Pentecost Sunday

Hey guys, this is the New Heights Church podcast and we just want to welcome you and thank you for joining us today. We hope this message inspires and encourages you. Here at New Heights, we exist to love people and point them to Christ. Enjoy today's service.

Today is Pentecost Sunday. I love Pentecost. There's no Pentecost, no power. It's really that simple.

No Pentecost, no power. You can't control God. You have to give control over to God. That's the way it is.

But what happened is, is Jesus died on the cross, rose from the dead after three days, and He rose from the dead. And then the Bible says that He walked with the apostles for about 40 days. He was seen by many people, alive. He ate with them.

He talked with them. And He was on the planet. And then the Bible says that He ascended into heaven. You can find this in Acts chapter number 1.

The Bible says that they watched Him ascend. And He went until they couldn't see Him anymore. And the Bible says that Jesus had told them to go to Jerusalem and wait for the promise of the Father or to wait to be endued with power. Now, everybody that's born again should be baptized in water.

And baptism in water is a public act of an inward decision to serve Jesus Christ. It is verification that you are converting your life. You are saying publicly, I believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and the power of what He did on the cross. I am no longer a sinner.

I am now set free in the name of Jesus. And I am repenting. I am turning from my sin. And therefore, I am buried with Him through baptism in His death.

And then I am raised to walk in new life. Can you say amen to that? In our church, I baptize people. I have many ministers and great faithful members of our church that help us baptize people.

And so the challenge of being baptized is not necessarily who did it because the truth of the matter is many people have been baptized by one person or another person, and you ought not lay hold to who baptized you. Does this make sense? The Scripture actually talks about this. It says, look, don't be bickering.

The Apostle Paul wrote, he said, I don't baptize people because you guys keep talking about who baptizes who. He said, I'm not with that. He's the guy that talked about I no longer live. Christ lives in me.

So he wasn't looking for the credit of what happened. So when you're water baptized, there is a human element involved. Somebody baptizes you. But the guy we call John the Baptist that ate locusts and wild honey and wore camel hair, he was just kind of a wild guy and lived in the wilderness.

And he would preach, the kingdom of God is at hand. He said, repent, turn from your ways. Turn from sin. Change how you think.

Repent means metanoia, to change your thought process, change what you think. The kingdom is at hand. Stop looking for a kingdom that's too far away that you can't touch it. The kingdom of God is at hand.

Change how you think. Repent and be baptized. And people were being baptized in droves. And Jesus walked up.

And Jesus came over to his cousin John and said, I want you to baptize me. And John says, I can't baptize you. You need to baptize me. Jesus said, I'm asking you to baptize me.

And John obliged. And when he was baptized, the Bible says that the Holy Spirit descended upon Jesus in the form of a dove. And the Father spoke from heaven and said, this is my beloved son in whom I'm well pleased. But when John was speaking about Jesus, he said it like this.

There's one coming after me. He said, I baptize you in water. But there's one coming after me. I'm not willing to untie his shoe.

Not willing. I'm not righteous enough. I'm not worthy enough. You guys are putting me on a pedestal because I'm baptizing you.

But I'm telling you, there's one coming after me. I'm preparing the way for him. There's one coming after me. I don't have the salt that I can say, you know what?

I'm the one who can or should or otherwise. I'm not even worthy to untie this guy's shoes, to unlatch his sandal. He said, I baptize you in water. Then he said this.

He will baptize you in the Holy Ghost. E fuego. And fire. Somebody say fire.

I'm getting just revelation after revelation. That's why I'm slowing down. It's almost like man. See, the Bible says that John was baptizing people.

In other words, you're going to need somebody to baptize you. They need to be involved in some element or another. But it's almost like man is good at dousing fire. And God is good at bringing fire.

But there's got to be an understanding that John baptized in water. But he said, Jesus will baptize you in the Holy Ghost and fire. That means when the day of Pentecost was fully come. In Acts chapter number 2, when the disciples were all baptized in the Holy Spirit.

We're not wondering who did it. Jesus baptized them in the Holy Ghost and in fire. And that same baptism is available for you and me today. But it's not my responsibility.

Come on. It's not your praying grandma's responsibility. The Bible says it's Jesus Christ who baptizes in the Holy Ghost and in fire. Now, we'll obey God.

We'll lay hands. We'll believe God with you. But there's a place there where you've got to decide that you want the Holy Spirit more than you want all the argument about the Holy Spirit. Because you can't have both.

You cannot have one or the other. Lakewood Church is started by a man named Pastor John Osteen. Pastor John Osteen was not baptized in the Holy Spirit. He had a young daughter who had cerebral palsy, couldn't walk, had all these different challenges.

And he locked himself in a hotel room. And he read the Scripture. He said, your Bible says you do all this stuff. I've never seen it.

And the Holy Spirit filled this man. And his daughter was miraculously healed of cerebral palsy. And Lakewood Church is Lakewood Church today because the Holy Spirit filled a man exactly how Acts chapter 2 says the Holy Spirit will fill a man. So let's go to Acts chapter 2 and see how it says it happens.

The Bible says in Acts chapter number 2 and verse 1, when the day of Pentecost was fully come, that's literally the day. It's not saying when we talk about like Pentecost Sunday, like as a celebration, we should and do. But it was saying the day of Pentecost was already a set time. And so they were just saying the day of Pentecost is here.

So when the day of Pentecost was fully come, they were all in one accord and in one place. And suddenly there came a sound from heaven as a rushing mighty wind. And it filled all the house where they were sitting. And there appeared unto them cloven tongues like as a fire.

And it sat upon each of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Ghost and began to speak with other tongues as the Spirit gave them utterance, as the Spirit made them able. Now let's just point out a few things. This is King James.

Go back to that verse 3 for me, please. There appeared unto them cloven tongues. Everybody say cloven tongues. I've read the Bible my whole life.

And I've tried to picture what this might have looked like. Because cloven, oftentimes if you hear somebody talk about it, it means like split. And so I've tried to picture like, is there a tongue cut in half sitting on somebody's head? I couldn't figure out what it would look like.

But if you go to that original word, it's not just the word split. It's the word distributed. So what it was saying, it wasn't saying split just like, you know, to see something cut. It was saying split like, hey, you want a sandwich?

Yeah, let's split it. Distribute it. Tongues is the word glosa or glossa. It's where we get the word glossary.

And it literally just means a language. So what he said here is not that there was a cut in half tongue sitting on everybody. What he's saying is new languages like fire were distributed to everybody. And it sat on them.

Have you ever seen anybody praying in the Holy Spirit and you were like, man, these people, like something must be burning their feet. Like something's going on. That's because when you get the Holy Spirit on the inside of you, there's an element of fire that comes along with it. And I have found if you want to reject the Holy Spirit, there's an element of the fire of God that you probably never get to touch because God gets to dictate how God acts, not you.

So if God says my people are going to pray in tongues of fire and it's going to rest upon them, then that's how it is. And tongue literally means language. So you're literally going to, when you're baptized in the Holy Spirit, the Bible says that you have a distributed new glossa, a new language that comes upon you and it sits upon you and sitting upon you means it's not leaving. That means you don't get filled with the Holy Ghost and all of a sudden you can't do it tomorrow.

The devil is a liar. You get filled with the Holy Spirit, that sits upon you. Now all of a sudden you take that glossa, that new language that God has put on the inside of you and you allow that thing to flow. And the more you allow that thing to flow, the stronger your spirit gets because as you're praying in the Holy Spirit, the every other gift of the Spirit was available, but the only way that you and me could have access to this beautiful baptism was He had to die to give it to us.

He had to die in order for us to have access to have the Holy Spirit live on the inside of us. Because without His death, we're not cleansed, but because He died for us and we accept that sacrifice, we're cleansed on the inside and now the Holy Spirit can make a dwelling, can live on the inside of us. Know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost? How is it that every other people group has a language and we just go, yeah, that's their language?

But God can't have a language. It wasn't flapping tongues on their forehead. It was distributed glossal, distributed language. They were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak, verse 4, with other tongues.

That word tongues, nobody ever interpret that as a tongue, as a literal tongue. They interpret that as a language. It's the exact same word in the original language as in verse 3. This is not, I mean, it's certainly a supernatural event, but this is not as mystical as it's been made out to be.

Because it's easy to say, well, I mean, they actually had tongues sitting on them. No. There were languages that were birthed in fire that were distributed to them and they didn't turn them off. I can pray in tongues all day.

I didn't get home until 10:30 last night. Me and a few guys were praying in tongues in my truck. What were you praying in tongues for? I want to build up our spirit.

I want to praise God well. Plus, I can. I'm not trying to lose what God gave me. I'm not trying to disrespect what God makes available.

I said, well, you have to pray in tongues to go to heaven? No. You have to be baptized in the Holy Spirit like this to go to heaven? No.

Acts chapter 19, one of the apostles walks up to a group of people that were born again and he says, have you guys received the Holy Spirit since you believed? They were Christians. They just weren't baptized in the Spirit yet. That's how it happened for me.

I was a Christian pretty much my whole life. I came out, the doctor slapped my hiney and my dad told me the gospel. Cry if you would like to accept Jesus. I never did know Jesus.

Jesus was at every meal we ate. Jesus was at every bedtime. Jesus was at every turn of my life. I don't know why it took so long to be baptized in the Holy Spirit.

I was baptized in the Holy Spirit about 18, 19 years old. I don't know why it took so long. I believe God for it. I'm just telling you, it's worth it.

Whatever it took to get there, it's worth it. Because without the fire, you can't hardly stay. You can't hardly stay lit. You can't.

Sooner or later, it goes to a mental place, like a mentality place. And the people that are just prone to being disciplined, they're super disciplined. I think everybody should get up at 5:00 a.m. I tell you what, God is so good.

You were that way before you got saved. No disrespect. You were. The people that want to sleep till 10, 11 o'clock, you know what I've had encounters with God late morning.

It's fine. You were that way before you got born again. Inside of every human, there's an innate desire to be passionate about something so much so that you would give your life for it if necessary. And because the church has not enunciated that the church and the cause of Christ is that thing for Christianity, then children, people, even Christians, are looking for something to be that passionate about and they're grasping at straws.

Anything becomes a cause. All of a sudden, God bless the environment. We need to take care of it. But the environment becomes this religion for you to die for.

You're chaining yourself to trees, but you won't chain yourself to the Bible. Because inside of every person, there's an innate desire to be passionate about something as unto death. In other words, there's nothing I wouldn't do for this cause, but because Christianity was relegated down to a decision and not a converted life to bring the kingdom of God into full manifestation here, we have a bunch of people that are looking for something to fill the passion void in their life when the Bible says the fire of Almighty God is available and can make you passionate about Jesus to the place that there is nothing that you would not do for Him. Inside of every person.

But when the gospel is told and preached as if it is an option, well, when you're ready, glory to God. You might die tomorrow. Inside of every person there's a passion level. So then you become, instead you're a Christian and nobody knows you're a Christian, but everybody knows you're a Republican.

You're a Christian and nobody knows it, but everybody knows you're a Democrat. Nobody knows it. Because your passion to the level where you don't care what anybody thinks about it is not for the cause of Christ. It is for the cause of this other thing.

Because inside of every person, God has placed an innate desire for you to want to be passionate about something to the place you would give the rest of your life or actually your literal life for it. And so people go grab at all these other things because they don't have the fire of God on the inside of them that gives them the passion to be passionate about the things of God. You walk by people that don't know the Lord and you roll your eyes and then you weep over something else because the reality is that you don't have a revelation that the person that doesn't know God is destined for a sinner's hell and the only stumbling block that might stop them and cause them to fall into the loving arms of Jesus Christ is a Christian that is passionate enough to tell somebody about the Lord. I'm dialing it back.

I might not even need a microphone if I keep it up this rate. Everybody needs something to be passionate about to be fulfilled. Some people, they're not even passionate about dogs. They're passionate about a breed of dog.

Like, nothing wrong with that, but to the nth degree. They're passionate about some cause. It might even be good. A charitable endeavor.

But their Christendom, their Christian life is as dead as a block of wood. And it's not because they don't know the Lord. It's because they haven't been baptized in the fire. I don't know about you.

I don't want to live a life without the fire. I don't want to live a life without the power of God. The supernatural power of God. You may say, well, what does it take?

I'll tell you. It takes two things. You must be born again. You can't be baptized in the Holy Ghost if you're unclean on the inside because the Holy Ghost can't live in a dirty vessel.

The second thing, you have to be willing. You have to yield. I have to be careful because when I'm praying for people, I can almost tell before I start praying who's going to yield to the Holy Ghost. And my flesh goes, don't even pray.

Just don't waste your time. Because my prayers or anybody else's for that matter means nothing if you don't want to yield to the Holy Ghost. It means nothing. God's not going to throw you for a backflip just to make me feel better.

You've got to yield to the Holy Ghost. So you've got to be born again and you've got to yield. There's a giving over that has to happen. There's an element...

Haley, come play the keys. There's an element of the things of God that has to be so precious to you that you remove all the caveats of what you won't do. You know, I want God to move, but not that way. Great.

You just told God He's only allowed to operate the way you want Him to operate. Congratulations, you tried to make yourself God's boss. It doesn't work like that. He doesn't work like that.

He's God. He's Alpha and Omega. He doesn't work for you. He's not your butler.

Most people's prayer life sounds like they're calling a butler or a janitor. Clean up on aisle three, God. I messed up again. Instead of entering His courts.

He's God. So maybe you're here and I really feel like this week has been just a supernatural week for a lot of us. Like I even said it last week, you know, believing God for just encounters even in your home. Who had some encounters with the Holy Ghost even this week?

Come on, raise your hand. We do that. Basically, we're testifying so everybody can see, hey, man, I had encounters with God. I'm not the only one here.

But if you want to be filled with the Holy Spirit, there's two things. The first one is you have to be willing. And the second is you've got to yield. You've got to say, I'm giving it over.

If there's an utterance, I'm going to release it. Out of your own mouth. And pray in that new fire tongue, fire language. You know, it doesn't sound like English.

And if you remember, it says cloven, distributed. But there's also an indication of different. Every person sounds different when they pray in tongues. I sound amazing.

Thanks. Every person sounds different when they pray in the Holy Ghost. So you can't let that stop you. The drunk on the barstool didn't let anybody stop him when people were trying to tell him to be quiet.

I just want to stay here. Friends are going to shut up. You're going to get arrested. I don't care.

You know why he didn't care? Because he was drunk. You know why we don't care? Because people think we're crazy in the Holy Ghost.

Because we're drunk. Totally intoxicated. It says if you receive the Holy Spirit since you believe, you must be born again. So if you need to be born again, you need to give your life to Jesus.

The whole church, I'm gonna lead us in a prayer. I want you to pray this prayer right now. Matter of fact, lift one hand. Just say this after me.

Say, oh God, I come to you now, and I ask you to save me. Write my name in your book. I believe Jesus died and rose from the dead for my victory. I'm a Christian now, a clean vessel, and I'm ready to receive your Spirit in Jesus' name.

Amen. Let's all stand to our feet. Here's how we're gonna do this. Every person that's baptized in the Holy Spirit, just begin to pray in tongues right where you are.

You can close your eyes if you want to. It definitely helps. Kind of gets you out of your, if we don't live by what we see, so kind of turn off what we see can help. Those of you who are baptized in the Spirit, continue to just pray in tongues.

If you're not yet baptized in the Spirit, you're about to be if you wanna be. And here's how it happens, okay? I'm gonna pray and I'm gonna ask the Spirit of God to fill you, but it's not a question that we don't know the answer to. God wants to fill you more than you wanna be filled.

But you've been born again. You've given your life to Jesus. The next thing you have to do is yield to the Holy Ghost. You have to yield.

So when the Spirit of God begins to move on the inside of your belly, you release that new language. You release that fire, glossa, glossa, that fire language of God. And then the Holy Spirit is gonna give you utterance. And at that time, I'm gonna ask the whole church to just lift our voice and pray in the Holy Spirit.

The most terrifying thing to the enemy is a bunch of Christians praying in tongues. Because when you pray in tongues, come on church, pray in tongues. When you pray in tongues, the Bible says that you pray out all the mysteries. You pray out mysteries.

You can thwart the plans of the devil just by praying in the Holy Ghost. This is the will of God. So if you're looking to be baptized in fire today, today is your day to be baptized in fire. It's not just because it's Pentecost Sunday, but it is Pentecost Sunday, praise God.

So if you're here to be baptized in fire, I'm gonna do this. Every member of the church, every person here, and every person that wants to be baptized, just lift your hands right now. Lift your hands. I'm gonna ask God to fill you.

I'm gonna ask God to fill you. And when I do, I'll tell you when, but I want each one of us to just shout the word hallelujah. And then right after that, I want you to just start praying in that tongue, real loud, real strong. The reason we say hallelujah is interesting.

It's a word that is used all over the globe, all over the globe in every language. And there's something about a word that we can say that's in unison with everybody around us. And basically the attempt is to put ourselves in one accord. That's when the Holy Spirit moves, when we get in one accord.

We're not trying to be thinking about 15 different other things. One of the reasons churches have no power is because everybody's praying their own prayer. I'm praying for this thing, and I'm praying for that thing, and I'm praying for this thing. Well, when we pray in tongues, we're praying in unison together.

We're praying out the will of God. Total unison can be there, but it can't happen if we're all praying under understanding because I understand things you don't. You understand things that I don't. So we're just gonna believe God for the fire of God to fall in this place this morning, right here on Sunday morning in the name of Jesus Christ.

I'm believing God for the fire, for the fire of Almighty God to fall. So let's all lift our hands. Those of you who wanna be filled with the fire of God, it's gonna happen this morning in the name of Jesus. Glory to God.

Glory to God. Come on, if you're baptized in fire, just wave at me. Come on, if you're baptized in fire, just wave at me. Glory to God.

Glory to God. Glory to God. Those of you who are filled today, listen to me very carefully for the next moment. Pray in tongues every day of your life.

Every day of your life. Pray in tongues on the way home. Pray in tongues in front of your children. Pray in tongues every day of your life.

This is the, it's like, it has become like the secret to a fire-filled life, is to keep yourself stirred up in faith. And there's nothing like the fire of God and that beautiful language that he baptized you in. Some of you this morning that he baptized you in, in the name of Jesus. Every day of your life, as long as you live, you pray in the Holy Ghost.

Come on, if you're thankful, can you give God a hand of praise this morning? I'm gonna pray a blessing over you and we gotta be dismissed or we're gonna have another group of tongue talkers in here. Just trying to sit in the same chairs, but let me pray for you. Father, bless your people coming in, going out.

The fire baptized, the born again. Those who are filled with you to overflow. In Jesus' name and all God's people said, amen. Come on, praise God before we leave.

God bless you, we'll see you. I hope you enjoyed the podcast today. If you did, there are a couple of things that I'd love for you to do. Number one, subscribe to our show.

That way, the most recent episodes will always be in your feed waiting for you, ready when you are. And secondly, follow us on social media. That is the best way to stay up to date on everything happening at New Heights. We look forward to you joining us next time on the New Heights Podcast.

And if you are ever in the Bryan College Station area, we invite you to come out to New Heights Church for a live service. I promise we'll make you feel right at home.