Guarding The Presence | Ps Glenn Bleakney

[00:00:01] Speaker A: Welcome to the Numa Church podcast. Wherever you are in the world, we are so glad that you've joined us. [00:00:06] Speaker B: Our prayer is that this message will. [00:00:07] Speaker C: Reveal more of who our heavenly Father. [00:00:09] Speaker B: Is as we grow deeper in intimacy with Jesus. [00:00:12] Speaker A: Enjoy the message. [00:00:15] Speaker B: Good to have you here. If you're here for the first time, please hang around, introduce yourself. We'd love to connect with you and also just to get involved in different ways. For example, on the 13th. That's a Wednesday night, 07:00 p.m. We're going to gather to pray again at all Saints Anglican Church here in Greensboro. We did that last Wednesday. It was amazing and we had a great time and just so important that we build on that foundation. And we just love to connect with you guys. And as was mentioned, if you'd like to serve, get involved in the team. There's lots of different ways to do that. And our teams grow and worship, team, kids, production, all sorts of different areas that we can get involved with. And we appreciate you guys. We're super excited to be here in the northern suburbs of Melbourne. As you can tell, we're not from Australia. Anybody figure that one out yet? Okay, we're from. Not America. Don't say that. We're from Canada. You know what it's like to say to a Canadian, you're from America. Do you know what I mean? No, it's okay. We're good. No, I'm kidding. [00:01:28] Speaker A: But there's a bit of that. [00:01:30] Speaker B: But it's true. But we lived in the United States for a long time. In fact, many years. We moved here from Dallas, Texas, and we lived in Chicago. We lived in Florida. Florida was hard. And now we're in Melbourne, which is kind of like Vancouver. Same weather, very similar. But anyway, awesome. Guys, let's go into the Bible. And where are we going to turn this morning? Lots of different places. So I don't have a scripture to start off with. I don't have a text to start off with. [00:02:05] Speaker A: Why? [00:02:05] Speaker B: Because honestly, if I just read that text with what I'm planning on sharing, it probably would just read it as a springboard and it wouldn't really have much relevance. So I'd rather just have you just get your Bible and we're going to talk about God's presence again. The house of his habitation, which we continued on, continuing on from last week. Last Sunday was our first Sunday morning gathering, and we are thankful for what God is doing. We continue to move forward and set the culture. This is so important because if you are not familiar with Numa, we are all about God's presence, and we have kingdom, culture, values, and it's about his kingdom. One of the things that we're adamant about is seeing his kingdom come and his will be done on earth as it is in heaven. And so we have to be intentional to become the habitation of God's glory. And our vision in the sense of globally, we have a very clear vision. And that vision is all about planting churches that carry the spirit of revival and result in the discipleship of cities and nations. But we also have a responsibility to have a vision locally. And I think that vision overall, it's the same. But ultimately there's a sense in which we have a responsibility to just begin to share those things that the Lord is releasing. And what is it that he's saying to us in particular seasons and even incrementally as we move forward. And so rather than have a lot of programs, it's not the time of year to do that anyways. Then we want to just start off by building community and tapping into the culture of the kingdom. What I mean by that is God's presence. So prayer is massive. Miracles, the supernatural culture of honor, these are some of our values, but we want to really see God's presence come. We want to see miracles become normal. And if you're believing for people to be saved in your family, maybe some friends, if you need a miracle in some way, let's begin to believe together. For God to be good. God is better than we think he is. And the Bible says he's able to do immeasurably, more than we could ask or think according to the power that works in us. And I really believe that. There's a scripture in Zephaniah, chapter one. I think it's verse 14. It actually says that there was a people who were complacent in their hearts, basically, is what he's saying. He said, they say in their hearts, the Lord will not do evil. And listen to this. Neither will he do good. He will not do good. I believe he's a good God. One of my favorite verses in the Bible. Are you ready for this? It's in the book of Hosea, chapter three, verse five. And it talks about the last days, the latter days, the last days. And it says there will be a people that will come trembling to David, their king, who that's a messianic prophecy. Speaking of Jesus and the goodness of God, they're going to come trembling. That's what the new American says, trembling to the goodness of God. And there's a sense we've seen that. But I really believe that God wants to reveal his goodness, and he's so kind, he's so forgiving. He's a father, which is a revelation, its own, that many have not fully grasped. And to bring us to that place where we understand what he's saying to us is so important, but who he is and who we are based on that relationship. So our vision is all about seeing his presence and power come to transform lives. And discipleship really is about becoming like Jesus. And what do I mean by that? So, Luke 640 says this. The pupil or the student is not above or better than the teacher, but when he's been fully trained, he or she's been fully trained, they're be like their teacher. Now, that word fully trained is the same word that's translated equipped in Ephesians four, verse twelve. When you're equipped, you'll be like the teacher. Who's our teacher? Who? Jesus. Right. And so we become like him. Romans 829 says, those whom he predestined, he did that to be conformed. Those whom he called, he predestined to be conformed to the image or the likeness of the son, to be like Jesus himself. That's an amazing revelation, because we in many places have adopted a humanistic theology, really, of understanding, and we say things like, well, you know what? We'll just give it our best shot. Well, your best shot doesn't mean anything. Your righteousness and my righteousness. Isaiah 64 six. Like filthy rags. Filthy rags. So we need his righteousness. But his righteousness isn't just positional in the sense that we go, oh, yeah, I'm righteous. But it actually transforms our nature and our character deep down within so that we not only are righteous positionally, but we live righteously, practically, and it comes from the heart. So it's a powerful thing. One scripture. I just want to start off with, here is one Corinthians two, four and five. Paul's speaking to the church in Corinth, and when he went there, it was a really dark place at the time, so very dark spiritually. So he goes there with the gospel, and he says, when I came to you, my speech and my preaching were not with persuasive words of human wisdom, but in demonstration of the spirit and of power. Why? That your faith should not be in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God. That your faith should not be in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God. Now, what does that mean? I know, this is often very subtle, but we do this. See, ministry that is void of the power of the Holy Spirit really fails to place the emphasis on Christ, the preeminence on Jesus and his power. And inadvertently, it draws attention to us as human beings, to our giftedness, to our eloquence, to our education, our expertise, all of these kind of things. And people see us, and when they look at us, they may say, wow, that person. Wow, they can sing. Wow, they're proficient. Wow, they articulate and expound the scriptures so well. But the bottom line is, that's not the way of the gospel. Paul could do all of that. Paul was trained in philosophy. He was also trained as a rabbi. So he understood both cultures, both greek philosophy, and as an orator, he could expound. And as a theologian, he understood all of this. He was master in both spaces. But he said, look, that's not my default, because what happens is that will cause the emphasis to be placed on the wisdom of man and not on the power of God. And when this happens, we unwittingly promote a subtle form of idolatry. We make men, women, leaders, musicians, whatever. Whomever. We make them idols, we set them up. And then when they fail, God forbid, then our world comes crashing in because our faith was in man. And if our faith is in God, yeah, it might be hard. When people fail us, we will experience disappointment, and there's a struggle. I get that. But can I tell you that I've been around a while and I've seen a lot of people fail. I mean, grossly, just talking about having a bad day, and I can tell you this, that it's never shaken my faith because my faith wasn't in that leader, that person. It was in God, in Jesus. As I said, I get it. It can be painful, and that's normal, to grieve, to be disappointed. But ultimately, our faith and our trust in our worship is to him, to Jesus alone, who is the king of kings and lord of lords. The question, know, I've had people say to me, wow, you've been so through a lot. You guys have been through a lot. How come you're still in ministry? I'm like, because we've been through so much. We're still in ministry because we know there's a call and Jesus is good. So if we looked at ministry experiences, which we've know, the good, the bad, the ugly, then we could say, yeah, we check out. We're not going to do this anymore. But when our eyes are on Jesus, his goodness, then we have no other recourse. He's called us. [00:12:12] Speaker A: Remember when Jesus said he challenged the followers? [00:12:19] Speaker B: And it actually says in John six, verse 66, isn't that crazy? I mean, is that. It's, like, creepy. John six six, he challenged them and he said, basically, hey, guys, if you're not all in, if you're not going to follow me, you're not going to take up your cross. He talked about drinking his blood and eating his flesh. I know, it's really weird. And then it says, from that point, many turned away. They walked away. They were offended. I said, it's a hard saying, and they got offended. And what did Jesus do? [00:12:58] Speaker A: Hey, guys, I was just kidding. [00:13:01] Speaker B: Come on back. Now. He turned around to the twelve and he looked at them and he said, hey, you guys want to leave, too? I'm paraphrasing, but do you want to leave also? And Peter said, well, where are we going to go? [00:13:18] Speaker A: Only you have the words of eternal life. So where are we going to go? There's no plan b. Our eyes are on you. No matter who goes with us, who doesn't go with us, our eyes are on you. [00:13:31] Speaker B: No matter what happens, we stay focused on you. So when the Holy Spirit is moving and has, he takes what is from Jesus, John's gospel says, and he declares it. And then what happens is we look at Jesus, we behold him for who he is, and then what takes place at that point is we see the beauty of his Holiness and we engage him for who he is, and it transforms us. We looked at that last week in two Corinthians 317 and 18. As in a mirror, we behold him, and with an unveiled face, the veil is removed, and we're transformed from glory to glory. And the spirit is the Lord. The Lord is the spirit is what it says in that passage. And where the spirit of the Lord is, there's liberty. See, the problem with churches. Can I just say it? I can talk about us, right? Let's talk about the family. The problem with church at times is Jesus is not welcome. You think? Oh, that's harsh. Well, Jesus said that himself. Remember in revelation three? And he said, behold, I stand at the door and I knock. Verse 20, right? Anyone hears my voice opens the door. Come in and I'll stop with him. Contrary to what we've been told and taught, he wasn't speaking to sinners. If you read revelations, chapter two and three, there's seven letters that were addressed to seven specific church. And in chapter three, verse 20, he's speaking to the church in Leodicea. [00:15:18] Speaker A: And he's saying, you guys have so. [00:15:21] Speaker B: Much going for you. I mean, they were rich, they were increased with goods. [00:15:26] Speaker A: They had all of this stuff. And yet Jesus looked at him and said, and you don't get it. [00:15:32] Speaker B: You're blind, you're miserable, you're wretched, you're poor, and you're naked. And then he know an analogy about buying eyesob from him, putting on garments of righteousness and so on. And he was saying, I'm standing at the door knocking. What is he saying? He's saying to the church, you guys are going through the motions. [00:15:50] Speaker A: You're having your religious gatherings, but I am not in your midst, and I'm asking you to let me in. Whoa. Condescension. That the son of God would ask permission to be in the midst of his people. So religion is all about just going through the motions, gathering where Jesus is not celebrated as the center, as the preeminent one. And we go through those motions, not even realizing, many of us, that he's not with us. [00:16:31] Speaker B: Now let's drill down a little bit into some theology, because I have to just let me just explain a couple of things. So there's what theologians refer to as the omnipresence of God. You've probably heard that God's everywhere, right? His spirit is everywhere. And then there's something called the manifest presence of God. Now, there's two other words. There's transcendence, and then there's Eminence. Eminence. I m a n a n c. Transcendence means he's everywhere. He transcends everything. He's above everything, he's eternal, et cetera. But imminence means that he can be with us and he is with us. Think about that, right? I mean, he fills the universe, but yet he can live in our hearts. Wow. He runs everything, but yet he sees our most unique and what would seem as insignificant, need the most minute details, the minutiae. He's aware of it. Amazing. So even though he's everywhere, he still says to you and I, draw near to me, and I will draw near to you. So if God's everywhere and he's with us, and he is, but yet he says, draw near to me. Right. James 410. And I'll draw near to you. So there's this call to fellowship, to intimacy. There's this call to experience his manifest presence. And that changes everything. It changes everything. [00:18:17] Speaker A: You know, the agenda of heaven is. [00:18:21] Speaker B: Found in the book of Habakkuk, chapter two, verse 14. [00:18:23] Speaker A: It says this, that the earth would. [00:18:26] Speaker B: Be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord as the waters covers the sea. Satan's agenda is found in Isaiah 60, verse two. [00:18:39] Speaker A: It says this, behold, darkness shall cover the earth and deep darkness the peoples. [00:18:45] Speaker B: That's his agenda. [00:18:47] Speaker A: That darkness would cover the earth and deep darkness the peoples. But the Lord has risen upon you. [00:18:54] Speaker B: Right? [00:18:55] Speaker A: So verse one, verse three, arise, shine, your light has come, and the glory. [00:18:58] Speaker B: Of the Lord has risen upon you. [00:19:00] Speaker A: In other words, what dispels darkness is light. Everything that is made manifest. Paul said in Ephesians five, is by light. Whatever's exposed, whatever is hidden, it's made manifest by light, by the glory of God. And God's will is that the earth would be filled not with the glory of the Lord, but with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord. One translation puts it this way, with the awareness of the glory of the Lord. Wow. That the whole earth would be aware of his presence. Wow. That's amazing. Come on. And how has he chosen to do that? [00:19:48] Speaker B: Well, he's chosen to do that through you and Amy. [00:19:51] Speaker A: Through us. He's chosen to do it through you. God wants to reveal himself in you and through you. He wants you to know him in that sense. But corporately, he's gathering together a people known as the church, the Ecclesia. And the church is to become the dwelling place of God on the earth. We are referred to as the body of Christ. And I love it. Says in Romans 1620, may the God of peace himself, he will crush Satan under your feet shortly. Now notice this. The God of peace does the crushing, but he does it. Under whose feet? Our feet. Now, are feet connected to the head? Jesus is the head. Or are they connected to the body? [00:20:43] Speaker B: The body. We're the body of Christ. [00:20:46] Speaker A: Do you understand that? We have a responsibility. [00:20:49] Speaker B: He's given us a responsibility. [00:20:51] Speaker A: We can teach more about this because many believers sit back and expect God to do everything. But psalm 115, verse 16, says, the heaven, even the heavens, are the Lord's. But the earth, he's given to the sons of men, he's given to us the earth, to steward it, to govern it. Just like Adam in the beginning, Adam and Eve have dominion, exercise authority. And so our responsibility is to rule and to reign and to permeate the earth with the glory of God, because the authority actually comes from the glory. Psalm 97, verse five, says this, that the hills or the mountains melt like wax at the presence of the Lord. Remember, Jesus said, if you speak to the mountain and you command it to be cast into the sea, it will be done just as you say. So how is it? What is the authority? Is it in the words? No, it's not in the words. The seven sons of Skiva commanded demons to come out of a man, and the demons looked at them and said, are you serious? Like, who are you, Paul, we know. And Jesus, we know, but who are you? So it's not the words, but it's the power behind the words. And when a man and a woman is walking in a place of surrender and they're committed to the lordship of Jesus, they're filled with the spirit, and they are literally allowing the lordship of Christ to rule and reign over their life. They will walk into a room and demons will stand up and take notice and tremble. It's a reality. But what has happened is it has become normal for churches to gather, and the presence of God rarely shows up in many places. I shared the stats last week. If you didn't hear it, the podcast. [00:22:53] Speaker B: You can go on our website and listen to the podcast. [00:22:58] Speaker A: So we have churches that are at. [00:23:01] Speaker B: Least four kinds of churches, program based churches. Hey, we need the program. We need the program. You know, I've traveled to many places in the world, and there are certain parts of the world where I go there and they say, so what's the program? And I'm like, program? [00:23:15] Speaker A: Are you serious? [00:23:17] Speaker B: How about his presence? How about what he wants to do? How about we just let God have his way, have his rightful place in Jesus move and the Holy Spirit move. Then we have churches that are personality led. [00:23:30] Speaker A: Those are the ones which tend to. [00:23:32] Speaker B: Attract people to the place that people look to man. And they don't put their trust wholeheartedly in God. It's kind of mixed. Yeah, we trust God, but it's all about the leader. The leader, the leader or the leaders, the leader, the leader. The leaders. Yes, we need leadership. Leadership is biblical. God has leaders throughout the scripture. But ultimately, we have to recognize that it's not about the personality. [00:24:00] Speaker A: We have other churches that are preaching. I mean, they are preaching focused. They can preach with fire, with power, and it's amazing how they preach. But ultimately, there's still something missing. [00:24:18] Speaker B: I remember I was in Texas at a pastor's gathering just over a year ago, and there was a pastor who was visiting there, and he was telling us in his humility, sorry, forgive me, forgive me, don't forgive me. You know what I'm saying? [00:24:37] Speaker A: So he was saying how he has. [00:24:40] Speaker B: So many followers on TikTok, and he says, yeah, and so guess what happened he's got so many followers on TikTok that a reality based TV show. They approached him to have his own reality TV show. As I listened to him, I began to talk. I said, so what is it about? He said, it's about preaching, preaching, preaching. So we went on this journey together where I befriended him. And after a period of time, I realized that unfortunately, his walk with God was not good. He was shallow spiritually, but he had a gift. He had a gift. He could preach. He could preach the pain off a wall. But there was something wrong. And later on, it came out. It was exposed. You see, the only thing that should be what we should be known for as a church, and God is doing something in this hour. He's recalibrating. He's purifying. He's cleansing his church. And recalibrating, I think, is a very good word. It is a reset. He's bringing us back to the New Testament way. And the New Testament was all about. [00:26:08] Speaker A: Presence from the very beginning of the. [00:26:13] Speaker B: Bible in Genesis, all the way through to revelation. There's this meta narrative. [00:26:19] Speaker A: It starts with Adam and Eve and. [00:26:22] Speaker B: The presence of God with them in the garden in Eden. [00:26:25] Speaker A: Then we see in the last two. [00:26:27] Speaker B: Chapters of revelation, the heavenly city, Jerusalem comes down. They don't even need the sun because the Lord will be the light. He's with them. He's in their midst. It's all about presence through every covenant, through Moses, through David, then Jesus himself, who became the temple of God. He tabernacled, he dwelt among them, is what it says in John one, means he became the temple of God. And then Paul has this revelation. And in Ephesians two, verse 22, he says that the church, the body of Christ, believers, are being built together. Built together. Just say to your neighbor, built together. Just making sure you're still awake. [00:27:13] Speaker A: Built together. [00:27:14] Speaker B: Okay, so the idea in the original language. Okay, watch this. The idea is Lego. You like Lego? So it's a greek word, Lego. [00:27:26] Speaker A: And the idea is, when it says. [00:27:27] Speaker B: Built together, think about Lego. Right? That's what he's doing. And it's super cool that God is doing this, but what's the purpose? What is he building? [00:27:39] Speaker A: To become a dwelling place of God in the spirit. A dwelling place of God in the spirit. I love those scriptures. [00:27:48] Speaker B: Zechariah eight, it talks about in one Corinthians 14. And it says, an unbeliever, an uninformed. [00:27:54] Speaker A: Person comes into your midst, and someone prophesies and the secrets of their heart are laid bare. And they fall down and they worship and they say, surely God is in your midst. [00:28:10] Speaker B: I am preaching better than you're responding. We're going to just have to loosen up a little bit here, okay? Are we going to go back? No, I'm kidding. Seriously. God is in your midst. [00:28:25] Speaker A: Not. [00:28:26] Speaker B: Whoa, she can preach. He can preach. [00:28:29] Speaker A: Not. [00:28:29] Speaker B: Wow, they're so anointed. They're so gifted. Look, obviously God enables us. He gives us gifts. He empowers us and he gives us the ability. In fact, the word dunimus, which is power, can also be translated ability. Remember, in the parable of the talents, it says they gave them talents according to their ability. It's the word dunimus. So the idea, guys, is he's doing something very powerful, but it's always to point back to him. So when we just minister according to. [00:29:05] Speaker A: Giftedness to human ability, it tends to. [00:29:09] Speaker B: Point back to us. But when we step into the anointing. [00:29:17] Speaker A: It'S no longer about me preaching with the abilities that I have or serving according to the abilities I have. Isn't it interesting that Jesus, when he called the disciples, he told them to forsake their natural giftedness? [00:29:35] Speaker B: Think about that. [00:29:36] Speaker A: Oh, you fish. [00:29:37] Speaker B: You're not going to fish anymore. [00:29:39] Speaker A: So Matthew is a tax collector. [00:29:43] Speaker B: Think about that. [00:29:44] Speaker A: He could work for the tax department. [00:29:46] Speaker B: He did work for the tax department for me. [00:29:49] Speaker A: If I was looking for a team. [00:29:51] Speaker B: Member, I'd want him to be my treasurer. [00:29:53] Speaker A: I'd want him to be my accountant. But Jesus chooses a thief. You know the rest of the story. [00:30:07] Speaker B: He doesn't call someone who has a natural ability over and over and over again. The idea is this, I'm going to make you something that you're not. [00:30:17] Speaker A: Now I'm not saying you can't use. [00:30:19] Speaker B: Your natural abilities for certain things, but. [00:30:22] Speaker A: I'm saying that there is a supernatural. [00:30:25] Speaker B: Endowment that comes with the presence and the power of God that enables you to do things you're not able to do in the natural. It's amazing. So we're called to be built together to become a single dwelling place of God in the spirit. Not a bunch of mini temples, not a heap of silos, but a body, a dwelling place. A habitation of God is what the word means. And habitation means permanent visitation is temporary habitation. It's normal. So. Ephesians 319. I love this. This is the amplified Bible. Paul is praying and I just want you to see it in the amplified. Obviously the amplified is expounding on it and it's trying to give a better understanding of what it is actually saying in the original language. So Paul prays for the believers that. [00:31:27] Speaker A: You may really come to know practically through experience for yourselves, the love of. [00:31:33] Speaker B: Christ, which far surpasses mere knowledge without experience. [00:31:39] Speaker A: That you may be filled through all your being, unto all the fullness of God, and that you may have the richest measure of the divine presence and become a body wholly filled and flooded with God himself. Wow. You think we have a way to go? [00:32:00] Speaker B: Are we there yet? Have we arrived? No, but that's the call. That's the mandate. And may I submit to us this. [00:32:11] Speaker A: Morning that it requires tenacity, intentionality, humility, surrender, repentance, and a whole lot of. [00:32:25] Speaker B: Forgiveness where we become this body, where we make room for one another. So think about this. If God wants us to become the house of his habitation, which he does, yet we know the enemy is trying to cover the earth with darkness. The enemy also has a plan to divide and conquer. Right? That's a military strategy. Divide and conquer. Divide, right. I mean, I have a friend who was in special forces, and you know what his job was? His job was to capture terrorists and to actually convince them to become a good person, stop what they're doing. [00:33:25] Speaker A: But the way he did it was. [00:33:27] Speaker B: He was trained to think and act like a terrorist. That's what they do. There's an elite group of guys out there. This is what they do. So they go in and they actually change people. First of all, they relate to them. I'm not saying we should do this, but my point is, what they do is they bring people to the place where they recognize and they see the way they're living. It's not good. It's not helpful. It's hurting others. Now, can I say to us that a lot of times we are really unaware of what we don't have? Can I say this? That we overvalue what we do have, and we undervalue what we could have. And what I mean by that is we might be thinking, well, this is the way I am. Now, that's an extreme example. But my point is, we can be living a certain way and not even realize it or think that we're right. [00:34:34] Speaker A: And God wants to bring us to. [00:34:36] Speaker B: A place where he literally changes us through a revelation of who he is and of his truth. And it brings a transformation. [00:34:45] Speaker A: So we in the natural, actually have a responsibility to ensure that God's power. [00:34:55] Speaker B: His presence, is moving according to his will. So I mentioned this last week. There's this scripture in one Thessalonians 519, it says, quench, not the spirit. Okay. That word quench literally speaks of putting out a fire. So there's one translation called God's word translation that renders this verse in the following. Don't put out the spirit's fire. Don't put out the spirit's fire. Don't put it out. Okay. So as powerful as fire is, it can be extinguished. Right? Okay. There's at least two ways that we can extinguish fire. We can quench it in at least two ways. We can do so by smothering it, by using a fire extinguisher, throwing a wet blanket on it or some non combustible material will suffocate that fire. It'll put it out. And the Bible tells us in Ephesians 430, do not grieve the Holy spirit of God, by whom you are sealed for the day of redemption. So we can grieve the spirit of God. Think about it. He is a man. He's a person, right? The Bible says he and he can be quenched. He can be insulted, he can be hurt. [00:36:13] Speaker A: How do we do that? [00:36:15] Speaker B: We grieve him. The passage tells us very clearly. It talks about sin, disunity, bitterness, gossip and the like, et cetera. So these things can quench the spirit of God. One of the things that conversely attracts the presence of God is a people who are in one accord whose hearts and lives are yielded to the father. Okay. There's two scriptures that are really interesting. The first one is in one chronicles, chapter five. And it talks about the Levites and the priests and how they came together and the priests had sanctified themselves. And then it begins to speak about how they were clothed in white linen. And then it says that the singers, the Levites, as well as there were trumpeters, and there were those who had symbols and other instruments of music. They praised the Lord, and they said, for he's good. His mercy endures forever. [00:37:12] Speaker A: And the house of the Lord was. [00:37:14] Speaker B: Filled with a cloud. Listen to this. So that the priests could not continue ministering because of the cloud, for the glory of the Lord filled the house of God. Interestingly, it says specifically in the previous verses that there were 120 priests who were sounding with trumpets. And verse 13. Indeed, it came to pass when the trumpeters and singers were as one. [00:37:37] Speaker A: Were as one to make one sound. That's when it happened. Now fast forward to the New Testament to acts, chapter two. How many are gathered in the upper room? 120 in one accord. All right, so here's 120 in the New Testament. [00:37:59] Speaker B: There's 120. [00:37:59] Speaker A: And both narratives say they are in. [00:38:02] Speaker B: One accord, in one place. [00:38:05] Speaker A: And when they were joined together in unity, one spirit, one accord, the power of God, the glory of God was released. Amazing. And so the scripture tells us in Ephesians four, endeavor to keep the unity of the spirit by the bond of peace. In other words, guard the unity of the spirit. Guard the unity of the spirit. The greek word, it's a military term, and it means to guard by keeping your eye upon it. Be watchful. Be watchful. Be watchful. Make sure that nothing would come and impinge and literally intrude that would disrupt that unity. [00:38:53] Speaker B: Think about that. That could be a bad thought. [00:38:58] Speaker A: The enemy drops a thought in our. [00:38:59] Speaker B: Mind, or we just revert in our flesh. We start thinking negatively about someone. [00:39:05] Speaker A: One of the things I love about. [00:39:06] Speaker B: Bill Johnson is the fact that he's never been known to speak against someone, even though he's got so many critics and he's never spoken against anyone. [00:39:25] Speaker A: And I can tell you that's a hard thing. [00:39:28] Speaker B: But the Holy Spirit is all over that. When we guard our tongues, when we don't harbor any type of ill feelings towards someone, but we see them the way Jesus does. Not saying there's not a time to have conversations, to confront things, but there's a place to keep our heart right with God. I was in the United States several years ago, ministering in Seattle, and I was asked to speak at this church. There was a move of God. We were there for several weeks. People were driving, coming in from all over. God was doing miracles, amazing miracles. And what happened was, one Sunday morning, I walked into the church building. I was preaching. They had two services in the morning. And I saw this woman walk in with some other ladies. And as soon as I saw her, I heard this in my spirit, one accord, in one place, so strong. [00:40:26] Speaker A: And I just said to the Lord, I said, lord, if you want me. [00:40:28] Speaker B: To share this with her, have her come over towards me. Have you ever prayed prayers like that? It's like, if you want me to do this, yeah, I do that sometimes. [00:40:39] Speaker A: So what happens was, she gets up. [00:40:42] Speaker B: And she starts walking towards me. I was like, okay, thanks, lord. [00:40:48] Speaker A: So I was obedient. [00:40:51] Speaker B: And I said to her, ma'am, I said, I don't know who you are. Obviously, you don't know me. Introduce myself. And then I said, I don't know what this means, but I just feel the Lord wants me to release this word to you. One accord in one place. You are to be in one accord in one place. [00:41:08] Speaker A: She looked at me and she shook. [00:41:10] Speaker B: Her head and she walked away, and she went and sat down. We went into worship. I knew she was not happy. It meant something to her. I had no idea. After the service, she approached me and she said, you made me angry. I said, well, technically, I didn't make you angry, but let's not do that. Go there. But anyway, I said, why were you angry? See how skillful that was? Why were you angry? Not, I made you angry. I didn't say, I'm sorry. I made you no, why were you angry? [00:41:47] Speaker A: Okay. So what happens is she says, how did you know? I said no about what? What you said. I said, one accord in one place. What does that mean? And she looks. And sitting in just a few seats over from me is the pastor. She goes, you didn't know? He's my husband. And I said, no, I had no idea. He never mentioned you. [00:42:18] Speaker B: Good reason. You'll find out. [00:42:21] Speaker A: So then she says, well, you didn't know what happened. I said, I had no idea what happened. You're keeping me in suspense. She said to me, what happened was about several months ago. I don't recall six months, a year ago. She said, we got in a big argument, and I took like 50 women from the church and went down the street and started my own church. Whoa. So now a husband and wife who were pastoring together are. And all I knew was one accord in one place. Holy spirit was like, I'm not happy about this. Jesus isn't happy about this. [00:43:08] Speaker B: And then she repented and came back to the church. [00:43:14] Speaker A: Wow. Come on. [00:43:15] Speaker B: Give God a hand. [00:43:19] Speaker A: One accord in one place. [00:43:21] Speaker B: We can quench the spirit of God through our corner ways. We can grieve him. We have to be so careful. Saints. The closer I get to the Lord, the more sensitive I become to those things. And it's just know, even in the natural, if you start to feel something, or maybe you begin to have a disagreement with your spouse. Lynn and I never do. But just hypothetically, if it happened. [00:43:55] Speaker A: It'S kind of. No, no, stop. It's not worth it. Okay? I'm bad. I did it all. You know what I'm saying? It's like you just feel the Holy Spirit saying, who really cares? Who cares? Like, you're both wrong. You're both in the flesh. You're both being selfish or whatever. And we come to that point where we recognize it's not worth it. I'm grieving his spirit. And because of the love of Jesus and the sensitivity to who he is and what he wants. We just like, no, I can't do this. [00:44:32] Speaker B: I can't cause this. I can't contribute to schism, to a disruption in a relationship. I can't speak ill of someone and actually poison someone else's mind, indoctrinate them with an opinion about someone else, based on my experience, you see, that grieves the spirit. All of this stuff grieves Holy spirit. And so we have to make sure that we're not grieving a spirit. Secondly, let me just close with this. [00:45:07] Speaker A: The second way a fire can be. [00:45:09] Speaker B: Quenched is by starving it. Starving it. Leviticus, chapter six, verse twelve and 13. Moses says, the fire in the altar shall be kept burning on it. It shall not be put out. And the priest shall burn wood on it every morning and lay the burnt offering in order on it, and he shall burn on it. The fat of the peace offerings of fire shall always be burning on the altar. It shall never go out. The fire shall always be burning on the altar. It shall never go out. What does that mean? [00:45:45] Speaker A: Keep the fire burning, saints. Keep the fire burning in your heart, in your life. Every day you have to stoke the fire. It's not going to keep burning from wood you put on it. The fuel you put on it a few days ago. You've got to be intentional to stoke the fire every day. How do we do that? We do that through prayer. We do that through worship. We do that through not despising prophecy. [00:46:16] Speaker B: You can read that in first Thessalonians 519. [00:46:19] Speaker A: We do that through worship and just praising God. I'm telling you, when we pray, when we worship, when we come and we place ourselves on that offering as living sacrifices every day, God, God, you're worthy. You're worthy, you're worthy. I'm going to worship you. I'm going to take time to honor you. I'm going to pray through. I'm going to bless you. I'm going to wage warfare with my spiritual language. I'm going to do whatever I need to do to break through and I'm. [00:46:59] Speaker B: Going to keep stoking the fire. [00:47:01] Speaker A: No way, devil, you're not putting out my fire. Devil, you're not putting out my fire. You're not stealing my joy. You're not stealing my victory. Satan and many of us have let him do that and he is a master distractor. He knows exactly what it takes to distract us. And if he can get know to put our eyes and give our attention to things that aren't important and not give Jesus his rightful place in our lives. The fire will go out. Pray, worship, contend, declare the word of the Lord. Stop telling people and even God how. [00:47:52] Speaker B: Big your mountain is. [00:47:54] Speaker A: And tell your mountain how big your God is. Begin to declare it in the name of Jesus. Guess what? God loves to mess up our plans. Hello. I wrote a book about it. [00:48:08] Speaker B: You can get it on Amazon called three ways to know God is moving you in a new direction. God is a master at interrupting our plans. [00:48:19] Speaker A: Why? Because he knows that we have a proclivity. To be stuck in the rut of. [00:48:27] Speaker B: Routine, to be stuck. [00:48:29] Speaker A: I'm stuck. I'm stuck. We're in our comfort zones. We're not changing. We're not growing in our comfort zone. So he has to do something to literally cause us to move forward. He moves us out of our comfort zones so that we will grow and expand and step into the next season. And even though it may be painful at times, he can even use people who have hearts that aren't good to move us in a new direction. Sometimes what we think is men's rejection is God's redirection for our protection. He's moving us in a new direction. He's the God of seasons. He closes one door and opens another door. And when we follow him, we never go down, we never go sideways. We go up, we go up, we go from glory to glory when we're following him and we become more like Jesus Christ, I'm telling you that this is a season for breakthrough and transformation. That God wants to restore your joy, restore your peace. He wants to heal relationships. He wants to move in powerful ways. Church. But we've got to put our eyes on him. Quench not his spirit. [00:49:54] Speaker B: Come on, guys. [00:49:55] Speaker A: Can I say it? The clock. The clock is the greatest enemy. The greatest enemy. [00:50:02] Speaker B: Oh, I got to leave it this time, really. [00:50:05] Speaker A: Where are you going to go? What are you going to do that's more important than meeting with the living God, than encountering his presence? What is more important? [00:50:16] Speaker B: You know the answer to that. [00:50:19] Speaker A: Pray through breakthrough worship. Stay in his presence. Last Sunday night we went to our. [00:50:27] Speaker B: City location, which we do on Sunday. [00:50:30] Speaker A: Afternoons, and we worshipped for 2 hours. [00:50:33] Speaker B: And 45 minutes before Pastor Corey preached. And it felt like 20 minutes to me because I was in the spirit. Now you may not be there yet. That's okay, right? Can't run a marathon straight away. I get it. [00:50:57] Speaker A: But the point is they have come. [00:51:00] Speaker B: To a place where they're pressing into God and people are hungry. Hungry for his presence, hungry for what God wants to do. [00:51:13] Speaker C: Thank you for joining us. We hope that you enjoyed today's podcast and we realize that not everyone has had the opportunity to respond to the good news of the gospel. And for this reason, in all of our services and platforms, we want to extend to you the opportunity to follow Jesus. The Bible teaches us that we have been created for a relationship with God. However, sin, which is essentially disobedience, independence and disbelief, or us simply missing the mark, entered the world and separated us from God. Romans chapter six, verse 23 says that the wages of sin is death and a debt was owed. And the Bible tells us that he, Jesus, demonstrated his love for us, that while we were still sinners, he died for us. Jesus paid the penalty for our sin. John 316 says, for God so loved the world that he gave his only son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. God so loved the world that he gave us Jesus, that whoever believes in him will be saved. All that is required of anyone is that they believe in Jesus. The son of God who came, lived, died and rose again so that we could be forgiven, made right and given the right to become children of God and to have life forevermore with him. Today you can begin a relationship with Jesus. To believe in him is to simply to respond with faith in our hearts and confess with our mouths that he is Lord and we do that through a simple prayer. Follow along with me dear Jesus, I believe that you are the son of God. I thank you that you love me and came to forgive me of my sin. I repent from my old way of life and I turn to follow you. I receive the free gift of eternal life and I ask that you fill me with the Holy Spirit so that I can live a life of following after you. I thank you that I am born again as a child of God and that I am a new creation in Christ Jesus. Amen. If you prayed this prayer for the first time, we would love to connect with you and connect you to your next step and the local church in your area. You can contact us on our website at Numa Church. Thanks for listening.