God Is Eager to Bless You Especially

Praise the Lord, I'm so happy that you all could come to hear God's Word this morning. There's a verse I'd like to begin with in John's Gospel, Chapter 1. When we ask the question, why did Jesus come to this earth, we can say that he came to die for the sins of the world, which is correct. But here is another reason, which is very important, which I feel that many Christians don't understand.

The theme for this conference is a spirit-filled family life. A family life begins with each person in the family being controlled by the Holy Spirit. To be filled with the Holy Spirit means to be controlled by the Holy Spirit.

So at least if the adults in the family, the father and mother, are filled with the Holy Spirit, that's what Jesus came to give us, then there can be a spirit-filled family life. And you know what will happen? The atmosphere of your home will be the atmosphere of heaven. All of you, I want you to think of that.

Can you imagine what your home will be like if it is the atmosphere of heaven there between the father and mother? That's enough. That will influence the children. That's been my passion for many years, but when I got married, I did not know this spirit-filled life.

I was born again, and I was sincere in wanting to be a good husband, but I did not know this spirit-filled life, the life filled with the Holy Spirit, which would bring heaven down. You know, like we sing in one song, heaven came down and glory filled my soul. We sing all those songs, but it's not true in many homes.

But as I studied the Bible, I discovered that the Holy Spirit has come to bring the atmosphere of heaven down into my heart and to bring the atmosphere of heaven into my home. It took a while for that to be fulfilled in our home, but it is true today, where we never raise our voice at each other, never get angry and upset, never blame or criticize, and always ready to humble ourselves and love one another and forgive one another. Because we make mistakes.

As long as we are on this earth, we will make mistakes. We will not cease making mistakes until we reach heaven. I don't believe I'm going to be perfect until Christ comes again, but I'm not going to be in the kindergarten forever.

If perfection is like getting a PhD, when we are born again, we are in the kindergarten. The great tragedy is many who enter the kindergarten remain in the kindergarten for 20, 30 years, and it doesn't disturb them. If your child is in the kindergarten even for two years, you'd be disturbed.

Why is it so many Christians are spiritually in a kindergarten for 20, 30 years and they're not disturbed? It teaches us one thing. Education on earth is more important to them than their spiritual life. If their spiritual life was as important as education, they'd be disturbed if they are in the same level spiritually year after year after year.

Even if you have progressed, you come to say third grade, how long do you want your son or daughter to be in the third grade? Not more than one year. Every class that our children go to, we don't want them to stay in that class for more than one year. We are concerned if they have to stay even two years.

Think of Christians who are in the same class for 10, 15 years. For example, the class of forgiving others, which we spoke about yesterday. How long are we going to sit there to learn to forgive everyone? One year? Two years? Ten years? How long have you been a born again believer? 20 years? And you still haven't learned to forgive everybody? My dear brothers and sisters, I'm not here to rebuke you.

I'm a sinner saved by the grace of God. I'm not better than anybody here. God has been very good to me and he's opened my eyes to see things which harm me and tells me to get rid of it, an unforgiving attitude.

God showed me that it's hurting me. You know how you see children sometimes getting into alcohol and drugs and you know it's hurting them but parents sometimes are not able to convince their son, this is bad for you, my boy. And they go at it and it grieves the heart of the parents and you see them being ruined with their alcohol and drugs.

It's exactly like that that God looks at a son of his or a daughter who won't forgive somebody. It's better to be on alcohol and drugs than to be unforgiving. Do you believe that? Alcohol and drugs may ruin a person's life but he can repent finally at the end of his life and go into the kingdom of God.

But if you live with an unforgiving attitude and you die like that, I can tell you without a doubt, you will be in hell for eternity. I'll tell you why. Because Jesus said in Matthew 6.15, if you do not forgive others, your heavenly father will not forgive you.

That is talking not about God, it's talking about your heavenly father. It's a born again Christian he's talking to. Matthew 6.15, never forget it.

If you do not forgive others, your heavenly father will not forgive you. Matthew 6.15. And if you die in that state without being forgiven, supposing you die without forgiving somebody, what's going to happen after you die? Hebrews 9.27 says, it is appointed unto men once to die and after this the judgment. I'm not trying to scare you.

I'm trying to help you. Just like you want to help your drug addicted son not to ruin himself. I'm trying to save you.

There is no place, there's no purgatory like some people teach or some place afterwards where after you die, somewhere God will forgive you. There is no forgiveness once you finish. It is appointed unto men once to die and after this is the judgment.

That's why everywhere I go, I tell people, forgive people now. Is it such a difficult thing? And if you find it's a difficult thing, meditate on the wretched sinner you were and how God forgave you. When I think of people who have hurt me, and many people have hurt me, particularly because I'm a servant of the Lord for 60 years now, I know I'm the target of, I've been the target of the devil for 60 years as a servant of God.

And particularly because I preach God's highest standard, I'm a greater target of Satan. And he, Satan doesn't attack me directly, he attacks me through people. There are many ways in which Satan has tried to attack me.

But God has always been my defense. He's a wall of fire round about me and the glory in the midst. And I want to say to you, my dear brother, sister, very lovingly, these are serious things that we talk about in scripture.

God loves you and that is why he tells you. Some things are painful. It's a doctor who loves you, who uses a knife on you when he's operating you to remove a cancer.

It's the same knife that a murderer uses to kill you, but there's a difference. When God uses something sharp, it is to do an operation on you to deliver you from something that will destroy you. How willingly we submit ourselves to a doctor on the operating theater, you see him with his knife.

You even pay for him to use the knife on you. Can you imagine paying a murderer to kill you? You use, you pay that mad doctor to use a knife on you because you trust him. That knife is going to deliver you from your cancer or from some other sickness in your body.

If you can trust a human being, a faulty human being, and even pay him money to use a knife on you, isn't it a shame that we don't trust God when he uses a discipline on you, a discipline is his knife, brings you into a trial because that's the only way he can deliver you from some bad habit, some wrong attitude. A trial is like a knife, like a knife of a surgeon. Are some of you facing a trial today and you think that God doesn't love you? An ignorant, illiterate man looking inside an operating theater will wonder, what is this man doing with his knife cutting open somebody's stomach and he'll say he's a murderer because he's ignorant, he's uneducated, he doesn't know what an operation in a theater is like.

And that is how many believers are. Why does God allow this trial in my life? He doesn't love me. Let me turn to John's Gospel, Chapter 1, please turn with me.

Why did Jesus come? To die for the sins of the world, yes. But here's another wonderful reason that has been a tremendous blessing to my own heart. Many years ago the Lord said to me, listen to all the sermons that whenever you opportunity you get to hear what all the preachers in the world are preaching and I've done that.

I've listened to many, many preachers and then the Lord said, read the Bible and compare the two. But the Bible teaches, I must really know the Bible thoroughly and I've studied the Bible carefully for 67 years. Every day I've read it for 67 years.

I've studied it carefully and the Lord says, now compare that with what you hear and see all the things that are missing in what people preach, number one. And then see the things they preach which are not in the Bible is to use an illustration. If you give a coloring book to a child, say a picture of a man in a very colorful dress and you give the child the different colors, there's a picture of how it should look like and the picture without the colors and you tell the child, now you look at those colors and put it here, this color of the shirt and this color of the trousers and this color of the face and this color of the hair and you know how children are.

We always go outside the borders and don't put the proper colors sometimes. And it's completely different from what is the original painting on the other side. This is the portrait of God that is presented by many preachers, completely different from the Bible.

And I discovered so many areas and as I have preached that and exposed corrupt, false Christianity, which is called Babylon in the Bible, many Christians have called me a false teacher. I said, fine, I'm following in the footsteps of Jesus who was called not only a false teacher but the prince of devils. So that never disturbed me because I have a clear conscience before God and I've never taken money for my services.

I've never received a salary in 60 years of Christian work. I refuse to do it because Jesus never received a salary to serve God, the Apostle Paul never received a salary to serve God and because God, Jesus said, there are only two masters in the world, not God and the devil, God and money. So steer clear of that other master.

So I want to show you something which, some of the things which I've discovered. For example, here it is. Why did Jesus come to earth? He came to die for the sins of the world, John 1.18. He came to explain to us that God was a loving father.

No one has seen God in any time. None of us has seen God. And so we have all types of ideas about God which are all completely wrong.

You know, I've often used this example. If you go to some country where there are no elephants, where nobody's ever seen an elephant, India, where I come from is full of elephants. Even a child would have seen an elephant in his young age.

But there are many countries where there are no elephants. You have to go to a zoo to see it. And there may be some zoos where there are no elephants there too.

Now if you go to that country and they've seen, a person, a child who's seen so many animals, even a teenager who's seen so many animals, say, can you draw a picture of an elephant? They'll never think of drawing a long nose, which they call the trunk. Nobody, because no animals like that. They'll never be able to draw a picture of an elephant if they haven't seen one.

And this is how it was when Jesus came to earth. No one had seen God at any time, it says here, verse 18. No one has seen God at any time.

And yet there were so many religions on earth. People who had never seen God, trying to explain what God is like. People who had never seen an elephant, trying to draw a picture of an elephant.

Everyone is wrong. This is the world into which Jesus came. And no one has, and Jesus came and explained it.

What about today's world? No one has seen God at any time. The only person who walked on this earth in all the 6,000 years of man's history from the time of Adam was Jesus Christ, who came from heaven, who could explain exactly what the Father is like. And that is what we read in the Gospels, and which is later explained by the apostles in the epistles.

But yet, many Christians who read the Bible, many who say they are born again, have not seen what God is really like. Many Christians have the idea of a God who is a very strict, hard, demanding God. He asks me to give up many things I enjoy, or many things I love.

A wrong picture, the aim of the devil, is to portray God in a wrong way, because then he can make you sin. So remember this. The way to avoid sin is, first of all, to see what God is like clearly.

Turn with me for a moment in your Bible to Genesis chapter 3. This is the place where sin originated in the human race. And notice how the devil approaches Adam and Eve. We can learn lessons from this chapter.

He begins by saying, has God really said this? Those are the first words that he said to Eve. Has God really said this? There are many Christians who ask me that question. Is it really? Do we really have to do that? Does the Bible really say that? And even after I show it to them in Scripture, they won't take it seriously.

I tell you, every one of you sitting here, this is how the devil is going to approach you. Has God really said? Has God really said that you must be like this? Has God really said that if you don't forgive everybody and die, you'll be lost eternally? Really? Has God really said that? It's there. It's plain in your Bible.

And Matthew is the very first gospel. It's there. But they still have to ask, has God really said? Please remember this all your life, whenever you're tempted to doubt the Scriptures.

That's the way the devil began. Has God really said? Has God really said that you cannot love God and money at the same time? A lot of Christians think you can. But Jesus said it so clearly.

If you love money, you cannot love God. People ask me, has God really said that? And even if I show it to them in Scripture, they won't believe it. It's tremendous, the power, the work the devil has done.

And a lot of Christians who think, we're wonderful Christians. Some people even call themselves spirit-filled. And the devil is able to deceive them outright.

So please remember this. The very first word that the devil spoke to Eve is the origin of sin. To portray a wrong picture of God.

First of all, to question His Word. Has God really said that? Even though you read it. Eve didn't have a written statement from God.

Saying don't eat from this tree of knowledge of good and evil. It's spoken to them, Adam and Eve. We've got it written.

And still, the devil comes and says, has God really said that? Has God really said if you don't forgive others, God won't forgive you? Has God really said you can't love God and money? Has God really said that there is only one way to the kingdom of God that is through Jesus Christ and His death on the cross? Did Jesus really say that if you don't take up the cross every day, you cannot follow me? Let me repeat that. Did Jesus really say in Luke 9.23 that you have to take up the cross and die to yourself every day to follow Him? It's there. It's in your Bible.

If anyone wants to come after me, Luke 9.23, let him take up his cross daily. You took it up yesterday? Good. It's not good enough for today.

Let him take up his cross daily and follow me. What does take up the cross mean? Die to yourself. Die to your choice and choose what God wants you.

And that's where the devil says, no, God doesn't want you to have the best for your life. You choose what is good for you. The great conflict in our mind is my will and God's will and we don't realize that God's will is the best.

You can see that in your children when they are small. You know something that's good for them and you tell them, do it like this. They think you don't love them.

Think especially of teenage children. If you have difficult teenage children and you know what is good for them and you know what is going to harm them and you tell them don't go that way and don't be with those friends, they think you hate them. And you know that they are destroying themselves if they go that way.

But they can't see it. Look at yourself. That you're like a teenage child when it comes to God and his word.

So often we can see faults in others. We don't see it in ourselves. Exactly like your rebellious children are, maybe you're like that towards God.

And maybe you're reaping in your children the way you've treated God. Is there a solution? There is a solution for the worst criminal on earth. If he turns to Christ, he can become the greatest saint.

That is my belief in the power of the gospel. The worst sinner and criminal on earth cannot just get converted and go to heaven. He can become the greatest saint before he goes to heaven.

That is the power of the Holy Spirit. From the deepest depths to the greatest heights, he can lift a man. This is the gospel we preach.

It doesn't matter how low you have fallen. Let me ask you a question, if you've read the Bible. When Jesus rose from the dead, it was the beginning of a new creation.

Jesus was the first man of this new creation, which we call being born again. We are born once, that's the old creation, as children of Adam. And now we are to be born again as children of God.

And the first person who demonstrated what the new man is going to be like. You know what type of body we are going to have in eternity? The type of body Jesus had when he rose from the dead. Today in our body we've got flesh and blood and bones.

In the new body, there'll be no blood. Did you know that? In heaven you'll have a body without a drop of blood in it. Because Jesus, when he rose up from the dead, there was no blood in his body.

All his blood was drained out on the cross. And the soldier pierced him. Every drop of blood.

There was not a single drop of blood in Jesus' body when he rose up from the dead. He appeared before his disciples. You can read that when you get time.

After his resurrection. And Jesus told his disciples, look at me. You think I'm a spirit? A spirit does not have flesh and bones like I have.

He didn't mention blood. A spirit does not have flesh and bones like I have. He had flesh and bones before he died.

He had flesh, bones, and blood. And he said we're going to have a body like that when Christ comes again. So Jesus resurrected from the dead was the beginning of a new race.

This is what heaven is going to be populated with. People whose body is like the body of Jesus risen from the dead. It is the beginning of a new creation.

The Son of God was initiating it. Now, wouldn't you have liked to see a video of God creating Adam? I would have loved to see it. A video of God taking up mud and shaping and breathing.

Wow. I know I couldn't be there myself, but if I could see a video of it, I'd be excited. What about, wouldn't you have loved to be at the tomb to see Jesus risen from the dead? I've asked myself, if God were to ask me, who do you think should be the first person to see this new creation? The first person to see Jesus risen from the dead? I would say his mother Mary.

She suffered so much being accused of having an illegitimate child because nobody believed that she was a virgin and was pregnant by the Holy Spirit. And she suffered that shame all her life for the sake of Jesus. Surely, Lord, she should be the one to see you, to have that honor.

Or perhaps, one of your great apostles is going to be the leader, Peter perhaps. And who do you think God chooses? Not Mary, his mother, not Peter. He looks for one of the worst sinners, a prostitute, demon-possessed person, who was converted and says, she's going to be.

Not even a man. Men think they are more important than women. But a man was not the one who saw Jesus first.

It was a woman who saw Jesus. Sisters, be encouraged. It was a woman who saw Jesus first after his resurrection.

You sisters are important to God. That's what he was teaching. In Jewish history, men despised women.

Have you noticed in the genealogy of Jesus, in Luke chapter 3, Mary's name is not even mentioned. Why is that? He's called the wife of Joseph. That is how Jewish people despised women.

And Jesus came into such a society and exalted women. Many of them went with his disciples as his followers. And Mary Magdalene, prostitute, demon-possessed, was the first person who saw the risen Christ.

What an honor. That showed me the heart of God for sinners, for the worst of them. That encourages me.

Jesus didn't come for holy people. He came for those who recognized that they were sinners. He came to explain the Father.

We read that. The Son of God explained the Father. So in a simple act like the first person to see him at the resurrection, he explained what God is like.

God does not despise women. God does not despise sinners. God does not despise prostitutes.

God does not despise demon-possessed people. Mary Magdalene was all that. She was a woman, she was a prostitute, she was demon-possessed, you name it.

She made money through sex. God did not despise her. Not only forgave her, but gave her the honor to be the first person, first human being to see the resurrected Christ.

And there Jesus explains what the Father is like. All the wrong pictures that people have about God get eliminated in my mind when I see Jesus and how he treated people, how he cared. Let me give you another example.

Turn with me to John's Gospel, chapter 5. When we talk about a spirit-filled life, you know what the Holy Spirit will do? He will make you like Jesus. You will never despise sinners again. You will never look down on someone who has failed miserably in their life.

Maybe a prostitute, demon-possessed, you will never despise such a person. You will never think women are inferior to men. Never again.

If you have seen Jesus. There are many churches where women are treated as inferior to men. There are many churches where they look down on terrible sinners.

I've heard in the, you know, John Wesley was a man who preached holiness. Very godly man. He started the Methodist Church.

But every church gets corrupt by the time it goes to the 2nd or 3rd generation. So after John Wesley died, after the 2nd or 3rd generation, there was a Methodist Church in England. And there was a man there called William Booth who had a great burden for the prostitutes and despised people in society and wanted to bring them to Christ.

As a young man, he had a burden. And he would bring some of these sinners, sinful women, to the church to hear the gospel. And all the others would move away from the edge when that sinner came and sat there.

All the other so-called holy people. And they told William Booth, don't bring such people here. The church is for holy people.

Really? Church is for holy people. Those are the greatest sinners sitting there who despise other sinners. So you know what William Booth did? The Methodist Church would not accept sinful people.

What is there as a church for it if you don't allow sinners to come and listen to the gospel? He said, okay, then I'll start something else. And that's how the Salvation Army started. Thank God for people like William Booth.

But every movement gets corrupted as time goes on. What was started in great godliness, whichever church it is, what starts with some godly man who's desiring to preserve a pure testimony for Christ, by the time it comes to the 2nd or 3rd generation, it's corrupt. And you see that even in the gospels.

Turn to John chapter 5. We read that Jesus went to Jerusalem, verse 1, and it was the time of the feast. But before he went to the feast, he went to a pool called Bethesda. Jesus was led by the Holy Spirit.

It's amazing how many things in Jesus' life. It's a wonderful example to me how when he says, follow me, and I really take up the cross every day, die to myself and follow him. That's just the negative part of it, I have to die to myself.

The positive part is, I can experience the leading of the Holy Spirit just like Jesus was led. And here is one example of that. Before I go into this, I'll give you another example.

When Jesus came to Jericho, you read that in Luke 18. The Holy Spirit, as he came to a particular street, the Holy Spirit said, take the turning on the left. See, Jesus was so much in touch with the Holy Spirit, why did the Holy Spirit tell him to take that turning on the left? To take that street? Because, down that street, there was a wretched, sinful tax collector called Zacchaeus, who had a heart to turn to the Lord, who had climbed up the tree.

And if Jesus had gone another way, he wouldn't have seen him. But the Holy Spirit saw that. He saw a sinner, a terrible sinner, who was despised by everybody in the town as a rich tax collector who took bribes and all that.

But the Holy Spirit knew he had a heart that wants to turn from this bribe-taking and money-loving way. And so, he wanted Jesus to go that way. And when Jesus walked down, at a certain point, the Holy Spirit said, stop.

Look up. In the tree, there's a man sitting there. And the Holy Spirit, speaking to Jesus, his name is Zacchaeus, tell him to come down.

Go and stay in his house today. Oh, I want to listen to the Holy Spirit like that. Wonderful.

Do you know that the Holy Spirit can lead you like that? To people who are lost, people who are despised by others, whom you can lead to Christ. You can live a worthwhile life on earth if you have a spirit-filled life. I have longed for that when I saw this.

I said, Lord, lead me to different places like that. And I can tell you how the Lord has led me to different places in India, different places in the world where we can start a church. Now, I did not know there were people there in that place who would start a church.

It's amazing how God has led. The same Holy Spirit who led Jesus Christ can lead you to a worthwhile life on earth. I lived as a born-again Christian for 16 years.

Born again, forgiven, on my way to heaven, but not knowing how to be led by the Holy Spirit. Till one day, God baptized me in the Holy Spirit, immersed me in the Holy Spirit 51 years ago, changed the direction of my life. That's not the day I got my salvation.

I got my salvation 67 years ago. I was born again. I was on my way to heaven.

But I did not know how to be led by the Holy Spirit to different things in life so that I could live a useful life on earth. It's not enough to go to heaven, brothers and sisters. Before you go there, please do something for the Lord.

And you cannot do something effective for the Lord unless you are led by the Holy Spirit. And the Lord says, I will fill you with the Holy Spirit. What is the qualification you need? You need to be filled.

You need to have a thirst. Okay, Jesus was led by the Holy Spirit, and this particular time He was led when He went, there was a time of a feast in Jerusalem it says in verse 1, but the Holy Spirit led Him before you go to the feast, go to the pool of Bethesda. And He went to the pool of Bethesda, verse 2, and there was a multitude of sick, blind, lame, withered people waiting for the moving of the waters.

Because it says in verse 4, an angel of the Lord, this is the mercy of God for that particular people that at certain seasons, an angel would come down and stir up the water and whoever jumped into that water first would be healed. Only one person. There's a multitude waiting there hoping that that would be their turn to jump in and be healed.

And whenever the angel came, which is only in rare occasions, the first person who jumped in said, they all wait for the angel to come. And they knew it was always at a certain season. And there'd be a big rush there, but only the first person who jumped in got healed.

You can see the picture that's in your mind, people waiting at the edge of the pool to jump in and waiting. And Jesus goes there and He walks up, He bypasses all the people lying there, and He walks up to one man lying all by himself on one corner who had been lying there for 38 years. Imagine waiting 38 years to try to be the first to jump into the pool.

Lame! Forsaken by his parents most probably. Lame! Begging for food. Hoping, I hope next year at least I can jump in first.

Can you imagine how frustrated you are when you're trying to get healed of some sickness for 38 years and not healed? Hoping some doctor will cure you, some surgery will cure you and 38 years people who suffer for one year begin to get worried. Imagine a man, 38 years the Holy Spirit said to Jesus, go help that man. I say, Lord I want to be like that.

I want to be sensitive to the Holy Spirit because there are needy people I don't know where they are but I pray you will lead me to them. And I've been so encouraged in the, particularly in the last 50 years how the Lord has led me to individuals and to groups of people without any ability on my part the Lord has raised up these churches, new covenant churches around different parts of the world because God led. And so when Jesus came there and saw this man lying down he asked him a question.

Do you really want to get well? If you get well, you can't just be lying here and be begging. You get up and get healthy, you've got to go around helping other people. It's a question the Lord asks us also.

Do you want to be freed from sin in your life? Every one of us will say yes. If you're freed from sin in your life you cannot live for yourself anymore. You cannot live to make money.

I'll deliver you from sin's power in your life but then you've got to live for me. You can't live to make money there. You can't live for your own honor or fame.

You'll have to serve others. You'll have to serve the church. You want that? Many people haven't thought of that.

Do you want to get well? Because if you get well you can't lie around here and be a beggar. If you're born again you can't sit around like other nominal Christians. And the sick man says, it's always depending on some man can help me.

Nobody's here to help me. Whenever I try to go somebody steps in before me and I miss. I always seem to miss out on God's work.

Somebody here feels like that. You always feel you're missing out. Other people give fantastic testimonies of God met with them and God did this for them.

But you seem to be missing out. You say, Lord, what's wrong with me? I hear people testifying of amazing things they experience with the leading of God in their life. I seem to be missing out on that.

Why am I not filled with the Holy Spirit? Today's your day, brother sister. God wants to meet with you in this conference. Don't say that somebody else steps in before you.

Today the water is being stirred not just for the first person who jumps in. Everybody can jump in and be healed. Everyone can be filled with the Holy Spirit.

Everyone who came for this conference can be spirit filled if you're willing to pay the price. You know how you desperately want to get something for your home and you go to the store and they say, boy, it's too expensive. You got the money but you don't want to spend it.

That's how many people turn away from the Holy Spirit. You desperately need that item for your home. It'll make life so much easier for you.

Some gadget, maybe a washing machine or something rare which will make life easy for you in the kitchen or somewhere. You say the price is too much. Even though you have the money.

In these earthly things it doesn't matter. But in spiritual things also there's a price to be paid if you want to be filled with the Spirit and have a useful life like other people around you. God picks up.

My temperament is not something that's outgoing and reaching out to people. Even now I'm not really free from that inward looking type of life I have, introverted. That's my basic personality.

I was born like that. But yet the Lord has used me in spite of that to help people to come to the Lord and even to be filled with the Holy Spirit. Because he doesn't look for natural outgoing qualities.

There are some people who are very outgoing. Easily make friends and then slap people on the back and say hi and all that. But they don't seem to bring people to Christ.

It's got nothing to do with human personality. You may be the most reserved, inward looking, introverted person and God can fill you with the Holy Spirit and make you a mighty witness for Christ. The answer is to be filled with the Holy Spirit.

It's got nothing to do with your personality. Even if you've been lame for 38 years like this man. And Jesus went up and healed him.

He picked up his bed and walked. And Jesus went away. What about all those other hundreds of people lying there? Do you think Jesus could have healed all of them? Sure.

There were hundreds of people lying around that pool. And Jesus goes to one man and heals him and walks away. I don't know why.

But I know God never makes a mistake. There could be some reason. Maybe I'll understand it only when I get to heaven.

But till then I believe what he did was right. And so often I preach this wonderful gospel that can lead everybody who's listening to me to forgiveness of sins and to a spiritual life. And yet most of them go away without receiving it.

And I say I don't know why. I wish everybody at the pool of Bethesda would get healed. But one person gets healed and the others don't get.

And I wish everybody in a conference would be filled with the Holy Spirit and their life would become flaming witnesses for Christ thereafter. But it doesn't seem to happen. But it does happen for one here, one here, one there.

There must be a reason. With God there is no partiality. There is no partiality with God.

The most impartial person in the universe is God Almighty, our Heavenly Father. He doesn't prefer somebody because of their race. Or He does not look down on certain people as saying I don't like that race of people.

Human beings are like that. They look down on certain people because of the color of their skin. Or because they're not so educated or intelligent.

Or because they're very poor. Or because they are homeless people. God doesn't look down on anyone.

But when He selects certain people and does things for them that He doesn't do for others, there's always a reason. Remember, He's not partial. If you can believe one thing, God is not partial at all.

He doesn't pick somebody just because He likes something in them or arbitrarily. There's a reason. He gives people plenty of chances to be free from the sins that burden them.

Have you ever thought of this one thing? When you read the Bible, please meditate. Would you ever appoint a crook, a known crook, to be the treasurer of your church? You know who did that? Jesus. You'd say how dumb He is to make a crooked man.

No, if you didn't know He was crooked, it's another thing. A Jesus who could see people through and through. There's a great verse in John chapter 2 which says in verse 24, wonderful verse, Jesus did not entrust Himself to certain people because He knew what was inside them.

He did not entrust Himself to certain people because He knew what was inside them. He did not need anybody's testimony saying this man is good or this man is bad. He knew what was inside man already.

And who does He select to be His treasurer? The biggest crook among the twelve, Judas Iscariot. Would you do that? God says in Isaiah 55, My ways are not your ways. I have to always humble myself when I look at Jesus and say Lord, there are many things about you I don't know.

And that's what's helped me to understand God more. I go to Him almost every day and say Lord, I don't know your ways. Even though I've been a Christian now for, I was born again 67 years ago, I still say Lord, I don't know your ways.

Teach me. Every day I go to God like a little child and say Lord, teach me. I don't understand.

I don't know. I'm asked to speak and I say Lord, I don't know what to speak. Will you please tell me? I'll speak whatever you want me to say.

I won't be afraid of any man. That I'll promise. I will not seek to please man, but tell me.

I don't know what to say to these people. I don't know what their need is. And Jesus will lead everyone who seeks Him.

And I find throughout scriptures like that, that He, why did He give the money treasuring the treasury bag to Judas Iscariot? You know, people voluntarily gave money to Jesus and He said, give it to Judas. Judas will put it in his bag. I'll tell you why.

He wanted to save Judas from that corruption in his heart of the love of money and from his crookedness. He said, let me give him plenty. Let me give him plenty.

Let me save him from this love of money. Sometimes He does that today. He gives people a lot of money to save them from the love of money.

But like Judas, they accumulate it and love money even more. Has God given you money? It's to save you from the love of it. That's why He gave to Judas Iscariot.

But He didn't get saved from it. Zacchaeus, he got saved from it. You know, when he met Jesus, he said return to that passage in Luke 17.

Whenever you read the scripture, you must meditate on it, not just, sorry, not Luke 17, Luke 18. Sorry. I'm getting old.

Luke 19. My mind is not as, memory is not as sharp as it used to be. Luke 19.

He told Zacchaeus in verse 5, hurry up, come down, I want to stay in your house today. And all the people grumbled in verse 7 saying, he has gone to be the guest of a man who's a sinner. Because Zacchaeus had cheated so many people in that town.

He had a reputation as a sinner and Jesus goes to the home of a sinner. I love that. I say, Lord, make me like you.

Don't lead me to the holy people, only. Yeah, Jesus spent time with the holy people also, like Peter and James and John. But he also went to the house of sinners.

Lord, make me like that. And I want to say to every believer here, don't just mingle with the holy people. Help the sinners to come to Christ as well.

Don't just mingle only with, oh, I'm always with the holy, godly people in town. That's very important. But care for the lost.

Jesus came to seek and save the lost. And so, he didn't allow those sinners to corrupt him, but he went there to help them. And so, even in the whole town, called Zacchaeus a sinner, Jesus said, I'm going to not only visit him, I'm going to stay in his house.

I say, Lord Jesus, make me like you. You pray that prayer, Lord, make me like you. This is how he was.

And have you ever understood what is the meaning of this verse? He's walking with Jesus. Whenever you read the Bible, use your imagination. Picture it.

I like to think in pictures. I see Jesus walking with Zacchaeus. Everybody making fun.

This guy's going to this sinner's house, and then as they come to the gate of Zacchaeus' house, it says, Zacchaeus, stop. When I read that, I meditate. I'm teaching you how to study the scriptures.

Zacchaeus stopped, and I say, why did he stop? Then as I read the rest of it, I understand. He said to the Lord, Lord, half my goods I'm giving to the poor. Why does he have to say that? Jesus never said anything about money to him.

And if I've cheated anybody, I'll give back four times. Why did he say that? I'll tell you. Let me expand on what is not written here.

Zacchaeus stopped and said to the Lord, if I were to expand his words, Lord, you want to stay in my house, right? This is my house. You cannot stay here. This house was built with corrupt money.

I cheated people, and I got money and built this house. How can a holy person like you come and sleep here with me, sleep in my house tonight? I've got to set certain things right so that this house will be cleansed before you come and live here. I'm expanding the words of Zacchaeus.

I didn't have much money, but I became a tax collector and I became a millionaire. That's how I built this house. So everybody whom I've cheated, I'll go to their house and not just return what I took from them, I'll calculate at the highest rate of interest and pay them back four times what I stole from them.

And by the time Zacchaeus had gone around paying everybody and the news got around, a lot of people would say, I wish Zacchaeus had cheated me too. I would have gotten back four times today. He returned four times what he took from people who cheated.

When you cheat somebody, how much do you return? Just the amount you cheated? Or do you calculate the interest for the two, three years that passed by from the time you cheated him? Zacchaeus was wholehearted. And just, he was so lavish. I'll pay them at a very high interest rate and give them back four times what I cheated from them so that I can make up for my cheating them so badly.

What a large heart he had. And he had just been converted. And then he says, there are a whole lot of other people whom I don't know their address.

I cheated them so many years ago, they moved house and I don't know where they are. What shall I do? Shall I conveniently forget about them and say, Lord, I don't know their address so I can't return it? No. I cannot keep one cent in my bank account that does not belong to me.

That's what I decided when I got converted. I will not have one cent in my bank account that is not righteously earned. And so Zacchaeus said, I'm not going to get away with that just by saying I don't know where their address is.

But that cannot be in my bank account. I will take all that money and give it away to the poor so that there's not one cent left in my bank account which is not righteously earned. And that's what I tell people today.

Somebody once told me in one of our brothers, in one of our churches, that he had got some money unrighteously from somewhere and there was no way to return it to that organization. I said, I'll tell you what. It was a huge amount of money.

Some hundred thousand dollars or something. I said, put it in the offering box. We don't give to the poor today.

In the Jewish society, they gave to the poor today. We give it to the church. If you have cheated anybody and you don't know where they are today, don't conveniently forget about it.

Take that money. It should not be in your account. It will never bless you.

It will be a curse to you to keep money that's not righteously earned. Put it in the offering box. Preferably return it to the government if you stole it from the government or to people you took it from.

Otherwise, put it in the offering box. And he did that and the moment he did that, clear. He said, now Lord, you can come to my house.

It's clean. And Jesus said some words to him which he never said to anybody else that we read in the Gospels. Read the statement in verse 9. Today, salvation has come to this house.

Read through the Gospels and see if Jesus said that to anybody else. He didn't. He said it to one man who was publicly known as a sinner but who decided to set everything right, particularly in the area of money.

I want to ask you, is anybody here like Zacchaeus who cheated others? Even a one dollar, borrowed money, not returned it? You want Jesus to say about you and your family? See, when Zacchaeus took a stand, even his family got blessed. Salvation has come not to Zacchaeus. It has come to the whole family of Zacchaeus.

Verse 9. When you take a stand for the Lord, your whole family will be blessed. I've seen that in my home. Salvation has come.

Do you want the Lord to say that about you? Salvation has come to you and your home? Set things right. Ask forgiveness from those whom you have hurt. Forgive those who hurt you.

Return money that you borrowed which you have not returned till now. Return money that you got wrongfully by cheating, cheating the government or cheating people. Humble yourself and ask forgiveness.

I did that. Before I was converted, I cheated the government of India of money. I was a naval officer and used to go and get a whole lot of things without paying duty on it.

And I calculated all that in this four-month salary that I had to return. And I didn't have it immediately. I collected, collected that money and one day, I went and emptied my bank account and gave it back to the government.

My heart was full. My bank account was empty. My heart was full of the joy of the Lord.

Many years later, the Lord told me, if you had not done that at that time, you would have had a chain on your leg that you would have been dragging around and you could not have run the Christian race. I thank God I got rid of that chain so that I could run the race. And it's been a wonderful race I've run the last 67 years.

It's been such a blessing in my life. You know, you think that I'm naturally gifted to speak and all. It's not true.

I was the most introverted, reserved, silent person in my class when I was in school. They all mocked me when they say, hey Zack, you're going to go to the military and defend our country? I can't believe that. That's how they mocked me.

And it is such a person God picked up to preach His word. Because it has nothing to do with my human personality or temperament. When God fills you with the Holy Spirit, you're turned into another man.

You're turned into another woman. And that's what God did to me when He filled me with the Holy Spirit. And I want to remain like that even today, empty of myself.

When Jesus said, take up the cross, you know what the cross does? It kills everything of Adam. That's what taking up the cross does. Everything I got from Adam, put it to death.

I want every part of me, all of that replaced with Christ. That's what Paul said. I'm crucified with Christ.

Adam has been killed in me. Everything I inherited from Adam is gone. Now it is no longer I, but Christ that lives in me.

If Paul can say that, you can say that, I can say that. But it is only possible if you open every part of your being to the Holy Spirit. Spirit filled life.

That's why he says you've got to take up the cross because the cross puts everything else to death. God wants you to have everything in you which is part of the resurrected life of Christ and there is no resurrection without death. You know why many people don't experience the spirit filled life which is the resurrected life of Christ? What is the spiritual life? It is the resurrected life of Jesus Christ.

But you have to share in his death to get that resurrection. There is no way to get to resurrection without death. You bypass death, there will be no resurrection.

It's the resurrected life of Christ that he wants to impart to us through the Holy Spirit. That's what God wants to give you and everything I read in the gospel is like that. When you read the scriptures, dear brothers and sisters, meditate on it.

You read just now for example I explained to you how Zacchaeus paid back everything. If you had meditated on it anything I told you today would not have surprised you. Why did he give four times to people? Interest.

And to make them happy that they got much more interest than they got from the bank. Why did he give half his money to the poor? Did you ever think? I thought about it and that's how I got the answer. Because there were many people whose address he didn't have.

They changed their addresses and location and he didn't know how to return it and he did not conveniently forget about it. He said, no, I can't forget about it. I've got money in my bank account which is not mine.

If I can't give it to them, I'll give it to the poor. I'll put it in the offering box. That's how we learn something when we meditate on scripture.

But if you don't meditate on scripture you don't hear what it is saying to you. So a little thing I want to teach you about how to study the scriptures. I believe that God wants every single person here to be filled with the Holy Spirit.

We don't want a theme for the conference saying the spirit filled family life. And you not experience that when you go away. I really pray you will open your being to have not only be filled with the spirit yourself but that it will lead to spirit filled family life.

I've taught in our church that the church is a three-story building. The foundation is the loving father who we know as our heavenly father. You've got to start there.

On top of that we have the first story, the first floor is our personal life with a good conscience. You heard about that yesterday. A life with a perfectly clean conscience.

As soon as my conscience convinced me of something, I said it right. Cleansed in the blood of Christ. On top of that is the second floor which is our family life.

How we lift our wife, how we bring up our children. On top of that is the church doing God's work. Now you cannot build the third floor without building the first and second floor.

That's why I told you about keeping a good conscience. I'm trying to help you build a three-story building where you can be a servant of God in the church. Start with a good conscience and then your relationship with your wife and children.

Then we build the church and our service for God. And every person sitting here, even you young people, you can be a servant of God to do some work in part of his church, to build his church. Think about that more in the succeeding sessions.

Let's pray. Please bow your head before the Lord. And just for a brief moment, think about something you heard today.

Maybe just one thing or more which the Lord spoke to you. Some area where you've got to change and God will help you to change. That's the good news.

Whatever area it is, the Lord will help you. My brother, sister, believe it. It doesn't matter even if you're like Mary Magdalene.

Sinful, prostitute, demon possessed, it doesn't matter. He can change you into a spirit-filled servant of his. Just believe him.

Heavenly Father, I pray that you will encourage everyone whose head is bowed here that not one will think that their case is impossible. Nothing is impossible with God. Thank you, Father.

Encourage everyone here. Let this be a life-transforming weekend for every person who's come. A weekend they'll never forget.

We pray in Jesus' name. Amen.