This sermon emphasizes the significance of the resurrection of Jesus Christ and the power it holds for believers. It challenges listeners to focus on Christ's resurrection as the foundation of their faith and to humbly surrender to God, seeking the Holy Spirit's transformative work in their lives.

Last week, last Sunday, Christians around the world, millions of them, celebrated what they claim was the day Jesus rose from the dead. Of course, we know he rose up from the dead in the first day of the week. But what does it mean to celebrate the resurrection of Jesus Christ? If we are convinced about this and we understand its significance and understand the connection of that with the coming of the Holy Spirit, then I believe it'll change our whole lives. One of the titles given to Jesus, to the Holy Spirit, when the Holy Spirit is given many titles, he's called the Holy Spirit. But one of the titles given to the Holy Spirit is in Romans 8 and verse 11. And this title has some connection with us. I mean, the Holy, the Word of God doesn't give different titles to Jesus or the Holy Spirit without a meaning. If Jesus is called a good shepherd, that means something. If he's called the way, the truth and the life, all those things mean something. And the Holy Spirit is called the spirit of grace, the spirit of truth, helper, comforter, all these things mean something. And here is another of those titles, Romans 8 and verse 11. He's called the spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead. That is the Father. It never says in the Bible anywhere that Jesus raised himself from the dead. In John chapter 10, he says, I have power to lay down my life and I have power to raise it again. He had the power because he's God. So what did Jesus have power for? You stand there for a moment to John's Gospel chapter 10 and verse 18. No one, verse 17 first, the Father loves me because I lay down my life so that I may take it again. It's an amazing truth that God loves those who are willing to lay down their earthly life in order to exchange it for a heavenly one. I'll tell you, I want God to love me because I know it'll make me a triumphant person. And there are different degrees in which God loves people. There's one sense in which he loves the whole world. God so loved the world that he gave his only son. That includes murderers, thieves, terrorists, everybody. But there's a special type of love he has for those like Jesus, those who follow in his footsteps. And my Father loves me because I lay down my life. And he taught us to take up our cross and lay down this earthly life we have all received from Adam. And we lay down that life in the moments of temptation. In the moments when I'm tempted to assert my life, to assert my rights and my reputation and to defend myself and to fight with others who try to take it away. If I lay down my life like Jesus, the Father loves me. When I'm tempted with this earthly life of Adam, to lust with my eyes, to watch internet pornography, to speak with my tongue, to be angry, and I lay down that life and I say, that's an awful life Lord. I lay down. I have to choose it. When I lay down, the Father loves me. I believe all of us are loved by God. But let me tell you, it's not equal. Because many of us don't lay down our life in the moment of temptation. You've got to be fooling yourself if you think that God loves everybody in the world equally. He loves everybody. But it's very clear that Jesus, Jesus said that there are certain people whom the Father loves more than others. So I lay down my life and so the Father loves me. And no one has taken away that life from me. No one can take it away. I laid down on my own initiative. You, if you want, you can assert yourself. Sure. Jesus could not have been crucified if he had not voluntarily given himself. He could have called 72,000 angels to defend him. One angel would have been enough. But he could have called 72,000, but he did not call them because he laid down his life. And I have also got the authority to take, I've got authority to lay down and I've got authority to take it up. That means I've got authority to go to the cross and die and go to the grave. I've got authority to come out of the grave. But he only used the authority to lay it down. He had the authority to take it up again, but he never took it up again. That's something we must always remember. Nowhere in the Bible does it say Jesus raised himself from the dead. He arose, true, but he arose because the Father raised him from the dead. Now it's a very important principle, which we testify to in baptism that I surrender to somebody putting me in the water, but I can't lift myself up in a proper baptism. If I'm baptized on my feet, I can't lift myself up. I'll just go into the water unless somebody else lifts me up. But going down, I surrender. It's very, very exact, the symbolism of baptism. I lay down my life, believe that God will raise it up again. And that raising up is so important. In Romans 8, 11, he's called a spirit. The Holy Spirit is called the spirit of the Father who raised Jesus from the dead. This is the Holy Spirit whom the Father worked with in raising Jesus from that grave. And we got to understand the significance of being raised from the dead. See, death came because of sin. If there was no sin, there'd be no death. If there was no disobedience to God, there'd be no death. So when Jesus was raised from the dead, it was because he had conquered sin and all the consequences and results of sin. If that was not true, he would not have been raised from the dead. And the Holy Spirit raised him from the dead, saying that man's greatest enemy, death, has been defeated. Some of you may have enemies. I think we live in a wicked world where all of us have some type of enemies. There also are different degrees of enemies, some who hate us a lot, some who hate us a little bit. Jesus said even members of your own family could become your enemies, particularly if you are a disciple of Jesus. But it doesn't make a difference. You make a list of all your enemies. The Bible says in 1 Corinthians 15, the last enemy is death. That's the greatest of all. And he conquered that. And he says if this spirit, Romans 8 11, dwells in you. Now there's a difference between dwelling and visiting. When I come to your home, I'm visiting your home, but you dwell in your home. I don't dwell in your home. I dwell in my home. Dwelling means a permanent residence, a permanent address. You know, some forms which we fill up for different things, they ask you, what is your permanent address? I want the Holy Spirit to say one of his permanent addresses is my heart. Is that one of the Holy Spirit's permanent addresses, your heart? He'll come into anybody's heart if you are willing, basically only two things, to keep it clean. That means as soon as it gets dirty, you confess it and cleanse it immediately. Don't wait. If you sin now, within the next five seconds of your knowing it, you must confess it, of your knowing it. Now you may sin in the morning and not be aware of that sin till sometime later. But as soon as you're aware of it, confess it immediately. And the Holy Spirit will make a permanent residence in your heart. The second condition is always humble yourself because the Spirit of grace is given to the humble. So anybody sitting here, if you surrendered your life to the Lordship of Christ, the Holy Spirit will give a permanent address as your heart if you are one of those who's quick to acknowledge, confess sin, don't blame others like Adam. Oh, the devil is so clever. When you sin, he will try to make you put at least some percentage of the blame on somebody else. Adam did take part of the blame for opening his mouth, but he said, put part of the blame on his wife and part of the blame on God. Don't do that. He, like the thief on the cross who went to paradise, said, it's all me. It's nobody else's fault. It's me. I'm totally guilty. Jesus said, that's great. Paradise is made for people like you who take the blame completely. And those who put the blame on others are kicked out of paradise like Adam. So you have a choice. You can either be kicked out or accepted. It all depends on one thing. Will you take the blame a hundred percent? Think of something that you blamed somebody for in the last one week. Can you think of somebody you blame? Yours is also the blame partially, but you highlighted the blame of somebody else. I'll tell you, that's why your Christian life is so miserable. That's why you can't rejoice in the Lord always. You can rejoice in the Lord always only in paradise, in God's presence. And if you want to get there, I'll tell you a little secret. Don't blame anybody else for your sin, for your mistake. Not your wife, not your husband, not your children. Say, Lord, it's me. It's me. So, and then in all situations, humble yourself. Humble yourself. Jesus humbled himself. Lord, I'm not going to, I'm not going to exalt myself. I'm going to go down. Then if this spirit dwells in you, made its permanent residence in you, what's he going to do? He who raised Jesus from the dead, the father who raised Jesus from the dead will give life to your dead, dying body through this spirit that lives in you. First of all, inside my body dwells my spirit. It's constantly exposed to death by sin. The Holy Spirit will give me life. I've got a mind which is so corrupted and spoiled by sin through the years. And it's warped and crooked in his judgment. Do you acknowledge that? That because of sin, you're, you know, it's like, you know, these foot rulers that children use in school. You can draw a straight line. Imagine if the ruler was all crooked. That's how our mind is. We think we're drawing a straight line, but the ruler is all crooked. But if you're humble enough to acknowledge that and say, Lord, my mind has been warped by sin, I can't think straight. And sometimes when I'm absolutely convinced I'm right, I could be a hundred percent wrong. Have you had that experience in the past? I've had it so many times that the Lord has told me, don't be so sure you're right. I'll tell you where I'm absolutely sure I'm right. Anything written in the Bible? There, I don't have any doubt. But when some area where I say, I think, I prefer to say what the Apostle Paul said in 1 Corinthians 13, I see through a glass darkly. I don't know fully. I mean, I have some idea, but I'm not sure. If it's written in the Word, no doubt at all. I'm talking about things which are not written in the Word. You know, sometimes even our assessment of certain people could be wrong. We need to discern people. We cannot live in the world if we don't discern people. Otherwise you'll be fooled by all the cult leaders and all the false religions and atheists and everybody. So we need to use our mind. But when we assess people, I think so-and-so is spiritual. I think so-and-so is carnal. I think so-and-so is worldly. You may be right, but allow for the possibility that you may also be wrong. That's all I'm saying. You may be wrong. Allow for that possibility, because there are many crooks in the world who can fool even clever people like you. Allow for that possibility, but the Holy Spirit will give life to this dying mortal mind of mine. My emotions, you know, the feelings of happiness, it can be a deception. There are a lot of people who drink, get drunk and feel so happy. They're not really happy. It's the effect of the drink. People who take drugs, they get high. They think they're in heaven. They're not in heaven. They're on their way to hell. But they think that they are. Emotions can be deceptive. Sometimes even, have you had these emotions in a Sunday morning meeting where you sing about the way Jesus suffered and died and, oh, you feel so sad for him and you feel you love Jesus so much? Wait till tomorrow and you'll see you don't love Jesus so much at all. It's just temporary emotion during the meeting. It's deceptive. Because Jesus says, if you love me, you'll keep my commandments. And if you don't keep his commandments tomorrow, all this feeling that you got here in the meeting when you were singing that song and even the tears came down your eyes, it's all a deception. Don't be fooled by it. I'm just trying to save you from deception. Our minds are mortal. Our emotions are deceptive. Our bodies are dying. But it's a wonderful thing that the Holy Spirit, the Father who sent the Holy Spirit to raise Jesus from the dead, that same Holy Spirit, not some other, the same Holy Spirit can dwell in me. And it says he can give me life to my body. And that includes all of my personality. Little by little, I taste more clarity in my mind that I discovered now that I can discern people more accurately than I could do 20 years ago or 30, 40 years ago. That I can look at people, look at their eyes and listen to their talk for five minutes and discern where they stand spiritually. See, that can happen for you. It's like, you know, you take a knife and you sharpen it and sharpen it and sharpen it. And that knife, which is so blunt, you had such difficulty cutting the meat. Now you touch it and it cuts. It's something like that. The Holy Spirit will make us sharp. And when we read God's word, you read and read. I was just reading something this week in Ezekiel, one of those, you know, difficult chapters in Ezekiel 44. And you don't get much out of those chapters, right? But I tell you, God spoke something so powerful to my heart from there as I was reading. It's like that, you know, the Holy Spirit makes the Bible, which many people say is boring. It is boring to them because the knife is blunt. It's like saying, I can't cut this meat. I agree you can't cut it, but that's because you allow your mind and your spirit to be defiled by sin. You blame other people and you don't judge yourself quickly. You don't confess your sin quickly. And then you say the Bible is boring. The Bible is boring because your knife is blunt. Whereas somebody else takes another sharp knife and touches the meat and it cuts. Somebody else reads the same Bible and he gets something living out of it. God Almighty speaks to him. How is that? It's the same book. It's the attitude of heart. Somebody else sees something in scripture, which you don't see. How is it? He's a human being like you, but he's opened his being to the Holy Spirit. And I want to say to you, my brothers and sisters, honor the Holy Spirit in your life. Don't allow all the confusion there is in the world today about the Holy Spirit to confuse you. I believe we all need to be filled with the Holy Spirit or baptized in the Holy Spirit. Call it what you like, but you must be filled with the Holy Spirit. And I don't mean the way most Pentecostals seek it. It's a seeking for power. I've often said that 90% of the speaking in tongues that I have heard in my life is all counterfeit. I don't believe it's genuine. It's my opinion. A lot of it I've heard on television and in meetings. 90% is human psychological manipulation. People are fooling themselves because they don't have power. There's a 10% that's genuine. And most of the people who have a genuine experience of speaking in tongues never use it in public or hardly ever in public. It's mostly always in private between them and God. So that's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about a power. Which power? This power that raised Jesus from the dead. What is the moon? Which is greater? You know that the Bible says the greatest power that was manifested on earth was the power that God exercised when he raised Jesus from the dead. Now there are many ways in God has exercised power through the years. He raised people from the dead in the Old Testament. Elijah, through Elijah, through Elisha, even through Jesus. Lazarus and others were raised but that was not a great manifestation of God's power because the people who were raised from the dead died again. Lazarus is not alive today. Imagine that God did something and finally the effect of it was after some years negated because the guy died again. They were raised from the dead but there was a difference when Jesus rose from the dead. He conquered death. You can't say Lazarus conquered death because death conquered him after a few years. Jairus's daughter, she didn't conquer death. Death conquered her after a few years. But Jesus conquered death. You need to see the resurrection of Jesus distinct from all the other raising from the dead in the Bible. God raised Jesus from the dead. There's something significant about that. It was conquering something because death was the main weapon of Satan. When Adam sinned and he handed over the world to Satan, Satan got the keys of death and it's always been in his hands for thousands of years. He could kill people. He could do anything to people. He could harm them. He could kill them. When God allowed Satan to attack Job in Job chapter one, you read that he could send fire and he could kill Job's children. Imagine Satan could kill Job's children. He had the keys of death. In the next chapter you read that God opened the hedge for him to attack Job also. He could have killed Job except God said, sorry you can't kill him. You can make him sick. You can give him anything but don't kill him. Otherwise Satan could have killed Job too. But something happened when Jesus rose from the dead. Something wonderful happened which we don't think about enough. We think a lot about the cross. I really believe we need to think a lot more about the resurrection. And I'll tell you what happened. It's turned to Hebrews in chapter two. When Jesus rose from the dead something happened. There are many things that happened. This is one of the things that happened. Hebrews chapter two verse 14. Since the children share in flesh and blood, Jesus himself took part of this same thing. What did he do through death? Through death he rendered powerless. That's the real meaning of that word. The one who had the power of death that is the devil. Now please read that verse. Even a third standard student can answer this question. Who had the power of death? Who? The devil. It's written there. Not who has, present tense, who had, past tense, the power of the devil. The devil. And he took away that power of death from him. That's the meaning of he rendered him powerless. This man who had power, he took away that power. That's the meaning. If I were to paraphrase it, that he took away the power from the one who had the power of death. And one way in which the Old Testament has spoke about power is keys, authority, the keys of the kingdom. And the Lord told Peter, I give you the keys of the kingdom. He's giving authority. So power of death is keys of death. Now turn to Revelation in chapter one and see what Jesus says there to John when he's John saw Jesus. And it says in verse 17, one Revelation 117, I saw Jesus. I fell at his feet like a dead man. And he's placed his right hand on me and said, don't be afraid. I am the first and I'm the last. I am the living one. I was dead and I'm alive forevermore. I was raised from the dead. I have the keys of death and of Hades, which is a place where people go after they're dead. Jesus used the picture of keys. I'm the one who opens the door of death and I'm the one who opens the door to where people go after they're dead. I have it. When did he get it? I mean, as God, he had power, but he had to, because man gave, it was a man who gave the key to the devil. In Genesis three, Adam, it had to be a man who took the key back from the devil. That's why Jesus had to become a man. It wasn't an angel who gave the key to the devil. It was a man. And Jesus came as a man and took that key back from the devil for our sake. Now turn back to Hebrews two. Why did he take the keys of death back? So that verse 15, it wasn't for his own sake. You know that Jesus never did anything for his sake. True Christianity, the closer a man lives to Jesus, the less he will do things for his own sake. The more he will do things for God and for Christ. The closer you live to Adam and this sinful humanity, the more you'll spend all your life doing things only for yourself. And you'll nominally do something for the Lord, maybe on Sunday morning. But Jesus never did anything. He did it for us. It says here, he did it to free us. Verse 15, who through the fear of death were subject to slavery all their lives. Do you know all fear is like somebody putting a chain on me. Any type of fear. I don't care what it is. The fear of death is the greatest fear. We can say those are the strongest chains. I may die. I may die of cancer. I may die of a road accident. I may die of something or somebody may kill me. The fear of death. And beneath that fear are all the other fears. The fear I may lose my job. The fear I may lose my house. The fear my children may suffer. The fear I may die before my children grow up. The fear that I may not be able to provide for my family. And you name it, a hundred and a thousand and one fears. Every fear is a chain the devil puts on my mind. It's a chain. Did Jesus come to leave me with some of those chains? Do you know the number of Christians, born again believers, who allow the devil to put chains around them? And they say, okay, okay, put it around me. What do I mean? The devil comes to them and says, what will happen if this happens to you? What will happen if this happens to you? And what will happen if this happens to you? And you keep listening. One more round. One more chain goes once more around your mind. And what will happen if this happens to you? And you think some more. What is the result? At the end of all those thoughts which the devil has put into your mind. What will happen if this? What will happen if this? What will happen if this? At the end of it, I'm a slave. I don't have freedom. I've lost my joy. I'm depressed. I'm gloomy. I make life unhappy for people in my own home. Do you know what you need to hear? Jesus rose from the dead, brother, sister. Jesus took away the keys of death so that you need never have a single fear in your life if you surrender to the Lordship of Christ. I never want to live one single moment of my life without Jesus Christ being Lord. I know it's the safest place in the universe. Do you think the safest place in the universe or in the world is your home? You say India is safe. Afghanistan is dangerous. Iraq is dangerous. Maybe physically. But I'll tell you the safest place in the world is the center of God's will. It is. If I live in the center of the will of God, I'm absolutely safe wherever I am because nothing can hurt me. He who does the will of God lives forever. He doesn't fear death because he's ready to meet the Lord anytime and he knows that he cannot die before the Lord opens the door. It's a tremendous assurance. I want to know that. I live in a world full of sickness. Anybody can get the flu. Anybody can get cancer. Do you know that even people can get AIDS without any sexual relationship? Just if some nurse puts an unsterilized needle into your vein, you can be absolutely living the purest life and you can get AIDS. It's that easy. We live in a dangerous world. There's terrorism. You don't know where a bomb will go off. How are we going to live? How are our children going to live? How is it going to be when you die and your sweet little children grow up and they're going to face a world a hundred times worse than yours? It's like we sing in that song, because Jesus lives, our children can face tomorrow. That's why I say to you, you better teach your children to trust in Jesus. You give them education. You give them food. You give them clothing. You give them so wonderful. Praise God. You're a good father. You've got a good mother. But if you haven't taught them to trust in Jesus, I tell you, you're a total failure as a parent. You've only taught them how to make money, how to live clean, how to wear good clothes, how to be stylish, how to follow those models who dress immodestly on the television screen and in the advertisements. And you haven't taught them to be holy and follow Jesus. I will say without any hesitation, you're a total failure as a father and mother. I don't care if your child is getting a hundred thousand rupees a month. You're a total failure. They won't be able to face the future with a hundred thousand rupees a month. I'll tell you that. But if you have Jesus, if the Holy Spirit raised Jesus from the dead, he said, my permanent address is that person's heart. Boy, you have done the greatest thing you can do for your children. Teach them to be quick, to acknowledge sin. Teach not to blame others. All this habit of blaming others. My dear brothers and sisters, everywhere in the world, you go, you'll hear it. It's true. I'm not saying they didn't make mistakes. Don't you think Eve made a mistake in giving Adam that fruit she did? But what the Lord doesn't want us to concentrate on that. That's not what I'm saying. I'm not saying you should pretend that people in the world are not making mistakes. No, they are. They're making thousands of mistakes. They may be worse than you. But I say, don't concentrate on them. When Isaiah chapter five, Isaiah went around saying, woe is so-and-so who gets drunk and woe is so-and-so who exploit poor people and woe is so-and-so who live in sin. He was absolutely right. But in Isaiah chapter six, that was chapter five. In chapter six, he says, I saw the Lord and he says, woe is me. That's what happened. This guy was saying, woe is so-and-so, woe is so-and-so, and he was absolutely right. When he saw the Lord, he says, woe is me. My tongue is bad, he says. And I live in the midst of people who speak bad things with their tongues. He didn't say, oh, they are all pure and I'm sinner. That's not humility. That is stupidity. I don't have to say, well, everybody else is holy. I'm so sinful. That's rubbish. Everybody else is also sinful. But I see my own sin. Maybe your wife is sinful. So what? What about you? Maybe your husband is sinful. True. What about you? That's the point. We don't have to pretend that other people are more spiritual. You know, some people read that verse in Philippians chapter two, verse four, which says, consider other people as more important than yourself. They misread it. And they, I mean, Christians misread most verses in the Bible. They misread it as consider everybody as more spiritual than yourself. Then even Jesus didn't obey that. Did Jesus go around saying, oh, Judas Iscariot is more spiritual than me. Peter is more spiritual than me. Did he say that? I'm following Jesus. I don't have to go around saying, oh, that brother is more spiritual than me. That sister is more spiritual. No, that sister is carnal. What did Paul say about the Corinthians? Oh, you fellows are more spiritual than me. No, he said, you're all carnal. I'm spiritual. And he was one of the humblest apostles. Don't think humility is to believe that everybody is more spiritual than you. That's a lie. And God doesn't ask you to do that. He says, consider them as more important than you. That means wash their feet. You're the servant because you're more spiritual. Read scripture carefully. So we see ourselves. Teach our children to see ourselves. And keep the Holy Spirit can be there. The Spirit that raised Jesus from the dead. They purify our mind, sanctify our emotions. We got control over our emotions. Anger, boy, that's an emotion. Just like joy is an emotion. You got to get into the control of the Holy Spirit. There's no other way to control it. No one can control the tongue, it says. You can control. You know, James chapter 3 says, you can tame a lion. You can tame an elephant. You can tame a tiger. But you can't tame your tongue. Absolutely right. If you put your tongue in a zoo, somebody will come out. You can't keep it there. The lion will stay there. The tiger will stay there. But your tongue will just slip through the cage and come out. You can't tame it. It's not possible. That's how it is. But the Holy Spirit can. He can control. It says here, he'll give life to our mortal body. The parts of my body. Think of the amount of death that comes into my mind through my eyes. Can you just think for a moment about the amount of spiritual death you have received into your mind just through your eyes. Forget every other member of your body. Just these little eyes. The amount of spiritual death that has got into your mind through the eyes. And forget about before you're a believer. After you became a believer. It's massive. It's like asking the lady who collects the garbage to come and dump it all in my sitting room. Why carry it around? Dump it in my sitting room. Next day she comes along with more garbage. Here, bring it in. Bring it right in. We got piled up here. And your house stinks like anything. Nobody will be so crazy. Nobody will ask a garbage truck to come and dump the garbage into their sitting room or even into their compound. The eye is a gate. You decide whether you open it or not. You can open your gate and allow the garbage truck to come and dump all the garbage in your compound if you like. When it's passing by, you say, come. Come right in. He doesn't force his way. And it's just passing by the road. You say, hey, stop. I want some garbage in my house. Come and dump it here. You open the gate. The eye is a gate. You open it. You open it when you go to the internet. You can take good things also. The eye is a gate from which you get good things. Or you can dump a lot of garbage. You know who can control it? Only the Holy Spirit. You can't do it. You think you can control your tongue? You can't. But the Holy Spirit can. When it says he'll give life to your mortal body, this is my mortal body, a body that brings, mortal means dying, capable of death. It's just going to go down into death, death, death, death, death. But the spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead, it says in Romans 8, 11, can give life to this mortal body so that I can live holy according to his name, which is Holy Spirit. I think most of you heard the story of the man who came to our church some years ago and said to me, you know, he was from some other Pentecostal church. He said, you don't have the Holy Spirit here. I said, why? Have you lived in my home? Have you seen how I handle money? Have you seen how I talk to my wife? How do you come here and decide that? Oh, you don't make enough noise here in this meeting. Oh, noise. I said, that's the difference. My trinity is father, son, and Holy Spirit. Your trinity is father, son, and noisy spirit. That's the difference between you and me. We worship a different trinity. Sorry. Our trinity makes us holy, not noisy. We make noise, sure. But holiness, noise without holiness, the prophets of Baal could make that. On the Mount Carmel, nothing happened. Holy Spirit comes and makes us holy. Gives life to our mortal body. I'll tell you some other thing. When we get this type of life into our eyes and our tongue and our mind, it affects our body. Any doctor will tell you that if you're always the anxious, nervous type, there's a sort of a nerve that gives you ulcers in your stomach. Yeah, it's true. It didn't come because you ate something. It's because you're always tense, tense, tense, and anxious. How is that? How can a man with tenseness and anxiety get ulcers in his body? Because the mind affects the body. And then there are doctors. There's a lovely book called None of These Diseases by Dr. MacMillan. I read that. Amazing. He's a doctor, a Christian doctor who went around treating hundreds of patients. And he gives example after example after example of a lot of people who could not be healed with hundreds of tablets and hundreds of injections. Surgery could not heal them. They got healed when they forgave somebody. When they got healed, when they got rid of that bitterness against somebody. Can bitterness cause you sickness? Read that book. I'm not a doctor, but that chap gives case histories of people who got healed, never got healed with all their tablets. He gives one example of someone who got healed because somebody else was in competition with them in business. And that person got some of the customers of his business. They got so bitter against that person, he got sick. That fellow didn't get sick. This chap got sick. You know, the one who has done harm to you, he's healthy. It's you who are bitter against him who gets sick. It looks a bit unfair. The fellow who should harm you, he should get sick. No, no. It's you who are bitter against him. You're the one who gets sick. What does that prove? It proves that to be bitter against somebody is worse than whatever harm he did to you. That's what it proves. He did some harm to me. That's not so bad. But I got bitter against him and I got sick. So mind affects the body. There are a lot of sicknesses. In fact, in a lot of these healing meetings, many people are healed of psychosomatic illnesses. That means illnesses that have come due to a wrong attitude towards people. They are healed, but they would have been healed even if they didn't go to those healing meetings, if they had just changed their attitude to somebody. I mean, this Dr. MacMillan, he didn't conduct healing meetings. He just went around telling people, forgive people, forgive them, let them go, release them. Somebody borrowed something from money from you and didn't pay it back. Okay, you asked him, asked him, he doesn't return it, forgive him, release it. He says, there are people, he says, you can't get any sleep at night. Have you had experience where you toss around in bed, toss around in bed, thinking of somebody who hurt you? The guy has even robbed your sleep. Look what power he has over you. Don't let those people rob your sleep. Now the reverse is also true. That's what I wanted to come to. If bad attitudes can bring sickness into our body, when the Holy Spirit makes our mind pure and our emotions controlled, it affects our body. We become healthier. We become healthier. I'll tell you that. I've experienced it numerous times in my life. We become healthier when we decide we're going to live according to the law of love. I'm going to love God with all my heart and I'm going to love other people as I love myself. I'm not going to keep a bitterness. I'm not going to live with suspicious thoughts. So-and-so is like this and she's like this and he's like this and get sick. I want to ask you, my dear brothers and sisters, please, please, please listen to me. There are many of you who Christians, you've heard these things from me for years, but you still haven't got rid of the habit of blaming others, criticizing others, finding fault with others. And you are right. Like Isaiah, when he said, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, he was right. They were all wrong. But he needed to see what was wrong with himself. God didn't tell Isaiah, oh, all those other fellows are right. No, they were wrong. Isaiah, you're right. What you say is right. They're all wrong. And I say to you, all those fellows you speak something wrong about, they are wrong. I agree with you, but you're destroying yourself because you're concentrating on their problems. Why not change your vision, change your focus and vision to Jesus and see his glory and see your own need. You'll be a hundred times better person and a hundred times healthier. You won't need so many pills and injections. I tell you, it's true. The spirit of him who raised you, that's the significance of the resurrection. One day, the Bible says, look at this lovely verse. When Jesus comes again, what's going to happen to this body of mine? Oh, it's really beautiful. It says one day, Philippians three, the last verse 20, verse 20, our citizenship is in heaven from which we are waiting for the savior to come, Jesus Christ, our Lord. And he will transform our bodies of humble state. It's humble state means it's so prone to sickness, so prone to sin, so many things. He'll transform it and make it in conformity, just like his, the body of his glory. When he raised up, when he was raised from the dead, he got a new body that sin could not touch, sickness could not touch. He could pass through a wall with that body. There's a scientific explanation for that. I won't waste your time telling you how there's a lot of empty space inside, atoms and all that, so it's possible to go through. Anyway, besides the point that, the point is the Lord will give us power. It's going to be a fantastic body, free from all sickness and everything else. And by the same power with which he made everything subject to himself, the power of resurrection. And many times when I'm sick, I'll tell you what I do. Even if it's a headache or a fever or something more than that, I say, Lord, tell me, is it not from you? Sickness is not from you. Why have you allowed me to get it? I mean, 80% of sicknesses we get because we live in a world under the curse. There are thorns, there are, the flu going around is not necessarily because you sinned. It's because we live in a world under the curse. But sometimes there could be a reason. And that's what I want to find out in those 20% cases. When I say, Lord, is there some reason? And once I've cleared my conscience and my conscience is clear, there isn't any reason. Then I say, Lord, either heal me. Or if you think this is a sickness I need to keep me humble, like Paul had a thorn in the flesh till the end of his life, then give me something better than healing, which is grace. Some extra grace, which I wouldn't have had without this. That's what Paul got. One of the two. I'm not going to let you go without one of these two. You either heal me or give me that extra grace, which Paul got because of his sickness. I'm not going to sit back and say, okay, I'll accept it. No. One of the two. I mean, if the Lord wants me to live with a sickness all my life, fine. But I'll ask for extra grace then. Sufficient for every need, including the power to conquer that limitation that comes due to a sickness or anything. Grace, grace. Oh, tell me, would you prefer grace or healing? I'd say grace any day. But I'd also like healing too. Why not? The way I say it, I say, Lord, this body is one day going to get your full resurrection body. Can you give me a little drop of that right now? Just one drop of resurrection life. I can't get the whole bottle to drink it up, but one drop of resurrection life, that's healing. That's the reason why we can ask Jesus to heal us also. Keep your conscience clear, humble yourself, and say, Lord, if you don't heal me, you've got to give me grace. Yeah. Don't let the devil rule you. Don't let the devil get power over you. But make sure you stop blaming others. Make sure you stop complaining and say, Lord, I submit to your way. I want to look at Jesus. I want to follow you. Let everybody around me be evil. What can I do? I can't do. I hope they'll be better, but I'm not going to be like them. Let everybody around me murmur, complain about others. I'm not going to be like them. I want to see. I've got enough problems with myself to bother about trying to complain about others. I want to help them, not blame them. We're not called here to judge the world. We're not called to blame. We're only called to bless and love others in Jesus' name, like we sing in that song. He did not come to judge the world. He did not come to blame Jesus. He did not only come to seek. It was to save he came. And when we call him Savior, we call him by his name. See, this is what the resurrection life of Jesus does to us. We go into the world not to judge anybody, not to blame anybody. We get the spirit of our Savior. We realize that everybody is in sin. They are in sin. I am in sin. Maybe they are a little deeper in sin, but I'm also in sin. There are things in me which I still need to overcome. I'm not yet totally Christ-like. There are pits I need to climb out of. So if I can climb out a little, let me do that and help other people. If I can help a man out of his pit, fine. But to say, go to a fellow and tell him, listen, by the way, just for your information, your pit is a hundred feet deep, okay? How does that help him? You go to somebody else and say, your pit is 150 feet deep. How does that help him, man? What's he's going around telling people that? I mean, if you can lift the fellow, I'll do it. But to tell your wife or your husband, you're just like your father. What's the point saying that? What can she do if she's like her father? You're in a 500 foot deep pit. Your father was there, you're also there. Jesus never did that. If you can help the person out, help him out, don't measure the depth of the pit and give him that information. That's no use to him. But that's what a lot of people are doing. You're like this and you're like that and that person is like this and the other person is like that. What about you, brother? What about you yourself? Why not allow the power of Jesus' resurrection? He came to save the world. He did not come to judge the world. He did not come to blame. I love that chorus. He did not only come to seek, it was to save he came. And when we call him savior, we call him by his name. I thank God he didn't come to judge me. I wouldn't be standing here if he had judged me. I'd have been finished long ago. He didn't come to blame me. If he had come to blame me, I would have got so discouraged. I've never come anywhere near him. He didn't even only come to seek me. He came to save me. And that's why I call him savior. And that's why, and when I open my life to his spirit, I go forth into the world seeing so many wrong things, but I've got the spirit of my savior not to judge, not to blame, not even to seek, but to save. Now, Jesus operates through me, through you. Isn't it great? It's wonderful. He wants to use you, my brother, sister. I love the stories in the gospels where he would never do a miracle on his own. Have you noticed that? He could have turned empty water pots into wine, full of wine, but he didn't do that. He told the servants, you do one thing, pour the water. I'll turn it into wine. Let's do it together. When he wanted to feed 5,000, he could have created bread from nothing. Agreed or not? But he didn't do that. He did it from nothing. Nobody would ever share in it. Ah, you little boy, you 10-year-old boy. Did your mommy give you some lunch? Yes. Give it to me. Takes it. And think of the excitement that boy had when he went home and said, do you know, mommy, today Jesus and I fed 5,000 people. Jesus and I. Uh-huh. Mother wouldn't even believe it, but it was true. You know what Jesus and you can do to thousands of people if you give your all to him? What about raising Lazarus from the dead? Did Jesus do it on his own? He told the people, you can't raise the dead, but can you roll away the stone? Okay, you do that. I'll do the difficult part. You know, I like that. What about when the disciple's net was filled with fish? You cast the net. I'll fill the fish. Every miracle is like that. That's why he says, trust me. You do something. You just trust me. That's your part. I'll do the miracle. He always wants us to cooperate. And our part is so little. And the picture I've had in my mind sometimes is if I'm carrying a big coffee table or something from one room to the other and say, my little three-year-old son comes to me and says, dad, let me help you also. I say, yeah, yeah, I need your help. Just hold that corner. And he holds the corner. And now I have to be more careful that he doesn't bump against something. But I'm giving him the privilege of being my coworker in carrying this table. And I take it to the other room and he's so excited. He says, mommy, you know, daddy and I carry the coffee table to the other room. I love that. The privilege and honor Jesus gives us. We do almost nothing. We touch one end of that, some work of his, and we think we've done a great thing for him. I'll tell you what the Lord spoke to my heart today from the Bible. It's really humbled me. 1 Corinthians 15. 1 Corinthians 15 we read. It's a great chapter on the resurrection. And I want to read it to you from the message translation. 1 Corinthians 15, we're going to start from verse 12 onwards. Now, let me ask you something profound and yet troubling. If you became believers because you trusted the proclamation that Christ is alive, risen from the dead, how can you let people say that there's no such thing as a resurrection? If there is no resurrection, there is no living Christ. He's dead like all the other religious leaders in the world. That's what makes Christianity different from all the religious leaders in the world. And that's why some religions, after they heard about this, they say, oh, our leader also ascended from the dead, rose from the dead and ascended to heaven. Rubbish. Christ is the only one who rose from the dead. And let's face it. If there is no resurrection for Christ, then everything we told you is smoke and mirrors or rubbish. Not only that, but we would be guilty of telling you bare faced lies about God and all those things we passed on to you, verifying that God raised up from Christ. It is all fabrication if there's no resurrection. You know that the whole New Testament truth depends on one thing. Jesus rose from the dead. If he didn't rise from the dead, there's no Christianity. If dead people can't be raised, then Christ was not because he was dead. And listen to this. If Christ was not raised from the dead, then all that you are doing today, all that you Christians are doing is wandering about in the dark as lost as ever. It's even worse for those who died, hoping in Christ and the resurrection because they're in their graves. And listen to this. In a lot of Christian preaching today, by the way, they say, allowing Christ, you can live a little better, you can behave a little better, your neighbors will respect you, et cetera, et cetera, which is all true. And you know, like I said today, you can be a little healthier, you can be free from sicknesses. It's all true. If all that we get out of Christ is a little inspiration for the few short years on this earth, then like it says here, you are of all the people in the world, most miserable, most to be pitied. That means you see that poor leper with the hands and legs all eaten up, nose eaten, you pity him. You are more to be pitied because you believe that Jesus rose from the dead and he didn't rise from the dead. Of all the people in the world, all the religions in the world, the true disciple of Jesus is the most to be pitied if Christ did not rise from the dead. He's the worst of the lot. He's living in a delusion. He's like a person who got a drug and he's on a high. He's living in a delusion because Christ was not raised. He says, this is so important. But the truth is that Christ was raised from the dead and he's the first in a long line of those who are going to leave their graves in the cemeteries and come out. And then it says how Christ is going to put everything under his feet. And it says here in verse 29, he won't give up until, sorry, verse 26, he won't give up until the last enemy, that is death, will also be abolished. And he's put everything in subjection under his feet. And listen to this. When he says everything is subjection under his feet, it excludes God the Father, of course, that means everything other than God the Father. Christ is going to move around, bring everything today in the world. Everything is not under Jesus feet yet. Potentially it is because he won it on the cross and the resurrection. But he's gradually bringing everything in subjection to his feet. And one day it says here when everything, the last verse 28, when everything and everyone is finally under God's rule because Jesus came and did that. You know what Jesus is going to, this is the part that spoke to me today. The son, having done this fantastic work, will step down and take his place as a man with all of us standing there showing that God the Father's rule is absolute. That really broke my heart. Forbid it Lord that I should boast, save in the cross of Christ my God. You know all the empty things we boast about. We think we are so clever, we are so smart, we're so good looking. We try to, or we are more spiritual, or we are so gifted, or God has used us here or used us there. Anything that makes us feel superior to other human beings and the world is full of people who are always trying to show that I'm one step above you. Even people who take titles like reverend and right reverend and all that. I'm not like you, I'm one step above you. And in other ways, sometimes in your conversation, you boast about how smart your children are and what ranks they came to school. And you know all these wicked wretched thoughts the devil puts in our mind just to prevent us from getting God's grace, because God gives his grace to the humble. I really spoke to my heart, here is Jesus. Now picture this in your mind, Jesus came down, died, rose again, spent 2,000 years now bringing the whole world in subjection and does this fantastic work saving so many people from hell. And when everything is done and all the millions of people are saved, are standing there before God, he steps down and stands with us just like another man and says, Father, you're everything. Can you do that? When you've done a fantastic work for God, or you've done a great job raising your family, or you've done so many wonderful things, can you step down from all of that and say, God, you're everything. That was the secret of John the Baptist's life. He must increase and I must decrease. Why was he the greatest man born of woman? Why did Jesus call him the greatest man ever born? What made him great? Did he come out looking different when he was a baby? Was his weight heavier? No, it was an attitude which no other human being before him had. They had it, but not as much as him. Oh, Jesus must increase and I must decrease. People must not look at me, they must look at Christ. Why do you think when some of you try to get a little attached to me, I push you off? You understand now? Some people have misunderstood that. There was a brother who was not in our church now. He came to my house once and I said, I don't want you to come here again till you have gone and appreciated the other brothers in the church. I don't want you to lean on me. I'm just another brother. It'll hinder you from your relationship with Christ. I'm here to help you, but I don't want you to be attached to me. I want you to be attached to Christ. I don't want you to look at me because that'll destroy you. Dear brothers, humble yourself. There's tremendous power available with God, fantastic power. Ephesians chapter 1 says the greatest power, it's towards the end, verse 18 to 24, the greatest power that God manifested in this universe was when he raised Jesus from the dead, greater than creation. And he says that power is available to you and me. I want it. I believe Jesus rose from the dead and I believe he rose for me and that spirit that raised him from the dead is in me and it's going to raise me from all the death I got in my mind, emotion, body, eyes, tongue, everything from my Adamic forefather. It's all going to go because I've been drafted into Christ. Praise the Lord. Let's bow our heads before God and let's open our beings to this wonderful Holy Spirit. Let's open our beings completely, my brothers and sisters. It is so simple. Humble yourself. Let's bow our heads in reverence to God. Let's close our eyes and concentrate on Jesus alone here in front of you and say, Lord, I want to open my whole being to you. Forgive me for blaming others. Forgive me for finding fault with others. Help me to see you and see myself in the coming days. And Lord, forgive me for my sin. I see myself as filthy, corrupt, thinking I'm so spiritual, but I am so filthy and corrupt compared to and so proud when I see the way you are willing to humble yourself and become nothing before your father. Oh God, have mercy on a proud, conceited snob like me. How easily I think I'm superior to other believers and others in the church and think I'm somebody just because God used me or because I've been a believer for some years. Lord, forgive me for this conceit. And Lord, please help me to go down. I know now I haven't got grace. I know now why I'm not the type of Christian I should be, but I'm determined, Lord. I want to be what you want me to be. Work in my life, Father. And Lord, I humble myself today. I confess my sin, especially the sin of blaming others and finding fault with others in my own home. Forgive me. Cleanse me right now in the blood of Jesus. There is power in the blood to cleanse me. Lord, I believe it. Help me, Lord. And I want to be filled with your Holy Spirit, the spirit that raised Jesus from the dead. I want that spirit to come and make its permanent address in my heart. And I want him to clarify my thinking, discernment, give me purity in my mind, my heart, my eyes, and my tongue. And Lord, I believe you'll heal my body too. Keep me healthy so that I can serve you. Lord, I believe you'll do more than we ask or think because you're such a good God. Thank you, Father. In Jesus' name. Amen.