 I'm going to give you just five levels of relationship with the Holy Spirit, based on the relationship that Jesus had with the Holy Spirit. The first degree of our relationship with the Holy Spirit, where all of us start, is when we get born. When we get born, you can write down born again. When we get born again, this is where our relationship with the Holy Spirit begins. Now actually the Holy Spirit is with us before we get born again, to bring us to Jesus Christ. But the relationship with Him begins when we get born again. Just like Jesus was born by the Holy Spirit, you and I, when we get saved, we get born by the Holy Spirit. And the Holy Spirit begins to live in us, can somebody say amen? So the Holy Spirit begins to live in us. One of the reasons Jesus lived a supernatural life was because he had a supernatural birth. When he came to Nicodemus and he said, Nicodemus told him, he says, Jesus, I've noticed that you are, you do incredible things. The miracles are amazing. The teachings are amazing. When you teach, demons come out. Awesome. And Jesus almost interrupts the whole thing and says, unless you're born of water and spirit, you cannot see the kingdom of heaven. You're almost like Jesus. Didn't you just hear what he said? Jesus was trying to explain to Nicodemus, the reason my life is so supernatural, because my birth was supernatural. See, salvation is not getting a ticket to heaven when you die. Salvation is an entrance into a kingdom of God when you live. Salvation is when the Holy Spirit gives me a new birth to qualify me for a supernatural life. Salvation is not just a little insurance card in the glove box of my theological preferences. When I die, so in case there is heaven, that I don't go into hell. Salvation, Jesus says, he says, unless you're born of water, which is physical birth and the spirit, which is supernatural birth, salvation, he says, you cannot enter the kingdom of heaven. Jesus wasn't talking about heaven in heaven. He was talking about the kingdom now that you and I can walk into. Your supernatural birth when you get saved is what opens the door for the supernatural life that you have with the Holy Spirit. Jesus did not model to us what God can do on earth. He modeled to us what a man submitted to the Holy Spirit can do on earth. Some people think, well, Jesus walked on water, that was God. Well, why did he say we can do what he did and more? We can't be God. No matter how hard we humble ourselves, submit ourselves to God, we'll never be God. But we can be like Jesus, because he demonstrated on earth what a man like you and I who submits himself to the Holy Spirit can achieve on this earth. When you get born again by the Holy Spirit, this is where your relationship with the Holy Spirit begins. Number two is when we get filled with the Holy Spirit. Filled with the Holy Spirit is Jesus was filled with the Holy Spirit when he was water baptized and John the Baptist baptized Jesus in the Jordan. The Holy Spirit came upon Jesus. We don't see Jesus actually speaking in tongues here, but we see a Holy Spirit coming upon Jesus. It's very interesting to see that Jesus was not filled in the Holy Spirit praying at home. He was in a service where John the Baptist, who had a smaller ministry than Jesus, who did not have miracles in his ministry, who was Baptist? That he was baptized, if you're not saying Baptist is a denomination. And Jesus goes to, let me just say it to you plainly, it's like this, Jesus the charismatic, because he had miracles, the gifts. He goes into a service that was not like his service that he's going to have, and the Holy Spirit touches him there. We must understand one thing. For us to have a relationship with the Holy Spirit, you have to learn to honor that people God uses, even those you don't disagree with. Even those who may not be reaching the fullest potential in the kingdom of God. Jesus didn't go to John and say, hmm, John, your diet is bad. You're eating locus. What kind of madness is that? John, your dress code is terrible. You're dressed up like, what is this? Jesus didn't come to John and say, John, you don't heal people. John, you don't cast out demons. John, your ministry is not good enough. See, this is what most of us do, and that's why the Holy Spirit cannot use us. No. Because we know what we're called to do, and so we think that our job is to go put everybody down, but Jesus comes to John and says, John, can you baptize me? John says, no, no, no, no, Jesus, you, you are greater. Are you so great? I'm not even worthy to tie your shoelaces, not even, no, I can't baptize you. Jesus says, I know, John, I know I'm greater. You know you're greater. High five, that's good. You need to baptize me. Wow. Wow. Most of us, we would never do that. We would come to John and say, John, I need to meet with you for coffee afterwards. There's a lot of things you need to change. There's nothing wrong with having your ministry greater than John's, but the Holy Spirit did not come on Jesus when he was praying. The Holy Spirit came upon Jesus when he went to John and said, John, baptize me. Sometimes I get personally attacked because they say things like, why are you following other ministers? First of all, I don't follow other ministers, I follow Jesus, but why do I listen to other ministers? I always do listen to other ministers. I preach, I meet with other pastors in town who are not like us, met this Friday with a wonderful pastor from New Vintage a few weeks ago from Bethel Church pastor, C3 pastor, whose ministries are different than even where we are going to be. I listen to podcasts, read the books and people say, why do you always do that? And you encourage us to do that because there is a degree of the presence of the Holy Spirit that will not be available to you if you don't respect other people that God is using that is different than you. If you're only able to listen and respect those that just literally tickles you, it's just like you. You're still with God, but there is a limitation there. See the spirit of Pharisees is this, the spirit of Pharisees says, I honor Moses, Moses is the man of God. Jesus don't understand him, but oh God used me to be a prophet for tomorrow. See when Moses was alive, everybody hated him and know everybody started loving Moses when Moses died. We love prophets that are dead, kill the prophets that are alive and hope and wish to be prophets tomorrow. We're all like that. You come to churches and say, Catherine Coleman was a mighty woman of God, Vlad Smith-Wigsworth, mighty man of God, except he was rejected from most cosmetic churches because you know what Smith-Wigsworth did? Who raised 32 people from the dead? He brought dead person on a stage and told them to walk. Parents with kids ran and they said, this is nonsense. You know what Smith-Wigsworth did? He walked in the kitchen and people dropped on the floor by the power of God and people said, this is crazy. This is not good. But when Smith-Wigsworth died, everybody said, Smith-Wigsworth, mighty man of God. We always do that. And so Jesus doesn't want us to be like that. He wants us to be like he was. He came to John and he didn't honor John when John was dead. He says, John, God is moving through you. Baptize me. Let's be students of the Holy Spirit, not scholars of the Holy Spirit. Can somebody shout, amen? The level three. When Jesus was filled with the Holy Spirit, level three is Jesus was led by the Holy Spirit. After you get filled, you have to be led by the Holy Spirit as the Holy Spirit begins to give you promptings. Now it's interesting, Jesus wasn't led by the Holy Spirit into a crusade or a service. He was led by the Holy Spirit to fast and to pray. When I was younger, I remember I even fasted and said, Lord, I want to hear your voice until God started to speak. And I said, Lord, please, a little bit less of your voice now. Don't speak to me as much. Because see, when I thought is that when God will speak to me, he will tell me which real estate to buy in Tracities, which has gold mine. I thought when he will speak to me, he will right away point out at the age of 16, who my wife is going to be. I wanted God to tell me, you know, what is going to be, what I'm going to do like in, you know, 15 years or 20 years down the road. But when God started to speak to me, he said, Lord, could you apologize to your mom for not cleaning up your room for three days in a row? And I said, Lord, no, don't don't talk to me about this stuff. Talk to me about deep things of the spirit, the mysteries of the kingdom of God, that the whole console of God. God says, yes, this is my console. Pick up a vacuum and vacuum that room that your mom be telling you to vacuum for so long. I don't want to hear that about Lord. It's not about hearing God. It's about hearing God that makes all the difference. Amen. And many times the Holy Spirit does not start speaking with, this person needs to be healed, this person needs to be healed. He will start speaking to you about things that involve your self-denial. You get in your knees, you say, Lord, speak to me. And he says, you know what? It's been six months. For some, it's been six years. You haven't fasted. You should start fasting. He said, I'll rebuke this in Jesus' name. God, speak to thy servant because they're serving here with thee. God leads, sometimes starts leading you into wilderness before he leads you to a mountaintop. And don't rebuke it and don't shut it down. If it aligns with the word of God, it might be the Holy Spirit leading you and you need to be obedient to that. Amen. The fourth step is when Jesus was in the wilderness, he overcame Satan in the wilderness in Matthew and Luke chapter four, verse four. Now you may say, there was Holy Spirit wasn't mentioned there. You're saying that the Holy Spirit, how does that help me to know the Holy Spirit? Listen to this very carefully. It will help you so much. The Holy Spirit was not mentioned in the wilderness temptation of Jesus. Yet he was there. Why? When you don't feel the Holy Spirit, you have to stand on what the Holy Spirit said in his word. That's where you find the Holy Spirit. And that is how Jesus overcame. Jesus overcame Satan and his hardest times is when you don't feel the Spirit, you can find him in his word. Jesus who felt the Holy Spirit come upon him, Jesus who felt the Holy Spirit lead him into the wilderness, and then he goes into the wilderness and there is no more mention of the Holy Spirit. And Jesus doesn't get distracted and say, God, you left me. He doesn't say, Holy Spirit, where are you? Where are you? Holy Spirit, help me. The Bible says Jesus begins to quote the scriptures Holy Spirit wrote. See, God's Spirit will always lead you to a place that only his word will get you through. God will never lead you. God will not give you so much of his presence that makes you unnecessary to rely on the Word of God. The Holy Spirit wrote the Word of God and when you cannot feel him in worship, you find him in the scriptures. When you cannot feel him during a sermon, you find him in the Word of God because he hides himself in his word when you don't see him, don't feel him, or don't experience him in your wilderness. And that is how you overcome. Can somebody shout, Amen. I cannot tell you how many times in my personal life I sense the leading of the Holy Spirit to give up, for example, the account comes to my mind is last year when I gave a vehicle away. It was the second vehicle within about four months. And I felt so great. I knew he was God leading me until the next day. I recognized that I don't have money. I had $150 left on my checking's account. The second day, both of us didn't have cars, me and my wife, and I did not want to go and get it from a dealer on the payment. So I said, great, I'm just going to call a few of my guys that I know who have dealerships. And I'm going to tell them that I have a problem. Hopefully, God will speak to them like he spoke to me to give a car. God will speak to them to give me a car. Simple solution, give and you receive. I'm like, I gave on Sunday, I'm going to get it back on Tuesday. That's going to be the fastest harvest ever received on this planet. And I will experience that. I called one guy on Monday, I called another guy on Tuesday, I called third guy on Wednesday. They all wanted to sell me a particular car for about 45 to $60,000. I was like, sorry, somebody else is calling me. I got to go. I was like, $60,000? And this is where by Thursday, I started getting depressed. And I said, Lord, you didn't speak to me about giving a car. Why did I give a car in the first place? My dad told me it was a stupid idea. I should have not done it. I should have listened to my father. And I said, God, nobody is giving me a car. And this is where I started to Holy Spirit. That presence, Lord, that I felt when I decided that, where is that presence? And I got on my knees. I turned on my favorite music and I started to create those same feelings and they were not there. And for two weeks, I'm not exaggerating, two weeks after three o'clock, I come home. I laid in the bonus room over there and cried my eyes. I said, God, where are you? Why did you forsake me? And God didn't speak. Nothing. The only way I got through that point is I realized, God leads me. What only what he says in his word will get me through. I started to rely on the fact God will never forsake me. I started to rely on the fact that God never promised to give me a car back. And I didn't give it to get a car back. I gave it because I felt leading of the Spirit. And I wanted to bless the people. God started to deal with my motives. And I came out of that. I said, Lord, now I'm going to go find another way. Gonna find a car and everything. But I didn't do it to get a car. God started to clean up with his word, my motives and my things. And eventually I have a car better than I had before. My wife has a car better than I know she had before. But it's not about the cars. It's about going through a season where only God's word, only God's word begins to clean you up, begins to change things inside. And it's not going to be what you feel. It's what you feed on in that season that will get you through. Somebody shout, amen. Are you with me? So the five, number five is you get empowered by the Holy Spirit. So after you go through some things and the Holy Spirit helps you with using his word, he empowers you. After Jesus came out of the wilderness, we see that Jesus was empowered. And the anointing of the Holy Spirit, he started to touch the life of Jesus. And Jesus started to minister with the power of the Holy Spirit. Now, without the Holy Spirit's anointing, Jesus wouldn't be able to accomplish anything that he accomplished in this world. Without the Holy Spirit, you cannot fulfill your calling. Now Jesus' calling was to die for the world. Your calling is to raise up your family. Your calling is to be a good husband. Your calling is maybe a businessman. Maybe you're in this room today. Your calling is to raise your grandchildren. Your calling might be to preach, to lead a home group. When I tell you something, without the Holy Spirit, you cannot fulfill your calling the way God wants it to be fulfilled. Put the Holy Spirit aside and says, I don't have time for you. I don't understand. You're confusing. You're kind of crazy and all the crazy people going to talk about the Holy Spirit. I want to stay. I just want to believe there is a God. Don't know who Allah, Buddha, there is one. And I'm going to stick with that. And that's it. But you say, I don't want nothing to do with the Holy Spirit. Saul, one day did that. He disobeyed the Holy Spirit by dishonoring his mentor. And the Holy Spirit withdrew from him. And something happened. The Bible says, deem and started to attack him. Brian, I want you to turn off all the lights in this sanctuary, including the lights on the top. Quickly. One, two, and three. All of them. Everywhere. In the side lights as well. Have you noticed the moment the lights were turned off? Like in a split second actually. The darkness came in. Anybody noticed that? Nobody invited the darkness. I only asked them to turn off the lights. I didn't invite the darkness. Where did the darkness come from? It's always been here, huh? Absence of light created right away the darkness. Turn on the lights, please. You don't have to invite the darkness. It will always come. You only have to invite the light. When you reject the light, you invite the darkness. That's how it works. When we reject the Holy Spirit, the darkness is always there. When you say, I don't want the Holy Spirit. I don't have time for the Holy Spirit. I ignore the Holy Spirit. That's exactly what happens. The light gets turned off. The demons of pornography, they quickly appear. The demons of drinking, they quickly appear. All kinds of addictions of depression, they quickly appear. The demonic is always there and it's waiting for you to switch off the switch. That's why your relationship with the Holy Spirit is not a luxury for us. It's not just, well, my life is good, but the Holy Spirit will be greater. This is life with the Holy Spirit. And without it, we are exposed to the darkness. I am and so are you. The best of us will see the worst in us when we reject the relationship with the presence of Jesus, the Holy Spirit, because somebody say amen.