 Okay. Good morning, everyone. Welcome to the course BC 214 on developing the human spirit. We're getting into the last few lectures on this course and touching on some important, important things. Let's pray and we will get started today. Good. Somebody please lead us in prayer this morning. Morning. Good day. Alright. Who will lead us in prayer? Jay, have been asked, would you please, oh, is Samuel going to lead us? Sure question. Go ahead, Samuel. Heavenly Father, we come into your presence this morning and we dedicate ourselves. Give us knowledge, understanding and wisdom. We dedicate your servant, Pastor Ashish Raju, into your hands. Speak through him a lot and everything that we learn about developing our spirit. Maybe be able to soak it in, apply it to our lives and use it for the manifestation of your glory. This and everything else we ask in the mighty name of Jesus. Amen. Amen. Thank you. Good morning. Good morning, everyone. Welcome. I see I've been asked, there's no problem, no problem. Okay. So we have been doing this course on developing the human spirit. And we are in the last two sections, or there's one more section that I will cover, but we're talking about the faculties of the human spirit, which I hope to be finished today. Next week we're going to talk about the functions of the human spirit. And then lastly, I want to do one lesson on imparting spirit to spirit, which is against another aspect that we see in the Bible concerning the human spirit. So there's a ground that we're going to cover. So what we have emphasized so far is that we are all spiritual beings, and our spirit is eternal, meaning from the time it was created, it's going to live on forever, never disappears, never disintegrates, or ceases to exist. And now our physical bodies, these human bodies will disintegrate. When we die, it'll become dust. Now, of course, God has promised to give us resurrection. Billy, as believers, will have glorified resurrected bodies and so on. But we're talking about our real person, the human spirit that will continue to live. So we talked about the fact that when we are born again, we receive the life and the nature of God. And then, you know, the human spirit needs to grow, needs to be developed. And in very, very many, there are many similarities between the natural human development that we see in a baby and growth, the many similarities to the development of the human spirit. So the Bible does draw that comparison or talk about those similarities. And so what we, you know, so we covered many things on that. We talked about how to develop, you know, what do you do to develop the human spirit, just like in the natural, to develop for a baby to grow, you know, you feed, you nurture, you exercise, so on. There are things that we can do in the spirit to develop our human spirit. But then that development also means that there are faculties that need to be trained. There are faculties that need to be sharpened and used, exercised. Just as in the natural, you know, we have the five senses, or we say five faculties at least, which need to be developed and trained and gets better as you train, so also in the spirit. So we spoke about, so we're talking about each of these faculties and just kind of open, I'm not necessarily covering everything the Bible says on each faculty, there's a lot. And I would encourage you as you're reading scripture to be mindful of, okay, what is, you know, you will find it throughout the Bible, as the Bible talks about the various faculties and how an individual is interacting with the spiritual realm. It's very good to keep your eyes open and make note of those things. And because everything is a learning experience for us. And so what I'm doing is I'm just, you know, introducing it in some way, awakening us to, hey, these are the things, this is how God interacts with us through the faculties of our spirit. We should be open, we should be aware and God will, and as God works, relates to each of us. It's God doesn't do a carbon copy for all of us. So there are various ways in which God would speak through these faculties, but the thing is for us to be open, to be aware that this is how God speaks and we receive from God and we interact with God and we fellowship with God through these faculties. So let me just go ahead and share the PDF. We are still in chapter six, we're talking about these five spirit senses. We covered the spirit sense of seeing, we were in the spirit sense of hearing. That's where we were kind of getting into. And what I was emphasizing is this part here where in the spiritual realm we hear without sound. I'll be here, you know, in the natural sound is required. Sound is a medium by which words are transferred. Of course we can transfer through writing, you know, you write it on paper or through email. I mean there are other forms of course of transferring knowledge or words. But I'm talking about communication, verbal communication. We use sound. In the spiritual realm, God communicates, God speaks words to us or messages to us. But it's not always audible in the sense of a sound coming. Now we know that there is sound in the realm of the spirit because, you know, we have John and others who say, you know, they heard in the spiritual realm the sound of many waters or there was a sound from heaven, et cetera. But when God is speaking to us on a normal day-to-day basis, we are not looking for audible words. But we just, you know, God just imparts those words into our spirit. So that transfer of words from God to our spirit happens without sound normally. So we must get, you know, we must tune ourselves. So when words just come into your spirit, you just know, okay, this is God speaking. I'm going with this, you know. So I want to encourage us. Now in our last class, I was just getting into that. I just want to encourage us to be aware that words just come. The knowing comes into your spirit and it doesn't have to be some, you know, sometimes it may be specific words, a word or words. Sometimes it's just, you know, like just the knowing of a whole lot of information. Okay. I know this is what I have to do. So God has communicated information to you through actually through your spirit sense of hearing. It's come into your spirit and that's why you know all this. In the natural, it takes time for many words to be transferred in the spirit. It happens in a moment. I guess one analogy or one comparison could be when you're downloading a file over the internet or whatever, you know. So a file basically has a lot of information, a lot of knowledge. And it's one file, but when you receive that one file or you download that one file, it's like a lot of knowledge, you know, you can download the entire book, so to speak. And a lot of that information has come to you. Similarly in the spirit, God is important. You just know in your spirit what to do, you know, and that's how, but we must be aware, we must be aware. Now I want to also mention that, you know, what we see in scripture, many, many things, many things, and I've just put a few bullet points here, but it's amazing when you look into the Bible, what we will find, you know. Sometimes God speaks a single sentence, you know, like Acts 8-29, the Holy Spirit told Philip, go join this chariot. So what is a simple instruction? One instruction, go join this chariot or go get into this chariot. Go, you know, step into that. It's very simple, it's about single sentence, but that's God speaking. And in this particular case, in Acts 8-8, it's very, very significant, because as Philip obeyed that one sentence instruction, he got into this chariot and in the chariot was, you know, a very important man. He was in charge of the treasury, the finances for the Queen of Ethiopia. I mean, like, you know, in modern day terms, we would say he's a chief financial officer for somebody very important who was responsible for an entire kingdom. And so Philip, just one sentence, go join this chariot, was an instruction setting Philip up to minister to somebody so important who would then take the gospel back into Africa, into Ethiopia. So very, very significant. Sometimes God will speak a few sentences, right? So that's a fine example that in Acts 10, the Holy Spirit tells Philip, sorry, Peter, three men are looking for you, go with them, doubting nothing or don't ask any questions. So it's a few sentences. He's telling, giving some details, three men are looking for you. Go with them, don't doubt, just go. So simple instruction, few sentences, but something very powerful was about to happen. Peter was about to bring the gospel to the Gentiles for the very first time. So, you know, God doesn't complicate things. God doesn't, you know, what to say, he doesn't exaggerate. Sometimes God is sometimes so simple, we tend to miss it. Can you imagine, you know, how simple these instructions were to Philip or to Peter? Very simple instructions, but huge, huge turning point moments in the life of the church, hinged on these small instructions. So we, you know, so what I want to say is God is very, you know, very simple in the way he communicates. He doesn't complicate it. He doesn't exaggerate. It's just very simple, but it's so powerful. Now, there are a lot of other things we see in the Bible that, you know, God can reveal personal details of what's happening in other people's lives. He might tell you, show you things. It could, God can speak numbers, you know, for example, in Acts 5. So let me just back up here. Personal details means situations and experiences that have taken place or are taking place in the lives of people. He does that just to, if he shows it to us, is using that to minister to somebody, to let them know, hey, I know about you. I know what's going on in your life. I want to speak into your life in the same way God can reveal, you know, specifics. In Acts 5, we see that Peter knew the amount for which a property was sold. And he was not there, but he knew, you know, this is the amount. And, you know, he told Nius, did you sell this land for so much amount? Yeah, I mean, Peter wasn't there, but he knew, you know, whatever that amount was. And he knew also that the amount that was actually in the offering, which Ananias was bringing, was not the amount for which the land was sold. There was a difference. And Ananias kept part, Ananias and Sapphira and kept back part of the land. So they were trying to fool the apostles, saying that, look, we sold the land, we brought the money here. But actually they could have just said, look, we sold the land, 50% we kept it, 50% we're giving. Everything would have been fine. But because they were misrepresenting things, you know, and Peter just knew by the Holy Spirit. Lots of other things we see in the Bible, where some people reveals people's addresses, names, numbers, you know, there's Ananias, there's a man called Saul. He's in the house of Simon. Or, you know, he's in this house here, on a street called Straight. Go to the house, he's praying or different things. Go to Japa, there's a man called Simon. He's living, there's a man called Peter, he's living in the house of Simon, who's a tanner. That was his occupation. So God revealed names, numbers, addresses, occupation, so on. So God can reveal all this. So we just need to learn to pick these things up as we hear from God, right? Now I want to say one thing before I pause for questions. When God is speaking, just like when I'm communicating to you right now, some of you may have your video on and you may be watching, you may be both listening to me, watching the PDF, as well as watching me. So there are three sensory inputs coming to you. There is the audio and there are two visual. One is, you know, what I'm looking at me and you're also looking at the PDF. So when God speaks to us, the communication happens in a similar way with multiple channels, right? It's not always just pure audio. The message can come to us with a combination of audio, video, what you feel. That means he's using multiple spiritual faculties in his communication. So we need to synthesize them together and then arrive at the message. That means what you see, what you hear, what you feel. You put it all together and say, okay, this is what God is telling me, right? So sometimes it could be you're seeing a picture, there's a message coming and there's a sense of go to it, get up and do it. You feel, you feel stirred. So all of that is part of God's message to you and it's coming to you, right? So the next faculty is the faculty of feeling or sensing. Let me just pause here before I go forward into this to see if there are any questions so far. Everybody's with me. Any questions? Okay, I'm going to go forward. So there's a question here from Christopher. When we interpret tongues, are we using our human spirits faculty of hearing? Well, the interpretation, the message or the meaning of what was spoken in tongues could come to us through any of our faculties, right? So when I, for example, suppose I speak in tongues and I feel led by God to interpret it. The interpretation, the meaning of what I've said in tongues can be communicated to my spirit through any of my faculties. So it could come through hearing, it could come to seeing, it could come through feeling. But I need to translate or interpret what God is saying and to lease the message or it could come through a combination of that. Right, so and I need to interpret that. There are times when, you know, the whole flow of the interpretation, I even feel like, okay, there's a melody coming, there's a song that's coming. And so I understand the meaning of the words, but I feel like singing it out, you know, so it's a combination of words, of feelings that's coming out. Sometimes I might see a visual and start describing it. So it's a combination. God is communicating the meaning to us through a combination of our faculties. Any other questions? So there's another question here. When we, from Christopher, when we speak in tongues, are we using any of our human faculties? When we are speaking, we are, our spirit is being exercised in the sense that the Holy Spirit is releasing words in our spirit and we are by faith speaking out. But we are not necessarily using our faculties, our spirit faculties, in the sense of, I'm not interpreting it, right, like when I'm speaking in tongues. I'm just letting the words come forth. And I'm not even processing it in my mind. So the answer there, and what I think is just from experience, I'm not giving chapter and verse for this, but just from experience, I think it's just a direct from my spirit, speaking by faith. So I may not necessarily hear distinct words, and even if I do hear distinct words, my mind doesn't understand it. So I have no way of interpreting it or picking it up. I may not feel normally or I may not see something that I am speaking. But normally just speaking in tongues is an exercise of the spirit where the words flow out of your spirit and straight out of your vocal organs. However, there can be at times, and not always, but at times, accompanying things that are happening through your faculties. So when you're speaking in tongues, and this is not an all always, but when you're speaking in tongues, you could be seeing visions, you could be having feelings, you could be, you know, receiving spiritual understanding or hearing from God. So it may or may not be related to what you are saying in tongues. But what I'm saying is if you're looking purely at the release of words out of your spirit in tongues, there is no exercise of your faculty, a conscious exercise. What I am saying is in that process that could be God could be speaking to you to us through our other faculties, through our faculties, telling us some things. So the answer to your question is we are not exercising our physical spiritual faculties in the way that we are talking about and seeing, hearing, feeling, but there is the possibility that God may use those faculties to communicate other things or even the interpretation. Okay. Anita's question. Pastor, why God shows the things what he is doing in others lives by God's grace I had such a dream. Well, there are many, many reasons as you see in scripture. He may want us to pray about it. He may want us to bring a word of encouragement to them. He may want them to know that he knows them. So there are many reasons and we have to be very, we just have to listen to God what he wants us to do with the information he gives us. Does he want us to just pray about it, keep quiet and just pray about it and not tell anybody? Does he want us to go and speak it to them to be an encouragement to them? Does he want us to do something about it? Sometimes he shows you a need in somebody's life so that you can be the answer to that need, you can give to that need. So there could be so many reasons why God is speaking that to us. And we need to listen to him and say, okay, this is what God is telling me to do with the information he's giving me about something in somebody else's life. Okay. The next question. Are dreams also part of God making known to us certain things? Yes. Yes. So dreams are part of that spirit sense of seeing, right? So we could see dreams. We could see visions. Our spirit is awake while our physical body is asleep. So the human spirit doesn't go to sleep, right? So your human spirit is awake. And so through your spirit sense of seeing, God is communicating visions, which are, which is then transferred into our mind. So when we wake up, we are conscious that, look, I've had a dream. God has spoken something to me through the spirit sense of seeing. And sometimes you may receive words, messages and so on. So when you're awake, your mind picks it up, you process it and use it. So the answer is yes. You know, it's part of that spirit sense of seeing. And many times it could be a combination. You may also hear messages in our dreams. Right. Okay. Welcome everyone. Let's move to, okay, Prabhakar has a question. Prabhakar's question. Why would God normally speak to us in images, dreams? Why not like we had conversations, we don't miss it. So God is very, very efficient in his working. And in English we have this little phrase, a picture is worth a thousand words. So I think that's one reason why God uses images, pictures, because in one picture he can communicate whole information to us. And that's why we see in the Bible also that pictures are a big part of God's communication. Dreams and visions are the language of the Holy Spirit. He uses dreams and visions, visuals, pictures, because, you know, a picture can communicate a lot of information. And so he communicates to us. And also he wants us to be involved in the process. And so he often uses riddles, meaning, okay, guys, let's have some fun. Try to figure this out. You know, and he doesn't just speak plainly, he doesn't show you, you know, somebody's face. But he might show you something else, a picture then. And so I think he just wants us to be involved in the whole process of interpreting, understanding and cutting things out. So he may speak to us using riddles or using, you know, what we call as images, prophetic images that have to be interpreted, understood. And so it's maybe he just wants us to engage with him in that. Okay. So there's another question here, Avni. Avni's question. Jesus mostly spoke in parables. What exactly was his purpose behind that? Well, there were many reasons. One is parables are our way by which Jesus would communicate spiritual truth in language. We could understand. So he would use things that we are familiar with to tell us about spiritual truth. Secondly, parables are a way in which to hide truth. So truth is concealed in the story. As the story engages the mind, the goal is for us to go beyond the story to discover truth. So first reason, because the stories are something we all can relate to. These were stories from people's everyday lives. Truth was concealed in the story. So again, there either you just enjoy the story and go away or you enjoy the story, but then go beyond the story to say, what is the truth? So what happened in people's, in Jesus' audience is many people enjoyed the story. They didn't pursue the truth, you know, and they couldn't really go after the truth. And so that was a problem. But if you ask, you know, these are the two reasons why he used parables to speak to people and that parable would stick in the minds of people, but they need to go beyond the story to discover spiritual truth. Yeah. All right. Now let's go back to the notes. We move forward with our, the faculty, the next faculty of feeling, right? So we've covered seeing, hearing, feeling. So the human spirit can also feel. Now we use the word sense. But when we use the word sense, you know, we shouldn't mix it up with sensing emotionally or physically, right? So that's why I put the word sense in brackets because sometimes we get confused. So we're talking about sensing of feeling in the spirit. Okay. And we need to distinguish that from what you feel emotionally or physically. And we will talk about how to differentiate that in the same lesson a little later on. Okay. And that is a big challenge for many of us. How do you differentiate what you're feeling as feeling in the spirit versus feeling in your soul, in your emotion or physical? Okay. But what we're talking right now is feeling in the spirit. And you find in the Bible, and I'm just again, what a few bullet points are many in scripture where you can feel. For example, these, you know, some of the fruit of the spirit of peace, joy, and comfort. These are feelings, right? You feel comforted, you feel encouraged, you feel revived, you feel refreshed, you feel peace, you feel joy, you know, and these are, I'm talking about spiritual feelings. These come from the Holy Spirit into your spirit. And then of course the rest of your being is touched by it. So when we say I'm feeling spiritually refreshed, what is it? It is, it is a feeling. You're feeling energized, you're feeling rejuvenated, you're feeling like all the tiredness is gone and you now have energy to move forward. What has happened in your spirit? You have been refreshed. And then that comes into the rest of your being. So we can feel peace, we can feel stirred up. That means you feel agitated, you know, like I've got to do something about it. And you can feel compelled. There's something urging you, pushing you, moving you. You can also feel bound or sometimes we use the word tightness or disturbed. I don't feel obviously uneasy. That's this feeling of being bound, you know, restlessness. I don't feel right about this. You know, it's disturbing me. You can feel bitterness, heat or anger in a right sense. Okay. I'm not angry. I'm not angry with a person. But you're angered in your spirit about something. You feel heat, bitterness and what those are all Bible terms, but it simply means you're angry in the spirit about something. Or you can, you can feel God upon you. It's almost like a blanket coming over you or some, you know, oil and when oil is smeared on you, you can feel it. Or when oil is poured on you, you can feel it. Now, think about that in a spiritual sense, right? Like a blanket coming on you. That's why we use the word mantle in the, in the natural. It's a blanket, but in the spiritual, you feel like a cloth, the mantle coming on you. Annoying thing in the natural, it's oil being smeared on you in the spiritual. It's like you feel the oil, the oil of the Holy Spirit coming on you. So these are just some of the things and these are all you find them in scripture. So I've given you, you know, verses that you could look at and you're not turning them into them. Like these are many experiences. Some felt like John or Daniel said, I felt like a dead person. They fell flat on. I mean, it's no more strength. You just fall down dead. So that's a feeling in the spirit. Now, of course, it will touch your soul and your body, but where's it coming from? It's coming from your spirit, your inner person. So what, so we, first of all, must be aware of the spiritual feelings because God is communicating to you through that. You see, in the natural, when somebody puts their arm around you, you can feel. But it's also communication. They're saying, Hey, you're my brother. I love you. I'm standing with you. Whatever, you know, or I'm comforting you. I empathize with you. You know, it's, it's also communication. So it's also in the spiritual. When you're feeling these things, God is actually communicating something to you when it gives you these feelings in your spirit. And I've tried to interpret some of these. And if you're peace, it means all is good. Keep going. When you feel stirred up, it means, you know, Hey, I want you to do something compelled. I want you to do something. You feel uneasy. Hey, be careful. There's warning. Don't step forward or pause. You know, if you're restless, you're moving into action, or it could also mean pause. Don't be careful when you're angry. Okay. I know I want you to do what is just and right and execute justice. You know, weighty feeling, or this is the presence of God. What does God want to do? God's presence is here. How does he want you to move? What does he want you to say? You know, so these are things. So you recognize. So first thing is to recognize these feelings. Right. Recognize these feelings. Then it is to understand what, what, what does God saying? What is this feeling me? What has got communicating to me through this feeling? Example, I don't know if I listed it here. Yeah. The next 20. Paul says he feels bound in a spirit. I feel, he says, I feel bound in my spirit. That means like, I feel so tight, you know, something's tight, you know, you know, tied me up. So he says, I feel bound in my spirit. Then it says, what is the meaning of it? He says, the Holy Spirit is telling me. So that is this feeling that he has in his spirit, this feeling of tightness. He's interpreting it. He's saying the Holy Spirit is telling me that there is danger for me in Jerusalem. Chains and afflictions are waiting for me in Jerusalem. So you see Acts 20 verses 20 to 23. The Apostle Paul is interpreting the feeling. He feels in a spirit like I saw he's bound. But he knows that feeling is actually a message from the Holy Spirit. And he interpreted it correctly. The Holy Spirit is telling me that in Jerusalem, you know, there's chains and afflictions. In other words, the Holy Spirit is warning him. Paul, if you go to Jerusalem now, this is what's going to happen to you. But Paul chose to go. So you see, when the Holy Spirit is warning us, ultimately the decision is in us with us. The Holy Spirit is not going to come and make the decision for us. But he's warning us. He says, look, if you go down this path, this is what is going to happen. Now you decide what you want to do. And in that case, Paul decided to go to Jerusalem and he got into trouble. The trouble the Holy Spirit said would happen. You know, now of course we can all ask the question. What would have happened if Paul hadn't gone to Jerusalem? What if he had stayed some or he had continued his missionary journey, gone into other cities and avoided going to Jerusalem? What would have happened? Well, that's anybody's guess. We don't know how his life would have unfolded if he had, he did that warning. But for whatever reason, Paul chose to go there. And you know, eventually God turned it around for good in the sense that he ended up in Rome and in Rome. He influenced the palace guards. He influenced the Roman hierarchy with the gospel. And that is very, very important because Rome was the then capital of that part of the world. So what happened in Rome spread throughout the Roman Empire. So in one sense it is very powerful. But so the point here is this, recognize the feelings, understand what God is saying. And then of course you must decide what are you going to do about it? How are you going to act in response to the feeling and so on? Okay, let me pause here. I'll try to answer some questions and I'm speaking a little fast, but I'm trying to complete this chapter today. Let's see now what's some question here. Okay, say you have your hand raised. Please go ahead. Yes, pastor. The story of Paul's encounter with Agabos, warning him of the trouble he was going to face in Jerusalem. For some years I've been thinking about it. Did Paul disobey the warnings of the Holy Spirit or was just God telling him what was ahead just to prepare his mind? I think about all this and I try to see what answers to give. So I just wanted to ask that where do you stand or what do you think God was doing? Was he giving him a warning not to go or was basically a warning to prepare him for what he was going to be facing ahead? If we bring it to ourselves, maybe a warning comes by the Holy Spirit on a place where we're not supposed to go. Ordinary for me, I think I would not go because of the warning of the Spirit. So I'm just trying to balance things out to be sure that if we're going to talk about this passage to any other person, we make it in context. Maybe I just want to ask him if he could just expand sheets so that we don't fall prey of the enemy. If God is warning us of a particular thing, sometimes I believe he's telling us not to go and I think sometimes he's preparing our minds. But in this context, could you just explain more what was God's counsel to Paul? It was in preparation of what was ahead or what? Good question. So we do see, like you said, in that particular situation, God spoke to the Apostle Paul three times. One, he spoke to him directly, Acts 20, which is the passage. The Holy Spirit is telling me chains and afflictions are awaiting me in Jerusalem. Second, the prophet Agabus came all the way from Jerusalem. He meets with Paul and says, Paul, Paul, I think was in Caesarea this time on his way. And Paul, and in a very dramatic, he takes off his belt or sash, we call it. He wraps himself and says, Paul, the Holy Spirit is saying, this is what will happen to you. You're the owner of this girdle. This is what happened to you, Holy Spirit. Thirdly, there were other disciples. So it wasn't prophet Agabus, it was just regular disciples. So also was stirred by the Holy Spirit to give Paul the warning. So Holy Spirit spoke to Paul three times, one directly, one second through the prophet Agabus, third through ordinary disciples of prophesied, saying, Paul, if you go to Jerusalem, you're going to get in trouble. But what we notice in all these three cases, the Holy Spirit never said don't go. So it was a warning, but not an instruction not to go. He only warned them saying, look, this is what is, if you go to Jerusalem, this is what is awaiting you. But we don't see the Holy Spirit telling Paul explicitly, thou shall not go to Jerusalem. So that is why we can say that the Holy Spirit warned Paul that this is what's awaiting you. And he left the decision was entirely Paul's. And Paul decided to go. He decided to go. And one of the reasons we find in the book of Acts why Paul went is he wanted to make a point. He wanted to make a point to the Jews that though he was preaching Jesus, he was not against them. So what Paul actually did was he went to Jerusalem and he went to shave his head. And like, you know, basically he's trying to prove a point to them that look, I am one of you. I am, you know, maybe it was his attempt to build a bridge with the Jewish brethren. You know, the Jewish people. So he goes to Jerusalem at the time of the feast and he shaves his head and all that. But these people are already so angry because Paul has been preaching so powerfully about Jesus, turning Jews and Gentiles to Christ. They are so angry. There is no way Paul can appease their anger. The moment they see Paul is in Jerusalem, they catch him. Anyway, so the answer to the question is this was a warning given three times, but the decision was left to Paul. What do we apply from it? There are times when God warns us, but he lets us make the decision. If God explicitly stated don't do something and then we did it, then we are in disobedience. If God just warns us and leaves the decision to us, then, you know, it's like God said, okay, you make your decision and you go, you walk through the rest of the outcome of that decision. But God was with Paul throughout the journey and all that happened. So God didn't forsake Paul just because he went to Jerusalem and got into trouble and, you know, he was under house arrest for a long time. God didn't forsake him. He was with him, accompanying him in his decision. But I guess that's the way God works. He honors our decisions. Thank you, Pastor. That was a good clarification. Thank you so much. Thank you. Alright, so back to our PDF. I'll take a few more minutes and we'll pause here. So what else do we see as far as our spiritual faculties? There is this whole thing about smelling and tasting. Now, from my own personal experience, and I guess from the experience of many others as well, this is not very common. It's kind of unusual. It's not very common. Maybe some people may have it more commonly than others, but we must be aware of it and also know, recognize it. I've had instances, few instances, when I've had this smelling type of things, but it's not very common. But anyway, we are aware that there are times when God can make us either taste, you know, or even smell because there is aroma in the spirit, fragrances in the spirit. You can see it in scripture. And we need to be able to interpret it, right? So usually this taste or this aroma comes without any natural cause. So obviously if somebody has sprayed perfume or deodorant or put in some air freshener, whatever, and the room smells nice, don't say God's presence is here. No, somebody sprayed something, right? Okay, so we are ruling that out. But we are saying that when there is no natural cause and you get a taste in your mouth or something sweet or, you know, something bitter, whatever. Or you smell something. You know there is no natural cause. There cannot be a natural cause, but you can get the aroma. Then you need to interpret it. So generally what we go with this pleasant taste and smells is God expressing his pleasure and he's telling us it's like the anointing. You know, the holy anointing or it was a sweet smelling oil, right? So it's a presence of the anointing and God is moving to do something, whether it's healing or comfort or whatever, you know, it could be many things. So we need to, along with the smell, just get a sense of what is God telling me? Or just sometimes he's saying, hello, I'm here with you. That's all. I'm here with you. I remember once in one of our, you know, we used to, before this lockdown, we used to meet for five days of prayer. And in our last five days of prayer, that was before the lockdown. So that must have been 2019, I think. Yeah, 2019, we were having five days of prayer. So this must have been in the month of, God, remember now. Anyway, it must be November, December of 2019. In one of those days, if we were all, this was in the Bible college, facilities, students, all of us would just worship. It's a whole day of worship and prayer. So you're all together worshipping and the worship leader was, I don't know who it was. Some of us were leading worship. Their eyes were closed. They were, you know, everybody was just in worship. I was standing in one part of the hall and suddenly I could just smell this beautiful smell coming from one side of the hall. So I opened my eyes and nobody was there. You know, so there's no, there's no reason, no natural reason for that smell. And there's just absolutely no reason. Nobody is there. It's one corner of the hall and there's a sweet smell just moving in from that corner into where we were all worshipping. So I, you know, I kind of, I got out of my place. I moved there to make sure that, you know, this is like, I'm not imagining something. I'm smelling. I could get this smell. Then I called Pastor Selena. She was there. I told her, you go there and you smell. Can you smell it? You know, I told her, go there. And she also went and she also said, yeah, I can smell this thing. You know, and it was just the presence of God coming in through that sense of smelling aroma into the room. Now I could not tell the worship leader anything because their eyes were closed and they were, you know, all and everybody was in deep worship. All the students were in worship and everybody was in worship. So, you know, we just, just let it be, you know, and then afterwards I shed and after a break time, he shed. So that's an example where, you know, and what was the purpose of it? God just saying that, look, I'm here. I'm pleased. That's all. You know, I just, we just enjoy it. We just receive it and welcome his presence, you know. Sometimes he may move you to do something like healing or deliverance or something. Now unpleasant taste and smells on the other hand can war be a warning to us. You know, suppose you're listening to somebody preaching and teaching and suddenly there's an unpleasant taste in your mouth. God, what is that? You know, I know I ate ice cream for breakfast. I'm just joking. I know I ate something really sweet for breakfast. So it cannot be something unpleasant that I ate, right? Or, you know, but then it's God alerting you saying, hey, what you're hearing is wrong. There is, there is something bad in the teaching. And this is biblically, you know, in Hebrews 13, Paul refers to false doctrine and I'll just give you the exact words very quickly. I know you're almost out of time. But in Hebrews 13, let me see here. He refers to this is, yeah, Hebrews 13, verse nine. He refers to strange doctrines as bad food. Hebrews 13, verse nine. Strange doctrines is compared to bad food, spoiled food. So, you know, if you eat bad food, what happens? You have bad taste. It's very unpleasant. You know, you get food poisoning, stomach is upset, etc. But he calls false doctrine as bad food. So can you imagine you're listening to wrong doctrine, you're just listening to somebody false for profit or somebody and then God is alerting you through an unpleasant taste or smell, you know, and so on. So we should be aware of it. Okay, we have to stop here. We did not finish what I wanted to cover today, but it's alright. We'll continue this next week. I want to talk about, you know, how do we train our spiritual senses so that we can get, you know, get sharp in recognizing these things. And we're also going to talk about how to differentiate between soul and spirit. Okay, so we'll pick that up next week. Everybody's with me. Let's see. Okay. Christopher's question. In Pentecostal Charismatic Churches, people who are being prayed upon feel the Holy Spirit and they fall forward or back. What has this happened in your experience? What is your view on these outcomes in prayer? And is this waiving the Holy Spirit? You know, I'll give a quick answer to this question about falling under the power. It is a genuine experience. We see it in the Bible that, you know, there are people who when they encounter the presence of God, physically they become weak. So they drop to the ground. So is it a biblical? Is it a genuine thing? Yes. But sadly, what has happened over the years in Charismatic Pentecostal Spiritful Circles is that some of this has been manufactured. So some of this has become programmed into the whole system, right? So that's something we should avoid. You know, in many, some, many, but in churches, you know, whenever the pastor lays hands, whether you feel anything or not, you'd expect it to go down on the ground. There's a catcher behind you and there's a person in front of you to put a cloth on you. So it's become so programmed into our services. Now, that is something we should avoid. And that's why at APC, you know, for the time we started, we said no catchers, no putting cloths. I mean, if you fall to the ground is God's responsibility. God will take care of you. And if you hit the ground hard, hey, so be it, you know. So we just stayed away from it because we don't want to program people into something like this, which if it's a programmed thing, then it's pointless, right? It's good for the video camera. It's good for viewership, but it's a meaningless thing. So we stay away from it. But has it happened? Yeah. There have been times when, you know, I don't touch, I don't push, but people fall to the ground. Now, if people fall to the ground, I don't get involved. I just, okay, if it's really God, God will do his work. If they're falling because they are programmed to some kind of a response like this, okay, forget it. It's a waste of time. So I don't emphasize on it. We know it's a genuine thing in the Bible. We know God generally does work through that. But then we don't want to make that the center of our attention. If it happens, let it happen. Let God do what he wants to do. Is it okay? That's a quick answer to a very big question. Okay. All right, let's take a quick break. Please. I don't use up your break time. I will meet in the other class shortly. God bless. Thanks.