 I want to welcome you to the first session of Life in the Spirit. Like I said this morning, my name is John Boll. You have been working for the university for the past 20 years, just celebrated by 20th anniversary this past spring, which was quite a milestone. Other than being married to my wife for 33 years, it's the longest I've ever done anything for anybody, which is very exciting. I graduated from Francis University in 1989, spent 15 years doing youth ministry in different places across the United States, and came back to the university in 2003. When I was a student here, I had a pretty good friend and roommate, Father Dave Pavanka, who's now, as you know, the president of this joint, which is kind of nice to have somebody that awesome as a friend for life, as well as leading the charge for the university right now. He's the right man at the right time. My experience in ministry over the last close to 40 years now, yeah, because I did my first ministry in 1983, when I was a missionary with net ministries out of St. Paul, Minnesota. I traveled around the country doing retreats, and that was in 1983, so it's like my 40th year of doing some sort of ministry for the church. And this last year, God saved a lot of the goodness for this year for me. Like I said, I celebrated my 20th anniversary. I think last year, if you were here last year, how many, how many came to this retreat last year? Raise your hand. All right, we got a handful. And how many, so the rest of you, let me see hands who are first time here at the, excellent. Last year, I was sharing with the men that were here that my daughter, Catherine, got married in Christ the King Chapel in May of 2022. And on May the 2nd, I became a grandfather for the first time, which is a really cool vibe that I'm loving. I haven't met her yet though, because in between the time my granddaughter was born and today, my father passed away. He had been sick for a number of years, and so there's been a lot of going back to Michigan to be with my family and funeral arrangements in the funeral itself. So I'm gonna be making it down to see my granddaughter soon. And the other big thing that it was a part of my life, and it's interesting to be a part of this retreat. It's like my eighth year at a row that I've been a part of this team and I love it, is in January, I started my own personal journey for the Dices of Steubenville as an aspirant for the Permanent Diacomet for the Dices. So God willing, in five years I'll be a deacon. And that's exciting and scary, because they do your best in your aspirancy to scare you into not wanting to be a deacon. So if you stick with it, you know you're really called. Like they just say, well, the bishop will tell you what you can do, what you can't do, and the minister and you know, and then they also told me that my wife could pull the plug on it at any time, which is, you know, not scary, but kind of cool in a way, but anyhow, for me, what I've come to realize through this all is this profound need for us to be at this time in the church more than ever surrendered to the power of the Holy Spirit to have the Holy Spirit alive and active, not only in our souls, but in the souls of those we serve. I think there's going to come a time and it's not very far away where only those people who are fully in love with the Holy Spirit and fully activating the Holy Spirit will still be in our churches. And I don't know what the future holds. I don't have any kind of prophetic sense, although I would be more inclined to say what would be the fruit of your life in the Holy Spirit would be not necessarily turning the whole church around. Probably won't happen in my lifetime. Probably won't happen in your lifetime, but perhaps what might happen in our lifetime is somebody loses their life in service of the gospel in our country because I don't know if you've noticed it out there. It's getting pretty divided, pretty full of hate and pretty crazy. The attacks against the church are ramping up and are becoming legitimized by our government. And that becomes a very slippery slope. Who knows where we're gonna be in five years and 10 years. We have to be ready. We have to be prepared as the Holy Spirit that gives us this grace. This is why I think starting off at this seminar, talking about life and the Spirit for you is a great joy to me personally. Very exciting because since I was 18 years old, it was the work of the Holy Spirit in my own soul that made me the man I am today. I wouldn't be here without the Holy Spirit. And I love to preach about the Holy Spirit. I love to share. I love to pray with people to receive the Holy Spirit. And in order to do that, John Paul is gonna be helping us out today and tomorrow leading some worship. So he's gonna right now just gather us in with a song or two of praise as we enter into the God's goodness and just ask the Holy Spirit to come. How's that sound? Let's stand, let's praise this worship. Just be with us now, Lord. That's where we just open our hearts. Breathe the life of Christ into us. Breathe the hope that we need into our hearts. Breathe the life of Christ into our souls. We trust in your power, Holy Spirit. And Mary, you are spouse of the Spirit. You who are full of grace to accomplish the mission that you were called to by the Father needed the overshadowing of the Holy Spirit. How much more blessed mother do we need this overshadowing, this covering, this indwelling, this filling with the Holy Spirit do we need? Blessed mother, you who are spouse of the Spirit, pray for us now that our hearts would be set on fire with divine love for God alone above all things and divine love for one another. Blessed mother, wrap your mantle of love and protection around each one of us as we pray together. Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee. Blessed are thou amongst women and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, mother of God, pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death. Amen. Amen. Please have a seat. I received the baptism in the Holy Spirit when I was 18 years old. I served as the youth minister for a charismatic community for four years while I lived in Dallas, Texas. I'm currently on the board of directors for Pentecost Day USA. I've seen the Holy Spirit do amazing things, miraculous things. But when I talk about life in the Spirit, I'm not saying let's gravitate to the extraordinary, the huge, the amazing things that God can do and those are real and those are powerful and those are good, but for me, life in the Spirit is not an eccentric spirituality, an extreme spirituality. For me, life in the Spirit is what fuels every spirituality. Whether you're a Marian or you have a devotion to St. Joseph, whether you're a Dominican or Franciscan or a Jesuit, your spirituality is empowered by the same Spirit. And the same Spirit that wants to make us rise up, put our hands in the air and scream, Hallelujah is the same Spirit that sometimes is gonna tell you to sit down, shut up and listen. And we gotta be open to it all because the Holy Spirit wants to come to us and lead us in this life in a particular way to guide us and empower us for the particular call and mission that's on each of our lives. And the best thing that we can do in our lives, in our spirituality is deepen our understanding and docility to what the Holy Spirit wants as he wants to guide us and lead us. I mean, look at the life of our blessed mother. It was the Holy Spirit that came upon her, gave birth to her mission, Christ and his baptism, the Holy Spirit comes down upon him. The voice from heaven confirms, this is my son with whom I'm well pleased. The Holy Spirit then sends him into the desert, leads him into the desert to do battle, to begin the war that would end all wars that would culminate with Christ's death on the cross. With his words, Father into your hands, I commend my spirit. And in between all of that, woven through all that is the presence of the Holy Spirit. Revealing himself in his fullness in a new and powerful way, not resting upon people like he did in the Old Testament. But as Jesus said, he will become like a river that wells up inside of you. There will be a new way that you'll experience the Holy Spirit. He'll well up inside of you. Out of you will flow a living river of grace. Baptism begins this life in the spirit. That is where it all begins. Through baptism, we are brought into this life of grace. I wanna start by looking at the catechism. Articles 1996 through 1999. It says, Grace's favor, the free and undeserved help that God gives us to respond to his call to become children of God. Yes, at that moment of our baptism, we are adopted into the family of God. We become a child of God. But it's also a call to respond, a call to respond. I think the other day at this Power and Purpose conference, Bob Rice said, well, worship is a response to what God is doing in your life. And I would say everything that we do as Christians that produces fruit is in response to God's action in love and grace. Even to the point where St. John says in the fourth chapter of his first epistle, we love because he first loved us. Like nothing comes from us. Everything comes from the Father. He is the Alpha, he is the Omega. Everything comes from him and everything is for him. And Grace is the favor to respond to his call to become children of God, to make that indelible mark place in our soul, a lived reality in every part of our lives that we would live as children of God. To be partakers of the divine nature and of eternal life. So our eternal life begins here on earth when we begin to take on the divine nature and participate in the life of the Trinity as God's children. It says in 1997, it says by baptism the Christian participates in the grace of Christ. He received the life of the spirit who breathed charity into him and who forms the church. So this life of the spirit is a term that is found in our catechism, is found in scripture. That God wants us to experience this new life in the spirit. It says in the next article, it says the vocation to eternal life is supernatural. It depends entirely on God's gratuitous initiative for he alone can reveal and give himself. And we don't, none of us stand before God saying look what I've accomplished for you God or look what I've found God. You know, we were lost and he found us. He does, and when we find ourselves in him, that's a great experience when we know we're filled with his love and we have the Holy Spirit speaking and revealing to our own hearts the goodness and love of God. It says, like I said, this vocation to eternal life is supernatural. It's above our nature. It's above human nature. And I think most people try to serve God out of their humanity. I've talked to a lot of clergy. That's the way they've grown is I used to try to serve God out of my flesh out of what I thought was good and wise and out of my ability. But I kept coming up short. That's what I've found in my life. I can always tell and I just got convicted in prayer two days ago. The Lord is like, you are not praying enough to sustain the work that I'm calling you to do right now. And okay Lord, teach me what I need to do. It's like, I just want to be what you want me to be. I just need to be what you made me to be. There's no happiness if I'm trying to go down another path. There's no fulfillment in life if I'm trying to do what I think is best and not what the Lord is calling me to be. And it's not like the word is like, oh my gosh, I'm such a sinner and I don't pray enough and God hates me. It's like, no, God is calling me into something new into something deeper. Like he's saying that this next chapter of your life you're gonna have to up your prayer game. Not because the burdens are gonna be so heavy that he's gonna try to crush me if I don't but because he wants more of me in the midst of it. And I need more of him in the midst of it. If it says it finally in article 1999, it says it is the sanctifying or deifying grace received in baptism that is the source of the work of sanctification. And we know this, this grace that we receive, this Holy Spirit is what makes us holy. And it is one of the universal calls. Every one of us from the Pope on down is called to love like Christ and to be holy like the Father is holy. These are universal to all Catholics. When you're baptized, that's your marching order to love like Jesus and to be holy like the Father. That's the call. In what it says in article 1699 of the Catechism, it says, life in the spirit fulfills the vocation of man. This life is made up of divine charity which is love of God and human solidarity, love of neighbor. It is graciously offered as salvation. Life in the spirit fulfills our vocation because it's not a theological concept. It's not a theological philosophy. It is a lived reality. The greatest gift that the Holy Spirit gives to each one of us is himself calling us into the very life of the Trinity to commune with God, to understand the heart of God, to be able to understand the love of God. The Catechism teaches in article 260, the ultimate end of the whole divine economy is the entry of God's creatures into the perfect unity of the blessed Trinity. That is it. God is calling us. The end of all this is not a particular mission or accomplishment. The ultimate accomplishment that God wants for each one of us is to enter into perfect unity with the Trinity. For we know where mission flows from and this is so key. When we think about wanting to put the church on mission, mission flows out of identity. Who are you? Do you know who you are in Christ? Do you have a solid understanding that you're a child of God? If that's not in place, it doesn't matter how well-equipped the laity are. It doesn't matter how equipped you are. If we don't move from a place where we know that we belong to Jesus Christ and that we are His beloved sons and that He will never forsake us, that He has called for us, this calling us to do everything that we do, if that's not in place, we won't have the power to use the tools correctly in a way that's gonna transform the world around us and identity flows from relationship, prayer, sacraments. And who's the one who reveals the Father's love to us? Well, it says to us in Romans 5.5, the Holy Spirit, God does not disappoint, hope does not disappoint because the love of the Father has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who's been given to us and this is why we pray to the Holy Spirit. We don't figure out God. The Holy Spirit has given to it. It is God's gratuitous gift, His initiative. He is the one who started this and He's the one who won't give up on us as long as we keep surrendering to Him. He has so much more for us. In that last part of that Catechism in 1699, it says, it's graciously offered to us as salvation. This life from the Spirit is offered. It's not forced on anyone. We all have a door on our heart that needs to be opened fully to God, fully to the Holy Spirit, but the only handle on this door is on the inside. God can knock, God can say, hey, I'm here, I have something for you. If we don't open our hearts to Him, it doesn't matter. It won't touch the deepest part of what needs to be touched in our lives. The immediate fruit of having an encounter with the Holy Spirit is a taste of heaven that prepares us and strengthens us for eternal salvation. To understand exactly what we're talking about and how the Holy Spirit wants to work with us, we just have to look at the words of what Jesus said at the Last Supper about the one he called the Advocate or in the Greek Advocatus, which literally translates to he who's called to your side. And I love that, because Jesus, this is how Jesus used that word. He says, if you keep my commandments, I will ask the Father and he will give you another advocate to be with you always. Another advocate to be with you always, another one who will be at your side. So I think Jesus is saying I'm your first advocate. And he reminds us of apostles of this when he says, look, I'm gonna be with you always, always. I will always be with you from the moment of your baptism until this very day, you have never truly been alone, ever in your life. God has been present to you. Christ has been present to you. The Holy Spirit has been present to you, maybe not perceived, but present. There's never been a time in your life where on one side of you, you had the Holy Spirit and the other side was Jesus. And they were walking with you and suffering with you. When you were succeeding, they were cheering you on. When you were in a place of sadness, they were mourning with you. But at every point in our lives, from the time we were baptized to this moment today, the Father has been with us, the Spirit's been with us, the Son has been with us. He's freely given to us as advocate. And we sometimes refer to lawyers as advocates, right? And what does a lawyer do? Well, a lawyer defends you. You know how a lawyer defends you? He even defends you if you're guilty. He's sworn to do that. And a lawyer says, I might believe whatever sent in my heart that this person's guilty, but I'm gonna give them the best defense I can. And I'm gonna help them win their case. And when we find ourselves in sin, and we're feeling that familiar sting of shame and guilt, and we wanna hide from the Lord, and we wanna hide our sin from the Lord, the Holy Spirit wants to take us by the hand, go before the Lord and say, this is still your son. Forgive him and the Father will have him. And if we participate in that grace and say, Lord forgive me, even if it's the 1,000th millionth time that we've had to ask forgiveness, and say we're sorry, we will be defended and we will be saved. A lawyer is someone who gives counsel. The Holy Spirit wants to direct our very movement, our very words. Even Jesus said, look, don't worry about the words you're going to say. The Holy Spirit will give you words. And I can't imagine, oh, actually, I did this for a while during COVID, right? I did a daily reflection on Facebook in case people were really spiritually hungry. I did a little bit of research. Do you know that like half the people in the United States who couldn't go to church developed a new spiritual habit during COVID? They were really looking for new and different ways to grow in their faith. They might not have come back to church yet, but I still think there's still this hunger for God out there. And people were seeking God. And so I started this thing on Facebook and getting 2,000 or 3,000 people to gather every morning. But then I felt all this pressure like, ooh, I better deliver something worth listening to. And it would be like a 20 minute reflection with a time of prayer. And then I realized this is how hard it must be to be a priest. And I'm just speaking into a camera when I'm doing my thing. I imagine standing in front of a church full of people who are all at a different place spiritually, economically, educationally. Some are really tuned into what you're saying, and some are just glazed over. It's just got to be the hardest thing in the world to feel, without the Holy Spirit to help, the ability to get up there and deliver an inspired message over and over again. Yeah, exactly. I'll know more. But I was a youth minister for 15 years, so I know it is like to stand in front of a room full of people who are half brain dead. But the Holy Spirit wants to act on our behalf for our good. Basically, I love this. He wants to be our personal spiritual life coach. But he wants to walk us through this life and equip us with everything that we need. Jesus continued to teach about the Holy Spirit when he says, the advocate, the Holy Spirit that the Father will send in my name, he will teach you everything. I love that. Jesus wants to make it very clear that there's no part of your life that the Holy Spirit doesn't want to touch with power. He will teach you everything. Well, what, everything? What do you mean everything? Well, the definition of the word everything is everything. What is the Holy Spirit not gonna teach me? No, he's not gonna teach me nothing. He's gonna teach me everything. I just think we need to get it through our heads that there's no part of our life where God wants you to feel orphaned or abandoned or unsure or unclear. He knew the apostles weaknesses going into this. Like he knew that Peter was a denier. He knew that James and John were fighting about who was gonna be the greatest. And he knew that Judas was a thief and would eventually betray him. He saw through these men. He saw into their hearts. He knew exactly who they were. He knew exactly what he was getting when he called them. Nothing surprised him. Nothing caught him off guard. And he knew that he would have to do a lot of teaching not just during the three years he was with them but keep teaching them. After he left, how to start a church? I mean, it must have been somewhat of a comfort although they fully didn't realize it when Jesus said go make disciples of all nations and they all looked at each other like, we got a manual for that? We have a pastoral plan. Has it been, do we need a committee? What's a committee? I don't know what we need one. We need lots of them. You know, they didn't, like, how do we go to all the nations? Jesus, how about we just evangelize the backyard? No, I want you to go to all the nations and make disciples and I'm gonna be with you. And remember the advocate, the Holy Spirit that I'm sending to him. He will teach you everything. He will teach you what it means to be a foreign mission and what you're going to need to do in order to build the church. He did not leave them unequipped. I mean, he didn't give them a bag of money. He didn't give them a building. He didn't give them a manual. He said, I'm going to give you the only thing that you need in order to be successful to achieve the mission that I give you and that's the Holy Spirit. And we see that in the fulfillment that the Holy Spirit comes on the day of Pentecost and the church is born. Mission is born, hearts are renewed, men go forth. The men who are locked behind the doors and afraid bust out, ready to change the world around them. And Peter who was probably up to that moment was probably, I'd imagine there were a lot of jokes that went along with being an apostle. Like, you know, every time Peter stuck his foot in his mouth, James would go, there goes Peter, the rock, crumbling again, way to go, this is good. And yet, when on the day of Pentecost, Peter became that rock, right? He stood before the Sanhedrin and said, look, you can beat me, you can throw me in jail. Do whatever you want, I'm not going to stop preaching Jesus. He found courage, he became the rock. But what will the Holy Spirit teach us? What will the Holy Spirit teach you? What does the Holy Spirit want to teach you? For me, I feel like right now, the Holy Spirit is teaching me how to let go. Raise your hand if you're like me and your patience seems to be constantly tried. I can seem like I'm the holiest guy around until I get behind the wheel of a car. Does anyone get behind the wheel of a car and turn into a complete a-hole sometimes? Because somebody cuts you off and you find yourself like dropping a word or two on them, you know, a very graphic word or two on people that just, for really, you're never going to see them. They don't hear you, but you're getting all worked up over nothing. And it's just this constant like me, me, me, I gotta get where I'm going and don't get in my way. And I'm like, okay, God, I gotta slow down. The Holy Spirit is calling me like, what is the root of this unrest? What does the Holy Spirit need to teach me here? It's not about me, calm down. Calm down, it's gonna be okay. Because I put myself under this pressure like I gotta get so much done and every little second counts and if I'm behind somebody who's doing two miles an hour slower than I wanna be driving at the moment, they're keeping me from getting where I wanna go by about 22 seconds. And I can't let go of that. I'm like, oh God, I have that. The Holy Spirit wants to teach me so much. I think He wants to teach us too. He wants to teach us how to love. It says in the Catechism article 221, St. John goes even further when he affirms that God is love. God's very being is love. By sending His only Son of the Spirit of love in the fullness of time, God has revealed His innermost secret. God Himself is an eternal exchange of love, Father, Son and Holy Spirit and He has destined us to share in that exchange. How many of us have made it their goal to enter into that exchange of love as much as the Spirit of God will allow us? Like your number one goal in life is I wanna enter into the life of the Trinity. Forget what's going on in this world. Forget what's going on around me. Forget my own dreams and ambitions, desires. Forget my sinfulness. God, I surrender all that. I just wanna enter into your love. I wanna disappear into your love. I wanna be consumed by your love. I wanna live in that love. I wanna detach from this world with all its falseness and all of its lies and all of its disappointments and live in the thing that doesn't disappoint, which is the love of God. For that's what He's destined us each to do, to live in that love. But we're not gonna get there without the help of the Holy Spirit. He'll teach us how to enter into that. When I think about the saints and just the ecstasy and the joy that they had of entering into this mystery of the divine and how I'm still so attached to the world that it's hard for me to enter into that and remain there for any length of time that I know I need more of the Holy Spirit. The same Holy Spirit that has spoken through me, the same Holy Spirit that has spoken to me wants me to be quiet and He just wants to lead me somewhere I can't get by myself. Deep into the mystery of God and His love, the Holy Spirit wants to teach me how to forgive, how to serve my family, how to serve my wife, how to serve the people I work with, how to serve the church. I'm gonna be learning a whole new way of serving the church through my formation which is exciting. And it's also scary because I know with that comes the flip side of that call of love which is that call to die to myself. Sometimes we're old dogs but can we learn that new trick? Can we learn something new at this age about entering into God's love? Can we let go of something that we've carried our entire lives that we might receive more of God at this point? So many times the enemy says, no, you are who you are. Your faults are yours until you stand before God and or you spend a couple centuries in purgatory and they're burned away. And Jesus is like, no. You think of someone like the woman who for 18 years was hemorrhaging and spent all of her money looking for a cure and thought she'd hit the end of her rope and was about to give up but in this moment of desperation she collapses, she touches, she goes, I just want to touch the hem of his garment. So where is she? She's down on her face as Jesus passes by just reaches up and grabs the hem of her garment and Jesus just walks by but he perceives that power has gone up because of her faith. Perhaps the Holy Spirit wants to teach you a new level of humility and trust and surrender. Whatever it is that the Holy Spirit needs to teach you he's the one that will teach us how to stay pure in this impure world. How to spiritually lead our parishes. How to celebrate the mass more fully. How to do all those things that we need to do. Literally everything. There's nothing that the Lord won't do. You know, the earth is covered with 70% water which means it's kind of weird that we called the planet earth because it's definitely in the minority. It should have called it water I guess but somehow the earth won that battle and so we call it planet earth. And in this ocean there's like 1.5 million different creatures that have been identified. 1.5 million different types of creatures that live in our ocean. Fish, crustaceans, small, big, large some of them could fill this room with whales but scientists estimate that there could be as many as 50 million more that need to be discovered that have yet to be discovered. Because most of that life, 90% of the life in the ocean exists below the abyss which is two miles or deeper. And in some places the ocean goes down seven miles. Also floating around in the ocean are 20 million tons of particulate gold. I mean like if you had a giant sieve and you just like could like sweep back and forth and if you don't have a retirement plan this might be it might take you a while but for the big sieve you could like maybe collect enough gold to retire and as much as we've explored we've explored less than 10% of the ocean. And for me that's the perfect metaphor for who the Holy Spirit is. He is this deep expansive mysterious person teaming with life but life that you have to go deep to find also loaded with riches but they will pass you by if you're not very intent on getting them. What's in the ocean can sustain all life on earth what we have in the Holy Spirit can sustain our lives and the lives of everyone on earth. The fullness of life that Jesus wants to give can be everybody's. The Holy Spirit in short is a life giving lover and a life loving giver. Like he wants to give us life he wants to give us happiness he wants to give us joy he wants to give us love but just like going down to the beach and putting your foot in the water doesn't make you an expert on the ocean just dabbling in the Holy Spirit is not enough. And yet for most Catholics the Holy Spirit remains the great unknown. They do not know his power they do not perceive his presence they have not released that grace in their lives. And just like in the world 80% of all the world's population lives within two miles of the ocean. So do most Catholics live very close to the Holy Spirit but not in the Holy Spirit. So we need to go deeper. We need to let the Spirit teach us lead us and power us and send us forth to send us on mission. You know Jesus says when the advocate comes I will send you from the Father the spirit of truth that proceeds from the Father he will testify to me and you must also testify because you've been with me from the beginning. We need to be testified we need to be proclaiming the goodness of God in word and indeed. And I've led countless retreats and parish missions and been a part of life in the spirit seminars on conferences and I've done them as stand-alones. I do work with our students here on campus. But what I've learned is that those things don't matter unless the mission is my life. Mission is not an occupation. Mission is who we are. It consumes us 24 seven. We're never not on mission for the Lord. And I remember I was going to the beach with my wife a few years ago and we were driving through West Virginia and we decided to spend the night in Berkeley Springs. And found this nice little hotel went in checked in went to bed and in the morning I woke up and I wanted to go down to the lobby and get a hotel waffle, right? You know like waffles are just they're fun to eat they're delicious. They're kind of a pain to make though. I mean because like you first you gotta first you have to own a waffle iron which I don't own and then you gotta have waffle mix and then you gotta do all that. And so when you go to a hotel and there's like oh all you have to do is like pour the little cup in there, clip it, flip it. Then you gotta waffle in like two minutes. That's perfect. I love that. So I went down to the lobby to get a hotel waffle and they didn't have a waffle they didn't have breakfast they just had coffee. I was so disappointed. Nothing more heartbreaking than waking up in the morning wanting to waffle and you can't get it. But what I did discover when I went down to the lobby there was one of the workers at the hotel her name was Vicki she was cleaning up and putting out cups and making sure the coffee crass were full and all that. And I walked up to get coffee and I felt the Lord nudge me as I walked over there and I go make sure you say good morning to her. So as I'm getting my coffee I'm like good morning how you doing? And she said oh I'm doing all right. But the way she said it you could tell she was not all right. And so I just asked a second question. I said that was like the worst all right in the history of all rights. What's really going on? And without any other prompting she starts sharing about how her sister had gone to the hospital the night before with the brain aneurysm that she was in the emergency intensive care because they were afraid it was gonna burst and they were looking to do some surgery and try to fix it before it burst. That was gonna be very tricky that the possibility she could die. And she was a hundred miles away at a hospital I think in Charleston. And she was like I gotta work to the end of the day when I get off I'm gonna have to try to get over there to see her and I don't get paid till next week and I only have like $5 and I'm just like freaking I don't know what I'm gonna do. And I just said can I pray with you? And she said sure. So I just put my hand on her shoulder and I started saying Lord Jesus just come with your love send your Holy Spirit and give her peace. Just let your presence be known to her heart right now Lord Jesus and give her peace. And I just prayed that way for like a minute and then I started to intercede. Lord we ask your Holy Spirit would fall upon Vicki's sister, the doctors, everyone at the hospital. And as I'm praying with her you know like tears are going down her eyes but at the end by the time we get done praying and only praying with her for like two minutes she was just in a different place. She had this peace about her and she just looked at me and said thank you so much. She says I've been hurting all night and even kind of coming to work this morning it's just been awful. But you know I feel like the Lord's got this and I said yes he does and I took $20 out of my wallet and gave it to her I said I hope this helps for gas money I'll continue to pray for you and your sister and have a great day. And I walked away and I don't know what happened after that. I don't know what happened to Vicki I don't know what happened to her sister. All I know is in that moment the Spirit said go pray be present. And God did the rest. Most of what we're going to do that makes a difference in the world and impacts people are gonna be things that we didn't devise, conceive of or plan. It's gonna be those moments when we are overwhelmed by God saying I'm gonna work through you right now will you do the great things that I'm calling you to do in the simple way you live your life will you do great things for me. The blessed mother could say without hesitation my soul magnifies the Lord because he's looked on my lowliness and the mighty one has done great things for me. And because Mary let the mighty one of God God do great things for her she was able to do great things for God. She never wanted the titles she never wanted the praise. When the angels told her you're gonna be the mother of God he's gonna be great and he's gonna be called holy and all this and she's like I'm the handmaid of the Lord thank you but I'm the handmaid of the Lord and I surrender who I am to God's design. It's not me, it's God. When Elizabeth says who am I that the mother of my Lord should have come to me which is interesting that she would say that because it must have been the Holy Spirit that leapt from Mary into her womb that caused John the Baptist to jump up and down in her womb that revealed in that moment that what was before her was not her cousin Mary but the mother of the Christ. How powerful Mary was full of the Holy Spirit that all she had to do was say hello and Jesus was being revealed to her cousin and to the unborn baby in her womb. That's the power of God and it is because Mary let God do great things for her and each one of us being created in the image and likeness of God are created to do the same great things. We do not serve the Lord by selling ourselves short and thinking that I'm not anything I'll just cover the light with the basket. I won't put myself out there. I'm not called to do this. We are all called to do crazy things for the Lord to walk on water with Jesus. That comes because we first let Him do something great in us. You know, Jesus said I tell you the truth is better for you that I go. For if I do not go the advocate will not come to you but if I go I will send him to you and when he comes he will convict the world in regard to sin and righteousness and condemnation. Sin because they don't believe in me. Righteousness because I'm going to the Father and you will no longer see me. Condemnation because the ruler of this world has been condemned. You see what's gonna happen? I'm gonna make this known not just in your hearts. You're not just gonna perceive and hear my words and have your heart moved. It's going to be written on your hearts now. The Holy Spirit will be there convicting you of this truth that the ruler of this world has been defeated that I'm with the Father and that my spirit lives within you and I can do this not just for you. I can do it with everyone that you pray with and lay hands on and preach to. I'm gonna give my spirit so that I can be intimate with the whole world at one time so that every man, woman, and child can come to know me the way you have. For the Holy Spirit makes real today the Jesus Christ that we proclaim and believe lived 2,000 years ago, but we know lives and it's the Holy Spirit that makes it real. The people you serve need to know through the way you preach, the way you live, the way you serve through your life in the Holy Spirit that Jesus Christ is alive and that they're called to that same glory. Like I said, Jesus Christ says in John chapter seven, verse seven, I'm sorry, verse 37 and 38. It says, on the last day of the feast, the great day Jesus stood up and proclaimed, if anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink. He who believes in me as the scripture has said, out of his heart shall flow rivers of living water. God wants to make you into a human drinking fountain to the people you serve, that through your love, your homilies, your care for your people, people will not just have a participation in the sacramental life of the church, but a full serving of the Holy Spirit. There's a lot more that can be taught on the Holy Spirit on the use of charisms and word gifts and speaking in tongues and all that, but I honestly believe that that stuff all flows from an understanding that we're loved by God. And so we're gonna wrap up here by singing a couple of songs, just calling upon the Holy Spirit, calling upon God's love to be stirred up in our hearts. And when we get together tomorrow, about half the time that we're gonna do tomorrow is gonna be spending prayer. I'm not gonna, I'm just gonna share my testimony, share a couple of brief thoughts and then we're gonna take it to prayer. And we're gonna pray for the Holy Spirit to be stirred up in our lives, that the love of God would be poured into our hearts and into it in a new way. And for those who've never received baptism in the Holy Spirit, we're going to be praying, we're gonna be praying for you to be baptized in the Holy Spirit. And I'll explain what that means exactly tomorrow, because I know that even that statement can cause a lot of people to go, wait, what, baptism in the Holy Spirit? What, don't worry, it'll all come together. But for now, I just want us to wrap up. I put in our hearts before the Lord and say, okay God, apart from you, I can do nothing. I want to trust in your love. I need to trust in your love and power right now. Just take my heart, I surrender it to you. So John Paul, if you'd be so kind.