August 4, 2025 • 39 mins
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Okay, it's going to be good.
Speaker 2 (00:07):
Now there was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus
, a ruler of the Jews.
This man came to Jesus by nightand said to him Rabbi, we know
that you are a teacher.
Come from God, for no one elsecan do the things you do unless
God is with him.
Jesus answered him.
Nicodemus said to him.
(00:34):
Jesus answered, truly truly, Isay to you, unless one is born
of water and the Spirit, hecannot enter the kingdom of God.
That which is born of the fleshis flesh and that which is born
(00:55):
of the Spirit is spirit.
Do not marvel that.
I said to you, you must be bornagain.
The wind blows where it wishesand you hear its sound, but you
do not know where it comes fromor where it goes.
So it is with everyone who isborn of the Spirit.
Nicodemus said to him how canthese things be?
(01:16):
And Jesus answered him Are youof the teacher of Israel?
And yet you do not understandthese things.
Truly, truly, I say to you wespeak of what we know and bear
witness to what we have seen,but you do not receive our
testimony.
If I have told you earthlythings and you do not believe,
(01:37):
how can you believe if I tellyou heavenly things.
No one has ascended into heavenexcept he who descended from
heaven, the Son of man.
And as Moses lifted up theserpent in the wilderness, so
must the Son of man be lifted upthat whomever believes in him
may have eternal life.
(01:58):
Thank you.
Speaker 3 (04:06):
I'm going to go ahead and do that, all right, thank
you, all right, thank you.
We not only heard the Word, wefelt it too, didn't we?
You feel the Holy Spirit workthrough that.
It's just powerful, justpowerful.
Well, I'm Joe Grano.
I'm glad to be back with you.
I was here a few weeks ago inthis Holy Spirit study.
I talked about the word study.
(04:28):
The word ruach in Hebrew andpneuma in Greek are translated
as breath, wind and spirit, andthey refer to the Holy Spirit,
do so by looking at the personof Nicodemus.
Nicodemus' story comes in theGospel of John.
Gospel of John is a powerful,wonderful book.
(04:48):
It's so different than theother ones.
Most of his book has to dealwith the last week of Jesus and
a lot of that is just the last12 hours of Jesus' life.
And he is structured in a waythat some scholars would look at
it this way that there areseven signs, there are seven I
(05:09):
Am statements and there areseven discourses.
Seven signs, miracles.
The Greek word that's used herejust a little tangent is samea,
and I have a granddaughter bythe name of Samea and she was
given that name because she wasa sign or miracle for our family
.
She was born with a bilateralcleft, palate and lip.
(05:30):
Her lip was stuck up on hernose, she had a brain cyst, she
had a heart murmur, had an extrathumb on her hand and she has
had to go through a lot ofsurgeries.
But she's just been a miraclein our lives.
She's 16 years old now, goingto be a junior this coming week,
(05:50):
and we just thank God for her.
So that's one of the signs.
So Jesus did seven miracles thatare in John.
He had seven.
I Am statements where he says Iam the door, I am the good
shepherd, I am the way, thetruth, the life.
Seven I am statements where hesays I am the door, I am the
good shepherd, I am the way, thetruth, the life, I am the
resurrection and the life.
And it's more than just sayingI am those things.
(06:12):
The word I am is actually thename for God, that's God's name,
and I believe that he's sayingthat he is God by using those
terms.
And then he has sevendiscourses, that is, seven major
teachings.
If you have a red-letter Biblein which the words of Jesus are
in red letters, you'll see sevenmajor sections, In contrast to
(06:33):
Matthew who only has five.
They chose them for aparticular reason.
You see, these were structuredtogether to make a point.
And so why is it 777?
Seven is the holy number, it'sGod's number and he's making a
point of these.
Jesus did more than sevenmiracles.
He did I Am more than seventimes.
He taught more than seven times.
(06:54):
But John, because of what he'strying to do, puts it together
this way.
But then we look at thecharacteristics of John, and
John's characteristics are thathe is much more metaphorical, he
is much more theological thanthe other writers.
In fact, he begins that way Inthe beginning was the Word, the
Word was with God and the Wordwas God.
(07:15):
He's referencing Jesus, buthe's using a metaphorical word
to express this, and part of hisreason is because of the
audiences to whom he is writing.
He's writing partially to aJewish audience and that's why
he says in the beginning, whichrefers back to Genesis 1.1.
In the beginning, god createdthe heavens and the earth.
But then he uses this word wordin the Greek it's logos because
(07:40):
he's also speaking to a Greekaudience and this Greek audience
believed that the Logos hadcreated the world.
So John is saying that theLogos I'm going to show you that
created the world is this Jesus.
And in verse 14, he makes itclear and says that the Word
(08:00):
became flesh and dwelt among us.
So he's much more metaphoricalin his approach.
Also, he is 90% unique.
90% of John is not in Matthew,mark or Luke.
Why?
Well, I think he's writing 20,30 years after they are.
(08:21):
He's had more time to reflect,more time to have a relationship
with God.
But also he decided to take adifferent approach, to do things
differently than the other oneshad done.
So one other thing I want topoint out, because it fits into
our text today, is hisdevelopment.
He has a way that he developedthings and he developed, for
instance, the word dark or night.
(08:43):
He uses several passages whereJesus is quoting and he says
that people walk in the night,in the darkness, and they
stumble and they fall, so youneed to walk in the day.
He is using something literally, but also figuratively, and
John uses the night darkness ina literal and a figurative
(09:05):
manner.
So one of the most poignant andone of the most powerful
statements are at the LastSupper, the Passover feast,
jesus is saying somebody's goingto betray him, judas leaves,
and at the end of that passagein John 13, 30, it says, and it
was night.
Now, it was night as far as thedaylight was concerned, but he
(09:31):
was saying more than it was justnight.
He is saying this is a darkmoment, this is an evil moment.
Evil is about to do its work,and in Luke he actually
clarifies that, because when heis being arrested, he says to
the soldiers why didn't you dothis in the daylight?
I was down at the temple everyday, you could have easily
(09:51):
arrested me.
But evil does its work indarkness, and so that concept is
going to fit into what I wantto talk about with Nicodemus in
just a moment.
Also, he does some characterdevelopment.
It's very interesting.
He does some characterdevelopment.
It's very interesting how hedevelops some characters.
And then one example, before Iget to Nicodemus, is Mary.
(10:12):
Mary is mentioned in chapter 2,where he is at a marriage feast
in Cana and that they have adialogue and she encourages him
to help out because they don'thave enough wine, and Jesus says
to her don't you know, my timehas not come yet.
The next time that we see Maryin the Gospel of John is in the
19th chapter, when Jesus is onthe cross, because his time has
(10:37):
come, and so there's a statement, even in the character of Mary,
of where she is placed in thatbook to be able to say something
about why Jesus came and whathis hour was.
Now we come now to Nicodemus.
Nicodemus is a teacher of thelaw.
He is a Pharisee, a Phariseewho was very religious.
(10:58):
They were very particular inthe things that they did, and he
was a part of what's called theSanhedrin.
He was in the ruling group ofpeople, he was in the Supreme
Court Congress group, altogetherin the Sanhedrin, and he comes
to Jesus at night.
Now he does come, literally atnight.
And why does he do that?
(11:19):
I think he does it because theSanhedrin as a whole did not
believe in Jesus.
In fact, they want to have himarrested, they want to do him in
, and so for him to say that hemight have some questions and he
wants to talk to Jesus is notsomething he would want the
other members of the Sanhedrinto know about.
So he comes in the night, sohe's in the cover of night, if
(11:40):
you will.
But I think that there is morethere and that in the dialogue
that they have, it shows thatNicodemus is in the dark.
He doesn't understand.
He doesn't understand thosethings that Jesus has taught,
but he doesn't comprehend them,and so he has some questions for
clarification, and even as hetalks to Jesus, he still doesn't
(12:00):
get it.
In fact, he makes.
A mistake that we often makewhen we read Scripture is he
took Jesus' words completelyliterally and you say well, joe,
don't you believe in the Bibleliterally?
I say yes, I do believe in theBible literally where it is
meant to be taken literally, butit is not always meant to be
taken literally.
There are figurative aspects,and so the Bible is a beautiful
(12:24):
library.
There are different kinds ofliterature.
There is history and there isbiography, and there is poetry,
and there's what's calledapocalyptic literature and, as
you know, each kind ofliterature needs to be read in
light of the genre of thatliterature.
So, when you read the Bible,one question you need to ask is
what kind of literature is this?
(12:45):
How do I interpret it?
So, if you read the Bible, onequestion you need to ask is what
kind of literature is this?
How do I interpret it?
So, if you're reading Psalms,for example, the Psalms are
poetry, and you know that youdon't take poetry literally.
You take the point literally,but not necessarily the image
literally, because it's sayingsomething.
And Jesus taught like that.
He taught in parables.
The parables weren't to betaken literally, they had a
(13:06):
point, there was somethingbehind them and so, as Nicodemus
is talking to Jesus, he'staking Jesus literally.
Oh, am I supposed to go back inmy mother's womb and be born
again?
How is that possible?
Jesus didn't mean it literally.
He meant it metaphorically,figuratively.
But Nicodemus is in the dark.
(13:27):
The next time we see him is inthe seventh chapter.
The Sanhedrin is gatheredtogether.
They have sent some guards togo arrest Jesus and they're
waiting for those guards tobring him to Jesus.
They come I mean to bring themto the Sanhedrin.
They come to the Sanhedrin, theguards do, and they don't have
Jesus and they say where isJesus?
(13:48):
He said no man has ever spokenlike this.
And he said are you followinghim too?
Are you like the mob out therethat has no knowledge?
Don't you realize that no oneof the religious leaders is a
follower of Jesus, that he needsto be dealt with as a follower
(14:09):
of Jesus, that he needs to bedealt with?
But Nicodemus inserts something.
He says do we do due processwithout bringing a person in and
talking to them and giving theman opportunity to say what they
have to say.
You see what he's doing.
He had been in the dark.
Now he is coming out a littlebit.
He's coming to a degree ofbelief enough so that he makes a
(14:30):
question in favor of Jesus.
And then, when we get to the19th chapter, we find him
through the third and final time.
Jesus has been on the cross, hehas died.
Joseph of Arimathea has a grave, has a tomb that he wants to
put Jesus in.
They go to Pilate to getpermission for that and
(14:52):
Nicodemus helps him bury Jesus.
He brings the kinds of spicesthat would be used in burial
then and some scholars say hebrought enough to honor a king,
which he was doing even thoughhe didn't fully understand that.
Now some people would sayNicodemus never came out overtly
(15:13):
and said his faith in Jesus.
But my personal opinion is thatby doing what he did at the
death of Jesus, he is making apublic statement.
He was doing for Jesus what thefamily should be doing and that
he has taken care of his bodyout of love and respect.
So, if you will, I see him asbeing a man in a spiritual
(15:38):
closet.
He's in the dark, he's not abeliever.
He starts asking questions.
He then opens the door a littlebit and stands up for Jesus,
and then he comes to a point ofmaking a commitment to him, and
so that's part of the questionthat I have for you today.
Where are you in that regard?
Are you here today and you'rein the dark and you don't
(16:00):
understand, and maybe you'rejust kind of wondering?
You're doubting these things,and that's okay.
It's a good place to be,because that's how you find
Jesus is by seeking, asking andbeing in a place with some
people that you can dialoguewith.
Maybe you're here today andthat you're doubting, and rather
(16:21):
than discourage that, Iencourage people to doubt.
I think doubting helps yourfaith to grow.
Everybody goes through a desert, but I want you to know that if
you keep crawling, you'll findthe oasis.
You just keep on crawling.
You could die in the desert,but you don't have to.
Doubting can help you becomestronger in your faith and then,
(16:45):
if you're here today and you'recommitted, I just hope and pray
that the Holy Spirit would workin your life day by day, which
is what we're going to talkabout.
But here's how the Holy Spiritworked in Nicodemus he first
drew him to Jesus.
He had him stand up for him alittle bit, and then he
committed his life to him.
(17:06):
And I think my time is up, doyou think—what's going on here?
Speaker 1 (17:10):
Let's wrap it up, buddy.
Speaker 3 (17:11):
Wrap it up, all right .
Speaker 1 (17:12):
All right, that was a good talk, Good talk, Good job.
This is—so it was 25 years ago.
I was in—.
Speaker 3 (17:24):
He's just getting back at me.
That's all he's doing, I am.
Speaker 1 (17:26):
It was 25 years ago.
I was in Dr Joe Grinna'shomiletics class and he used to
make us do a five minute message, which was like the hardest
ever.
So I was like you got 10minutes, buddy, let's do this.
We got things to do.
So some of you guys saw theemail Questions.
You know we finished three anda half years on the Gospel of
Matthew.
We take a long time to readsomething that should have taken
(17:46):
two hours to read.
Yeah, you're right, and I knowhow are we ever going to get
through anything else Three anda half years.
So then it was like, okay, sonow what?
We just finished that.
So we've spent seven weeks nowtalking about the Holy Spirit
and there's so much more to talkabout.
We're going to be jumping intosome other stuff.
I'll tell you about that at theend.
But I had talked to Dr Grantand said, hey, what if we just
(18:08):
take some, you know, q and atime?
Because there's things thatyou're like, oh, I really wish
you would have talked about this, or can we understand this a
little bit more?
Or just even like our personalgrowth or experiences, and so
wanted to bring that to life alittle bit.
So we got some questions outhere.
We're going to try to getthrough as many as we can.
You ready for just a couple ofminutes?
We'll wrap it up All right.
So let's just jump in the deepend.
(18:29):
Let's talk about the blasphemyof the Holy Spirit, the
blasphemy of the Holy Spirit.
Speaker 3 (18:33):
Unforgivable sin.
Unforgivable sin.
Yeah, you done that one fearfulthat I've committed the
unpardonable sin.
Speaker 1 (18:42):
Yeah, how many of us felt like that, Like ugh.
Speaker 3 (18:45):
I don't know.
And then one day it was helpfulfor me when someone said if
you've committed theunpardonable sin, if you think
you've committed it, if you'reworried about committing the
unpardonable sin, you have notcommitted it, because if you had
committed it you wouldn't beworried about it.
So that was very comforting andhelpful.
(19:06):
And then I came to realize thatthe blasphemy of the Holy
Spirit is not an act.
You can't do something toblaspheme the Holy Spirit.
It is an attitude, it is alifestyle, it's an absence.
Yes, and so the Holy spiritpoints to Jesus.
If you continually reject Jesus, you're committing blasphemy of
(19:30):
the Holy spirit.
Yeah, but you can be forgivenof that.
Speaker 1 (19:34):
Well said, there you go.
So some of you can rest easyright now Thinking about it.
You're in the clear.
Um so in.
Uh, here's a good question.
Um.
Um, so in.
Uh, here's a good question.
Um.
In matthew, chapter 3, john thebaptist talks about baptizing
with water, uh, but mentions oneis coming that can baptize with
the holy spirit, uh.
So the question is are thesetwo different kinds of baptism?
(19:56):
Um, paul refers to it again inacts 19 uh.
So when we get baptized today,which baptism do we participate
in?
Speaker 3 (20:04):
Well, neither of the first two, Okay.
Okay, One thing that we forgetis that Jesus lived during Old
Testament times.
The New Testament didn't happen.
Actually, the Gospels, most ofthe story of the Gospels, during
the Old Testament time.
It's after the death, burialand resurrection of Jesus.
We have the New Testament.
(20:24):
It's a transition time.
So you have the baptism of John,John the Baptist, of repentance
, Then Jesus' disciples baptized.
In fact it's a little thing inJohn 3 and 4 where it says that
they claim Jesus is baptizingpeople.
That's what the rumor is.
And then John clarifies that inthe fourth chapter he said well
, Jesus didn't actually baptize,but his disciples did.
(20:46):
But you could still say thatJesus baptized because they
baptized under his authority.
So when somebody has authorityand somebody else do it, it's
like they've done it.
So Christian baptism doesn'thappen until afterwards, after
the death, burial, resurrectionof Jesus, In the day of
Pentecost.
It begins afterwards, after thedeath, burial, resurrection of
Jesus and the day of Pentecostit begins.
(21:07):
What we find in the 19thchapter of Acts is that some
people who are believers inJesus had only had the baptism
of John the Baptist.
They didn't know anything aboutthe Holy Spirit, they said, and
they didn't know anything aboutChristian baptism, so Paul
baptizes them then intoChristian baptism.
Speaker 1 (21:23):
Yeah, it's great, great question.
Speaker 3 (21:26):
Here's another one.
This one is, I think— which, bythe way, I'm going to throw this
in we didn't have this.
Just about the baptism thing.
Some people say, well, youdon't need to be baptized,
because, after all, the thief onthe cross wasn't baptized.
Well, a couple things.
One is we don't know whetherhe'd been baptized or not.
We don't know if he'd been Johnor Jesus' baptism.
Maybe that's why he came aroundon the cross.
(21:49):
But secondly, again, this isduring Old Testament time he
couldn't have been baptized inthe Christian baptism, because
it didn't exist yet, becauseJesus hadn't died, been buried
and resurrected yet.
Speaker 1 (22:03):
Thanks for adding that.
Yeah, Okay, so this was a goodquestion.
This goes to like how do you goabout hearing the Holy Spirit
and interacting Specifically,how do you go about hearing and
discerning the voice of the HolySpirit speaking to you about
(22:24):
something, versus your inner mespeaking to you about something
Even?
Moreover let me just paint thisas a broader picture.
What do we do then?
When you have two followers,let's say, and someone says I
really feel like the Holy Spiritsaid this to me, and it's in
conflict with another personsaying, well, I feel like the
Holy Spirit said this to me, orthe Holy Spirit told me you're
(22:45):
going to marry me.
Speaker 3 (22:46):
Yeah and I'm like no, he did not tell me that he
didn't tell me that I didn'tknow that I'm still waiting on
that phone call?
Yeah, it's not being clear,right?
Yeah, something like that.
Speaker 1 (22:56):
How do we discern that?
What do we do?
Speaker 3 (22:57):
with that.
It's hard because we put intoour own minds what we want to
happen and we say God did it,but other times we're being
sincere, we just really want toknow, and so I think that's
where there's wisdom, incounselors, and so you can talk
to godly people, people that yourespect.
(23:19):
God speaks to us in a lot ofdifferent ways.
Some people would say he speaksaudibly to them, others through
his mind, others throughScripture, through Jesus,
through creation, through otherpeople.
I think you'd find aconfirmation from those sources
to see whether it's really fromthe Spirit or not.
Speaker 1 (23:37):
Yeah, some of you may have experienced this.
I know that the Holy Spiritis—God has spoken in the Holy
Spirit to me through Joe.
I've talked to him about somestuff and it wasn't even but a
few months ago that he texted meand you started out with I
don't know if this is from God,but here's what occurs to me,
(23:58):
and it was so affirming becauseI was like yeah, absolutely,
because it also, in turn, waskind of spoken through other
things and circumstances to givethat affirmation.
And there's another spot wetalked about this last service.
That is really important.
I think it's actually animportant practice that all of
us can kind of flex this muscleor, you know, put some more
weight on the bar, which is whenyou feel like the Holy Spirit
(24:22):
is prompting you about something, the action that you should do,
and you can talk to that alittle bit Sure.
Speaker 3 (24:27):
Now, you know, sometimes we wonder if the Holy
Spirit is just in daily thingsor it's always the big stuff.
Speaker 1 (24:33):
The mundane, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3 (24:35):
But here's—this is an everyday type of thing, right,
for many people, it's everyminute, every hour, but this
could be used by the Holy Spirit.
And let me give you twoexamples.
This week which fits into, Ithink, what you're saying I
texted a former student who's apastor, just like I had done
(24:56):
with Larry, and he wrote me back.
I just said I prayed for you,your family and your ministry
this morning and he wrote back.
He said I felt that and Ineeded it.
I'm struggling with my agingfather, and that was all
specific that he was, and I'massuming that means health and
or mental issues with his agingfather.
(25:17):
And so the Holy Spirit promptedme and I gave a prayer, and it
was a general prayer but it hada specific need, because the
Holy Spirit was able to meetthat specific need.
And so then there was anotherincident where I have a student
who was in danger of losing hiscredential to teach school.
(25:41):
He's a high school historyteacher in Los Angeles and there
was circumstances going on andthere's a lot of issues, legal
issues going on.
And so I texted him and he saidwhen he got my text, he got
chills.
And he said just an hour beforemy text.
He got a letter saying thateverything was clear and it was
(26:01):
okay, and so God knows what he'sdoing and he takes things where
when he puts.
When God puts somebody on yourheart, it's because that person
is on God's heart, and then Godcan use you in even a small way
to be able to touch them and tohelp them.
Speaker 1 (26:23):
Yeah, so that's that muscle I'm talking about.
Don't let that pass by.
You see, speaking of passing by, you see, throughout Scripture
where God kind of tells you likehe's about to pass by right,
and even the story of Elijah,like I'm about to pass by and he
goes and it's an earthquake andfire and wind.
But he wasn't in that and itwas in this small whisper Later
(26:44):
in the New Testament.
You see, you know Jesus wasabout to pass by his disciples.
These moments where God's juston the move and it's, are we
able to slow down enough or beopen enough to catch the small
whisper and the prompting.
And so for you, maybe you'vehad that happen before, maybe
you've had someone just reachout to you or give you a word or
(27:06):
, like you said, nature or adream or something that you just
needed.
Don't let that pass you by.
Pay attention to that smallwhisper and just try it out and
see what takes place there.
This is something to work withand not just to read about but
(27:28):
to actually interact with.
And so when that person and youguys, I'm sure you've
experienced this when you'relike driving along and that
person comes to mind, act on itLike it's oftentimes you might
even find you're like.
I thought I should have justtexted him and said, hey, I was
thinking about you, this thing,and oftentimes we just feel like
we're so offensive you know,we're so nervous about stuff,
like I'm not going to doanything, and then it passes by
(27:50):
and we don't do anything with it.
And that could be somethingreally important to somebody
else needs.
It's theirs to choose to dowith it what they will and how
God's going to use it.
But you can find, even like man, it kept being on my heart, it
kept being on my heart.
Oh, they kept being on my mindand then it just passed by and
then you realize, like theyactually really needed it and
you're like man, I kept thinkingof that, we just didn't do
anything with it, and vice versa.
Some of you may haveexperienced the other side of
(28:13):
that and the impact that it canmake.
So let's see, Jesus taught usto pray to the Father.
Speaker 3 (28:26):
We pray in Jesus's name.
Should we pray to the HolySpirit?
How do we interact with theHoly Spirit?
Well, I did this morningbecause I knew we were talking
about the Holy Spirit, so Iasked the Holy Spirit to guide
me and to help me and to beamong all of us.
We did it in our worship songtoday Holy Spirit, you're
welcome here.
So we prayed a song to Him.
So, because I knew this wascoming too, during the communion
(28:47):
time, I prayed to the Fatherand I thanked Him for being
Creator and Sovereign and beingFather.
I thanked Jesus for what he didon the—for being a human being
and what he did on the cross,and I prayed for the Holy Spirit
, thanking Him for being acomforter and a counselor, as
well as one who convicts once ina while of sin.
Speaker 1 (29:06):
Yeah, every once in a while.
Speaker 3 (29:08):
So the answer is yes.
Okay so yeah, but along withthat you're praying to the whole
Godhead as well.
Can I throw in about theTrinity?
Speaker 1 (29:17):
The Trinity?
Speaker 3 (29:17):
yeah, and you talked about that a couple weeks ago,
yeah, I mentioned this when Iwas here last time, but many of
you weren't here then and all ofyou have slept since then.
Speaker 1 (29:29):
Or they were sleeping then, or they might have been
sleeping, then Exactly, or both.
Speaker 3 (29:34):
So this is something that's helped me, because the
Trinity, the Godhead, is sodifficult to truly comprehend.
And that's why this question dowe pray to individuals within
the Godhead?
And so Judaism and Islam thinkwe're polytheistic.
They think that we believe inthree gods and it sounds like
(29:56):
it—God the Father, god the Son,god the Spirit.
One plus one plus one is three,but, as Deuteronomy says, god
is 1.
And so I thought about this inregard to mathematics, that,
rather than adding, usemultiplication, 1 times 1 times
(30:18):
1 equals 1.
So, mathematically, you couldhave three entities but still
have one.
So, mathematically, you couldhave three entities but still
have one.
So that opens a doorphilosophically, theologically,
that there could be a God who isthree in one Three entities but
they're one.
And so that was something thathelped me deal with that a
(30:41):
little bit more.
Speaker 1 (30:42):
That was way better than what I used to do with my
kids.
I used to be like it's like athree-headed monster.
They're like what?
It's nighttime stuff, oh great,okay.
So here's kind of a fun oneno-transcript.
(31:03):
In Galatians, paul's talking tokind of he's a frustrated group
and he talks about the fruit ofthe Spirit and I think to a
degree people are like nah, thatdoesn't sound really fancy.
It's love and kindness andgentleness and peace and all of
this stuff.
But then people get reallyjacked up when in Corinthians he
talks about the gifts of theHoly Spirit and you're like, ooh
(31:25):
, now we're doing something,like you got zappers, and you're
like, do this and I can do thatand I can speak in this special
language.
Or specifically, the questionwas around tongues or the gifts
of the Spirit.
What is that used for?
Can we elaborate on some ofthat?
So I'll let you take the firstlittle.
Speaker 3 (31:40):
Yeah, okay.
Well, megan mentioned about theDay of Pentecost and the
speaking of tongues and aboutthe Day of Pentecost and the
speaking in tongues, and thereis a debate among theologians
was the miracle tongues or wasthe miracle hearing that people
just heard in their own language?
But I think it was the tongues.
I think that the apostles werespeaking in languages they did
not know to people who did knowthat language and I think,
(32:03):
generally speaking, that's thegift of tongues.
To give an example of my own, isis in Corinth, the people speak
Greek, but that particularSunday there's a whole section
of Italians there.
They don't speak Greek, sosomeone is able to get up and
speak Greek I mean Italian, eventhough they didn't know Italian
(32:26):
to be able to edify thosepeople.
Somebody else interpreted thatback into Greek for the people
who did understand Greek butdidn't understand the Italian,
and so the purpose of tongueswas for edification.
I think that's how it generallywas used.
But Paul does talk about aheavenly language, a prayer
language, and so anytime anytongue would be done in the
(32:48):
assembly, there had to be aninterpreter, and Paul was very
strict with saying it should bedone one by one.
It needs to be done in decencyand order.
There's not all kinds of chaosgoing on Individually.
If somebody has a gift oftongues, then they could pray
personally to God.
Speaker 1 (33:03):
Yeah, that's a great clear example.
I mean Guineveve, who's aninterpreter here for American
Sign Language, is just anexample exactly of someone
standing just even here in ourWestern culture interpreting or
Spanish services.
You go to other places, etc.
So hopefully it's reallyhelpful.
We can kind of use that totransition of some of the gifts.
(33:26):
Is it like you're given a giftand then that's the marker
that's your gift, or is it likeyou get a gift and then you
don't have the gift?
How is the Holy Spirit kind ofworking through that space?
Speaker 3 (33:38):
Well, first of all, you know, in Corinthians, paul
says that the Holy Spiritdetermines what gift you have.
Everybody's not going to havethe same gift, but you may have
different gifts at one time.
You may have them seasonally,so it could be a new gift
arrives.
Yeah, as needed.
Speaker 1 (33:57):
Yeah, last thing, as you know, we could sit here and
talk for probably hours aboutsome of this stuff, but as a
practice, as you're discerningbecause I think that's one of
the toughest parts that peoplestruggle with is just discerning
like, who is the Holy Spirit?
What is he saying?
What is he saying to me, aboutme, about this person?
(34:19):
I think and you can expand onthis some really important
things to understand is thatwhen you're listening and
something's being spoken eitherto you from someone else as you
know, they're a representativeand they're saying I feel like
this is from the Holy Spirit, oryou have a voice or you feel
like you're having aninteraction.
It was used and we see thisthroughout scripture to unify,
(34:42):
to edify and to glorify God andwhat he's doing and his people.
It's full of love.
So this is just maybe helpfulfor some of you.
If the things you are hearingaren't doing that, it most
likely, as it occurs to me, isnot of the Holy Spirit.
The same thing as it comes toyou through someone else, and
where have maybe you experiencedthe gift of knowing that and
(35:05):
maybe seeing the detriment ofnot believing that truth?
Speaker 3 (35:09):
Sure, when I was a pastor for 10 years in Downey
California, I had a man in thechurch who claimed to be a New
Testament prophet and he wouldsay God told me.
And then he would tell me ortell other people what God had
said to him, to tell whicheverindividual he was talking to.
(35:30):
And as I listened to him, 95%of what he said was negative.
It was critical, it wasknocking people down, it was
putting them in their place, andI got observing that.
I said you know, the HolySpirit does convict us and
sometimes we need to beconfronted.
Okay, that's true, but not 95%of the time.
(35:52):
The Holy Spirit is a comforter,he's a guider, he's one to help
us, and so there's got to besome balance in there.
And there was no balance inthis guy's life and I finally
had to tell him that it reallyis.
Speaker 1 (36:07):
It's like the 5%-er, yeah, and often we find people
or ourselves living in the 5%and not experiencing the 95%.
Speaker 3 (36:15):
So then, I question whether the other part is of the
Holy Spirit or not.
Speaker 1 (36:18):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (36:19):
Or just a mean spirit .
Speaker 1 (36:21):
Well, this series has been a gift.
Dr Granite gave me somematerials.
I'm going to actually send thatin like an email to everyone
more information about the names, some theological kind of
breakdown and study where we seeand experience the Holy Spirit.
So I'll send that out to youguys.
Speaker 3 (36:37):
And I just want to clarify that the main part of
the study was done by a goodfriend of mine, dr Don Green,
and then I did a little bit.
So I actually just wrote hisname, because when he did the
paper he didn't put his name onit, so I just wrote it in.
So it's Don Green.
And then there's a little stuffI did, but he did major work.
Speaker 1 (36:54):
All right, we won't give you credit, it's fine.
Well, you guys, thank Dr Granofor being with us these few
weeks.
So this has been a really funseries.
We're going to continue havingthese types of conversations and
just to let you guys know it'scoming up.
Starting next week we're goingto kick back into some
(37:16):
expository teaching where we'regoing to go verse by verse.
So we spent three and a halfyears in the gospel of Matthew.
We learned about who Jesus was,and so then we kind of came
into this.
Okay, so Jesus happened.
Now what the Holy Spirit?
So of came into this.
Okay, so Jesus happened.
Now what the Holy Spirit?
So then it's like okay, so HolySpirit, this is interaction.
And so now we're going to jumpto actually and Dr Grant has set
up really well today we'regoing to jump to the three
(37:37):
letters from John to the church,which was written 60 years
later to the church of like okay, so now you understand Jesus,
now you know this is actuallyhow you live.
And so we're going to hop intofirst John, chapter one.
Next week we're going to takethat verse by verse.
Don't worry, we're not going tospend three and a half years on
literally five pages ofscripture, um, but we're going
(37:59):
to spend like 14 weeks.
It'll be good, um, so I want toinvite you back to that because
I think it's just going to bepowerful for us to be like okay,
so now what as we walk intothis next season?
So, um, for now, the now whatis?
Um?
We're going to just finish whatwe've been doing here together
as a faith community, asresponse to worship to the Holy
(38:22):
Spirit, uh, to God, the Father,jesus, the Son, uh, for
everything he's done for us aswe get to interact with him
before we get into the rest ofour day, into the week.
So would you stand as we justrespond in song and worship?
Okay, it's going to be good.
Speaker 2 (00:07):
Now there was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus
, a ruler of the Jews.
This man came to Jesus by nightand said to him Rabbi, we know
that you are a teacher.
Come from God, for no one elsecan do the things you do unless
God is with him.
Jesus answered him.
Nicodemus said to him.
(00:34):
Jesus answered, truly truly, Isay to you, unless one is born
of water and the Spirit, hecannot enter the kingdom of God.
That which is born of the fleshis flesh and that which is born
(00:55):
of the Spirit is spirit.
Do not marvel that.
I said to you, you must be bornagain.
The wind blows where it wishesand you hear its sound, but you
do not know where it comes fromor where it goes.
So it is with everyone who isborn of the Spirit.
Nicodemus said to him how canthese things be?
(01:16):
And Jesus answered him Are youof the teacher of Israel?
And yet you do not understandthese things.
Truly, truly, I say to you wespeak of what we know and bear
witness to what we have seen,but you do not receive our
testimony.
If I have told you earthlythings and you do not believe,
(01:37):
how can you believe if I tellyou heavenly things.
No one has ascended into heavenexcept he who descended from
heaven, the Son of man.
And as Moses lifted up theserpent in the wilderness, so
must the Son of man be lifted upthat whomever believes in him
may have eternal life.
(01:58):
Thank you.
Speaker 3 (04:06):
I'm going to go ahead and do that, all right, thank
you, all right, thank you.
We not only heard the Word, wefelt it too, didn't we?
You feel the Holy Spirit workthrough that.
It's just powerful, justpowerful.
Well, I'm Joe Grano.
I'm glad to be back with you.
I was here a few weeks ago inthis Holy Spirit study.
I talked about the word study.
(04:28):
The word ruach in Hebrew andpneuma in Greek are translated
as breath, wind and spirit, andthey refer to the Holy Spirit,
do so by looking at the personof Nicodemus.
Nicodemus' story comes in theGospel of John.
Gospel of John is a powerful,wonderful book.
(04:48):
It's so different than theother ones.
Most of his book has to dealwith the last week of Jesus and
a lot of that is just the last12 hours of Jesus' life.
And he is structured in a waythat some scholars would look at
it this way that there areseven signs, there are seven I
(05:09):
Am statements and there areseven discourses.
Seven signs, miracles.
The Greek word that's used herejust a little tangent is samea,
and I have a granddaughter bythe name of Samea and she was
given that name because she wasa sign or miracle for our family
.
She was born with a bilateralcleft, palate and lip.
(05:30):
Her lip was stuck up on hernose, she had a brain cyst, she
had a heart murmur, had an extrathumb on her hand and she has
had to go through a lot ofsurgeries.
But she's just been a miraclein our lives.
She's 16 years old now, goingto be a junior this coming week,
(05:50):
and we just thank God for her.
So that's one of the signs.
So Jesus did seven miracles thatare in John.
He had seven.
I Am statements where he says Iam the door, I am the good
shepherd, I am the way, thetruth, the life.
Seven I am statements where hesays I am the door, I am the
good shepherd, I am the way, thetruth, the life, I am the
resurrection and the life.
And it's more than just sayingI am those things.
(06:12):
The word I am is actually thename for God, that's God's name,
and I believe that he's sayingthat he is God by using those
terms.
And then he has sevendiscourses, that is, seven major
teachings.
If you have a red-letter Biblein which the words of Jesus are
in red letters, you'll see sevenmajor sections, In contrast to
(06:33):
Matthew who only has five.
They chose them for aparticular reason.
You see, these were structuredtogether to make a point.
And so why is it 777?
Seven is the holy number, it'sGod's number and he's making a
point of these.
Jesus did more than sevenmiracles.
He did I Am more than seventimes.
He taught more than seven times.
(06:54):
But John, because of what he'strying to do, puts it together
this way.
But then we look at thecharacteristics of John, and
John's characteristics are thathe is much more metaphorical, he
is much more theological thanthe other writers.
In fact, he begins that way Inthe beginning was the Word, the
Word was with God and the Wordwas God.
(07:15):
He's referencing Jesus, buthe's using a metaphorical word
to express this, and part of hisreason is because of the
audiences to whom he is writing.
He's writing partially to aJewish audience and that's why
he says in the beginning, whichrefers back to Genesis 1.1.
In the beginning, god createdthe heavens and the earth.
But then he uses this word wordin the Greek it's logos because
(07:40):
he's also speaking to a Greekaudience and this Greek audience
believed that the Logos hadcreated the world.
So John is saying that theLogos I'm going to show you that
created the world is this Jesus.
And in verse 14, he makes itclear and says that the Word
(08:00):
became flesh and dwelt among us.
So he's much more metaphoricalin his approach.
Also, he is 90% unique.
90% of John is not in Matthew,mark or Luke.
Why?
Well, I think he's writing 20,30 years after they are.
(08:21):
He's had more time to reflect,more time to have a relationship
with God.
But also he decided to take adifferent approach, to do things
differently than the other oneshad done.
So one other thing I want topoint out, because it fits into
our text today, is hisdevelopment.
He has a way that he developedthings and he developed, for
instance, the word dark or night.
(08:43):
He uses several passages whereJesus is quoting and he says
that people walk in the night,in the darkness, and they
stumble and they fall, so youneed to walk in the day.
He is using something literally, but also figuratively, and
John uses the night darkness ina literal and a figurative
(09:05):
manner.
So one of the most poignant andone of the most powerful
statements are at the LastSupper, the Passover feast,
jesus is saying somebody's goingto betray him, judas leaves,
and at the end of that passagein John 13, 30, it says, and it
was night.
Now, it was night as far as thedaylight was concerned, but he
(09:31):
was saying more than it was justnight.
He is saying this is a darkmoment, this is an evil moment.
Evil is about to do its work,and in Luke he actually
clarifies that, because when heis being arrested, he says to
the soldiers why didn't you dothis in the daylight?
I was down at the temple everyday, you could have easily
(09:51):
arrested me.
But evil does its work indarkness, and so that concept is
going to fit into what I wantto talk about with Nicodemus in
just a moment.
Also, he does some characterdevelopment.
It's very interesting.
He does some characterdevelopment.
It's very interesting how hedevelops some characters.
And then one example, before Iget to Nicodemus, is Mary.
(10:12):
Mary is mentioned in chapter 2,where he is at a marriage feast
in Cana and that they have adialogue and she encourages him
to help out because they don'thave enough wine, and Jesus says
to her don't you know, my timehas not come yet.
The next time that we see Maryin the Gospel of John is in the
19th chapter, when Jesus is onthe cross, because his time has
(10:37):
come, and so there's a statement, even in the character of Mary,
of where she is placed in thatbook to be able to say something
about why Jesus came and whathis hour was.
Now we come now to Nicodemus.
Nicodemus is a teacher of thelaw.
He is a Pharisee, a Phariseewho was very religious.
(10:58):
They were very particular inthe things that they did, and he
was a part of what's called theSanhedrin.
He was in the ruling group ofpeople, he was in the Supreme
Court Congress group, altogetherin the Sanhedrin, and he comes
to Jesus at night.
Now he does come, literally atnight.
And why does he do that?
(11:19):
I think he does it because theSanhedrin as a whole did not
believe in Jesus.
In fact, they want to have himarrested, they want to do him in
, and so for him to say that hemight have some questions and he
wants to talk to Jesus is notsomething he would want the
other members of the Sanhedrinto know about.
So he comes in the night, sohe's in the cover of night, if
(11:40):
you will.
But I think that there is morethere and that in the dialogue
that they have, it shows thatNicodemus is in the dark.
He doesn't understand.
He doesn't understand thosethings that Jesus has taught,
but he doesn't comprehend them,and so he has some questions for
clarification, and even as hetalks to Jesus, he still doesn't
(12:00):
get it.
In fact, he makes.
A mistake that we often makewhen we read Scripture is he
took Jesus' words completelyliterally and you say well, joe,
don't you believe in the Bibleliterally?
I say yes, I do believe in theBible literally where it is
meant to be taken literally, butit is not always meant to be
taken literally.
There are figurative aspects,and so the Bible is a beautiful
(12:24):
library.
There are different kinds ofliterature.
There is history and there isbiography, and there is poetry,
and there's what's calledapocalyptic literature and, as
you know, each kind ofliterature needs to be read in
light of the genre of thatliterature.
So, when you read the Bible,one question you need to ask is
what kind of literature is this?
(12:45):
How do I interpret it?
So, if you read the Bible, onequestion you need to ask is what
kind of literature is this?
How do I interpret it?
So, if you're reading Psalms,for example, the Psalms are
poetry, and you know that youdon't take poetry literally.
You take the point literally,but not necessarily the image
literally, because it's sayingsomething.
And Jesus taught like that.
He taught in parables.
The parables weren't to betaken literally, they had a
(13:06):
point, there was somethingbehind them and so, as Nicodemus
is talking to Jesus, he'staking Jesus literally.
Oh, am I supposed to go back inmy mother's womb and be born
again?
How is that possible?
Jesus didn't mean it literally.
He meant it metaphorically,figuratively.
But Nicodemus is in the dark.
(13:27):
The next time we see him is inthe seventh chapter.
The Sanhedrin is gatheredtogether.
They have sent some guards togo arrest Jesus and they're
waiting for those guards tobring him to Jesus.
They come I mean to bring themto the Sanhedrin.
They come to the Sanhedrin, theguards do, and they don't have
Jesus and they say where isJesus?
(13:48):
He said no man has ever spokenlike this.
And he said are you followinghim too?
Are you like the mob out therethat has no knowledge?
Don't you realize that no oneof the religious leaders is a
follower of Jesus, that he needsto be dealt with as a follower
(14:09):
of Jesus, that he needs to bedealt with?
But Nicodemus inserts something.
He says do we do due processwithout bringing a person in and
talking to them and giving theman opportunity to say what they
have to say.
You see what he's doing.
He had been in the dark.
Now he is coming out a littlebit.
He's coming to a degree ofbelief enough so that he makes a
(14:30):
question in favor of Jesus.
And then, when we get to the19th chapter, we find him
through the third and final time.
Jesus has been on the cross, hehas died.
Joseph of Arimathea has a grave, has a tomb that he wants to
put Jesus in.
They go to Pilate to getpermission for that and
(14:52):
Nicodemus helps him bury Jesus.
He brings the kinds of spicesthat would be used in burial
then and some scholars say hebrought enough to honor a king,
which he was doing even thoughhe didn't fully understand that.
Now some people would sayNicodemus never came out overtly
(15:13):
and said his faith in Jesus.
But my personal opinion is thatby doing what he did at the
death of Jesus, he is making apublic statement.
He was doing for Jesus what thefamily should be doing and that
he has taken care of his bodyout of love and respect.
So, if you will, I see him asbeing a man in a spiritual
(15:38):
closet.
He's in the dark, he's not abeliever.
He starts asking questions.
He then opens the door a littlebit and stands up for Jesus,
and then he comes to a point ofmaking a commitment to him, and
so that's part of the questionthat I have for you today.
Where are you in that regard?
Are you here today and you'rein the dark and you don't
(16:00):
understand, and maybe you'rejust kind of wondering?
You're doubting these things,and that's okay.
It's a good place to be,because that's how you find
Jesus is by seeking, asking andbeing in a place with some
people that you can dialoguewith.
Maybe you're here today andthat you're doubting, and rather
(16:21):
than discourage that, Iencourage people to doubt.
I think doubting helps yourfaith to grow.
Everybody goes through a desert, but I want you to know that if
you keep crawling, you'll findthe oasis.
You just keep on crawling.
You could die in the desert,but you don't have to.
Doubting can help you becomestronger in your faith and then,
(16:45):
if you're here today and you'recommitted, I just hope and pray
that the Holy Spirit would workin your life day by day, which
is what we're going to talkabout.
But here's how the Holy Spiritworked in Nicodemus he first
drew him to Jesus.
He had him stand up for him alittle bit, and then he
committed his life to him.
(17:06):
And I think my time is up, doyou think—what's going on here?
Speaker 1 (17:10):
Let's wrap it up, buddy.
Speaker 3 (17:11):
Wrap it up, all right .
Speaker 1 (17:12):
All right, that was a good talk, Good talk, Good job.
This is—so it was 25 years ago.
I was in—.
Speaker 3 (17:24):
He's just getting back at me.
That's all he's doing, I am.
Speaker 1 (17:26):
It was 25 years ago.
I was in Dr Joe Grinna'shomiletics class and he used to
make us do a five minute message, which was like the hardest
ever.
So I was like you got 10minutes, buddy, let's do this.
We got things to do.
So some of you guys saw theemail Questions.
You know we finished three anda half years on the Gospel of
Matthew.
We take a long time to readsomething that should have taken
(17:46):
two hours to read.
Yeah, you're right, and I knowhow are we ever going to get
through anything else Three anda half years.
So then it was like, okay, sonow what?
We just finished that.
So we've spent seven weeks nowtalking about the Holy Spirit
and there's so much more to talkabout.
We're going to be jumping intosome other stuff.
I'll tell you about that at theend.
But I had talked to Dr Grantand said, hey, what if we just
(18:08):
take some, you know, q and atime?
Because there's things thatyou're like, oh, I really wish
you would have talked about this, or can we understand this a
little bit more?
Or just even like our personalgrowth or experiences, and so
wanted to bring that to life alittle bit.
So we got some questions outhere.
We're going to try to getthrough as many as we can.
You ready for just a couple ofminutes?
We'll wrap it up All right.
So let's just jump in the deepend.
(18:29):
Let's talk about the blasphemyof the Holy Spirit, the
blasphemy of the Holy Spirit.
Speaker 3 (18:33):
Unforgivable sin.
Unforgivable sin.
Yeah, you done that one fearfulthat I've committed the
unpardonable sin.
Speaker 1 (18:42):
Yeah, how many of us felt like that, Like ugh.
Speaker 3 (18:45):
I don't know.
And then one day it was helpfulfor me when someone said if
you've committed theunpardonable sin, if you think
you've committed it, if you'reworried about committing the
unpardonable sin, you have notcommitted it, because if you had
committed it you wouldn't beworried about it.
So that was very comforting andhelpful.
(19:06):
And then I came to realize thatthe blasphemy of the Holy
Spirit is not an act.
You can't do something toblaspheme the Holy Spirit.
It is an attitude, it is alifestyle, it's an absence.
Yes, and so the Holy spiritpoints to Jesus.
If you continually reject Jesus, you're committing blasphemy of
(19:30):
the Holy spirit.
Yeah, but you can be forgivenof that.
Speaker 1 (19:34):
Well said, there you go.
So some of you can rest easyright now Thinking about it.
You're in the clear.
Um so in.
Uh, here's a good question.
Um.
Um, so in.
Uh, here's a good question.
Um.
In matthew, chapter 3, john thebaptist talks about baptizing
with water, uh, but mentions oneis coming that can baptize with
the holy spirit, uh.
So the question is are thesetwo different kinds of baptism?
(19:56):
Um, paul refers to it again inacts 19 uh.
So when we get baptized today,which baptism do we participate
in?
Speaker 3 (20:04):
Well, neither of the first two, Okay.
Okay, One thing that we forgetis that Jesus lived during Old
Testament times.
The New Testament didn't happen.
Actually, the Gospels, most ofthe story of the Gospels, during
the Old Testament time.
It's after the death, burialand resurrection of Jesus.
We have the New Testament.
(20:24):
It's a transition time.
So you have the baptism of John,John the Baptist, of repentance
, Then Jesus' disciples baptized.
In fact it's a little thing inJohn 3 and 4 where it says that
they claim Jesus is baptizingpeople.
That's what the rumor is.
And then John clarifies that inthe fourth chapter he said well
, Jesus didn't actually baptize,but his disciples did.
(20:46):
But you could still say thatJesus baptized because they
baptized under his authority.
So when somebody has authorityand somebody else do it, it's
like they've done it.
So Christian baptism doesn'thappen until afterwards, after
the death, burial, resurrectionof Jesus, In the day of
Pentecost.
It begins afterwards, after thedeath, burial, resurrection of
Jesus and the day of Pentecostit begins.
(21:07):
What we find in the 19thchapter of Acts is that some
people who are believers inJesus had only had the baptism
of John the Baptist.
They didn't know anything aboutthe Holy Spirit, they said, and
they didn't know anything aboutChristian baptism, so Paul
baptizes them then intoChristian baptism.
Speaker 1 (21:23):
Yeah, it's great, great question.
Speaker 3 (21:26):
Here's another one.
This one is, I think— which, bythe way, I'm going to throw this
in we didn't have this.
Just about the baptism thing.
Some people say, well, youdon't need to be baptized,
because, after all, the thief onthe cross wasn't baptized.
Well, a couple things.
One is we don't know whetherhe'd been baptized or not.
We don't know if he'd been Johnor Jesus' baptism.
Maybe that's why he came aroundon the cross.
(21:49):
But secondly, again, this isduring Old Testament time he
couldn't have been baptized inthe Christian baptism, because
it didn't exist yet, becauseJesus hadn't died, been buried
and resurrected yet.
Speaker 1 (22:03):
Thanks for adding that.
Yeah, Okay, so this was a goodquestion.
This goes to like how do you goabout hearing the Holy Spirit
and interacting Specifically,how do you go about hearing and
discerning the voice of the HolySpirit speaking to you about
(22:24):
something, versus your inner mespeaking to you about something
Even?
Moreover let me just paint thisas a broader picture.
What do we do then?
When you have two followers,let's say, and someone says I
really feel like the Holy Spiritsaid this to me, and it's in
conflict with another personsaying, well, I feel like the
Holy Spirit said this to me, orthe Holy Spirit told me you're
(22:45):
going to marry me.
Speaker 3 (22:46):
Yeah and I'm like no, he did not tell me that he
didn't tell me that I didn'tknow that I'm still waiting on
that phone call?
Yeah, it's not being clear,right?
Yeah, something like that.
Speaker 1 (22:56):
How do we discern that?
What do we do?
Speaker 3 (22:57):
with that.
It's hard because we put intoour own minds what we want to
happen and we say God did it,but other times we're being
sincere, we just really want toknow, and so I think that's
where there's wisdom, incounselors, and so you can talk
to godly people, people that yourespect.
(23:19):
God speaks to us in a lot ofdifferent ways.
Some people would say he speaksaudibly to them, others through
his mind, others throughScripture, through Jesus,
through creation, through otherpeople.
I think you'd find aconfirmation from those sources
to see whether it's really fromthe Spirit or not.
Speaker 1 (23:37):
Yeah, some of you may have experienced this.
I know that the Holy Spiritis—God has spoken in the Holy
Spirit to me through Joe.
I've talked to him about somestuff and it wasn't even but a
few months ago that he texted meand you started out with I
don't know if this is from God,but here's what occurs to me,
(23:58):
and it was so affirming becauseI was like yeah, absolutely,
because it also, in turn, waskind of spoken through other
things and circumstances to givethat affirmation.
And there's another spot wetalked about this last service.
That is really important.
I think it's actually animportant practice that all of
us can kind of flex this muscleor, you know, put some more
weight on the bar, which is whenyou feel like the Holy Spirit
(24:22):
is prompting you about something, the action that you should do,
and you can talk to that alittle bit Sure.
Speaker 3 (24:27):
Now, you know, sometimes we wonder if the Holy
Spirit is just in daily thingsor it's always the big stuff.
Speaker 1 (24:33):
The mundane, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3 (24:35):
But here's—this is an everyday type of thing, right,
for many people, it's everyminute, every hour, but this
could be used by the Holy Spirit.
And let me give you twoexamples.
This week which fits into, Ithink, what you're saying I
texted a former student who's apastor, just like I had done
(24:56):
with Larry, and he wrote me back.
I just said I prayed for you,your family and your ministry
this morning and he wrote back.
He said I felt that and Ineeded it.
I'm struggling with my agingfather, and that was all
specific that he was, and I'massuming that means health and
or mental issues with his agingfather.
(25:17):
And so the Holy Spirit promptedme and I gave a prayer, and it
was a general prayer but it hada specific need, because the
Holy Spirit was able to meetthat specific need.
And so then there was anotherincident where I have a student
who was in danger of losing hiscredential to teach school.
(25:41):
He's a high school historyteacher in Los Angeles and there
was circumstances going on andthere's a lot of issues, legal
issues going on.
And so I texted him and he saidwhen he got my text, he got
chills.
And he said just an hour beforemy text.
He got a letter saying thateverything was clear and it was
(26:01):
okay, and so God knows what he'sdoing and he takes things where
when he puts.
When God puts somebody on yourheart, it's because that person
is on God's heart, and then Godcan use you in even a small way
to be able to touch them and tohelp them.
Speaker 1 (26:23):
Yeah, so that's that muscle I'm talking about.
Don't let that pass by.
You see, speaking of passing by, you see, throughout Scripture
where God kind of tells you likehe's about to pass by right,
and even the story of Elijah,like I'm about to pass by and he
goes and it's an earthquake andfire and wind.
But he wasn't in that and itwas in this small whisper Later
(26:44):
in the New Testament.
You see, you know Jesus wasabout to pass by his disciples.
These moments where God's juston the move and it's, are we
able to slow down enough or beopen enough to catch the small
whisper and the prompting.
And so for you, maybe you'vehad that happen before, maybe
you've had someone just reachout to you or give you a word or
(27:06):
, like you said, nature or adream or something that you just
needed.
Don't let that pass you by.
Pay attention to that smallwhisper and just try it out and
see what takes place there.
This is something to work withand not just to read about but
(27:28):
to actually interact with.
And so when that person and youguys, I'm sure you've
experienced this when you'relike driving along and that
person comes to mind, act on itLike it's oftentimes you might
even find you're like.
I thought I should have justtexted him and said, hey, I was
thinking about you, this thing,and oftentimes we just feel like
we're so offensive you know,we're so nervous about stuff,
like I'm not going to doanything, and then it passes by
(27:50):
and we don't do anything with it.
And that could be somethingreally important to somebody
else needs.
It's theirs to choose to dowith it what they will and how
God's going to use it.
But you can find, even like man, it kept being on my heart, it
kept being on my heart.
Oh, they kept being on my mindand then it just passed by and
then you realize, like theyactually really needed it and
you're like man, I kept thinkingof that, we just didn't do
anything with it, and vice versa.
Some of you may haveexperienced the other side of
(28:13):
that and the impact that it canmake.
So let's see, Jesus taught usto pray to the Father.
Speaker 3 (28:26):
We pray in Jesus's name.
Should we pray to the HolySpirit?
How do we interact with theHoly Spirit?
Well, I did this morningbecause I knew we were talking
about the Holy Spirit, so Iasked the Holy Spirit to guide
me and to help me and to beamong all of us.
We did it in our worship songtoday Holy Spirit, you're
welcome here.
So we prayed a song to Him.
So, because I knew this wascoming too, during the communion
(28:47):
time, I prayed to the Fatherand I thanked Him for being
Creator and Sovereign and beingFather.
I thanked Jesus for what he didon the—for being a human being
and what he did on the cross,and I prayed for the Holy Spirit
, thanking Him for being acomforter and a counselor, as
well as one who convicts once ina while of sin.
Speaker 1 (29:06):
Yeah, every once in a while.
Speaker 3 (29:08):
So the answer is yes.
Okay so yeah, but along withthat you're praying to the whole
Godhead as well.
Can I throw in about theTrinity?
Speaker 1 (29:17):
The Trinity?
Speaker 3 (29:17):
yeah, and you talked about that a couple weeks ago,
yeah, I mentioned this when Iwas here last time, but many of
you weren't here then and all ofyou have slept since then.
Speaker 1 (29:29):
Or they were sleeping then, or they might have been
sleeping, then Exactly, or both.
Speaker 3 (29:34):
So this is something that's helped me, because the
Trinity, the Godhead, is sodifficult to truly comprehend.
And that's why this question dowe pray to individuals within
the Godhead?
And so Judaism and Islam thinkwe're polytheistic.
They think that we believe inthree gods and it sounds like
(29:56):
it—God the Father, god the Son,god the Spirit.
One plus one plus one is three,but, as Deuteronomy says, god
is 1.
And so I thought about this inregard to mathematics, that,
rather than adding, usemultiplication, 1 times 1 times
(30:18):
1 equals 1.
So, mathematically, you couldhave three entities but still
have one.
So, mathematically, you couldhave three entities but still
have one.
So that opens a doorphilosophically, theologically,
that there could be a God who isthree in one Three entities but
they're one.
And so that was something thathelped me deal with that a
(30:41):
little bit more.
Speaker 1 (30:42):
That was way better than what I used to do with my
kids.
I used to be like it's like athree-headed monster.
They're like what?
It's nighttime stuff, oh great,okay.
So here's kind of a fun oneno-transcript.
(31:03):
In Galatians, paul's talking tokind of he's a frustrated group
and he talks about the fruit ofthe Spirit and I think to a
degree people are like nah, thatdoesn't sound really fancy.
It's love and kindness andgentleness and peace and all of
this stuff.
But then people get reallyjacked up when in Corinthians he
talks about the gifts of theHoly Spirit and you're like, ooh
(31:25):
, now we're doing something,like you got zappers, and you're
like, do this and I can do thatand I can speak in this special
language.
Or specifically, the questionwas around tongues or the gifts
of the Spirit.
What is that used for?
Can we elaborate on some ofthat?
So I'll let you take the firstlittle.
Speaker 3 (31:40):
Yeah, okay.
Well, megan mentioned about theDay of Pentecost and the
speaking of tongues and aboutthe Day of Pentecost and the
speaking in tongues, and thereis a debate among theologians
was the miracle tongues or wasthe miracle hearing that people
just heard in their own language?
But I think it was the tongues.
I think that the apostles werespeaking in languages they did
not know to people who did knowthat language and I think,
(32:03):
generally speaking, that's thegift of tongues.
To give an example of my own, isis in Corinth, the people speak
Greek, but that particularSunday there's a whole section
of Italians there.
They don't speak Greek, sosomeone is able to get up and
speak Greek I mean Italian, eventhough they didn't know Italian
(32:26):
to be able to edify thosepeople.
Somebody else interpreted thatback into Greek for the people
who did understand Greek butdidn't understand the Italian,
and so the purpose of tongueswas for edification.
I think that's how it generallywas used.
But Paul does talk about aheavenly language, a prayer
language, and so anytime anytongue would be done in the
(32:48):
assembly, there had to be aninterpreter, and Paul was very
strict with saying it should bedone one by one.
It needs to be done in decencyand order.
There's not all kinds of chaosgoing on Individually.
If somebody has a gift oftongues, then they could pray
personally to God.
Speaker 1 (33:03):
Yeah, that's a great clear example.
I mean Guineveve, who's aninterpreter here for American
Sign Language, is just anexample exactly of someone
standing just even here in ourWestern culture interpreting or
Spanish services.
You go to other places, etc.
So hopefully it's reallyhelpful.
We can kind of use that totransition of some of the gifts.
(33:26):
Is it like you're given a giftand then that's the marker
that's your gift, or is it likeyou get a gift and then you
don't have the gift?
How is the Holy Spirit kind ofworking through that space?
Speaker 3 (33:38):
Well, first of all, you know, in Corinthians, paul
says that the Holy Spiritdetermines what gift you have.
Everybody's not going to havethe same gift, but you may have
different gifts at one time.
You may have them seasonally,so it could be a new gift
arrives.
Yeah, as needed.
Speaker 1 (33:57):
Yeah, last thing, as you know, we could sit here and
talk for probably hours aboutsome of this stuff, but as a
practice, as you're discerningbecause I think that's one of
the toughest parts that peoplestruggle with is just discerning
like, who is the Holy Spirit?
What is he saying?
What is he saying to me, aboutme, about this person?
(34:19):
I think and you can expand onthis some really important
things to understand is thatwhen you're listening and
something's being spoken eitherto you from someone else as you
know, they're a representativeand they're saying I feel like
this is from the Holy Spirit, oryou have a voice or you feel
like you're having aninteraction.
It was used and we see thisthroughout scripture to unify,
(34:42):
to edify and to glorify God andwhat he's doing and his people.
It's full of love.
So this is just maybe helpfulfor some of you.
If the things you are hearingaren't doing that, it most
likely, as it occurs to me, isnot of the Holy Spirit.
The same thing as it comes toyou through someone else, and
where have maybe you experiencedthe gift of knowing that and
(35:05):
maybe seeing the detriment ofnot believing that truth?
Speaker 3 (35:09):
Sure, when I was a pastor for 10 years in Downey
California, I had a man in thechurch who claimed to be a New
Testament prophet and he wouldsay God told me.
And then he would tell me ortell other people what God had
said to him, to tell whicheverindividual he was talking to.
(35:30):
And as I listened to him, 95%of what he said was negative.
It was critical, it wasknocking people down, it was
putting them in their place, andI got observing that.
I said you know, the HolySpirit does convict us and
sometimes we need to beconfronted.
Okay, that's true, but not 95%of the time.
(35:52):
The Holy Spirit is a comforter,he's a guider, he's one to help
us, and so there's got to besome balance in there.
And there was no balance inthis guy's life and I finally
had to tell him that it reallyis.
Speaker 1 (36:07):
It's like the 5%-er, yeah, and often we find people
or ourselves living in the 5%and not experiencing the 95%.
Speaker 3 (36:15):
So then, I question whether the other part is of the
Holy Spirit or not.
Speaker 1 (36:18):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (36:19):
Or just a mean spirit .
Speaker 1 (36:21):
Well, this series has been a gift.
Dr Granite gave me somematerials.
I'm going to actually send thatin like an email to everyone
more information about the names, some theological kind of
breakdown and study where we seeand experience the Holy Spirit.
So I'll send that out to youguys.
Speaker 3 (36:37):
And I just want to clarify that the main part of
the study was done by a goodfriend of mine, dr Don Green,
and then I did a little bit.
So I actually just wrote hisname, because when he did the
paper he didn't put his name onit, so I just wrote it in.
So it's Don Green.
And then there's a little stuffI did, but he did major work.
Speaker 1 (36:54):
All right, we won't give you credit, it's fine.
Well, you guys, thank Dr Granofor being with us these few
weeks.
So this has been a really funseries.
We're going to continue havingthese types of conversations and
just to let you guys know it'scoming up.
Starting next week we're goingto kick back into some
(37:16):
expository teaching where we'regoing to go verse by verse.
So we spent three and a halfyears in the gospel of Matthew.
We learned about who Jesus was,and so then we kind of came
into this.
Okay, so Jesus happened.
Now what the Holy Spirit?
So of came into this.
Okay, so Jesus happened.
Now what the Holy Spirit?
So then it's like okay, so HolySpirit, this is interaction.
And so now we're going to jumpto actually and Dr Grant has set
up really well today we'regoing to jump to the three
(37:37):
letters from John to the church,which was written 60 years
later to the church of like okay, so now you understand Jesus,
now you know this is actuallyhow you live.
And so we're going to hop intofirst John, chapter one.
Next week we're going to takethat verse by verse.
Don't worry, we're not going tospend three and a half years on
literally five pages ofscripture, um, but we're going
(37:59):
to spend like 14 weeks.
It'll be good, um, so I want toinvite you back to that because
I think it's just going to bepowerful for us to be like okay,
so now what as we walk intothis next season?
So, um, for now, the now whatis?
Um?
We're going to just finish whatwe've been doing here together
as a faith community, asresponse to worship to the Holy
(38:22):
Spirit, uh, to God, the Father,jesus, the Son, uh, for
everything he's done for us aswe get to interact with him
before we get into the rest ofour day, into the week.
So would you stand as we justrespond in song and worship?
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