Amen. Okay, so again, it's just a topical study on power. We don't have a lot of time, and so it'll be fairly quickly that we go through the truth here this morning. But first of all, how God affects your power. And when we're talking about power in the Christian life and experience, obviously, The power is God. There is no power without God. God is the power. So the source of power is God. So you've heard it said, don't try to drive your vehicle without petrol. Don't try to drive your vehicle without diesel. And I had to ask in France, what is diesel? It was gasoline or something like that, which looks a lot more like gasoline to me than diesel. But anyway. You know, without that in your tank, you don't have power. Without God in your tank, you don't have power. If you're not saved, you don't have power. You can't live a Christian life. You can't measure up to God's standard. You can't be a righteous person. You can't accomplish the things that you might even look at in the Word of God and say, that's great. I'd like to do that in my life. I'd like to put that on in my life. But if you don't have Christ in your heart, there's no way that you could possibly do that because you don't have the source of power. And remember Peter, when he's preaching in Acts, he said to the people, if you'll repent and accept Christ, then you'll receive the spirit of God, right? You'll receive the blessing that you see here at Pentecost and the speaking in tongues and the dynamic power that you see evidence before you. You'll get that if you get saved. The person of power is Jesus Christ. So God's the person of power, Acts 1.8. but you shall receive power. After that, the Holy Ghost has come upon you." All right? That's when that happens. When you got saved, you received the person of power. You shall receive power. After that, the Holy Ghost has come upon you. That's why we believe that the church actually began at Pentecost. The church, the Holy Spirit baptizes into the body of Christ. The Holy Spirit didn't come as he did until Pentecost. When he came, that was the birth of the church. because he baptized believers into the body of Christ. Now they had Old Testament salvation, but there was a transition time there. They had Old Testament salvation. They got New Testament salvation. I don't know exactly how that transition takes place. You understand what I'm saying? They went from having faith in what God would do to faith in what God did through Christ. They believed on Jesus. They received Jesus Christ as their Savior. God knows how that transition time actually took place, in both cases by faith. But as a New Testament believer, we have a blessing. that the Old Testament believers didn't have, and that is the Holy Spirit coming and indwelling us in all the things that he does. We'll talk a little bit about that. 1 Corinthians 2, 4, Paul said, My speech and my preaching was not with enticing words of men's wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power. There ought to be some evidence that it's not just a form of godliness denying the power thereof, but that there is an authority that is behind that, a power that's behind that, that is communicating. And that's why, and listen, I got saved as a little boy as the Spirit of God spoke to my heart as my dad was up preaching. But the Spirit of God testified of the truth of what he said. That demonstrates God. That inner conviction that takes place to the preaching of the Word of God, that is not the man up in front, not the witness that's speaking to somebody on the street, but is beyond that in the bedroom, in the house, knocking and saying and convincing that is God, right? It's a person of power of the Holy Spirit. 1 Thessalonians 1 5 for our gospel came not into you in word only but also in power and in the Holy Ghost and in much assurance as you know what manner of men we were among you for your sakes now You think about that? Paul just declares that he says, you know, you know that as we were sharing the gospel as we were preaching and teaching. You know that the Spirit of God was at work. Again, what a testimony to the reality of what we're talking about, that that dynamic person of power was present ministering and working in people's hearts. Now, I praise God. We're not going to speak much about this right here, but I've done it recently in our church. The Holy Spirit is God. So as we receive power, it's not in a I'm gonna sneeze. It's not in a thing. One of the greatest things about salvation is that God indwells you. not something other than God, not a force, not an it, but a him, a he, a person, just like Jesus Christ was bodily on earth, the Spirit of God is bodily in us, God in us, in our bodies, our temple, his temple. And so he is the person of power. And so he is the power, but he also gives the promise of power. The disciples were commanded to wait for this power, Luke 24, 49. It says, behold, I send the promise of my father upon you, but tarry ye in the city of Jerusalem until you be endued with power from on high. John 14, 26 says, but the comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, whom the father will send. Okay, it was future. It was future to them, Jesus instructing them and saying, okay, this is gonna happen, but ye shall receive power. All right, it's a promise that God gave. And then, of course, we understand Pentecost was the coming of that person in power. So they were commanded, though, to wait for that power. And Jesus humbly lived in dependence upon God's power. Now, Jesus was spiritually empowered in a way that others were not. The Bible says about Jesus, Acts 10, 38, how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Ghost and with power, who went about doing good and healing all that were oppressed of the devil, for God was with him." Oh now, that's an interesting statement, right, to say about Jesus. To say God was with him? Wait a second, isn't he God? Yes, he's God. But remember, he took upon him what? Flesh, he became a man. The power that you see demonstrated in the life of Christ when Jesus Christ walks on water, when Jesus Christ heals, when Jesus Christ forgives sin and exercises God's power, how does he do that? He does that through the person of the Holy Spirit. Why? Because he set aside his Godhead, the powers of his Godhead. He didn't set aside the fact that he was God. He was God. He accepted worship. He received worship. As a man, he was still God, but as a man, he was fully man. Does that make sense? So he's fully dependent upon God for God's power. So the disciples were commanded to wait for this power. The Spirit of God had this power in Jesus' life. Then John the Baptist's ministry was a special enablement of God by Spirit. Luke 115, he shall be great in the sight of the Lord. But the Bible says he shall be filled with the Holy Ghost even from his mother's womb. Now was John the Baptist filled with the Spirit of God in his mother's womb? Can you give me a story that testifies of that? Yes. Yeah, so when Jesus Christ in the womb of Mary comes into the presence of John the Baptist, the babe in the womb of Elizabeth, John the Baptist, he leaps for joy. Why? Because the Spirit of God in him rejoiced. And again, just think about this. The Spirit of God overshadowed the birth of the Lord Jesus Christ. That's what the Word of God says. but it doesn't speak about the Spirit of God being upon Christ. And so as far as a proximity, the Spirit of God in John the Baptist and the Spirit of God in Jesus Christ coming together, there was something special there that God had rejoiced in coming into close proximity. The Spirit of God comes fully upon Jesus Christ when? At his baptism. What does that precede? His earthly ministry, Jesus Christ, all the preaching and teaching, now listen, he lived a sinless life, he was holy, he was sanctified, he was set apart, he obviously had power, but we don't read about the miracles, we don't read about all the wonders that Jesus Christ did in his life until when? After the coming of the Holy Spirit. And so the power that was in the life of Christ there, the Holy Spirit and John the Baptist as well. Barnabas, Acts 11, 24, he was a good man, full of the Holy Ghost and of faith, and much people was added unto the Lord. So if you looked at Barnabas, you could perceive that Barnabas was a man that was filled with the Spirit of God. He was a man of faith. He was a man that dynamically trusted God. He took and he sold his goods, the Bible speaks about. And he distributed them to the church. And Ananias and Sapphira wanted to copy that. But Barnabas was walking there in the power of God. And people recognized that. Acts 7.55, Stephen, one of the early deacons. By the way, do you think Stephen's a hero of the faith? Yes. Was he a pastor? No. He was a lay preacher, I guess. I mean, yes, did he have the gift of preaching? Did he have the gift of teaching? Yes, he did, but sometimes God gifts deacons in that way. Many times in the Word of God, when it speaks about deacons, there's an ability to teach that they have as well. And so Stephen was not a full-time pastor. But as a deacon, he was a man that was filled with the Spirit of God, he was a godly man. Acts 7.55, he being full of the Holy Ghost, the Bible says. And so the Holy Spirit, I wanna point this out, when somebody gets saved, the Holy Spirit seals that individual. That means that he puts the mark of God upon them, they're a child of God. He baptizes them into the body of Christ, the church. Okay, and that's just the local church. He indwells them. Is the spirit of God, when somebody receives the spirit of God at salvation, is the spirit of God ever gonna depart from them? No, he that hath a son hath salvation. Life, he that hath not the Son of God hath not life. These things have been written unto you that believe on the name of the Son of God that you may know that you have everlasting life. And the Bible speaks about what know you not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost, which is in you, which you have of God and you're not your own. And so when somebody gets saved, they receive the spirit of God. Can they lose him? No, because you can't lose eternal life. He is the principle of life and understand that we've talked about it before. Jesus Christ is truth and Jesus Christ is life. Now the person of the Godhead that actually is physically in us is the Spirit of Christ. God can't indwell us bodily in his body, but in his Spirit he can. Make sense? Okay, so those three things can take place that we're sealed, we're baptized in the body of Christ, we are indwelled by the Spirit of God, but I have a question for us. Does that mean that we're filled with the Spirit of God? And if not, what is being filled with the Spirit of God? Or how do we have that dynamic taking place? Because the Bible's very clear that some are full, but some are not. Notice it says in Acts 6, 3, it says this, wherefore brethren, looking out among you, seven men of honest report, full of the Holy Ghost and wisdom, whom we may appoint over this business. So if he's saying to them, look, consider among yourselves, find somebody that is filled with who? The Spirit of God. Now he's not speaking about finding somebody that's saved. Somebody that has the Spirit of God. He said, identify somebody that is filled with the Spirit of God. Paul commands us to be filled. Ephesians 5.18. Who is the audience that Paul is writing to in the book of Ephesians? Christians, right? Believers at Ephesus. So when they got saved, did they receive the Spirit of God? Yes. But he says to them, he says, be not drunk with wine where it is excess. Don't be controlled by wine. Don't be intoxicated. He's not saying alcohol is good. Alcohol is never good in the word of God when it's speaking about drinking to get drunk or drinking for intoxication. It's always forbidden in the word of God. But so when it says, be not drunk with wine where it is excess, it's not saying it's okay to drink a little wine, but it's saying don't be controlled by alcohol. But then it says, but be filled with, Spirit. Now, when I got saved, I received the spirit. So I, you know, if I was in Ephesus and I'm a Christian, Paul wrote that to me. I said, wait a second, Paul, what are you saying? I haven't received the spirit of God. And Paul would say, no, that's not what I'm saying. I'm saying be filled with the spirit of God. Be somebody that is controlled by the spirit of God. Somebody that is directed by the spirit of God. Again, once you're saved, you expect to not only have the Spirit of God, but have an overflow of the Spirit of God. Jesus spoke about it in John 7, 38. But this spake he of the Spirit, which they that believe on him shall receive, for the Holy Ghost was not yet given, because that Jesus was not yet glorified." Okay, when Jesus went up to heaven, he had a promise from the Father, which he claimed that the Spirit of God would be given. And so he claimed that before the Father, he sent the promise that came down at Pentecost. And so in referencing that, he said, out of their belly shall flow rivers of living water. If the life of Christ is actually flowing through that person and impacting others, are they filled? Yes. Yes, there ought to be a dynamic outflow out of our lives that is the person of power, the person spirit of God. Okay, so he's the person of power, but we can affect his power. And again, I may not have time to complete this. I may come back to this. I may not. We'll just see what we get through just now. And so he's the person of power. We've got to have his power. but we can limit it. And so what I want to look at is areas that we can limit God's power and how we need His power. So how you affect His power. Your prayer affects His power. Your prayer life affects his power. And I put this first in my study because prayer impacts, and actually all these areas that we'll look at, they actually, they also come back and impact each other, okay? But prayer kind of impacts a lot of these areas. And prayer's a great privilege. Isaiah 45, 11 says, thus saith the Lord, the Holy One of Israel and his maker, ask me of things to come concerning my sons, concerning the work of my hands, command ye me. It's a privilege to go to God and say, I want to pray about what God's doing with people. I want to pray about what God's doing with things. Those two areas are major areas that we can impact. To put it in perspective for our local church here, we can have a great impact on people in our congregation, our church, but also in facilities. also in outreach and other things that we're seeking to see God do, okay? So concerning my sons, concerning the work of my hands, what I'm doing, and part of that's people as well, but command ye me. And so let's just think about what the power of prayer, the power of prayer. Prayer accesses wisdom. It accesses wisdom. Remember when the first qualifications for the deacon was full of the Holy Ghost and of Wisdom. Wisdom is a strength, is it not? If you're looking for character and leadership, you look at them and you think they're a wise person, that is a strong Christian, if they are truly a wise person. And so the Bible does say, and this is about prayer, James 1.5, if any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God. that giveth all men liberally and braideth not. And if I were just to ask you, what is the way, you know, in your family, as a dad, you need wisdom? Or as a mother in a family, or a child in a family, you need wisdom? Or in an employee-employee relationship, or in a situation in your neighborhood, or anything like that, you need wisdom. If I were to say to you, how do you get that wisdom? You know, a lot of people would say, well, get on Google, right? And you Google it, because Google has all the answers, don't you know? I mean, it's just at your fingertips, you know? Oh, I got a question, so I go to Google. Well, listen, that's not what the Bible says. Well, if it's a medical question, I go to my doctor. Well, if it's a scholastic question, I go to my educator. Okay, I get that. I mean, there might be some wisdom in doing that and seeking information and evaluating that, but the true source of wisdom is who? God, and specifically Jesus Christ. I read a scripture this past week that really stood out to me, and I forget where I was reading. I've been reading through the epistles. I'm almost through my Bible this year. But as I was reading the epistles, it said about Jesus Christ, in whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. So that is all in Christ. And so if I have a question about something, whatever it is in life, where should I go? I should go to God, and I should what? Pray. And wisdom, again, is a strength. It's an amazing strength that God gives. Solomon said this, wisdom is the principle thing. Therefore, get wisdom, and with all thy getting, get understanding. He's looking at his young men, his sons, and saying, you wanna be strong in your life, you wanna be strong in your marriage, you wanna be strong in your leadership and the roles that God has given to you, get wisdom, get wisdom. It's the principle thing. Jesus said it this way, he said, if he that heareth these sayings of mine and doeth them, I will liken him unto a wise man that built his house upon a rock. And the storms came, and the house stood, but the foolish man builds his house on the sand, and there's tons of people today building their life on sand, and it crumbles, it doesn't last, it doesn't make for a good marriage, it doesn't make for a good life, it just is nothing, it's empty, there's no foundation there because it's lies. That's a foolish person. We're talking this morning about strength. We want to see somebody in our church, we want to see our young people grow up to have strength in their life. The power areas that we're considering, wisdom is a main thing. Where does it come from? Prayer. If any man lack wisdom, let him ask of God. So we're talking about what we can do to impact our power and prayer. is a key, prayer accesses wisdom, prayer accesses God's spirit. There's a promise Jesus gave, Luke 11, 13, if ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him? It's an interesting verse, because you go, wait a second, wait a second, and certainly it applies to salvation when somebody gets saved, but they're not asking for God's spirit, they're asking for salvation. They receive God's spirit, But in the book of Acts, the disciples, they claimed that, they prayed to God and the Bible, they cried out for boldness in Acts chapter 4, 31. When they had prayed, the place was shaken where they were assembled together and they were all filled with the Holy Ghost and they spake the word of God with boldness. You read this story and what you'll find is a prayer meeting. Now when did, maybe if you don't know the book of Acts, what chapter in Acts did Pentecost take place, do you know? Acts chapter two, all right? Chapter one, Jesus is getting ready, he's going to heaven. Acts chapter two, they're praying. It might be right at the beginning of chapter three, but the Spirit of God comes. It's evident that he's come. They are speaking in tongues and the power of God is there working in the hearts of people, but after that takes place, did the Spirit of God depart from them? No, right? They still have the Spirit of God. But in Acts chapter four, the persecution has taken place. And as the persecution takes place, they get on their knees and they say, God, God, we've gotta have your power. God, give us boldness. And what's the Bible say? He fills them with his spirit. And so again, we could look at that and say, well, there again, that's power. If you've got the spirit of God, you're filled with the spirit of God. Well, let's ask God, God, fill me with your spirit. Obviously, if I'm gonna be filled with the spirit of God, can I be filled with sin? No, and we'll look at that if we get to it. We're not gonna get to it today. I might come back to this next week. But prayer, prayer accesses wisdom, prayer accesses God's spirit, and then prayer accesses the impossible. Matthew 17, verse 21 says, how be it this kind goeth not out but by prayer and fasting. Do you know the context of that story? You know, the disciples would come and say, why couldn't we do it, right? There was a father that had a son that was demon possessed, and that demon possessed child was casting himself into fire and other things and self-harm, and by the way, some of the self-harm that we see in our day, the cutting and things, it's demonic. Even the abuse of body with piercings and tattoos and all these things, there's a lot of demonic things that are associated with that. There's a lot of people in bondage with that. And so this father's crying out and saying, hey, I want my son to be set free. And the disciples come to Jesus and they say, Jesus, we tried. Why did we fail? Do you remember Jesus did not say, well, you know, I'm the son of God. He said, this kind goeth not forth but by prayer and fasting. They've got to have the power of God. Now again, we could say, oh, you know, man, why am I not seeing anybody get saved? Why is it so difficult to bring somebody to saving faith? Well, who alone can open their eyes? God. We've got to have the power of God. And see, there have been other generations, you can read the history, I've read the history, and I'm not saying nobody else here has read it, But I've read the history. And there have been generations of people that have sought God, that have gotten on their knees and said, we gotta go to prayer. You know, this prayer time that we have at 5.15 on Sundays, why? Because we've gotta have the power of God. In our day, I mean, do we really think it's possible at all to reach people in Scotland with the gospel in our day? When we've seen for the last 12 years in our ministry experience, we've seen the difficulty of it. But you know, it ought to make us get on our knees and seek the face of God and begin to cry out to God and say, God, you've got us in power. You've got us in power. And so prayer access is the impossible. Hudson Taylor, to Jonathan Goforth, said this. Jonathan Goforth was with the China Inland Mission that Taylor began. He said this, nobody has succeeded in that province. If you would take that province, you must go forward on your knees. He's saying to them, look, it's not gonna be the effort, it's not gonna be the language that you can understand, it's not gonna be your gifts and your strength, it will be. It will be getting on your knees and seeking God's power. Thomas Chalmers, he said, read Edwards on prayer, he would counsel men. A season of revival in the church is generally preceded by a season of prayer. And again, as you look at the history of the revival in the Isle of Lewis, you've got, the story's well understood and well told that there were two women that were burdened and they were in their 80s to seek God. One of them, I think, was blind and they would pray until late in the night. Imagine this, two 80-year-olds that would say, hey, we're gonna pray from this time to this time. Pastor, you get your people together and you guys pray on that side of the island from this time to this time. And it's a long time and it's late into the night. But it preceded the revival in the Isle of Lewis. That's history. And again, we can sit around as a church and say, well, I don't get it, Pastor, why don't we see things like that? Why don't we see the power of God? And then just step back and say, well, are we praying? Are we really seeking God like we could? We didn't get through very much here, and we only got through two points, really, and the main point is the spirit of God is the power, but he's a person. When we get saved, we receive him. We can't begin to walk the Christian life or do the Christian thing without God. We gotta be saved. We gotta have that personal power. We can't, you can't get victory over sin. Now somebody could try. Benjamin Franklin tried. He was a moralist. There's a lot of people that I think they can do it. They can't. He tried to work on his virtues in his life and he did his best, but he just kept failing. But after I'm saved, I can be somebody that is filled with the Spirit of God, I can be somebody that is not filled with the Spirit of God. There's other things that impact that we didn't have a chance to talk about, but let's just talk about prayer. If your prayer life this week was typical of your prayer life, how great of expectation do you have that God would fill you with the Spirit, that God would send revival, that God would awaken our area, you know? And we look at that and think, you know what, just considering that one area, I could do a lot more on my knees for God. You know, our churches need preachers, they need pastors, we need pianists, we need Sunday school teachers, we need deacons, we need all sorts of things, but you know what, we need more than anything as a church, we need people that know how to go to God in prayer and pray. Because prayer accesses so many things that will make our ministry everything that it needs to be if we're a person of prayer. So we'll just stop there. And Lord willing, I think we'll come back to this next week and pick it up here and considering some areas that affect our power. All right, let's go ahead, go to Lord in prayer. Father, I thank you that you are a gracious God, a good God, a loving God. I thank you for the wisdom that you give. And Father, I just, I look up to heaven and Father, we're so unworthy of your grace. Father, thank you that you care about us. You know our shortcomings, you know our failures. You know how much we need, what we've considered even this morning. Somebody might be here this morning, they need salvation. And Father, we can't, it's not something men can do, to open somebody's eyes to the truth of the gospel, but I pray that your spirit would do a great work, and Father, that's one of the great testimonies as to who God is, that still small voice that prods us and convicts us and helps us to understand our need. But Father, even if we're saved, we could be saved this morning, but we could be somebody that just, we're not living in power. There's other things that we need to consider. We'll consider them next week, but prayer is a part of that. Father, prayer accesses wisdom. Prayer accesses the spirit of God. And Father, prayer accesses some incredible answers to prayer, some incredible power. Father, we wouldn't have the bank account that our little church has without prayer. We wouldn't have this property that we're standing in right now without prayer. We wouldn't have the minibus without prayer. And Father, there's so many things that we've seen. I believe even to the salvation of souls that we've seen, those that have been baptized, I don't believe that we'd have that without prayer. And so I just pray, Spirit of God, speak to our hearts, help us to truly give ourselves, and maybe just this one thing, even this week, and say, I'm gonna work on my prayer life, and recognize that God's Spirit is a person of power. It's in Christ's name we pray, amen. Amen, all right, Benson, would you turn the music back on? We just have seven minutes, and then we'll come back for our morning service.