Authentic Christianity is synonymous with a Spirit-filled life. Explore practical, biblical principles for seeking and receiving the Holy Spirit for victorious, faithful living.

GYC 2011: Fill Me

<p>Authentic Christianity is synonymous with a Spirit-filled life. Explore practical, biblical principles for seeking and receiving the Holy Spirit for victorious, faithful living.</p>

<p>Free sharing permitted under the Creative Commons <a rel="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/us/">BY-NC-ND 3.0 (US)</a> license.</p>

Generation. Youth. Christ. (GYC)

GYC 2011 Seminar: The Necessity of the Spirit

Doug Batchelor

Conformation or Transformation, Part 1

This message was presented at the GYC 2011 conference.

For other resources like this, visit us online at GYCweb.org.

Please turn in your Bibles to the book of Romans, Romans chapter 12.

We're going to look at verse 1 and 2 I think most of us are acquainted with this Romans 12 verse 1 and 2 I beseech you therefore brethren by the mercies of God that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service.

And do not be conformed to this world but be transformed by the renewing of your mind that you might prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God." Wow, there's a lot there.

First I want you to notice that proving what the perfect, good and acceptable will of God is involves presenting your bodies.

Being transformed and not conformed in your minds also involves your bodies, because your body is going to play out what's happening in your mind.

And he begins by saying, I beseech you, I beg you, I plead with you.

Brethren, by the mercies of God, He's offering us this incredible mercy that you present yourself, you surrender yourself.

The only way that we can have the Holy Spirit is to present ourselves as a holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is reasonable.

Now, I think the main purpose of this seminar is that we might plead for the filling of the Holy Spirit.

When a person is, they lose their temper and they're angry, and they're full of anger, what controls them?

If a person has fallen in love and they're full of love, what controls them?

You know, how they plan their time and how they plan where they go and how they spend their money, it's all being governed by this person they have fallen in love with.

And when a person is full of the Spirit, what controls them?

It's the Holy Spirit that's controlling them.

You know, I'll just, I'll be very open and honest with you in our time that we have together, I think that the Lord has a very interesting sense of humor in that before I ever came to this seminar or knew what the theme was, the desire of my life has been to be filled with the Holy Spirit.

I mean more so than usual and I probably ought to encourage you a little bit by making it clear right now that you don't get filled with the Holy Spirit 1 time, and I'm convinced everybody here has experienced the Holy Spirit in some degree.

When you're baptized, the promise that Peter says, repent and be baptized, This is Acts chapter 2.

Matter of fact, why don't we turn there real quick?

Peter said, Acts chapter 2, 38, I hear the rustle of the pages.

Then Peter said to them, repent and let every 1 of you and be baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ for the remission of sin and you shall receive, you might?

You shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit for the promise promise of what promise of the gift of the Holy Spirit is to you and your children and to all who are far off and as many as the lord god will call that covers everybody.

God has made a promise of the Holy Spirit to everybody.

If you repent of your sins and you come to Christ for baptism and you want to live a new kind of life, he has promised to give you the Holy Spirit.

It's the Holy Spirit that comes in our life that convicts us of sin.

How many of you have been convicted of sin before?

It's the Holy Spirit that gives us the ability to resist temptation.

Everything you need for the Christian life comes through the Holy Spirit.

But I think when we talk about being filled with the Holy Spirit, we all picture maybe what happened at Pentecost.

And we're going to look at that in a little bit.

But that baptism of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost was unique.

Now the filling of the Spirit happened many times after Acts chapter 2.

You can read in Acts chapter 4, I think it's verse 32, the place where they prayed was shaken and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and they began to speak the Word of God with boldness.

So even after they were baptized with the Holy Spirit in Acts chapter 2, that wasn't, They didn't just get like filled up like some kind of oil tank that's sealed and they just went around the rest of their life filled and sealed.

The Holy Spirit tends to seep out and you need a constant filling every day.

The spirit is like oil in a lamp and it burns and you've got to keep adding kerosene to the lamp and So Christians need an ongoing filling of the spirit And then we're talking about being cleansed by the spirit which is different again from the latter rain of the Holy Spirit.

Now, we might all pray for the latter rain at this meeting.

I think that we've been counseled to do that.

I think both in the Word of God and the spirit of prophecy.

But that's something that's connected with a time that is in God's keeping.

God has a time on his calendar when he is going to pour out the Holy Spirit in latter reign power.

When the disciples received the Holy Spirit at Pentecost, did God schedule that?

Or did that just happen because they prayed?

Well, maybe a little of both, but it was according to God's schedule.

Remember Jesus said, wait in Jerusalem until you receive the Holy Spirit.

50 days after Passover, Pentecost, Penta means 50.

It fell right when it was supposed to fall during the time of the former rain.

But for us to be filled with the Spirit as they were in Acts chapter 4 where they were all praying that they might have boldness to preach, did the Holy Spirit come on the disciples before Pentecost?

In the upper room when Jesus breathed on them and said, receive ye the Holy Spirit, did they get a measure of the Holy Spirit then?

Can you get the Holy Spirit after baptism?

Can you get the Holy Spirit before baptism?

Cornelius In chapter 10 of Acts, the Roman centurion, Peter comes to him and he preaches to him and while he hears the word, the Holy Spirit fell on them and they began to speak in tongues and they had the evidence of the Holy Spirit.

Speaking actually not 1 of the fruits, 1 of the gifts.

At Jesus' baptism, the Holy Spirit came at the time of baptism.

He came up out of the water and the heavens were open and the Holy Spirit descended like a dove and he was led of the Spirit into the wilderness.

By the way, what does the word Christ mean?

Christ is Christos, it means anointed in Greek.

The Messiah is the anointed in Hebrew, Jesus if he was anything he was the anointed, the anointed.

When did he especially get the Holy Spirit?

It says that 27 AD at the 483 years after that prophecy in Daniel chapter 9, to anoint the most holy, I'm talking Daniel chapter 9 now.

How many of you know what I'm talking about?

I'm talking to you like you have some Bible background.

That prophecy in Daniel 9 about when the Messiah would come, you know how it identified him?

That's when he began his public ministry.

He was filled with the Holy Spirit in a special way.

Did Jesus not have the Holy Spirit before his baptism?

John the Baptist, when did he first get the Spirit?

Conformation or Transformation, Part 2

For other resources like this, visit us online at gycweb.org.

Father, again we're praying, not that we've left your presence, but we just want to refocus and ask that you give us ears that are willing to hear, remove any distraction, help us to just have hearts that are prepared, lord, to hear what your spirit is saying to us and do at this meeting, lord, what we know you want to do.

Pour out your holy spirit in in a way that will just not only amaze us, but could even shock a nation.

I pray, Lord, that you'll help us to be part of that and just to yearn and to pray for the outpouring of the spirit.

We thank you and ask this in Jesus' name, amen.

All right, in our introduction, we talked about being filled with the Holy Spirit and the criteria for being filled with the Holy Spirit is we must present ourselves as a living Sacrifice.

When you brought a lamb to the Lord, you didn't bring a sick 1 or a maimed 1 or a blind 1 or a crippled 1.

That doesn't mean if you've got any physical defect, you can't come to the Lord.

We are to present ourselves as holy sacrifices.

And that means that we repent of our sins.

When we come to the Lord and we ask for the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, we're willing to repent of our sins.

What did the disciples do in the upper room before Pentecost?

They put aside their differences, they came together in 1 place, they prayed.

Peter spent some time in weeping, he had denied the Lord.

Before The children of Israel received the rain in the days of Elijah.

You know, before the rain came, they fell on their faces, they said, the Lord, He is God, the Lord, He is God.

They repented of their sins, but it didn't rain yet.

Elijah then said, seize the prophets of Baal, don't let 1 of them escape.

These false prophets were then taken down to the Brook Kidron, and it says Elijah there slew them.

Now whether he is the 1 who wielded the sword, he may have been.

When Saul was not willing to kill Agag, Samuel hacked him to pieces, the Bible says.

And Elijah slew, could have been anywhere from 400, 1 place it says 400 prophets of Baal and then it says 450 prophets of the grove.

But he went down and he slew every 1 of them.

He repaired the altar of the Lord That means restored devotions in our lives regular time of devotions at the time of the evening sacrifice the fire came down and Then after they did that he went up on Mount Carmel and he prayed 7 times.

Now does that mean if you kneel down and you pray, kind of like, you know, Muslims kneel 5 times a day, or if you get down on your knees and stand up and get down and stand up and get down and stand up 7 times, you're going to get the baptism of the Holy Spirit.

Instead of saying that Elijah prayed 7 times for the Holy Spirit, I like to say he prayed until it came.

So when the people humbled themselves, they said the Lord he is God, he rebuilt the altar of the Lord, we need to restore regular devotions in our lives, He destroyed the false prophets that they had been listening to.

Then he went up on Mount Carmel and he prayed and then the rain came, a big rain.

How many of you would like to have that kind of ladder reign in your lives?

Now before I leave that point, I'm just praying for the Spirit as I talk right now.

When it comes to The Holy Spirit, God compares it to rain.

Being a Christian means that sometimes you feel God is closer than others.

Sometimes you may have that ecstasy and that feeling of that joy and sometimes you're living by faith and you may not feel very good.

Any farmer knows it doesn't rain every day.

But we want this baptism of the Holy Spirit.

It came after they killed the prophets of Baal that they'd been listening to.

Now we're going to talk about holiness, friends.

You don't want to be conformed to this world, but you want to be transformed by the renewing of your mind.

1 Peter 2, verse 9, but you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, his own special people, that you might proclaim the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.

But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, Acts 1 verse 8, and you will be my be witnesses unto me in Jerusalem and in Judea and Samaria and the ends of the earth.

Why does God want to fill us with the Holy Spirit?

You'll be baptized with the Holy Spirit that you might be my witnesses.

At Pentecost, when God poured out the Holy Spirit, immediately after they were filled with the Holy Spirit, what did the disciples do?

They began to declare the wonderful works of God, and people were baptized.

Acts chapter 4, they prayed, and the place where they were assembled was shaken.

And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and they spake the word of God with boldness.

So we can then use the gifts of the spirit in ministry and telling others about Christ.

So when you present yourself a living sacrifice to the Lord, you're really saying, Lord, I'm willing to go where you want me to go.

God may have called some of you into ministry and like Jonah you're running from it because you've got your eyes set on something you think is more lucrative.

Did I hit a note with somebody or a raw nerve?

God is calling all of us into some form of ministry and you need to be willing to say, Lord, wherever you want to call us, whatever you want us to do, he fills us with the Spirit, not just for us, but that he might shine through us and reach others.

So if you just want the Spirit for you, well, I mean, it's okay to want the Holy Spirit so that you might be filled with God But even more important than that you want to be filled with God so that you can be a blessing to others you want to ricochet The love of Jesus off your life like a mirror You spend time looking at the Lord, but we often have false prophets in our lives that are Preventing us now.

Let's talk about holiness for just a moment Blessed are the pure in heart they will see God When do we expect to see God?

It says in heaven when we have our glorified bodies, then we'll see Him face to face.

But is it possible to see God in this life?

Revelation 1, 17, And when I saw him, I fell at his feet as dead.

Hebrews 9, I'm sorry, Hebrews 12, oh, bless your heart.

Of course, what happens then is that light shines on my page and then it kind of shines up on my face and it gives you that macabre look.

Any of you ever tell ghost stories around the campfire with a flashlight on your chin?

Blessed are the pure in heart for they will see God.

Pursue peace with all people and holiness, meaning pursue holiness without which no 1 will see the Lord.

And without holiness, we cannot expect to be filled with the Holy Spirit.

Victorious Overcomers, Part 1

Dear Father in Heaven, we've gathered again and the evidence here is that we're seeking after you.

I pray, Lord, that you will honor your promise.

Where we gather in your name, you are in our midst.

If we draw near to you, you are drawing near to us.

If we search for you with all of our hearts, we'll find you.

Now, Lord, and through this weekend, we have a lot of people, a lot of young people we've gathered together because we're seeking after you.

Help us, Lord, to do what the disciples did and help us to find what they found.

There's no greater blessing than you could give us, Lord, than the Holy Spirit.

And as we're even praying for that right now, we're living in such a godless age.

But we're not coming because we believe we're worthy.

We're coming because we're trusting in the worthiness of Jesus.

We're trusting in His merits and His grace.

I pray that as you've done before you'll forgive the sins of the 1 who's going to speak and that you will be the 1 who really is heard.

And so touch our hearts Lord and help us to learn that it is possible through Christ to have revolutionary lives, spirit-filled lives.

We thank you and we pray this in Jesus' name.

Now some of what I'll be sharing with you is actually a little backwards.

I'm going to be talking now about the possibility for you to experience victory in the Christian life.

And I don't know about you, but my biggest problem is sin.

In fact, the whole plan of salvation revolves around sin and salvation.

And it is possible, through the power of the Holy Spirit, for you to be a new creature.

You know the promise of that new covenant.

I'll write my law in your hearts and in your minds.

Old things are passed away, all things become new.

That God gives us a supernatural power that's outside of ourselves and you basically are born again.

How many of you were raised in a Christian home?

1 liability is that you can grow up with the illusion that being raised in a Christian home makes you a Christian.

Or that by virtue of being born in a Christian home, that's the same thing as being born again, that you're born born again.

You may be born in a Christian home, but that doesn't mean you're born born again.

We all need to have a personal relationship with Jesus.

That goes for me, that goes for Pastor Doug's kids, and goes for my grandkids.

So all of us need to have a personal relationship with him.

And I'd like to begin with a quote from the book, Desire of Ages.

There is no limit to the usefulness of 1 who by putting self aside makes room for the working of the Holy Spirit upon his heart and lives a life wholly consecrated to God.

There is no limit, unlimited usefulness for that person who puts self aside.

I don't know about you, but my big problem is Doug Batchelor.

Maybe your problem is Doug Batchelor too, I don't know.

And just laying self aside, I've discovered that Even in my conversation with people, someone will tell me something amazing that happens to them, and automatically my mind goes, I think I've got an amazing story that can compete with that amazing story.

And at the heart of that is just another kind of selfishness.

Or someone will tell me about some special event and I'll think, how come I wasn't invited?

And just automatically in my thinking, my mind, it's like the needle turning to the pole.

Automatically, without the Holy Spirit, all of your thinking and function is always me me me me And it takes a supernatural power for us to get back to where Adam was before sin Adam was created with the nature where love for God was natural for him.

Whereas for us we are not born with that natural desire to love God and to serve him.

And it's a miracle of God when the Holy Spirit comes into our lives and gives us that outside power, makes us do something beyond ourselves.

There's no limit, 1 more time, I haven't finished the quote yet, oh by the way, Desire of Ages 250, no limit to the usefulness of 1 who by putting self aside makes room for the working of the Holy Spirit upon his heart, and lives a life wholly consecrated to God.

If men will be endued with the necessary discipline, without complaining or fainting by the way, God will teach them hour by hour and day by day.

If His people will remove obstructions, oh wait a second, there's something we need to do.

If His people will remove obstructions, He will pour forth the waters of salvation in abundant streams through the human channels.

If men, humbled in life, were encouraged to do all the good they can do, if restraining hands were not laid upon them to repress their zeal, there would be a hundred workers for Christ where now there is but one." So not only will God do great things for any 1 person, you'll see evangelism explode.

How could 12 men, the apostles namely, turn the world upside down in 1 generation?

Because they were filled with the Holy Spirit and consumed by love for Christ.

Furthermore, they were not thinking about the here and now, they were living lives with the perspective of eternity.

It makes a big difference when you think about what's going to really last.

I wrote this little book, I don't know if you ever saw the sharing book for last year, it's called Who Do You Think You Are?

And I've got an illustration in there about a shopping spree.

I guess I can walk away from here and my microphone works.

Any of you ever heard about a shopping spree where you win at this market or some store and they say, all right, for 30 minutes you get to run up and down the aisles and whatever you can fit in as many shopping carts as you could push to the checkout, you get to keep.

Have you ever fantasized that you might get something like that?

And now if you were going to do that, if you were running up and down the aisles, what would you put in your cart?

Of course, it depends on what store you're at.

All right, let's just pretend we're at Walmart, because most of us are acquainted with that.

Would you go and get popped popcorn and put it, they actually sell that, and put it in your cart?

Series

GYC 2011 Seminar: The Necessity of the Spirit

The Greatest Need, Part 1

Transcript

Description

Parent Series

Parent Conference

Sponsor

Recorded

GYC 2011 Seminar: The Prophetic Significance of the Early and Latter Rain

The Sanctuary and the Early and Latter Rains, Part 1

50m

GYC 2011 Seminar: The Holy Spirit in Evangelistic CARE Groups

RE-Evolution, Part 1

41m

Alan & Nicole Parker: Love Me, Love Me Not

I Love Me, I Love Me Not, Part 1: Why Self-esteem Will Never Satisfy

1h

You are Needed!

3. How To Share the Adventist Message in 30 Minutes

1h 9m

Devotions For Decisions

1. Devotions, or Just the Motions?

1h 2m

Knees, Keys, and Please!

1. To Know Christ

1h

Plenary

Encountering the Glory of God

58m

The Life, Death, and Resurrection of Sabbath School

The Life of Sabbath School

58m

Making Sons of Hell? The Don’ts and Do’s of Soul Winning

Addressing Objections and Answering Difficult Bible Questions

1h 2m

Relentless Prayer

2. Relentless Prayer

51m

Every Wind of Doctrine

2. The Third Person of the Godhead

1h 15m

GYC 2013 Seminar: The Neophyte and the Great Controversy

05-The Neophyte and The Great Controversy, Part 5

1h

Sound Doctrine