Introduction

Holy Spirit – Joseph

The Bible tells us how to be continuously filled with the Holy Spirit, so you may become like Joseph and Elisha.  

Me – Even Now

1. The saved believers are set free from sin (Revelation 1:5)

1) John 8:32 

2) 1 John 3:5 Jesus took away our sins

3) 1 Corinthians 15:3 Jesus died because of our sins

4) Matthew 1:21 Jesus saved us from our sins

5) Hebrews 1:3 Jesus cleansed us from our sins

6) John 5:24 Jesus changed our status

Healing, Liberation

Your diligence cannot save you from your sins.  Even on Friday nights, churches do a lot of strange things, poking people in their eyes and pushing people over, they’re doing everything they can, and because some churches don’t allow that, they’ll go to big churches and people are doing strange acts, and they go to these places where you can scream and yell out, “Lord, Lord!” But on Sunday they go to their own church, meaning they’re not content.

People who have spiritual problems are not living their life being continuously filled by the Holy Spirit, so they have to scream and yell. There are even people who, after eating a meal, say they’re not filled, so they keep eating. If you live your walk of faith like this, what will happen?  So, in order for you to receive the filling of the Holy Spirit in your right mind, you must know what healing and liberation truly are.

2. What is the sin of the believers?

People know the word “sin,” but they call things “sin” even though it might not be, because they don’t know what “sin” really means.

1) Disbelief (Mt. 16:22, 17:14-20, 29:69-75, Jn 21:15-18)

Unbelief is the biggest sin, so they call people out on their sins without recognizing their unbelief, so you have to recognize that you don’t believe in God and come out of that, but individuals don’t know this, that they don’t believe in God, so they say a bunch of different things.  Then, not being filled with the Holy Spirit, their discontent drives them to follow the things of the flesh.

2) Anxiety, Lazy (Mt. 26:41)

Then people become anxious and lazy.  These are similar because they’re both weaknesses.

3) Carnal thoughts and physical life (Gal. 5:16, 19-21, 1 John 2:15-16)

Having carnal thoughts is a sin, but you call other things as sin.

4) Jealousy, humanism (Mt. 18:1-5, Eph. 4:25-30)

If we decide what is sin or not, many things can be considered sins.  If a pastor is not able to be a pastor, that is the greatest of all sins.  If an elder cannot be an elder, that is the greatest of all sins.  If a lay leader is raised to be a lay leader by God, the sin would be that they are not fulfilling their role.  But people think they can do whatever they want, following the ways of the world, and that’s their state. In order for God to raise you as a lay leader, God will give you the filling of the Holy Spirit and do His work through you, but if you’re not on this path, you’re on a different path, and that’s a sin; you must repent of that, there’s nothing else for you to do.

5) Self-attainment (Proverbs 14:12)

Instead of living for God’s purpose, you try to live for yourself, you keep trying to depend on people.

6) Dependence on people (Mark 6:39)

Relying on people instead of God is a sin, and for you to not do these things, you must believe in God, but the sins you have against people, whether it’s ideological or common sense, there are even unbelievers who live a clean life.  However, there is a sin the Bible talks about that precedes all sins.  Unbelievers can call the visible sins as “sins,” so you must really know what “sin” is.

7) Mysticism (hypnotism, superstition, divination, illusions, visions, mind control, meditation, etc.)

Thinking God is mystical is a sin.  Sin means, not going down the proper path, but going astray from that path.  Then, if I accurately follow after and believe in God’s Word, I will receive the filling of the Holy Spirit.  

(1) These problems may not disappear even with the assurance of salvation, knowledge of the principles of the Word, and self-training

Why?  It’s because of sin, because if sin remains, unbeknownst to me, I will keep going astray.  We can’t count up all these things, we can’t do this, and we sin without even knowing what sin is.  We call things as “sin” even if it’s not, because we don’t know what a real sin is, so that’s why we need the filling of the Holy Spirit and to acknowledge our limitations.

If you don’t know what real sin is, you won’t receive the real filling of the Holy Spirit.  Right now, if you talk about your identity, if it’s not within the filling of the Holy Spirit, it will be hard to carry it out.  If you have been anointed with a position in the church, you can’t leave. You say you repent, but what are you repenting about?  This isn’t something we can’t count, so we say that we can never do it.  I think this is the beginning by which we can go into the filling of the Holy Spirit.  

(2) Such people may not experience God because they are limited by themselves.

You have to be able to deny yourself, why? Because I came out of Genesis 3, out of sin, and I’ve become seized by Satan, going in the direction Satan desires.  That’s why you ask for the filling of the Holy Spirit of God.  For example, when students continue to study but they study without God, that’s a sin, but parents don’t know this, so they say, “It’s a good thing,” and according to the world, it looks good, but according to God, it’s a bad thing, why? Because people go towards the world, and they go further from God.

Then what will happen if you don’t correct them? Then they will be the same when they become adults, doing work that is irrelevant to God.  But they don’t know that this in itself is the wrong thing. When they grow up in their walk of faith, they think sin means “not stealing” or “not doing bad things to other people.”  They take this very low-class thing and try to do their walk of faith, but it doesn’t work out.

Before I do any work, I must believe in God because if I go outside of this, I can’t live except for what Galatians 5 teaches us.  You have to acknowledge this for you to realize why you need the filling of the Holy Spirit and why you must surrender to God.  

3. Being filled with the Holy Spirit is the only way to overcome these problems.

The statement, “Be filled with the Holy Spirit” is in present tense.  This means to continue receiving the power of the Holy Spirit, why is that?  Because if you don’t, you rely on the flesh.  If you ask for it, will you receive it?  He promised to give it to you, so just pray for it. If He didn’t promise it, He wouldn’t give it even if you asked.  So before you start praying, you must understand who you are.  You have to have the conclusion, “I cannot do this with my own efforts.”  For people who come to this realization, you realize why you must pray.  If they do not come to this realization, they try to do it with their own efforts, so they have no prayer for the filling of the Holy Spirit.  

This is such an important concept.  If you don’t understand why you need the filling of the Holy Spirit, you’ll do it with your efforts and do all these programs like prayer retreats in the mountains.  What does that mean? It means if you have a limitation, you go to these special places; you have no choice but to do these things, but you must be able to see your limitations every day. What will happen if you see your limitations? Then you will rightfully pray for the filling of the Holy Spirit.  That’s the most important part of our walk of faith. You must realize why you need the filling of the Holy Spirit through the gospel for you to pray.  We naturally live a life without this, but take every moment to go back to this and pray.

1) We must entirely rely on the Almighty, perfect God and cast out our anxieties and doubts. He never errs. He is omnipresent, omniscient, and omnipotent.

You must realize that you need only God, because only then can you lay yourself down to truly trust in God and entrust your life to Him, then this time becomes a very happy time for you.  If you’re not happy with this, you won’t be happy, because where does happiness come from?  It won’t come.  Whatever you’re thinking of isn’t happiness.  Your happiness is found when you entrust yourself to God.  If you’re able to believe this in your life, you will receive true happiness and joy.

He is omnipresent, He is everywhere, and He’s omniscient, there’s nothing He doesn’t know. He’s omnipotent, there’s nothing He cannot do.  So if I go into Him, because He is such a God, I can entrust myself.  We have limitations, we cannot transcend time and space, but God is the One Who can work, transcending time and space.  He is the one who can do everything, and I am enjoying this time.  That’s why your prayer time is a happy time.  You have to have this time of happy prayer for you to continue a life of being filled by the Holy Spirit

2) He must completely become our Lord.  Jesus being the Savior is different from Jesus being the Lord.

To say that Jesus is the Master means He is the central focus, pulling my life along. If He is your Savior but not your Master, what will happen? You become the master of your own life, and that’s why you cannot continue receiving the filling of the Holy Spirit. 

3) Through prayer, we dwell with the Lord and are freed from carnal thoughts, egoism, avarice, humanism, and mysticism.

Through prayer, I entrust everything to the Lord, all my thoughts, my ego, my greed and avarice, everything.  The fact that you emigrated to America means you have this greed.  Even if you came running from someplace, it’s because you couldn’t get rid of your greed. You came running here; you could’ve stayed in Korea, but instead, you have this greed to try to make something in a new land, but you cannot.  What’s not working out?  There are people who may be successful in work, but their life isn’t working out.  Unbeknownst to me, the life of Galatians 5:19 keeps coming back into me. I keep causing division, I keep fighting with people and generate factions, all this envy comes out of me. 

I have envy and keep getting drunk, and I can’t help it.  Then when I get drunk, I spend all my money and don’t give offering.  This is how people live their lives, so they have orgies because they’re not content with their families.  Everyone is turning their eyes to others, why? That is mankind.  Apart from what is good or bad, that’s what mankind does.  Even people who point their fingers do the same things.  Legalistic people stand and say, “I’m not like that,” but you actually do something else.  You crush other people, but you elevate yourselves.

All people have no choice; everyone has to know their weaknesses and pray for the filling of the Holy Spirit.  This is the wise person, but if you live your life not knowing this, you’re not wise.  Why? Because you live not knowing what will happen in the future.  As they come to live, they see the things they read in the Bible coming to life.  So your work isn’t going well and you’re facing limitations? That’s how unbelievers live, they’re completely seized by one thing.  They just look for things that work out, that’s it for unbelievers.  

Unbelievers only look for successful work and money, things that benefit themselves, and all the things that come out will generate stress and turn into cancer. While you’re young, you might be able to bear this, but as you get older, you get weaker and it turns into things like cancer, right?  Because ever since you were young, you had a scar passed down through your family line, and without knowing this, you will pass this to the next generation.  Because they don’t know who they are, they spend energy on incorrect things. 

I’m thankful to God because I went through a time where I could completely deny myself.  “Deny myself” isn’t in the legalistic sense, “I can’t do it and it has to be God’s Word,” because that’s just knowledge.  When I live and sin, there are things that may come out of me, but even David and Paul considered themselves to be the sinner of sinners.  David even said, “I was born guilty, a sinner even as my mother conceived me,” and David said this even as a king.  Thus, he knew that he wasn’t just a king, he was a sinner, so he realized he had to continuously go towards God.

What happens if you don’t know the fundamental root of who you are?  In Galatians 2:10, Paul says he is a sinner, and he must die on the cross.  It’s not just something you can say, but you must realize that you can’t do it.  You can’t say it’s not working out just because you realize you make mistakes, but you must receive this grace, “I can’t do this.” Without coming to this conclusion, you will say “Christ” but you will do things yourself.  Because you can’t be continuously filled with the Holy Spirit, you will crumble as you do not know who you are.

Denying yourself means you know who you are.  Judging others means you don’t know other people and you don’t know yourself. You must recognize they have no choice but to be like that.

4) We must experience the indwelling of the Holy Spirit through constant prayer (Acts 2:1-10, 41-47)

Unseen to your eyes, God will give this to you. You completely entrust this to the Lord, and the Holy Spirit will capture your heart, spirit, and mind. Pray towards this, as they did in Acts 2 where God worked.  This means you have to continuously have the filling of the Holy Spirit every day.  If you pray because hardship comes, that’s not changing the fundamental person you are.  There’s a hardship and there’s no problem with praying about it, but you pray about the physical aspects only.  

Sin comes from unbelief and thinking badly of others.  This must be healed fundamentally.  You’ve been saved, but you still have no choice.  Quickly go back to God.

5) We must immediately repent and rid ourselves of our sins

4. The outcome of being filled with the Holy Spirit

God will attach people to you who need the gospel, who will do world evangelization. This is a life of someone filled with God.  What happens if you’re filled with yourself?  You live a life where you have no choice but to look at others, “How will this person benefit me?  How can I use this person so I can ascend?” So this blessing of meeting would be cursed, because you’re trying to gain some benefit from someone else, and you have to continuously break this other person down for yourself, so you can gain some advantage.  This happens when you’re filled with yourself.

That’s why when you don’t receive the filling of the Holy Spirit, you can’t work or do anything. When you meet with someone, it’s a blessing, but not because of your skill, but because of the Holy Spirit.  Every meeting is a blessing, is it something I make?  What a blessing it is between a parent and child! Change all your meetings at church into blessings, but if you can’t, what will happen?  When you work, you have to change all your relationships into blessings of meeting. It’s possible only if you go into the filling of the Holy Spirit, but God can do this.

1) Acts 2:5-9, 3:1-12, 4:1-10, 5:1-6, 7:26-41

In Acts 3, Peter saw the crippled beggar in a different way than before.  When you’re filled with yourself, you can only see things physically, so they only saw a crippled beggar who was less well off than they, “He has to beg to make a living,” but evangelism isn’t something you can just do.  Typically, because we’re filled with ourselves, we cannot do world evangelization, and it might work because we resolve in our hearts.  Even when we do camps, we set a designated time and go and resolve to do it, and we think works will arise, but when you go into your normal lives, just because you see things physically, you can’t evangelize.

If you can’t evangelize, it means your life isn’t working out. Isn’t that so? If you had the filling of the Holy Spirit, then every meeting changes into a blessed meeting.  In Acts 4, 5, and 7, you see all these things happen.

2) Galatians 5:22-23

The nine fruits of the Holy Spirit will arise.  These fruits contain the three fruits pertaining to God, so our love for God becomes deeper, and we keep wanting to go into the filling of the Holy Spirit, and we want to praise God.  Then joy and peace will abound all the more.  You’ll have patience, kindness, and goodness towards people.  This isn’t something you can do with your own skill.  

Then there are the fruits pertaining to yourself, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.  Honestly, the word “faithfulness” doesn’t align with people; people only pretend to be faithful because it gives them an advantage, why? Because they’re filled with their own calculations, but the church is a place where you can be faithful.

God is unseen to the eyes, so what are we doing for God?  We do our small acts for God.  When we help the children or evangelize, we do this for God.  Even though God is unseen, you are able to serve the church and the church members.  Absolutely, the blessing will flow down to your children, and this comes only with the filling of the Holy Spirit.

Someone like this has a good work-life.  But if you’re calculating and trying to cut corners, one day, you’ll be found out.  You keep lying and turning around and betraying people? Even I would fire you.  I have to remain there because, for myself and for God, I will go into the workplace, so I am obedient to God.  It’s not so I can just eat and live, but God said He will take responsibility for it, so we are doing it for the Lord.

Then, it’s not my strength, but it is the strength that God gives me.  When a hardship comes, it’s not by my strength, but God guides me.  Then, every day, you are able to look forward to it and be excited.  But if you cannot do this, you’re going to live according to your own self.

Gentleness means you want to continue to follow after God’s Word, to turn your heart to God’s Word.  It is not about memorizing God’s Word, because people can study and gain knowledge, but my life goes towards this direction and follows after that direction.  If I’m not aligned, nothing matters until I’m aligned with God’s Word.  But people who are aligned are obedient and soft because no matter what direction the Word takes them, that’s how they will be.  They don’t determine which way they want; it is God’s Word.

Why are you not aligned with God’s path? Because you want to do what you want, then you will be caught by your limitations.  That’s why when you’re able to receive the filling of the Holy Spirit, you can have gentleness and self-control. Even if you want to do something badly, you’ll have self-control, and God will enable you to have this.

We must have the continuous filling of the holy spirit.  To do this, my reality must be one where I’m completely liberated from sin.  What is sin?  Not believing in God is the greatest sin.  “My teacher said some bad words and I was scarred,” but before this, you’re in sin. You’re talking with words from not believing in God, and these are useless words.  

Knowing this, you must repent, meaning you must turn into the direction of God’s Word, then all these curses will end.  Now, when you ask for the filling of the Holy Spirit, you must believe He is perfect, otherwise I cannot rely on Him.  What’s the result?  You see the works from Acts 2, 3, 5, and 7 where people come to life, and you’ll have the nine fruits of the spirit pertaining to your relationships with God, others, and yourself.

You can bypass everything else and start this today.  If you’ve already been doing this, continue with it.  Where are your thoughts and heart? Are they entrusted to God?  That’s important.

Prayer

Father God, may You work in us with faith so we may have a life that is continuously filled with the Holy Spirit.  In Jesus Christ’s name I pray, amen.