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say what we're looking at keeping in step with the spirit and uh Martha asked me um if there was an appropriate place I mentioned uh ji
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Packer and his book of of this name um and one of the things he does is lists some of the common conceptions if you will or
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um more uh influen IAL concepts of the spirit's Ministry and I think most of us if you
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were to to ask if I were to ask you know what are what is the kind of the first thing that comes to your mind uh when you think of the concept or the actions
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of the Holy Spirit um we'd get a list maybe similar to this list um Packer uh uses using alliteration calls it his
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sweet peas um one of them I think it's quite a stretch to get a pee out of it but um most of uh or a lot of people would
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would think almost uh instantly of the idea of of power um we read in in Acts one uh when
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when Jesus um is instructing his disciples to remain in Jerusalem until the Holy Spirit comes upon them um he he
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says uh you will receive power um acts um acts 18 you will receive power when the Holy
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Spirit comes upon you and you shall be my Witnesses both in Jerusalem and in Judea and Samaria
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even to the remotest part of the earth and we and we know that that all came true as they were the dispersion of the Believers
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throughout that portion of the world but a lot of people will go to to power and it doesn't we're going to talk about that idea of of power of the Holy Spirit
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uh hopefully this morning but what people think of and I don't think this is wrong wrong but an
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right another of his P's is performance but it's it's not so much um well I think some take it to a very dangerous extreme of extreme of wanting to perform in terms of
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exercising um what they consider the more spiritual of spiritual gifts um but there is
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perhaps in many different levels to be able to exercise the spiritual gifts for the good of the Body for Ministry of of service and
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service and um we see that in 1 Corinthians 12 we see that the spirit gives to each believer uh gifts for service for
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Ministry it's all about the the body however not performance of the individual for individual's sake but but it's there um um and so
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wrong but they're there and I think they are part of the spirit's
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motivation thought word deed Purity awareness of awareness of um sorry um Romans
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8 and Paul speaks of the believer and the fact that there's there's no condemnation for those who are in
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Christ in that same chapter he has a so then brethren we are under obligation not to the flesh to live according to to the
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flesh for if you are living according to the flesh you must die but if by the spirit you are putting to death the Deeds of the body you will live for all
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who are being led by the spirit of God these are the sons of God so it's again something that the Apostle is is saying
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them you are the sons of God you have been redeemed you have been set free as he says in Romans 8 from the law of sin and death so then Breen live walk by the
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spirit so again this desire or this um influential concept of the holy spirit is there in
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scripture uh this is the one I think he searches pretty hard to find the P um and I'll try try to explain it as I
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it what what what does he mean it's from Ephesians 3 where Paul is looking at the
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is prayer or whether this is his conclusion but to me it's uh it's almost
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um it's almost a a doxology Ephesians 3:16 that he would Grant you according to the riches of his glory to be strengthened with power through his spirit in the Inner Man so
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that Christ May dwell in your hearts through faith and that you being rooted and grounded in love may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and
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depth and to know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge that you may be filled up to all the fullness of God um what what Packer sees in
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there and the way he looks at the presentation for decision it's it's an awareness
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it's a being able to discern not only um yourself but that is part of it awareness of of yourself but others around you and um being able to
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discern um situations objects uh that are presented the realities of of life um that that
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so if any of you are a walking thesaurus and can give us a p word that means awareness um use perception perception yeah okay um but it's again it's it's involves a
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the P's and I wrote in my notes that these are kind of outside of what we might call traditional
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Christianity um and it's interesting that Aon used that word perception that
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awareness but some people would would go and this is the term that he uses for a
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Consciousness and it kind of dobes tales with how people think of the spiritual gifts but I'm going to put
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a and I'll use the term that you probably have seen
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there are I guess you have to call them Cults the kzk movement for example in the what 40s
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50s um some of the as we mentioned last week these uh Church ecumenical movements those kinds of things there is this this
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spirit is pushed into um well that's a individual thing and it's on a different plane and it has
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a there's a idealistic idea of what the spirit is um some move into some kind of religious
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aesthetic where unless you have the spirit or this higher Consciousness you're not fully what you could be as a
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again Packer searching for his sweet peas here push and pull but it's a push and
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pull of what he describes as inner urges visions voices dreams perhaps the push and pull and some of you probably this is one of the
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things when I was a young Christian um and every time Chuck and Thursday night talks about why would you want to go back to the 70s and that um
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that time of the Jesus movement and all of that but one of the things that was
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philosophy I guess of Christianity was you have two beings inside you which one are you going to listen to are you going to listen to the bad you know it's kind of if you've watched the uh you know the
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gollum creature in The Hobbit right and he's the Two-Face he's yelling at himself and then he's praising himself
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and he's got the two sides in him and that's was a common theme of which one are you feeding the most and
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that's the one who's going to win and I don't know maybe Packer didn't have that in mind but that's what comes to my mind of those
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again this is what I think the emphasis in when people go this direction the direction the individual what is my worth what is my relation to these
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what I guess I would want to say what exalts the exalts the individual and again I don't see how you reconcile this and this because the whole context of 1
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Corinthians 1213 and 14 is the body not the individual I have been crucified with
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exod well right well that's why these are I I would say in defense of of Packer he's actually doing what you're saying he has pushed them to a different category and saying
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a lot of Christians will come up with these four but then these three are outside of even what he would
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consider scriptural so yes so he's not he's not advocating any of these he's saying this is what I see people doing
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and um so yeah I I didn't um not not that I had picked up in my notes
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well um actually I don't think so because he's saying yeah these we see these and we see people doing these
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okay well what he would say is emphasis on any of these individual things is an
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imbalance and it messes with our perspective of who the spirit is it emphasizes one aspect of the spirit's
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but ignores the full scope of his ministry so I believe the reason he's he's outlining these is that one
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imbalance many people oh it's about power it's or it's about purity
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picking out or emphasizing one of these over the others particularly again these is inadequate to inadequate to describe the fullness of the spirit's
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Ministry but it is a a practical imbalance for a Christian's life because it it emphasizes again
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perhaps one aspect of the spirit's Ministry but not the the essence or the heart of that Ministry which I tried to
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peace is the spirit presents Christ that he magnifies Christ that he shines the full flood light on Christ um he has an
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example in his book of um going from where he he uh lived uh going on a Snowy Evening to
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a evening service at the church that he was attending and rounding the corner and seeing the floods lights lighting up
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a building in all of its Splendor with the the snow kind of adding to the reflection and the light and seeing
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that that exposure that flood light gave depth and and Splendor to what he was looking at and
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so what he sees in the scriptures is that the spirit is presenting Christ that he's showing us the the
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power The Authority that he has motiv ation yes for for Purity motivation for Ministry a
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true perception of who God is who Christ is and his work a real awareness of who we are and looking at the the call the
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so then's Breen of of Paul um Paul um but seeing that in its in its
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fullness not in picking out one of these aspects um yes comment question
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yeah yeah okay all right yeah the comment in case you didn't heard didn't hear um hear um yeah the the spirit is is not and and you'll you'll hear and read people using
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words like an energy or an energy force or an or an influence okay I got in trouble last I don't know three years ago two years ago
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calling the spirit an influencer and to me that's different from influence because the I see the spirit
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as has an executive influencer in people's lives he has that kind of of force but he's not just a a vapor or a
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energy field com good because not only descries What Spirit does and how we can him and geve him
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but it also addresses modern situation where so many people are being paths by these
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influences addresses the Contemporary situation very bially I think he is the Supreme influen should be our gu um when I looked up the definition
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um of influencer this is this these are notes that I wrote at the time um three years ago an influencer is one who has the
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power because they have the authority and when I I'm not a ticker or
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a Tucker um I'm not a Twitter some people think I'm a twit so I I'm not on any social media at
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all um I don't know how to get into snap face or whatever those things are
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called but when I read that one who has Authority um most of the people that I see that are either being shot up or shot or shot down from that their Authority is
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manufactured it's it's not an authority they have they've purchased it or they've wrangled it or pull the W over
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people's eyes but it's one who inspires or guides the actions of others and relationships not merely Market
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was one of the [Music] um the the spirit and I hope that we can get into some of this um as he's presented to us
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in the Old Testament scriptures and then moving into the New Testament scriptures but I I keep coming back to to John um have to come back to John
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because it's where we see the spirit um outlined I think most vividly
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us um but we we see Jesus saying [Music] um things you know I am going to him who sent me and
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none of you asked me where I'm going and because I've said these things Thor has filled your heart but I tell you the truth it is to your advantage that I go away for if I do not go away the helper
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shall not come to you but if I go I will send him to you and when he comes he will convict the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgment
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concerning sin because they do not believe in me and be and concerning righteousness because I go to the father and you no longer behold me and concerning judgment because the ruler of
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this world has been judged I have many more things to say to you but you cannot hear them now or bear them now but when he the spirit of truth
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comes he will guide you into all the truth for he will not speak on his own initiative but whatever he hears he will speak and he will disclose to you what is to come he shall glorify me for he
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shall take of mine and disclose it to you all the things that the father has are mine therefore I said that he takes of mine and will disclose it to you
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and a little while and you will no longer behold me and again a little while and you will see me he's the telling us the spirit is
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presenting Christ he will take of mine he'll disclose it to you he'll make known these things to you he will explain these things to you
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um he he is not just a vapor he is not just an influence he's not just an energy field he's a person and what we see here and again I
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don't know how others miss it I I've told you before and I I just I probably would have to go listen to
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the whole thing again but years and years ago uh we were in a small group Bible study and the the leader decided to play a tape
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a tape of uh I guess it was a sermon or lecture on the Holy Spirit and I I don't know beyond the first two sentences what he said but
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when he began to talk about he said there is the Trinity there are two who's and a what and I stopped listening after
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that and I don't know how he gets the what but many people think of the Holy Spirit as a what and not a person and yet even what we see here Jesus speaks
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of him using personal language he he will take what is mine he will disclose it to you you will no longer behold me
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right yeah I yeah I'm not again I I agree with you in terms of we we want to make the spirit something less we want to make the two who's and then a what we want to make a
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subcategory of God somehow that when Jesus says I am the father are one we want to put him and then but we want to put the spirit partly I I think and I'll
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speak for myself um just I think sometimes we're sometimes we're embarrassed to talk about the Holy Spirit um as as Believers you know oh
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you believe in you know um I mean growing up in the church I did we recited is it the Apostles Creed you know the Holy Ghost and you believe in a
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ghost and it's like well it it is a spirit and we want to look at the words Spirit um but we want to put the spirit in some
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kind of third or subcategory and uh it's the scriptures I don't think the script let us do that in fact they they lead us
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to see the Holy Spirit working um in a very integral part of the U from from the
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beginning at creation we see the Spirit uh as creating we see him yes he's
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influencing people um and we can look at um I was prepared to look at a few passages in the Old Testament and let me
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um as we move there and that's kind of where I want to go
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um I want to uh make a couple of Preparatory statements Preparatory statements and keep an eye on the
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time I I guess again along with the comment about the spirit being a person and not just an energy or something um we we sometimes do have these vague Notions
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about the Spirit uh we we speak um what do you call it colloquially you know he's in good spirits today right and we
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kind of have that yeah okay that you know Jolly attitude he's uh you know he's he's good but that's not the Holy Spirit um we do think of and one author
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put it uh we think of the Holy Spirit as a non-human disembodied intelligence it's like okay George Lucas
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may have had something like that but that's not the Holy Spirit okay um we're we're not speaking of material versus
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immaterial um and then of course uh one of the authors and probably one of the British said uh no the holy spirit is not a distilled liquor
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um the word in Hebrew is Hebrew is ruach and ruach and I even on the best of uh voice days I can't do the guttural
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ru from the Hebrew but it means breath breeed breathed out um the idea of not just
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breathing but air moving forcefully or powerfully and again we almost immediately from the word we we get an
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or you've ever uh worked at the big French Tire Factory south of south of town um the new Numa the air tires
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air tires that most of the ones I um I worked on held there um except most of the ones tires I ever worked on are now rotting in a landfill and uh contributing to
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global warming or something I guess but um it's it's a blast a blast of God uh one interpreted it it's um
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again it's no wonder that we want to jump to the power but we have to see that this is coming from God it's God at work changing things it's God at work
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accomplishing his purposes and it the the words themselves imply a power or an energy and a life except they they come from a person they come from a being
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used yes yes breath Ru the Holy Spirit and that's how we we see
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Cordes um the Holy Spirit it Spirit it implies to be
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right the holy spirit in Greek we see so this is the the Hebrew obviously here the word for Holiness is
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apart I don't think they're different to be cut off or to be separate to be set apart but it's in the scriptures that which is holy is to be
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set apart to belong to God so there is that connection that it is something
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different something set apart something holy as his name the Holy Spirit but again it's not just an
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energy um but it's it's God himself God himself at work God exercising power in
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um and again the the idea that it it is a just a kind of a force field or a energy um this this is this is power in
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action this is this is God actively involved in his creation um there is a personal involvement here um that I again I if
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you if you take the scriptures as a whole I I don't see how you miss the personality here the way he is spoken of um Chuck mentioned this I think or maybe
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Tim mentioned it in his last um Amos study I I can't remember um but there are many people who want to put um that
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this is a a mode of God so there's the there's the
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um modalism that this is God and sometimes he's acts as the father sometimes he acts as the son sometimes he acts as the spirit is just a mode that that we see he's a
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shape shifter and we sometimes see him acting this way or that way um again to to me and maybe I'm just too
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simplistic but a mode is is not a being uh and a mode of God's being is not personality um God's
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expressing God the Holy Spirit expresses a personality that is um it is a distinction within the being of
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God and again I I think it's important that we that we see that um and that we we begin to understand
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ruach Elohim um how he hovers um I'm not sure that I could understand that but what we see that he does is he establishes order
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out of chaos that's what happens in Genesis 1 he's the Creator um he is the person creating
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um from Psalm 33 by the word of the Lord the heavens were made and by the breath of his mouth all their host he gathers the water of the sea together as a heap he lays up the deeps and
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storehouses let all the Earth fear the lord that all the inhabitants of the world stand in awe of him for he was he spoke and it was done he commanded and
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it stood fast let's pray Heavenly Father we do again ask that you would would help us in
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our understanding of the scriptures our response to the scriptures in obedience but also in in diving deeper
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and searching that we may know you and that knowing you we may honor you and glorify you we ask that you would continue to build your church that you would Adorn
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her as as a bride as she proceeds to her bridegroom and that we may be in honor and glory to you in Christ's name we pray amen
