I started this message by teaching on how we can "feel" the presence of God. This is something that happens when we receive His Holy Spirit. Being filled or baptized in the Spirit means that we opened ourselves to His presence and when we have full conscience of God's presence we can suddenly "feel" his presence. This has to be received as a gift from God. People have feelings and when we live far from God we still can have a sense of right and wrong or we can have unexplainable feelings about places, situations or people. We called a "good vibration" or a "bad vibe". This is nothing to compare with the gift of living a supernatural way of life. When you are filled with His Spirit something unexplainable happens.
You know that your life changed and that God is with you. This is the power of faith! There is an invisible way of knowing that God is present or that he is about to act, that a miracle is about to happen or that something dangerous is on our way. The Holy Spirit is not a feeling, He is a person and we can have a sense of his presence! People that don't have God can also have Spiritual feelings, but if you invite God and his Spirit into your life a powerful sense of discernment will start to guide you in your decisions and what used to be "good vibes" or "bad vibes" are now magnified by hundreds and suddenly you realize that God is showing you hidden things about situations, people, your life.
To receive this anointing your need to be filled with the Holy Ghost and fire! if the Word of God is not burning within your hearts, then memorizing Scriptures or perfecting your knowledge of the Bible is meaningless. All your religious activities mean nothing without the fire of God. The Bible said of Jesus that never a man spake like Him. His Words came from His heart, not His head. He had the FIRE!
It is the Holy Ghost that leads God's ministers into certain methods for who they are and what they are called to do. Our methods must be Spirit-led. It is frightening to see that politicly correctness and soft preaching are spreading among the Christian World and many Churches are religious, cold, dead, and even have a business-like style. They're fancy, but Spirit-empty. Money does not equal favor with God. Those who sit in those pews and chairs probably wouldn't recognize the Holy Spirit if He was to appear in Person right in front of their faces.
Isaiah 29:13 (GWT) The Lord says, "These people worship me with their mouths and honor me with their lips. But their hearts are far from me, and their worship of me is [based on] rules made by humans.
In order to understand the Spiritual World we need to become like children. Start learning again; overcome offence; and above all things we need the presence of God. We need to put God First and be filled with the Holy Ghost and FIRE! How can we receive the Holy Spirit? We need to be in the right place and we cannot receive it if we are under a religious spirit . Let us try to understand this a little further.
Aggressive Preaching
When we read the New Testament we find that Jesus and John the Baptist had a very aggressive, sometimes insulting way of preaching. The amount of pejorative words and politicly incorrect words they used is really astonishing. When the religious leaders came down to the Jordan River to meet with John, he greeted them with this, "You snakes, who warned you to flee from the wrath to come?". Jesus by other hands would call the Pharisees hypocrites. The Greek term "hypocrisys" was used in the Greek theatre with the idea of playacting. Jesus' criticism of the Pharisees was that they were "playacting" the part of righteous people. They had a "mask" of holiness but he called them things like,
Matthew 23:27 (ISV) "How terrible it will be for you, scribes and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You are like whitewashed tombs that look beautiful on the outside but inside are full of dead people's bones and every kind of impurity.
We know in the 21st century that is not a good thing to label people. I know that's sort of not politically correct today in a tolerant environment, but it's amazing how many pejorative terms are used to describe people by Jesus and John. Jesus goes to the point of telling the religious folks , "You are nothing but chaff for burning."
So now you know why they ended up killing both John the Baptist and Jesus, because they where speaking the truth in a very aggressive way.
Jesus lived a holy life. He didn't preach righteousness to the crowds and then go about visiting the bars (pubs) and the houses of ill repute (whorehouses), gluttonizing with the profane and rebellious.
We can have two different kinds of Spiritual experiences
FAKE - Human rules and methods - What we today call Religion
REAL - Godly transformation and baptism (infilling) of the Holy Spirit
What kind of life do you want to live? Are you a modern day Pharisee or a godly person? Are you a fake or are you "the real deal"?
Jesus confronted his listeners and describes the people of his generation as little brats.
The Parable of Brats
Jesus shared this parable in Matthew 11:16-19: But to what shall I liken this generation? It is like children sitting in the marketplaces and calling to their companions and saying 'We played the flute for you, And you did not dance; We mourned to you, And you did not lament.' For John came neither eating nor drinking and they say, 'He has a demon.' The Son of Man came eating and drinking and they say, 'Look, a glutton and a winebibber, a friend of tax collectors and sinners!' But wisdom is justified by her children.
John F. MacArthur calls this passage "The Parable of Brats". I kind of like this title because it really captures the essence of what he is trying to tell us.
"We played a flute for you, And you did not dance." (v. 17a) If you truly tried to please someone, it shouldn't matter if they danced or not. If you wanted to play a flute for Jesus, you should be happy that He would listen. He need not dance!
"We mourned to you and you did not lament." (v. 17b) To expect others to mourn for you is selfish and immature. Scripture says: "When I was a child, I did childish things but now that I am a man, I have put away these childish things." (I Corinthians 13: 11) It is like Jesus was saying to the Pharisees or even to some of the leaders and people in this generation: "Stop acting like kids, grow up!"
John didn't drink wine because God called him to take a Nazirite vow not to drink! Because of this, you say he has a demon. Jesus came and said "I drink with my friends. Because I do this, you call Me a drunk! No, I don't fast all the time, so you call Me a glutton! You class me as some kind of pervert because I prefer to hang out with My tax collector friends other sinners. This, you would never do because you piously consider it to be offensive and undignified for it may scar your precious reputation. You have far too high an opinion, about yourselves!"
Wedding Music versus Funeral Music
People reject the Gospel because the style of the messenger doesn't correspond to their expectations. They don't like the "tune".
When Jesus is talking about the dancing to the sound of flute he is clearly making reference to what happened in these ancient days when someone got married.
Apparently at this particular story that Jesus tells they had two games that day they liked to play, one was wedding and the other was funeral. And if you understand anything about life in the world, most of the world for most of human history, weddings and funerals were the premier social events of life. Jesus is pictured in the Bible as the image of the Bridegroom and Church is his bride.
Jesus had a very aggressive way of preaching and this offended the religious crowd. Those that honor God with their lips but have no fire in their hearts are constantly offended by the message of holiness.
The Pharisees had a problem with Jesus because He was not interested in keeping their rigid laws. Pharisees had made up in their wrongful interpretation of the Law. How you interpret the Bible and your opinions can drop your spiritual life in a trap. You cannot come out of a whole without some level of what Jesus called "violence"
Matthew 11:12 (KJV) And from the days of John the Baptist until now the kingdom of heaven suffereth violence, and the violent take it by force.
Jesus used a lot of "verbal violence" because he was filled with the Holy Ghost and fire. He didn't operate in a way that pleased people but his mission was centred in pleasing God and doing God's will. He used aggressive words but displayed unbelievable love to those around him. He had more that just words to show that his message was authentic. Signs and wonders followed him and the number of disciples kept growing.
What is your style of "Music"?
It's so easy to attack the style of a Church or a preacher. There are people who are happy to attack those who preach judgment, preach hell, preach a true and pure gospel message. And they say, "I'm offended by that." Others are offended by the message of faith and prosperity. They will say "I don't believe in that!" Well I personally don't know other Gospel...He came to give us life and life more abundant.
There's a time and an place for the hell-fire-damnation preaching of judgment and warning sinners of the wrath to come. But when they reject the message, believe me, they'll attack the style, but the problem it's not the style, it's their hatred of the message of holiness and separation. People with a fake experience of God will always attack and criticize those that walk in the power of the Holy Ghost. The message of holiness is always attacked by people that fall into the classification that Jesus labeled as "this generation".
When he was mentioning the spiritual reality of his time he used this expression several times. When he said "this generation" he wasn't just referring to people that were listening to him at that point in time, but there is a particular kind of people that get constantly offended with God's messengers. The problem is not the style of the messenger but when the message touches you the blame game suddenly begins.
If you constantly leave the Church services with a feeling that the message was directed at you this is probably a good thing because God loves you so much that he prepared it so that you can know that He loves you, He cares for you and He want's you to separate yourself from the world and follow Him!
What is your Style of Fellowship?
John the Baptist was a loner and associated with nobody. Jesus associated with everybody. Because John associated with nobody they said he's demonic. Because Jesus associated with the sinners, look what they said about Him. "Behold a gluttonous man and a drunkard, a friend of tax gatherers and sinners." You see you couldn't win. If you wanted to play the funeral game, they wouldn't play. If you wanted to play the wedding game they wouldn't play. They're just obstinate, hard-hearted brats, spiritually speaking. John never interacted with people at all. Jesus interacted with people all the time. They said about Jesus, "He's a glutton," of a person, a term indicating contempt. They said He's a drunkard and they said He's the friend of the scum of society, tax gatherers, sinners. Some people are very social and they make friends with everybody, others are reserved and prefer to be alone. Preachers are people and have styles. You may not like the style of the messenger but wisdom resides in understanding the message.
Conclusion - Tune in to a "Good Vibration"!
You criticize John the Baptist because he's no fun; you criticize Jesus because he's too much fun. What should you do then?
We see the same thing today. Take the church for example: people say all the church is interested in is money, or people who go to church are all hypocrites. Most recently, it isn't safe to go to church because all the priests are child molesters. It is a technique of using criticism as a way of avoiding the message of the one you don't want to hear.
Well today I want to tell you the message of the Gospel! Jesus came to reconcile man to God and pay the price for your sin. God loves you and allowed you to be here today so that you will have no excuse to reject his compassion. He gave his only son to die in the cross for you, to pay a price for the forgiveness of your sins and if you give your life to him and decide to abandon your old way of life you will receive Salvation. This is not a religious word or a religious experience but a way of life. If you'll accept him today you can become a new person. There is a new chapter to be written in the book of your life, a New Life of blessing and victory with Jesus by your side.
In order to "tune in to a Good Vibration" we need the Holy Spirit in our lives. Not a fake experience but "the real deal". God gives the Holy Spirit to all of those who ask him.
