Here are the other promises: METRO CORE SESSION #14 THE HOLY SPIRIT: THE BAPTISM WITH THE SPIRIT February 19, 2014 Greg Cahalan & Jeremy Schossau

1 We gave you these little prayer cards and we spent the last 30 minutes last week ASKING God to give us what He promised. I hope you spent significant time in prayer this week just simply ASKING for the promises on this card. The most fundamental promise is this: Your Father in heaven will give the Holy Spirit to those who ask Him (Luke 11:13). METRO CORE SESSION #14 THE HOLY SPIRIT: THE BAPTISM WITH THE SPIRIT February 19, 2014 Greg Cahalan & Jeremy Schossau Welcome back to Core Session! I hope you came expecting to receive what God has promised! We are going to talk about Baptism with the Holy Spirit, and I am trusting that God is going to POUR OUT His Spirit on us tonight, right here in this room. Now listen, I know that for a lot of people, maybe even some here in this room, the concept of Baptism with the Spirit pushes you to one of two extremes. For some of you, you re excited! You ve been waiting for Metro to get a little crazy and bring out the sheets and start speaking in tongues and being slain in the Spirit like they do on TV. But for others of you, that s everything you re afraid of. For you, this stuff just freaks you out, and you re already planning how you re going to escape if it gets too crazy. In fact, some of you are so freaked out by this that you didn t even come tonight and instead you re at home watching it on Vimeo or listening to the podcast. In all honesty, I think it is legitimate to be a little concerned when someone starts talking about being filled with the Holy Spirit. There is a lot of craziness out there. For example, did you know that there are actually people who handle poisonous rattlesnakes in the name of the Holy Spirit? True story. A little over a year ago, a pastor from a church in West Virginia held an outdoor snake-handling service that he promoted on his Facebook page by saying: It s going to be a homecoming like the old days. Good ole raised in the holler, mountain ridge running, Holy Ghost-filled, speaking-in-tongues signs & wonders. Holy Ghost snake-handlers like this guy claim that God calls them to handle poisonous snakes to show their faith in him. I guess this guy didn t have enough faith, because the snake bit him and he died 10 hours later. Listen, the Holy Ghost does not come upon you so you can handle poisonous snakes! We all know that, right? But, at the same time, God HAS promised to fill us with His Spirit. There is a REAL experience of God s Spirit even if there is a lot of counterfeit experience out there. It would be the wrong reaction to turn away from the REAL thing just because we are afraid of the counterfeit. If we did that, Satan would have the victory. I, for one, am not willing to settle for that in my life. Anyone with me? Anyone want the REAL presence and power of God? Last week, we focused on what has been promised to us. Here are the other promises: The Promise of a NEW HEART with NEW DESIRES I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you.i will put my Spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws (Ezekiel 36:26,27). The Promise of POWER from God I tell you the truth, anyone who has faith in me will do what I have been doing. He will do even greater things than these (John 14:12). The Promise of the PRESENCE and LOVE of God God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us (Romans 5:5). The Promise of JOY! you are filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy (1 Peter 1:8). The Promise of PEACE. the peace of God, which transcends all understanding (Philippians 4:7) The Promise of POWER OVER SIN by the Spirit you put to death the misdeeds of the body (Romans 8:13). The Promise of POWER to LOVE, HEAL and SAVE Preach this message: The Kingdom of heaven is near. Heal the sick, raise the dead drive out demons do not worry about what to say or how to say it. At that time you will be given what to say, for it will not be you speaking, but the Spirit of your Father speaking through you. (Matt. 10:7-8, 19-20). All of these promises are fulfilled through an experience called the Baptism with the Holy Spirit, or being FILLED with the Holy Spirit, or sometimes it is simply called RECEIVING the Holy Spirit. This is what we are here to experience tonight. The goal tonight is to actually RECEIVE what God has promised and be BAPTIZED with the Holy Spirit! The Promise of BAPTISM WITH THE SPIRIT: - Wait for the gift my Father promised, which you have heard me speak about. For John baptized with water, but in a few days you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit... (Acts 1:4-5) As Jesus said, this is not about being baptized with water. Water baptism is a symbol or a shadow that points beyond itself to THIS experience. In water baptism, you are immersed under water as a symbol of being buried with Christ. In Spirit baptism, you are immersed with the Spirit of God and EMPOWERED to live a new kind of life. In Spirit baptism, the Spirit of God literally FILLS your body with His presence and power! He fills you with new desires! He fills you with God s love! He fills

2 you with God s joy and peace! He fills you with power over sin, and sickness, and demons! He fills you with the ability to speak with power on His behalf! Baptism with the Holy Spirit is the initial fulfillment of Paul s command in Ephesians 5:18: be filled with the Spirit. Before we go any further, I think we need to get rid of any preconceived ideas of what this experience is like or what it FEELS like. It is different for everyone. Some people get outwardly emotional and start crying like a baby. Some people get very excited and start laughing out loud. Some people get very quiet and just sit with their eyes closed. Some have the strongest feelings they ve ever had, and some people don t feel much of anything other than an intensified desire to follow Jesus. So I want to make CRYSTAL CLEAR that we are not seeking any specific FEELING tonight. We need to understand that being baptized with the Spirit is way more than just the EMOTIONS of it although it is absolutely accompanied by Spirit-filled emotions. This is not just some kind of emotionalism. It s about being filled with the presence and the power of God and joining Him in what He is doing in this world! To illustrate this, let me start by telling you a true story about a friend of mine named Mike. Some of you probably know him. He told me this story when I was having breakfast with him a little while back. A few years ago, he was studying about this topic of Baptism with the Holy Spirit, and he really started seeking it for his life. He wanted more of the presence and power of God in His life, and he wanted to be a more effective witness for Jesus. So he prayed and prayed for God to fill him with His Spirit, but he wasn t sure how to know if it had happened. He knew that some people speak in tongues when it happens, but that wasn t happening to him. Then one day, he got a visit out of the blue from a woman whom he hadn t seen for a while. She was the wife of an old friend of his, and she needed some advice because she was having trouble in her marriage. During the conversation, Mike prayed for God to show him what to do and how to help her. And then all of a sudden, a woman s name came to his mind and he heard a voice in his head saying This is the person her husband is having an affair with. Mike didn t say anything at the time, but he knew in that moment that he had to confront the husband with this. A day or two later, he called the husband and straight up asked him if he was having cheating on his wife. At first he denied everything. But Mike knew that God had spoken this to him, so he kept pressing and eventually shared the name of the person God told him. After he shared the name, the guy was just silent for a couple minutes. Then he finally broke down and admitted everything. This started the process of this guy coming back to Christ in his life and experiencing healing in his marriage. What Mike experienced here is what the Bible calls a word of knowledge (1 Cor. 12:8), and it is one of the evidences of baptism with the Holy Spirit. The Bible calls these evidences manifestations of the Spirit (1 Cor. 12:7), and THIS is primarily what the baptism with the Spirit is FOR! It is God giving you supernatural POWER so that you can SERVE Him and SPEAK for Him. You will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses (Acts 1:8). Mike didn t FEEL much of anything at first, but he experienced the presence and the power of God at work through him and THAT filled him with the joy and peace of God like nothing else ever could! That s what this about! My most memorable experience of this was very different from Mike s. It happened when I was praying for my dad to be healed of cancer. And for me, I was overwhelmed with emotion. It felt like God s presence literally exploded inside of me. I started laughing and crying uncontrollably at the same time. And at that moment, I knew God was going to do something amazing through my prayers! And sure enough, God healed my dad of stage four lung cancer when he was only supposed to have another month to live! This is what the Bible calls a gift of healing (1 Cor. 12:9), and it is another evidence of Baptism with the Spirit. 1 Corinthians 12 gives a partial list of these manifestations or evidences of Baptism with the Spirit. Take a look at this: Now to each one the manifestation of the Spirit is given for the common good. To one there is given through the Spirit the word of wisdom, to another the word of knowledge by means of the same Spirit, to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healing by that one Spirit, to another miraculous powers, to another prophecy, to another distinguishing between spirits, to another speaking in different kinds of tongues, and to still another the interpretation of tongues. All these are the work of one and the same Spirit, and he gives them to each one, just as he determines. (1 Cor. 12:7-11). These are some of what are called the gifts of the Spirit, and we are going to spend the entire week on these things next week. But for this week, what you need to know is that these are the evidences or manifestations of baptism with the Spirit. God does not give the same gifts to everyone. None of these gifts is the primary evidence of the Baptism with the Spirit, but the Spirit gives these things to each person just as he determines. The goal is to experience the Presence and the Power of God in our lives. We want the Kingdom of God to break into our lives and give us a taste of heaven right here on earth! We want to receive Jesus POWER to be His WITNESSES and spread the Gospel to the ends of the earth! Are you with me on this? During Jesus lifetime, he was the only person who was baptized with the Spirit. But NOW, because of Jesus, Baptism with the Spirit is available to ALL of his followers! And when a bunch of people are Baptized with the Spirit all at once it is powerful beyond description! We call this a Revival or an Awakening and it is often accompanied by signs and wonders and results in hundreds or even thousands of people coming to Jesus for salvation! And this is what we are praying for here at Metro! The first thing that we need to get our minds around is that Baptism with the Holy Spirit is PROMISED to us. Even

3 though we won t experience the fullness of the Kingdom until we get to heaven someday, the remarkable news is that in the person and mission of Jesus, the Kingdom of God has now broken into this present age, and we can experience a taste of heaven RIGHT NOW! This is what it means to be baptized with the Holy Spirit! Jesus referred to this as the GIFT His Father PROMISED! The Presence and the Power of God are promised to us right here and right now so that we can effectively be Jesus witnesses in this world! We need to keep coming back to this: The primary purpose of Baptism with the Spirit is power for witness. If you want to experience a foretaste of heaven in your life, if you want to be filled with JOY unspeakable, and have PEACE that passes understanding, and have POWER over sin, and POWER over sickness, and POWER over demons, then you need to join Jesus in His mission of spreading the Gospel of the Kingdom of God to the ends of the earth! And as you do, you are promised the presence and power of God! The only question is: DO YOU WANT IT? Do you want to be baptized with the Holy Spirit? Do you want to experience the direct presence and power of God in your life? Do you want to be used by God and be Jesus witnesses in this world? Do you want to see signs and wonders and lead people to Jesus? Tonight we are going to talk about HOW this happens, but first I need to quickly clarify a few more things. First, you need to know that if you are a Christian, then the Spirit of God ALREADY lives inside of you. This is just what it means to be a Christian. When you put your faith in Jesus, the Holy Spirit takes up residence within you. If anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Christ (Romans 8:9). So when I talk about being baptized with the Holy Spirit, I am not talking about becoming a Christian, even though sometimes this happens to people right after becoming Christians. Here s the deal: the only people who can be baptized with the Holy Spirit are people who are already Christians and who already have the Holy Spirit living inside of them. BUT Let me say this clearly: It is possible to be a Christian, to have the Holy Spirit living inside of you, and not have experienced the Baptism with the Holy Spirit. We talked about this last week. If you have not been baptized with the Spirit, it does NOT mean you aren t a Christian. But what it does mean is that you probably aren t following Jesus into His mission. And second, we need to know that this is not a one-time experience and it is not a permanent experience. This experience needs to be repeated over and over again in your life. It is possible to be filled with the Spirit at one moment of your life, and not be filled with the Spirit at another moment of your life. And we need to be re-filled with the Spirit every time we seek to obey God, step out to serve Him or be His witness. Listen, this is something that we should be seeking MOMENT by MOMENT in our lives. Alright, so let s dig into HOW this happens. If you have your Bible, turn to Acts 2 because this is where we are going camp out. But first, look at a couple of verses in Acts 1 to set this up: Then they returned to Jerusalem and when they arrived, they went upstairs to the room where they were staying and they all joined together constantly in prayer (Acts 1:12-14). So Jesus told his disciples to stay in Jerusalem and to WAIT to be baptized with the Spirit. In Luke 24:49, he called it being clothed with power from on high. So they went to Jerusalem and PRAYED constantly for power to be His witnesses. This is what we have been doing for the past week. Drop down to chapter 2: (Acts 2:1) When the day of Pentecost came, they were all together in one place. 2 Suddenly a sound like the blowing of a violent wind came from heaven and filled the whole house where they were sitting. 3 They saw what seemed to be tongues of fire that separated and came to rest on each of them. 4 All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit enabled them. [So in this particular instance, the initial evidence of baptism with the Spirit was speaking in tongues. But as we saw a few minutes ago, 1 Corinthians 12 makes clear that, in general, speaking with tongues is NOT the ONLY or PRIMARY evidence of Spirit Baptism. The experience of speaking with tongues is given sometimes, but it is NOT given every time more on this next week.] 5 Now there were staying in Jerusalem God-fearing Jews from every nation under heaven. 6 When they heard this sound, a crowd came together in bewilderment, because each one heard them speaking in his own language. 7 Utterly amazed, they asked: Are not all these men who are speaking Galileans? 8 Then how is it that each of us hears them in his own native language? 9 Parthians, Medes and Elamites; residents of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, 10 Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya near Cyrene; visitors from Rome 11 (both Jews and converts to Judaism); Cretans and Arabs-- we hear them declaring the wonders of God in our own tongues! 12 Amazed and perplexed, they asked one another, What does this mean? 13 Some, however, made fun of them and said, They have had too much wine. 14 Then Peter stood up with the Eleven, raised his voice and addressed the crowd: Fellow Jews and all of you who live in Jerusalem, let me explain this to you; listen carefully to what I say. 15 These men are not drunk, as you suppose. It s only nine in the morning! 16 No, this is what was spoken by the prophet Joel: 17 In the last days, God says, I will pour out my Spirit on all people. Your sons and daughters will prophesy, your young men will see visions, your old men will dream dreams. 18 Even on my servants, both men and women, I will pour out my Spirit in those days, and they will prophesy. [If the Bible puts forward anything as the PRIMARY evidence of Baptism with the Spirit Baptism, it is the gift of PROPHECY. We will talk

4 more about this next week too.] 19 I will show wonders in the heaven above and signs on the earth below, blood and fire and billows of smoke. 20 The sun will be turned to darkness and the moon to blood before the coming of the great and glorious day of the Lord. 21 And everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved. 22 Men of Israel, listen to this: Jesus of Nazareth was a man accredited by God to you by miracles, wonders and signs, which God did among you through him, as you yourselves know. 23 This man was handed over to you by God s set purpose and foreknowledge; and you, with the help of wicked men, put him to death by nailing him to the cross. 24 But God raised him from the dead, freeing him from the agony of death, because it was impossible for death to keep its hold on him. 32 God has raised this Jesus to life, and we are all witnesses of the fact. 33 Exalted to the right hand of God, he has received from the Father the promised Holy Spirit and has poured out what you now see and hear. 36 Therefore let all Israel be assured of this: God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and Christ. 37 When the people heard this, they were cut to the heart and said to Peter and the other apostles, Brothers, what shall we do? 38 Peter replied, Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. And you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. 39 The promise is for you and your children and for all who are far off-- for all whom the Lord our God will call. 40 With many other words he warned them; and he pleaded with them, Save yourselves from this corrupt generation. 41 Those who accepted his message were baptized, and about three thousand were added to their number that day. So there you have it! The Spirit fell on the church, and 3000 people were saved in ONE DAY! This is what the Baptism with the Spirit will bring! It will bring POWER to our witness! Look closely at how this worked. It began when the disciples were gathered in a room just like we are gathered here today. They were worshipping God and praying. They were ASKING God to fulfill His promises and give them POWER to be His witnesses. And God kept His promise. He answered their prayer! He poured out His Spirit on them, and the results were breathtaking! It filled the disciples with an intense heart of WORSHIP and JOY so much so that a crowd of unbelievers gathered around to see what was going on! It filled them with so much FAITH and PEACE that they were willing to risk their very lives to share the Gospel with the very same people who had crucified Jesus 40 days earlier! And it filled them with POWER to speak in such a way that people s hearts were opened and they believed! Don t you want this? Don t you want this WORSHIP, this JOY, this PEACE, and this POWER? That s why we are gathered here tonight! And that s why we gather here at Metro EVERY single week! We gather for four weekend experiences on Saturdays and Sundays for this reason! We have youth ministries and a young adult ministry and a men s ministry and a women s ministry and a recovery ministry and life groups for this same reason! We gather HERE to be FILLED with the Spirit of God, so that OUT THERE we will have POWER for the mission of reaching a lost and dying world with the hope and love of Jesus Christ! What we do in here is GROUND ZERO for the mission of God out there. For the rest of our time together tonight, we are going to walk through a process of RECEIVING the Holy Spirit. There is no hocus-pocus or magic formula to this. This is not something you can conjure up. The Holy Spirit is sovereign and He does whatever He wants. Jesus said the wind blows wherever it pleases, so it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit. So you can t force this to happen. But God has promised to give His Spirit to those who ask Him. God WANTS to give this to us. So the question is: What can we do to prepare for it? And the first answer is that you need JESUS! Jesus is the one who baptizes with the Spirit! God has raised this Jesus to life, and we are all witnesses of the fact. Exalted to the right hand of God, he has received from the Father the promised Holy Spirit and has poured out what you now see and hear. (Acts 2:32-33) So if you want to be baptized with the Spirit, you have to come to Jesus to get it. You have to have a living, personal relationship with Jesus. You have to be a FOLLOWER of Jesus. In other words, this experience is only available to people who are Christians. If you re here tonight and you are not a Christian, then this experience is not for you. BUT you can become a Christian tonight, and I want to invite you to do so, right here and right now! And I just have to say, I can t understand why anyone rejects Jesus. I mean seriously, why would you reject him? Everything you are searching for in your life finds its FULLNESS in Him. Do you want to be loved? There is no love better than Jesus love! His love is unconditional, and free, and forgiving! He only wants what is BEST for you, and will do ANYTHING to give it to you to the point of DYING for you! If you receive His love, He will never leave you and never disappoint you! Do you want JOY? In the presence of Jesus is FULLNESS of joy! Do you want pleasure? In His presence are pleasures FOREVERMORE! Do you want beauty? There is nothing more attractive than the beauty of His HOLINESS! Do you want adventure? There is nothing more exciting than joining Him in His mission in the world! Do you want to live forever? His gift is ETERNAL LIFE! Listen, there is NOTHING better than Jesus! You are crazy if you reject Him! Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved (Acts 2:21). So call on Him today! Ask Him to forgive your sins and give you eternal life! And He will! And He will do it right now if you call on Him! Just say to Him, Jesus, forgive my sins and give me eternal life. Help me to love you and live for you. If that is the prayer of your heart tonight, then

5 you just became a Christian! And that s amazing! So right now I want every Christian in the room to raise your hand, including those who just now became Christians. If you are a Christian, raise your hand. Keep your hands up for a minute. If you are a Christian, then the Holy Spirit of God lives inside of you, which means it is POSSIBLE for you to receive the baptism with the Holy Spirit! You need to believe this! It is possible and it is PROMISED to you! The promise is for you and your children and for all who are far off-- for all whom the Lord our God will call (Acts 2:39). Do you believe this? This is for YOU! And what I want to do now is walk you through what the Bible says about HOW to receive this. And then I want us to spend some time actually RECEIVING it! Are you with me on this? I believe that everything we need to know about receiving Baptism with the Spirit is found in Acts 2:38. Here it is: Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. The first step is to repent. REPENT = Hate sin, all sin, every sin. The biggest thing that will keep you from the baptism with the Spirit in your life is SIN in your life. When you sin, the Bible calls this Grieving the Spirit. Do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God (Ephesians 4:30). And then the Bible goes on to list some of the sins that grieve God s Spirit both in Ephesians and in Galatians. Take a look at this list and be honest with how you are grieving the Spirit in your life: Pride Anger/Bitterness Divisiveness Worry/Anxiety Lying Stealing Laziness Materialism Jealousy Drunkenness/Drugsis H Lust/Sexual immorality Filthy talk/crude joking Is there anything on this list that you don t HATE? If so, then you re lacking repentance in your life and you will never experience the filling of God s Spirit. These things will keep you from the Joy of God, the Peace of God, and the Power of God in your life. You need to HATE them! You need to REPENT! This is the first step in preparing for Baptism with God s Spirit. So, RIGHT NOW, I want us to spend some time with God repenting of our sin. While the band plays, I want you to ask God to show you the sin in your life. I am going to leave this list on the screen, and I want you to ask God to show you which of these things is keeping you from the fullness of His Spirit. And then I want you to ask God to help you to HATE them and TURN from them. I want you to ask God to BREAK your heart over these things. Spend some time repenting before God. The second step is found in the phrase be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ. This is talking about water baptism, and there is something we need to understand about this. Water baptism in the Bible was not just some ceremony where people were dunked under the water. It was WAY more than that. It was a SYMBOL of something way deeper. Water baptism in the Bible represents Total SURRENDER and COMMITMENT to FOLLOW Jesus. When someone was baptized with water in Jesus name in the Bible, it REALLY meant something. This was not something that people did lightly. It meant that they were PUBLICLY identifying themselves with Jesus and His mission, and it could cost them their lives. Christians were intensely persecuted in the first century and many of them were killed for going public with their faith. So my question to you is: Have you TOTALLY surrendered your life to Jesus and are you TOTALLY committed to following Jesus, regardless of what it costs you or where it takes you? Will you go PUBLIC with your faith? Will you do whatever Jesus says to do? Will you go wherever Jesus says to go? Will you give up whatever Jesus says to give up? If you are holding any part of your life back from God, you should not expect to receive the Baptism with the Spirit. If God is not at the center of your friendships or relationships, then you are resisting the Spirit. If God is not at the center of work life or school life, then you are resisting the Spirit. If God is not at the center of your entertainment, then you are resisting the Spirit. You need a TOTAL surrender and commitment to follow Jesus in every area of your life. This is the second step in preparing for Baptism with God s Spirit. You must hold nothing back. You must say I am Yours and all that I have it Yours! RIGHT NOW, spend some time with God just GIVING yourself to Him. Tell Him that you are willing to go anywhere He tells you to go and to do anything He tells you to do. SURRENDER your life to Him! Surrender your relationships, your resources, and your time to Him! And then spend some time LISTENING to Him. Ask Him to SHOW you what He wants you to do. The third step is very simple: ASK! The Bible is very clear about this: your Father in heaven will give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him! (Luke 11:13). This is the asking of INTENSE DESIRE! The Bible says that we should earnestly SEEK baptism with the Spirit and not give up. How badly do you want this? How badly do you want

6 the Presence and Power of God in your life? The Bible says that God rewards those who DILIGENTLY seek Him! How much time did you spend with God this week asking Him for this? You won t receive this until you have an intense desire for it. And you also won t receive it until you ask with right motives. The only right motives are to WORSHIP Jesus and lead others to WORSHIP to Jesus! Is worshipping Jesus the deepest desire of your heart? Then you are ready to be Baptized with the Spirit! This is all for the glory of God! RECEIVE all that the Spirit of God wants to give you tonight! And then let it flow THROUGH you like a river of living water to the lost world around you! That s what Baptism with the Holy Spirit is for! It is power for witness! Next week we will talk about the manifestations or the gifts of the Holy Spirit. But let s start tonight by simply worshipping KING Jesus who has given us His Spirit! So right now, ASK God to give you His Spirit. Ask God to baptize you with the Holy Spirit and pour out His presence and power into your life! Let s pray for this TOGETHER! Now listen, once you have met these conditions, once you have repented of all known sin in your life, once you have made a total surrender to follow Jesus, and once you have asked God for His Spirit with an intense desire to worship Jesus and lead others to worship to Jesus, then the fourth and final step is this: BELIEVE that you have received it. This is received by FAITH! Here is the promise: And this is the confidence that we have toward him, that if we ask anything according to his will he hears us. And if we know that he hears us in whatever we ask, we know that we have the requests that we have asked of him. (1 John 5:14-15). Don t miss this! This means that if you ask for something according to God s will, then you WILL be GIVEN what you ask for! And, listen, you KNOW that receiving the Baptism with the Holy Spirit is God s will for you! This means that if you meet the conditions of this, and you ASK for it, then God WILL give it to you! It is a PROMISE! You simply need to RECEIVE it by FAITH! God gives you his Spirit and works miracles among you because you believe what your heard (Galatians 3:5). There it is! BELIEVE and RECEIVE! Receive the Spirit of God! Let Him fill you! Be filled with His LOVE, His JOY, His PEACE, and His POWER! It is PROMISED, you have ASKED, and it is YOURS if you believe and receive! The very first evidence of being filled with the Spirit is a heart of intensified worship. So the Band right now is going to lead us into a time of WORSHIP, and I want you to just PRAISE and THANK God that He has baptized you with His Spirit tonight! Ephesians 5:18-20 Be filled with the Spirit. 19 Speak to one another with psalms, hymns and spiritual songs. Sing and make music in your heart to the Lord, 20 always giving thanks to God the Father for everything, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. The Spirit of God wants to fill us to the point of overflowing so that, when we leave here, the love, joy and peace we have received will flow through us to the lost world around us. John 7:38-39 Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, Out of his heart will flow rivers of living water. Now this he said about the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were to receive