things, but don't minimize him.

Speaker 2 (22:36):
That ain't who he is.

Speaker 1 (22:37):
The Holy Spirit is the third person of the Trinity,
not third because he is leased in value.

Speaker 2 (22:43):
Just third, because he's the last to be revealed to
us in the pages of scripture.

Speaker 1 (22:48):
But all of the power, all of the glory, all
of the authority, all.

Speaker 2 (22:52):
Of the grandeur of God the Father, is in.

Speaker 1 (22:55):
The person of the Holy Spirit, which means, if you're
a believer, in the Holy Spirit lives in you.

Speaker 2 (23:04):
That means all of the grandeur and all of the greatness.

Speaker 1 (23:06):
All of the authority of God him self now lives
on the inside of you. So if you are a believer,
you have the Holy Spirit. You are not waiting on
more of the Holy Spirit. All the Holy Spirit you
ever gonna get. You got the moment, you got saved.
Now you do need to be filled by God's spirit

(23:29):
so that his influence in your life grows and grows,
so that you operate under the gifting of the Spirit,
so that you can live according to the fruit of
the Spirit. That means living beyond your natural capacity. It
means when your patience runs out, you can still have
more patience with that person.

Speaker 2 (23:47):
It means when gentleness has long since.

Speaker 1 (23:49):
Left the building, you still find you got a little gentleness.

Speaker 2 (23:53):
For that peron.

Speaker 1 (23:53):
When self discipline, I mean you just don't have no
more self discipline in that area. We need the fruit
of God Spirit. So we need to be filled by
the Spirit. As we yield to human obedience, we are filled,
which means He influences us more.

Speaker 2 (24:08):
Our mind is renewed and transformed.

Speaker 1 (24:11):
We are sanctified into the image of Christ Jesus.

Speaker 2 (24:15):
So the Holy Spirit.

Speaker 1 (24:16):
Is in you, But Simeon, his relationship with the Spirit
is not described in that way. It doesn't say that
the Spirit was in him. It says that the Holy
Spirit was on him, which means there is a difference
between the Spirit being in you.

Speaker 2 (24:39):
And the Spirit resting.

Speaker 1 (24:44):
Listen to me, the gift of God's Spirit in you. Oh,
this brings tears to my eyes. The gift of God's
Spirit in you. He will never leave you nor forsake you.
There is nothing you can do to work yourself out
of a relationship with.

Speaker 2 (25:02):
The Holy Spirit.

Speaker 1 (25:03):
Okay, but him being on you.

Speaker 2 (25:08):
You gotta live a life.

Speaker 1 (25:10):
I want to live a life that is a magnet
for the presence of God to rest on me. We
can sit in this conference until we're blue in the
face and applaud the truths of God and say amen
to the truths of God.

Speaker 2 (25:24):
But if we leave.

Speaker 1 (25:25):
This room and live in a way that is out
of alignment with the truths of God, we will not
have the spirit resting on us. If you want the
mark of God's presence on you, I'm talking about where
other people can see you operating in your gift, moving

(25:45):
about in the assignments that you have been given. Where
they can just see there's a unique favor on your
life toward that particular task or that particular endeavor.

Speaker 2 (25:55):
Where you are marked by something.

Speaker 1 (25:56):
That gives you favor, that gives you His for a
particular area of your life.

Speaker 2 (26:02):
Then you must live.

Speaker 1 (26:03):
I must choose to live in a way that honors
God so that God's presence can rest upon us.

Speaker 2 (26:11):
Because He will not force himself on you.

Speaker 1 (26:14):
He offers you this resting of his presence and his
grace upon your life if you will choose to live
in a way that does not disturb His presence, that
does not keep him from being able to be near you.

Speaker 2 (26:28):
Because you have chosen here it is to be holy.
Listen to me, Are you listening? Yall?

Speaker 1 (26:41):
We live in a day and age where we have
become more interested in being impressive.

Speaker 2 (26:46):
Than being holy.

Speaker 1 (26:49):
Where we are more interested in making sure we have
likes and friends and.

Speaker 2 (26:55):
The applause of people more than just being flat out holy.

Speaker 1 (27:02):
By making sure that political correctness is not our main goal,
that we're not after the applause of people. We're after
the applause of Heaven. You gotta choose to be ye holy.
And so I implore you, sisters, by the mercies of God,
to walk in a manner worthy of the calling by

(27:25):
which you have been called. So the spirit rested upon him,
Let me just show you quickly. Verse twenty six says
if the spirit revealed to him, so that means the
spirit not only rested upon him, the spirits revealed to him.
Old preachers call this illumination. It's shining a spotlight. It's

(27:47):
when you're sitting in church on a Sunday and your
pastor opens up the Bible to preach, and man, he
just reads or she reads that first two verses that
they're going to be preaching from, and you sit straight
up in your seat because you feel like it's all
about you.

Speaker 2 (28:01):
Anybody know what I'm talking about.

Speaker 1 (28:04):
It's where you're trying to figure out, how did the
church bug my house?

Speaker 2 (28:08):
How did they know. That's the illumination of the spirit.

Speaker 1 (28:14):
It's when the old truth of scripture leap up off
the page, and, for lack of a better way word,
it's when they grip you in your soul where you
see how that intersects with something you are personally facing today.
That is the revelation of the Holy Spirit. This is
what the Holy Spirit does. He reveals, He illumines, he

(28:36):
shines the spotlight. Simeon was there that day because he
had been promised by the revelation of God's Spirit.

Speaker 2 (28:44):
It wasn't just a random promise. It was his promise. Oh,
you've had that happen over the course of these days
that we've been gathered.

Speaker 1 (28:51):
You probably have had that happen where something that has
been said.

Speaker 2 (28:54):
It wasn't just great to hear it. It gripped your soul.

Speaker 1 (28:58):
You knew. It wasn't a sign for you. It was
a conviction that you knew the Lord was going to
send you out of here with that assignment because the
Holy Spirit revealed.

Speaker 2 (29:07):
It to you. God's Spirit rests.

Speaker 1 (29:10):
He reveals, and then he ruled Simeon because it says
in verse twenty seven that he came in the spirit
to the temple, meaning the Spirit told him on this
day to go into the temple.

Speaker 2 (29:22):
And it says that.

Speaker 1 (29:23):
He came into the spirit the into the temple under
the conviction.

Speaker 2 (29:29):
Of the Holy Spirit.

Speaker 1 (29:30):
When the Spirit said go, Simeon said yes, sir. He
submitted to the leadership of the Holy Spirit, and he
was in the right place at the right time to
run right smack dab into the Messiah because he was
submitted to the leadership of the Holy Spirit. Do you

(29:52):
know that the more you ignore that still small conviction,
the quieter that voice will become, not because he is
no longer speaking, but because.

Speaker 2 (30:01):
You've built a callous of disobedience. You have muffled the
voice of the Holy Spirit.

Speaker 1 (30:07):
So it is better to be so sensitive to God's
Holy Spirit that sometimes you give when maybe he hasn't
even prompted you to give.

Speaker 2 (30:14):
But it's okay, because.

Speaker 1 (30:16):
To the best of your capacity, you are obeying the
Holy Spirit of God, just to keep those airways open
and clear from the disobedience that will begin to muffle
his voice in your life, because more than anything else,
the enemy wants you disconnected from the privilege of.

Speaker 2 (30:33):
Hearing the voice of God.

Speaker 1 (30:35):
Y'all, this is what separates our faith from every other so.

Speaker 2 (30:39):
Called faith on the face of the earth. It's that
our God is alive. It's that he speaks. It's that
we have the privilege to hear his voice.

Speaker 1 (30:49):
Never downplay or minimize the value, the beauty, the lavish
grace of this privilege that we have to hear the
voice of God.

Speaker 2 (31:01):
So the Holy Spirit rested upon him.

Speaker 1 (31:04):
There are two other things that I want to point
out to you that were symbolic or were significant about
Simeon that opened up his eyes to see Jesus as
he was to be seen in this.

Speaker 2 (31:15):
Package that other people down played.

Speaker 1 (31:17):
And found insignificant, that they totally ignored because they didn't
think that their king would look like that. Here's what
opened Simeon's eyes, not only that he was in the
spirit when he came into the temple. And by the way,
here's another rabbit trail. Sorry, if we came to church
in the spirit, it would change our experience in church.

Speaker 2 (31:41):
Can I just say that?

Speaker 1 (31:44):
Because while everybody else was looking at that poor couple
wondering why in the world they were in their midst
and discounting Mary and Joseph, Simeon came in the spirit,
and he was less concerned about who was wearing what,
and who was driving up what, and who sat where,
and who was in his seat, and whether or not
it was hot outside and they had to walk forward
to go take their children to Sunday school. He was

(32:04):
less concerned about his convenience. Whether or not the preacher
preached good was irrelevant to him.

Speaker 2 (32:08):
He was looking for Jesus.

Speaker 1 (32:11):
Whether or not the microphones were perfectly balanced, or the
lights were exactly as they should be, whether or not
the LD's screens were on full display that day, Whether
or not the ushers were or were not kind.

Speaker 2 (32:21):
Was not his priority. He had come with his eyes
peeled for Jesus.

Speaker 1 (32:26):
We would be less critical and less skeptical if we came.

Speaker 2 (32:30):
To church in the spirit.

Speaker 1 (32:33):
Then the pressure wouldn't be on the person who's on
the stage, because you didn't come to see them.

Speaker 2 (32:37):
You came to see Jesus.

Speaker 1 (32:41):
Okay verse twenty seven. So he comes in the spirit,
and then look what happens in verse twenty seven, The
parents bring in the child Jesus. Jesus comes in in
his parents' arms. Look at the Savior, Look at how
the manifest presence of God arrives on this remark arkable day.
Watch him show up into the experience of this aged

(33:04):
saint named Simeon in a very personal way, and onto
the landscape of human history. He arrives in the arms
of his parents. There is something about the way we
see Jesus when we look at him through the well
worn paths that have been hewned out by our parents,
our grandparents, our great grandparents, our forefathers, and our fore mothers.

Speaker 2 (33:28):
Spiritually speaking, the people who.

Speaker 1 (33:30):
Have gone before us and have walked with Jesus just
a little while, who have spent their lives serving him.

Speaker 2 (33:37):
I am always nervous.

Speaker 1 (33:38):
When I see a young group of Christians with their
little skinny jeans and their lattes and their avocado toast,
which I love, by the way. I'm just always a
little nervous when I see them instagramming all their religious
experiences without the oversight of some spiritual parents.

Speaker 2 (33:58):
Because y'all, we.

Speaker 1 (33:59):
Have modernized Jesus today, the modern version of Jesus that
we have crafted, he has made him water down. Now
he's tolerant of sin without the expectation of holiness. Our
Jesus is politically correct.

Speaker 2 (34:17):
We need to see Jesus coming in.

Speaker 1 (34:19):
The arms of our parents, the people who have gone
before us, the folks who have walked the road a
little while, who know what hymn those are who sang
the good old hymns that were based.

Speaker 2 (34:31):
In some theology.

Speaker 1 (34:32):
We got to make sure that our new praise and
worship songs, I love them. We got to make sure
they're rooted in some good theology.

Speaker 2 (34:43):
And so the package may change.

Speaker 1 (34:45):
Listen, I still go to the kind of church that's
come a long way, but it started when I was
one year old, the church that I go to now.
So you know, back in the day, there was no
way in the world I would have ever gotten on
a stage with Panther?

Speaker 2 (34:58):
Are you kidding me? Anybody know what kind of church
I'm talking about.

Speaker 1 (35:02):
We still have a few people in our church, a
few mothers of the church.

Speaker 2 (35:06):
If anybody knows what I mean. Jeans in the church,
Are you kidding? They came in in their suits.

Speaker 1 (35:14):
I'm talking about where the skirt matches the jacket.

Speaker 2 (35:19):
Like they were bought together.

Speaker 1 (35:23):
And not only that, but underneath that suit, she's gonna
have some actual panty hose on.

Speaker 2 (35:29):
I'm not talking about spanks with the feet cut out. Ah,
I mean panty.

Speaker 1 (35:32):
Hose, the ones with the girdle top. Anybody know what
I'm talking about? Anybody remember that?

Speaker 2 (35:41):
And she's gonna have a handbag in her hand, and.

Speaker 1 (35:44):
That handbag, that clutch is going to match that jacket,
which matches that skirt, which matches her patent leather shoes
that she has on her feet, closed toe, patent leather shoes.
But the outfit is never complete. And you know it

(36:09):
ain't no regular hat, right, you know, it's got something.
It's a feather or a net or something that's sitting
just like this.

Speaker 4 (36:20):
And she's gonna worship God. Anybody know what kind of
church I'm talking about?

Speaker 1 (36:40):
And I love when she comes up to give a testimony.

Speaker 2 (36:47):
About what she has seen the Lord. It might not
be modern, it might not be new and.

Speaker 1 (36:54):
Improved, but it's the Jesus of Abraham, Isaac and Shape.

Speaker 2 (37:00):
It's the God of our forefathers. There's some things you
cannot learn on Instagram.

Speaker 1 (37:07):
There are some things you just need to be with
the Mother of the Church, somebody who's walked the road
a little bit longer than you, to make sure you
can bounce off of her or him from the true theological,
biblically based, unchanging, venerated.

Speaker 2 (37:25):
Word of God. So the package may change, but the
principles never do. Y'all. Jesus was never politically correct. He
was always a revolutionary.

Speaker 1 (37:36):
He never dismissed sin. He called it out in grace,
but most certainly in truth. He was never watered down.
He always said I am the only way, I am
the truth, and I am the life.

Speaker 2 (37:50):
He didn't acquiesce or tolerate. He loved, but.

Speaker 1 (37:53):
He did say repent, for the Kingdom.

Speaker 2 (37:56):
Of God is at hands God.

Speaker 1 (38:00):
God made us in his image, And one philosopher said,
we have now returned the favor by trying to make.

Speaker 2 (38:09):
Him in ours.

Speaker 1 (38:13):
We got to see Jesus as he's always meant to
be seen, and sometimes it requires you going to find
a parent, a spiritual parent, who can show you the
Jesus of the Bible. Simeon saw Jesus because as he
was meant to be seen. He saw him in the
package in which our Savior wanted to come, because there
were some spiritual parents who were willing to bring him in.

(38:37):
So I speak to the younger people that are in
this room.

Speaker 2 (38:39):
I'm telling you.

Speaker 1 (38:41):
Check your arrogance, check our lack of teachability, where sometimes
we just think we know it all, so we won't
recognize and see the beauty of our Savior because we
won't receive him from the parents who are trying to
give him to us.

Speaker 2 (38:58):
So the package may change, change the package.

Speaker 1 (39:01):
Enjoy that freedom, but watch and make sure that you're
sticking to the true milk.

Speaker 2 (39:06):
Of the Word of God.

Speaker 1 (39:08):
And then can I implore you, who are in this
room and you've sort of graduated to that parent department,
take this as your privilege to carry Jesus to those
who need him, to see him and experience him as
you will bring him. Simeon shows us that in order
to have our eyes open, his experience demonstrates to us

(39:30):
that we need to have the Holy Spirit upon us,
and we need to be looking for how.

Speaker 2 (39:34):
The parents bring him into our experience.

Speaker 1 (39:36):
But finally, it says in verse twenty eight, that is
soon as he caught a glimpse of him, he went over.
Look at the boldness, look at the audacity, look at
the eagerness of Simeon.

Speaker 2 (39:48):
He runs over to the parents. He takes the baby out.

Speaker 1 (39:54):
Of their arms and gathers him to himself, because an
experience with Jesus from Afar wasn't enough for Simeon.

Speaker 2 (40:06):
Can I just tell you in this.

Speaker 1 (40:07):
Room that God does not have grand children. You gotta
have your own relationship.

Speaker 2 (40:23):
You have to make your own choice. You have to
go and gather him up for yourself.

Speaker 1 (40:29):
You have to taste and see for yourself how good
he is. You can celebrate him in the testimonies of
other people, in the experience of other people, till you
are blue in the face. But there's got to come
a time where you decide, I'm gonna stop sitting on
the periphery and applauding his experience with other folks. You
gotta decide today will be the day that I go

(40:49):
and gather him up for myself, That I start to
spend time with him in prayer and in conversation, so
that I can take advantage of this privilege to hear
his voice and to speak to him in prayer. That
I won't let everybody keep spoon feeding me the word
of God.

Speaker 2 (41:05):
I'm gonna go to the scriptures myself and know that
I too can have.

Speaker 1 (41:09):
An ongoing, fervent relationship with Jesus. I'm gonna gather him
up in.

Speaker 2 (41:15):
My own arms, and when you do, you will see him.

Speaker 1 (41:19):
And experience him and encounter him in a way you
have never encountered him before.

Speaker 2 (41:25):
At TBN, our mission is to use every available means
to reach as many individuals and families as possible with
the life changing gospel of Jesus Christ.

Speaker 1 (41:34):
Thank you for helping make the Gospel of Grace go
around the world.

Speaker 2 (41:41):
Without you, we couldn't do it.

Speaker 1 (41:43):
God bless you.