 omnipotent, father, mercy, and grace. Rudene, brevida, ba-ba-ba, and multiply it, and increase it, and multiply it, ha-ha, that'll astound. You're mine for my use! One of the things that you'll see more and more today, especially in Pentecostal charismatic circles, is this move of the spirit or what they call the move of the spirit. The question is, is it really a move of the spirit or is it just someone just moving for the sake of either getting attention or to try to kind of move the spirit on their own to engender some sort of emotional reaction? Is what they're doing, what they're saying, what's happening, what you're seeing, is it biblical? The hard part is, when you talk to someone who is involved with this, it's hard to really get a good biblical response. It's hard to get a response that is kind of coherent because oftentimes, and I don't mean to be offensive, but a lot of times you see the people who are proponents of this, they tend to be more emotional than anything else. Having a firm grasp on what a hermeneutic actually is or how to exude a text or anything like that sound doctrine is really kind of out of the way. Typically what you have is people who, when they read the scriptures, they tend to spiritualize them more than anything else and look for a hidden meaning, something that maybe if they read it and they're the domination of understanding, someone else might read the same thing and get something totally different, which is obviously not what God is after, what God is not looking for. And so to try to find someone who is going to give a sort of a biblical or coherent defense of this, it's kind of hard to find. Now, you go to EncounterTV and you look at or you listen to this person's response, you see him try to lay out a defense. The problem is his argument is kind of flawed. Firstly, there are those who believe that the manifestation is anti-biblical. Second, there are those who believe that the manifestation should be rejected because it is extra biblical. Let me first address the concern that being slain in the spirit is anti-biblical. There is nothing in Scripture that specifically condemns the manifestation itself. The manifestation cannot be considered anti-biblical as there is nothing in the Scripture that labels it as demonic or of the flesh. In fact, the skeptics will say it's not even found in Scripture. So if that were true, what grounds would they have in the first place of labeling it as anti-biblical? Those who say it is anti-biblical say so without any justification whatsoever. He states that or he says that it's not anti-biblical. When someone says that being slain in the spirit is anti-biblical, there is no passage against it. Well, that's not an argument because you can't find a passage against it. As a matter of fact, that is the argument against it because you can't find an argument for it. Maybe you can't say it's anti-biblical. What you can say is that it's not biblical, meaning there is no biblical mandate for it. There are no biblical examples for it. They give examples of, let's say, sometimes unbelievers falling back with Jesus. But in all the other cases that he gives, he cites examples where a believer didn't fall back, but someone bowed forward. Like with Paul. Paul didn't fall backwards. Paul didn't fall backwards. He knew who he was talking to and he bowed down in reverence. You see that even in his example in First Kings. Well, this is an example where they were standing. This is an example where they just could not be in his presence. So that's why he says they could not stand in his presence. What a sentence that they were not back or falling over. Certainly not like what's happening here. But the question has got to be, when you see someone so-called being slain in the spirit, the question has got to be why? Now as I said in the past, the very first person I belonged to was a Pentecostal church. And so I got to see this up close and personal every Sunday. And I would always ask myself, and even others, when I see people so-called being slain in the spirit and falling out and so forth, my question was always why? Why is this happening? And I recall a moment when we went to another church. And I just wanted just to get closer to God. And I remember being up at the front and the man was going around laying his hand and people were just falling over. And I said, Lord, I just want a real genuine experience with you. I didn't want to just fall out for the sake of falling out. I didn't want to just be slain, just for the sake of being slain. But also it was like I was the odd man out. I didn't want to just look like an idiot and everyone else being touched and receiving or catching ahold of ghosts. And here I am not. And so I said, I'm just going to be legitimate. I'm not going to fake anything. And so he came and put his hands on me and nothing. I just stood there. And I was genuinely searching. And what I found out was when you ask someone, what is the point of this? What's the purpose of this? You don't get a biblical response. Because these ministries, these so-called ministries are looking for signs and wonders that kind of lets you know a little bit about their motives. Oftentimes the people who are putting their hands on people, it's not so much for the benefit of God or for the ministry or for the gospel. It's often time for the benefit of them. What you don't hear a lot of time, I'm not going to say all the time, but what you don't hear here a lot of times is the gospel being preached. You may ask or you may hear them say or ask who wants to receive the Holy Spirit, not who wants to receive salvation, who wants a relationship with Christ, who wants to receive the power of the Holy Spirit. Well, recall when Philip goes down to Samaria, there was a sorcerer named Simon who he may have looked like he wanted a genuine relationship. But when the apostles come, what does he want to do? He wants to buy that power from them. He wants to be able to utilize that same power for it because he wants to go back to his old way. He wants to utilize this Holy Spirit as a means of gain. And so these people who are looking for signs and wonders, what did Jesus say? He said, a wicked and adulterous generation seeks after signs, but no sign will be given to them except for the sign of Jonah, which is obviously Jesus being in the tomb, being buried for three days. That's not good enough for them because they can't do that for themselves with that. When you compare men in the Bible who were true spiritual giants, so to speak, what you don't see is what you see today. What you don't see is somebody putting their hands on them or blowing on them or anything like that and them receiving some sort of encounter and them falling over and frothing at their mouth. You don't see that happen. As a matter of fact, you don't see them doing that to anyone else. You don't see them, certainly what you see here from... What you have now is you have a bunch of people now who are just making a mockery who, since you can't find any biblical mandate for what they're doing, and they can't find it. And I know that there are probably some who probably have bought into this, but there's no one who has spent any legitimate amount of time in this so-called signs and wonders ministry knowing that they haven't actually seen any legitimate signs and wonders who can honestly say that this is a move of God. They know it's a move of themselves. It's about their money, about their stance, about their status, about how people see them. And so I will be able to say this, that their reward is going to come soon. The best part of their ministry is happening now, but the rest of their life, their eternal life, that's the part they're not going to enjoy, because everybody's going to have eternal life. It's just where you're going to have it at. And now you see this woman here, she is... I think she's got a bitty hand beat. He's waving his jacket, but she's just using her finger like a pistol. And then you've got this, what is it? Street Ministry 7 or whatever it's called, where I don't know what this guy is doing this holy water drink or him taking his... Jesus. It's the lily water. Ho! Shop on power. Watch him. Take this Bible. Hold on to it. Jesus. Give it to him. Give it to him. Jesus. Jesus. So before I continue to them, if any of them or anyone who's in one of these kind of ministries happens to be watching, you need to stop. I don't know what God is going to do to you, but I can promise you he is going to have his way and it's not going to be pleasant. You are making a marker of him and you have made him to be an offense to people, to be a stumbling block of people who really want to know him. And if this is what they see, this is what they're going to get, you turn people off. You've made the gospel more confusing and since we know he's not the author of confusion, all I can say is you just need to stop. We'll get back to the purpose of this in a second, but someone might even say, well, what's the harm of this? Well, here's the harm. I remember having a friend of ours back at this church. This was a person who was genuinely looking to grow in Christ, who wanted to mature, who she wasn't looking for health and wealth and prosperity. She just wanted a better relationship with Christ. Her problem was she never received the Holy Spirit the way that they thought she should have received the Holy Spirit. They would have these little tearing service when you would go down to the front to the altar and you would tear it from the Holy Spirit. And then you knew the Holy Spirit showed up because you were sort of speaking in tongues. And so she would go down there week after week after week and it just never would come. Well, here's what happened with her. She became so defeated, so distraught because why am I not receiving the Holy Spirit? What's wrong with me? Why am I not speaking in tongues? Why am I not falling out? All these things. But what you saw her, when you saw her outside of church, when you saw her just in her regular day, she was always talking about the gospel. She was always ministering to someone and need some other woman the way she talked to her children. She wanted the gospel to be first and foremost in her life and in her children's life. And so I told her one day, I said, I don't think that you have it wrong. I think they have it wrong because here is what the move of the Spirit looks like. Jesus tells his disciples that they are going to receive the Holy Spirit. And what is the Holy Spirit when he's in you? What is he going to do? He's going to testify. The whole purpose of the Holy Spirit is to grow the body. What is happening here when these people are falling out and shaking and laughing and dancing? Take it. Take it. Hey! That's the new way. When you go to some religious church, they're going to say, come out. That's the Holy Spirit. Stay in. There he goes. What's happening here, I don't know what that's about. There is no way that one God has been magnified. There is no way that anyone is hearing the gospel out of that. But when the Holy Spirit is actually involved, as Jesus said, when the Holy Spirit is involved, he is going to testify of Jesus, not of the Holy Spirit. And so when you see someone talking about the gospel, they're trying to sell an aspect of the gospel that really isn't the gospel, they're not even speaking of the gospel. And so what you end up seeing is some sort of orchestrated almost WWE-like performance where you've got folks just falling out and you've got these folks that are catching them. Well, what would happen if you didn't have the catchers? And then another question that makes you just wonder, how come no one ever catches the Holy Spirit out in public? How come you can't find a specific area where I guess it's safe? Because you don't see one person catching the Holy Spirit and there's no one else who expects it to happen that's around. Now I'm not saying that an encounter with God does not elicit some sort of emotional response. Because some people it does. So I wouldn't deny that, but how we're seeing it played out in many of these churches as though it's some sort of performance, where 18 Paul says not to be drunk with wine, but be filled with the Holy Spirit. He's not saying at some take of that instead of being drunk with wine, be drunk off the Holy Spirit. No, it is not a comparison, it's not a comparison between the Holy Spirit and wine. It's a contrast. That's why we use the word but, the word but or in Greek, it's a point of contrast. It's a show the difference between one and the other. They're not talking about the same thing. And so when we say but, we're going in a different direction. And so he contrasts being drunk with wine versus having or being filled with the Holy Spirit. Well, we know that the fruit of the Spirit is self-control. The Bible talks about us having this control of ourselves. And so it can't be that the Holy Spirit comes to us and we lose control. Doesn't spread the gospel, we just fall out. And the only person who gets glorified is the person who laid hands on us or waved his jacket or breathed on us or whatever. And so without question, the greatest manifestation of the Holy Spirit, when a person really gets empowered with the Holy Spirit, you see it not so much in church. You see it outside of church. You see it in their lives, in their daily life. You see it in them ministering the gospel. Remember what Paul says in 1 Corinthians 12. He said, now concerning these spiritual things or your Bible may say spiritual gifts. He says in chapter, in verse 7 that the point of these spiritual gifts are for the edification of the rest of the body. It's for the common good of the rest of the body. It's not for you. The Holy Spirit is not poured out on you for you. And so here's what you ought to see. You ought to see these people who have so-called these so-called gifts of healing and so forth. Why don't you go to the hospital? Now we keep saying this all the time. But you don't see you don't see them so-called in their power as they say they have. There should be no COVID-19, should it? There should be no cancer running amuck. There should be no sickness and disease because you've got this power and all you've got to do is wave your hand or wave your jacket or offer somebody something to drink. But you're not doing it. Which tells us that you are a fraud. Harsh words, but I'm not being harsh enough truth be told. These are people who should be avoided. Now, for those of you who are insisting on being under these ministries, who want to defend them, have at it. You'll get exactly what you deserve because you are helping to make a mockery of the gospel. Remember, they can't do what they're doing if they don't have these full stadiums. They can't do what they're doing without you enabling them. And so if in these ministries God is not being magnified. Souls are not being one to Christ. That's no ministry at all. All you've done is to put money in the coffers of these charlatans. All you've done is partake in these evil deeds. You have looked for these signs and wonders. You've gotten the treat. You've gotten your reward. Your reward was a show and that will be it. And so you're going to miss out on heaven. You're going to miss out on a field, a full field life here on earth and you're going to have a bunch of misery to go along with. There will be as he says weeping and gnashing of teeth. You will join them and you'll have your reward with them. So that is my warning to you if you are looking for a way out I beg I plead with you find a Bible believing church. Find a ministry that you can find a Bible. How about that? Find a Bible read it and see that none of this that's taking place now is happening in the scriptures. You're not going to find a single chapter and verse of the Bible which specifically and completely gives us the foundation for the slain in the spirit manifestation. But the same is true about the doctrine of inerrancy eschatology, salvation dispensationalism, ministry leadership and so forth. My point is that you have to look at the scripture as a whole. So I want you to really hear this now. We are not looking for a single instance in the Bible that completely demonstrates the slain in the spirit phenomenon. Those who demand a single chapter and verse aren't interested in what the Bible teaches as a whole. They're just interested in winning a debate. And so last to the finish off on what he's saying he doesn't think it's a good thing or he didn't see a problem that you can find a biblical example of this. That should be alarming if you don't see anyone else doing what he's doing, what he's advocating. That's proof of enough to not do it. He's saying because we don't see anyone talking about it or against it that means it's okay. Well we don't see anyone talking negatively about pedophilia. That means it's okay. We don't see a lot of things that we know that are wrong being talked about in the Bible because we just innately know that these things are wrong. What we don't see or we need to see is we need to see an example. There's no biblical example of this happening. And since there isn't we ought to follow what we see in Scripture. Amen.