 So it's my goal tonight that by the end of this message that if you've never prayed in tongues before that you will be praying in tongues by the time we finish this word. Perhaps you've been asking God for your prayer language, this heavenly gift that you hear so much about and you've been met with frustrating moment after frustrating moment. Maybe you've had hands laid on you, you've gone to the conferences, the revival meetings and you've been asking God to allow this gift to flow through you and for some reason or another you just haven't been able to step into this beautiful expression of the power of the Holy Spirit. Well tonight we're gonna take the word and the word will begin to reveal and remove those blockages that keep you from expressing this gift that the Holy Spirit has deposited in you. Do you want all that God has for you? I said do you want all that God has for you? If you want everything that God has for you just lift your hands and say I receive it. You in the comment section, if you want everything God has for you, I want you to write those three simple words, don't be ashamed, just write I receive it and that is an expression of your faith. Even if you're watching online I believe that the same power that's present here can touch you right where you're watching and maybe you are that one that I've been talking about that is frustrated because they've been unable to move or step into this gift, this will be a changing night tonight. This will be a night of transformation for you and more than that, this is more than just for those who've yet to be able to use this beautiful gift of the Holy Spirit. This is also for the believer who has the gift of speaking in tongues, who knows what it is to use that prayer language but wants to be equipped to help others step into that gift as well. So everyone is going to benefit from tonight's message. Let's look first at Second Timothy chapter one verse six. Second Timothy one six. Scripture says this, for which cause I put the in remembrance that thou stir up the gift of God which is in thee through the laying on my hands. Now, if we're going to take context into consideration here, this is Paul the apostle talking about Timothy's teaching gift and he's talking about the fact that he needs to overcome fear and just step into the confidence in the gift that God has given to him. And this is not necessarily saying that the gift came from Paul but it came through Paul from Christ, from the Holy Spirit. But the takeaway principle here that has universal application for every believer and for every spiritual gift is the simple fact that the spiritual gifts or the deposits that God has made in our lives, those deposits must be stirred. I find it amazing that every time I talk about activating a spiritual gift, a lot of we'll call them interesting people get triggered. You can't teach people to receive gifts. It's from the Holy Spirit, but we understand that. And we know that only God can give gifts. Verse Corinthians chapter 12 is very clear on the fact that it's the Holy Spirit who divides to each of us as he wills. So when I talk about activating a gift, I'm not talking about forcing God to give you something that he didn't want to give to you. I'm talking about realizing that something has already been deposited in you and it's just a matter of activating that or stirring that. Now, you receive the Holy Spirit at salvation. Let's just make that absolutely clear. You do not need to speak in tongues to be saved. We need to balance this because I think there's extremism on both sides. You don't need to speak in tongues to be saved but you do need to be saved in order to speak in tongues. Romans chapter eight verse nine makes it very clear that the Holy Spirit is given to us because we belong to God. And if we didn't have the Holy Spirit, we wouldn't belong to God at all. Therefore, the very moment you believe, the very moment you placed your faith in Christ, the very moment of salvation, the Holy Spirit was present. He is not someone that we receive later. He is the very one who works salvation in us. So it's not a matter of receiving but releasing. John 7 38 says, out of your innermost being will flow rivers of living water. So it comes from within to without. So this beautiful expression of the gift of tongues comes at the very moment of salvation. Now, in a moment, I'm gonna talk about this idea that the gift of tongues is not for everyone and anyone who usually says that is coming from a very well-intentioned place. People who say such things, they're not evil, they're not wicked. I think sometimes we make enemies out of other believers simply because we disagree on doctrines but disagreements don't have to become divisions. And we don't have to label people and say, well, you don't have the fire or you don't have the power of the Holy Spirit. You don't have the Holy Spirit. No, no, no, no, no. If they're born again, they have the Holy Spirit. Okay, we need to make that clear. So no one is our enemy for disagreeing but that doesn't mean that we can't address these ideas. I never attack people I address ideas. I don't speak against anyone I speak for truth. And in doing this, we find a standard and that standard is the word of God. So I will address that in a moment. Usually when people believe this, it's coming from a place, as I said, of good intentions and it's very often based on 1 Corinthians chapter 12 where Paul the apostle lists several rhetorical questions. Do we all have this gift? Do we all have that gift? Are all apostles? Do I work miracles and so forth? And we're gonna study that text. I'm gonna show you exactly what's being communicated there in just a moment. But first, we have to lay this groundwork if we're going to receive this beautiful expression because before you can walk in this, you must understand what you're walking in. Otherwise you're going to be left with emotionalism and hype. And you may leave out of here with an emotional rush but not a life-transforming moment in the presence of God and it comes by the word for the word brings transformation. Now, let's go first to Romans chapter eight. This is one of my favorite portions of scripture. Romans chapter eight and I'm gonna read just a few verses here. This particular verse is not talking about speaking in tongues and neither is the scripture when it talks about praying in the Holy Spirit. Neither is that verse talking about speaking in tongues. Praying in the Holy Spirit is not the same thing as praying in tongues. Praying in the Holy Spirit is simply praying under the influence of, in the power of and in surrender to the will of the Holy Spirit. It's praying in alignment with him, praying in agreement with what he prays and he does pray as we're about to read. So as long as we leave each verse in its proper context, then we have safe boundaries that are set so that we're not left with bizarre doctrines. How many of you know, being spiritual doesn't mean being strange. Going deep doesn't mean becoming bizarre. Sometimes I think some believers are so deep they're drowning and it's not the word they're deep in. Get deep into weird theologies and this is why we have to let the scripture speak to us on each and every instance. So Romans eight, 26, I'll begin there. This is what the Bible says. And this is so powerful. And the Holy Spirit helps us in our weakness. For example, we don't know what God wants us to pray for but the Holy Spirit prays for us. Wait a minute, stop there. That is incredible. The Holy Spirit prays for us? Wow. Lift your hands, say thank you Jesus. Thank you for the Holy Spirit but the Holy Spirit prays for us. Watch this now with groanings that cannot be expressed in words. Now again, right here usually we'll say, oh, that's tongues. No, no, no. This is much, much, much deeper than speaking in tongues. This is the foundation of the gift but this is not the gift itself. I'm gonna show you right now and this is astonishing what's in the scripture. I'm telling you, whenever I read scripture on the Holy Spirit, something in me just starts stirring. The Holy Spirit prays for us with groanings that cannot be expressed in words and the Father who knows all hearts knows what the Spirit is saying. For the Spirit pleads for us. He pleads for us believers in harmony with God's own will. Now first of all, there's so much packed into just these few verses here. But here we see that the Holy Spirit prays for us. I remember when I was first beginning to seek the Lord in terms of my calling for ministry and there's nothing wrong with this so don't hear what I'm not saying. Man, I would go from conference to conference. I had apostles lay hands on me. I had prophets lay hands on me. I had evangelists and teachers and pastors lay hands on me. I went to revival meetings and worship conferences. I went to prayer meetings and Bible studies, consuming books, consuming television programs, consuming at the time even YouTube videos. And I would just soak everything and my friends would laugh at me because I was the only 14 year old watching TVN. But I would soak in so many different things. And of course I say it's like eating a watermelon. You eat the watermelon, spit out the seeds. There were some seeds along the way. But I began to glean from many different expressions of ministry. Whenever we have guest speakers at our church, I would make sure, because I was the pastor's son, I would make sure to go with my dad when we took them to lunch and I would sit there and I would just pester them with question after question after question after question. Some of them liked it, some of them got a little annoyed because they didn't know how to answer some of my questions. But I was coming from a sincere place and I would go and I would just say, oh wow, so and so laid hands on me and he laid hands on me, she laid hands on me and they prophesied over me and they imparted some spiritual gift but the Bible says the Holy Spirit prays for you. He himself prays for you. The one who knows you like no one else knows you. He prays for you like no one else can pray for you. And then the Bible continues this, it gets even better if that were even possible that because I don't know what to pray, the Holy Spirit's praying for me and the Bible says he's praying with groanings. These are deep desires. He doesn't just pray for you, bless them, touch them, help them. The Bible says please. In other words, he's praying with this passion. He's praying with love, he's praying with great force. You ever had one of those Holy Ghost church grandmas pray for you? And they just pray with force? Well the Holy Spirit prays with force and with might. He prays for you with more love than a parent prays for their child. He prays for you with more love than one of those Holy Ghost church grandmas prays for you. He prays for you with more love than your mom or your dad prays for you. And he prays with passion and with pleading. Now watch this. The Bible says and the Father who knows our hearts knows what the Spirit is saying where the Spirit pleads for us believers in harmony with God's own will. In other words, the Holy Spirit is constantly interceding for you, pooling you into God's will. People are so afraid, am I gonna miss God's will? Am I gonna miss God's will? Am I gonna miss God's will? My friend, the will of God is not some fragile thing. The will of God is a great immovable force. And the Holy Spirit is constantly pooling you into that river of God's will. I think of Jonah. He was trying to get away from God's call and he couldn't. The Bible says that a powerful wind came from the presence of the Lord. I think more important than Jonah and the whale is Jonah and the wind. That was the hand of the Holy Spirit destroying his means of disobedience. Destroying the vehicle that he was using for his sin. Snatching him up, putting him back on the shore and saying you have an assignment. That's what the Holy Spirit does. So he's pooling you into God's will. He's pleading for you on behalf of God's will. This is why there are those moments where sometimes you get into those spiritual slumps and then out of nowhere you get this breath of fresh air and suddenly you get this desire for prayer and reading and worship. Those are the prayers of the Holy Spirit. He's breathing that fresh life on you. Now that's just the first one. I'm gonna tie three verses together and we're gonna see what the gift of tongues is. Now watch this. So we know, A, the Holy Spirit prays for us. Now watch this. 1 Corinthians 617. The Bible says, but the person who is joined to the Lord is what? One spirit. There is this common misconception about the nature of the believer that tells us that we have two spirits. We have the spirit of the world and we have our Holy Spirit or the spirit that is connected with God. But really, you and I don't have two natures. We have one. The other one isn't really us. It's a shell, a shadow of our former selves. And here we see in the scripture very clearly that our spirit is joined as one with God's spirit. Picture, if you will, that I get two glasses of water and I pour one glass of water into the other. Who could separate those? That's what it's like when your spirit mingles, becomes one with the Holy Spirit. Now what is spiritual growth? Spiritual growth is not your spirit growing. It's impossible. Spiritual growth is the rest of you catching up with your spirit. Revelation is not you receiving new knowledge from heaven. Revelation is when that which I already know in my spirit manifested my intellect from within to without, out of that relationship, out of that oneness with him. And so, if my spirit is one spirit with the Holy Spirit, then what the Holy Spirit prays, my spirit prays, watch this now. If I am one with the Holy Spirit in my spirit, this is why the scripture says deep calleth unto deep. Deep calleth unto deep the depths of who I am calling out unto the depths of who God is and the two speaking to one another, becoming one and that fellowship 24-7 taking place is affecting change in the outer shells of who I am and this is where now my spirit is in agreement with him. I walk according to the spirit, I will not fulfill the lusts of the flesh. Why? Because my spirit is in agreement with the Holy Spirit. And so, they are in agreement with one another. Now let's tie the threads together here. Look at 1 Corinthians 14, 14. So we know the Holy Spirit prays, A, B, we know that my spirit prays with the Holy Spirit prays, C, for if I pray in tongues, my spirit is praying. But I don't understand what I am saying. Now, a common misconception regarding 1 Corinthians 12 and 14 is that Paul the apostle was somehow criticizing the gift of tongues. Paul was not criticizing the gift of tongues, he was comparing the gift of tongues with the gift of prophecy. He was not saying that speaking in tongues was bad, he was saying that prophesying was better in the context of a church assembly. You look at his writings, he very clearly tells you, when you come together, here's what will be most beneficial. Now, Romans 8, 26 tells me that my spirit is being prayed over by the Holy Spirit. 1 Corinthians 6, 17 says that my spirit is one with the Holy Spirit. That means when I pray in tongues, I am speaking aloud the prayers that the Holy Spirit prays in the spirit realm. When you pray in tongues, the Holy Spirit is praying for you through you. When you pray in tongues, you're giving a voice to the groanings deep within. This is why praying in tongues is so powerful. 1 Corinthians chapter 14 verses two and four tell us that when we pray in tongues, our spirits are being strengthened. What does that mean? If my spirit is being strengthened, that means whatever is affected by my spirit is intensifying. This means that my spiritual gifts become sharper when I pray in tongues. This means that my ability, my sensitivity toward the voice of the Holy Spirit becomes sharper when I pray in tongues. This means that when I pray in tongues, all of the gifts, all of the expressions, my ability to resist temptation, my ability to hear his voice, my ability to understand the word, all of that is elevated when I pray in tongues. Why? Because when I pray in tongues, I'm allowing the influence of the spirit to take over more aspects of my life. It is the language of surrender. It is the language of yielding. Leave it to God to leave behind such awesome power to leave that behind a childlike act. Very few people who pray in tongues care what you think of them. So what are the obstacles? Number one, misunderstanding the gift. This is the first obstacle. Can every believer pray in tongues? Yes, and I'll show you why. But first, let's take a look at the particular portion of scripture that's often misunderstood. Before I give you this, please understand, and you can actually check last Tuesday's teaching, and I have it written here. You can go and check the teaching eight minutes, Christians still believe about speaking in tongues. In that particular teaching, I talked about various different lies that have become prevalent in the body of Christ concerning this beautiful gift. There's a lot of confusion around the subject. And one of those lies that we addressed was the fact that there isn't, or there aren't many expressions of the gift. So just real briefly, I'll give them to you. If you wanna deeper look at these, you can go back and look at Tuesday's video. You will see that there is the proof tongue. This is what we saw in Acts chapter two where the people prayed aloud and the unbeliever was looking and heard their own languages being spoken. Then there's the prophetic tongue. This is 1 Corinthians chapter 14, the louder part of the chapter where Paul is talking about somebody standing, giving a tongue and someone else interpreting that tongue. That's the prophetic expression of the tongue meant to be interpreted for the body of Christ in an assembly of believers. And the third one is the personal tongue. This is 1 Corinthians 14, two and four, what I just referenced. This is the personal prayer language that strengthens you personally. So if you compare, watch this now. If you compare 1 Corinthians 14, two and four with 1 Corinthians chapter 12 verse seven, you see two things that are completely different. 1 Corinthians 14, two and four tells us that when we pray in tongues, one of the expressions will edify me personally. Yet 1 Corinthians 12, seven tells me that the spiritual gifts were given to edify one another. Is this a contradiction? No, these are lines of distinction that reveal to us different expressions regarding the spiritual gift. And by the way, 1 Corinthians 14, two and four also make it very clear that it's not just an earthly language, impossible. You can point to the Greek and say language means language, of course it does. But it's a heavenly language if you look at the context. Now watch this, here's the often misunderstood portion of scripture. Are you receiving this tonight? Let me know online if this is helping you. 1 Corinthians 12, 29 through 31. We're gonna see a list of rhetorical questions here. Watch this now. Are we all apostles? Are we all prophets? Are we all teachers? Do we all have the power to do miracles? Do we all have the gift of healing? Do we all have the ability to speak in unknown languages? Do we all have the ability to interpret unknown languages? Of course not. So you should earnestly desire the most helpful gifts. But now let me show you a way of life that is best of all. Now, this is the only verse that's ever pointed to that seems to indicate that not every believer has a prayer language. But let's break this down here. Because in 1 Corinthians 12, 29 through 31, Paul the apostle is making reference to public expressions of gifts. There are nine different ones that were listed. Among those were the word of wisdom, the word of knowledge, faith, healing, miracles, prophecy, discernment, tongues and tongues, interpretation. Now, what if we applied the same logic that we use on the gift of tongues to all of the other gifts listed? We know that every believer is to walk in wisdom. Well, you know, the word of wisdom is only for a few, so not every believer can have wisdom. We don't say that, do we? The word of wisdom is a very real spiritual gift. So we acknowledge that while all believers can walk in wisdom, only some have the specific gift of the word of wisdom, the word of knowledge. Are we all to be ignorant? Is knowledge only for a few believers? Of course not. So, well, we acknowledge that every believer is to walk in knowledge. At the same time, we can still look and see that the scripture talks about a very specific gift of the word of knowledge. What about faith? The gift of faith. Well, you know that faith is a gift, so not every believer can have it. Now, wait a minute. This particular gift of faith is talking about an other's centered expression and benefit. Why do we know that 1 Corinthians 12, 7? So the gift of faith isn't my faith being strengthened. The gift of faith is the ability to strengthen the faith of others. Well, wait a minute. Does this mean that not all believers can help strengthen the faith of others? By no means. It's just telling us that there is a public expression of the gift, an area of grace for ministry to be used among the assembly of believers. The gift of healing, here's a great example. Mark chapter 16. And you'll often hear this conspiracy theory that says that the last few verses of Mark were added later. Now, this is something that actually, if you study it, and I don't mean study the first layer, because some people study the first layer and see, see, I was right, it was added later. You gotta go deeper than that. Because what actually happened throughout the years is it became a popularized idea based on some poor information. And then each generation just kind of accepted it. Well, you know it was added later, it was added later. And so eventually it just kind of became this cliche that everyone embraced without ever really questioning the original research. There's a great book on this, I can't remember the name now. Britain Remind Me will put it in the description for them to look it up later. There's a book on this, I didn't write it. But it actually begins to explore all these different faulty areas of study that actually show us that those last few verses in Mark are actually a part of the original writings. Now, in those writings we see that all who believe will lay hands on the sick and see them recover. Is that true or not? That's the Bible. Wait a minute, but not all have gifts of healing. So what's the difference? The difference is one is an act in the lifestyle of every believer, the other is a special area of grace, a higher potency, I know we don't like to hear that, but with someone with the gift of healing praise for you, you are more likely to be healed than if someone who doesn't have the gift praised for you, you say, how can you say that? Well, then why would God give it to us? So while all of us can lay hands on the sick and see them recover, those with the gift of healing have been given a special assignment to minister this particular gift, are you following me? Okay, so if we apply the same logic to the gift of healing that we do to the gift of tongues, then we would say no believer ever can believe for healing again, but we don't see that. We acknowledge here that it is in fact a public expression of ministry, the same for miracles. You can't believe for miracles now if we apply the same logic. Prophecy, you can't hear from God for yourself now if you apply the same logic. Discernment, well, there it goes, there goes all our discernment, just accept anyone and everyone, because discernment's not for every believer. So why do we do it with the gift of tongues? Why do we say, well, for the others, that's talking about a specific expression, but then there's a lifestyle that every believer is to, at least in some form or another, use these particular aspects of God's power. Why do we only do that for the gift of tongues? What is Paul writing about here? He's talking about the prophetic expression of the gift of tongues, the one that's used in the public assembly of believers where someone will stand, speak aloud in tongues, and someone else will interpret. Well, it's right there. Do all have the gift of tongues? Do all interpret? This is talking about the tandem, the pair of the two. And this is a public expression of the gift, not the personal prayer language. Now, we see that the Bible doesn't teach that all believers don't have the gift, but does it teach that we all can have this gift? Let me show you something else. Let's go now to look at what happened in Acts 2.4. Turn there, please. The Bible says, all of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit enabled them. Did they stand up and would say, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. You can't do that because it's not for all of us. Why would the Holy Spirit pour out a gift on all of the church if the gift wasn't for all of the church? Why would the Holy Spirit pour out a gift publicly if it wasn't meant to be used publicly? First Corinthians chapter 14, verses four and five, a person who speaks in tongues is strengthened personally, but one who speaks a word of prophecy strengthens the entire church. Now watch this. I wish you could all speak in tongues. Whoa, wait a minute. Paul, don't you know that's not God's will? He even said, I pray in tongues more than you all. Well, how did he know that unless there was some form of evidence? I wish you could all speak in tongues. Well, wait a minute. Why would Paul the apostle wish for something contrary to the will of God? And then why would the Holy Spirit allow for that wish to be added to an epistle, which is an instruction for the church? Looking further, we see Acts 2.39. This is Peter now standing up on the day of Pentecost. He says, the promise is to you, to your children and to those far away, all who have been called by the Lord our God. So okay, who's the promise for? For generation after generation of believers, every single one of us who have been called. Okay, now what is he talking about specifically? What is for every believer? What is for every generation? Look here in Acts 2.33. And the Father, as he had promised, gave him the Holy Spirit to pour out upon us. Watch this now, just as you see and hear today. What were they seeing? They were seeing the power of the Holy Spirit at work. What were they hearing? They were hearing them speak in tongues. And that's the promise for all believers. So this idea that it's not for everyone is probably the first and greatest obstacle. Because if you don't know that it's for you, you're gonna hesitate to receive it. And you're gonna settle for less. You're gonna shrink back and say, well, you know if God wanted to give it to me, he'd give it to me. Why is everyone pressuring me to do this? I don't want it. I don't know about you, but I don't want any less than all for which Christ died to give me. I don't want any less. Now watch this. So we've at least begun to chip away at this myth that not every believer can speak in tongues. But another misunderstanding about the gift of tongues is that it can't be controlled. People imagine that they're gonna come up to the altar. I did. I thought I was gonna stand at the altar. Someone was gonna place their hand on my head. The Holy Spirit was gonna grab my tongue and start moving it up and down. But why would Paul the apostle write an entire chapter, 1 Corinthians 14? Why would he write an entire chapter on controlling the gift if the gift couldn't be controlled? And so many times people will come to receive this gift and they don't receive it because they don't recognize their role in it. All spiritual gifts require some exercise of faith on the part of the one using them. Why would speaking in tongues be any different? Prophecy, you have to speak. Pray for the sick, you have to lay hands. Teach, you have to study. Evangelize, you have to witness. Praying in tongues. Why do we do that? This gift has been assaulted by the deception of the enemy because the enemy knows its power. That's why. And so we have to recognize that there is a participation on our part. Obstacle number two is fear and I'll move through these more quickly. Obstacle number two is fear and then we're gonna pray and I'm gonna believe that that gift gets unlocked tonight for you as well. May not be nighttime when you watch this, but for you as well. Number two is fear. One of the fears that people have is what if I get a demon when asking for the Holy Spirit? Well, first of all, I think a much larger problem in the church than demon oppression or possession is demon obsession. The church is too obsessed with demons. Let me just make this clear. There's no spirit more powerful than the Holy Spirit. Period. Period. Now, Luke 11, 11 through 13 says this. Look at how gentle Jesus is being. You fathers, if your children ask for a fish, do you give them a snake instead? Or if they ask for an egg, do you give them a scorpion? Of course not. So if you sinful people know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him? If you ask him for the Holy Spirit, do you think he's going to send a demon? Or do you think that a demon could sneak one in there? I mean, imagine it. You're looking at God, he's looking at you and you're saying, God, in the name of Jesus, I'm asking for you to allow the Holy Spirit to flow through me and the devil is waiting for God, what? To look away, to just sneak something in there? Well, he's sending the Holy Spirit? This is just paranoia. Paranoia that's been worked up for what? To prevent people from walking in this beautiful gift. Now, let's say at worst, it's not a heavenly language, which I don't believe at all. You look at scripture, it's clear. There's a heavenly language that we're given. But let's just say, okay, let's play a role here. Let's pretend for a moment that we are wrong, that this is not a heavenly language. It's not what I'm saying, but let's just pretend that this is not a heavenly language. At the very worst, it's just another expression of worship. You mean to tell me that when I hum, humming worship songs to the Lord? Well, you know, that's unintelligible. The enemy can come through when you're humming unto the Lord. Clapping my hands, well, you know, you're not really speaking anything so the devil can come into those noise, those sound waves when you're clapping. When I'm crying, well, that's just an emotional expression. There's no real coherency to what you're doing there. And because there's no intelligible message coming through your tears, that's where the devil can enter. Such paranoia. If speaking in tongues is not a heavenly language, at the very worst, it's just another expression coming from our being days. Coming from that place of worship. So if I wanna hum or shout or clap, there may not be an intelligible message in those expressions. Why then do we zero in on this gift? Again, I believe it has to do with this all-out assault on the gift. Do you realize that it's the tongue talkers who've done more for missions and evangelism than any other group in the world? Any other group in the church? It's the tongue talkers where there's revival and growth. You hear all these statistics about the church is dying, people are leaving in droves, not with the tongue talkers. We're growing. We're growing faster than ever before. Why? I mean, ask yourself, why is every other movement dying? Ask yourself, why is every other movement placating to the messages of the world? Co-signing what culture says instead of what the scripture says. I'm not saying it specifically because of speaking in tongues, but I am saying that there's something to be said about surrender to the Holy Spirit. So at best, it's a heavenly gift. At worst, it's another expression of worship. Another fear they have is, what if it's just me? It will be partly you. That's the confusion there. You have to surrender the syllables and the sounds. You'll say, well, no, in the Bible, they just began as the Spirit enabled them, not forced them. Verse 14, again, we see Paul saying, turn it on, turn it off. You can control it. Another fear is, what if I just look silly? Can we just settle this now? You're gonna look silly. It's gonna look funny. It's gonna sound funny. And people say, well, you know, I don't wanna turn people off to the gospel. My friend Jesus told us in John 3 why people are turned off to the gospel. He says, they hate the light because they love darkness. It's got nothing to do with you speaking in tongues. It's a very cowardly way of trying to be relevant where we say, well, you know, we just push that gift aside because we don't wanna offend anyone. Were they afraid of offending anyone in Acts 2? In fact, the Bible says that the gift of tongues is a sign for the unbeliever. How is it supposed to be a sign to the unbeliever if we're supposed to hide it? So we see that yes, we will be made from them. Yes, they will talk about us. Yes, they will think you strange, but guess who they're gonna call when they need a miracle? Guess whose phone is gonna ring when someone's manifesting demons at three o'clock in the morning? Guess who's getting an email or a text when things start going wrong and they're wondering where God is? They're gonna call their crazy tongue-talking friends. You may think a strange, but there's power in this gift. And finally, the third obstacle. The third obstacle is ego. Now, when I say that, the response is, well, I'm not prideful. I'm not saying it's pride. Pride is an expression of the ego, but ego is not necessarily the same thing as pride. Ego is simply self. We get in our own way, don't we? I can't tell you how many times I've prayed for someone to receive the gift and over and over they're just saying Father God, Father God, Father God, Father God, Father God. Hallelujah, hallelujah, hallelujah. Well, how are you supposed to speak in tongues when you're speaking in English? There's a story I like to tell. And I enjoy this story because every night, it's similar to kind of my life right now, every night I pray, Jess and I pray with Aria. And the other night she was just really, really sleeping. She goes, Dad, pray for me. Because she wanted to go to bed. So she comes to me every night and we pray and it reminds me of this story that I tell. And that is a story about a father who was trying to teach his little girl how to talk to God. And he comes into her room one night and she says, we're gonna pray and I'm gonna teach you how to talk to Jesus. And so the father kneels beside the daughter's bed, the daughter kneels beside him. And they begin to pray. The dad prays first and the little girl prays. And this continues for a few nights and then the father gets it in his heart. You know, I think I want my little girl to pray on her own just so she can begin to understand it's personal. So he lets her pray on her own for a couple nights and one night as she's praying around bedtime, he sticks his ear to the door. And he's listening. And this little girl is praying. A-B-C-D-E-F-G-H-I-J-K-L-M-N-O-P. And she goes to the whole alphabet. I'm not gonna sing it for you, but she's singing it. And he thought it was funny. He chuckled and went on his way. The next night he comes back. She's doing it again and now he's getting concerned. Like, I hope this isn't what she thinks prayer is because she's got to talk to God. She's got to express what she's thinking, what she's feeling. She's got to communicate. Third night comes. Here's her praying again, the alphabet. He says, I got to say something. I'm gonna try to break it to her gently so I don't crush her spirit. He goes in, talks to the little girl. He says, sweetie, listen, when you talk to God, you have to actually talk to God. You can't just say the alphabet. He said, Dad, I am talking to God. I just give him the letters and let him arrange it however he wants. That's what it's like when you pray in tongues. See, when you speak words with your own understanding, you are attaching to those vocalizations, your own intention, your own will, your own ideas, your own thoughts, and they're flooded with your own emotions, your own misunderstandings, and your own wayward desires. When you pray in tongues, you are releasing syllables and sounds that are empty of your meaning, empty of your intention. And you, by faith, are saying, Lord, as I release these sounds to you, you fill them with your intention and your meaning. Let them not be of my intellect, as Paul writes, of our understanding, but let them be words of the spirit. You pray through these words. And most people just don't want to release those sounds because they're turned off by the idea that they have to be the ones releasing them. But it really is like turning a key. You're not the engine. You don't have the power of the engine in your car, but you've got to turn that key. And the moment you turn that key, power begins to kick in. It's the same way, and you will experience this when you begin to pray in tongues. At first, it's unnatural. At first, it seems and feels like it's just you. But as you begin to release those syllables and sounds in faith, you're gonna notice a moment as you're doing it, where there's just this flow where the Holy Spirit comes in, and you will actually sense the Spirit taking over praying, even as you do it. But it's the language of faith. It's the language of surrender. You have to take the step. This is why you haven't been able to do it. You're either believing a lie about the gift of tongues that isn't so, and so it's blocking you, you're overthinking it. And overthinking is probably the main one. Praying for you, you're thinking, this is just me, this is just me, this could be the devil. How do I know if I'm actually doing this? Am I doing this right? Is God gonna get mad at me? And all those thoughts take you out of that moment of surrender. And I've prayed with literally thousands of people. I would say, Tim, if I'm being accurate, over a million people have gone through this teaching. Over a million people, this one I just gave you, have gone through this teaching. And we've received literally tens of thousands of reports from Christians, who said for years, 20 years, 30 years, 15 years, I've never been able to pray in tongues. And now that I see what the words is, nothing to do with my message, it's not my teaching, it's the word. Once that truth has cleared the blockage, they're happily praying in tongues today. And so that is yours tonight. You don't have to wait, you don't have to put it off to some other day, you don't have to be disappointed again, but you do have to act. You have to act. You have to work in partnership with the Holy Spirit. So number one, you realize that the gift is already in you. Number two, relax. Don't overthink it. And then number three, you release. Release the syllables and sounds. Are you watching online? Get ready right now, we're gonna pray. You in this place, I want you all to stand to your feet. And if you pray in your heavenly language, just hold back on that for a moment because I don't want anyone to think that they're just repeating someone else. I want them to do it of their own relationship with the Holy Spirit, but you can pray. You can pray words of understanding right now. And I would ask you to do that right this moment. You watching online, get ready, get ready. This is it, this is the moment. This is the moment. Hands, let the eyes close, church. Can you just begin to ask the Lord to touch people tonight? Come on, speak it out, speak it out, speak it out. You're here and you've been wanting this gift, this beautiful expression of the gift of tongues. Then I want you to come stand at this altar right now. You haven't been able to pray this or maybe you have prayed it before and it's just something that has stopped and you haven't been able to seemingly get it back. Just come, this is you. You're saying, you know what, I want that. I've been asking the Lord, I see now that it's for me. I see now that I can have this. I see the role I have to play in it. Now I know in moments like these, you can become a little nervous because of high pressure situations, seemingly high pressure situations, but don't worry, everybody here loves you. Everybody here loves you. The rest of you pray in tongues, huh? Just come, don't worry, don't be afraid, don't be afraid. Come man, right here, you come right here. You watching online, just begin to ask, wow, can you guys feel that right now? Something just happened, something just shifted, something just shifted. Just be mindful, Usher, I just saw a couple people fall out under the power in their seats right now. Just be mindful, be mindful. Now you who are down here, just lift your hands and close your eyes. You watching online, if you're able, lift your hands and close your eyes. Why do we close our eyes? It's not because God ignores us if we have our eyes open. It's simply to remove distraction, that's why we do it. To not look with the eyes of this earth, but instead to look through the eyes of faith, to retreat to the realm of the Spirit. It's very simple. That's exactly right, Stephen. What they're doing is exactly right. Get ready, get ready, get ready. Now you down here, hands lifted, eyes closed. I want you to say these words of understanding and then after this, these will be the words of understanding, the last words you speak of understanding before you finally receive that gift, but only if you partner with the Holy Spirit. Don't wait for him to come and do it for you. Don't overthink it and tell yourself that it's just you. Don't allow these obstacles anymore. Just no more overthinking, just relax. Relax and receive. So repeat after me, say, dear Jesus, I come to you today asking for the gift of tongues by your Holy Spirit. Jesus, I know that you are the baptizer. Baptize me with fresh power in your name I pray. Amen. Now church, continue to pray with understanding. Father, I pray right now that you would cause them to receive and release. Lord, we thank you, they've received it. The moment they were born again and I pray it be released right now. That's it. What I want you to right now, some of you, I can see it all over you, my goodness. What you're sensing on you, that's the power of God touching your physical being. But now you've got to release it. You've got to release it, start to speak it aloud. Don't worry, just release the syllables and sounds that the Holy Spirit begins to cause to flow out of you. Church, praying with your understanding, loudly and boldly, come against every lie, come against every distraction. Lord, let her receive. There's one, someone got that gift right now. Keep praying, keep praying, keep praying. That's it, that's another one right there. Give the Lord a hand of praise, come on. Something is happening here, church. You online, just begin to speak it out, begin to speak it out, begin to speak it out. Don't worry, don't worry, release, release, receive it and release it. Hold her up, hold her up, speak it out, speak it out, speak it out. Help her up, guys. That's another one, church. Can we give the Lord a hand of praise? Thank you, Jesus. Thank you, Jesus, thank you, Jesus. Keep praying, keep praying, keep praying. We bind the lives of the enemy in the mighty name of Jesus. You receive yours, too. Just begin to release, release, release, release those sounds. Touch her, Lord, and let her mouth be lit on fire by the Holy Ghost. That's another one right there, church. That's another one right there. These are people who've been believing for it. Thank you, Jesus. Whoa. There's another one. Can we give Jesus a hand of praise? We thank you, Lord, we thank you, Lord. That's it, that's it, speak it out. She's a little shy, she said, but she's speaking little things. I won't put the mic to her. But she, I heard her speaking little, little things right there. You sense that power on you right now? It's beautiful, isn't it? You can see the touch of God all over her. Isn't this awesome? Easton, I want to talk to those online. Lord, in the name of Jesus, let them receive that power from unhide. We thank you, Lord, that that gift is flowing. It's flowing now. We give you the glory and the honor. Just begin to speak it out. If you're praying in tongues, I want you to write it in the comment section. Just write simple words, simple words, live or replay. Write, I prayed in tongues. Just begin to write it, and this will be something that will be a little bit delayed. I'll see the comments begin to come in. Just write those simple words. I prayed in tongues. Isn't this awesome, church? Isn't this awesome? I prayed in tongues. And I'm seeing a lot of fire emojis on the chat right now, which means God's touching his people and they're responding in that way. But I'm waiting to see some of those comments coming in. There's about a one minute delay, right, Tim? So in the meantime, everybody praying in the Holy Ghost. Now, come on. Now that we're praying in tongues, just begin to release that sound in this atmosphere. Yue said, I received it. Medeo said, I prayed in tongues. Another one, I prayed in tongues. Jung Ali, I prayed in tongues. Robert Fast, I prayed in tongues. Godliness and contentment writes, I received it. Lauren said, I prayed in tongues. Christopher said, I prayed in tongues. Annie, I prayed in tongues. Gianni, I prayed in tongues. Another one, I prayed in tongues. I prayed in tongues. I prayed in heavenly tongues. Can we give the Lord a hand of praise for this gift being imparted? Wow. Isn't it just awesome? Such a beauty, such a beauty, such a beauty of His presence. Thank you, Jesus. Whoa, release those sounds. There it is. Thank you, Jesus. Thank you, Jesus. Very reverently, please. Back to your seats very reverently. That's the power of His word. When the word goes forth in the truth, His minister, it clears blockages. It clears blockages. You stop it, my friend. Was that your first time praying in tongues? It was just released right now? Yeah. Taupe, can you just describe? Can you just describe what it was like? It's just the first time I prayed believing that it was actually the Holy Spirit speaking through me. And I've had so much blockage and so much false doctrine. Come again, this is me. And tonight? I think that says it all. And to Jesus belongs the glory. And to Jesus belongs the glory. And the comments are still coming in. Prisa and Mysella and Randall and Faye and Hugh and God's chosen and Denise, they all writing, I prayed in tongues, I prayed in tongues, I prayed in tongues, this is just, I can't even count the comments all coming in right now. That's how many people are receiving this gift. You may be seated, God bless you. Just love His power. Don't you just love Him? We love you, Lord, we honor you. Sing it out, I surrender all. And I surrender all. Come on, sound man, fill the room with that key sound right now. I surrender all. All to thee, my blessed Savior. That's what it's about, surrender. All to thee, my blessed Savior. As you stay with me, Ishmael, Matthew six, go there now, Matthew six, verses 19 through 21. Don't store up treasures here on earth. Or moths eat them and rust destroys them. And where thieves break in and steal, store your treasures in heaven. Or moths and rust cannot destroy. Thieves do not break in and steal. Wherever your treasure is, there will your heart be also. One of the greatest tests of our heart is in the area of finances. It is make no mistake. It is a test of the heart. You know, it's interesting to me, is I can preach on any subject I've talked about in the Bible. I can preach on sin. I can preach on spiritual warfare, spiritual gifts, the Holy Spirit, prayer, salvation, and very few believers, possibly none, will tell me that I spent too long talking about those things. But the moment I teach what the Bible says about money, that's when that spirit rises, that mammon, and they say, why are you talking about it? Well, because it's in the Bible. Why do you spend so long talking about it? Well, because I wanna teach clearly what's in the Bible, like any other subject. Now, why does the flesh so resist that? It's because if we can master our resources as the church, the body of Christ as a whole would see such a rapid expansion of the kingdom it would be untold. I can't even imagine what it would be like if every single person who attends church and calls themselves a Christian, I couldn't even imagine the impact we could make. If every person who claims the name of Jesus were to release generously into the kingdom of God, and I'm throwing myself in there with you because I'm not exempt from giving, I too must practice giving. And this is something that the Lord challenges us to do as a test of the heart. We'll say things like, well, I can't really give right now and then we have a brand new flat screen TV in the house. Or I can't partner with you monthly, but you can partner with Netflix monthly, Disney Plus monthly and Hulu monthly. Oh, am I going too deep right now? Why would you partner with those wicked agendas and not the kingdom of God? Now, I'm not saying you can't monitor what you watch on there and there's some Bible programs on there too. I'm not saying wrong with having those things, but if we have these things and then at the same time say, well, I can't support the gospel, that's a test of the heart. And I say this with love and gentleness because this is not a message of condemnation. This is an invitation to step into biblical generosity for you watching online as well. Because I think that sometimes we imagine that because we're watching online that we're not participating, but do you realize you are joining us in spirit? And as someone who's joining us, you also have the invitation to participate in supporting these works of the ministry. But it's a test of the heart, isn't it? That's where the fight is sometimes, that old flesh. Either we're too afraid, we imagine that if we support God's work, we're gonna lack in some area of our life. Don't withhold. Jesus has never held anything back from you. Let's not hold back from him. Why do we give? Why do we give? We give because we love him. Will God bless you? Sure. But that's not the message of the gospel, is it? Health, wealth, happiness, sometimes we learn how to obey sand to about it. In this world, you will have tribulation. Yes, generosity produces an increase in resources. That's not why we do it. We do it because we love him. We do it because we wanna see souls saved. We do it because we wanna see the kingdom expand. Now I'm asking you for your help. This ministry has been a blessing to you. I come to you as your brother in Christ saying, we need your help, church. We have major projects that need to be finished. We have vision that God has given to us. He will bring it to pass. And the way he brings it to pass is by touching God's people. You are God's people. And I know you, there's a heart of generosity in you. But if you're like me, sometimes we get a little nervous with things like this because of the way people talk around the world and because of the way things might be looking. But our faith is in God. And so I'm asking you for your help. This ministry has ever been a blessing to you if you've ever received anything from us. I'm asking you for your help. We want to continue to do live streams. We want to continue to create content. We want to continue to host events around the world. And as this is live, maybe a year or two from now the project will be completely done. I don't know, you can check our website. But as of right now too, we still need to complete the funding for Project ETV. And we have to complete the funding for Project ETV by the end of August. That is our goal date. That is the hard line right there. Now nothing detrimental happens if we don't complete it. We just have to stop and wait until it comes in. But the moment we do that, what that means is the costs can go way up as you know with inflation. So we don't want to pause. This is not the time to pause the work of the kingdom. Now is the time to allow the generosity that's in our hearts, that love for Jesus, that love for souls, that love for the kingdom to release, release. And I'm asking you to do your best gift. Give a one-time gift or become a partner or if God should so lead you to both. And really get involved with what God is doing in this ministry. Especially I challenge you here who come regularly Thursdays. You consider this your church. I challenge you to make this something you support regularly too. Because we're all gonna benefit from this. And we're gonna see souls saved, amen. So I'm gonna ask the usher's please come forward. And as you give online by the way I can see your names coming up. Thank you Terry for your gift. Thank you Beverly for becoming a partner. And they're continuing to come in from all around the world that's loading on my end. They're gonna pass out to you here in person envelopes. Those of you watching online you can give by going to davidhernandezministries.com slash donate. And those of you here you can give by that envelope or if you want to be super techie and futuristic you can scan those QR codes and it'll be much cleaner and quicker that way. But use the envelopes if you're gonna do cash or check. Use the QR code if you wanna give by debit card. That's the easiest way to do it. And in doing so you're releasing your resources to this ministry that we might continue to expand the kingdom. Thank you Frank and Joanne our dear friends from Canada. I see they just gave a one time gift. Thank you and by the way Frank and Joanne your partnership over the years is just so appreciated thank you. Lauren just gave a one time gift. Thank you Lauren. Nadine our dear friend Nadine gave a one time gift. Someone by the name of Sovereign gave. Chris thank you for your support. Kingsley thank you for your support. Jason thank you. Frank thank you for signing up to become a monthly partner that is so kind of you. And then I see Gladys became a partner and Ed became a partner and George became a partner and Alicia became a partner. These are people just giving out of the kindness of their hearts from around the world. Joanne Thomas thank you for being a partner. I appreciate your support. And as those continue to come in I'll continue to see them in thank you. And I may not see all of them right here live but I will read as many more as I can. In the meantime those of you filling out these gifts these envelopes give generously. Give knowing that there are needs in this ministry and their needs that are not man centered. They're kingdom centered. Our goal is to see souls saved. Our goal is to expand the kingdom that we might equip others not just see souls saved but see leaders raised out of this ministry to go and take the fire of the Holy Ghost around the world. That's what we wanna see. So thank you for your support. Thank you for your giving. We don't take it lightly. Thank you to the Patrick family. Thank you to Jennifer. Thank you to Janetta and so many others just giving a moosey thank you for your gift. Jeremy thank you for becoming a partner. I moved and overwhelmed. I can't tell you how much I appreciate you guys. So how many of you need just another minute or two to fill out that envelope? Okay just a couple of you. In the meantime I'll just say and remind you again that next week we are gonna be meeting again or not next week next week we will not be it's the week after that. In the meantime I'll say to those of you watching online if this blessed soon you wanna go deeper into this topic then make sure that you watch a miss Christian still believe about speaking in tongues in that teaching we go really, really deep. It's over an hour of teaching just scripture after scripture after scripture where we dismantle some of these misconceptions around this beautiful expression that is the gift of speaking in tongues.