 Genesis 24 verse 61, then Rebecca and her mates arose and they rode on the camels and followed the men. So the servant took Rebecca and departed. The Holy Spirit is God sent on this earth to be with us. When Jesus was on this earth, if he would be able physically to see people for 14 hours a day, 60 seconds, he would be able to see 840 people in one day. It will take him 1,190 days to see one million people and to see seven billion people would take him over two million years. For Jesus to attend to every person for 60 seconds on this earth, it would take him two million years. That's why Jesus says, it is better that I go. It is to your advantage that the Holy Spirit can come. Because even if I give you 60 seconds, it's not gonna be enough to answer every question, to meet every emotional need, to fix every relationship issue because many of us, we need Jesus every day. We need Jesus every few hours, we would be calling him. You would not be able to get the kind of meeting with Jesus. The airport in Jerusalem would have been crowded. Every hotel would have been overpriced. It would have been impossible for you to have more than 60 seconds with Jesus. But he says, it is to your advantage that I go. I had the opportunity, me and my wife, when we took a trip to the Skowen, to the ministry of TB Joshua, a prophet, he is a very, very famous and also very controversial man in Africa. And when we went there as a trip, usually at the end of before you go home, TB Joshua will see people one on one. So he will bring him, you would come into his office and it's usually 60 seconds. You have 60 seconds to say something very powerful or like ask him something and that's about it. And then the next person, the next person, because he has to do other things. And so I remember this particular time that we were waiting to see him and I saw the wife of the president of Sudan was waiting before us. So I was like, well, there's no way he's gonna see us. And they actually let her go. They said, sorry, TB Joshua won't see you. He's praying. I'm like, well, if he's not gonna see the wife of the president of Sudan, he ain't seeing Vlad and Lana. That's for sure. And my wife painted this picture of TB Joshua. She's a painter, so she painted the picture of him. So we wanted to just offer it to him as a gift and just honor him. And so we wrapped the picture, gave it to one of his guys and we're like, hey, we know he's not gonna see us for sure. He's too busy talking to God and he let this woman go and the security of this president's wife was mad. They were furious. So we're sitting there waiting for our bus and we get a call and say, hey, the man of God, that's how they call him, wants to see you. We're like, wow. So we go in, I'm quickly waiting for my 60 seconds because I know my 60 seconds, that's all I'm gonna have. And he tells me to sit down. So we sit down, he took a piece of paper, tells me to start telling us about the private jet somebody tries to buy for him. How his daughter is going to school and you're literally starts telling a lot of his personal business and like six or seven minutes go into it. I'm like, oh my goodness, this is most incredible. When we left, people started applauding us. They're like, what did you guys do? Did you offer some money? How did you get a meeting for six minutes with the man of God? I said, I don't know. Till this day, I don't know. You know the best part? He found out that I was going to some kind of a mission trip. He gave me money. I was like, man, six minutes with the man of God can get you so much, you hear so much about him. But honestly, that was the only time I had the meeting with him. And I won't be able to have the meeting again probably because he's so busy. Imagine God, how busy he is. Imagine Jesus, how busy he was. And that's why he tells you, if I would continue to be here guys, you will not be able to, most of you will be able to get a little bit more time. You won't be able to get anything with me for too much. It is to your advantage that I go. I have a good news for you today. Holy Spirit is Jesus Unlimited. The Holy Spirit is Jesus Unlimited. If you think in your mind, if Jesus would have been in this room, could he kill cancers? Could he heal cancers? Without a shadow of the doubt. The Holy Spirit is Jesus Unlimited. If Jesus would have been here today, would he do this or that? Yes, the Holy Spirit is here. And the Holy Spirit is Jesus Unlimited. He has no limits of time. He has no limits of location. He has no limits and no barriers. And this Holy Spirit, he's not a doctrine for us. He is not just something that happened 2,000 years ago or something that came on Azusa Street, 100 years ago. The Holy Spirit is the reality of heaven and he lives in you and he lives in me. Can somebody say amen? Can somebody shout, amen? And I want to tell you something. You were created to live for supernatural. You were not meant just to settle, to live for the religion and the routine. That's why something inside of you always aches for more. That's why a young generation like mine is drawn to the occult and drawn to superstition. And so many things, why? Because you were created on inside to live with that kind of world, the Holy Spirit. And the Holy Spirit is Jesus Unlimited. That's why today as we're gonna pray in the prayer line, as we're gonna pray even in a service, as the sermon or the message is going on, I want you to be open to the Holy Spirit because it's Jesus. You wanna know who the Holy Spirit is? It's Jesus without limits. You wanna know the character of the Holy Spirit? You wanna know his heart? You wanna know what he thinks? You wanna know what he would do in that situation? It's Jesus without limits. Amen. Rebecca followed the servant whom we know to symbolize the Holy Spirit. And she followed him without a map, directions, or navigation. I want you to think of this. The only way Rebecca got to her destination of meeting her husband, Isaac, she only got there because of a guide, not because of a map. We live in today's world where the word of God is the manual for your Christian life. You want to know how to get your life better? Read the manual. And we exalt the word of God. And we should because the Bible says God exalts his word above his name and God's word is so powerful and everything. But I wanna let you know that when Holy Spirit lives in you, you don't just have a map and directions and navigation. You have a guide. When disciples had Jesus, they relied on the scriptures, but they followed Jesus. You don't see disciples walking with Torah and studying about Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. They had God living with them. And so what they did is they walked with Jesus while they relied on the scriptures they led were led by Jesus. The same thing is with you and I. We rely on the scriptures. This is the foundation for our life. But our life is not just led by scriptures. It is led by the Holy Spirit. Jesus didn't say my sheep know my word. He said my sheep, they know my voice. The Bible says that we are born by the Holy Spirit, right? That's how we become children of God. But the scripture says that we become sons of God when we are led by the Holy Spirit. Son means maturity. That means for you and I, there is no maturity outside of being led by the Holy Spirit. If you are led by the Holy Spirit, if you let the Holy Spirit influence you the same way alcohol influences a drunken man, you mature. See, you don't mature by just memorizing how many books are in the Bible. You don't mature by just having more degrees than a thermometer. You don't mature by just having a very huge theological head. Please understand, don't get me wrong. This is very, very important. But maturity, you become a son when you are led by the Spirit. The Bible will tell you not to marry unbeliever, but only the Holy Spirit will tell you which are of two billion believers to marry. The Bible will tell you to attend the church, but the Holy Spirit will lead you which are of 150 churches in tri-cities to attend. The Bible will tell you, you know, don't cheat at your job, but the Holy Spirit will lead you which job to take. The Holy Spirit is our guide. Many people, they study the Bible, but they don't know the author. You may say, that's not possible, Vlad. You know, you, it's all about studying the Word. It's all about studying the Word 100%. I agree with you. Pharisees study the Word so much, I apologize for what I'm about to say, that they kill the author. Someone said, Tommy Tenney said, they knew first five books of Torah, so good that you could put a nail and pierce it through first five books of Torah, and they'll tell you every letter the nail pierced. And when the author of those books showed up, they nailed him. Because the Bible was never written about the Bible. Bible was always pointing to a person. The purpose of the Bible is not that you fall in love with the Bible, it's that you fall in love with God. You don't see in the Bible, Bible commanding you to love the Bible. Yes, David says, I delight in your Word, but David was man after God's heart, not just after the scriptures. The scriptures is to reveal the beauty of the Holy Spirit, it's to help me find him and be led by him. Many people have a guide sitting beside us and we are literally frying our brains because we are studying the map. You need the map, but don't ignore the guide. That's what Christian life is about. It's knowing the map, but following the guide. In the run of me 28, where God talks about blessings and curses. You know what the sign of blessing, he says, if you heed my voice and keep my commandments, commandments speak of the scripture, but the voice speak of the prompting, leading of the Holy Spirit. God's blessing is not only comes when I obey the letter, it's when I am led by the Spirit. Amen. The Holy Spirit wants to lead your life. He wants to guide your life. I want you to read, I want us to read this verse in Psalm 32. And I want to kind of in the next part is to mention just a few tips to help us hear God and be led by him. In Psalm 32, I highly encourage you to read the whole Psalm, but the part where seven and verse eight it says the following, you are my hiding place. David saying, God, you're my secret place. You're my escape, not for the escape. You are my medication. You're my coping mechanism. You're the one that I run to when I need to hide from the world, others run to the bar, I run to you. Some pick up a bottle, I pick up you. You are my hiding place. And he said, and when this happens, he said, you preserve me from trouble. See, whoever you go to for a place of hiding when you're struggling will determine whether you're going to be preserved from trouble or brought into trouble. Ask Samson, he'll tell you, he rested on the lap of the lila and up without eyes. It was the most expensive haircut in the world. But Jacob, when he rested upon the rock, he woke up with revelation of the ladder of God. Who you go to to rest when you are hurting and suffering will determine how you will wake up. You preserve me from trouble. Can somebody say amen? You surround me with songs of deliverance. See, when you make God your secret place, you don't get surrounded with nightmares. You get surrounded with deliverance. You know, sometimes you get a deliverance that you testify about. But this deliverance is when you sing about it. You sing about it in your car. You sing about it in your shower. You literally have so much of what God has done. You can't keep it. And if you don't have a good voice, you're singing a song of deliverance. Means God supplies your life with deliverance. You are my hiding place. You preserve me from trouble. You surround me with songs of deliverance. And this I want you to see next. He said, and then God starts speaking. So no longer David says, now God starts speaking. He says, God says, I will instruct you and teach you in the way you should go. I will guide you with my eye. We get so close that I won't guide you with my voice. I'll look at you and you'll know where to go. And if you're married, you know how the eye thing works. Your wife just looks at you just one time and you can write an essay or what she said or what she feels and everything. And you got it, yep, I got it. Or your husband can look at you just one glance. And literally, do you, it means everything. Someone else will look at us like what? Why are you doing this? He was like, didn't you see her eyes? Because God's direction is not just only in his voice. It's not just only with his hands when he leads you. There are time when you get and make him your hiding place where you begin to walk so close, he blinks and you get direction. But you know, before David made God a hiding place, the first verse of chapter 32 starts talking about verse one till about verse six. You know what it talks about? David having problems with sin. David has some big issues and he starts talking about how sin weighted him down. He said, how sin sucked life out of me. I lost my vitality, I lost my strength, I lost my energy. And he said, God, the longer I kept my sin the harder I felt my bones start hurting, my physical body starts aching because I was hiding sin. But oh God, when I came to you and I confess my sin, he says, God, you lifted that sin. And then in verse seven, he says, you are my hiding place. It's time to move from secret sins to secret place. Point number one, how to hear God remove secret sin. Secret sin happens to every one of us. It's the secret struggles that we hide. Secret sin is what David struggled with and you might find yourself struggling with that as well. In Galatians, there's a verse in Galatians and I want you to look at this verse. Most of you have heard this because it's always been applied to offering. Galatians chapter six, verse seven. I want you to see this, do not be deceived. So if God starts off saying don't be deceived, that means there's a very high chance you and I can be deceived. God is not mocked, put his strong words. For whatever men sows that he will reap. How many times you heard this verse being applied to offering? Most of the time we heard this and I even used it when it comes to offering. But I want you to notice it's not talking about offering. For he who sows into his flesh, will of the flesh reap corruption. But he who sows into the spirit, will of the spirit reap everlasting life. Now Paul is not suggesting, if you keep sowing into the Holy Spirit, you get eternal life as a reward. We know eternal life is a gift. Paul is talking about here the life you live inside, the life you live in your family, the life you live in your finances and he's saying that whatever you sow, you will reap. Flesh came to you as a gift from the devil on your natural birth. Holy Spirit came to you as a gift on your second birth. But I want you to notice, if you can go back to the verse, corruption did not come because flesh came. Corruption came because you and I participated in sowing into the flesh. It's called secret sense. It's when you sow into the flesh, you disobey your parents or you disobey, you steal something from your job or you keep looking at things that are wrong or you're spending a lot of leisure time on things that are destroying your consciousness. You sow, you sow, you sow and then the corruption come. The blame is not on the flesh. The blame is on the sowing process. And I want you to see the everlasting life means the life that's bursting inside of you. It's not, doesn't come because you have the Holy Spirit. It comes because you partner with the Holy Spirit to sow into the Holy Spirit. So I want you to see this today and the fact that God says, don't be fooled indicates many of us think, because I speak in tongues, I will have life inside of me and the power of God. You can have the Holy Spirit. The question is, who are you sowing into? Because see, you have the flesh, the same flesh David had, Apostle Paul has, TB Joshua has, every man of God has the same flesh that you and I have. The reason many times we live in corruption from that flesh is because we spoon feed it all the time. It's called secret sin. And many of us, we don't even know what it's like to come clean before God because the only time we get clean is when we get caught. Yeah, I'm sorry. Of course I'm sorry because you're sitting in the back seat of police's car. I'm sorry. Yeah, because you got caught. But we're not talking about that. David didn't wait until he got caught. David realized, I'm feeling down. I'm feeling the weight of my sin. He comes clean before God and something happens. God removes that. God cleanses from that. And David doesn't stop there. He switches quickly from living in secret sin to living in secret place. He starts to sow into the Holy Spirit. He starts making God his escape, his dwelling place and something happens. He begins to reap. What is that reaping? The Bible says God preserves him from trouble. The Bible says that God surrounds him with songs of deliverance. And the Bible says God led his life. Remember this. Leading of the Holy Spirit is a harvest of investing into the relationship with the Holy Spirit. You can pray and pray and pray, God, lead me and lead me. But until you and I walk away from secret sin into the secret place, just when you stop sinning or stop doing things that you feel guilty about, that is not enough. Now that's good. That is a plus. You will stay away out of Benton County jail. You won't have the UIs. You won't get fired. I mean, you won't get kicked out of your house. I mean, this is awesome. You probably are gonna have some decent job. But if you wanna experience, he preserves me from trouble. He surrounds me with songs of deliverance. He leads me and instructs me with my eye. You gotta make him your secret place. Come on, give God around the same honor you gave to sin. See, many of us, we know what it's like to be sneaky with the devil. To hide stuff on our computer. Delete our browsing history. Delete, you know, when we go somewhere, we make sure nobody is watching. And we know how to do that. But many of us, God wants to develop within us as sneakiness about the Holy Spirit. That you sneak out to pray. That you sneak out to read the word. That when you go running or jogging, you put on some music and not just usher or, you know, Justin Timberlake or Eminem or even Justin Bieber, but you tune on to music that you're gonna have to stop running. Why, because tears are rolling down your eyes and the Holy Ghost is visiting you there in the park. So into the spirit. If you so into Netflix, you won't reap everlasting life. If you only so into NBC, ABC, Facebook, Snapchat, Instagram, Twitter, if you only so into that, there is no life that's coming from that. But when you so into the secret place, you cultivate that. When you have a free minute, you begin to cultivate that relationship with Holy Spirit. God says this, you will reap. What are you gonna reap? Many of us are afraid. We're like, well, if I start investing time with Holy Spirit, I'll become religious. Nowhere in the verse, God promised that you'll be religious. God said, you become trouble free. I know in many times say, if you follow God, you know, it doesn't means he will take away the trouble. But in here, the Lord promises, not just when you follow him, you make him your hiding place. He said, I'll preserve you from trouble. I will surround you with songs of deliverance. And then he says, I will lead you. Don't pray for God to lead you. Follow him to develop intimacy and it will be so hard to miss his will, nearly impossible. But the third thing that I wanted to point out, so the first is we get rid of our secret sin. Second is we make God our secret place. And the third one is remain teachable. We get rid of our secret sin. We make God our secret place. And in Psalm 32, David says, God says actually, after he said, I'll lead you with my eye. He says this, which puzzled me. I was taking this Psalm for almost the whole month and I'm praying it through. So it's become actually my prayer manual and prayer guide, this whole Psalm, because I wanna make God my hiding place. I don't wanna go to God so I can get a word of knowledge or a sermon. I don't wanna go to God so God give me this and give me this and give me. I want him to be my hiding place and I want him secretly to start dispatching angels to take care of problems that I won't even know existed. I want him to lead my life. I want him to lead our church and I want him to lead you. But then when God finished saying that he said in Psalms, he says, don't be a mule. Hiding place, you leading me and God's instruction is don't be a mule. There's not a translation for the word mule. I won't use it in the church today. I mean, God says don't be stubborn, like a mule. You're like, Lord, I used to live in secret sin. Now I'm trying to live in a secret place. You're leading me, you're guiding me. I'm beginning to see the grace of God. Why are you saying that I need to not be a mule? Because many spiritual people develop spiritual stubbornness. You know that the number one sin that's more dangerous than smoking, even killing, drinking, the number one sin that's the worst sin in the world. It's the root of every other sin. That sin did not start in a drug house. That sin did not start somewhere in the gang. It started in heaven and it started with someone who became a mule. Oh, I know nobody gonna be saying anything right now. It's when you begin to develop a secret place. You begin to experience tiny little bits of God's blessings. They gave you two cent promotion in your job. And you begin to feel God is moving in your life and that is indeed, and something begins to happen. You become spiritual guru. You don't listen to anyone. You don't take advice from anyone because now God speaks to you directly. I have five things that I follow personally when it comes to leading of the Holy Spirit in some crazy ways. For example, when it comes to giving, I follow five things. One is compelling of the spirit. Means what does the spirit tell me? What do I feel Holy Spirit tell me right now in this issue? For example, do I feel the prompting of the Holy Spirit to do this or to that? That's number one test. Number two, commanding of the scripture. What does the scripture say about this issue? Because you may feel the spirit is telling you to date this person, but the scripture is saying that you shouldn't be dating someone who is not of your faith and you shouldn't be dating someone who your parents, you know, you live under the roof and they're saying you shouldn't be doing that. The scripture says honor your parents. What does the scripture tell me? Because just because you follow the spirit, the spirit doesn't contradict the scripture. Can somebody say amen? Number three, what does the common sense tell me? See, many of us think if the spirit comes, my mind has to leave. We have this idea, the more closer I am to the Holy Spirit, the more out of my mind I become. Yes, with the Holy Spirit, I become out of my comfort zone, but never out of my mind. The only reference in the Bible where somebody was out of their mind, it was a guy who had a legion of demons. The Bible says when spirit comes, he comes to renew your mind, not to remove your mind. The scripture says he came to give us spirit of power, love and sound mind. For many of us when the spirit comes, our mind leaves. And we think the more out of my mind I am, the better I am closer to God. Somehow God has a war with the mind. Yes, against the carnal mind, but your common sense, I cannot tell you how many people sometimes get led by the Holy Spirit, who would only be safe if they could hear themselves saying what they're trying to do. They will realize, oh my goodness, I am out of my mind. I am crazy. You don't have to be out of your mind to be led by the Holy Spirit. You can listen to your common sense many times. I remember even having a particular individual that was God touching this person and this person has an angelic visitation and angel comes to this person's life. And somebody tells me and angel tells me, when I was younger, when somebody tells me and angel came to them and tell them something, oh my goodness, what did he say? And now I'm just thinking of Joseph Smith and Muhammad because angel came to them too when they started their religion. You know, and I'm like, an angel said, okay, what did he say? And so this person begins to say, well, the angel just gonna confirm that I need to, you know, that this person, I'm gonna date this person. I begin to ask, who is this person? I can't tell you about him. I can't tell you about this person. Why it's very secretive. I don't know much, but I know God said. I was like, listen, God's angels, don't do this. You're not Mary and he's not Joseph. I was like, do you even hear yourself? You're like, no, no, but God, God is moving and I don't need to listen to my mind. A few days later, I follow up on this person because I started to pray for them. And I said, what happened to this wonderful relationship that the angel instructed you with? And this person said, I abandoned it, blocked the person on Facebook and I dropped it. I said, why did you drop it? The more I listened to myself, the more I realized, I'm crazy. And this person could have had their life ruined by some spiritual experience. I'm not saying the angel didn't show up, but if things that begin to go against your common sense, many times that is a red flag. The fourth thing that I ask myself is the console of saints. For me, my saint is my wife, my pastor and my parents. If I'm trying to do something that's crazy, I ask, what does my wife think? I ask, what does my pastor think? What does my parents think? I remember last year we were on the vacation and on the cruise to Mexico and I'm reading a Bible. I'm churning 30 and just a few weeks after that and we just sold our property. We had a $30,000 in our savings account. And the year before, me and my wife gave $20,000. The year before that, we gave $10,000 to missions. So I get this brilliant idea. I'm gonna churn 30 and I will give to the missions $30,000. I'm like, this is gonna be awesome. So I come to my wife after I finish my devotions, she finished some massage. And so I'm like, hey babe, I have this awesome idea and I know you'll agree with it. We gonna give $30,000 to the missions. She said, no. And I was like, yes. She's like, why? I said, because I'm 30 years old and we need to do that. She says, are you wanting to do that because God is telling you or because you wanna have a story to share? I said, never thought about that. She says, I know that 30 and 30, you like the numbers. But he says, that's our $30,000 and that's a very expensive story. He said, that's our money, not just your money and you can't be giving it just because you wanna have a story to share. And I remember I went, she's like, just pray about it. And if I prayed about it, we still gave, not 30,000, we gave a little bit less. We still gave, but I realized many times God puts saints around us in the form of a spouse, in the form of our pastor to protect us from some crazy stuff. Amen. And last one is circumstantial signs. If the whole world goes against you and you're trying to date that chica. That's not a sign that God is in it. If your pastor, your parents, and everyone is saying, listen, hold on, wait. And you're seeing that as God. You wanna build this Romeo and Julius story that everyone was against us. Walt Disney was trying to stop Walt Disney, 300 people denied his banks. We are like that. We're just embarking against the whole world. Listen, you actually might be going against God. If circumstantial signs don't fall in your place, that's not always the sign you are with God. Sometimes that could be a sign you are not with God. I remember even talking to Bryson into just a few days ago and he's getting married next month. I was asking him, how's the wedding preparation? And this is the common word that people say, when God's blessing is on the relationship, this is what they say. Vlad, things are just falling into place. The family's very supportive. The church, it's just, it's so much gifts are coming in, blessings are coming in, and sometimes you're talking to other couples. Parents are against it. The pastor's against it. Everybody's against it, but we are in love. It's like Samson. He wanted to get married. His first marriage, and the parents were against it. The law was against it. Poor Samson is going to an engagement party. The lion was against him. Wanted to eat him. He devours the lion and feels proud. Listen, God is leading me. And the words of God says, because it was from the Lord. Means Samson felt like, you know what? This was a God thing. Even though God clearly stated in his word, not to date felicines. Even though God clearly stated it in his word to honor your father and your mother, and his father and mother said, hold off Samson. There's other girls in Israel. Don't get yourself entangled in this. The lion came against him. But he overcame all of these things. Banned his parents' will, killed the lion, ignored the scriptures, because Samson is in love. He gets married to her, and seven days later, into their wedding feast, he finds out that she is not who she claims to be. She manipulated him. She lied him. And I'm not blaming the poor girl. It was his fault. He should have not been in the first place. He leaves her, goes back to his parents, comes back with the goat. This was equivalent to roses and chocolate during those days. Comes to see her, brings the goat, and finds out that Chica is married to his best friend. He goes out on a revenge rampage and starts destroying felicines. The felicines came and burned the lady to the ground. And after this marriage experience, Samson never ever had another healthy relationship again. You know why? He ignored every one of these things. It's more than just your feelings, your dreams, or your spirit telling you. You have to follow common sense. You have to follow the scripture, and you have to follow the advice of the saints in your life. And you have to pay attention to circumstances. When our church started, yes, it was radical. But when God gave us this building, that became God's circumstantial sign of confirming what he was doing. Amen. And God will lead you and guide you in Jesus' name. When I want to be led by the Holy Spirit, give rid of secrets and make God a hiding place and remain teachable, flexible. Remain, don't be stuck up because you can have a disease that Satan died from. It's pride. Remain teachable. And I know some people say, but Lord, mind God spoke to me. Listen, Bible clearly states, let one prophesy and the rest judge. Let that sink. If God is speaking through prophecy and God does speak to prophecy, why does God give permission for the rest of us to judge it? If God doesn't make mistakes, God never makes mistakes. We do. Remember the story I told you about a guy who said his name was Mike? I heard Mike. I kept calling him Mike on Wednesday night. And right before he left, he says, just letting you know my name is Marco. I was sincere. I was very honest and authentic. But I was also sincerely wrong because I heard Mike but his name was Marco. And sometimes that's how we are. And when you are especially speaking to young people right now who maybe just got on fire with God and used to hearing things and being led, listen, remain teachable. Don't be a mule. This is what God says. God says, be teachable. You can preserve yourself from so much trouble, so much hurt and disappointment. If you just remain just little bit teachable, let others speak into you and you will see you won't miss God's will. You'll fall right into it in Jesus' name.